The Long-Knives 6

by Patrick E. Andrews

  By the time they neared the town, the sun had become a thin, red-orange slice hanging over the mountain at their backs. A crudely lettered wooden sign was tacked to a post, driven into the ground beside the narrow trail. “Slaughter,” it read in big, runny letters, “population 378.” Some wag had crossed out the figure below, “377,” which was in turn struck through and the next smaller number lettered on, down to “296,” and then came the single word,

  “Next?”

  O’Callan shivered in the chill of the higher altitude. “Don’t exactly make ye feel the welcome of a warm hearth an’ a friendly face, does it?”

  “Civilians,” Brannigan answered by way of complete explanation of the sign. Nodding toward it, he asked, “Wonder what happened to the smart-aleck?”

  “Let us truly hope he was the one brought the population to two hundred ninety-six,” Terry O’Callan replied before nudging his horse forward, past the sign and into the muddy street.

  Both sides of the main—and only—street of Slaughter seemed lined, wall to wall, with tall, dirty, stained white tents and rough-clad miners. Human and animal life thronged everywhere, ebbing and flowing in a greasy surge through the sticky mud on the main drag. Horses, burros, and mules added their voices to the general air of noisy restlessness, and an occasional shout of joy or anger came from inside one or another of the lantern-lighted tent buildings. Flies buzzed around the carcass of a dead cat and a few dogs lolled in the culs-de-sac formed by tent sides and empty beer barrels.

  “Notice somethin’?” O’Callan asked his friend, indicating the mass that surged around them, oblivious of their presence. “This is supposed to be a town, yet do ye see any womenfolk or kids about?”

  Brannigan started to answer but was interrupted by two shots that blasted off inside one double-tent saloon with high wooden walls. A woman screamed from the interior, followed by a man’s lusty laugh. Then the piano picked up the tune and the general uproar of “business as usual” resumed.

  “Sounds like there’s women of a sorts here, anyway,” Brannigan observed,

  “Now that’s a comfortin’ thought, I swear it is. What say we stop here and wet our throats? We can find out about some eats.”

  Without a doubt, the large saloon from which the shots had come looked the most prosperous of the lot—and easily the least scrofulous. Brannigan grunted assent and they tied up at the crowded rail. Liberal use of their elbows got them through the packed bodies in front of the entrance and also a place at the bar. The plank-on-barrel affair was reminiscent of Hays’s place in Lester Wells, though none of it had the look of permanence possessed by that distant establishment. A bald, mustachioed barkeep, who topped both six feet and two hundred fifty pounds, surged in their direction, setting down two glasses and a bottle.

  “Five dollars dust, four cash.”

  “What?” O’Callan spluttered.

  “Five dust, four cash.”

  “For a dollar four-bit bottle o’ rotgut?” O’Callan shouted above the din, thoroughly shocked.

  “Take it or leave it. That’s the price. You must be new here.”

  “What?”

  “I said, you must be new. It’ll quiet down a bit soon now. We’re due to shovel out the drunks and make room for a new crop.”

  Fifteen minutes later, true to the barkeep’s prediction, the shrill sound of several whistles battered down the roisterous noise of the miners, and a bull voice bellowed over and over, “Time! Everyone out. All right, now, make way and clear this place.”

  When the tide of ejected drinkers surged toward where O’Callan and Brannigan stood, the bald-headed apron hovered near. One thick-necked, muscular bouncer reached out to give the pair a shove toward the door. The barman spoke up.

  “Those two can stay. They just came in.”

  “Thank ye, kindly,” O’Callan said sincerely as the last of the crowd got shoved from the doors, which were closed tightly and barred.

  “Pleasure’s mine. Figgered you boys could use a little instructin’ in the ways o’ Slaughter.”

  “Ye’ve a bit o’ the lilt o’ Dublin in yer voice,” Brannigan declared, brightening.

  “That I have, bucko. ’Though I’ve been in this country nigh onto thirty years, man and boy, and would swear I lost it. Me name’s Sean Casey.” The barkeep shoved out a hand in welcome, his accent thickening with each word.

  Brannigan snagged a third glass and filled it, pouring refills for himself and O’Callan before accepting the greeting. He shoved the thick-bottomed shooter in front of the apron, then lifted his own. “Well, Mr. Sean Casey, Erin go brah!” he toasted.

  Sean looked in both directions before lifting his glass. “Luck o’ the Irish! ’Tis cleanup time. We’ve half an hour before they open the doors and let in another mob. So a little nip or two won’t hurt, I suppose.”

  O’Callan and Brannigan introduced themselves and, during the next half-hour, learned all there was to know about life, and death, in Slaughter. Any man, Sean told them, could call out any other man in a fair gunfight, wrestling match, or free-for-all. Should either man run from the challenge, he forfeited anything and everything he left behind. There was law of sorts. Once a month, a U.S. marshal rode over from Flagstaff, bringing along a circuit judge. Trials were then held for any accused of crimes like murder or claim jumping. The ones, that is, who had not met swifter justice at the end of a lynch rope.

  “Oh, they’s quite a few dances the Miss’ippi two-step ’round here,” one of the bouncers chimed in, joining the conversation.

  He was built like a bloodhound, thick-necked and heavily muscled in shoulders and arms, though whip-lean from there on down to nearly nonexistent hips and rickets-bowed short legs. His soft, Southern accent sounded mush-mouthed to ears accustomed to years of Irish and German guttural accented, broken English. He gave the pair of sergeants the rules of the place and suggested they avoid several establishments on down the street. Then, with a friendly nod, he left to join his companions who were engaged in a beer-drinking contest at a table in the rear. On the matter of outfitting as prospectors, Sean Casey was somewhat reticent.

  “Don’t be buyin’ from Ebenezer the Cripple,” he advised. “He’ll cheat ye like the devil on the price, yell about how you’re skinnin’ a poor crippled man to take it for that, and give ye second-rate goods on top o’ that. Ye’d best be advised to take jobs here as bouncers, or in another honest establishment. There ain’t much gold out there in the hills, an’ what’s there is most all claimed by others. What you’d make workin’ fer wages for a minin’ outfit—even paid in dust—wouldn’t buy ye the time o’ day around here. No. The best and quickest way to make money out o’ a gold strike is to provide goods and services. Mark that, ‘goods and services.’”

  O’Callan couldn’t believe it. His naturally combative spirit wouldn’t accept that he’d made a mistake in seeing gold prospecting as a way out of his dilemma.

  “An’ ye mean to tell me ye’re content workin’ fer another man, drawin’ wages and whatever ye can snitch from the gold dust with a wet thumb?”

  Casey’s face split open in a wide grin, giving him a jack-o’-lantern appearance. “Workin’ here, is it? Hell, man, I own this place. And another like it down the street two blocks. So there’s work a-plenty for the both o’ ye. All ye need say is ‘Mr. Casey, will ye be fer hirin’ us?’”

  “That’s kind o’ ye, Mr. Casey,” O’Callan replied in a solemn tone. “An’ I’m sure ye’re more’n fair as an employer, too.”

  “I’m easy to git along with,” Casey agreed. “All that I ask is that me bartenders keep their faces clean-shaved.”

  “An’ why is that?” Brannigan inquired.

  “Most of the payment around here is in gold dust or nuggets,” Casey explained. “Sure an’ ’tis an old trick to take the dust, then run yer fingers through yer beard. By the end of an evenin’, ye could comb out close to a thousand dollars. Now give me yer answer. What do ye say?”

  Jim Brannigan n
oticed O’Callan’s discomfort and replied for both of them, as diplomatically as possible. “We thank ye kindly, Mr. Casey. ’Tis a generous offer. But me friend here has his heart set on doin’ a little prospectin’, so we’ll be tryin’ our hand at that, first off. Much obliged for yer consideration, and we’ll surely keep it in mind—that is, if the offer’d be open at another time.”

  “Never fear o’ that, lads. The boys are always gettin’ knifed, or shot, or carved up with a broken bottle. I’ve more vacancies than I can ever fill, so any time ye’re a mind to try it, let me know.”

  In the restaurant recommended by Sean Casey, O’Callan drank deeply of a large glass of buttermilk.

  “’Tis somethin’ the darlin’ cavalry never provides that I been thirstin’ far fer a long time,” he commented, smacking his lips. Then his face took on a serious cast, though mischief glimmered in his blue eyes.

  “’Twas nice of our new friend, Sean Casey, to be so generous an’ offer us the priceless opportunity to be knifed, or shot, or carved up with a broken bottle. Wasn’t it, Jimmy?”

  “An’ that’s a fact, Terry.”

  O’Callan snorted. “As if the darlin’ Apaches weren’t likely to do that any day o’ the year around Fort Dawson.”

  “The very truth just drips from yer lips, O’Callan.”

  “Considerin’ the price we’re payin’ fer this meal out o’ me savin’s, mind ye—we’d best not be eatin’ in a restaurant again till we strike it rich.”

  “I agree. Oh, I agree,” Brannigan answered solemnly.

  ~*~

  Far to the south, in the Dolores Range, the first tender shoots of green had pushed though the scattered, rotted crusts of snow. With the Moon-When-Snow-Melts nearly half over, Halcon found life in the rancheria much improved. His son still spoke little, sat alone much of the time, and drew his strange marks in the dust. Only now, at least, his odd ways had the stature of being the acts of a mystic. The Thunderbird smiled on the boy. The youngster would have had a hard time living with defeat on the very edge of manhood. Now he could dream his dreams and learn, it could be hoped, what it really was Spirit-Woman-of-the-Mountain had destined him to do. The fruitfulness of a new year brought even further rewards to the wikiup of Halcon.

  Niente had shyly, but proudly, announced that she was with child. A new baby was an omen of good things for everyone. The winter had not been harsh. Deer and bear were sleek and walked unafraid. Even the timid rabbits grew fat and sassy on the first thin blades that sprang up in the meadow where the horses fed. It seemed as if the land had gone back to its beginning. If only the white-eyes no longer profaned the place with their presence, it would be as it had been in the time of the first of the People. There was even hope that this could come to pass.

  Mochuelito had spoken at the council fire two nights before. Still some three moons shy of thirteen, the slender lad possessed an uncommon presence in the company of his elders. He had said that he had seen a vision in which, when the water stopped with a roar above the rim of the valley, many white-eyes would be found among the rocks. They would have come to kill the People, but would run away with the hearts of rabbits. Many would die.

  How this could be, Halcon reasoned, only the Spirits could know. It might be that it would mark the beginning of the time foretold, when all of the pen-dik-oye would be driven from the land and their evil works would plague the People no more.

  Strange, though, the war chief thought as he stared upward at a clear night sky. The pony-soldiers must know we are in this rancheria. Yet they don’t come with their guns, killing the women and children. If the band were left alone, should they not reverse what they had been doing? Raid instead in Me-hee-koh and bring back the cattle and horses and grow fat and happy here, as the Chiricahua have done in Cochise’s stronghold? It is something to ask of the Spirits. Perhaps Mochuelito would know.

  “Ah!” Halcon enthused aloud. “How brightly the warriors of the spirit world shine over us tonight. It is good.”

  A soft footstep intruded on his communion.

  “Put your arm around me, Father. Please. And tell me about the warriors in the sky.”

  Gazing upward with the same pleading look of seasons long past, Mochuelito became once again Da-soda-hae, if only for one night. Tears filled Halcon’s eyes and his heart knew the happy pain of devoted parenthood. He quickly clasped his boy to him and they sat upon the ground.

  “Yes, son. It is an old, old story ... ”

  ~*~

  “Look how bright the darlin’ stars are,” O’Callan enthused as he and Jimmy Brannigan walked through the unabated throng on the muddy main street of Slaughter. There might be only close to three hundred residents, but the hordes of prospectors, swarming in from their claims, swelled the count beyond reckoning.

  “What say we pop in here fer a little dram before beddin’ down fer the night?”

  Brannigan studied the entrance to a narrow, pen-like saloon, dimly lighted by a single kerosene lantern. “A wee bit o’ whiskey would be fittin’ fer body and soul, right enough. But I’m thinkin’ we’d be well advised to have it in Casey’s place.”

  “’Tis too far back, Jimmy lad. An’ our bunks are paid fer just across the street. Step lively now, and let’s show ’em how an Irishman can drink.”

  Inside, a surly bartender with hands no less grimy than the filth-encrusted, once-white apron that encompassed the pendulant bulge of his flabby, jiggling belly, served them a suspiciously yellowish liquid in fisheye shot glasses, charging a dollar each.

  O’Callan lifted the magnifying shot glass—which gave its contents an appearance of twice the true volume—and took a small gulp of the ocher liquid. Choking on the raw, vitriolic burn in his throat, he spewed the lot out in a fine spray. The “whiskey” served in this particular sleazy shake-me-down consisted of watered-down raw bootleg alcohol with just a passing touch of melted-caramel color and a handsome dash of cayenne pepper. When O’Callan recovered enough to speak, he bellowed angrily at the bartender:

  “A dollar a shot far this swill! Are ye tryin’ ta murder a man? I’d not give away this rotgut to a pig o’ an Englishman, let alone be sellin’ it to an honest man fer a dollar a shot.”

  “You pay yer money and drink what’s served ya, or shut yer mouth and get the hell outta here, ya Mick bastid,” the apron growled.

  Brannigan had been separated from his friend by the influx of several thirsty miners and was halfway down the bar, unable to act as a moderating influence when O’Callan’s temper exploded up through his vocal cords.

  “I paid for a drink o’ whiskey, not this horse piss! An’ I’ll have a drink o’ whiskey or this place gets redecorated as of right now!”

  “Doake’s right,” a miner on O’Callan’s right growled. “Shut yer big Mick mouth or get yer arse outta here.”

  All the brave songs of all the brave lads who had fought for Irish freedom chorused through O’Callan’s head and the sound of drums and bagpipes sang in his ears. Now this was more like it! Something he could handle far better than all the words in the language.

  “So that’s the way it’s to be, is it? How’d ye like a smack in the mouth fer yer interferin’ boorishness?”

  Terry O’Callan still had one hand on the half-full glass of questionable liquor. Unperturbed by this obstruction, his right hand clenched into a ball of rock-hard knuckles. As he started to swing, two miners grabbed his shoulders from behind.

  Without conscious thought, he tossed the raw booze over his left shoulder into the face of one man, who released his grip to dig at his eyes, howling in pain. At the same time, O’Callan reversed the direction of his right arm, driving a sharp elbow into the stomach of the second man to his rear. A rank, rotgut stink shot from the prospector’s mouth with a whoosh, followed by the rancid, roiling contents of his tormented stomach. He kept on doubling over until a chop behind the ear by O’Callan sent him face first into his own gorge.

  Without allowing the action to distract his attention f
rom the man who had challenged him, O’Callan abruptly raised a bony knee. Sharp contact with the tender treasures of the gold-seeker’s groin caused the argumentative man’s face to redden as inarticulate sounds screeched from his throat. His hands groped helplessly at the throbbing pain that had suddenly bloomed in his loins.

  Stricken, he sagged to his knees while he made small mewing sounds. Four more prospectors rushed to take on the red-haired fury who had so irreverently criticized their favorite bar.

  O’Callan snapped three fast lefts, followed by a nose-smashing right, to the head and face of a boiled-cabbage-smelling German miner, while he kept his elbows and upper arms in position to block the ineffective, close-quarters blows of the other three. O’Callan’s hands lashed out, grabbed the wrist of the man on his left, and used the momentum of the miner’s blow to throw him into the other pair. The trio went sprawling across a table, into the laps of the men seated there cheering on the fight.

  One man sat up, making ready to rejoin the brawl, only to be punched in the face by the sourdough whose drink he had spilled. His comrades began to flail out at those nearby, and O’Callan’s fight spread like lightning through a dead tree until the entire saloon became a writhing mass of panting, fist-throwing mayhem. One man jumped into the air, grabbed a rafter that supported the tent walls, and swung back and forth to gain momentum.

  Gradually the range of his swings increased. He bellowed like an ape and snapped his legs out, full length, aimed at O’Callan’s head. In an eye-blink it was no longer there. O’Callan had nimbly bobbed to one side. The thin stringer had to absorb the full force of his thrust—and it failed.

  He let out a yelp of surprise and terror as the board snapped. The tent roof sagged in. Eyes white with the vision of doom, he fell to the slimy mud floor, to be trampled into unconsciousness by the churning feet of the combatants. At the same moment, Doake of the dirty hands and sloppy belly reached under the bar, to come up with a bung starter. He took aim at the vulnerable back of O’Callan’s head.