Black Hats (17 page)

His flat-topped black derby at its customary jaunty tilt, Bat was in a well-tailored gray suit, his tie a golden yellow that went well with the gold-crowned cane in his left hand. He didn’t often use the cane, but considering the crowds, and the prospect of Coney Island’s unreliable streets and sidewalks, he’d removed the heavy, straight black stick from the front closet in the apartment. He’d even polished up the knobby crown with a kid cloth.

This he’d done sitting on the edge of a Queen Anne chair in the living room, a Victorian space he did not usually frequent, being the domain of his wife Emma, who liked to sit in the peaceful room and do her needlepoint, which she at that moment was.

When he’d married Emma in Denver, some thirty years before, she’d been a lithe blonde song-and-dance gal he’d booked into the Palace Theater, which he then owned and operated.

Now she was heavyset but handsome, a graying dignified patron of the arts whose worst habit was playing bridge for pennies, and whose best quality was never asking questions about where he was going and when he’d be back.

But seeing him with the gold-topped cane had perked her interest enough to freeze her needle-in-hand and lock her pretty blue eyes upon him.

“Why the cane, my darling? Is the old wound bothering you?”

“No, dear. I’m accompanying Wyatt out to Coney Island, and you know how that hustle and bustle is.”

“Oh yes,” she said, although they both knew she’d never been to Coney Island in her life.

“And, of course, with that rough crowd, you are clearly keeping in mind what your friend Teddy always said.”

She meant Teddy Roosevelt, but otherwise Bat didn’t know what she was talking about.

His wife smiled at his confusion, the same teasing smile she’d so often shown him at the Palace on (and off ) stage. “‘Walk softly and carry a big stick?’”

He laughed. “Emma, you are right again—as always.”

And he’d departed the apartment with no further inquiry from her, although she had (for the twentieth time or so) inquired as to when he’d be bringing Wyatt around for a “decent meal,”

as if the restaurants in New York were not up to the fare of their colored cook, Alberta (and, truth be told, they often weren’t).

At Holliday’s, Bat had witnessed the discussion between Johnny and Dixie as to whether or not the latter would join the former on this trip to Coney Island.

“Oh, Johnny,
please
! I’ve heard about that magical place since I was a little girl!”

Bat—thinking Dixie still was a little girl, and that describing Coney Island as “magical” was worthy of argument—had glanced at Wyatt, whose expression gave away nothing. They were standing near the foot of the stairs on the main floor.

Johnny—looking eerily like (a healthier version of ) his father in a cream-colored suit, a pastel blue shirt and a darker blue tie with diamond stickpin—was preparing to put on a dark brown snapbrim fedora. He seemed appalled to hear Dixie make this suggestion; she was in the green polka-dot dress, clearly poised to go along.

“Dix,” he said firmly but not cruelly, “that’s ridiculous. In the first place, it’s a business meeting. In the second—”

“Bring the girl along, John,” Wyatt said.

Bat’s head swivelled to see if Wyatt were foaming at the mouth or otherwise displaying symptoms of dementia.

But Wyatt seemed calm.

Dixie was clapping and saying, “Goodie, goodie,” while Johnny approached Wyatt, apparently to get his own close look for symptoms.

“Wyatt, you can’t be serious,” the younger man said. “This is much too dangerous for Dixie.”

“Are you intending to fire her?”

“What?”

“When you’ve refurbished and reopened—are you intending to fire her?”

“Why no! Of course not!”

“Then you intend to continue employing her as an entertainer in a speakeasy—a speakeasy that was recently shot to pieces.”

“…Well. Yes.”

“Then your protective instincts for her only go so far.”

“That’s not fair!”

Wyatt put a hand on Johnny’s shoulder and spoke softly; Dixie couldn’t hear but Bat could.

“Bring her along. Her presence makes it less likely our hosts will get lively.”

“You really think so?”

“I asked for a meeting with Yale in a public place on a Saturday night.
His
public place. Dixie will fit in just fine.” His eyes went past Johnny and he granted the young woman a smile as he raised his voice to say, “Glad to have you along, Miss Douglas!”

She was figleafing a small beaded bag to herself. “Oh, Mr. Earp—you’re such a gentleman!”

Bat muttered, “I was just about to say that myself.”

Wyatt said to her, “Dixie, thank you for that sentiment. You look beautiful.”

She beamed at him.

“But I need a moment with Johnny and Mr. Masterson. Would you wait here?”

She nodded, and Wyatt led Bat and Johnny into the latter’s own office.

Wyatt gathered them into a huddle near the desk. “Johnny, I do feel we’re not facing any great danger, otherwise I wouldn’t suggest bringing Miss Douglas along. But feel free to overrule me—”

“As if I could,” Johnny said with a smirk, “at this point. You think there’s any dissuading that girl?”

“No,” Wyatt admitted. “She has a child’s will and a woman’s wiles. But I do think we need to take precautions. Bartholomew, I note the cane, which tonight may serve as a club.”

Bat nodded.

“And I assume you have your revolver. In your pocket?”

Bat patted under his arm. “Holster.”

“Excellent tailor job. I didn’t spot it. Johnny, you’ve seen my revolver—the best tailor on the planet couldn’t disguise that.”

“It does have a singular snout,” Johnny said with an admiring smile.

“Could I borrow your nickel-plated job?”

Johnny lifted it from his suitcoat pocket. “Frankly, Wyatt, I was planning to—”

“Thanks,” Wyatt said, taking the weapon and depositing it in his own coat pocket.

“Am I to go bare naked?”

“Do you have another piece?”

Bat said, “Yeah, Johnny—you know the old saying, physician heel thyself?”

Johnny frowned to himself momentarily, then said: “I do have something at that.” He began to slip out of the suitcoat, saying, “Be with you in a minute,” clearly wanting some privacy, and Bat and Wyatt exited the office.

For a few minutes Wyatt and Dixie chatted, Wyatt informing the girl that he’d grown up near Des Moines himself, in nearby Pella, and she mentioned how lovely the tulips were there, this time of year, and he said yes they were. Then he asked her if her people were farmers and she said no, her father was a policeman.

“That was my trade,” he told her, “off and on.”

“Oh. Do you like to hurt people?”

“No.”

“Well, Daddy did.”

Wyatt nodded, once. “Maybe he hurt them when they were causing trouble, or had it coming.”

Bat was struck by how lovely and sad her smile was when she replied, “Well, I never.”

Johnny emerged from the office, straightening his suitcoat and in particular snugging the left sleeve. He planted himself a few steps from where Bat, Wyatt and Dixie were congregated, and opened his arms in presentational fashion.

“Anything show?” he asked Wyatt.

“No. What caliber?”

A smile twitched. Bat had seen the smile before, or at least its predecessor: a nasty little thing, on Doc Holliday’s slightly scarred upper lip.

“You’ll find out,” Johnny said, “if it comes to that.”

Wyatt took a step and placed a hand on the younger man’s shoulder. “We’re not looking for trouble. That’s why this sweet child’s coming along. We’re a friendly delegation.”

“I understand that. But the last delegation these animals sent came ’round with a tommy-gun calling card.”

“Noted.” Wyatt tossed a thumb at Bat. “I’ve asked Bartholomew to do our talking. He and words are well-acquainted.”

Johnny frowned. “But, Wyatt—it’s my place….”

Bat wasn’t sure Johnny meant literally his place—the club—or his rightful role. Not that it mattered.

“Son,” Wyatt said, “Bartholomew could talk a nun out of her habit.”

This remark seemed a little rude, in front of a lady, but Dixie’s big bright brown eyes showed no sign that its meaning had registered. Or that it hadn’t.

Wyatt was saying, “Bat’ll talk, we’ll listen and watch. Agreed?”

Johnny took a deep breath, swallowed it, said, “Agreed.”

“How are we traveling? Do you own a car?”

“I do, but we’ll take the subway. Short walk, then forty-five minutes and we wind up right at Stillwell Avenue station.”

“That’s good?”

“Right across from Nathan’s hot dog stand.”

Dixie clasped her hands. “Oooh, can we eat there?”

They had.

And now that that delight was history, the delights of Frankie Yale’s Harvard Inn remained to be savored. On a corner of sorts—numerous dark narrow alleys bisected the Bowery, leading to the ocean, or perhaps disaster—the grand-sounding dive inhabited a modest one-story clapboard affair with an electric sign—perhaps significantly, with bulbs burned out spelling har—d inn, but with its front windows blacked out.

“Oh dear,” Dixie said, still on Johnny’s arm.

Alarmed, Johnny glanced at Wyatt. “Are we really taking this angel into that hellhole?”

“Yes,” Wyatt said. “And bringing her back out again, wings and all.”

Wyatt opened the door, and Johnny with Dixie, and Bat just behind, followed him inside, where they were met by the bouquet of sawdust and spilled beer, and trundling up to them came a heavy-set fellow in black trousers, white apron, white shirt and black bow tie.

The greeter was none other than their old friend, young Alphonse Capone.

He grinned at them, his teeth large and almost white, his lips obscenely reddish-purple; despite the dim light of the saloon, his dark eyebrows over the slightly bulging gray eyes and that bulbous yet flattened nose and the slightly acned chin all added up to a nastier, more ugly countenance than Bat had perceived during their meeting in Johnny’s office Friday night.

Perhaps it was the absence of the garish but expensive apparel, the Borsalino hat and the tailored purple suit and silk tie and diamond stickpin. As a greeter-cum-bartender in apron and bow tie, Capone was just another thug, albeit an obnoxiously grinning one.

“Mr. Yale will be with you shortly,” Capone said, upper lip curling the smile into a patronizing sneer, as he gestured with a fat palm toward an empty booth, a little off to the left side near a door marked exit.

Capone walked them over and gave Dixie a frankly fresh eye. “Didn’t expect you boys to bring your own talent along. What’s your name, doll?”

Johnny said, “Don’t talk to her.”

Capone reared back, his smile becoming a frown but remaining amused. “Is she deaf and dumb? Pretty little lady can’t talk for herself?”

She said, crisply, “I’m with Johnny.”

Capone gestured grandly at the booth and its reserved card. “Well, honey, everybody makes mistakes. What can I bring you to drink?”

“We’re not thirsty,” Wyatt said, and tossed his Stetson on the tabletop. Johnny’s fedora and Bat’s derby followed.

Capone shrugged and winked at Dixie and lumbered off.

Bat sat nearest the exit; Johnny, with Dixie next to him, had the other outside seat. Between Dixie and Bat sat Wyatt, surveying the place; but Johnny’s eyes were on Dixie, who was frowning.

“Are you are okay, Dix?” the young man asked her. “We can leave. Wyatt and Bat can—”

“We’ll stay,” she said. “What a horrible man.”

“That’s Capone. He’s the one who shot up the club.”

“He’s evil. What an awful liver-lipped creature.”

“You’ll get no argument from me.”

Bat took a look around himself.

The crowd at the Harvard Inn was not particularly collegiate—its name was, after all, a stupid joke of Yale’s, which Bat doubted was the proprietor’s real name. A group of chippies in garish make-up and short skirts and rolled-up stockings (who might have been parodying Dixie) sat at a row of tables along the left wall just the other side of the Earp party, past the exit. They were dime-a-dance girls, possibly prostitutes; but the place wasn’t a brothel—the one-story facility didn’t provide space. Tickets were bought at the bar, opposite, an endless affair, twenty feet, anyway, the most impressive thing about the long, narrow joint.

A small jazz combo on the bandstand was playing a sluggish “Avalon” and the fairly good-sized dance floor—twenty by forty, easy—was packed with a mix of working-class couples and guys with tickets for the dime-a-dance dolls. All were dancing so close it was damned near sex standing up.

Three bartenders were working the long bar, with Capone sometimes serving off a well-balanced tray, sometimes greeting and seating new customers, and the other two making the drinks in tea cups—a lame deception, Bat felt, as beer was being openly sold in foaming mugs. Bat counted eighteen stools and six spittoons at the bar, and the rest of the green-plaster-walled place was packed with small tables, mostly couples, with barely enough space for Capone and a couple other waiters to get by.

Capone’s role was unique—he seemed popular here, joking and chatting with customers, a number obviously regulars. He presented a jovial front and had a certain theatrical presence.

Bat was no stranger to saloons, but to him this kind of dive held no appeal. What an outrage that a gutbucket like this could thrive openly, while the great watering holes remained shuttered, like Shanley’s or such stellar hotel bars as the Metropole or the Churchill or the Knickerbocker. A nightclub like Holliday’s was one thing; but the Harvard Inn was no better than the roughest barrelhouse on the plains. Christ, the goddamned Lady Gay was better!

Funny that the Lady Gay should jump into his mind…or maybe not. The Harvard’s dime-a-dance girls were not so unlike Mollie Brennan, and this sawdust-and-suds-scented slophouse was just the sort of dump to suit a besotted bastard the likes of Sergeant King of the Fourth Cavalry.

And, to be frank, it was just the kind of seedy, noisy saloon the twenty-one-year-old Bat Masterson might have frequented….

By the summer of ’75 in Sweetwater, Texas, Indian scouting had slowed way down. Most months Bat had little else to do but pick up his paycheck at Fort Elliott, and gamble and drink and generally frolic at the Lady Gay and other such joints. Though he’d skinned buffalo and killed Indians, he wasn’t yet wise in the ways of the world, and when black-haired, blue-eyed Mollie said she loved him, Bat believed her, even though the wench with the hour-glass shape sold her dances (and probably more) to any scout, soldier or cowboy who swaggered in (and staggered out of ) the Lady Gay.