Rising Fire. William W. Johnstone

nodded and went to the corridor door. By the time he opened it, Malatesta was standing nonchalantly by the window, lighting a thin black cigar.

      “Ah, Sheriff . . . Carson, was it? So good to see you again.” Malatesta shook out the match he’d been using, dropped it in a glass ashtray on a small table near the window.

      “That’s right, Monte Carson’s the name,” the lawman said. “I hope you’ve gotten settled in good here at the hotel.”

      “Of course. These are very comfortable accommodations.”

      “Probably not what you’re used to, being a European nobleman and all.”

      Malatesta smiled and said, “I have stayed many places, Sheriff, and have always found that the pleasantness of the people is more important than the luxuriousness of the furnishings. So far, I have to say that Big Rock is a pleasant place.”

      “Mighty generous of you,” Carson said drily, “considering that as soon as you stepped off the train, folks started shooting at you.”

      “Ah, but those scoundrels were not citizens of your fine community, were they?”

      “That’s what I came to tell you. I had a look through the wanted posters in my office, like I said I would, and I turned up those two fellas who are down at the undertaker’s now.”

      Carson pulled a couple of sheets of folded paper from his pocket and held them out to Malatesta. The count took them, unfolded them, and studied the words and likenesses printed on them.

      “‘Casey Murtagh and Wilbur Morrell,’” Malatesta read. “‘Wanted for murder, assault, train robbery, arson . . .’” He looked up from the reward dodgers. “Outlaws, just as I thought.”

      Arturo had been standing in the background, listening. He said, “They sound like villains from some American dime novel.”

      “Yeah.” Carson took the wanted posters back and put them in his pocket again. “I have to say, the posters make those two seem a mite more impressive than they actually were. They’re known to have run with a man named Ned Yeager. You may have noticed his name on the posters as being the leader of the gang. Yeager’s the genuine article, a really bad man. If you want somebody dead, he’s the man you hire.” The sheriff looked intently at Malatesta. “What I’m curious about, Count, is who wants you dead bad enough to hire somebody like Yeager?”

      Malatesta took the cigar out of his mouth and blew a perfect smoke ring that hung in the air for a couple of seconds before starting to dissipate.

      “Unfortunately, Sheriff, I have no idea,” he said in reply to Carson’s question. “I wish I did, because if someone has such a grudge against me, it would be a good thing for me to know.”

      “Yeah, I imagine so.”

      “But on the other hand,” Malatesta said, “isn’t it still possible that those men just intended to gun me down and then steal whatever they could find on my body? They’re thieves. Those wanted posters said so.”

      Carson shook his head slowly and said, “That fracas didn’t strike me as a simple robbery. They were waiting to ambush you.”

      “I can’t help you, Sheriff,” Malatesta said flatly. “I have no enemies that I know of in America.”

      “How about in Italy, or somewhere else over there?”

      “Do you really believe trouble would follow me all the way across the ocean?”

      “You tell me.”

      Malatesta put the cigar back in his mouth. His teeth clamped on it harder than before.

      “I can’t tell you, Sheriff, because I don’t know,” he said. His smile had disappeared, and there was an edge to his voice. “But I’m confident that with you on the job, I’ll be safe as long as I’m in Big Rock.”

      “You can rest easy on that score,” Carson said with a little edge in his own voice now. “And I’ll assume that if you think of anything I ought to know, you’ll tell me.”

      Malatesta made a gesture of agreement with the cigar.

      “Don’t reckon there’s anything else to say.” Carson started to turn toward the door.

      “One moment, Sheriff, if you would.”

      “Sure. What is it?”

      “Those two men, Murtagh and Morrell . . . The only reason you have those posters with their pictures on them is because there are rewards posted for them. Correct?”

      “That’s right,” Carson said.

      “Dead or alive?”

      “That’s usually the way it works.”

      “Then since Miss Jensen killed one of them and Marshal Rogers took care of the other, I suppose they are entitled to those rewards?”

      “Well, as a federal lawman, Brice Rogers can’t claim a reward like that,” Carson explained. “And the bounty on Murtagh . . . he’s the one Denny ventilated. . . is only three hundred dollars, so I doubt if she’d bother to collect it.”

      “Because she is rich, or at least her father is,” Malatesta said.

      “Because Denny’s not really the sort of person to be interested in blood money.”

      “Yes, I would say you are correct about that. She looked very different today than she did the last time I saw her, two years ago in Italy. I’m sure she is still the same sort of person she was then.”

      “She’s a fine gal,” Carson said. “One of the finest I’ve ever known.”

      “Then we are in total agreement on that, Sheriff,” Malatesta said with a smile. “I have never met another woman quite like Denise Nicole Jensen.”

      CHAPTER 12

      Harkerville, Wyoming

      Eight people on horseback sat their saddles and looked down at the settlement in the valley below them. Evergreens grew thickly atop the ridge where the riders had paused, and on this cloudy afternoon, the shadows were thick enough that anybody in Harkerville, half a mile away, who glanced up here wouldn’t be likely to spot them.

      “Place don’t hardly look big enough to have a bank,” one of the men said with a sneer of contempt. He added to the impression by leaning over in his saddle and spitting on the ground. “That’s a one-horse town if I ever seen one.”

      “The place is small and that’s the way the folks who live here like it,” a thickset man dressed all in black replied. “But all the ranchers who own big spreads on up the valley have to have someplace to put their money, and Harkerville’s the closest town. Yeah, they’ve got a bank, Curly.” He chuckled. “You can bank on that.”

      Curly Bannister, whose tangled mass of brown hair that fell to his shoulders had given him his nickname, said, “I’m not doubtin’ your word, Alden, just sayin’ that looks can be deceivin’, I reckon. If you say there’s a bank down there and it’s worth takin’, I believe you, one hunnerd percent.”

      Alden Simms nodded. Curly was his second-in-command, and a good one, so he was in the habit of cutting Curly some slack whenever he got mouthy, which was too often, to tell the truth. One of these days, Curly would catch Alden in a bad mood when he made one of his snide comments, and Alden would put a bullet through the snaggletoothed varmint’s brain. He’d be sorry to kill Curly, he supposed, but he’d get over it.

      Another rider edged forward to join Alden and Curly, who were slightly ahead of the rest of the gang. “How much do you believe is in there?”

      The rider’s husky but undoubtedly female voice, along with the long, straight dark hair that hung down her back from under the flat-crowned black hat, marked her as a woman. So did the lack of beard stubble