by Matt Braun
“Defend yourselves.”
Richter backed away, hands thrown up as if to ward off bullets. Johnson’s hand snaked inside his coat and came out with a stubby bulldog revolver. Hickok was a beat faster, leveling a Colt Navy even as he cocked the hammer. He fired two shots in rapid succession, the roar reverberating off buildings. The slugs struck Johnson over the sternum, not a handspan apart, and he buckled at the knees. He toppled off the curb and into the gutter, the revolver slipping from his grasp. His eyes rolled back in his head.
A short distance downstreet, Richter ducked into an alley. Hickok rushed forward, flattened himself against a storefront, and cautiously looked around the building. The alleyway was black as a tunnel, the far end dimly illuminated by lamplights from the next street over. He saw Richter, a shadow against the fuzzy aureole of light, sprinting headlong for the opposite end. He sighted and fired, the bullet whistling harmlessly through the night. Richter disappeared around the far corner.
Hickok started to follow. Then, aware that the gunshots would draw the police, he turned away from the alley. He couldn’t afford to be arrested, much less explain to a court the convoluted tale of why he’d killed a man. His overriding concern remained the safety of the children.
He hurried off toward the hotel.
* * *
The depot was mobbed with an early morning crowd. The train for New York was scheduled to depart at seven o’clock, and people waiting to board were already congregated on the platform. Cody and Hickok, with the children in tow, threaded their way through the crush. Their passage drew stares.
Hickok was attired in a handsomely tailored Prince Albert frock coat. A brocaded vest and striped trousers were set off by a colorful tie and a diamond stickpin. He wore a scarlet embroidered silk sash around his waist, with the brace of ivory-handled Colts carried crossdraw fashion. He looked somewhat like an armed peacock.
Cody was himself a dashing spectacle. His bone-white buckskin jacket was decorated with fringe and elaborate quillwork. A royal-blue shirt and gaily colored kerchief complimented the outfit, with nankeen trousers stuffed in the tops of dark oxblood boots. His Colt Army was carried in a holster at waist level.
Earlier, when they arrived at the station, Cody had again booked space on a parlor car. Their dapper attire, and the children’s animated manner, attracted the conductor’s eye. He personally escorted them on board, insisting a porter take their war bags, and got them settled in their compartment. The train pulled out a short time later.
All morning Hickok had kept a wary lookout for Richter. He and Cody were in agreement that they couldn’t let their guard down. So long as Richter was alive, the children were still in imminent peril. Yet, for all their watchfulness, they’d seen nothing of Richter in the station or among the passengers on the platform. They were nonetheless convinced he’d somehow managed to board the train.
Last night, after the children were asleep, Hickok had related details of the fight. Cody already suspected someone was dead, for he’d heard three gunshots as he rushed Katherine and Augustus into the hotel. Upon learning that it was Johnson, he had expressed concern that their problem was far from solved. Richter was a formidable adversary, a zealot of sorts, staunch in his resolve to kill the children. His narrow escape would hardly deter him from another try.
Some miles east of Chicago, Hickok got to his feet. He commented that he needed a smoke, trading a hidden look with Cody. Outside the compartment, he moved through the passageway and proceeded to the first passenger coach. Every seat was full, and he methodically searched the faces as he walked along the aisle. There were five coaches on the train, and he went through each on like a hunter patiently stalking prey. He found Richter in the last seat of the last coach.
There was no one sharing Richter’s seat. He kept his hands in plain sight, nodding to Hickok. “Won’t you join me, Mr. Hickok. Perhaps it’s time we had a talk.”
Hickok stopped in the aisle. “What’s there to talk about?”
“Let me ask you a question. Are you a wealthy man?”
“Get to the point.”
“You have something I want,” Richter said. “I’m willing to pay quite generously for an exchange.”
“Yeah?” Hickok said without inflection. “How much?”
“Ten thousand.”
“Lot of money.”
“Enough to put you and Cody on easy street.”
“What makes those kids worth so much? Why you after ’em anyway?”
“I’m not at liberty to say.”
“Guess that’s your tough luck.”
“What?”
Hickok took him by the collar. Richter tried to resist and Hickok jerked him into the aisle and waltzed him to the rear door. Outside, on the observation deck, Hickok grabbed him by the collar and the seat of his pants and bodily threw him off the train. Richter hit the roadbed on his shoulder, tumbling head over heels, and rolled to a stop in a patch of weeds. He lay motionless as the train chugged eastward.
The conductor slammed open the door. “What in God’s name happened?”
“Would you believe it?” Hickok said guilelessly. “That feller hadn’t bought a ticket.”
“How do you know that?”
“Why, he told me so himself. He was so ashamed, he just up and jumped off the train.”
The conductor gawked. “Why on earth would he jump?”
“You know, it’s funny, he never said. Some folks are mighty strange.”
Hickok left the conductor to ponder the riddle. He walked back through the coaches and stepped into the compartment. Cody looked up with a quizzical expression.
“Enjoy your smoke, Jim?”
“There you go again, slipping up on names. You got to remember I’m the one and only Wild Bill.”
Cody chuckled. “I take it you had yourself a good time?”
“That little problem we was talkin’ about?” Hickok said. “We won’t be bothered with it no more.”
“You handled it, did you?”
“You shore as hell got that right.”
“Honestly!” Katherine admonished prettily. “Why do you curse so much, Wild Bill?”
“Well, Kate.” Hickok knuckled his mustache. “I reckon it’s the bad company I keep. Buffalo Bill taught me all the wrong words.”
“But he almost never uses curse words.”
“You just ain’t been listenin’ real close.”
“Who cares!” Augustus laughed happily. “We’re on our way to New York!”
Hickok grinned. “Gus, we’ll have you there in no time.”
CHAPTER 13
THE TRAIN arrived in New York on January 29.
Grand Central Station was a sprawling five-acre complex that served over a hundred trains a day. The railyard was covered by an immense overstructure of iron sheds, the most spacious enclosure on the North American continent. New Yorkers were quick to boast that it rivaled London’s St. Pancras as the largest train station in the world.
Hickok and Cody stepped off the train with the children. Augustus was practically hopping with excitement, and Katherine was radiant, hardly able to contain herself. Their long ordeal on the Orphan Train, and their adventures on the Western Plains, were now at an end. Their protectors had brought them once again to Manhattan Island. They were almost home.
Ned Buntline and Texas Jack Omohundro were waiting on the platform. Buntline was a short, stout man with a game leg and a winning smile. He limped forward like a toy soldier no longer in good working order. Texas Jack was a leathery, rawboned plainsman with a soupstrainer mustache. A former scout, he was close friends with both Cody and Hickok.
“Welcome, welcome!” Buntline said with a moon-like grin. “How was your trip?”
Cody accepted his handshake. “Ned, it’d make the best dime novel you ever wrote. This here’s Bill Hickok.”
“Indeed?” Buntline said gleefully. “Wild Bill Hickok in the flesh. You are just as I imagined you, Mr. Hickok.”
Hic
kok nodded. “Glad you got what you expected, Mr. Buntline.”
“Call me Ned!”
Cody and Hickok warmly shook hands with Omohundro. He ducked his chin at the children. “Who’s your friends?”
“Katherine and Augustus,” Cody said proudly. “These youngsters are long on grit, Jack. I’ll tell you about it on the way to the hotel.”
“Hotel?” Katherine echoed. “Aren’t you taking us home, Buffalo Bill?”
“Well, not just yet. Wild Bill and me got a couple of things to check out first.”
Her face crumpled. “But we want to go home.”
“Kate, listen to me.” Hickok gently touched her shoulder. “You remember the man that was after you and Gus? We’ve got to make sure he don’t have friends waitin’ for you here in New York. You understand me?”
“I think so.” Her bottom lip trembled with fright. “Would they try to steal us again?”
“That’s a chance we ain’t gonna take. We’ll have a talk with your folks and see what’s what. No need to rush into things.”
“Wild Bill knows best,” Augustus chimed in. “Him and Buffalo Bill have brought us this far. You have to trust them, Katie.”
“Oh, Augustus, you’re such a ninny sometimes. I trust them with all my heart.”
“Then everything will be all right. You wait and see.”
Buntline and Omohundro exchanged a puzzled glance. But Cody had promised the story in good time, and they held their silence. Omohundro led the way along the platform as Buntline went into a rhapsodizing monologue about the theater he’d contracted. A few moments later they climbed the stairway from the railyard and entered the main terminal. Hickok stopped in his tracks.
Grand Central Station was the masterwork of railroad baron Cornelius Vanderbilt. The beaux-arts architecture, a mass of brick and granite, was an airy colossus completed in 1871. The central chamber rose majestically, nearly two hundred feet high, with vaulted arches above massive stained-glass windows. The marble floor stretched onward forever and the constellations of the zodiac, gold against blue on the ceiling, gave it a kaleidoscope effect. The impression was not unlike that of a vast amphitheater reaching for the stars.
“Godalmighty,” Hickok breathed, looking upward. “You could put most of Kansas in here.”
Omohundro chuckled. “Floored me the first time I saw it, too. These New York folks, they think big.”
“Jack, it purely beats all. Damned if it don’t.”
“Wait’ll you see the city.”
Outside the terminal they emerged onto Forty Second Street. Buntline had a landau carriage waiting and they squeezed into the enclosed cab. Two blocks over they turned south onto Fifth Avenue and the traffic abruptly became chaotic. The broad thoroughfare, as far as the eye could see, was jammed with wagons and carriages of every description. All of them horse drawn.
Even inside the cab, the air festered with the stench that was unique to New York. A ripe blend of rotting garbage, horse manure, and noxious coal smoke pouring from chimneys. Hickok wrinkled his nose, unable to hold his breath and yet overpowered by the smell. He suddenly longed for the crisp, clean winds of the plains.
“Takes getting used to,” Omohundro said, noting his expression. “Couple of days, you won’t even notice it.”
“Jack, it’d gag a dog off a gut wagon.”
“Well, mostly, it’s all them horses.”
Buntline, like many New Yorkers, was prone to brag on the enormity of the city in all its facets. He merrily recounted the gist of an article he’d read in the New York Times only yesterday. There were forty thousand horses in the city, and every day they unloaded four hundred tons of manure and twenty thousand gallons of urine. He slapped his knee with a ripsnorter of a laugh.
“You can imagine, it keeps the street-sweepers busy!”
“Jack’s right,” Cody remarked. “I’d forgot what it smells like here. Does take getting used to.”
“Yeah, it’s odoriferous,” Omohundro said. “A whiff of fresh air would likely kill me now.”
Texas Jack Omohundro was a Westering man who had come East. By birth a Southerner, he had served with J.E.B. Stuart’s Cavalry Corps during the Civil War. Afterward, he migrated to Texas, where he’d gained his nickname and a reputation as an Indian fighter. He knew Hickok from a sojourn through Kansas, and until last year, he had worked as a scout at Fort McPherson. Cody had talked him into joining the Buffalo Bill Combination.
New York, curiously enough, agreed with Omohundro. One season on the stage seemingly turned a roughhewn plainsman into a citified dandy. All the more important, he had fallen for a beautiful Italian actress and married her in the spring of 1871. When Cody returned to duty at Fort McPherson, Omohundro had elected to remain behind with his bride. He was now a professional actor, appearing in occasional stage plays until Cody came East for the new season. These days, he acted the part of a plainsman.
Hickok thought Omohundro had taken leave of his senses. The idea of forty thousand horses in one town boggled his mind; he considered their daily droppings too great a sacrifice for the love of any woman. Yet, as he stared out the window of the carriage, he was nonetheless impressed by the sheer magnitude of the place.
They drove past buildings seven and eight stories high, so tall he had to crane his neck to see the sky. Three stories was the tallest building he’d ever seen, and now he was looking at structures that towered like mountains. He told himself he was a long way from Kansas.
Too damn far for comfort.
* * *
The Fifth Avenue Hotel was located on the southwest corner of a busy intersection. Broadway angled across Fifth Avenue directly in front of the hotel, and on the opposite side of the street was Madison Square. The landscaped seven-acre square was lined with such fashionable shops as Tiffany’s and F. A. O. Schwarz.
A liveried doorman greeted the carriage. Bellmen rushed to collect the scant baggage, and Buntline led the entourage into the hotel. The lobby was a sea of pink marble, with glittery chandeliers and plush seating arrangements, and an air of decadent opulence. The hotel manager welcomed them with an obsequious smile.
Buntline had reserved a suite for Cody and Hickok. There were two bedrooms, each with its own lavatory, and a sitting room with an onyx marble foreplace. A lush Persian carpet covered the sitting-room floor, and grouped before the fireplace were several chairs and a chesterfield divan. The view from the third-floor windows overlooked Madison Square.
Giuseppina Morlacchi, Omohundro’s wife, was waiting for them in the suite. She was small and svelte, with youthful breasts, a stemlike waist, and nicely rounded hips. Her features were exquisite, somehow exotic and doll-like, with a lush, coral mouth that accentuated her high cheekbones. Her hair was the color of dark sable, and she spoke with a pronounced Italian accent.
“Beeel!” she squealed, dragging Cody into a tight embrace. “We are sooo happy to see you again!”
“Same here.” Cody said with a loopy grin. “You’re lookin’ mighty fine, Giuseppina.”
“Oh, you were always the flatterer!”
Hickok quickly learned that Morlacchi was her stage name. Buntline explained that every Western play required an Indian maiden, and Giuseppina, with her flawless olive complexion, perfectly fit the part. She graced Hickok with a dazzling smile and bold, flirtatious eyes, and he abruptly changed his mind. He thought perhaps Omohundro was wise to stay in New York.
“Pleasure, ma’am,” Hickok said, offering her a courtly bow. “Texas Jack’s a lucky feller.”
“How gallant!” she trilled. “All of you scouting men have such a way with words.”
“Well, ma’am, that’s easy enough where you’re concerned.”
She looked at the children. “And who are these beautiful leettle darlings?”
Hickok smiled. “This here’s Kate and Gus. They’ve been travelin’ with us a spell.”
“Giuseppina, my love,” Buntline broke in smoothly. “We have business matters to discuss. Would
you be a dear and entertain the children? We won’t be long.”
“But of course!” she exclaimed. “I weel tell them a story.”
Hickok laughed. “You might like to hear their story. It’s a real humdinger.”
“Come along, then, we weel all tell stories.”
Giuseppina took the children into one of the bedrooms. Augustus looked smitten by her sloe-eyed sensuality, and Katherine watched her with the alert expression of one woman studying another’s worldly allure. The door to the bedroom closed with Giuseppina’s spirited laughter.
On the way to the hotel, Cody had briefly explained the situation with the children. He dropped into one of the easychairs as Buntline and Omohundro seated themselves on the divan. Hickok stood staring out the widow at Madison Square.
“We got ’em here safe and sound,” Cody went on where he’d left off. “But we’re not just exactly sure how their folks fit into all this. You ever hear of a Henry Morton Stanley?”
“Stanley?” Buntline mused aloud. “I seem to recall there is a Stanley involved with the Guaranty Trust Bank. Old New York money and lots of it. Could be your man.”
“You recollect whether he lives on Gramercy Park?”
“That would certainly be an address for a banker. Gramercy Park is old money and old New York.”
Hickok turned from the window. “I ain’t got the least goddamn interest in what he does for a livin’. We don’t trust nobody till we get a handle on things.”
Omohundro looked at him. “You sound a mite tetchy about these kids.”
“Yeah, I reckon so,” Hickok said evenly. “Bill and me done planted a slew of jaybirds that was tryin’ to kill Gus and Kate. Somebody wants ’em dead awful bad.”
“Planted?” Buntline appraised the word. “Are you saying you killed men to protect the children?”
Hickok shrugged. “No more’n we had to.”
“So what’s your move?” Omohundro asked. “You mean to contact the family?”
“Think I’ll handle that,” Cody said quickly, glancing at Hickok. “You’d barge in like a bull in a china shop. What we need’s a tactful approach. You agree?”