The Stranger from Abilene

Chapter 14

Cage Clayton rode north out of Bighorn Point, then followed Sans Bois Creek east until its fork. He splashed across shallow water and drew rein in a stand of willow and cottonwoods.

According to Kelly, the terminal of the railroad spur should be less than a mile ahead, in rolling long grass country.

It was not yet noon, but the day was hot under a hammering sun. Nothing moved and the only sound was the small music of crickets in the grass.

Clayton swung out of the saddle, eased the girth on the buckskin, and let the little horse graze under the trees.

He fetched his back up against a cottonwood trunk, laid his hat on a bent knee, and lit a cigarette.

Around him stretched beautiful country, but it was a lost and lonely land, haunted by the ghosts of vanished buffalo herds and the Indians who had hunted them.

Clayton smiled. Kelly knew what he was doing. Nobody would look for him out here. This was the end of the earth and the beginning of nowhere.

“If you get the chance, see what’s in them packing cases in the refrigerator cars,” the marshal had told him. “Maybe it’s only beef, but it could be something else.”

And Clayton had smiled at the man. “You’re making busywork for me, right?”

Caught in his own deception, Kelly grinned. “Well, I don’t reckon you’re going to find dead Apaches. But you never know.”

“And it will keep me out of mischief.”

“Two days, Cage. You can stick it out that long. I’ll pack you plenty of grub and a bottle of Old Crow, unopened, mind.”

“Will you have Terry when I get back?”

Kelly shook his head. “I don’t know. But I’ll try my best to find him.”

“Man can’t say better than that.”

“Keep safe out there, Cage. I don’t think Vestal will discover where you’re at, but you never know.”

“Maybe he’ll wish he hadn’t—if he finds me, I mean.”

“Cage, Shad Vestal can shade you any day of the week, without even half trying.”

“I’m that bad, huh?”

“No, you’re pretty handy with a gun. You proved that in the Windy Hall when you killed Seth Wilson, but you’re not in Vestal’s class. But then, few are.”

Kelly laid a hand on Clayton’s shoulder. “Remember that and you’ll live longer.”

Now, pleasantly drowsy among the trees, lulled by the creek’s soft song, Clayton knew his best option was to ride north and forget the whole sorry business.

But he realized that was impossible.

There was one thing about him that Nook Kelly didn’t know—the force that drove the man called Cage Clayton. . . .

He was filled with hate.

That’s why he wouldn’t back off, from Shad Vestal or anybody else. Hate is like water in a dry gulch: The longer it runs, the deeper it digs. And Clayton’s hate was deep . . . the product of twenty-five years, a hate so intense, so painful it afflicted him like a disease.

He rose to his feet, tightened the buckskin’s cinch, and swung into the saddle. To the south, purple clouds were forming over the peaks of the Sans Bois, and the wind had picked up, carrying with it a distant rumble of thunder.

It would storm before too much longer. Clayton took a yellow slicker from behind his saddle and laid it over the horn. He allowed himself a smile. Maybe he wasn’t ready for much, including Shad Vestal, but he could still beat the rain.

Clayton topped a rise and saw the railroad spur ahead of him. Beside the single track were a water tower, a woodpile, and an old boxcar that had been converted into a makeshift station house. A handful of men moved around down there and he backed off. He rode down the rise, dismounted, and slid his Winchester from the boot. Slowly he inched back to the crest and dropped on his belly in the long grass.

Two mounted cowboys watched three Mexicans load sides of beef, wrapped in thin burlap, into one of the new Swift refrigerator cars.

The loading, from two heaped wagons, took the best part of an hour, since the beef had to be carefully packed into the bottom of the car where the air was coolest. The cowboys didn’t help. If they couldn’t work from the back of a horse, they didn’t work. But they were happy to supervise, encouraging the sweating Mexicans to greater effort with regular kicks up the ass.

After the car was packed, another wagon drove up to the spur. An elderly Mexican handled the four-mule team, and a couple more men sat in the back.

The wagon was loaded with boxes made of rough, unfinished pine, and these were manhandled into the car.

Clayton touched his tongue to his dry top lip. Kelly had sent him here only to kill time and stay the hell out of the way. But he wanted to look inside those boxes.

Was there beef inside—or dead meat of a very different kind?