“That’s okay,” Clint said. “He’s expecting me.”
“Suit yerself.”
Clint went up the stairs to Room 5 and knocked.
A slender man with a carefully manicured mustache opened the door.
“Yes?”
“Mr. Tesla? I’m Clint Adams.”
The man stared at him for a few moments, then said, “Oh, my bodyguard, right?”
“Right.”
“Come in, come in,” Tesla said.
Clint entered. The first thing he saw was a girl sitting in a chair. She was naked to the waist, and there were some wires hooked to the nipples of her small breasts. He followed the wires to a box with some dials on it, and on top some metal rods with wires wrapped around them.
“What’s going on?” he asked.
“Oh, this?” Tesla asked. “This is Angela. She’s agreed to help me with some experiments.”
The girl stared up at Clint with a glassy smile. He saw an empty whiskey bottle on a table next to her.
“Just watch what happens when I flip this switch,” Tesla said.
“You got her drunk so she’d do this?” Clint asked.
“Well,” Tesla said, “I just needed her to loosen up a little.”
As Tesla approached the box to flip the switch, the girl giggled.
“Okay, hold it,” Clint said. He put himself between Tesla and the box. “Forget that.”
“What?”
“Part of my job, Mr. Tesla, is to keep you out of trouble.”
“I’m not getting into trouble.”
“If you hurt this girl, you will be.”
Clint removed the wires from the top of the box, then went to the girl. She had abnormally large, distended nipples, and Tesla had wrapped the thin wires around them.
“Jesus,” Clint said. “Doesn’t that hurt?”
She looked up at him and said, “It kind of tickles.”
Clint knelt in front of her and unwound the wires from her nipples.
“We goin’ to bed now?” she asked. “All of us?”
Her shirt was hung over the back of her chair, so Clint grabbed it and draped it over her.
“Sorry,” he told her, “nobody’s going to bed tonight.”
He got her to her feet and pushed her toward the door.
She wasn’t too drunk to ask, “Am I still gettin’ paid?”
“Sure you are,” Tesla said. He looked at Clint. “Pay her.”
“That’s not part of my job,” Clint told him.
Tesla grinned.
“It was worth a try.”
He paid the girl, and she left.
FOUR
“I was just doing an experiment,” Tesla said.
“On a live person?” Clint asked. “Is that wise?”
“Did you see her nipples?”
They were sitting at a table in a steakhouse that Tesla had recommended. Given the hotel Tesla had chosen to stay in, Clint wasn’t sure about his choice of restaurant, but it turned out to be excellent.
“I don’t think the President would be happy to hear you were using live prostitutes for your experiments.”
“Well,” Tesla said, cutting himself a hunk of steak, “we don’t have to tell him, do we?”
“I work for the man,” Clint said.
Tesla put the steak in his mouth and then pointed across the table with his fork.
“You’re the Gunsmith, right?”
“Right.”
“I heard you were your own man.”
“That’s true,” Clint said. “I’m also a man who’s loyal to his country, and his President.”
“Well,” Tesla said, going back to his steak, “I can see you’re going to be a lot of fun to have around.”
“Is that what this is supposed to be all about?” Clint asked. “Fun?”
“No, it’s about electricity,” Tesla said. “What do you know about it?”
“Just that Ben Franklin flew a kite.”
“Wow,” Tesla said, “I am tired of hearing about that. Do you know anything about alternating current?”
“Not a thing,” Clint said. “Do you know anything about somebody wanting to kill you?”
“Not a thing,” Tesla said. “I’ve seen no evidence of that rumor.”
“The President feels it’s more than a rumor.”
“The only person I can think of who would benefit from my death is Thomas Edison,” Tesla said, “and I cannot see Thomas going to that extent. We may not be friends, but I won’t believe that of him.”
“Then maybe it’s someone else.”
“Like who?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” Clint said. “How many other women have you tried to experiment on? Maybe somebody’s boyfriend or husband is after you?”
“I doubt it,” Tesla said. “This was a first. I’ve never attached wires to the nipples of a woman before. That’s what made it so appealing.”
“Appealing?” Clint asked. “I didn’t see anything appealing about it.”
“You’re right,” Tesla said. “She didn’t have very good breasts. But she did have marvelous nipples.”
“Eat your steak,” Clint said, “and tell me why you’re staying in that hotel.”
“I like it.”
“I’m sure the government would provide you with better lodgings,” Clint said.
“I like to make my own arrangements.”
“Money, then.”
“I have my own.”
“I see,” Clint said.
“Do you?” Tesla asked. “You see, much like yourself, I like to be my own man.”
“I can understand that,” Clint said, “but the government—”
“Has no claim on my work,” Tesla said. “They’re interested in my work, but they have no claim on it.”
“Then who does?”
“Me,” Tesla said. “Just me.”
FIVE
Tesla told Clint he was leaving Denver the next day.
“Where are we going?”
“We?”
“It’s my job to stick with you,” Clint said. “Where you go, I go.”
“Well, we’re going up higher—above Gunnison.”
“Littleton?”
“You know the area?”
“Yes.”
“Well, not as far as Littleton,” Tesla said. “There’s a house between the two towns. That’s where we’re going. Out in the middle of nowhere.”
“You bought the house?”
Tesla shook his head.
“I am renting it.”
“You got supplies?”
“I am having them delivered,” Tesla said. “Everything should either be there when we arrive, or get there soon after.”
“Supplies, food stores, water . . .”
“Everything I need,” Tesla said.
Clint wasn’t sure that meant everything that he needed, as well.
They left the restaurant and got into a cab. Clint told the driver to take them to the Denver House.
“Excuse me?” Tesla said. “Everything I own is at the Bijou.”
“And my stuff is at the Denver House. We’ll pick it up and then I’ll go back to the Bijou with you.”
“Is that necessary?”
“Like I said over dinner,” Clint reminded him, “I go where you go.”
“You’re not going to share my room.”
“Don’t worry, I’ll get my own.”
“What if there are no more rooms?”
“Don’t worry,” Clint said. “I’ll get one.”
At the Denver House, Clint made sure Tesla went in with him. First, he didn’t want the man running away. Second, maybe seeing the place would convince the man to stay there.
It didn’t.
“Nice room,” Tesla said as Clint collected his belongings, “but I like mine better. More character.”
“You’re probably right.”
They went back down to the lobby, where Clint checked out.
“Leavi
ng already?” the clerk said. “Come back soon, sir.”
“Thanks.”
They went back out to their cab and took it to the Bijou.
Clint got a room right across from Tesla’s.
“Leave your door open,” Clint said, fitting the key into his lock.
“What are you afraid I’ll do?” Tesla asked.
“Get killed.”
Tesla left his door open.
Tesla appeared at Clint’s open door sometime later, holding a bottle of whiskey and two glasses.
“Drink?”
Clint looked up from the book he was reading.
“I prefer beer.”
Tesla wagged the bottle back and forth.
“If you let me drink alone, I’m liable to do something stupid.”
Clint put the Mark Twain book down and swung his feet off the bed to the floor.
“In that case, I’ll join you.”
“Excellent!”
Tesla entered, closing the door behind him. He poured two glasses full and handed one to Clint. The filled glasses represented half a dozen shots.
“Thanks.”
Tesla saw the Twain on the bed and gave Clint an interested look.
“A gunman who reads?”
“I’m not a gunman.”
“But your reputation—”
“An intelligent man like you should know better than to believe everything he reads or hears.”
Tesla stared at Clint again, then sipped his drink and said, “I’m sorry.”
“What if I believed everything I heard about you?” Clint asked. “I’d think you were some kind of mad scientist.”
“Well, in my case that wouldn’t be far from the truth,” Tesla admitted.
Clint studied the young man, who looked as if he was not yet thirty.
“All right, then,” Clint said. “I’ll admit I’m good with a gun, and I’ve used it to kill men, but only when there was no other way to resolve an issue—or if they deserved it.”
“Where are you from?” Tesla asked.
“I was born in the East, but have spent my life in the West,” was all Clint would say. “And you?”
“Serbia,” Tesla said, “but I quickly outgrew my village, Smiljan. I left, traveled, and found my way to the United States, where I could pursue my work.”
“Could there be somebody from home who means you harm?” Clint asked.
“I doubt it,” Tesla said. “I truly don’t know of anyone who’d mean me harm. I believe your President is overreacting to some rumors he may have heard.”
“Well, they have a man trying to track down the source and find out if the threat is real,” Clint said.
“Meanwhile, you will keep me safe.”
“Yes.”
“A toast, then,” Tesla said, raising his glass, “to being safe.”
Clint raised his glass and echoed the sentiment.
“To being safe.”
The two men drank, and then Tesla headed for the door.
“I’ll go back to my room and let you continue with your reading,” he said. “I have some thinking to do. I’ll see you in the morning. Early.”
“How are we traveling?”
“We are taking some supplies with us, so by wagon,” Tesla said. “It will be waiting outside for us.”
“Very good.”
“A quick breakfast,” Tesla said, “and then we shall be off.”
He said good night to Clint, and then went across the hall to his own room, closing the door behind him. Clint’s door remained open.
He noticed that Tesla had taken the whiskey bottle with him.
SIX
In the morning Clint found Nikola Tesla waiting in the seat of a buckboard, with a team of two. The bed behind him seemed loaded for bear and was covered with a tarp.
“Good morning!”
Tesla seemed wide-eyed and awake, and Clint assumed he had not finished off that entire bottle of whiskey by himself.
“Morning,” Clint said.
“Toss your belongings in the back, if you can find room,” Tesla said.
Clint lifted the tarp and stuffed his bag underneath, then joined Tesla in the seat.
“What about breakfast?” he asked. “You promised me breakfast.”
“Just down the block,” Tesla said, “Same place we had the steak last night.”
“That suits me,” Clint said.
Nikola Tesla drove the buckboard half a block, long enough for Clint to see that the man knew how to handle a team.
Sitting across a table from Tesla, having breakfast with him, Clint could see that his eyes were very clear, further indication that he had not drunk all the whiskey last night.
Or he was an extraordinary drinker.
“Don’t you usually need some kind of assistant for your experiments?” Clint asked over his plate of steak and eggs.
“No,” Tesla said, “but if I do need an assistant over the next week or so, you’ll be there.”
“As long as you don’t try to attach wires to my nipples,” Clint said, “I’ll try to help you as much as I can.”
“I think you’re safe,” Tesla said.
“Good.”
“Maybe I’ll even make a scientist out of you,” Tesla said.
“I’ll be satisfied just to be a good assistant,” Clint said.
“Actually,” Tesla said, “I suppose I would be happy if you were just a good bodyguard.”
“I guess we’ll find out.”
After breakfast they climbed aboard the wagon and headed out.
“Just to be on the safe side,” Clint said, “you did bring enough supplies for us to camp along the way, didn’t you?”
“I did,” Tesla said. “I’m not a fool, Clint. I realize this is a long trip, and we will need to set up camp as we travel.”
“Like I said,” Clint pointed out, “I was just checking. It’s going to take us the better part of two weeks to get up there, and I want to make sure we’ll be able to eat.”
“Won’t we come across other towns?” Tesla asked.
“Some settlements, maybe,” Clint said. “But we should make sure we’re outfitted to make it all the way, just in case.”
Tesla swallowed and said, “Uh, well, maybe we should make one more stop before we leave, then. Just to be on the safe side.”
“Sure thing,” Clint said, “just to be on the safe side.”
SEVEN
They stopped at a mercantile store and Clint stocked up on canned goods and coffee, as well as some beef jerky. By the time he got the supplies stowed in the back of the buckboard, he couldn’t have gotten a cigar in there.
“What is all that stuff back there?” he asked, climbing back in the seat next to Tesla.
“Those are my supplies,” Tesla said. “What I’ll need for my experiments.”
“And why are we going all the way to where we’re going to do those experiments?”
“Because I need altitude,” Tesla said, “and that’s about as high as I can figure.”
“Can’t argue with that,” Clint said. “We’re certainly going to get some altitude going up past Gunnison.”
“That’s exactly why I chose this house,” Tesla told him.
A full day’s ride outside of Denver, already at a higher altitude, they reined the team in and stopped for the night. Clint suggested an earlier stop than Tesla had planned, so they could get their fire built before nightfall.
“Don’t want to break an ankle while we’re out looking for firewood,” he said. His main concern was that Tesla was a city boy, not used to being on the trail. If anyone was gong to break an ankle, it would be him, if he didn’t wander too far away from camp and get lost first.
As it turned out, Tesla was very adept at making camp, finding firewood, building a fire, and was even good with the horses.
“My village in Serbia was in the middle of nowhere,” he told Clint as they sat around the fire. “The terrain was much like this. So I am not the—what
is the word: tenderfoot?—I am not the tenderfoot that you feared I would be.”
“My apologies for underestimating you,” Clint said. “I won’t do it again.”
It was Clint who made the coffee and the beans, handed a plate across to Tesla, and then a cup of coffee.
“Thank you.”
“When we get up to the house you rented, I can go out and hunt up some meat for us.”
“That would be good,” Tesla said. “By the time we arrive, I will probably be tired of beans.”
“I bought some bacon,” Clint said. “I can mix that in next time.”
They pulled their coats tightly around them as the temperature continued to drop. Thank God it wasn’t winter, so they wouldn’t have to deal with snow.
When they’d finished eating, Clint double-checked the horses to make sure they were secure, then returned to the fire to make another pot of coffee.
“No more for me,” Tesla said.
“I’ll be drinking it while I’m on watch,” Clint said.
“You are not going to sleep?”
“I didn’t notice anyone following us,” Clint said, “but it is my job to keep you safe, so I’ll be on watch all night.”
“But . . . when will you sleep?”
“I can doze while you drive the buckboard,” Clint said.
Normally Clint would have depended on his Darley Arabian, Eclipse, to alert him to trouble, so he could have dozed while on watch.
“I will take a second watch,” Tesla said. “It would not be fair to you for you to stay awake all night.”
“Can you shoot?”
“With a rifle, yes. Perhaps not well, but yes.”
“Well,” Clint said, “you’ll just have to sit with it across your knees. If you see anything, or hear anything, you can just wake me.”
“Fine,” Tesla said. “I can do that. I’ll also be looking at the sky.”
“Part of your experiment?” Clint asked.
“Research,” Tesla said.
“Well, I may not have to tell you this, but make sure you don’t look into the fire.”
“Night vision,” Tesla said. “Yes, I know.”
“Well,” Clint said, “apparently you know a lot more about what goes on in my life than I know about you and yours.”
“Electricity?” Tesla said. “I can teach you.”
Gunsmith 360 : The Mad Scientist of the West (9781101545997) Page 2