Ralph Compton Slaughter Canyon (9781101559499)

by Compton, Ralph; West, Joseph A.

  Battles drew the Chamelot-Delvigne, a short-barreled revolver that balanced in the hand as well as a Colt.

  He pointed the gun at Hattie. “Outside, now!”

  The fat woman was outraged. “What is the meaning of this?”

  “Ma’am, the meaning is that if you don’t head for the door I’ll put a bullet in your hide,” Battles said.

  “You won’t shoot a woman,” Hattie said.

  “Depends on the woman,” Battles said. “Let’s go.”

  Chapter 39

  A Daring Escape

  Matt Battles overcame his revulsion for Hattie Warful and pushed her onto the deck with his arm around her neck, the muzzle of his revolver jammed against her temple.

  For the first few moments, everyone stood frozen in place and it seemed to Battles that even the ocean breeze held its breath.

  His face registering both shock and horror, Warful was the first to react.

  He took a step forward, but again froze when Battles said: “Come any closer, Warful, and I’ll scatter her brains.”

  “He means it, Hatfield,” the woman wailed. “He’ll kill me. He said he would.”

  “Beloved!” Warful cried.

  He raised a fist at Battles. “Harm a hair of her beautiful head and I’ll kill you.”

  “Take the nooses off those men, Warful,” Battles said.

  The man hesitated, and Battles said: “Do it now or I’ll drop the fat lady dead at your feet.”

  Battles glanced at the gunmen facing him on the deck. None showed any inclination to intervene, even Durango, who was armed and fast enough to be dangerous.

  The marshal wasn’t particularly liked by most of the gunmen, but he wasn’t particularly disliked either. It seemed to Battles that they were holding pat, as they tried to decide whether or not to make a play.

  Hattie’s raw stench curling in his nostrils, Battles waited until the four old men were freed from their nooses; then he said: “You, Judah Rawlings,” he said, “help these men into the boat.”

  The seaman played his role to the hilt. “Anything you say, matey,” he said, his voice shaking a little. “Just don’t shoot.”

  After the four men were safely in the jolly boat, a pair of burly sailors at the oars Rawlings had promised, Battles backed toward the rail, using Hattie as a shield.

  “You’ll never reach shore alive, Battles,” Warful said. He waved a hand. “All these men are marksmen.”

  The rail bumped against Battles’s waist and, suddenly angry from both fear and stress, he lifted his right leg, put his boot into the fat woman’s backside, and pushed hard.

  Hattie floundered across the deck, windmilling her fat arms like a cartwheeling she-bear, and then pitched flat onto her face.

  Battles scrambled down the ladder and yelled to the seamen at the oars to get the hell away from there.

  The sailors must have owed Rawlings a favor or three, because they bent to their task and pulled swiftly away from the Lila.

  Warful, a gun in his hand, was the first to appear at the rail. He fired, and fired again, but both his shots went wild.

  “I fear we have put you in the greatest danger, my friend,” Jacob Bensoussan said, his blue eyes concerned.

  “Don’t worry about me, old-timer,” Battles said. “Right now worry about yourself.”

  The oarsmen were doing their best to put distance between themselves and the Lila, but now several gunmen, including Durango, joined Warful at the rail and cut loose.

  It was one thing to refuse to participate in the hanging of old men, but taking potshots at a fleeing rowboat was quite another.

  Now, that was fun.

  But the gunmen were close-range revolver fighters, and to Battles’s relief he saw no rifles among them.

  A bullet chipped wood near the port oarlock and another kicked up a spurt of water near the bow.

  Irritated, Battles double-actioned the French revolver. The trigger was light and smooth, but he was unfamiliar with the weapon and his shots pulled high. But he had the satisfaction of seeing both Warful and Durango duck as his bullets whined over their heads.

  The boat was now out of revolver range, but, to Battles’s horror, he saw Ben Lane swing the starboard swivel gun in his direction.

  The man could fire a cannon, but he wasn’t a cannoneer.

  If he’d been, he’d have known that the gun hadn’t been reloaded since the Lila left port and the powder charge was probably damp.

  Such was the case. The gun misfired and, robbed of his fun, Lane’s curses carried across the water.

  Warful danced with rage on the deck, screaming words that sea and distance made impossible to hear.

  Matt Battles looked back at the ship, a harsh reality dawning on him. If the Lila was his bridge back to the United States, he’d well and truly burned it.

  Jacob Bensoussan, looking old and impossibly frail, stood on the dock with Battles, the two seamen lounging nearby.

  “You must come home with me,” the old man said. “I’m afraid the madman will leave no stone unturned to find you.” He smiled. “Over the centuries, Jews have become quite good at hiding themselves and others.”

  Battles shook his head. “No, I can’t do that. I could bring Warful right to your doorstep.”

  Bensoussan shrugged expressively. “My wife is dead, my children are all gone, I live alone, and I’m ill. What can the madman do to me?”

  “Hang you,” Battles said. “Or next time use a gun.”

  “I will take that risk to save your life, as you saved mine.”

  Battles laid a hand on the old man’s skinny shoulder. “Go home. Please. I’ll be all right.”

  Bensoussan realized that further argument was useless.

  “Then zay gezunt, and may God bless you,” he said.

  “Thank you,” Battles said. “And ride easy, old-timer.”

  After the old man left, the two sailors stepped to Battles.

  The taller one, a good-looking youngster with a topman’s muscular shoulders and arms, said, pointing: “Mate, you can find a cozy berth at the Saracens Head Inn, just along the dockside yonder.”

  “That takes money, and I have none,” Battles said.

  “My name is Dave Noonan,” the sailor said. “Now you go to the inn and find Molly Poteet, then, says you, ‘I’m a shipmate o’ Dave Noonan’s and he said to put my score on the slate.’ Then, says you, ‘Dave says to never fear, he’ll pay the bill later.’”

  “Why would you do this?” Battles said, a man recently grown to suspicion.

  “For one reason, mate, the way you saved them old galoots from a rope. That was done handsomely, an’ no mistake. So says Cap’n Rawlings, and so say I.”

  “You’re gold dust, Mr. Battles,” the second man said, smiling.

  “I’ll take you up on your offer, Noonan,” Battles said. “And I’ll repay you when I can.”

  The sailor grinned. “Don’t you concern yourself with that, matey. I’ll be a rich man soon and there’s the cut-an’-dried of it.”

  “You might be a dead man if Warful thinks we were in cahoots and you helped me escape,” Battles said.

  “No worry on that score, mate. Take Cap’n Rawlings, now. He has a silver tongue in his head when he wishes, speaks like a chapling, you might say. He’ll be telling Warful that we was held at gunpoint an’ only rowed the boat to save our lives, lay to that.”

  Battles held out his hand. “Well, good luck.”

  “And luck to you too,” Noonan said.

  But right then, Battles didn’t feel lucky.

  He didn’t feel lucky at all.

  Chapter 40

  The Saracens Head

  “You’re telling me that Davy Noonan will pay your score, and I’m a-tellin’ you that he’s a lying rogue who should’ve been hung at execution dock years ago or died of the rum or the French pox.”

  Molly Poteet, plump, pretty, and belligerent, put her fists on her ample hips. “So, what do ye think o’ that, Mr. Cowboy
, or whatever the hell you be?”

  “I’m sorry, ma’am,” Battles said, touching his hat. “I meant no harm, and I’ll be on my way.”

  “Wait,” Molly said. “You’re a man of manners, or at least you’ve been around them as have them.” She scrutinized Battles’s face, her eyes lingering on his scars. “Maybe I’ll take a chance on you, since you’re a fellow American. Are you hungry?”

  Battles nodded. “I can’t recollect when I last ate a decent meal.”

  “Well, that’s what you’ll find here, a decent meal and a clean bed, and a dove to warm it if you so choose.”

  Battles smiled. “The bed will do just fine.” He hesitated, then added: “I’m sure Dave Noonan will pay my score.”

  “Maybe he will, maybe he won’t,” Molly said. “We’ll see.” She beckoned to Battles. “Come with me.”

  The woman led him into a room at the back of the premises that she kept as her bedroom. There was a pantry against one wall, a bed against the one opposite, and a table and four chairs in the middle of the floor. Two easy chairs by the fireplace and knotted rugs gave the room a cozy feel.

  The Saracens Head was a narrow building, a tavern and dining room on the ground floor, bedrooms on the two above. Like all the structures in town, it was a ramshackle, wooden edifice with a sharply steeped gable roof that overhung the street.

  Withal, it looked as though a breath of wind could send the whole building crashing down in a pile of shattered timbers and rising dust.

  Molly Poteet stepped to the pantry, then turned. “I can’t call you Cowboy,” she said. “What do you call yourself?”

  Battles gave his name, and the woman said: “How did you end up in this godforsaken place?”

  “The ship anchored out there, the Lila. I was a... passenger.”

  “Do you have a return passage?”

  “I don’t really know.”

  “Is Poke Yates still captain?”

  “No. He’s dead.”

  Molly seemed taken aback. “Then I hope he roasts in hell,” she said. “I guess Mad Dog Donovan is now master.”

  “No, he’s dead too.”

  “Mad Dog’s been dead before. He keeps coming back.”

  “Not this time. I shoved a cutlass into his guts, then threw him into the sea.”

  Molly absorbed that without comment, as though the recounting of violence was an everyday occurrence. She said: “I was Poke Yates’s kept woman. He grew tired of me and marooned me here. That was ... damn, it was ten years ago.”

  “You’ve prospered since,” Battles said, looking around him.

  “I guess so, if being the owner of a cathouse and tavern in a heathen land can be called prospering.”

  Before Battles could comment, Molly said: “Do you like cheese?”

  “Just fine, so long as there’s no weevils in it.”

  “Hardboiled eggs? Do you like those?”

  “Sure.”

  “And how about a dish of cold samke harra?”

  “You got me there,” Battles said, grinning.

  Molly smiled. “I thought I would. It’s an Arab dish, made with salted, fried fish.”

  “Begging your pardon, ma’am, but I reckon the cheese and eggs will do just fine,” Battles said.

  The woman watched Battles eat for a few minutes, then poured him a glass of wine.

  “What are you running from, Matt?” she said.

  “Is it that obvious?” Battles said, startled.

  “A man with a French pistol in his pants who keeps his eyes on the door is running from something. The law?”

  “Here, in this town? What law?”

  “You’re running nonetheless. Tell me about it. Who knows? I may be able to help you.”

  “It’s long in the telling.”

  “Fine by me. I’ve got all day.”

  Battles sat back in his chair, lit a cigarette, then, being spare with words, told the woman of everything that had happened between his meeting with the president and his rescue of the four old Jewish men.

  He was building his fourth cigarette as he finished the story and said: “So, I’ve failed on all counts. I didn’t get in contact with the president to explain the sudden disappearance of the West’s most dangerous gunmen, I failed to prevent the theft of the gold, and I couldn’t put an end to Hatfield Warful’s madness.”

  “Maybe. But you saved Jacob Bensoussan and his cronies,” Molly said. “I set store by those old men. They often come into my tavern to drink a glass of wine and argue about the Torah.”

  The woman smiled. “Something told me that I should take a chance on you.”

  She stepped to the door, opened it wide, and yelled: “Hassan!”Almost as though he’d materialized out of thin air, a ragged little Arab urchin appeared at the door.

  “Yaz, Miz Molly,” he said, grinning from ear to ear.

  “Hassan, go down to the dock,” the woman said. “If you see a very tall man”—she raised her hand above her head, showing the boy just how tall, Warful was—“you come running back here and tell myself and Mr. Battles.”

  “Yaz, Miz Molly.”

  The woman stepped to the pantry, found a red-and-white-striped candy stick, and gave it to the boy.

  “Go now,” she said.

  After the kid left, Battles reloaded the Chamelot-Delvigne, a fairly complicated process that was something of a chore.

  But he had no choice.

  Something told him he’d need the revolver sooner rather than later.

  Chapter 41

  Shark Bait

  Matt Battles was dozing in one of Molly Poteet’s armchairs when the woman burst into the room, Hassan in tow.

  “He’s on the dock,” she said.

  Battles woke up fast and jumped to his feet.

  “Tell him, Hassan,” Molly said.

  “Big man,” the boy said, and, as the woman had done, he raised his hand, standing on tiptoe. “Like a tree.”

  “Has he other men with him?” Battles said.

  Hassan held up his hands and spread his fingers twice. “That much mens. Look like you,” he said. “Big hats.”

  “There’s a vacant room on the top floor, Matt,” Molly said. “You can see the dock from there.”

  Battles followed the woman upstairs and then stepped to the window.

  Molly left for a few moments, then returned with a ship’s brass telescope. “You’ll see better with this,” she said.

  Battles trained the scope on Warful and even at a distance he saw that the man was still hopping mad. He smiled. That last push he’d given Warful’s lady wife had been the final straw.

  The gunmen gathered around Warful and he appeared to be giving them final instructions. A few moments later, they walked away and dispersed into the town.

  “They’re looking for you all right,” Molly said. “I’d better go downstairs and wait for them to show up.”

  “Molly, I’m beholden to you,” Battles said. “I won’t forget this.”

  “Don’t fret it, Matt,” the woman said. “So far all you owe me is the price of a meal.”

  After Molly left, Battles again studied Warful.

  He sat in a bollard, Durango standing next to him. Warful consulted his watch, said something to the breed, and Durango nodded, his eyes on the teeming main street.

  Battles took his gun from his waistband and laid it on the windowsill in front of him.

  Then he noticed something ... strange.

  The two big jolly boats that had transferred Warful and his gunmen from the Lila had pulled away from the dock and were heading for the ship at a fast clip.

  He trained his glass on the Lila in time to see the anchor lift from the sea, the flukes and chain dripping water, and sailors were high on the yards, lowering the sails.

  The Lila was readying for sea.

  Acting captain Judah Rawlings was making a run for it.

  Battles saw the boats winched on board. Then the bark turned her bow into the northern trade wind, her
sails already billowing.

  It took a while before Warful noticed what was happening.

  But when he did, he acted like a man possessed.

  Battles couldn’t hear from that distance, but Warful sprinted up and down the dock, waving his arms, his head back, mouth open in what had to be a string of curses.

  Durango pulled his gun, but the Lila was out of range and he didn’t make any attempt to fire.

  Warful ran to the gunman, grabbed him by the front of his shirt, and shook him, ordering him to do something, anything.

  There were many tall ships and oceangoing dhows tied up at the dock, but none small enough or nimble enough to catch the Lila.

  The bark was tacking into the wind, now a rifle shot from shore.

  Then the unthinkable happened.

  It was an act of violence that left Battles shaken to the core so badly that the telescope shook in his suddenly unsteady hands.

  The Lila’s crew was about to toss shark bait over the side.

  Chapter 42

  Betrayed!

  Matt Battles trained his glass on the Lila’s deck and watched in horror as Hattie Warful was dragged to the rail.

  The woman was wearing only a shift and her great, sagging body bulged and moved like pigs fighting in a sack.

  Grinning sailors ripped away the shift, then manhandled the now-naked woman over the rail and let her go.

  Men pumped the air with their fists, jeering, as the gross white body hit the sea with a mighty splash.

  For a few moments Hattie floundered in the water like a stranded whale, but then, to Battles’s surprise, she recovered and struck out for shore, swimming strongly.

  Sailors are a fickle bunch, and soon their jeers turned to cheers, as they encouraged the fat woman to go for it.

  She’d stroked maybe twenty-five yards when the first shark struck.

  Appalled, yet fascinated, Battles kept the glass glued to his eye.

  The shark had bumped Hattie, and she stopped, treading water, looking around her.

  A few moments later, the second attack was much more ferocious.

  The shark attack drove upward, from under the woman, hitting with such speed and impact that she was hurled high out of the water. Hattie hung motionless in the air for a split second, then cartwheeled back into the sea.