Holmes on the Range Read online

  That settled that.

  “Don’t let Hungry Bob get you!” I called as the stage and wagon clattered away from the castle.

  The shotgun rider looked back from the stagecoach and waved. “Don’t let the McPhersons get you!”

  I turned to see how Uly would take that crack, but he’d already gone back inside, no doubt to apply more lip varnish to the Duke’s seat cushions.

  While Lady Clara and Emily had been setting up house, the old man, Edwards, and Young Brackwell had holed up with Uly in Perkins’s office. Snoopiness having become a habit by now, I found every excuse I could to tarry at the bottom of the stairs, outside the office door. But all I heard from the other side was the rumble of the Duke’s deep voice and the occasional “Yes, sir” or “No, sir” or “I don’t know, sir” from Uly.

  All this kowtowing apparently had Uly a bit buffaloed, for he’d made a rare mistake when he’d been barking at us a moment before. Unaware that the lady was through using us as her personal pack mules, he’d simply told us to get to work—without telling us what to do. As we saw it, that made us our own bosses for as long as we could make it last.

  Tall John volunteered to take care of our horses, something he could do at as leisurely a pace as he pleased with Uly occupied and Spider out on the range somewhere. Swivel-Eye said he was going to help the Swede get supper going, which really meant he was going to hang around the cookshack and see if he couldn’t get an early meal. And I chose to go back into the house to check on Lady Clara. After all, there might have been more heavy lifting to do, and it wouldn’t be very gentlemanly to leave such work to the women.

  Swivel-Eye and Tall John saw right through me, of course, but they didn’t give me any guff but a couple of wicked grins.

  After the boys left, I lingered outside the office door again. All I heard this time was the opening of drawers, the rustling of papers, and a low murmur of voices that just about lulled me to sleep. After a minute or so, I began making my way to the second floor to avail myself of the decidedly more stimulating company we’d been blessed with that day.

  When I was about halfway up the stairs, I heard a door below me open, followed by the clop-clop-clop of someone taking the steps two at a time. I whipped around to see the rail-thin form of Young Brackwell flying at me—and then past me. When he reached the second floor, he hurried to the room Lady Clara had claimed for herself.

  “You must come downstairs immediately,” I heard him say.

  “What is it?”

  Brackwell sighed. “They’re already going over the ruddy bookkeeping and the tedium is simply killing me. I made an excuse to slip out and—”

  “They weren’t supposed to start without me.”

  “Edwards and old Dickie just couldn’t contain themselves. And you know how that horrid Edwards feels about women and—”

  Before he could finish, Lady Clara came storming out of the room and swept past me without so much as a glance in my direction. I didn’t mind being overlooked just then, for there was enough fire in her eyes to melt a man.

  Brackwell followed at a slower pace, dragging his heels like a fellow on his way to the gallows. When he saw I was eyeing him he brightened up, and he actually gave me a nod and a smile as he passed by. Why a high-class aristocrat, even as gawky and poorly tailored a one as this, should favor a low-class hand like myself with such friendliness I didn’t know.

  Downstairs, the lady went marching into Perkins’s office, and I managed to catch only two sharp words before Young Brackwell slouched in after her and closed the door.

  “Gentlemen!”

  “Clara!”

  Slam.

  I started down the stairs again to catch what tidbits of conversation I could, but just then the front door flew open and Spider came striding in. He was still in chaps and spurs from saddle work, and clouds of dust gusted off him with each stomping step.

  “Amlingmeyer!” he snapped before he’d even seen me, leaving me to wonder how he knew I was in the house.

  I didn’t have time to wonder long. He caught sight of me on the staircase and waved me outside with an angry jerk of his hand.

  “Listen good, you big, dumb son of a bitch,” he said once we were out on the porch. “You stay away from them Britishers. Shoot off your mouth around ‘em, and I’ll shoot off your damn face. Understand?”

  I restrained myself to a simple nod as opposed to the punch to the gut his words warranted.

  “Good. Now get over to the barn and help Tall John with the horses.”

  I nodded again and got on my way. As I trudged along, taking out my anger on whatever rocks I could get my boot toe under, I saw Swivel-Eye and the Swede coming from the cookshack, their arms piled high with kitchen gear.

  “You fellers goin’ to a bar-b-q?” I called out.

  The Swede answered in his usual gibberish, which Swivel-Eye quickly translated into regular English.

  “We’re headed to the big house. Spider told the Swede to get set up there for some fancy cookin’.”

  I stopped dead in my tracks. “Who’s gonna cook for us then?”

  “Talla Yon!” the Swede said.

  Swivel-Eye didn’t need to decode that for me. I knew who the Swede was talking about. And I knew what that meant for my stomach: hard times. Putting Tall John in charge of a skillet made about as much sense as putting an Eskimo in charge of a cattle drive.

  I found our new pot-rustler in the barn. It looked like Tall John had fared better shirking work than I had, for he’d barely begun putting away the saddles, bridles, harnesses, and whatnot. We got to it together. By the time we’d finished with the horses, Old Red and the rest of the fence crew came rolling in on the wire wagon.

  I’m sure my brother was overjoyed to discover that Swivel-Eye and Tall John hadn’t sunk me in a bog hole. Yet when he saw me he simply said, “How’d it go?” so casual you might’ve thought he was making chitchat with a hand coming back from the outhouse.

  “You ain’t gonna believe it, Gustav!”

  “The owners are here!” Tall John cut in.

  Being one who’s reluctant to give up the stage when there’s a tale to be told, I cut right back in, trotting out the detail that was sure to be greeted with even greater amazement.

  “And they brought women!”

  There was little variation in the responses, most of the boys opting for either “What?” or “Holy shit!” Old Red being Old Red, he stuck with silence.

  For once there were fellows fighting to help with the end-of-theday chores, as the boys didn’t want to leave the barn until they’d heard everything. Naturally, I held a few choice details in reserve for some later time when my audience would be reduced to one. Just when that time might come was unclear, as hot gossip is strong glue, and it looked like nothing was going to break apart the Hornet’s Nest bunch until these new developments had been totally talked out.

  I only got one moment alone with my brother. It was later that night in the bunkhouse, and the boys were deep in debate. Half of them hadn’t laid eyes on our guests, yet they’d already broken into two camps: the ones who favored the delicate, raven-haired maturity of Lady Clara and those who found themselves stirred more by the bawdy, blond girlishness of the maid, Emily. Old Red didn’t weigh in himself, except to say that pining for either woman made as much sense as trying to can sunshine. Then he got up and drifted to the doorway, puffing on his pipe. After throwing in a few more words on the lady’s behalf, I ambled after him.

  It was dark by then, and we could see squares of light shining from the big house. One of those squares was the window to Perkins’s office.

  “Just when we thought things couldn’t get more cockeyed around here,” I said, “all of a sudden we’ve got lords and ladies in the castle. I’ll bet even your Mr. Holmes wouldn’t have seen that comin’.”

  Old Red shook his head. “I ain’t so sure about that. Now that the Duke and them others are here, certain things make a lot more sense.”

&
nbsp; Before my brother could spell out what exactly those “certain things” were, the boys started yelling for me to come back—Swivel-Eye and Tall John were having a tough time describing the women’s clothes, and they needed my help. The rest of the night was eaten up by such talk, and the fellows wouldn’t let me go to sleep until I’d described those gals’ every hair, tooth, and dimple ten times over. When I finally hauled myself up into my bunk, my jaw was throbbing from overwork.

  As the other hands settled in for the night, I tried to make use of the quiet and dark that settled over the bunkhouse to focus my thoughts. I meant to puzzle out the meaning behind Old Red’s remark, but that focus I was aiming for kept straying elsewhere—onto Lady Clara. I’d worked so hard to construct her image for the boys, it was now burned into my brain like a brand. After a while, I stopped fooling myself. The only thinking I was going to do just then was about her. I affixed my mind to the lady’s likeness in my last waking moments, hoping she would do me the kindness of visiting me in my dreams.

  Whether she did or she didn’t I don’t know, since I can never recall what I’ve been dreaming if I’m startled awake. And that’s exactly what happened the next morning.

  Just after dawn, I was jolted from my slumber by the sound of gunfire.

  Thirteen

  THE DUDE

  Or, The VR Gains a Hand More Fit for Kid Gloves

  Tall John’s bunk was closest to the door, so he had his head poked outside before the gunshot’s echo had even died away.

  “Who or what in the hell is that?” he said.

  In a flash, five more bodies were pressed up against the doorway. What we saw outside was straight out of Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show.

  By the nearest corral was the most prettified cowboy I’d ever laid eyes on. His knee-high boots were sky blue with white stars. Tucked neatly into the boot tops was a pair of fringed buckskin trousers around which was slung at the waist a jet-black two-gun holster. Above that the man wore a buckskin pullover with an eagle done in red and blue beads across the back. Around his neck was a red silk bandanna and on his head a tall-domed ten-gallon hat so pure white it looked like a snowcap atop some distant, rainbow-streaked mountain.

  And in his hand was a shiny silver peacemaker, smoke still slithering from the barrel. There seemed to be nothing around for the fellow to be shooting, and after a moment it became clear that’s exactly what his target was—nothing. He held up the gun and stared at it, in apparent surprise that such doodads would make loud noises and emit fire and fumes and nuggets of lead.

  As the man’s profile came into view, Tall John, Swivel-Eye, and myself chuckled in chorus.

  “I’ll be damned,” I said. “That’s Young Brackwell.”

  “He’s gussied up more than a twenty-dollar whore,” Anytime said.

  “What kind of stock you think a hand like that would work?” Tall John asked. “Poodles?”

  “I’d like to see his saddle,” Swivel-Eye added. “I bet it’s purple velvet stuffed with swan feathers.”

  “Too bloody right,” Crazymouth threw in, “ ‘e’s a Christmas caboose served as bangers and mash, and no one what knows ‘is bum from his ooh-me-little-thumb is apt to be fooled by it.”

  A silence followed while we tried to dig the meaning out of this remark. But the man who spoke next didn’t offer a translation or yet another funny aimed at Brackwell.

  “Strange that Uly and his boys ain’t takin’ note of this,” my brother said. He was looking at the McPhersons’ bunkhouse, the doorway of which was surprisingly free of giggling cowboys.

  “I don’t think they’re around,” Swivel-Eye said. “I heard ‘em up and about extra early. Sounded like the whole gaggle pulled out half an hour ago.”

  Old Red cocked an eyebrow at me, the meaning of which I didn’t grasp until he hopped into his britches, walked out of the bunkhouse, and headed for Brackwell.

  When the cat’s away. . ., he’d been saying.

  I sighed and set off after him, dressing myself on the run. Once it had been Gustav’s job to keep me out of trouble. Now it looked like the boot was on the other foot—except it didn’t fit me very well. At least this particular morning I’d have help, for every other hand followed along behind me, no doubt anxious to get a closer look at our clown-cowboy.

  You don’t have to be a Blackfoot scout to hear a herd of half-asleep punchers stumbling up on you, and Brackwell turned toward us when we were still a good many yards away, his slender face going as red as any Blackfoot’s at the sight of us.

  “Good morning,” he said with a sheepish nod.

  “Takin’ a little target practice, were you?” Old Red asked.

  “Well. . .why, yes. Yes, I. . .yes.”

  “Those are some mighty fine sidearms you got there.” Gustav held out his right hand. “May I?”

  The gangly young aristocrat’s expression changed from embarrassed to wary.

  “Of course,” he said, slowly handing over the gun he’d been holding.

  The Hornet’s Nesters stirred with anticipation, no doubt imagining some gratifying humiliation Gustav was about to visit upon this silk-and-satin cowboy. But that just showed how little they’d come to know my brother. Though the trading of petty indignities is a much beloved pastime amongst drovers, he took little pleasure from such sport himself—unless perhaps it was me who was getting the ribbing.

  Gustav inspected the gun—a gleaming silver-plated Colt .44-40 with a mother-of-pearl grip.

  “Very nice.”

  He popped the cylinder open and inspected the cartridges inside.

  “Loaded it with six bullets, did you?” Old Red shook his head. “That takes guts. I never keep more than five in my iron. I’m always worried I’m gonna catch the hammer on somethin’ and send a shot flyin’ out Lord knows where. So I keep the chamber under the hammer empty. Some other fellers are known to do likewise.”

  “Some other fellers” would be every man with a lick of gun sense in his head, but Old Red didn’t say so. He was taking care to gentle-break our duded-up guest.

  He closed the cylinder, spun the Colt around, and handed it back grip first.

  “Yes, I can see how that might have its advantages,” Brackwell said. “Perhaps I should think about loading my revolvers as you do.”

  Gustav shrugged. “They’re your guns.”

  Having by now figured out that Gustav meant to help Brackwell save face, not rub his face in the dirt, the other Hornet’s Nesters took matters into their own hands. Despite the Englishman’s buckskin and beads, he had an air of fragility about him, and rowdy cowboys are drawn to such vulnerability like wolves to a lame cow.

  “If you want to play it truly careful,” Swivel-Eye said, “maybe you oughta leave out the bullets altogether.”

  “Or the guns,” Tall John added.

  “Awwww, don’t listen to them,” Anytime said. “I think you need even more guns. You could probably fit five or six on that belt of yours.”

  “No, Tall John hit it on the bunk. The guv ‘ere don’t need any hot-cross at all,” Crazymouth said. “That gear of ‘is would blind any geezer what tries to shoot ‘im.”

  I could’ve added some brilliant, biting witticism of my own here, of course, but the Englishman struck me as a decent enough fellow, despite his foolish choices in matters of fashion. On top of that, I didn’t want to bring Old Red’s wrath down upon me. For whatever reason, my brother was taking the young man under his wing, and he spun on the boys looking as ruffled up as a gamecock in the ring. Before he could speak, however, something behind us caught his eye, and he held his tongue.

  We looked over our shoulders to see Edwards marching toward us. He was again attired in tweed, with a cap and brightly shined shoes and a pince-nez flashing sunlight in our eyes. Though well-tailored, the outfit couldn’t conceal the thick lumpiness of the man’s body. He dressed himself like caviar, but beneath the tweed he was pure potato.

  “What’s happening here? What was that noise?”
he asked, aiming his questions at Brackwell.

  The Hornet’s Nesters tomfoolery had turned the Englishman kind of wilty, but the closer Edwards got, the more he straightened up. By the time Edwards came to a stop in front of him, Brackwell had added four inches to his height.

  “Just a little target practice. These fine lads were sharing their insights on the use of firearms.”

  “You’ve no time to be socializing with the help,” Edwards replied, sounding like a not-so-loving father talking to a feebleminded stepchild. “Now run along and change out of that ludicrous costume before His Grace and Lady Clara see you.” A snort of disgust erupted from his big spud nose. “You know, I never understood why your family would send you as their representative—until now. If you’ve harbored a secret desire to be a ‘cow-boy,’ you should have said so sooner. I can have McPherson hire you on. You won’t earn as much as from your allowance, but hopefully you’ll find a way to make yourself useful at last.”

  Brackwell’s face went crimson with barely restrained rage—or shame. Before he could make any reply, Edwards turned and addressed us hands.

  “Bring the buggy and two good riding horses around to the house. Emily will bring out our saddles.”

  He began to walk away, leaving Brackwell glaring after him impotently.

  “Hey, Edwards!” Old Red shouted.

  The man whipped his stout frame around looking ready to spit. He obviously wasn’t used to hearing “the help” hollering at him.

  “Are you American or British?” Old Red asked.

  Edwards simply glowered for a moment, obviously weighing whether to answer.

  “I’m from Boston,” he finally said.

  “Oh?” Gustav rubbed his chin, his left eyebrow arched up high. “You know, I’m not sure if that really answers my question.”

  “I expect to see those horses in five minutes,” Edwards growled, then he turned and stomped toward the castle.