“Grace, you’re gonna burst a blood vessel less you relax,” the Gunman drawled, a smile on his lips.
Jessie licked his lips and forced himself to quit fighting against the Gunman’s invisible hold. As soon as he surrendered, the pressure on his chest and shoulders released. It was easier to breathe.
“Grace, stop struggling to get up,” Jessie said.
Grace tore her gaze from the Darksome Gunman and glared at Jessie. He nodded to her and frowned as her face purpled with the effort to move. Finally, she slumped back in the chair. As soon as she did, her arms were able to lift, and she pressed her splayed hands against the table. She stared at the Gunman with a sneer on her lips.
“There. Ain’t that better? Now, let’s have us a civilized exchange without irons or cussing.”
“Fuck you,” Grace spat.
The Gunman smiled and leaned toward Grace. “Cuss at me again and I’ll put a knife through the boy’s eye.”
Something about the conversational way he uttered the threat made it all the more menacing. The blood drained from Grace’s face, and her gaze slid from the Gunman to Jessie. She closed her eyes for a moment, and Jessie knew the Gunman had hurt her. He gripped the edge of the table as his heart hammered against his ribs. When Grace opened her eyes and faced the Gunman, the fiend smiled. He leaned back and continued shuffling the playing cards. Without a word, he began to deal.
“What do you want?” Grace spat.
“See? You can be mannerly.” The Gunman flicked five playing cards in front of each of them. He put the remaining cards in the middle of the table and scooped up his hand. After a moment he gestured to the cards in front of Grace and Jessie. They glanced at each other and made no move to pick up the cards.
The Gunman sighed. “A civilized exchange ought to take place over a game of sharps, chaps.”
Jessie reluctantly collected his cards.
When Grace made no move toward the cards, the Gunman sighed and wrapped his gloved hands around the handle of a bowie knife strapped to his gun belt. His intent was clear, and before he could draw the blade, Grace snatched up her cards.
The Gunman smiled. “There now. Let’s play.”
“No. Let’s talk. What do you want?”
The Darksome Gunman gazed at his hand. As he arranged his cards he said, “Still got the lad following you? Thought you’d’ve cut him loose by now.”
Grace frowned at Jessie. He mirrored her expression and shrugged.
The Gunman raised his dark gaze and eyed Jessie. “He ain’t part of this, you know.”
Jessie squirmed beneath the Gunman’s penetrating gaze. It was all he could do to keep drawing in breath. He studied the cards in his hand instead of those Stygian black eyes. He held a handful of high hearts and one spade.
“Part of what?” Grace asked.
The Gunman swung his attention back to her. He tapped the table. Grace scowled and picked up a coin from the small pile in front of her. She threw in a bet. The Gunman smiled and turned to Jessie. He threw in his ante and gazed back down at his cards. The Gunman’s smile widened as he reached into his pocket. He pulled out a shiny silver dollar and placed it carefully in the middle of the table.
“Part of the game, Grace. Haven’t you figured out, it’s all a game?”
“Killing my parents weren’t no game. Killing Tokota’s kin weren’t neither. And Ruby? What you did to her? Was that just a game too?”
The Gunman’s lips twisted. “Every game’s got rules and penalties. They’re necessary for the big payoff. Are you drawing, Grace?”
Grace grimaced and glanced at the cards in her hand. “Two.”
The Darksome Gunman flicked two cards from the stack in the middle and took two from Grace in return. Jessie watched her carefully. Her lips thinned as she looked at her hand.
The Gunman smirked and turned to Jessie. “How about you, boy?”
“What’s the payoff?” Jessie returned.
The Gunman blinked and frowned. He drummed his fingers on the table. Jessie thought he was going to refuse to answer, but after a moment he smiled. “Power.”
Grace and Jessie exchanged a glance.
“See, in cards, you play by the rules and take a gamble for high cards. For power. Now, our little posse here has lived their lives by the same rules. They gambled, they played it hard, they even bluffed, and now—”
“Now they’re high cards,” Jessie finished.
The Gunman’s grin broadened. “You really are a smart lad. Draw.”
Jessie frowned at his hand. He pulled the spade from the pack and tossed it on the table. The Gunman peeled off a card and handed it to Jessie. The Gunman’s dark gaze was sharp as Jessie put the heart in his hand.
“Alright, we get it. Through your meddling you got Tokota, Ruby, Boothe, and me juiced up and mean.”
“Like a cocked and loaded rifle,” the Gunman said.
Grace leaned close to the man and said, “So just who the hell do you mean to point us at?”
The Gunman grinned. “Now you’re getting it. Dealer sits.”
Grace blinked rapidly. She frowned and looked at her hand. Wordlessly she grabbed a coin and tossed it in the center of the table. She looked back at the Gunman expectantly.
“How’d you get to be a high card, Grace?” The Gunman’s sudden change of topic seemed to throw her for a moment.
She glanced at Jessie, then turned back to the Gunman. “You know how. Tracking the sonuvabitch who killed my parents.”
“That’s not quite all though, is it?” the Gunman prodded.
Grace winced. When she didn’t respond the Gunman continued, “Tracking, sure. Hunting, definitely. You honed those ace-high skills of yours hunting and killing all those bad things that crossed your path. Wouldn’t you go so far as to say those evil things that crossed your path?”
The Gunman leaned closer to Grace. “You were born in blood, girl—or perhaps I should say reborn in blood—because you needed to be. You needed to be branded and burned before you could take on the world’s evil.”
Blood rushed to Jessie’s head and left his body cold and tingling. “You mean to send them after all the things that roam the frontier. The chupacabras and demons and blood-suckers and...all them things. You raised the Four Horsemen to wipe all those evil things away.”
The Gunman inclined his head but did not remove his gaze from Grace. “Like I said, right smart boy.”
Grace leaned back on her chair. “You did all this—me, Tokota, Ruby, Boothe—all just so we’d ride around beefing a bunch of demons?”
Jessie frowned. “It’s likely Grace would have done it without your meddling.”
The Darksome Gunman raised a single brow. “Really? You think she’d be who she is—capable of what she is—if I hadn’t started her on the path? You’re made for this, Grace. Born for this.”
“Why.”
The Gunman blinked.
Grace looked at him expectantly. “Why do all this to see the end of demons on Earth? You some kind of saint?”
An uncomfortably hot sensation swept through Jessie as a corner of his brain twitched. His throat was dry, and he wished he hadn’t finished all the beer in his tankard.
The Gunman’s lips turned up into a grim smile as he answered, “Something like that.”
His smile faded as Grace stared at him with flinty eyes.
The Gunman sighed. “Let’s just say I have a vested interest in seeing an end to the vile, evil corruption ruining this world.”
Grace glanced at Jessie. He frowned but didn’t say anything in response.
Grace leaned in to the Gunman. “I ain’t seen anything as vile and evil as you.”
Jessie tensed as he waited for the Gunman’s response.
The Darksome Gunman merely smiled and drummed his fingers on the table. “You ain’t seen nothing yet, girl. But listen up. Just know this, Grace Dyer, you and yours are here in Worm Wood for one purpose—to begin your destined journey and walk the path laid ou
t for you. It’s the perfect place to start your purge; got a whole town full of evil souls at your disposal. The place ain’t nothing but a base den of sin just waiting for your...special touch. But don’t decide now, I’ll give you the night to talk it over with the others. Come see me tomorrow when the sun stands over the church steeple. I’ll be waiting in the street.”
Grace opened her mouth, likely to spit venom at the Gunman.
He leaned forward and laid his cards on the table. Four aces and a king.
“Remember, girl, it’s my game.”
Grace blanched and looked down at her cards. The Gunman smiled and rose to his feet.
Jessie frowned and without stopping to think things through, reached out and laid his cards over the top of the Gunman’s. A royal flush of hearts trumped the Gunman’s ace-high hand. Jessie’s lips widened as he unsuccessfully tried to squelch his smile. He raised his eyes and met the Gunman’s. There was no rage across the Gunman’s features. There was no wrath or vexation. There was merely cold curiosity as the Darksome Gunman looked down at Jessie’s cards.
“Seems it’s anyone’s game,” Jessie croaked.
The Darksome Gunman’s lips thinned as his gaze raked over Jessie’s face. His hand drifted to his equalizer. “A wild card. How interesting.”
The Gunman sniffed and shrugged, his expression clearing. He turned to Grace and nodded. “See you at high noon.”
Without another word, the man in black turned and strode away through the empty saloon. The jingle of his spurs reached them long after he’d drifted through the batwings and out into the night.
Grace breathed out and threw in the cards she was holding. She reached across the table and grabbed Jessie. “I should slap the snot out of you for frustrating him like that!” Her grin told Jessie that despite her words, she was proud of him. She looked down at the array of hearts on the table. “How in the hell did you get a hand like that out of his deal anyway?”
Jessie shrugged. “Cain’t rightly say, but I get the feeling there’s more at work here than just him.”
Grace sobered and raised an eyebrow. “You may be right. We should go get the others. Gotta jaw on this.”
Jessie’s attention was caught by a gray-haired prospector leaning against the saloon wall by the batwings. The prospector tipped up his hat and fixed his watery eyes on Jessie.
Jessie’s lips thinned and he nodded at the old moss.
“Jessie? Jessie!” Grace snapped her fingers in front of Jessie’s face.
He shook his head and turned to her. “You round them up, Grace. I got something to do first. Meet you upstairs in a few.”
Jessie slid off his seat without waiting for Grace’s answer and followed Clinton Cottonmouth Cross out into the night.
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
Cottonmouth was waiting for Jessie outside the saloon. He stood beside Crowbait, stroking the mare’s withers. Crowbait’s ears were flat and she snorted and tugged against the tie hitching her to the post.
“She’s an ornery cuss,” Jessie said as he approached Cottonmouth. Crowbait dipped her head and nickered in response.
“She ain’t meant to be tethered to a hitching post in a place like this,” Cottonmouth murmured. He gave the horse a firm pat and turned to Jessie. “Walk with me, lad.”
Jessie fell into step beside Cottonmouth. The streets of Worm Wood that had scuttled with supernatural things only hours earlier were devoid of life now. Jessie found that passing strange. They were approaching the time of night when most things born of darkness liked to roam and hunt. By natural law, Worm Wood should have teemed with the strange and macabre. Instead, it was as silent as a boneyard. The only sounds that filled Jessie’s ears were his boots crunching on gravel and Cottonmouth’s unusual shuffling stride. They walked in silence for a long time and drifted through town until they approached a place where the ground dropped sharply away. They walked to the cliff’s edge and stared over thousands of acres of mesa illuminated by the pale moonlight.
Jessie crossed his arms over his chest and peered over the drop. Cottonmouth squatted beside him and plucked a rock from the trail. With a quick snap of his wrist, he flung the rock over the cliff.
“Does the Darksome Gunman really mean to send Grace and the others after all the demons and...things?”
Cottonmouth pitched another rock. “That what he reckoned?”
Jessie nodded. “Reckoned he’s got a vested interest in seeing an end to all the evil and corruption in the world.”
“That so?” Cottonmouth fished around in the dust for another rock.
Jessie shrugged. “Don’t feel right.”
Cottonmouth sighed and stood. He turned to Jessie, and the moonlight caught the angles of his face. For just a moment the moonlight seemed to smooth away the wrinkles and creases, making Cottonmouth seem a much younger man. “Don’t feel right?”
Jessie chewed the inside of his cheek. “He said they gotta start their purge here in Worm Wood. He reckons the town’s a den of sin, ripe for their special touch. He said every soul in Worm Wood’s corrupted and evil.”
“Purge. Interesting choice of words.”
Jessie nodded. “Yeah, but know what really sets my bones all acock?”
Cottonmouth’s gaze was intent on Jessie’s face.
“I sure spied a lot of weird folk in this town when we rode in, but not everyone’s something from out of a bad dream. The bartender. He’s as biddable as any folk I grew up with.”
Cottonmouth shrugged. “So, one innocent man in a town full of demons and spirits. Is that what’s got you shy?”
Jessie frowned. “Nope. It’s that the Gunman didn’t even make the distinction that there was one normal—innocent—man. He just said all the town’s evil and corrupt and all gotta be purged by Grace and the others. It’s like he don’t even care if normal folk get wiped out too. I mean, gummy! How many other normal folk are in this burg?”
“Kinda like he’s on a righteous path of damnation...of destruction.” Cottonmouth’s voice was quiet.
Jessie’s gaze snapped to Cottonmouth, and he slapped his breast pocket. He dug around inside his vest and withdrew his journal. He flipped through the tattered pages until he found a loose scrap of paper. He shook open the deed to Barren Mountain and scanned the writ. This indenture made this third day of May, between Abner A. Doncaster, of Los Angeles, California...
“Abner A. Doncaster...” Jessie breathed. His eyes took on a faraway look as he recalled his childhood. “When Pa used to read scripture, the part that did me the most fright was Revelations. How all folk were judged and persecuted. How the angels sounded their trumpets and roused the Four Horsemen to be their tools of divine retribution. Scared me stupid when he reckoned how the angels opened up the Abyss and let the locusts of Purgatory torture and strike down them folk marked as sinners; them folk not branded with God’s seal. And the bit that afeared me most was the description of the king of all them monsters who crawled outta Purgatory...the Angel of the Abyss, whose name in Greek is Apollyo—the Destroyer—and in Hebrew is named Abaddon. Abner A. Doncaster...”
Jessie raised his gaze from the trembling paper. “Oh, Heavenly Father... The Darksome Gunman... He’s the Angel of the Abyss?”
Cottonmouth nodded slowly, his gaze serious, the usual glint in his eyes gone. He silently tapped his nose.
Bile heaved up Jessie’s throat, and he turned aside and vomited on the ground. As he retched, Cottonmouth came over and thumped his back. After he’d heaved up everything in his stomach, Jessie straightened and wiped his mouth. He held his journal in a white-knuckled grip in one hand, the deed in the other.
Cottonmouth reached down and grabbed Jessie’s right wrist. He raised the hand holding the journal and looked deep into Jessie’s eyes.
“You got his name now, son. You got his measure. Remember the rulebook? There’s power in words. There’s power in the blood. And do not doubt it, blood must be spilled...for the sake of us all. The blood of the lamb.”
>
Jessie studied his battered old journal and coughed. He spat a glob of phlegm on the ground. “You saying I’m the lamb?” he asked quietly.
Cottonmouth raised a single brow in response.
Jessie sniffed. “The lamb of sacrifice was a pure soul—an innocent soul. In scripture, I mean. That don’t sound much like me. I’ve sinned plenty.”
Cottonmouth poked his cheek with his tongue as though pondering Jessie’s words. “You might have some blood on your hands, Jessie—some sin in your heart—but only on account of following them. The Four. Her. Your Grace.”
Jessie frowned, not quite sure how to respond.
“Besides, the lamb was also spoke of as being a symbol of gentleness, meekness,” Cottonmouth said quietly.
Jessie jerked sideways and said, “I ain’t meek!”
Cottonmouth smiled wryly. “No? Then why do you still ride by her side, wounded that you cain’t do anything to change your fate but unable to leave? ’Cause the lamb is meek.”
Jessie turned back to the mesa. As he twisted, he felt the sharp little pencil Abigail had given him dig into his chest. He reached into his vest and pulled it out. He opened the leather-bound book and flipped to a blank page. He scrawled men, women, children, beasts, demons, the first children. The Four Horsemen. The Angel of the Abyss. Abaddon.
Cottonmouth nodded as Jessie scratched. He patted Jessie’s hand and leaned in close. “You get why he needs them now? The Four?”
Jessie nodded. “In Revelations, the Angel of the Abyss weren’t allowed to kill, he was commanded only to torture. So, he woke them to kill for him. He woke Grace to kill for him. To kill monsters and beasts at the start, but on to men and women when they develop a taste for it...for killing. Like in Revelations—to bring about Armageddon.”
Dread settled over Jessie’s shoulders like a mantle. “And you know what? I reckon she’ll do it. The need to kill...sometimes I think it’s all that drives her.”
Guns of Perdition Page 29
