Blood at Bear Lake Read online

  Then, smiling broadly, he headed for Wilson’s Café and that glass of whiskey he had been looking forward to for the past week or more.

  33

  “WELL, I’LL BE a son of a bitch!”

  The hairy man in buckskins grinned and said, “Yeah, I heard that about you, Joe.”

  Joe threw his arms around Cyrus Brainard, tipped his head back, and let rip with a roar that no mountain lion could have matched. “Damn, Cy, what’s it been? Four, five years since I seen your ugly face?”

  “Som’pin like that.”

  “All that time”—Joe shook his head—“an’ you ain’t got a lick handsomer.”

  “But we’s older, Joe. Say, I heard you got killed down in Santa Fe a while back.”

  “Yeah, but it didn’t take. Old Scratch an’ me had us one of them duels to see did he get my soul. His mistake was lettin’ me choose the weapons, an’ I picked knife fighting.” Joe laughed. “Only man I ever met could best me in a knife fight, Cy, was you. And I ain’t so sure about you.”

  “Are you still a drinking man, Joseph?”

  “Does a bear shit in the woods?”

  “Then let me buy you a drink.” Cy winked. “’Cept here they call it Missouri coffee. Guaranteed to taste like river water. And if they watered it any more, it likely would. Hey, Mike, two Missouri coffee for me and my friend Joe Moss here. Me and him have rode the high mountains together and lifted more scalps than you could tote if you had a wheelbarrow to carry them all in. Hurry up now and don’t skimp on the whiskey, hear?”

  Joe leaned his new Henry in a corner and took a seat at the table near it. Cy fetched their “Missouri coffee” from the bar and joined him there.

  “How’s it going for you, Joe?”

  “Pretty fair. I got myself hitched for one thing.”

  “No shit.”

  “Not no winter marriage neither. I mean the real thing. The forever kind.”

  “I never would’ve suspected that from you, Joe. You always had a way with the squaws and the doxies. But permanent? With a decent woman? I never woulda thought it.”

  “T’ tell you the truth, Cyrus, neither would I. How’s about you?”

  “Oh, a little of this, little of that. I hunted buffalo for a spell. Trapped some wild horses. You know how it is.”

  “So I do, Cy. But this is a big country. I expect there’ll always be a way for the likes of us to scrape by.”

  Cyrus took a long swallow of the liquor. Which in truth was not all that bad. “Drink up, Joe. Your money ain’t no good this evenin’.”

  “You in the chips now, Cy?”

  “I damned sure am. Just got paid off from guiding a fella that thinks he can find a route he can take a railroad across the mountains clear to the Pacific Ocean.”

  “Then I hope the son of a bitch is wrong because this country would go to hell quick if a railroad ever comes through an’ a pile of pork eaters with it.”

  “I think maybe he can do it, but it wouldn’t be easy,” Brainard said. “Besides, they’re all busy with their war back East.”

  “That’s still going on, is it?”

  “Ayuh. It’s in all the newspapers.”

  “I’ll have to get me one. A newspaper, I mean.”

  “Joe, you can’t read a damned thing. I seen you make your mark when you sold your plews. You can’t even write your own name.”

  “I can now. I studied on it while I was laid up hurt one time.”

  Cyrus grinned. “My old friend Joe Moss can read. Now I’ve heard everything.” He finished his whiskey and called for another, then turned back to Joe. “Guess what I’m doing now.”

  “Hell, Cy, I’d believe most anything. Tell me.”

  “You know I’ve hunted just about every beast there is in this country.”

  “Yeah. We both have.”

  “Well, now, I’ve gone to hunting men, too. One man anyway.”

  “What the hell for?”

  “There’s a reward out, Joe, for the person who can bring in some crazy sonuvabitch that blew up an entire silver mine back in Nevada. Blew it clean off the map an’ killed a bunch of people, too.”

  “I’ll be damned,” Joe said. “Who is this fellow?”

  “Nobody living seems to know his name, but he got away on a Appaloosa horse.” Cyrus accepted his refreshed drink and took a swallow, then cocked his head to one side and half-closed his eyelid on that side of his face. “It occurs to me, Joe, that you used to favor them flashy horses. You still got that old Palouse?”

  “No, he got killed. Injun arrow that was intended for me got him instead. He was an awful good horse, though. Now I’m on a big black. Supposed to be a dray horse, but he goes fine under saddle. The more I use him the better I like him, too. Steady as a rock and not stumble-footed like you might think a horse with such big feet would be. Why?”

  “I was just asking, Joe, that’s all.”

  Cyrus finished his cup of whiskey, then leaned forward across the table to peer into Joe’s eyes. “I won’t be able to quit wondering about this, Joe, unless I come right out and ask the question. It will gravel me something awful.”

  “Then ask it, Cy. You know I won’t lie to you, no matter what.”

  “Joseph, old pard, did you go and blow up a silver mine belonging to a family name of Peabody?”

  “Cy, I promised I wouldn’t lie to you no matter what you asked, nor will I. Yes. It was me that done it. I had good reason to do it, though. The Peabodys were trying to kill my wife. They still are. You know I won’t step back an’ let that happen.”

  “Aw, shit!” Cy pushed his empty cup aside and shifted his chair back a few inches. “Joe, I gave my word an’ took money on a deal, too. I promised a man I’d stand watch here in Salt Lake for that man on the Palouse horse.”

  “And when you found him?” He was sure he already knew the answer to that, but he wanted to make sure before he did anything he might regret later.

  “Joe, I took money from the fella . . . a down payment, he called it, to bind the deal . . . you and me is drinking on his money right now.”

  “What did you promise to do, Cy?”

  “Dammit, Joe, I promised to kill the fellow for this Peabody.”

  Joe fingered his chin. Then smiled. “You an’ me go back a long way together, so let’s at least make this interesting. I’ve always wondered if I could take you with a knife, Cy. Like I said before, you’re the best I ever seen. Except maybe me. Now’s our chance to find out which of us is the better hand with a blade.”

  “Knife only? No tomahawks? You was always way better’n me with a ’hawk, Joseph. It wouldn’t be a fair fight was we to use the ’hawks.”

  “All right, Cyrus. No tomahawks nor pistols neither. Just cold steel, rough an’ tumble.”

  “Like in the old days,” Brainard said rather wistfully.

  “Yeah, Cy. Like in the old days.”

  “Then let’s have us another drink together before we get down to it. Is that all right with you?”

  “Aye, old friend, so it be. But it would please me t’ be able to buy the next round of drinks.”

  “You’re a good man, Joe Moss.”

  “And you’re a good friend, Cyrus Brainard.”

  Joe went to the bar and brought back two more cups of whiskey. He handed one to Cy, saluted him with the cup, and said, “Drink up, friend. At least we can enjoy one last cup together, eh?”

  “To old times,” Cy said, raising his cup to Joe as well.

  “To old times.”

  34

  “HEY! DAMMIT, LEAVE those tables where I had them,” the barman yelled across the room. Joe and Cy were dragging the heavy tables aside to clear a space.

  “We won’t be long,” Cy promised.

  “I don’t want them moved to begin with,” the bartender insisted. “Now put them back where you found them.”

  “In a minute,” Joe told him. “We need us some room here.”

  “What the hell do you want room for?” />
  “We’re gonna have us a little fight, mountain style.”

  “A fight! Not in my place you aren’t.”

  “Who’s gonna stop us? Some pork eater like you? I don’t damn well think so.” Cyrus shoved another table to the side and kicked the chairs underneath it to get them out of the way, too.

  There were not a great many men in the place, but when they heard there was to be a fight, they crowded close around the rough ring Joe and Cyrus had laid out with the tables and the chairs.

  “You boys want a minute to make some bets?” Cy said, laughing. “That’s fine if’n you do, but keep one thing in mind. I’m a wild an’ woolly he-coon of the mountains. Old Joe here is a fine fella, but his scalp is gonna be on my belt t’night.” Cyrus tipped his head back and roared.

  “My friend here never figured out that it ain’t stew till there’s meat in the pot, and he ain’t won no fight with me,” Joe returned.

  “Yet,” Cy amended. “And I ain’t fixing to neither. Not until you and me has had us one last drink together.”

  Joe bobbed his head in agreement. “Damn right.”

  “Barman! Two mugs o’ your best. Fill them full to the top, mind you, for one of us is about to have his last drink on this earth.”

  A buzz swept through the crowd at the news that this would be a fight to the death. Several men ran outside and began shouting the word up and down the street. Then they and a horde of others thundered back inside Wilson’s Café.

  By the time fresh mugs were delivered, there was barely room enough in the place for another soul to squeeze inside the door, and the bartender was doing a bang-up business. The man was no longer complaining that his tables had been moved, Joe noticed. He was too busy pouring liquor into mugs and money into his cash box to take time for comment for or against the fight.

  Joe tossed his whiskey back. Its warm glow spread through his belly, and the effect of the alcohol made him feel loose and ready for anything. He grinned. “You’re a good man, Cy. I want you t’ know how I feel about that.”

  “Likewise, Joe. You’re a good man and a good friend.”

  “You ready?”

  “Ayuh. Reckon I am.” Cy tipped his head back and drained the last of the liquor from his mug, tiny rivulets of whiskey escaping from either side and running into his beard where it disappeared from sight.

  Joe set his empty mug onto the nearest table. Cy tossed his onto the floor.

  Cy pulled his knife, a long slender blade that looked like it had started out as an ordinary kitchen butcher knife, but with a handle that had been wrapped in beaded deerskin with long fringes falling from the butt end. Cy had been carrying that same knife for about as long as Joe could remember.

  But then the same was true about Joe’s old bowie. He drew it out of its sheath now.

  Joe smiled at his old friend and nodded.

  Words were no longer needed between them.

  For the sake of honor, one of them would die here, Cyrus to keep his word to a man whose job he had accepted, or Joe, who would not turn aside from his quest to again find his beloved Fiona.

  As one, the two old friends dropped into fighting crouches, free hands slightly extended, knives balanced in their right palms.

  As one, they began shuffling slowly to their left. Circling. Watching. Waiting for the other to make that one fatal error.

  35

  A KNIFE FIGHT CONDUCTED between men who know what they are doing looks more like a dance than a brawl. Often, it is decided by a single thrust or slash. But it can take a long time getting to that point.

  Each tightening of a muscle or shift of balance can be read by the other. Each time one combatant readies himself to thrust, the other can see and can counter the motion.

  Joe knew Cy’s fighting style from of old. Cyrus liked to lull an opponent in with a false opening, then lash out and disembowel the other with a cut high on the belly.

  Joe himself preferred to bore straight in, battering down the other man’s knife hand with a cut across the wrist followed by a stab to the heart. And Cy knew it.

  Cy had a slightly longer reach than Joe. Joe felt he was a little the quicker of the pair.

  Circling. To the left, always to the left. Right foot forward. Knife held low. Breathing shallow and rapid. No matter how many times a man had done this in the past, it was not something he would ever accept as routine. There was damned sure nothing boring about it. Not to the participants.

  The shouting, yammering crowd inside Wilson’s Café quickly began to tire of the slow shuffle round and round.

  “Come on, you.”

  “Blood. Show us some blood, eh?”

  “Ah, you bastards’re jus’ playin’ around.”

  “My old granny can fight better’n this.”

  Joe ignored the fools. Likely, not a single one of them had ever himself been a participant in a knife fight. Cy, however, seemed to flush a little darker as the noise of the hecklers increased and their taunts came from all around the café.

  If Cy became thoroughly agitated by the taunts, it would break his concentration and degrade his ability. Joe slowed the pace of his circling. The shouts from the crowd swelled in volume and became nastier.

  Joe found that almost comical. How many of these pork eaters would dare to say those things directly to Cyrus or to Joe? They needed the anonymity and the encouragement of a crowd to give them the courage to speak, to say things that they otherwise would not dare lest they get their own scalps lifted.

  Very carefully, Joe slowed down even further until he was barely moving.

  Cy was breathing rapidly now. His eyes kept cutting back and forth, roving over the shouting faces behind Joe. He was obviously distracted by the crowd.

  Joe feigned tripping, but Cy did not take the bait. Joe followed his phony trip with an equally false limp, as if he had pulled a muscle in his left thigh.

  And he slowed again, almost coming to a halt, barely moving. To his left. To his left. Circling.

  The crowd shrieked in fury over the lack of action in this so-called fight to the death they felt had been promised to them.

  Joe barely heard, but Cy’s face flushed dangerously dark. He had taken just about all he could stand, and Joe knew it.

  “Don’t do it, old friend,” he silently told himself. “Don’t.”

  But Cyrus did.

  With a roar he leaped forward, eyes flashing, knife held back until the last possible moment, but then lashing out with all the speed of a striking rattlesnake.

  Joe thought he was ready, but even so he misjudged his old friend’s ability. He felt an icy cold sensation flick across his left forearm, and knew he had been cut, perhaps badly. Blood began to flow, dripping off his hand.

  The crowd roared their approval. There was blood in sight. The volume of their shouts increased until Joe felt he could feel it like a weight pressing in on him from all sides.

  Cy grunted, stepped quickly to his right, and his blade flashed again, driving toward Joe’s gut.

  Joe’s own blade darted forward, reaching not to open up Cy’s belly, but cutting hard across the hand that held that deadly butcher knife. It was a maneuver that meant Joe’s own death if he misjudged the speed or the direction of Cy’s thrust. It was all or nothing.

  The razor-sharp bowie whipped across Cy’s hand.

  Cy cried out. He pulled his hand back. Or what remained of it. His thumb, along with his knife, tumbled to the floor. His forefinger had been severed, and dangled loose from what was left of his hand, held there by a thin strip of skin. Cy blanched and ripped it free, letting it drop into the sawdust on the floor.

  Cyrus Brainard’s knife-fighting days were ended.

  But he was still alive. Both of them were.

  Joe felt a flush of deep relief.

  Cy could snatch up his knife and try to fight with his left hand. Joe did not for an instant believe that he would. Honor had been satisfied. For both of them.

  “Let me get you a bar towel t’
wrap around that,” Joe said. “An’ a mug o’ whiskey to help take the pain away. We’ll get a doctor later if we need to.”

  Cy nodded. “You’re a pal, Joe.”

  “Always will be, Cy. God knows, you’ve saved my bacon enough times in the past.”

  “Just like you done mine.”

  “Pull that chair out, Cy. I’ll bring the whiskey.” He turned away and raised his voice. “You there. Clear aside. I need to get t’ the bar.”

  “Not in here you won’t,” someone called back. “Set down. We’ll bring you boys your whiskey. All youse can drink.”

  Joe didn’t figure he could reject an offer like that. He dragged a table and two chairs free of the mess he and Cy had created. He glanced toward the floor and then at Cy. “D’you want those?”

  “Those what?”

  “Those there.” He nodded. “Your thumb an’ that finger.”

  “Naw, I don’t want ’em.”

  “One more thing, Cy.”

  “Yes?”

  “You know I got t’ take your scalp, don’t you?”

  “Jesus!” Cyrus sighed and dropped his chin. “Go ahead then. Fair is fair.”

  Joe took up his bowie again and leaned forward. But instead of lifting Cy’s scalp, he took hold of his friend’s beard and carved a few inches off the bottom, then turned and held the trophy high, to the approving laughter of the men who had watched the fight.

  “Damn you, Moss,” Cy complained. But he was smiling when he said it, even though he was holding a bit of rag over the empty meat where a thumb and finger should have been.

  “Shut up and have a drink, Cy. It’ll make you feel better.”

  36

  JOE’S HEAD HAD surely doubled in size and turned hollow. And there was some evil sonuvabitch pounding on it with drum mallets every time his heartbeat sent blood pulsing through his veins.

  “Jesus, Mary, an’ Joseph,” he mumbled as he tried to sit up, failed, and fell back on . . . on what? Where the hell was he anyway? He could smell . . . shit. Genuinely. It smelled like somebody had crapped himself. And he could smell beer and puke and sawdust.

  Which explained where he was, lying on a saloon floor. Must have passed out and spent the night there.