by Ford Fargo
He looked at the marshal, his eyes wet. “Do you know, that look on his young face wasn’t one of blame. No sir, it was one of forgiveness. And I ain’t telling a windy, because forgiveness is the last thing I want or deserve. But that boy, in his last seconds of life, he was more man than I have ever been, or will ever be.”
His bandaged head slumped back down between the points of his shoulders, and it was a long minute before the marshal realized the pathetic one-armed drunk was sobbing. A tear ran off Rupe’s thin nose, hit the wood floor. “I couldn’t move. I thought I was dying, when that savage hit my head I couldn’t feel anything. I wish to hell I had died then, I tell you. They didn’t even see fit to scalp me. Just left me alive, damn their eyes.”
“It ain’t too late, Rupe. You could do that boy proud yet—”
Faster than Gardner had ever seen the man move, Rupe jumped to his feet and pointed a long, trembling finger at him. “No sir, don’t you dare! You may have picked me up off my face more times than I deserve, might have gotten me paying work that a one-armed man ought not have, might have bought me more meals than a body such as me has a right to eat, might have bought me this haircut and shave, but that don’t never give you nor anybody else the right to tell me what I should be doing where that boy’s memory is concerned.”
In a lowered, shaking voice he said, “I should never have talked of it.” He made for the jailhouse door, then stopped and made his way to the back room. The marshal heard him lie down on the bunk.
Sam Gardner stayed in his chair for a long time, staring at that spot on the floor long after Rupe’s tear had dried.
* * *
Gardner had been considering making another pot of coffee—it was going to be a long night—when from the back room he heard—not Rupe’s snores, as he expected—but the sound of the man getting up off the bunk. Then Rupe appeared in the doorway.
“Can’t sleep?”
“Brogans.”
“What?”
“Remember how I said how things look different from the ground, how I spent so much time down there it seems natural somehow?”
“Yeah, sure. What of it?”
Rupe rubbed his hand along his cheek, wincing as his fingertips grazed the bandage looped under his chin. “I told you I didn’t really see what happened last night, not even the man’s back. But I did see something.”
Gardner dropped his boots to the floor and leaned forward, eyes narrowed. “Yeah?”
Rupe nodded, walked to the stove, held out his hand, though the stove was long cold. “I wasn’t lying then, I just couldn’t recall much. But I have, you see. Now I have.” He turned to face Gardner, a smile tugging at his mouth. “Brogans.”
“You already said that, Rupe.”
“Yeah, but I’m telling you I think the shooter wore brogans. Hell, I’d swear to it.”
Gardner stood, the wooden chair stuttering on the floor. “Rupe, are you damn sure? Do you know what you’re saying?”
“Yeah, I know, not a whole lot of people wear brogans, but this fella did.”
Gardner fingered his moustache. “You sure it’s a man, then?”
“Course I’m sure. I ain’t never been so drunk I can’t tell the difference betwixt a jack and a jenny.”
“You know how many men wear brogans in this town, Rupe.”
“You askin’ or tellin’, Sam?” Rupe didn’t even turn around as he said it, just headed into the back room. Presently, Rupe said, “I know of one man who wears brogans in this town. And now I wish I hadn’t remembered a damn thing. And Sam?”
“Yeah, Rupe.”
“What I talked of before….”
“It’s between us, Rupe. Nobody else.”
“Appreciate it, Sam.”
There was quiet for a moment, then Gardner heard Rupe lay down again and soon, the steady, heavy breaths of a man dropping like a stone into a deep sleep.
Gardner sighed and stoked the near-dead coals in the stove. He envied Rupe. There wouldn’t be any sleep for him or his deputies this night, so he’d better make coffee and hope Croy or O’Connor made it back before too long. They had people to talk to, things to look at, work to do.
The knot in his gut eased a bit. He tried to concentrate on the killing, but his mind fixed on Rupe’s young tortured boy, Davey, staring at Rupe as he died.
* * *
“Aw, hell no….” Gardner pushed himself back up to his knees and slapped his palms on his legs.
“What?” Deputy Croy paused, squinting in the morning sun at the mouth of the alley. His hand rested on a wobbling stack of barrel staves behind which he was definitely not finding sign of brogans. “Marshal, I hope that means you found something, because I’m just wasting my time back here.”
Gardner jerked his chin toward the dirt before him.
Croy pushed his hat back and leaned in. He kept his voice low. “They made by brogans, you think?”
“Yep.”
“Some boots might make the same prints as brogans, though.”
“True, but there’s more. That one there? What do you see?”
Croy bent lower, much the same as Gardner had.
“Hey, you two….” Ira Breedlove leaned on the paint-faded post at the corner of the porch, half smiling. “Little early to be face-down in the dirt, even for you all.”
The lawmen both looked up at him. “Mind your own, Breedlove,” said Gardner, then directed his attention back to the tracks before them.
Straightening up as if he’d been slapped, Breedlove looked around to see if anyone had heard the exchange. Then he muttered “ungrateful bastard,” and headed back inside.
“It’s that curvy bit there you’re pointing at, right?”
“Yep,” said Gardner, leaning in again. “That’s Rattlesnake Jake’s mark. Likes to wear his brogans and likes everyone to know he’s a hard case.”
Croy kept staring at the mark. “From what I’ve seen and heard, he looks to be one.”
“In my experience, Quint, any man who has to go out of his way to prove he’s mean and ornery isn’t really much of either.”
The men stood and looked down the nearly empty street.
“There are always exceptions,” said Croy.
“Yep. I reckon we’ll find out presently if Jake’s one or not.” Marshal Gardner started walking. “First, you can buy me a cup of coffee.”
Deputy Croy shook his head and followed the marshal.
INTERLUDE
Samuel Jones liked to take his breakfast at Isabella’s Restaurant. Most folks in town who could afford to eat away from home preferred Ma’s Café, or Joe’s Whistle-stop up by the depot—they were less pricey, and served up more familiar fare. Jones, though, could afford to splurge, and Isabella’s was worth splurging on—especially to him. Samuel Jones might have been a wayward cardsharp, but he had spent most of his life in New Orleans as Philippe Beaumont.
Antonio Isabella was a cheerful Italian in his early fifties. As a young sailor he had fallen in love with New Orleans, and married a girl from there—they now had a houseful of kids, and a kitchen whose savory aromas were a mix of Italian, Spanish, and French. The smells of the Crescent City, in other words. And whichever name he used, breakfast was not breakfast to the gambler unless it included andouille sausage.
It was surprising, and a little unnerving, how many people with New Orleans connections lived in Wolf Creek. There were the Isabellas, Spike Sweeney the blacksmith, and of course Jones himself. Fortunately, the other former New Orleans dwellers had not moved in the same circles as Jones, and thus had not recognized him. It was safe, therefore, for him to occasionally get a taste of home without answering any questions about his own past life. People in Wolf Creek didn’t ask questions, anyhow. Most of them had their own secrets to keep.
His reverie—and his meal—were interrupted by an unexpected visitor. A man in a cheap, rumpled suit sat across from Jones. He was about forty-five years old, balding, and carried a weathered carpetbag. After a moment J
ones placed him—it was the new whiskey peddler, the one who’d replaced Lester Weatherby after the recent Kiowa incident.
“We haven’t officially met, sir,” the drummer said. “My name is Malchius Offerman.”
Jones nodded. “Whiskey peddler.”
“Yes indeed.”
“It’s a mite early for me, Mister Offerman.”
The drummer smiled, but it was a cold smile. “I’m not here in that capacity, Mister Jones. And yes, I know your name, even though we haven’t met—you were the talk of the town last night, after that duel.”
Jones popped the last bite of sausage into his mouth. “Which is better than being the talk of the town because one is dead,” he said, then polished off his eggs.
“No doubt, Mister Jones, no doubt. And I’ve asked around—Valentine Hébert wasn’t the first man you’ve killed in Wolf Creek. You’ve outdrawn a couple of people who tried to protest your poker skills with bullets.”
Samuel Jones put down his coffee cup, and his eyes narrowed. “I recall now,” he said, “that the marshal was asking after you at the Lucky Break yesterday evening.”
Offerman shrugged. “That’s neither here nor there.”
Jones leaned forward. “Let me guess, Mister Offerman. My gunplay has impressed you, and you’ve thought of some angle to use it to attract customers and sell drinks.”
The cold smile returned. “Oh, no, Mister Jones,” the drummer replied. Then he looked around to make sure no one was sitting nearby, and continued in a soft voice. “I want you to help me kill someone.”
Samuel Jones was not often surprised anymore, but this had done it.
“I know, I know,” the drummer said, “you are a professional gambler. But I know a gunman when I see one. I’ve been around enough, believe me. I can pay you very well.”
“Keep talking.”
“I assume you know the bounty hunter who hangs around this town from time to time, the one they call Rattlesnake Jake?”
“I know him. Not well, but I know him. And I know he didn’t get that nickname because he shakes a rattle. He is a very dangerous man.”
“I’m well aware of that,” Offerman said. “That’s why I haven’t tried to accomplish this goal by myself—believe me, I would like nothing better, but I wouldn’t have a chance. Even trying to bushwhack a man like that by yourself is too risky. That’s why I need help. And that’s why the marshal couldn’t find me last night—I was down in Tent City, trying to recruit some helpers. I got three men, but I need a real professional to seal the deal.”
“I see. So you’re not really a whiskey drummer at all.”
Offerman chuckled. “That’s the funny part,” he said. “I really am. I’ve had my eye on this town for awhile, trying to work out the best angle to get at him—and when that blithering coward Weatherby quit, I jumped at the chance to take over his route. It’s the perfect cover, because it’s not a cover. And I do have a little money, mostly from selling my father’s house and hardware store down in Austin when he passed away.”
“What business does a whiskey drummer have with a hard-case bounty hunter?” Jones asked.
“That’s my affair,” Offerman said, and Jones shook his head.
“I’m afraid not,” Jones said. “If you’re asking me to go up against someone that I know to be a dangerous gunfighter, I want to know what your stake is.”
Offerman bit his lip and considered his reply for a moment. “All right, I’ll tell you. He murdered my little brother in St. Joe two years ago. He was only my half-brother, and he was an idiot, but I loved him. Clyde robbed a bank in Austin and took to the outlaw trail, but he didn’t kill anybody. Someone else in the gang shot the tellers. He didn’t deserve to die for it. Clyde’s death broke our father’s heart, and I believe that’s what killed him.”
Samuel Jones could read faces, it was his job. Offerman’s eyes were equal parts fury and grief. He could tell that the drummer’s story was true—at least from his perspective. Although his love for his kid brother was definitely obscuring his objectivity; someone who robs a bank in which a teller gets killed would be guilty of second degree murder in most states whether they pulled the trigger or not. The gambler deemed it unwise to point that out under the circumstances, though. When a man loses a brother, especially a younger one, reason often goes out the window.
Jones nodded his understanding.
“What do I have to do?” he asked.
CHAPTER SIX
“That’s him over there in the corner, at the back. But, beggin’ your pardon, ma’am, I just have to ask, have you given sufficient thought to seekin’ out a bounty hunter to track your husband? You’re likely to end up without your money or your husband,” Mack, the bartender of the Wolf’s Den, said, with a wizened leer as he wiped a wet spot on the polished bar for the fifth time. “Now, for the right price–”
“You let me worry about whether I get my husband back, or not. I’ll thank you to mind your own business,” the petite lady answered curtly, spinning around and walking away. She had hair black as night and eyes green as emeralds
The bartender, red-faced at being dressed-down by a lady in front of his other customers–all two of them–went back to wiping the same spot for the sixth and seventh times. The lady sashayed over to the table of a man with a face that looked like a well-traveled road, ruts and all. He was shuffling and reshuffling a badly worn deck of cards, bent, cracked, and dirty.
“You the man they call Rattlesnake Jake? The bounty hunter?” she asked.
“Maybe. Who’s askin’?”
“I’m Teresa Munder and my husband is missing. I want him back.”
Jake recognized the last name. Alexander Munder was a pain in the ass—he made the rounds of every saloon in town about once a week, crying in his beer and everyone else’s about what a bitch his wife was. Jake had always figured anyone who had to put up with that whining bastard was justified in treating him like shit.
“Why?” Jake asked.
“Why did he go missing or why do I want him back?”
“Take your pick.” The man spread the cards out in front of him then flipped the whole row with the one card still in his hand.
“Well, to start with, I’m unwilling to believe he just up and abandoned me. He’s not that kind. And I doubt he’s taken up with another woman.”
“Why?”
“Because he’s a hard-working, honorable man and he wouldn’t let himself be caught up on a whim by another pretty face.”
“When did he go missing?”
“Two days ago.”
Jake grinned. “Hell, that’s not even long enough for a good drunk. He’s probably sleepin’ it off somewhere.”
“He is not. Alexander always comes home by dawn—he did not, not dawn yesterday and not dawn today. And he is not, as you say, sleeping it off—I have been to every bar in town and no one has seen him since Monday night. Today is Wednesday, in case you don’t keep track.”
“What was the last thing he said before he left?”
“He said, ‘Damn you woman, I’m a man with needs and…’ Oh never mind. It’s not important what he said. I want to know how much you need to be paid to find him.”
“How much is he worth to you?”
“I have, er, a thou…uh…about five hundred dollars saved up.”
“Uh-huh.” He reshuffled the deck again, peeling off the top four cards and turning them over. Four aces.
“Well, will you do it?”
“I’ll give you some damned good advice. And it won’t cost you one red cent.”
“What’s that?”
“Give it up. When a man like Alexander Munder goes on the scout, it’s because he don’t want to be found.”
“H-how did you know my husband’s name?”
“Hell, lady, everybody in Wolf Creek knows Alexander Munder. They all know he’s got a beautiful wife whose colder’n an icicle.”
“Wha-what did you call me?”
“A beautiful ic
e queen, that’s all. Deny it.” He put the aces back in the deck, reshuffled three or four times, then peeled the top four off again. And, once more, turned up four aces.
Tears flooded the lady’s eyes as she looked around, obviously embarrassed by what this crude man had said. She started to reply, but instead, dropped into one of the captain’s chairs across the table from Rattlesnake. She put her face in her hands and began to sob.
Rattlesnake said nothing. He did, however, continue to do card tricks, repeatedly flipping over aces. After several minutes, with tears still streaming down her face, she fixed a sad gaze on him. Her voice had turned from strong woman to helpless child.
“Please. I need help and don’t know who else to turn to. Won’t you help me?”
Ever the sucker for a sobbing female, Rattlesnake tossed the deck of cards down on the table, revealing that every card in the deck was an ace, and pushed his chair back, stood, and snapped his suspenders.
“Aw, hell, why not. I could use the money. Up front, of course,” he said, as though it were neither a statement nor a question. He cocked his head and raised one eyebrow. He expected a reluctance to let go of five hundred dollars without some guarantee of success. He was surprised by her response.
“Of course,” she said, pulling a small, embroidered purse from one of her pockets. She peeled off five one hundred dollar bills and handed them to him. “Do I get a receipt?”
“Me findin’ your husband will be all the receipt you’ll need. If I don’t, then you’re just out the money. Findin’ a wayward husband is always a gamble.”
“That’s not a very honorable way to do business if you want people to feel comfortable in the arrangement,” she said, having regained her composure and her stiffness.
“Reckon you’re right. But them’s the terms. Your choice.”
She looked at the floor for a moment, twisting a dainty foot left and right. Jake figured his cavalier attitude had turned her off and she would say forget it, I’ll find someone else. He was surprised by her next words and they had nothing to do with money or rewards or receipts.
