Salty pulled the cork with his teeth, spit it out, and lifted the bottle to his mouth. The whiskey gurgled as he took a long swallow of it.
“I hear that,” Jennings said. “It’s a pretty sound.”
Salty reached out, took Jennings’s hand, and pressed the bottle into it. “Have a slug, old son. It might not restore your sight, but it can’t hurt to try.”
While Jennings took a drink, Salty looked up at Frank and went on. “If folks was to leave right now and had good sleds and dogs, I reckon they could make it through the passes to Whitehorse.”
“You couldn’t go on horseback?”
Salty shook his head. “No, there’s already snowpack up there. You could go part of the way on horses, but you’d have to break out the dogs to get over the passes and on down to Whitehorse.”
“How about getting back here?”
“That’d be riskier. Still, a fella might could do it, if he knew the quickest way there and back.”
“Someone like you, you mean?” Frank said.
“Well, come to think of it…yeah. I know all the trails.”
Frank didn’t hesitate. “How’d you like to go to Whitehorse with us?”
Before Salty could answer, Conway stepped forward and lifted a hand. “Wait a minute, Frank. We’ve already picked up a blind outlaw—”
“You’re an outlaw?” Salty said to Jennings.
“I was,” Jennings replied with a sober nod. “I’ve given up banditry. I’m a changed man because of Mr. Morgan.”
As if he hadn’t been interrupted, Conway went on. “Now you’re going to add a drunken old man to our party? You’d put the safety of those ladies in the hands of a—”
“A former range detective, army scout, and unofficial deputy U.S. marshal?” Frank said. “I reckon I would.”
Salty reached for the bottle again. “Now, the young galoot may have a point there, Mr. Morgan. I ain’t all that dependable these days, not since I got a taste for this Who-hit-John.”
Frank picked up the bottle before Salty could. “Then maybe it’s time to put this away. How about you have the rest of it when we get back to Skagway from Whitehorse?”
“But…we might not make it back till spring. That’s a long time!”
“You’ll be all right, Salty. You’ll have a job to do.”
The old-timer ran gnarled fingers through his tangled beard. “That would be nice,” he said in a half-whisper. “Folks used to depend on me, and I never let ’em down.”
“You won’t now, either.”
Salty gave an abrupt nod. “Count me in,” he declared. “Put the cork in the bottle, and we’ll have it when we get back.”
“Maybe,” Frank said, “or maybe we’ll have something better.”
Conway looked like he thought they were making a big mistake.
The young man would really feel that way, Frank thought, if he knew that before they left Skagway, he intended to have a talk with Soapy Smith about an old man’s stolen gold.
Chapter 20
Before leaving the shack, Frank asked Salty if he had any more bottles of whiskey stashed there. The old-timer insisted that he didn’t. “I ain’t never had enough money to buy a whole bottle since Smith and his varmints cleaned me out,” Salty declared. “Most I could ever beg was enough for a shot or two.”
Frank believed him. “You can stay here for now, but tomorrow you’re going to help me pick out some sleds and dogs and everything else we’ll need for the trip.”
“Why’re you so bound and determined to go to Whitehorse? This got somethin’ to do with them pretty young gals who come into town with you?”
“It has everything to do with them,” Frank explained. “They’re mail-order brides, and they have husbands-to-be waiting for them in the Klondike.”
Salty let out a little whistle of surprise. “Doggone! No wonder you’re anxious to get through. I reckon some o’ them prospectors who’ve found good claims would pay a mighty handsome price to have a comely gal keep ’em warm all winter.”
“That’s the idea,” Frank said with a grin.
“Makes me feel like I’ll be doin’ some good for the world by helpin’ you get ’em there.”
“That’s one way to look at it,” Frank said.
“One thing you got to remember, though…this late in the season, the best dogs is prob’ly already gone. You’ll be gettin’ the runts of the litter.”
Frank nodded. “We’ll do the best we can.” He wondered how Dog would take to being hitched to a sled. They might find out before the journey was over.
He and Conway and Jennings went back to the hotel to check on Fiona and the rest of the women. They had split up among the three rooms and were resting, some on the bunks, some on blankets spread on the floor. After everything they had been through, even such primitive accommodations seemed almost like the lap of luxury. Frank didn’t disturb them, but left them sleeping instead.
“I’m going down to Clancy’s,” he told Conway and Jennings. “I want to have a talk with Soapy Smith.”
Jennings shook his head. “I ain’t sure that’s a good idea. You’d do well to stay as far away from him as you can, Mr. Morgan. He’s a bad man, and he’s got those toughs workin’ for him.”
“You heard what Salty said. Smith stole his poke, or was responsible for stealing it, anyway.”
“You can’t prove that, and you can’t hope to get the old man’s gold back after all this time.”
“We’ll see about that,” Frank said with grim determination.
Conway sighed. “Then we’re coming with you. I am, at least.”
Frank shook his head and said, “I’d rather you didn’t, Pete. I want you and Bart to stay here and keep an eye on the ladies in the hotel and the horses in the stable. We can’t afford to have anything happen to any of them. And I’m sorry about the way I put that, Bart. I shouldn’t have told you to keep an eye on them.”
Jennings waved a hand. “Don’t worry about that, Mr. Morgan. I know what you meant. You can’t change the way you talk just on account of me.”
Conway said, “I don’t like the idea of you going to see Smith in his den by yourself. Although, I guess if anybody can handle something like that, it’d be you, Frank.”
“Don’t worry, I won’t be looking for trouble. I just want to see if I can talk Smith into doing the right thing.”
“Pretty long odds against that,” Jennings said glumly.
Frank grinned. “I’ve beaten ’em before.”
He left the two men at the livery stable and followed the plank sidewalk around the corner, avoiding the worst of the mud in the street. As he approached Clancy’s Saloon, he saw a man stagger out of the place, vomit in the street, and then collapse on the plank sidewalk. By the time Frank got there, the man had started to snore.
Two men in derby hats came out of the saloon. From the looks of them, Frank wondered if they worked for Soapy Smith. That was confirmed when one of them said, “Grab that bum’s feet, Big Ed. Soapy wouldn’t want him blockin’ the sidewalk.”
The man called Big Ed got the drunk’s feet while the other one took hold of his shoulders. They lifted the man and threw him into the street. He rolled over a couple of times and came to a stop facedown in the mud without waking up. The two men turned to go back into the saloon.
“Hey!” Frank called to them. “Are you going to leave him like that? He’ll suffocate!”
They stopped and looked at Frank in surprise. “That fella a friend of yours, mister?” Big Ed asked.
“No, I never saw him before.”
“Then why do you give a damn whether he suffocates or not?”
“Because I wasn’t raised to stand by and let a man die when there was something I could do about it,” Frank snapped.
The other man shrugged. “Then do something about it. You go out there and turn him over. I ain’t gettin’ my boots muddy doin’ it.”