“Johnny North, a neighbor of Smoke Jensen's.
Cotton Pickens, a rancher from up Wyoming way, and this, Earl, is Charlie Starr.”
“I am awed and humbled, sir,” Earl said, with genuine emotion in his voice. “You rank among the few men who have become a legend in your own time.”
“Thank you, sir,” Charlie replied, shaking hands with the gambler/gunfighter. “I may take it that you are a friend of Smoke Jensen?”
“You may. Let’s go into my office, and I’ll bring you up to date on Smoke’s troubles.”
Larry Tibbson had taken the first stage out of Big Rock, heading down to where Smoke was hiding out. He kept a very low profile and kept his big mouth shut concerning his opinions of Smoke Jensen. He decided that since the town was growing so quickly—he didn’t have sense enough to know what was causing the rapid growth, nor that it would very likely bust as quickly as it boomed-he would hang out his shingle in the newly named town of Rio. Everybody needed the services of a good attorney from time to time, and this looked like the ideal spot to make some quick money.
But my word! Larry thought, stepping off the stage, it was so rowdy here. All these rough-looking fellows carrying guns and knives right out in the open. Shocking! He had never seen anything like it.
And their boorish behavior was offensive to someone of Larry’s gentle sensibilities. All the more reason to stay, he thought. Bring some refinement to the savages.
He managed to get the last room available in the hotel—and he did that by paying five times the usual going rate.
“Them sheets ain’t been slept on but three times,” the man told him, in protest over Larry’s demand for clean sheets. “The last feller used ’em didn’t appear to have no fleas.'
“Change the sheets!”
“All right, all right,” the newly hired room clerk grumbled.
Larry turned to the stairs and was stopped in his tracks at the sight of Louis Longmont dismounting and shaking hands with what appeared to be a constable of some sort. It was hard to tell in this barbaric setting, since lawmen, for the most part, did not wear uniforms denoting their profession, as was the case in more civilized parts of the nation.
Louis Longmont . . . here? Larry walked to the window of the saloon and looked out, seeing the six-guns belted around the millionaire’s waist. So the rumors were true after all, Larry mused. The man was an adventurer. But was he here to hunt down Smoke Jensen, or to aid the gunfighter?
And who was that long-haired, grizzled-looking older man shaking hands with the constable? Obviously some sort of gunfighter, but it was hard to tell, since all those gathered around the constable wore two guns, tied down. It was so confusing out here.
With a sigh, Larry turned to climb the stairs. He angled over and spoke to the room clerk, whose small station was at the end of the bar.
“Do you have inside facilities?” Larry inquired.
“Huh?”
“Water closets inside.”
“Hell, no!”
Larry shook his head and headed for the room.
“You forgot your bags,” the room clerk called.
“Carry them up for me.”
“Tote your own damn bags, mister!”
Larry climbed the stairs, sweating under the load of his trunk. All in all, he thought, the West just had to be the most barbaric and inhospitable place he had ever traveled.
“How many men in Slater’s bunch?” Johnny asked.
Earl spread his hands. “Fifty to seventy—five are the numbers I keep hearing.”
“Smoke’s a tough ol’ boy,” Charlie Starr said. “But he’s not indestructible. He’s gonna need some help with this one. Come the morning I’ll provision up and head out for the lonesome. Louis, I think you and Johnny and Cotton ought to stay close to here. This town’s a-fixin’ to bust wide open and Earl, here, is gonna need some help keepin’ order. ’Sides, Smoke needs all the friendly ears he can use right here.”
“I agree,” Louis said. “Sooner or later, Smoke is going to tire of the mountains and come into town, and to hell with the U.S. Marshals. We need to be here to back him up.”
Johnny had left Big Rock before Larry Tibbson started with all his mouth, so all he knew about the Eastern lawyer was that he’d come trying to spark a married woman, Sally, and that was a stupid thing to do. If Smoke had been home, the lawyer would be cold in the ground with the worms playing the dipsy-doodle around his sewed- together lips. Which was about the only way anybody could get a lawyer to shut up.
Someone had set up a portable saw mill and was already backed up with orders for lumber. The sounds of sawing and hammering and nailing and cussing overrode any other sound in the town. With Earl Sutcliffe as the marshal, few dared to fire a pistol, even for fun. And the whole town knew within minutes of their arrival that Cotton Pickens, Johnny North, Charlie Starr, and Louis Longmont were on the side of the law with Earl Sutcliffe. That knowledge smoothed out just a whole bunch of otherwise sharp and explosive tempers. It would take a puredee damn fool to go up against those five.
“Now,” Earl said, “we have to see about rooms for you gentlemen.”
Louis shook his head. “No need. Andre is hiring people now to erect my saloon and gambling hall. We’ll have board floors and wooden sides, but a canvas top. I’ll have the workmen build an addition to the saloon for us. Until then, we’ll sleep out under God’s blanket.”
“I’m gonna start puttin’ my provisions together,” Charlie said. “I get it done soon enough, I just might take off while there’s a few hours of daylight left.”
“Get whatever you need and charge it, Charlie,”
Earl told him. “Your money is no good in this town.”
Charlie looked at the man. “I ain’t no broke saddle bum, Earl.”
“Of course, you’re not,” Louis said with a smile. “If you wish, you can settle up when you return from the mountains.”
“I just might do that. See you boys.” The old gunfighter left the office.
“Whew!” Johnny said. “That, fellers, is one randy ol’ puma.”
“I concur,” Louis said. “Have you ever seen him in action, Earl?”
“No, never.”
“Awesome. He’s a little slower than he used to be, I would imagine. But still one of the fastest guns around. And he never misses.”
“I would like to get word to Smoke that you are here,” Earl said. “But I haven’t the foggiest where he might be.”
Louis shrugged his shoulders. “Knowing Smoke as I do, he probably already knows. Although how he manages to learn those things mystifies me.”
“Indians say that eagles come tell him,” Cotton said.
“I’ve heard that, too,” Johnny said.
“If he knows you gentlemen are here,” Earl said drily, “it is probably because he squatted on a mountain and watched the road below through field glasses.”
“I like the eagle story better,” Louis said, and the men burst out laughing.
A bounty hunter they called Slim Williams wasn’t laughing. He had left the road miles from the newly named town of Rio and headed into the high country. He’d come upon tracks: a man riding and a pack horse behind.
He found where the man had stopped and dismounted for a drink of water at a rushing mountain stream. A big man, judging by his boot tracks. And Smoke Jensen was a big man.
Then he lost the trail. Slim wandered around for a hour and never could pick it back up. He had sat his horse for a time, smoking a cigarette and thinking things through. His eyes caught movement in the timber, about a hundred yards away. Then the man—-and he was sure it was a man—was gone.
