Mojave (27 page)

“It's locked,” he said.

I cussed.

Was about to suggest we go around back when I heard some spurs jingling inside the building. The handle jiggled from the inside, then there was a snap, a click, and a belch, and the door pulled open.

“Is that you, Whip?” Bug Beard asked.

He answered the question when he seen me. “You ain't Whip. You're dead.”

I could smell the whiskey on his breath, and see the red in his eyes, and the bloodstained bandage covering his ear that had gotten shot off. Then he got wise, and started for the gun in his belly, but I smashed him right across the face with the stock of the Winchester, and he went flying back, turning over a table, breaking a bottle of whiskey—Scotch, though, never cared much for the taste—and rolling over in a bloody heap.

“You killed him!” Mr. McCoy cried out in that nasal wail.

I shoved him inside, told Mr. Slater to follow real quick. Right behind them I followed, pulling the door closed, hearing a voice upstairs say, “Julius, what the Sam Hill is going—”

A fellow had come out of one of the upstairs rooms, scratching his head, but when he saw me, and Bug Beard Julius lying on the floor, he started to bring up the shotgun he was holding loose in his arms.

The last thing I wanted to do was shoot off a gun this early in the morning. That would alert the folks in town, and Whip Watson if he was near Calico. So I brung up the Winchester quick, taken my aim, and said, “Drop it.”

He didn't drop it, but he sure didn't bring it up into a firing position. Instead he smiled.

That's when I heard someone upstairs to my left say, “No, you drop it.” He punctuated that thought by earing back what sounded to be a right powerful rifle.

“I thought you was dead,” the man with the shotgun said. “Hey . . .”

His expression changed, and I heard a crunch I'd heard many times before. It's the sound of a gun barrel slamming into a skull. There was a moan, a crash, and the sound of a rifle falling onto the floor to my right. Then the man with the shotgun lost his grin, and his shotgun, and raised his hands.

Slowly, I turned around, looked up, and saw Mr. Clark beaming at me, another man in buckskins lying like a sleeping baby at his feet.

“Good morning, Mister Bishop,” Mr. Clark said. “Glad you could make it.”

Mr. Clark come prepared. He had wrist and ankle irons, and plenty of rope, so I made Mr. Slater and Mr. McCoy drag them vermin to the storeroom behind the bar, where we trussed them up with irons and rope and gags. The two merchants got real cooperative, but that's because Mr. Clark said he'd kill them if they acted poorly.

My heart pounded against my ribs, the hole in my forearm ached, I sweated, my belly felt like it was full of crashing waves against the side of a whaling ship. I leaned against the bar, laid my arsenal atop the mahogany, and checked everything. A long-barreled Colt and a Winchester rifle and that “Swamp Angel” .41.

“What do we do now?” I asked Mr. Clark.

“We wait.”

Waiting ain't my best trait, but there wasn't nothing else to do. Turning, I spotted my reflection in the mirror, and shaken my head at my battered appearance. Then I noticed something else on the back bar.

“Hey,” I said to no one in particular. “Is that Jameson?”

 

 

The morning bracer of Irish whiskey made me feel a mite better, and then we gathered at a table—a fancy one, with a top of green felt—by the big plate glass windows, and I dealt a little poker with the cards I'd purchased from Slater and McCoy's store.

While I dealt—not even off the bottom, and I didn't pocket any card, it being a friendly game of passing time—Mr. Clark revealed his plan.

Later that morning, Whip Watson would arrive, and, like a snake oil salesman, would begin his preaching and shouting and advertising. Next, the ladies would come up Main Street in the Columbus carriages, the brides-to-be first, then the girls Whip had designated as courtesans of The Palace of Calico. The wanna-be husbands could bid on the brides as they rode down the street. The bachelors could see what temptations awaited them in Calico's newest brothel.

“I'll help the girls out of the carriage,” Mr. Clark said, “and then escort them in here. The carriage driver and his guard will head back to the edge of town to pick up the next girl. Once the girl is inside, we'll guide them out the back door.”

A tall wooden fence ran behind the alley separating The Palace of Calico with Miller's store. A few adobe privies beyond that would also keep the girls out of view from the street.

“Have the girls run straight across the bridge into Chinatown. Have them hide. They'll be safe there.”

“What about us?” Mr. McCoy asked in his nose-busted tone.

Me and Mr. Clark, and even Mr. Slater, glared at the coward.

“And when the last girl is outside?” Mr. Slater asked.

Mr. Clark grinned. “We open up.”

“But . . .” Mr. McCoy hesitated. “Won't there be a lot of innocent people on the streets.”

“The innocent people,” I told him, “will be at Sioux Falls reading Scripture and singing ‘Rock of Ages.' Who'll be left on the streets is a bunch of swine bidding on brides like they was at a cattle auction.”

Those boys looked across the table and stared hard at me, like they couldn't believe I'd said that. Well, my dander was up. I dealt the last cards up for our five-card stud.

“You'll be outnumbered,” Mr. Slater said.

“Nope.” Mr. Clark looked again at his hole card, snorted, and flipped his cards over. He couldn't beat what nobody else was showing. “
We
will be outnumbered.”

Mr. Slater folded his hand, too. “We?” He turned pale again.

I bet a bottle of gin. Mr. McCoy looked at the bet, then at Mr. Slater, then at Mr. Clark. “But we're not gunmen.”

“You are now,” Mr. Clark told them, which got Mr. McCoy to fold his hand, and allowed me to win with a jack high.

“What happens?” I filled everybody's tumbler with two fingers of the gin I'd just won. “What happens if Whip Watson decides to come inside here? While the girls are still on the streets?”

“Let's hope,” Mr. Clark said, “that doesn't happen.”

Waiting ain't no fun, especially when you know that when the waiting's over, things will become dangersome. I didn't drink too much gin or Irish, didn't even really focus on playing cards. Wasn't no clock on the wall. Who keeps time in a brothel? Every last one of us would stand, move to the window, peer outside. Nothing. Nothing at all.

Until . . .

Wasn't no mistaking that sound. A whip cracking in the midmorning air, followed by some shouting. Even a pistol firing off a round or two into the air.

All of us went to the windows. Whip Watson stood in the street, flanked by a couple of his gunmen. He'd be explaining some things, and what he was explaining rankled some of those husbands who thought they'd already paid for their wives. A tall fellow took umbrage, but one of Whip's gunmen cured him of that by buffaloing him across the skull with a pistol barrel. After that, most of the menfolk nodded their heads. A few—not husbands, I figured—even looked excited.

Mr. Clark sneaked away, went to the storeroom, and a few minutes later come out with two of the guards. He unloaded their pistols, shoved them toward us. Bug Beard wasn't one of the men, likely on account that I'd smashed his face, and his nose was swole up, lips split, some teeth busted, and where there wasn't no dirty beard was fairly bruised.

“You two will stand at the door.” He give them two boys shotguns he'd also unloaded. “Just like Whip expects. You give any warning, make any move, do any fool play, and you'll be dead.”

“Whip Watson will kill you for this,” one of the fools said. “He'll see you in Hell.”

“You'll both be in Hell long before we get there. Don't forget that. Now . . . outside. No words. Just look tough, and ugly.”

He nodded at Mr. McCoy, who got the hint, and held the door open for our two guards. When they was outside, standing on either side of the door, Mr. Clark tossed Mr. Slater and Mr. McCoy a Winchester each.

“If they move . . .” he begun.

“Kill them!” Mr. Slater had gotten over his fear and was practically giddy with what was about to happen.

“Not so loud,” I told him, and moved down the room to the corner, looking out through the glass.

We waited.... Waited some more. Kept right on waiting, sweating, nervous.

Finally, I spotted the dust, shifted the Winchester, leaned closer to the window to make sure them two guards wasn't trying nothing suspicious. The carriage went by Whip Watson, who was now standing atop a cracker barrel in the center of the street. One fellow run toward the coach, but Whip whirled, snapped his whip, and popped the dude's bowler hat off. He scurried back amid hoots and heckles, and got whipped on his buttocks before he reached the boardwalk. I sort of felt sorry for him.

Later, the editor of the
Calico Print
told me that embarrassed fellow had been Jürgen Baader, who had lied to the late Maud Fenstermacher of St. Louis, and helped get her killed, and I didn't feel sorry for that peckerwood no more.

Two men rode in the front seat, one armed with a double-barrel shotgun. Whip was shouting something, but I couldn't hear it.

“Do you know her?” Mr. McCoy whispered.

“Not by name,” I said. It was one of Candy Crutchfield's gals. She wore a nice silk dress, had a parasol. The carriage turned wide at the edge of town, and the driver reined in his matched pair of black horses. Mr. Clark stepped outside, off the boardwalk, helped the girl down. Said something to the driver and guard, who laughed a bit, and as soon as Mr. Clark was leading the girl inside, the buggy was heading back down the street. Already, I spied another carriage coming our way, and there stood Whip Watson on his cracker barrel, yelling, popping his whip, having a fine old time.

Once Mr. Clark escorted the young woman inside, he closed the door and urgently steered the woman, whose face was streaked by tears, red with shame, into Mr. McCoy's arms.

“Get her out of here,” Mr. Clark said.

Mr. McCoy obeyed, whispering to the woman, now sobbing so hard she was shaking. I heard the back door squeak open, slam shut, and Mr. Clark was stepping outside again, and the second Columbus buggy was pulling closer.

So that's how things went. Right according to Mr. Clark's plan. We taken turns, me and Mr. Slater and Mr. McCoy, leading the women out the back door, behind the buildings, to the bridge that led to East Calico.

I'd just taken the big German gal, pointed to the bridge, then run back to The Palace of Calico. We was growing shy of women. Once the last was gone down that bridge, I knowed Whip Watson would be coming, and things would turn ugly. So I wiped my sweaty palms on my new denim trousers, come through the door, and moved the Winchester to my other arm so I could wipe the sweat off my right hand.

Then I seen Mr. Clark bring Jingfei inside, and Mr. Slater taken her into his arms, heading right toward me. I stopped him.

“I'll take her,” I said.

“No,” he said. “It's my turn.”

“I insist,” I said.

“But . . .”

“Thank you,” Jingfei said, and she turned and bowed slightly at Mr. Slater, who sighed, shrugged, and returned to the front door.

“How many more women are left?” I asked Jingfei as I led her to the rear.

“Four,” she said.

Four more women. Then hell.

I was telling her what to do, where to go, warning her not to cross that bridge back into Calico proper until everything was settled. She didn't say nothing. She hadn't been crying. No, her face didn't show no tears, no lines, nothing but rigid determination.

I opened the door, stepped outside, and felt something slam into my head, crushing the brim of my new black hat.

Down I went, dropping the Winchester, yelling, rolling over, and hearing some wild cussing. I pulled myself up, holding my aching head, and, shaking off the pain, I reached for the Colt on my hip.

“I'll kill you! I'll kill you! Nobody betrays—” That was a whine I'd recognize anywhere. Through blurred vision, I saw Candy Crutchfield, her face fried from the sun, gaunt and pathetic and even more hideous, and she was wielding that little knife with the big handle at Jingfei.

But not for long.

I ain't rightly sure if I saw all this or imagined it. I mean, there stood Jingfei, between a trash barrel and the door, in her fine dress, not doing nothing, not moving, just watching Candy Crutchfield come with that sticker.

Then all I saw was a blur, but it seemed that Jingfei was jumping, and I mean real high, and not from no running start. Spinning like a ballerina or a real rank, unbroken mustang, and her foot caught the side of Candy Crutchfield's hand, and I heard a bone pop, and seen the knife sail against the wall. But Jingfei wasn't done. She kept spinning in the air, and her foot caught Candy Crutchfield on the side of her jaw. Bones popped. Teeth and blood flew. The old hag slammed against the wall, and swallowed her plug of tobacco, juice and all.

Once Jingfei come down, she kicked that woman four or five more times, then slapped her upside the head with about a half-dozen blows, kicked her twice in the belly, then grabbed her frayed, dirty, stinking clothes and pitched her right beside me.

Hadn't even worked up a sweat.

I just sat there, blinking, and then Candy Crutchfield climbed to her knees, shaking her head and sending blood onto my new pink shirt. Just like that, she snatched my Colt, and staggered off, slammed against the fence, and the whole shebang come crashing into the alley.

That brought me to my senses. I heard a shout, and come to my feet, finding the Winchester. Peered around the corner, and saw Candy Crutchfield hobbling toward the street. The driver of the Columbus carriage had reined to a stop. He was shouting something, and then the guard was leaping out of the buggy, thumbing back the barrels of the Parker twelve-gauge.

The guard, I noticed, was Juan Pedro.

That's when Candy Crutchfield shot him in the belly.

Damn good shot. I mean, Candy Crutchfield had shot him with her left hand, since Jingfei had just broke her right wrist. She was also bleeding considerable, and was staggering. Juan Pedro groaned, dropped to his knees, and then Candy Crutchfield fired at the driver.

That shot wasn't so good. The driver dived out, and the horses took off running, taking the empty buggy behind them.

“That tears it!” I shouted, and drawed a bead on Candy Crutchfield's back, but before I could kill her, she'd rounded the corner to the Miller store.

“Come on!” Jingfei grabbed my shoulder, yanked me around. She was heading right back toward the door, and I was shaking some sense into my head, telling her, “You need to get to Chinatown.”

Mr. McCoy was escorting the two Lannon twins outside when he stopped.

“What the hell is going on out here?” he said.

He got his answer when a cannonade of gunfire rocked the streets of Calico.