Robert B. Parker's Blackjack (A Cole and Hitch Novel)

by Robert Knott

  “What about the three men?”

  “Two of them left. They left the third man and he shot and killed my Ray this morning. He would have killed me, too, but I took care of him, I pulled two of his teeth. Then you come riding up and shot him. Thank God in Heaven. Thank God.”

  “What caused him to shoot your husband?”

  “I do not think that man needs a reason. Besides being a goddamn miscreant,” she said. “He’s completely out of his mind, delirious and sick with the fever.”

  “Is he dead?”

  “I don’t know,” she said. “I sure hope so . . . oh, God, I hope so. He screamed and fell back, holding his bloody face. Then I got up, opened the door, and ran.”

  “The other two men, when did they leave?”

  “This morning,” she said. “While the other fella was asleep. He woke up mad as hell and with no horse. Them other two took his horse. Wished my boys would had been here. This would have never have happened.”

  “Where are they,” I said. “Your boys.”

  “They made a supply run and took all the horses to get re-shod over in Pilgrim’s Corner,” she said. “Be back anytime. Ray told the sonofabitch to wait and he’d have a fresh horse, but no, he was angry and . . . Oh, God, I don’t know, this is, oh, God . . .”

  “How many of them, your boys?”

  “Two boys. Ray Junior and Carl.”

  She lowered her head and sobbed.

  “Stay right here,” I said. “Don’t move.”

  I moved to tie off my horse as Virgil came riding up the wash with his Winchester in hand.

  “What do we got?” he said.

  “Shot him,” I said. “Not sure if he’s dead or alive. Neither is she.

  “This woman, this is her place here, hers and her husband. She said her husband was killed this morning by the one man that was left here, the sick one. Guess Truitt and Black left him here, left him to his damnable fate.”

  “Who else here, besides her?”

  “Nobody. She said her two sons were expected back here soon.”

  “Ray told him he could have a horse just as soon as my boys returned,” she said. “But he shot Ray anyway.”

  Virgil nodded, then dismounted.

  I exchanged my Winchester for my eight-gauge, and once Virgil got tied off we moved off, following the wash south.

  19.

  Virgil and I followed the rock-bottom wash for about a hundred yards, and then it curved back toward the road. We crossed the road out of sight of the way station. Then we made our way back toward the building. Once we had it in sight we cut back to the west, walked another couple hundred yards, and came up on the depot from the back side.

  We split up and moved up on opposite sides of the living quarters. After a time of waiting, hearing nothing and not seeing movement, we crossed swiftly up to the back of the way station.

  The back door was cracked open, and Virgil moved up to one side of the door and I positioned myself on the other side.

  I pushed on the door with the barrel of my eight-gauge and it swung open. There were no shots fired. I took off my hat and moved it just past the doorjamb, soliciting fire, but again there was nothing, and within an instant I moved in and Virgil followed.

  The interior was a simple storeroom with supplies for sale and a kitchen with a counter for eating and drinking.

  Lying flat on his back in the center of the room was the man with the dark scraggly beard we’d heard about. It was obvious by his size and shape he was young, but how young exactly was hard to tell because his face was covered with blood. He was very much alive and it was clear to see the result of my single shot was at least for the moment not fatal, but the bullet had clipped off his nose. The combination of his missing nose and swollen jaw from where Mrs. Opelka removed two teeth made for a grotesque image.

  He turned his head ever so slightly, looking blankly at Virgil and me, and then looked back up at the ceiling. Every labored breath he took made a bubble of blood where his nose used to be.

  The rifle he killed Skinny Jack with was lying in front of the north window where he dropped it when I shot him. He made no effort to go for the rifle or the pistol he had on his hip.

  I moved to him and removed the pistol from his hip and snugged it behind my belt.

  “Where are the other two?” Virgil said.

  He choked on his blood, then spit.

  “Fuck them,” he said. “They . . . they left me here . . .”

  His voice was muffled and muted from a swollen mouth and a missing nose. He turned his head a little and spit a large gob of blood across the floor, and when he did we could see the bullet not only took off his nose but took a hunk of flesh from his cheek as well.

  “They . . . they . . . took my horse,” he said.

  “Truitt and Bill got your nose shot off, too,” I said.

  He looked at me wide-eyed as tears welled up.

  “Fu . . . fuck them,” he said again, then moaned.

  “Where are they?”

  He didn’t answer. He lay motionless, staring at the ceiling.

  “How about we help you,” I said. “Give you an ounce of satisfaction.”

  He stared at the ceiling for a long moment.

  “Wh . . . what?” he said, then spit another stream of blood. “How the fuck are you gonna give me satisfaction?”

  “By you telling us where they took off to,” I said. “That would have to give you some satisfaction.”

  He raised his hand up to his face where his nose used to be. Then he shook his head from side to side and spoke through clenched teeth.

  “Oh, God,” he said. “Fuck . . .”

  “Yeah, you don’t look so good,” I said. “Don’t imagine you feel too good, either.”

  “Seeing how they left you here to fend for yourself,” Virgil said. “And got your nose shot off and took your horse to boot, I think the quicker you let us know where Truitt and Bill went, the better things might go for you.”

  “Fuck,” he said.

  He looked at the ceiling and shook his head from side to side and mumbled as if he were having a conversation with himself.

  “They . . .” he said.

  “They what?” I said.

  A bubble of blood swelled up as he exhaled, and then it popped. He gasped, choked on more blood, then coughed and spit. He tried to talk, but blood filled his mouth and he gagged. I pulled a chair from the counter and grabbed him with one hand by the collar and lifted him.

  “Up,” I said.

  He managed to rise. He leaned over and spit. I slid the chair under him and he sat. He lowered his head as if he were about to black out.

  “I got little concern for you,” I said. “Where?”

  He looked worse sitting up than he did lying down. In my time fighting the Comanche I’d seen plenty of people live with faces disfigured like this, missing lips and noses and ears and scalps. He lowered his chin to his chest.

  “Do not pass out on us,” I said.

  “Tell us what you know,” Virgil said.

  He lifted his head a little.

  “You’re . . . you’re Hitch . . . and Cole,” he said.

  20.

  Bill knew you’d be after us,” he said. “Knew you was marshals in Appaloosa and that it would not be long until you was on his trail.”

  He leaned over and spit blood on the floor.

  “Oh . . . goddamn . . .”

  “Go on,” Virgil said.

  He lowered his head again.

  “Why’d you shoot at us?” I said.

  “He told Truitt and me you’d be coming. Figured you to be a few days back . . . I figured different. I’m smart like that.”

  “Black’s long gone and then you poked that Winchester out that window and killed one of us,” I said. “Why?”


  He didn’t answer.

  “There is a good man out there dead ’cause of you,” I said. “He was younger than you. You killed him.”

  “I’m sorry, goddamn it,” he said.

  “You’re sorry?” I said.

  It was all I could do not to raise my eight-gauge and blow his disfigured head off, but the idea of Mrs. Opelka having more of a mess to deal with than what was already being left behind by this disregard tempered my resolve.

  “Why?” I said.

  “Ain’t going back to being locked up. Not now, not ever.”

  “What’s your story?” Virgil said.

  He looked back and forth between Virgil and me.

  “What?” I said.

  “I broke out a while back.”

  Virgil glanced to me, then looked back to the bleeding man.

  “Yuma?” Virgil said.

  He looked at Virgil for a long bit, then nodded.

  “What’s your name?” I said. “Your real name, and don’t lie.”

  “Ricky,” he said. “Ravenfield.”

  “You’re one of the five that escaped a few months back?” Virgil said.

  He stared at Virgil for a long moment, then nodded.

  “Where are the others?”

  “I don’t know,” he said. “Went our separate ways. All I know is I ain’t going back there. Not now, not ever . . . You’ll have to kill me.”

  “We don’t have to do anything,” Virgil said.

  “I was in that goddamn place since I was sixteen,” he said.

  “For?” I said.

  “Killing a man that tried to kill me.”

  He lowered his head and shook it back and forth. Then he looked up to the ceiling and cried.

  “Oh, God, I hurt . . . fuck.”

  “How was it you and Truitt come to team up with Black?” Virgil said.

  He breathed and breathed, then looked to Virgil with bloodshot eyes. He was having a hard time keeping his head up.

  “Truitt . . . knew him . . .”

  “What were you doing with Bill, for Bill?” I said.

  He shook his head.

  “Truitt said we’d get a good wage, I . . . I was trying to stay out of trouble, I was, I swear to God.”

  “Good wage for what?”

  “I don’t know,” he said.

  “You don’t know?” I said.

  “They talked with each other and not to me.”

  “Why,” I said.

  Ricky leaned over in pain and coughed blood.

  “Why did you ride to Benson City?”

  “Money . . .”

  “What money?”

  “We left in a hurry, and Bill knew this lady he could get money from.”

  Virgil looked to me, then back to Ricky.

  “How’d you know Truitt?”

  He spit before he spoke.

  “He come to Yuma a spell for thieving. I goddamn protected him and now this shit . . . Truitt acted all tough in front of Bill, but got jumpy, Truitt got jumpy and shot a goddamn lawman.”

  Ricky turned his head to the side and spit again.

  “Oh . . . hell. Oh,” he said, wincing in pain. “The next thing you know we are on the run and . . . Truitt don’t think shit about me. Said he didn’t need me, said he was the gun hand. Fuck. Then I get sick as hell and now they goddamn leave me.”

  “Where we gonna find them?” Virgil said.

  He tilted his head a little to look at us. Then he looked to me with a pleading expression.

  “I’ll tell you,” he said. “If you can do me a favor.”

  “You ain’t in a very good position to be asking for favors, Ricky,” Virgil said.

  Ricky moaned and tears welled up as his eyes looked back and forth between Virgil and me.

  “Finish me . . .” he said. “I do not want to live no more.”

  Virgil glanced over to me, then looked back to Ricky.

  “I don’t got nothing now,” Ricky said. “And all I done was wrong and I’d hate like hell to live like this and I damn sure don’t want my life to be the last life I take . . . Please?”

  Virgil looked to me.

  I nodded.

  “Sure,” I said. “Talk.”

  “They’re headed for Socorro,” he said.

  Virgil looked to me.

  “Lying, Ricky?” I said.

  “I ain’t,” he said.

  “They gone to La Verne?” I said.

  “No,” he said. “Socorro.”

  Ricky lowered his chin again and was still.

  “Ricky?” I said.

  He did not move.

  “Ricky?”

  He looked up.

  “We know about La Verne,” I said.

  Ricky shook his head ever so slightly.

  “Socorro,” he said. “That is where you will find Truitt . . . bet your ass.”

  “What makes you so sure?” Virgil said.

  “Truitt has a bunch of shitheads he runs with from there,” he said. “His gang, he says.”

  Virgil looked at me and shook his head.

  “You telling the truth?” I said.

  “Mark my words,” Ricky said.

  21.

  Why should we believe you, Ricky?” I said.

  “Believe what you want.”

  Ricky leaned over and moaned.

  “We been moving fast,” he said, and then spit some more blood into the patch of blood on the floor in front of the chair. “You can catch the shit. The threat of you or any other law . . . was . . . fading from his sight, Bill’s, too.”

  “Didn’t fade from yours,” I said.

  He grimaced and shook his swollen head a little.

  “They ain’t as smart as me,” he said. “They ain’t spent half their born days locked up in no prison. And they weren’t left behind in the middle of the night, neither.”

  He leaned forward with his elbows to his knees and spit more blood on the floor, then looked back up at us.

  “All he fucking talked about,” he said. “Once he’s down Socorro way, that any law better look out.”

  Virgil looked at me, then back to him.

  “And Black?” Virgil said.

  “Fucking left with him,” he said.

  “Where in Socorro?” I said.

  He shook his head.

  “Shouldn’t be too hard to find . . . There’s a cantina in the square there, north side of the plaza, a lively place with pretty whores. Saturday night, the place is famous for good times and there is nothing that would make me happier than to see the two of you spoil his good times.”

  Virgil stared at Ricky.

  “It’s his birthday,” Ricky said with a bloody smile.

  Virgil looked to me, then back to Ricky.

  “No bullshit,” he said. “Swear on Grandma Ravenfield’s Bible. You get there by Saturday night, that’s where he’ll be, with all of his no good friends.”

  “You know something about Black you ain’t telling us?” Virgil said.

  “I don’t,” he said. “I’d fucking tell you if I did, ’cause I don’t give a rat’s ass about him. He never really said shit to me about nothing.”

  Virgil stared at Ricky for a bit.

  “All Truitt talked about for fucking days now. Truitt’s got two cousins there, too, big boys, Walt and Douglas. Assholes, the both of ’em. They think they are tough shit. Truitt and his fucking bullshit. He’s just full of shit. Even Bill told him to shut the fuck up.”

  “What else ain’t you telling us?” I said.

  “Nothing, not a fucking thing . . .”

  Ricky leaned over and spit again.

  “Don’t think Black would be party to a party,” Virgil said.

>   “Hard to say about him,” Ricky said. “I think he’s planning to get as far away as he can.”

  Virgil looked at me and shook his head a little.

  “Goddamn all I know. When you find Truitt, and Bill, for that matter, you can tell them it was me, Ricky fucking Ravenfield, that sent you.”

  Ricky leaned his head back and looked to the ceiling. A bubble of blood swelled again, then popped.

  “All I know,” he said quietly.

  “Why’d you kill the fella here that run this station?”

  Ricky tilted his head a little, making his neck pop.

  “He was gonna warn you, when you come,” he said. “I could not let him do that, you see.”

  Ricky leveled a look at me as more tears welled up in his eyes. He lowered his chin to his chest.

  “Let’s get this over with.”

  Virgil looked at me for a long moment, then nodded. He looked to Ricky for a second, but Ricky didn’t meet his eye and Virgil walked out the front door.

  I collected the Winchester Ricky dropped by the window, then removed his pistol I’d snugged behind my belt.

  “Ricky,” I said. “I am most comfortable with one of a few choices that will decide your fate.”

  “What?” he said.

  “Take you with us back to Appaloosa where you can face a judge, who will decide your fate for all that you have done and will not continue to do.”

  “You said you’d finish me.”

  “I changed my mind.”

  I removed all but one bullet from his revolver and placed the wood-handled pistol on the counter near the front door. I looked back to Ricky. He looked at the pistol, then at me.

  I left out the front door, walked across the road and up the embankment toward our horses, and when I got to the other side of the rise I heard the report of Ricky’s pistol from inside the way station.

  I stopped for a moment and looked back toward the building. I could only see the roof of the place and the thin trickle of smoke coming from the chimney of the wood-burning stove inside.

  I thought about Ricky and what he’d been through, his time in prison and his broken life. Then I thought about Skinny Jack and all he’d been through. He was as good-hearted as they come and all I could readily allow was how some people just have a better shot than others.