Under the Vultures Moon Read online

  “They were the sheriff’s,” Clementine explained. “Cain’t have a gunslinger with no guns to sling.”

  Jed stood up, wrapped the belt around his slender hips and cinched it. He loaded the revolvers and pocketed the rest of the bullets.

  “Glad I kep’ ’em,” said Zeke. “Glad Miss Clementine made me my catapult. Bullets would have been long gone by now but around here there ain’t no shortage of sharp stones. And here,” he pulled something else from a drawer, “here’s my old lasso. Might come in handy.”

  “You must let me pay you...” Jed reached into his pocket but Zeke was scornful.

  “I ain’t accepting money for old rope. Besides, what would I spend it on? And I’m awful sorry about your eye, by the way.”

  “It don’t matter,” said Jed. Not no more, he thought to himself. He thanked the old timer for his hospitality and excused himself to go hitch the horse to the cart. A look flashed between the others.

  “You can leave the cart,” Clementine met Jed’s eye. “You’ll make better time without it.”

  Jed saw the lie of the land. He saluted them both with a touch of his hat. Clementine handed him the parcel of biscuits.

  “You take care now, you hear?”

  Jed said nothing. As he walked from the jailhouse, he heard the old man call after him with a note of panic in his voice.

  “Jed! You danged fool! You done forgot your pot of coffee!”

  Chapter Fourteen

  Ten Men!

  Jed had to bear in mind that the horse was not his Horse and there would be no leaping over canyons in a single bound or gliding through clouds - not that there were many of either in his path. The landscape was flat and featureless and the sky a uniform pale blue, the colour of a duck’s egg. As a travelling companion, the horse left everything to be desired - unless all you wanted was a good listener who didn’t interrupt with sarcastic asides, but Jed was in no mood for talking.

  Clementine had told him the critter’s name was Lazarus but Jed had no need for the information; as long as the horse did what it was bid, they would get along in companionable silence. If it didn’t - well, Jed would call it by many names, none of which would be Lazarus.

  For the most part, he kept the critter running below full gallop but as the sun-bleached signposts for Crosspatch Hill began to show up at regular intervals, he urged the horse on. The end of this leg of the journey was in sight.

  Jed pulled up at stables in the outskirts of town. Lazarus looked more ready to join the dead rather than come back from them. Jed patted the horse’s foam-flecked neck with genuine gratitude. He overpaid the stable hand for care of the critter, instructing the lad to be sure to give only the best fodder.

  “Yes, sir!” the stable hand just about stopped short of saluting. Jed flipped the boy a gold coin along with the promise of another to match if’n the lad could keep his mouth shut.

  “I ain’t seen you, Mister,” the boy jabbered, eager to please. “You was never here.”

  Jed left Lazarus in his enthusiastic recruit’s care and strode into town. He couldn’t help noticing just about every pole, noticeboard and vertical surface was plastered with posters all offering a HANDSOME REWARD for information leading to the capture DEAD OR ALIVE of the culprits responsible for the shuttle crash and the TRAGIC LOSS OF LIFE by ORDER of O. CARRIAGE, SHERIFF of Silicon County.

  Jed recalled his interview with the lawman and felt a resurgence of distaste for Carriage’s unorthodox approach to crime deterrence.

  I ought to tell him, he considered, weren’t no common band of outlaws did for that shuttle. But it was a glass-headed bandit or bandits from far under the ground - all to try to catch a ten-year-old boy. Carriage would laugh and spit - maybe not in that order but he would greet Jed’s story with contempt and derision. Jed could only hope he could bring an end to all of this before some money-grubbing, public-spirited citizen of Crosspatch Hill turned in his neighbour and denounced him as a shuttle-crasher.

  The booking office was closed UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE but that was hardly surprising. Jed directed his feet toward the Lonesome Goat. His gullet needed a-wetting and he could ask ole Wilbur about stages out of town.

  He pushed through the swinging saloon doors and saw at once the bar room was as deserted as the last time he saw it. Why, with its population recently doubled, even Palmerston had more folks in it. The bartender was busy polishing a glass. Jed hadn’t expected a parade but he had envisaged a warmer welcome than the one he got.

  “Howdy, stranger,” Wilbur said flatly.

  “The name’s Jed.” He hitched himself onto a stool. “How are you, Wilbur?”

  “Good,” said the barman a little too emphatically. “All’s good here at the Goat.”

  But his pallor and the sheen of sweat on his brow belied his affirmation.

  “Who do I have to shoot to get a drink around here?”

  Wilbur’s eyes rounded with a flash of panic. Jed thought he’d better smile to show the barkeep he was joking. Wilbur made a show of relaxing and laughed just a little too long.

  “Red eye,” he pointed at Jed as if recalling the name of an old friend.

  “Sounds good,” said Jed.

  There was a muffled sound of breaking glass. Both gunslinger and barman tensed - but for different reasons. More sweat dripped from Wilbur’s forehead.

  “Mice?” he offered weakly.

  Jed got to his feet, revolver drawn. “There’s somebody here,” he whispered. “In the back room. You take cover and I’ll check it out.”

  “No!” the barman flapped. “There’s no need! Honest there ain’t!” He raised his voice. “There ain’t nobody in the back room, Jed; I swear!”

  Jed pushed him aside and opened the door with a kick.

  The fug of cigar smoke and the whiff of strong liquor hit him at once. Unfinished drinks were dotted around on tables. Chairs and stools were overturned. Hands of cards were scattered. A little white ball was still dancing around a spinning roulette wheel.

  “Somebody sure left in a hurry,” Jed muttered. Behind him, Wilbur was in the doorway, wringing his apron in fear. “What the hell’s going on here?” he snarled over his shoulder. “Don’t try to tell me your mice are into smoking, drinking and gambling.”

  “Just come back to the bar, Jed,” Wilbur pleaded, desperation painting his features. “I’ll fix you that red eye. On the house.” He made gestures to usher the gunslinger back to the bar but Jed moved away from the door and took a tour of the gaming tables. He gave his stubbly chin a casual scratch and then turned over the nearest table.

  Two men were cowering on the floor, curled up tight with their hands over their heads. Jed looked over at the barkeep. “Ugliest mice I ever did see.” He tipped over another table, revealing three more men in hiding. “I don’t get it. Gambling ain’t illegal in Crosspatch Hill.”

  He moved to the centre of the room and addressed the rest of the furniture. “Y’all come out now, you hear? I don’t feel like putting holes in this good feller’s fixtures and fittings.”

  The men on the floor got up. They stood with their hands in the air and sheepish expressions on their faces. More men crawled out from under other tables. One was behind the piano. Another, in the darkest corner, had donned a lampshade in a foolhardy bid to pass himself off as a standing lamp.

  There were ten of them in total. Jed kept them all where he could see them.

  “Howdy, gentlemen,” he began. “I’m wondering why I’ve gathered you all here today.” He turned to Wilbur. “Explanation, please.”

  The bartender hemmed and hawed. Jed exhaled in a way that expressed how thin his patience was growing. The story, once Jed had teased it out, both surprised and dismayed him.

  The men were all of the same height and build. They all wore their moustaches and sideburns after th
e same fashion. They were all the same age, give or take a couple of years and they were all unmarried.

  “We fit the profile,” said one, keeping his eyes on the gunslinger’s boots.

  Jed cottoned on. All his years patrolling Vultures’ Moon meant he knew a stereotypical outlaw when he saw one. And now he was looking at ten of them.

  “It’s that Sheriff Carriage,” Wilbur found his voice at last. “He’s rounding up men just like these guys and he’s taking them away for a big public hanging. But these guys ain’t done nothing wrong, Jed. They just happen to have a certain look.”

  “That’s right!” some of the men chorused, along with other terms of agreement.

  “He’s trying to pin that there shuttle crash on us,” wailed the one who had worn the lampshade. “T’ain’t right nor just.”

  The other men gave voice to their endorsement.

  “So,” Jed turned to Wilbur, who flinched from his steely gaze. “You’re hiding these fellers in the back room and boosting your takings at the same time.”

  The men were quick to jump to the barman’s defence. They assured Jed that Wilbur would accept no payment for what they called their accommodation and entertainment. Jed looked at the nervous bartender with new eyes - and in a new light!

  “Hmm. What kind of world is it when a man is ashamed of doing a charitable act? Gentlemen, it seems like I’ve misjudged the situation and for that, I’m sorry.” He caught Wilbur’s eye. “I truly am. But y’all cain’t cower in here the rest of your days. That ain’t no way for a man to live. Y’all may as well be in jail already.”

  “Better’n being hanged!” said one.

  “Yeah!” chorused the rest.

  Jed waved at them to calm down. He showed them he was putting his guns away. “I need to think about this. I’m going for a walk and get the lie of the land. You just continue - but don’t drink too much; I’ve a feeling you’re going to need your wits about you afore long.”

  ***

  Jed left the Lonesome Goat and was immediately accosted by a giant crow.

  “I knowed it was you going in there,” said Miss Ellen Peabody with a sneer of disdain aimed at the saloon or at Jed or, most probable, at both.

  “Ma’m.” Jed touched his hat and tried to step around. Miss Peabody was surprisingly quick. Flapping her black shawls like wings, she matched the gunslinger’s every move and would not let him pass. Jed remembered Horse laughingly suggesting the old bird be deputised for the quickness of her reactions - the memory of Horse prompted Jed towards greater frustration, reminding him why he was heading where he was heading to do what he had to do. “If’n you’ll excuse me, ma’m.”

  A claw darted to grab Jed by the forearm but he was anticipating it this time. He dodged but the old woman surprised him by stamping on his foot. Jed did his best not to cuss and while he hopped around, Miss Peabody said, “Now I got your attention, you can tell me: Did you get to the Grove? Did you see the boy?”

  Jed stood up straight. “Ma’m,” his tone was curt and serious. “What I may or may not do ain’t none of your business.”

  Miss Peabody’s mouth puckered like a cat’s backside on a hot day. Her black eyes looked him up and down, as though reading him like one of Carriage’s Wanted posters.

  “If you finds evil in the world and you don’t do nothing to cross it, you can number yourself among the evildoers.”

  “Sounds about right,” said Jed, wishing she would stop looking at him. “And no, ma’m, I did not see the boy.”

  “I have to know he’s dead!” Miss Peabody clutched the brooch that pinned her shawls to her chest. “I cain’t get no peace of mind until I knows for sure.”

  Her face was a mask of anguish. Jed’s heart was touched.

  “Listen up, ma’m. I’m going to do my level best to see you get your peace of mind; do you hear?”

  The black eyes scrutinised him again. She decided he was sincere.

  “Thank you, son,” the old spinster shed a tear. “You’re a good man.”

  She tottered away, shawls flapping. Jed’s mouth dropped open. He tipped his hat at her receding figure. The old crow had given him an idea.

  ***

  For the second time Jed opened the door to the back room of the Lonesome Goat with a kick. This time it was because his arms were loaded with clothes. He shed them onto a table, interrupting a game of blackjack. The protests of the card players were nothing compared to the ruckus made by the others when Jed outlined his plan for their escape.

  “Ain’t no way I’m wearing women’s clothes!” wailed one.

  Others added variations of this theme.

  “Better’n hanging,” said Jed. He tossed skirts, shawls, bonnets and blouses - all of them black - at the men’s chests. “Get these on and fast. Stage leaves town in twenty minutes. And,” he emptied a bag of soap and razors onto the table. “I suggest you get rid of them fancy taches if’n you’re going to pass for womenfolk.”

  Deaf to their complaints, Jed steered a gobsmacked Wilbur back to the bar room where he ordered a shot of red eye while he waited.

  “It’s crazy,” was the barman’s opinion. Jed raised his glass in toast.

  “Reckon so, but no crazier than hanging innocent folks and letting the real culprits go free.”

  Presently, the men, some with cuts on their cheeks, filed from the back room. Wilbur tried to mask his amusement but in the end gave up the struggle and just laughed out loud. The men shifted uncomfortably. Some of them said they were getting changed back and would take their chances.

  “No, you ain’t,” said Jed. “I done booked us eleven places on the stage and it won’t look right if I turns up with less than ten ladies. That’d be arousing suspicion from the get-go. Now, I suggest you stop your spitting and your swearing and starts behaving like the old maids I say you are. You’re all bound for Tarnation to protest the expansion of the saloon there. You believe it’s your moral duty to speak out. You don’t want folks backsliding into the lawless days of the first settlers.”

  The men grumbled.

  “And quit scratching! No lady scratches herself, leastwise not in public. I suggest you pick names for yourselves, purty as you like, but as we walk across town to the staging post, I also suggest you keep your purty mouths shut and your eyes low.”

  “Ain’t natural,” complained the one who’d had the lampshade on his head, “All gussied up like females. Ain’t right.”

  There were several murmurs of accord but nobody took off his bonnet or shimmied out of his skirt.

  “I reckon we’ll be leaving now,” Jed tossed a couple of coins to the barman. Wilbur looked sorry to see them all go. He watched sadly as the men trouped out of the saloon, in that bow-legged fashion men have. He chewed his lip. They wouldn’t get as far as the staging post, walking like that.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Ten Women!

  The coach was late. This afforded Jed some time to instruct his party of ladies in proper feminine deportment. He told them to walk in little steps rather than great strides. They were to keep their eyes downcast and their voices - should they need to speak - as a whisper.

  “Best to leave all the talking to me, ladies,” he concluded. “As your chaperone, I’ll be your spokesman. It ain’t the fastest way to travel but, well, since the shuttle...”

  The men needed no reminder of why they were on the lam. They fell into a contemplative silence, which suited Jed just fine.

  Eventually the stage coach hove into view, stirring up clouds of dust as it came. It was fashioned after the old style but with more recent modifications. The carriage was larger, built to accommodate a couple of dozen passengers. Luggage was strapped to the roof behind the driver’s seat. In a concession to the old days, the engines that pulled the vehicle were contained within metallic mannequins in the
shape of horses. Folks liked to travel in romantic style, Jed figured - until the shuttle came and showed them speed had some advantages.

  The metal horses and Lazarus were at opposite ends of a spectrum, with Horse somewhere in the middle. Jed felt a twinge of pain for his captured friend, like a dig of spurs to his heart, goading him onward with his journey.

  The sooner I do what I have to do, the sooner I’ll get Horse back.

  What’s left of him after Shish has finished.

  If Shish can be trusted to keep to our bargain, that is.

  Jed doubted that any relation of Farkin Plisp could be trusted at all.

  He showed the driver his booking slips and counted his party on board. One he stopped before he climbed on board. Jed held out his hand for the wad of chewing tobacco the feller had been enjoying, and shook his head. The feller surrendered it unwillingly but Jed’s steely gaze silenced his protest before it was begun.

  “Truth be told,” the driver wiped the back of his neck with his kerchief. “I’m mighty glad to have your ladies on board. Should make for a calmer journey. Folks can get a little rowdy and overly boisterous on a long journey and what with the boredom and the liquor, ain’t long afore a fight breaks out and I has to stop the coach and eject the malefactors, which causes delays and makes the rest of them all the more ratty and ill-tempered.”

  Jed assured the man his party would be no trouble or they would have him to answer to.

  “Funny-looking broads,” the driver glanced at the rows of bowed bonnets. “If’n you don’t mind me saying so. I reckon when a woman looks like that, all she can do is try to stop the rest of us from having our fun.”

  “Maybe so,” said Jed. “But we’re running late already...”

  The driver’s good humour dropped from him like a horse losing a shoe. He climbed up to his seat and suggested Jed strap himself into his seat and hold onto his hat; it was going to be a bumpy ride.

  Jed got into the carriage. There were other passengers from further up the route, places like Spit Creek and Gopher’s Gulch. They seemed like decent enough folks, but there was one burly feller in a checked shirt who was half-cut already and continued to swig from a whisky bottle. Perhaps he’ll doze off, Jed hoped. Perhaps he’ll be no trouble at all.