Diamond In The Rough (Bodie Kendrick - Bounty Hunter Book 3) Read online

  As if bidden by Kendrick’s thoughts, the sheriff’s office door opened and Watson stepped casually out into the mid-day sun. One end of a long toothpick jutted from the right corner of his mouth and in the crook of his left arm rested a Winchester rifle.

  Watson eyed Kendrick as the latter came to a halt in front of him.

  “We got too damn many live people pouring into town these days,” Watson drawled. “We sure as hell don’t need anybody hauling in dead ones.”

  One corner of Kendrick’s mouth lifted in a wry smile. “If it makes you feel better, Sheriff, this is only half of what I could’ve hauled in. Left two other dead men buried back on the trail.”

  Behind his thick lenses, Watson’s eyes lingered on the pair of booted feet sticking out from under the canvas, then cut back to Kendrick. “So you’re the fella came in with the stage, eh?”

  Kendrick was somewhat surprised that the sheriff had gotten the news so quick. But then he noticed a thin, narrow-faced young man standing in the shadows of the doorway behind Watson and he recalled seeing those same features among the other faces crowding in around the stage right after it rolled in.

  “Yeah, I’m that fella,” Kendrick allowed. “Name’s Kendrick. Bodie Kendrick.”

  Watson squinted, regarding him more closely. “Do I know you from somewhere?”

  “We’ve met. I’ve passed through Lowdown before—back when it was just a quiet, sleepy little town.”

  Watson grunted. “Amen to the good old days. Can’t wait for ‘em to return, just as quick as that damn silver vein dries up.”

  “You’d be dashing a lot of dreams with those sentiments.”

  “Too bad. I got dreams of my own and, like I said, one of them is to get my sleepy little town back once that … Hey, wait a minute. Now I remember.” Watson’s eyes narrowed. “You’re a bounty hunter, ain’t you?”

  “That’s right,” Kendrick said edgily. His line of work didn’t meet with favor in the eyes of many folks, lawmen especially. And even though he and Watson had conducted business in the past without any trouble, there was no way of knowing what might have occurred in the meantime to possibly change the sheriff’s outlook on things. There was, unfortunately, no shortage of men who took up the bounty hunting trade to pursue it with all the viciousness of the lowest form of vermin-ridden scavenger. It only took a few of those to taint the water for everybody.

  Watson gestured toward the bodies on Blockhead. “So you got a couple money-makers here, is that it?”

  “One of ‘em is for sure. Piece of crud named Gordo Lucas. I got papers on him in my saddlebags.”

  “And these are two of the ones who hit the stage?”

  “Uh-huh. The other one I didn’t recognize, but I figure if he was ridin’ with Lucas then there’s the chance for a dodger out on him, too. I was hopin’ you might recognize him or have a stack of more current Wanteds I could check him against.”

  “Sounds reasonable enough,” Watson allowed. “I’ve heard of Lucas, didn’t know he’d shown up anywhere around these parts, though. Christ knows who else we got circling in closer out there.”

  “Reese Eckert was one of the others riding with Lucas, one of the ones who got away.”

  Watson made a sour face. “You’re just full of good news, ain’t you?”

  Kendrick made no reply to that. Instead, he moved around to one side of Blockhead and began untying some of the leather thongs that had the canvas tied down. When he had the tarp loose enough, he peeled the edge of it back and exposed the heads of Lucas and the other man.

  Watson hitched around for a closer look, grabbing a handful of hair and lifting the head of each victim. When he finished with the unidentified man, he let his head drop indifferently and wiped his hand on the canvas.

  Turning back to Kendrick, the sheriff said, “Kinda hard to identify a lump of hamburger that used to be a man’s face, don’t you think?”

  “I had a good look before I pulled the trigger on him. Wasn’t a big improvement.”

  Watson sighed. “Well I need to get up there to the stage station and get a report from Hickory and the surviving passengers. In the meantime, you can go ahead and look through my Wanteds. Luther will show you where they are.” He motioned to the narrow-faced young man still hovering in the doorway. “You hear that, Luther? Show Mr. Kendrick here where I keep the Wanted flyers. While he’s looking through them, send for the coroner and have him come pick up these damn stinkin’ bodies. Tell him to go ahead and pump something in ‘em to cut down that awful stink before I make it back ‘round to see him.”

  Luther finally emerged from the doorway and for the first time Kendrick noticed a deputy’s star pinned on his shirt. “You bet, Sheriff.”

  “Where will I be able to find you after while?” Watson said to Kendrick.

  “I’m hopin’ the Silvertip Hotel has a room available.”

  “If they don’t, Harrup’s saloon a little farther down the street has got rooms upstairs. They keep ‘em up good. A little noisy when the saloon gets to hoppin’, but nice and clean all the same. Don’t tell anybody I said so but, for the difference in price compared to what the Silvertip charges—for their rooms and for the drinks they pour in the hotel bar—that little bit of noise at Harrup’s ain’t enough to keep it from still being a helluva bargain.”

  Kendrick grinned. “Sounds like my kind of place.”

  Chapter Five

  “Leastways you didn’t ride all the way down here for nothing, Kendrick. Hell, you even got a bonus, considerin’ how that Gaucho hombre who was ridin’ with Lucas turned out to also have a price on his head. So what if somebody else already got to Jules Lester, the fella you actually came looking for? Hell, two for one ain’t a bad trade by anybody’s measure.”

  Kendrick shrugged his shoulders. “Can’t argue with that. I got no complaints with the way it turned out. Ain’t like I had any personal beef with Lester, he was nothing to me but a horse thief with a price on his own head. The pay-off for Lucas and Gaucho will spend just as good.”

  “I’ll send out telegrams first thing in the morning to the lawmen who issued the Wanteds on those two,” said Sheriff Watson. “Soon as I get authorization for payment, I’ll square what you’re owed and you can be on your way.”

  The two men were seated at a round-topped table over near one of the front windows to Harrup’s saloon. Only three other patrons were present, nursing drinks down at the far end of the bar. It was early evening, the nighttime crowd of serious drinkers not yet gathered. Outside, through the glass of the big window, the setting sun bathed the dusty main street in a soft, pinkish-gold glow.

  Acting on Watson’s advice from earlier, Kendrick had taken one of the rooms at Harrup’s. Though a bit cramped, it was comfortable and clean, as promised. He sure as hell had stayed in worse.

  In the process of checking in, Kendrick arranged for Blockhead to be stabled at a nearby livery barn. He also found out a hot bath was available in a lopsided shack out back of the saloon so he’d arranged for that, too. He ended up soaking in a wooden tub of sudsy water for the better part of an hour, finally crawling out as pink and puckered as a newborn sparrow.

  After shaving and dressing all in clean duds, he took advantage of what suds were left in the wooden tub and sloshed the soiled clothes he had just removed in them. Once he’d hand-wrung these as dry as he could, he wadded them in a ball and carried them back up to his room where he hung them over the foot of the bed to finish drying.

  The bed had looked too inviting to resist stretching out on it for a short nap. Kendrick woke to find long, late afternoon shadows reaching into the room. He also woke to find himself equal parts hungry and thirsty.

  These conditions were understandable enough, inasmuch as he’d partaken of nothing since a hurried breakfast out on the trail at the break of dawn. Downstairs in the barroom, Kendrick had wasted no time addressing those needs. He ordered a schooner of beer and while it was being drawn he went to the serving counter spread
with cold cuts and bread and other lunch items. The fare was somewhat picked over, since it was well past lunch time, but he had little trouble finding enough to pile a plate high with meat, cheese, slices of sourdough bread, a handful of pickles, and some hardboiled eggs.

  It took a second schooner of beer to wash down the meal. He was left with nothing but a dusting of crumbs on the plate and only two or three remaining swallows of beer, when Sheriff Watson had shown up looking for him.

  Inasmuch as it was late enough in the day to reasonably claim being off duty, the sheriff ordered himself a beer and also another for Kendrick. In the course of the conversation that followed, their talk soon enough got around to the men Kendrick had brought in face down across Blockhead’s saddle. Kendrick confirmed what Deputy Luther had already reported to the sheriff—that he had found a Wanted flyer on Gaucho, the second man no one initially recognized.

  Not much later, however, after Watson idly inquired what brought Kendrick to town in the first place—aside from interrupting the stage ambush and coming in the rest of the way with the coach, that was—the sheriff had cause to confirm some news of his own. When Kendrick explained that he’d come in search of a man named Jules Lester, a fugitive horse thief whom the bounty hunter had gotten a reliable tip could be found in the Lowdown vicinity, Watson recognized the name right off. Trouble was, Lester had been shot and killed only three nights ago in an argument over a crib whore in the miners’ tent city that had sprung up west of town.

  All in all, though, Kendrick didn’t have any gripe. Not considering he’d gotten a “two for one trade,” as Watson had put it, for delivering Lucas and Lester in place of the no longer available Lester. Money-wise, he’d even come out a little ahead.

  “Appreciate you sendin’ those telegrams, Sheriff,” Kendrick said now. “But, knowin’ that Reese Eckert is still somewhere in the area, I hope you won’t mind if I maybe hang around for a spell. Can’t help thinkin’ there might be more money to be made here in your back yard—and I don’t mean from diggin’ in the side of some damn ol’ mountain, either.”

  “What the hell,” said Watson, belching back a gulp of beer. “With all the fools we got pourin’ in every day lookin’ to get silver rich—by fair means or foul—I don’t see where havin’ you around would give me too much more to fret about.”

  Kendrick grinned crookedly. “I think I just got either complimented or offended. I ain’t sure which.”

  “I mean to insult you, son, you won’t have to wonder about it.”

  “I’ll remember that.”

  “Now that you mention it,” the sheriff continued, “there’s probably another reason for you not to hurry off.”

  “What’s that?”

  “The Cavendish station master wanted me to tell you to be sure and drop by and see him when you got the chance. Seems the driver and the passengers from that coach did such a good job of braggin’ on you for the way you came to their rescue that the station master thinks you might have some kind of reward comin’—you know, a sort of appreciation thing.”

  Kendrick cocked one eyebrow. “See what I mean? The opportunities for makin’ money around here just keep poppin’ up.”

  “I don’t want to bust your bubble,” Watson said, “but was I you, I wouldn’t build my hopes too high for pocketing any Cavendish money. The station master—his name is Markeson, by the way—is a fair-minded fella who might look at things a certain way. But that don’t mean Ol’ Skinflint Cavendish is gonna see it the same. Not when it comes to forkin’ over any kind of payment he don’t absolutely have to.”

  “A real dollar-squeezer, eh?”

  “Till the poor things squeal.”

  Outside, the street was growing steadily dimmer. A half dozen new customers had wandered in and four of them had started up a card game at one of the other tables toward the middle of the room. They were all puffing on cigars or cigarettes and a bluish cloud was beginning to form over the table. As was his habit, Kendrick (and perhaps Watson, too, although he likely already knew most of them) gave the new arrivals a quick but thorough once-over as each of them came in. He categorized them as townsmen, laborers and clerks and such, probably regulars and basically harmless types. They all seemed acquainted with one another and as they slapped down their cards there was a good deal of friendly banter tossed back and forth.

  “I mentioned what high marks those stage passengers gave you,” drawled Watson after taking a long pull of beer that nearly emptied his mug. “You spent a fair amount of time in their company, camped overnight with ‘em and all. I’m curious what kind of read you got off of them in return.”

  The question caught Kendrick off guard. He paused for a moment with his own beer raised part way to his mouth. Than, after he’d taken a drink, he said, “That’s kind of a strange thing to ask. You got a particular reason for wanting to know?”

  “Like I said, just curious. Mostly.” Watson shrugged. “That, and the fact I’m a little annoyed because I can’t quite decide what to make of ‘em my own self.”

  “Yeah, I know what you mean,” Kendrick allowed. “On the one hand they seem like fine, upstandin’ folks who had the misfortune to get caught in a dangerous situation. On the other, you get the feeling there’s something more going on that makes them not exactly strangers to trouble. But what the ‘something more’ might be and exactly why I get that feeling about ‘em, I can’t rightly say.”

  “The Gailwood gal claims she’s a writer of some kind. For newspapers and magazines and such. Workin’ on a big, important story.”

  “Uh-huh. The story of a lifetime.”

  “The thing is, though, I’ve seen other writers come through here. Everything from authors of dime novel shoot-em-ups to so-called serious journalists like she’s supposed to be … But I can’t recall any of ‘em ever traveling with a whole crew like she’s doing, especially needin’ her very own private detective for research and protection.”

  “Been wonderin’ on him some myself.”

  “I’ve already got a couple telegrams off. One to the sheriff in Pueblo, where Crandall operated out of, one to his agency’s home office in Denver. Partly I needed to notify ‘em about the loss of their man, partly I’m hopin’ how they answer might reveal something about what he was working on. In turn, that could give me a better clue what to make of Amelia Gailwood and her two companions.”

  “Good thinking, Sheriff. All I got to give you is a hunch. Sounds like you got other things going that stand the chance to turn up some solid answers.”

  “Be nice to think so.”

  By then, Harrup’s had filled up some more. Two barmaids in low-cut spangled dresses had appeared from somewhere and were beginning to circulate, exchanging bawdy remarks and taking drink orders. One of them, a buxom blonde with inviting brown eyes and a generous display of creamy cleavage that a man could get lost in, came over to where Kendrick and Watson were seated.

  “Evening, Sheriff,” she said in a honeyed drawl.

  “Miss Sally,” Watson replied, touching a finger to the brim of his hat.

  “Can I get you and your broad-shouldered friend here a couple of refills?”

  “Not for me, thanks.” Watson produced a thick pocket watch and checked the time. “I best be headed home. Myrtle’s makin’ roast chicken for supper tonight and if I show up too late, after she’s slaved in a hot kitchen all afternoon, she’s liable to take a carving knife to me instead of the bird.”

  The sheriff finished his drink and stood to leave, saying to Kendrick, “I’ll let you know as soon as I hear back on those Wanted dodgers. And don’t forget to check in with the Cavendish station master in the morning. But, like I warned you, don’t get your hopes too high.”

  “I’ll keep that in mind. Thanks for the follow-through on those Wanteds, and for the drink.”

  “Don’t mention it. See you ‘round.”

  Sally remained standing beside Kendrick’s table. After the sheriff had gone out the door, she said, “All that talk
of Wanted papers and such—you must be that fella who broke up the stage robbery before it turned any worse.”

  “I happened by and lent a hand,” Kendrick admitted. “Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough to be much help to the two men we had to leave buried back on the trail.”

  “I knew Lenny Thorpe. He was a decent sort. He usually stopped by for a few drinks when he was in town. But he knew how to handle his liquor and he also knew how to keep his hands to himself.”

  Kendrick smiled. “He must’ve been real iron-willed, then. Spendin’ much time around a pretty thing like you would make it hard for most men to behave themselves.”

  “Sometimes,” said Sally, her lips spreading in a sly smile of her own, “a gal don’t mind the right fella misbehavin’ a little.”

  “I’ll be sure to keep that in mind,” Kendrick said, meeting her gaze boldly.

  Further discussion was interrupted by a young Mexican lad who’d entered the saloon only moments earlier and had been standing just inside the doorway, holding his sombrero in his hands looking around uncertainly. Spotting Kendrick, he came over to the table. “Excuse me, senor, senorita,” he said. “Is it, senor, that you are the one called Bodie Kendrick?”

  “It is,” Kendrick confirmed.

  From behind the sombrero, the lad produced a sealed envelope, which he held out to Kendrick. “Please pardon the intrusion, but I was asked to deliver this to you.”

  Kendrick took the envelope. “Gracias.”

  The lad turned and was gone before Kendrick had any chance to ask about the sender or to offer a gratuity for the delivery.

  “Secret admirer?” asked Sally, looking on.

  “Guess I’ll have to find out,” Kendrick said.

  He broke the wax seal with his thumb and, from inside the envelope, withdrew a folded sheet of Silvertip Hotel stationary. Sally was trying not to show it, but clearly brimming with curiosity all the same. Kendrick unfolded the piece of paper so only he could see what was written on it.

  Mr. Kendrick – At your earliest convenience, please call on me.