The Assassins

by F. M. Parker

  “Just answer yes or no.” Lew’s voice crackled. “Move into the street like a cur dog, or stand with me.”

  Tim bristled at the harsh rebuke. “Dammit,” he said, and braced himself for trouble.

  “Don’t weaken, or it’s going to be mighty unhealthy in half a minute.”

  Lew raised his hand to the front of his jacket. A faint icy smile creased his cheeks.

  “Off the sidewalk,” Custus called out.

  “It’s a public sidewalk,” Lew replied. “My friend and I’ll use this half.” He gestured to the portion near the wall of the building. “You and your friends can use the other section.”

  “We need it all. Get out of the way,” growled the redhead. “Or you’re going to get a terrible headache.”

  He pulled an oak club from the rear of his belt and began to smack it in the palm of his hand.

  “I don’t think I want a headache,” Lew said. He reached inside his jacket and took hold of the butt of his Colt.

  The redhead came on. He heard the trod of his gang behind him, their booted feet drumming on the wooden sidewalk. He measured the two well-dressed men in his path.

  “Boys, these dandies are going to be more fun than we’ve had all night.” He looked at Lew. “Mister, I’ve whipped three men your size with my fists this past night. You’d be nothing to me. But my fists are sore from busting all those hard heads, so I’m going to break your skull with this.” He raised his club above his head.

  Lew slid his pistol from its holster and brought it into view.

  “Sam, I’ll shoot the redhead,” Lew said in a voice loud enough to be heard by the gang. “You shoot anyone else who tries to use a club or pulls a gun.”

  The gang abruptly halted at the sight of the gun and the cold words.

  Lew cocked his weapon, and in the stillness it was like a thunderclap. “Go around me,” he warned.

  “We haven’t got guns,” said the redhead.

  “That’s lucky for you. If you did, they would just get you killed. Now, walk around me, and no one will get hurt.”

  “Custus, these uptown cowards won’t shoot,” said the man on the redhead’s right.

  “You’re the second man that’ll get a bullet,” Lew told the man.

  The man swallowed hard and became very quiet.

  Custus evaluated the two men blocking part of the sidewalk. The blue-eyed one seemed nervous as he held his uncocked pistol. The gray-eyed man stared back with a sure and certain purpose.

  “I think that fellow would use his gun.” Custus made a motion at Lew.

  “You’ve read me right,” Lew said.

  The gang leader hesitated a moment more. Then he reached behind and shoved his cudgel into his belt. He stepped out into the street.

  “I’ll not forget you. We’ll meet again.”

  Lew shrugged. “Bring all your men. You’ll need them.”

  “Let’s go,” the redhead told his followers. His men left the sidewalk and fell in around him. They were grumbling to each other as they went down the street.

  Tim put his pistol back into his holster and he watched the departing backs. “There wasn’t any reason for that argument,” he told Lew.

  “Yes there was. Bully boys like those have to be faced down.” And I wanted to see how you would react when threatened by the gang, thought Lew.

  “But now you have made more enemies.”

  “I do agree that we have all the enemies we need. Are you afraid?” Lew intently studied Tim.

  Tim stared back without blinking. “No,” he said, and knew that he meant it.

  “You’ll do,” Lew said. He clapped Tim on the shoulder.

  22

  The morning grew old as Lezin Morissot waited. From time to time, he peered in through the open door of the barroom at Russee Loussat sitting at a table in a shadowy corner. Loussat drank steadily by himself, staring at the top of the table. He had looked no man in the face since Wollfolk’s duel earlier in the morning.

  Morissot knew what the expression on Loussat’s face meant. It was the look of a man who had discovered that he feared a man. He would forever hate the man who had made him see the sour blackness of that cowardice.

  Near noon, Loussat fell unconscious across the saloon table. The bartender called his young assistant and gave him instructions. The assistant left the saloon and trotted off to the west in the direction of the Garden District.

  Half an hour later a surrey, driven by a black man in red silk livery, rolled up to the barroom. The man halted the team of horses and entered the establishment.

  A moment passed and he emerged with the bartender, Loussat supported between them, his feet dragging. The drunken man was placed on the rear seat of the vehicle and the thick curtains drawn closed to hide the unconscious form. The surrey driver climbed into the front „ seat, picked up the reins, and drove off.

  Morissot fell in behind a block to the rear. The servant J would take Loussat directly home. Morissot wanted to know exactly where that was.

  * * *

  For five days, Morissot spied upon Loussat’s mansion.

  The man never once left the house. Several times visitors came, but they were always met at the door by a servant and turned away.

  Farr Rawlins came. Old Ella trailed him, staying far back. Rawlins was not admitted and walked away, his cane pecking on the sidewalk.

  Morissot had paid Ella and set her to following Rawlins. She could easily keep pace with the crippled man. Either Rawlins or Loussat would lead them to the fourth member of the Ring.

  In the morning of the sixth day, Loussat left his home. Driven by the black man in red livery, he visited the offices of three dock-owners. He spent a few minutes in each and then went to his own place of business.

  Morissot recognized the office of Rawlins. Stanton Shattuck’s name was on the front door of his building. The third business was called the Mississippi Company. Morissot asked questions of the black porter of the small hotel across the street and learned the owner of the company was named Edward Tarboll. The last enemy, the fourth member of the Ring, had been identified.

  Morissot hastened off to find Tim and the impostor. He thought it odd that he had begun to think of the impostor as an ally. But that was just a temporary situation. Soon now would come the time to slay the man.

  * * *

  Lew moved with long, purposeful strides along the street. He wanted to see a man’s face. Lezin Morissot had found Sam and Lew on the docks. He reported Loussat’s visits to Rawlins, Shattuck, and a third man named Edward Tarboll. Lew and Sam had agreed that Tarboll must be the fourth member of the Ring. Lew intended to find out for certain.

  Since it was noon, there was less than half the number of people normally on the street. Their faces were strained with worry as they hurried along on some private errands. Two hearses passed, each carrying three coffins packed tightly together in the limited space of the vehicles. Every coffin was smeared with lampblack. No procession of mourners followed to send off the deceased with the wailing of laments at their deaths.

  Several wagons, buggies, and surreys went by loaded with men, women, and children, their bedding, and a few supplies to subsist on as they fled the city.

  The heavy, sour smell of garbage, human waste, and smoke filled Lew’s nose. To the northeast where the nearest cemetery lay, a pillar of gray smoke climbed to merge with the low-hanging clouds. Funeral pyres were burning the dead that had no grave.

  The old blind fiddler man was slumped in a chair in his habitual place on the sidewalk. His fiddle had fallen and lay on the damp brick. The bow hung loosely in his hand.

  “Hello, old man, wake up,” Lew said, stooping to retrieve the man’s instrument. “You’ve dropped your fiddle.”

  The man did not stir, and Lew bent to shake him by the shoulder. The man’s head fell backward. His mouth gaped open. The glazed eyes in the bronze face of the dead man stared up at Lew.

  “Goddamn,” ejaculated Lew, hastily removing his hand
from the man’s body. Then in a kind voice, Lew said, “I’m sorry, old man.”

  He glanced around for someone to tell about the dead fiddler. A man and woman were watching him from the open door of a print shop, but they jerked their eyes away when Lew looked at them, and moved back into the shadowy interior of the shop.

  A wagon with two corpses wrapped in bedsheets rolled by on the street. Lew shouted at the driver. “Can you take another body to the cemetery?”

  The driver pulled his animals to a stop. He cast a look at the man in the chair. “How much money does he have?”

  “How much does it take to get buried?” Lew asked.

  “I’ll take him for twenty dollars and five dollars for the gravediggers.”

  “Do it.” Lew took out his wallet and gave the man some bills.

  “Help me load him,” said the driver as he clambered down over the wheel of the wagon onto the ground.

  Lew assisted the driver in placing the body of the fiddler on the bed of the wagon. He lay the dead man’s instrument near him.

  “Bury that with him,” Lew said.

  “All right.”

  Lew stared after the vehicle as it continued down the street. The fiddler’s death and the frightened expression of the people on the street saddened him. New Orleans was a bleak, dismal city filling with death and rapidly becoming deserted by the living.

  Near the corner of Clay and Iberville streets, Lew entered the office of the Mississippi Company. The desk in the front office was vacant.

  “Anybody here?” Lew called.

  “Yes, what do you want?” A man spoke from somewhere in the back.

  “I want to see Edward Tarboll,” Lew said.

  Shortly a man in shirtsleeves appeared from a side door. The skin of his face was rough and there were deep squint wrinkles at the corners of his eyes, as if he had spent much time in the sun and wind. He sported a reddish, heavily waxed mustache extending out in little spikes from both sides of his mouth. He halted and looked at Lew with sharp brown eyes.

  “Are you Edward Tarboll?” Lew said.

  “Yes.”

  “I’m Timothy Wollfolk.”

  The man blinked. Lew saw the man’s recognition of the name and the wariness that came into him.

  “So what does that mean to me?” Tarboll asked.

  “Quite a lot. You’re number four. I wanted to see what you looked like. If I ever need to come looking for you, I want to be sure to get the right man.”

  “I don’t understand. Why would you want to find me?”

  “If you or any of your three friends cause me any more trouble, if anyone tries to harm me or interfere with my business, I’m going to come and make you a sorry son of a bitch.”

  “Are you threatening me?”

  “You’re damn right I am. Get yourself a gun and I’ll do more than threaten you.”

  Tarboll said nothing. The lids of his eyes lowered. The young Wollfolk had just made a grievous error. A man should never tell an enemy that you know who he is and then threaten him. You should kill him as swiftly as possible. Tarboll almost laughed.

  Lew caught the amused twist to Tarboll’s mouth before the man hid the emotion. Laugh, you bastard. But don’t send another paid killer at me.

  “Is that all, Mr. Wollfolk?”

  “For now.”

  “Then close the door as you leave. I expect no more customers. The business of the city is almost dead, as are many of its people.” Tarboll turned and went back through the door he had entered by.

  Lew stared at his retreating back. The man had shown no fear. And such a fearless man would now have to attack him. The attack would be strong, and it would come soon.

  * * *

  Honoré Savigne sat in Mayor Crossman’s office with the other men called to the emergency assembly. He held his notepad on his knee, a stub of pencil ready as he listened to the discussion. However, he was having difficulty catching all the words, for an echoing drum inside his temples was growing louder, the percussive beats jarring and thunderous. His skull was straining to explode.

  He heard Tigorson, the board-of-health chief speaking to the mayor.

  “Charity Hospital has thirteen hundred patients. The Marine Hospital has nearly two thousand. Beds of the ill are crammed in every ward, hallway, and storage room. At the Marine Hospital hundreds of Army tents have been set up outside. They are overflowing.”

  “What is the death rate?” Crossman asked.

  “About three hundred a day,” replied Tigorson.

  Dr. Carstensen spoke. “An equal number of people, and perhaps more are dying each day among the sick lying in thousands of homes throughout the city. We will never have an accurate accounting of the dead. I personally believe it is much worse than we imagine.”

  Crossman faced the head physician of the Louisiana Medical College. “Doctor Smythe, why can’t you discover the cause of this dreaded disease? You have been given many thousands of dollars to search for it. Yet you have found nothing.”

  “It is sad that we don’t know the cause,” replied Dr. Smythe. “We have studied many things, to no avail. The disease may be picked up from some invisible pestilential effluvia from the swamps or riverbanks, because it seems to be associated with dampness. However, it may be some miasma riding on the dust specks in the air. Or something we have never even contemplated. It strikes in the most unexpected places. We don’t know how it is passed from victim to victim, or if it actually is contagious.”

  “Damnation, Doctor, do we get that kind of answer after thirteen years of study by you and the full staff of the medical college?” the mayor said in dismay. He looked around the room at General Drake, commanding officer of Fort Jesup and the U.S. Barracks, and the three ward alderman. “Gentlemen, what do you recommend we do to combat the disease?”

  “Mayor Crossman, my soldiers are at risk, same as the civilian population,” said General Drake. “The Army doctors know no more than do the doctors at the college. I stand ready to do whatever I can to help you.”

  “Thank you, General Drake,” Crossman said.

  The mayor waited a minute for the aldermen to speak. When they remained silent, he stood up and walked to the window. He stared for a long time out from the second-floor room of the Cabildo and down at deserted Jackson Square.

  The mayor faced back to the gathering of men. “We must do something, and do it now. This terrible disease must be driven from New Orleans.”

  “We must purify the air,” Tigorson said.

  “How do we do that?” asked the mayor.

  “By loud noise and smoke,” said the chief. “We have tried that before during epidemics, and it has been of some help.”

  The mayor looked at the head physician of the Medical College. “Do you think that would be effective?”

  “Possibly. I agree with Tigorson that it has seemed to be somewhat effective in the past. If this thing is alive or is carried by something alive, then extremely loud noises and dense smoke might indeed drive it away.”

  “Doctor Carstensen, your opinion?”

  “Let’s do something. If it does nothing but lift the spirits of the citizens, then it’s worth the effort.”

  “General Drake, you have cannon at Fort Jesup that will not be going to General Scott in Mexico, isn’t that so?” asked the mayor.

  “I have over two hundred cannon and a hundred howitzers.”

  “Will you bring all of the guns to the city and fire them at short intervals? Make as much noise as possible.”

  “I will certainly do that. I can have them in the city and set up by nightfall.”

  “Begin firing them as soon as they are ready,” said the mayor. “Place at least one near each hospital and one near the row of sailors’ boardinghouses on the waterfront. Those places seem to be the centers of the worst infections of the fever.” The mayor turned to Tigorson. “Assemble all the city employees that are still on the job. Order them to round up every tar barrel they can find. Go across the rive
r to Algiers and confiscate the tar from the shipyards. Take a policeman with you to be sure no one prevents you from getting the tar. Burn a barrel at every major street intersection in the city.”

  “The people must be told why the cannon are firing, or they’ll panic more than they already are,” Savigne said from across the room.

  “That is why I asked you to come, Honore, to inform the people. Is the Louisiana Courier still staffed to print a newspaper?” asked the mayor.

  “Yes.”

  “Then you tell the citizens what we are doing,” said the mayor. “And tell them to pray.”

  * * *

  Honoré Savigne clenched his teeth to keep from moaning with the horrible pain in his head. His skull felt swollen to the point of bursting. His mind seemed to flicker off as the pain soared to a crescendo. Then the pain relented step by step, and his thoughts became clear and solid again.

  Honoré’s sickness was getting worse. He must hurry. He picked up a pen from his desk and dipped it in the well of black ink. He wrote the lead sentence, “The scourge of death, yellow fever, disguised in its mask of bronze, is laying waste to New Orleans ...”

  Savigne lifted his pen and listened to the three printing presses clanking away sheet by sheet on the day’s paper at the far end of the building. Another typesetter came in through the front door. A puff of wind followed him and fluttered the baire that hung from the ceiling and enclosed Savigne’s desk. The movement of the baire set off an impotent buzzing of the cloud of mosquitoes that could not get inside to him.

  He peered out through the window as a cart jolted noisily over the cobblestones in front of the building. A corpse wrapped in a red blanket and tied with twine was being bounced obscenely about in the bed of the vehicle as it hustled off to the cemetery. No longer were there the sedate and dignified funeral processions the dead deserved.

  The gravediggers could not keep up with the demand for their services. They were now on strike, demanding their wages be increased from twenty cents a grave to five dollars. The families of the dead were digging their relatives’ graves. Often the excavations were but shallow trenches hardly deep enough to hide the corpses. On the side street near Saint Louis Cemetery Number Two, Savigne had seen families lighting funeral pyres to cremate their dead. In normal times it was common to see large mausoleums and tombs costing ten, twenty, even thirty thousand dollars. Now a man was fortunate to get a dozen shovels full of dirt thrown on him to hide his rotting body.