“He what?”
“He carried your head on his saddle horn.” She blinked, her eyelashes fluttering like black lace fans. “I ran and he came after me . . . and . . . and then you woke me up.”
Shawn smiled. “Too much coffee before bed I reckon.”
Maria shook her head. “No, it wasn’t. It was real. I remember my grandmother used to put seven leaves from an ash tree under her pillow to attract prophetic dreams and she told me how to identify them. I’ve had a warning dream. It told me that evil is headed our way, but we still have time to change the outcome.”
“Good. Then I can keep my head,” Shawn said.
“It’s not funny, Shawn. It’s real.”
Maria was so visibly upset that Shawn decided not to tease her any further and held her trembling body in his arms. “I guess we’ll have to be more careful until the danger passes.”
“You do believe me, Shawn, don’t you?” Maria had sobs in her voice.
“Yes, yes, I believe you. And I’ll be careful.” Only then did he remember . . . Behold a pale horse and he who sits on it has the name death. “Yes, I believe you.”
Suddenly, the morning air felt chill.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
“Since my gun frigates interest only governments that can afford the cost, I’m used to dealing with diplomats, not policemen.” Caleb Perry’s mouth was a thin gash of irritation.
“Sir, I can assure you that her Britannic Majesty’s government has given me full authority to make the necessary airship purchases,” Inspector Adam Ready said.
“But I still ask myself, why send a relatively low-ranking policeman?”
“Because my detective skills will help ensure that the British Empire will have parity in the air. In other words, Mr. Perry, we must be able to match the great powers of Europe combined. I am here to see that this is the case. Of course, our immediate concern is Germany and our hereditary enemy France.”
“The French have placed no orders for my steam frigates,” Perry said.
“Not yet, but they will once Great Britain and Germany have them. The French are not ones to lag behind in modern weaponry. Their Lahitolle 95-millimeter breechloader cannon is the envy of the world.”
“Let us not forget that the United States will not lag behind either.”
“The British government entirely discounts that possibility. The United States will not let itself be embroiled in future European wars. After the slaughter of your Civil War, the American public doesn’t have the belly for another fight and will always put bread before battles.” Ready touched the side of his nose. “And that leads me to a question, Mr. Perry, to be answered in the strictest confidence. I have it on excellent authority that the Germans have ordered twenty frigates. Naturally, the British will require twenty-one. How do you plan to build all those air weapons?”
“I’ll add more building bays to the existing foundry and increase the labor force tenfold, perhaps much more than that.”
“Where will you find such numbers of workers?” Ready wondered.
“High wages will always attract professionals like engineers, mechanics, carpenters, and their ilk, Inspector. As for common laborers, I can find all I need in Mexico. Mexican peons are not real people like you and me. They are very primitive and adapt very well to hard physical labor. And they are a docile people, especially when I intend to allow them to bring their wives and children to Abaddon.”
“And they work cheap, I presume. Her Majesty’s government is not a spendthrift institution.”
“The Mexicans work cheap and since they’re small they don’t eat much,” Perry said. “Be assured that every British pound sterling will be carefully spent.”
“On the face of it, all seems to be well.” Ready placed his cup on the saucer and switched his attention to Lizzie Skates. “You make a nice cup of tea, my dear.”
“I have a lot of talents, Inspector,” she said, smiling as she crossed then uncrossed her shapely legs.
That flustered Ready a little. “Mr. Perry, I would like to see the steam frigate that is currently under construction.”
“Ah, the Count Werner Von Jungen. Why of course you can.”
Ready was appalled. “That’s what the frigate is named?”
“Yes,” Perry said, enjoying himself. “It’s the first of the German ships, named after a famous industrialist.”
“Then the first British ship must be the Queen Victoria.”
“Of course. What other name could we possibly use for such a fine vessel?”
“Indeed,” the inspector said, feeling that he was being teased.
* * *
Jacob O’Brien was on the floor of the construction bay with Manuel Cantrell when Caleb Perry led Detective Inspector Ready onto the gantry. Lizzie Skates in her usual boned corset, short skirt, and boots stood with them. She wore a white top hat adorned with diamond-studded goggles and carried an ivory-handled riding crop in her hands.
While Perry pointed out the various parts of the rapidly emerging steam frigate and the work crews became suddenly busy, Jacob spoke urgently to Manuel. “You’ve told the others about the plan?”
The young man nodded as though the big foreman was giving him work instructions. “They will do as you tell them.”
“Good. It’s not going to be easy.”
“Nothing at Abaddon ever is. Did you hear about the attempted escape?”
Jacob nodded as if confirming instructions. “Three men, wasn’t it?”
“Five. They couldn’t open a locked door and were gunned down by Breens and Kilcoyn right where they stood. One of them was sixteen years old.”
“That will come to an end real soon,” Jacob said, a slow-rising anger in him.
“So you say,” Manuel said. “Maybe there’s no escape from hell. You ever think on that?”
“There is a way to escape from this hell. And I’ll help you find it.”
* * *
That evening, Detective Inspector Adam Ready signed a contract for twenty-one steam frigates. The contract would later be mailed to the British Legate in Washington to be ratified.
Caleb Perry was so delighted he gifted Ready with a fine top hat and a pair of goggles to wear while he was in Big Buck. He also gave him the use of Lizzie Skates as a gesture of goodwill.
Ready chose not to remain within the smoky, noisy confines of the foundry and Perry agreed that the hotel would probably be more restful.
It would prove to be a tragic, terrible mistake, but how was Perry to know that close contact with a homicidal madman had infected Adam Ready’s mind?
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Lizzie Skates’s death was neither quick nor pleasant. She’d tried to scream, but her vocal cords had been cut and making any sound had been impossible. Adam Ready was good with the knife. He’d studied Jack the Ripper’s technique up close and modeled his own blade work on that brilliant model.
Lizzie was only his second kill, the first a nameless streetwalker in the Whitechapel district of London. His colleagues who investigated the murder said the woman’s mutilations were definitely the work of Jolly Jack and Ready had been secretly pleased at the comparison.
Drenched in blood, he sat back in the easy chair that the hotel had thoughtfully provided and regarded Lizzie’s body with considerable pleasure. The cutting had gone well and she was opened up like a gutted fish, her insides exposed for all the world to see. Her dead face bore an expression that intrigued him, an open-eyed look of horror, pain, and surprise all mixed together. She’d bled more than his first one, probably because that cutting had taken place outdoors in a fog-shrouded alley and he’d hurried the process for fear of being discovered. But cutting and carving at his leisure, the wounds were much more extensive and, naturally, the more cuts he made, the more blood was spilled.
He lit his S-shaped pipe with scarlet hands, wishing there was someone he could tell about the difficulties he’d faced. Her boned corset, done up with straps and buckles and lace
s, had deflected his initial knife thrusts and for a moment he’d panicked. Subsequent stabs at her had gone home deep and he and Lizzie had become perfect friends again. He believed an onlooker would have laughed to watch his cursing struggles to divest the woman of her corset, the better to expose her large, white breasts. But in the end he’d managed . . . and as they say, all’s well that ends well.
Ready consulted Lizzie’s pocket watch that hung around his neck. Early yet, only eight o’clock and barely dark. He’d sit for an hour or so and enjoy the company. Ah yes, life was good, but he would kill for a nice cup of tea. Earl Grey, please, with no milk and one lump of sugar. Thank you very much.
* * *
Adam Ready was dozing when the grandfather clock in the lobby woke him. He opened his eyes and stretched and the thickly crusted blood on his hands and arms pulled at his skin. Lizzie Skates’s body was a patchwork of gray skin and black gore. Her face was shadowed and there was no light in her eyes. She was just a corpse, stiff and cold and of no further interest to the killer.
The mess had to be cleaned up.
He rose, shrugged into his tweed overcoat, and placed his new top hat on his head. They only person he could turn to, the only man who could possibly understand his strange compulsions, was Caleb Perry.
Ready left the room, took the stairs, and once in the street, headed for the Abaddon Foundry. Guards stood at the door and looked him over, unable to see his bloodstained clothes since his coat covered them. He was allowed to enter and another guard led him to Perry’s office where the man still worked at his desk, the thick ledger in front of him illuminated by an oil lamp.
When Perry looked up, Ready said, “Something terrible yet exciting has happened.”
* * *
To his foremen Anstruther Breens, Blaine Keeners, and Valentine Kilcoyn, Perry said, “Bring some trolls from the foundry and get this place cleaned up, every inch of it, walls, floors, and windows. Damn it, there’s blood everywhere.”
“What about Lizzie?” Kilcoyn asked.
“Well, she isn’t Lizzie any longer, is she?” Perry said. “Carry her back to Abaddon as though she’s drunk—”
“The body will fall apart in the street, boss,” Kilcoyn said.
“Then bring a box and we’ll load her into it. Damn it all, do I have to tell you everything? She’ll go up the chimney tonight.”
Keeners glared at Adam Ready. “I liked Lizzie Skates. She was good to me.”
“Yes, she was a nice lady . . . I mean, for a harlot.”
“Then why did you butcher her?” Keeners’s hand was on his gun butt.
“I was infected in London by a dread disease that pollutes a madman the press calls Jack the Ripper. Jack cuts up harlots for fun. An evil being he’d left at the scene of one of his murders jumped into my body and it makes me do things . . . terrible things.”
“Mister, your cutting days have come to an end right here,” Keeners pulled his gun.
Perry yelled, “No, you damn fool!” He saw the shock in Keeners’s face and said in a more level tone,” I don’t want anything to disrupt my contract with the British government. We can’t gun its representative and say he disappeared. There would be an immediate investigation from Washington and London and they might even say the agreement that Ready signed is no longer valid.”
“So he just walks away from this a free man?” Kilcoyn asked.
“Yeah, that’s how it’s going to be,” Perry said. “He walks away from this.”
“Don’t hardly seem right, boss,” Keener said. “I mean, Lizzie murdered like that . . .”
“Of course it isn’t right. But it’s good business. What does her life matter when a contract worth a million dollars is at stake? Now holster your gun, get the body out of here, and see that this place is cleaned up. When that’s done, shoot the trolls. The fewer who know about this the better.” Perry, small, stocky, and stiff with anger turned a blazing face to Ready. “You’d better come with me to Abaddon, away from the scene of your crime.”
“Certainly, Mr. Perry, but could you arrange for a nice cup of tea when we get there? I have something of a headache.”
CHAPTER THIRTY
Shawn O’Brien looped the reins around the saloon’s hitching rail, gazed around Big Buck’s main street, and lifted to his eyes to the Abaddon Foundry crouched close to town like a monstrous beast of prey. Somewhere inside that colossus was Manuel Cantrell, the man he’d pledged to save, and Caleb Perry, the man he’d vowed to kill. “Well, I’m here now, Perry, out in the open. Come and get me any time you feel like it.”
Beside him, Maria Cantrell said, “Shawn, making yourself a target will solve nothing. There has to be a better way.”
“If there is, I haven’t been able to find it. But I’m all through hiding in the brush like a wounded animal. From now on, Perry will have to come for me gun in hand.”
“He has men for that.” Maria’s eyes were wary, frightened.
“Then I’ll kill them one by one until I finally get to Perry.” Shawn smiled. “Now, can I buy you a drink? It isn’t Le Procope in Paris, but it will have to do.”
“Shawn, please don’t do this,” Maria begged.
“You may take my arm, madam. Shall we promenade and make a show?”
Arm in arm, they strolled along the boardwalk. Shawn lifted his hat to every woman they passed and offered a cheery good morning to the men. He was making his presence known to as many people as he could. Finally, Maria convinced him to get off the street where he was an obvious target for a rifleman.
After the glare of the late morning sun, the interior of the saloon was dark and cool—and so was bartender Ambrose Hellen’s reception. “My God, O’Brien. Are you crazy?”
“Bourbon for me and a gin punch for the lady,” Shawn said.
“There’s a five-thousand-dollar reward for your head,” Hellen said.
Shawn ignored that. “Do you have lemons for the punch? Doña Maria must have lemons.”
Hellen shook his head. “Shawn, you were a dead man the moment you rode into Big Buck this morning. Don’t you know that?”
“Pour my bourbon, Ambrose, and do what you can with the gin punch.”
“Bourbon is fine for me,” Maria said. “I think I’m going to need it before too long.”
Hellen poured the drinks, casting an eye over the other patrons at the bar and tables. “Enjoy your whiskey and get out of town, O’Brien. You life isn’t worth a plugged nickel in Big Buck and, Maria, neither is yours.”
She nodded. “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell him. He won’t listen.”
“How do I get inside Abaddon, Ambrose?” Shawn asked.
“Easy. You just go to the door, tell them you want a job, and march right in with the Mexicans. About two minutes after that, the peons will be working and you’ll be dead.”
Shawn absorbed that and said, “Let me have a handful of those Dutch cheroots, Ambrose.”
“Big handful or small handful?”
“Call it a dozen and I need a box of lucifers.”
A voice from the other end of the bar called, “Hey Ambrose, what went on at the Rest and Be Thankful last night?”
“I don’t know and I don’t want to know.”
“They say a couple Abaddon foremen carried a heavy box out of the hotel and took it to the foundry. Carried it like a coffin they say.”
“They say too much, Jeb. What goes on at Abaddon is none of my concern or yours either.”
“It’s strange all the same. Very strange.” Jeb went back to his drink and his female companion.
“How strange was it, Ambrose?” Shawn whispered.
“Strange enough that it shouldn’t concern you.”
“They call me the Town Tamer and I aim to tame Big Buck. So how strange was it?”
Hellen sighed and dropped his voice to a whisper. “There was a trail of blood in the street. Charlie Elsyng the night watchman saw it. He says it led from the hotel to the foundry. Charlie said th
ere was so much blood it was a cutting for sure.”
“What did he do about it?” Shawn asked.
“Do about it? For fifty cents a night, Charlie did nothing about it. He lit a shuck and spent the rest of the night bedded down right here in the saloon, said he was scared of boogeymen.”
“Shawn, whatever it was and whoever was cut up, is none of our business,” Maria insisted.
“Caleb Perry was up to something last night,” Shawn said. “I’d like to know what it was.”
“Why?”
“I have to do something, anything, to bring Perry to me,” Shawn answered. “Ambrose is right, I wouldn’t last long inside the Abaddon foundry.”
“In or out of the foundry you’re not gonna last long.” Hellen thumbed his chest. “This old crow has eaten enough field corn to know that sometimes scarecrows carry shotguns. You’re in the wrong meadow, O’Brien. I suggest you get while the getting’s good.”
“Thanks for the advice, Ambrose. But all the same I think I’ll wander over to the hotel and have a word with the desk clerk about last night. It may be preying on his mind.”
Hellen suddenly looked older. “I won’t come to your funeral, O’Brien, but the drinks are on me. Just make believe I’m paying for your wake.”
* * *
The gloomy desk clerk opened his eyes wide when he saw Maria and wider as soon as he eyeballed Shawn O’Brien. “It’s you again. Last time you was here, you shoved the barrel of a Colt’s gun up my nose.”
“I come in peace,” Shawn said, smiling. “All I want is some information.”
“That’s what you wanted the last time,” the clerk whined, “and I got no information to share.”
Maria wore a fitted black dress split up the front over a white blouse and high boots. Her only jewelry was a skeleton pocket watch suspended on a silver chain around her neck. She wore a black top hat and goggles in the accepted Big Buck fashion. Well aware of the effect she had on men, she stepped close enough to the clerk that he felt the warmth of her body. “I do worry that perhaps some of my friends were involved. I believe several members of the Women’s Temperance Guild of Texas were staying here last night.”
Better Off Dead Page 12
