“Call in the French army regiment and we can end this thing before it even gets started. Warful is your enemy, not the men with him.”
“They are hired mercenaries, are they not? You will find we French have a short way with mercenaries—the rope or the firing squad.”
“Damn it, Toucey, have your men surround the palace now,” Battles said. “A show of force could convince Warful, insane though he is, that he doesn’t stand a chance of taking the palace.”
Toucey took his time, even stopping to light a cigar.
“If and when I am attacked, I’ll call out my troops, never fear,” he said. He bent his head to a paper on his desk. “Thank you for the warning. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have work to do.”
Battles felt like a drover attempting to turn a stampeding herd before it reaches the cliff.
Then he recalled hearing some pompous windbag of a politician declare that, “Desperate times require desperate measures.”
Well, the times were desperate, no question about that.
He pulled his French revolver from his waistband and pointed it at the Frenchman’s bandaged head.
“On your feet, Toucey,” he said. “Or I’ll scatter your brains all over the desk.”
Chapter 49
Butcher Blanchard
Marcel Toucey sprang to his feet, his eyes red with anger.
“This is an outrage you’ll regret,” he said. “I’ll have you caged for this.”
“Toucey,” Battles said, “I’m not a regretting man. Now get over here. Me and you are gonna get real close, like kissin’ cousins, you might say.”
Molly Poteet was horrified. “Matt, what are you doing?”
“Nothing much,” Battles said. “I’m just about to start a war with the French empire is all.”
“You’re insane,” Toucey said, spluttering his words.
“I told you before to get over here, Toucey,” Battles said. “I’m not a man who likes repeating himself.”
The Frenchman saw something cold in Battles’s eyes he didn’t like. He walked around the desk, and then winced as the marshal shoved the muzzle of his revolver into his belly.
“You’re going to shoot a cannon for me,” Battles said.
Toucey’s face registered puzzlement, then shock.
“I don’t know how to shoot a cannon,” he said.
“Then find me somebody who does,” Battles said.
“Never!” Toucey said. “I will die before I’ll betray my country.”
“Fine,” Battles said. He shoved the muzzle of the revolver against the Frenchman’s temple and thumbed back the hammer. “Say good night, Marcel,” he said.
“Wait!” Toucey wailed. “Perhaps I can live with a small act of betrayal.”
“I knew you would see it my way in the end,” Battles said.
He motioned with the revolver. “Go to the door and call for your cannoneer.” Battles turned to Molly. “Do you speak French?”
“A little.”
“Then make sure Toucey calls for a man to shoot a cannon, and not for a man to shoot us.”
“I will do exactly as you told me to do, monsieur,” the Frenchman said. “Your little moment of triumph will not last very long. Soon it will be my turn to deal the cards.”
Toucey stepped to the door, Battles right behind him, his revolver jammed into the small of the Frenchman’s back.
Toucey opened the door and called out something in French. A few moments later, a Handmaiden appeared, a bayoneted rifle in her hands.
Battles felt a surge of panic, but Toucey quickly said something else and the woman left, flouncing a little, her generous hips swaying under her leather skirt.
“I ordered her to bring my capitaine d’artillerie,” Toucey said. “His name is Viktor Mabuza, and he’s a first-rate cannon shot.”
Battles looked at Molly and she nodded. “That’s what he said.”
“Does this man speak English?” Battles asked.
“No,” Toucey said. “He speaks French and a little German.”
“All right, here’s what I want you to tell him,” Battles said. “I want him to load a cannon with a ball and train it on the biggest tent in the French army camp, the one with the flag flying over it.”
Toucey was appalled. “But that is the tent of Colonel Blanchard, a brave French officer,” he said. “He will be eating lunch at this time.”
“Good,” Battles said. “I plan to feed him a nice hot cannonball.”
“You’re mad,” the Frenchman said. “And your madness will be the death of us all.”
Toucey, an emotional man, began to wail that he’d be hung for treason, and Molly, as shocked as the little Frenchman, said: “Matt, do you know what the hell you’re doing?”
“You bet.” Battles grinned. “I’ve declared war on the French empire.”
Captain Viktor Mabuza was a tall, handsome mulatto, his blue and red uniform impeccable. Unlike the enlisted men he wore knee boots in the French style and his kepi boasted an ostrich feather plume.
“Tell him,” Battles told Toucey.
The soldier looked totally baffled, his eyes shifting back and forth between Toucey, Battles, and Molly.
“I can’t do this, monsieur,” Toucey said. “Colonel Blanchard will hang me for sure.”
“And if you don’t I’ll shoot you,” Battles said shoving the gun harder into the man’s back. “Only my way will be quicker.”
Toucey’s jowly face sagged, like a man already walking up the steps to the gallows. He began to speak rapidly in French to the captain, and Molly moved closer, listening intently.
When Toucey stopped speaking, Battles said: “Tell the captain to just aim the cannon. I don’t want him to shoot the damned thing until I get there.”
The Frenchman spoke again and again Molly listened.
“Sound all right to you?” Battles asked the woman.
“I caught the gist of it,” Molly said. “I’m sure he leveled with you.”
Captain Mabuza saluted and left and Toucey wheeled on Battles.
“If you fire the cannon, the colonel will hang everyone,” he said. “His officers call him Butcher Blanchard because he rejoices in killing prisoners.”
Battles ignored the man, but realized all too well that he was rolling the dice.
If his war with France didn’t go as planned, Blanchard might indeed hang him, and probably Molly with him.
Then the outburst of shooting he heard from outside told him it was too late anyway.
He’d thrown snake eyes.
Chapter 50
A Thunder of Gunfire
“What is happening?” Marcel Toucey demanded, his eyes wild.
“It’s Warful,” Battles said. “The fools finally joined him in his madness.”
The marshal ran to the door and threw it open.
He saw a Handmaiden go down, blood splashing over her breasts. Screaming her rage, she joined the lanky bodies of two other women on the marble floor.
Several Handmaidens, rifles at a high port, rushed the palace doorway, only to immediately fall to a rolling thunder of gunfire. The expert Colt-handling of Warful’s men was taking its toll.
From outside, a Gatling gun, sounding like an iron bedstead dragged across a rough pine floor, chattered briefly, then fell silent.
Battles slammed the door shut.
“Is there another way out of this room?” he said.
“This way,” Toucey said. He was thoroughly frightened and sweat beaded his forehead. “Mon Dieu, nous sommes tout mort!” he wailed.
Toucey, with considerable alacrity for a fat man, ran to a door at the rear of his office and held it open.
Battles pushed Molly through, then followed her.
Behind him the gunfire grew in intensity and he guessed that at least some of the regular troops of the palace guard had joined the fight.
It was too late for his plan to work. Battles knew that.
But the desire to frustrate Warful and
end the slaughter drove him on.
Toucey led the way along a brick-lined hallway with a concrete floor. Here there was no marble and the passageway looked as though it had been crudely constructed as an escape route by one of the old African rulers.
Breaking into a run, gun in hand, Battles headed for the door at the other end of the passage.
Because of a quirk of acoustics, the racketing roar of rifles reverberated through the corridor, overlaid with the sharp splinter of wood and the smash of shattered glass.
The marshal swore. The fight wasn’t nearly won, but the fools were already searching for treasure.
The door at the end of the passageway opened onto the rear of the palace.
Ahead of Battles stretched five acres of flat ground, planted with acacia trees and rectangular beds of native flowers. Beyond the trees a grassy slope dipped sharply to a narrow valley crowded with an orderly row of wooden barracks surrounded by outbuildings and cattle pens. The gaudy flag of Eugene de Montijo fluttered over the compound.
The valley was empty of troops, and as near as Battles could tell, the firing had grown less.
All right, at least he could save the survivors, if there were any, from the cages.
A cannon sat to his left, among the trees. Battles ran toward it, but Toucey stepped in his way.
“No!” he yelled. “I won’t let you perform this outrage.”
There’s a time for talking and a time for doing, and right then Battles wasn’t in a conversational frame of mind.
He slammed the heavy Chamelot-Delvigne into the side of Toucey’s head and the Frenchman dropped without as much as a whimper.
Battles glanced along the cannon barrel and saw that it was sighted as Captain Mabuza had promised.
But Colonel Antoine Blanchard was not to home. He stood in front of the regimental flagpole and watched the palace through binoculars. Bugles sounded in the French camp and men tumbled out of tents carrying rifles in one hand, buttoning tunics with the other.
Battles grinned, about to put the cat among the pigeons and thoroughly enjoying his act of vandalism.
“Matt, are you sure you know what you’re doing?” Molly said, her face worried.
“Nope,” Battles said.
He stepped to the side of the cannon to avoid the recoiling wheels and yanked the lanyard.
The cannon roared, jumped, and spat a gout of flame and grains of unburned black powder.
To Battles’s joy, the ball flew true and slammed with tremendous violence into the colonel’s tent. The tent immediately collapsed in a billow of flapping white canvas, like a monstrous, stricken bird.
Battles let rip with a Rebel yell and turned to Molly, grinning, she would remember later, like a mischievous schoolboy.
“I’ve done it!” he said. “What a shot!”
The woman nodded. “You’ve done it all right. They’re coming for you and Colonel Blanchard looks like he’s foaming at the mouth.”
Chapter 51
Vive La France!
Matt Battles looked to the French camp. Troops poured across the border in ordered companies, eagles and battle flags in front of them.
Behind him he heard a shuffle of feet and Marcel Toucey staggered past him, his hands in the air.
“Vive la France!” the man yelled, waving as he ran toward the advancing troops. “Je suis votre ami!”
Toucey was hit at least a second before Battles heard the rattle of rifle fire.
The Frenchman took a step back, his mouth open, gawking at the unseemly manner of his death. The front of his white suit ran red from at least three or four rounds and he looked at Battles, his face puzzled. Then he pitched forward, dead before he hit the ground.
Bullets kicked up dirt near Battles and others viciously split the air close to Molly.
He saw a company halt and level its rifles for volley fire.
On the run, Battles grabbed the woman’s hand and dragged her toward the door to the passageway.
They got inside in the nick of time.
A hail of bullets chipped marble from the rear of the building, thudded into the wooden door, and a few caromed off the left interior wall of the passageway, spraying fragments of brick.
Battles slowed his pace. “Are you hurt?” he asked.
Molly shook her head.
“Now what the hell do we do?” she said.
“The firing from inside the palace has stopped,” Battles said. “Either everyone is dead, or Hatfield Warful is the new ruler of Eugene de Montijo.”
“I’d put all my chips on the dead,” Molly said.
Battles nodded, but said nothing. He led the way to the opposite door, but when he reached his destination he put a forefinger to his lips and made a motion with his other hand, telling Molly to stay where she was.
His revolver up and ready, the marshal opened the door.
The entrance hall was littered with bodies, both black and white, the floor puddled with pools of blood.
It looked to Battles that all the Iron Handmaidens had died here. He saw one woman, no more than eighteen, with her teeth still sunk into Ben Lane’s throat and the handle of the man’s knife protruding from between her breasts.
At least a dozen soldiers were sprawled in death, bloody testimony to the skill of first-rate gunmen. Fat black flies had already gathered, crusting bodies in a heaving, buzzing mass.
Battles heard the shouts of the approaching French and did a quick count. At least half of Warful’s gunmen lay dead on the floor. He presumed the rest, including Warful himself, had died elsewhere.
“Howdy, Matt.”
The voice, weak but clear, came from Battles’s right. He swung around and found himself looking into the muzzle of Durango’s gun.
He brought up his own revolver, his nerves jangling.
Too slow, Matt. Way too slow....
Durango’s Colt clicked twice. “Bang! Bang!” the breed said. Then he laughed.
Battles’s tunnel vision cleared and the taut fiddle string that was his body relaxed.
Durango sat with his back against a wall, a couple of dead soldiers at his feet. Beside him Lon Stuart also sat, grinning at Battles.
Both men were wounded, weak, their shirtfronts stained with blood.
“Where’s Warful?” Battles said.
“Hell if I know,” Durango said. “Looking for his throne somewhere, I guess.”
His hazy eyes focused on Battles. “You were right,” he said. “There’s no treasure.”
“It’s a shame so many people had to die proving it,” Battles said.
A dozen French soldiers led by a young captain clumped into the reception hall. Rifles trained on Battles and he tossed his revolver away, sending it skittering across the marble floor.
“I arrest you for treasonous rebellion against the French nation,” he said in English.
Suddenly Molly was at Battles’s side. “No, Captain Mercier,” the woman said. “You don’t understand. He—”
“Silence, Madame Poteet,” the officer snapped. “Unless you wish to share his fate.”
“But—”
“Take her away from here,” Mercier said to one of his men.
Molly was hustled out, still pleading for Battles, but the captain had already moved on. “Sergeant, find the others,” he ordered. “Dead or alive, bring them here.”
The sergeant led a clattering squad upstairs and then Battles was ordered to sit against the wall with Durango and Stuart.
“What do you think they’ll do to us?” the breed said.
“My guess would be a firing squad,” Battles said.
“Well, that’s better than hanging,” Durango said. “I never did cotton to being hung.”
“Can they do that, execute American citizens?” Stuart said.
“Yeah,” Battles said. “If we’re on French soil in Africa, they can.”
Stuart turned and looked at Durango. “You ever kill a Frenchman?”
Durango shook his head. “Nah, can�
�t say as I have.” He stared at Battles. “How about you?”
Battles shook his head.
“The only furriner you ever shot was a poor Swede boy, ain’t that right, Matt?” Durango said.
Battles could have denied it, now that it was over and he’d failed on all counts, but he said only: “That’s what they say.”
“I never shot a poor Swede boy neither,” Stuart said. “Maybe I took a pot at one, but I don’t recollect.”
A small, dark officer with the caduceus symbol on his belt buckle had been moving from body to body. Now he stopped in front of Durango and Stuart.
“Where are you men wounded?” he said.
“You a doctor?” Durango said.
“Yes. My name is Major Solomon.”
“Then take a look-see for your own self, Doc,” Durango said. “How the hell do I know where I’ve been hit?”
The major examined both men, then said: “You each have bullets inside you. I will have to remove them later.”
Stuart grinned. “Don’t make much sense, Doc, digging bullets out of a man you’re gonna shoot.”
Solomon’s face stiffened. “Monsieur, the French army does not execute wounded men. We will nurse you back to health and then shoot you.”
“Real nice of you, Doc,” Battles said, his tone as dry as mummy dust.
The Frenchman’s expression didn’t change.
“Yes, I know,” he said. “We French are a considerate people.”
Chapter 52
The Jewish Doctor
Hatfield Warful was carried downstairs by two soldiers. With him, both unwounded, were the Texas gunman Joe Dawson and Sam Thorne, a fast-draw killer who notched his Colts.
Dawson and Thorne were taken outside, but Warful was laid on his back among the dead in the middle of the floor.
Battles saw that the man’s left leg was shattered at the knee, white bone splinters showing through raw, red meat.
Solomon picked up his black bag and crossed the floor to Warful. He kneeled beside the grimacing man and examined the bloody knee.
After a while, the major straightened his back and said: “Your knee is shot to pieces. I must amputate the leg, and soon.”
Ralph Compton Slaughter Canyon (9781101559499) Page 17
