Chapter Fifteen
Spitting Sam, one of the Admiral Ranch foremen, raced up to my office on a lathered horse, and came roaring in.
“Trouble, sheriff. Them two hooligans, they’ve got King and Queen captive and are holding out for ten grand.”
“Captive? Ten grand?”
“The orphans. Little bastards. They worked this out. There’s guns all over the ranch, and they collected a bunch, and caught King Glad and his sister at dawn, and are holding them in the big house, and say they want ten grand and a getaway buggy, and if they don’t get the dough, they’ll kill King and Queen.”
“There ain’t ten thousand dollars in Puma County.”
“You gonna come out there or what?” Spitting Sam said, an edge to him.
“I should bring the money? Get Hubert Sanders to give it to me?”
“It’s your baby, Pickens. We can’t even get near the big house. For city brats, they know how to shoot.”
“And the Glads, you’re sure they’re in there, alive?”
“No, we’re not sure of anything.”
“Those boys, Mickey and Big Finn, they set any deadlines?”
“It’s a mess, and if you’re going to help us, come on out. If not, the hell with you. We’ll play it our way.”
“They gonna let me talk to them?”
“Who knows? City boys don’t hear a damned thing.”
“I’ll get Critter and we’ll go talk.”
I buckled on my gun belt, and checked the loads, and collected a scattergun. If I had to use any of those, I’d lose. And the Glads would be history. Spitting Sam nodded, and I knew he’d meet me at Turk’s where I’d get Critter saddled if I was lucky, and get my leg broke by a flying hoof if I wasn’t.
I sure didn’t know about this one. If it came to shooting, the owners of the Admiral ranch, brother and sister, would soon be buried, and maybe a bunch more of us, and likely those two little rug rats that came in with the orphan train.
I wasn’t going to take any ransom money; not now. I wasn’t even sure Sanders would open his vault to pay the ransom without collateral. There was a mess of things to think about, and I’d have a little time riding out there to look at some possibilities. But I knew the first thing was not to underestimate those two orphan hooligans, who knew more angles than a hungry carpenter.
Spitting Sam and Turk stood silently in the barn, waiting for me to back Critter into the aisle and get him ready for travel. I got a piece of two-by-four and went up to that bronc and told him I’d whack him between the ears, because I was in a hurry, and he’d better behave.
“I’m a horse whisperer,” I said to Turk.
Turk smirked.
“More like a horse shouter,” Spitting Sam said.
But Critter was listening. He tried one ritual kick when I opened the stall door, and then backed out like he was wanting to be sociable. In quick time, I got him bridled and saddled.
“That’s a record,” said Turk. “It’s a bad omen.”
“He’ll throw you into prickly pear,” Spitting Sam said.
But we trotted out smartly, and when Critter was warmed, we slid into a rocking chair lope that would get us there in half an hour. Critter, he was enjoying it more than Sam’s Roman-nosed nag.
“There’s been some shots fired?” I asked.
“Oh, yeah. They was trying out the hardware, and keeping us well away from the house. We tried circling around and breaking in the rear door, but they were wise to it.”
“They got food and water and plenty of rounds?”
“Who knows? But them punks is smart, and they got it all schemed out.”
“What’s the deal?”
“Bring money, put a buggy in front of the house, one with a top on it, and they’ll take a hostage and kill him if they’re followed.”
“Can we put some slow plugs in harness?”
“No, they want two saddle horses, too, tied behind the buggy.”
“They know where they’re going?”
“Hell, no. They’re off the waterfront. They don’t know which way is north.”
“They talk about their destination?”
“They don’t know Wyoming from Florida. They just want to beat it with ten grand in their satchel.”
“You think they’d kill the Glads?”
“At their age, it’s easier than if they were older. Yes, and Queen first, just to show off a little.”
“You say they’re off the waterfront? In New York?”
“Yeah, that’s a good place for little thugs like that to learn the racket, stealing, slipping past ship’s pursers, cleaning out freight warehouses, latching on to food. The longshoremen, they don’t care. Half of them were waterfront rats before they hired on.”
“Is one of those boys a little softer than the other? Listen to reason?”
“Mickey, he’s sometimes friendly. Big Finn, that one was born in hell and is going back soon.”
We covered ground, loping for a while, then jogging, then loping. In time, we raised the Admiral Ranch, which rested solemnly in a green basin, with mountains rising to the west, and a good creek watering their beef.
“Well, my ma used to say, treat a child like an adult, and he’ll toe the mark.”
Spitting Sam, he just shook his head.
The Big House, as the impressive building was called, rose in majesty, well apart from the barns, bunkhouse, corrals, and sheds that one usually saw on cattle outfits.
There sure wasn’t any straw bosses or drovers standing around in the open. The windows of the house were dark, and revealed no sign of anyone peering out, but I didn’t doubt that we were being watched.
“You figure out what we should do?” Sam asked.
“Go talk,” I said. “I can’t make any sense of it until I talk to them.”
“It’s hard for you to make sense of anything, Pickens,” said Big Nose George.
I’ve heard that talk all my life, and don’t bother to get mad anymore.
“Get me a white flag on a stick,” I said.
George, he sort of smiled. “Chicken, ain’t ya? If I had my druthers, I’d surround that Big House and charge, and leave two bodies behind. We got a dozen tough drovers here, and a few more.”
“You got big balls, George. Me, I do things my way.”
“Give him his chance, Big Nose,” said Spitting Sam. “Then when he gets shot up, or can’t budge those little turds, we’ll do it our way.”
They wasn’t saying much about trying to keep their two employers alive. The fastest way to put the two Glads into their graves was to start a war.
“Long as you’re all bulletproof, including the Glads, your plan might work fine,” I said.
Spitting Sam headed for the bunkhouse, running across an open area where he might take a hit, and pretty quick came back with a sheet on a stick. The thing was all sheet and no stick, but it’d do. I took it, told them kibitzers to watch their topknots, and headed out, waving that monster sheet on the dinky stick, like I was flagging a horse race. I got maybe twenty paces toward the Big House and a shot hit the dirt ahead of me.
“Stop there, sheriff.”
“Who am I talking to?”
“Pair of no-good orphans.”
“All right, you gotta tell me what you want, and who’s in there.”
“We got them Glads, and we’ll put enough bullets in them so they bleed out in thirty seconds if you don’t follow what we ask.”
“Who are you, boy?”
“Who do you think?”
“I bet you’re Big Finn, right?”
There was wild laughter in the window. Neither boy was visible. They were back in the shadows, like good smart gunmen. They’d been around the block, seems like.
“Finn, you gotta show me the Glads, one by one. I got to see if they’re alive and well. If you don’t show them, then we figure you’ve got no hostages, and it’s all over for you when we come in.”
That met with a mess of silence.
“We ain’t gonna show them to you,” Big Finn finally yelled. “Keep you guessing.”
“How about you cutting them loose and sending them here to me? That way, you get out of the house alive.”
“Sucker bait,” the kiddo yelled.
“How about you sending me Queen Glad, and keeping women out of it? Just let her out the front door.”
“She’s worse than he is. We ain’t gonna spring her or him, sheriff.”
“How come she’s worse?”
“She’s hell on earth, sheriff.”
“Then cut her loose.”
“What do ya think I am, King Arthur?”
That stumped me. I’d never heard of that dude. “Hey, kiddo, ask her what she’s queen of. I always wanted to know. Her old man named her. His name was Admiral. That was his real name.”
“Cut the crap, sheriff. You get us a horse and buggy with a top on it, two saddled horses, and ten thousand clams. You got until sundown.”
“Where you going, boy?”
“San Francisco.”
“When you gonna get out there, boy?”
“We ain’t saying.”
“What’ll you do when you get there?”
All I heard was a bunch of cackling. For two boys about eleven or twelve, they sure could snicker away. This sure was shaping into something strange. Two half-grown boys threatening a ranch family, and wanting to clean out the till, and the pair of them ready to shoot. That’s what troubled me. Boys that age could be good shots, and know all about handling a weapon, but they didn’t have an ounce of judgment. My ma always used to say, men ain’t men until they’re thirty. That means I barely made the grade myself, and I was more than twice the age of those two brats threatening to bring tragedy down on a lot of good people.
“Big Finn, how are you gonna stuff food into you when it runs out there?”
“We’ll eat Queen Glad first, sheriff, then King, and then you.”
“That don’t work, boy. You kill off the hostages, there’s nothing holding us back, and once we come in, boy, you can measure your life in minutes.”
For a response, he fired another shot. It plowed the earth twenty feet away. Sure was making me itchy.
“Hey, I want to talk with Mickey,” I said. “He’s dumber than you.”
“Dumber? I heard you was the dumbest lawman in Wyoming.”
“Well, my ma agrees with you, boy, but how are you gonna get out of there?”
“Ten grand, in small bills, sheriff, by sundown. Plus that buggy and fast saddle horses, and you get to be our insurance.”
“There isn’t that much cash in the bank, boy.”
“That’s the deal, sheriff. Bring the dollars or Queen’s gonna croak.”
“Show me she’s alive, boy, and King, too.”
That met with a mess of cackling again, and I was getting real itchy. I hadn’t seen hide nor hair of the Glads, and no one else had, either, and it sure made a feller wonder what was going on inside that ranch house.
I backed away, slowly, and they let me. I had some calculating to do, and fast.