Little Girl Lost
By Singerme and Leighann
Chapter Four
"Kitty! Matt!" Doc greeted the two as they climbed off the stage. "Sure is good to see you two back."
"Oh, it's good to be back, Doc." Matt answered. "Actually, it's good to be anywhere off that stage."
Kitty shook her head at Matt as she gave Doc a quick hug. "It'd better have been the stage that made you uncomfortable and not the company." She remarked making Doc chuckle.
"Oh it was." Matt quickly agreed, just as Chester came hustling down the street towards them.
"Mr. Dillon!" Chester huffed as he reached them. "I sure am glad to see you. Barney just gave me an urgent wire for you from Hays."
Kitty closed her eyes. She knew the wire would most likely mean Matt had to leave town, but she was grateful it was after their vacation rather than during as it usually happened. "When you leaving?" She asked Matt after he finished reading the wire.
"Right away," Matt answered with a scowl. "Chester, would you go and get my horse for me?"
"I sure will, Mr. Dillon. You want me to go with you?" Chester asked hopefully. He hated being stuck in town.
"No, Chester." Matt shook his head. "I want you to stay here and watch over things. Kitty…"
"No need, Matt." She sighed. "Just be careful and don't take any chances."
"Thanks." Matt nodded at Kitty as he hurried down to the jail to get a few things for his trip.
"Well, it was nice while it lasted." Kitty shook her head as her eyes followed Matt's retreating back before looking over at Doc. "Well Doc, come on I'll buy you a drink."
"By gum I thought you'd never ask," Doc replied as he held his arm out for Kitty to take.
As Kitty and Doc walked off, little Brenda stood in the shadows watching the couple walk towards the Long Branch and disappear inside. There was something about the pretty lady that the little girl trusted, and Brenda decided right there and then that if trouble came her way she was going to find Kitty.
LGL*LGL*LGL
"Well, Mr. Warren, I'm sure sorry." Sherriff Sprague said somewhat remorsefully. "We've searched these parts high and low and can't find hide nor hair of your little girl. We even dove into the creek, and back tracked the trail in to here for miles. She's not anywhere around here."
Robert Warren stood with a scowl on his face, as he took another look around the yard of the relay station. The Sherriff, Station Master, the relay station's hired hand, as well as several townspeople, and even Robert himself had practically combed the surrounding countryside in the past two days in search of Brenda and they hadn't found a single sign of what happened to her.
The Sherriff, upon learning that the stage to Dodge City had left shortly before Brenda turned up missing, suggested that she had gotten on that stage by mistake and was even now in Dodge City waiting on Mr. Warren.
At first, Warren rejected that idea completely. He didn't care for his niece, but Robert knew she was a smart little girl and if she'd gotten on that stage it wouldn't have been by mistake. Besides, if Brenda had of boarded the Dodge City stage the US Marshal that was riding on it would've either returned her, or notified the relay station of her presence there when he arrived in Dodge City. That, coupled with the fact that Robert wanted nothing to do with said US Marshal, made him refuse to even consider the possibility. Be that as it may, it had been two days now since they'd stopped at this God-forsaken station in what Robert considered to be the wilderness, and it was obvious Brenda was nowhere around here. The only possibility left to him was that Brenda had indeed got on that West bound stage with or without the US Marshal's knowledge.
"Well." Robert said with no small amount of annoyance. "I guess I shall have to go to Dodge City as that is the only logical place left to look."
"That's sorta what I've been sayin' for the last two days, Mr. Warren." Sherriff Sprague pointed out in exasperation.
Robert glared at the Sherriff, but didn't reply, as he wasn't too concerned with how irritated Sherriff Sprague might have been. Robert had greater concerns on his mind, such as the two men he'd hired to kill his niece. While searching an isolated spot near the creek, Robert met with Grimes and Hy and explained the current situation before trying to get out of paying the two men or even continuing their association. Nevertheless, Grimes and Hy weren't so accommodating.
"You listen here, Mister." Grimes jabbed a finger into Robert's chest. "You offered me and Hy a good sum of money to do away with that brat of yours, and we ain't lettin' you out of the deal. Me and Hy here need that money, and we're gonna get it from ya, one way or another. Even if it ain't your niece we kill. You get my meanin'?" Grimes stated staring Warren down.
Realizing the position Robert had put himself into, he backed up. The money from the stage, that was now gone, was no longer his to surrender to these two thugs. And, what little money Robert had on him wasn't going to be enough to save him. "Now, now, wait." Robert brought both hands up as though in surrender, while praying he could talk his way out of the situation. "I told you men that the money you took in the hold up was to be your payment, and it was. I could not help it that my niece disappeared and that we were not on that stage."
Grimes hiked a brow up his grimy forehead. "Whatdaya mean it was? You telling me the money you was gonna pay us with ain't on ya?"
"Exactly." Robert responded before thinking. "That stage was carrying a strong box and your payment was in there. I intended to make it easy for you to get that money when you took care of my niece."
Hy Harker, a stocky built brown haired man with a scar running across his left eyebrow, looked in disbelief at his partner. He'd hated the idea of killing a little girl in the first place, but the amount of money Warren had offered them had overridden his initial disgust. Now, to find out that the money wasn't even with Warren made Hy madder then a wet hen in a Sunday rainstorm.
"Grimes, I think we got us a skunk here." Hy snarled. "This here dude was try'n to put one over on us. He weren't never gonna pay us."
"I assure you Mr. Harker that I was in fact going to pay you. I had the money put in the strong box as a precaution. I could not risk keeping the money on my person with all the savages and outlaws here in the West. I could not risk the money getting into their hands, now could I?"
"I still say you're a skunk, cause somethin' don't smell right about all this. And I don't like skunks."
"Me neither." Grimes agreed. "I think we oughta do with this one what we do with all skunks." Grimes grinned as he reached for his gun.
But just then, the Sherriff's voice could be heard close by calling for Robert Warren. "Mr. Warren? You around here?"
"Here!" Robert immediately answered, his voice holding a vaguely strangled quality. "I'm here, Sherriff!"
The two outlaws shared a glance before looking back at Warren. "It ain't me and Hy's problem your niece went miss'n. But you keep your eyes open cause we ain't done with you. Ya owe us money, and we're gonna get it one way or the other." Grimes said in a low voice filled with menace.
As Grimes and Harker faded into the surrounding cover and Sherriff Sprague suddenly came into view, Robert Warren realized he had only one option. He would have to find his niece and dispense with her quickly and efficiently, or it would be Brenda who would be filthy rich and he who would be dead.
TBC