Backwoods Bloodbath

7

Fargo said very little to Arthur Draypool over the next several days. He did not tell Draypool what Sloane had told him. Better he kept the information to himself until he found out what was going on.

Avril and Zeck had seen to Sloane’s burial after they returned from chasing Frank Colter. Colter got away, which secretly pleased Fargo. He offered to help dig Sloane’s grave but Draypool would not hear of it. “Menial chores are why I have Mr. Avril and Mr. Zeck in my employ.”

As the pair in frock coats busied themselves with broken branches, scooping out earth, Fargo searched Sloane’s pockets. He hoped to find something that would tell him who Sloane had been and what Sloane and Colter were up to, but all he found was thirty dollars, a folding knife, and a compass.

In an effort to justify the shooting, Arthur Draypool had gone on and on about the dangers of traveling in that part of Missouri. “Scoundrels are everywhere. It shouldn’t surprise you that two of them were following us. No doubt at the first opportunity they planned to relieve us of our valuables, if not our lives.”

That was three nights ago. Over the subsequent days, Fargo racked his brain for an excuse to bow out. All he had to do was walk up to Draypool and flatly refuse to go another mile. But he could not bring himself to do it. Part of the reason was that he had agreed to do the job, and while his promise was not carved in granite, he never went back on his word if he could help it.

Curiosity was also a factor. Colter and Sloane had given the impression that Draypool was up to no good. The idea seemed preposterous. Fargo could not for the life of him figure out what Draypool hoped to gain by deceiving him. Why go to so much trouble to track him down and offer him so much money if the whole arrangement was underhanded?

For the time being Fargo was content to go along. But he was no man’s fool, and he stayed alert for gleanings of Draypool’s true intentions.

The day came when they crossed the border into Illinois. Fargo reckoned they would push on to the next town and rest there for the night. But to his surprise, after only a few miles, Arthur Draypool turned off the main road and down a long lane that brought them to a stately farmhouse. It reminded Fargo of mansions he had seen in the deep South. Scores of workers, nearly all of them black, were busy at various tasks.

“I hope you won’t mind if we stop early tonight,” Draypool commented. “I thought it might do to treat you to some Illinois hospitality.”

Apparently word of their coming had preceded them, for four people were waiting on a broad porch. For farmers, the four were dressed in remarkably nice clothes. A craggy-faced man with a bushy mustache came down the steps to greet them, declaring, “Arthur! What a pleasure to see you again!”

“Permit me to introduce Clyde Mayfair,” Draypool said while shaking their host’s hand. “He and I go back a long ways.”

“I should say so!” Mayfair exclaimed. “We grew up in South Carolina not twenty miles from one another.” He went to say more, seemed to change his mind, and instead gestured at the trio coming down the steps behind him. “This is my wife, Margaret, my son, Jace, and my daughter, Priscilla.”

“How do you do, sir?” the wife said. Her hair was graying and she had a plump body that jiggled when she moved.

“A pleasure, sir.” Jace gave a courtly bow. He was in his twenties, and the spitting image of his sire.

Fargo was more interested in the daughter. Tall and willowy, Priscilla Mayfair filled out her dress in the shape of an hourglass—a rather tight dress for a farm girl, cut low in front to accent her cleavage and snug at the thighs to accent something else. She offered her hand with a graceful flourish.

“I do declare. Aren’t you a handsome devil!”

Grinning, Fargo imitated the son’s bow and kissed the back of her hand. Only she was aware that he pressed the tip of his tongue to her skin. “I’m pleased to make your acquaintance.”

“Not half as pleased as I am,” Priscilla said, her lovely green eyes twinkling. She did not resent the liberty he had taken. Quite the contrary.

“Why don’t we all go inside?” Clyde Mayfair proposed. “I will have refreshments brought.”

Fargo shucked his Henry from the saddle scabbard, untied his saddlebags, and followed Draypool and their hosts indoors.

A butler and two maids, all of them black, snapped to attention as if they were soldiers on a parade ground. Clyde Mayfair had one of the maids take Fargo’s personal effects upstairs. Then he said, “Follow me, gentlemen,” and led the way to a sitting room.

The house was a model of elegance. Mayfair was no simple farmer. He had money, lots of it, and he was lavish in spending it. Fargo found himself in a plush chair across from a giant window that afforded a sweeping vista of the thousands of acres Mayfair owned. The butler brought him a cup of coffee on a sterling silver tray. The cup itself was of the best china.

Draypool sank into another chair with a contented sigh. The maid gave him a glass of brandy, which he sniffed, then sipped, savoring it as if it was liquid gold.

“You have no idea, Clyde, how wonderful it is to be back among civilized society.”

“Had a rough time, did you, Arthur?” Margaret Mayfair asked.

“You have no idea. I cannot describe it in mixed company,” Draypool assured her. “Suffice it to say that everything you have heard about the frontier is true. It is overrun with barbarians who have no appreciation for the niceties of life.”

Fargo almost laughed. If Draypool thought Kansas City was wild and woolly, he should visit a few prairie towns or some of the mining camps up in the Rockies. Compared to them, Kansas City was as tame as Paris or London.

“How sad.” Margaret Mayfair sniffed. “People these days have lost all sense of decorum. It comes from bad breeding.”

Clyde glanced sharply at Fargo, then cleared his throat and said, “Yes, my dear. I wholeheartedly agree. But we don’t want to bore our guest with a discussion about the decline and fall of American culture.”

“It would bore me,” Priscilla remarked, drawing a barbed look from her mother. “We hear it nearly every day.”

“That will be quite enough, young lady,” Margaret chided. “When I was your age I would never have presumed to be so impertinent.”

“When you were my age,” Priscilla said sweetly, “you were as straitlaced as your corset, Mother, and nothing has changed.”

Clyde flushed and started to rise, but caught himself. “That will be enough, young lady. Must you constantly bait your mother and I over trifles?”

“My apologies, Father,” Priscilla said with mock sincerity. “I meant no disrespect. But we have talked about it endlessly, and it does so bore me.”

Bestowing an embarrassed smile on Fargo, Clyde said, “Please excuse my daughter’s antics. We spoiled her growing up, I’m afraid, and her maturity has suffered as a result.”

Now it was Priscilla who colored and clenched her small hands into fists. “There you go again. Carping on my presumed flaws. But I do not have to sit here and listen.” She began to rise.

“Sit back down!” Clyde’s command had the same effect as the crack of a bullwhip; his daughter flinched, and did as she was told.

Arthur Draypool was nervously running his hands along the polished arms of his chair. “Perhaps we have come at an awkward time and should take our leave.”

“Nonsense,” Clyde said. “Parents must keep their offspring in line. I am sure our other guest does not think less of us.”

All eyes swung to Fargo. “I will if I don’t get a glass of whiskey,” he said good-naturedly.

“You would rather have that than coffee? How remiss of me.” Clyde snapped his fingers and the butler scampered to comply.

Jace Mayfair had not said a word the whole time. He had been studying Fargo, and now he shifted toward him, crossed his legs, and remarked, “I have heard you are one of the best trackers alive.”

Since no one had mentioned anything about Fargo’s profession since they had arrived, he responded, “Who told you that?”

“Mr. Draypool, before he left.”

Arthur smiled and spread his hands. “Clyde is one of my oldest and dearest friends. He believes, like I do, that we must take steps to clean up our fair state. In fact, he put up a portion of the ten thousand dollars.”

Clyde Mayfair nodded. “When the law can’t do what it is supposed to do, decent men must take the law into their own hands. I frown on vigilantism, but it can’t be helped. Our group is devoted to the greater public good.”

“How many of you are there?” Fargo inquired.

“Oh, about a dozen so far,” Clyde said vaguely. “But more will rally to our cause before too long. Wait and see.”

“Ours is a great and holy crusade,” Margaret commented. “We will not rest until Illinois is exactly like the sovereign and law-abiding state of South Carolina.”

Jace had not taken his eyes off Fargo. “I like to hunt, and I have done some tracking, but I am an amateur compared to men like you and Hiram Trask.”

“Who?”

“Trask is from down South,” Jace explained. “He lives deep in the backwoods. He’s not as famous as you, but he can track anything that lives, anywhere, anytime. Maybe you will run into him someday.”

“You never know,” Fargo said.

Jace’s mouth quirked upward. “It would be interesting to have a contest between the two of you to determine who is the king of the trackers, as it were.”

Clyde Mayfair made what Fargo took to be an impatient gesture. “Don’t be silly, son. Trask operates out of Georgia, and it is unlikely Mr. Fargo will venture south of the Mason-Dixon Line anytime soon. His usual haunts are much farther west. Isn’t that right?”

Fargo acknowledged that it was.

“Still, it would be interesting,” Jace insisted with that enigmatic grin. “It isn’t often that men of their caliber are pitted against one another.”

“Let’s change the subject,” Arthur proposed, and he began asking Mayfair questions about the state of the farm, the state of Mayfair’s crops, and the weather.

Now it was Fargo who was bored. He gulped the whiskey the butler brought and nursed a second. With nothing better to do, he admired Priscilla Mayfair’s tantalizing figure. She met his scrutiny with amused interest, undressing him with her eyes. When she thought no one else was looking, she grinned and winked.

The night ahead promised to be entertaining. Fargo looked forward to getting to know Priscilla a lot better. But first he had to endure another half hour of idle chatter. Then Clyde Mayfair took it into his head to give him a tour of the grounds.

“Something to do until supper.”

Once they were outside, Margaret wanted to show Fargo her flower gardens, which she claimed were the grandest in Illinois. At one point she pointed at a rose and said, “Have you ever seen one so big?”

Priscilla bent down and sniffed. “I like the big ones,” she said casually, and when she unfurled, she peeked at Fargo from under her long lashes to see if he got the point.

Talking animatedly about his breeding stock, Clyde steered Fargo to the stable. “Thoroughbreds, all of them,” he boasted of the twenty horses in their twenty stalls. “Some I’ve obtained from as far away as England.”

“Where is that new stallion you wrote me about?” Arthur Draypool asked, and everyone drifted toward a stall at the end.

Not Fargo. He hung back, and so did Priscilla. She was patting a mare. He moved over next to her. “Don’t you like stallions as much as you do big ones?”

An unladylike snort burst from Priscilla’s throat and she covered her mouth to smother it. “My, my, aren’t you naughty?”

“You’re one to talk.” Fargo lowered his voice. “When and where?”

“Why, sir, I have no idea what you mean,” Priscilla responded with a blank expression.

“I don’t play games, girl.”

Priscilla glanced at the others, then whispered without looking at him, “Neither do I. But I must be careful. If my parents find out, my father will have you shot.”

“When and where?” Fargo repeated.

Jace was strolling back toward them.

“Ten o’clock,” Priscilla whispered. “Under the maple east of the stable. For God’s sake, don’t let anyone see you sneaking out.” Straightening, she said loud enough to be heard, “I ride every day, rain or shine. If you were staying longer, I would show you a wonderful spot for a picnic.”

“Knowing you, that isn’t all you would show him, dear sister,” Jace lewdly declared.

“Don’t be crude,” Priscilla scolded.

“Come now,” Jace said. “You’re the one who has been making cow eyes at him, not me.”

“I mean it,” Priscilla said.

Chuckling, Jace nudged her. “You can pull the wool over Mother’s and Father’s eyes, but never mine. You would do well to remember that.”

“And you would do well to remember that I know about your visits to a certain shack out by the corn-fields. Father would disown you if he ever discovered you are cavorting with a darky.”

Jace seized her wrist. “Don’t you ever threaten me, you hear?”

“Oh, please,” Priscilla said in contempt, and pulled free. “We each have our secrets, brother mine, and neither of us will betray the other.” She smiled at Fargo and walked off, her hips swinging invitingly.

“Damn her!” Jace grumbled. “Damn all women. We should lock them in chains and keep them at the foot of our beds, like dogs.” He glanced at Fargo. “What do you think?”

“I think I need another whiskey.”