Tanglefoot

  Tanglefoot

  Paul Lederer writing as Logan Winters

  ONE

  Glen Walker didn’t pay much attention to the stagecoach as it swung into the Las Palmas depot on that sun-drenched New Mexico day. It didn’t make much difference to him who came or went. The town always remained the same – dusty-white, lazy, seemingly weary to its bones and yet quite dangerous. Walker could not have cared less about the new arrivals unless they appeared to be someone who might have business with him, or a lady with a well-turned ankle.

  He tugged his hat down further as the Overland stage braked to a stop in front of the plastered-adobe building and the trailing dust filtered past. Along the plankwalk more-interested spectators watched the new arrivals. The first passenger disembarking from the coach caught his ignominious nickname in that moment. The young, slender man caught the heel of his boot behind the iron rail of the coach step, fell onto his face in the center of the street, and someone called out:

  ‘Hey, Tanglefoot!’

  The chuckling was nearly unanimous. It didn’t take much to amuse the local wits.

  It was funny enough as far as it went, but there is always someone who decides to take a joke too far. As Glen Walker watched with hooded eyes half-closed against the glare of the white day, Domino Jones walked toward the fallen young man, hitching up his belt. The whiskered Jones winked broadly at the other onlookers and bent over the newcomer.

  ‘Help you up, mister?’ Domino asked.

  ‘Sure, thanks.’

  Domino dusted off the front of the stranger’s coat with his thick hands and said, ‘Sorry to introduce you to Las Palmas like that.’

  ‘It’s all right,’ the young man said. He was slightly flushed as he studied the group around him. Again he muttered, ‘All right,’ and started away. Domino stuck out a boot and tripped him. The crowd roared again with taunting laughter.

  ‘Now he’s all dirty again, Domino. Needs a bath! Why don’t you help him out? There’s the horse trough.’

  A quiet voice interjected, ‘Why don’t you just leave him alone instead?’

  Domino Jones wheeled angrily, his beefy face set in a scowl. When he saw who had spoken his fists uncurled and his mouth relaxed into an appeasing smile.

  ‘I didn’t know he was a friend of yours, Walker.’

  ‘He isn’t,’ Glen Walker replied. ‘But the man’s obviously had a long trip and we can’t be welcoming folks to Las Palmas with rough manners.’

  ‘No.’ Domino Jones tilted his greasy hat back from his red forehead. His forced smile was still set although his glowering eyes revealed a different humor. Those eyes swept over the sleekly-built tall man in the pressed white shirt and black trousers, impeccably shined boots, gunbelt riding low on his hips. ‘I guess you’re right, Walker. You know we were just having a little fun.’

  ‘Sure,’ Walker said, his amiability easy and transparent. He did not offer to help the young man struggling to his feet. His right hand hovered negligently over the butt of his walnut-gripped Colt .44 revolver. There was nothing obvious about it, but Domino knew Glen Walker well enough not to mistake the implied menace.

  The crowd, gathered to watch the joke, briefly expecting – hoping – for a flare-up of tempers between two of Las Palmas’s most renowned citizens, now began to drift away toward the shade of the cantinas. With a sound which could have been interpreted as a growled threat or a grunt of amusement, Domino Jones turned and lumbered away, leaving Walker alone in the empty street with the boyish newcomer.

  ‘A rough town, is it?’ the fresh arrival asked, dusting himself off again.

  ‘Rough enough,’ Glen Walker answered, his eyes still focused on the bearish back of Domino Jones.

  ‘Well, I thank you,’ the young stranger said, extending a hand. ‘I wouldn’t have wanted to end up in a horse trough … though I expect I could use it after three days on the road.’ He grinned appealingly. Walker did not return the smile, but shook the young man’s hand with his own, which seemed to the stranger to be hewn out of walnut. Lithe, strong, calloused in the way only a Western man’s can be.

  ‘My name is Charles Proctor Dempster,’ the newcomer said, introducing himself.

  ‘Not in this town it isn’t,’ Glen Walker replied. ‘They’ve branded you, son. From now on in Las Palmas, they’re going to call you “Tanglefoot”.’ Glen Walker clapped a hand on Dempster’s shoulder. ‘Come on, Charles, let’s get whatever baggage you have, find you a hot meal and a place to bunk.’

  ‘I don’t understand you a lot sometimes,’ Carmalita said to Glen Walker as the badman stood bare-chested and freshly shaven, looking out the window of the hotel room they sometimes shared. The slender woman moved to him, slipping her arms around his waist as she kissed his back, her huge black Spanish eyes mysterious and content.

  ‘I know that,’ Glen Walker said without taking his gaze from the white expanse of desert beyond the window.

  ‘I mean – what you take that pup in for? This Tangle-footed kid. I know that you helped him with Domino, bought him breakfast and found him a place to stay. Why, Glen Walker!’

  Walker turned and brought Carmalita’s face up to his own, kissing her deeply. Then he laughed, for no apparent reason, causing her cheeks to burn.

  ‘The pup might be of help to me, Carmalita. Leave the thinking to me. Mind your own business and keep on doing what you do best.’

  Well, Charles Dempster was thinking as he sat on the edge of his bed, watching the brilliant sunlight stream through the high narrow window of the adobe house, he had at least made a start. He had managed to trek all of the way from Plainview, Kansas to Las Palmas, New Mexico Territory. He had undergone a humiliating but harmless initiation ceremony, been befriended by someone who was apparently well-respected in the town, been fed and housed comfortably if not magnificently in a small adobe house run by two heavy Spanish ladies, whose cooking skills and devotion to their craft were obvious in the meal he had taken that morning and the constant, spicy scents of better things that promised to come.

  That is, Charles felt that he had become a man of the West, one of the last of the truly brave and free men on this earth.

  So what if, as Glen Walker had warned him, they continued to call him ‘Tanglefoot’ for a while? The joke would soon wear out and they would forget. For the time being, it was no different from being called Tex or Lefty or Red or Shorty. Men picked up nicknames. Not many could be bothered to call him Mr Charles Dempster when they met. In time they might call him Charlie or Chad, which he preferred. He would carry the name Tanglefoot for a little while; so what? The sobriquet did not offend him, not if he refused to let it.

  He had heard men called worse names.

  ‘Am I going mad!’ she asked in a troubled voice. ‘Or is it you, Glen?’

  ‘I hope it’s neither of us, Carmalita,’ Glen Walker said, turning away from the mirror, his partially shaven face set in a frown. ‘What’s troubling you this morning?’

  ‘I heard over at the store – this falling man.…’

  ‘Tanglefoot,’ Glen said, returning to his shaving.

  ‘Yes, this Tanglefoot man. They say you have found for him a job driving for the stage company. Isn’t that the stage that you told me is transferring funds to the bank in Diablo?’

  ‘It is – if I can believe Samuel Pettit, and he does own the bank, so I think he knows.’

  ‘What is it you want to do, Glen?’ Carmalita asked, sagging onto the bed. ‘Lose that money and get this Tanglefoot killed at the same time.’

  Glen Walker wiped his razor, folded it and washed the remainder of the shaving soap from his face and ear.

  ‘Neither,’ he told her, lowering his voice as he walked to her and knelt beside her. ‘You have to trust me to run my own business.
When will you learn that?’ His hand was on her thigh. Her fingers toyed with his dark hair. Beyond the window they could hear a group of young boys screaming as they played at some game. It was Saturday morning; there was no school.

  ‘I know,’ Carmalita said with a sigh. ‘It is just that sometimes I don’t know if you are terrible smart or terrible foolish.’

  Glen Walker laughed and got to his feet. ‘Sometimes I don’t know either,’ he admitted.

  The day was still yawning when Glen Walker knocked on Chad Dempster’s door. Enough hot dust was swirling in the air to indicate that the early risers, the miners and the freighters, were active around town. The rest of Las Palmas was locked behind closed doors; most people would rise only when the heat inside their desert holes became intolerable. Dempster opened the door almost immediately.

  ‘Good morning, Mr Walker.’

  ‘’Morning, Mr Dempster.’ Walker surveyed the dim interior of the adobe house. He caught a glimpse of one of the round-faced sisters who managed the tiny boarding house for him. Which, he did not know. Walker didn’t remember either of their names, although they were related to Carmalita. But they kept the property, cheaply purchased by him, clean and saw to the needs of any passing men who might have business with Glen Walker.

  ‘How’s your room?’ Walker asked, stepping inside without removing his hat.

  ‘Fine,’ Chad answered. ‘And can these women cook! I thank you for letting me stay here. As soon as I can find work, I’ll pay you back, of course.’

  ‘That’s what I’m here about,’ Walker said, gesturing for Chad to sit down on one of the two Navajo blanket-covered sofas. Walker repositioned his holster slightly and sat opposite Chad.

  ‘What is it?’ Chad asked.

  ‘I may have found you a job. Can you handle a four-horse team?’

  ‘I have before. It’s been a while.’

  ‘This job takes no unusual skills,’ Glen Walker said with a smile. ‘I’ve talked to the stage company. They need to run a special cargo through to Diablo today, and none of the regular drivers is available.’ Doubt must have crept into Chad’s expression, for Walker held up a soothing hand; his smile deepened. ‘The horse team has made the run more than fifty times, Chad. They know where they’re going and what’s expected of them. All you have to do is keep them under control. Can you do it?’

  Chad paused only a moment before he said, with a confidence he did not feel: ‘I can do it.’ After all, what was he to do: turn down his benefactor the first time he offered him work?

  ‘Good,’ Walker said, rising. ‘I’m counting on you. The stage will be hitched and ready behind the Main Street stable at ten o’clock.’

  ‘Am I going alone?’ Chad asked as the two men walked to the front door of the adobe.

  ‘Just you – there are no passengers to worry about. I told you, this is a special run.’

  Chad felt a little hesitant, but he had given his word to the man who had befriended him. The heavy door opened to let a slice of desert glare expose the darkness of the room with stunning brilliance. The two men shook hands on the narrow porch and Glen Walker strode away through the fine white silt of the street.

  That was taken care of then.

  Now he only had to wait for Domino Jones to make his move, which he certainly would considering the amount of money the stage was carrying, and close the mouse trap with his own band of men. Glen Walker felt that nothing could go wrong with the scheme, but as a cautionary reminder, the words of Carmalita sounded somewhere in the back of his mind.

  I don’t know if you are terrible smart or terrible foolish.

  Whichever, the plan was set. Much could go wrong, but if all went well Glen Walker would have the entire town of Las Palmas in his grip, and that was a good feeling. No more double-dealing with scoundrels like Domino Jones, no slipping out of towns in the dead of night to ride the long desert with a posse on his trail, no bribing his way out of some county jail.

  Glen Walker had found the perfect way to promote himself to wealthy respectability. He had only needed to wait for the proper dupe to show up. Now he had one, if ever there was one. Tanglefoot was to be his way to pleasant retirement from the outlaw game. And the dupe would not be hurt, might even be greatly aided.

  One thing was certain, Tanglefoot would never be the same man he had been after today’s work was done.

  TWO

  The stagecoach was hitched and ready when Chad Dempster walked there through the suffocating dry heat of the day. He had several concerns in his mind; chief among these was his ability to handle the task. He had driven four-horse teams before – twice – for a flour mill in Kansas, but no one had been struck by his proficiency then.

  Also, Chad could not help but wonder why a stagecoach with no passengers would be running on a Sunday. He should have asked Glen Walker a few more questions, but he’d been so anxious not to displease the man that he hadn’t. Now, as he approached the building where a stablehand stood holding the team, Chad noticed that there was a man just inside the doors of the stable, a rifle in his hands. Across the dusty alley he spotted another man in the meager shade of a stand of cottonwood trees, also armed with a Winchester.

  Glen Walker was there to meet him, handing him a pair of fringed coachman’s gauntlets. ‘You’ll need these,’ Walker told him. ‘Those reins can tear a man’s hands up after a few miles.’

  Thanking him, Chad asked the obvious questions.

  ‘Is this a dangerous job? Why the armed guards?’ Glen Walker smiled easily and slid his hand around Chad’s waist, guiding him toward the box of the stagecoach.

  ‘It’s a little risky, like most things,’ Walker said, ‘that’s all. The little bank in Diablo is low on cash money and Sam Pettit, our banker, is transferring some funds to them.’ Walker’s voice hushed a little. ‘That’s why I picked you, Mr Charles Dempster – you’re an honest man. Some of the regular drivers … well, I don’t trust them too deeply.’

  ‘Will there be a shotgun rider, then? Or armed guards in the coach?’

  ‘No. Don’t look worried, Mr Dempster. That’s the reason we’re doing it this way – on a Sunday with no passengers. From time to time our coaches have been robbed along the way, but with this an unscheduled, empty coach, no one will be waiting for it, and if it’s spotted, they will just assume that it is the coach company shifting coaches and stock to a way station.’

  ‘I see,’ Chad said, although he wasn’t sure he did, but then he was the new man in town, eager to find work, be trusted, and repay Glen Walker. He climbed into the stagecoach box and waited to be handed the reins.

  Glen Walker watched him as he untangled the unfamiliar ball of leather ribbons and fitted them to his fingers. Walker spotted the well-used Colt revolver in the stiff, store-new holster and belt Chad wore and smiled thinly. When Chad indicated he was ready, Walker waved goodbye and turned to watch the stagecoach disappear in a cloud of white dust, Chad driving like he was a man holding on for dear life. Walker shook his head and summoned the two riflemen to his side.

  ‘You boys know what to do, don’t you?’

  ‘You told us about five times,’ one of the men, a stiff-faced thin man answered.

  ‘Then get to it,’ Walker ordered.

  ‘This seems like a pretty roundabout way of doing things,’ the thin man muttered, drawing a scowl to Glen Walker’s face.

  ‘Just do it,’ he commanded them. ‘It’ll pay off later in ways you can’t imagine.’ Shrugging, the two riflemen walked away to join the others who were holding their horses in the cottonwood grove.

  The horses were tough to handle for Dempster. They cleared the outskirts of town and struck out across the long sagebrush stippled flats at a dead run. Walker had told him that the horses knew the way, but it wouldn’t do to let them have their heads and run flat out across the desert. He wasn’t going to arrive at Diablo with a sweating, foundering team – not on his first job. It took some adjusting of the reins, some more struggling against the ani
mals, a lot of grinding his teeth and cursing, but eventually he managed to settle the horses into a steady, ground-devouring, trot.

  The land was long and white, stretching toward the low line of chocolate-colored hills far away. The sky was the palest of blues with sheer puffball clouds scattered across it. It was hot.

  Ahead in the road then, Chad spotted the small, indistinct figure of a man standing. There was a saddle at his feet, a rifle in his hand. Chad’s first thought was of trouble, but he could see for miles around. The man was alone on the bleak and searing desert. He saw the man’s head come up, saw him looking hopefully at the oncoming stagecoach. What was there to do? Chad could imagine himself being stranded on the desert without a horse or water, and he began slowing the team.

  ‘Thanks, friend,’ the stranger said, struggling to toss his saddle onto the luggage rack behind Chad. ‘I was just slowly baking to death out here.’ He clambered up onto the stage seat beside Chad, and they looked each other over. The stranger, Chad saw, was tall, blue-eyed, dark-haired and seemed to be well set-up. His shoulders filled his shirt well. He smiled, showing pleasant white teeth and offered his hand.

  ‘Byron Starr’s the name.’

  ‘Chad Dempster. Glad to meet you, I’m only going as far as Diablo.’

  ‘Never heard of it, but if they’ve got water, that’s a place I wouldn’t mind seeing.’

  ‘Here,’ Chad said, handing him the canteen which had been hanging from a hook on the coach’s side. ‘This ought to help some. Lost your horse, did you?’ Chad asked as he started the team on once again.

  ‘Yes. I should have known better – she was too pretty to last long.’

  Chad wondered if Starr was talking about a horse, but it didn’t matter. He had other things to occupy his mind. Once the horses had regained their steady pace, Chad said uneasily to Starr:

  ‘I’m really not supposed to pick anybody up.’

  ‘No, I realize that. I sure am glad you did, though,’ the likeable young man said. ‘I didn’t expect to see a stage on a Sunday.’ He glanced back, although he could not see the interior of the coach. ‘I see you’re running empty.’