Dark Trail

by Ed Gorman

  “I’ll tell him I’ll give him just one more chance.”

  “Umm-hmm.”

  “No call to get sarcastic.”

  “I’m not getting sarcastic. I’m just saying you’ve given him one last chance a lot of different times.”

  “But this time he’ll understand.”

  “Why this time?”

  “Because he’s getting older, Leo. He’s got to understand that. A girl like Beth . . . if Ben Rittenauer can’t hold her, how can Frank hold her?”

  “I wouldn’t bet Frank believes that.”

  They were back at her hotel. The lobby was filled with geezers reading newspapers and The Police Gazette, smoking cigars, and chewing tobacco, which they deposited in impressive brown arcs into tarnished brass spittoons. Pimples of steam covered the front display window.

  “You’re really a good friend, Leo, and I appreciate it. Sometimes I wish I hadn’t—”

  But he put his hand to her soft warm lips and stopped her from saying it. He knew she didn’t mean it—it was just the moment and her grief speaking—and in some way it would be painful to hear her say it, so he stopped her.

  “You get some sleep,” he said.

  “That Hollister.”

  “I was thinking about him, too.”

  “Wonder how he knows Frank.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “And he even knew my name.”

  “I noticed.”

  “What do you think he wants?”

  “I don’t have any idea.”

  “You’ll tell me?”

  “I will.”

  “You promise?”

  “I promise.”

  “Maybe I should never have left you, Leo.”

  So she’d said it after all.

  “You go get some sleep, Sarah.”

  “You’d never treat a woman this way.”

  So he leaned over and kissed her on the cheek and said, “Just try and relax a little, Sarah.”

  “Leo, I—”

  “Really,” he said. “Just relax.”

  And then he was gone, footsteps in the gloom moving briskly toward the saloons and taverns along the river.

  At ten o’clock Guild walked into the Swenson Tap Room. The lights ran to kerosene lanterns, and the atmosphere to the kind of leather-seated opulence the more successful drummers not only enjoyed but insisted on. The place was only a few blocks from the depot and likely did a lot of business with travelers. There was a man in a dark and conservative suit at a piano. A woman with high-piled hair and a nice bosom framed in a low-cut dress greeted Guild as he came in. There was nothing coy about her. Her smile was pleasant, perhaps even sincere, but utterly without sexual promise, and Guild admired her for that.

  When he told her he was looking for Hollister, she nodded and led him to the back of the place where a large booth was hidden behind massive burgundy-colored drapes. She parted the drapes and peeked in, saying, “Mr. Guild is here.”

  A low, masculine voice rumbled something. She closed the drapes and looked up at Guild. “Could you give them a minute?”

  “Sure.”

  “Thank you.” She nodded to the front door. “I need to get back.”

  Guild nodded. She left.

  He stood there looking over the place—the huge cloud of smoke that had settled in the center of the room, the nicely dressed clientele, the pinochle game going on over in the corner. He did not belong in a place like this. It brought to mind the fact that he was by trade a farmer and rancher and now bounty hunter, that he was not educated well and did not always dress well. He felt ashamed of himself and then angry at himself for feeling ashamed. If Hollister had not invited him, Guild would never have come into a place like this.

  The curtains parted. Two men sat at a round poker table. One was Hollister. The other was a tall, white-haired man with a long white mustache and pitiless blue eyes. He wore a gray suit that lent him the air of a Confederate general. He was probably forty.

  He sat there quite frankly taking Guild’s measure. Guild couldn’t tell if the man was impressed with what he saw. He was the sort of man you’d never know anything about unless he chose to tell you, and that wasn’t very likely.

  Hollister said, “Mr. Guild, this is Tom Adair.”

  Adair put a long arm out. Guild shook his hand. The man had a strong, dry grip.

  “And you’re drinking what, Mr. Guild?” Hollister asked.

  “A shot of whiskey and a schooner would be fine.”

  “Any particular brand?”

  “Whatever they’ve got.”

  Hollister’s eyes showed a kind of amused tolerance for Guild.

  Once they were all seated and the barmaid had set their drinks in front of them and drawn the curtain, Hollister said, “Do you know who Tom Adair is, Mr. Guild?”

  Guild looked at Adair. “I’ve heard the name. But right off I couldn’t tell you where.”

  “Richest man in this river valley,” Adair said. “I have farms, two bauxite mines, several retail stores, and a half interest in the short-line railroad that serves this state and the four contiguous states. I also have a lot more, but I’ve probably done a pretty good job of impressing you already, haven’t I, Mr. Guild?”

  There was no hint of irony in the man’s voice.

  “You’d think so, wouldn’t you?” Guild said.

  Tom Adair leaned forward. There was something predatory about his face up close in the glow of the Rochester lamp. “I also have a lot of important friends.”

  “I’m sure you do.”

  As if he were a vaudevillian taking over his part of the act, Hollister asked, “Have you ever studied history, Mr. Guild?”

  “Not as much as I should have.”

  “Well,” Hollister said, “if you ever read about the Roman emperors, you’ll find that they all had one problem in common.” Guild didn’t say anything. Hollister looked at Adair and then continued. “They had a difficult time keeping their friends—and all the other citizens of Rome—amused. You’re familiar with the Coliseum and the games?”

  Guild nodded.

  “Well, during the reign of each emperor, the citizens and friends of the court got bored with the games and demanded new pleasures.”

  “I see.”

  “Have you ever heard of Tiberius?”

  “I’m afraid not.”

  Adair took over once more from Hollister. “He had a particularly bad problem, Mr. Guild. His palace courtiers were so bored with the games that they began to dislike Tiberius personally. He had to come up with something that was really unique.”

  Hollister said, “So that’s why he came up with the idea of the bear and the baby.”

  “The bear and the baby?”

  “He’d have his soldiers capture great black bears from the mountains and then bring them to Rome.”

  Guild wasn’t sure he wanted to hear the rest of this.

  Hollister continued, “Then he’d gather the elite citizens of Rome along the river’s edge. Before their eyes, he’d have the bears killed in a very brutal fashion, after which he’d have them gutted and laid open.”

  “I see.”

  Adair said, “Not yet you don’t, Mr. Guild. Do you know what he’d put inside the bears?”

  Guild said nothing. Knowing what was coming next, he felt sick.

  Leaning even farther forward so that Guild could feel the man’s spittle spray across his face, Adair continued. “He’d take the youngest infants of the palace slaves and have them sewn inside the empty bellies of the bears. The babies were alive inside there. You could hear them crying and screaming.”

  “And then the guards would take the bears and hurl them into the water,” Hollister took over, “and the crowd would watch the bears sink with the babies drowning inside.”

  “And it turned Tiberius’ fortune around. He was known, for the rest of his life, as one of the great games-givers of Roman history,” Adair said.

  Guild knocked his whiskey back. He want
ed to reach across and slap Adair. Hollister was too much of a toady to even bother with.

  “What do you think of that, Mr. Guild?” Hollister asked.

  “I think Tiberius should have been killed. With somebody’s hands.”

  Hollister laughed. “Now don’t go and get moral on us, Mr. Guild. We told you that story for a reason.”

  The barmaid came, and Hollister ordered another round for the three of them.

  When the barmaid had gone, Adair said, “Important people tend to get bored easily, Mr. Guild. They’re too sophisticated to put up with things that would amuse ordinary people.”

  “Tomorrow night there’s a birthday party out at the ranch for Mr. Adair. He’ll be forty-two,” said Hollister.

  “I haven’t been able to come up with any event that would really please my friends,” Adair said. ‘Till now, that is.”

  “What he’s got in mind is a real honest-to-God gunfight held right at the ranch,” Hollister said.

  Adair said, smiling for the first time, “And I’m willing to pay you two thousand dollars to deliver the two men to my place tomorrow night. I’m talking about Frank Evans and Ben Rittenauer, Mr. Guild. And you can tell them for me that the winner gets ten thousand dollars in good Yankee cash. Now how does that sound, Mr. Guild?”

  “Not interested,” Guild said.

  “Not interested?” Hollister said. “In two thousand dollars?”

  “That’s right. Not interested.”

  And with that he stood up.

  “I appreciate the drinks, gentlemen.”

  “You’re actually going to turn down two thousand dollars?” Adair asked.

  “I am,” Guild said.

  “You don’t have to take part in any of it, Mr. Guild. All you have to do is deliver them,” Hollister said.

  “I realize that.”

  “And you still won’t do it?”

  “That’s right,” Guild said, taking a certain pleasure in frustrating two men as sure of themselves as these two. “I won’t do it.”

  “Well, I’ll be damned,” Adair said. “A bounty hunter with scruples.”

  Guild touched his hat in a farewell salute and left.

  Chapter Six

  Ben Rittenauer stood in the street across from the hotel and looked up at the fourth floor window, the one where the desk clerk said Beth and Frank Evans were staying. A kerosene lamp burned beyond the gauzy white curtains, and once or twice he’d glimpsed the silhouette of a woman passing quickly by the window. He’d felt sick and exhilarated alike. Twice a uniformed policeman walked by the comer where Rittenauer stood, taking suspicious note of the stranger standing there.

  It was getting late now. Everything but a few saloons was closed up. Fog in silver tatters floated down the streets. Inside the fog you could hear footsteps on the board sidewalks, and the occasional sounds of lovers laughing about something to each other. A huge clock mounted on a pole outside the jeweler’s chimed loudly at midnight. Far away a single surrey worked its way home, the hoofslaps of its one horse lonely in the silver gloom. The fog made everything dreamy and unreal. Rittenauer stood there staring up at the fourth floor window, having absolutely no idea what to do with not only this evening but with his entire life. Being heartsick made him like this, crazed and frantic in a quiet way.

  The third time he passed by, the policeman said, “You got business here?”

  “I’m just getting some air.”

  “You keep looking up at the hotel.”

  “I suppose I do.”

  “I’d like to know why.”

  Rittenauer sighed. “There’s a woman up there.”

  “Oh?”

  “A woman I know.”

  “Why don’t you go up and see her then?”

  “I can’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “She’s with somebody.”

  The policeman raised his eyes to the fourth floor, third window from the right. The silhouette was there again. Beth.

  “Yeah, she might complain,” the policeman said.

  “Complain?”

  “Look down and see you standing here and complain. You’ve been here a long time. She’s apt to get frightened.”

  The policeman, who had a belly beneath his blue uniform with the smart gold buttons, wore a wide creaking holster and a pair of stylish fawn-pink gloves. He tugged the gloves on tighter now, as if he were going to punch Rittenauer. “You don’t take a hint very well, do you?”

  “Huh?”

  “I’m asking you to move on.”

  “Oh.”

  The policeman stared at him. “Now.”

  “Oh. Right.”

  Rittenauer took one more look up at the window. He felt sick to his stomach. She was so close. In a minute or two he could be at her room. He had so many things to say. Soft and loving things, hard and bitter things. He wanted to hold her and feel her and taste her. He wanted her to be the way she’d been back in the days when he’d been the peacekeeper in the infamous Kansas City saloon where everybody from the Earp brothers to Wild Bill took time to get drunk.

  Being a gunfighter wasn’t in itself lucrative, but when you were a gunfighter of some repute, rich and powerful people always wanted to hire you for something or other. Rich and powerful people seemed to like gunfighters as much as young kids did. You could sit with a rich man and he’d buy you steaks and drinks all night, and maybe even get you a woman or two. Just as long as you kept playing hard at being the tough and fearless gunfighter he wanted you to be. You never told him about the night before a gun-fight, how you paced and prayed and sweated, or about the aftermath sometimes, how you couldn’t quit shaking till way into the next day. They wanted to believe that you were brave and fearless, and so that’s how you played it for them.

  “You hear me?” the policeman said. “About moving on?”

  Rittenauer, moving his gaze from the window to the policeman’s doughy, middle-aged face said, “I hear you.”

  And then Rittenauer, too, was just invisible footsteps on the board sidewalk in the silver floating fog.

  He didn’t even really look at the place or anybody in it while he downed three shots of whiskey and two glasses of beer. When he saw that one drunk was in the process of recognizing him, he turned his face away. He was in no mood to amuse hayseeds with tales of gun battles.

  Rittenauer was in the place an hour. He didn’t feel any better when he left but he did have an idea anyway. Tonight, this very moment, he was going to speak his piece, and if Beth didn’t like it or Frank Evans didn’t like it, he didn’t give a damn.

  He walked straight over to the hotel.

  Except for an old man sleeping in a chair, the lobby was empty. The young desk clerk was reading a magazine when Rittenauer walked past.

  The desk clerk looked up. “Hey.”

  “Pardon me?”

  “You got business upstairs?”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “What sort of business?”

  “Seeing a friend.”

  “What friend?”

  Rittenauer walked over to the desk. “Son, do you know who I am?”

  “No.”

  “Good.”

  “Good?”

  “Yes. Because if you did know who I was, you wouldn’t be taking that tone with me.”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t, huh?”

  “No, you wouldn’t. I’m Ben Rittenauer.”

  And it worked. Just like that it worked. Rittenauer didn’t even have to drop his hand to the .44 strapped around his waist. He just spoke his name and watched the reaction.

  “You really are?” The desk clerk now sounded as young as he looked.

  “I really am.”

  “I’ll be dogged.”

  “Now I’d like to go upstairs if you don’t mind.”

  “All I ask is you don’t get me in trouble. Don’t shoot anybody or anything.”

  “Right.”

  “I’m really glad to meet you, Mr. Rittenauer.”

  “
Right.”

  Rittenauer went upstairs.

  Beyond the doors were the sounds of coughing, of nightmares, of snoring. Beyond the doors drummers lay lonely, long-married couples lay sleeping with a familiar hand planted fondly on a familiar hip, and young married couples lay making love. He felt separate from all this. He had his anger now, his need to tell her everything that was constantly exploding in his head and heart.

  He found their door and put his head to it and listened. And heard nothing. They were sleeping.

  He wanted to ease open the door, go in there and slap the hell out of Evans, and then take her by the arm and drag her down the stairs and out of this place forever.

  His hand touched the doorknob. Started to turn it. His heart hammered. He was eager to get inside.

  And then he heard the footsteps creaking down the hall. He turned to see this slender and very pretty woman standing there. She had an odd, almost crazy smile on her face and she said, “I see we both got the same idea.”

  “Ma’am?”

  “Go in there and tell them what we think of them. Make them just as miserable as they’ve made us.”

  “Ma’am?”

  The woman took a few steps closer to him. “You’re Ben Rittenauer. I’m Sarah Evans. I’m Frank’s wife.”

  “Oh,” he said. “Oh.”

  Chapter Seven

  Guild was halfway back to his boardinghouse when he heard footsteps coming up fast behind him on the board sidewalk. He touched his hand to his .44, ready to draw and fire if necessary. The fog, thick and chill, unnerved him.

  “Mr. Guild! Mr. Guild!”

  The footsteps got faster. He could hear an overweight human being panting now from exertion. From the fog there emerged the shape of Adair’s hired man, Hollister.

  Hollister got his hand on Guild’s shoulder and slowed him down. Hollister’s chest was heaving so hard, Guild was afraid the man was going to have a heart attack.

  “Mr. Adair thinks we misjudged you,” Hollister panted, swatting silver fog from his face the way he would gnats. In the shadows from the streetlight, Hollister’s face looked fat and sweaty.

  “He does, huh?”

  “He said that he didn’t know you were a man of honor.”