Defiance of Eagles

by William W. Johnstone

  “Well, do you have any ideas?”

  “One,” Peggy said. “If I can talk her into it.”

  Peggy opened up one of the other cells to get the mattress, then bringing it back to the cell Mary Kate had occupied, she rolled it up and pulled the blanket over it.

  “I don’t know,” Peggy said. “If he just glances back here, he’ll probably think you’re asleep. That might keep anyone from knowing you are gone until tomorrow morning, at least.”

  Peggy closed the door and locked it, then returned the keys and the lantern to the front of the jail. She opened the front door and looked out, then signaled to Mary Kate.

  “Come on.”

  The town, which had been fairly quiet during the day, was now alive with noise. There were at least two pianos playing, the discordant notes clashing against each other out in the street. There were the competing voices of scores of conversations and dozens of arguments, some of them louder than others. There was the occasional cackle of a woman, and the deeper guffaw of a man. There was the sound of a couple of gunshots, and Mary Kate jumped, and gasped in fear and surprise.

  “Don’t worry, those weren’t angry gunshots,” Peggy said. “More ’n likely it was just some drunk lettin’ off steam.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Believe me, honey, when you’ve been around this town for as long as I have, you learn to tell the difference between angry gunshots and friendly gunshots.”

  Peggy started walking down the street and Mary Kate had no option but to follow her.

  “Why are you doing this?” Mary Kate asked. “Why are you helping me?”

  “Honey, didn’t your mama ever tell you never to look a gift horse in the mouth?”

  Mary Kate chuckled. “I suppose she did.”

  “All right, it gets a little harder here,” she said. “We’re going to have to go back into the alley. I hate the alleys, but we need to go in through the back door.”

  “Go into where?”

  “The House of Pleasure.”

  “The what?”

  “It’s a whorehouse, honey. I’m sorry, but in this town, that’s the only place I can think to take you.”

  Mary Kate felt a quick sense of apprehension. Was Peggy actually trying to help her? Or was this some scheme she had worked out with Ackerman? She paused, and Peggy walked on several more steps before she realized that Mary Kate wasn’t behind her.

  Peggy came back to Mary Kate. “Is something wrong?”

  “How do I know that . . . ?” she paused in mid-question.

  “How do you know what?”

  “How do I know that you aren’t doing this for Ackerman?”

  “I’ll show you how you know,” Peggy said. She reached up to the top of her dress, then pulled it down, exposing her naked breasts and skin.

  “What are you doing?” Mary Kate asked in alarm.

  “Like I said, I’ll show you.” Peggy turned her bare back to Mary Kate. “Run the palm of your hand down my back.”

  Mary Kate had no idea what this was about, but she did as Peggy asked. Then she felt them, the raised welts. She also felt Peggy wince in pain as her hand encountered the welts.

  “Oh, I’m sorry,” she said.

  “Those are whip marks,” Peggy said as she pulled the top of her dress back up. “From Ackerman.”

  “He whipped you? Why? For bringing me food?”

  “Oh, no, dear, if that was all it was, I might be able to understand it. Ackerman just likes to bring pain to women.”

  “I had no idea. I’ve known him for a long time, I never knew him to . . . ,” she paused, and put her hand to her cheek, remembering then that he had slapped her. “Yes,” she said. “Yes, I can see now how he might be like that.”

  “It’s not might be, he is like that. Here’s the house. We’ll have to go in through the back because the men will be coming in through the front.”

  Peggy led Mary Kate up the steps, then she opened the back door and stepped inside. Once she was in, she turned back to Mary Kate and motioned with her hand.

  “Come on in,” she said. “The coast is clear.”

  Mary Kate stepped inside with her and found herself standing in a hallway.

  “We’ll go in here,” Peggy said, opening a door to a side room. Mary Kate went in with her, then gasped because she had expected the room to be empty. Instead there was someone here, sitting in a chair crocheting. At first she thought it was a woman, but as she looked more closely she realized that it was a man . . . but it was unlike any man she had ever seen before. He was made up like a woman, and not like an ordinary woman, but like a prostitute.

  “Hello, Hector,” Peggy said.

  “Well, look what the cat dragged in,” Hector said in a singsong, almost lisping voice. “I swear, Peggy, I haven’t seen you in a month of Sundays. And who is this delightful creature with you?” Hector put his hands, or rather his fingertips, together in a prayer-like pose.

  “This is my little sister, Belle,” Peggy said. “Can you believe she came all the way here for me to break her into the business?”

  Again, Mary Kate felt a flash of anxiety, but when she glanced toward Peggy, she realized that Peggy was just protecting her real identity.

  “Belle, honey, you stay here until I see Gladys. Hector, you look out for her now.”

  “Oh, I will,” Hector said. He held his hand out toward Mary Kate, palm down, with his fingers bent. “I am ever so pleased to meet you, Belle.”

  Mary Kate had no idea how to react to this man, or what she should do with that hand. Not knowing anything else to do, she lifted it to her lips and kissed it.

  “Ohh!” Hector said, shuddering. “What a dear, dear, thing you are. Come over here and sit by me. Tell Hector all about yourself.”

  “I . . . I’d rather hear about you,” Mary Kate said. It wasn’t hard for her to say this; she really would rather hear about him. Never in her life had she met anyone like this person, nor had she ever even heard of such a person.

  “Well, of course, I am always happy to talk about myself,” Hector said. “I am what is called a sodomite. Most of the men who come here for a sexual interlude prefer to bed women.” He held up his finger. “But you would be surprised at how many men in this town . . . oh, fierce outlaws, gunmen, stagecoach robbers, the denizens of the West, prefer to go to bed with another man. I provide that service for them. For a fee, of course.”

  “You mean like a . . . a prostitute?”

  Hector laughed out loud, and even his laugh was different from the laugh of any man she had heard before.

  “But of course, my dear. Only I am not like a prostitute, I am a prostitute. But, I have to stay back here all the time, and Gladys directs my customers to a special room. You see, I can’t stay out front with the other girls, because sometimes men who don’t understand the delicacy of such a thing can be awful brutes. And of course, all of my customers must have an absolute guarantee of secrecy.”

  “Yes, I suppose I can understand that,” Mary Kate said. “But, can I ask you something?”

  “Oh, my dear, you aren’t going to ask that dreary question, why am I like this, are you?”

  “No,” Mary Kate said. “But, why are you here? I mean, this whole town, as I understand it, is a place where almost everyone is running from the law.”

  “That is quite true, my dear. And that is exactly why I am here. I am running from the law.”

  “You? But what have you done?”

  Again, Hector chuckled. “You are so precious,” he said. “I told you, I am a sodomite. Sodomy is a felony in every state and territory in America. Indeed, in some states, it is punishable by death. So you see, being here, in this den of inequity, I am safer than I would be walking the streets of Denver, Colorado.”

  “Oh, I had no idea.”

  At that moment Peggy came back into the room. “Belle, come with me, I want you to meet Gladys.”

  “All right,” Mary Kate said. “It was nice meeting you, Hec
tor.”

  “Oh, my dear, the pleasure has been all mine. And I do hope we will be wonderful friends,” Hector replied.

  “I have told Gladys who you are,” Peggy said quietly as they climbed a back set of stairs. “She’s a good person.”

  “What can she do?”

  “We’ll come up with somethin’, don’t worry. You might not like what we come up with, but I promise you, it will be better than bein’ in jail. And it’ll keep you safe until we can figure out some way to get you back home.”

  “Now you was just real good! I’ll be comin’ back to see you again!” a man’s voice said. “But I ain’t goin’ to tell the others about you. I want you for myself.” He laughed, a loud, raucous, laugh.

  Mary Kate felt a chill as she recognized the voice of the man talking. It was Jerrod, one of Ackerman’s men, and he was coming straight for her.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Peggy acted swiftly. Stepping back into the stairs and turning her back to the upstairs hallway, she wrapped Mary Kate in an embrace and pulled her close.

  “Whoowee!” Jerrod said. “Now that feller can’t even wait ’til he gets to the room. He’s startin’ in right there on the stairs.”

  Mary Kate had her head pressed up against Peggy’s chest and she listened to the footsteps until Jerrod went on to the back of the house.

  “Come on,” Peggy said quickly, grabbing Mary Kate’s hand and pulling her along.

  They crossed the hallway, then went in to one of the rooms. A lamp was burning on the table beside the bed, and an older, and rather heavyset, woman was sitting on the bed. Her hair was very black, but Mary Kate was sure the color came from a bottle. She had rolled herself a cigarette, and it was dangling from her lips, a thin line of smoke curling up from the tip. The smell of the tobacco was oppressive in the close room, but Mary Kate said nothing.

  “So this is her?”

  “Yes,” Peggy said. “Gladys, we have to do something for her. We have to. We can’t let Ackerman have her. He is a beast, an absolute beast.”

  “Oh, I agree, he’s a son of a bitch, all right,” Gladys said.

  Mary Kate had never heard a woman say that before.

  Gladys took the cigarette from her mouth and held it between her forefinger and middle finger as she studied Mary Kate.

  “Tell me about it,” she said.

  “What do you want to know?”

  “I want to know everything. How did you wind up here?”

  “Ackerman killed my husband and took me as his prisoner. Now he is asking my father for a great deal of money in order to get me back.”

  Gladys lifted the cigarette to her lips, took a puff, then blew out a long stream of smoke.

  “Is your papa just sittin’ there, waitin’ to make the deal?”

  “No. I know that at least one of my uncles is looking for me.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Because one of Ackerman’s men was killed back in Lincoln. And it was my uncle Falcon who killed him.”

  “Falcon? That’s his name?”

  “Yes. Falcon MacCallister.”

  “Oh, my, I’ve heard of him. His is a name that many here fear. If you are going to have someone coming after you, I would say he is a good one to have,” Gladys said.

  “Still, he is just one man,” Peggy said. “And don’t forget, Ackerman has an army.”

  “Yes. Well, we’ll have to do something to help the young lady until her uncle comes for her,” Gladys said. She squinted at Mary Kate through the cloud of smoke that had gathered around her.

  “Turn around, honey, let me look at you,” Gladys said.

  Mary Kate didn’t know what Gladys had in mind, but she turned around slowly, under the woman’s observation.

  “Yeah,” she said. “Yeah, I think it will work. We’re goin’ to have to get her some clothes, and get her made up, but she’ll pass as one of my girls.”

  “What? No, I can’t . . .”

  “Hold on there, honey, it ain’t like you think,” Gladys said. “We’re only doin’ this to hide you out. You aren’t ever going to actually have to go to bed with anyone.”

  “How can I pose as one of your girls if I don’t . . . uh, go to bed with someone? What if someone sees me, and asks for me?”

  Gladys laughed out loud. “You’ve got confidence, I’ll give you that. But we can take care of it. I don’t know any man who wants to take a chance on beddin’ a woman with the doxy’s disease.”

  “Doxy’s disease?”

  “Syphilis,” Peggy said. “Have you ever heard of it?”

  “I’m not sure exactly what it is, but I remember the post surgeon talked about it once to my father. He said some of the soldiers were coming down with it.”

  “Peggy, look through the drawers there, and see if you can come up with something for her to wear. I’ll go down and bring Hector up here to get her made up.”

  “You want a man to make me up?”

  “Oh, honey, Hector will be in seventh heaven,” Peggy said. “He loves to do makeup. Here, put this on.”

  The dress Peggy held up, if it could be called that, was about one-third the size of any dress Mary Kate had ever worn. It had very little top and very little bottom.

  “Oh,” Mary Kate said. “Peggy . . .”

  “Would you rather be in Ackerman’s jail?” Peggy asked. “If you wear this, you will look no different from any other girl here. By the time we get through with you, your own father could be within ten feet of you and not recognize you.”

  “All right,” Mary Kate said.

  Mary Kate stepped behind a dressing screen and was still getting dressed when she heard Gladys and Hector coming back in.

  “Where is she?” Hector asked.

  “She’s behind the screen, getting dressed,” Peggy said.

  “Well, heavens to Betsy, what is she hiding for? None of the other girls do.”

  “I think she’s ready now,” Peggy said.

  When Mary Kate stepped out from behind the dressing screen and saw herself in the mirror, she gasped and put her hand to her mouth. Compared to what she normally wore, she looked absolutely naked. The tops of her breasts were spilling over, and there was much more than mere cleavage, there was actual separation of the two globes.

  “Oh, yes,” Hector said. “It will be wonderful working with you. Sit here on the bed. Peggy, honey, could you bring that table over so I’ll have a place to put my makeup box?”

  Peggy complied, and Hector, after studying her face for a moment, pursing his lips, and moving from side to side, finally picked up a brush and began working around her eyes.

  The night creatures called to each other as Falcon, Morgan, and Matthew stood in a small grove of trees, looking toward Purgatory. A cloud passed over the moon and moved away, bathing in silver the little town that rose up like a ghost before them. A couple of dozen buildings, half of which were lit up, fronted the street. The three biggest and most brightly lit buildings in town were the saloons.

  They could hear sounds from the town, competing out-of-tune and badly played pianos, and a dog’s bark. Some woman in the saloon raised her voice, launching into a tirade about something, but her angry outburst was met with raucous laughter.

  “Do you think she’s here?” Morgan asked.

  “I’m sure she’s here. But just where she might be is another question.”

  “Do you have any ideas? You do a lot more of this kind of thing than either of us do,” Matthew said.

  “We’ll start with the saloons,” Falcon said. “And hope that there’s nobody in there who might know one of us on sight.”

  “Do you think that’s likely?” Morgan asked.

  “Not too likely. I don’t get up into this part of the country that often.

  “Shall we go in together, or each one of us take a saloon?” Matthew asked.

  “Let’s each one of us take a saloon,” Falcon said. He pointed to one. “Ha, the Pig Palace. All right, I’ll take that one. Yo
u two split up the others.”

  “I’ll take the first on the left,” Morgan said.

  “Let’s not ride in together. I’ll go in first,” Falcon said.

  “Falcon,” Morgan called.

  “Yes?”

  “Let’s meet out in front of the Pig Palace at eleven.”

  “Good idea,” Falcon said.

  Falcon entered this saloon as he entered every saloon, by stepping just inside the door, then moving to the side to press his back up against the wall. The saloon was brightly lit with at least two dozen lanterns, some of them attached to a wagon wheel that was hanging from the ceiling, while the others were on the wall, or on a few tables scattered around the room.

  Falcon perused the room for a long moment, looking into everyone’s face to see if he knew them, or if he could perceive whether or not one of them might know him. He didn’t see anyone he had ever seen before, and he saw no hint that anyone in here might recognize him. He did see several who were looking at him with obvious curiosity, though.

  He turned back toward the bar. “I’ll have a . . .”

  “Mister, you are standin’ in my place,” a man behind Falcon said.

  Falcon looked up and down the bar and saw that there was plenty of open area, so he moved about five feet down.

  “Sorry about that,” he said. “I just guess I’ve never been in a saloon where someone had their own place at the bar.”

  “Now you’ve gone and done it,” the man said. “You’ve took my other place.”

  “Billings, this fella just arrived,” the bartender said. “Don’t be ridin’ him now.”

  “If he’s just arrived, he needs to learn a few things,” Billings said. “He needs to know that when I tell him to do somethin’, he better do it. Now, mister, are you goin’ to move, or not?”

  “No, I don’t think so,” Falcon said, turning to face the man who was haranguing him. “I moved the first time out of courtesy. But you’ve just run my courtesy dry.”