Mankiller, Colorado

by William W. Johnstone

  Thad sneered. “I’m not interested in bein’ on any damn town council. The whole thing’s loco anyway. When I get outta here, I’ll show all of you who the real law is in Mankiller.”

  “I reckon we’ll see about that,” Bo said, although he thought it was a foregone conclusion that if the Deverys got elected, Edgar would dismiss the charges against his own son. Bo went on, “It won’t take long, either. The election’s only six days away.”

  “A lot can happen in six days,” Thad said.

  Bo didn’t like the sound of that. Didn’t like it one damned bit.

  CHAPTER 25

  That evening, the group that had hired Bo and Scratch to be deputies in the first place met again. Lucinda sent word to Bo that they would like for him to be there.

  “Are you sure you don’t mind missing out on whatever they’re going to talk about?” he asked Scratch before he left the sheriff’s office to attend the meeting.

  “You mean, would I rather sit in some stuffy room and listen to folks yammer about politics, or stay here and play dominoes with Biscuits?” In recent days, Scratch had been teaching Biscuits how to play the game. Like any good Texan, he was horrified by the thought of somebody not knowing how to play dominoes.

  Bo smiled. “Yeah, I know how you feel about politics.”

  “It brings out the windbag in just about anybody, even good folks like the ones we’re tryin’ to help. When you get back, you can tell me what they said, Bo. The important stuff, anyway. That’ll do me just fine.”

  “And I don’t reckon I’d be welcome,” Biscuits said. “It was Pa Devery who pinned this star on me, after all.”

  “That was when you were drinking,” Bo pointed out. “You’re sober now.”

  Biscuits heaved a sigh. “Don’t I know it? And there ain’t no tellin’ how long that’ll last.”

  “It’ll last,” Bo said, probably with more confidence than he actually felt. Biscuits was still pretty shaky at times, and more than once Bo had caught him sitting and staring into space as he licked his lips, the almost overpowering thirst for liquor easy to see on his whiskery face.

  As Scratch began to shuffle the dominoes on top of the desk, Bo left the office and walked across the street to the café, where the meeting would take place. Night had fallen, although there was still a little bit of red in the western sky from the vanished sun. Music came from the saloons and there were still quite a few people on the boardwalks and in the street. Nobody seemed interested in making trouble, though.

  Bo went into the café, which had closed early for this meeting. In addition to the group that had hired him and Scratch, Dr. Jason Weathers, Harlan Green, Colonel Horace Macauley, and several other business owners Bo had gotten to know were there. Some of them sat at the counter with their backs to the kitchen, while the others were grouped at a couple of the tables. Lucinda stood in the center of the meeting. She was the only one who didn’t have coffee.

  “Go behind the counter and help yourself to a cup if you’d like, Bo,” she told him with a smile.

  Bo returned the smile and said, “Don’t mind if I do.” When he was fortified with a cup of the strong, black brew, he thumbed his hat to the back of his head and sat down on one of the stools at the counter.

  “We’ve gotten together here tonight to talk about what we’re going to do about the Deverys running against our candidates,” Lucinda began.

  “We can’t do anything about it except defeat them,” Colonel Macauley said. He was a white-haired, white-mustachioed Virginian who tended toward expensive cigars, frock coats, and beaver top hats. A Southern drawl softened his voice. He had commanded a cavalry regiment during the Late Unpleasantness, as he referred to the war, and had left his ruined plantation behind afterward to come west and practice law.

  He went on, “What they’re doin’ is perfectly legal, no matter how much of a consarned shame and fraud it may be. I think we all know that the Deverys aren’t interested in establishin’ any kind of legitimate local gov’ment. They just want to keep the reins of power in their own iron fists by any means possible.”

  “Colonel, if you’re going to make a speech—” Lyle Rushford began, then the saloon keeper stopped short and looked around at the others. “That’s it! We need to have a rally so that all of our candidates can get up and tell people why they should vote for our side.”

  Lucinda looked uncomfortable. “I don’t know,” she said. “I’ve never been much of one for making speeches.”

  “Nor have I,” Wallace Kane added.

  “They don’t have to be fancy speeches like the colonel here, say, could make,” Rushford said. Macauley looked pleased at that. “They can be simple, as long as they’re sincere.”

  Dr. Weathers spoke up. “Well, I, for one, don’t object to telling people how I feel. One of the things you learn as a doctor is how to give people a piece of your mind when you think they need it.”

  Harlan Green chimed in, “I reckon I could say a few words, if I need to. I’m not that crazy about the idea, but I guess it would be all right.”

  “I’m still not sure,” Lucinda said. She looked at Bo. “What do you think, Bo?”

  He shrugged. “Personally, I’ve never cared much for political rallies and all that speechifying. But they must work, or people wouldn’t keep having them.”

  “Deputy Creel’s got a point, Lucinda,” Sam Bradfield said. “If we’re going to beat the Deverys and finally break their hold on this town, we have to use whatever weapons are available to us, even speeches.”

  Lucinda sighed. “I suppose you’re right, Sam.” She looked around at the others. “All right, if we’re all in agreement, we’ll have a rally. When?”

  “The night before the election,” Abner Malden said. “You want what you say to be fresh in folks’ minds when they go to vote the next day.”

  A chorus of agreement came from the other men. With the issue of whether or not to have a rally settled, they started hashing out the details, and after some discussion, they decided to hold the gathering in front of Rushford’s Colorado Palace Saloon. They would build a speaker’s platform at the edge of the street and hang red-white-and-blue bunting on the railing that ran along the edge of the second-floor balcony. Lanterns could be hung from that balcony, too, so that there would be plenty of light for the crowd to see the speakers.

  When they started talking about the order in which the speeches would be presented, Bo drank the last of his coffee and eased off the stool. “If you’ll pardon me, gents…and ma’am,” he added with a nod to Lucinda, “I ought to get back to the sheriff’s office. I think you’re on the right track here, folks, but you don’t really need me to help you figure out what you’re going to do.”

  Lucinda put a hand on his arm and squeezed for a second. “Thank you, Bo.”

  He smiled, nodded, tugged on the brim of his hat, and left the café.

  He wasn’t quite back to the sheriff’s office when he heard the sound of running footsteps approaching. A man came out of the darkness. He didn’t seem to see Bo until the Texan reached out and grabbed his arm.

  “Whoa there!” Bo said. “What’s the matter, mister?”

  “Deputy, is that you?”

  “Yeah. What’s wrong?”

  The man was out of breath. “Some fellas are…bustin’ up Bella’s Place.”

  “Again?” Bo said, recalling how he and Scratch had been summoned when the three Devery boys were wrecking the brothel. He recognized the man as Ernie Bond, who had brought word of the trouble that other night. “Who is it this time?”

  “A whole gang of…prospectors.” The little townie puffed a couple of times as he tried to catch his breath. “I dunno…what set ’em off.”

  Bo said, “All right, thanks. We’ll take care of it.” He sent Ernie on his way and hurried into the office.

  Scratch and Biscuits looked up from their domino game, clearly startled by the abruptness of Bo’s entrance. “What’s up, Bo?” Scratch asked.

&nbs
p; “Trouble,” Bo replied tightly. “Some sort of riot over at Bella’s Place.”

  Scratch started to his feet. “More Deverys, you reckon? We don’t have all of ’em locked up yet.”

  “No, according to what I was told, it’s a bunch of prospectors causing the ruckus this time.” Bo looked hard at Biscuits. “Sheriff, can we leave you here to guard the prisoners?”

  Biscuits swallowed nervously. “By myself?”

  “Load all three shotguns and set them on the desk,” Scratch suggested. “That’ll give you six barrels full of buckshot to discourage anybody tries to get in and ain’t supposed to.”

  “Well, I…I suppose so.”

  Bo and Scratch were thinking the same thing, that this might a trick to get them away from the jail so that the long-awaited attempt to break out the prisoners could take place. For some reason, though, Bo had his doubts this time. The Deverys, led by their patriarch, seemed to have their sights set on winning the election and solidifying their hold on the town that way. Bo wasn’t sure they would risk that on a jailbreak at this point.

  He also knew that so far, Biscuits hadn’t been forced to take a real stand against the man who had put him in office. He might buckle if he had to face Jackson Devery. But sooner or later, the Texans had to find out where Biscuits stood, and now was as good a time as any, Bo decided.

  “You’ll do fine,” he told the sheriff. “We’ll be back as soon as he can.”

  “Load those shotguns,” Scratch added as he clapped his hat on his head and started for the door with Bo.

  “And bar the door behind us!” Bo called back through the entrance.

  As they started over toward Grand Street, Scratch said, “Maybe we should’a brought a couple of shotguns with us. They don’t call ’em riot guns for nothin’, you know.”

  “We’ll be all right,” Bo said. “Probably just have to talk a little tough, and those miners will settle down.”

  They heard the yelling and commotion coming from Bella’s before they even got there. Hurrying even more, they reached the building and had to duck as a chair came crashing out through a window just as they got there. Broken glass sprayed over the boardwalk around them.

  “Son of a bitch!” Scratch said.

  Bo drew his gun. “Reckon this might take more than a few harsh words.”

  He yanked open the elaborate front door and plunged into the whorehouse with Scratch right on his heels. Chaos surrounded them, filling both the foyer and the parlor. Punches flew as men battled feverishly with each other. At least a dozen combatants were involved. Racket filled the air, a mixture of curses from the battling men, screams from the frightened soiled doves caught in the middle of the violence, and splintering crashes as furniture was grabbed, broken up, and used as weapons.

  George, who appeared to be fully recovered from the pistol-whipping he had received at the hands of the Deverys, stood at the edge of the action, obviously eager to plunge right into it. Bella was beside him, though, both hands gripped tightly around one of his muscular arms as she held him back.

  “You’ll just get yourself hurt!” she was saying. “Let the damn fools fight it out of their system!”

  Then she saw Bo and Scratch. “Deputies! Do something!”

  So it was all right for the two of them to risk life and limb, Bo thought, but not George. That was how it should be, he told himself. After all, they were paid to take such risks. But George probably was, too.

  Scratch leaned close to Bo. “If we fire a couple of shots into the ceilin’, that might settle ’em down!”

  Bo shook his head. “Yeah, but if any of them are packing irons, it might cause them to start shooting, too. Then we’d have a real mess here. Plus it’d leave some holes in Bella’s ceiling.”

  Scratch shrugged and asked, “What do you think we ought to do, then?”

  “Settle this down the hard way,” Bo said.

  He holstered his gun, stepped forward, and grabbed the shoulder of a man who stumbled backward toward him after an opponent had landed a punch in his face. Bo hauled the man around and threw a punch of his own. His fist crashed into the surprised man’s jaw and drove him off his feet.

  The man who’d been fighting with the one Bo had just hit glared at the Texan. “He was mine!” the man yelled. He lunged forward, swinging a wild, roundhouse blow at Bo’s head.

  Bo ducked under the man’s fist, stepped in close, and hooked a right into the man’s belly. His fist sunk deep and made the man bend forward. That put him in position for the hard left hand that Bo brought almost straight up under the chin. The man’s head jerked so far back it looked like his head was going to come right off his shoulders.

  Scratch whooped, “Now you’re talkin’!” and plunged into the melee.

  George said, “Dadgummit, Miss Bella, I got to get in there!” He pulled loose from her and joined the Texans in hand-to-hand battle with the rioting miners.

  For several hectic minutes, Bo, Scratch, and George waded through the thick mass of struggling men. Their fists shot out to the right and left, delivering punches that landed solidly and sent men sprawling on the floor. One of the fighters started trying to kick a man who had fallen, but he had landed only one kick when George grabbed him from behind by the belt and the shirt collar and lifted him off his feet. The man let out an alarmed yell that cut off abruptly as George rammed him face-first into a wall.

  One of the men jumped on Bo’s back from behind. Bo staggered a couple of steps before he caught his balance. He bent over, reached up, and grabbed the startled man by the hair. With a heave, Bo threw the man over his shoulder. The man came crashing down on his back, and Bo was left with a couple of handfuls of hair with bits of bloody scalp attached to them. He had pulled the hair out by its roots.

  Scratch stood toe-to-toe with a husky miner and traded punches, each man giving as good as he got for several moments. Scratch’s opponent had the advantage in just about everything: height, weight, reach, and age.

  But Scratch had the wiliness that came from years of brawling. He feinted so skillfully that the man fell for it and left himself wide open for the hard left that Scratch planted on his nose. He bit on the next feint as well and let Scratch get close enough to lift a knee into his groin. It was a low blow, but effective. The man groaned and doubled over as he clutched at himself. Scratch clubbed his hands together and brought them down on the back of the man’s neck. The impact hammered the man to the floor.

  George grabbed two more men by their necks and banged their heads together. Their skulls met with a loud thud. When George let go of them, they collapsed bonelessly.

  “That looks like all of them,” Bo said.

  It was true. Some of the men had knocked each other out, and the Texans and George had taken care of the others. A few of the men on the floor were moaning and semiconscious, but most of them were out cold. Bo checked for pulses and found that they were all still alive. He was grateful for that, anyway.

  The three men weren’t hurt except for some bumps, bruises, and scrapes. Bo and Scratch found their hats, which had come off during the fracas, and put them back on. Then Bo turned to Bella and asked, “What started this?”

  “I don’t know,” the redheaded madam said helplessly. “About half a dozen of those men just came in and started fighting with some of my customers. There was no reason for it I could see unless they were carrying a grudge because of something that happened somewhere else.”

  That was possible, Bo thought. The two bunches could have been enemies, and one could have followed the other here to the brothel.

  Bella’s green eyes suddenly widened. “Unless…” she began.

  “Unless what?” Bo asked when she paused.

  “Can you come with me, Deputy? There’s something in my office I want to tell you.”

  Bo looked over at Scratch and George. “Can you keep an eye on those varmints in case they start to wake up?”

  Scratch grunted and drew his Colt. “If they start to wake up,
I’m liable to give ’em a little love tap with my gun butt.”

  “Just don’t bust any skulls permanent-like,” Bo said.

  He followed Bella back to her office in the rear of the building. It was a small but comfortably furnished room. She motioned Bo into a leather armchair and went behind the desk.

  “Jackson Devery came to see me this afternoon, Deputy,” she said as she sat down.

  “Devery?” Bo repeated with a frown. “What did he want? I mean—”

  Bella smiled and shook her head. “Devery’s a lot of things, none of ’em good, but he’s not a man who patronizes a whorehouse. No, he acted all friendly-like and asked a favor of me.”

  “A favor?”

  “He said he wanted me and my girls to tell every man who comes in here to vote for him and the other Deverys in the election. Said we ought to tell them that if that bunch on the other side is elected, they’ll shut down all the saloons and gambling dens and houses like this one.”

  “I doubt if that would happen,” Bo said. “I haven’t heard them say anything like that, and Lyle Rushford, the owner of the Colorado Palace, is a member of the group.”

  Bella nodded. “I know. It doesn’t seem likely to me, either, and I said as much to Devery. I told him I wasn’t going to mess with politics. When a man’s here visiting one of my girls, the last thing he wants to hear is some damned political speech.”

  Bo figured that was probably true. He asked, “How did Devery react to that?”

  “The same way he reacts to just about everything. He got mad.” Bella leaned forward. “And he said that if I didn’t go along with what he wanted, I’d be sorry, Deputy. Mighty sorry.”

  CHAPTER 26

  Bo looked across the desk at Bella for a long moment, then said, “You think Devery had something to do with what happened here tonight?”

  “He threatened me, Deputy. There’s no other way to look at it. It can’t be a coincidence that he came to see me today, and this fight broke out tonight after I wouldn’t go along with what he wanted.”