Hell's Half Acre

by William W. Johnstone

  Luke slid farther into the bed and pulled the covers over his head.

  “Where can I find him?” Jess said.

  “Where he’s always been, the Alamo,” Luke said, his voice muffled. “He’s got a fancy woman there.”

  “I can call in the favor and ask you to go with me to the Alamo,” Jess said.

  Luke threw the covers off his face. “And go up against Wilson? Are you crazy, cowboy? You don’t call out a man like Wilson Tucker if you don’t have to.”

  “He tried to kill me yesterday, remember?”

  “Yeah, I know, but he missed, so no harm done.”

  “Luke, I’m calling in the favor you owe me. I want you to go with me to the Alamo and then stay at my side today until I say you’ve returned the favor.”

  Luke groaned. “Damn it, as soon as I saw you storm through my bedroom door I said to myself, ‘Luke, it’s time to shoot the cowboy.’ Why didn’t I listen to myself?”

  “Get dressed, Luke,” Jess said. “We have a long day ahead of us.”

  CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

  “Sheriff, it seems like you never learn,” Larry Kemp said. “You ain’t closing down my place again. It’s under the personal protection of Mayor Stout and another party I can’t mention.”

  Jess’s nose wrinkled. “Kemp, don’t you ever bathe?”

  “You didn’t come here to smell the landlord,” Kemp said. “What the hell do you want, and why do you have a killer with you?”

  “Thanks for the compliment, Kemp,” Luke said. “I won’t soon forget it.”

  “Mr. Short is no part of why I’m here,” Jess said. “My business is with Wilson Tucker.”

  “He’s not here,” Kemp said.

  “Get him up and tell him I await his convenience in the bar,” Jess said.

  “You damned fool, he’ll kill you,” Kemp said.

  “The cretin is right,” Luke said. “You can’t handle Wilson.”

  “Tell him, Kemp,” Jess said.

  Kemp said, “Your funeral, lawman.”

  After Kemp left, Luke said, “I’ll see you buried decent, cowboy. It’s the last favor I’ll do for you.”

  “There’s one thing more you can do, Luke,” Jess said.

  “Put a name to it.”

  “If Wilson Tucker kills me—”

  “You mean when he kills you.”

  “—put a bullet in him.”

  “Sure. If he’s got his back turned to me at the time.”

  “You’re true-blue, Luke,” Jess said.

  “No, I ain’t,” Luke said.

  Jess smiled. “You’re right. You ain’t.”

  * * *

  A narrow hallway that smelled of piss and boiled cabbage led to the bar, an unassuming room with some tables and chairs and an area left clear for dancing. A battered, bullet-pocked piano stood in one corner and on the wall a cheap print of the Alamo was draped in the Texas flag. The bar was made of rough pine, repaired here and there with slats from Arbuckle coffee crates. Like the hallway, the place smelled of piss and boiled cabbage.

  His spurs chiming, Jess stepped to the wall and studied the Alamo print. He turned when he heard someone enter the saloon.

  It was Wilson J. Tucker, dressed in black pants, elastic-sided boots and a white shirt opened at the neck. Tucker wore two Colts and he held a steaming coffee cup in his left hand.

  “You wanted to see me, Sheriff,” he said.

  Jess nodded. “I’m here to arrest you for the murder of a woman known to this city only as Dixie and for the attempted murder of an officer of the law, namely myself.”

  “The old woman talked too much and her death was a small thing. But you were lucky yesterday, cowboy. If Luke Short hadn’t showed up when he did . . . well, I’d have gunned you.” He smiled. “Man’s got to be careful around Luke. On his good days he can be a handful.”

  “Who paid you to kill me, Tucker?” Jess said.

  The gunman laid his cup on a table. “I want to get this over with before my coffee cools,” he said. “By the way, Sheriff, your gun is too high. Man, it’s almost under your armpit. You won’t be fast on the draw and shoot with that. Lower it some.”

  “Who paid you to kill me?” Jess said.

  “All right, I’ll answer your question since you’re already a dead man. But once my talking is done, I’ll gun you. Savvy?”

  Jess said nothing and Tucker said, “My client says you’re not very smart, cowboy. In the beginning he tried to kill you a couple of times because he didn’t want a new lawman around. But then he realized that you’d be of more value as a cover for his activities so he befriended you.”

  Jess said, “He wants to sell a new opium drug.”

  “Yeah, especially now when he can finally guarantee a steady supply,” Tucker said. His guns had fancy stag-horn handles. “He’s pushing things now, calling in a promising young feller named Tom Horn who’s in the same business as me. But before he gets here I’ve been ordered to tie up loose ends. First I’ll kill you, cowboy, then Kurt Koenig, Luke Short and a few others. After that my client will control all of the drug trade in Fort Worth.” Tucker grinned. “We’re talking millions here, a fortune.”

  A thought cartwheeled through Jess’s mind. How fast was Tucker? He answered his own question: probably as sudden as a lightning strike. Damn it, keep him talking.

  “And your client murdered Zeus, the prizefighter, and then Lillian Burke?”

  Tucker tested his coffee. “Not much longer, cowboy. It’s getting cooler.” He directed his attention back to Jess. “That’s more of a private matter with my client. He wanted the girl because he thought she was a virgin and he set store by that. He courted her, bought her nice things, put her up in his home and then one night she gets sky-high on morphine and tells him she once slept with a black man. A bad mistake.”

  “And that man was Zeus.”

  “Yeah, of course. The black got blamed for robbery and the killing of a shop girl and my client hired some Acre toughs to lynch him. Then, when Lillian Burke heard of the black man’s death she tried to run away. Understandably, my client was annoyed and his thugs went after her. She was brought back, whipped, strangled and nailed to a cross. Which brings us full circle to yesterday.”

  “One last question: Is your client that fat pig Harry Stout?”

  “The mayor?” Tucker said. “What are you talking about?”

  “It’s simple, Tucker. Is your client Harry Stout?”

  “No. Are you crazy? My client is your good friend Dr. Sun. He plans to get rich with his new drug and then go back to China a wealthy, important man. He wanted to take a beautiful virgin bride with him, but that didn’t pan out.”

  Tucker grinned. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I must get another cup of coffee.” The grin faded and Tucker’s mouth tightened thin and hard. “Grab the iron cowboy,” he said.

  CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

  A clumsy scullery maid named Mabel Ball saved Jess Casey’s life.

  The girl was carrying a stack of cheap tin trays from the kitchen to the bar when she tripped on the uneven wood floor and fell. The trays made a tremendous racket as they clattered all over the floor.

  Wilson Tucker, his back to the hallway, jumped in surprise and quickly swung his head to his left. It was an instinctive movement that took only a split second but it was all the time Jess needed.

  He drew and fired.

  At a range of just five feet, Jess’s bullet slammed into Tucker’s chest dead center and did terrible damage to the gunman’s heart and lungs. But Wilson Tucker was a man with bark on him. He took a step forward and raised his Colt. But the bullet that crashed into the left side of his head dropped him and put his lights out forever.

  Luke Short stood at the entrance to the bar, a smoking Colt in his hand. “Sheriff, you just called in your favor,” he said. Then, angrily, “Why the hell didn’t you hit him again?”

  “Dud round,” Jess said, his face pale. “All I heard was a click.”

  Lu
ke holstered his gun. “Let me see that piece,” he said. He saw the wary look on Jess’s face and said, “I’m not going to shoot you, cowboy. At least not today.”

  Jess passed the Colt to Luke and the little gunman opened the loading gate and rotated the cylinder. Three unfired rounds and two empty shell casings fell into the palm of his hand.

  “You didn’t reload after yesterday?” he said.

  Jess shook his head. “I guess I forgot.”

  “If I hadn’t been here your forgetfulness would have got you killed.”

  Luke shook his head, then hauled back and slapped Jess hard across the face. Too stunned to react Jess stood there for a moment. Then he said, “Why the hell did you do that?”

  “So you’ll never forget what I’m about to tell you. Always, and I mean always, reload your weapon after a shooting scrape.” Jess opened his mouth to speak, but Luke held up his hand. “No ifs, buts or maybes . . . always reload. Have you got that, pilgrim?”

  Jess rubbed his cheek. “Don’t ever do that again, Luke.”

  “And don’t you ever go into a gunfight with an empty Colt.”

  “I’m not likely to forget,” Jess said. “Am I?”

  Luke said, “Damn, Casey, if you survive a year in the Acre it will be a miracle.”

  * * *

  Nate Levy had heard rumors.

  The whispers came from the black community in Fort Worth, which numbered around seven thousand and lived in the south end of town. Zeus had been their hero and many were angry at the manner of his death.

  Moses Johnson was a washed-up, bare-knuckle tent fighter who’d taken too many blows to the head, but he was smart enough to know that Nate was always good for a grubstake.

  He sat upright in a chair in Nate’s hotel room, his battered hat at his feet. His huge hands, corded with veins, lay on the top of his thighs and when he breathed his flattened nose made a faint whistling sound.

  “I hear bad t’ings, Mr. Levy,” he said. “T’ings about a black boy.” Johnson’s chocolate-colored eyes were webbed with red veins. “Black folks say Mayor Stout didn’t do much to save him when the lynch mob came.”

  “Moses, you’re talking about Zeus, huh?” Nate Levy said.

  “Zeus was a good man, did right by folks. Did right by me. He never done bad, no.”

  “He was sure a good man,” Nate said.

  “Then why did the white peoples kill him?” Moses said.

  “Because he was a black man, I guess.”

  “I’m not in the fight business no more.”

  “I know you’re not, Moses. You were good, very good.”

  The black man scratched his head. “I got real trouble remembering t’ings, me.”

  “You were talking about Mayor Stout,” Nate said.

  “Mayor Stout, yes. Nobody notice black folks who work at City Hall, but black folks hear t’ings. They say Mayor Stout went home early day Zeus was killed. He lef’ a poor ol’ white man in charge. Poor ol’ white man couldn’t stop them vigilantes, no.”

  “Why would Mayor Stout do that, Moses?”

  “’Cause he was paid. That’s what black folks say.”

  Moses Johnson picked up his battered hat and got to his feet. “I fergit why I came here, Mr. Levy.”

  Nate smiled. “Perhaps you need a loan, Moses.”

  “Yeah, I t’ink that’s what it was, me.”

  Nate gave the man ten dollars and said, “Until your next payday.”

  “I don’t know when that be, Mr. Levy,” Moses said.

  “Oh, I’m sure it will be soon,” Nate said.

  Moses shuffled to the door then said, “I was class one time, wasn’t I, Mr. Levy?”

  “One of the best, Moses. You had fast feet and a killer right hand.”

  Moses lifted a huge fist and grinned. “Yeah, now I remember.”

  * * *

  When Nate Levy pulled the handle of a brass pulley contraption it rang a jangling bell inside the mayor’s house. A couple of minutes passed before the door opened and the vast figure of Harry Stout stood in the doorway. Behind the man Nate caught a fleeting glimpse of a young woman wrapped in a sheet running from one room to another.

  Horny Harry beamed. “Well, well, Mr. Levy isn’t it? My door is always open to Children of the Book and I wish others would do the same. Unfortunately I’m rather busy with city business at the moment, so come back later, tomorrow maybe, or the next day.”

  “Do you always conduct business in a dressing gown?” Nate said.

  “Best to be comfortable, I always say. Now, if you will excuse me.” Stout made to shut the door, but Nate put his thin shoulder against it. “Were you paid to throw my boy Zeus to the wolves, Stout?” he said.

  The mayor’s jowly face fell. “What in the world gave you that idea?”

  “You left City Hall early the day Zeus was dragged out and murdered,” Nate said. “You left an old watchman in charge.” His hand dropped to the pocket of his coat and he came up with the Remington derringer. “Who paid you?”

  Stout stuck his head outside the door and looked around. Then he said, “You’d better come in.”

  Stout, the muzzle of the belly gun sticking into his back, led the way to a room off the main foyer. “This is my parlor,” he said, waving Nate inside. “I think you’ll find it quite comfortable.”

  In the background a woman’s voice called out, “Harry . . . I’m waiting.”

  “I’ll be with you shortly, ah, Miss Jones,” Stout said. He smiled at Nate. “The pressures of business never cease.”

  Nate Levy sat in a chair but he kept the derringer leveled on Stout.

  “I did not betray Zeus,” he said. “The day in question I had to hurry home because I had a . . . business meeting with Miss Jones. I had no idea he’d be abducted from City Hall. It was an outrage.”

  “Why did you leave one old man to guard him?” Nate said.

  “Because such a terrible thing had never happened before, so why would I take extreme steps to keep Zeus safe? I consider the portals of City Hall to be sacred, and up until Zeus was taken they were.”

  “Did you help frame Zeus for the jewelry store murder?” Nate said.

  “No, I did not. I was as surprised as everybody else when he was accused. The testimony of the shop girl was damning.”

  Stout’s replies had a ring of truth and Nate put the derringer away and got to his feet. “Stout, I think you’re a damned scoundrel,” Nate said. “You were derelict in your duty to Zeus and that was why he was murdered. You’re a disgrace to yourself and this city.”

  Stout retreated into bluster but Nate ignored him and walked out of the room. As he opened the front door the woman’s voice sang out, “Horny, honey, I’m getting lonely . . .”

  “And you’re welcome to him,” Nate yelled before he slammed the door shut.

  CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

  Jess Casey was about to commit murder and the whiskey helped ease the pain of what he had to do.

  “Nate, I have to do this myself,” he said, lowering his glass. “You can have no part in it.”

  “You’ll have to live with it afterward,” Nate said. “A cold-blooded killing lies heavily on a man.”

  “You were planning to kill Harry Stout,” Jess said.

  “That urge passed quickly. He’s a buffoon.”

  “For a long time he was my prime suspect,” Jess said.

  “He doesn’t have the brains God gave a goose,” Nate said.

  Jess smiled. “Maybe you should have shot him anyway, out of spite.”

  “Did Luke Short hear what Wilson Tucker told you?”

  “No. He didn’t.” Jess drank more whiskey and said, “My case against Dr. Sun will not hold up in court; his lawyers would dance rings around me.”

  “Afterward, what will you do, Jess?”

  “Leave Fort Worth and find a cowboying job somewhere. I can still fork a bronc.” He smiled. “Even though I no longer have a bronc.”

  Nate glanced at the clock.
“Why midnight?”

  “It seems like a fitting time to murder a man, end an evil. You know, when ghosts prowl and witches fly and all that stuff they have in the picture books.”

  “Did you take Luke Short’s advice?” Nate said.

  “Concerning what?”

  “About loading your gun.”

  Jess rubbed his cheek and grinned. “I’ll never forget it.”

  “Twenty-five minutes to midnight,” Nate said.

  “I know. I’m watching the clock. I liked him, you know. I thought Dr. Sun was a fine man.”

  “It’s easy to be wrong about people. I was wrong about Harry Stout.”

  “Yeah, me, too,” Jess said. “I was way wrong.”

  With an air of finality, Jess placed his empty glass on the desk.

  “Nate,” he said, “I may swing for what I’m about to do. If that happens, I’ve left an address in the top drawer here, my sister in El Paso. Sell my traps and see that she gets whatever money they bring. Tell her . . . no, don’t tell her anything. Just make sure she gets the money.”

  “Count on it, Jess,” Nate Levy said.

  “I’m beholden to you, Nate.”

  Jess got to his feet, let out a couple of notches in his cartridge belt and lowered his holster. “Wilson Tucker said I wear my gun too high,” he said.

  “I guess he was the expert,” Nate said. “Only now he’s dead.”

  * * *

  Nate Levy followed Jess out of the office and onto the boardwalk. There was a halo around the moon and coyotes yipped in the brush country. Somewhere close a woman cried out in her sleep and an alarmed dog barked then fell silent.

  Nate watched Jess Casey walk away from him, the sheriff’s big-roweled Texas spurs ringing. “Hey, Jess,” he said, “you step out like a puncher.”

  Jess walked on.

  “Did you know that?” Nate said, louder this time as the distance between them grew. Again Jess made no answer, and Nate whispered, “Good luck, cowboy. Good luck to both of us.”

  * * *

  Lamps burned in the home of Dr. Sun and when Jess Casey stood at the door he smelled the fragrance of burning incense from within. He tried the handle but the door was locked. Jess rapped hard three times, imagining that it must sound like the official knock of a lawman.