Benedict and Brazos 2

by E. Jefferson Clay

  “I don’t know a damned thing about California Nick, other than I don’t trust him.”

  Brazos shrugged. “That don’t surprise me none.” He started to move off, then paused. “You hear anythin’ of that jasper of yours that’s been missin’? Harmer, ain’t it?”

  “Nothin’,” Briskin said glumly. “Harmer’s plumb vanished.”

  “You got any idea of what might have happened him?”

  “Some.”

  “But you ain’t tellin’?”

  “You’re dead right.”

  “Well, if you change your mind …”

  “I won’t.”

  Brazos shrugged, snapped his fingers at Bullpup and went off to the jailhouse. Striding in, he came to a dead halt. His chair was occupied. Plenty occupied.

  Dutch Amy’s homely pan creased in a way that those who knew her meant she was smiling.

  “Well, there you are, big boy. We been waitin’ for you.”

  Pretty Boy Tyler lounged against the wall.

  “How’s it comin’, Brazos?”

  “Sheriff Brazos to you,” he growled, tossing the man his hat. “Hang that.” He’d whipped Tyler along with the others the day he’d come to Harmony, and he liked people to remember who was boss.

  Tyler sulked but took care of the hat. Brazos propped a big boot up on a chair and leant back against the wall.

  “Somethin' I can do for you, Dutch?”

  “The other way around,” Dutch Amy replied, crossing her big boot-encased feet up on the desk and rolling an unlit cigar across her mouth. “All right, Pretty Boy.”

  Tyler took a packet from his jacket pocket and passed it to Brazos. He opened it, found it contained a hundred dollars.

  “What’s this?”

  “Pay day,” Dutch Amy supplied.

  “But I ain’t been here a month yet.”

  “Mebbe you ain’t, but I don’t mind tellin’ you as how I’m mighty pleased with the way you’re runnin’ things, big boy.”

  “Yeah,” Pretty Boy put in, “you sure enough got them miners walkin’ small, Brazos.”

  “Sheriff Brazos.” The blue eyes cut back to Dutch Amy. “I’d like to know what’s eatin’ them miners, Dutch. They hate my guts on account I work for you. Why they got such a grudge agin you?”

  Dutch Amy’s expression hardened. The big boots dropped to the floor.

  “That ain’t no concern of yours, big boy. You just go on doin’ your job the way you’re doin’ it and don’t fret too much over nothin’ else.”

  Had he caught a hint of a threat in Dutch Amy’s tone? Brazos wasn’t too sure. He wasn’t about to buck even if there was. Running the purse strings always gave somebody a few privileges.

  “Just curious, Dutch,” he said mildly.

  “Yeah, well, curiosity is somethin’ you can do without in Harmony,” the woman said, heading for the door. “Just remember that and you and me are goin’ to get along just fine.”

  Brazos stood where he was until they’d both gone, their steps fading away to silence on the walk. Then he took out the wad of bills, fanned them and grinned. Nice work if you could get it.

  Stuffing the money away and realizing he was hungry, he quit the jailhouse and went along to the Hash House and got himself a man-sized steak. After that he went to the hotel, took a leisurely tub and changed into fresh gear before taking a turn of Main. He spent some time at the Green Room watching Benedict and Christian playing poker as if their lives depended on it, then patrolled the streets. It was Friday night and the town was jumping and he was kept busy until around nine when he was able to take the time off at the Red Dog for a badly-needed beer.

  He was halfway through his first drink when the bad news arrived from Whipple Creek.

  Heck Harmer had finally been found floating face down in the creek with eight bullet holes in him.

  “Well, he weren’t a bad boy,” Preacher Pete Maxwell avowed over the remains, as if expecting some argument. “And he always went sparin’ on the likker, and wild wimmen was outside of his territory as I recall.”

  The preacher wasn’t recalling any too good tonight. Heck Harmer had been a boozer and wencher of some proportions in his palmy days and the only reason he had curtailed these activities in recent times was the dire shortage of cash money.

  But Heck Harmer was dead and gone with eight six-gun bullets in him, and nobody was going to argue a technical point with the preacher. Encouraged by the silence of the crowd of shabbily-dressed men and women who’d filled the Harmer house to pay their last respects to Heck, Maxwell filled his skinny chest with air and went on:

  “I never seen him at Sunday service all that often as I recall, but that don’t mean to say he weren’t a good man. Matter of fact, when I see his wife Lizzy weepin’ here beside his poor mortal remains and I look into her good honest womanly face and see her grief, why, I know that Heck Harmer was a good man. A good man cut down in his prime by some dirty murderin’ varmints whose names we don’t rightly know.”

  “We got a fair goddamn idea,” spoke up the voice of Mick Briskin standing by the wall.

  “No, hesh now, Mick, hesh,” Preacher Maxwell admonished, holding up a finger. “Let’s have no cussin’ while the last words are bein’ said over poor Heck.”

  Mick Briskin hushed. But the worthy Mrs. Harmer burst into a fresh flood of wailing which set off the rest of the women and the preacher couldn’t get a word in anyway. So he just stood with hands folded and wearing his most solemn expression and looking down at the deceased.

  They’d laid Heck out on the living-room table with another table brought in from the kitchen to support his feet. Despite all the holes and several days’ immersion he still managed to look aggressive. Somebody had wanted to cover up the blood and the bullet-holes but Mick Briskin had told them to leave him lay so everybody could see just how brutally Heck had been done-in. Heck had been one of the stalwarts of the Whipple Creek settlement, and the discovery of his corpse had aroused the miners, widening the stream of anger that ran through their lives.

  Finally the women hushed and Preacher Maxwell finished off with a tidal wave of flowery oratory, anointed the remains with some coal oil then went off to stuff himself on chitlins and speckled gravy. In ones and twos over the next half-hour the mourners lost interest and drifted away until only Mick Briskin and the worthy widow were left. Mrs. Harmer yawned, scratched and grunted for some ten minutes further and then, totally worn out by spectacular grief, went inside to bed.

  Briskin stayed on as the camp fell still and quiet outside until there was only the wind and the deep rush of the river to be heard. Anybody coming in through the open doorway might have thought he was mourning, but the old man was only thinking. Maybe it was time to pull up stakes, he was brooding. Maybe it was time to stop trying to figure out why Two-Bar was trying to drive them off their lease, and to just get gone. Heck Harmer had been a tough man. If Heck could get killed thataway, why, there wasn’t a man who was safe on Whipple Creek ...

  He must have dozed sitting in the rocker in a corner, for the next thing he knew a familiar giant figure had appeared from nowhere to stand looming in the doorway.

  “Howdy do, old man. Heard as how Harmer showed up, so I come out to take a look at him.”

  Briskin blinked. “Brazos!”

  Coming out of his shock, Briskin jumped off the stool, bony fists clenched. Brazos held up a warning hand.

  “No call to get steamed up, old man. I come in quiet and peaceable, and that’s the way I aim to go out. Now what do I do? Bang you over your hard old head with my Colt and take a look at Harmer, or you act sensible and just leave me look at him? Either way makes no never mind to me.”

  Briskin glared at his unwelcome visitor for long moments, then suddenly slumped at the shoulders. The day seemed to have been forty-eight hours long. He was feeling every one of his sixty-eight years and he just didn’t have the energy to wrangle with this young hardhead.

  “All right, all right,” he
sighed, letting his work-worn hands drop limply to his sides. “Look all you damn-well want. Hain’t nothin’ but a dead man fer you to see.”

  Eight – The Right Kind of Law

  Benedict awoke at the gambler’s hour of noon with the realization that somebody was standing over him. His hand snaked under the pillow and closed over the white-boned handle of his .45 before he realized it was only the maid.

  “Annabelle! What the ...?”

  “Oh, Ah’m sorry, Mistuh Benedict, suh,” the girl blushed. “Ah ... didn’t wake y’all, did Ah?”

  Benedict slid the gun back and smiled. With the window behind her, Annabelle’s lushly-curved young body was clearly outlined through the thin cotton of her working dress. He’d suspected before that the nubile Southern belle didn’t wear anything under her dresses. Now he was sure of it.

  He patted the bed beside him. “Sit down, Annabelle.”

  “Oh, Mistuh Benedict, Ah shouldn’t,” she said, and promptly sat down anyway, smiled guiltily. “Ah could lose mah job ...”

  Benedict touched her plump arm and felt her tremble. “What were you doing just then, Annabelle?” he said curiously. “Before I woke up I mean?”

  The girl blushed prettily. What she’d been doing was simply standing there worshipping at the shrine of the most beautiful man she’d ever met, even if he was a Northerner. Annabelle had thought Hank Brazos was delicious but she hadn’t even been able to see the sheriff since his friend had showed up. Florrie the kitchen help swore that she almost fainted every time Duke Benedict passed by, and Florrie was sixty-four years of age and about as romantic as a hodful of old bricks. Unknown to anybody, Annabelle had been sneaking into his room to watch Benedict sleep every morning, and now she’d been caught.

  “Ah ... Ah don’t rightly know, Mistuh Benedict, suh,” then shivered deliciously as he ran a finger down her spine. “Oh, Mistuh Benedict ...”

  Benedict drew her gently down to him. For a moment her wide green eyes were afraid. Then they turned smoky and closed as their lips crushed together, her arms sliding under his naked back.

  It was a full half-minute before the girl broke off the embrace. With flushed cheeks and her hair charmingly disarrayed, she looked even more delectable than ever.

  “Please, Mistuh Benedict,” she whispered, “Ah shouldn’t. Ah’ll lose mah job ...”

  “Call me Duke,” Benedict purred lazily, moving her cotton blouse off one snowy shoulder. “You know, you’re the softest girl, Annabelle ...”

  “Mistuh Benedict ... I mean Duke ... mah job ...”

  She was helpless to move as the blouse slid down and her warm breast lay cupped in his hand. He held her mesmerized for an endless moment of such intense ecstasy that she thought she must surely faint. Then with one sudden violent motion she ripped her blouse away and pulled his face to her swelling breasts.

  “You busy, Dutch?”

  “Never too busy to talk with you, Sheriff. Name your poison, big boy.”

  He eyed the bottle of red-eye.

  “Not right now.”

  “Whatever you say. I guess I’ll just have a little finger or two of rye.” Dutch poured a five-finger snort then faced her noontime visitor with one eye squinted as if she was sighting along a gun barrel. “Well, what’s this I hear about last night?”

  Brazos motioned Tyler to get out. Pretty Boy glared and looked at Dutch. Amy jerked a thumb and her playmate stamped out and slammed the door behind him.

  “You’ll get on the wrong side of Pretty Boy one day,” the woman growled. “Well, what were you doin’ out at Whipple Creek?”

  “So you heard?”

  “Dutch Amy hears everything and hears it first. What in the pluperfect did you think you were doin’?”

  “Went out to look at Heck Harmer.”

  “That son of a whore turned up dead, I hear tell.”

  “Don’t come deader.” Brazos loomed up to the desk, hat thrust back, hands on hips. “You know, I’m right curious about Harmer, Dutch. Who’d want to beef a hard-luck miner?”

  Dutch Amy’s battered mug took on a guarded look. “Why ask me?”

  “This ruckus twixt the miners and the Two-Bar. How come the cowboys are tryin’ to force the miners off their lease when it ain’t worth a damn? And how come Briskin tells me he’s lost nigh on ten men in the last year?”

  “Hold it right there, big boy. I don’t know nothin’ about all of this. Why the hell should I?”

  “Well, I figgered you and Maclaine bein’ friends and all—”

  “Friends is all we are. How he runs his affairs is his business.”

  Dutch heaved herself to her feet, negotiated her unlit cigar from one side of her mouth to the other and clapped his shoulder with a confidential hand.

  “Big boy, do you like your job?”

  “Sure”

  “And you’re gettin’ paid regular?”

  “Uh huh.”

  “And you ain’t had no complaints from us?”

  “Nope.”

  “Then let’s leave it lay that way, huh? Don’t start frettin’ about who gets shot and who don’t out in the sticks. That ain’t no concern of yours or mine. Hardheads like Maclaine and Briskin are bound to wrangle, but that ain’t no skin offen our noses, is it? You just go on keepin’ the peace here in Harmony and stick to the town and everythin’ll be fine.”

  “But damn it all, Dutch, I want—”

  “You want a little more dough—okay.” Dutch dipped a hand down her mighty bosom and came up with a pair of sweaty sawbucks. “Here you are, big boy, now go buy yourself a drink and stop givin’ yore head a pain.”

  “But—”

  He got no further as he was propelled politely but firmly through the door which thumped shut behind him. He stood frowning back at the door for several moments, then slapping the notes against his palm stomped past a sullen, silent Pretty Boy Tyler and went down the stairs to the street.

  “Do y’all have to go just yet, Duke honey?” Annabelle said sleepily from the bed.

  “Afraid so, beautiful,” Benedict said, dabbing at his freshly-shaved face at the wash-stand.

  “Just fahve mo’ li’l ole minutes?”

  “Sorry.” That was the trouble with the hotel maids like Annabelle he told himself as he shrugged into a heavy sack coat. No moderation ... though come to think of it there were worse faults ...

  Duke Benedict the gambling man felt bushy-tailed most mornings, but today he was aware he felt even better than great, thanks only partly to Annabelle. The real reason behind his high spirits lay fat, solid and comforting in the secret pocket of his coat as he put the careful finishing touches to his immaculate pompadour. No offence to sweet-lipped Annabelle, but he was going to be damned glad to get out of this town and back on Bo Rangle’s trail again. And they were in a position to quit right now, today, thanks to his only true mistress, Lady Luck.

  Satisfied with his reflection in the mirror, he went back to Annabelle and kissed her. She tried to grab him but he moved nimbly away. The coverlet fell down from snowy shoulders and Annabelle very pointedly made no attempt to draw it up again. Benedict averted his eyes and reminded himself very forcibly that he had things to attend to. Important things.

  “I really must go, Annabelle,” he said sternly. “And perhaps you should—er—rise or you might indeed lose your job.”

  “You weren’t worried about mah job jus’ a little while back, Duke honey,” the girl purred. Then she pointed. “Ah’ll bet yo’ only goin’ off to play cards or drink beer with the sheriff.”

  “Now there’s a happy thought. The sheriff about yet?”

  “Of course he is. That big fellah ain’t no late risuh like you, Mistuh lie-abed Benedict.” Annabelle smiled and sat up, this time observing a little maidenly modesty with the coverlet. “Ah told him he ought to sleep in a little after bein’ out so late last night but he don’t pay me no never mind.”

  “He was out late?”

  “Shore was. Why, that crazy man
went out to the minin’ camp on Whipple Creek, said it was somethin’ to do with a dead fellah, Mistuh Harmer. I warned him not to go out thah, and Ah shore was relieved to see him back safe and sound this mornin’.” The girl shook her head at such reckless behavior. “Ah just don’t know what makes that man do the things he does sometimes, do you, Duke?”

  “I sure as hell don’t,” Benedict said feelingly as he headed for the door. “Stay lucky.” He blew a kiss and went out.

  He went looking for the Sheriff of Harmony.

  Brazos wasn’t at the jailhouse, the Red Dog, the Rawhide nor anywhere visible on Front Street. On a hunch, Benedict then went along to the library and sure enough there was Bullpup sitting by the front door with his pink tongue lolling out, his bullheaded presence virtual assurance against the library doing any noontime business.

  The dog took a passing swipe at the gambler’s immaculate trouser leg as he went in, but Benedict had developed a nimble-footed skill in avoiding such attacks. He found Brazos seated at the big polished table with Eleanor Barry. They looked up in surprise and in turn Benedict blinked in disbelief when he saw an open book in front of Harmony’s guardian of law and order.

  “Why, howdy do, Yank,” Brazos greeted him, the librarian giving just the briefest nod. “Somethin’ I can do for you?”

  “What’s this?” Benedict said indicating the book.

  A smile worked Hank Brazos’ bruised and battered face as he looked at Eleanor Barry. “Miss Eleanor is tryin’ to teach me to read, but I guess she’s findin’ it’s like tryin’ to teach tattin’ to a buffalo bull.”

  “Oh, I wouldn’t say that,” replied Eleanor, even if it were fundamentally correct. She got to her feet, closing the book before her. “Do you want to see Hank, Mr. Benedict? If you do you can talk here as I have to go down to the milliner’s for a minute.”

  It was Hank and Eleanor now, Benedict wasn’t slow to note. Just showed you how you could be wrong about a girl. On meeting Eleanor Barry he’d thought her a lady of style and taste. Just showed how wrong you could be.