“I don’t want trouble, mister. I’m the marshal here and as anybody’ll tell you, I don’t enjoy shootin’ people. Now I just want you to turn around slow and easy and hand me your gun without me having to kill you to get it.”
The gunny’s shoulders and head jerked at Davis’s words. His broad back, covered in an expensive white shirt—getting a better grade of gunnies in town, the lawman noted wryly—hunched some and his elbow rose. He was getting ready to turn on Davis and fire.
But the marshal, despite rheumatism, arthritis, and advancing age, moved with surprising speed. In four quick steps he was standing within inches of the gunny. Just as the man started to turn, Davis slammed his Colt into the back of the gunny’s head. He was still a powerful man. The gunny stayed conscious long enough to spin half around. But by then the lawman’s fist had exploded on the side of the man’s face. The gun dropped to the floor and the man followed seconds later.
“We sure do appreciate it, Marshal,” the bald card-player said. Even though he’d sounded calm when the gun was on him, his voice now sounded shaky. Sweat gleamed on his forehead. Sometimes a man didn’t get scared until afterward.
“Just doin’ my job, boys. But you could do me a favor by cartin’ this one over to the jail and throwin’ him into a cell. There’ll be a deputy there to help you.”
“Hell, yes, we will,” the bald one said. He glanced down at the unconscious gunny. “Be our pleasure, matter of fact.”
The other players voiced agreement.
Davis went back to the bar. Irish shoved a glass of beer at him.
“Thanks for letting me know about him,” Davis said. “At least that’s one less I have to worry about.”
Irish scanned the place, making sure that business was getting back to normal. Didn’t want to lose any money just because a gunny raised a little hell. Then his eyes returned to Davis. “It’s the damned gold shipments. No easier way to make money than to hire some gunnies to hijack the gold.”
“Yeah, and no easier way to take over somebody else’s mine than by stealing all their profits.” He took a deep swig of beer. Irish knew who he was talking about. Nothing more needed to be said.
“I’m your first stop?”
“Yep. Now I check out the other saloons and hotels. They’re not all as cooperative as you. Easiest way to deal with gunnies is to get to them before they can do anything. But to do that I need people to keep an eye out. Most folks just don’t want to be bothered.”
“Or they’re afraid.”
Davis sighed. “Yeah, I guess I forgot about poor old Millard.”
Ab Millard had run a saloon a block down Main Street. He’d sent a runner telling the lawman that a drifter who looked a lot like a gunny was doing some drinking and bragging in his saloon. Davis showed up and arrested the man without incident. He held him for five days, then sent him packing without any guns or weapons. Unfortunately, this particular gunny held a grudge. Three days after his release, now armed, he snuck back into town and killed poor Ab for cooperating with Davis.
“Glad you killed that little bastard when you caught him, Marshal,” Irish said bitterly. “If you hadn’t, I would’ve.”
And Davis reckoned he would have at that.
“Thank the heavens you were with us today,” Walt said to Fargo as he and two others piled the bodies on a tarp on top of the gold boxes in the wagon. Fargo and another man had already rounded up the robbers’ horses. It looked like Cain was not only going to get his gold into Sacramento, he was going to gain some nice horses for his stable.
“You men would have done all right against these idiots,” Fargo said as he dismounted. Then he turned to Cain. “You recognize any of this gear or the horses?”
Cain shook his head. “None of it, but they don’t go with these men. At least the four miners.”
“Noticed that, huh?”
Cain laughed. “Yeah. Don’t miss a detail, do I?”
Fargo glanced around at the other guards. “Anyone recognize any of these jokers or the horses?”
One of the guards said he might know one of the men, but he wasn’t sure. He thought he’d seen him in town, and he more than likely worked for another mine in the Placerville area. He didn’t know which one though.
No help at all.
But it made sense that Cain and his men didn’t know the robbers. The Placerville area had exploded in size to a small city, and the men working in each mine tended to stay together and drink together and not mix much with others from other mines. The mine owners liked it that way as well and tended to demand as much loyalty out of their men as they dared.
What Fargo wanted to know was how men from another mine knew when Cain was planning an ore shipment into town. There was a leak in Cain’s organization, and Fargo intended to plug it, more than likely with lead. But bringing up that subject standing in the hot sun with dead bodies in the wagon and guards listening didn’t seem like a good idea.
Fargo had the wagon wait twenty minutes before starting back up to give himself time to scout ahead. But he didn’t find any problems, and they reached Sacramento just before sunset.
They dropped the bodies off with the undertaker and reported in to the marshal, then took care of the gold ore. After that, Cain got rooms for his men in a boarding house on the edge of town and stabled all the horses together. Cain and Fargo had to take rooms in a cheap hotel because the expensive hotel was all booked up.
Fargo’s room was being cleaned when he reached it. He saw a slim but shapely bottom clothed in blue gingham as a young woman was bent over the bed tugging the covers into place. When she heard him and faced him, he saw she had the freckle-faced prettiness of a lot of pioneer girls.
“I’m just about done here,” she said in a sweet little voice.
“No hurry,” Fargo said. “It’s a pleasure to watch you work.”
She blushed but then allowed herself a tiny smile. “Well, that’s not a very polite thing to say, but I appreciate it.”
Fargo dumped his saddlebags in a corner and surveyed the room. Not that there was much to see. One cheap hotel room was the same as another no matter where you were. Bed, chair, bureau, washbasin, pitcher. It was a step up from a prison cell and a step down from where respectable folks stayed. At that he had to laugh at himself. That was one of the few things he’d never been called—respectable.
“My name’s Fargo. What’s yours?” he asked her as she moved to dust off the bureau.
“Sally DeWitt. My uncle owns this hotel.”
The sunlight streaming through the window made her reddish blond hair glow. The deep blue eyes glowed too. He watched the rise and fall of her fetching breasts. He felt himself stir in a pleasant way.
He crossed the room to the bed. He sat down and began to pull his boots off. He was pleased to see her come over to him. “Here, I can get those off for you.”
“Part of the service?”
This time she didn’t blush. This time, unspoken, she’d clearly decided that she was as intrigued with him as he was with her.
“I do this for just about everybody, actually. My uncle says guests come back if we kind of coddle them a bit.”
He stuck his right leg out and she pulled his boot off. She was close enough that he could smell the natural perfumes of her body, of her hair. It was difficult to keep from grabbing her.
Left foot. She leaned over, slid his boot off. But this time, whether by accident or design, she lost her balance momentarily and started to pitch forward.
Right into Fargo’s arms. He held her there for a moment. Her face was so close, her lips so ripe, he didn’t want to let her go. She must have shared the same feeling because she gently pushed him back on the bed, her open mouth on his even before his spine touched the covers.
She was no innocent, which pleased him. She quickly found the buttons on his trousers and brought forth the stern proof of his desire. She put her lips to it and made him twist and gasp in pleasure. No innocent at all. She knew exactly what she was doing.
He rolled on his side so that while she was bringing him to even greater need, he was able to unbutton the
