Mrs. Carbrook broke off abruptly, sensing that she had lost her listener’s attention. Turning, she saw why.
The gambling man, Duke Benedict, was coming up the walk with his hat in his hand and smiling at the delegate ladies—and horror of horrors, some of them were actually smiling back!
“Well, what’s all this?” Benedict said to Belle, coming up the steps. He flashed Mrs. Carbrook a wicked grin. “Recruiting, Belle?”
For a moment Matilda Carbrook forgot to be incensed at the fellow’s tasteless attempt at wit. For dressed up like a Broadway actor in a beautifully tailored dark blue suit and with his thick dark hair brushed high in an immaculate pompadour, Duke Benedict was the most breathtakingly handsome man Mrs. Carbrook had ever laid eyes on. So handsome in fact that he actually took her breath away for a moment, but when she recovered she was angrier than before.
“Sir,” she told him, “your wit, it would seem, is on a par with your morals.” Then she swung back to Belle. “Goodnight to you then, Miss Shilleen. I only regret that we could not reach some agreement, and I can assure you that before this night is over, you will have full cause to regret it also. Come, ladies.”
She led them for the gate at a march. They followed her looking grim, with the possible exception of the Martins. The Reverend was sneaking one last look at the girls upstairs while his pretty little wife looked glumly back over her shoulder at Benedict.
Just as they reached the gate, hooves drummed down Johnny Street and six riders slewed in at the hitch rack and jumped down. They were the boys from the Big 6 Ranch, wild young hellions full of fun and in town for the opening. Their noisy arrival spurred the C.L.O.D. ladies off at top speed, and Belle Shilleen laughed at Benedict’s elbow, watching them go.
“Well, I don’t think Mrs. Matilda Carbrook will be back in a hurry, Duke.”
Benedict nodded soberly in response to the noisy greetings of the Bar 6 Boys as they tromped inside to be welcomed with squeals of delight by the girls. “I wouldn’t be too sure about that, Belle.”
Belle looked at him sharply. “How do you mean?” Benedict was looking thoughtfully up Johnny Street the way the delegation had gone. “Just a hunch I guess. But I’ve seen women like that stir up more trouble than a fox in a chicken coop before. Sure, they might be a bunch of blue-stockings and perhaps even a bit ridiculous, but they just might be dangerous too.”
“Oh bosh!” the woman said, linking her arm through his. “If a bunch of old biddies is all I have to worry about, then I don’t have much. Come on, let’s go inside, it sounds like things are warming up.”
They turned for the door, as boot heels sounded on the walk. The couple halted in the doorway as Hank Brazos came up the path. The big drifter as usual was wearing his demoralized memory of a hat perched right on the extreme back edge of his skull. He’d just shaved and bathed and his bronzed face shone with good health, cleanliness and amiability. He still sported levis, the leather shotgun chaps and battered boots, but in concession to the occasion, he’d put on a fresh shirt. “Howdy-do, Miss Belle, Yank.”
Belle Shilleen smiled warmly but Benedict winced. “Let me guess. You’ve got a whole satchetful of those shirts?”
Detecting a hint of criticism, Brazos looked down at his brand new purple shirt. It looked great to him and he said so. And then, “What do you say, Miss Belle?”
“I think it’s a lovely shirt, Hank,” Belle assured him, taking his arm also. “I think you both look very, very handsome.”
Brazos beamed even more broadly and Duke Benedict looked heavenwards. Sometimes Benedict paused to wonder what his Boston banker father and his socialite mother would say if they could see him. Now was one of those times, as he stood here on the gallery of a brand new bordello arm-in-arm with the madam and a saddle tramp wearing a shirt that would certainly get a man arrested in any civilized town. Still, if he’d wanted the sedate dignified life, he’d have stayed in Boston and would not have come West looking for wealth and excitement, he had to remind himself, and forced a smile.
“Thank you very much, Belle, and all I can say in response is that you look uncommonly fetching yourself. Shall we go in?”
They went in. The steam piano was going full blast, beating out Blue Tailed Fly. Mexican Rita and Sweet Shirley were dancing with a couple of the cowhands and Bob French was already pouring drinks. Some half-dozen towners had already come discreetly in the back way and the big hew parlor was filled with color and music, noise and laughter. Gypsy left a cowboy at the bar immediately she sighted Brazos and came silkily across the room, rolling her hips, to lead him out onto the dance floor. Duke Benedict kissed Belle Shilleen on the cheek, Floralee squealed as a naughty cowboy slipped her blouse off one shoulder to reveal a round, creamy breast and the Blue Tailed Fly roller stopped and immediately Oh Susannah began.
The big night was under way.
They watered their mounts at the river where they’d found the outlaw’s dead horse. Mayor Humphrey Carbrook jerked his horse’s head out of the water after a minute so he wouldn’t get too much too quick. Around them the Arrowhead was a trembling sheen under the moon and the trees soared high against the sky, light-streaked where the wind turned the leaves. He turned his head back up to the bluffs at the sound of hooves. Surprising Smith rode into sight and reined in, silhouetted against the new-risen moon.
Carbrook looped his reins over his arm and trudged up the slope, the others following. Surprising Smith swung down and stretched his small body to ease the stiffness, then spoke in response to Carbrook’s questioning look.
“Yeah, the tracks lead straight into the badlands right enough.”
Carbrook sighed. He didn’t like the idea of leading a weary posse out there into that no-man’s-land of arroyos, cactus, twisted trails and little water, but he had no choice.
“Okay, boys,” he said heavily. “Let’s fill leather.”
The men moved slowly. Knees were thick now with fatigue and there was a clamminess of dank sweat in their shirts that their bodies no longer warmed. The night was chilly and slender mist tatters wove above the prairie girth-high and gathered in the hollows. The men were bushed and the night was cold and getting colder, yet to a man they mounted up without protest. The discovery of Olan Fletcher’s bullet-ridden corpse some time back had acted as a spur to flagging spirits. They were tired and cranky, but they were still ready to ride on.
All except one. “I don’t figger they’re in the badlands,” opined Surprising Smith, making no attempt to mount.
He pointed north across the river. “I’ve got a hunch they’re over there.”
“How in the world do you figure that?” Carbrook wanted to know.
“Only a fool would ride into the badlands at night with three men to two horses, and a posse on his heels,” the bounty-hunter reasoned. “And I don’t reckon Sprod’s any fool.”
“But the tracks lead in there.”
“Sure they do. But you know what I’d do if I was Sprod, Carbrook? I’d lay a false trail into the badlands, hopin’ we’d follow it, then I’d put my horses to the river and ride back up this away and take off across that there easier country north.”
“A theory,” Carbrook said shortly. “We don’t have the time or energy for theories, Mr. Smith. Come on, mount up.”
Surprising Smith shook his head. He was quite sure his theory was sound. He wanted Carbrook to lead the posse across on the north side of the Arrowhead and look for the outlaws’ sign. Carbrook refused. An argument developed and finally Smith snapped.
“All right, you go your way and I’ll go mine, Carbrook, and we’ll see who’s right.”
Carbrook protested. He didn’t fancy the idea of going on into the badlands without Smith. Then, sensing Smith was challenging his authority, he began to realize he didn’t really need Smith. Somewhere along the trail from Daybreak, the men riding with Carbrook had developed a unity and a sense of purpose he’d never have thought possible. If the bounty-hunter was so damned insistent on pulli
ng out, then Carbrook felt that his men with their newfound strength of purpose could prove more than a match for Sprod when the showdown came.
Yet even so, he made one last attempt to get Smith to change his mind by threatening that he wouldn’t get paid if he pulled out. Smith countered by declaring that if he didn’t find Sprod, he got no bounty anyway. There were several more minutes of wrangling and testiness and then, fearing that his men might run out of steam with too long a delay, Carbrook bade his rebellious gunman and sign reader goodnight, and led the posse west.
Delaying only long enough to water his horse, Surprising Smith forded the Arrowhead and cut west with his eyes on the ground.
By the time he’d gone a mile, the posse was out of sight, clattering along on Sprod’s trail. Smith was as certain as he could be that Carbrook was wrong and he was right, yet the main reason the bounty-hunter had turned stubborn was that he wanted to get back to Daybreak as quickly as possible. He knew only too well what a hot little flirt his wife was, and all day long he’d been troubled by jealous thoughts of Honey and a certain good-looking gambler. No, he didn’t feel he had time to waste poking about the badlands. The quicker he flushed Sprod the better—and such was the little man’s vanity that he was confident he could take care of the fugitives alone when he did catch up with them.
Picking up the sign where the outlaw trio had left the Arrowhead just as he’d hazarded, the bounty-hunter tracked them north for several miles to Cripple Canyon and the old tumbledown ranch house of the Star 40. Sighting the two blown horses and a dim light in the old house, Surprising Smith staked down his horse and closed in silently, gun in fist, ready to add immeasurably to his fame by capturing or killing the three members of the Sprod bunch single-handed.
Perhaps he might have done just that if Sprod hadn’t posted Frank Piano back trail to make certain that the posse followed his red herring trail. It was Piano who sighted the small solitary figure of Surprising Smith thirty minutes back, which was more than enough time for them to stake out the house and wait for him to come in.
Sprod knew his bad run of luck was continuing when, with Smith about to drop into their laps like a ripe plum, Dick Grid got anxious and shot too soon.
The shot missed and Surprising Smith jumped like a startled antelope and, finding himself in open country with not a blade of grass to hide behind, had no alternative but to dash for the nearest outbuilding, a tumbledown barn. From there, as he blasted back at the outlaws with deadly accuracy, he quickly found himself encircled and the timbers of the old barn shuddering and crumbling about him under the chop of the angry lead.
The guns yammered to and fro like the voices of savage dogs. For Surprising Smith there was no way out, but the lethal accuracy of his lead kept the outlaws from closing in.
Stalemate.
And as the battle raged, the moon climbed high in the sky, the cold wind fell and the crashing thunder of the guns carried far on the still night air, all the way to Bighorn Ranch to the north... and all the way to the moon washed badlands to the south...
Eleven – Big Friday
Hannibal Moore went along because he was the Reverend Martin’s brother-in-law and because the Reverend hinted that Hannibal might be forced to quit sponging off him in the future if he didn’t join them.
Thad Darcy joined in because he and Hannibal were drinking friends, while Tom Whitney went along just for the hell of it. Donny Dunn joined in because he hated Belle’s girls who turned down his custom regularly every week on account he stank like a polecat. Slim Carter went with Donny because he liked the idea of running with a bunch, while Joe Parker simply went in the hope of being able to steal something if violence erupted down on the corner of Johnny and Piute.
Coming along in ones and twos to the Carbrook house which had been designated as the marshalling point for the “march of protest” against Belle Shilleen’s bordello, the recruits were surprised to find another dozen men already there, smoking cigarettes and looking a mite self-conscious about the whole thing. They shouldn’t have been surprised for, to a man, those already there were husbands of the militant ladies of C.L.O.D. and the C.L.O.D. ladies were adept at nothing if it wasn’t bossing their menfolk around. Joe and Mick and Sam were there because they didn’t dare not to be. Besides, it might be fun.
By ten o’clock the crowd had grown to well over forty, roughly half men and half women. Mrs. Carbrook was elated, but insisted on waiting a further fifteen minutes in case of late comers. The delay paid off when a dozen or more town loafers saw what was going on at the Carbrooks’ and decided to join in the fun. The excitement in the air increased when Mrs. Carbrook addressed them before they set out and emotion was already high by the time she had finished. One or two good customers of Belle Shilleen’s were even heard to declare that maybe that great big red brick bordello was a bit much anyway.
The plan was to march on the bordello, show themselves and let the “enemy” realize what they were up against. It was to be hoped then that Belle would throw in the towel and vacate the premises, after which they would be set alight. Bob Dunbar of the Kansas Insurance Company had revealed that the new building and its interior had been fully insured by Belle Shilleen. Therefore nobody would be caused any great hardship by what must be done, while at the same time a great blow would be struck for decency in Daybreak.
That was the plan. But so much for the best laid plans of mice and men. Everything went all right up to the point where Belle Shilleen was supposed to quit. But Belle didn’t want to quit. Instead she got angry, pulled Matilda Carbrook’s nose, and told them all to get to hell and gone away from her place before she really lost her temper.
That was when Donny Dunn got carried away and threw a brick through a window. Big 6 cowboy Brunk Carter immediately retaliated by striding out and knocking Donny flat with as good a right cross as had been seen in Daybreak for many a day.
Up until then there had been no real harm done. The mob, swelling by the minute now as others came down to see what was going on, milled around shouting at the house, not quite sure what they should do next or what direction proceedings should take. Inside, Belle Shilleen was good and mad about her broken window but still not taking things too seriously. Some of the girls who’d come from tough backgrounds were in favor of marching out and driving the mob off with whatever was handy, but were dissuaded by Belle’s cowboy and towner clientele who still regarded the whole thing as a big joke.
Watching proceedings from the upstairs gallery in the company of Gypsy, Floralee, Mexican Rita and Benedict, Hank Brazos thought it a great joke too, and couldn’t understand why Benedict was looking so pensive as he watched the carryings-on below.
“Seems to me you might have lost a lot of ginger since Pea Ridge, Yank,” he joshed good-humouredly. “Seems to me it would have taken more than a bunch of old biddies to start you in bitin’ your nails back there.”
Benedict didn’t bother to answer, just went on smoking his fine cigar with a small frown etching his brows. He didn’t even smile when fat Mrs. Jesse Morgan stumbled over a piece of lumber left over by the builders and sat down heavily, to wild applause. Benedict didn’t like mobs. In his adventurous years in the West he’d seen too often what could happen when they got out of hand.
But if Duke Benedict was concerned, nobody else really was—until the gun went off. It was Tom Whitney’s gun and Tom, getting carried away by the excitement of the occasion, decided it was time to liven things up a little and punched a shot harmlessly at the sky.
Inside the parlor, Big 6 cowboy Lee Hunter, drunk as could be, even when he’d arrived at Belle’s, heard the shot, jumped to the wrong conclusion, and before anybody could stop him, hauled his gun and cut loose through the broken window.
Brazos and Benedict were diving for the stairs as Thad Darcy crumpled in the crowd with a bullet in the shoulder. By the time they stormed into the parlor, Hunter’s friends had already taken care of him and he was spread out on the Brussels carpet with a lump the
size of a pigeon’s egg rising on his forehead.
“What a crazy thing to do,” Brazos said angrily. “C’mon, Yank, we better go outside and quieten ’em down afore anybody else gets hurt.”
They only got as far as the door. The mob was advancing toting staves and lumber and bricks and anything they could lay hands on. In as long as it had taken Brazos and Benedict to get from the upper balcony to the front door, the thing that Benedict had feared had happened. The germ of hidden violence that nobody besides himself had really suspected was there at all, had in the matter of moments suddenly erupted into life. Suddenly this just wasn’t a great big caper any more. Guns had been fired and Thad Darcy’s blood was spilled there where they all could see it. Something unquenchable had arisen out of the earth, the boards, the very air of Daybreak itself. The beast of violence had been set loose. It showed in the eager wet-lipped face of the man who threw a brick, it was there in the flushed red faces, the women yelling at them to burn the bordello to the ground. It was there everywhere in faces grown suddenly cruel, in clutching hands and wet lips. It was the face of the mob, one of the ugliest sights on earth.
Benedict and Brazos just had time to leap back and slam the big front door before they hit it. The bordello shook with the impact. A Big 6 cowboy cleared his gun as a brick came whistling through the window and hit Baby Betty on the shin. Brazos reached the man with two strides, struck the gun aside. Wild-eyed, the cowpoke lashed out. Brazos chopped to the jaw with a punch that travelled no more than six inches and the man went down like a dead-fall log. There was a stutter of boot heels out back. The towner customers had decided it was time to quit.
“Douse the lights and take positions around the windows and doors!” Duke Benedict shouted above the tumult. “The most important thing is to keep them out! Come on, get moving!”
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