Blood Duel

by Ralph Compton

  “You confuse me, Mrs. Luce,” Ernestine said.

  “Only because you are new to this,” Adolphina told her. “You are thinking with your heart and not your head. If you were thinking with your head, you would realize your husband is not much of a catch and you would be better served if you were shed of him.”

  Ernestine gasped. “How can you say that?”

  Adolphina was only trying to spare the woman’s feelings for when Frost was taken into custody. “Be honest with yourself and with me. If your husband were a pickle, he would be at the bottom of the barrel.”

  By then Jeeter was next to the kitchen table. “Pickle this,” he said, and swung the frying pan. It connected with the side of the big woman’s head with a satisfying thunk and she folded over the table.

  “Jeeter, no!” Ernestine squealed. “What did you do that for?”

  “If people don’t want to be hit over the head with frying pans, they shouldn’t call other people pickles.”

  “Is she dead?”

  Adolphina groaned.

  “No,” Jeeter said, and hit her again. He did not use all his strength, as much as he wanted to.

  “Oh, Jeeter,” Ernestine said softly.

  “I didn’t kill the sow.” Jeeter set the pan on the counter. He clasped his wife’s hands, pulled her out of the chair, and embraced her. “I won’t let anyone, man or woman, try to break us apart.”

  “She was only trying to—” Ernestine stopped and stared at the slumped form on the table. Spittle was dribbling from a corner of her mouth. “To be honest, I don’t know why she was being so mean.”

  “From now on, no one speaks ill of you,” Jeeter said. “Not where I can hear. Not if they want to stay healthy.”

  “My protector,” Ernestine said.

  Winifred Curry was not in the best of tempers. He made money selling liquor. He did not make money selling coffee. Coffee he supplied for free, and so far the posse had downed two pots and Undersheriff Glickman had just asked him to make another.

  “It is for a good cause,” Chester said when Win swore.

  “I don’t see you making any,” Win criticized. “And what good cause would that be?”

  “We are helping the minions of law and order.”

  “We?” Win said. “When you make a batch, then you can say we. For now it is me, myself, and I, and I wish they were drinking whiskey and not Arbuckle’s.” He went through the door in the back into his living quarters.

  Chester Luce grinned and walked over to the table occupied by the undersheriff, the journalist, and the old scout. “Mind if I join you gentlemen?” he asked, pulling out an empty chair.

  “Why did your friend have that sour face when I asked him to make more coffee?” Seamus asked.

  “We woke him too early,” Chester said. “He is always a grouch when he does not get his sleep.”

  “I could use some,” Lafferty said, and yawned. “The coffee isn’t helping as much as I hoped.”

  Seamus glanced at Coombs. “How are you holding up, Jack? You sure do fidget a lot.”

  “I am wide awake.”

  “You don’t sound happy about it.”

  “I am awake and sober,” Jack Coombs said. “There is nothing to be happy about.”

  Seamus masked a smile by taking a swallow of coffee. He had observed how the tracker kept gazing at the shelves behind the bar and licking his lips. “That’s right. You are not used to being sober, are you?”

  “Don’t remind me.”

  “The sun will be up soon,” Seamus said. “Then you can start tracking. A few hours in the heat and dust and you will forget all about whether you are sober or not.”

  “I suppose,” Coombs said, with about as much enthusiasm as if he had been told he was to have a spike driven through his knee.

  “I hope we can take Frost alive,” Lafferty said. “An interview with him would be carried by every newspaper in the country.”

  Chester asked, “Is that all he is to you? A story?”

  “That is all anyone is to me,” Lafferty said. “Dead or alive he is news, but alive I can milk it more.”

  “How about you?” Chester asked Glickman. “What is he to you?”

  “A pain in the ass,” Seamus said.

  Jack Coombs was gazing at the long row of bottles again, his expression a mix of longing and pain. “It was downright dumb of him to kidnap the schoolmarm. It is the first dumb thing I ever heard tell of him doing.”

  “You don’t call killing people dumb?” Lafferty asked.

  “Not if they give cause,” Coombs said. “In the old days we did not make the fuss over it that folks make today. Sometimes it had to be done and that was all there was to it.”

  “In the old days there was no law,” Chester mentioned.

  “You say that as if it was bad,” Jack Coombs said. “But the less law there is, the more freedom you have. I miss those old days. The days when a man could do what he wanted without a tin star looking over his shoulder.”

  “You mean drink?” Seamus said. “A man has always been able to drink as much as he wants.”

  “I could use one now,” Lafferty said. “But we might have a lot of riding to do and I don’t ride well when I have had liquor.”

  “I will treat myself to a bottle when this is over,” Seamus said. “There is nothing quite like the warm feeling you get when whiskey goes down your throat.”

  “Quit talking drink,” Jack Coombs said.

  “Sometimes I will have rye or scotch, but neither holds a candle to the best whiskey,” Seamus went on. “I could sip on a bottle all day and all night and not miss eating food.” He almost laughed when the old scout trembled and wiped a sleeve across his mouth. “Yes, sir. Good whiskey is better than a good woman or just about anything else any day.”

  “Is there such a thing as a good woman?” Chester responded without thinking.

  “You should know,” Lafferty said. “You are the only one at this table who is married.”

  “There are good women, then,” Chester said. He stared at the bottles. “Hell, I could use a drink right now myself.”

  Seamus rose and went around the bar. He selected his favorite label of whiskey, forked several glasses with his fingers, and returned to the table. Setting one of the glasses in front of the mayor, he proceeded to open the bottle so he could pour.

  “What are you doing?”

  “You said you wanted a drink.”

  “I said I could use one,” Chester said. But when the glass was half-full, he raised it to his lips and gratefully sipped. “Mmmm. Nice.”

  Seamus poured one for Lafferty and one for himself and made it a point to set the bottle near Jack Coombs. He swallowed and made a show of smacking his lips. “This here is fine whiskey.”

  “I suppose one wouldn’t hurt me,” Lafferty said, and indulged. “You are right,” he told Seamus. “It goes down smooth.”

  Just then Winifred Curry hurried from the back and over to their table. “I am plumb out of coffee,” he said to Chester. “You will have to get a can from your store.”

  “Me?” Chester said.

  “Who else?” Win smiled. “It is for a good cause. You are helping the minions of law and order. Isn’t that right, Sheriff Glickman?”

  “What? Oh, sure,” Seamus said. He was only half listening. His main interest was in Jack Coombs.

  The old scout was chugging whiskey straight from the bottle.

  Chapter 28

  Chester Luce was not smiling as he started to cross the street from the saloon to his store. He could count on one hand the number of times in his life he had given something away for free. Chester would be damned if he would provide free coffee for the posse. He would get a can of Arbuckle’s, but he would present Glickman with a voucher and demand payment. If the amount on the voucher was more than the amount he paid for the can, well, that was commerce.

  The bell over the door tinkled. Chester debated on waking Adolphina and decided against it. Asleep, sh
e could not cause him trouble. With luck she would stay in bed until noon and by then the leather slapper and his lady friend would be long gone.

  Chester moved down the center aisle. He came to the shelf with the Arbuckle cans and kept walking. He would check on his uninvited guests in case they needed anything. Better to keep them happy and content until they left, he reasoned.

  The kitchen door was closed. Chester knocked and opened it. Smiling, he began, “Is every—” Then he stopped, frozen in astonishment at the sight of his wife sprawled half across the table with blood trickling from a gash in her temple. “Adolphina?”

  In a rush of insight Chester divined what had happened. His wife had woken up and come down to the kitchen. She had stumbled on the killer and the schoolmarm, and the killer had killed her.

  “Dear God!” Chester blurted. Sorrow seized him, sorrow so potent his head swam and he had to put a hand on the table to stay on his feet. “Adolphina!” he cried. He could not bear to look at her. Turning, he stumbled from the kitchen and sagged against the hall wall.

  As strange as it seemed to other people, he had cared for that woman. She had not been much to look at. She had the temperament of a bull. But she had a shrewd head on her broad shoulders and she had stuck by him through good times and rough, and he had, by God, cared for her.

  A bleat of sadness escaped him. Although he resented her bossiness, he had relied on her guidance. He could always count on her to have their mutual best interest in mind.

  Belatedly, Chester realized her killer and the schoolmarm were gone. Snuck off, no doubt, intending to slink out of town before their foul deed was discovered. Not while he drew breath! Straightening, he hastened down the hall and through the store to the front door. He started to open it, and paused. He must collect his thoughts and do it right. He would rush into the saloon. He would say he had stumbled on Jeeter Frost and the schoolmarm in his store, and seen Frost kill his wife with his own eyes. The posse would be quick to spread out and search for them.

  Chester hoped they killed Frost. Or, better yet, took him alive so he could hang. Frost would deny murdering Adolphina, but it would be Frost’s word against his. The schoolmarm might side with Frost, but Chester would say she was not in the room when Adolphina was killed, and anyway, no one would believe her once they found out she had run off with Frost and not been abducted.

  Chester opened the door and bolted out, only to stop short.

  Four riders had drawn rein near the posse’s horses and were staring at the bodies wrapped in blankets. To the east the sky was brightening, and Chester could see the four were lanky and dirty and had bulging Adam’s apples. Scruffy sorts, bristling with weapons. More riffraff passing through, he judged.

  “Hold on there, mister,” said the oldest of the four in a distinct Southern drawl. “We would like a word with you.”

  “I am in a hurry,” Chester said.

  “You can take the time to be civil,” the man said, an edge to his tone. “Who might you be?”

  Chester introduced himself, stating proudly, “I am the mayor of Coffin Varnish, and I have urgent business in the saloon.”

  “I am Abe Haslett. These are my brothers, Jefferson, Quince, and Josephus.” The three nodded in turn. “We have business, too. With you. But it can wait.”

  “Before you scoot off,” Jefferson Haslett said, “do you mind tellin’ us who these dead folks were?”

  “I was told they are the Larn brothers,” Chester replied, and was taken aback by their shock.

  “The devil you say!” Abe Haslett declared.

  “The Larns!” Jefferson exclaimed.

  “How in hell?” asked the youngest, Josephus.

  “Who could’ve done it?” wondered the last, Quince.

  Chester thought he understood. Glickman had mentioned something about the Larns being from the South. These Hasletts were from the South, probably their friends. “Did you know them?”

  Abe Haslett nodded, his gaze glued to the bodies. “I should say we did. Their families and ours go back a long ways.”

  “Whoever killed them has deprived us,” Jefferson said.

  “I am sorry to hear that,” Chester said. “Now, if you will excuse me.” He could imagine them getting worked up, and he did not want to be the brunt of their anger. Skirting their mounts, he was almost to the batwings when they opened and out stepped Lawrence Fisch, the son of the president of the First Bank of Dodge City.

  “Who are those fellows you were talking to?” Fisch asked.

  “Friends of the Larns,” Chester said. “Good friends, as upset as they got when I broke the news.”

  “You don’t say?”

  “Southerners,” Chester added, and went to go on by, but Fisch was blocking the doorway.

  “Just what we need. More Southern trash. My father does not think much of Southerners and neither do I.”

  “What’s that about the South, sonny?”

  Chester had not heard Abe Haslett dismount and come up behind him. The man moved as quietly as a cat. He did not like the glint in Haslett’s dark eyes, but young Fisch did not seem to notice.

  “My father says you are a bunch of poor losers,” the banker’s son said. “He was in the South right after the war.”

  “This pa of yours,” Abe said. “He is a Yankee, I take it?”

  “He was born and raised in Indiana,” Lawrence Fisch said. “He did not fight in the war, though. He was and has always been a businessman.”

  “I fought in the war,” Abe said. “I wore the gray with pride.”

  “Good for you,” Lawrence Fisch said.

  Abe Haslett colored. “This pa you keep mentionin’, he was in the South, you say? Right after the war? And he was in business?”

  “Your ears work at least,” Lawrence replied.

  “That would make him a carpetbagger,” Abe Haslett said. “One of those vultures who preyed on us when we were down, buyin’ land cheap and such so they could fill their pokes.”

  “Now, you hold on,” Lawrence bristled. “My father is always fair and honest in his dealings.”

  “Sure he is, boy,” Abe said with thick scorn. “He is a stinkin’ Yankee carpetbagger and you are the son of a stinkin’ Yankee carpetbagger.”

  Chester thought he should say something. “Please. Let’s not provoke one another. There is no call for this.”

  “There is plenty of call,” Abe Haslett said, and motioned at his brothers. “My kin and me hate Yankee carpetbaggers. Our family, our friends, lost land and valuables to the scum.”

  “You better not mean my father when you say that,” Lawrence Fisch said.

  “If the shoe fits, boy. He is a Yankee and he was a carpetbagger, so that makes him scum the same as the rest.”

  “The hell you say, you damn Reb,” Lawrence said angrily, and put his hands on his nickel-plated Remingtons.

  “You just made the biggest mistake of your life, pup,” Abe Haslett said, and went for his own hardware.

  Minutes earlier, in the bedroom of Chester and Adolphina Luce, Ernestine Frost pried herself from the man she had married and dreamily asked, “Did you just hear a bell?”

  “All I hear is my heart pounding in my chest,” Jeeter told her. It had been his idea to come upstairs. They could not see the street from the kitchen and he wanted to keep a close eye on things and note the posse’s comings and goings. Ernestine had refused to stay in the kitchen alone.

  “What if this poor woman wakes up? She will be mad as can be and will take it out on me.”

  “She won’t wake up for a month of Sundays,” Jeeter had responded. But he let Ernestine come. The bedroom was small but nicely furnished and smelled of pleasant odors. They had not made it to the window, though. Halfway across, Jeeter took her in his arms and kissed her as he had hankered to kiss her ever since they said their I do’s. She had the softest lips, this woman. One kiss was not enough. They had kissed and kissed and kissed some more, until Jeeter thought his chest would explode. “I didn’
t hear no bell and I am a better hearer than you.”

  “I am sure I did,” Ernestine insisted.

  “Maybe it was a wedding bell,” Jeeter joked.

  “Oh, you.” Ernestine grinned. “You are superbly wonderful, do you know that?”

  Jeeter wished he could stand there forever with his arms around her waist and that loving look in her eyes. “I have been called many things but never wonderful.”

  “Any woman would be proud to call you hers.”

  Jeeter knew better. “The only female I want is you, so it has worked out right fine.”

  Ernestine giggled, then said tenderly, “Each moment with you is a moment of discovery for me.”

  “Discovery?” Jeeter repeated.

  “I learn truths about myself I never realized,” Ernestine explained. “You bring me out of myself.”

  “Is that a good thing?”

  “It is a very good thing,” Ernestine assured him, and tilted her face to be kissed yet again.

  Jeeter would gladly have obliged her, but at the juncture hooves clomped in the street. “Hold on,” he said, and darted to the window. Cautiously parting the curtains, he peered down on four dark silhouettes and their mounts.

  “Who are they?” Ernestine whispered at his elbow.

  “Maybe more of the posse showing up late.”

  “Oh Lord. There must be a couple of dozen. We can’t let them find us, Jeeter. I will die if anything happens to you.”

  Jeeter smiled at her. “I ain’t about to be bucked out in gore now that I have you.”

  “But there are so many,” Ernestine fretted. “We should leave. Now. Before we are found out.”

  “You worry too much,” Jeeter said. “The safest place to be is right under their nose.”

  Ernestine crooked her neck around. “I just heard the bell again.”

  Jeeter heard voices. He looked outside. The mayor was talking to the four newcomers. “Did he just come out of the store?”

  “That’s what that bell was!” Ernestine exclaimed. “The one over the front door.”

  “Then he has seen his wife,” Jeeter guessed, and lowered his hand to his Colt Lightning.

  Placing her hand on his, Ernestine pleaded, “No shooting! Please! There are too many of them.”