by Jonas Ward
“What's in there?" Sandoe asked in surprise, looking
from the sign of the barber's shop to Buchanan's face.
"The drinks are down at the Happy Times."
"Be sure you leave some,” Buchanan said, entering the shop.
Sandoe continued on south, eagerly.
"You're next, mister,” the barber said? eying the big man doubtfully.
Buchanan laughed and sat down on the stool
"You're about to earn your two bits now, brother,” he told him. "I want the full treatment."'
That consisted of a haircut, a shave, and hot bricks wrapped in tent cloth and held to the face with tongs. Then he followed the barber out through the back of the shop, where a converted horse trough was filled with boiling water and a generous helping of borax. Buchanan bent over, hands on knees, and the barber submerged his head in the mixture and held it there. That untangled the knots in his hair sufficiently to allow a wide-toothed iron comb to be pulled through it. Bay rum and a slapdash brushing completed the operation and Buchanan tipped him a dime.
At the haberdasher's next door he chose a pair of denim work pants, a shirt of softer cotton, a new hat, and other essentials. He wore the hat away from the place and carried the rest under his arm in a paper wrapper as he went in search of a bed for the night. This he found on a side street, in a place that called itself the Green Lantern and advertised room and board.
His landlady rented him a room in the rear, which included a towel, showed him where the bathtub was, and collected in advance for one night's lodging and three meals tomorrow. When she was gone, Buchanan stretched himself full length along the bed, and though a good four inches of him lapped over, a great smile of contentment spread slowly across his face.
Man, there would be some great exhibition of sleeping in here tonight. . . .
He got up again, reluctantly, and took the towel down the corridor to the bathroom. But now the door was closed and he waited. Five minutes passed and he was still waiting. He tested the door handle on the chance that the door had been blown shut. It was locked. He squatted and put his eye to the keyhole, and was frozen in that imperious position when the door was thrown open. He looked downward and saw slippered feet, slim ankles, and the hem of a flowered wrapper. He raised his eyes the length of the loose-fitting gown to a neck that extended above it and the chin, mouth, nose, and flowing red hair at a young girl. She had eyes, of course, but there was an expression in them now that made Buchanan wish the earth would open up and swallow him whole.
"I thought this was a house for men only," he said
lamely, rising slowly to a standing position. She looked very small and fragile to him now, and deadly as a coral snake.
"Up until now it was for gentlemen only," she said, and stepped around him, holding her arms close and her shoulders bunched, as though even to brush against the man meant contamination,
Buchanan watched her go down the hall, watched the dancing lights in her unpinned hair, the completely feminize rhythm of her stride. She suddenly stopped and whirled on him, hands angrily on hips.
"Well?" she demanded,
"Well . . ." Buchanan answered feebly, then tried to grin his way out of it. "Well, fine," he said heartily. "Just fine."
It hadn't worked. He knew from the way she turned and resumed walking again that it had been a complete rout. The hot tub, however, cramped as it was, closed his - wounds and restored his deflated confidence. The reconstruction was completed back in his room, where he surveyed the new haircut, the new face, the new duds, and pronounced himself a crop-eared dude if ever there was one. He buckled the gunbelt at his waist, gave the holster a fashionable hike, and sallied forth to sample the perils and pleasures of the great city.
The best place was the nearest place in Buchanan's book of life, and the nearest saloon to the Green Lantern was Little Joe's. Little Joe himself served from behind the bar, and Buchanan was hardly below the neck of the bottle when he and the boss were fast friends. But though Little Joe smiled and was happy in big Buchanan's company, there was no hiding his concern about the rotten business his saloon was doing.
"Not just my place," he said. "It's everybody on South Signal Street. When I first opened up it was just plain Signal Street, fair chance for all of us. Then all of a sudden Frank Power hits it rich." Joe paused to refill both glasses. "Overnight he's a big man in the meat business. Up to then all he does is deal faro in the slot at Troy's little joint,"
"Little?"
"Oh, that big one is only a couple of years old. Power and Bernie Troy built that one together. Then they put in the deadline."
"I heard. South of Happy Times,”
"But what's north of the Happy Times?" Joe demanded. "Troy's, that's what."
"Sounds like a good deal,” Buchanan said. "If they can make it stick."
"They make it stick, all right. Marshal Grieve was a good fellow when I first came to Bella. But now what is he? Just another hired man for Power and Troy. And if Grieve needs help, they send him Kersey and Bowen, or Moose Miller. Say? you hear about the shooting in front of Bella House?"
"Yeah.”
"Wild story I got was that somebody started all even with Sam Kersey and beat him. Then a bunch of them jumped Marv Bowen. Suppose to have busted the bones in his gun wrist and broke his jaw. I don't hardly believe that could happen in Bella, Especially outfogging Sam
“Doesn’t seem possible,” Buchanan said, and drained his glass. "Well, Little Joe, old horse, I got to look up a business acquaintance of mine."
“What line you in?"
"You name it,” Buchanan said truthfully, "and I'm in it"
"A promoter, eh? Well, stay this side of the deadline unless you got a pass from Power or Troy,”
"Thanks for the warning. So long."
Little Joe watched the tall form pass through the swinging doors, then turned to an old man hunched over a mug if beer at the end of the bar.
“Now there," he said warmly, "goes a solid citizen."
The old man snorted. "There goes a dude, you mean. Could smell him comin' a mile off."
"All real gents smell of bay rum. They just don't drop in here. is all. They spend their money at Troy's."
"And welcome. Let me do my drinkin' with men."
"Men, he says! Homeless drifters, that's all I ever get. Killers, rustlers, dodgers, the lot of 'em."
"What makes you think that slicked-up dude ain't another?"
"Because I'm a judge of character," Little Joe said, "that's what! One look and I told myself. Now here's a reliable gent that's straight as a string and mild as milk. Wouldn't have surprised me none if he'd introduced himself as a circuit preacher."
The old man nodded thoughtfully. "Knew me a preacher back in Fort Sam Houston," he said quietly. "Specialized in the Ten Commandments, that one. Left town one midnight with another man's wife and the mortgage fund."
"Aah, you're just sour on human beings," Little Joe told him. "You can't see chaff from wheat no more."
"Maybe so, Little Joe. I'll take another assay of that fella someday when he ain't offendin' my nostrils." He raised the mug to his lips, soaking his mustache with the beer, and signified an end to the conversation.
Chapter Four
Somewhere between Little Joe's and the Happy Times, Buchanan acquired a walking companion. She had appeared on his arm out of the night, a bosomy, pleasantly scented young woman with frolicsome eyes and no pretenses. She told him frankly that she was going to be good company for someone tonight and Buchanan agreed that there was no reason why that someone shouldn't be he. He took her through the ladies' entrance of the Happy Times, sat her down in a booth, and made his way toward the partition that separated this room from the men's saloon up front.
The Happy Times was four times the size of Little Joe's, and in addition to the long mahogany bar, there was a small stage where an unplayed piano stood all alone, a good-sized dice table, a roulette wheel, and three round tables specially rigged for p
oker and faro. But there were no dealers, no croupiers, and no players. The equipment gathered dust, unused and forlorn-looking.
Hard times instead of Happy Times, Buchanan thought, searching the half-filled bar for Mike Sandoe. There was no Sandoe, but there was a bartender motioning to him.
"You Buchanan?"
"Yeah."
"Your friend said I couldn't miss you.”
"Where is he?"
"He might be heading for trouble. He left here saying he was looking for action—and the only action in this town is at Troy’s. I tried to tell him he wouldn't be welcome, and that Moose Miller was no man to monkey with in his condition."
"What condition?"
“He went at the bottle a little too quick.” the bartender explained. "It hit him fast."
Buchanan started for the front door, stopped, and came back. He handed the bartender a five-dollar bill.
"I’ve a lady friend in a booth out back. If she'd like a drink, serve her. If she wants to wait till I get back, that's all right, too. Either way, the five is hers." The bartender nodded and Buchanan left, crossing the deadline without giving it a thought, entering Troy's without the slightest hesitation.
He saw at a glance, was more like it. Well-dressed men stood shoulder to shoulder at the brightly polished the dice and poker tables were filled to capacity, players crowded for a chance to bet at roulette. And there was music, music from a grand piano and violins. This was more like it, but where was his trigger-happy friend? Dressed as he was, looking as hard as he did, Sandoe should be no problem to spot.
Then he saw him, standing with the biggest crowd of all at the busiest faro table. Someone vacated his seat and Mike Sandoe moved to fill it. There was a brief commotion an opening in the thick group, and though he wanted to keep his eye on Sandoe, Buchanan found all his attention captured by the redheaded girl who sat in the dealer's slot. Her hair was not hanging in waves to her shoulders, but piled high above her ears, so it could be another one. He wished that she would just get up and walk the length of the room. By her walk he would know her for an absolute certainty. But the nerve of her, the colossal gall, looking down her nose because he'd made an innocent mistake, and her dolling up to deal faro all night with fifty men looking down the front of her dress. What front there was, he added, moving to have a better view of things himself.
"Let's go, let's go! Wheel and deal, baby doll!" That was Mike Sandoe, raucous-sounding through his liquor.
She gave him a sidelong glance, her face neutral, and dealt around the table as if there had been no disturbance in the routine.
"Place your bets, gentlemen,” she said quietly.
"Yeah, get it up, boys!" Sandoe shouted too loudly. "Get it up or get out!"
Buchanan was moving through the four-deep group. He arrived beside Sandoe's chair.
"Take it easy, kid," he said easily. "Enjoy the game."
Sandoe's head jerked up sharply. He was red-eyed. "I told you not to call me kid," he snarled.
"And I'm telling you to cut out the nonsense." *
"Nobody tells me nothing!" There was the scrape of the chair, the movement of that flashing hand—then a halt to all action. Buchanan's thumb and forefinger were at the base of Sandoe's neck, pressuring, disciplining the hothead without punishing him. He had the gunfighter at the precise point where he could not move.
"Get up easy, kid," he said close to Sandoe's ear, trying to spare him humiliation. "Get a smile on your mug."
Sandoe protested, just once, and the result brought no smile. He stood up, obediently, and Buchanan was turning him around when someone made a mistake. It was someone who had bulled his way through the crowd, a behemoth of a man, taller than Buchanan by inches, heavier by a hundred pounds, a hundred and fifty. A giant.
He shoved the crowd aside and never stopped coming forward. He was grinning and his pig eyes saw nothing before him but the dirty, disheveled form of Mike Sandoe. Buchanan saw his intention, couldn't believe it would happen, and then died a little inside himself as the man's massive fist was driven sadistically into the pit of Sandoe's unprotected stomach. The tremendous force drove Sandoe into Buchanan; the immediate aftereffect jack-knifed Sandoe's body at the waist. The same hand descended on Sandoe's neck, the fist a blade now. The blow felled him as a hundredweight of sand would have done.
"You son of a bitch! You miserable son of a bitch!"
A weird silence followed in the wake of Buchanan's bitter voice, accentuating the emotion, making it seem to echo. The giant had been following Sandoe's collapse, his grin a satisfied smirk, and now he looked up. He was incredulous.
"You heard him? Moose,” someone yelled from the bar. "Give it to him. Slip him the grip!"
"A son of a bitch?" Moose Miller said broadly, playing to the crowd. "You called me a son of a bitch?"
"What'd you hit him for?" Buchanan asked raggedly. "I had him on the way out of here."
"'He just learned about the deadline. Now you're going to.” His arm suddenly lunged for Buchanan's shirt front. Buchanan backed off to avoid those fingers, but two unfriendly hands planted themselves firmly against his back and shoved him forward. Moose Miller looked as if he had anticipated the assist. He walked into the unbalanced Buchanan, enclosed him in a grotesque embrace that made the onlookers murmur expectantly, had them waiting tensely for that next instant when the man in the grip would groan his agony and go loose as a rag doll. After that the Moose's latest victim would suffer any number of punishing indignities, depending on the giant's mood and the crowd's stomach.
They waited for the inevitable, and then they waited some more. The cracking point for Buchanan came and went half a dozen times in half a dozen seconds, but still the Moose kept straining at his work, kept getting more purple-red in the face with the effort. At last Miller had to take in fresh breath, and the tempo of the brawl changed abruptly. Buchanan's heel came down against Miller's instep, Buchanan's forehead butted vigorously against Miller's Adam's apple. Miller's forearms slackened their hold against Buchanan's spine and his great moon of a face was a study in surprise as Buchanan stepped away briefly and drove first one hand, then the other deep into his tremendous belly.
Buchanan raised the attack then, got leverage on the balls of his feet, slammed his left fist against Miller's solar plexus, and hit him below the heart with a right. The man never lived who would be completely right after that pile-driving assault. It was as if an idol had fallen when the astonished patrons of Troy's saw what complete destruction had been done to their champion in such a few seconds. The temptation then was to keep this gasping, helpless hulk aloft, to take him apart from top to bottom. But Buchanan was still too angry with Moose Miller to think it out that coldly. He spun him roughly away from the unconscious form of Mike Sandoe on the floor, measured him briefly, and then dropped him with two shoulder-driven punches on each side of the jaw.
That was not the end of it. Buchanan bent down to raise Sandoe and a freely swung bung starter caught him at the base of his skull. He'd been hit by an expert, a man who'd spent some years around seaports, and he toppled forward unconscious. A second man who worked in Troy's got busy then, and a third, and their clubs beat a vicious and unnecessary tattoo about his head and shoulders.
It might have gone on all night if the redheaded faro dealer hadn't kicked and clawed and made such an unladylike fuss about it that they finally stopped.
Earlier that same night, when Frank Power was visiting Room 46 of Bella House and Buchanan was handing in his resignation to Bill Durfee, the man named Bernie Troy was fingering the dark new growth of beard along his chin-line and frowning. The working partner of Troy's liked to appear in public smooth-shaven, liked to have the white silk shirt feel fresh on his back, the black suit crisply tailored. Nor was he happy about his virtual confinement to this private room where the big game had been in progress since the night before.
The visiting fireman was a crusty bourbon drinker from Chicago, a meat buyer Frank Power had brought in l
ast night. It had begun as a friendly little game, ten dollars per chip, two raises per hand, but along about dawn Mr. Wilson demanded table stakes in an effort to recoup his losses.
''Let's smoke the damn drummers out," he'd said insultingly, and from then on the poker had been in grim earnest. Power checked out soon after, pleading the pressure of business, then Troy had cashed in his modest winnings. The others hung on, lured by the knowledge that the house had given this Wilson unlimited credit, but it seemed to Bernie Troy that hardly had he put his head to the pillow than he was being awakened by a houseman with the information that Boyd Weston was in the game.
He got out of bed, dressed again, and went back to the place, wondering what in hell brought Weston to start gambling at nine o'clock in the morning. He had expected the man to join the game the night before, had seen him having supper at Bella House with Power and the meat buyer. But Weston had separated from them then, come over to the bar for his customary brandies, then ridden out in the direction of his little ranch.
How come? Bernie Troy didn't know. He didn't know a lot of things about Boyd Weston, and he especially didn't know what the relationship was between Weston and Frank Power. His partner's seduction of Mrs. Weston was something he followed with great interest, enjoying their "chance" meetings, the studied politeness in public, but he suspected that Power had more use for the woman's husband than merely getting him out from underfoot. Frank was too direct for that.
So Troy had to know what Weston did for Power. Bernie could not hope to compete on a basis of physical strength, or even the force of his own character. A slim, small-boned, sardonic-eyed man of forty, he had gradually drifted westward from New York State, with extended stopovers in St. Louis, New Orleans, Chicago, and Dodge City, and not only survived, but prospered on wits and guile alone. From childhood Troy had been possessed with curiosity, insatiable curiosity about everything and everyone. He fed it, during every minute of every waking hour, and the compulsion to know gave him information that was a very potent weapon against any adversary.
