Read Online Scream of Eagles by William W. Johnstone - Free Book Online Page A

fine tomahawk with the buckskins.
    The Utes, he was sure it was them, were leaving the outlaws alone—leaving them for Jamie.
    Jamie sighted the trading post and swung down from the saddle. He took his field glasses from his saddlebags and studied the place for a moment. The long, half-open lean-to that served as a stable was filled with horses.
    He had found Slim Terry and his bunch.
    * * *
    Ben F. Washington had not noticed the men trailing him, but Falcon had. He’d spotted them several days before. After seeing Mary Marie O’Donnell off on the stage for Valley, Falcon returned to the hotel and sat in the lobby, pretending to read a newspaper. As shadows began to creep silently over the city, signaling that dusk was about to turn the day into night, Ben walked through the lobby and out to the street. Falcon laid his paper aside and followed him.
    Falcon had learned that James William and Page had taken the train to New York City the very day that Falcon had arrived in Denver. They would be gone for a month at least, maybe longer.
    And maybe that was a good thing, Falcon thought. That would give him time to get to the bottom of whatever the hell was going on here.
    Ben was taking his nightly walk before dinner. Falcon knew the route he would take, for Ben had never deviated from it. Staying across the street and half a block behind Ben, Falcon spotted the three toughs when they swung in behind the reporter. Falcon quickly crossed the street and closed the distance just as the three thugs—nicely dressed, but thugs nonetheless—reached Ben and dropped a bag over his head and shoved him into a darkened alley.
    Falcon picked up a broken wheel spoke from the gutter and ran into the alley, swinging the hard wood. He didn’t want to shoot unless it was absolutely necessary, for he wanted some time alone with Ben, without the police.
    Falcon’s attack came as a surprise to the thugs. The heavy spoke rang off of noggins, splitting the skin, sending the blood flying, and dropping the goons to the dirty and trash-littered alley floor.
    Falcon jerked the hood from Ben’s head and slammed the reporter up against a brick wall, a .44 stuck up under Ben’s chin.
    â€œMy name is Falcon MacCallister, mister.” Falcon whispered the words to a very scared Ben F. Washington. “James William Haywood is my nephew. Now, you’ve been snooping around, muttering some damned odd words. You and me, Mr. Washington, are going to have a long talk. And you’re going to level with me about what the Billy-Hell is going on around here. And you’re going to be truthful with me. For if I think you’re lying, I’m going to blow your goddamn head plumb off. You understand all that, city boy?”
    Ben managed to nod his head, the muzzle of the .44 cold against his chin.
    â€œFine,” Falcon said, easing the hammer down. “I just knew you’d see it my way.”
    * * *
    Jamie rode up to the trading post from the rear, reining up behind the stable. He broke open and filled the twin barrels of the sawed-off shotgun with buckshot loads. At close range, the Greener was a fearsome weapon, capable of taking out two or three men with a single blast from both barrels.
    Walking around the stable, Jamie paused as the front door to the trading post opened and two old gray-bearded men stepped out. Trappers, from the looks of them. Men whose time had come and gone, but who were still hanging on to a way of life that advancing civilization had forever destroyed.
    The old mountain men spotted Jamie and walked up to him. “They’s a smell of evil in yonder, MacCallister,” one told him, jerking a thumb toward the trading post. “Fairly stinks, it does. They’s six of ’em and they’s waitin’ for ye. You need airy hep?”
    â€œNo,” Jamie said softly. “But I thank you for the offer.”
    â€œKnowed your grandpere,” the second old mountain man