The Drifter Detective

by Garnett Elliott

  "Have a seat," Gideon said, pushing forward a rocking chair with his booted toe. "I just put on some coffee."

  There were two holding cells within spitting distance of Gideon's desk, but both were empty. The door to the closest one sagged open like an invitation. Jacked noticed a fine coat of dust on the rifle cabinet.

  "It's humble, but it's mine." Gideon poured coffee into a tin mug, followed by a generous slug of whisky. "Just in case you got a hangover," he said, and passed the cup to Jack.

  "Appreciate it." The brew tasted of chicory.

  "Say, I got one of those birds," Gideon said, cocking a finger at Jack's hat. "What branch were you with?"

  "Air Corps. I was a waist-gunner on a B-17."

  "No kidding? They put me up in a B-24, only I had the belly-turret on account of my size. Almost destroyed my hearing. Did you see much action?"

  Jack grimaced. "I spent most of the war in Stalag Luft Three."

  "Ah." Gideon swung his legs off the desk. "Well, I won't pry. Let's get to business. Strummer, I want you to drive on out to the Lydon farm for the morning and look around. Mrs. Lydon says some stewbum's been sleeping on the property. You find him, haul him in on a vag charge."

  Strummer's face clouded. "Hell, I've been with you long enough. You know you can trust—"

  Gideon raised his hand, which was enough to make the taller man flinch. Strummer stalked out of the office and slammed the door behind him.

  "Your deputy's got a temper," Jack said.

  "Among other things." Gideon waited until the sound of a motor turning over reverberated through the walls. "How are you at surveillance?"

  "That's my stock-in-trade."

  "Ten miles north of here there's a former rancher turned oilman named Thomas McFaull. He's sitting on several acres of pumpjacks, which by Clyde standards makes him a Rockefeller. Interested so far?"

  "Go on."

  "There's rumors—nothing substantiated, mind you—that McFaull runs liquor to Indian reservations in Oklahoma. A sort of side-business."

  Jack frowned. "That's a long distance to haul booze. Lot of risks and not much profit, for an oilman."

  "Who knows why he does it?" Gideon's narrow shoulders rose and fell beneath his sheriff's uniform. "Maybe he's running low on crude, looking to branch out. Whatever the case, I've been keen to nail him. An arrest for an operation like that could get me transferred to someplace civilized."

  "If McFaull's moving liquor across state lines—"

  "Alright, so the Feds can do the actual nabbing. I want to point the finger, with evidence the DA in Abilene will find credible. Strummer's useless when it comes to subtlety, and I'm not what you'd call low-profile, myself. There's no rule says a P.I. can't work with law enforcement."

  Jack was thinking, funny as the case sounded, how good it would look for his career. The hefty retainer didn't hurt, either.

  "I'll pay you twenty-five a day, plus expenses," Gideon said. "You'll need to testify about whatever you find. I assume a courtroom doesn't scare you."

  "Not at all."

  "Good, because McFaull keeps a dozen roughnecks on his estate, and they'd beat anyone silly they caught skulking around. That's the scary part."

  "They'd have to find me to beat me."

  Gideon got up from behind the desk and slapped Jack's shoulder. "That's the spirit. I figured it would take a lot to faze a P.O.W."

  "I've been face to face with screaming Messerschmitts. You too, I imagine." He didn't add the guard dogs at Luft Three had terrified him far more than any German ace.

  "Let's drink on it," Gideon said.

  They skipped the coffee for their second round.

  * * *

  Jack talked Luke into renting him a 'loaner,' a pre-war Packard with dubious tires. He drove it to a dirt road on the fringes of town, following a map hand-drawn by Gideon. Five miles out and the terrain became treeless. Hills thick with waist-high grass began to dimple the horizon.

  The Colt rode on the seat beside him. He'd loaded all the chambers with magnum rounds before setting out. Fictional P.I.'s might be content to have their skulls staved in on a regular basis, but Jack knew better. If discovered, McFaull would just as likely shoot him in the head as a trespasser than bother asking questions or summoning police. Rural landowners still believed in frontier justice.

  Another four miles and the road forked. He drove over an ancient cattle guard. Yellow signs appeared, warning him exactly of the fate he'd expected. The Packard topped a hill. Below, in a depression too gradual to be called a valley, stretched the McFaull estate. At least fifty pumpjacks nodded around a ranch house and its adjoining buildings. Fast as he could, Jack put the car in reverse, backed off the road, and circled around to the leeward side of the hill. If he'd been spotted his new case was over.

  He waited twenty minutes. Thirty. No pickups full of angry men came hauling up the road. No sounds of approaching horses. He put the Colt in his shoulder rig and got out. Crouched like a British commando, he worked his way up to the hill's summit. There was enough grass at the top for concealment if he lay prone. Good thing McFaull had gone out of the ranching business, or all the natural cover would've been grazed to stubble.

  From his pocket he took a seven power telescopic sight. The Red Army infantryman he'd won it from swore the sight had been used in the defense of Stalingrad. Jack had been putting it to less noble uses. He scoped the ranch house and nearby feedlot, but saw no movement. Farther out, a flatbed truck was parked next to one of the derricks, and three men labored at the top. Wrenches flashed in the sun.

  Jack willed himself to a buzzard's patience. The workers finished their maintenance, climbed into the truck, and drove four pumps down to scrutinize a length of pipe. Jack was contemplating rolling over and resting his arms when dust roiled in an angry cloud behind the barn. A red Mercury convertible shot out. Jack managed to angle the crosshairs on the driver: a distinguished looking man in his late fifties, sunglasses, with a head of thick, silver-gray hair. He swung the convertible around in an arc and headed for the flatbed a hundred yards away. Got out. Jack watched him gesticulate at the three men next to the pipe, arms waving. They did whatever they were doing at a faster rate. The man climbed into the convertible and drove back to the main house.

  Jack flipped open a small notebook. He scrawled: "2:16 P.M. McFaull chews out the help."

  It was the only entry of note for the rest of the day.

  * * *

  After sunset he returned to town. Any booze-smuggling would likely take place under cover of darkness, so he figured he'd have to pull an all-night surveillance soon. No need to rush things yet, though. Gideon was paying him by the day.

  The widow Talbot had made a big bowl of hash with fried eggs for dinner. She seemed to take her time, watching Jack eat. He could've sworn she'd smeared a hint of rouge on her cheeks.

  "I hear tell you're working for Giddy, Mr. Laramie," she said.

  "I can't go into specifics, ma'am."

  "Oh, I understand." She refilled Jack's milk. "It sounds exciting, whatever it is."

  "Hey Shirl," called a railroad worker, sitting at the other end of the table, "how come you never ask me about my job?"

  "'Cause I can guess what you do all day, Emmett," she shot back.

  Around midnight Jack woke from a doze to the sound of furtive steps outside his room. The boarding house had a fair amount of racket at night, but this was someone trying to be quiet. He snatched the Colt off the nightstand and padded over to the door. Cracked it. A woman's silhouette was coming down the hallway, toward him. Too short to be the widow. She wore a man's hat pulled low over her forehead and a long coat. A door had just closed somewhere behind her.

  "Shhhh," the woman said to Jack, putting a carmine-tipped finger to her lips. He caught a glimpse of her narrow, pretty face beneath the hat's brim. Perfume, sweat, and a familiar musky odor came rolling off her as she glided by. Her feet and legs were bare beneath the coat. Hips swaying, she unlatched the back d
oor and slipped out into darkness.

  Jack closed his own door. He wondered who the lucky son of a bitch had been.

  * * *

  Two days passed. Jack spent the bulk of them stretched out on his surveillance hill, noting every movement of the reclusive McFaull and staff. He got ticks on the back of his neck. He drank water from an Army surplus canteen and ate biscuit sandwiches prepared by the thoughtful Mrs. Talbot—usually meatloaf slathered in Tabasco, which prompted Jack to wonder if the late Mr. Talbot hadn't died of constipation.

  There was no hint whatsoever of criminal activity.

  "You're doing fine, just fine," Gideon told him, after he'd presented his initial report. "I don't want you sneaking around there at night, taking unnecessary risks. Not yet. I'll let you know when it's time to step things up."

  Jack felt vaguely guilty about taking the sheriff's money. The more he thought about it, though, the more he started to wonder. Where was Gideon, sheriff of a one-horse town with few opportunities for graft, getting all his scratch?

  "You ever hear of anyone in these parts running booze to Indian reservations?" he asked Luke, after he'd paid him for fixing the DeSoto.

  "What're you talking about, son? Is that what Giddy's got you up to?"

  "I'd just heard—"

  "Don't know where you would've heard that. There's no reservation within two hundred miles of here."

  So much for rumors.

  On the third day's surveillance something happened. Late into the afternoon, the red Mercury roared away from the ranch house and sped toward the road. McFaull was finally leaving his estate. But when Jack got the sight steadied, he saw a brunette in a tight black dress at the wheel, alone. He recognized her as the woman from the boarding house. She took the fork and headed for town. Jack considered following, but figured Gideon would want him to stay put.

  He saw the Mercury again two hours later, on his return to Clyde. The big convertible was parked in front of the saloon.

  No Ernest Tubb or Bob Willis greeted him when he pushed the door open this time. The entire bar had gone church-silent. All attention was focused on the back room, where Strummer and a burly railroad worker were engaged in a stare-down. Between them, leaning against the pool table and gifting the bar's patrons an eyeful of cleavage, was the narrow-faced, red-lipped beauty.

  "Who's that?" Jack asked a nearby yokel, nodding toward the girl.

  "Dottie McFaull. Hottest piece of ass in town."

  "McFaull's daughter?"

  The yokel grinned at him. "His wife. I told Strummer to stay away from her. That's Cal Johnson he's eyeballing over there. Used to be a Navy heavyweight champ, during the war."

  Strummer thrust a finger against the larger man's chest. "The lady's staying here," he said, with fierce-eyed conviction. "She's not interested in you."

  Cal snickered. Jack had seen him before at the boarding house, grabbing the lion's share of food at dinner, and taking his time in the bathroom. "Why don't we ask the lady what she wants to do?" Cal turned to Dottie. "How about it, hon? You gonna let me show you another good time? Or you want to waste an evening with the deputy here, knocking balls around on this old table?"

  Dottie's eyelids lowered by a fraction. "You boys will have to settle that for me, I guess."

  "You heard her." Strummer cocked a thumb at the back door.

  "It'll be a pleasure," Cal said.

  Both men filed out, Cal pausing long enough to snatch a cue stick off the table.

  Half the bar's patrons stampeded for the back door. The other half poured out the front and circled around. Jack jostled his way with the latter. Even before he'd reached the back lot, he caught the sharp sound of wood splitting, and a pained grunt. The heavyweight champ had opted for the cue instead of using his fists. He beat Strummer over the head with the thick end, his blows already opening the scalp. Red streamed down the deputy's forehead and shoulders as he dropped to his knees.

  Nobody in the crowd would intercede, Jack knew. Not with all that blood flowing. He slipped the belt from around his waist. A heavy brass buckle weighted one end, and he whipped it at the cue as Cal readied for another blow. The buckle wrapped tight around the upraised shaft. Jack yanked; the cue went flying from Cal's grasp.

  Cal gaped at his empty hands. "Who the f—"

  A right cross pre-empted the question. Jack put his hips into it. Cal skittered backward, but kept his footing. He looked more surprised than hurt. His chin dropped, while his hands shot up into guard position alongside his head.

  "Paste him one, Cal," a voice called.

  Jack stepped backward, lowering his own guard. "Think for a second. You just beat an off-duty cop."

  Cal blinked. "So?"

  "That's assault with a weapon, and about thirty witnesses. How do you reckon it's going to turn out for you?"

  "I don't care. He started this crap—"

  "He's the deputy, remember? You think the sheriff's going to let something like this go?"

  Cal's face clouded, as fighting instinct seemed to grapple with reason. Jack stepped close. Cal didn't try to hit him. "You need to get out of town," Jack whispered, so the crowd wouldn't hear. "Grab your things and hop the next train. There might be one leaving the depot tonight."

  "There is, at midnight. But …"

  "But what? Go on, get the hell out of here before the sheriff shows up."

  "Why are you telling me all this?"

  "Because I don't think I could take you in a straight fight," Jack said, truthfully.

  The big man lowered his fists. Behind Jack, two locals helped Strummer sway to his feet. The blood was pouring from his head now. Dottie looked at him and then Jack; he could've sworn she was disappointed. Cal seized her by the wrist. "Come on, baby," he said. "We've got things to do."

  She let him lead her away. Jack turned his attention to Strummer. The bar's patrons were heading back inside, a few mumbling about what a piss-poor fight they'd just seen. "You want me to take a look at that?" Jack said, gesturing toward the bloody crown of Strummer's head.

  "Why'd you go and jump in like that? I had him. I was just about to clock him one."

  "He was cheating."

  "Yeah, well, he was. Otherwise I'd of … where's Dottie?"

  "She left with him."

  "Ah, Christ." Strummer looked ready to cry. "Why'd she … that son of a bitch, he must've …"

  "Not that it's any of my business, but married women are usually trouble."

  "Damn straight it isn't your business."

  "You going to tell Gideon what happened?"

  "I'm not telling him shit, though he'll probably know everything by morning. Goddamn small towns."

  Jack watched him lope away, one hand atop his bleeding head.

  * * *

  At five minutes to midnight Jack's eyelids fluttered open. Coleman Hawkin's tenor sax was still playing on the turntable next to the bed. He'd fallen asleep with a chessboard laid flat across his stomach; pieces rattled as he sat up. He'd been working a direct mate problem before the music had lulled him. Now he strained his ears. He could've sworn he heard someone knocking, softly.

  The knocking came again.

  He swept the chessboard aside. He was still dressed, and force of habit made him jam the Colt in the back of his jeans before he eased open the door.

  Dottie McFaull stood in the doorway.

  Her black evening dress looked like it had been torn off and hastily put back on. Her hair was mussed on one side, her lipstick smudged. Still, she was the nicest thing he'd seen in awhile. He swallowed, remembering his advice to Strummer about married women.

  "Ain't you going to invite me in?"

  His feet seemed to move backward of their own accord, and Dottie followed inside. She shut the door behind her.

  There was no furniture to sit on other than the bed. Dottie plunked herself down on one corner. She was short, only about five-one, but so curvy her body resembled a squat hourglass. Her heavy breasts were jammed together under bl
ack fabric. Jack's eyes kept rolling to that soft vale of cleavage. He hadn't had his ashes hauled since Lubbock, and now raw physical need rubbed at him. His tongue felt thick. His throat dry.

  "You're a quiet one, aren't you?" She smiled. "I kinda like that."

  "I'd offer you something to drink, but …"

  "Ah." Dottie waved it off. "I've already had plenty tonight. I don't go into booze too much on account of my old man."

  His ears pricked at the reference to McFaull. A quiet voice told him this was his chance to get some answers, if he could keep his priorities straight.

  Dottie glanced at the record player, her lips curling. "What kind of music is that? There's no guitar or nothing."

  "Jazz."

  "Isn't that for … colored people?"

  He marveled at her restraint in not using the other word. "All kinds of folks listen to jazz. Not so much in West Texas, though, I'd imagine."

  She picked up a rook from the bed sheet. Examined it.

  "Ah, Dottie, can I ask why you're here?"

  She blinked at him, slowly, her smile returning. "I wanted to thank you, for saving Lou from having his head bashed in."

  "Strummer?"

  She nodded. "He's such a nice little boy." Her full lips added emphasis to the word 'little.'

  "If you were so worried about him, why didn't you stop the fight?"

  "Oh, you know men. Once they get to beating their chests over a girl, well, they just gotta go and fight. I suppose I better break it off with Lou tomorrow, before this happens again."

  "What happened to Cal?"

  "He took your advice. I just left him at the depot with all his things. He said he's taking the next train whether they want him or not." She ran her tongue over her lips. "That was pretty clever of you, getting rid of him like that."

  "I was just trying to end the fight as quickly as possible."

  "Uh-huh." She kicked off a shoe.

  "Aren't you going to ask me my full name? What I'm doing in town? My favorite color or something?"

  "Is that really necessary?"

  "How about I ask you some questions, starting with: doesn't your husband care if you're fooling around?"