He thought they would have to walk all the way to Kansas City until they found the town lockup at Rusk and 2nd Street. It didn't surprise him that the light burned inside or that the door was open to let out the thick fumes as men smoked their cigars.
"Looks like a hot and heavy poker game in the marshal's office," Kate said. "You want me to ask or stay outside? They don't look like they'd take kindly to anyone interrupting their game."
"Five of them," J.D. said. "Might be a sixth. Can't see for all the smoke."
Kate took a deep whiff of the night air.
"They're boozing it up pretty good, too."
"I'm not waiting for morning." J.D. did some fancy footwork and got through the jailhouse door without banging up the body more than necessary. He wanted the lawman to be able to identify the outlaw he was claiming a bounty on. Morrisey had already seen better days what with getting shot up, bleeding to death and getting tossed out a two-story window in the middle of the night.
"What the hell you got there, boy?" A gray-haired man with a mustache like a set of longhorns dropped his cards on the table, drew his six-shooter and laid it atop the pasteboards to keep the others from sneaking a peek and then stood up.
He was slightly hunched over. One arm moved stiffly, as if the elbow had been broken and never healed. As he stepped around the table, he displayed a noticeable limp. He thrust out his hand and pointed accusingly.
"You, boy. What's the meaning of this? You plug this poor sot?"
"My name's J.D. Blaze, and I'm bringing in a wanted man for the reward." J.D. didn't quite drop Morrisey to the floor, but his energy had drained hiking across town lugging the dead weight. "That's my wife, Kate."
"Ma'am." The marshal nodded in her direction, but he kept his hard gray eyes fixed on J.D. "You kill him?"
"Can't say I did. Another fugitive killed him. An owlhoot by the name of Three-fingers Frank Bell."
The men at the table had been whispering among themselves. Mention of Bell caused a silence so profound J.D. heard the blood rushing in his own ears.
"You ventilate that son of a bitch?"
"Would you like it if we did, Marshal?" Kate stepped around to partially hide her husband. If Bell was considered a prominent, upstanding citizen, there might be gunplay. She had seen Justin Bogardus' reaction to the name.
"Can't say yes, can't say no. Heard tell of him getting involved in matters best not mentioned. Who's the dead cowboy?" He shuffled to the body and prodded Morrisey with his boot toe. "I don't rightly recognize him."
"He's just getting started on the outlaw trail," J.D. said.
"Didn't ride far, now did he?"
"Do you mind if we look through your wanted posters? Zeke Morrisey must be on one of them. Him and Bell robbed the Wichita Falls bank."
"Help yourselves. Me and the boys will keep on playing, if you don't mind."
J.D. shook his head. He was bone tired. He wished the marshal had identified Morrisey immediately to save them the trouble of pawing through a stack of wanted posters printed on stock that crumbled as they looked. Kate already began leafing through an inch-thick pile. He took his share, but he wasn't surprised when they got to the bottom without finding Morrisey's likeness on any of them. What did surprise him was not finding Three-fingers Frank Bell on several. It was as if the two outlaws didn't exist. At least not here in Fort Worth.
"You'll need to telegraph Wichita Falls. Deputy Marshal Henry Davis is the lawman who put us onto the Bell gang."
"I've heard tell of Davis. A good enough man."
J.D. whispered to Kate, "This is the first he's shown that he believes us."
"Then you'll do it?" Kate waved off J.D.'s protest.
"What else can I do? I ain't lettin' him rot inside my office. Drag him on out back. It's cold enough that he won't start to stink 'fore morning."
"We brought Morrisey in. He's your responsibility now." J.D. had a sore shoulder from carrying the body. It offended him to lug it even ten feet farther.
"Fair enough, if this yahoo's a bank robber like you claim." The marshal motioned. Two of the men at the table grumbled but got up and dragged Zeke Morrisey's body out the back way. "You gonna linger while I wait for a reply to the telegram or you gonna do something else?" The marshal glanced at a spare chair, silently offering a spot in the game.
"We'll come back in the morning. Do you think you'll have a reply early?"
"Depends on when the lazy telegrapher over at the Western Union office bestirs his sorry ass. Then it depends on how quick Wichita Falls is returning the 'gram."
"Eight o'clock. We'll be back then. Thank you, Marshal." Kate flashed him a sweet smile, took J.D.'s arm and steered him away.
Outside J.D. stared up at the stars and made a quick guess as to the time. He shook his head. It seemed as if they had been risking their necks forever, but it was hardly two in the morning. So much had happened. Then he took off his hat and slapped it again his leg, disgusted with himself.
"I've overlooked something real important."
"Those slugs you put into Bell's chest. If he didn't die, he'll have to find somebody to dig them out."
"A doctor. We find a doctor willing to tend outlaws, and that's where we will find Three-fingers Frank."
Getting the name proved easy. They asked the night clerk at the El Paso Hotel. A quick trip to their room replenished their supply of ammo and gave them a chance to splash water on their faces to freshen up. Kate changed into her trail clothes, six-shooter hanging again at her hip, then they headed for Doctor Burts' office, not six blocks away.
"Everyone's keeping late hours. I doubt the good doctor keeps a kerosene lamp burning all night long unless he's working on a patient." J.D. slipped the thong off his Colt's hammer. Kate did the same.
"We can spy on him first." Kate pointed to a dirty window that barely let the light escape from the surgery.
J.D. didn't like the idea. Sneaking around all too often gave a view of people that turned his stomach, but this time Kate was right. If they barged in, they might startle the doctor and risk some innocent person's life. Or they could do nothing more than awaken him from a drunken stupor.
He approached the window, then stopped and looked around.
"What's wrong?"
"Maybe nothing. I got the feeling of someone walking on my grave."
"I never liked that expression. It's too...accurate."
He shrugged off the feeling of imminent disaster, edged to the window and rubbed away a patch of dirt to peer inside. At first he didn't see anyone, then a tall, thin man crossed his field of vision. J.D. grabbed for his six-gun but checked the action. Following the man who had to be Doctor Burts came Three-fingers Frank Bell. The outlaw had a gun drawn and leveled on the doctor.
He sank below the window ledge and pressed his back against the wall. Gesturing, he got Kate close enough to whisper an explanation of what he had seen.
"Do we barge in? Bell has to put down the gun when the doctor starts cutting on him. I've never seen a man able to take the pain of a knife digging around in his gut to pull out a bullet and keep his wits about him."
"If he's smart, Doctor Burts will give Bell a slug of whiskey to deaden the pain. Maybe more than a swig—enough to make him pass out." He pressed his ear against the wall. He couldn't make out the words but heard loud cries of pain. "The doctor is starting. Stay here and make sure Bell doesn't get past me."
"He won't if—"
J.D. kissed her to silence her protests. He stood, wiped away more dirt from the window pane and got a better look at the layout inside the surgery. Bell stretched out on a table, with Doctor Burts leaning over him, back to the window. From the way Bell waved his six-shooter around, any entry would be dangerous to not only the doctor but the intruder.
Moving swiftly, he went to the door, grasped the latch and slowly lifted the handle until it clicked open. With a surge, he entered, his six-gun cocked and aimed at Three-fingers Frank Bell.
"Drop it, Bell. Don't
try." He aimed straight at the outlaw, ready to shoot.
"Who are you? I've got an injured man here." The doctor held up a bloody knife. His hands dripped onto his patient.
"I'm the one who shot him." J.D. moved to get a better angle to shoot Bell, should it be necessary. The outlaw groaned and tried to sit up. But in spite of appearing so weak, he didn't drop the six-gun clutched in his hand.
"I'll tend to him, then fetch the marshal. You can't..."
Bell twisted around and fired. The slug went wild. J.D. held his fire when the doctor flopped forward to protect his patient. Then Bell shoved him away. As he did, he fell from the table onto the floor. J.D. got off a shot. Missed.
"I'm taking you in, Frank. You can't get out of here alive."
"If you take me in, they'll hang me. I killed them tellers and customers."
"Where's the gold from the bank?"
The only answer J.D. got was another round from the outlaw's pistol. Behind the table Doctor Burts yammered nonsense. This wasn't going to be his night for saving patients, and J.D. was damned if he was going to give the doctor another patient by letting Bell shoot him.
"Stay down, doc. He's a killer."
"He's a damned bounty hunter out for my hide. I can't let him take me in." Bell got off a couple more shots as J.D. took refuge behind the doctor's desk. Slugs tore into the wood but failed to penetrate. He was safe for a moment—until Bell realized he had to use a hostage to escape.
A quick peek around the side of the desk showed that the outlaw might have been in sorry shape, but his brain still worked. He had crept around the operating table and had joined the doctor. J.D. couldn't let him use the sawbones as a shield. Shouting at the top of his lungs, he leaped up to stand on the desk, giving him plenty of elevation to shoot down behind the operating table. A cold knot formed in his belly. Bell had anticipated the move and had gone in the opposite direction, not using the doctor as a shield. He poked up at the far end of the table.
J.D. saw death coming.
The gunshot startled him. For an instant he wondered how he could have been hit and not feel any pain.
"You killed him! You killed him!" Doctor Burts rolled Bell over, sliding him away from the operating table. The outlaw crashed to the floor. A bullet had entered his forehead and blown out his brains.
J.D. stared dumbly at the gun in his hand. He hadn't fired. He looked around and saw the glass glittering on the floor. The killing shot had come through the window. Hopping down, he rushed to the door and peered out. He sagged when he saw Kate with her six-shooter out.
"Thanks," he said. "You saved me getting ventilated."
"I didn't shoot." She turned and aimed into the night. "The shot came from over there, maybe the roof of that store across the street."
The cold knot returned to his belly. He had been right about someone following them from the hotel. Was it the same man who had trailed them from Wichita Falls to Fort Worth?
Chapter Nine
J.D. stood over Frank Bell's body. The sniper had drilled him squarely in the forehead. It was a hell of a shot or a case of damned good luck. But had the bullet been meant for the outlaw or for the man trying to take him in for his crimes? He turned and looked through the shattered window and lined up where the shooter had to have been. From that distance at night picking a target was damned near impossible unless the sniper was an expert marksman. The shot had come into Doctor Burts' office straight for the outlaw.
"I'll see that he's moved out of your way right now," J.D. said.
"You're turning the body in to the marshal for a reward? I figured he was on the run. Nobody gets a couple bullets in his chest—and another wound on his head—without crossing the law somehow." The doctor settled in a chair and drew out a silver flask. He pulled the cork, took a sip, then said. "He had to be all shot up from a lawman's gun or an outlaw's. That's the way it always is. I never get accidental gunshot wounds. Well, hardly ever."
"He might have been in a bar and gotten shot," Kate said.
The doctor snorted, took another drink, then silently offered the flask first to J.D. and then to Kate. Both declined. He finished off the contents and tucked the flask back into his coat pocket.
"It's not like that. You ever see a gunfight in a saloon?" He eyed both of the Blazes' holsters and the weapons there. "I reckon you have. Then you know drunks spray lead all around and are lucky if they don't shoot themselves in the foot. This one, the one you called Bell, was shot up too neat and clean. Somebody who knew what he was doing put those slugs in him. Was that one of you?"
"I had help from a man he killed. His partner."
"No honor among thieves. I heard you say he was a bank robber. One double-crossed the other, they shot it out and you came on the scene?" Doctor Burts belched, rubbed his eyes and leaned back, staring out the broken window. "Did you shoot him, ma'am?"
Kate shook her head.
"Just another night in Fort Worth. Get this varmint out of my office. I've got living patients due in for appointments in an hour or two. Dead bodies make for terrible advertising."
"Sorry to have troubled you, doc." J.D. grunted when he got Bell's body upright, then heaved and draped him over his shoulder. The twinges in his back would haunt him for weeks. Longer, if they had to ride any time soon.
"At least you killed him before I dug out the bullets. I hate wasting good work."
Doctor Burts held the door as J.D. got outside into the chilly night. Kate followed, then touched his arm.
"He's not going anywhere. Set him down and let's see if we can't figure out where the sniper fired from. It's got to be from the roof of that building."
J.D. carried Bell across the wide street, then dropped him in the alley between stores. He circled the flat-roofed, one-story clapboard store until he found a water barrel and called for his wife.
"Can you get to the roof or do you need a boost?" He lifted her easily to stand astride the rain barrel.
"I can always use a boost from you, big guy. I can also use some help getting to the roof."
J.D. climbed up, balanced on the rim, then cupped his hands for Kate to step in. A mighty heave sent her rocketing upward. Then suddenly all her weight disappeared. She had caught the edge of the roof. Her feet kicked a couple times as she shinnied over. He reared back, judged distances, then jumped with all his strength. His fingers curled on the edge. A bit of scrambling got him to the roof to stand alongside her.
She held up spent brass.
"Our sniper used a rifle."
"That would have been an even more impossible shot with a six-gun." J.D. sighted along and saw the trajectory the bullet had taken to shatter the window and kill Three-fingers Frank Bell. Then he knelt and looked around the roof and found scuff marks where a man had settled down.
"He's got to be agile, not only to climb up here but to get down again without breaking a leg," she said.
"Did you ever consider 'he' might be 'she?'"
"Big-hearted Abby? Did that wisp of a girl look like she had it in her to trail us from the whorehouse to the marshal's office, then over here, climb onto the roof and make what has to be a shot any marksman would be proud to call his own?"
"We don't know anything about her, other than she and Zeke Morrisey were probably in cahoots."
"She looked horrified when I said the two were lovers."
"But, darling wife of mine, she never denied they knew each other. Maybe they were related. Brother and sister?"
"They don't look a thing alike. Even with a step mother or father, there'd be more to their features, but I won't deny it's a possibility."
J.D. scowled. He knew that tone. She disagreed with him in spite of what her lips said. He prowled around on the roof for a few more minutes, finding the cracked edge in the adobe where the sniper had climbed up and then returned to the ground. Peering off in that direction led to the heart of Hell's Half Acre.
"Let's get Bell to the marshal's office, then grab some shuteye until the deputy sen
ds the telegram authorizing our reward money."
"Sleep? That's what you want to do in that fine, big bed in a posh hotel with a naked, willing, wanton woman next to you?"
"It's been a long night."
"I know how to make parts of it even longer," she teased, rubbing up against him like a cat.
And she did.
* * *
"Got to hand it to you folks. You surely are prompt." The marshal rocked back in his chair and hiked his feet to his desktop where grooves had been cut by his spurs.
"Eight o'clock on the dot," Kate said. "I expect you've heard back from Wichita Falls about Zeke Morrisey and the reward on his head. Or have you sent a second telegram adding in Frank Bell to the pile?"
"Well now, little lady, it's like this." The marshal's long mustaches twitched as he talked. He never took his eyes off their gun hands. "I got a 'gram back purty quick from the marshal. He said he ain't seen hide nor hair of his deputy in more 'n a week."
"Since the bank robbery?" J.D. saw how the marshal's hand twitched as he relayed the news to them.
"He didn't say nuthin' 'bout no bank robbery, just that Henry Davis ain't been seen. He lit out like a pack o' devils was on his tail chasin' down a gang of desperadoes. That's what Marshal Fredericks said and nuthin' more."
"So we don't get paid for either Morrisey or Bell?" Kate sidled around and perched on the desk, looking down on the marshal. He moved his feet off the desk and sat a mite straighter so his hand rested closer to the butt of old black powder Remington.
"That's the gist of it, the way I see it."
"You're not paying us for Bell because he works for Justin Bogardus, is that it?" J.D. saw his jibe hit dead center. The marshal suddenly looked as if he had swallowed a mouthful of chili peppers and couldn't get the burning to stop.
"What I think of Frank Bell don't matter much. I'm happy to see him dead, if it comes to that, but I ain't never seen a wanted poster on him. If he's this big bad outlaw you claim, he done all his thievin' outside of Fort Worth. The law here ain't got a quarrel with him." The marshal pushed back and moved his hand closer to his pistol. "Truth is, I ain't hankerin' to tell Bogardus one of his own's been gunned down."
Blaze! Hell's Half Acre Page 7