“This isn’t a back alley, Raven. This is my room. And you agreed to join me here.”
“For a brandy.”
“Yes, for a brandy.”
He doffed his Stetson, hung it on the hat rack beside the bureau, and then walked over to where a large oak cabinet stood to the left of the door that likely opened onto the balcony. Heavy drapes a shade lighter than the purple wallpaper covered the door. He glanced at the door, then went over, drew open the drapes, and opened the metal-framed glass door about a foot.
“There’s your air.”
The noise of the street drifted up from the room, including revelrous whoops and hollers and occasional pistol fire. Somewhere nearby, a girl was laughing hysterically. There were the smacks of fisticuffs. A couple of drunks were apparently fighting over the girl, who found it humorous.
There was also the smell of the cool night air touched with pine resin and wood smoke.
Goodthunder opened a door of the heavy cabinet, pulled out a bottle and two goblets, filled the goblets, and carried both glasses over to where Raven stood in front of the bedroom door. Her heart thudded slowly, anxiously.
She’d overstepped by coming here this evening. There was always a risk, of course. But there was no going back now, unless she turned and ran.
She was not, however, a woman who made it a habit of turning and running. She’d get what she could out of this mercurial bastard, his sour mood be damned.
His mood was indeed sour. He stood before her, his eyes darkly opaque, cold, angry. All the levity of earlier in the day and evening was gone without a trace. If she didn’t know better, she’d have said his body had been overtaken by a sinister spirit.
Her mind flashed to the derringer strapped to the inside of her thigh. It gave her a modicum of comfort.
“Here,” he said, thrusting the goblet at her. “Your drink.”
“Thank you.”
“Do you really think I only asked you up here for a glass of brandy?” Goodthunder sipped the liquor. “Come, now, Raven, how long have you been working the line?”
Raven coolly sipped from her glass. “It’s good brandy. Well worth the trip. And . . . the conversation earlier was rather enjoyable. Can’t we just stick with that until . . . until we get to know each other better, Jack?”
Goodthunder laughed without mirth. “Is that what you tell all your customers?”
Raven didn’t know what to say to that.
Goodthunder took another sip of his brandy. His dark eyes were all over her now. He was thinking of only one thing. One thing only. From her past experience with men, driven by their cocks, there would be little steering him back to a more productive topic.
Now she needed to make as graceful an exit as possible. Before she could speak, however, Goodthunder said, “What do you charge?”
Holding her brandy glass up close to her chin, she blinked up at him. She considered a response, parted her lips, reconsidered, and stepped forward, placing a hand on his forearm. “Jack, I don’t consider myself to be working this evening.”
“Oh—a free one, then?” Goodthunder said through a tense, vaguely jeering grin.
Raven shook her head. “I consider this trip an exploratory one. You know, the way miners blast holes in the ground to see if there’s any gold worth mining? I’m merely here to meet people—people like you . . . and businessmen. I want to make sure that Wendigo is a good town for my kind of business venture. I want to make sure I’m not trampling on already existing—”
“Ah, hell!” Goodthunder swung around and plopped down onto a mahogany red velvet couch with high arms near a small stone fireplace to Raven’s left. “One of us hasn’t been altogether honest here, Raven.”
Raven felt her heart hiccup in her ears.
Goodthunder stared into his brandy goblet. “I told you earlier that there’s no trouble here. Or only a little trouble. Well, I lied, because you’re beautiful and intoxicating, and, well, frankly, I wanted to sleep with you the moment I saw you.”
He chuckled that dry, self-remonstrating laugh again.
“We men are peculiar that way, although I’m sure that’s no revelation to you.”
He laughed again. Raven’s interest was piqued. She walked over and sat slowly down in an armchair across from the sheriff, who sat with his drink on his lap, knees spread, staring down and looking very much like a beaten man. She found herself almost feeling sorry for him now.
Part of being a good detective was knowing when to ask questions and knowing when to keep one’s mouth shut. Raven sat in her chair, her own drink on her lap, and stared at the thinning sandy-brown hair on the top of the sheriff’s head while he himself stared down into his glass.
When he looked up, his eyes appeared tired, red at the inside corners.
“This is no place to start a business. People die here every day. Up there.” He pointed his finger at the ceiling. “In the mountains. The war between the freighting companies . . .” He shook his head. “A dozen men have been killed so far, and more will die. I’ve seen this same thing happen before in other places. The greed that drives us all wells up at this point in the boom of a mining camp. Rarely can it be controlled.
“If it’s not the miners who go to war against one another, fighting over mineral rights and claims, it’s the men who haul the ore down to the processing mills. Sometimes it’s the owners of the processing mills. Sometimes, if rails are laid to haul the ore—the terrain won’t allow rails here—it’s the owners and supervisors of the rail lines who take up picks and shovels and beat one another’s heads in. Or they hire men to do the beating and the bludgeoning—the killing—for them.”
Goodthunder sighed, sipped his brandy, and lowered his glass again to his lap. He appeared filled with remorse. “I’m getting too old for this shit. Too old for a woman like you, too, I reckon. I realize I’ve made a fool of myself this evening. Go on. Go.”
He jerked his chin at the door. “Leave here tomorrow, and don’t come back. This is no place for a new business, even a brothel. A powder keg’s about to blow Wendigo right out of these mountains. Me right along with it, and it’s my own goddamn fault!”
He threw back a large sip from his glass.
Raven wouldn’t have left now if he’d paid her to.
Leaning forward, she fashioned a sympathetic expression. Now, she thought, she could begin to probe again. Maybe a little harder than before.
“How could it possibly be your fault, Jack? I’m sure you’ve tried to keep the peace.”
Goodthunder merely sighed and shook his head.
Raven decided to throw the dice: “Jack, who was that man? The one downstairs?”
“Kane?” Goodthunder sat back on the couch, crossed his ankles. “A gunman. I hired him. Not to do any gunning, although many around town think that’s exactly what he’s been hired to do. Everybody around Wendigo’s a little edgy. Understandable, with what’s been goin’ on and with Kane’s reputation. No, he won’t do any gunning unless we’re forced, just keep an eye on the freight trails for me. He’s a good tracker, Kane. Better than my men.
“A man’s been up there with a rifle, shooting freighters. That’s why it’s gotten hard for a couple of the freight companies to keep mule skinners on their payrolls. It’s a dangerous enough job, running a ten-mule hitch down those mountains with ten tons of raw ore per load. Some of those trails are less than a foot wider than the wagons themselves, with thousand-foot drop-offs on both sides. Then, when you got a man shootin’ at you with a Sharps Big Fifty . . .”
Goodthunder grunted as he rose from the couch and walked over to the liquor cabinet.
Raven knew that a Big Fifty was a large-caliber rifle that buffalo hunters had once used. One of the most powerful rifles ever made. The heavy guns could hurl a fifty-caliber chunk of lead two thousand yards and more. If the shooter was good, with such a rifl
e, he could hit a target a thousand yards away.
“Who do you think is doing the shooting?” she asked.
Goodthunder splashed brandy into his glass. “Some regulator hired by one of the freight companies. Tryin’ to close the others down, get all the business for itself.” He was slurring his words now. “Don’t ask me which one. Could be Black Diamond, for all I know. Judith!” He chuckled, shook his head again. “Could be one of the others.”
“What are the others?”
“More?” Goodthunder asked, holding up the bottle.
She’d only drunk a few sips of her brandy. She polished off the rest and held up her glass. “Why not?”
“Good stuff, eh?” Goodthunder chuckled and shambled over to her chair. He had to close one eye to pour without spilling. Then he returned the bottle to its shelf, leaned back against the cabinet, and threw back a good half of his fresh drink.
Raven didn’t want to push too hard, but she had to ask. “Who are the other freighting companies, Jack?”
He frowned at her, narrowing one eye as though trying to keep from seeing two images of her. “Why?”
“I’m curious.”
Goodthunder studied her. She felt heat rise to her face from the scrutiny. Suddenly, she felt a little like a bug on a pin.
“Who are you?” he asked slowly, tipping his head to one side. He pointed his drink at her. “You ain’t no whore. You’re too damn purty to be a whore. Nah, you ain’t a whore. Shoulda known you wasn’t, but”—he chuckled, his gaze dropping again to the plunging neckline of her dress—“I reckon I was too distracted to do much thinkin’ at all.”
He paused. “Who are you? And why’d you want me to let that big ranny out of my jail? Who’re you . . . and who’s he?”
Raven rose from her chair. She smiled in an attempt to temper his suspicion and also to calm her jangled nerves. She strode slowly toward him, her smile in place. “Jack, I am just who I told you I am. I’m curious about Wendigo because I plan to bring a business here.”
She stopped before him. He looked down at her, his eyes not seeming to focus.
“Tol’ . . . I . . . I tol’ you not to.”
“Do you mind if I let the final decision be up to me?”
He scowled down at her and then curled his nose, looked at her tits again, and said morosely, “Fuck me, God damn it, Raven.” He set his drink on the liquor cabinet and unbuckled his cartridge belt.
She watched, aghast, as he quickly, desperately unbuttoned his pants. He shoved his trousers down to his knees and pulled his cock out of the fly in his longhandles. His swollen red cock jutted up from between his dangling shirttails.
“Jack, for Christ’s sake!”
He lurched toward her, grabbed her arms, drew her to him, and shoved her down to her knees. His cock brushed her right cheek. “Suck me, God damn it, you lyin’ little bitch. Suck my cock, and make it good!”
Rage burned through Raven like a wildfire. She wasn’t accustomed to being pushed around, much less ordered to suck a man’s cock against her will.
The fool had dropped his cartridge belt right in front of her. She reached for the pearl-gripped Remington jutting from the holster, but she hadn’t gotten the keeper thong unsnapped from over the hammer before he kicked the gun aside.
Doing so, he got his legs entangled in his pants, and he gave a curse as he fell forward, slamming his right knee into Raven’s left cheek. Pain shot through her. He’d caught her leaning forward, and now her head slammed back against the floor.
“Oh,” she groaned, stretching her lips back from her teeth and digging her hands into the rug beneath her, trying with every shred of her will to remain conscious.
Fireworks flared and whistled behind her eyes. Her ears rang. The room pitched wildly around her.
She tried to get a fix on Goodthunder, but she lost him during the wild though brief ride her battered head took her on. Then she realized she must have lost consciousness for a time, because suddenly, the man was sprawled on top of her.
He was naked and grunting.
He had worked her dress down to her waist, and he was licking and pawing her exposed breasts. His swollen cock jutted between her thighs as he tried to shove it into her.
Raven pushed his head away and snarled, “Get away from me, you pathetic son of a bitch!”
Goodthunder lifted his head. He looked like some wild creature, his thin hair mussed, his eyes bleary. The stench of alcohol and sweat wafted off of him. He cursed and climbed heavily to his feet.
From somewhere, he’d grabbed his revolver. He clicked the hammer back and aimed it at her.
“Get up, you lyin’ bitch. You may not be a whore, but I’m gonna make you one. My whore!”
Raven thought of the derringer residing in the holster strapped to her thigh. She looked at the maw of Goodthunder’s pistol yawning down at her. She’d never make it to the little .36 before he drilled a .44 pill through her head.
She didn’t have to try.
There was a crisp tinkle of breaking glass.
Goodthunder grunted. His head jerked violently.
He lowered his arm and dropped the Remington. He staggered two steps forward before his knees buckled and he hit the floor. He knelt there beside Raven. He stared toward the door, down which thick gobs of blood speckled white with bone and brains dribbled. Then he fell forward and hit the floor flat on his face with a resolute thump.
Raven rose to her haunches and looked at the sheriff. Blood and brain shone through a large hole in the back of his head. She looked at the glass balcony door. The firelight from below showed her a neat, round hole about as large as a silver dollar.
Then she remembered that about the same time she’d heard the glass break, she’d heard a popping sound louder than the rest of the gunfire emanating from around the town.
She stared down at Goodthunder once more, and shock pitched her voice as she said, “Oh, my God, a Big Fifty . . .”
17
A man clad in skins and furs and a fur hat emerged from a beer tent on the right side of the trail, near the east end of Wendigo, and gave a howl as he triggered an old cap-and-ball pistol at the stars.
“Whoo-hoooo!” he whooped. “I’m prob’ly gonna be blind come mornin’, pards, but ain’t tonight grand? Whoo-hooo!”
He blasted the old Confederate popper skyward, and Haskell turned to Slake, riding just off his right stirrup.
“Christ, do these cork-headed fools do this every night?”
“What, shoot? Blow off steam?” asked Bodeen. “Yeah, I think there’s something in the busthead the lesser barmen serve around here that makes ’em a little loco.”
“They ever shoot each other?”
“Why, of course they do. But the way Goodthunder sees it, the population is growin’ too fast, anyways.”
“Shit,” said Slake, “the only real problem with it is that every morning, me an’ Bodeen gotta go out and load up all the dead into a wagon and haul ’em way the hell out in the mountains ’less’n the bears and wildcats start comin’ into town to dine!”
He snickered and pulled a little canvas sack of Levi Garrett snuff from inside his coat and packed a pinch against his gum.
There was more pistol fire and even some rifle blasts behind Haskell, who glanced back over his shoulder at the firelit main street of Wendigo. Being unarmed and trussed up like a pig to the slaughter, he felt edgy with so many guns being triggered around him. He was happy—at least, as happy as possible under such circumstances—to ride on out of the village and have the raucousness of the bacchanal dwindle behind him.
On the other hand, he was still unarmed out here, trussed up, and Slake and Bodeen might very well be leading him out to where they hauled the rest of the dead men, with him on the verge of being one of them.
Frustration and anger burned through him. He gave a
grunt as he tried to pull his hands free of the cuffs. Powerful as he was, he was no match for the steel bracelets. As he strained against them, they merely cut deeper into his wrists.
But then lights shimmered on the trail’s left side. The trail itself forked. Slake and Bodeen hazed Haskell’s black onto the left tine of the fork and up onto a gravel-paved, circular drive crowned with a large house thrusting its steeply pitched roof and turrets toward the starry mountain sky. There appeared to be a barn and a couple of other outbuildings behind the place and a small corral beside which a buggy sat, its tongue drooping.
From one of the several chimneys of the grand house, gray smoke unfurled. It perfumed the air with a piñon tang.
Before the house’s large front veranda, a rod-iron hitch rack stretched between six-foot-high stone pyramids. Haskell stared in fascination at the tall house with its gingerbread trim and the large front door bedecked with a brass knocker. The curtained windows glowed with a dull red light bespeaking warmth, opulence, and decadent comfort in dramatic contrast to the crudeness that Bear had just left.
“What the hell?” Bear said, still seated on the black and scowling at the house.
“Shut up,” Slake snarled at him. “Just climb down from there. You got an appointment.”
“Yeah, an appointment with a devil.” Bodeen snickered as he tied all three horses to the hitch rack.
Just then, the front door opened. A trapezoid of umber light slid out onto the dark veranda. A silhouette appeared in the half-open doorway, and a woman’s crisp voice said, “What was that, Deputy?”
Bodeen jerked his hatted head toward the door. “Uh . . . sorry, Miss Judith. I didn’t mean nothin’—”
“Shut up, you insolent bastard. You do realize that if it weren’t for me, you’d likely be sweeping horse shit out of the local livery barns, don’t you?”
Haskell could see the deputy’s throat work as he swallowed. Bodeen glanced at Slake, who also stood staring dreadfully toward the silhouette of the woman in the doorway.
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