“Don’t forget the tobacco,” I said. “I’m beginning to think you and I look like the stupid type, Buck.”
“Maybe you. Me, I look smart and handsome. Women are always telling me how they like my big brown eyes.”
“They look like cow eyes to me, and they slaughter cows.”
We rode on for another good clip, and I was just about ready to turn back when Mix said, “Here ’tis.”
The trail broke open and fanned out into a little path that led upward into a mass of yellow pines; the same trees that gave the Black Hills its name. From a distance they looked jet black.
“This is it?” I asked.
“This is the path to Carson,” Mix said. “He’s got headquarters up there a piece.”
I didn’t like it and said as much, but Bucklaw said, “What the hell. We’ve come this far.”
So we traveled another two hours and the sunlight bled out and a silver moon came up and peeked over the rocks and trees like a huge eye. I tell you, that late December moon was a beaut.
We came to another narrow trail and veered off to the right. Mix pointed down the path and said, “Last leg of it.”
I looked at Bucklaw. “I think maybe I’ll just whip hell out of you for getting me into this.”
Bucklaw laughed.
“I mean it this time,” Mix said. “Ain’t no more than a hundred yards down that trail.”
“Well,” I said, taking my Springfield from its boot and pointing it at Mix, “lead on. And remember this, Mix. If you’ve got some plans that I don’t like, I’ll end them.”
Mix looked nervous for the first time. He turned his face to the trail and urged his mule forward. “Just be careful with that thing,” he said softly.
“If it goes off,” Bucklaw said, “we’ll just tell God you died.”
We rode on. Mix hadn’t been lying. A hundred yards down the trail we came to a couple of little wooden shacks, and around it were a half-dozen miner tents.
Several men, all armed to the teeth, stood about in the light of a big fire. They leveled their rifles at us. They didn’t look shy about using them. Many of those rifles were shiny Winchester 73’s. Within moments those repeaters could make a sieve out of us, but I would have the satisfaction of seeing Mix lose the back of his head. I kept the carbine leveled on him.
As we drew nearer the shacks, I saw there were a half-dozen men in old, gray uniforms —or at least parts of uniforms. They were ex-Confederates like ourselves. It struck me odd that they clung to the memories of that foul war this long. I liked to think of it as dead, ten years past and buried. But here were the worms of it wriggling up from the dirt.
There were also several Indians in the group. From their looks—handsome faces and combed-back hair—I took them to be Crows. One of them was nearly six-feet tall with a fistful of eagle quills in his hair. Someone had once told me that the eagle feather was the highest honor a Crow warrior could achieve, and here this buck had enough in his hair to plumage a bird. It meant he was brave and had lifted many scalps.
It struck me odd that the Crow would be here, but then again many of the Indians—especially the Crow who had always been friendly with the whites—were hiring out to white men. The army had as many Crows as scouts. They were perfect for hunting and tracking the Sioux, whom they hated.
We rode up to the largest shack and dismounted. I kept my carbine with me, and in as casual manner as he could manage, Bucklaw slipped his old Henry from its boot.
The men watched us. We watched them.
Mix led us up on the porch of the large shack and knocked at the door. A lantern was lit inside, and after a moment a tall man in a crisp white shirt stuffed into surprisingly well-conditioned Confederate trousers, answered the door. Lantern light crawled along the left side of his face, a hard face of about fifty. He had graying black hair and a mustache that had already made it to snow. His eyes were slitted.
“Recruits?” the man said.
“Mr. Carson,” Mix said, removing his hat, “I think I got you some new boys. Southerners like us, sir.”
“Of course,” Carson said, as if that were understood. “Name’s Beau Carson, formerly major in the army of the Confederacy.” Then, flatly: “I pay good wages and I don’t take any bull.”
“Name’s Melgrhue,” I said. “This here is Bucklaw. Being a major in the Confederate army don’t mean a damn thing in 1875. War’s been over for years.”
“Not by my reckoning.”
“Nor mine either,” Bucklaw said.
Carson smiled at him.
Bucklaw said, “But I didn’t ride all the way out here to agree with you.”
“I don’t like smart mouths,” Carson said.
“Snaps my heart in two,” I said.
“You best hold your tongue,” Mix said. “This here is the Major Carson that rode with Quantrill.”
“We’re fresh out of medals,” Bucklaw said.
Carson frowned at Mix.
“They looked like good men,” Mix said. “You know I can pick good men just by looking at them.”
“That’s what you keep telling me,” Carson said sourly.
“You know I can, Mr. Carson, Major, sir.”
“I think I’m going to throw up,” Bucklaw said.
“They wear those revolvers like they know how to use them,” Mix whined. “I can tell.”
“We know how to use them,” I said.
“I could have you two shot, you know?” Carson said suddenly, looking right at us.
“You could,” I admitted. “But I could have you shot as fast as you ordered us shot. Maybe faster.” I let my carbine float that way.
“You are very insolent,” Carson said.
“We keep hearing that,” Bucklaw said.
Carson licked his thin lips and mustache. “We seem to have gotten off on the wrong foot, gentlemen. Shall we step inside and discuss business matters in a civilized manner?”
“Why not?” Bucklaw said.
It was smoky inside, due to both a fireplace and a too highly wicked lantern. The place smelled of smoke, tobacco, sex and whisky.
On a bunk bed, in the dark side of the room, was a woman. She was Indian, Cheyenne, maybe. She sat upright in the bunk with a dingy sheet pulled up around her breasts. She was pretty, but very sheepish looking. There was a large scar on her right nostril. The slitting of a nostril was the punishment many Plains tribes reserved for adulterous women. Their lives were often miserable after being branded that way, and they sometimes sought sanctuary among the whites. I figured that was the story here.
“Get out,” Carson said to the woman.
She pulled the sheet around her, wrapped it, rolled off the bunk and went into the back room.
Carson sat down at the table, waved a hand at the remaining chairs. We all sat. Bucklaw and I kept our rifles in our laps.
“Hungry?” Carson said.
“Let’s get on with it,” I said. “We were told we could get a job.”
“So you can,” Carson said. “You boys know how to use those guns?”
“We’ve had right smart experience,” Bucklaw said.
“The war?”
“Yeah,” I said. “That and Indians, few other things.”
“You look to be experienced men.”
“We are,” Bucklaw said, “and we’re broke.”
“We can fix that,” Carson said. “We can offer you men, say, four thousand dollars?”
“For the both of us?” Bucklaw said.
“Apiece,” Carson said. He stood up and picked a cigar off the fireplace mantel.
“What’s the hitch?” I asked.
Carson bent to the fireplace and plucked out a blazing brand, lit his cigar with it. “No hitch,” he said after puffing the cigar to life. “I just want you two to go to work for me, join the team.”
“What does your team do?” I asked.
Carson looked at Mix, and they traded smiles. He turned back to me, tossed the brand in the fireplace.
“Well, friends,” Carson said, “we take from the Yankees and give to the poor—meaning ourselves.”
4
A little later Carson had the Indian woman bring biscuits of a sort, dried meat and coffee.
“Gal isn’t much of a cook,” Carson said, after shooing her away, “But she has her purposes.” He winked at us. I decided right then and there that I did not like the man, or trust him.
We had given up our rifles, leaned them against the wall, but Bucklaw and I never let our hands stray far from our revolvers. That old converted 1860 Colt .44 had seen me through many a scrape, and if need be, I was prepared to test it again. It was sort of like my Springfield 73. It did not match the speed of a repeater, but it was accurate and had served me well. I liked having friends I could count on, and they, along with Bucklaw, had served time after time.
Mix was carrying a modern revolver, and racked near the fireplace were two shiny Winchesters and a fine double-barreled shotgun. I kept them, as well as the armed men outside, in mind.
I was certain of one thing. If we did not join Carson, we’d be buzzard chow by sunup. Once recruited, you were in, like it or not. Knowing Bucklaw, I figured that was the way he saw it too.
“I reckon you got something planned?” Bucklaw said.
Carson nodded, called to the Indian woman for more coffee and food. She brought a pot of coffee to the table and a bowl of some sort of greasy gravy. Carson poured coffee in his cup, gravy in his plate, and chased the greasy stuff around with a biscuit.
“You can talk about it,” Bucklaw said. “I’m not shy.”
Carson grinned. “I can talk about it, but I won’t. I like to put it to my men right before I do the job. Two weeks at the earliest.”
“Well,” Bucklaw said, “There aren’t many banks around here, and no immediate railroad. That means we’ve either got to go to Bismarck and jump the Northern Pacific, or down to Cheyenne and jump the Union Pacific.”
Carson let the biscuit hang halfway out of his mouth.
“We just look stupid,” I said.
“Remember what I told you, Jim,” Bucklaw said. “You look stupid. Me, I look bright and handsome.”
Carson finished off his biscuit. “All right, so we’re going to rob a train.”
“Probably the Northern Pacific, now that I think about it,” Bucklaw said. “Not quite so many settlements around.”
Mix looked like a rattlesnake about to strike. “You just might be too smart for your own good, boy.”
“I’ll worry about that, Mix,” Bucklaw said.
“Shut up, Mix,” Carson said. “You too, Bucklaw.”
Bucklaw looked at me. “You think maybe he’s talking to me?”
“I think he is, Bob. Let’s see. I’m Melgrhue, that’s Mix, and he isn’t talking to himself, and he did say Bucklaw. Yeah, it’s you.”
“You boys ought to try and get in one of them stage shows since you’re so clever,” Carson said. “You boys in or not?”
“We’re in,” I said, “but let’s not talk around it. Tell it straight and tell it now. Your other boys may be too stupid to figure a little thing like that out, about the train and all, but we’re not. Tell it.”
“Very well,” Carson said, and he poured himself another cup of coffee. “The Northern Pacific it is. Mix here knew a man that worked in Bismarck. He says that they intend to haul a lot of miner’s gold out of Bismarck and back east shortly. Says there will be as much as one hundred thousand dollars.”
“That sounds like an awful lot,” I said.
“Comes on good authority,” Mix said.
“There’s enough for everyone, a good share,” Carson said. “Between you and me, boys, the four thousand apiece I offered you is more than double what most of these fellows are getting. I took you two for a smarter-than-average pair right from the start. And them Crows, well, they don’t hardly get a damn thing. Whisky keeps most of them happy, that and a few dollars here and there.”
I liked the man even less than I thought. “When’s all this happen?” I asked.
“That little secret stays with me,” Carson said. “Couple of smart boys like yourselves just might decide to do the job on your own, leave me out. If you knew when the gold was going out, that is. You don’t. I do.”
I looked at Bucklaw. “And we wonder why we lost the war.”
“I advise you,” Carson said, “to keep the war out of this. We lost because Lee was foolish, gave up easy.”
“That it?” I said.
“We shouldn’t have lost,” Bucklaw said.
I looked at Bucklaw again. “Hey, didn’t I come in here with you?”
“Yeah, but Carson’s right. We shouldn’t have lost.”
“The hell with it,” I said. “War’s over.”
“Enough then,” Carson said. “You boys in?”
“I reckon,” I said, and then we all shook on it.
5
Mix took us outside and showed us our bunkdown spot. “You boys play your cards right,” he said, “and you’ll do just fine.”
“I was real worried about that,” Bucklaw said.
“Keep it up,” Mix said. He went back to Carson’s shack.
“I hate that little shit,” Bucklaw said.
When we had our bedrolls laid out, I said, “Are we going through with this? We could sneak off.”
“Why not? Want to go back to mining?”
“No, but I’m not real keen on robbing trains. Law frowns on it.”
“Yankee law.”
“You and Carson can’t accept change.”
“I reckon not,” Bucklaw said, and he got into his bedroll and was soon fast asleep. A light sleep, I knew. Once when we had been set upon by claim jumpers—just like there was a claim there to steal—I had seen him roll out of the covers and shoot two out of three before I could drop the other. The boy was fast.
I positioned my saddle under my head and decided I wouldn’t get much sleep this night. No sir, I didn’t trust that old major, not one damn bit.
Well after midnight I awoke from an uneasy sleep. Sound had brought me around. Not stealthy sound, just plain old noise. Bucklaw was already sitting up. He had that .38 Prescott revolver in his lap on top of the blanket.
“Those Crows,” he said. “They’re drunk.”
Sure enough, they were. All except one. The man with the eagle feathers.
The Crows were clustered together about the fire, turning up jugs of whisky—all but Eagle Feather. He sat on a log in front of the fire and looked into the flames. Behind him one of the Crows laughed, stumbled and fell on his back.
“To hell with them,” Bucklaw said, and pulling the Prescott under the covers with him, he went back to sleep.
One of the Crows stumbled over to Eagle Feather with jug in hand. He laid an arm around Eagle Feather’s shoulders, jabbered something.
Eagle Feather jumped up, wheeled and forearmed the drunken Crow, knocked him reeling to the ground. He snapped something at the drunk Indian, then at the others. All of them were silent a moment, then Eagle Feather turned and stomped off to where the horses were tied. I heard him ride out of there, and I couldn’t help wishing it was me.
The Crows started up again. The one Eagle Feather had knocked down rolled to his knees and puked. The others laughed.
I pulled back under my covers and tried to sleep.
Next morning Eagle Feather had not returned, and it would be some time before I saw him again.
6
All of this went through my head as we rode down to meet the train. We had been with Carson only a short while before it was time for the job, and every minute it drew closer, I wished I’d gotten out.
I didn’t, though. Reckon it was because I knew Bucklaw wouldn’t.
So I rode down to meet the train.
The plan was simple. Carson and his men had blocked the track with trees. At a designated time we were supposed to come out yelling and shooting, as were other men posted on the far side.
Carson thought this might dishearten the soldiers who were supposed to be guarding the train; might make them think that there were more of us than there were and that we had them properly surrounded.
We would take the gold, with as little force as possible, then fade back into the Hills and Sioux country. That in itself was a bit risky, but it would keep the army off our tracks to some extent, would allow us time to split our spoils and split the team, let every man go his own way.
It would be a good haul. I was worried that one train wouldn’t do Bucklaw, however. He was a good man and I loved him like a brother, but he was eaten up by the bitter aftertaste of the war. Easy money looked good to him.
No matter what Bucklaw wanted to do, I had decided this was it for me. I had plans to go down to Texas, or maybe Mexico, for awhile. No more trains for me.
We could see the train clearly now, slowing to a stop. There was the deadly sound of gunfire. Bucklaw and I began to fire our rifles in the air.
The locomotive sputtered and creaked to a stop. The central core of Carson’s operation—three Crow Indians, Mix, and a blonde giant named Taggart—rushed the engine.
The train gave up without a fight. We didn’t see any soldiers. After a moment or two, a couple of men were pushed down from the engine and they crumpled in the dirt before a dozen leveled rifles and revolvers.
“Up against the train,” Carson ordered.
They did as they were told. The men who had pushed them out turned back to the train to search for the gold. They forced the passengers out at gunpoint, lined them up in front of the cars. One of the Crows confiscated weapons.
We sat on our horses and waited.
After awhile the two men who were searching the train came back with confused looked on their faces.
“You looked good?” Carson said.
They nodded.
“Look again. Mix, Taggart, help them.”
Mix climbed down off his horse and Carson said, “I thought you said there were supposed to be soldiers.”
Mix shrugged.
“He sounded disappointed,” I said to Bucklaw.
Carson rode down the length of the train and back. After a bit Mix came out of one of the passengers cars and dropped to the ground.