“Luke Rawlings. What are you doing here guarding this dam?” Hawke asked. “I thought you had made a lot of money gold mining.”
“It ain’t none of your business what me ’n’ Percy’s doin’ here,” Luke replied. “The thing is, we are here, and we’re telling you to leave.”
“I don’t think we’re ready to leave yet.”
Luke pointed his shotgun at Dorchester.
Hawke drew his pistol then and pointed it at Luke.
“Luke, you want to ease those hammers back down before someone gets hurt?” he asked.
“What are you doin’ here, anyway? This is none of your affair,” Luke said.
“I just made it my affair.”
“Looks to me like you are a day late and a dollar short,” Luke said.
“Not really,” Hawke replied. “I have the advantage.”
“Yeah? How is that?”
“Neither of you are pointing a gun at me. On the other hand, I am pointing my gun at you.”
“Maybe not, but we are pointing them at your friend.”
“My friend isn’t armed—I am. And if you shoot him, I’ll kill you. In fact, I will kill all four of you.”
“What?” Ford suddenly shouted. “What are you talking about? You are going to shoot all four of us? Do you realize that you are threatening a representative of the United States government?”
“Mister, every man I killed during the war was a representative of the United States government in one way or another. Now, you tell your men there to lower their guns, or I’m going to start shooting.”
“You two men put your guns down,” Ford said in a frightened tone.
“I think he’s bluffing,” Luke said.
“I said put the guns down! Now!” Ford ordered, his voice nearly breaking.
The two men lay their weapons on the ground.
“Back away from them,” Hawke ordered.
When neither of the two men moved, Hawke shot at Luke’s foot, coming so close that he took a small nick from the sole of Luke’s boot.
“What the hell!” the man shouted in sudden fear, dancing back from the impact of the round. He looked down at his boot and saw the little nick. “You just barely missed blowing off my toe,” he said angrily.
“I didn’t miss,” Hawke said. “If I wanted to hit your toe, I would have. Now, back away, or the next one will take off a toe.”
The two men backed away. Hawke kept waving them back until they were at least twenty yards from the guns.
“Mr. Dorchester,” he said quietly. “Perhaps now would be a good time for us to leave.”
“Yes,” Dorchester said. “Yes, I do believe you are right.”
Just before they crossed back onto Dorchester’s land, a lone rider came out from behind a rock outcropping. He placed himself right in front of them.
“Father!” Pamela said with a gasp.
The rider was Ethan Dancer.
“You folks are trespassing on private property,” Dancer said in a low, evil, hissing voice.
“We were checking on why the water stopped flowing,” Dorchester replied.
“Next time you come onto this land, get permission,” Dancer said.
“And if we don’t?” Hawke asked, putting himself between Dancer and the others.
Dancer stared at Hawke for a moment. “You’re the one they call Hawke, aren’t you?”
“That would be Mr. Hawke to you,” Hawke replied.
He held Dancer in a gaze that was fully as intense as it had been in the mirror on their first encounter. Dancer’s face twitched a couple of times and he ran his finger across his scar. Why wasn’t this man afraid of him? he wondered. Who was he? Was this someone he should know?
“Who the hell are you?” Dancer asked.
“I thought we had settled that. I’m Mr. Hawke.”
“I wouldn’t get too smart…Mister…Hawke.”
“Yes, well, it’s not very likely that you would,” Hawke said.
Dancer’s eyes narrowed for a second. He had the idea that he’d just been insulted, but he wasn’t sure exactly how.
Despite the tension of the moment, Pamela couldn’t hold back a chuckle.
Dancer pointed at Hawke. “One of these days, you’re going to find yourself dancing with the demon.” Slapping his legs against the side of his horse, Dancer rode off quickly.
When he was gone, Pamela shuddered. “What do you suppose he meant by dancing with the demon?” she asked.
“I’ve heard tell that’s what he says to someone just a’fore he shoots ’em,” Willie said.
“Oh!” Pamela said, putting her hand to her mouth and looking at Hawke with fear in her eyes. “Hawke! He just said you were going to dance with the demon.”
“Ah, I wouldn’t worry about it.” He smiled. And to ease her fear, he joked, “My dance card is already full.”
Chapter 16
IT TOOK FOUR DAYS FOR JAY DUPREE AND HIS LITTLE wagon train to reach South Pass. Three of the wagons had precut lumber, windows, doors, and other building items, and the fourth had furnishings.
At the time of Dupree’s arrival there were no permanent structures in the mining camp, so the fact that he had the building material was enough to attract notice. But what really got the attention of the prospectors in the camp were the three beautiful women riding in the surrey with him. Though less than six weeks old, the mining camp, which called itself South Pass City, had nearly a thousand residents. It was now the third largest settlement in Wyoming, but the three women with Jay Dupree made up the entire female population of the settlement.
The men flocked down to the edge of the road and walked alongside the convoy, keeping pace with it and looking on in awe. Libby, Lulu, and Sue smiled, waved, and blew kisses at the men.
The shelters were tents, though many of the tents, including the saloon, had wooden floors.
Jay drove until he reached what he considered a suitable location. There, he stopped, stood, and called back to his drivers, “We’ll unload here!”
“What is all this?” one of the men from the gathered crowd shouted.
Jay held up his hands to call for quiet, then addressed the men who had crowded around.
“Gentlemen, I bring you greetings.” He paused for a second, and with a broad smile continued. “But greetings are not all I bring. I bring you also three of the most beautiful women this side of the Mississippi River. Take a look at them, boys. Am I exaggerating?”
He made a sweeping gesture to draw attention to the three women with him, and the men cheered loudly and lustily.
“As you can clearly see by the beauty of these women, they are not your ordinary soiled doves. And you’ll never find these girls keeping a crib, working in a bar, hustling drinks, or walking the streets. No sir. These ladies are beautiful, talented, intelligent, and gracious. Stand up, ladies.”
The three women stood up, smiled, waved, blew kisses again, and flirted outrageously with the men in the crowd.
“I’m sure you understand that ladies of this quality do not come cheap. They are reserved for those of the most discriminating tastes, those who are knowledgeable enough to understand that something worth having is worth paying for. They are reserved for you. So, there you have it, gentlemen, the three lovely ladies I have brought to help me run the Golden Cage. As proprietor of the Golden Cage, I promise you a place to come to relax, have a few drinks from my specially selected stock of beer and blended whiskey, enjoy a good meal, and spend some very interesting private time with one of these beautiful women.”
“What do you mean by very interesting private time?” someone called from the crowd. “I mean, you said they was intelligent, but I ain’t interested in any of ’em readin’ no poetry to me, or anything like that.”
The other men laughed.
“By private time, I mean just that. You, and the young lady of your choice, will retire to her room. Whatever you do there is strictly between you and the young lady. Now, propriety and common decency prevents me from spelling out exactly what you can do there, but I guarantee you, they won’t be reading poetry.”