The Mammoth Book of Best British Crime 9

by Maxim Jakubowski

  I picked up one of the dark strands of hair. “I bet this was cut from Ramona’s head. It’s precisely her shade.”

  Hong shivered. “Creepy.”

  “You don’t understand. They are keepsakes. It’s touching that they meant so much to him.”

  As I spoke the words, I knew instinctively how Rafe had felt about his souvenirs. Our possessions define us. Throw them out, and you throw away your history, your personality, the very life that you have lived. When we are gone, our possessions remain; they give our loved ones something to remember us by.

  “You’re right,” she muttered, “I don’t understand.”

  * * *

  The next day I continued to sift through the endless clutter. Hong set out for a long walk, much to my relief. I’d been afraid that she might embark on a clear-out when I wasn’t looking. I dropped in on the pub for a snack lunch, and found myself chatting to the Russian barmaid. Anya was a pretty student, on a gap year. Something prompted me to ask for her phone number, and she wrote it down for me with a coquettish smile.

  When Hong returned late in the afternoon, she was sneezing and out of humour. I pointed out that opening windows on a damp winter’s day had been unwise, and she stomped off to bed with a glass of whisky and a paperback of Zuleika Dobson that she’d found under a pile of coffee filters in a kitchen cupboard. She was a voracious reader of English fiction, one of the reasons why she had mastered the language, and I said she ought to be thrilled to live in a house containing as many novels as a public library. She sniffed and headed upstairs without another word.

  As the bedroom door slammed, I picked up the phone, and dialled Beazell’s office.

  “How did you come to meet my grandfather?”

  The solicitor hesitated. “Why do you ask?”

  “You’re a criminal lawyer. Did Rafe do something wrong?”

  “Certainly not.” Beazell sounded as if I’d impugned his integrity. “Innocent until proven guilty, that’s the law of the land.”

  “But he was accused of something?”

  “He was a man of certain … tastes, shall we say? His lifestyle was by no means risk-free, his untimely demise is evidence for that.”

  “What happened?”

  Beazell sighed. “He is dead now, so I am not breaching a confidence. A young Filipina accused him of whipping her black and blue; she claimed he was a sadist. He insisted that the, um, acts in question were consensual.”

  “Was he prosecuted?”

  “A summons was issued, but the complainant dropped the charges and refused to testify. The case collapsed.”

  “A change of mind? Or did he buy the girl off?”

  “I will not dignify that question with an answer.” I pictured Beazell puffing out his sallow cheeks. “Suffice to say that I gave my client certain advice as to his future conduct. He went to his grave without a stain on his character.”

  I put the phone down and stared at the contents of the casket I’d discovered under Rafe’s bed after returning from the pub. It wasn’t covered in as much dust as the rest of his possessions, and I suspected that he regularly inspected its contents. When I grew frustrated after trying a couple of dozen keys in the lock, I took a hammer he’d kept in the dining room and smashed open the lid. Inside the casket were photographs, some of which I recognized. A portrait of Ramona was among them, another showed the girl from Thailand in the nude.

  But it wasn’t the photographs that made me catch my breath, but the spangly brooch that once adorned Ramona’s prominent chest, the little round spectacles worn by the Thai girl, the heart-shaped locket containing a picture of a Slavic woman. Hooped ear-rings which I recognized from another woman who posed for one of Rafe’s photographs. And a whip streaked with dark blotches.

  In my head, I heard my grandfather’s silky tones. A conversation I’d forgotten until this very moment.

  “You may consider it strange that I surround myself with so much ephemera, but the most precious of my possessions make me feel more real. Tangible reminders of the life I’ve lived, and those with whom I’ve shared it. Memories of the highs and the lows, the ups and downs. These are things to be cherished, not tossed away as if they never mattered.”

  “I think I understand,” I’d said, although, until now, I had not. He’d smiled and said, “Well, well, my boy. I believe you do.”

  * * *

  When Hong came downstairs, she was in a mood to conciliate. The whisky had brightened her eyes, and made her voice rather loud.

  “We don’t need to clear out much,” she announced. “Just the bare minimum. Enough to enable us to turn this place into a decent home.”

  “You know,” I said, almost to myself, “I think I’ve finally found somewhere I can be myself.”

  As she squeezed my hand, her bracelet brushed my wrist. “We don’t need to clear out everything.”

  “Tell you the truth,” I said. “I really don’t want to clear out anything at all.”

  Her pleasant face hardened. The smile vanished, and for an instant I saw her face as it might look in forty years’ time.

  “We have a perfectly good incinerator outside the back door,” she hissed. “Why not use it?”

  I gave a long, low sigh, as I surrendered to the inevitable. Rafe was right, I was a man after his own heart. I patted the mobile in my pocket. Anya’s number was safely stored.

  “All right.” I ran my fingertips along her silver bracelet. I must no longer think of it as a present, but as a souvenir. “Tomorrow, I will.”

  COLT

  Ken Bruen

  * * *

  DAMN COLT 45.

  Jammed.

  Doggone it all to hell.

  Darn thing is supposed to work every time and I clean it like I do my tin cup, plate, every evening.

  I’d landed up in a one-horse town named Watersprings, and I ain’t joshing you, one horse is what they had and that was mine. Well, OK, I’m joshin you a bit here but my ride was the best, apart from the sheriff’s and the owner of the saloon, who had three Palominos.

  Sweet, sweet horse.

  I’ve had my Sorrel since the Injun trouble and that baby ain’t never quit, nohow.

  I had me a thirst, been riding hard, real hard to get way the hell outa Arizona. They wanted me real bad in that godforsaken place.

  The why is a whole other yarn and I ain’t gonna bother you none with that hokum now.

  Doggone, no.

  This here is about a gal.

  Ain’t it always?

  I tethered my horse outside the rail at the saloon. Couple a neer-do-wells given me that slack-eyes jaw look. I touched the brim of me beat-up Stetson, said, “How de?”

  Not too friendly, didn’t want em getting no damn fool notions but enough to show I meant no injury, leastways I was pushed.

  I took my Winchester outa its pouch, and I could see they knew it’d been well worn. Make em think twice about foolin around some.

  They done muttered some answer. I didn’t detect nuttin there to reach for my Colt so I carried on up to the saloon.

  Real bird place, darn right.

  Couple guys moseying at card playing but not more’n a buck on the table. Big stakes, huh, but I noticed they was all carrying iron, watching me over them cards.

  I seen em.

  The bartender, big, burly, like a grizzly I seen one time up near Canada, too damn cold up there, and I had my Winchester, that bear in my sights and I swear, the beast turned, looked at me, like he was thinking, “I hurt you?”

  I lowered the rifle, and never had a day’s regret, not a one. He was kinda, I dunno the word … noble. He sure a shotting was a big mother.

  The grizzly behind the counter gives me a slow eye, asks, “What’s it gonna be, partner?”

  Could have said, “I ain’t your partner, mistah.” But no point touching trouble, one way or the damn other, the stuff done find me anyways.

  I jacked my boot up on that brass foot-rail, laid my Winchester lightly against th
e bar, said, “Whiskey.”

  Didn’t put no please or nuttin on there. My daddy used to say, “Son, I ain’t got a whole lot to teach you cept how to shoot, shoe a horse and this, don’t start nuttin you ain’t aiming to finish.”

  I ain’t gonna lie to you none, I haven’t always followed my daddy’s saying, the reason I got me a bullet hole in my leg, drags a bit but I ain’t a moanin, the other guy, he’s not doing no walking, not nohow ’s I see it.

  Grizzly sets the bottle on the counter, shot glass, and it weren’t durty but it weren’t clean neither. I figured the whiskey will wash it most ways.

  I knock back two fast ones and damn, tasted real fine, like the Tucson sun after six months’ hitch in the State Pen.

  He’s lookin at my holster, goes, “That there a Colt?”

  The hell else it be?

  Real slow, I reach, take it out, let him see it. Don’t let no man touch it, not unless he’s got the draw on me, and even then, well, he better be prepared to do more than mouth.

  He lets out a slow whistle, said, “You rode with the Cavalry?”

  The guy was whole lot smarter than he looked. The Colt was Army issue, and the notches on the butt, an old horse soldier tradition. Mine was riddled.

  I nodded, not a story I wanted to share with some damn barkeep.

  He reached out his massive hand, about to touch it, and felt, rather than saw me stiffen, pulled back, asked, “You ever run into Custer?”

  That Yallah. And I ain’t even talking bout his hair.

  I downed another shot, let it warm me belly, then real easy said, “Man never passed a mirror he didn’t love.”

  Let it out there, see where he stood on that whole darn mess.

  He poured himself a shot, downed it in one, grimaced, the whiskey of Custer?

  He said, “He sure ran into one mountain of shinola that day.”

  OK.

  Then he done told me about those fine horses he had and I gave him the face that asks, “Say I was in the market for a horse?”

  I put a few bits on the counter and he asked, “You fixing to stay a few days?”

  And when I didn’t answer, it’s real foolhardy to be asking a stranger his business these wild days, he added real fast, “Reason I ask is, we got us a hanging, folks coming for miles round, ain’t often you gets to see a woman dangle.”

  I seen most stuff, lynchings, burnings, scalpings, and I don’t got me no taste for it, especially not the legal ones. But I was interested, who wouldn’t be, and I repeated, “A woman?”

  “Yeah, done shot her husband and now they gonna stretch her pretty little neck, see if they don’t.”

  I dunno, I still can’t get me a fix on it, I was aiming to get some chow, get my horse seen to and then hit out next day. I had business over in Shiloh and I was antsy to git movin but I asked, “She local?”

  He was shaking his head, wiping down the counter with a greasy rag, said, “Hell no, outa Virginia, name of Molly Blair.”

  The whiskey stuck in me gullet and I’d to fight real hard to keep me face tight. I tipped my Stetson, said I might stick around for the rope party and he shouted as I reached the swing door, “Real purty little thing, shame to let all that fine woman go a begging.”

  My hand went to my Colt, pure instinct, I would have drilled that sum of a gun for two cents.

  Outside, I had to grab me some deep breaths.

  Molly, damn her to tarnation, the only gal I done ever loved.

  I hawked me a big chunk of spittle and let it out on the boardwalk … looked round and could see the sheriff’s office down a ways.

  Cussin nine ways to Sunday, I hitched my gun belt, headed on over, thinking, “The hell I had to go running off me fool mouth.”

  I glanced at my horse, tired as he was, tired as I was my own self, we could have bin outa there in two seconds flat, left her to rot, like she did me but …

  Darn story of my life, I just can never mosey on the other way.

  I put a chaw of bacca in me cheek, began to walk towards the jail, me fool heart thundering like the Injuns reining down on Custer.

  Stepping up to the porch outside the sheriff’s office, I heard loud hammering and looked to my left, damnation … how in all that’s shottin did I miss seeing it?

  The scaffold, ugly looking thing but then, I guess, they ain’t building em for purtyness.

  Damn thing was near done too, they was even trying out a sack of taters, body weight I guess, though Molly, a cup of sugar would have been about right with her.

  Petite sweet thing I’d thought way back in Tennessee when I done first run into her.

  Sweet? … Like a coyote on heat.

  They let the bag fall, and it startled me, I had to shake me own self, get it tight.

  I opened the door and a man was sitting behind a desk, cup of gruel going, cheroot dangling in his mouth, boots up on the desk and I thought, “Uh oh.”

  Frontier lawmen, a real mean breed of buzzard, they get that tin on them, they’re as dangerous as a herd of buffalo in a Cheyenne autumn. He had him a belly there, a man who liked his vittles and his drinking if his flushed cheeks were any story. Round thirty, I’d hazard, and all them years, mean as can be.

  He had him a smirk too, like he knew I wasn’t bringing him no good news.

  He got that right.

  He drawled, “Help yah?”

  Sounding like that was a darn fool notion.

  I kept my hands loose, no threat showing, least not yet, said, “I’m kin to Molly.”

  He mulled that over then spat to his side, said, “That so.”

  Not a question.

  I kept with it, tried, “Yessir, on my Momma’s side, we ain’t been real close or nuttin but I figured I’d better come, pay my respects.”

  He had a metal cup on the table and lazy as can be, he reached over, his cobra eyes never leaving my face, took his own time in a long swallow, making noises like a hog, said, “Funny, ain’t it?”

  What?

  I went, “What?”

  Then stuck on, “Sir?”

  Let the beat in.

  He blew a cloud of smoke at me, said, “The murdering gal ain’t mentioned no kin?”

  I gave a real slow grin, the gee shucks I keep for killing vermin, said, “Like I said, sheriff, we ain’t been real close.”

  He stood up, real sudden and I kept very still. He grabbed a bunch of keys, asked, “Well, whatcha waiting on son, you’re real keen to visit with yer kin, am I right?”

  Sumofapistol … son … I had a good ten years on him. I nodded and he led me back.

  She looked even more damn beautiful than I remembered and before the sheriff could try his game, I said, damn near hollered, “Coz, Momma done told me to come visit, see you be needing anything?”

  He gave me the look then and his eyes showed most of what he was, a piece of trash with a Smith and Wesson, nothing no mo in that.

  Molly, sharp as always, smiled, and I swear, even squeezed a tear out, shouts, “Cousin Lucas, I was believin my family washed their hands offa me.”

  I turned to the sheriff, asked, “Mind if I have me a moment with my kin?”

  He minded, heck, he minded a lot. He spat right next to my boots, said, “You got five minutes and I’ll be right outside.”

  I done already said about me and my running off mouth and even now, I had to go, “That’ll be a comfort, sir.”

  His eyes sparked and he moved right in my face, drawled, real slow, “You sassing me, boy?”

  Like I was nigrah.

  I shot men for less.

  I heard Molly say, “Now sheriff, he’s just a country type, don’t know a whole lot how to behave round decent folk.”

  He thought about it, said, “I’ll be talking some more to you, boy.”

  He was closing a nickel to a dollar on that.

  Course, a lard ass like him, he ain’t going to let it go easy, said, “I’ll be needing that there Colt.”

  I gave it up, real slow, see
ing another notch on the butt already and this time, it would be a whole lot of funning.

  He made lots of grunting on his way back to his coffee. I hoped it would choke him … slow.

  She gave that radiant smile, that damn melt yer heart and yer senses, all in one, done make a fool outa a man everytime.

  She reached out her hand, touched my arm, said, “You lookin real fine, darling.”

  Cold to her heart.

  I’d made me some gold offa a claim that was already staked out and I was looking to spend it, met Molly in a saloon and she not only took off with my stash but my dumbass heart as well.

  Broke, hungover, I had me some real trouble to git on outa there with my skin.

  I asked, “Why’d you throw me over, wasn’t I good to you?”

  She lowered her eyes, said, “I was real young, real reckless, what do you know at seventeen?”

  I whistled, went, “Boy howdy.”

  She was caressing my arm and I got riled, said, “You didn’t know enough that leaving me without cash could have got me killed. Them fellahs in that saloon didn’t take kindly to some greenhorn saying he couldn’t pay the freight, they done give me a horse whipping, took my boots and ran my ass outa town.”

  She let her eyes melt in the honey way she had, said, “Lucas, I’m so damn sorry, can you forgive me?”

  Dammit.

  Then she said, “You gotta get me on outa here.”

  I laughed, not with any merriment or anything, asked, “And how you fixing on me doing that, that fat ass took my Colt.”

  Now her real smile showed, the smile of a woman who is one hundred years old and means to live another, said, “You telling me, darling, you ain’t still got that derringer in your boot.”

  I always had that spooked feeling she knew things she never should have known and like a lovesick pup, I reached in my boot, took out the tiny pistol, two shots.

  She said, “Give it here, hon.”

  The gun felt tiny in my hand, small as the focus of my thinking. I asked, “You’re fixing to do what?”

  A cloud passed briefly over them lovely features, then was gone and she asked, “You want to see them hang me, see me spoil me bloomers as the rope bites in, you want that, lover?”