It was true enough that Rattlesnake Wells—so named for the nearby spring-fed wells that had originally caused pioneers traveling through this part of Wyoming on the Oregon Trail to branch off from their intended destination and instead settle right here, once they’d gotten rid of the numerous rattlesnake nests also to be found in the area—was undergoing a gold boom. In the space of less than four years, ever since the yellow ore had been found in the Prophecy Mountains just to the northwest, what had once been a quiet community serving surrounding cattle and horse ranches and a few farms, more than doubled in population and sprawl.
In addition to being a long-standing stop on the Rawlins-to-Casper stagecoach run, a railroad spur had also been added. The original layout of the town, running at a southwest-to-northeast angle and nowadays referred to as “Old Town,” had stayed solid and largely unchanged. The growth sprawl, running off the northern point of Old Town and extending at an angle to the northwest, pointing toward the Prophecy Mountains, naturally enough came to be called “New Town.” Its main drag was dubbed Gold Avenue, and lining it was every kind of hastily slapped-together structure one could imagine. Shacks and tents were predominant. Occupying these was a span of businesses that included shot-and-a-beer saloons, greasy spoon eateries, gambling dens, cut-rate equipment dealers, by-the-night sleeping cots, and whore cribs. And the clientele for these businesses included every kind of easy profit seeker from swindlers and pickpockets to card sharps and pimps pushing their exclusive string of soiled doves.
It was hardly the kind of growth spurt that could be called uplifting for the original community. But along with the undesirables and the trash that poured in, so did a lot of money. And enough of that spilled over into Old Town to make the rest tolerable.
And now, for better or worse, right in the heart of the New Town sprawl, entrepreneur August Gafford would soon be opening his gaudy new saloon, the Crystal Diamond.
“Of course there are going to be customers who’ll stay loyal to our saloon,” said Maudie, her words aiming to soothe and reassure. “But you’re also right in thinking that the novelty of Gafford’s place will, in the beginning, most likely attract some of them to at least take a look and probably even throw back a drink or two.”
“Any who do that, I don’t care if they come back in here or not,” declared Bullock, his scowl returning even fiercer than before. “In fact, I’d just as soon they didn’t!”
“Now you’re sounding grumpy and stubborn and, frankly, a little ridiculous,” Maudie told him, demonstrating her standing with Bullock as being one of less than a handful of people who could get away with saying something like that to him. “What are you going to do—post a spy out front of the Crystal Diamond and mark off any of our regular customers who are seen going inside?”
“I’ll know. I’ll hear things.”
“People have a natural inclination, not to mention a right, to be curious about something new and different. And that includes me.” Maudie thrust out her chin defiantly. “I might want to take a look inside Gafford’s place myself, once it opens. If I do, will you bar me from coming back in here?”
“Now who’s being ridiculous?” Bullock growled in frustration. He looked plaintively over at Bob. “See what I have to put up with? Not only do I have that silk-tongued, fancy-pants Gafford trying to horn in on my business and steal my customers, now I’ve got treason threatened from within my ranks at the very highest level.”
Bob couldn’t keep one side of his mouth from curving up in a lazy grin. “Seems to me, Mike,” he said, “that the biggest threat you’re under right at the moment is the way you’re gonna blow a gasket if you don’t calm down. You said yourself how you’ve faced tough competition before and made it through. So you will again. Sure, the novelty of the Crystal Diamond is gonna cost you a few customers for a while. But, before long, things will level out and I bet you’ll hardly notice the difference. My guess is that the ones who’ve got the biggest worry about being hurt by Gafford are the tent saloons and gambling dives currently pulling in business along Gold Avenue.”
Bullock suddenly looked thoughtful and much of the tension seemed to ease out of him. “You really think so?”
“Stands to reason, don’t it?” Bob said, aiming to add to the calmed-down reaction he’d already gotten. “If Gafford keeps his prices fair and can offer a glitzy setting complete with dancing girls and the rest, who with any sense would want to keep doing his drinking or gambling in a musty, mud-bottomed tent when he can walk a few doors up the street and do the same thing in so much better surroundings?”
“Sounds to me like those are some pretty good points,” said Maudie.
Bullock heaved a big sigh. “Yeah, I guess they are . . . I guess, too, that I sometimes let myself get more riled up over things than I probably should.”
“You think so?” Maudie responded, arching one finely penciled brow and putting an unmistakable dose of sarcasm in her tone.
“Okay, okay. I admitted it, didn’t I? No need to rub it in.” Bullock twisted his mouth ruefully. “But there’s something about that Gafford skunk that just plain rubs me wrong, so don’t be surprised if I let him get me worked up all over again before this is through.”
Maudie smiled. “I’d only be surprised if you didn’t get worked up over something on a regular basis. That would cause me to be seriously worried about you.”
Bullock rolled his eyes and then cut his gaze to Bob. “See what I mean? She never lets up.”
“And if I did,” Maudie told him, “you’d be the one with something to worry about.”
Speaking of something to perhaps worry about, right then was when three rough-edged hombres came crowding through the batwings, loudly stomping dust and caked mud as they boiled toward the bar like a pack of parched coyotes. And it didn’t take long before one of them—the leader, judging by the way the other two held back and let him do most of the mouth-running—started in with some howling.
“Whooeee!” he cut loose. “I do declare this is one fine-lookin’ establishment. I gotta admit, however, to bein’ a mite perplexed. Is this really a saloon? Or is it a church? I know what the sign said outside and I know what it kinda looks like in here . . . but it’s so dadgum peaceful and quiet, way more so than any other saloon I’ve ever been in, that I just can’t be sure.”
The one making the noise and drawing obliging snickers from his two companions was a tall, rawboned specimen who might have been almost handsome before his nose got broken and reset so many times that it now looked like it had been put back together out of mismatched pieces. He had a narrow, V-shaped face with knife-edge cheekbones and small, yellowed teeth.
One of his pards was a dumpy Mexican with a round brown face, a drooping mustache, and greasy, curly hair spilling out from under the front of his sombrero and dangling down in the middle of his forehead. The other was a bland-looking individual, average in every detail except for a set of perfectly shaped and razored sideburns that looked as incongruous on his dirt-streaked, beard-stubbled face as a pair of ivory grips on a rusted pistol.
All three were clad in worn, dust-caked range garb that marked them as having likely been wranglers in the not-too-distant past. All wore guns holstered on their hips and Broken Nose, in particular, carried himself in a way that Bob immediately recognized as the mark of someone who fancied himself pretty handy with a shootin’ iron. That, in turn, made all three of them worth keeping an eye on as the source for potential trouble.
Maudie sensed the same thing, as evidenced by her remark, “I got a feeling that here are three hombres we’d wish as customers for the Crystal Diamond.” Even as she was saying this, however, she was rising up to go perform bartending duties for the trio.
In the meantime, as he leaned back against the bar, resting his elbows on the edge and hooking a boot heel over the brass rail along the base, Broken Nose focused on the near table where the four oldsters continued quietly playing cards. Addressing them, he said, “Hey, you bunch of gram
paws. Any one of you happen to be a bartender or a priest? That might help me figure out this puzzlement I got.”
Once again, his companions snickered and snorted at his great wit.
But one of the card players, Delbert Carey, a former soldier and railroad worker who still had more than a little bark on him, was neither impressed by Broken Nose’s brand of humor nor intimidated by his loud mouth. Without looking around from the cards fanned out in his hand, he said indifferently, “What we are, you rather impertinent young pup, is of no consequence to you. And your so-called puzzlement, I assure you, is of equally little concern to us.”
Broken Nose’s reaction to this response was at first one of surprise, his eyebrows lifting high. But then, just as quickly, the brows came back down and knitted tightly above a glare aimed at Carey’s back.
“Say now,” he said. “You’re a sassy old goat, ain’t you?”
Carey ignored him.
Sideburns, also leaning against the bar, looked a little uncertain, like he didn’t want to see this escalate into something more than it had to. “Too sassy for a priest, right?” he said. “So that’s a good sign this probably is a saloon after all, wouldn’t you say?”
“Either way,” said Broken Nose, “I don’t cotton worth a damn to bein’ talked to like that.”
Moving up on the back side of the bar and adopting a tolerant smile, Maudie said, “How about if I was to ask you gents what you’d like to have to drink? That more the way you’d like to be talked to?”
CHAPTER 2
The three newcomers turned their heads, each one openly and appreciably taking in the fetching sight behind the questions.
“How-dee!” exclaimed Broken Nose. “You not only are sayin’ exactly the words we want to hear, darlin’, but you are also lookin’ mighty doggone fine while speakin’ ’em.”
“Thank you. I aim to please,” Maudie replied. “So what can I pour you to add to your pleasure?”
“Red-eye. Some of the good stuff,” said Broken Nose, slapping a palm down on the bartop. “You’re lookin’ at three fellas who have worked our tails near off back in Nebraska to put together a grubstake. And now we’ve come here of a mind to climb up into those Prophecy Mountains and not come back down again until we’re packin’ a fortune in yeller gold. But, before we do that, before we commence the diggin’ and more hard work, we aim to have us a final round of hootin’ and hollerin’ down here on flat land.”
“Well, you’ve come to the right place for that,” Maudie said as she spread out three glasses and reached for a bottle of whiskey from which to fill them. “There’s a good deal of hootin’ and hollerin’ gets done here most nights. Within reason, of course.”
“Within reason,” Broken Nose echoed, a lopsided grin spreading across his face. Then, raising his glass, he added, “You heard her, boys. Here’s to keepin’ our hootin’ and hollerin’ within reason.”
In unison, three elbows bent and the shots of red-eye were tossed down. The emptied glasses had scarcely clapped back onto the bartop before Broken Nose was calling for more. “Do another round, darlin’. Just like that one.”
“Be happy to, cowboy,” Maudie told him with a smile. “But the way it works is, in order to keep my whiskey-pouring hand busy, my payment-taking hand needs to get in on some of the action, too.”
Again the lopsided grin from Broken Nose. “What? We look like lowlifes who can’t make good on our tab?”
“You could have a halo shining above your head,” Maudie explained, “but the policy remains the same when it comes to drinking in here. You pay as you go.”
“I’ll cover that first round, Jax,” said the Mexican as he dug into his pocket.
Broken Nose—Jax, as he’d now been identified—waved him off, saying, “No, I got it. Next one, too. On account of, once I get my money dug out, I’ll also have me some further negotiatin’ to do.”
From his pants pocket, Jax produced a handful of coins and wadded bills. These he slapped onto the bartop. “There now, darlin’. Take what you need for two rounds of drinks. And then, after you’ve poured, tell me how much more you’ll need out of that pile in order to arrange for me and you slippin’ off somewhere private-like where we can make some music together.”
Maudie hesitated in her pouring for just a fraction of a second. Then, after resuming the task and refilling the final glass, she set down the bottle of whiskey and said to Jax, “Unless I’m misunderstanding what you just suggested, I think you got a seriously wrong impression. We have gals on premises, some right pretty ones, who do the kind of ‘slipping off ’ you seem interested in. They’re still up in their rooms since they don’t usually come down until more toward evening. But, if you don’t want to wait, I can send word for a couple of them—ones I’m sure would meet your approval—to get ready and come on down now.”
“Ain’t none of that necessary,” said Jax. “I’ve already seen what meets my approval. You. No need to do no more window-shoppin’, not where I’m concerned.”
“But that’s where your wrong impression comes in,” Maudie told him. “You see, I’m not one of the upstairs gals. I serve drinks, make friendly conversation with customers, and so forth, but that’s as far as it goes.”
Jax shook his head. “I ain’t buyin’ it. You work in a saloon, you parade around showin’ yourself off that way”—he waved a hand indicating the manner in which Maudie’s low-cut dress accentuated her fine bosom—“so the message is plain enough for me. You can be had—it’s just a matter of agreein’ on the right price.”
“You’re wrong, mister. To the point of being obnoxious and insulting. Much more of it,” Maudie warned him, “will only get you an invitation to leave and not be welcome back.”
Again seeming to want to mollify things, Sideburns spoke up, saying, “Why don’t we just find somewhere else to spend our money and do our drinkin’, Jax? This joint is pretty dead, anyway.”
“No way,” Jax was quick to respond. “Be a cold day in hell when I let some saloon floozy put the run on me and tell me not to come back!”
Up to that point, Bob and Bullock had been listening and looking on from where they still sat at the back table. Because of Maudie’s proven capability for handling pushy customers all on her own, they hadn’t seen any need to get involved in her exchanges with Broken Nose Jax. Until now. The threatening tone of Jax’s last remark, however, made it a different matter. One that Bullock did decide to take a hand in.
As the stout saloon owner got to his feet and started toward the bar, Bob remained seated. Despite Jax’s attitude raising the hackles on the back of the marshal’s neck, the situation was hardly a legal matter warranting him sticking his nose in. In fact, he and his badge might only aggravate things more. Best just to leave Bullock and Maudie handle it, he told himself.
Marching up and coming to a halt beside Jax, Bullock got right to it. “You have some kind of problem with the way we run things around here, bub?” he wanted to know.
Jax turned his head and frowned down at the saloon owner. Bullock was three or four inches shorter than Jax, but he was broader through the shoulders by an equal amount, and the defiant thrust of his chin made it clear he wasn’t the least bit intimidated by the taller man.
Nor did Jax show any sign of taking a step back from the demanding question put to him. “What’s it to you, whether I do or not?” he asked in turn.
“My name’s Bullock. Mike Bullock. If you paid any attention to the sign out front of this establishment on your way in, that oughta give you your answer.”
“So you’re the big he-goose around here. Is that it?”
“However you want to say it,” Bullock answered. “What it boils down to is that a problem in my place is my business to take care of. So I’ll repeat my question: Do you have a problem?”
“Damn right I do. A big one,” said Jax. “I don’t like havin’ the ol’ bait and switch game pulled on me.”
“You’ll have to spell it out plainer. I don’t fo
llow you.”
“How much plainer does it have to be? You’ve got this little teaser behind the bar here”—Jax once again swept an arm to indicate Maudie—“paradin’ around with her mams practically hangin’ out, gettin’ a fella all stoked up, and then, when I try to set a price for samplin’ the whole package, she tells me it’s no deal. Claims she ain’t no ‘upstairs girl.’ What kind of shit is that?”
“It’s called telling the truth. Maudie leveled with you. I heard her explain it clear as could be. We’ve got gals—hostesses, we prefer to call ’em—who are available for the kind of thing you’re interested in. But Maudie ain’t one of them. She don’t do that kind of work.” Bullock’s thick shoulders rose and fell in a shrug. “You’re just gonna have to accept it.”
“Like hell I will!” Jax’s expression turned ugly and a bright flush of anger flooded his face. “I ain’t ready to take that for an answer out of her nor you, either one. I say any woman who sashays around half-dressed in a joint like this is a saloon slut who deserves nothing more than to be treated like one. Now all I want to know is how much money I have to lay down to be the one to give her what her flauntin’ ways are askin’ for!”
“There ain’t no price, you foul-mouthed, thickheaded fool,” Bullock snarled. “And you’ll be layin’ down no more of your money in my place for anything. Down the drinks already poured for you and then hit the door. Get out of here and don’t bother coming back.”
“Supposin’ I ain’t ready to go?”
“You’ll be leaving. Either by walking of your own accord, or being dragged out. The choice is yours.”
The angry flush continued to color Jax’s face as his mouth twisted into a sneer. “You’d like that, wouldn’t you, you grizzled old scrapper? I can see by your flattened nose and the scar tissue around your eyes how you enjoy escortin’ customers out the hard way. But if you think I’m gonna butt heads or bust knuckles with the likes of you, mister, you got another think comin’ . . . What I will do, though, is bust a cap on your double-dealin’ damn hide if you keep pushin’ me!”
The Last Mountain Man Page 17