Badlands Bloodsport

2

Fargo, moving with piston precision, tacked the Ovaro and swung up onto the hurricane deck. He reined around toward the camp circle and spoke to Slappy and Montoya from the saddle.

“Get ready for a set-to, boys. There’s Cheyenne hunters just north of us, and they’re under Hunt Law. If these two thick-skulled limeys find that herd and fire on it, they could lead the braves right back to our camp.”

“Christ on a crutch!” Slappy swore, for he was well acquainted with Plains warriors and their strict codes.

“Make the circle tighter,” Fargo directed, “and bunch the horses in tight as you can before you hobble ’em. Show the women how to use the guns. If trouble comes, put the females under the coaches, not inside. And, boys . . .”

Fargo glanced around and lowered his voice. “You know the unwritten order for Indian attacks—if it goes bad and all hope is lost, do not let the women be captured.”

With these ominous words, Fargo wheeled the Ovaro and raced to the north.

“I say, Fargo!” Blackford shouted as he passed. “What’s all this ruckus?”

Fargo waved him off and opened his stallion out to a lope, then a gallop. Although the broken and eroded terrain of the Badlands marked the land to his west and south, to the north it was a vast, rolling sea of grass pockmarked with sandy knolls and occasional stands of stunted growth.

He kept up the hard pace, reining back to a trot now and then to breathe the Ovaro. Fargo didn’t bother looking for tracks made by the Brits’ horses—gusting winds scoured the ground, and the time it would take him to cut sign, much less hold their trail, was too costly.

He topped a long ridge, a wind gust almost snatching away his hat, and broke out his army field glass. There was a natural tank straight ahead that had attracted the small herd he spotted yesterday. He focused the glass and soon saw the buffalo grazing in small clumps. He spotted no Cheyennes today but assumed they were out there. For hundreds of years they had perfected the art of sneaking close to Uncle Pte—the buffalo.

Great Shaggy’s eyes were weak, but his sense of smell powerful, so Fargo made sure he remained downwind of the herd. He traversed all of the wide-open terrain before him, desperate to spot Skeets and Derek before they triggered a plains vendetta. Both men were drunkards and he consoled himself with the thought that they might have missed this spot altogether.

But the goose tickle on the back of his neck suggested otherwise. Nervous sweat trickled out from his thick hair, but the wind dried it almost instantly. He swung the field glass to the west and immediately felt his pulse quicken.

A dry lake bed formed a grassy bowl in that direction, and a prominent headland jutted out over it. Two horses were hobbled back from the edge, and standing beside them, sharing a bottle, were Brady “Skeets” Stanton and Derek “the Terrible” Wilder.

Even at this great distance Fargo couldn’t fail to recognize Stanton’s lipless grin and flap holster. And bluff-faced Wilder stood now as he often did in camp—both feet planted wide and his thumbs hooked into his shell belt. Arrogant, domineering, the kind of man who had to geld every man around him. Fargo knew that a hugging match with this former hangman was inevitable—assuming the Cheyenne didn’t kill them both first.

He spotted their buffalo guns—two Sharps Big Fifties with scopes—lying in the grass. The distance from the headland to the herd was at least fifteen hundred yards, an unlikely shot even for a professional hunter. But maybe not for sharpshooter Skeets.

Don’t fire those weapons, Fargo urged them silently. Those big-cracking thunder sticks were loud enough to wake snakes and would scatter the herd to hell an’ gone, ruining the Cheyenne hunt—and if white men were spotted, woe betide any paleface in the region. Once the Cheyenne got blood in their eyes, only the unborn were innocent.

Derek Wilder headed toward his horse, and hope surged in Fargo’s breast—maybe they were giving it up as a bad job. Then Fargo saw the hangman pull a marksman’s bipod from a saddle pocket.

“Pigheaded sons of bitches,” he muttered.

Fargo reined the Ovaro around hard and suddenly felt as if he’d been hit but not quite dropped. A tall Cheyenne brave in a breechclout and a long war bonnet sat his buffalo-hide saddle right behind Fargo, a British trade rifle aimed at the white man.

“You are Son of Light,” he greeted Fargo in heavily accented English. “The brave hair-face named Fargo who saved Navajo children from slave traders. The man who kills red men but does not murder them—or so the old grandmothers sing.”

“And you,” Fargo said after a moment’s thought, “must be Touch the Clouds, the warrior who was taken slave as a child by white fur trappers. I see your coup stick is heavy with eagle-tail feathers.”

“As you say. I would know a thing—why are you watching the herd?”

Fargo guessed that Touch the Clouds did not yet know about the two reckless intruders about to bring down hell on the Great Plains. Lying was a grave sin to a Cheyenne, so Fargo chose his words carefully. “I want to make sure that no white men are nearby.”

Touch the Clouds lowered his rifle and scowled. “You are nearby. Are there more yellow eyes with you?”

The first white men the Cheyenne had ever seen were mountain men with bad jaundice—yellow eyes.

“There could be,” Fargo hedged. “I am being paid to scout for some hunters from the Land of the Grandmother Queen. But secretly I have steered them away from the buffalo so far. Now they are impatient.”

“Impatient to die a hard death? Do you know our Hunt Law?”

Fargo nodded, his face now clammy with sweat. Those two beef eaters could squeeze off at any time now, and the third shot would be a .33-caliber ball punching into Fargo’s lights.

“You have stayed downwind,” the Cheyenne said, “and you are not close enough for your stink to ruin the hunt. Therefore I have no cause to kill you. But place my words in your sash that you may examine them later—any white hunters caught near our herds will watch us feed their own guts to our dogs.”

He paused, eyes as hard and black as obsidian boring into Fargo. “These hunters you speak of—to them, killing Uncle Pte is merely a child’s game. For us, however, the buffalo is everything: food, shelter, clothing. Its sinews give us thread, its bones our awls. If Uncle Pte smells the white man’s stink, he may never return to this range. Have ears for these words: Ride away now, Son of Light, and stay away.”

Touch the Clouds emphasized his point by pointing his rifle due south, the direction from which Fargo had ridden. At the moment Fargo had no intention to do otherwise. Those two British thugs could spark their powder at any moment, and Fargo wanted to be on a fast horse riding hell-for-leather when they did.

But they didn’t. Fargo listened, the Ovaro eating up the landscape at a long lope, but there was no powerful concussion from a Big Fifty. Maybe they had changed their minds or—Fargo perked up at the thought—maybe the Cheyenne had closed a net around them.

With a brass-colored sun setting in the west, Fargo opened his stallion out to a gallop.

* * *

Derek and Skeets had still not returned by the time Fargo rode into camp. Day was bleeding into night, and soon the full moon would be bright enough to make shadows. As usual, the Quality, as Slappy sarcastically called the Blackfords, Rebecca, and Sylvester Aldritch, were playing cards and having tea in the largest tent.

Slappy had built up a good fire to ward off the evening chill. Fargo moved close enough to feel the heat as he stripped the leather from the Ovaro and began rubbing him down.

“What’s the grift?” Slappy demanded as he poured Fargo a can of coffee.

“It’s a damn mare’s nest,” Fargo replied. “I’d say we’re all about two shakes away from an Indian haircut.”

He explained the scene with Derek and Skeets, then the ominous encounter with Touch the Clouds.

“He cut me some slack this time,” Fargo said, “but if a paleface butts in one more time, we’ll all be crossing the River Jordan. I don’t know what the hell those two louts are up to—with luck the Cheyenne are using their teeth for dice by now. But one thing is certain sure: If we don’t haze this bunch of fools out of here, they’ll be trying to get at that herd.”

Carlos Montoya turned up the collar of his sheepskin coat and shook his head in discouragement. “They will leave only at gunpoint. Blackford and Aldritch want to kill a buffalo with a desire like hell thirst. Fargo, they think you have made up this Hunt Law matter to stop them because you do not like the English.”

“These English women are right out of the top drawer,” Fargo replied. “All three of them. But these four men ain’t worth the powder it would take to blow them to hell.”

Slappy glanced carefully around. “What I say, this ain’t no time to be lally-gaggin’ around here. What if them two cockchafers was caught by a buncha pissed-off bucks? Them red sons will hie after the main gather, too, and that means us. I say we just grab leather and leave these tea-sippin’ fools right here.”

Montoya’s deep-creased face looked shocked in the sawing flames. “And just abandon the women? Even an Apache is not that cruel.”

“Yeah, I forgot. Hell, Fargo ain’t even tapped into that stuff yet.”

Slappy reached into a pile of wood and pulled out a corked bottle. “Time for a spot of the giant killer, boys.”

He took a sweeping-deep slug, wiped his mouth on his sleeve, and belched. “That’s the boy you don’t wanna give the slip to.”

He handed it to Fargo, who knocked back a jolt and felt the cheap liquor fire up a boiler in his stomach. He handed it to Montoya, who took a fastidious sip.

“H’ar, now!” Slappy disapproved. “Sancho, when it comes to drinkin’ whiskey, it’s better to go down hard than to hedge.”

“Ease off the man,” Fargo said. “Montoya’s insides are shot to hell from his bronco-busting days.”

Just then Fargo heard the rataplan of hooves. Two riders approached the camp, long guns resting across the bows of their saddles.

“Here’s the mighty hunters,” Slappy muttered.

Both men pushed their mounts right up to the fire, Skeets flashing his lipless grin at Fargo. “So only Daniel Boone here can locate the buffalo, eh? Bullshit! Chappies, don’t be fooled by his buckskin togs—this bloke is just for show. Skeets and me found enough buffalo to clear out Fleet Street.”

“Did you shoot any?” a curious Fargo asked.

At this both men exchanged foolish glances.

“Now, as to that,” Derek replied, “this fool here forgot the sodding powder flask.”

“You cheeky bastard!” Skeets Stanton exploded. “You said you had the bloody thing in your saddle pocket!”

Fargo exchanged amused glances with Montoya and Slappy. “Daniel Boone always had his powder,” Fargo told the Brits.

“Put a stopper on your gob, Fargo,” Derek growled, sliding clumsily off his gelding and tossing the reins to Montoya. Skeets followed suit. Both men reeked of liquor and had the flushed faces of men who’d been drinking a long time.

All the commotion had attracted Blackford and Aldritch. They came bustling toward the fire, Ericka Blackford following with her sketchpad.

“What cheer, lads?” Blackford called to the new arrivals.

“Buffalo, milord,” Skeets replied. “About two hours from camp, due north. It seems our vaunted frontiersman couldn’t spot them.”

“Oh, he told me about them,” Blackford said. “But he warned there are Cheyenne Indians with first dibs on the herd. Claims we’ll all be massacred if the savages see us anywhere near the herd.”

“That’s a bloody lie!” Derek the Terrible almost shouted.

“Derek,” Sylvester Aldritch reproved, nodding toward Ericka Blackford. “Be mindful of your tongue around a lady.”

“Sorry, mum,” Derek muttered.

“And another thing,” Lord Blackford chimed in, “I see no call to accuse Mr. Fargo of lying. I harbor some doubts as to his story, but that’s not the same as a lie.”

“Well, then he’s barmy, milord. We didn’t spot one Indian anywhere near this herd.”

Which meant, Fargo knew, that the Cheyennes somehow missed them up on that headland.

“Mr. Fargo?” a musical feminine voice said. “Would you kindly turn a bit more in the direction of the coaches?”

Ericka was rapidly sketching Fargo into her pad with charcoal. The fire flatteringly backlit her russet hair, braided over one shoulder, and softly lit her fair oval face. The smile she sent Fargo was not as obvious as those Jessica gave him, but the underlying message was the same.

“There are Indians near this herd,” Fargo said with finality. “Including a dangerous war chief named Touch the Clouds. He caught me spying in the area and warned me in no uncertain terms that his tribe will kill any palefaces they catch too near the herd.”

“Bosh,” Skeets said. “We spotted no redskins.”

“So I’m lying?” Fargo said quietly.

“Well, perhaps you spotted one of those red lubbers. And perhaps he uttered some threats. But come off it! Did Jonathan defeat the British to be ruled by flea-bitten savages?”

“Savage is the word,” Fargo agreed. “Savage as a meat axe. There are other herds free of Indian claim. It’s not worth the risk, especially with women along.”

“I say, that’s a point,” Blackford said. “We hired Fargo for his experience, and it’s best we rely on it.”

“Yes, I suppose that makes sense,” Sylvester Aldritch agreed reluctantly. “It’s best we move on.”

“But, Mr. Aldritch,” Derek protested, “Fargo has done a sorry job, so far, of leading us to buffalo. Now he’s finally found a scraggly herd, and lo! We may not touch them. I say it smells bad. Skeets and I will ride out tomorrow and get each of you gents a buffalo.”

“And after you shoot these buffalos,” Fargo interposed, “what will you do with them?”

Derek and Skeets stared at each other, then at Fargo.

“Why . . . how do you mean?” Skeets replied. “We’ll take the fur, of course. Lord Blackford and Mr. Aldritch want buffalo robes. We have skinning knives.”

“Fur? A fox has fur. And it’s not skin you need to do battle with, it’s hide. Thick, tough hide that’s like cutting leather. It can take two days to hide a buff, and then the work really starts. It has to be staked out and every last gobbet of flesh scraped from it. Then, if you want a soft hide to use as a robe, it has to be cured with salt water or it’ll turn stiff as a board. The job is so tough that even professional hiders work in teams. No offense, but two men who’ve never done it before will botch the job.”

“Fargo,” Sylvester Aldritch said in his special “Fargo tone,” “why didn’t you mention any of this when we hired you?”

“Well, at the money you’re paying, I intended to help with all of it. Slappy has experience, too.”

“Blast it to hell! So you’re saying you won’t help if it involves this particular herd?”

Fargo nodded, watching Ericka work quickly. “When we find a safer place to hunt buffalo, I’ll pitch in to the game.”

Derek made a growling noise in his throat. “Fargo, have you never heard of subordination—the proper ordering of mankind? You’re naught but a hireling, yet you constantly lay down the law to Lord Blackford and Mr. Aldritch. You aren’t good enough to lace their boots, now, are you?”

“I’ll leave that to you, hangman,” Fargo replied. “And after you lace them you can lick them. Englishmen are natural-born toadies.”

“You bloody wanker,” Derek snarled, moving toward Fargo with his fists curled like an exhibition boxer. “I’ll knock you sick and silly.”

“Derek!” Aldritch barked. “You and Skeets are stinking drunk! Get to your tent. And I told you to launder your talk around the ladies.”

“Just you wait, Fargo,” Derek muttered before he left. “The worm will turn.”

“Worms usually do,” Fargo agreed pleasantly.

“It’s a good thing you intervened, Sylvester,” Lady Blackford remarked as she put the finishing touches on her sketch.

“Yes, he would have left Fargo crippled for life.”

“I didn’t mean that,” she disagreed in a pleasant voice, watching Fargo with great interest. “I mean that you quite likely saved Derek’s life. Mr. Fargo is quiet of manner and strikingly handsome, but he is the quintessential American frontiersman, civil to most but servile to none. Derek’s hard-hitting fists cannot shatter his implacable will. Mr. Fargo has been gallantly practicing forbearance for the sake of us ladies, but I feel he is going to kill Derek, and perhaps Skeets, before this foolish expedition terminates. I truly hope I am there to see it, for I confess I have always wanted to see an evil man killed for his crimes.”

Slappy, Montoya, Fargo, Aldritch, and Lord Blackford all dropped their mouths open in sheer astonishment.

Blackford looked at his wife. “I say,” he mumbled. “I say.”