The Legend of Caleb York Read online

“A killer, too, remember,” Whit put in, his eyes as gentle on her as his words were harsh.

  She said to the foreman, “You said . . . a killer ‘in his own way.’ ”

  Whit nodded. He wasn’t turning the hat in his hands now. “York was a Wells Fargo agent—a detective. The shoot-first-investigate-after breed. Known for returning with the money and the men who stole it—slung dead over their horses.”

  She laughed a little. “That sounds like the stories little boys tell.”

  “Then they better tell their story to the Monte Pierson gang—every one of them shot dead, and Caleb York? Not a graze. He faced down both Nub Butler and Wild Angie Hopper and both lay dead in the dust in an eye blink.” Whit chuckled deep. “They say York had enough notches on that gun butt of his to make it look like a saw blade.”

  “More little-boy talk,” she said.

  “Maybe, Miss Cullen. But I will tell you one story I don’t believe.”

  She cocked her head. “Oh?”

  Whit’s thin lips formed a smile that might have been a gash in his face. “Ten to one, Banion never faced him down.”

  Her Papa stirred.

  Whit finished: “The only way Wes Banion could take down Caleb York was with a bullet in the back.”

  Eyes wide, Willa said, “Father! Is that the kind of man you sent for?”

  “It’s the kind of man we need,” Papa said defensively. “The kind of man it takes to deal with the likes of Harry Gauge.”

  She covered her mouth with a trembling hand. “Oh, Papa . . . I can’t be hearing this.”

  His expression was cold. “This ranch was built on ground soaked in the blood of Indians and white men alike, who all thought it should be theirs. Never forget that, daughter.”

  She swallowed. “I know who you are, Papa. I know the things you’ve done. But they were necessary and right, in their way, in those days. You met adversaries face-to-face, and protected what you worked for. You didn’t kill anybody for . . . for money.”

  “Land is money.”

  She felt the tears welling and fought it. “This is not you, Papa.”

  The unseeing eyes stared into something known only to him. Then he said, “I’d face Gauge down if I could. But a blind man has to seek other ways.”

  “There are different kinds of blindness, Papa.”

  His head swung toward her. “You wouldn’t fight for the Bar-O, daughter? You wouldn’t scratch that devil’s eyes out if he came near you?”

  “Of course, I would. But we can fight our own battles. We still have fifteen men, Papa.”

  “You heard Whit, girl! They’re cowboys, not gunfighters. I pay them enough to make a living, but not enough to die.” His eyes squeezed shut. “Gauge must have thirty top gunhands at his beck and call.”

  Whit sat forward. “Your men will fight, sir.”

  Papa batted that away. “Why make that sacrifice? No, it won’t be necessary. Not when . . . the man comes here who Parker sends.”

  Whit’s eyes were wide again. “And you don’t think Gauge will be waiting for him?”

  Her father had no answer for that.

  And Willa, with no more questions, left them there.

  The office of the jail was a modest plank-floored space with two windows onto the street, open to let the breeze in, and four cells in back. No prisoners today.

  Seated behind his big dark wooden desk, Sheriff Harry Gauge had his feet up and crossed on its scarred top. His boots wore no spurs, not in town—he didn’t care to announce himself. Across the way was a wood-burning stove, and a table with a few chairs by a wall with WANTED posters haphazardly nailed there. In front of him, seated in a high-back chair, was his redheaded deputy, Vint Rhomer, frowning so hard as he worked at thinking that the man looked as if he might cry.

  Rhomer, arms folded, said, “Well, at least we know who’s comin’.”

  The big blond sheriff said, “Banion, you mean.”

  “Yeah. Who else?” Then a thought made it through to the front of his head and the deputy leaned forward. “But suppose it ain’t Banion? Old Man Cullen sent word asking his buddy to send Banion or some other shootist!”

  “Most likely be Banion.” Gauge poured tobacco from his pouch into a waiting curve of paper. “Not that it makes much never-mind. I’ll know him when I see him.”

  “So you’ve seen Banion, then?”

  Gauge licked the paper’s edge. “Nope.”

  Rhomer got some more thoughts going. “Remember Jake?”

  “I remember Jake.”

  “Jake knew Banion. They pulled some jobs together.”

  “This would be more helpful,” Gauge said lazily, rolling the cigarette, “if Jake wasn’t dead.”

  Jake Farrow had been killed on a bank job Gauge and his boys had pulled about six months before taking over Trinidad and—the thought making Gauge smile—going straight.

  “Talked about him enough, Jake did,” Rhomer said, still on his thinking jag. “Said Banion’s meaner than an Apache and fights twice as dirty. They say, in Tombstone ? Even the Earps steered clear of him. And in Ellis, Reg Toomey turned his badge in, second he saw Banion ride into town.”

  Gauge lit a match off a boot heel. “That right.”

  “Jake saw him burn out the Casaway bunch. Set fire to their house with their women in it, too. Banion and his crew left half of that town dead, and all they got for their trouble was a few hundred greenbacks.”

  Gauge had his cigarette going now. “Do tell.”

  “Anybody who wasn’t part of his gang got shot dead. By Banion hisself. Didn’t like havin’ his face seen.”

  “That ugly, huh?”

  “No! Didn’t want to be identified.... You yankin’ my leg, Gauge?”

  “Mebbe. You say Jake saw him face-to-face. Well, Banion didn’t kill Jake. What, was Jake lucky? Makes him a lucky dead man, don’t it?”

  “Well, Jake was part of his gang. Banion’s a bad egg, but he don’t kill his friends without good reason.”

  “Ah. That would explain it. Say, Vint—who was it again, outdrew Banion? Remind me.”

  “Gill Peterson.”

  “Whatever happened to Peterson, anyway?”

  Rhomer smiled. Chuckled. “He pulled on you and you gunned him down. Last month it was.”

  “Where was it I got him? Remind me.”

  “Front of the Victory.”

  “No, I mean where?”

  “Oh. ’Tween the eyes. Dead center.” Rhomer grinned. “He did have kinda wide-set eyes, though.”

  “Still in all,” the sheriff said, with a shrug.

  “Still in all,” Rhomer allowed.

  Gauge tamped cigarette ash on the floor. “And who was it shot Jack Reno through the heart?”

  “That was you, Gauge.”

  Gauge took in smoke, held it, let it out. “So tell me—why is it again, I should worry about Banion?”

  Rhomer leaned in. “Because we got dark alleys in this town, Harry. And you got a big ol’ back ’tween them shoulders.”

  Gauge nodded, unconcerned. “And that’s what I got you fellas for. So’s nobody gets the chance to back-shoot me.”

  “You mean, ’cause we walk behind you.”

  “Well, that’s part of it. But what else do I mean?”

  Rhomer frowned. “Not sure I follow, Harry.”

  “There’s more than one way to watch a man’s back.”

  “Is there?”

  “You can keep track of anybody new in town. Somebody don’t smell right . . . well, there’s plenty more room in that bone orchard outside town. And lots of range out there to bury strangers in.”

  Rhomer thought about that. “But what about the Bar-O boys? We already planted our share of them. Even in this town, there’s only so far we can go, nippin’ trouble in the bud.”

  “They ain’t gonna be a problem much longer.”

  “That right?”

  Gauge nodded. “I hear pretty soon it’s going to get real warm out there. Hotter days’re
comin’, you know. And that long grass burns real damn hot. And fast.”

  Rhomer grinned. “Takin’ a page out of Banion’s book?”

  “Now you are thinking, Vint. We kill Banion and let him take the blame.”

  “How does that stack up?”

  Gauge shrugged, let out more smoke. “It’s got all around town by now, that wire Old Man Cullen sent. Banion comes to Trinidad, things get warm out at the Bar-O, Banion shows up dead.”

  “Okay. . . .”

  “How’s it look, Vint? Like a fallin’-out between employer and employee, windin’ up bad for all concerned. Anybody left still breathin’ out at the Bar-O, that’s what we got these cells for.”

  Rhomer squinted at his boss. “What about the pretty filly?”

  “We make sure she don’t get burned. I’ll sweet-talk her how Banion was responsible for the bad things that happened at the ranch—pity. And then she’ll need a man to help her rebuild that spread, won’t she?”

  The deputy had been smiling through that, but now was staring out the window, distracted by movement and sounds out there. “Harry—somethin’ goin’ on out there.”

  Both men got up and went out into the dry, warm afternoon. The sheriff and deputy stood on the porch and watched. Men and women were on the opposing boardwalks, but weren’t going anywhere, just clustered talking, often in an animated fashion, some pointing toward the sheriff’s office.

  “What are all them people doin’ on the street?” Rhomer wondered aloud. “I don’t like it. It’s like they’s waitin’ for a parade to go by or somethin’.”

  “They’re waiting for something to happen.”

  “What to happen?”

  “For me to react to that telegram Cullen sent. Only I ain’t gonna react just yet.” Gauge nodded toward the gossiping citizens. “But get used to that, Vint, over the next week or so. You’ll see the good folks of Trinidad out watchin’, talkin’, every damn time they hear a horse ride in or a stage roll up.”

  “Yeah?”

  “Oh yeah. They want to get a good, long look at this bad man Banion.”

  “If it’s Banion.”

  Gauge pitched his cigarette sparking into the street. “I hope it is. Killing him will make me look pretty damn good. Show this town just what kind of sheriff they got for themselves.”

  The two men went back in the office, smiling.

  Beneath their porch, in one of his favorite hiding places, a white-bearded, skinny old desert rat known only as Tulley was smiling, too. Grinning to himself as if the sheriff and his deputy had been telling jokes. A fairly new addition to the Trinidad populace, Tulley was well on his way to becoming the town drunk.

  Sipping at his latest bottle, then grinning stupidly to no one in particular, he cackled out loud. “Banion! That’s a good one. Banion . . .”

  Then he took another sip, curled up, and went back to sleep.

  CHAPTER THREE

  When Sheriff Harry Gauge pushed open the telegraph office door, he hadn’t intended to startle operator Ralph Parsons. But the skinny, four-eyed Parsons was always on the skittish side, and plainly the wire Old Man Cullen had sent earlier today—now the talk of Trinidad—had the pip-squeak well and truly spooked.

  Faintly amused, Gauge leaned an elbow at the counter and gave Parsons a small, calm smile in exchange for the operator’s big, nervous one.

  The sheriff asked, “Any message for Cullen come in yet, Ralph?”

  The nervous smile disappeared and a rush of words squawked out: “Oh, uh, oh no, sir, Sheriff.” The man’s expression was gravely serious now. “And, uh, look . . . about the wire Mr. Cullen sent this morning? I didn’t want to do it. No, sir, I didn’t. But that old man had a gun, and—”

  Still amused, Gauge said, “Why, do you want to press charges, Ralph?”

  “No!” Eyes behind glasses went so wide that white showed all around. “I mean . . . did you want me to?”

  Gauge shook his head. “Forget it, Ralph. The old boy’s in a tizzy ’cause of the man he lost. Grievin’ and all. We’ll cut him some slack.”

  “That’s real white of you, Sheriff.”

  Gauge curled a finger to draw Parsons closer. “But I want you to let me know the minute an answer to that wire of his comes in.”

  The operator swallowed thickly. “I’m all alone here, Sheriff. But I can come over right after closing.”

  “Well, you just close the second something comes in. That sign in the window has two sides, don’t it?”

  “It does, Sheriff. I’ll be glad to do that, Sheriff. Is there . . . anything else I can do for you, Sheriff?”

  Gauge thought if the man said “Sheriff” one more time, he might slap him. But he forced a smile and kept his tone friendly.

  “Yes. Take this down for me, would you?”

  “Surely.” The operator reached for a form and a pencil.

  “ ‘To all territorial sheriffs,’ ” Gauge dictated. “You do have that list, right, Ralph?”

  “I do indeed.”

  “ ‘To all territorial sheriffs. Send photograph and general information regarding Wesley C. Banion immediately. ’ Sign it, ‘Harry Gauge, Sheriff, Trinidad, New Mexico.’ ”

  The operator had blanched upon hearing the name. Parsons let out enough air to blow up a balloon and said, “You think . . . you think maybe this Banion character is around these parts, Sheriff?”

  “I surely hope so.”

  Parsons didn’t know what to make of that. “Well, from what I hear, he’s . . .”

  “He’s what, Ralph?”

  Now it was the operator who forced a smile. With the filled-out form in one hand, he made a dismissive gesture with the other. “Nothing, Sheriff. Not my business. I’ll get this right out for you.”

  “Thank you, Ralph. In case you’re wondering, I’m well aware this Banion is the gunfighter Old Man Cullen sent for. And it doesn’t bother me a lick. I just like to keep . . . on top of things.”

  Parsons nodded, said, “You bet, Sheriff, you bet,” and went to his telegraph key to send the wire.

  That evening, back in his office by himself, Gauge sat with his feet on the floor, hunkered over a WANTED poster he’d plucked off the wall. His request for a picture was likely a long shot. This poster had no photograph or drawing, just the following information:

  WANTED

  WESLEY CHARLES BANION

  FOR MURDER, ARMED ROBBERY, ARSON.

  KNOWN TO CARRY TWO COLT PEACEMAKER .45’S,

  SLEEVE DERRINGER, SKILLED KNIFE FIGHTER.

  LAST SEEN ABILENE, KANSAS.

  BELIEVED TRAVELING SOUTHWEST TO MEXICO.

  DEAD OR ALIVE

  $5,000 REWARD

  The bell over the door jangled as if announcing a customer in a general store—Gauge was a careful man in practice, if reckless in ambition—and a beautiful woman familiar to everyone in town entered.

  If Lola had a last name, no one in Trinidad, not even Harry Gauge, knew it. Not that it came up much in conversation. Darkly beautiful, her black curly hair worn up, tall and slender but for a full bosom, Lola was Gauge’s partner in several ways, among them co-owner of the Victory Saloon, where she ran the girls, though she herself was available only to the sheriff.

  She wore a long gray mannish coat over her blue-and-gray satin gown. She wore the coat in part due to it getting chilly here after dark, but also because she rarely traversed the boardwalk in her low-cut dance-hall-queen working clothes.

  Entering as if she owned the place, Lola removed her coat in a swirl, folded it like a blanket, and dropped it on the sheriff’s desk like a present. Her satin gown had black lace that caressed and lifted her bosom, and the dress parted in front at the knees to reveal fishnet silk stockings and high-laced high-heeled shoes.

  She sat on the chair opposite him, shoulders back, chin high, folding her lacy-gloved hands in her lap. Her eyes were big and dark brown and wide-set in her oval face; her nose small and tip-tilted; her lips wide and sensual and red-rouged. The dark
beauty mark near the lush lips was nature’s work.

  Her voice was a throaty purr as she said, “Working a little late, aren’t you, Harry?”

  “Shouldn’t you be over at the Victory? Your ‘day’ is just starting, ain’t it? Cowhands get paid today, remember.”

  She shrugged and the half-exposed bosom did a little shimmy. “They won’t be in for another hour or so yet. I thought maybe you and me could kill a little time, Sheriff. Don’t you have a bottle that isn’t swill, down in one of those desk drawers?”

  “I do.”

  “And don’t those shades draw?”

  “Ain’t in the mood, Lola.”

  She got out of the chair and sat on the edge of the desk, leaning in to show off the breasts even more. “Since when are you ‘not in the mood’?”

  “Since I said I wasn’t. I got work to do.”

  “Where’s that dumb deputy that follows you around? Not that I care.”

  “Doin’ my bidding. What else?”

  Smiling at that, she glanced at the WANTED poster on the desk, turned the sheet toward her. Then she nodded. “I heard about this, Harry. That’s why I came over.”

  “Is that right.”

  She leaned in even more. “I figured you might like to take your mind off your troubles, Harry.”

  He gave her something halfway between a smile and a sneer. “Sit it down. I ain’t buyin’.”

  Hurt flashed in the dark eyes. He’d meant to give her the needle—she hadn’t sold herself for a very long time, so the insult surely stung. But she did as she was told, sitting back down, folding her arms, hiding the exposed flesh as if to punish him.

  “There was a time,” she said, voice still throaty but the purr gone, “when there was nothing in your life that meant more to you than me.”

  “You’re wrong. You’ve always come in second to my life, Lola.”

  She frowned. “You’re that worried? When I first brought you here, nothing used to bother you.”

  “Bigger a man gets,” Gauge said quietly, “bigger his troubles.”

  She smiled. She had nice teeth, a rarity among her breed. “Well, you’re a big man, all right. County sheriff, land owner, co-owner of damn near every business in town.”