“I bet you do! I just bet you do. But what you don’t know is what’s gonna happen to you right soon, and it won’t be near as fun as the birds and the bees.”
“Oh?”
“No, sir. A man don’t pull what you did on Harry Gauge and live long around here.”
The stranger shrugged. “Well, let’s give the sheriff time to figure out what to do about me. Here we are.”
They were at the Victory.
He gave Tulley a warm smile. “Ready for that drink, old-timer?”
“Well, now.” Tulley licked dry lips. “I guess we can continue our little talk in there as well as anywheres.”
The stranger pushed through the batwing doors with Tulley right on his heels. This time of day at the Victory, things were quiet—no music, very little gambling, just a row of cowboys lined up along the brass rail, seeking the hair of the dog. Faces exchanged wary glances in the mirror as the stranger found a place midway for himself and Tulley.
A handlebar-mustached bartender in white shirt and bow tie attended them immediately, or anyway did the stranger. “Yes, sir. What’ll it be, sir?”
The stranger glanced at Tulley. “How about you, pal?”
“Beer’s fine, mister.”
“Two beers, bartender.”
But when the foaming mugs arrived, and the stranger went to digging out a coin, the bartender held up a palm and said, “No charge.”
“Right friendly,” the stranger said, with a nod of thanks.
A cowhand called down from the far end of the bar: “Mister, that true what you told the sheriff, ’bout Stringer and Bradley? Was they wanted men?”
The stranger took a sip, nodded, said, “You can write the territorial governor for copies of the circulars if you want.”
“That’s okay, mister. Take your word for it.”
From down the other way, a voice called out, “Four of them ‘deputies’ headed to Boot Hill! Sure puts the squeeze on the sheriff.”
Somebody else said, “Couldn’t happen to nicer fellers.”
Glancing down the bar both ways, the stranger said, “If the sheriff and his bunch are all that bad, why don’t you folks clean them out?”
As if in answer, two men pushed through the swinging doors, big, burly, unshaven, battered hats snugged down, six-guns low on their hips, their expressions daring you to look them in the eye. A dare no one was taking.
Tulley whispered, “That’s why.”
“Pretty playmates the sheriff has,” the stranger said, speaking over the rim of his glass.
The two gunhands took a table. One of the bartenders automatically brought them beers. The taller of the two rolled a cigarette while the other lit up a stogie. Their eyes remained on the bar.
In particular, on the stranger.
“Now, don’t you go startin’ nothin’,” Tulley advised his new friend. “You had enough fun for one mornin’.”
“Is that possible, really?”
“What?”
“Can a man ever have enough fun?”
The doors opened again, but it wasn’t a gunhand who breezed through: it was a beautiful, dark-haired female in a figure-outlining satin dress, a parasol over her shoulder.
The stranger, seeing this in the mirror, said, “You get my point, old-timer?”
Tulley said, “You might want to steer clear of that one.”
“I can see a lot of reasons not to take that advice.”
“That’s Lola.”
“It would be.”
“She belongs to the sheriff.”
The stranger gave him a mock frown. “Tulley, didn’t this country get in a ruckus a while back that settled this whole business of folks belonging to other folks?”
They watched in the mirror as she hip-swayed up to them. Then the stranger turned toward her, Tulley keeping his back to her, but watching in the glass.
She looked the stranger up and down like a dress on display she was considering buying for herself. Then she smirked at him, eyes hooded, and purred, “You’re quite a topic of conversation around this town, handsome.”
“Am I? What topic would that be?”
“Whether you’re a brave man or a fool.”
“What’s your preference?”
She shrugged one shoulder. “I’ll buy either one a drink.”
He grinned at her. “Everybody is just so darn friendly around here. Bartender already set me up, thanks. Anyway, I don’t consider it gentlemanly to allow a lady to buy me a drink. But I’d gladly buy you one.”
Shaking her head a little, still smirking, she said, “Maybe you’re a brave man and a fool.”
“Wouldn’t be the first time in history.”
She tilted her head, as if trying to get a different, better angle on him. “How about you buy the first round? Then the second is on me.”
“I don’t know. . . .”
“Come on! Lady’s prerogative. Shall we sit?”
Tulley looked back over his shoulder at her.
“Not you, Tulley,” she said in a scolding tone.
“Well, now,” the stranger said, “that’s not very friendly.”
She frowned. “That barfly would drink the juice out of a thermometer. Why waste anything on him?”
“He’s my friend.”
She sighed. “All right, Mr. Tulley. Would you do us the honor of joining us?”
The desert rat chugged down his beer, then turned to them and raised his hands, as if in the process of being held up. “No, Miss Lola, thank you kindly, but I was just shoving off, anyway. Gettin’ a little too old for all this excitement.”
And he went out, leaving the stranger to his own devices.
After all, hadn’t the dude said he already knew about the birds and the bees?
Lola went to the nearest table, but the stranger nodded toward the corner one, where the two Gauge gunmen sat, nursing their beers.
“How about over there?” he asked.
She smiled at him. There were half-a-dozen empty tables around. But she clearly liked his choice. She went over, tossed her parasol on the table and the beer mugs jumped. So did the two hard cases.
“Find somewhere else to sit,” she said.
The bigger of the two said, “Now, look here, Lola. . . .”
“Sorry. I meant, find somewhere else to drink.”
The other one said, “There is no other place in town to drink.”
“I don’t believe that’s my problem.”
They looked at her. She looked at them. They got up, shot her dirty glances that were kind of pathetic, and headed back out the batwing doors.
The stranger came to her side and said, “Brave woman or fool?”
“Neither,” she said, and gave him a sideways smile. “I own the place.” She gestured to the nearest chair. “Have a seat.”
He did, but taking the chair that put the corner walls to his back.
“So that’s why you wanted this table,” she said, sitting.
“That was one reason,” the stranger said.
“Always this careful?”
“Why learn the hard way?”
“That’s what I like,” she said with a chuckle. “A man who knows his mind. Now, why don’t you tell me about yourself?”
He’d brought his beer along and he sipped it. “Not much to tell. Just drifting my way to California.”
A bartender delivered her a mixed drink that she hadn’t needed to request.
She asked the stranger, “What’s a hard man like you doin’ wearing such soft threads?”
He shrugged. “I like to look good.”
And he did look good to her, but the clothes had little if anything to do with it. Such a big rock-jawed man with those hard Indian angles in his face, but such beautiful eyes peering from those cautious slits, a blue the color of faded denim. This was a man. But she somehow knew that this was not a man who would raise a hand to a woman, like some she knew.
“Anyway,” he said, “if I look like a mail-order cowb
oy, I figure nobody will see me as a threat.”
“And just leave you alone.”
“That’s right.”
“How’s that workin’ out for ya?”
Her deadpan expression finally made him burst out laughing.
He seemed genuine as he said: “I like you, Lola.”
She raised an eyebrow. “You know my name, but I don’t know yours.”
He waved that gently away. “Not worth knowing. Just passing through. Why make attachments?” He yawned. “Sorry.”
“Am I boring you, cowboy?”
“Anything but. I just been up a long, long time.”
“And killing dunderheads wears you out?”
He chuckled deep. “Something like that. But there’s not a room available in the hotel, I’m told.”
“Probably not. Payday hangovers gettin’ slept off.” She lifted a satin shoulder and set it down. “But I can arrange a room for you upstairs.”
He half-grinned. “Well, uh . . . aren’t those usually used for other than sleeping?”
“There’s neither sleeping nor the other in most of them right now. I can fix you up so you can nap awhile. And come wake you up around supper.”
“That would be very kind.”
She walked him to the rear of the saloon and up the stairs to the landing along which half-a-dozen doors waited. She unlocked one at the end and showed him into the small functional area where there wasn’t much but a brass bed and porcelain basin, though the red-and-black San Francisco-style wallpaper lent a certain mood.
“Thank you for this,” the stranger said. He sat on a chair and started taking off his boots.
She got the kerosene hurricane lamp on a small bedside table going. “I’d sleep on top of those covers, if I were you.”
“I already made that deduction, thanks.” He was in his stockinged feet now. He stood.
She came over to him. “I just want to make sure you knew you were right in what you said.”
“What did I say?”
“That this is a friendly town.”
Which called for a friendly kiss, which she got on her tiptoes and gave him.
Then he put his arm around her waist and drew her close and returned the kiss with interest.
Her breathing was heavy and halting when he finally let go of her.
He gave her a boyish grin that lit up the raw-boned face. “Just my way of saying ‘you’re welcome,’ ma’am.”
Her upper lip curled back over her teeth in an insolent smile. “My name isn’t ‘ma’am.’ It’s Lola.”
And she kissed him again, the way he had her.
Then the kerosene lamp got turned down, and in the darkness came a rustle of satin and the clunk of a belt buckle hitting the floor.
Later, at the door, she stopped to look back and asked, “Your name wouldn’t be Banion, would it?”
“Sounds like maybe you already know the answer to that.” He climbed back onto the bed and the mattress springs sang. “You mind leavin’ that key, ma’am?”
She grinned and threw it at him and left.
CHAPTER SEVEN
At her father’s request, Willa put on a navy-and-white calico dress and played hostess for the meeting of the Trinidad Citizen’s Committee at the Cullen ranch. Dutifully, she delivered smiles, gathered hats, and guided each man into the dining room, where Papa waited.
This impromptu gathering, on the afternoon after the morning of the gunfight outside the sheriff’s office, was not being held in the usual space at the rear of Harris Mercantile. That was too public—anybody might wander in and overhear the discussion.
Including the sheriff. Or any of his men, for that matter.
And what the Citizens Committee had to discuss was about as private as town business got.
Before leaving Trinidad this morning, Cullen had told Thomas Carter, the president of Trinidad Bank and Trust, to spread the word for a two o’clock get-together. And now the six men, including her father and foreman Whit Murphy, were seated around the big dining-room table, a heavy dark-wood, decoratively carved Spanish piece with matching chairs that her late mother had brought back from one of her buying trips across the border.
Willa served coffee, refilling cups, staying on the periphery as was expected of a female . . . but missing nothing.
Mayor Jasper Hardy, also the town barber and as such a well-groomed individual with slicked back hair and trimmed mustache, was saying, “My understanding is that this . . . this drifter is reluctant to give out his name. Could be he’s a wanted man.”
“Or a bounty hunter,” said slender, bug-eyed Clem Davis, who ran the apothecary, Adam’s apple making his bow tie bobble. “He knew those two, Stringer and Bradley, were wanted men, didn’t he?”
Clarence Mathers, fleshy and in his fifties, bald on top with compensating muttonchops, was a reluctant partner of the sheriff’s in the town hardware store. He said, “Could be anybody. Bounty hunter? Maybe. Former lawman? Possibly. Gunfighter? Surely. But just passing through.”
Her father was shaking his head, his hands flat on the table. “He isn’t just ‘anybody,’ Clarence. I’m telling you, my friend Parker sent him.”
“You have confirmation of this, George?”
“No.”
“Yet you’re saying this man is Banion?”
“Or someone as good or better than Banion.”
Mathers threw his hands up. “Then why in hell hasn’t he identified himself to you, George? Excuse the French, Miss Cullen.”
She smiled a little, but said nothing. She was making a round of filling coffee cups.
Her father was saying, “If he’s Banion—or some other professional gun that Parker sent in response to my instructions—he came to do a job. That didn’t require checking in with us. In fact, he could be protecting us by putting distance between himself and those who hired him.”
“You’re who hired him, George,” the mayor reminded her father. “We didn’t approve this enterprise. And if you’d brought it to us, I’d venture to say we would have voted it down.”
The old man shrugged. “Well, it was my decision, my choice . . . and my money.”
Wearing a humorless smile, banker Carter was shaking his head. “In any event, it’s a moot point. This couldn’t be Banion, or anyone else your friend might have sent.”
“And just why is that, Tom?”
The banker flipped over a hand. “Simple reality. Very unlikely that any man could have made it here so fast.”
The sightless host seemed to return his friend’s gaze. “Is that so? Railroad at Las Vegas is only twenty-five miles from here. Parker could have reached Banion by wire and the man could have made it here from, hell, as far away as five hundred miles.”
“What about those last twenty-five miles?”
“He’d been riding all night!”
Whit, smirking in doubt, said, “Mr. Cullen, what about his horse?”
Her father remained unfazed. “Maybe he bought it over at Las Vegas. Maybe he arranged to have a mount waitin’ for him. Could be he shipped it with him by train. Just like they ship cattle.”
The men around the table exchanged glances, weighing these possibilities.
No matter—her father had convinced himself. “By damn,” he said, “that must be it. He must be Banion.”
Hardware man Mathers said, “I still say, had that been the case, your man would contact you right away. He wouldn’t leave you in the dark.”
That remark, made to the blind man seated at the head of the table, had been unintentionally tactless enough to create a momentary lull in the conversation, though her father didn’t appear to have taken any offense. Instead, his face was taut with thought.
“Perhaps you have a point, Clarence,” her father said.
Willa set the coffeepot down with a small clunk that got everyone’s attention. She sat at the other end of the table and joined the meeting, weary of her servile role.
“Maybe,” she said, “he’d rathe
r earn his money first.”
Perhaps faintly irritated that she’d joined the male confabulation, Cullen said, “He’s doing pretty well so far without any down payment, daughter.”
“Well, he didn’t take Gauge out or Rhomer, either,” Whit observed, vaguely disgusted. “And they was standin’ right there for the takin’.”
Willa’s eyes and nostrils flared, words exploding from her: “I’m beginning to think you good members of the Citizens Committee are all as bad as Harry Gauge! Hiring somebody to kill a man.”
There were protests to that remark, flustered reminders that only her father had done the hiring, but she spoke over them, saying, “You’re happy to have George Cullen take the lead and the blame, aren’t you?”
The hardware man said, “Miss Cullen, we’re between the proverbial rock and a hard place. When the sheriff took office, he bought interests in many of our businesses. You must know that. And maybe you know that it seemed a wise business move at the time. Gauge shared our tax burden, he provided new capital for expansion. Some of the newer businesses in Trinidad couldn’t have opened up at all without the sheriff’s backing and blessing.”
“And now,” she said, “he’s returned all the tax burden over to you, and is calling these investments ‘loans’ and demanding repayment while retaining his interest in your businesses.”
The Trinidad merchants wore glum expressions, several hanging their heads.
She went on: “Harry Gauge allows the cowboys from his spread, and for that matter ours and all the others, to come to town and shoot the place up every payday . . . because it’s good for business. Especially the Victory.”
Her father said, “What do you suggest we do, girl?”
Her voice was firm and clear. “Stand together. Stand up to Gauge and his men. You say you’re a concerned citizens group. Do something about it!”
That prompted hollow laughter and head shaking among their guests.
The mayor said, “Harry Gauge has a small army of gunhands, Miss Cullen. You know that.”
“He’s lost four of them in two days,” she reminded him. “The Bar-O boys took down Stringer and Bradley themselves. Papa, you came out on top because you outfought Gauge.”
“No, daughter. It was because I outthought them. But superior tactics can’t overcome strength of numbers.”
The Legend of Caleb York Page 8
