The Assassins

by F. M. Parker

  Baudoin gathered up a wooden box containing his dueling pistols from the buggy seat. Lew took the pouch holding his powder, balls, and caps and followed Baudoin. The structure, some sixty feet long, was narrow and had a dirt floor. Targets hung on thick wooden backstops at one end. The opposite end had a crudely made table.

  “We shall shoot from behind the table,” Baudoin said. “You begin.”

  “If I do something that can be changed to improve my accuracy don’t hesitate to tell me,” Lew said to the dueling master. “I’m not used to a shoulder holster,” he remarked as he drew his pistol. “Usually I have carried my gun in a hip holster.”

  “I was not aware that men in Ohio commonly carried guns on their sides.”

  “Some do,” Lew replied. He must be more careful of speaking of past things. Texas was a place far different from Ohio.

  Baudoin watched the young Wollfolk raise his pistol and shoot. The movement was smooth and the shot was squeezed off without a flinch at the very moment it came level. Wollfolk’s strong arm controlled the kick of the revolver to but a slight upward bounce. The second shot came instantly upon the sound of the first. Both bullets had struck the center of one of the smallest bull’s-eyes.

  “Well done. Well done,” Baudoin said. The pistol seemed to be a natural appendage of Wollfolk’s arm. He was one of the very rare instinctive shooters.

  “The range seems short,” Lew said. “Why is that?”

  “This distance is the approximate range two opponents would stand during a duel. But we can set targets at other ranges. What would you like?”

  “Twice that distance, or even longer. If a man can hit , a distant target, then surely he can hit a close one.”

  “Come, let us set one up outside,” Baudoin said. “Step off the paces you would like. I’ll bring a target.”

  The two men practiced for more than an hour, until nearly all of their powder and balls were spent. Then » they sat together at the table and, while meticulously cleaning the handguns, discussed the finer points of shooting.

  * * *

  The throng of people blocked Decatur Street in front of the Cabildo. Vehicles were backed up. Drivers and passengers were climbing down and walking forward.

  “What’s happening?” Lew asked.

  Baudoin stood up in the buggy and looked over the heads of the people on the ground. “Looks like a public flogging is being readied. The whipping stand and post have been brought out of the Cabildo and set up, and a policeman is bringing a prisoner toward it.”

  “Why a flogging here?” Lew asked.

  “The Cabildo, that large building on the right, is the seat of city government. Court is held there. The punishment for certain crimes is to be whipped in public. It appears a fancy-dressed mulatto is the unfortunate person today. Probably a placée that some white woman is taking her revenge on.”

  Lew climbed erect and shaded his eyes against the westering sun to look ahead. “What do you mean about revenge?”

  “A white woman can swear that she saw a placée flaunting herself before a white man. That brings an immediate arrest of the placée by the police. Then there is a short discussion with a judge. The verdict is always the same, for the judge takes the word of the white woman over that of the Negress. That assumes the white woman is known and reputable. The punishment is ten lashes in public with a whip well laid on. The flogger of the court likes his work and does indeed lay it on very well.”

  Lew watched the mulatto woman being dragged upon the whipping stand. She struggled fiercely as they forced her arms up to be tied to the iron ring fastened to the top of the post. For an instant as she fought the policeman, her face was turned toward Lew.

  A shiver shook Lew as he recognized the woman. Then rage poured through his veins like molten lead. “Goddamn, it’s Cécile.” He leapt from the buggy and hurtled forward.

  Two men walking closer to view the spectacle were knocked apart. Lew hardly saw them for his eyes were locked on Cécile. He drove at the wall of people ringing the whipping post.

  The policeman swiftly finished tying Cécile’s hands. He nodded at the flogger and backed away to the edge of the crowd.

  The flogger raised the whip, a four-foot leather strap attached to a handle of about the same length. He was smiling as he struck with the whip, a whistling, cutting stroke upon the woman’s back.

  Lew saw Cécile cringe under the blow. Then she straightened. She pressed her forehead against the post and stiffened, awaiting the next slash of the whip.

  Lew yanked people roughly out of his path. He heard their curses. A man hit him. He felt the sting of the fist. But he ignored everything, except the hateful fall of the second cut of the whip on Cécile’s back. Then he was through the press of people and rushing across the opening at the man with the whip.

  The whip rose and fell. A silent sob shook Cécile’s body. The arm drew back again.

  The flogger found his hand caught abruptly in midswing. A powerful grip crushed his fingers against the wooden handle of the whip. A face with gray eyes hard as granite was thrust within a foot of his own. “If you hit her again, I’ll kill you,” the man growled at him in a ferocious voice.

  The flogger tried to wrench free. But the man held him solid as iron.

  “Did you hear me?” Lew squeezed harder.

  The man winced. “I’m an officer of the court. The judge ordered me to give the wench ten lashes. I’m going to do exactly that. You’d better let me go.”

  “I don’t give a damn who ordered you to whip this woman. I know her, and she would do nothing to warrant such punishment.”

  “Mister, she may be your nigger, but a white woman saw her showing herself to tempt a white man. That means she gets a whipping.”

  “What woman? Whoever she is, she’s a liar. Show me.”

  “There. Standing over there at the edge of the crowd.” The man pointed with his free hand.

  Annette Grivot smiled wickedly at Lew when his eyes fell upon her. Damn you, Lew thought.

  “She’s a crazy woman,” Lew said. “You can’t believe what she says.”

  “I don’t give a fart about that. Let me go or you’ll be up here and I’ll be laying this whip on your hide. Here comes the policeman now.”

  Lew saw the lawman hurrying toward him. He turned back to the man with the whip. He leaned very close. “If you hit her again, I’ll call you out on the dueling ground and shoot out both of your eyes. Believe me, I can do it. Now go ahead and give the rest of your licks. Make it look good, but damn you, don’t you hit her.”

  Lew released his grip on the man’s hand and stepped down from the platform. The policeman moved straight at him. Lew held up his left palm to the lawman.

  “Hold it,” Lew said. “It’s all over. Just a little discussion to find out what was happening.” If it was necessary, he would fight the whole town to protect Cécile.

  The policeman waited for the flogger to voice a complaint against the man who had stopped the punishment. But the man said nothing. He raised his arm and struck at Cécile.

  The swift air current thrown out by the speeding end of the whip rippled the cloth covering Cécile’s back. Lew saw the leather itself had not touched her flesh. The man was very practiced. He struck six times more, rapidly, one after the other.

  The flogger hung the whip over his shoulder. “Turn her loose,” he ordered the policeman in a curt tone.

  The policeman stepped close to Cécile and hastily released the thongs that bound her to the iron ring of the post. “You may go,” he said.

  Cécile lowered her arms. She turned, her black eyes snapping with anger, and stared directly at Annette. Then Cécile’s head came up, and she walked toward the entrance of the Cabildo.

  “Where are you going?” asked Lew, taking up a position beside her.

  “They have my purchases inside the Cabildo. I’ll not leave without them.”

  The crowd gave way before Lew and Cécile as they entered the building. She gathere
d up her possessions from the desk in the front office of the judge’s chambers. Hugging them to her breasts, she pivoted around and left.

  “I’ll hire a carriage,” Lew said.

  “No. Don’t do that. A placée can’t ride in a carriage in the streets of New Orleans. She must always walk wherever she goes.”

  Lew saw the three splotches of blood, each large as his hand and growing, on the cloth covering her back. The whip had cut lasting marks. “Are you all right?” he asked.

  “They can’t hurt me,” Cécile said.

  She looked at Lew.

  His eyes were filled with pain for her. And there too was an anger like she had never seen before in a human.

  Lew’s jaws clenched at the unfairness of a law that allowed an innocent dark-skinned woman to be whipped merely on the word of a white woman. “If the Grivot woman was a man, I’d kill him before nightfall,” he said.

  “But you can’t.” She was worried about him. He was taking her whipping harder than she did. And that was very bad. Revenge would not do, for it would only bring trouble.

  Cécile reached out and touched Lew’s arm. She had to chase the hot hate from him. Her lips bowed upward in a bright smile. “Truly, I’m not hurt.”

  Lew knew she was trying to draw him away from his thoughts of revenge for her public flogging. He looked into the depths of her black eyes. She was not only a beautiful mistress, but an excellent companion. A man could travel a very long journey with this woman and never become disappointed or grow weary of her.

  19

  The four companies of Missouri volunteer Riflemen marched grim-faced across the muddy drill field of the U.S. Barracks. The captains and their lieutenants marched at the head of the columns. The soldiers looked straight ahead. The right guards lifted the company guidons and shook the pennants and tried to make them flare, but the damp cloths hung limp and lifeless against the wooden staffs.

  Lew and Tim halted at the entrance of the military compound to allow the departing soldiers to pass.

  “The Missourians don’t seem very happy about leaving for Mexico,” Lew said to Tim.

  “They’ve probably seen the funerals and read the articles in the papers about the yellow-fever epidemic here in New Orleans, and in Vera Cruz, where they’ll be landing in Mexico. The disease scares them much more than the Mexican army does. Ten men are being knocked out of action by disease to every one wounded or killed in battle.”

  Lew did not reply. His thoughts had shifted from the departing soldiers to the request of Colonel Hays of the Army Quartermasters Corps. The colonel had asked Lew to come to the U.S. Barracks and discuss military contracts with him.

  The last company of departing soldiers passed through the gate. Lew and Tim moved into the compound.

  The U.S. Barracks encompassed an area three hundred feet along the river and nine hundred feet deep to the north. It was designed for a garrison of four companies but held twice that number. The commandant’s building, flanked by the offices of his staff officers, was located in midfront. A large parade ground, handsome in dry weather, but now a field of mud and water, occupied the center. The soldiers’ quarters and base hospital were behind the parade ground. Farther to the rear were the storehouses and powder magazine, and a wagon park filled with ammunition carriers, ambulances, field kitchens, and ferrier carts.

  “I was told Colonel Hays’ office is in the building on the right of the headquarters,” Lew said to Tim. He led, striking out over the sodden ground, trying to pick the more-solid-appearing earth.

  They were halted by an armed guard at the entrance of the quartermasters’ office, then allowed to pass after identification was made and the purpose of their visit stated. They crossed a large room where several men in civilian clothing lounged about talking, or sitting silently waiting. Lew and Tim went directly to the door marked Colonel J. T. Hays.

  “My name is Wollfolk,” Lew told the corporal at the door. “Colonel Hays has asked me to come and talk with him.”

  “Yes, sir. He told me to send you straight in,” said the corporal.

  Colonel Hays stood up behind his desk as Lew and Tim came into the room. “Welcome, gentlemen,” he said. “Thank you for coming so promptly. Which one of you is Timothy Wollfolk?”

  “I’m Wollfolk,” said Lew, stepping forward and shaking the officer’s hand. “This is my chief accountant, Sam Datson.”

  The colonel shook Tim’s hand and reseated himself at the desk. “Time is short. Shall we get directly to the reason I sent for you?”

  “How can we help you, Colonel?” Lew asked.

  “It has to do with your bids on the military contracts. You were the low bidder on many of them.”

  Lew glanced at Tim. Then he looked back at the officer. “That is good, Colonel.”

  “Maybe so, and then maybe not so good from my point of view. I have some concerns. New Orleans is the chief military depot and staging area for the war against Mexico. During the next few months, hundreds of chartered merchantmen loaded with soldiers and war supplies will be arriving from the East Coast. An even greater number of river steamboats will be coming downriver from Cincinnati and Saint Louis and half a hundred other cities carrying men and supplies.

  “The soldiers will go to Fort Jesup or come here to the Barracks for a few days to be completely outfitted. The army will take care of that. However, all of those army supplies that will be arriving will be handled by private contractors like yourself. The very outcome of the war depends upon the temporary storing and swift repacking and shipping of the vehicles, clothing, medicine supplies, and other goods according to the quartermasters plans.”

  “We understand all of that, Colonel,” Lew said.

  The colonel leaned over his desk. “Mr. Wollfolk, your company has eight hundred feet of dock space. Now, tell me frankly, can you handle all of these contracts you are low bidder on?” The colonel handed Lew a sheet of paper containing a list of contracts.

  “The Wollfolk Company is low bidder on all of these?”

  “Yes.”

  Lew hitched his chair closer to Tim’s and held the papers so that both of them could read it. They quietly studied the listing, recalling and discussing the contents of the contracts.

  Finally Lew said, “What do you think, Sam?”

  “Two large ships or three smaller ones can berth at our dock at one time. By tying other ships to the first ones, we can handle four, maybe six at a time.”

  Lew nodded in agreement. “We have one crew of stevedores and drivers working twelve hours a day. We can put on another crew for a twelve-hour night shift.”

  “We may need another bookkeeper,” Tim said.

  The two men looked at each other. There was agreement in their eyes. Lew turned to the colonel. “We can handle the contracts.”

  Colonel Hays did not speak for a full minute, evaluating the two young men before him. Finally he said, “The Wollfolk Company has always carried out every contract in an excellent manner. But that was under the management of Albert Wollfolk. I have reservations about you because of your lack of experience. Should you fail, I then have to immediately find another company to complete the contracts. That would surely cost the army a premium over the existing price. Would you put a cash performance bond to ensure your compliance with the provisions of the contracts?”

  “How much bond?” Lew questioned.

  “One hundred thousand dollars.”

  Lew was staggered by the amount of the bond. The company funds would not be enough to cover the bond and also the purchase of the clipper ship. A portion of Albert Wollfolk’s private bank account would have to be used. Still, the total profit from all the contacts would be nearly four hundred thousand dollars.

  Lew spoke to Tim. “How do you feel about it, Sam?”

  “That is a very large sum of money, but we can do it.”

  Lew faced the officer. “My answer is yes, we will post the bond.”

  “Then write the U.S. Army a bank draft for that a
mount,” said the colonel. He slid pen and ink and a sheet of paper across the desk to Lew.

  Lew shoved the writing material back. “Have your clerk properly draw the draft up and I’ll sign it.”

  “Very good. What bank?”

  “The Mechanics and Traders Bank.”

  “I know of it.” The colonel stepped to a rear door and left the room.

  Shortly the officer returned with a sergeant. The enlisted man handed Lew the bank draft. Lew signed it.

  The colonel gave him a receipt for his check. He stared sternly at Lew and Tim. “I warn you that only an act of God or war in the city will exempt you from completing these contracts on the schedules that have been set.”

  The colonel gestured at the sergeant. “Post the full list of successful bidders outside. Then come back here, for I want you to go and make arrangements to cash this draft and have it deposited in the army funds.”

  “Yes, sir,” said the sergeant. Carrying the paper, he went from the room.

  “I wish you good luck, gentlemen,” the officer said. “The official notification and the signing of the contracts and bond will be within three days. Work on the contracts will begin immediately after that. Prepare yourselves to carry them out.”

  Lew and Tim went out into the big outer room. The men who had been waiting crowded around the sergeant as he fastened the announcement to the bulletin board.

  Lew spotted Farr Rawlins pushing to the front of the group of men. Rawlins glanced at Lew and then looked away.

  “Let’s watch a minute,” Lew said in a quiet voice to Tim. “These men are our competitors. One or more of them are very likely responsible for Albert Wollfolk’s death.”

  Tim was startled at the statement. In a surprised voice, he said, “Do you mean he was murdered?”

  “I’m certain of it. Also I’ve been attacked. And Gunnard’s action to slow operations at the warehouse must have been paid for by somebody. We have enemies. They have killed, and they will kill again.”