Spellbound

by Sharon Ihle

  “That ought to hold you until you get to a doctor,” Gant said. “Where are the boys, and what happened?”

  “Not that you give a damn anymore,” the old man said as he pulled out his gun and reloaded the chambers. “But we had a little trouble at one of the saloons over a little hand of poker.”

  “What happened?” Gant asked, although he had a pretty good guess. “Did you come across a crooked game, or did you turn it into one?”

  The old man laughed as he spun the cylinder on his pistol and then holstered the weapon.

  “It was on the up and up as far as I could tell, but there musta been six, maybe seven thousand bucks in the pot.” His father glanced up at Gant and stared him straight in the eye. “So naturally, we took it.”

  “I figured it might be something like that,” Gant said, wondering if J.R. had been dragged into the robbery. “Where are the boys? Did you get them all killed this time?”

  “All, son?” The old man narrowed his gaze, blazing a path across Gant’s face. “By that you wouldn’t happen to be including J.R., would you? Remember him, the kid you haven’t seen in a while?”

  Gant sighed. There wasn’t a hell of a lot he could say about that, so he kept his thoughts to himself.

  “Yeah,” the old man said. If you’re wondering, I saw J.R. all right. I don’t know where he got that yeller hair or how he got so fat so fast, but I knew it was him the minute the shooting started.”

  The old man paused to laugh. “Know how I knew it was him? J.R. rolled over into a dead faint the second things got messy.”

  “Where is he now?” Gant said, more worried than ever.

  “Don’t interrupt me, pup,” the old man said, taking a furtive glance around the area. His sense of security in place for another few moments, he went on in a slow drawl. “That damned Luther shot his mouth off about us being the Gantry Gang as he was getting ready to leave. That’s about the time all hell broke loose.”

  “Was J.R. in on it?”

  “I’m getting to that—give me a minute.” Rubbing his shoulder, the old man went on. “Luther grabbed the money and run out of there like his ass was on fire. The dealer might a winged him, but I couldn’t tell for sure. He’s probably up the road by now at our meeting spot. That’s where I’m heading. Why don’t you come along with me?”

  Feeling his gut churn, Gant said, “No thanks.”

  “Come on. Join up with us again, boy. We could really use you. I don’t know if y’all noticed it, but Lou, well he ain’t half the man you are. He ain’t even half the man J.R. is. What do you say? Join up with us again.”

  Gant ignored the request. “The others. Where are they?”

  “Damned if I know. I was in a kind of hurry when I lit out of the saloon.”

  “Which saloon, then?” Gant persisted. “I’d like to know what happened to my brothers.”

  “I expect you might try checking the jail.” The old man shrugged, looking as if he didn’t give a damn. “I’d go myself, but I don’t think it would be too good for my health.”

  Resisting the urge to throttle his father, Gant asked, “Who got arrested?”

  “I ain’t real sure, but maybe you can find out and then get the boys sprung. Tell them to head for the meeting spot and think about coming along with them yourself.”

  Gant barely heard his father’s instructions. All he could do was picture J.R. and Lou, possibly Junior, behind bars. Their faces, he knew from experience, would be shadowed with lines, etched in misery. Most heartbreaking of all was thoughts of J.R. and all he’d accomplished of late, lost now, probably forever.

  “Well, what do you say?” the old man went on. “Luther and I will wait for two days. No more.”

  “I wouldn’t waste the two days if I were you,” Gant said, eager to send the old man on his way. “You’d best get going now before you wind up in jail with them.”

  When his father didn’t move, Gant didn’t waste another minute worrying about what he intended to do next. He took off toward the town without so much as a backwards glance, offering the old man his back for what he hoped was the last time.

  When he reached the sheriff’s office, Gant paused a moment to calm himself, making sure that he could approach the situation with level-heading thinking and a healthy dose of caution. Then, full of purpose, he opened the door and walked inside.

  A lone deputy, his legs propped up on his desk, sat snugged up to the far corner of the room. A shotgun and rifle, both fully loaded Gant assumed, were propped up beside the lawman within an inch of his reach. The deputy’s gaze lingered over Gant’s features, no doubt comparing him to the handbills in his mind. Apparently satisfied that Gant was a reasonably law abiding citizen, the lawman glanced back down to his finger and resumed using a small knife to work a sliver out of his flesh.

  “Evening,” Gant said with as much calm as he could muster. “I’m with the floating circus. I heard you might have a couple of my performers sleeping it off in one of your cells. Mind if I have a look?”

  His attention still riveted to his finger, the deputy gave off a small shrug. “Don’t guess it’d matter. We’re kinda full up tonight. Wouldn’t mind losing a few of them assholes.”

  As Gant approached the desk, the deputy set his knife down and brought his injured finger to his mouth. Sucking on that digit as he spoke, he said, “Put your weapons right here on the desk. Guns, knives, keys, everything you got. Empty your pockets.”

  As Gant relieved himself of his only weapon, the gun, the deputy’s boots crashed to the floor. Then, in one quick movement, he reached for his shotgun and stretched it across his lap.

  After cocking the hammers of both barrels, he pointed the weapon at Gant and said, “Go ahead and empty them pockets. Don’t mind this little beauty. Can’t be too careful tonight.”

  “Oh?” Gant said as he dumped a few coins on the desk. “Is something out of the ordinary going on?”

  The deputy hooted a laugh. “Ain’t you heard? The Gantry Gang is in these parts.”

  Gant hoped that the man hadn’t seen the sudden twitch in his jaw or the slight trembling in his hands as he stuffed his empty pockets back inside his Levis.

  Swallowing hard, struggling to make sure that his voice conveyed casualness, Gant said, “Gantry’s, huh? I thought that bunch ran down in Texas.”

  “I guess maybe they run out of Texas then, cause they’re definitely here.” He reached into a drawer and took out a steel ring filled with keys. “I got two of them Gantry’s locked up down in the last cell. Stay clear of them mean sons a bitches while you’re in there. The bastards gunned down my favorite poker dealer, and then knocked Miss Marabell Goodnight on her ass before they grabbed the money and run. Wasn’t no call for them to go treating a lady that way.”

  Memories of running with the gang flooded Gant, stalling him for a moment. Then he realized that the deputy had mentioned he held two Gantry brothers, not three. Again feigning nonchalance, he said, “You rounded up the whole gang, did you?”

  “Not quite.” The deputy pushed out of his chair, circled the desk and headed for the padlocked door leading to the cells as he added, “Couple of them bastards got away and another one tried.”

  “Tried? What does that mean?”

  Turning back to Gant, the deputy offered a broken-toothed grin. “He’s cooling off over at Lester’s funeral parlor, where his brothers is gonna be come Saturday morning.”

  How he kept a sudden groan inside, Gant never knew, but somehow he managed. All he could think was that one of his brothers had been killed—who? Junior or Lou? Not J.R. It simply couldn’t be J.R.

  Afraid to hear the answer, he asked, “What’s going on Saturday?”

  “That’s hanging day in these parts. Stop by at noon. Unlike your circus, this show is free.” The deputy laughed, and then glanced through the peephole looking into the cells before turning the key in the lock and opening the door.

  As he turned back to Gant he said, “You got about ten minutes
in there. Give a holler if you want out before then.”

  “Thanks,” he said, dreading his next move.

  Walking inside the cold dark cellblock of his own free will was about the hardest thing Gant had ever asked of himself. He actually had to force his legs to accomplish the task, one wooden step at a time. When the heavy oak door slammed shut behind him, its echo bouncing off of every brick in the room, he had to waste an entire minute of precious time trying to calm his suddenly jittery body.

  Then, with just a quick glance to make sure the deputy was not observing him, Gant strode past the first two cells and made straight for the last. The air was fetid, pungent with the biting stench of stale urine and vomit, alive with the grunts and snores of its unwilling inhabitants—odors and sounds he’d sworn the day he’d walked out of prison that he’d never endure again. So much for promises made even to himself.

  A drunk called out to Gant as he walked, begging for a drink of water, and then another inmate fell to his knees, fountaining bile and whisky. A few of those foul splatters reached Gant’s boots, but intent on finding which of his brothers had survived, he took little notice. By the time he reached the last cell, Gant had managed to shut out the sights and sounds, even most of the putrid odors. All that mattered now and for the first time in his life, was salvaging what little good that might come from his family of thieves.

  Gant gave his eyes time enough to adjust to the darkness, and then picked out a lone figure sitting on a narrow bunk with his head in his hands. It was Lou, Gant realized, relieved on the one score. Searching the rest of the cell, he spotted another figure huddled on the stone floor in a corner near the small chamber pot. Gant’s breath caught and then eased out in a sigh of relief. Still wearing his disguise, J.R. was curled up in a ball.

  Giving thanks for the two live brothers, knowing he would have to deal with the death of the third some other time, he whispered, “J.R. Get up.”

  Startled to hear his name, he jerked his head upright, and then stared into the darkness where Lou sat. “Huh?”

  “Over here, kid,” Gant whispered again, this time adding a warning. “Keep your mouth shut for the time being, and just get over here.”

  J.R. whipped his head toward the cell door, and then jumped to his feet. Shuffling up close enough to the bars to recognize his visitor, he hung his head snake-belly low.

  “Guess you were right,” J.R. muttered. “I shoulda stayed on the ship and let a real man come after Lou.”

  Gant forced a harsh tone. “Stop that nonsense. Just tell me what happened.”

  Tugging at the corners of his mustache, J.R. tried to jerk the thick strip of hair off of his upper lip.

  “No, don’t do that,” Gant warned. “If we can get you out of here alive, it’d be best if no one knows what the real Gantini looks like.”

  “Getting out alive is gonna be a real trick.” J.R. let his hands fall to his sides, and then dropped his voice as low as his spirits. “They mean to hang us day after tomorrow.”

  “So I heard. What happened at the saloon?”

  J.R. wedged his finger between his head and the wig and scratched at his scalp. “I was pretending to be a stranger while I talked to Lou over at the bar. One minute we was going on about him getting some schooling and the next thing I knew, all hell broke loose at the poker table.”

  J.R. interrupted himself to glance over his shoulder where Lou still sat folded in half, a trembling lump of misery. Turning back to Gant, he spoke in the smallest of whispers. “When the dealer shot Pa, Lou got all crazy and jumped right into the middle of the fight. Next thing I knowed, Luther had shot the dealer dead, and then Pa knocked a little saloon gal on her ass. Then he run out the door, guns a blazing.”

  He paused to draw a breath. “It seems Luther gut-shot that dealer. I kinda fell down when I seen all that blood, but I think I remember Junior got shot, too.”

  Gant whispered so only J.R. could hear. “He’s dead.”

  “Oh, shit,” J.R. cried, wringing his hands. “Shit, Gant, what are we gonna do? Me and Lou didn’t shoot nobody. I tried to tell the sheriff that we was just trying to break everything up, but all that mattered was they had a couple of Gantry’s and they didn’t care about nothing else. They’re a hanging us and that’s that.”

  “No,” Gant assured him. “I won’t let that happen.”

  “I don’t see how you can stop it. We’re goners.”

  “Not yet, you’re not. Give me a minute.”

  Gant glanced down the end of the hallway, and then up to the ceilings and air vents. The jail appeared to be impenetrable. The only way out was the main door that led to the sheriff’s office, and it was locked. If Gant had any chance of making an escape path for his brothers, it would have to be through that door at gunpoint. Not exactly what he had in mind for his new clean life.

  J.R. followed his gaze and assumed the worst. “There ain’t no way out of here. It’s like I said, we’re goners.”

  “Stop saying that,” Gant said. “There’s a way out of here. I just haven’t figured out what it is yet.”

  From the bunk, Lou began to cry. Apparently he’d been listening in to the conversation.

  Gant said to J.R., “Keep Lou calm. I’m going to need both of you thinking straight when I come back.”

  “Come back? What for?”

  “To get you out of here.”

  “You can’t do that,” J.R. said, forgetting to whisper. “If you do, you’ll be on the run again, right back where you started.”

  Although suddenly his future did indeed look very bleak, Gant said, “If I don’t come back for you two, my life on the outside won’t be worth a damn. I couldn’t face myself if I just let you boys die.”

  J.R. bit down on his lip, catching a coarse mustache hair between his teeth. All he wanted to do right then was cry—Lou’s job—but at any rate, he wanted to cry like the little snot-nosed baby his father always said he was. Instead of suffering the indignity in front of Gant, J.R. grabbed an iron bar with each hand and then jerked himself forward, slamming his forehead against the cell.

  “What are you doing?” Gant said, astonished. “Are you trying to bash your brains out?”

  “Sorta.” Staggering with pain, J.R. stumbled backwards, and then made his way back to the bars. Still wincing, he said, “I was just saving you the trouble in case you do get us out of here. You’re gonna want to beat the shit out of me in the worst way when you figure out what I’ve gone and done to your new life.”

  Gant studied J.R., gripped by the insane urge to hug him and beat the tar out of him all at the same time. Then, too soon, the deputy’s voice rang out from the other end of the cellblock.

  “Hey, you down there. Time’s up.”

  Taking another precious second, Gant gave J.R. some final instructions. “Tomorrow night. After it’s dark. Be ready, both of you.”

  Then he quickly made his way back up the aisle where the deputy stood waiting for him, shotgun in hand.

  “You talking to them Gantry boys down there?”

  Gant curled his lip into a sneer. “The son of a bitch called me over, said he had something for me.”

  “Yeah? And what might that be?”

  “He spit in my face, the dirty bastard. I punched him one through the bars. Hope you don’t mind.”

  The deputy howled with laughter as he locked the heavy door behind Gant. “Hell, no, I don’t mind. I figure if a fellah’s fool enough to put any part of his body into a cell with one of those animals, that fellah’s definitely entitled to the rewards. Find your men?”

  Making a careful study of the room, Gant shook his head and gathered his belongings off of the desk. “No, I guess they’re still kicking up their heels at one of the saloons I missed along the way.”

  As the deputy settled back in his chair, he rippled his slender eyebrows and suggested, “Might want to have a look for them over at Lucy’s whorehouse up the side of the hill.”

  Gant raised a single eyebrow in mock fas
cination. “I might have to take a look around for myself. Maybe I just won’t care if I never find my men.”

  Laughing along with the deputy’s ribald laughter, Gant slowly made his way through the doorway and then broke for the steamboat as soon as he was out of sight of the jail. Once he was back onboard and had checked in with the night guard, he made his way to Rayna’s cabin.

  Gant stood outside her door for a long moment weighing responsibility against desire, her happiness against his own. He’d known from the beginning that they’d each go their separate ways some day, but never had Gant imagined that the day would come so soon, or that it would hurt so badly. He supposed a gentleman, someone better versed in affairs of the heart at least, would quietly go on his way leaving behind a simple note of farewell. Selfish or not Gant knew that he couldn’t face the rest of his life without holding her in his arms again, without saying goodbye to her heart, if not to her mind. Swallowing his regrets, he quietly slipped into her room.