by Ralph Cotton
In a corner of the busy saloon, a guitar, an accordion and a wooden flute played happy fiesta music. On the dirt and tile floor an elderly Mexican showman danced with a scruffy, toothless black bear. The sow bear stood on her hind legs, her thick paws embracing the old man, swaying to the music. A short, ragged striped skirt girthed the cumbersome animal; a string of saliva swung from her rubbery lips, a circle of gnats and flies danced in the air above her bristly ears.
But the music suddenly stopped. The laughter and the gaiety followed, waning to a halt when Bobby Candles and his three bandits filed through the batwing doors and stopped and looked all around. Even the big sow bear turned her dance partner loose and stood swaying deftly, staring at the four newcomers.
“My goodness, men, look who’s here,” Chicago said, peeling the whores from his sides in order to have his hands near the guns in his waist sash.
Candles’ first impulse was to raise his Colt and start shooting. But upon seeing two men in the iron birdcage suspended from the ceiling atop the stairs, he whispered over his shoulder to Dad Lodi, “Easy, now. We’re on neutral ground.”
Lodi and the other two desert bandits eyed the eight-gauge deck guns mounted on the rail of the iron-plated birdcage. “You heard him, fellows,” Lodi whispered in turn to Dorsey and Dirty Foot. “Let’s keep this cordial and polite.”
Chicago’s tight stare eased into a laugh once he realized Candles wasn’t going to make a move under the watchful eyes from the birdcage. “I swear, Bobby Candles, you are a puzzle to me. We waited and waited for you and your sand bandits to show up in Saverine Pass. But you never did!”
“Show up, why would we, Chester?” said Candles. “So you and your men could ambush us?”
“Well, yes,” Chicago said with a bemused shrug. “That was one possibility. The other was, we might have felt bad about all that’s happened and wanted to square things with you.” He shook a finger and grinned. “You seem to always go around thinking the worst of everybody. That’ll ruin a friendship quicker than anything.”
Baldhead Paul, his brain starting to churn from the peyote buttons, said with his crossed eyes a-swirl, “It’s not Chester anymore. It’s Big Chicago.”
“Quiet, Baldhead, eat your buttons,” said Big Chicago. “Bobby is only calling me Chester to aggravate things.” He gestured up toward the birdcage, seeing the two guards staring down intently. “But I’m going to suggest, Bobby, that this is a poor time for us to go drawing guns and shooting one another.”
“I agree.” Candles let out a tense breath and stepped closer, saying between them, “I can put off killing you for the time being.” He patted his lapel. “My men and I are going to relax here, spend Garr’s share of the strongbox money . . .” Garr bristled and almost reached for his gun, but Buddy Short stopped him as Candles continued. “And decide the best time and place to stake you down and skin you like a buck elk.”
“Bobby, Bobby, Bobby.” Chicago grinned and shook his head, undisturbed by Candles’ harsh talk. “I know there’ll be a time when one of us has to kill the other. It’s a natural thing between friends.” He shrugged. “But until that time, let me buy you a drink. I know how thirsty it can get out there, eating my dust day in, day out.”
“No, Chester,” said Candles, pulling a wad of money from inside his coat. He gave Delbert Garr a smug look and said, “Let’s let my former pardner, Delbert, buy us all a drink.”
A bartender wearing sleeve garters strung out a line of clean shot glasses along the bar. He uncorked a bottle of rye as the men gathered closer around Chicago and Candles.
As the bartender filled the shot glasses, suddenly Baldhead Paul let out a loud scream and charged across the floor, his arms spread, his shiny head lowered like that of a charging bull. “I’ll kill that sow!” he shouted. “She never treated me right!”
The two guards in the birdcage stared intently, the big eight-gauge deck guns poised and ready on the cage’s handrail.
“What do you suppose he means by that?” Chicago asked Candles.
“I don’t know,” said Candles, glancing up at the birdcage. “You better give him room.”
Behind the bar the big bartender with the gartered shirtsleeves grabbed a rope hanging from a large brass bell. He jerked the rope vigorously. “Hurry, hurry!” he shouted above the clanging bell, the bawling, snarling bear and its cursing, wild-eyed challenger. “Get your money down! We’ve got ourselves a bear fight!”
Chapter 20
On the floor of the Gold Poke Saloon, the three musicians grabbed their instruments and took shelter behind the piano. The frightened piano player did not retreat. Instead he stood with his back to his keyboard, his arms spread as if to protect the helpless piano from a rolling, thrashing, bouncing mountain of fur, human limbs, discarded boots and ripped clothing.
At one point the big snarling sow, her ripped skirt hanging from one leg, slung Baldhead Paul high into the air, leaving him pinned for a moment on a rack of antlers. The trembling piano player screamed as the enraged sow turned to him, her arms outstretched as if requesting him to accompany her. Along the bar and in a cautious circle, the drinkers cheered and goaded and shook fists full of money, each shouting his support for both Baldhead Paul and his opponent.
“I am not through with you!” Baldhead Paul shouted as soon as the antlers turned him loose and he hit the tile floor.
The piano player let out a sob of relief as the big sow turned toward Paul and caught him in midair as he hurled himself at her.
“Jesus,” said Candles, turning away in disgust, “he can’t leave that damn bear alone.”
“I know,” said Chicago beneath the din of the crowd, the bawl of the bear and the screams of Baldhead Paul, now being mauled on the bloody floor. “Not to speak ill of the man, but it’s hard to conduct serious business with somebody when you can’t even tell who he’s talking to, let alone what he’s apt to do next.”
Candles gave him a look; then his eyes took on a hard glare. “Whatever you’re about to propose, I’m not going for it, Chester,” he said. “I would not trust you with a she-baboon.”
“That’s only prudent of you,” Chicago said with a thin smile. He raised his shot glass and grinned as the bear jumped up and down on Baldhead Paul, using its big paws like fists, batting his head back and forth with each swing. “But you have to admit, you make more money in one week with me than you will your whole short life with those three scrubs.”
“I don’t know about that,” Candles said smugly. “We’re not doing so bad.” He patted the money in his lapel and gave a toss of his eyes around the large saloon. “We’re both frequenting the same fine places.”
“Right, we both are for now,” Chicago said cynically. “But if you’re counting on Garr’s cut holding you over till your next score, you’re as stupid as I think you are.”
Candles grinned and threw back his drink. “My next score might be closer at hand than you think, Chester,” he said. On the bloody floor behind them, Baldhead Paul let out a muffled scream as the big snarling sow held him up, his head squeezed between her paws. Burying his face in her wet, toothless mouth, she bawled loud and long and slung him back and forth violently by his head.
When the bartender first rang the big brass bell, Brady Shay had stepped over, opened the office door a crack and looked down upon the spectacle. “Another nimrod who thinks he can whip anything female,” he said over his shoulder to his brother, Emmen. “We’ve got to tell these whores to quit feeding peyote—else we need to get rid of the bear altogether.”
“Get rid of Old Louise?” said Emmen. “I don’t think so.”
Still cuffed to the chair arm where Emmen had left him, Hatton lay slumped to one side, a long welt from a gun barrel running the length of his jaw. “Maybe we need to think about how Old Louise can help us get our distinguished guest here believing we’ll kill him if he doesn’t do as he’s told.”
“Yeah, how’s that?” said Brady.
“Simple.” Em
men smiled. Holding his cigar scissor-style between his fingers, he blew a reflective stream of smoke. “Instead of us wearing ourselves out, chopping off fingers and making threats, let’s have Old Louise do our work for us.”
“Are you saying that flea-bitten old bear will scare a rich like Hatton getting into up off of his gold?” Brady asked.
“I’m saying it’s worth a try,” said Emmen, “to keep me from bloodying our office again.”
“There’s nothing harder than getting a rich man to turn loose of his money, brother Emmen,” Brady said. “That’s how they become rich to begin with, not turning loose of it.”
“We’ll see,” said Emmen. He opened the office door, stepped out onto the balcony and looked down at the bloody tile floor where the big sow bear stood holding Baldhead Paul upside down, using his face as if it were a mop. Among the hooting and catcalls, Shay called down to the old Mexican, “Edwardo, stop the fight.”
All eyes turned upward to the landing where Emmen stood, cigar in hand. Some of the men started to complain, but a look from Emmen stopped them cold as he pulled back his swallow-tailed coat and let them see the handle of a big Colt at his waist.
“Sí, Senor Shay,” the old man replied. He rushed in with a short quirt and soundly slapped the big sow on her broad rump.
The bear turned in his face and let out a loud bawl. But she shied back from him, dropped onto all four and ambled away a few feet and sat down.
Emmen stared down at the bloody bear and said to the old Mexican, “When she settles down, put her collar on her and bring her up here.”
“Up there, senor?” Edwardo asked, as if not to believe his own ears.
“Would you hear me better if I stick my foot in your face?”
“Por favor! Forgive my stupidity, senor! I will bring her right away!” Edwardo replied hastily. “As soon as I have cleaned the blood off her.”
“Naw, leave all the blood on her,” said Emmen with a grin. “I want to introduce her to a friend of mine.”
Emmen walked back inside and shut the office door. As soon as he was out of sight, the men in the saloon began to argue and curse over the outcome of the halted fight. When one man reached across the bar and grabbed the bartender by his forearm, the bartender gave an upward glance at the two men in the birdcage.
“Stand away from him!” one of the guards shouted down at the crowded bar. On either side of the man, the other customers cleared the way quickly. Jerking free from the man’s grip, the bartender ducked straight down and crawled quickly along the catwalk behind the bar.
“Oh my God!” the lone man cried, looking up at the two eight-gauge deck guns aimed down at him. “Don’t shoot. I meant no harm. I wasn’t going to hurt him. I’m drunk, see? I’m drunker than a damn dog!”
At the end of the bar, the bartender sprang back into sight and called up to the birdcage, “No harm done, Victor. No harm, Ulan. He’s just drunk, like he said.”
“Then get him out of here,” one of the guards called down in a harsh tone.
The bartender ran back along behind the bar, snatched up a billy club and laid a whack across the man’s bare head, sending him crumbling to the floor. “You asked for it, you damn fool,” he shouted down at the knocked-out customer. “You can’t be manhandling a bartender!”
The guards in the birdcage sat down and shoved their swivel-mounted guns away from the bar. Customers sighed with relief and moved back to their places along the bar. A Chinese swamper appeared and dragged the knocked-out man away to the rear door. Two more swampers hurried forward, pulled Baldhead Paul to his limp feet, helped him to the open rear door and gave him a shove into the late evening air, toward a line of rickety plank privies whose rancid odors permeated the night.
One of the Chinese men ran forward with Baldhead Paul’s gun, which had fallen from his holster during the trouncing he’d taken. As he reached out to slide the gun into the holster, Frank Dorsey’s hand wrapped around the gun handle. He said, “I’ll take my pal’s weapon, lest he hurt himself.” He gave a tight grin.
The Chinaman gave him a curious look and rattled something in his own tongue.
Behind the unsuspecting Chinaman, Dad Lodi yanked his long braid up and down roughly and said, “Hey! Get out of here—go boil a dog.”
The two Chinese swampers walked back inside, grumbling in their native language, stepping around the struggling half-conscious drinker the bartender had hit with the billy club.
Leaning back on a stack of wooden shipping crates, Baldhead Paul said through bloody, swollen lips, “I—I licked that bear, eh?” His crossed eyes danced wildly in every direction, the pupils large and shiny in a flicker of light from an overhead lantern.
“Yeah, you beat the hell out of the bear,” said Dad as his fingers riffled through Paul’s ripped and ragged clothes and found one stack of dollars, then another.
“Hey, what are you doing?” Paul asked from within a swirling peyote stupor, his brain badly jarred and addled from the beating.
“We’re taking all your money, Baldhead Paul,” said Lodi. He handed the money over to Dorsey, who stuffed it down into his waist. Dirty Foot stood back, keeping an eye toward the rear door.
“On your feet,” Lodi said to the bloody, bruised, incapacitated gunman. “Take a little walk to the jakes with us.” The two jerked Baldhead Paul to his feet and half guided, half dragged him along the alleyway to the line of privies, farther out of the lantern light.
“What the hell is this?” Paul asked in a dreamy, trancelike voice. “You took all my money . . . ?”
“That’s right. Now we’re going to cut your throat, Baldhead,” Dorsey said close to Paul’s mangled ear. “Then we’re going to leave you back here, let you bleed to death.”
“Oh, I see,” said the hallucinating gunman, offering no further questions on the matter.
Inside the Gold Poke, the drinkers and gamblers had settled back into their vices along the bar and at many green felt-topped gaming tables strewn about the place. As the old Mexican bear handler led the big sow up the stairs to the Shays’ office, a man and a half-naked whore on their way down leaped over the banister to avoid passing the big animal.
“Where the hell is Baldhead?” Buddy Short asked, looking all around the crowded saloon.
Chicago said, “Last I saw him, two Chinks were dragging him out back. They’ll probably throw a bucket of water on him and send him away.”
“Uh-uh,” said the wary outlaw, having none of it. “Baldhead never leaves a place until the drinking’s all done.”
“Maybe all the peyote and mescal have altered his thinking,” said Chicago.
“Yeah,” Candles added, standing beside him, “not to mention getting the hell pounded out of him by a bear.” He laughed and threw back a long shot of tequila from a bottle.
But Buddy Short only gave Bobby Candles a sharp, suspicious stare.
“Relax, Buddy,” said Chicago, seeing the look on Short’s face. He leaned in closer to him and said, “I don’t trust this sumbitch any more than you do. But the fact is, he’s been standing here beside me all along.”
“Yeah, and where’s those ragged-assed sand bandits he’s got riding with him?” Short asked. “You never want to turn your back on them rattlesnakes.”
“That I can’t tell you, Buddy,” said Chicago, glancing around the crowded bar. “I’ll send Russell and Thatcher to take a look for them.”
“Never mind,” said Short, seeing Russell and Thatcher busily drinking and pawing at two half-naked young women at the far end of the bar. “I’ll go look for myself.”
“What’s got your pal Buddy Short stoked up?” Candles asked, liking this position he found himself in. He wondered idly just how many of Chicago’s men his bandits could rob and kill without fear of reprisal.
Chicago stared at him, then said bluntly, “He thinks Baldhead Paul Crane might have run afoul of you and your desert snakes.”
Candles sighed into his tequila bottle and shook his head. �
�It’s disheartening, how little faith some of us have in our fellow man.”
Chicago stared at him longer, closer. “You know, I might have misjudged you, Bobby. You might be the only sumbitch as low-down evil as myself.” He tipped his glass slightly toward Candles as if in a toast.
At the rear door of the crowded saloon, Buddy Short grabbed one of the Chinese bar swampers by his long braid and spun him around. “Hey, you. Did you and another fellow lead my friend out back?”
“You betcha, you betcha.” The Chinaman didn’t understand a word, but he stared and nodded nervously with a fearful smile on his face.
“Bear fight, damn it,” Short said, trying to explain. “Big man, fight bear.” He crossed his eyes in an attempt to describe Baldhead Paul.
“Ah, he!” said the Chinaman, a light seeming to have come on in his head. He pointed to the rear door and said in broken English, “Wit frens, wit frens!”
“With friends, my ass,” Short growled. “Come on. You’re going with me.” He grabbed the frightened man by the nape of his thin neck and stomped away toward the rear door, his free hand clamped on his gun butt.
In the birdcage above the milling drinkers, whores and gamblers, one guard turned and said to the other, “Did you see that? One of Chester Goines’ men just grabbed a Chink and dragged him out the back door toward the privies.”
“These sick-minded bastards.” The other guard let out a sigh and shook his head in disgust. “Nothing they do surprises me.”
“No, that’s not what I meant,” said the guard. “It’s Buddy Short. He had his hand on his gun. He looked awfully mad. What if he kills the little Chinaman?”
“That’s the risk one takes, working abroad,” said the guard. He settled into a straight wooden chair. “We get paid to keep them in line between these walls. What they do in the jakes out back is no concern of mine.”