William Johnstone - Triumph of the Mountain Man

Smoke shook his head. “No. We have an hour before they supposedly murder a young woman before our eyes and then come in and take what they want.”

“Oh. That—ah—that makes a difference.”

Smoke’s face registered his discontent. “Mr. Lang, I was trying to be sarcastic. I chose the wrong words. The facts are that they cannot take this town no matter how hard they try. A lot of them are along out of curiosity. They have no real loyalty to Paddy Quinn or Clifton Satterlee. When they get a taste of our firepower, a lot of them will drift away. More than twenty of them ran out this morning before sunup.”

“What about the young woman?”

Again, Smoke made a negative gesture. “Quinn will never kill her, not even hurt her in a serious way. He believes she is still the lady friend of his boss. With all the gunfighters he commands, Quinn would never buck Satterlee.”

Lang persisted. “Why is that?”

“Mr. Lang, do you pay your employees at the start of the week or at the end?”

Charlie Lang frowned. The question puzzled him. “Why, at the end of the week, for all that it matters.”

“My point. You don’t pay them until they have performed the work for which they are being compensated. I firmly doubt that Satterlee has paid Quinn, and won’t until the job is done. If Quinn and Satterlee got at odds, and Quinn didn’t get paid, he’d have a whole lot of angry, broke gunhawks to contend with.”

Lang thought on that awhile. “That makes sense. Even so, we’ve been talking about the danger we’re in, what those outlaws can do to us. We have families, investments, roots in the community. We don’t want to risk harm to our wives and children and lose everything we have. This Clifton Satterlee has offered to compensate us fairly for our property. It seems wise for us to accept what he is proposing.”

“Not anymore. Quinn says our resistance has changed all that. Satterlee is going to take what he wants, and that’s all of Taos. As to protecting what you have at stake, I suggest that all of you grow a pair of stones and fight for what’s yours.”

Lang and three others began jabbering as one. “But some of us will get injured.” “We’ll be killed.” “We have a right to be protected.”

Smoke Jensen’s disgust spilled over. “Listen to me you yellow-bellied rabbits,” he thundered. “You are going to have to fight for your rights; we’ll be too busy protecting the town as a whole. Here’s my final word. Not a one of you will give in to such cheap intimidation. If I need to, I’ll put a Tua warrior in every store, eatery and saloon to prevent your surrender. Now, get out of here.”

* * *

Paddy Quinn rode to the abandoned adobe farmhouse where Martha Estes had been imprisoned. Following his instructions, his underlings had lashed her arms to a chair and left her sitting at a table, with only a crumbling wall to stare at. Quinn entered and stood between her and that unpromising vista. At once, Martha’s gorge rose, and she began to unload onto him all her disgust and loathing.

“You are the most disgusting, foul, misbegotten piece of human refuse I have ever laid eyes upon. Your every act shames your mother and father.”

She stopped for a breath, and Paddy seized the opportunity to get in a word of his own. “My mother, God rest her soul, is dead these twenty long years. An’ me father is a drunk, who would not feel insult if someone crapped in his hat.”

Eyes narrowed in her rage, Martha spat, “When Clifton discovers how you have treated me, he’ll have you horsewhipped.”

“Ye’ve got the right of it, lass. He’s not got the balls to do it hisself.” Realization that Jensen’s taunt had struck home made her reminder even more unwelcome. “It’s well an’ good, it is, that ye know I’ll never be for carryin’ out me threats against you. That was for those dogs from town. Let them be worrin’ over it. But, between you an’ me—ah, an’ Lord, there’s somethin’ I’d love to have between you an’ me, there is—before this is over, I intend to get to know you better. Intimately better, if ye catch me meanin’?”

Martha twisted her face into an expression of disgust. “I’ll see you in hell before that happens.”

His smile bright as ever, so disarming it did not lend credibility to his words, Paddy Quinn spoke lightly as he started for her. “Will ye now? An’ what’s to stop me? All I need do is hoist them skirts and have at you with a will.”

A sudden clatter from a carriage outside halted Quinn. He stopped, then took two hasty back steps. The next moment, Clifton Satterlee stormed through the askew doorway. His face flushed, Satterlee pointed a glove-covered forefinger at Quinn.

“That lout of yours out there tells me that you have Martha Estes in here as a prisoner, trussed up like a Christmas goose.”

Paddy gestured to his prisoner. As though jerked by a string, Satterlee took two steps toward the young woman, then turned on Quinn. “Release her. At once!” Then to Martha, “My dear, this is inexcusable. I’ll have you freed in a moment. And I promise you nothing like this will ever happen again. Where is Lupe?”

Martha turned her cobalt gaze on Clifton. “She’s . . . being held someplace else.”

Ice formed around the words of Clifton Satterlee. “Quinn, you will finish untying this young lady; then you will go and fetch her maid. And be certain that she has with her everything needed to restore Miss Martha to her usual loveliness.”

Paddy Quinn had recovered himself enough to bark back. “She ran away from you, did you know that? I didn’t send men to take her, I didn’t. She went off with none other than Smoke Jensen.”

Satterlee cut his eyes from Quinn to Martha. “Is that true?”

“Yes and no. I left on my own. I encountered Mr. Jensen on the road, and he was to escort me here to Taos.” Hurrying to get it out before her nerve failed, Martha added, “I felt so terrible when I learned that the jewelry you gave me had been stolen. And that they were sacred objects to the Indians here. I wanted to do what I could to make amends.”

Satterlee’s anger found a new source. “Lies. Jensen must have told you that. It is not true. Trust me in that.”

Martha clenched her jaw a moment, then braved it out. “I talked with a young Indian policeman who identified the necklace I wore . . . when they visited in Santa Fe.”

“A copy perhaps,” Satterlee suggested.

Martha held her own. “They do not make copies.”

Satterlee took another tack. “Come, my dear. Let’s put all that behind us. I am so relieved to find you safe and sound.”

“Not so safe, nor so sound, if that one had his way,” Martha challenged.

Clifton Satterlee rounded on Quinn again. “I thought I gave you an order. Now do it.”

“You may regret this, Mr. Satterlee,” Quinn muttered softly while he undid Martha’s bonds.

Satterlee winced as though the threat had hit home. In that instant, after her release, Martha bounded upright and made a break for the door. Before Satterlee could react, Quinn passed him in a flash and snagged Martha by one arm.

“Not so fast, me fine colleen.”

Martha did not resign herself so easily. She clawed at Paddy Quinn, scratched his cheek and neck, kicked him in the shins and pounded one small fist on his chest. While she struggled, Clifton Satterlee took it in with an astonished, bemused expression. Martha tried to knee Paddy in the crotch, and he hurled her against a wall.

All fight left her as she slammed painfully into the adobe blocks. Shoulders slumped, she faced the two men like an animal at bay. Her chest heaved from her exertion, and her face had turned a pale white. Clifton Satterlee studied her with new eyes.