Funeral By The Sea (8 page)

Vic nodded and looked up the trail to where his horse had halted. He whistled and the gelding trotted obediently back toward him.

‘He’s got gall, Joe. You gotta allow him that. And plenty of guts, too.’

The scar-faced man spat a stream of saliva as he massaged an elbow bruised in his fall from the panicked horse. ‘He ain’t gonna have any guts for much longer, man. On account of that Delroy bitch is gonna have them for garters.’

CHAPTER EIGHT

A bucket of water hurled forcefully into his face jerked Barnaby Gold back to painful awareness and the gut-wrenching knowledge that he had failed to get himself killed in the ravine.

He had to blink several times against the beads of water, the bright sunlight and the urge to ease agony with darkness before the scene in front of him came into sharp focus. This as he licked his lips and discovered from the futile act that the reviving water had been taken from the ocean.

It felt as if there was a fire raging inside his skull. And a lesser degree of pain was attacking every other part of his nervous system.

This because he was spread-eagled between the stoop pillars before the closed double doors of the big house in the same manner as Seth Harrow. And he had been strung up this way for a long time, the dead weight of his limp and unconscious form dragging on the ropes that lashed his wrists and ankles to the timbers at either side.

He had been stripped to the waist and his boots had been removed.

Hal Delroy said bitterly, ‘It’s a terrible shame, young man. I was greatly looking forward to discussing Europe with you. Having long harbored a wish to take a trip there myself.’

This morning he was attired in the same way as the other Americans at Oceanville - Stetson, kerchief, work shirt, denim pants and riding boots. With a gunbelt slung around his waist, a Peacemaker in the tied-down holster.

It was he who had thrown the water up into Gold’s face, the empty bucket now set down at his side. He was alone on the stoop, but Gold could hear a hushed murmuring from behind him which signified that an audience was gathering. While from further along the street harsh shouts ordered the laggards to hurry.

‘The prospect of cultured conversation with somebody who shares my interest was the real reason I submitted to Eve’s request that you stay, young man.’ Hal Delroy went on as the prisoner struggled to hold back an urge to give vocal response to his pain. ‘And that being so, I cannot now deny her the right to beat you.’

The shouting had ceased and the latecomers shuffled to join the gathering in front of the big house.

‘We have never had to deal with a horse thief in Oceanville before. Elsewhere, it is usual to hang somebody like you and it was my first instinct to do just that. But you did strike a helpless woman and...’

All talk from behind Gold was curtailed and the pale-faced fat man interrupted what he was saying. Gold looked in the same direction that he did as footfalls rapped on the stoop boarding. And saw Eve Delroy approaching, dressed as she had been when punishing the old-timer, and carrying the whip. Grim-faced and looking not in the least helpless.

A rocking chair had been placed to one side of the house entrance and her brother backed over and lowered himself into it.

The woman took his place in front of Gold and fingered the dark contusion on the side of her jaw as she stared hatefully into the green, pain-filled eyes.

For stretched seconds she remained silent. Then, ‘Hal has given permission.’ Her voice was no more than a harsh whisper. But now she screamed loud and shrill, the words resounding off the face of the arc of cliff. ‘To the death, Barnaby Gold!’

Then she went from sight, vaulting over the stoop rail, and he did not try to turn his head to
watch her or to see the audience gathered at his back. He continued to stare directly at the closed double doors. And to nurture a hope that his pain-wracked body would not be able to take many biting lashes of the whip before he was again plunged into merciful unconsciousness.

‘Scream, you bastard!’ she shrieked and he heard the hissing sound of the thong as it curled through the warm air of early morning.

But it was she who screamed, and the sound of the whip was suddenly ended.

Cries of shock and alarm and anger erupted from many throats. And Hal Delroy’s booted feet slammed hard to the stoop boarding. But there was not enough noise to mask the unmistakable crack of a rifle shot, not reaching the area of the target until after the bullet found its mark.

Barnaby Gold wrenched his head around now, hardly aware of the fresh wave of pain the sudden move exploded under his skull. And saw Eve Delroy staggering backwards, a dark crimson stain blossoming over the white silk of her blouse where it contoured her left breast.

Her eyes were wide open and already glazed by death. And before she toppled to sprawl out inert on her back, he forced his eyes to the far sides of their sockets, saw that the men and women who were not staring at the dead Eve were peering and pointing toward the top of the cliff behind the house.

Hal Delroy leapt over the stoop rail and half fell to his knees beside the unmoving form of his sister. ‘Holy Mother of God, Eve’s dead!’ he shrieked. And drew his revolver as he staggered to his feet and whirled around - to aim the Colt high and empty it toward the top of the cliff.

‘Handgun’s no use at this range, Hal!’ Joe snarled when the revolver rattled empty.

‘A friggin’ cannon, neither!’ Bud snapped. ‘The bastard’s ducked out of sight.’

The grief-stricken and enraged Delroy hurled the empty gun to the ground and raked his blazing eyes over the shocked, fearful and grimly scowling faces that looked to him for an order.

‘Get after the bastard that killed her! Every man! Get the horses and ride! Bring my horse out here! Move your stinking asses!’

The strain of holding his head around became too much for Barnaby Gold and he faced front again, allowed his chin to sink to his bare chest. Heard running footfalls that diminished as the Americans raced toward the stable block at the rear of the house.

‘You and you!’ Delroy snarled. ‘Take my sister into the house! You and you, cut that man down and lock him in the basement! Gold, can you hear me?’

‘I hear you.’

‘If you think you’ve just got lucky, forget it! As soon as that murderer has got what he has coming, we’ll be back! To hang you!’

Horses were thudding their hooves outside the stable block and snorting their eagerness for exercise.

Delroy swaggered away, snarling for the men to hurry up.

Two knife-wielding Mexicans mounted the steps to either side of Gold and first cut the ropes that held his ankles. A third man gripped him around the waist from behind and kept him from crumpling when his legs failed to support him after the wrist bonds were released.

‘Our regrets,
señor
this man said softly. It was the bartender from the cantina. ‘We must do as we are ordered or all of us will suffer.’

Gold did not trust himself to speak for fear that the sense of elation that transcended pain would find an outlet in tears. So he merely nodded his understanding and gratefully accepted the support of all three men as he was helped down the steps.

Saw two other men carrying the corpse of Eve Delroy up them. Noticed that one of them had closed her eyes.

The vastly diminished gathering in front of the house now comprised only of Mexicans, and the whores watched in stunned silence.

Behind him, men cursed at their mounts and the horses lunged into a gallop. Then he was steered around the corner of the house and halted beside the basement access that jutted out from the frame wall. The bartender slid the two bolts along their brackets and raised the two trapdoors. Steps led down into cool darkness.

His bare feet were raised and lowered over the lip of the access. Then his entire pain-wracked body, held by the armpits until his head was below the level of the trapdoors.

‘We will pray for your deliverance,
señor,’
one of the three promised tenderly.

‘Although the constant prayers for our own have never been answered,’ another warned bitterly.

‘Appreciate it,’ Gold managed to rasp as the doors were folded together above his head.

The bolts were shot home and the footfalls of the three Mexicans retreated. Cool, silent darkness enclosed the prisoner as he lay on the wooden steps, older pains still too intense for him to be aware of the fresh discomfort as the stair treads dug into his back.

He was unable to judge the passing of time. Knew it was still running out for him and that he had been granted a period of limited freedom in which to assess the possibility of another escape bid - quite literally a stay of execution. But he also knew that he had to take some time to partially recover from the punishment he had received, that if he tried to stagger to freedom on unreliable legs following a plan suggested by a mind under constant assault from searing agony, he was doomed to a second failure.

So he rested without the slightest movement for awhile. Then he gently flexed his muscles. Next eased tentatively into a sitting posture on the lower step, rose and tested his ability to walk.

Once he was almost sick, but managed to swallow the bile and subdue the threat of vomit.

The basement was under just part of the house and he walked around its walls three times - the first occasion with great care, in case there was anything blocking his path.

Agony diminished to hurting. His head felt like it was set to ache for a very long time. Above his right ear there was a large bruise, with blood congealed in the hair which covered it. His throat was parched.

He reached the foot of the steps on the completion of his third circuit of the empty basement and looked up at the narrow strip of sunlight which showed where the two trapdoors came together. And his mind was now thinking clearly enough for him to realize that there should not have been such an uninterrupted line of light, that it should have been broken in two places by the securing bolts.

He clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth and went up the steps, halted with his head cocked to one side, ear close to the crack. And could hear only the low thud of waves breaking on the beach and the occasional shrill cry of a seabird.

The hinges creaked a little when he eased open the trapdoors and held them to either side of him, as he came further up the steps to look for whoever had made it possible for him to escape the basement. But the area between the side of the house and the southern headland of the bay was deserted.

He stepped out from the access and lowered the doors, slid the bolts to refasten them closed. Then went to the front corner of the house and flattened himself to the wall, peered with one eye around it to look along the street.

Three whores stood outside of the cantina, idly gossiping in the manner of women with time on their hands on any street of any town. Out front of the adobe houses, some small children
played. At some doorways and windows, Mexican women gazed across the beach to the ridge of sand, where men were starting to shove the boats down the slope toward the water’s edge.

The whores cursed and moved away when the fat Mexican woman vigorously pushed a broom under the batwings to sweep a pile of stale sawdust and a billowing cloud of dust out into the street.

So, with no orders to the contrary, the second-class citizens of Oceanville were going about their business in the usual manner. While, up on the cliff top, there was neither sound nor sight of what Hal Delroy and his men were doing to find the sharpshooter.

Barnaby Gold withdrew from the front corner of the house and went to the rear. He ducked beneath the four windows he had to pass, in case the ash-blonde Emily was in any of the rooms beyond, or the servants Eve Delroy had mentioned.

The outbuildings behind the house were sited to form three sides of a square and he moved around the backs of them to stay out of sight of the house window. He was almost at the far corner of the big barn where he heard footfalls on the square area enclosed by the buildings and came to an abrupt halt. Then tensed to lunge forward when he saw a figure appear ten feet in front of him, stepping into view at the corner of the barn.

It was a woman, tall and statuesque, with ash-blonde hair. She brought up a hand fast and a sense of fear greater than pain gripped Gold. But then he saw her hand was empty, clenched into a fist except for the forefinger that was extended. And Emily rested this finger to her lips in a sign for him to be silent.

He felt incredibly weak and had to lean against the barn wall. She shot a glance along the side of the barn and quickly came toward him, her lovely face showing the same depth of fear which he had experienced a moment earlier.

He jutted out his lower lip to blow a draught of cool air up over his sweat-beaded face as his green eyes asked countless tacit questions of her. But she kept her finger pressed to her lips as she shook her head. Then cocked her head in a gesture of listening.