"Impenetrable," Cash finished the half-wit's sentence. Puffing on his cheroot, he wondered where Boland found these guys.
"Yup, to bullets," Hayes said.
As he interviewed the two jaspers in the back room of the general store, Cash looked from one fool to the other. Boland got a nickel's worth of nothing for help.
"Where'd you meet Boland?" Cash asked, jotting down notes in his notepad as they spoke.
"At Dodge's Six—"
"Who's Dodge?"
"Farley Dodge," Hayes answered. "He's the Mayor. Whenever a posse needs a roundin' up or sumthin' needs gettin' dun or whatnot, he's the one to see about it."
"And he also owns the bank," Reed chimed in, "and the saloon and pretty much everything else in town."
Hayes shot Reed an aggravated glance over the interruption then carried on with his story. "So, we meets Marshal Boland at Dodge's Six Gun Saloon and was told about the money an' trip to Rawlins and whatnot. We swore oaths to be all quiet, and then he told us to meet up with 'im later that evenin' at the livery to ride by night. After he was done talkin', me and Reed took our advance and went up to the bar fer a drink of whiskey."
"And Marshal Boland?" Cash asked.
"Why, from the moment he walked into the Six Gun, Miss Carlene was all over him."
"Saloon girl?"
"Yup and I kin tell ya not just any saloon girl but a top-dollar whore. She beds just the rich fellers that pass through. The rest of us settle fer Molly Ann. She ain't a bad poke if you can get past the one leg and foul breath."
Reed scrunched his nose and nodded.
There was a quick succession of raps on the door and then it was opened by a short square man with a graying beard and a dark brown moustache. The newcomer extended a hand to Cash. "Hi—Mayor Dodge."
"Laramie. Deputy U.S. Marshal Cash Laramie," he said as he shook the mayor's sweaty palm.
"Well, Marshal, I live a ways out of town but came as soon as I was notified you were here. I see you've met Hayes and Reed. I hope you didn't rake them over the coals too much. It was clearly a savage masquerading as the Devil that killed Marshal Boland. The townsfolk are pretty riled and want to hang the lot of them redskins for what happened."
Cash reckoned Dodge talked too fast and said too much.
The mayor spied an Arapaho arrowhead hanging from Cash's neck on a leather thong and shifted uncomfortably.
Cash didn't like the plump politician, and he savored the mayor's uneasiness for a beat while he blew out smoke. Finally, he broke the awkward silence. "I'd like to see where this 'savage' cut Boland down."
***
Leaving Hayes and Reed, the mayor led Cash outside and along the dusty street toward the livery stable. As they passed by the general store, Cash eyed a hunched-over black beggar dragging his belongings in a potato sack, humming "Amazing Grace." The only other onlooker was a solemn Indian on the edge of town, about a hundred feet from the livery.
"This is it." Dodge pointed at faint spots of dried blood. "Yesterday's rain just about washed the signs away," he said.
"Interesting," Cash mused, his eyes flicking over the wider area.
"What is?" Dodge asked.
"The witness report I got said Boland emptied his cylinder and was about to reload when he died. But I don't see any empty shells lying around."
"Well young'uns have a tendency to pick up such things and keep 'em as souvenirs," Dodge said.
"I see."
The beggar had wandered over and started to cackle with dubious glee.
"Now git!" Dodge rushed at the black man, flailing his arms.
The beggar stepped back a few feet, and huffed before resuming his stroll down the street with the potato sack.
"What's his story?" Cash asked.
"He's just a tumbleweed that blew in a couple of days ago. He's been gathering up the garbage around town, burning it to stay warm at night. He seems harmless."
"Wouldn't you like to think so," Cash said, dissecting the stray.
Dodge turned to the marshal and his gaze flicked to the arrowhead. "I didn't mean to offend you back there with talk about savages and all."
"Sure, no offence taken," Cash replied coldly.
The mayor changed the subject. "Now, I know Hayes and Reed don't seem like much, but they're honest and fair to accurate with a gun. When I was asked for some help with the money transport, I couldn't think of two better men in Pleasance for the job."
Cash noticed the Indian had vanished in the dust being kicked up by the wind. Dark rain clouds formed in the distance.
"I didn't question their integrity." Cash scowled, dropping his spent cigar and mashing it into the ground with the heel of his boot. He turned and walked away, leaving Mayor Dodge to follow after, scratching the bridge of his nose. Cash headed for the hanging shingle marked, Art Bell—Minister / Coffin Maker / Undertaker.
***
"I cleaned the body best I could but wasn't sure where to send it," said Bell, his words falling flat. His drawn face and angular posture reminded Cash of all the undertakers he had ever met: pallid replicas of their customers.
Cash examined Boland's head which was crated separately in a square box. He pulled his notepad from his pocket and sketched the grisly sight for his report to Penn. The sword's entry through the soft tissue of the neck and exit point through the mouth had ripped the tongue and left it dangling. The detached ear lay in the box next to the head. Cash had met Robert Boland's wife, Emily, and he knew they had three children with one on the way. He cringed at the ghastly image that awaited them.
"Sew him back together best you can," Cash commanded, "and fit him with a high collared shirt that will cover the stitching."
"Pardon?" Bell asked. "I'm an undertaker, not a mortician."
Cash pulled twenty dollars from his wallet.
"Mister, I don't have the facilities to embalm or reconstruct like that. Besides, he's been dead near four days."
Cash pulled out another twenty.
The undertaker's eyes lit up as his hand moved toward the bills. "Of course. It's not fitting that the family should lay their eyes on such horror."
Cash let Bell have the two twenties. "Pack him on ice and see he makes the one-twenty to Cheyenne tomorrow."
***
The Pleasance town hall was under siege by Mrs. Maude Van Ettan's fiery tirade against everything from Reconstruction to whiskey. Mayor Dodge had gathered the group in hopes of quieting fears but the forum had become a free-for-all as anger swelled among the town's privileged. One thing seemed clear to Mrs. Van Ettan and her forum: Indians, Negroes, and phantoms were the cause for every woe since Pleasance's founding.
Cash sat at a table near the window, listening to the gaggle of the crowd. His investigation took him to all the businesses in town but he garnered little information of any value, except the bank, where some sizable transactions had occurred that needed some deeper digging. He looked through a grimy window streaked with raindrops from a steady afternoon drizzle.
Across the street, the old Arapaho he'd seen earlier now stood outside the blacksmith shop, watching. Then Maude spotted the Indian and the pitch of her voice went up an octave. "There, a red devil stands in the middle of town and no one lifts a finger. If only we had real men here, they'd take care of these godforsaken savages."
She lifted her sagging chin in the air and huffed her way from the room. Men hung their heads in her wake.
Unnoticed by anyone there, Cash nodded to the Indian.
The Arapaho ambled past Maude. She stood with clenched fists tight against her sides and flung insults at him. The rain turned Pleasance into a mud bowl around her but she brazenly stood her ground like an old water buffalo staking its claim.
***
It wasn't easy talking in weather like this. They were under a rock that jutted out like a roof, protecting them from the driving rain slamming against the granite. Day was giving way to night. Two warriors stood nearby, holding a small arsenal of Winchester ri
fles and bow and arrows. Cash learned the old man was Little Wing, chief of a small band of Arapahos forced to relocate whenever the land they inhabited was deemed valuable to white men.
Cash was at ease among them. Peculiar, some might think, because when he was an infant, his family had died in crossfire between the U.S. Calvary and the Arapahos at the Battle of Fall Creek. Chief Lightning Cloud spared young Cash's life and raised him as one of his own. Cash eventually learned the story of his slain parents, which made him confused and bitter. He fled the only home he knew and lived off the land as his surrogate family had taught him to do. Cash returned the first winter only to run away again. He survived the next winter but not alone. His Arapaho father's protection was never far, always watching from a distance.
Little Wing was very much like Lightning Cloud. Strong and stoic. Cash still hadn't fully come to terms with his past, but when he did, he knew he would return to the Arapaho. He also knew, even before talking to Little Wing, that the Arapaho had nothing to do with the Masked Devil. The proud Arapahos would never play such games.
***
The beggar's eyes traced them in the dark. He cursed the rain that soaked his poncho but he remained focused.
When the marshal and the Arapaho finished their business and parted ways, the beggar followed the lawman.
***
She stood at the bar. Chestnut curls pinned up high on her head, ruffled black dress cut low and scalloped over her milk-white breasts. Cash wandered over, throwing two bits on the counter. "I'd like to buy the lady a drink."
The greasy barkeep looked up, glanced at Carlene. She nodded. He poured a pale yellow ale into two spotty glasses.
"Much obliged," she said.
Cash carried his drink to the end of the bar and studied her closely. Indeed she was beautiful, maybe a little too beautiful to be turning tricks in a small jerkwater town.
"I heard you were the place for excitement," Cash said, taking a swallow of his beer.
She turned her back to the bar's edge, resting her elbows on the rail, and thrust her breasts out. She eyed him sideways. "That's quite a way to frame it."
"No offense intended."
She watched the lines in his face break into a warm grin.
"None taken. For ten dollars, you'll have your answer."
"Lead the way."
They passed a lone drunk lying facedown on the table.
"Another satisfied customer?" Cash cracked.
"Hardly. He's just a washed-up circus performer."
The man lifted his bald head and opened one drunken eye to ogle Carlene's swaying hips as she led the marshal upstairs.
While Cash moved along the landing, he glanced sideways at the reflection in a big mirror at the far side of the saloon: the bartender wiped oily sweat from his forehead and slipped out into the street.
Carlene's room was sparsely furnished—a four-poster bed, a ladder-back chair, a bureau with a washbasin, and a nightstand with a lamp and two books: The Bible and The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.
"Interesting reading for a painted lady," Cash said.
"I was once a school teacher in Boston. Married a snake who dumped me here."
She stepped out of her dress, resplendent in her scarlet bustier and garter, and strolled over to him.
She kissed him on the cheek, fluttered a hand down his chest and across his lap. She lowered herself before him, unbuckling his belt. "But enough about me, let's see what you're packing."
He dropped his head back with pleasure as she went to work. Once more, he considered the nightstand. The Bible?
***
A bright sliver of first light peaked under the emerald curtain. The sound of a galloping horse came from the street. Then gunfire. Cash grabbed his belt and peered outside. "Beelzebub" had returned to Pleasance and delivered a stream of bullets into the dawn sky. Alarmed faces peered from windows and doorways as Cash strapped on his gun belt.
"You better not leave me here like this, you son of a bitch," Carlene said. Still wearing her bright red undergarments, she was spread-eagled on the mattress with her arms and legs tied to each bedpost.
"My apologies, ma'am." Cash grabbed a washcloth from the basin and stuffed it in her mouth. "We will continue this conversation."
A muffled scream escaped her as he headed out the door.
The horseman waited at street's end, where Robert Boland had fallen.
"Looks like it's your turn to face old Scratch's redemption," the beggar said. He squatted next to the horse trough, his poncho pulled tight around his neck to deflect the cold morning wind. "Yes-suh, seems it's your time to be pushin' up daisies," he sang and then let out a deep baritone laugh.
Cash gritted his teeth. "That'll be the day."
Little Wing and his men were in front of the funeral home cattycorner from the livery. A small crowd emerged from the hotel and bank entrances. Maude Van Ettan shielded a young girl's eyes and hurried her inside, returning a moment later to observe the ensuing mayhem.
The rider pulled his shining cutlass from its sheath with theatrical flair and began galloping toward Cash.
Cash Laramie saw firsthand how this menace inflicted fear. Chalky hands gripped taut reins. A black cape flowed over blocky shoulders. Charred black holes peered through a red leather mask. Ebon-tipped horns jutted from the sides of its head. Unreal, as if it the apparition charged straight from the heart of Hades' inferno.
Cash drew his Colt and stood steadfast, waiting until the rider was fifteen feet away and then tripped the hammer onto a cartridge that sunk a bullet into the Masked Devil's throat.
The horseman doubled over his saddle horn. Cash grabbed the dangling reins and was dragged a few yards before the white horse came to a halt. He lowered the rider to the ground and removed the mask.
The ex-circus performer gurgled foamy blood. His head reeled back with a lifeless stare.
More shots rang out. Cash dove to the ground and rolled. He came up behind the water trough as bullets from Hayes' Remington .44 whistled from the second floor hotel window, splintering the trough's wood. Cash poked his head up.
Before Cash could get a shot off, Hayes lurched forward, a dark hole opening up his forehead. Hayes plunged through the window, his rifle falling beside him.
The black beggar straightened up to full height, threw the poncho over his shoulder, the hump disappeared. Spitting the paper wadding from his mouth, he flashed a smile at Cash, his Peacemaker still smoking.
Hayes lay motionless on the ground.
Cash started to speak when lead spurted from the Six Gun.
The bartender screamed an oath and thrust his shotgun over the saloon batwings. His shots sent Cash spinning around. He aimed and blew the left side of the man's skull away. The barkeep collapsed and the batwing doors swung back and forth above his body.
The marshal surveyed the town for further signs of danger but an eerie silence had settled over Pleasance.
"What took you so long?" Cash asked the black man.
"Is that all the thanks I get for saving your life again?"
"Again? I reckon it's the other way around."
The citizens who had flattened themselves on the ground alongside the town's buildings slowly rose to their feet. They seemed perplexed at the anti-climatic showdown with the horseman.
The mayor ran from his office wiping his brow with a handkerchief. "I don't understand," he said, looking at the beggar with the Peacemaker in his hand.
"Let me introduce you to my partner, Marshal Gideon Miles."
Miles tipped the corner of his hat.
Dodge continued to stare at Hayes and the bartender.
"They ... I don't believe it ... were responsible for—" Dodge stammered.
"Partly them, partly the lovely Carlene," Cash said, turning to Maude Van Ettan, who had wandered over to listen, "but mostly you."
She stepped back, startled. Then, as the crowd closed in, she seemed to regain her courage. "What's the meaning of this?" Maude demanded
.
"Marshal Laramie, what do you base your accusation on?" Dodge said. "Why, Mrs. Van Ettan is a leading citizen of this community."
"Miss Carlene gave you up after a little gentle persuasion," Cash said.
"What kind of gentle persuasion?" Miles interjected, grinning.
Cash returned the smile. "No more than required."
"I'll bet."
"Ha! That's your evidence?" Maude Van Ettan guffawed, standing dignified and haughty. "Who will believe the ranting of a whore?"
"You're right. It helps to have some evidence." Cash reached into his pocket and withdrew several empty cartridges. "Next time you ask someone to dispose of evidence, you ought to make sure she does."
Dread swirled across Maude's face.
"I couldn't quite figure out how an accomplished gunman like Marshal Boland could miss at such close range," Cash said. He bounced the empty shells in his hand. "Miss Carlene switched his bullets for blanks after she'd serviced him and he dozed off for a spell. While everyone was distracted by the Masked Devil's staged showdown with Boland, the bartender swiped the money."
"Where'd you find the casings?" Miles asked.
"Miss Carlene had a hollowed-out book on her shelf where she hid them. It seemed odd that a prostitute would be reading the Good Book so I took a gander at it while she was working."
Miles smiled. "She kept a little collateral on hand just in case someone tried to double-cross her."
"Or to siphon off a little more. Whatever the reason, a judge should find it thought-provoking. Also, I inquired at the bank about any large transactions in the past week. There were two: Mrs. Van Ettan here and Carlene. Circumstantial perhaps, but with Carlene's confession and Marshal Boland's bullets switched for blanks, we have the makings of a solid case."
Cash turned to Maude. "Where's the money?" he demanded.
She swallowed, then swallowed again. "At my house," she said. "There's a built-in safe behind the family portrait."
***
"A fire!" Devon Penn interlocked his fingers and placed his hands on his desk.
"Gutted Mrs. Van Ettan's house," Cash said.
"None of the money was found?"
Adventures of Cash Laramie and Gideon Miles Vol. II Page 8
