Deke nodded. “I guess that’s really why you’re so interested in savin’his hide, huh?”
“Yep,” Kane said, “four thousand dollars is enough to make anyone interested.”
“I’d save Ford even without that money,” Deke offered, looking a little embarrassed by this admission. “He saved my life a time or two and I’d like to return the favor.”
Kane snorted with derision. “You always was dog-trustin’ simple, Deke. Go ahead and do what you want, but I’m in this for the money same as Ford has always been. Friendship don’t mean spit. It’s the money, and that four thousand dollars belongs to all of us. We lost two men on that job and I almost got killed myself and so did you.”
“Well, that’s true, but …”
“We got a share comin’,” Kane said. “We almost got killed and we deserve our share. Ford shouldn’t never have hid that four thousand dollars without tellin’ us. It was wrong!”
“But we was on the run and-“
“Then we should have split the money up and each gone off on our own!” Kane stormed. “But we stuck together except for Ford, who got drunk and got himself arrested. Now look at the mess we’re in. We’re dead broke and he’s in the hands of a federal marshal and facin’ a hanging. All of the blame falls on Ford, not us. He’s had his turn to be top dog. Maybe it’s time that I had mine.”
“You ain’t no leader,” Deke dared to say, his chin up and defiant.
“No leader?” Kane asked, voice shaking with fury. “You say I ain’t no leader?”
Deke paled. “Well,” he stammered, “I mean, you’re a leader and everything, but nobody in their good senses would follow you because-“
Kane exploded in fury and his big fist whipped upward in a blur. It caught Deke in the gut and lifted him completely off the ground. Deke’s mouth flew open like a fish out of water, and then Kane grabbed him by the shirtfront and slammed him up against the wall. While Deke’s eyeballs were rolling up in his head, Kane drove his knee into Deke’s crotch. Deke screamed in agony, and Kane dropped him on the sawdust floor.
“Jaysus!” the bartender shouted. “If you’re going to kill poor Deke, drag him out in the alley and do it!”
“Shut up!” Kane bellowed, dragging Deke back to his feet and pinning him back up against the wall. “I ain’t going to kill the little bastard. I’m just giving him a lesson.”
“You’re gonna kill him if you hit him again,” the bartender yelled.
“Well, then,” Kane said, “maybe I should just put him out of his misery.”
Kane drew his six-gun and pointed it at Deke’s face. “Say hello to Hell, Deke.”
“No!” Deke choked, reviving in a hurry. “Red, I didn’t mean it! Please. Don’t shoot me! I swear I didn’t mean it. You’d be a great leader!”
Kane tapped the barrel of his six-gun against Deke’s perspiring forehead. “Now you’re using them brains,” he said, releasing the man and letting him sag back down to the floor.
He turned his back on the terrified man and turned his attention to the bar. “Gus, you and Willard hurry up and get the horses. Bring’em around back of this saloon and get ready to ride.”
Gus was a thin, intense gunfighter, while Willard was Kane’s young brother, with the same big frame and red, sun-blistered face. Gus set his beer down and thumbed-back the brim of his Stetson. His pale blue eyes shifted back and forth between his brother and Deke, who continued to writhe on the floor. “What’s up, Red?”
“I’ll tell you later,” Kane said.
Gus nodded and plucked at Willard’s sleeve. “Boss says we got to get our horses.”
“Boss is mighty bossy since Ford got caught,” Willard said, shooting his brother a challenging glare.
Kane’s lips drew back from his teeth. “Little brother, unless you want me to kick the shit outa you like I just did Deke, I think you’d just better do what I said and do it right gawddamn now!”
Willard smiled. “Your day is comin’, big brother. Comin’ soon too.”
“The day you try me,” Red Kane said, “is the day you’ll be knocking at the gates of Hell.”
Deke hauled himself to his feet and he was gasping and clutching his crotch. “What do you want me to do, Boss?”
“Deke, just sit back down here by the window and don’t you go and get drunk while I’m gone. If you see them two women again, you just stay where you’re at and don’t make a sound. Do as I say, I won’t hurt you again.”
“You shouldn’t have put your knee to my balls like that,” Deke whined, moving all bent over to the table beside the window and collapsing into the chair. “What I said about you … you shouldn’t have taken it so damn personal, Red.”
“I take everything personal,” he told the man. “And I mean to take care of this business my way when we catch up with Ford and them two gawddamn lawmen.”
A tear slid down Deke’s cheek, and it caused Kane to shake his head. “You’re nothin’but a gawddamn baby,” he said with contempt. “You’re just plain weak.”
Deke’s gun hand moved a little closer to his side, but it froze when Kane said, “Go ahead, prove me wrong. Show me that you’re man enough to make a play for that gun. Go on, you chicken-shit little coward!”
Deke’s nerve broke and he placed both of his trembling hands on the table. “I wouldn’t shoot you, Red. We’re friends!”
Kane relaxed. “Deke, you just better hope you never get sent to the Nevada Territorial Prison in Carson City. Cause, if you do get sent, you’re gonna make some inmate a real fine little bunk-mate.”
“We get this money business done, I’m leavin’Nevada once and for all,” Deke said, nodding up and down as if trying to convince himself of this bold declaration. “I am leavin’ for California and I’m buyin’ a little farm.”
Kane sneered. “You don’t know nothin’ about farmin’ or about anything else except how to pick someone else’s pockets or back-shoot ‘em when they ain’t lookin’.”
Deke looked away, staring through the grimy glass, his eyes radiating pain and hatred as he listened to the heavy sound of Red Kane’s boot heels thumping on the floor.
When Kane went outside, he stopped and rolled another cigarette before he sauntered down the street, keeping to the shadows and trying to look as inconspicuous as a man well over six feet and 250 pounds could look. He pretended to admire a pair of new saddles in the saddle shop window, and then seemed to give careful consideration to a new coat being displayed in the Gold Mountain General Store window.
In fact, what Red Kane was really doing was waiting for Sophie Flanigan and Molly Bean to reappear on the street and lead him to Ford Oakley and the two lawman, all of whom he intended to kill after learning where the hell Ford had hidden their four thousand dollars of stolen bank money.
It didn’t take long before Sophie and Molly emerged, and Kane slipped into the shadows between a pair of buildings and watched as they hurried over to the town’s only livery. Kane grinned as he noted that the women were both dressed in riding skirts and had small traveling bags in their hands. They looked nervous, as if they didn’t want to be noticed by anyone as they made their way quickly along.
Kane gave them a wide berth. He’d seen enough to confirm his suspicions, and now it was time to go get their own horses and follow these scheming bitches to a big payday.
He tromped back to the saloon and collected Deke. “Let’s go get those horses,” he said.
“Yes, sir!”
As Kane was passing through the saloon toward the back door, he snatched a nearly full bottle of whiskey from the bar.
“Hey!” the bartender shouted. “You’re gonna pay for that!”
“Don’t worry!” Kane shouted. “As soon as we spring Ford from those lawmen, we’ll come back here and put on a party the likes of what you never seen!”
“You do that!” the bartender groused. “You just bring your money next time.”