The third man pulled a Colt and cocked it. "I'll gun you down where you stand if you don't move."
"No, you won't. Not if Gigi wants to get at me first, you won't," Wyoming said. He walked ahead of the man to the door.
Wyoming stepped outside quickly and dodged to one side, bringing up his knee into the groin of the man with the Colt. He grabbed the gun and threw down on all three of them and stepped back inside.
"Stand up," he said coldly and pulled the hammer back on the hand gun. "Looks like this town ain't going to set right with me."
"You won't live long enough to see the sun come up," the man he had kicked in the stomach managed. "You better kill me now, cause I'll get you."
"No you won't," Wyoming said. "You ain't nothing but talk."
"I'll show you—another time."
"Sure."
Wyoming slipped his gunbelt on and picked up the carbine. He threw the Colt on the floor and jammed a shell into the rifle. "Now if you gents will tell me where I can find your friend Gigi I'll go down and see what he wants."
"He's in a restaurant down the street," the carbine carrier said.
"Thanks," Wyoming said. "Now you gents step out of my room so I can lock up."
The men stepped past him, and out the door. Wyoming walked after them, locked the door and followed them downstairs. In the vestibule, just before he entered the lobby, Wyoming put the Colt back in leather and grinned at them. "Go ahead, we'll go see him together," Wyoming said.
He held the carbine up, but not in a conspicuous way and passed through the lobby, dropping the key off at the desk. "Going to eat, Mrs. Crosby. I'm finished with the tub now if you got anybody else wants to use it."
They stepped out of the door and Wyoming followed several paces behind. They passed half a dozen shops, some of them still open in the gathering dusk, and Wyoming glanced in the windows, eyes searching for the man with yellow hair.
The three men stopped short and Wyoming saw they were in front of a well-lighted, fancy restaurant. "After you, gents," Wyoming said. "Just take me right to where he is."
They wheeled into the restaurant and swept past a wide-eyed headwaiter and through the plush gentility of San Antonio's finest eating place, right through to the back and off to the right where the small private dining rooms were located.
The three men stopped before a door.
"Go right in, gents," Wyoming said.
They opened the door and stepped inside, and Wyoming followed them. The room was dark and Wyoming half expected to see food on a table instead of the circular arrangement and the seven men sitting around the green top beneath a single bright lantern light.
"Three aces on top of kings," a man said, and Wyoming saw him pull a pile of chips.
Wyoming saw the big man sitting opposite him. He looked up, and then at the others, understanding flashing across his face when he saw that Wyoming carried the gun and the others didn't.
Gigi Sanoui grinned and then laughed. "I'll send six men next time, cowboy."
The card playing stopped. Wyoming grinned back. "Why don't you come yourself?"
"Holding a hot hand, cowboy," he said. "All right, boys, take off. All I said was get him here, I didn't say how. It's unimportant whether you brought him or he brought you."
Wyoming stepped aside and nodded to each of them as they passed out of the door. Gigi Sanoui stood up and picked up his chips, counted them and shoved them to the dealer. "There's about nine hundred there, Sam. I'll be back later."
He stood up and walked around the table. He offered his hand to Wyoming. "My name's Gigi Sanoui."
Wyoming shifted the carbine to his left hand, still steadied on the big man's middle, and offered his right hand. "Wyoming Jones."
"You eat yet, Wyoming?"
"Nope."
"Join me?"
"Why not?"
"You won't need your guns, Wyoming," Gigi said with a grin. He opened his coat. "See, I'm not wearing mine."
"You took yours off once before. Seems to me you don't set much store by them."
They passed out of the private room into the main room, and Gigi Sanoui signaled to the headwaiter who showed them to a side table.
Wyoming let the man take the carbine, but he didn't remove the Colt. He sat down and stared Gigi in the eye. "Well, Mr. Sanoui," he said, "what can I do for you?"
"Nothing," Gigi said. "You're just the first man that ever put me down and I wanted to see if it was an accident or if you actually did it."
Wyoming frowned. "Is that all that's bothering you?"
"That's all, Wyoming."
"Does that mean I'm going to have to do it again some time?"
"Then you don't think it was an accident?" Gigi asked seriously.
"Man, it ain't the size of a man that counts. You appear to be a pretty smart soldier to me; it's a wonder you ain't figured that out."
"Most people I've run up against used their fists."
"Against you? That's a damn shame."
"Then you don't believe in a fair fight?"
"Do you?"
Gigi laughed. "I've been taking advantage of that for years."
"I know just what you mean. Curly taught me about that code idea a long time ago."
"Who was Curly?"
"My pa—in a way. He raised me when my folks got killed coming west when I was little."
"And now you're just drifting?" Gigi asked.
He held his hands perfectly still on the table. There was no emotion in his face or his eyes. He sat relaxed and stared straight into Wyoming's face.
"No, I'm looking for a man," Wyoming said. The waiter came over and they ordered. "Maybe you know him. You been here long?"
"Three years or so. This is my restaurant."
Wyoming looked around. "Nice. Then you might know who I'm looking for. Name's Arky Steel. Yellow hair, wears two guns and rides a gray horse."
Gigi Sanoui was perfectly still. "I know him."
"Been here recently?"
"I think so, though his type comes and goes often and you never miss them," Gigi said. "What do you want him for? Are you a lawman?"
"No. He killed Curly—and a hell of a lot of other people that believed in that code you was mentioning."
"You going to kill him?"
"Yeah."
"He's fast with his guns," Gigi said placidly. "I've never seen anyone faster or more accurate."
"Does he have a heart?"
"Why?"
"Then I'll stop him. I'll get one in his heart, Mr. Sanoui. If I have to take six to get in one, I'll get it in."
Sanoui had not taken his eyes off of Wyoming's face. "You might have a chance."
"You got ideas where I might find out if he's here in town?"
"I'd be glad to find out for you," Gigi said. "I don't like his kind."
"That's funny. I'd already put you and him in about the same barrel."
"Why?"
"The way you sent those three up after me."
"I was holding a hot hand. I couldn't leave."
"Then what makes you different from Steel?" Wyoming asked.
"I know when to stop pushing a man, when to steal money, his horse or his woman. There's a time and a place for everything."
"That sounds sneaky." Wyoming returned the steady stare of Sanoui.
"Here are our steaks, Wyoming," Sanoui said coldly.
They ate in silence. Neither of them spoke again. Sanoui ordered wine and Wyoming drank half the bottle. They finished off their apple pie and while Gigi Sanoui lit a cigar, Wyoming rolled a cigarette.
"Want a job?" Sanoui asked.
"Doing what?"
"My partner—in this." He waved his hands around the restaurant. "And I have a cattle ranch fifty miles south of here."
"Why would you want me as a partner? I don't have anything," Wyoming said.
"You have something I used to have when I was your age," Gigi Sanoui said. "Some people call it honesty. I call it common sense and a sense of fairnes
s that most people out in this country can't understand."
"Thank you, but all I'll take from you is this steak and the wine and then I'll be on my way looking for that fellow."
"You could be killed."
"I know it."
"I can have Steel found and brought here to San Antonio and you can do anything you like with him."
"No, you don't even trap a rattler. You let him roam and live his way of life—but if he gets in your way you shoot his head off. That's the way it is with people like Steel. I don't guess he knows he's a rattlesnake, do you reckon?"
"No, I don't think he does."
Wyoming stood up. "Thanks for the steak and the offer, Sanoui. Curly would probably tell me I'm crazy as hell turning you down like this. He was always one for grabbing anything that came along. He called it opportunity."
"He sounds like he might have been a good man," Gigi said.
"He was. That's why I have to find my man."
"I'll find out what I can and leave word at the hotel. Eat here any time you want food and can't pay for it. And if you change your mind, look me up. But don't wait too long. I might think I was playing myself for a sucker two weeks from now."
"You're no sucker, Gigi," Wyoming said. "And I'm sorry about the pistol-whipping I gave you."
"It taught me a lesson."
"Mind if I ask what it is?"
"Never think you're the only honest man in the world." Gigi grinned, and they shook hands. Sanoui returned to the card game room and Wyoming walked toward the door.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Wyoming felt the steak and French fries pressing tightly against his belt buckle and the taste of coffee still in his mouth as he stood on the boardwalk and looked up and down the street. He began to move, eyes and ears alert, and walked slowly to the first saloon. He stepped inside and looked around.
"Know a man named Arky Steel?" he asked the bartender.
"Sure."
"Been in here tonight?"
"Ain't seen him for a couple of days," the bartender said. "What'll it be, mister?"
Wyoming turned on his heel and walked out of the bar and back into the street. He studied the faces he passed in the lamplighted darkness, noting the difference in the manner and customs of the people in San Antonio and Dodge City.
He stopped at another saloon. The place was bigger and busier than the first and it took him some time to study the faces of those inside. And when he finally moved to the bar it was ten minutes before the bartender was able to serve him.
"Beer," he said. And when the man came back, he put money on the bar and asked. "Know a fellow named Arky Steel?"
"I do, but I ain't seen him tonight."
"Been around lately?"
"I think he has. Just got in from up north of Dodge."
The man was gone. Wyoming sipped his beer and listened to the talk. There were more women in San Antonio than there had been in Dodge City, and they were much prettier.
He finished the beer and slipped through the crowd of men around the blackjack and poker tables and stepped outside. There was another saloon further up the street on the same side. He headed toward it. . . .
Wyoming visited every saloon in San Antonio before midnight. And by midnight he asked every bartender the same question and got about the same answer. Arky Steel had been in San Antonio, but he had not been around the last few days. There was no way of telling when he would be back.
Back in his hotel Wyoming stretched out on the bed fully clothed and studied the peeling wallpaper on the ceiling. He had turned the light out and opened the window. The noise and the music and the shouts from the bars and saloons drifted up to him in waves, and finally he dozed off.
There was a man in his room. Wyoming slipped the Colt out of the holster easily and aimed it at the man's head. He drew the hammer. "Put on the light and don't make a move," he said coldly.
"Mr. Jones?"
"Turn on the goddam light!" Wyoming said. "I'm tired of people busting into my room uninvited."
There was a movement and the scratch of a match and the glare of the lamp. A shiny dark face stared at him.
"Who are you?" Wyoming demanded. "What do you want in here?"
"Mr. Sanoui sent me, sir," the thin Negro said. "I work for Mr. Sanoui over at the restaurant. He says to tell you Mr. Steel gone down into Mexico after his woman and then he's coming right back to San Antonio. You just sit tight, and Mr. Steel will come back. That's what Mr. Sanoui told me to say to you."
Wyoming lowered the gun and slipped it into his holster. He sat up in bed and pulled out a silver dollar. He tossed it to the old man. "Tell Mr. Sanoui I thank him kindly and I'll be waiting."
"Yessir," the Negro said and slipped soundlessly out of the room.
Wyoming stood up and walked to the window. The lights and the roar of the saloons was going full blast. The moon was down. He judged it to be close to dawn.
He stripped off the new shirt and pulled off the boots. He slid the Colt under his pillow and lay the carbine down alongside of him in the bed. He closed his eyes and went to sleep. Arky Steel would be back, and when he came, Wyoming would be waiting.
There was a light tapping on the door.
"Damn!" Wyoming said. He got out of bed holding the Colt and padded barefoot to the door, flinging it wide open.
"I am sorry to disturb you, sefior."
She was small and dark and full-breasted. She wore a little too much paint and the dress was a cheap imitation of those he had seen on the women in the Sanoui restaurant.
"My name is Rose." She slipped into the room.
"I'm afraid you got the wrong room, Rose," Wyoming said.
She frowned and looked at the room number. "No, it ees number seven. And you look like Señor Wyoming."
"Who sent you?" Wyoming asked.
"M'sieu Gigi gave me twenty dollar and told me I was to see what I could do about changing your mind."
She slipped the dress over her head and stood in her slip. She kicked the high-heeled shoes off, and came toward Wyoming. "What does he want to change your mind for, señor?" she said.
"It's not important," he said. He kicked the door closed and drew her to him with one arm, tossing the Colt to the chair with the other. She smelled of cheap perfume and a little light body sweat, but she was soft and eager. He had forgotten how long it had been.
She laughed deep in her throat when he pulled her toward the bed.
The day broke clear and hot. Wyoming woke up and glanced down at Rose, curled up into a little ball. She looked like a little girl.
Wyoming slipped out of bed and dressed quickly. The streets of the city were quiet except for the distant crow of an old rooster. The sun was yellow and bright. It was going to be another hot day.
"Don't leave me, Wyoming," Rose said, opening her eyes. "It ees too early to leave me."
"I'll be back. You go on to sleep." He winked at her and she stuffed a pillow over her head, snuggling deeper into the sheet.
He felt fine. He felt relaxed. He pulled the Colt out and cleaned it carefully, and then checked the carbine thoroughly.
There was activity in the streets by the time he got downstairs. Mrs. Crosby was poring over her books. She glanced up at Wyoming. "I don't like those girls in my hotel, Mr. Jones."
"Yessum," he said.
"Why didn't you tell me. I could have gotten you a good girl here in the house."
Wyoming grinned. "So you could—"
"Don't say it, boy. There's some things you don't talk about with a lady."
"Yessum," Wyoming said. "I'll pay double."
"No you don't. Not if you're a friend of Gigi Sanoui's. And that is something I can't figure. You pistol-whipped him like he was a growing boy and then he takes you in for dinner and offers you part of the business." Mrs. Crosby's face creased in a frown. "Why don't you take it, boy? There ain't no percentage in going after a no-good like Arky Steel. His kind are worth a nickel a dozen. You must have something if Gigi offered
you a partnership."
Wyoming stared at her in amazement. "How did you know all about this?"
"Can't keep any secrets in this town, son," she said.
"No," Wyoming said with a wry grin. "I see that you can't."
"Your horse is down at the Peso Stables if you want him. That's where all animals of the hotel go," she said. "That's another dollar a day. Good hay and oats and a combing. One dollar."
"You want it all now?" Wyoming asked. "No; you have an honest face."
Grinning broadly, Wyoming stepped out of the door and into the street. The first thing he saw was a man lying face down in the street, tucked up neatly against the boardwalk.
He turned to the street and walked slowly. Huge wagons with hardly room enough for the driver pulled out of the side streets to the cracking and hiyiiing of the drivers. The saloons were closed. The doors, unlike those in Dodge City, were locked and you could not enter. A few drunken cowhands were sleeping it off where they had been dropped the night before by the bartenders and bouncers. Wyoming strode down to Gigi's restaurant and was surprised to find it closed.
"Breakfast is et in the Mexican joint, mister," a man said and pointed toward a low adobe building on the other side of the street. "Them French cooks Gigi's got are so damned particular they won't get up to fry eggs and ham and make grits for us."
The man chuckled at his own humor and waddled on down the street.
Wyoming crossed the street slowly, measuring the distance to the other side as a matter of natural caution and habit, looking for cover should there be a necessity for it. He stepped inside the clean, aromatic-smelling little cafe amid a lively yammer of noise and talk. It paused momentarily while every eye swung to examine the newcomer and then back to their conversation.
He took a seat at a table with two other men, nodded, and ordered breakfast.
The men returned his greeting but did not continue their talk. They kept their heads down and did not look up until they had finished their meal. Wyoming thought nothing of it. They could have been talking business. He turned his attention to food when it arrived and did not notice until he was halfway through that he was sitting at a table, alone, with space for three others, and there was a line of men waiting to sit down. There was less talk than before, too. He turned and looked at the nearest man who had been staring at him. "Howdy," Wyoming said.
Wyoming Jones Page 9