Terror Town by Jon Sharpe

Author:Jon Sharpe
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2010-10-12T00:00:00+00:00

13

Willowby was off the wagon seat and standing near the ditch talking to several others when Fargo rode up leading the horses with the dead men slung over their saddles. One of the diggers said something and Willowby turned. The others stopped digging to stare.

Fargo came to a stop and smiled and said, “I believe these belong to you.”

Willowby was a big man gone to paunch. He had remarkably pale skin for a farmer, and close-set eyes. His lips were the size of middling pickles, and when he scowled, as he did now, they seemed to cover half his face. “What the hell?” He stepped to the horses and put a hand on Keller’s back. “Who did this?”

“They were shot,” Fargo said. He was watching the others without being obvious. Only two wore revolvers and neither had made a move to draw.

“I can see that,” Willowby said curtly. “What I want to know is why? And who the hell are you?”

“I’m the gent who did you a favor and brought them back,” Fargo said.

“I’m obliged, mister. But I’m still waiting to hear the particulars. I sent them to check on a woman and her boy, the Lucases, and now they’re dead. It doesn’t make any sense.”

“Maybe it was the boy who shot them,” a digger said.

“They say he’s a good hunter,” said another. “He can handle a rifle real good.”

“They were shot with a pistol,” Fargo said.

“How do you know?” Willowby asked.

“I was there.”

“Why didn’t you say so?” Willowby stepped up to the Ovaro. “Tell me about it. Every detail.”

“There was a man at the farm—”

“Did you get a good look at him?” Willowby interrupted. “What was he like?”

“He told your men that you stole the farm out from under the Lucases.”

“What?”

“He said you had the father hung on a trumped-up charge.”

“What?”

“He said you did it because your farm is dying. You need more water and figured to help yourself to theirs.”

“This man said all that?”

Fargo nodded. “He said you’re in cahoots with the mayor and the marshal, and the three of you put together aren’t worth a gob of spit.”

Willowby sputtered and stamped a foot like a riled buffalo. “Lies. All lies. Describe this man to me. I’m going after him.”

“He’s about my height,” Fargo said.

“Yes.”

“And about my weight.”

“Yes. Yes.”

“And he wear buckskins and a white hat and a red bandanna,” Fargo said.

“Mister, you’ve just described yourself—” Willowby stopped. He had it now, and a hint of fear crept into his tone.

“Hold on. You shot them?”

“Dead as dead can be.”

“And it was you who said all that about me stealing the Lucas farm?”

“I cannot tell a lie,” Fargo lied.

“Why, you’ve committed murder.”

“So did you, at the end of a rope.”

Willowby took a step back. “Lucas was arrested and tried and convicted. I wasn’t the judge. I didn’t sentence him.”

“A rigged trial,” Fargo said, “with your friend Bascomb presiding. You might as well have pointed a gun at Lucas and pulled the trigger.”

Willowby glanced at Fargo’s Colt and wet his lips.

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