by J. T. Edson
‘Do either of you realize how long it will take us to reach the junction in Canada?’ Sangster asked, but he was looking relieved.
‘Quite a while, I would say,’ Freddie answered. ‘But Dusty won’t need to go that far. Once he’s got things going, you should be able to find somebody capable of replacing him and he can head back to Texas.’
‘That’s the way I see it,’ the small Texan declared and held forward his right hand. ‘How’s about it, amigo. Do we have us a deal?’
‘I’d be a damned fool to refuse,’ the New Englander stated and took the offered hand, feeling the strength of its grip even though this was not put on with the intention of impressing him. ‘And I’ll be forever in your debt for what you’re doing.’
‘Forget that,’ Dusty requested. ‘I’m deeper in yours and this’ll give me a chance to pay you back.’
Seven – It’s Dancing I’m Feeling Like, Not Leaving!
With the decision on how best to help Raymond Sangster made and accepted, leaving Freddie Fog to run her business, Dusty accompanied him to Phineas O’Toole’s Driven Spike Saloon. When the New Englander had asked him whether they would be taking the rest of the floating outfit with them, the small Texan, knowing his acceptance as gang boss would depend upon letting it be seen he was not dependent upon anybody else for backing, had replied he did not consider there was any need to make them leave whatever diversions were occupying their attention.
Although most similar places had been quiet, the sounds of a band playing a lively jig, laughter and shouted scraps of conversation which reached the ears of the two young men as they were approaching indicated the Driven Spike Saloon was doing good business despite the sun not yet having gone down. Because of his service as town marshal, Dusty knew more about it than his companion. Situated in the vicinity of the Mulrooney depot, on the opposite side to the cattle holding pens, everything from its name to its appointments inside and out indicated the owner sought the trade of railroad workers rather than the other transient visitors from whom the population derived revenue. While run in a scrupulously honest fashion, it had acquired the reputation for being one of the toughest places in the town. In fact, so many brawls took place on the premises that there was some justification for the often repeated joke, ‘Did you see the new sawdust Phineas O’Toole’s put down in his place?’ which elicited the reply, ‘That isn’t sawdust. It’s last night’s furniture!’
However, the small Texan knew nobody had ever been seriously injured during the fighting while he had been in office as town marshal. Nor had any of the brawls been allowed to spread from the bar-room on to the street and endanger uninvolved passers-by. What was more, knowing to have done so would have served as an open challenge sure to be taken up by the other groups—such as cowhands, buffalo hunters, or soldiers—in town, O’Toole had refused to allow the gandy dancers to hang the brass lamp from an engine outside his front entrance to signify the place was the sole province of railroad workers.
Pausing on the sidewalk, Dusty looked through a window to ascertain what he might expect when he went inside. The first thing he noticed was the owner was nowhere to be seen. Continuing the scrutiny informed him that the suggestions of celebrating to be heard while coming up were not exaggerated. Some thirty men of European origins and wearing a variety of types of clothing, except those which were favored by and suited to the specialized needs of cowhands, were mingling with O’Toole’s girls at the tables or on the space in the center of the room left clear for dancing. All obviously had been drinking, but as far as Dusty could see, beer was the tipple instead of the more potent hard liquor which was available. Certainly he could only see schooners being held, even by the girls, or on the tables.
While the rest were strangers, Dusty recognized three as acquaintances from his earliest days as town marshal. Largest of them all in the room was, Shamus O’Sullivan, black haired, brawny and so obviously Irish he might have been painted emerald green. Almost matching him in height and heft, Fritz ‘Dutchy’ Voigt had close cropped blond hair, Germanic features and the carriage of the Prussian soldier he had been before coming to the United States. [21] Not much taller than Dusty, slender, with dark hair and a swarthily handsome face, Louis ‘Frenchy’ Rastignac was just as obviously Gallic by birth. Yet, despite his size—which appeared even more diminutive in his present company—Dusty knew the latter to share the unofficial leadership of the gandy dancers with the other two. He was equally aware that their reaction to his appointment as gang boss could prove crucial.
‘You see what I mean?’ Sangster inquired.
‘I sort of expected something like this,’ the small Texan replied, unbuckling his gunbelt and holding it towards his companion. ‘Here, tote this along for me.’
‘But you’ll be unarmed,’ the New Englander gasped, staring from one to the other of the bone handled Colt 1860 Army Model revolvers in the holsters.
‘Those hombres aren’t gun fighters,’ Dusty explained, without explaining he was carrying a primitive weapon which was remarkably potent at close quarters in the right back pocket of his Levi’s pants. ‘So going in on ’em packing iron isn’t the answer.’
‘Then what is?’ Sangster asked, accepting the rig with obvious reluctance.
‘I’d say that was up to them,’ the small Texan replied as the band stopped playing and the dancers began to leave the floor. ‘Come on, amigo. Let’s go get her done.’
Pushing through the batwing doors with the New Englander coming after him carrying the gunbelt, Dusty strolled slowly towards the bar. The band had not commenced its next tune and all the talking died away around the room as every eye turned in their direction. While the trio of gandy dancers he had recognized and the employees of the saloon identified him, he felt sure he was a stranger to the rest except through reports of his activities as town marshal. Because he was not wearing anything to indicate his recently concluded status as a peace officer, believing him to be no more than an ordinary cowhand, they might be puzzled about why he had come into what, by this stage of a celebration, they regarded as being the private domain of workers on the railroad. Therefore, recollecting the previous visit made by Sangster, they were more interested in him. On the other hand, Dusty felt sure the locals and the trio were puzzled by seeing him enter without wearing either his badge of office or his guns.
For his part, Sangster was comparing the response of their arrival with his previous visit. Nobody had stopped talking, or even given him more than a cursory glance, on that occasion. He had had to wait until there was a lull in the music and, mounting the small raised bandstand, obtain a partial silence before he was able to announce the work train was waiting to take the gandy dancers back to their rail-head camp. Now, all of the bar-room’s occupants had stopped whatever they were doing and were looking in the direction of the small Texan and himself with obvious interest. However, he did not believe for one moment that he personally was the subject of the attention. Nor did he need to wonder why this should be.
As the New Englander had observed—and envied—on other occasions, such was the strength of Dusty’s personality, the crowd did not see him as small or in any way insignificant. Rather his bearing and demeanor was giving the impression that he was by far the largest person present. Most of the gandy dancers were newly arrived from the East or from working further west and had spent only a short time in Mulrooney before going to the rail-head. Therefore, they probably did not know him by sight. Nevertheless, they had an inborn respect for what they saw as being size and bulk in excess of their own. Sensing something of his true potential as a man to be reckoned with, regardless of actual feet and inches, they were waiting to discover what had brought him into their midst.
However, despite the way things were going so far, one thing puzzled and worried Sangster. He had expected the big Texan to enter wearing the two Colts, which he had witnessed being drawn and used with devastating speed and accuracy, as a means of enforcing the demand for an immediate return to
the rail-head.
Having forgotten what he had been told at the Fair Lady Saloon about the objections to Dusty arriving armed and in an official capacity, the New Englander was unable to think of any logical reason for the discarding of the gunbelt before entering. On the other hand, he had to admit the omission did not appear to be making any great difference to the response elicited by his companion. Being employed for work requiring brawn rather than brains, few of the gandy dancers were men of intellect or given to deep thought. Nevertheless, none were so drunk they would not guess his own return heralded another demand for them to give up their pleasures and make for the work train. They would also guess, from the way he was bringing up the rear, he expected the big cowhand to support him on the issue. If that was the case—and he believed it was—as always happened in such situations, the majority were waiting to see the reaction from the men they regarded as their leaders. In support of the supposition, he noticed many glances were being directed at the trio of gandy dancers he knew came into that category. It was, in fact, one of them who broke the silence.
‘Howdy there, Cap’n Fog,’ O’Sullivan greeted, his manner amiable and even respectful in timbre. ‘I hear tell’s how you’ve been a mite busy of late—and not just keeping the peace among them rapscallion cowhands, blue-bellies ’n’ buffler-hunters’s try to disturb it.’
There was an exchange of muttered comment from the crowd on hearing the name spoken with a noticeable emphasis by the burly Irishman. While the newer gandy dancers had not come into contact with the marshal of Mulrooney, they had heard enough of him to be all too aware of the reputation he had acquired and they were puzzled by his arrival with the man in charge of building the railroad. They were celebrating, but not in such a rowdy or boisterous fashion as to constitute a disturbance, so wondered if he had come to claim this was the case and order them to leave town. According to rumor and occasionally personal experience, peace officers had been employed in a similar fashion elsewhere by influential railroad bosses who met with opposition to their wishes.
‘There’s some would say I’ve been just a mite busy of late, Shamus, what with one thing and another,’ the small Texan confirmed, not commenting on the omission of railroad construction workers from the list of “rapscallions”, but noticing that the leader of the five piece band had signaled for the others to refrain from playing. ‘Only I’m not hired to keep the peace in Mulrooney any longer. Marshal Kail Beauregard’s took over and I’ve turned in my badge.’
‘Then you will be taking your so lovely wife back to Texan, no, mon Capitaine,’ Rastignac suggested, looking from Dusty to the New Englander and back with an air of puzzlement. He made a very Gallic gesture of disappointment and, although most of his audience felt sure he would not usually have been deterred by such a consideration, he went on with the air of one paying a tribute which he hoped would give no offence, ‘Ah, what a pity for Mulrooney to lose her.’
‘The town won’t be losing her for a piece yet, Frenchie,’ the small Texan denied. ‘Way things are, she’ll be keeping on running the Fair Lady for a spell.’
‘Not meaning any disrespect, Captain Fog,’ Voigt injected in his Germanic accent and it was noticeable to even the most undiscerning of the other gandy dancers that he too was speaking in a more polite and respectful manner than they would have expected. ‘But I thought you was a cattleman, not a saloon-keeper.’
‘I’m neither right now, Dutchy,’ Dusty corrected, knowing the crisis point was approaching. ‘Fact being, Mr. Sangster’s hired me as gang boss for the railroad you gents should be building out to the end of track.’
‘Gang boss?’ O’Sullivan repeated, glancing in the New Englander’s direction and, taking in the sight of the gunbelt, he swung his gaze quickly to its owner’s sides. Paying no attention to the rumble of talk which once again welled up, he nodded after a moment’s thought and an exchange of looks with his companions. ‘So that's the way of it, huh?’
‘That’s the way of it,’ Dusty confirmed, deciding the Irishman and, he felt sure, the other two, had reached the correct conclusion about his presence. He was also aware that everything could depend upon their response to the issue. However, he showed nothing of his thoughts and continued in the same even tone, ‘And I want every last man of you on the work train in a quarter of an hour.’
Keeping his gaze going around the room while the conversation was taking place, without moving his head more than a fraction in either direction—a trick he had developed as a Cavalry officer in the War Between The States and put to good use while serving as a lawman since it ended—the small Texan studied the response to his announcement. Although O’Sullivan, Rastignac and Voigt did no more than nod in concurrence with what had clearly been an order from him, he felt certain the sentiment would not be mutual. Nor was he wrong.
‘Well now,’ said one of a pair of obvious brothers in the forefront of the crowd, his accent labeling him as Irish. Striding into the center of the open space with a demeanor which indicated he had drunk enough to become truculent, he went on, ‘Let it never be said’s how Bob Molloy of Castlebar ever allowed anybody to tell him where he’s got to go, or when. Hey there on the bandstand, it’s dancing I’m feeling like, not leaving. Strike up a jig and may me sister marry a Protestant if I’m not still doing it in half an hour.’
‘There’s always one,’ Voigt commented dryly, watching and listening with an air of eager anticipation.
‘That there is,’ Rastignac supplemented, showing just as little concern and interest over the way the situation was developing. ‘The only trouble with the Irish, mon ami, is that even those who can’t fight think they can.’
‘Will you be shutting up, the pair of yez?’ O’Sullivan requested, although there were few people from whom he would have accepted the second part of the Frenchman’s comment without violent physical retaliation. ‘This’s going too good.’
Looking at Dusty while the quietly spoken exchange between the trio was taking place and receiving a quick nod of concurrence, the band leader led his musicians in a tune. Grinning in satisfaction at having his wishes respected, or so he supposed, Bob Molloy began to perform a lively and, considering his drunken state, well executed jig. However, he was not allowed to make good his boast to continue for at least thirty minutes. Picking up a nearby unoccupied chair, the small Texan sent it sliding across the patch of floor worn smooth by the feet of numerous dancers. The front of its seat caught the Irishman behind the knees as he was in the middle of a complicated step. Taken unawares, he lost his balance and sat down on the chair with a bump which caused its legs to buckle a little.
‘Looks like you’re plumb tuckered out already, hombre,’ the small Texan drawled, strolling forward with seeming nonchalance.
‘Now there’s a pretty thing!’ Stewart Molloy bellowed, provoked by a desire to uphold the honor of his family and, even more, the effects of the beer he had been drinking. Exuding aggression, he lumbered unsteadily across the dance floor towards where Dusty stood facing away from him. Reaching out with his hands as he was drawing near, he continued, ‘I’ll soon be teaching you’s how you can’t treat me darlin’ brother that ways!’
Watching from where he had halted, Sangster suddenly returned to an awareness of the small Texan’s actual size. While the approaching Irishman had nowhere near the bulk of O’Sullivan, or even his older brother, he had a height advantage of some six inches and was far from punily built. In addition to being taller and heavier, it seemed he was approaching his intended victim unexpected. However, even as the New Englander opened his mouth to yell a warning and considered drawing one of the revolvers from its holster, he discovered neither was required. What was more, it quickly became obvious that being unarmed was no impediment to Dusty’s ability to protect himself.
Although the shouted threat gave added evidence that some form of hostility against him was planned, it was not entirely necessary to alert the small Texan to Stewart Molloy’s intervention. Hearing the thumpi
ng of the heavy work boots on the smooth planks, Dusty realized somebody was coming and guessed it would not be a friend. Pivoting around swiftly and assessing the situation, he concluded there was no need for him to bring the potent primitive weapon from his back pocket. Instead, he took two strides towards his would-be assailant. Bringing up both hands, keeping the fingers extended together and thumbs bent across the palm in a manner different from that used in any form of fist fighting to which the rest of the room were accustomed, he used the edges to knock the outstretched arms apart. Then he grasped and bunched up the front of Stewart’s shirt in both fists. Having done so, exerting a strength seemingly out of all keeping with his size, he began to push his captive backwards.
Startled by the way his jig had been brought to an end, Bob Molloy recovered sufficient of his wits to appreciate what was going on. Giving vent to a Gaelic profanity, he lurched erect. Seizing the back of the chair in both hands, he swung it up to be used as an extemporized club and started to go after his brother and Dusty. However, still being short of breath from his exertions and unexpected descent onto the chair, he did not speak to give warning that he was coming. Once again, Sangster was on the horns of a dilemma. While impressed by the way in which the younger brother was being handled, he thought the elder would prove too much for the small Texan to cope with at the same time. As previously, before the New Englander could think of how best to help, he discovered there was no need to do so.
Despite the absence of verbal verification, Dusty had something more than just approaching footsteps to warn him of danger. There was a gap in the crowd which allowed him to keep an eye on the mirror behind the bar. What he saw being reflected supplied the requisite information. Coming to a halt, with the high heels of his cowhand style boots spiking to offer a purchase against the planks as they would have on sun-baked ground if he was expecting to be subjected to powerful pulling when roping a recalcitrant animal on foot, he made another pivot. Still in the powerful grasp, the younger brother could not prevent himself being swung around. Nor, such was the timing of the response to his approach, could the elder stop his intentions.
