“But none of us gets the message — or so Sweetman thinks. So a sheriff’s deputy just happens across our trail and spots Sweetman right off. Takes him without a fight, too. And where does this lawman want us to go? Where else? Vinson.
“And it’s a funny thing about this lawman. Quite a coincidence. His horse’s wearin’ the Diamond T brand. And that just happens to be the same brand I saw on Sweetman’s pinto.
“What am I to make of that? Well, there’s only one thing to make. Both those horses were stolen from the same place by the same gang, and this feller callin’ himself ‘Pryor’ is no more a deputy than the beans I ate for dinner. He and Sweetman want us to turn southeast toward Vinson. I suspect they’ve got a crooked buyer there just waitin’ for our herd — and probably a few gunmen sittin’ up in the hills, whittlin’ the hours away till we get our steers close to town and they can pick us off at their leisure.
“That’s how I reckon it all, anyhow. As my brother’s reminded me a few times, I ain’t no Sherlock Holmes, so I could be seein’ things all cross-eyed. But I’ve been workin’ hard to see it straight, the way Mr. Holmes would, and if I’ve got it wrong... well, I invite you boys to tell me another way to figure it that makes half the sense.”
Nobody said a word for nearly half a minute. We all just stared at Old Red in a trance of glassy-eyed stupefaction. It was Pryor who broke the spell with a dry chuckle.
“Whoooeee,” he said. “I think your friend here must’ve been ridin’ without a hat today. The sun cooked his brain right through, eh, fellers? Now to get back to the business at hand...”
Every man in the outfit turned to face him, and those faces didn’t look thunderstruck any longer. They looked mad.
“Don’t tell me you think that crazy little coot’s on to somethin’?”
Pryor didn’t get an answer in words. He got it in action. Charlie and Tornado stepped up together to grab his arms. He tried for his six-gun, but I got a fist upside his skull before he was halfway to the grip. It was a good, solid punch, too. Pryor sagged in Charlie and Tornado’s hands, and when they realized he’d been knocked cold they simply let him plop to the ground like a patty out of a bull’s backside. I bent down and unholstered Pryor’s gun and handed it to Charlie.
He thanked me with a little nod, then turned to glare at the rest of the boys. “Anyone here still feel like holdin’ a vote?” he grumbled.
Everybody stared down at the dirt, suddenly looking mighty ashamed of themselves.
“All right, then.”
Charlie turned toward my brother, and his grim scowl blossomed into a big grin.
“Well, Old Red, looks like that Sherlock Holmes has got hisself some competition.”
He gave my brother a shake of the hand so enthusiastic it nearly tore his arm off, and suddenly the rest of the boys were pushing in around them both, slapping my brother on the back and huzzahing his world-class smarts. Gustav withstood it all in bashful silence for a moment before he held up his hands and called for everyone to quiet down.
“Thank you, fellers, thank you. But before y’all go and elect me President, someone needs to get over to the chuck wagon and tie up Sweetman before he can cause any trouble.”
I looked past my brother and the men gathered around him. “Ain’t he already... well, I’ll be damned!”
Sweetman was on his feet next to Pryor’s horse. He had a rifle halfway out of its saddle scabbard. In a flash he had nearly a dozen guns on him. He let go of the rifle butt and kicked at the dirt.
“How’d you know he wasn’t tied up proper?” Charlie asked.
“Who was doin’ the tyin’?”
Charlie nodded, understanding right off. “Pryor.”
“That’s right. I figured he might want his partner free to lend a hand, so I put an eye on the rope he’d wrapped around Sweetman. It was done up with a timber hitch knot, so Sweetman could slip it any time he chose. He had to wait and see if his play was gonna come off, but once Pryor was down he was bound to pull somethin’.”
Everyone shook their heads, marveling at how simple all that deducifying seemed once it was talked out. Over the next few weeks, the boys had Gustav go over the whole thing again and again. It got to be torture for Sweetman and Pryor, who had to hear over and over how my brother had tripped them up. Sweetman would get to swearing a blue streak whenever the subject came up, which naturally inspired everyone to reminisce about it all the more.
The two outlaws rode with us as far as Dodge City. We kept both of them out in the open, and not a second passed when there wasn’t a shotgun stuck in Sweetman’s face. If the rest of his gang trailed us, looking for a chance to spring him, we never knew it. Should they have tried, he wouldn’t have done them much good as a mastermind, not having a head and all.
When we got to Dodge, it turned out the reward on Sweetman was still good — five hundred of it, anyway. Pryor was just dripping a little honey when he said it was up over two thousand. We picked up some extra dinero, though, since Pryor had a bounty on him, too, only it was under the name “Frank Adams.”
The boys took a vote on it and decided to give all the money for Sweetman to Old Red. My brother’s too retiring a fellow to argue with such gestures, so he just slipped me a big wad of the cash and told me to treat the outfit to the biggest rave-up Kansas had ever seen. Charlie had consented to give us two whole days to live it up before we hit the trail again, so I used the money to indulge the fellows in every pleasure Dodge City had to offer, which is plenty.
Gustav didn’t partake of the fun, though. He used some of his newfound fortune to rent a hotel room and hire a working girl to spend the days there with him. It was all purely gentlemanly, though, I assure you. You see, he managed to dig up a copy of “A Study in Scarlet” somewhere around town and he needed someone to read it to him.
If only that gal had the patience to write for him, too. Gustav tried putting this letter together with her, but she kept interrupting his yarn-spinning with questions. The man can’t even read, for Pete’s sake, and she’s asking him how to spell “Sherlock.” He finally came and grabbed me out of the Blue Boar Saloon and forced me up here practically with a gun in my ribs.
But even though I lost the chance at a few more drinks, a few more hands of poker, and a few more hours of sleep, I’m actually sort of glad it turned out this way. Writing this all down was a mighty big chore, and it helps me feel a little bit of extra ownership in my brother’s world-class conundrum-busting. I reckon your pal Dr. Watson probably feels the same way sometimes. You might want to ask him about that.
Well now, looks like I finished up just in time. Charlie’s started pounding on the door threatening to set fire to the hotel if we don’t saddle up pronto. We’ve still got a thousand miles of ground to cover before those Blackfeet get their steers. Wish us luck, Mr. Holmes.
Anyway, that’s how it all happened, I swear on my dust-covered soul.
Sincerely,
O. A. Amlingmeyer
Dodge City, Kansas
July 2, 1892
Copyright © 2002 by Steve Hockensmith.
Totoo
by William Hallstead
William Hallstead began his fiction-writing career as Franklin W. Dickson; under that name he authored the 31st book in the Hardy Boys series. According to Mr. Hallstead, “There never was a Franklin W. Dickson. That was the pen name assigned to every one of the many writers who turned out books on Frank and Joe Hardy.” Under the pseudonym William Beechcroft he has had six more suspense novels published, as well as many short stories.