Revenge at the Rodeo

by Gilbert, Morris

  He closed his eyes, muttering, “I’ve got to get up. Head’s still swimming.” Using his injury as an excuse, he figured, would prevent Ruby from getting angry. He slowly came to his feet and discovered that he didn’t really need an excuse. The room seemed to tilt as he stood up, and he reached out to gain his balance. “Whole world is out of joint,” he muttered.

  Ruby stood up and put out a hand to steady him. “Maybe you better go to bed. You’re pretty shaky.”

  “No, I’d rather stay up.”

  Ruby bit her lip, considered him, then confessed, “Well, I was going to the party Clyde and Fran are throwing. I don’t guess you feel up to that.”

  “Better than going to bed,” he told her. “If I pass out, just ignore me.”

  “I’ve got to dress. Maybe you should eat something. Help yourself to what’s in the kitchen.”

  As she moved to the rear of the motor home, to change, Luke waited only until the bedroom door clicked shut, then at once began searching the place. His head ached, but he lost the dizziness and moved only slightly less quickly than usual. There was little to be gleaned from the kitchen, but across from the couch was a compact desk, and with one ear cocked toward the bedroom, he went through the contents.

  If Sixkiller had been asked, “Why are you shaking down Ruby’s place?” he would have answered, “Because it’s there.” He was by nature a curious man, and his years on the police force had nurtured that tendency. But even more than that, he was interested in the relationship between Ruby and Clint. He had already heard of it, so her “confession” that they had lived together came as no shock. If she had not told him about the arrangement, he would have found evidence of it in the desk—a bill of sale from Clint Thomas to Ruby Costner for the motor home, with a price of one dollar. This rig must have cost thirty big ones, Luke thought. Clint’s fun comes pretty high.

  He went through the drawers quietly and efficiently, finding several letters from Clint—and one from Clay Dixon. He scanned through Thomas’s letters, finding the last one interesting. It was brief and contained a final release: I’ve told you, Ruby, it’s all over. Now let’s act right about this thing. We’ve had fun, but these things all come to an end. We can still be friends, but that’s all.

  Sixkiller looked at the letter from Dixon—more a note than a letter actually. Luke studied it carefully, one page, printed in large block letters, much like a child’s crude effort: IF YOU DON’T DUMP CLINT, I’LL KILL YOU FIRST AND THEN HIM!!!

  It was signed Clay Dixon in cursive. Luke replaced it carefully, thinking of the hulking Dixon, trying to picture him as the man who was bleeding the performers. Finally he shook his head, muttering, “He’s not bright enough.”

  He looked quickly through the remaining drawers and almost missed the most interesting thing of all. In the back of the bottom drawer was a brown-leather blackjack with a plaited handle—exactly like the one he’d found close to where Clint had been lying with his head busted. Taking out a handkerchief, he wrapped it up and slipped it into his pocket. Not what you’d expect to find in a lady’s desk. Can’t see Ruby breaking that horse’s legs—but she’s mad enough at Clint to have let him have a sock in the head.

  He was sitting on the couch when Ruby came in. Getting to his feet, he said, “Good thing you’re driving. I’m seeing double.”

  Ruby grinned at him. “If this party is like all the rest, you’ll be right in style. Everyone gets pie-eyed drunk anyway. Come on.”

  The Watering Hole was as seedy as most dives in the area, Dani decided as she drove into the concrete lot—a lot of blue neon and windows all painted over. Inside she discovered the usual long bar, propped up by what seemed to be a gathering of zombies. People floated around like fish in an aquarium, darting here and there to shout intimacies over the din of about a hundred others determined to shout their own. Above this a six-piece country-Western band with a short, chubby blond belted out a plaintive song.

  As she entered Dani was met by Clyde Lockyear. He grinned at her, a roly-poly figure with the face of cherub. “We got a place in the back, Dani. C’mon with me,” he invited.

  As he took her arm and steered her through the noisy room, Dani thought that few places were sadder than the insides of the million and one joints that line the outer limits of America’s cities. Misplaced persons of emotional culture. Bunnies ravenous for romance, yet settling for what they call “making out.” She took in some of the futile, acne-pitted young men, right out of high school, thrown into a world surfeited with unskilled labor, forced to take jobs sacking groceries at food marts. Most of them, she noted, were moving around the dance floor with some semblance of excitement, but beneath it all there lay a desperation—as if they had to keep moving to avoid considering the emptiness of their lives.

  Somewhere, Dani thought soberly, They must have had at least a hope that if you are sunny, cheery, sincere, group adjusting, and popular the world is yours. The world of barbecue pits, diaper service, percale sheets, and friends for dinner. The entire room seemed the antithesis of that—some sort of murky cavern, hidden away from all that was light and good and wholesome.

  “Right in here,” Clyde said, opening a door and stepping back. “Got a pretty good crowd here. Glad you could come.”

  Dani stepped into a long, narrow room with tables set up along the walls, where two Mexican bartenders were busy mixing drinks. Six or seven round tables covered with red-and-white checkered tablecloths were scattered around the room, and a stereo belted out a song by George Stuart.

  “Hey, come sit with us, Dani!” Fighting Bill Baker yelled from a table where he sat with Hank Lowe and Boone Hardin.

  But Clyde took a firm grip on her arm. “Nothing doing, Bill,” he called back, his high tenor voice rising above the music. “Go get your own girl!” He steered Dani to a table near the back of the room, where Fran was sitting with Bake Dempsey and Megan Carr. “Look who I found,” he announced. “Sit down, Dani. We got lots to eat and all you want to drink.”

  Dani sat down, and Bake rose, offering, “We got all kinds of Tex-Mex stuff, Dani. Let me get you a plate.” He moved across the room to a long table loaded with Mexican food. Soon he slapped a huge platter before her, loaded with enchiladas, tamales, refried beans, and tacos, and a huge glass of some red liquid. “Eat all that, and you’ll be fat and pretty, like me.” He grinned.

  Dani tasted the enchilada, then made a face. “I see you found the hot sauce,” she quipped.

  “No such thing as Mexican food that’s too hot,” Bake contended. He began eating, saying between huge mouthfuls of the spicy food, “You better enjoy that punch, though. It’s the last chance you’ll have at one of Clyde’s parties to drink anything that ain’t alcoholic.”

  “That was a good ride you made yesterday,” Fran praised Dani. “If you got a faster horse, you’d be in the big money soon.” Every other woman in the place had come in Western dress, but Fran Lockyear wore a strapless lace-over-satin dress with a double-tiered V front, cut very low. It was a delicate shade of aqua, which picked up the glints in her greenish eyes. A small fuchsia flower and a pair of classic sling-back pumps of the same shade completed her outfit. Two enormous diamond earrings flashed as she turned her head, and the diamond on her left hand would have supported and fed an African village for ten years.

  “Thank you, Fran.” Dani nodded. “Guess I’ll just stick with Biscuit.”

  “He’s a pet, I suppose?” Fran frowned and shook her head, sending gleams and yellow flashes from her earrings. “Not a good idea, Dani. If you get too fond of an animal, you’ll let up on him. That’s rule number one—use up your animal, if you have to.” She glanced at Dani, then ordered abruptly, “Come on, Bake, dance with me.”

  Clyde watched them leave, then took a swallow of amber liquid from his glass. “That’s her way with people, too, not just horses. Use them up, then throw them away.”

  Dani suddenly became aware that Lockyear was drinking steadily. He didn’t yet slur his word
s, but pronounced them very carefully to cover up. She tried to change the subject by saying, “I’ve heard that Fran was a fine barrel racer, when she was competing.”

  “Sure. She’s fine at everything she does.” Clyde took another swallow, then stared down into the empty glass. The music throbbed heavily, but he seemed oblivious to his surroundings. Finally he lifted his eyes to meet Dani’s and commented, “She’ll use me up one day, just like her horses.”

  Dani felt awkward, as she always did when someone revealed a tragic flaw. She had heard Clyde say that all he ever wanted was to be a bronc rider in the rodeo, and now she understood that all his money and success were hollow victories. He’d give it all away just to be a rodeo performer—even one as low on the scale as Wash Foster! A wave of pity for the little man with the paunch and the weak eyes overcame her. “You make it all work, Clyde. If it weren’t for your stock, there wouldn’t even be a rodeo,” she encouraged him.

  He gave her a startled glance and a slight smile touched his lips. He pulled himself up, studied her, then spoke approvingly, “I heard you were religious, Dani. But you’re more than that.” He reached out and put his pudgy hand on hers, and a warmth filled his eyes. “You’re kind. I don’t see a lot of that in my world.”

  “Hey, are you two holding hands?” Both looked up to see Megan returning to the table with a plate of food. She was smiling at them as she sat down and added cheerfully, “Watch out for this one, Dani. He’s a real charmer.”

  Her words pleased Clyde Lockyear, and for a time the three of them sat there, talking. When Bake brought Fran back, the cowboy promptly claimed Dani, and soon the two of them were dancing in the large room. The music was loud, the room was dark and crowded, and Bake was squeezing her tightly. Dani laughed and pulled back, objecting, “You’re hanging on to me as if I were one of those steers you bulldog, Bake!”

  “Aw, Dani.” He grinned. “You’re lots better looking than any steer I ever dogged!” Then he asked, “You cheer Clyde up some?”

  “He’s not a happy man, Bake.”

  “Well, I would be, if I had his cash!”

  “No, you wouldn’t.”

  Her abrupt statement made him miss a step, and he paused to look at her carefully. With a rueful laugh he admitted, “You’re right. I guess Clyde would give every penny he has, if he could rodeo.” Then he made a face. “And when he married Fran, he just made it worse. She throws it up to him all the time.”

  “Throws what up?”

  “That Clyde’s not the man Clint Thomas is.”

  Dani stared at him. “That’s pretty rough, Bake.”

  “You’ve seen her, Dani. I guess you’re smart enough to see what she is. A man-eater. Why, she’s been after me for a long time, but I got better sense than to fool with a married woman.”

  “Afraid Clyde would shoot you?”

  “No! Not ol’ Clyde—but I know Fran would, if I gave her cause!”

  After the dance, they returned to the smaller room, and for the next hour Dani watched people drink and busily fended off those who tried to get her to join in. But all the while she remained alert, wondering how the instructions for handing the money over would come. A black telephone sat precariously on one of the food tables, wedged in between cheese dip and lunch meats, and it rang several times. Each time she stiffened, expecting that it would be for her.

  At one point, Sixkiller drifted by. She got up at his offer to dance, and when they were moving around the smoky dance floor, she demanded tartly, “Well, did Clara Barton get you patched up?”

  He gave her a lazy look, saying innocently, “You mean Ruby? She’s got a tender heart, Dani. Can’t stand to see any of us poor cowboys suffer!”

  “I notice she was sticking to you like a Band-Aid!”

  He grinned broadly. “She’s a suspect. I’m keeping a close watch on her.” When Dani scoffed at that, he nodded. “Sure. I found a clue in her motor home.”

  Dani listened as he told of finding a blackjack exactly like the one he’d sent to New Orleans for lab work.

  “What does that mean?” Dani asked. “Did you hear from New Orleans about the other one?”

  “Yep. No prints but a few flakes of dead skin caught in the webbing. All we have to do now is test everybody who could have dropped it, and we’ll maybe have something. Shouldn’t take long—only about a thousand people could have dropped it.” Then he frowned, adding, “But this second one, I can’t figure it. Maybe they come with Crackerjacks or something.”

  Dani broke in abruptly, “I got a call tonight. . . .”

  Sixkiller listened, his face taut with interest. When she had finished, he insisted, “If you go to make a drop, I go as a tail.”

  “He’ll be looking for that, Luke.”

  “I can be invisible.”

  Dani argued with him, and they finally went back into the party room without settling it. Dani said only, “One thing, if I get a call, look around the room.”

  “Ah-ha!” Luke tapped his temple with a forefinger. “If he’s in the room, he can’t be calling you, right? So we eliminate anyone who’s in the room from being the Creep.”

  “My, you got it the first time!”

  “I didn’t finish the third grade for nothing, Baby!”

  When they walked into the party room, Clyde Lockyear was calling for quiet, having to shout, “Hey! Shut that music down, will ya?” Someone cut Willie Nelson off right in the middle of an off-key note, and Clyde nodded. “Now, before you all get too drunk, we’re gonna have a talent show.” He waved his hand at the groan that went up, insisting, “We got some folks here who can sit on a bucking horse, but there’s more to life than that.”

  Wash Foster yelled out, “Hey, Clyde, if you want this bunch to perform, you better let us all get more drunk, not less!”

  Dani had gone back to sit with Bake and Fran, and as Clyde went on, Fran shook her head. “We go through this at least once a year—usually when Clyde has had too much to drink.”

  Megan looked at her. “What kind of ‘talent’ is he looking for?”

  “He’s not looking for much from anyone else,” Fran informed her wearily. “It’s just a chance for him to show off.”

  “What does he do?” Dani inquired.

  “Oh, he’s a pretty good singer.” Fran shrugged. “Sooner or later you’ll find out he could have had a great singing career.”

  As Clyde persuaded one of the couples to dance, Dani looked at Sixkiller. He caught her gaze, but not a sign crossed his smooth face. Under Clyde’s insistence, some of the crowd began to enter into the spirit of the thing. But by the time two or three of them had “performed,” there was little skill called for. Several of the cowboys’ “talent” was telling stories, most of them pretty raw. Several couples danced to the stereo, none of them showing half the skill that the cowboys showed on riding stock.

  “Reminds me of show-and-tell, back in the second grade,” Fran complained. She got up to leave the room, warning, “Clyde’s going to be next. I’ve learned how to judge these things.”

  She had not been gone over three minutes when people began calling out, “Come on, Clyde! Let’s hear a little singing!”

  Clyde held up his hand in protest, objecting, “Aw, you’ve all heard too much of me!” But he allowed himself to be persuaded and went over to a small spinet piano. Sitting down, he ran his hands over the keyboard expertly and moved right into a smooth version of “Ain’t Misbehavin’.”

  Dani listened, then said to Megan, “He’s good, isn’t he?”

  Megan nodded. “Yes. He might have had a shot at a singing career—at least he might have made it back in the old days, when people sang on key and the words made sense. He’s like Perry Como, all smooth and easy.”

  “Too bad all the song lyrics say today is ‘Mama, mama, yeah—I love you bay-bee!’” Dani agreed. She applauded when he finished and liked the next song, which was also a golden oldie—“Moon River.”

  For twenty minutes Lockyear sang, but not
all the nostalgic songs. Someone called out, “Let’s hear ‘Shake, Rattle, and Roll,’ Clyde!” and he kicked his seat back, stood up, and did an imitation of Jerry Lee Lewis.

  Megan laughed as he finished. “Well, he doesn’t look like the killer, but he sure sounds like him!”

  Lockyear, Dani discovered, had the gift of mimicking people. It was not new to the crowd, for someone called out “A little Ray Charles, Clyde!” and he sat on the stool, swaying and singing “Georgia on My Mind.” He did a credible Elvis, a fair Hank Williams, Jr., and an incredibly accurate Conway Twitty.

  The crowd ate it up, and Clyde was in his element. He went from one song to another, sometimes in his own smooth tenor, but often using his ability to imitate other singers.

  He was doing “Smoke Gets in Your Eyes” in a Tony Bennett manner, when Tom Leathers suddenly appeared beside Dani. Leaning down, he whispered, “Telephone, Dani.”

  Dani almost jumped as he spoke, but managed to smile. “Thanks, Tom.”

  She made her way to the phone, and just as she picked up the receiver, Clyde moved into a piano-pounding rendition of an old Chubby Checker number. Dani closed one ear with her left hand, and pressing the receiver tightly against the other, said, “Yes?”

  “Ah, Dani, glad I caught you.” It was the same voice. Dani asked, “What is it?”

  “Why—it’s premium time, of course!” There was a touch of surprise in the voice, but instantly he recovered. “Now, listen carefully. Leave the party and go into the parking lot. There’s a 1990 Ford Ranger pickup sitting by itself in the northeast corner of the lot. The license number is LEM-4431. The door is unlocked. Put the cash on the floor under the driver’s seat. Go back to the party. You got that?”

  “Yes.”

  “Dani, don’t be clever. Remember Biscuit. He’d scream if I broke his legs.”

  He hung up, and Dani turned to see Sixkiller watching her carefully. But she shook her head, saying no with her lips. He shrugged, and when she nodded at the crowd, he began going over it carefully.