Winter Kill

Chapter 33

Frank stood at the railing of a ship called the Jupiter and watched the wharves at Skagway coming closer. The town had grown in the months since he had been here last, he thought. It had a ways to go yet, but it was actually starting to look respectable.

Salty Stevens flanked him to the left, Meg Goodwin to the right. Meg leaned closer to him and said, “Are you sure you want to do this, Frank?”

“It needs doing,” he said.

“And you’re too danged stubborn not to do it,” Salty said. “Might as well not argue with him, gal. He ain’t gonna change his mind.”

Meg smiled her crooked little smile. “He wouldn’t be the man I think he is if he did.”

Salty’s stint as marshal of Whitehorse hadn’t lasted long, only a few weeks. Then a whole troop of Mounties showed up, rumors having reached Dawson about Constable Fleming’s disappearance. They left a couple of men in Whitehorse to keep order, but by that time the settlement had gotten pretty much back to normal anyway.

Over the next several months, most of the respectable miners and businessmen in the area for a hundred miles around paid court to the ladies who had come to Whitehorse for husbands. They might not have been mail-order brides, as they had thought, but by spring they were all brides, Jessica marrying Pete Conway, Lucy marrying Vic Keenan, and the others all finding suitable mates…except for Meg. She had steadfastly refused to get involved with anyone, even though Frank had just as steadfastly insisted that a romance between them wasn’t in the cards.

But when the time came for Frank and Salty to leave Whitehorse, Meg had gone with them. Nothing would sway her from that decision. Instead of going back over the passes, they had ridden south through British Columbia and eventually back to Washington. It was a long trip through rugged country, and there had been a couple of late spring storms to cope with along the way, which slowed them down even though the storms weren’t as bad as the blizzard that had punished them on the way to Whitehorse.

Frank didn’t mind the delays. Stormy, Goldy, and Dog were always good company, and Salty and Meg were, too, even though Salty was still a little scandalized by the idea of a young woman traveling with a couple of men, neither of whom was her father, brother, or husband. Meg, as usual, didn’t give a damn about that.

When they finally made it back to Seattle, it was summer, and Salty wanted to keep going south. Frank still had an errand to take care of, though. He told Salty and Meg to head for the border country with a promise to catch up to them later. Meg had said nothing doing to that, of course, as Frank expected, and Salty had stubbornly tagged along, too.

So now it was midsummer and absolutely gorgeous in Alaska as the Jupiter docked at Skagway and Frank, Meg, and Salty disembarked. Frank was back in boots, jeans, a faded blue shirt, and his high-crowned Stetson. Salty wore overalls, a red-checked shirt, a cowhide vest, and a battered old hat with the brim turned up in front. Meg was dressed like something out of a Wild West show, in Salty’s opinion, in a fringed buckskin shirt, jeans, and a brown, flat-crowned hat. If she was going to be improper and scandalous, she said, she might as well go all the way and wear trousers like a man.

“All right,” Salty had agreed reluctantly, “but if you go to chewin’ tobaccy and spittin’, then I ain’t gonna let on I even know you!”

As they walked along the dock, the first thing Frank noticed was that there were a number of soldiers in evidence. The U.S. Army had come to Skagway. He spotted a young officer and said, “Excuse me, Lieutenant, but what’s going on here? Why is the army in Skagway?”

“Not that it’s any business of yours, mister,” the lieutenant replied, “but we were sent in to quell the riots.”

“Riots?” Salty repeated. “What riots?”

“The ones that broke out after Soapy Smith was killed, when his men went to war among themselves trying to seize power.”

“Smith’s dead?” Frank asked sharply.

“That’s right. He shot it out with a member of the vigilantes that were organized against him and his cohorts. Both men were killed, and after a few days the rest of the vigilantes succeeded in driving Smith’s cronies out of town.” The lieutenant sounded a little disappointed as he added, “We really didn’t have that much to do. Most of the trouble was over by the time we got here.”

Frank nodded slowly. “Thanks,” he said. He turned and started back toward the Jupiter.

“Hey!” the officer called after him. “Didn’t you just get off that boat?”

Frank looked over his shoulder. “Yeah. But there’s no reason for me to be here now.”

Salty cackled as the three of them headed for the ship. “You didn’t get to shoot him after all. Don’t that just beat all?”

Meg linked her arm with Frank’s and smiled up at him. “It’s not that bad,” she said. “Now there’s nothing stopping us from going to Mexico, is there?”

Frank grinned back at her. “Not a thing in the world,” he said.