“Excellent, excellent,” said Bailey. “I can see you have a distinct flair for getting to the real meat of a story.”
* * *
The lunch-hour crowd at Bullock’s was starting to thin, but Maudie Sartain was on hand to rearrange some things and get them seated at a large round table off in one corner where they could have their conversation in relative quiet and young Stevens could set up his tripod and camera.
Before taking her leave, Maudie said to Bailey with a wink, “After you’ve listened to the yarns these characters spin for you, come around to see me and I’ll give you the real story on them.”
“The prospect of coming around to see you, lovely lady,” Bailey replied, “strikes me as such a hypnotically pleasurable one, I fear I would forget how to spell my own name, let alone write down anything you told me.”
Maudie gave a laugh. “Mister, with a line of lingo like that, you oughta be fertilizing farmland back in Iowa or Illinois somewhere instead of wasting your time with dull old journalism.”
“The way I write journalism,” Bailey said rather stiffly as if he was mildly offended, “I assure you is neither dull nor a waste of time.”
Bob groaned inwardly. Things was getting worse by the minute. All he needed was some high-minded word slinger to wildly embellish things in order to add color and excitement to the simplest story.
After they’d all made a trip to the spread of cold cuts, cheeses, bread, and various side dishes, they returned to their table, where they were served tall mugs of cold beer, and coffee for Bob and Fred, who were on duty. As they ate and drank, Bailey produced a pencil and notebook and began his questioning. Between sporadic bites off his plate and infrequent sips of his beer, Stevens set up the tripod and camera.
In contrast to what his remark to Maudie might have implied, Bailey asked probing, thoughtful questions about the raid and attempted robbery. He seemed well prepared and knowledgeable on the gang and on Arlo Sanders, as well as the history of Rattlesnake Wells. When he learned something new or got answers to his direct questions, he furiously wrote detailed notes and often read them back to make sure he’d gotten it right.
As the interview went on, Bob started to relax a little. Maybe it wasn’t going to turn out so bad after all, he tried to convince himself. If only he could avoid getting photographed . . .
It was when Fred stood and went back for seconds that everything changed. And it had nothing to do with the interview or a photograph or any of that.
As he was returning to their table with his plate full, Bob heard the outburst of loud, braying laughter coming from the bar area. Unfortunately, it was directed at Fred, who heard it, too. It was the kind of thing he had been experiencing all his life. His shoulders slumped, his chin sagged, and the sting was always the same.
Bob felt the sting too—felt it for his deputy and friend. Heat instantly crawled up his neck and over his face, his cheeks turning as fiery red as his hair.
Seeing the transformation, Bailey stopped in the middle of asking a question and blurted out a different one. “Marshal? What’s wrong?”
Sinking into his seat beside Bob, Fred softly said, “Leave it go, Marshal. They’re just a bunch of loud-mouthed jackasses. They aren’t worth the trouble.”
“What jackasses? What trouble?” Bailey demanded. “What’s going on?”
Before Bob could answer, he saw movement from within the knot of men over by the bar where the derisive laughter had come from. One of the men separated himself and started in their direction. Right behind him came two others. Bob recognized them as the three rail yard roughnecks he’d seen getting off the train earlier.
“Aw, shoot,” Fred muttered under his breath.
Chapter 25
“’Scuse me, gents. Don’t mean to interrupt, but I need just a minute of y’all’s time.”
The man who approached their table was a shade wider through the shoulders than his two comrades, neither of whom were exactly scrawny. They moved up behind the speaker, halting a distance of a yard or so. The speaker was a burly number, mid-twenties, with a lantern jaw covered by bristly black stubble, intense dark eyes, and greasy black hair spilling down behind his ears from a long-billed workman’s cap. The other two were of a similar age and dressed the same. One was clean shaven with evidence of close-cropped hair, based on what wasn’t covered by his cap. The third had a blond mustache and bushy sideburns of the same color.
“I’m sorry,” said Bailey in response to Black Whiskers. “You are meaning to interrupt or else you would have held off until you saw we were finishing up. It happens we are in the middle of an important business meeting here and therefore—”
“Well, that fits just fine then,” said Black Whiskers, cutting him off. “Because what I want to talk about is important, too.”
“You, sir, are being very rude and impertinent,” huffed Starbuck.
Black Whiskers grinned. “It probably wouldn’t surprise you to know, Gramps, that you’re a long way from bein’ the first person to ever call me rude. But as for that other word . . . impertinent? I don’t even know what that means.” He cut his gaze to Fred. “That ain’t something illegal, is it, Deputy?”
Bob was quick to answer instead. “You push it far enough, we can arrange for it to be.”
Black Whiskers put away the grin. “See, it’s the same story in every pissant little town I ever been to. They pin a tin star on some shuffle-footed sucker who’s never been of any consequence or importance in his life, and all of a sudden he thinks he is important.” He tossed a glance over his shoulder. “Ain’t that just the way, boys?”
The other two snickered obligingly.
Fred’s face flushed a bright red, making his round cheeks practically glow in sharp contrast to the purple-black circles around his eyes. He came to his feet. “On his worst day, you bigmouthed lout, Marshal Bob Hatfield is more important than you and those other two skunks combined.”
Black Whiskers’ eyebrows shot up. “Hey now, Tubby, you can talk. Next you’ll be tellin’ me that it’s true—like some of those other fellas over there at the bar are claimin.’ How you’re the fee-rocious law dog who helped the marshal of great consequence here put the run on the Sanders gang and slapped ol’ Arlo hisself behind bars. That’s what I came over here to get straight on. I’m sayin’ there ain’t no way in hell a lard bucket like you could’ve been any part of gettin’ the drop on the likes of Arlo Sanders.”
“Then you’re saying exactly wrong, bub,” Fred told him. “So, now that you got your answer, beat it. Go on your way and leave us to our business.”
Black Whiskers shook his head stubbornly. “That ain’t good enough. Not by a barrelful it ain’t. I’m callin’ you a damn liar.”
Quick as a handclap, Fred balled his meaty right fist and swung a clubbing blow to the side of Black Whiskers’ face. The taunting man was knocked backwards, staggering. Only the hands of his two pals reaching out to steady him kept him from being knocked down.
Bob sprang to his feet and swept the Colt from his holster.
Fred was quick to extend an arm, palm out. “Not this time. Put it away, Marshal. These jackasses ain’t wearing guns, so that’s how we’ll keep it.”
After lifting his own gun from its holster and tossing it on the table, Fred waded straight into the three rowdies with both fists raised and ready. Bob looked on momentarily slack jawed. He was surprised and impressed and . . . well, proud. He felt the corners of his mouth stretching into a wide grin.
Fred traded a series of punches with Black Whiskers, landing as good as he got and then some. When he sent the man staggering nearly off his feet again, one of the other two—the one with the blond mustache—blocked what would have been Fred’s follow-up punch and threw one of his own in return. Bob suddenly realized that’s what he’d been waiting for. Hell, maybe hoping for. Still grinning, he tossed his Colt on the table and lunged into the fray.
For the next several minutes, the five men surged back and fort
h, slugging and kicking, slamming the occasional head butt, overturning tables, and smashing chairs as other patrons scrambled frantically to get out of the way and give them fighting room. Eventually a semicircle formed at a safe distance and those within looked on with excited, sometimes wincing expressions as their cheers and jeers filled the room to the accompaniment of thudding blows, grunts, and curses.
From behind the bar, Mike Bullock shouted, “Stop it, you men! Stop it, I say!” all the while loudly pounding the bar top with his bung starter. When his shouts met with no result, he seemed to relax, and a thin, satisfied smile formed on his mouth as he watched Bob and Fred position themselves back-to-back, slowly circling, repeatedly beating off the three-on-two assaults.
When Maudie wailed, “Aren’t you going to do something?” Mike’s smile only widened.
“It’s already being done, gal . . . and being handled quite well, I might add.”
As the two lawmen circled, Bob lashed out with lightning-quick jabs and sharp right and left crosses. Fred threw heavy-handed roundhouses and clubbing backhands. One nostril of Fred’s already broken nose was streaming blood, and Bob had blood dribbling steadily from a split lip.
Their three opponents were suffering the worst of it. Blond Mustache, who’d lost a tooth and bitten his tongue near in two, was hacking up gobs of bloody mucus. One of Clean Shaven’s eyes was puffed nearly shut and trails of blood were streaming from both corners of his mouth. Blood was pouring out of both sides of Black Whiskers’ broken nose, and he was doubled over, hugging his left arm to his side where one of Fred’s ham-fisted punches had cracked a pair of ribs.
Finally, Blond Mustache hit the floor. He made one valiant effort to get up, then collapsed onto his stomach and just lay there, bubbling blood.
Clean Shaven was the next to go. Half blinded by his swollen left eye, he was able to neither block nor duck a slashing right cross from Bob that landed solidly, knocking him cold and dropping him flat onto his back.
That left Black Whiskers. Still doubled over in an attempt to cover and protect his busted ribs, he was breathing hard and spraying blood with each labored exhale. Focused blearily on Fred’s fists getting set to deliver more, Black Whiskers suddenly threw up one hand, palm out. “That’s enough! We’re done. You win . . . I take back the things I said.”
His own breath coming in ragged gasps, Fred said, “Maybe you’re done . . . but what if I’m not?”
Black Whiskers swung his gaze to Carson Bailey, who stood huddled at a safe distance with Starbuck and Stevens. “You heard me . . . You can see . . . for yourself... that we’re whipped . . . Damn it . . . You swore you’d stop it . . . if it started to get . . . out of hand.”
Bob, Fred, and several other faces turned to look at Bailey.
“What’s he talking about?” Bob wanted to know. “What have you got to do with starting or stopping this?”
Bailey’s mouth worked silently for a moment before he got any words out. “I . . . I assure you . . . You’ve got to understand—”
“Understand what?” Bob demanded. “You’d better start making sense, and you’d better start doing it pretty damned quick.”
“He hired us . . . to start this ruckus,” Black Whiskers said. “Back in Cheyenne . . . Said he was comin’ here to do a story . . . on you . . . and wanted to make sure . . . you was as tough as he’d been told . . . so he didn’t risk lookin’ the fool.”
“What he says is true. I heard Bailey make the deal,” Stevens suddenly spoke up in a slightly quavering voice. “The whole thing was a foolish, manipulative idea and now look!” He thrust his hands despairingly toward his camera, which had gotten knocked off its tripod during the scuffle and was broken wide open on the floor. “That’s my own personal equipment. And now it’s destroyed because Mr. Flamboyant Reporter insisted on trying to add some firsthand color to his stupid story.”
Starbuck scowled fiercely at Bailey. “Do you deny any of this, you scoundrel?” he demanded.
Bailey scowled back, getting defensive. “What if I don’t? You think I’d come all this way, risk wasting my time to do a story based merely on the embellishments you put in that telegram of yours? If all you claimed was accurate, so much the better—but I wanted to make damned sure that I’d have some firsthand excitement and color to write about, one way or the other.”
“How about if I bust your stinkin’ jaw,” said Bob, taking a step toward the reporter. “You’d still be able to write, and that would give you some real firsthand excitement to tell about.”
Bailey shrank back. “You wouldn’t dare! That would be assault. There are witnesses.”
“I’m the law in this town. I decide who’s a credible witness and who’s not,” Bob told him. “As far as assaulting you, because you hired those men I could charge you with inciting a riot—and probably a lot more, if I put my mind to it—which would give me plenty of grounds for throwing you in the clink. If you resisted arrest and got roughed up a little in the process, how could that be assault?”
“B-but I’m not . . . Y-you couldn’t . . .” Bailey stammered.
“Don’t kid yourself, Mr. Reporter,” Bob said through clenched teeth. “There’s a long list of what I could do to you as a result of your shenanigans here this afternoon. But I won’t, and it’s for two simple reasons. Number one, I’ve got way more important things on my plate, and number two, the sight of you makes me sick, and I don’t want you around to look at for any longer than I have to. Haul your bony ass back down to the depot, get on that train, and out of here as fast as you can, understand?”
Bailey licked his lips and nodded meekly.
“A couple more things,” Bob said. “You get back to Cheyenne and start feeling brave enough to write some kind of trash piece about me or this town, I’ll hear about it.” He cut a quick glance to Stevens. “Won’t I, kid?”
The photographer nodded. “You can count on it.”
“Comes to that,” Bob said, addressing Bailey again, “I’ll be the one paying you a visit, and I guarantee you won’t be happy to see me. Far as the kid’s camera goes, either you personally or your paper is gonna reimburse him for it. Ain’t that right?”
“I’ll see to it,” said Bailey with a weak nod.
“What about us, Marshal?” asked Black Whiskers as he helped Blond Mustache up to his feet. “You gonna charge us with anything?”
Bob twisted his mouth wryly. “What would it be? Acting stupid in public? Agreeing to be part of a stupid idea?”
Black Whiskers looked sullen but made no reply.
Bob looked at Fred. “What do you think?”
Fred backhanded blood from under his nose and glared at Black Whiskers. “You get paid decent for coming here to cause this trouble?”
“Seemed like it at the time.” Black Whiskers gently rubbed his ribs. “But now I ain’t so sure. Never expected to run into a punch as mule-kick hard as yours.”
The corner of Fred’s mouth twitched, almost like he wanted to smile. “You act like a jackass, I hit like a mule . . . Reckon we can call it even.”
Black Whiskers nodded, looking relieved.
“We call it even as long as you and your two compadres are also on that train leaving here in short order.” Bob added. “The ride back might give you time to renegotiate your deal with Bailey . . . if you’re so inclined.”
“It might at that,” Black Whiskers agreed.
“What about the damage to my place?” called Mike Bullock from behind the bar, his voice cutting through the ring of onlookers who’d been standing quietly once the fight ended.
Before anybody else could say anything, Abe Starbuck jerked a hand in the air. “I’ll take care of that, Michael! Since I had the poor judgment to send for this fool”—another jerk of his hand indicated Bailey—“it seems only fitting I should compensate you in some way. Plus,” he added with an uncharacteristic twinkle in his eye, “I’m doubly willing to pay for the rousing fight I just witnessed.”
Bullock iss
ued a booming laugh. “There’s a sentiment after my own heart! To which I can only add—a round of drinks on the house!”
Chapter 26
“You!” Upon answering the knock on her hotel room door, the woman in the blue dress took an abrupt step backwards, her expression alternating between surprise and concern.
The tall man, whose knock she had answered and who was subsequently causing the uncertain reaction from her, moved into the room, crowding her and forcing her to take more steps back. He heeled the door shut behind him and then smiled, his white teeth flashing under his walrus mustache. “Hello, Libby. Long time no see,” said Vernon Brock.
“A long time doesn’t necessarily make it long enough,” said the woman called Libby.
“That almost sounded unfriendly. Is that any way to be?”
“I wasn’t aware we were ever friends, so why should I be friendly?”
Brock shrugged elaborately. “The term friend can be stretched to cover a lot of things. We surely have a common interest, don’t we? Doesn’t that come close enough?”
Libby just looked at him, made no reply.
Brock’s gaze swept the room, coming to rest on the large carpetbag lying on the bed. One corner of his mouth lifted in another smile, at least a partial one. “I’d be surprised if you don’t have some spirits in there. Aren’t you going to at least offer a visitor . . . an old acquaintance, if not exactly a friend . . . a drink?”
Libby shook her head. “There’s nothing to drink in there.”
“Don’t tell me you’ve become a teetotaler?”
“I ran out on the train. The clerk is supposed to be sending something up. When you knocked, I thought that’s who it was.”
“Ah. That’s more like it.”
Libby’s eyes narrowed. “What are you doing here, Brock? And how did you know I was here? I just got in a short while ago.”
“It should be obvious that my reason for being here is the same as yours. As far as knowing of your presence, it was just my good fortune that I was in the hotel bar and happened to look into the lobby as you arrived to check in.”
Rattlesnake Wells, Wyoming Page 15