He wasn’t surprised by Bosworth’s answer. He knew what effect wealth and power in a man had on some women. He held up the roll of bills. “I’ll go give the boys their share. Much obliged.”
“Just keep doing your job,” Bosworth said. “There’ll be a lot more where that come from.”
That was exactly what Grimshaw was counting on.
He tucked the roll away inside his shirt as he left the suite. He wasn’t going to walk through a hotel lobby, even a hotel as high-class as the Eureka House, carrying that much money in the open.
When he reached the porch, he paused and looked both ways along the street. A man on horseback caught his attention. The hombre was riding a big, gold-colored horse and had a shaggy dog that looked more like a wolf padding along beside him. The man had rigged a crude travois, and he was dragging it along behind the horse with something loaded on it…
Grimshaw stiffened as he looked closer at the thing on the travois. Then he nodded slowly as if realizing that what he was looking at was inevitable. He had known this man was in Eureka. He had heard the talk. And sooner or later, they were bound to run into each other.
Grimshaw gave his hat brim a tug, stepped down off the porch, and walked out in the street to intercept the man. As the fella reined in, Grimshaw lifted his left hand in greeting, smiled, and said, “Howdy, Frank. Long time no see.”
Chapter 14
Frank didn’t recognize the man who had hailed him right away, although he knew he should remember the hombre. The stranger was almost as old as Frank, and while Frank couldn’t put a name with the face right offhand, he recognized the casual stance, the alertness in the eyes, the way the man’s right hand never strayed far from the butt of his gun. He was ready to hook and draw in case this fella had an old grudge against him that needed settling.
Then the stranger said, “Remember that time we decided to go fishin’ in the Brazos River while it was flooding? Like to washed us both away.”
“Jack!” Frank exclaimed as the name came back to him. “Jack Grimshaw!”
“That’s right.” Grimshaw stepped closer and reached up, extending his hand. “How are you, Frank?”
Frank clasped the man’s hand. “I’m all right. A little stiffer than I used to be when I get up in the morning.”
Grimshaw chuckled. “Ain’t we all?” He let go of Frank’s hand and gestured toward the body on the travois. “Somebody run into some trouble?”
“Bad trouble,” Frank agreed. He frowned slightly. “You wouldn’t happen to know him, would you?”
“Let me take a look.”
Grimshaw moved closer to the corpse and studied its face. Frank swung down from the saddle and stood beside him, holding Goldy’s reins.
“What do you think?”
Grimshaw shook his head. “Sorry. Don’t think I’ve ever seen him before. I don’t see any wounds either. What did he die of? Looks like it was pretty bad, judging by the expression on his face.”
“You don’t see any wounds because he’s lying on his back. The Terror got him. Clawed him wide open.”
“The Terror?” Grimshaw sounded surprised. “You mean that monster folks say is out in the woods? You really believe in a thing like that, Frank?”
Grimshaw’s tone implied that he might think a little less of his old friend if Frank replied in the affirmative.
“I wasn’t sure at first,” Frank said, “but I’ve seen its handiwork now, several times. It’s real, all right. I just don’t know exactly what it is.”
That was true. He knew that Nancy Chamberlain was sincere in her belief that her brother Ben was the Terror, and while Frank hadn’t found any real evidence supporting that theory, he hadn’t come across anything to invalidate it either. The jury was still out as far as he was concerned.
“Well, whatever got him, I’m sorry this hombre had to die the way he did,” Grimshaw commented. “Looks like it was a bad way to go.”
“Yeah.”
“Where are you takin’ him? The undertaker’s parlor?”
Frank shook his head. “I thought I’d stop at the marshal’s office first, see if maybe he recognized the gent.”
Grimshaw chuckled and nodded down the street. “I don’t think you’ll have to go all the way to the marshal’s office. Judgin’ by the badge on that hombre’s vest, the law’s comin’ to you.”
It was true. The body on the travois had drawn quite a bit of attention as Frank rode into town. One of the townies must have run down to Marshal Gene Price’s office to tell him about it.
Grimshaw reached up and ticked the tip of his index finger against the brim of his Stetson. “I’ll be moseyin’ on, Frank. Mighty good to see you again. Maybe we can get together later and have a drink, catch up on old times.”
“Still don’t care much for badge toters, eh?”
Grimshaw shook his head. “They make me antsy, even when I ain’t done anything.”
Frank slapped a hand on Grimshaw’s shoulder. “I’ll be seeing you.”
As Grimshaw strolled away and Marshal Price continued hurrying toward Frank, The Drifter’s thoughts went back to the last time he had seen Jack Grimshaw.
“They’ll be comin’ soon,” Grimshaw said as he crouched next to the window in the ramshackle old cabin. “You ready, Frank?”
“Ready as I’ll ever be,” Frank replied with a nod. He was next to the window on the other side of the cabin’s only door. Whenever he risked a glance out that window, he could see a magnificent vista of Wyoming mountains spread out before him.
Unfortunately, hidden out there in the trees and the brush were nearly a dozen hardened gunmen who wanted to kill Frank and Jack Grimshaw because Frank and Grimshaw rode for one side in the deadly war that had spread across this part of the territory and they rode for the other.
It was as simple as that. A fella took money from one man, and he became mortal enemies with the hombres who took money from another man. That was crazy, Frank had been known to think, but it was the way of the West and had been ever since the great cattle barons had begun clashing over the rich rangeland.
Of course, for some men, things were a little more complicated. Frank himself had never sold his gun strictly for cash, despite the reputation that had attached itself to him over the years. The only causes he fought for were the ones he believed in.
In this case, he had allied himself with a rancher named Maynard Pollinger, an Englishman who had come to this country to make a new life for himself because he’d had the misfortune to be born the second son in an aristocratic British family. Pollinger wasn’t looking for trouble, but his MP spread had grown to be successful enough that it attracted the attention of Pete Dwyer, the boss of the Diamond D. Dwyer regarded Pollinger as a threat, and so he had started trying to run him out of the territory, sending hired guns to ambush Pollinger’s cowboys, poison his water holes, and stampede his stock.
Pollinger had had no choice but to fight back using the same methods. Jack Grimshaw was one of the men he had hired. Frank was another. They had been riding Pollinger’s range today when they’d been ambushed by a group of Dwyer’s gun-wolves. Forced to flee, they had taken shelter in this old line shack.
But even as they forted up inside the shack, both men had known that it would be only a matter of time before their enemies rushed them. The numbers were on the side of Dwyer’s men. They would lose a few, without any doubt, but in the end they would overrun the cabin and kill Frank and Grimshaw.
As Frank waited beside the window, a six-gun in each hand, ready to sell his life as dearly as possible, he suddenly heard a thump on the roof overhead. So did Grimshaw, who looked up and exclaimed bitterly, “Damn it!”
A couple of seconds later, both of them smelled smoke. That didn’t come as a surprise to either Frank or Grimshaw. Dwyer’s men had decided they didn’t want to lose anybody. One of them had gotten behind the line shack and tossed a torch onto the roof. They were going to smoke out their quarry.