Luke Jensen: Bad Men Die Part 7

"No, sir," Burroughs agreed. "I've had enough of war to last me the rest of my life." He took a sip of his coffee. "I'm a peace-loving man now."

"I try to be," Luke said with a sigh, "but somehow it never seems to work out that way."

There was a lot of truth to that. Clearly, in his line of work a man couldn't expect much peace and quiet. Death and danger were his frequent companions, in fact.

But there were times when he wasn't chasing outlaws, and even then trouble seemed to have a way of finding him.

Maybe it was the Jensen name, he mused. Judging by what he had heard from Smoke and Matt, the same thing happened to them. No matter where they went or what they did, sooner or later somebody wound up shooting at them.

The food was good, and Luke enjoyed the meal. He kept an eye on the time, though. He didn't want to miss that train and have to wait for the next one. He had nothing against Rattlesnake Wells-in fact he liked most of the people he had met-but he was ready to put the place behind him.

After checking his turnip watch one last time, he slipped it back into his pocket and said, "I've got to be going, Derek." He laid a couple silver dollars on their table, which would more than pay for their meals. "It was really good to see you again, and a stroke of excellent luck, too." Luke smiled. "In all likelihood, I'd be dead now if you hadn't been around last night."

"Right place, right time." Burroughs held out his hand as both men stood up. "Maybe we'll run into each other again one of these days."

"I hope so." Luke clasped Burroughs' hand for a moment and then left the cafe to head for the marshal's office.

Consuela had been there while he was gone, he discovered. She'd brought breakfast for both prisoners.

"It was more than they deserve," Helton told Luke. "Especially the gal. She called poor Seorita Diaz all sorts of ugly names. But she's a real lady, the seorita is. She never turned a hair. It beats me why Bob hasn't married her yet."

"Wondered the same thing myself," Luke admitted, "and I haven't even been around here very long."

Helton chuckled. "He'll come to his senses one of these days, maybe." The deputy stood up and reached for the keys. "I reckon you're ready to take McCluskey down to the depot."

"That's right."

As if to punctuate Luke's words, the shrill sound of a steam whistle came through the open front door of the office. The train was about to roll into Rattlesnake Wells.

After leaving the cafe, Derek Burroughs walked at a deliberate pace along Main Street until he reached the livery stable.

Joe Peterson greeted him by saying, "Got your horse ready to go just like you asked, Mr. Burroughs."

"Thanks, Joe," Burroughs said with a friendly smile. His saddlebags and rifle were already on the mount. He had brought them over earlier, before meeting Luke for breakfast.

"You think you'll ever be coming back to Rattlesnake Wells?" The liveryman didn't seem offended that Burroughs checked the cinches. Any man who spent much time in the saddle wanted to be sure everything was as it should be before he mounted up.

"I don't really know," Burroughs replied to Peterson's question. "Maybe one of these days I'll mosey back in this direction."

"Well, if you ever do, you know where to bring your horse. It's been a pleasure doin' business with you."

"Same here, Joe." Burroughs handed an extra silver dollar to the liveryman. Everywhere he went, he tried to be as pleasant and easygoing as possible. Everybody was glad to know him and sad to see him go.

That was the way Burroughs wanted it.

He swung up into the saddle, lifted a hand in farewell, and turned the horse to ride out of the settlement and head into the mountains to the north. As he started up the slopes, he heard the whistle of the locomotive. The train was pulling in, and in less than an hour it would roll out of Rattlesnake Wells, heading back to the junction with the Union Pacific.

Burroughs smiled as he thought about what that train was going to be carrying, in addition to a bounty hunter and a prisoner.

CHAPTER 13.

The train's pa.s.sengers disembarked fairly quickly, then with much clanging of metal and hissing of steam, the locomotive backed the caboose onto a siding where it was uncoupled. It pulled forward again and was uncoupled from the coal tender, the two pa.s.senger cars, and the two freight cars that made up the train.

With that done the locomotive rolled into the roundhouse to be turned so it could head back the way it had come. Luke felt his impatience growing as minutes pa.s.sed and the locomotive didn't reappear.

He stood on the platform next to McCluskey, who was wearing cuffs and leg irons again. Luke kept his left hand on the outlaw's right arm. The other pa.s.sengers getting ready to board the train kept their distance.

"You'll never get me to Cheyenne alive," McCluskey said as he scowled.

"That's a foolish thing to say, McCluskey," Luke replied. "I'd think you would understand by now, I don't care if I get you there alive. I'd just as soon get you there dead."

"You won't get me there at all, d.a.m.n you."

"Yesterday you were so cooperative," Luke said dryly. "What happened?"

"I knew something would happen to get me loose."

"You knew that crazy Delia would show up?"

"No. I just knew it would be something. And I still do. I won't die at the hands of the law, and that includes bounty hunters. I had a vision."

"Good Lord," Luke muttered. "Spare us from two-bit bandits with visions."

"I mean it," McCluskey insisted. "I know my destiny. I'm not gonna hang, and you're not gonna kill me, Jensen. You just wait and see."

"That's exactly what I intend to do. Actually, I don't attend many hangings. But I'm going to make a point of watching you dance on air, McCluskey, hopefully not too far in the distant future."

And that future was coming closer, Luke thought. The locomotive had finally rolled out of the roundhouse and was pulling past the platform again on another siding so it could get in front of the cars. Once that coupling was made, the train would pull past the caboose on the other siding and then back up so it could be hooked on.

It was a laborious and hazardous process for the railroad workers who handled the coupling and uncoupling, but it was the only way to turn a train around at the end of a spur line like Rattlesnake Wells.

The blue-uniformed conductor moved onto the steps of one of the pa.s.senger cars and bellowed, "All abooarrdd!"

The people waiting on the platform, including Luke and McCluskey, moved toward the cars.

Luke Jensen and his prisoner were gone, and Chuck Helton was pouring himself a cup of coffee from the pot on the stove when the part-time deputy heard noises coming from the cell block.

He frowned and turned in that direction as he tried to figure out what was going on. It sounded almost like a cat had gotten in the cell block somehow and was squalling. That was impossible, though.

Or was it? Helton supposed a cat could have squeezed in through one of the barred windows in the cells. The blasted critters could get in places you never thought they could. He liked having them around the livery stable where he worked because they kept the mice and rats down, but other than that, he'd never warmed up to them.

If a cat had gotten in there, it could just get back out on its own, he decided.

The whimpering and crying sounds continued, and after a minute, he started to get worried. He still had a prisoner in there, after all, and with Marshal Hatfield and Fred Ordway laid up, she was his responsibility.

He carried the coffee over to the desk and set it down. "All right, all right. Hold your horses."

He got the keys from the nail where they were hanging and went over to the cell block door. The sounds were louder as they came through the barred window in the door. "Hey, are you all right in there?"

The prisoner didn't answer, but Helton could tell that the pitiful noises were coming from her cell. Muttering a curse under his breath, he unlocked the door and swung it open. "Lady . . . whatever your name is . . . are you all right?"

He still got no response, so he stuck the keys in his pocket, drew his gun, and stepped into the cell block. Jensen had warned him to be careful, and so had the marshal, but the prisoner was a woman, after all, and just a little bit of one, at that.

Helton stepped closer to the cell door. The light was dim, but he could see well enough to tell that the blonde was huddled on the bunk, doubled over and clutching her stomach. She lifted her head, and he was shocked to see how pale and haggard her face looked, beaded with sweat.

"That greaser woman . . . poisoned me!" she gasped.

"N-now hold on," Helton stammered. "I'm sure Seorita Consuela wouldn't do that. Anyway, McCluskey ate the same thing you did . . ."

"That's right. He's not here anymore. You don't know if he's sick or not."

Helton started to back off. "I'll go get the doc-"

"Maybe you could . . . get me some water first?"

He'd been told to keep his distance from her, but she was so sick there was no way she could be a threat. He had sense enough to step back into the marshal's office and lay his gun on the desk, though, just to make sure she didn't try to grab it away from him.

He poured some water from a pitcher into one of the cups they used for coffee and carried it into the cell block. "You're gonna have to get up and come get it. I'm not unlockin' that door."

"All right. Th-thank you . . ." She struggled up from the bunk and stumbled toward the cell door. When she reached it, she leaned against the bars and clung to them with one hand while she reached through with the other arm. That hand trembled violently, so Helton had to step closer and press the cup into her fingers with both of his hands.

He felt a slight impact against his belly, almost like somebody had tossed a rock and hit him, and looked down to see the handle of a knife protruding from his body. His eyes widened as crimson began to spread on his shirt around the blade. He gasped. "How-" He didn't know where she'd had the knife hidden. He hadn't even seen her other hand move.

His knees folded up and he dropped the cup. Clattering loudly, it fell onto the stone floor. The prisoner grabbed his shirtfront with her other hand and jerked him closer. She was surprisingly strong for a woman, especially one so sick.

But she wasn't sick at all, Helton realized as he looked into her face from a s.p.a.ce of a few inches and felt the cold steel going in and out of his body as she stabbed him again and again. His weight dragged him down, and she knelt with him as she continued to thrust the knife into him through the bars.

He couldn't believe it was happening.

He died that way, with his mouth still hanging open in amazement.

"Please, I need a ticket."

The clerk at the ticket window in the station looked up and saw a young woman. She wore a blue dress and looked a little disheveled and pale, but she was still attractive, other than the look of desperation on her face.

"Ma'am, the train's about to leave-"

"I know. That's why I have to hurry."

"Well, you might make it . . . How far do you want to go? All the way to Cheyenne?"

She nodded. "That's fine. How much?"

"Let's see . . ." He could tell she was getting more impatient, but such things couldn't be rushed. The railroad didn't pay him for making careless mistakes. "It'll be two dollars and fifty cents."

She thrust a bill through the wicket.

"There's five dollars. I don't need any change back, just the ticket."

"Well, now, ma'am, I'm not sure it's wise throwin' money around like that-"

"Please. It's a matter of life and death."

Some folks, it was just a waste of time arguing with them. The clerk wrote up the ticket, tore it out of the book, and handed it to her.

She'd been telling the truth about not wanting the money she had coming back to her. She turned and ran from the lobby, across the platform, and swung up onto the last pa.s.senger car after it had already started rolling. Couldn't be easy for her to do that, a little thing like her.

The clerk shook his head. It took all kinds in this world, he supposed.

He looked down at the five-dollar banknote she had given him and saw the dark stain along its edge. A frown creased his forehead. It looked almost like . . . He shook his head. That didn't make any sense.

The stain looked almost like blood.

Derek Burroughs rode onto a rocky promontory where he could look down at Rattlesnake Wells. The train was just leaving after getting the caboose hooked up again, clouds of white smoke billowing from the Baldwin locomotive's diamond-shaped stack as it pulled out.

Horseshoes rang loudly on the rocks behind Burroughs. He glanced around as more than a dozen hard-bitten, well-armed men rode out of the trees. He was expecting to see them, so he wasn't surprised by their appearance.

As the group of riders reined in, the man in the lead asked, "Is that it? The train with the gold?"

"That's it," Burroughs confirmed. "It stayed extra time in the roundhouse so the shipment could be hidden in the cab of the locomotive, just like my source at the mine told me it would be. Once they're well out of town, they'll stop and transfer it to the caboose."

"A hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars in gold," the other man said with an avaricious grin. "We're all gonna be rich men once we take it off that train."

"Yes, we are," Burroughs agreed, nodding. He wasn't thinking about the gold as much as he was about Luke Jensen. He sincerely hoped that his old friend wouldn't try to interfere when he and his men stopped the train.

He'd really hate to have to kill Luke, he mused, especially after saving his life just the night before.

CHAPTER 14.

The first thing Luke had done when he boarded the train with McCluskey was to seek out the conductor. That hombre's eyes had widened at the sight of the outlaw shuffling along in handcuffs and leg irons. Others who had seen the prisoner seemed upset, looking askance at Luke and McCluskey and giving them a lot of room.

"You can't bring that man on my train like that," the conductor said.

"I don't have any choice in the matter," Luke declared. "I'm sure not taking these irons off him. This is Frank McCluskey. He's wanted all over this part of the country, and I'm taking him to Cheyenne to turn him over to the authorities there."

The conductor's forehead wrinkled in a frown. "I don't see a badge on you, mister, so I suppose that means you intend to collect the reward on this fellow when you turn him in."