Killer Poker

Chapter 29





The Kid followed the canyon’s twists and turns for more than half a mile. Once he was between its rocky walls, he couldn’t hear much from outside, so he didn’t know how close the search was getting. He concentrated on forcing his exhausted muscles to work and ignoring the pain in his feet.

He spotted a narrow game trail, and the sight caused his heart to leap. Animals always knew where water was. The ordeal he’d been through had left him blistered and parched. The trail led deeper into the canyon, which was the way he wanted to go anyway, so he followed it.

A few hundred yards later, he came to a place where brush grew thickly against the canyon’s left-hand wall. The game trail angled toward the spot. The vegetation and the trail told The Kid what he would find there, so he wasn’t surprised when he parted the bushes and saw a small pool of water that lay against the canyon wall where a tiny spring bubbled out of the rock.

The stone basin that formed the pool kept the water contained. He knelt carefully beside the pool and stretched out a hand toward the surface that seemed to shimmer, even though the sunlight didn’t strike directly on it in the narrow defile. He cupped a handful of water, brought it to his mouth, and let it trickle between his lips.

He had never tasted anything so cold and delicious in his entire life.

Throwing himself forward, he plunged his head into the pool. The icy shock of the water sent the blood pumping madly through his veins. He opened his mouth and gulped down a long drink. The bracing effect of it made some of his depleted strength return.

It wasn’t easy, but he pushed himself away from the pool. He knew that if he drank too much, it would make him sick. Shaking the wet hair out of his eyes, he wiped his face, and turned around to unwind the rags from his feet. They were glued to his flesh by dried blood. He had to stick his feet into the pool to soak the cloth before he could work it loose.

The cold water numbed his feet and brought blessed relief from the pain. He sat there soaking them for what seemed like a long time. Gradually he became aware of a soft current against his skin. He leaned forward to study the pool. When he saw how clear the water was, instead of fouled by the blood from his feet, he knew there had to be a crack in the rock that carried it away to some underground stream.

It was Eden, The Kid thought in his exhausted half stupor. He had stumbled into paradise.

His next thought was about Rance McKinney. Paradise always had to have a serpent in it, and in that case the low-down snake was McKinney. Lilith the temptress was there, too, in the person of Rose Sullivan.

And if Satan was a woman, Pamela Tarleton fit the bill. Even dead, her hand stretched out to work its evil in his life.

One at a time, The Kid pulled his feet out of the pool and examined them. The water had washed away all the dried blood and cleansed the cuts. Walking on them would just start the wounds bleeding again, he supposed. He would stay off them for as long as he could.

As he looked around, he noticed something at the edge of the pool, where the brush grew up almost to the water. On hands and knees, he crawled over there and pulled the branches back. The rocky wall of the canyon bulged out, forming an overhang. Under that overhang was a small space about a dozen feet long and three or four feet deep. Anybody riding by would never see it, The Kid thought. It would make a good hiding place.

He hadn’t gone up the canyon intending to hide. He had been looking for a place where he could ambush one of the searchers. But fate—and that game trail—had led him there. As tired and beat-up as he was, he might not be able to whip a newborn kitten, let alone some tough-as-nails hardcase.

He needed rest, no two ways about it.

He could see all of the cave-like area, but he broke a branch off one of the bushes and raked it back and forth inside the opening anyway, just in case a rattler had crawled in there to escape the heat of the day. When nothing buzzed ominously at the poking stick, he figured it was safe.

The Kid took another long drink from the pool, then crawled under the overhang. Letting the branches he had pushed aside spring back into place, it was soon cool and shady in there, and he felt himself falling asleep right away. He didn’t try to stay awake. He let himself go, and within a few breaths, he was dead to the world.





It was the middle of the afternoon before Arturo and Bat Masterson reached Rance McKinney’s ranch. They had taken Arturo’s buckboard, with Masterson handling the reins since Arturo’s arm was injured. As the former lawman hauled the team to a halt in front of the sprawling ranch house, an elderly hostler came out of the nearby barn and stared at them in surprise.

“Lord have mercy,” the old-timer exclaimed. “You’re Bat Masterson!”

“That’s right,” Masterson said with a nod. “I’m looking for your boss. Is Rance here?”

The hostler shook his head. “Nope, ’fraid not.”

“When do you expect him back?”

“Couldn’t say. Him and the crew are out takin’ care of a, uh, chore.”

Masterson and Arturo exchanged a glance. “What sort of chore?” Masterson asked.

The hoster snorted and said, “You reckon they tell me anything about what’s goin’ on around here? I’m just a stove-up old waddy who can’t make a real hand no more. Ain’t fittin’ for nothin’ but carryin’ water and muckin’ out stalls.”

Arturo figured the old man would go on feeling sorry for himself and expressing the sentiment at length until someone stopped him, so he spoke up. “What about Miss Sullivan? Is she here?” The tone of his voice made it sound like a natural assumption that Rose was at the ranch.

“That gal who come in with the boss last night?” The holster shook his head. “Ain’t seen hide nor hair of her today. Lady like that, you wouldn’t expect her to hang around with a worthless ol’ bum like me.”

“McKinney got back from Denver last night, you said?” Masterson stopped the next wave of self-pity before it could get started.

“Yep. Mighty late, too. I had to get up outta a warm bed to handle the horses and that wagon team. Didn’t care much for it, neither.”

“Did he have any strangers with him except the woman?”

Suddenly, a cagy look appeared in the old-timer’s rheumy eyes. He realized he was running off at the mouth too much. In a surly voice, he said, “I don’t know nothin’. I just take care of the horses—”

He stopped with a gasp of surprise when Masterson, in the blink of an eye, produced a gun from under his coat.

“You know who I am,” Masterson said coldly. “You know it’s not a good idea to lie to me, amigo.”

“I . . . I never lied—”

“I don’t believe you. McKinney brought someone back from Denver with him, didn’t he? Someone besides the woman.”

“Perhaps wrapped up in some blankets in the back of the wagon you mentioned,” Arturo added, making a guess based on what they had learned so far.

“Dadgum it!” the hostler burst out. “Are you fellas tryin’ to get me killed? I can’t go ’round blabbin’ about the boss’s business! Rance McKinney ain’t what you’d call a forgivin’ man.”

“Tell us something we don’t know,” Masterson muttered. “Better yet, tell us the truth.” The barrel of the gun in his hand lifted a little to emphasize the command.

“All right, all right! Take it easy, Mr. Masterson. Ain’t no need for you to go shootin’ up the place.” The old-timer took off his shapeless hat, pulled a red checked bandanna from the pocket of his overalls, and mopped away some of the beads of sweat that had sprung up on his face. “There was a fella in the back of the wagon, all right, and when some of the boys went to drag him out, there was a ruckus. I was in the barn, so I didn’t see it all too good. It didn’t last too long.”

“Was anybody hurt?” Arturo asked tensely.

“I don’t know. There weren’t no shootin’, I can tell you that much. I think they got the fella in the house somehow. That’s all I know.”

“Did you see him again today?” Masterson asked.

“Nope. But I been stayin’ in the barn most of the time, mindin’ my own business. Figured the way things were goin’ around here, it was a good idea.”

“Where is everybody now?”

“The boss and the rest of the crew rode out around the middle of the day. They ain’t come back yet.”

“Which way did they go?”

The old man pointed toward the foothills and the mountains beyond them. “West.”

Masterson looked over at Arturo again. “Are you up for some more riding?”

“Of course,” Arturo replied without hesitation. He wasn’t going to admit how much his arm hurt or how tired he was. Not while Conrad was out there somewhere, probably in danger.

Masterson looked at the old-timer again. “There’s no reason for you to tell anybody we were here.”

“Sure, Mr. Masterson,” the man agreed readily. “Whatever you say.”

As Masterson got the team moving again and turned the buckboard toward the rugged hills Arturo asked, “Do you think he was telling the truth about not telling anyone we’ve been here?”

“I doubt it. But I’ve got a hunch this may be all over before it’ll matter.”

“What about Miss Sullivan? She may have seen us.”

Masterson smiled. “I can’t picture her getting on a horse and riding out to warn McKinney that we’re coming, can you?”

“I don’t know.”

But in truth, based on what had happened so far, he wasn’t sure there was much of anything he would put past Rose Sullivan.