The Long Trail (The McCabes Book 1) by Brad Dennison (microsoft ebook reader .TXT) 📗

“It ain’t too late,” Kiowa hissed. “All I need is the word from Vic.”

Dusty turned to face him. “You’ll need a lot more than that. I’m not a kid anymore, and you’re nowhere near man enough to do the job without a lot of help.”

“Enough, you two,” Falcone sad.

Dusty turned back to Falcone. Kiowa let his gaze linger on Dusty a moment longer, then looked back to his boss.

“Who’s this one?” Falcone asked, indicating Josh.

“Josh,” Dusty said, thinking quickly, grasping for a name. “Josh Brackston. A gunhawk I’ve been riding with a while.”

“Never heard of him,” Falcone said.

Josh decided to enter the play. After all, he was finding this was not unlike poker. “You hang around Montana Territory a while, you’ll hear of me.”

Dusty looked to him, not knowing whether he wanted to laugh, or kick him. Shut up, he wanted to say. Leave this to me.

The outside door then opened, and a woman stepped in. The saloon whore from Midas.

“I so love a bath in this mountain water,” she was saying, before she saw who was standing with Falcone.

Her hair fell in dripping wet strings down her back, and she wore only a petticoat and a slip. Her eyes met Josh’s for a moment, then turned away, but the moment was long enough for Falcone to notice.

“So,” he said, “I see you two have met?”

Damn, Josh thought. I’d love to get him to a poker table. He’s good.

“Yes,” the girl said. “They stopped at the Midas saloon a couple days ago.”

“Yeah,” Dusty said, thinking quickly. “We were asking for you.”

“Tempy,” Falcone said, addressing the girl Dusty and Josh knew also as Felicia and Sarah-Ann. “Are these also the two you met at the campfire?”

She had moved to Loggin’s side, and he swung an arm about her shoulders proprietarily, as though he were trying to make a statement to Josh and dusty. His pistol was in his other hand.

She said, “They surely are, Vic.”

“I say we kill ‘em both now,” Kiowa said.

“It wouldn’t make good sense,” Dusty said, “to kill two men who’ve come looking’ for a job.”

Here we are, Josh thought, in more danger than he had ever been in. With but one word from Falcone, this Kiowa Haynes would probably give them worse deaths than they could imagine. But damn, he was enjoying this.

“What kind of job?” Falcone asked.

“Hopefully, the kind that can pay better than working for two-bit cattle outfits. I told Josh, here, I knew Sam Patterson and Vic Falcone, and maybe they could hire us on. We’ve been looking for you since.”

“Boss,” Kiowa said, “I never did trust this kid. And I don’t now.”

Falcone set the bottle and glass down, and rested his hands on his hips. “I have to admit, Dusty, I never did consider you the type for a life like this. When Sam gave you the choice to either ride with us or ride away, I was not surprised when you chose the second of the two.”

Dusty shrugged. “I tried to take Sam’s advice, and ride the straight and narrow. But there’s just no money in it. Sure, I could homestead, maybe run a few head of cattle. But I want more than that out of life.”

“I don’t know. I always liked you, Dusty, but liking you and trusting you are two different things.”

“I say we kill ‘em both right now,” Kiowa said again.

Falcone directed his eyes to him. “I pay you to scout, not to think. If they are to be killed, and I mean if, I’ll be the one who decides. Is that clear? Or do I need to make it more clear?”

Kiowa knew Falcone’s speed with a gun wasn’t the equal of Patterson’s, but he was still damned good. Kiowa was an accurate shot, and his rifle was in his hands, while Falcone’s pistol was still holstered. Yet, Falcone had set down his glass and bottle, so his hands were now free. Dusty saw Kiowa weighing all of this in mind. Could he swing the rifle toward Falcone and squeeze off a shot before Falcone could draw and fire?

Kiowa stood his ground, but didn’t move. “All right. You’re the boss.”

“Take them both outside.”

“Should we tie them up?” Loggins asked.

“No. There’s no place for them to go without horses, and nothing they can do without guns. But keep an eye on them.”

At the back of the cabin the meadow dropped into a gentle grassy decline, extending a hundred more yards before being met by a stand of aspen.

Loggins directed Josh and Dusty to where the decline began, and said, “Sit.”

“I thought we might walk around a bit,” Dusty said. “Stretch our legs a little.”

Loggins shook his head. “I don’t want you boys getting too good a look at the lay of the land. If the boss says you ride with us, then I’ll show you all I know about this place. But not until then.”

Dusty nodded, as if to say he considered that sensible thinking, and dropped to the grass to sit cross-legged. Josh followed Dusty’s lead. The knee he had banged up falling from the roof during the gunfight protested a bit and he winced, but made it down to the ground. Loggins dropped to sit on his heels, balancing his rifle across his knees.

“You and Kiowa don’t get along too good,” Loggins said.

Dusty pulled a strand of grass from the earth and bit into its sweet tasting stem. “Nope. The man drew the battle lines when I was too small a child to fight back. If it wasn’t for Patterson, the man would have carved me up for the vultures just for the fun of killing. Don’t ever turn your back on a man who finds fun in killing.”

“It might also be good advice,” Josh said to Dusty, “not to egg on a man who finds fun in killing.”

“Kiowa has never been able to think straight when he was mad,” Dusty explained, “and he’s always been too stupid to keep himself from getting mad.”

“The man’s