“Let’s go see her then,” Phyl said. “Only she’ll for sure blister your hide if it’s not important.”
Watching Phyl and Jacobs make for the stairs, Calamity decided she must try to learn what brought the pedlar to town. A couple of the cowhands drifted over and asked Calamity and Mousey to join them. Rising, Calamity told Mousey to go ahead and she would sit in once she had been upstairs to collect a handkerchief.
By the time Calamity reached the head of the stairs she found that Phyl and the pedlar were just entering Ella’s room. Calamity waited until the door closed, then walked over and halted by it. Glancing along the passage, she could see no sign of life. However, she wished she knew where Maisie might be as the big brunette had not been in the bar room. Calamity did not wish to be caught eavesdropping at Ella’s door, especially by Maisie for the brunette disliked her due to her friendship with Phyl. Seeing no sign of Maisie or any of the other girls, Calamity placed her ear close to the door and listened to the muffled, but audible conversation inside. She only heard a few words before deciding it had been a good idea to come up and take a chance to discover Jacobs’s business.
In the room Ella Watson sat behind the table and looked at Jacobs with cold, speculative eyes. For his part, Jacobs stared back with frank interest. On his arrival, Ella had been about to change into the clothes she wore when riding the range on visits to the stolen stock’s hiding place. At such a time Ella wore men’s clothing with only a pair of drawers beneath the shirt, levis, boots and jacket out of sight and pulled on her robe. While this covered her naked torso, it gave more than a hint of her state of undress underneath.
“This’s private, Miss Ella,” Jacobs said, glancing at Phyl.
“Likely,” the saloonkeeper replied. “Spit it out, Jake, and put your eyes back in, it won’t do you any good.”
“I got something to tell you,” the pedlar told her, jerking his eyes away from the valley between her breasts.
“I didn’t think you’d just dropped in to pass the time of day.”
“Just come up from Austin way,” Jacobs went on, not put out by her apparent lack of interest.
“So?” asked Ella calmly, although she did not feel calm inside. The nearest company of Texas Rangers had their base in Austin as she well knew.
“So I heard something as might interest the right folks up here.”
“I’m busy and tired, Jake. Come to the point, or let’s miss you?”
“I’m a poor man, Miss Ella,” the pedlar whined. “Not like these cow thieves up this ways.”
“Let’s have it!” Ella spat out, opening the table drawer and taking out a five-dollar bill. “Damned if I know why I’m bothering, but if you’ve something interesting you can have the five.”
“I hear tell Cap’n Murat’s sent a feller up here to bust the cow thieves.”
“Why should that interest me?” Ella asked, trying to keep her voice normal although her throat felt dry and her body cold.
“No reason—’Cepting that if this feller does it, you’ll lose a fair few good customers.”
“Hey——!” Phyl began.
“I see,” Ella interrupted.
Only with an effort could she hold her voice even and Phyl’s obvious agitation drew a warning scowl from Ella. Annoyance at the red-head’s reactions stiffened Ella and enabled her to hide her true feelings. Clearly the pedlar knew something. In some way he must have learned that she ran the cow-stealing organization. Yet he could not know, unless—at that moment Ella remembered a remark passed a few days before, about her bartender’s friendship with Jacobs. Izzy must have sold her out, either accidentally or deliberately. Well, that matter could wait until later. More important right now was to discover the identity of the man sent by Captain Murat. Ella did not underestimate the Texas Rangers. The trouble with a Ranger was that he wore no uniform and kept his badge concealed. There had been one new arrival in the area who claimed to have come from down Austin way, she recalled.
“All right,” she said. “Supposing I give a damn for my customers! Who is this Ranger?”
“Like I said, ma’am——” Jacobs started to say.
“I know,” Ella cut in, “you’re a poor man. Here’s twenty dollars. Who is he, Jake?”
There she had the pedlar, but he did not intend to mention the point. While Jacobs had gathered a vague rumor that a Ranger left town headed for Caspar County, he could not learn which member of Company “G” was assigned to the task. However, Jacobs could put two and two together so as to come up with a reasonable answer.
“One of them fellers brought in Choya’s bunch of Comancheros a few days back. Only he’s not in town any more, left near on as soon as he come in. I figure he’s the one.”
“And his name?” asked Ella.
“Danny Fog. He’s Dusty Fog’s kid brother.”
This time Ella could not hold down her startled gasp. Danny Fog—Danny Forgrave—it must be true. Ed Wren claimed that Forgrave reminded him of the Rio Hondo gun wizard. So he would if he was Dusty Fog’s younger brother.
“What does he look like?” she snapped.
“Tall, blond, youngish, not bad looking. Rode a big sabino stallion last time I saw him.”
“Forgrave!” Ella and Phyl said at the same moment.
Even as they spoke the door of the room flew open.
Calamity had just figured that she must find some way of warning Danny of his danger when she found she had troubles of her own. So interested in the conversation had she been, that she forgot to stay alert. Maisie stepped from her room, took in the sight and crept stealthily along the passage toward the listening Calamity. Instead of hearing the gentle pad of bare feet, Calamity missed the sound. The first knowledge she had of Maisie’s presence being when one hand gripped the scruff of her neck and another jerked her arm up behind her back.
Dropping the hand from Calamity’s neck, Maisie twisted on Ella’s door handle and pushed open the door. Before Calamity could make a move to prevent it, she was shoved into the room.
“What’s all this, Maisie?” Ella asked.
“I just caught her listening at the door, boss.”
Pain in her trapped arm, and a natural aversion to being pushed around, caused Calamity to take action. Lifting her foot, she stamped the heel down hard on Maisie’s foot. The big brunette let out a screech of pain and released Calamity’s arm, then started to hop on her other leg, clutching at the injured toes. Before Calamity could turn and take the matter further, Phyl leapt forward and pushed her against the wall. Even as Calamity tensed to throw herself into the attack, Ella rose, jerking open the table’s drawer and bringing out the Remington Double Derringer which took Gooch’s life.
“Now just hold it right there!” the saloonkeeper ordered. “Phyl, take her gun. Keep back, Maisie.”
The latter warning came as the brunette prepared to hurl herself at Calamity and take reprisals for the vicious stamp on her foot. Knowing her boss’s temper, Maisie halted and watched, scowling and muttering to herself, as Calamity stood still and allowed Phyl to pull up her skirt and remove the Derringer from its garter holster.
“She’s a liar, boss!” Calamity yelped, getting her defense in before the attack began. “I’d only just come up here.”
“She was listening, boss!” Maisie screeched.
“All right! Shut it, both of you!” Ella spat out. Her fingers drummed on the table top, then she frowned as she remembered that Calamity came to town from Austin. “How many Rangers did Murat send, Jake?”
“One. That Danny Fog like I told you,” the man replied, staring at Calamity once more. “Say, I seen that gal afore somewheres.”