“You all right, Chad?” Ken asked.
“No,” Chad said, quietly. “No, I’m not all right.”
“Were you hit?” Ken asked anxiously.
“I wish I had been. I wish I had been killed, along with Hank.”
“No, you don’t,” Ken said. “You don’t really mean that.”
“How the hell do you know what I mean?” Chad snapped back at him.
“Come on, fellas,” Gene said gently. “This is no time for us to be fightin’ among ourselves. I’m real sorry about Hank, Chad. I’m sorry about Eddie, too.”
“Yeah,” Ken added. “Me, too. We shoulda listened to you.”
Chad shook his head, then sighed. “It’s not your fault,” he said. “Eddie and Hank already had their minds made up to do this. I think they would’ve gone ahead and tried it whether we went along with them or not.”
“The thing is, I believed Eddie’s plan was a good one,” Ken said. “You have to know that any normal train that’s carrying no more than two or three hundred dollars, at the most, won’t have guards.”
“Yeah,” Gene said. “It was just our luck that we chose to hit one that was carrying a bank shipment.”
“What’ll we do now?” Ken asked.
“We’ll do whatever Chad wants to do,” Gene said. “He was the only one of us who had enough sense to try and talk us out of the foolish mistake we just made. I’d say it’s time we began listening to him.”
“All right, Chad, what will it be?”
“Like I’ve been saying all along. We’ve got a telegram from Frank Ford and Jim Robison offering us work,” Chad said. “I think that’s where we ought to go now.”
Without a word, Gene remounted, then turned away from the railroad track they had been following, heading off to the left.
“Where are you going?” Ken asked in surprise.
“We’re goin’ to El Paso, aren’t we?” Gene asked. “It’s this way.”
Chapter 6
El Paso
The liveryman was working on the gate of the paddock when Barry Riggbee and Tennessee Tuttle rode up. Barry dismounted.
“We need to do a little business,” Barry said.
The liveryman looked up. “Well, that’s what we’re here for. You fellas wantin’ to board your horses?”
“Yes, and feed ’em,” Barry replied. “Problem is, we don’t have any money.”
The liveryman pushed his hat back and ran his hand through a thick shock of hair that was brindled gray and black. “Maybe you boys don’t understand how business is done. The thing is, I board and feed horses, but you have to pay money to have it done.”
Barry nodded toward the gate. “I thought maybe we could fix that gate for you,” he said, “and maybe take care of one or two other chores in exchange for feeding and boarding our horses.”
“Uh-huh. And you’ll be wantin’ to stay in the stall with ’em, I suppose?”
Barry nodded. “Yeah, that, too,” he answered sheepishly.
“Hell, mister, I wish I could help you, but I just work here,” the stable man said. “If the boss comes by and finds you doin’ my work, then I’m out of a job. You understand?” By way of dismissal, the liveryman went back to working on the gate.
“Yes,” Barry said. He sighed. “Come on, Tennessee, we’ll . . .”
“Wait a minute,” the stable man said, looking up quickly. He nodded toward Tennessee. “Did you just call him Tennessee?”
“That’s what he called me,” Tennessee said. “My real name is Dan, but folks been callin’ me Tennessee ever since I come out here.”
“Would it be Tennessee Tuttle?” the liveryman asked.
“Yes,” Tennessee replied, surprised that the liveryman seemed to know who he was.
“And you’d be Barry Riggsbee, I take it?”
“That’s my name,” Barry replied. “Say, what is this, mister? How is it that you know who we are?”
“Couple of friends of yours are in town,” the liveryman said. “They said if you stopped by I was to put up your horses and feed ’em. So go ahead and leave them.” He put his tools back down and rubbed his hands together. “What I mean is, they already paid for you two.”
“Well, how about that?” Tennessee said, smiling broadly as he swung down from his horse. “That must’ve been Jim and Frank. Where are they now?”
The liveryman pointed toward one of the several saloons. “You might find ’em in any saloon in town, but it wasn’t too long ago that I seen ’em go into the Border Oasis, and I ain’t seen ’em come out.”
“Thanks,” Barry replied. He and Tennessee handed the reins of their mounts over to the liveryman, then started across the street toward the Border Oasis.
The liveryman started leading the horses into the barn. “Wisht I’da know’d who you was when you first made the offer,” he said with a chuckle. “I’da took you up on it. I’da had you doin’ my work, and I’da had the money, too.”
The Border Oasis was filled with the odors of tobacco smoke, stale beer, and various alcoholic spirits. The drinking men, wearing wide-brimmed or high-crowned hats sat at tables, either playing cards or engaged in animated conversation. Half a dozen painted women, their hair adorned with feathers, ribbons, or sparkling glass jewelry, paraded about, their silk dresses rustling. Another dozen drinkers were at the bar, their spurred, high-heeled boots resting on a brass rail. Highly polished brass spittoons were placed at strategic places around the bar, though stains and bits of chewed tobacco were so prevalent in the sawdust on the floor that the spittoons seemed to serve a more decorative than functional purpose.
Jim Robison and Frank Ford were standing at the bar when Frank saw Barry and Tennessee in the mirror.
“Here come a couple of the boys,” Frank said, nudging Jim. Smiling, he turned away from the bar and waved their two friends over to them.
“Well, I see you boys made it,” Jim said. “Step up to the bar and have a drink with us.”
“I’d love to, Jim. But if you had to pay a penny to wet your tongue, neither one of us could afford a smell,” Tennessee answered.
“Oh, we can take care of that, can’t we, Jim?” Frank said.
“We sure can,” Jim said. “Go ahead and pay them.”
“Pay us? Pay us what?” Barry asked.
Pulling out his wallet, Frank removed a stack of twenty dollar bills. He counted out five apiece to Tennessee and Barry.
“What is this?” Tennessee asked, looking at the notes.
Frank laughed. “That’s money, my friend,” he said. “One hundred dollars. Has it been so long since you saw any that you have forgotten what it is?”
“I mean, what is it for?”
“It’s an advance against the work you’re going to be doing,” Jim explained. “That is, if you take the job.”
“Hell yes, we’ll take the job,” Barry said. “What is it?” Then, with a chuckle, he added, “Wait a minute. I don’t care what it is.”
“No, you’ve got a right to ask,” Jim said. “You ever heard of a fella named Clay Allison?”
“Sure, who hasn’t?” Tennessee replied. “He’s got himself quite a reputation with a gun.”
“Wait a minute,” Barry asked. “Jim, what does this have to do with Clay Allison? Is he hiring guns for a range war or something?”
Jim chuckled. “No, nothing like that. We’re going to be wrangling horses for him. He’s bought a herd, five hundred head, or so I’m told—from a fella down in Mexico. He’s paying us two hundred dollars apiece to go get them. One hundred dollars now, and another hundred when we deliver the herd to his ranch just outside Alamosa, Colorado.”
“Where do we find these horses?”
“Allison is sending a Mexican fella to guide us to where we’re goin’.”