The Black Widow Read online

  The men sometimes patrolled in pairs and sometimes alone. Since he and Becky had arrived in the area, Jed had tried to find some kind of pattern in the sentries’ movements, but had been unable to do so. He didn’t know whether they made their checks at random, out of cunning or simply because they had never arranged a set routine. Either way, it made his task that much more difficult.

  With the Sharps he could have waited somewhere on the fringe of the trees, and could virtually have guaranteed to bring down one of the twins. But the Sharps was a single-shot weapon, and by the time he’d reloaded the other would have escaped. To make sure of them both he had to get close enough to gun them down with the Colt, which would be impossible from the outside. He had to get right inside.

  ‘Got to find a way in,’ Herne muttered to himself.

  ‘Yeah. That’s about the way that I figured it, too, Jedediah,’ said a voice from somewhere behind him.

  Herne didn’t move a muscle. ‘Hello, Whitey,’ was all he said.

  Chapter Three

  ‘Well, Jed,’ replied the concealed man. ‘Guess you better take that cannon out from your belt, and toss it down somewhere far enough for you not to get any ideas about diving for it. And put your sticker down as well.’

  Herne’s face was carved from stone. Coburn had him colder than the Sierra snows. And he’d made it easier for him by coming up that trail. Whitey had seen the path and guessed that was the way Jed would come.

  He threw down the bayonet, glancing as it fell to check its position, and drew the Colt, holding it regretfully for a second in his hand.

  ‘Quickly, Jed. Don’t get foolish.’

  The handgun followed the bayonet.

  ‘Make like you been caught by the teacher and get your hands up on the back of your neck, Jed. That’s it.’

  ‘We known each other too long, Whitey. Ridden too many miles. Know the way each other’s minds work too damned well. I should have guessed you’d guess.’

  There was a dry laugh from behind him and he heard the crunch of boots in the frozen snow. Slowly, taking care not to let his hands slip away from his neck, Herne turned round.

  Coburn stood about eight paces from him. Plenty close enough to cover any sudden move, but not close enough to get caught by a dive or a kick. Just the right distance, as Herne would have expected.

  ‘Why did you come here, Jed? You must have known that I’d be here. Sooner or later. You killed plenty of men in the last year. Why not just have left it at that? Leave these kids alone with their Ma, and just have ridden on with that pretty little gal we tangled with back north.’

  ‘Like I read in some book, there are some things that a man just can’t ride round. These punks raped Louise. And then she killed herself. Can’t just leave it at that, Whitey. You know it.’

  Coburn nodded, the pistol in his hand beaded rock-steady on Herne’s belly. ‘I knowed it, Jed. Still kind of hoped I wouldn’t be here to pick you up. I got a job to do, Jed and it ain’t that I want...’

  ‘Leave it,’ interrupted Herne. ‘Contract’s out, then that’s it.’

  ‘Right, Jed. Figured you’d know that well as me. Old man Nolan wants you back.’

  ‘Dead or alive?’

  ‘Ain’t that concerned. So let’s try and make it alive. Look at it like this, Jed, any of these punks he’s landed me with would have gunned you down. Backshot you and left you like a dog. Cut off your head and taken it back to ‘Frisco for the old man. This way, after I hand you over, then you’re on your own. Might be a way out. Man like you.’

  ‘How many of ’em?’

  ‘Five. Full o’ wind and piss. Reckon they’re men but act like babies. Without me, they’d have spilled their guts all over the Sierras.’ With a grunt Coburn stopped and picked up the gun, tucking it in his heavy belt, following it with the bayonet. This old knife of yours. Recall that faro dealer in... where was it?’

  ‘Albuquerque.’

  ‘Yeah. Recall him?’

  ‘The one who figured he had the right to deal off the top or the bottom.’

  ‘Runty guy with a little moustache. When he reached out for his winnings, you whipped this old bayonet out and stuck him clean through the back of the hand. Squealed like a pig at the gelding!’

  Herne laughed. ‘Then when he put out his other hand to pull out the blade, you spiked him with your knife. Left him there all night Teach him a lesson.’

  Coburn moved round Herne, his eyes raking him for any sign of other weapons. ‘Right. Hung himself the next night when he found his hands were all crook’d up. You carryin’ a pocket gun?’

  ‘No. What I got, you got.’

  ‘Then we better be moving oil.’

  As he started to walk cautiously across the slippery ground, Herne at last asked the question that had hung at the front of his mind ever since Coburn jumped him.

  ‘The girl?’

  Coburn tutted. ‘Never should have brought her. I tell you, Jed, old Nolan wanted the contract out on her too. Told him I wasn’t in the game of butchering little girls. Might have been once, but I’m gettin’ all tender.’

  The idea of the lanky albino ever getting tender brought a wry grin to Herne’s mouth.

  ‘So as far as I’m concerned, she’s free to go.’ Although they were alone, heading back towards the lake, Coburn dropped his voice. ‘But I can’t answer for these young dudes back at the camp. I ain’t told them I’d seen you both camping up on the ridge over yonder. I’ve been doing some figurin’, and I’m not sure that Nolan don’t have some sort of contract out on the girl with them.’ Herne half-turned to speak, but Coburn stopped him. ‘And to save you askin’, then I’ll do what I can. After I seen you safe back at our camp, I’ll go for a walk up there and have some words with her. See her on the way to where she wants to go. She got kin?’

  ‘Me.’

  They were near the edge of the lake, and Coburn seemed disinclined to carry on the conversation. Herne had tried to get a glance at his old friend, but he was swaddled up against the cold. Strands of fine white hair spun like silk from the edges of his hat, tied in place like Jed’s with a long black scarf. Whitey’s eyes and face were buried in its shadow, with only the pale tip of his nose protruding.

  ‘Camp’s a half mile up this draw. Been here only a day before you arrived.’

  They climbed once more, their voices struggling to carry against the rising wind. The sky had darkened once more and the traces of blue had quite vanished. Herne paused and looked back across the expanse of the valley, and saw a flurry of snow breaking like surf against the walls of Mount Abora.

  ‘They know you’re here?’ he said, pointing towards the big mansion.

  ‘Nope. Nobody knows. Not even Nolan. You’ve been tough to keep a trail on. Considerin’ that girl, you been makin’ good time all over the damned country.’

  ‘I done my best, Whitey.’

  ‘Yeah. Look, Jed. I’ll do what I can for the girl. Maybe get her to some folks I know down in New Orleans.’

  ‘Not one of your damned cat-house madams?’

  Coburn was genuinely shocked. ‘Jedediah! I’m ashamed of you. I might have done a whole heap of bad in my time, and killed a lot of men. But most of them needed it, and I ain’t never killed a woman.’

  Herne stopped once again, hoping that Coburn would be tricked into coming close enough for him to have a chance at him.

  He wasn’t.

  ‘No women, Whitey?’

  ‘Well... I recollect one or two who might have been kind of women, and a couple I wasn’t too sure about. But they all were badder’n a broke-back rattler.’

  The snow reached them as they climbed, and both men huddled behind their clothes. Jed thought about Becky all alone back at their camp, then dismissed the thought. There was not a thing he could do for her. His only chance, and it was a slim one, was to get away from Coburn. Then he’d think about her.

  ‘Nearly there,’ panted Coburn, tired by the stiff climb from the lake.

&n
bsp; They both stopped as they heard the mournful cry of an owl, echoing across the valley, answered by another one from up to their right. Herne looked enquiringly at Coburn, who tugged down his scarf with his left hand and spat in the fine snow at his feet. ‘Stupid bastards! Reckon that all this secret whistling code is going to make them scouts. Old Jim Bridger would have had this gang between two slices of sour-bread and then walked fifty miles in a day.’

  ‘That you, Mister Coburn?’

  ‘Who the fuck you think it is! George Armstrong Custer and the Seventh Cavalry?’ Under his breath to Herne: ‘At least they call me Mister Coburn. One of them tried to get overly familiar a week or so back.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘Cut his ears off,’ Coburn grinned. ‘Had to quit. That’s why there’s five when there used to be six.’

  ‘Come ahead,’ shouted the voice. Then, to someone else: ‘The old man’s got him.’ A pause. ‘Yeah. I remember. Here they come.’

  Herne moved his shoulders, feeling the stiffening of the muscles from the strain of walking up the steep hill with his hands behind his neck. Coburn’s camp was in a sheltered clearing, close by a stream. A flurry of snow blew in his eyes and he blinked to clear them. When he looked again, there were four men in the camp, all holding guns, looking grimly at him.

  ‘Jesus! It’s another old bastard!’

  ‘Where’d you get him?’

  ‘Where’s that girl he rode with?’

  Coburn ignored them, steering Herne towards the fire, where they both stood, side by side, looking outwards. Almost, thought Jed regretfully, as though they were about to face them down together.

  ‘This is Jed Herne. You kids might have heard of Herne the Hunter. Here he is. I known him a long ways back. And he’s ten times any of you little snots. Get us some coffee.’

  Nobody moved, and Herne felt the tension nudging at the base of his spine. Prickling the nape of his neck. There was something wrong here. He sensed that Whitey felt it as well.

  ‘Where’s the girl, Mister Coburn? You know that the Senator wants her brought in as well.’

  ‘No. I don’t know nothin’ bout that.’

  ‘Maybe the Senator don’t tell you everything, after all, Mister Coburn.’

  Whitey ignored the atmosphere, waving round the group of men with the barrel of his Colt. ‘Let me introduce you to the posse, Mister Herne. The guy there with more weight round his middle than’s good for him is Frank Janson. Next to him, the Mex, is Rivera. The left-hander’s Pete Austin. Last one in line is Babe Wood.’

  ‘Don’t call me Babe!’

  ‘That’s Abilene Wood. Called Abilene ‘cos that’s where his Ma left him when she moved on. Ain’t got no other name. That’s four. Where’s the German?’

  ‘Netzen’s off scouting,’ said Wood.

  The snow was getting thicker, masking out the surrounding trees. Herne had a feeling he’d had many times before. There was a tension there, as though everyone was waiting for something to happen.

  ‘The girl, Mister Coburn?’

  It was Austin, the left-hander. Holding a Colt. Janson also had a Colt. The other two held Winchesters ready at their hips.

  ‘Weather’s closin’ in. If n she’s up there, then she ain’t goin’ far. We’ll get a meal, and see what happens this afternoon. That make sense?’

  He was buying time. Trying to feel out just what the men wanted. Herne glanced round the clearing, hearing only snow falling in the fire. And feet shuffling.

  ‘Good to be back by a fire,’ said Coburn, throwing open his coat, half-turning as he did so. It was an easy, natural sort of action. If he hadn’t been ready for it, Herne would never have noticed that the movement brought the butt of his own pistol within reach, tucked in Coburn’s belt.

  ‘You said Netzen gone huntin’?’

  ‘Yeah, you could say that.’

  ‘What’s he hopin’ to catch himself?’

  The fifth voice came from the bank of darkness behind them. A voice with heavy accents.

  ‘You, Mister Coburn.’

  Herne couldn’t see the hidden man, but he almost made a grab for his gun. Only Coburn, again with that seemingly accidental movement, swung his body round a little, so that the Colt wasn’t so accessible. Jed guessed that Whitey must be waiting for the German to show himself, before they made their play. Five against two. All the five with their guns out ready, and all on the alert.

  ‘What’s this?’ said Coburn. ‘Something up with you boys? I brought in Herne, just like my contract. And I’m aiming to deliver him back to San Francisco. How come you boys seem to have different ideas?’

  ‘Senator Nolan don’t trust you, old man. He thinks that maybe you might be getting soft for this bastard Herne. So he asks us to watch. If you step out of line, we hit you. Or if you bring Herne in, you let us take over and you ride on.’

  ‘The bounty?’

  ‘You is muy hombre, Senor Coburn. Maybe we keep the dollars for you.’

  ‘They’re going to move any minute,’ whispered Herne to Whitey, wondering how the hell they were going to get any sort of start on the five young gunmen.

  Coburn nodded slightly to show he’d heard, and moved back again, putting the Colt within reach of Jed’s right hand. But there were still those gloves!

  ‘That fire’s damned welcome, boys,’ said Herne, casually letting his hands drop while he pulled off the gloves.

  ‘Don’t try anything, Herne,’ snapped Coburn. ‘What’s happening between me and the boys ain’t no concern of yours. Whatever happens here, it don’t make any difference to you. Right?’

  ‘Whatever you say,’ replied Herne, wondering where the fifth man was and what kind of gun he was holding.

  ‘Cut the damned talking and let’s get to it.’

  ‘Wait on, Kurt,’ said Babe Wood. ‘Don’t be too hasty. I just want Mister Coburn here to realize what’s going on. That things aren’t under his say-so no more. Is that clear Mister Coburn?’

  The ‘Mister’ was becoming more and more insulting.

  ‘You’re going to take Herne from me, after all I’ve done to capture him? So you’ll kill him.’

  It was a flat statement. The gunmen laughed, their breath frosting out round their faces. Once again the snow had eased. There was the crunching of footsteps, and Herne half-turned to see the tall figure of the German appearing from the trees. Holding a sawn-off scatter-gun.

  ‘I ain’t saying we kill him just like that. But there’s a kind of a chance he might try and run. Know what I mean?’

  ‘I know. And what about me?’

  There was a silence, and the gunmen exchanged glances.

  Herne guessed they were still worried about the albino, despite the fact that they outnumbered him five to one. Coburn held his Colt easily, taking care not to point it at any one of them. That way they’d all feel menaced by it.

  Herne saw that all of the young punks were still wearing their gloves, and that gave him a lot of hope. It was hard to work a gun fast like that Netzen was the main threat. You didn’t have to aim too good with a scatter-gun to make a mess of a man at that sort of range. Then the two with Colts. Easier and quicker in confined shooting. Last the two with the rifles. If they missed with their first shots, then the lever action would slow them.

  ‘Maybe you ride on, old man. Or maybe we kill you where you stand. I’m tired of this fuckin’ word-game. Let’s get to it, boys,’ said Frank Janson, stamping his feet in the cold.

  ‘Now wait on,’ said Coburn, pulling the glove from his left hand, then casually changing the gun to his other hand to take off the other glove.

  ‘No more damned waiting, Whitey,’ barked Janson,

  ‘I see. Whatever happens, you know me well enough to realize that at least one of you is going to get killed before you cut me down.’

  ‘So ride on.’

  ‘No man tells me to ride on, Janson. You should know that. But what of Herne? Am I to give up six months’ work and a saddle-sore ass just f
or you to take the bounty on him?’

  Herne couldn’t work out what Whitey was doing. There wasn’t the slightest doubt that the gunmen were going to make their play at any moment. So it was down to Whitey to give the two of them an edge.

  ‘Jed?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I’ve been telling Jed here about you young bravos. Personally, I think that Kurt there is the best. And then I count on Pete Austin with his Colt. What do you think about them?’

  ‘Guess that’s right. But I’d put my money on Janson, with the others about equal.’

  ‘Cut the fuckin’ talkin’. Are you movin’ on, Coburn, you crippled son of a bitch? Or do we go?’

  Coburn ignored them, still talking to Herne, his tone as calm and conversational as if he were discussing the weather with the pastor’s wife.

  ‘Remember that ramrod with the matched Colts? The pair with ivory-handles he said he’d won in Paris off of a Lascar seaman?’

  ‘Yes. What about him?’

  ‘Recall his trick with the lamp, that damn near got us killed?’

  Herne nodded. There had been a tense situation in a bunkhouse with the ramrod. He and three of his hands were ready to draw against Herne and Coburn, and the cowboy had tried to give them the advantage by ‘accidentally’ setting fire to the waxed cloth on the table, timing his move until the material flared up and Jed and Whitey were distracted.

  It might have worked only there was so much smoke that it also distracted his fellows and they had been easy meat for the two gunmen. Coburn obviously intended something like that. But what?

  ‘What?’

  ‘Gloves.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘Now.’

  While the five men watched, growing irritation on their faces, Whitey turned further so that the Colt was within inches of Jed’s fingers, then dropped his own woolen gloves in the middle of the camp-fire.

  ‘Hell and damnation!’ he shouted, pointing with his left hand at the burning gloves.