Fort Buzzard, page 19
O’Sullivan smiled, and said, “Well, better none at all than having a bunch of them around trying to scalp us, I suppose.”
Jamie laughed and lifted his cup of beer.
“I’ll drink to that,” he said.
CHAPTER 29
They remained in the saloon for a while, chatting with O’Sullivan. Jamie noticed that the man glanced toward the entrance every now and then and seemed a bit nervous. He was probably worried that Booker might come back in and try to stir up some more trouble, even though Gullickson had given O’Sullivan more time to come up with the payment he owed.
Booker was the iron fist inside the velvet glove that Gullickson wore, Jamie mused.
Eventually it was late enough in the day Jamie’s belly began to remind him it had been quite a while since he and Stanton had eaten anything. Too much whiskey and beer on an empty stomach was beginning to bother him.
“Where can a man get a good meal here in Angusville?” he asked.
O’Sullivan shook his head, and said, “You don’t have to call it that. Honestly, there’s been a little talk about calling the settlement by that name, but that’s all it is. Right now the place doesn’t have a name.”
Stanton said, “Angusville seems like a better name than Fort Buzzard. Who came up with that?”
“I don’t have any idea, lad. But where you have people, you’re going to have garbage that attracts scavengers. Enough of the ugly creatures circle around now that somehow the name came up and then stuck.” O’Sullivan turned back to Jamie. “But to answer your question, Jim, if you’re looking for a good place to eat, you should try the Red Top. Walk north along the creek a ways, and you can’t miss it.”
“Why do they call it the Red Top?” Jamie asked.
O’Sullivan laughed. “Because the tent has a red top, my friend! I think it must have belonged to a traveling circus at some time in the past, or else maybe a gypsy fortune teller. Because it’s bright, and it’ll catch your eye!”
“The food’s good there, you say?”
“Aye. Not as fancy as you’ll find in a restaurant back east, of course, but good simple fare that’ll fill your bellies, and for a reasonable price. The fella who runs it is named McKay, Baxter McKay. Tell him I sent you.”
“We’ll do that,” Jamie said with a nod. He slid a coin onto the bar to pay for the beers he and Stanton had nursed while they were talking, but O’Sullivan shook his head.
“After the help you boys gave me and my missus earlier, your money’s no good in here,” he insisted. “For today, anyway. Tomorrow may be a different story! Haw!”
Jamie didn’t argue the matter, just put the coin away, and said, “We’re obliged to you. See you again, Seamus.”
“You’re welcome any time.”
The shadows of dusk were gathering as Jamie and Stanton went outside. The settlement was still busy, evidently not getting ready to close down for the night just yet.
Enough light was left in the sky for them to find the Red Top without any trouble. As O’Sullivan had said, the canvas on the tent’s top was dyed a bright red. The place appeared to be doing good business. People were going in and out of the entrance, which had the canvas flap tied back.
Inside, Jamie and Stanton found two long rows of tables with backless benches on both sides, bunkhouse style. Two stoves stood at the far end with large, steaming iron pots simmering on them. A pair of Dutch ovens were set up, too. Delicious aromas of stew, coffee, and fresh-baked bread filled the air.
A big, fair-haired man was stirring the contents of one of the pots. Even though his back was to the entrance, he somehow seemed aware that Jamie and Stanton had come in. He turned his head to call over his shoulder, “Come in, fellas, come on in and grab a seat! We’ll have some grub to you in just a minute!”
“I guess you don’t order what you want here,” Stanton said as they sat down on a bench at one of the tables. Several other men sat nearby, spooning stew out of tin bowls into their mouths.
“A place like this is liable to have just one thing on the menu, so you take what they give you,” Jamie said. “But if it tastes as good as it smells, that’s all right with me.”
A couple of women were working in the kitchen area, too, and a few minutes later one of them carried a tray over to the table where Jamie and Stanton sat.
She was young, Jamie saw, probably around twenty years old. Her blond hair was pulled back and tied behind her head, but a strand of it had escaped and fallen over her face. She blew it back and then set the tray on the table in front of them.
“Here you go, gents,” she said. “That’ll be two bits apiece.”
Jamie handed her a silver dollar, and asked, “Is that enough to keep the coffee coming, as well as maybe some extra biscuits?”
“More than enough, mister.”
“Well, keep any that’s left over.”
She bobbed her head as she slipped the coin into a pocket on the apron she wore. “Much obliged to you. Just wave when you want anything else, and if that doesn’t work, let out a holler.”
Jamie grinned, and said, “We’ll do that.”
When the young woman had returned to the front of the tent, Stanton leaned closer to Jamie, and asked quietly, “Did you see how blue her eyes are?”
“I might’ve noticed,” Jamie allowed with a chuckle, “but don’t forget, I’m an old married man, so I don’t pay as much attention to such things as young fellas like you do.”
That wasn’t strictly true. He had, in fact, noticed how pretty the young woman was. She’d been a little red in the face from the heat of the stoves, but that hadn’t detracted from her looks.
If anything, it might have made her a little prettier.
The tray had two bowls of stew on it, along with two cups of coffee, a pair of spoons, and a plate with half a dozen huge biscuits stacked on it. Jamie and Stanton parceled out the food and dug in with enthusiasm.
The stew was steaming hot, savory with spices and the juices from the chunks of beef swimming in it, along with onions and pieces of potato. The coffee was black as midnight and strong as an ox. Steam rose, too, from the biscuit Jamie tore open. It was fluffy and tasted wonderful.
The combination was potent and satisfying. Not much conversation went on while Jamie and Stanton were eating. They didn’t want to be distracted from what they were doing.
The blonde had told them to wave to get her attention, but they didn’t have to. She showed up again without being summoned, carrying a coffeepot by using a thick piece of leather to grasp the handle. She had another plate of biscuits in her other hand.
After refilling the cups and setting the plate down, she said, “My pa wants to know if you’re enjoying the meal.”
“Very much so,” Stanton responded. “Everything is delicious.”
“Thanks.”
Jamie nodded toward the man moving around the kitchen area at the front of the tent, and asked, “That’s your pa?”
“That’s right.”
“Then you’d be Miss McKay.”
He had seen that she wasn’t wearing a wedding ring. That might not mean anything, but it probably did.
She confirmed that hunch by saying, “Yes, I am. My name’s Annie. Annie McKay.”
“It’s an honor and a pleasure to meet you, Miss McKay,” Stanton said. He got to his feet and nodded as he spoke.
“Well, aren’t you the gentleman.” It wasn’t really a question, and Annie McKay’s voice held a trace of crispness, as if she were accustomed to men making a bit of a fuss over her and didn’t particularly care for it. But the faintest hint of a smile hovered around the corners of her mouth, Jamie noted, and maybe in those blue eyes of hers, too. Maybe in this case she didn’t mind too much.
“My name is, uh, Ron,” Stanton said. He nodded toward Jamie. “This is my friend, Jim. Uh, Smith. Both of us.”
“You don’t look like brothers,” Annie said.
“We’re not. Just friends. We just, uh, happen to have the same last name.”
“Well, it doesn’t matter to me what they call you, Mr. Smith. Welcome to the Red Top, and I hope you enjoy your meal and will come back to see us again.”
“It’s wonderful,” Stanton said. “I’m sure we’ll be back.”
Annie smiled this time and waved a hand toward the bench. “Sit down and finish your food. Yell if you need anything else.”
She took the coffeepot back to the front of the tent.
“Don’t get too smitten,” Jamie said quietly to Stanton when Annie was gone. “We still have work to do.”
“I know. I was just surprised to . . . um . . . find someone so nice in a . . . a place like this frontier settlement.”
Jamie took another sip of the excellent coffee, and mused, “I suspect her pa would be another good man to get to know. Bartenders and cooks see and hear just about everything that goes on in a place.”
They had finished the big bowls of stew and all the biscuits and were lingering over coffee when the blond-haired man came along the aisle between the tables, wiping his hands on the apron he wore. He was middle-aged, with some gray starting to show in his fair hair and sweeping mustaches.
He came to a stop beside Jamie and Stanton and shook hands with them.
“You fellas are new in town, aren’t you?” he asked.
“That’s right,” Jamie said. “Just rode in today.”
“And you’re the ones who have already had a run-in with Bad Egg Booker.”
“Guilty as charged on that, too. Word of the fracas has gotten around town, has it?”
Baxter McKay laughed, a friendly, booming sound. “If you’ve been around the frontier very long, you know how it is. Anything to break up the monotony.” His expression turned serious as he went on, “You’d better be careful as long as you’re in these parts. Booker isn’t a good man to cross.”
“People keep telling us that,” Jamie said, nodding slowly. “We plan to keep it in mind.”
Stanton said, “We haven’t caused you any trouble by coming in here, have we, Mr. McKay?”
“You mean, am I afraid that Booker will come after me because I fed you?” McKay laughed again, scornfully this time. “Let him do his worst. I may be cautious, but I’m not afraid of the man.”
“I reckon that sums up how we feel about it, too,” Jamie said.
“Just remember that you’re welcome in the Red Top any time you feel like it. I have to get back to my cooking. Have a good evening, gents.”
McKay returned to the stoves. Jamie and Stanton finished their coffee and stood up to leave. Stanton turned one last glance toward Annie McKay at the front of the tent, but she had her back to him and was busy working.
They would be back, all right, Jamie thought. Stanton’s interest in Annie would see to that, regardless of how such a visit would fit into their investigation.
It was full night outside now. Fewer people were moving around. Lantern light came from some of the buildings and tents while others were darkened. People turned in early out here.
“We didn’t find another place to stay,” Stanton said. “So I suppose we’re going back to the fort?”
“If Gullickson’s willing to put us up in his barracks, I don’t see why not,” Jamie said. “We’ll be close to the action there if anything happens.”
“Do you expect something to happen?”
“No reason to, but you never know—”
The sudden rush of footsteps behind them told Jamie that, while he might not have been expecting it, necessarily, trouble had found them again.
CHAPTER 30
Jamie called, “Look out!” to Stanton and whirled around to spot several shadowy figures charging at them out of the gloom. There was enough light behind them from the lamps and lanterns in the settlement for him to glimpse their silhouettes.
The attackers held clubs of some sort that swept toward Jamie and Stanton in vicious swipes.
Jamie wanted to pull the Walker Colt on his hip and blast these fools into eternity. But at the same time, he would just as soon not kill anyone so soon after coming to Fort Buzzard. Besides, he didn’t know who these men were, and he’d never liked gunning down some hombre without knowing who he was.
Jamie had a pretty good idea who was behind this ambush, though—Josiah “Bad Egg” Booker. He didn’t know how Angus Gullickson would react if he killed Gullickson’s right-hand man, and it was too soon to find out.
Those thoughts flashed through Jamie’s mind in the time it took for him to spin around and catch sight of the attackers. Instead of reaching for his gun, he barked at Stanton, “Duck!” and then did so himself, dropping into a low crouch so that the club swinging toward his head missed by a good foot.
Then he came up out of that crouch bringing a big fist with him that crashed into the jaw of the man who had missed. The powerful blow landed with stunning force. It lifted the man off his feet and dumped him on his back. The club flew out of his hand and sailed off into the darkness.
A few feet away, Stanton didn’t follow Jamie’s advice to duck, but he did dart to the side and avoided getting his head crushed that way. The man who had just tried to stove in his skull grunted from the effort of the miss and stumbled forward. Stanton stepped in, hooked a left to the man’s ribs, and then sunk a fist wrist-deep in his belly.
As the attacker doubled over, Stanton seized the club with both hands and ripped it out of his grip.
More assailants closed in from the darkness. Clubs clashed loudly as Stanton used the one he had grabbed to block a bludgeon swung by another attacker.
Jamie sensed a weapon coming at him and flung up his left hand. The club smacked into his palm with an impact hard enough to hurt but not do any real damage. His fingers closed around the club, stopping it short.
He aimed his right fist where he thought the attacker’s face ought to be and felt the satisfying crunch of cartilage under his knuckles. Blood spurted hotly on his hand from the flattened nose. Somebody was going to have a mite of trouble breathing the next day, not to mention being bruised and swollen and ugly.
The blow to the face made the man let go of the club and stagger backward. That gave Jamie room to ram the end of the club into the man’s belly like a spear. It was blunt and didn’t penetrate, but it doubled the man over and dropped him to the ground, where he lay gagging and groaning.
Jamie whirled the club around and waded into the other shadowy figures, swinging left and right and scattering them like ninepins.
Stanton was doing the same thing. The fierce counterattack was more resistance than the unknown men had counted on. They broke and ran, leaving two of their number on the ground behind them.
So much for loyalty in the face of danger.
Stanton was caught up in the heat of battle and might have pursued them, but Jamie caught hold of his shoulder, and said, “Let ’em go. They’ll think twice before they jump us again.”
“Yes, and they’ll try to do a better job of it next time,” Stanton said. “It’s liable to be a real ambush with guns.”
“Could be, but they know this ground better than we do. There’s no telling what we might run into if we go after them.”
Stanton was still tense, almost quivering with anger. Jamie could feel that under his firm grip. But then the young officer relaxed and nodded.
“You’re right,” he said. “Anyway, we have a couple of prisoners. Maybe we can find out who the others were.”
“I don’t reckon we have to do much guessing about that,” Jamie said.
He tossed the club aside—which he could tell now was a peeled length of a sapling’s trunk—and turned back to the two men on the ground. They were struggling to get up.
Jamie told Stanton, “Cover me,” then helped them accomplish their goal by taking hold of their collars and jerking them to their feet. He maintained his grip on them and shoved them toward the fort while Stanton paced alongside them with his Colt drawn and ready.
Fort Buzzard’s gates had been closed with the fall of night, but a lantern burned in the guard tower just inside the entrance. As Jamie, Stanton, and their stumbling prisoners approached the gates, a guard leaned over the top of the wall, and called, “Who’s that down there?”
“My partner and I hired on with Mr. Gullickson this afternoon,” Jamie replied, “and he said we could stay in the barracks inside.”
“You need to be in the fort when the sun goes down if you’re going to do that,” the guard responded. “Who’s that with you? What’s wrong with them? Are they sick?”
As if in answer to that, the knees of the man Jamie had hit in the stomach buckled, and as he sagged forward, he emptied the contents of his belly. The sharp tang of whiskey filled the air. The attackers must have been girding themselves for their assault with plenty of liquid courage.
“They’re stupid more than sick,” Jamie said. “They and some others jumped me and my friend on our way back here from the settlement. I reckon they thought we’d be too surprised and outnumbered to put up a fight. They were wrong.”
“So what do you want to do?” the guard asked.
Jamie considered for a moment. In the dim glow from the lantern, he could see the faces of the two prisoners well enough to recognize them. Just as he expected, they had been in O’Sullivan’s Saloon with Bad Egg Booker earlier that afternoon.
For the second time today, they had tangled with Jamie and Stanton and come out on the losing end.
“They’re not worth bothering with,” Jamie declared. He let go of them, giving them both shoves in the process that sent them flopping forward. The one who had thrown up landed in it and groaned.
“If you’ll let us in,” Jamie went on, “we’ll just leave these varmints out here. Their friends will probably come along to collect them after a while.”
“All right.” The guard leaned over and called down to someone inside the fort. “Open the gates.”
Jamie heard men moving around and then the rasp of the heavy bar that held the gates closed being removed from its brackets. One side swung open a few feet with the creak of hinges, and a man standing inside beckoned to them.
