Saving Masterson

by Bill Brooks

  He poured them each a glass and sat there beside her on the horsehair divan not inches away and watched her put the glass to her lips, to that tender mouth that seemed to him in the low light of the lamp hardly stained at all by the mouths of a thousand men, Bone Butcher’s included, and he wanted to kiss that mouth himself but refrained.

  “Does he do this to you often?”

  “More lately than ever before.”

  “Why do you allow it?”

  She gave way to more tears when he asked this of her.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “It’s none of my business.”

  “What choice is there for a woman like me in such a place if not to whore and drink with men and be their good-luck charm as they gamble and later their comfort up in a room they pay for by the hour? I made the foolish mistake of becoming one man’s whore and not for the multitude. I would have been better off staying what I was than what I’ve become.”

  “Oh, I don’t need to know everything,” he said.

  “But you do know everything,” she said. “Your business is the same as his.”

  “No, not the same, not exactly. I don’t beat my girls…” And instantly he was sorry he had said it just that way, for he saw how she flinched as if his words were like fists about to strike her again.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to…”

  She sighed and leaned against him, nearly spilling the last drops of cognac from her glass.

  “Oh, I’d kill him if only I could. I’ll kill him and run away if only I had some place to run to.”

  It made him think.

  The weight of her against him like that was the first such weight he’d felt in a very long time. For he did not consort with whores, knowing as he did the diseases they were prone to, the cruel and harsh ways they tended to laugh at anything they did not respect, how they talked among themselves about the inadequacies of the men who visited them. These things, along with the Catholicism that had scarred him, it seemed, with too much guilt, thinking as he did that Jesus was always watching to see and judge his every move. Still, the guilt hadn’t stopped him from pursing the pleasure trade, for he saw it as nearly honorable as many other types of work and more than some. And the work paid far better, him knowing, as a man, that men would always have a need and a willingness to pay for their pleasure. The farther from civilization he plied his trade, the better. And if he had to get down on his knees and pray every night for forgiveness from his sins, by God, he would and did. Sometimes when he drank too much and his mood turned gregarious he told himself a private joke about how his knees had calluses from so much praying.

  She didn’t seem a sin to him as she leaned against him breathing easily now, wiping away the last of the tears as she sipped more cognac. She seemed to him not what she was, but more a virgin. She seemed a woman who had at least temporarily emancipated herself from her cruel master. And for this small bravery alone he admired her.

  I would kill him if only I could. The words resonated in his heart like the steady beating of a drum.

  He put his arm around her tentatively and she did not resist or draw away but gave over to him more of herself, coming so close he could smell the smoke of men’s cigars in her hair amid her other scents of perfume and fear.

  It raked his very skin, the scent of her.

  “What should I do?” she said at last.

  “Stay here with me,” he said, without giving the least thought to the consequences of what all that would mean come the next day or the next or the next.

  Bone Butcher often publicly swore the vengeance he’d take on any man who fooled with her. But in that moment Frenchy did not consider such threats, for the night was black and the doors to his place now locked and a loaded gun was handy enough if he needed one. Her weight against him there on the divan gave him strength to consider any possibility.

  For once, he felt like a man who knew the price other men willingly paid for love and would pay again if asked to do it. He wanted to say how he would liberate her but was afraid he might frighten her even more.

  His eyes strayed into the shadowy recesses of the room and he thought—wondered—if Jesus was watching him now, judging him, adding to his book of transgressions.

  “I know just the thing,” he said. “Wait here…”

  And he went into an anteroom and heated water, pail after pail of it, and filled the copper tub he kept as one luxury he refused to do without. His girls often used it and he quite approved their penchant for doing so. And when he’d filled it full, he came and retrieved her and said, “For you,” and pointed toward the steaming bath.

  “Oh,” she said, with genuine surprise and delight.

  He turned away thinking she would want to undress in private.

  “I don’t mind if you want to see me,” she said.

  “No, no,” he said. “Let this be a thing only for you.”

  She kissed him tenderly on the mouth and he felt like the flame the moth was drawn to, the tip of the flame hot inside him, a dancing hot tongue to ward off the darkness that had been there for so many years.

  He turned and said as he did, “I’ll be back soon.” Then went in search of the man who’d visited his saloon the other night, the tall young man who had pulled his coat open wide enough to reveal a hanging pistol and said “I do certain kinds of work” and gave his name before departing.

  So he knocked on the door and the young man answered and though he was unwilling to conduct any sort of business at that hour did agree to come again the next day to the saloon and discuss it, and it was all he could do and it was enough.

  When he returned he found her just lifting herself from the copper tub, the water sheeting off her pearl white body where he could see, here and there aside from her beauty, the dark bruises put there by Bone Butcher, whose roughness knew no limits.

  She did not try and hide herself from his eyes but instead turned fully so he could see her, her arms hanging loose at her sides.

  “Am I beautiful to you, Frenchy?”

  “Yes,” he admitted.

  She stepped from the tub as he reached for a towel, and came toward him like that, wet and beautiful and bruised in places that in that moment seemed not to mar her beauty at all, and stepped into the towel he held for her. Then he wrapped it about her like a cloak and she stood trembling.

  “I’m going to fix it,” he said.

  “Fix what?”

  “The troubles you’re having with Bone.”

  Her eyes appealed to him. “He’s a very dangerous man,” she said.

  “I know, but dangers can come in many forms.”

  “I like the way your voice is, your little accent.”

  “I think there was a reason you came to me and not someone else,” he said.

  “Reason knows no reason,” she said.

  She led him by the hand up to the little loft where he slept above the room where the tub stood, the water in it cooling now as though saddened by her departure. He looked at it just before disappearing into the loft with her and thought how he would have liked it very much to have taken a cloth and gently washed from her the bruises and scars placed there.

  She dropped the towel and showed him where to touch her.

  “This isn’t necessary,” he said.

  She pouted.

  He realized how much older than she he was. It did not seem to matter when she went and lay upon the cot, the dim light from below having climbed the stair as well and trying desperately to give the room some hope. And upon the bed she reclined, cast in shadow and that little bit of light, which caused a stirring of his passion for her and made him resolve to do whatever it would take to liberate her from the terrible force that deemed it necessary to bruise her and damage her.

  “Come lay with me, Frenchy.”

  He knew he could not, would not resist her invitation.

  Taking off his clothes he felt the eyes of Jesus as well as her own on him. He heard chants in Latin, smelled th
e burning incense, saw the great Gothic spires of Notre Dame rising against the doughy gray skies of Paris.

  She gathered him in like a young girl gathering in a sheaf of wheat and held him to her and kissed his unshaved cheeks, his knife-sharp nose, his eyelids now closed over his dark eyes.

  “I wish it were you who owned me and not Bone Butcher,” she said, her voice a feathery whisper of hope.

  He wished the same, but owning seemed too harsh a term for it.

  “I would give anything if I belonged to you instead of him.”

  The little light that had crawled up the stair with them wavered in the room against one wall, then expired as the lamp that had borne it drank the last of the oil in its glass bottom and guttered out. Then they were there in the dark, held together like that, two near strangers until this moment, both desperate for things to be other than what they were.

  Frenchy had a plan, he thought a good one, and told himself that he would tell her about it someday, but for now he was content to lie there in her arms and let her cling to him and he to her and let the rest of the night do what it would.

  Chapter 13

  When Teddy awoke the second time, the bed was empty of her and he knew it hadn’t been a dream. He’d slept soundly and hadn’t heard her leave. He worried that she’d awakened and regretted their night shared. He quickly dressed and that’s when he found the note there atop the bureau leaning against the packed valise.

  If you leave, I will miss you. If you stay, come by and see me at work. Affectionately,

  Mae.

  He felt the thinnest thread of relief. He realized too that he was as starved as a wolf.

  On his way to the Wright House he stopped off at the telegrapher’s to check for any messages from George Bangs. There was one. He took it outside and read it in the sunlight. The weather was uncommonly good, the winds warm, no sign of storms or other trouble.

  Have you uncovered anything? Inform me of any progress. No further developments on Las Vegas situation. Have contact with the circuit judge, old friend of Allan’s, good where you’re concerned but not likely for Mr. Sears. Tracking information on Carnahan’s relative. Awaiting word from you.

  George Bangs Esq.

  He wondered as he crossed the street exactly what information George might have uncovered concerning the female relative of Horace’s killer. He dodged a wagon pulled by a four-horse team and a cursing teamster and entered the Wright House. Mae was waiting on a table of ladies wearing large hats. She saw him and came over and stood there looking down at him where he sat.

  “Why’d you leave without saying a proper good-bye?” he asked.

  “I was already a bit late for work as it was,” she said. “Besides, I wasn’t sure if you’d feel differently toward me, us—what happened…”

  “No, I don’t feel any different toward you…at least not in a negative way. It almost felt like a dream to me.”

  “It wasn’t a dream, Teddy.”

  He heard a church bell ringing and realized it was Sunday.

  “What time do you get off work?”

  “Not until five o’clock.”

  “Can I stop by so we can go for a walk?”

  “If that’s your pleasure.”

  “It is.”

  “Do you want to order breakfast?”

  “I already see what I want.”

  Color rose in her cheeks. He ordered coffee, scrambled eggs, ham, biscuits, butter, and molasses.

  “Whatever could have made you so ravenous, Mr. Blue?” she teased, then walked off toward the kitchen before he could answer. He realized he liked her. He liked her a lot, for having barely known her for no more than a few days. She was that kind of woman: easy to get to know, easier still to like.

  Dog Kelly came in wearing a cellulose collar that looked tight around his throat, and sporting his familiar swallowtail coat now looking like he’d at least spanked most of the dust out of it. He had on a new beaver hat. He came over immediately and sat down across from Teddy.

  “You finished eating, or just waiting to get started?”

  “Waiting to start.”

  “Good. You don’t mind, I’ll eat with you.” Dog’s eyes were their usual bloodshot red.

  “You ever sleep?” Teddy asked.

  “Not if I can help it. Here and there some. Catnaps mostly. About all I can stand is taking catnaps.”

  Mae brought the coffeepot and two cups.

  “Morning Mae,” Dog said.

  “Morning Mayor.”

  Dog’s smile was like a storm-weathered fence of brown crooked stakes. Mae poured coffee into their cups and asked Dog if he wanted his usual—flapjacks and bacon—and he nodded appreciatively and watched Mae’s backside as she went off.

  “Nice woman, that Mae,” Dog said.

  Teddy didn’t reply.

  “I think maybe I know who it is wants the Masterson boys rubbed out,” Dog said, spooning sugar into his coffee and keeping his voice low.

  “Who?”

  “Angus Bush is who I’m betting.”

  “Why him?”

  “A feller who used to work for him tending bar came into my place last night drunk as a turkey and was grumbling how the Mastersons was siphoning off lots of Angus’s trade by serving better liquor and hiring all the best-looking whores. Feller said Angus had to lay him off because business was down.”

  “That’s pretty thin evidence.”

  “I know it is, but hell, it’s at least something to think about, wouldn’t you say?”

  “I had a visitor last night—Frenchy LeBreck. He wants to offer me a job.”

  “Doing what?”

  “I’ll find out when I go see him this afternoon, but my guess is it’s to kill somebody. You always put that much sugar in your coffee?”

  Dog looked at the fourth spoonful he was dropping into his cup.

  “Helps keep me awake. You think it’s the Mastersons he wants you to kill?”

  Teddy shrugged, said, “I’ll find out this afternoon.”

  Mae brought them their breakfasts and looked Teddy directly in the eyes and said, “Is there anything else you’d like?” Teddy hoped Dog was too concentrated on his flapjacks to have noticed the bold flirtation. Dog was already digging into them.

  “No ma’am, not this minute. Perhaps later.”

  “I’ll check back on you boys,” she said and went off to the table with the ladies in the large hats.

  Dog ate like a wanted man with the posse pulling up outside.

  “You even taste those?” Teddy asked when Dog had stuffed the last bit of flapjack into his mouth and swallowed it practically without chewing it.

  “Mmmm, they’s good,” Dog said. Droplets of molasses clung to his chin. “Gotta go, church is starting. You let me know what you find out with Frenchy and I’ll sniff around more on Angus. We gone put the bad brothers under the sod.”

  Mae came over after Dog left.

  “Was it Dog Kelly who came and knocked on your door last night to offer you a job?” she said.

  “No.”

  “You going to tell me more about that?”

  “Probably, but not now, not here.”

  “So I can expect you to come by when I get off today?”

  “I’m counting on it.”

  “I could pack us a meal and we could ride out on the prairies and have a picnic, even though it’s not exactly the season for picnics.”

  “That sounds like a fine idea. I’ll see about renting us a cab.”

  She smiled and he did too.

  He went down to the stables and made arrangements to rent a cab, then went over to the barbershop and sat his turn waiting for a shave. A barbershop was a good place to hear gossip.

  “I’m surprised so many places are open on a Sunday,” he said to the barber when he climbed into his chair.

  “Only the rich can afford to take a day off,” the barber said. “You want the works?”

  “Just a shave.”

  “You ain�
�t no cowboy.”

  “How can you tell?”

  “You ain’t got no cowboy haircut.”

  “Bowl around the head?”

  “That’s right. They come in here off the trail all butchered-looking from getting their hair cut by their pards with sheep shears and expect me to make ’em look pretty. I tell em I ain’t no miracle worker, and ’sides, whores don’t care what you look like and neither does a barkeep. Long as you got money in your pockets you could look like a gol-dang dog.”

  The man snapped out a barber’s cape and snugged it around Teddy’s neck, then wrapped his face in a hot damp towel. Teddy could hear him stropping his razor, brushing up the lather in the soap mug.

  The barber talked about the weather and religion and politics and his sick wife and dumb kids and about everything that came to his thoughts, and for once Teddy didn’t mind hearing about another man’s troubles; it made his own pale in comparison. To think about having to cut hair and give shaves every day for a living was unsettling. He thought about men like John Sears, who wouldn’t do any sort of work except what could be done from on the back of a horse, men who’d rather be dead and in the ground than tied to a regular job for regular pay.

  He closed his eyes and heard only the snick, snick of the scissors and it was a comforting sound to him. When the barber finished his cutting, he daubed warm lather on Teddy’s cheeks and deftly scraped off the growth of days-old whiskers.

  “Here,” the barber said and handed Teddy a bottle of bay rum. “Make you smell like a New York dandy.”

  “Why not?”

  Then the barber said, “I notice you carry your piece in a shoulder rig. Unusual. Only man I ever knew to do that was a lawman in Philadelphia. He was real good with it.”

  Teddy pulled on his coat, said, “I just always thought of it as discretionary, that’s all.”

  “Discretionary, huh?”

  “How much do I owe you?”

  “Two bits.”

  Teddy dropped the coins into the man’s palm.

  “You staying in town long?”

  “For a time.”