The Devil's Lair (A Lou Prophet Western #6)

by Peter Brandvold

  “Keep moving,” he told Polk and Carmody riding behind him. “I’ll catch up to you in a few minutes.”

  “Where you going?” Polk asked.

  Prophet shucked his Winchester from the boot beneath his thigh and gigged his horse toward the hillocks rising in the east. “To get supper,” he said, and spurred the buckskin into a lope.

  Ten minutes later, the posse men heard a shot. Fifteen minutes after that, hoofbeats sounded behind them. Turning in their saddles, they saw Prophet approach in the gloaming, a small muley buck flopping behind his saddle.

  He trotted past the long line of riders, dead and alive. Taking the lead again, he lead them into a cove in the hills bisected by a shallow stream and flanked with cottonwoods and willows.

  Prophet found a charred fire ring between the stream and the trees and a few prints, but he didn’t think the camp had been used in several days, and then only by passing drovers.

  It would be as good a place as any to bivouac for the night.

  It wasn’t long before the dead men were laid out on the gravel along the stream and the horses were picketed on a long line strung through the trees. The other men built a fire while Prophet skinned and quartered the deer, and then they had all four quarters roasting on spits made from green willow branches.

  As the night deepened and the men ate, there was a festive quality as the day’s events were recounted in amazed tones. They were all tired, however—”dead-dog tired,” as Carmody put it—and not long after they ate, most rolled up in their soogans near the fire and sent up deep, rumbling snores toward the stars that hung like Christmas trimmings in the tops of the cottonwoods.

  Chapter Nine

  Prophet kept watch from two a.m. to three, slept for a few hours, and rolled out of his dew-damp soogan just after the birds began chirping and the dawn made a milky smudge behind the eastern rimrocks.

  He made enough noise starting a fire and setting coffee to boil that the others gradually woke, grumbling against their tight muscles, sore bones, and sun-blistered faces and necks. They rose, stomped into their boots, rolled and tied their blankets, and leathered up their horses.

  After a quick breakfast of left-over venison and coffee, the group, including the dead Scanlon Gang—a little stiffer, more bloated and blood-crusted—was mounted and riding north through grass that dampened the horses’ hocks and glittered like diamonds as the sun rose.

  To Prophet, it was just another day in the saddle, and he wasn’t all that eager to return to town. In fact, if he’d had his own horse and his reward money, he’d have lit a shuck. The others, however, unaccustomed to having their asses chafed by saddle leather and roughing it under the stars, were eager for stiff drinks, hot baths, and soft beds.

  No one said much until the mountains and foothills receded behind them and the roofs and smoke-billowing chimney pipes of Bitter Creek rose out of the ruffling prairie grass and wind-blown sage ahead.

  “EEEEEE-howwwwwwwwwr exclaimed young Ronnie Williams, holding his “new” Spencer rifle over his head as he spurred his horse into a lunging gallop over the last rise toward town. The horses sporting the Scanlon Gang galloped along behind, the dead men’s heads and legs bobbing stiffly on both sides of their saddles.

  The others perked up then too and gigged their horses into trots or lopes. Prophet held his own buckskin to a walk, however, riding easily in the saddle, his funneled hat brim shading his face. He just couldn’t get his blood up over a town, especially a town he was long past ready to leave. A nice little box canyon somewhere in the Bitter-roots sounded better to him about now—complete with a waterfall and good grass for old Mean and Ugly, fresh antelope or prairie chicken, and a bottle of Arkansas applejack in his saddlebags.

  “Come on, Mr. Prophet,” yelled Wallace Polk over his shoulder as he rode away. “We have some celebrating to do!”

  He’d celebrate, all right—in a dark saloon corner with a bottle of rye. Then he’d head over to the telegraph office and see if his money had been wired. If so, he’d buy himself a bath, a meal, and a tall bottle of Bitter Creek’s best rye.

  He threaded his way through the shanties and log cabins along the outskirts of the village, then turned onto the main drag.

  While the posse whooped and hollered out in front of the mercantile, calling for all the saloon customers and businessmen and ladies to come out and see the cats they’d dragged in, Prophet rode over to the mercantile.

  He turned his buckskin over to the swamper. Then, his shotgun slung over his shoulder and his Winchester in his right hand, he walked back to the Mother Lode, hoping to kind of edge around the crowd and sneak through the batwings without being seen by the other posse boys.

  He wasn’t in the mood for a celebration. Killing even horned devils like the Scanlon bunch left him sour, and he was glad it did. When it didn’t, it’d be time to retire his Greener and maybe start repairing tinware or shoeing horses for a living.

  “Someone get the photographer!” someone called, while the others busied themselves with cutting the ropes holding the dead Scanlon Gang to their saddles.

  The saloon was vacant, everyone including the apron apparently having gone out to see the dead men. Prophet helped himself to a beer. He tossed his last nickel onto the mahogany and took a seat at a table near the back of the room. He leaned back in his chair, sipped his beer, and looked out the saloon’s dusty window at the crowd gathering around the posse on the mercantile’s wide loading dock.

  The town’s photographer, in his cheap suit and bowler, stepped into the street puffing a cheap cigar. He began setting up his camera, struggling to separate the wooden legs and get them seated in the wheel ruts.

  Meanwhile, Polk, Carmody, and the other posse men were laying out the dead Scanlon bunch in the street, on planks propped against the mercantile’s loading dock. The posse men were talking like Romans at a lion social, while the onlookers and listeners exclaimed and shook their heads with interest.

  Prophet sipped his beer and smiled.

  Let them have their fun. After all, the Scanlons were a sizable gang out of their hair. One big pain in the ass, gone. Maybe now the town could hire a marshal and a new deputy and get back to normal.

  Prophet ran a thumbnail through the beard stubbling his jaw, remembering his curious conversation with Whitman the day before he’d died. The lawman had alluded to dark trouble in Bitter Creek. Could he have meant the Scanlon Gang ... or something even darker?

  Prophet shook away the thought and sipped his beer. Whatever the marshal had meant, it was of no concern to Prophet. He kicked a chair out and was propping both feet on it when young Ronnie Williams, Wallace Polk, and Ralph Carmody crossed the street to the saloon. Carmody rose up on the toes of his dusty, black shoes and stuck his pie-shaped, sunburned face over the batwings, squinting into the shadows at the back of the room.

  “Ah, I thought we’d find you here, Mr. Prophet.” The banker jerked his head, a beckoning gesture. “Come on out and get your picture taken with the Scanlons!”

  “You boys go ahead.”

  “Nonsense, Mr. Prophet,” objected Polk, who pushed past Carmody and shoved through the doors. He crossed the saloon, weaving through the tables upon which a few half-empty beer and whiskey glasses sat. Ronnie and Carmody followed, all three making a beeline for Prophet’s table.

  “Boys, I don’t like gettin’ my picture taken,” Prophet objected, grimacing as the others surrounded him. “It’s kinda like the Injuns see it—I’m afraid that box’ll take my soul. And since the devil already has it...”

  “Oh, don’t be a spoilsport, Lou!” young Ronnie cried, tugging on Prophet’s right arm while Polk tugged on the left.

  “All right, all right...”

  Prophet didn’t have the energy or the heart to resist. He knew these men wanted their own pictures taken for posterity but would have felt foolish if he—the man who’d taken down most of the gang—didn’t get his taken too. Wearily and feeling embarrassed about the whole thing, t
he bounty hunter got up and allowed himself to be led across the floor, through the doors, and onto the street.

  He was jerked through the crowd and up the steps to the loading dock. The rest of the posse was already hunkered? down on their haunches, above the dead gang members propped on the boards.

  The posse men all had their pistols and rifles out, held across their knees or over their chests as they stared steely-eyed at the box camera set up in the street, though the photographer hadn’t even gone under the curtain yet.

  “Oh, for chrissakes,” Prophet muttered.

  A few seconds later, he found himself hunkered down, in the middle of the group, half the posse on one side, half on the other. Ronnie knelt beside him, holding the Sharps between his knees. Ralph Carmody crouched behind the group, his head just behind and above Prophet’s. He wasn’t holding his six-shooter, but he’d folded his coat back to display it prominently on his right hip.

  “Get your gun out, Proph,” Ronnie said.

  Prophet was staring at the camera like it was about to fire minie balls. “What?”

  “Swing your barn-blaster around to the front, so the camera sees it. You gotta look tough.”

  “That’s all right, kid,” Prophet said, smiling woodenly as he faced the box. “You look tough enough for both of us.”

  The photographer waved all the kids and dogs away from the shot, then ducked behind the camera while the crowd, standing in two wedges on either side of him, watched.

  Prophet saw an attractive young lady in a black bodice and see-through wrapper eyeing him admiringly. It made him feel self-conscious, but also heavy down in his loins. It also made him raise his chin a little higher and gather a little steel in his gaze as he stared hard at the camera.

  “All right, steady now, boys ... steady ...” the photographer admonished from under the black wool curtain. “Steady now ... steady ...” Prophet stared so hard his eyes watered. He blinked at the same time the camera popped and flashed. And then all the posse members stood, several clapping him on the back and leading him back down to the street.

  “Come on, Proph, the drinks are on us!” Carmody insisted. “A thing like this—wipin’ out the whole Scanlon Gang only a few days after blowing the Thorson-Mahoney bunch back to hell where they came from—why, that’s cause for celebration indeed. And believe you me, mister, you won’t be buyin’ one solitary drink tonight!”

  Prophet couldn’t argue with that. He was out of money, at least until he could get over to the telegraph office. He’d seen the depot master in the crowd, looking pleased as punch at the dead Scanlons, but he hadn’t found the opportunity to inquire about the reward bounty. He’d have a few drinks with the boys, then head that way…

  He and the others were stepping through the batwings when the good-looking girl Prophet had seen in the crowd stepped up to him. The crowd stopped for her, as did Prophet.

  She was a short but long-waisted blonde with blue and green feathers in her hair and with a shape that would have stopped a cavvy of galloping broncs in mid-stride. Powder-white breasts spilled out of her black bodice like twin scoops of ice cream, mercifully drawing the eye from her rather heavy-handed face paint.

  Her head barely rising to his chest, she looked up at him wistfully. “So you’re the gent that took down the Scanlons?”

  Prophet’s ears warmed. He shrugged and was glad to have Ralph Carmody answer for him. “He certainly was, Miss Janice. This is the famous bounty hunter, Lou Prophet, who’s taken down not only one but two gangs in only a few days!”

  “Proph here has saved this town from ruin!” Wallace Polk exclaimed, clapping Prophet on the shoulder.

  “Well, in that case, mister,” Janice said, canting her head and shutting one eye to stare up at the big bounty hunter wistfully, “you deserve an extra special treat on the house.” She smiled at the others. “Don’t you think, boys?”

  All agreed with hearty laughter, slapping Prophet on the back as the girl led him toward the room’s rear by his right hand. His ears and cheeks were as hot as a locomotive’s boiler, but he didn’t object. Getting his ashes hauled was going to be a hell of a lot more fun than getting his picture taken.

  She led him up the stairs at the back of the saloon’s main hall. Prophet admired the sexy hitch in her git-along, nearly salivating at the prospect of taking the girl’s round butt in both his admiring hands. When she’d opened one of the doors on the left side of the hall, she led him inside, shut the door, and turned to him, smiling alluringly.

  “You have no idea how happy I am to have the Scanlons dead,” she said, her voice growing hard and her eyes snapping a bit but the smile remaining. “As if we didn’t have enough trouble without them adding more…”

  There it was again—another allusion to trouble. It went in one of Prophet’s ears and out the other as he watched her remove the wrapper, drop it, and begin unlacing the corset.

  “Well... I was glad to oblige,” Prophet said, watching heavy-throated as the girl’s smooth, pale hands loosened the whalebone’s ties.

  The corset bobbed away as her breasts sprang free. The garment dropped and two full breasts lay before him— porcelain-white and pink-tipped. They were the most delicate of fruit, highlighted by the window behind her and slightly to the left.

  When she reached up and back to loosen the bun at the back of her head, the smooth, pale globes drew up and flattened against her chest. Her hair fell down across her shoulders, and the breasts resumed their natural shape once more, alluringly framed by the rich blond hair that owned a touch of sunset red.

  The girl’s full red lips spread with a smoky smile as she moved toward him, rose up on her tiptoes to kiss him. He fondled her breasts gently, and she leaned back with a swoon. Slowly, she began unbuckling his belt and unbuttoning his fly. When the trousers and his summer underwear fell below his knees, her eyebrows arched.

  “Oh ... my ... !”

  Prophet grinned. “You do know how to start a man’s fire.”

  “Yes,” she said breathily, gently stroking him, inching her face slowly toward the object of her attention. “Yes, I reckon I do.”

  Then she closed her mouth over him and, as he eased toward the bed, she went to work showing him—in the kind of expert fashion he’d known only in cities like Denver and St. Louis and once in the lodge of an Indian chief’s talented daughter—how pleased she was that he’d snuffed the Scanlons’ candles and sent them all to hell with coal shovels.

  Chapter Ten

  “You sure are a well-built man, Lou Prophet,” Janice cooed as she tattooed his broad chest and tight, rope-muscled belly with kisses, long after they’d gotten on a first-name basis.

  Naked, he lay back on the sheets, which he could tell by the starchy smell and crisp feel had been washed only that morning, and stared dreamily up at the lemon rectangles the west-angling sun made on the hammered-tin ceiling. Absently, he squeezed the girl’s left breast with his right hand and sighed with contentment.

  “Thank you, Janice. You ain’t built so almighty bad your ownself.” He frowned at her. “I been in the saloon a few times and didn’t see you. Where do you keep yourself anyway?”

  She planted a soft kiss on his belly button, then rose up onto her knees. She straddled him, her pale orbs, mottled now from his whiskers, swaying this way and that. In her right hand she held a water glass half-filled with whiskey she and Prophet had been sharing.

  “The gent who owns the place, Burt Carr, doesn’t think I should work the main room with the other two girls. He thinks stayin’ upstairs and only comin’ down for special occasions or to sing on Saturday nights gives me an air of mystery.”

  With that last, she sipped the whiskey and threw her head back with theatrical drama, tittering. Then she gave the glass to Prophet and massaged his equipment back to life with her own.

  “I see,” Prophet said. The girl gently engulfed him in her warm, moist center. A deep, happy fog streamed over him with the golden sunlight angling through the windo
w. “But I don’t think a girl of your, uh, talents needs any such smoke and mirrors to make her more enticing. You do just fine your ownself.”

  She tittered again. “Why, thank you, Lou. You’re gonna give me a big head!”

  “Wouldn’t be nothin’ you ain’t already done for me,” he chuckled, his chest shivering, “... four times, by my last count—”

  Before he and Janice were through, the other posse men began yelling up at him, telling him to quit lazing around all day and to get down there and help them celebrate the demise of the Scanlon Gang. Prophet and Janice ignored them, though they got louder and louder. Someone even banged the ceiling with a broomstick or something.

  “Oh, I guess we shouldn’t be rude,” Janice allowed, taking Prophet’s wide, scarred, sun-seared face in her hands and planting a brusque peck on his nose. “But God, I could stay here all week!”

  Prophet reckoned she was right, and after they’d each taken a sponge bath and helped each other dress, Prophet and Janice left the room and headed for the stairs. They strolled arm-in-arm down the staircase at the rear of the main hall and joined the crowd that had grown so large several men had to stand in the open batwings to drink their beers.

  Prophet hadn’t walked far before a beer was thrust into one hand, a whiskey shot in the other. He got separated from Janice for a while, and then she was on his knee as he sat at a table in the middle of the room, surrounded by townsmen standing or sitting, all drinking beer or whiskey or tequila and generally stomping with their tails up.

  After a few drinks, the world got hazy. It kept getting hazier until he was only vaguely aware of being helped up a staircase that kept skittering out from under him like the deck of a storm-battered ship. The world became a dark, warm arena of vague, erotic sensations punctuated with the sounds of girls cooing, sighing, and tittering.

  Then it went black altogether.