Tin Swift

“Unfortunately your services are inadequate and incomplete, Mr. Mullins. I sent you to bring him back with you, which you have not done.”

“Like hell,” Mullins wheezed. “You wanted to know where he’d hid himself, and now you do. I’ll take my money.”

“What you will do, Mr. Mullins, is allow my doctor to tend to you, free of charge, of course. After that, you will attend to one last mission. You will travel with six of my men and follow Marshal Cage’s trail. You will find him and bring him to me. Alive. Upon completion of that task, I will pay you. Very generously. A full glim stake in the fields above the Cascade Range.”

The Saint waited. He knew the man wouldn’t say no. Knew that glim, and the profits that could be made off it, was a powerful motivator to a man like Les Mullins.

“You drive a hard bargain,” he said.

“Take him to Mr. Shunt,” the Saint said to the soldiers. “Tell Shunt I want him on his feet by nightfall.”

The men picked up the litter and hurried out.

“Not you, Private.”

The soldier stopped at the door. “Sir?”

“Tell Captain Dirkson I want to see him.”

“Yes, sir.”

The boy left the office and the Saint returned to his desk.

The Bitterroots. Near enough there was a good chance they’d catch his trail. And if he was making a point of bragging that his ship was the fastest in the skies, surely there would be more men who would point to where he’d been seen.

It was a stroke of luck that General Saint would not let slip through his fingers.

The private was back shortly, knocking on the door.

“Come,” he said.

“Captain Dirkson, sir.” The private held the door and a man walked in past him.

Dirkson was a burly man with a square plug of a face, small eyes, and a nose broken flat into the shape of a shovel. He was a force on the battlefield, unafraid and merciless.

“Captain Dirkson,” the Saint said. “I want you to choose six men to accompany you on a mission to locate Marshal Cage and his ship, the Swift, in the Bitterroots. You will take Mr. Les Mullins with you, once the doctor has seen to his wounds.”

“Yes, sir,” he said. “And when I find Marshal Cage?”

“Bring him to me. Breathing.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Dismissed.”

Dirkson turned and walked out into the silence of the morning.

“Is there anything else, sir?” the private asked.

“No, Private, that is all.”

But before the private closed the door, the Saint saw Lieutenant Foster being helped out of Mr. Shunt’s tent. He looked pale. Other than the sweat that soaked his shirt, he was sharp as ever, not a stitch out of place.

He saw the general looking at him, pulled his arm away from the man who was helping him keep his feet, and stood unsupported.

Alabaster gave him a short nod, which he returned.

Good. The men would soon be repaired, and now Cage would be brought to his knees before him without Mr. Shunt’s help. That changed the game a bit.

After Mr. Shunt mended his eye, General Alabaster Saint would have him killed.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Cedar Hunt waited just inside the Swift. Captain Hink and his men were on the ground, out in the hard wind and drizzle. Negotiating with Old Jack was what the captain had said he was doing.

Sounded a lot more like arguing.

“Two days at the most,” Captain Hink was saying. Again. For the hundredth time.

Cedar rested his shoulder against the doorway. He intended to keep to the shadows unless it looked like Captain Hink had gotten in over his head. Or if he suddenly decided his passengers were part of his bargaining chips.

“Beds, hot water, supplies for repair, and restocking our larder and needs.” Hink went down the list. “We’ll pay in glim dirty, or gold pure, either way you want it. Half now, half on lift.”

“You’ll leave in the morning,” the man said in a ruined voice.

Cedar expected he’d taken a blast to the throat, or maybe had a habit of drinking kerosene. Whatever he’d done to his voice, or had done to it, it had left it sounding like the rasp of a saw against metal.

Old Jack was white-haired, white-bearded, and bent so bad at the shoulders that he had to tip his chin up to look out from under the brim of his hat.

But Cedar could count the glimmer of four cannons mounted in the rise of cliff that took up three sides of the landing field, and the four silent Negro boys who stood behind them.

He could also count the one very bright Colt in Old Jack’s steady hand.

“It will be two days, you know that, Jack,” Hink said, his patience going sour. “She’s shot full of holes, and I have a young woman in need of a bed and medical attention.”

“The young woman have a name?”

“I suppose she does,” Hink said. “Don’t think that much matters in our price. You know how it is. I don’t ask what you’ve got stashed here in this labyrinth of yours, and you don’t ask me what, or who, I have stashed in my hold.”

Hink’s men shifted slightly. Not making a big deal of it, but enough that anyone would know they had their hands on their guns.

This was the line in the sand. Well, mud. Cedar knew if Jack crossed it, they’d be in for a fight. He didn’t like the odds of facing down cannons with a ship that didn’t have fuel to fly.

Finally, Jack took his finger off the trigger.

“Medicines will cost you twice as much as last visit,” Old Jack wheezed. “And you know why.”

“I told you I’d make clean on our last dealings.” The clink of coins under cloth shook in the cold night air. “This takes care of our previous meeting.” A second clink rang out, this one a little louder.

Cedar heard Guffin’s whispered curse.

“And that,” Hink said, “is a generous thank-you for extending our credit. For two days.”

“Two days,” Jack said. “No longer. Medicine still puts you back double, food isn’t cheap, but it don’t have bugs. You want hot water, boil it over your own fire. Follow me this way.”

“Good doing business with you,” Hink said. “Gentlemen, let’s see to a bed that’s both warm and dry tonight. Except for you, Ansell. Stay with the Swift.”

“Aye, Captain.”

“Seldom, please follow our proprietor.”

Seldom strode off behind Old Jack, silent as a ghost in the wind.

Hink walked up to the ship, and paused short of the door. “Didn’t see you there.”

Cedar moved away from the threshold so the captain could step in.

“We’ve a bed for the night and the next, Mr. Hunt,” Captain Hink said, pulling a satchel down from the overhead rack and filling it with maps and other oddments. “Old Jack can’t much be trusted, but we’ve paid him to keep his mouth shut, and keep his hands to himself. We won’t be robbed or shot in our sleep.”

“Don’t mean he won’t rob us or shoot us when we’re awake,” Ansell rumbled, walking in behind the captain.

Cedar glanced over at Mae, who stood stiff, her hands clenched at her sides. She looked as if she’d been