“More often than you think,” Shanaghy said.
“And maybe Holstrum will make it this time.”
“No … “ Shanaghy shook his head slowly. “I know the kind of people he is dealing with and he does not. He is thinking of her, and of what they can do in some great city. She is thinking of that money, and what she can do. And George is thinking of the money and wondering how he can wind up with all or most of it. And I think that other man, I think he is the one named McBride. I think he intends to have it all and knows how he will … And they are all wrong unless I can stop something here.”
“Here?”
“We must get our tickets.”
Shanaghy closed the door behind him, fastening it as securely as possible. They walked back up the alley together. A few people were in the streets now, and some were talking, pointing out where the men had stood when the gunfight took place.
Shanaghy paused. “You said … I killed them?”
“Both,” Josh said, “dead center. I never did see better shootin’. Wilson Drako was here on the steps. He went down right there, and Dandy, who was clerkin’ at the ho-tel … “
“The clerk was a Drako? The one with the rifle?”
“Didn’t you know? Sure, he was a Drako, and he hated your guts.” They had paused on the boardwalk in front of Greenwood’s saloon. “Judge, Josh … where we’re going isn’t far, I’m thinking. But at the end of it there will be shooting, and when there’s that much money at stake they won’t care who they kill, or how many.”
“I cut my teeth on a shootin’ iron,” the judge said dryly. “I fit Injuns before I was dry behind the ears, and I served four years in the War Between the States. I can stand beside any man when it comes to gunfire.” “All right.” Shanaghy paused. “Judge, we’re going to take that evening train out. Josh, you go down and get the tickets for us. Don’t mention where we’re going, just buy tickets for Kansas City.”
Shanaghy took the money from his pocket. “And above all, don’t tell that agent or anybody else who’s going along. If you want, tell them it’s for the Pendletons.”
“Do you think he’s in on this?” McBane asked.
“I do.”
“And that engineer? And the brakeman?”
“I think they were slipped a few dollars just to act stupid with the train. And, if anybody came along, to block the road.
“They had it all timed nicely. I think they had practiced taking that wagon down, and I believe they had horses waiting. And I think they ran them hard to the Holstrum place and then took off on fresh stock. “By now they are swinging back around to meet the railroad line-“ “What if they don’t?”
“Then I’ll have my work cut out for me. But look at it this way. Some of these people are easterners. The railroad is something they know. They’d have to ride a long, long way to get anywhere a’horseback. They won’t have any idea we have this figured out, and they’ll think we’re running in circles back here. When that train pulls in and they want to board it, we’ll be waiting for them. With luck we can do it without shooting … but don’t bank on it.” It was a long shot, and he knew it. Shanaghy checked his guns, then reholstered them.
“Judge”-he saw Josh coming back up the street with the tickets-“there’s one more thing. Maybe I’ve read this right and maybe I haven’t. Somebody said once, ‘Set a crook to catch a crook.’ Well, I’m no thief but I’ve known a’plenty of them back in New York town. I think what we’ve got here is one of the nastiest triple-crosses I’ve ever seen.”
“We’d better get on down to the station,” Greenwood suggested. “Wait … we’ll hear the whistle and we can start then. It’s less than a hundred yards.
“What’s happening must have started just about the time you people got together and planned to bring money in here to pay off the cattle drivers, and I don’t know whose idea it was … Maybe it started in two or three places, but I do know there’s one person who not only wanted all the money, but was a bitter, vengeful person along with it.
“They think they’ve won. They have the money, or think they do, and only one thing remains. That’s to kill the man who caused them so much trouble, and somebody has figured out a way of doing it without risk.” “Without risk? You?” Josh exclaimed. “That’s crazy! Why, I’ve seen you in action and there isn’t a man-“ “That’s right,” Shanaghy said quietly, “so … “ Mrs. Carpenter was walking up the street toward them.
TWENTY
She was neatly dressed in a fashionable black traveling dress, with a small bonnet perched on her head. In her hand she carried a handbag. “You’ve got to be crazy!” Greenwood said. “Why-!” “The story is around that I killed her husband. She is a bereaved wife. Who else could kill a man, in this country, and get away with it? Even have the blessing of most of the townspeople?”
“You mean she was in on it?”
“Maybe not from the beginning, but you can just bet most of the planning was hers. And right now, if she kills me, she can board that train and ride off a wealthy woman, sharing with no one but her brother.” “But they have the gold!”
“Maybe, but I doubt it. I don’t believe the gold ever left the train.” She was walking up to them now and she had slipped her hand inside her bag. She stopped. Her thin, rather pretty face was drawn in suddenly hard lines. “Marshal, you are an evil man! You murdered my husband! You killed him and then tried to burn the-“ “Mrs. Carpenter,” Shanaghy said. “Sure, ma’am, and you’re too late. It’s all over. We know what was done and how it was done, and we know that you yourself killed your husband, and that it was you who closed the doors and set the barn afire.
“It was you, with your brother, who planned to steal all that gold.” Her eyes tightened at the corners, as did her mouth. “I have no idea what you are talking about, and-“ “Mrs. Carpenter, I have no desire to be rough with a woman-even one who has murdered her husband and probably others as well. So please … Do not try to take that gun from your purse, because I-“ Her hand started to come out from the handbag, but almost casually Shanaghy slapped the purse from her hand with his left and then brought his right hand up under the barrel, twisting it up and away. It was let go or have a broken finger, and Mrs. Carpenter let go. Shanaghy passed the gun to Judge McBane. “It is all over, Mrs. Carpenter, all over. None of it worked.” She was very cool. The hardness became only a shadow in her eyes, covered by amused contempt. “You’re such a little man, Marshal, so pleased with yourself, taking a gun away from a woman. Mr. Holstrum will testify-“ “Holstrum is dead,” Shanaghy said.
McBane turned his head sharply and Josh was staring. “Or if he is not, I shall be very surprised. You see, Mrs. Carpenter, some of the others were thinking just as you were. Once outside of town Holstrum was no longer needed, so why share with him? I am betting they killed him somewhere between his ranch and that little station thirty miles east where they planned to rejoin the train.” He smiled. “Rejoin it with what they thought was the gold.”
“You mean they don’t have it?” Greenwood exclaimed. “As I said, it never left the train. What they took off at the water tank were some boxes prepared for the purpose. Mrs. Carpenter’s brother, as station agent, had connived to get the manifest changed. The boxes that actually contained the money were being shipped right back to Kansas City … where Mrs. Carpenter would pick them up.”
“You mean they have already been shipped back?” “My guess is that they went west last night, and that they will be on the evening train when we board it.”
Mrs. Carpenter stood stock-still, her hands clasping her purse, staring off into space. Yet, while there might be some shock at being frustrated, at having all her carefully laid plans go sky-high, Shanaghy had an idea her mind was working swiftly toward some sort of a solution.
“I’d like to go home now,” she said suddenly.
Shanaghy shook his head. “You’re not thinking clearly, Mrs. Carpenter. You are under arrest. But something which you should be thinking of now is your friends, if you can call them that.”