Badlands Bloodsport

15

Fargo was numb from cold and exhaustion, at moments even falling asleep in the saddle, when he suddenly started awake at the sound of a woman’s piercing scream.

His right hand automatically knocked the riding thong from the hammer of his Colt even as he slewed around in the saddle to look behind him. The three conveyances had halted, and Rebecca, Jessica, and Ericka were pouring out of them. Fargo spotted Skeets—the group’s best marksman—lying in a crumpled heap beside the coach.

He wheeled the Ovaro and rode back, swinging down from the saddle and kneeling beside the inert form.

Ericka said, “Is he . . .?”

Fargo didn’t bother to check for a pulse. The back of Skeets’s head had been smashed to a bloody pulp, and his neck had snapped at an impossible angle when he fell off the box.

“He is,” Fargo confirmed. “Prob’ly dead before he even hit the ground.”

“Before he—?” Rebecca looked confused. “But didn’t the fall kill him?”

“He landed on his front,” Fargo explained. “His face is scraped up some, is all.”

Slappy hurried forward, and the two Englishmen had climbed out of the coach. But Derek sat demurely on the seat of the mud wagon.

“What in blazes happened?” Aldritch demanded. “Did a savage get him?”

Fargo shook his head. “He’s been beaned—hard—on the back of his head. I’d say it was a rock.” He didn’t need to add, “Plenty of which are now close to hand.”

He stared at Derek. “You were right behind him. You must have seen something.”

Derek folded his arms across his massive chest. “The dumb bloke fell asleep. I saw him tumble off the seat. Even a blind man can see it was an accident, now, wasn’t it?”

“That’s hogwash,” Fargo said, still staring up at him. “The back of his head has been crushed like a stepped-on cake. But he fell face forward.”

“Don’t be daft,” Derek said dismissively. “The blighter landed on his back and bounced over. It’s a bloody long fall.”

“One big problem with that lie: If he landed on his back and bounced over, the wounds on his face wouldn’t be so serious.”

“So, now I’m a liar, is it? I’m going to enjoy pounding that fresh mouth of yours, Fargo.”

Fargo resisted a sudden impulse to draw down and blow the brain-sick bastard off the mud wagon. “It was the vote last night, wasn’t it, Derek? When Skeets voted to shoot you?”

Derek grinned. “Don’t be barmy, lad. Ask your salty friend Ebenezer if he saw me fling a rock. He was right behind me.”

Slappy looked guilty. “Fargo, I confess I was sleeping behind the reins. I didn’t wake up until one a’ the gals let out a scream.”

“There you are, mate,” Derek said briskly. “You have no witnesses, eh?”

“Sell your ass, you red-handed murderer.” Slappy bristled. “That rock didn’t get crapped out of a cloud. And you got the muscles to toss it hard.”

“Now, now,” Fargo said with false unction, “the man is right, Ebenezer. A man is innocent until proven guilty, and we can’t prove anything.”

“That’s the true American spirit,” Derek approved. “None of these bleeding drumhead courts.”

Slappy sputtered with indignation. But Fargo took him aside and spoke low in his ear. Suddenly Slappy’s lips twitched into a grin.

“H’ar now,” he said to the rest, “’pears like I was a mite hasty. Ol’ Derek is right, we got no proof. Mayhap poor Skeets just nodded off to sleep and—Tumbledown Dick, off he went.”

“Surely, Mr. Fargo, you can’t believe that in the face of the evidence to the contrary?” Ericka objected. “Why, only look at the back of his head. It’s a clear case of cold-blooded murder.”

“We can’t prove it, Lady Blackford, and right now time is pressing. The main mile right now is to get as close to Fort Laramie as we can. The day is half over, and those Cheyenne braves are moving at a two:twenty clip to reach us.”

“Well, aren’t we at least going to give him a Christian burial?”

Fargo pulled at his beard, mulling it over. “Actually, ma’am, I thought me and Slappy would just pile some rocks over him. The cold weather has hardened the ground, and—”

“Ah, I see how it is.” Ericka cut him off. “Mr. Montoya deserved a real grave because he was an American. But poor Skeets is a foreigner, so rocks will suffice.”

Fargo heaved an impatient sigh. She failed to add that “poor Skeets” was the very reason they were all staring death in the eye. But Fargo was a fair man, and there was truth to her argument. Besides, he admired her immensely, and the disapproval in her pretty face was more than he could bear.

“Right you are,” he said in a poor English accent, and all three women laughed.

Slappy pulled the shovel out of the fodder wagon while Derek scrambled down off the mud wagon, unbuttoning his coat. “I’ll dig the grave,” he offered, staring at Fargo. “Good for my muscles.”

Derek made short work of the hard, flinty soil. Rebecca said a short prayer, and Brady “Skeets” Stanton became perhaps the first Brit to find eternal rest in the rugged Badlands.

“Derek,” Fargo said, “you’ll take over driving the coach. Aldritch, I’m afraid you’re going to have to become a teamster and drive the mud wagon.”

Aldritch popped his monocle into an eye socket and studied Fargo as if he were a talking dog. “I? Fargo, I cannot manage a team. I’ve had a coachman since childhood.”

“We can’t just desert the mud wagon—most of our supplies are in it, and besides, the coach could break down at any time in this rough terrain. We need the fodder wagon, too, so . . . well, take your pick, the mud wagon or the fodder wagon. The fodder wagon is easier to handle.”

Aldritch drew himself up, his face a mask of indignation. “Fargo, in England we practice strict social stratification. As Dr. Johnson so aptly phrased it to Boswell: ‘I believe in subordination, sir, as the proper friend of mankind.’ Perhaps in your country the gentrified class do manual labor, but it is strictly out of the question for an English gentleman.”

“Hookey Walker!” Slappy exclaimed. “Right now, Baldritch, your bacon is in the fire. You best shit-can them high-hattin’ ways and do what Fargo tells you. When them war-whoopin’ Injins come swooping down on you, they won’t give a frog’s fat ass about social strati-whosis. They’ll—”

“I’ll drive the fodder wagon,” Jessica volunteered. “I sometimes drove my father’s coal wagon when I was a young girl.”

“A mere slip of a girl,” Slappy said sanctimoniously, staring hard at Aldritch. “At least she is a credit to her dam.”

“Chuck the flap-jaw,” Fargo snapped at his friend. “Let’s get this medicine show on the road.”

“You heard the ramrod,” Slappy bellowed, thrusting his chest out. “The hell we dillydallying for?”

Just before Fargo gigged the Ovaro forward, his glance slanted toward Derek. The hangman’s pale-ice eyes fixed on Fargo and pierced him like a pair of bullets. Then his liver-colored lips eased into a taunting smile that was both challenge and promise—promise of a hard death to come.

* * *

They pushed on hard for the next three hours, stopping only briefly to let the horses blow. A sky the color of wet slate flattened out the colors and shadows, making the grotesque terrain around them look even more forlorn and menacing. The temperature dropped until wraiths of steam rose when the horses pissed. A few large, wet flakes of snow pelted Fargo’s face and clung to his beard, and he hoped the blizzard would hold off one more day. With one hell of a lot of luck, they would edge out of the Badlands a few hours before nightfall and reach Fort Laramie by the following evening.

By now Fargo was making regular scouts along their back trail, watching for signs of the pursuing Cheyenne. Twice he scaled tall pinnacles and broke out his field glass, but no soap—all he could see was empty, desolate terrain.

“They decided to flank us,” he reported to Slappy when he rode back from his latest scout. “They took the buffalo plains to the south of the Badlands.”

“Didja spot ’em?”

Fargo shook his head, breathing on his hands to warm them. “You can’t see past Devil’s Ridge from here. But they’re out there, old son, pushing them tough mustangs full throttle. It’ll take ’em a bit longer to jump us, but it means we’ll be out on the open flats when they pounce.”

“Think they’ll hit us today?”

“Damn good chance. They know they have to close with us before we get in sight of that fort. I can’t even send mirror signals in this weather.”

Slappy hunched his shoulders forward against the bitter wind. “God-in-whirlwinds! And that chicken-fucker Derek had to kill our trick shooter. Don’t that knot-head know his tit’s in the wringer, too?”

“I don’t think he sees it that way,” Fargo mused aloud.

Slappy, miserable in the cold, missed Fargo’s point. “Damnation but I’d like to get outside of some hot grub,” he complained.

Despite the cold the lead pair of coach horses were blowing lather. Reluctantly, Fargo called for a thirty-minute rest. He gathered the others around him and explained their situation.

“I calculate they’ll launch at least two attacks before we can shake them,” he said. “If we use discipline, if we hold and squeeze, we might be able to repel the first attack with our remaining ammo. If we can pop over enough braves, Touch the Clouds will have to retreat. Indians don’t fight to the last man unless their main camp is attacked and women and children are in danger.”

“What is the point, Fargo?” Derek demanded. “You’ve admitted there’ll be a second go-round with the savages, and then all we have are sodding rocks.”

“A man’s got to match his gait to the horse he’s riding,” Fargo replied matter-of-factly. He glanced at Ericka as he added, “Who knows? Maybe we’ll pull a rabbit out of our hat. Anyhow, hangman, if you can come up with a better weapon than rocks and empty brags, let us know.”

“It’s no concern of mine, Trailsman. God rot all of you.”

“One other thing,” Fargo said. “Cheyennes like to unstring an opponent’s nerves before they attack in force. It’s likely they picked one or two of their best braves to cut across from the plains, sneak past us, and lie in wait for us. Keep a sharp eye out—there’ll be no warning.”

“Fargo,” Aldritch said in a querulous voice, “you have admitted that you’ve spotted no savages since the last attack day before yesterday. It is possible—is it not?—that you are mistaken? That the Indians have given up on us?”

“Sure, it’s possible,” Fargo conceded. “I’ve told you all along that Indians are notional, and trying to predict their actions is like trying to catch a falling knife. Hell, I hope I’m wrong. But on the frontier you don’t survive by counting on good luck.”

Fargo called an end to the rest, and everyone headed toward the conveyances. But Ericka hung back to get a word with Fargo. “Did you hear Derek just now? That rather peculiar comment, ‘It’s no concern of mine’?”

Fargo nodded. “So you noticed it, too?”

“Mr. Fargo, I’ve known that human monster for years. I intensely dislike his employer, also, but I must tolerate Aldritch for my husband’s sake. Mr. Fargo, I’ve given this great thought. Derek didn’t murder Skeets simply for revenge.”

Fargo nodded. “I know. He killed him because he’s the best marksman among us. He also plans to kill me and Slappy next, then Aldritch and your husband.”

She nodded vigorously. “Yes, precisely. That leaves him free to rape all three of us women and leave us for the Indians while he escapes on your fine horse. Like most bullies he is an abject coward, and he has no intention of facing any more Indian attacks.”

“You’re as smart as you are pretty and talented.” Fargo flirted, evoking a smile from her. “I take it you’re confused?”

“I am, rather. Clearly you know his plans, so why didn’t you kill him for murdering Skeets?”

“Well, let’s just say he’s more useful to us alive than he is dead. Will that hold you for now?”

She smiled again. “Coming from you, yes.”

As she turned to leave, Fargo thought of something else. “Lady Blackford? Do you really think that your—your—what did you call your sketches? Repre-something?”

“Representational art?”

“There you go. Do you really think it could have a heap big effect on wild Indians who’ve never seen it?”

“Why, yes, undoubtedly. It’s been documented.”

Fargo nodded. “You take good care of your drawings, all right?”

For a moment understanding glimmered in her eyes. Then her jealous husband poked his head out of the coach and bellowed her name.

“It’s pretty thin,” Fargo muttered to himself as he stepped up into leather. “But rocks ain’t much better.”