Sidewinders (8 page)

The face that looked up at him from the paper, sketched there with what appeared to be a piece of charcoal, was undoubtedly that of Bo Creel.

Scratch stared at the drawing in silence for a long moment, then said, “I don't care what it looks like, Bo didn't hurt those women. It just ain't possible, I tell you.”

Marshal Haltom let out a contemptuous snort and swept the piece of paper back into the desk drawer.

“You get me sworn statements from Judge Parker and that federal marshal you were talking about, and then I might believe you.”

“Might?”

Haltom shrugged and said, “I've got to admit, evidence like that would carry a lot of weight. But I'd still like to know how Barney Dunn could draw a picture of your friend like that if he'd never seen him before. I looked mighty close at Creel when I arrested him. He's the man in that drawing, all right.”

Scratch just shook his head, but he was expressing his confusion as much as he was disagreeing with the marshal.

“I want to see Bo,” he said.

“There's no law says I have to let you see him.”

“No, but there's no law that says you have to keep me from it, either.”

“All right,” Haltom said, turning to snag a ring of keys off a peg on the wall behind the desk. “Take off that fancy gun rig first. I'm not letting you go back there armed.”

Scratch unbuckled his gun belt and set it and the pair of holstered Remingtons on the marshal's desk.

“You don't have a hide-out gun you plan on slipping to Creel, do you?”

“If I did, I don't reckon I'd tell you about it, do you?” Scratch asked, not bothering to keep the scorn out of his voice.

Haltom flushed angrily.

“Just for that, I'll have to search you.”

He patted Scratch down and didn't find any other weapons. The silver-haired Texan said, “I never ran into anything yet I couldn't handle with those two Remingtons of mine, and maybe my Winchester, which is outside on my horse.”

“All right, you made your point.” Haltom picked up the key ring again and went over to the cell block door. He unlocked it and swung it open. “Five minutes.” He paused, then added, “And I'll be right out here, so don't try anything funny.”

“Wouldn't dream of it,” Scratch said. He went into the cell block. Haltom left the door open behind him.

Bo was sitting on the bunk in the first cell to the left, leaning forward with his hands clasped together between his knees. He stood up as Scratch came into the cell block.

“I thought I heard your voice out there,” he said. “I'm glad to see you, Scratch. I think maybe you're the only friendly face in the whole county, except maybe for my little brother Hank.”

“Miz Fisher's on your side, too,” Scratch said, “and I think your pa wants to be. He's just mighty confused by the whole thing, and I got to admit, I am, too.”

Bo smiled and asked, “You don't think I've figured out how to be in two places at once, do you?”

“It'd be a neat trick if you could,” Scratch said with a smile, “but no, I don't reckon you could manage that, Bo, even as smart as you are.”

“I don't feel so smart now. I can't think of any way that bartender ought to be able to draw my picture without ever seeing me.”

“The marshal just let me take a gander at that picture.” Scratch sighed. “It sure looks like you, Bo.”

“I haven't seen it yet, but I don't doubt it. If it wasn't the spitting image of me, I don't think everybody around here would have been so quick to make up their minds that I'm guilty.”

“They'll soon know better. I'm headin' over to Hallettsville this afternoon to send a wire to Judge Parker. With any luck I'll be back with his reply before nightfall.”

Bo nodded and said, “I thought about that, too, and was going to suggest it. The judge's testimony ought to clear me of any wrongdoing.”

“I don't know if a telegram will be enough to satisfy the marshal,” Scratch said uneasily. “He said he wanted a sworn statement from Parker, and from ol' Forty-Two Brubaker, too. That's liable to take time.”

“Yeah, but even a telegram from Judge Parker ought to be enough to slow things down until that statement can get here.”

“That's what I'm worried about,” Scratch said. “I'm not sure this jail would stand up to a lynch mob.”

“Marshal Haltom won't let that happen.”

Even though Scratch could tell that Bo was trying to sound confident, he knew his old friend was worried about the same possibility.

Bo went on, “That Fontaine kid was a member of the posse. When we got back to town he offered to buy drinks for everybody at the Southern Belle.”

“Damn it, that ain't good,” Scratch said. “Most of the people in Bear Creek are decent folks—or at least they used to be, I ain't so sure anymore—but if they sit around drinkin' all day with Danny Fontaine eggin' 'em on . . .”

“That's exactly what I was thinking,” Bo said. He lowered his voice so Marshal Haltom couldn't overhear as he went on, “It sure works out well for the Fontaines that there's all this sentiment against one of the Creels, doesn't it?”

Scratch leaned closer to the bars and asked, “You think they're behind all this trouble somehow?”

“The thought occurred to me,” Bo admitted. He shook his head. “But then something else started nagging at me. Once Barney Dunn drew that picture and somebody said it looked like me, the Fontaines may have tried to take advantage of the situation . . . but there's no way they could have set it all up beforehand. In order to do that, they would have had to know that you and I were coming back to Bear Creek. And when that first girl was murdered, you and I didn't even know that yet.”

Scratch grimaced and said, “Dadgum it, Bo, we keep comin' up with these ideas, and then they don't pan out.”

“That's what makes the whole thing a mystery, I reckon.”

“Well, I know one thing that ain't a mystery,” Scratch said. “It ain't gonna be safe to leave you here, not with a lynch mob in the makin' across the creek.”

“You're not thinking about trying to bust me out of jail, are you?” Bo asked with a frown.

“If that's what it comes down to—”

“No,” Bo said. “You'll just get yourself hurt . . . or killed. I don't want that.”

“I don't want those varmints stringin' you up, either, and that's what's liable to happen if you have to stay in here for very long.”

Wearily, Bo scrubbed a hand across his face and then said, “Let's see what happens when you get back from Hallettsville with that wire from the judge. That's the next step. I think I'll be safe enough this afternoon.”

Scratch thought it for a moment and then nodded.

“Yeah, it'll probably take until after dark for that bunch across the creek to soak up enough liquid courage,” he said. “I'll be back before then, one way or another.”

Bo extended his hand through the bars.

“Thanks, Scratch. I knew I could count on you.”

Scratch gripped his friend's hand and said, “Just like I know I could count on you if it was me on the other side of those dang bars.”

From the office, Marshal Haltom called through the open cell block door, “Are the two of you about done back there? You're trying my patience, Morton.”

Scratch nodded to Bo and said, “I'll see you later.”

“
Hasta la vista, amigo.
”

Scratch walked into the marshal's office. Haltom glared at him and said, “I was starting to think I might have to run you out of there at gunpoint.”

Scratch ignored that comment.

“Do you have any deputies, Marshal?” he asked.

Haltom frowned and shook his head.

“No, the town doesn't see fit to pay for any. But I've never had any trouble doing my job without them,” he said. “What business is it of yours?”

“It's just that I'd feel a little better about you protectin' this jail if you weren't by yourself.”

The lawman snorted contemptuously.

“I don't need any help doing what needs to be done. No lynch mob is getting in here. Me and my shotgun will see to that.”

Scratch just hoped that Haltom was right. He thought the man's overconfidence might turn out to be dangerous for all concerned, especially Bo.

“I'll be back,” he said as he buckled on his gun belt. “And when I get here, I'll have a wire from Judge Parker with me.”

“You do that,” Haltom said, but Scratch could tell from the marshal's condescending tone that Haltom didn't expect him to be successful. Haltom's mind was set so firmly in its belief that Bo was guilty, he couldn't allow himself to believe even for a second that he might be wrong.

Scratch left the office, pausing on the boardwalk to heave a sigh. He and Bo had found themselves neck-deep in trouble many times before, but usually he'd been able to rely on Bo to figure out what they should do next.

This time it was all up to him, and Scratch didn't care for the feeling.

One step at a time, he told himself, and as Bo had said, the next step was getting in touch with Judge Parker. Scratch stepped down from the boardwalk and reached toward the hitch rail for his horse's reins.

A sudden outbreak of loud voices from down the street made him pause again.

Scratch turned his head to look toward the disturbance. The wagon he had noticed as he came into town was parked in front of the general store. The top-hatted driver stood beside the team of fancy-rigged horses. The good-looking redhead was on the seat. Scratch figured they had just come out of the store.

Three men in range clothes stood on the boardwalk in front of the store, having followed the professor and the redhead out. Even from a distance, Scratch could tell they were troublemakers just by looking at them. Their tense, aggressive attitude was a giveaway.

The man in the top hat—Professor Sarlat, that was the name painted on the wagon, Scratch recalled—reached for the team's reins to untie them from the hitch rail.

At the same time, one of the men stepped down from the boardwalk, reached over the rail, and grabbed the reins before the professor could take hold of them.

“You ain't goin' anywhere, you damn medicine show quack!” the man yelled.

Scratch sighed. He didn't even come close to having time for a distraction like this. He needed to get to Hallettsville as quickly as possible and send off that telegram to Judge Parker in Fort Smith. The sooner he did that, the sooner he would be back with Parker's answer . . . the answer that might be enough to free Bo.

But the redhead looked scared, and the tall, skinny professor was no match for a trio of burly cowboys. Despite the urgency of his mission, Scratch knew he couldn't just mount up and ride away from this confrontation.

He left his horse tied where it was and walked toward the medicine show wagon.

Other people were on the street and the boardwalks, but they ignored what was going on in front of the general store. Obviously they didn't want to come to the defense of the two strangers. Maybe they were scared of the cowboys, or maybe they just didn't care what happened to the professor and the redhead.

Either way, Scratch was disappointed in the way Bear Creek had changed over the years while he and Bo were gone.

As Scratch approached, one of the cowboys still on the boardwalk said, “Tell your daughter to come down off of that wagon and give us a little sugar, old man, and maybe we'll let you go.”

“The young lady is not my daughter,” Sarlat said stiffly. “She's my assistant.”

“Well, then, in that case it shouldn't bother you for her to give us a kiss,” the puncher insisted.

Sarlat squared his shoulders, gave the three men a haughty look that probably didn't help matters, and declared, “I wouldn't subject her to that indignity.”

“You think it wouldn't be dignified for her to kiss three fine, upstandin' fellas like us? Hell, we ride for the best outfit in these parts, the Rafter F!”

So they were some of Fontaine's men. Somehow that didn't surprise Scratch at all.

One of the other cowboys said, “Anyway, callin' her an assistant don't mean anything. Everybody knows that all medicine show gals are nothin' but thievin' whores! If they don't steal your money one way with that snake oil they sell, they'll steal it another way!”

“By God, sir!” Sarlat exclaimed. He reached back to the floorboard of the driver's box and picked up a cane that had been lying there. Scratch hadn't seen it until now. He brandished the walking stick at the men and went on, “If you don't leave us alone, I'll—”

The man who had been holding the team's reins let go of them suddenly and lunged at Sarlat. He grabbed the cane and twisted it. Sarlat let out a pained cry as the cowboy wrenched the cane out of his hands. On the seat, the redhead pressed the back of her hand to her mouth in fear, either for herself or the professor or both.

“Threaten me, will you?” the cowboy said. “I'll give you a taste of your own medicine, old man, and it won't be that damn snake oil you sell!”

He lifted the cane, ready to swing it at Sarlat's head in what was bound to be the first blow of a painful thrashing.

Scratch's right-hand Remington came out of its holster in a smooth, fast draw. He eared back the hammer with an audible ratcheting sound that made the cowboy with the cane freeze.

“I wouldn't do that,” Scratch said. “Give that walkin' stick back to the professor, and be careful how you do it, too.”

One of the men on the boardwalk said, “Back off, you crazy old coot! This is none of your business.”

“Yeah,” his companion added. “And there's three of us and only one of you!”

“There'll only be two of you once I've put a bullet through that hombre with the walkin' stick,” the silver-haired Texan drawled. “I'll just go ahead and shoot him as soon as either of you boys makes a move toward your gun. And you may not have noticed, but I've got a second Remington. I'm pretty good at gettin' it out and usin' it, too, if I do say so myself. I'd bet this Stetson of mine that I can get lead in both of you before you put me down. Feel like riskin' it?” A cold, dangerous grin stretched across Scratch's face. “Remember, I've got a lot less years to lose than you hombres do. But it's up to you.”

The atmosphere in the street was tense now, heavy with the feel of impending violence as the seconds ticked by. The man with the cane broke that stalemate by throwing the walking stick on the ground at Sarlat's feet.

“There!” he said. “Now put that gun up before it goes off by accident.”

“Oh, if it goes off, it won't be no accident,” Scratch said.

He didn't holster the Remington. He knew that all three men wanted to slap leather. He could tell it by the hatred and fury he saw in their eyes. None of them wanted to back down, especially from a man who was so much older than they were.

But they knew that if they started shooting, one or two of them, possibly even all three, would die here today, and none of them wanted to chance that.

One of the men on the porch spat disgustedly and said, “Come on, fellas. Gettin' a kiss from some medicine show whore ain't worth it.”

He turned and stalked off along the boardwalk. The other two joined him, but not without casting venomous glances over their shoulders at Scratch.

He considered making them stop and apologize to the redhead for what they had said, but decided against it even though such unchivalrous language definitely rubbed him the wrong way. He'd been willing to throw lead to protect somebody from a beating, but with Bo depending on him, he didn't want to get himself shot over some gal's hurt feelings.

Anyway, she didn't seem all that offended. When the Rafter F hands were gone, she said, “Professor, you are all right?”

“Of course, my dear,” he answered in his deep voice that held a hint of a Southern accent. He bent and picked up the cane. As he straightened, he went on, “Thanks to our friend here, I came to no harm. Although if that miscreant had attacked me, he might have been surprised. You know that my elixir gives me the vigor of a much younger man.”

Even under these circumstances, the fella had to get in a pitch for his snake oil, Scratch thought. He supposed it was a matter of habit for the professor to always be selling.

The three cowboys reached the bridge and started across it. Not trusting them, Scratch didn't holster his gun until then.

“Professor Thaddeus Sarlat, sir,” the goateed huckster introduced himself. “Purveyor of the greatest boon to mankind since the invention of fire and the wheel. I'm pleased and honored to make your acquaintance.”

“Scratch Morton,” Scratch replied with a nod. “Purveyor of, well, not much of anything.”

“On the contrary, Mr. Morton, you brought salvation to us. I would have given a good account of myself in battle, but in the end I'd have been no match for those ruffians. There's no telling what they might have done to me and my lovely assistant Veronique. Speaking of which . . . Mr. Morton, allow me to present Mademoiselle Veronique Ballantine.”

Scratch tugged his hat brim and nodded to her.

“Ma'am,” he said. “It's my honor.”

“And my pleasure, M'sieu Morton.”

Scratch had already noticed the French accent. He doubted if she had ever set foot in France, though. She looked more like the sort of gal who hailed from New Orleans.

“Do you live here in Bear Creek, my friend?” Professor Sarlat asked.

“Used to,” Scratch replied. “I grew up in these parts. But right now my pard and I are just visitin'.”

“Returning to old haunts, eh? A worthwhile endeavor. If you're going to be here tonight, I hope you'll attend our exhibition. I'm quite the expert in prestidigitation, you know.”

Scratch frowned and shook his head.

“Magic,” Sarlat explained.

“Oh. Card tricks and such-like.”

A pained expression came over Sarlat's face for a second before he banished the reaction. He said, “I suppose you could put it like that. I prefer to think of it as a demonstration of dexterity and the power of illusion.” He waved a long-fingered hand toward Veronique. “And if magic doesn't interest you, I'm sure you'd be enchanted by the lovely Mademoiselle Veronique's performance. She's a superb singer and dancer. When the show concludes, I'll be offering bottles of my elixir at such a low price that the members of the audience will practically be losing money if they
don't
purchase a bottle or two.” He paused in his spiel. “In your case, however, I wouldn't feel right about charging you for this miraculous, health-giving liquid after what you've done for us. Mr. Morton, I'd like to give you a bottle right now, absolutely free of charge. If you have a chance to try it between now and this evening, perhaps you would be willing to stand up and offer a testimonial to its absolutely splendid benefits.”

Scratch was beginning to wonder if he was ever going to be able to get a word in edgewise. The professor spewed words like a politician.

Sarlat had to take a breath eventually, though, and when he did, Scratch said quickly, “You don't have to do that, Professor. I was glad to help. And right now I've got somewhere I need to be, so I'd best be movin' along. I don't know where I'll be tonight.”

“Please, sir, take a bottle of my elixir and tonic for later,” Sarlat insisted. He reached inside his long, swallowtail coat. “I happen to have an unopened bottle right here.”

For a second Scratch wondered if the professor might have paid those three cowboys to cause a commotion, just so somebody like him would come to their aid and wind up being given a bottle of elixir, in the hope that the Good Samaritan would then help them sell some more of the concoction.

He discarded that idea, though, as he remembered how the Rafter F hands had looked at him. There was nothing phony about the anger they had felt.

But even though Sarlat hadn't set up the confrontation, he was still going to try to take advantage of it.

Since Scratch was in a hurry and had already spent too much time on this, and because he could tell that Sarlat wasn't going to take no for an answer, he accepted the pint bottle that the professor held out to him. The bottle was made of dark brown glass and had a cork in its neck.

“I'll give it a try later,” Scratch said as he slipped the bottle into the pocket of his buckskin jacket. He might take a small sip of the stuff when he got a chance, just to see how vile it was, but he figured he would wind up pouring out most of it. He sure wasn't going to get up at the medicine show and tell people they ought to buy it.

“Excellent,” Sarlat said. “I hope we see you tonight, Mr. Morton.”

“Yes,” Veronique said as she gave Scratch a sultry smile. “I would be very pleased to see you again, m'sieu.”

Scratch knew she was just flirting with him and it didn't mean anything, but he still enjoyed having a gorgeous redhead smiling at him that way. He touched a finger to his hat brim and said, “The feelin' is mutual, mademoiselle.”

With that he lifted a hand in farewell and headed back to his horse. He didn't look behind him, because he didn't want to take a chance on being delayed again.

He mounted up and rode out of Bear Creek, taking a road that led northeast toward Hallettsville. There was a telegraph office at Victoria, too, southeast of Bear Creek, but Hallettsville was slightly closer.

Scratch kept his eyes open. He wasn't expecting any trouble, but it sometimes jumped out at a man when he wasn't looking for it.

His horse had plenty of stamina and maintained a ground-eating lope for miles. Scratch pulled the animal back to a walk every now and then to let it rest. He paused once for half an hour, a delay that chafed at him even though he knew it was necessary to keep from riding the horse into the ground.

It was well past midday by the time Scratch reached the good-sized town of Hallettsville. He glanced down at the Lavaca River as he rode across the bridge that spanned it. As usual, there wasn't much water in the twisting stream. Bear Creek was bigger and flowed more. It was common in Texas to find creeks that were bigger than the so-called rivers.

The courthouse and the business section of town perched atop a small hill. The railroad ran south of it, and the telegraph office was inside the train station. Scratch dismounted, tied his horse, and went into the depot.

A counter on one side of the big waiting room had telegraph flimsies and pencils on it. Scratch got one of the yellow pieces of paper and printed on it:

He addressed another telegram to Deputy U.S. Marshal Ed “Forty-Two” Brubaker and put the same message on it. Then he took both of them over to the window and slid them across to the telegrapher.

The man's brows rose under the green eyeshade he wore as he scanned the words.

“Are you a federal lawman?” he asked Scratch.

“Would I be sendin' wires to those fellas if I wasn't?” Scratch replied, which wasn't exactly a lie since he was just asking the telegrapher a question and letting the hombre draw his own conclusions. But if the man thought Scratch packed a badge for Uncle Sam, it might make him more efficient.

“I'll send these right away,” the telegrapher said. “Sorry, I've got to charge you for them, though.”

“That's fine,” Scratch said. “Just get 'em on the wire as fast as you can.”

The telegrapher counted up the price, and Scratch paid it. Then the key started clattering as the man tapped out the messages.

“Are you going to wait for the replies?” he asked when he was finished.

Scratch hadn't taken the time to eat anything before he left Bear Creek, and it had been a long time since breakfast, his stomach reminded him.

“Is there a hash house close by?”

“A block up toward the courthouse,” the telegrapher said. “Mighty good food there.”

“That's where I'll be, then,” Scratch said. “If a reply comes in to either of those wires before I get back, can you send a boy to deliver it?”

“Sure,” the telegrapher said with a nod. “I'll do that immediately, Marshal.”

“Much obliged,” Scratch said, letting the man go on thinking he was a lawman. As long as nobody asked to see his badge and bona fides, he didn't see where it would hurt anything.

The hash house was owned by a Swedish couple. There were a lot of Scandinavian settlers in this part of Texas, Scratch recalled. North of here a ways there were entire communities made up entirely of Swedes and Norwegians. They were mighty good folks, too, he thought. Salt of the earth.

The man and woman who ran the little café served good old American food, though, including a thick, juicy steak that went a long way toward restoring Scratch's energy and his spirits. He washed the meal down with several cups of black coffee and was about ready to head back to the train station when a towheaded youngster came in carrying a couple of telegrams. Scratch spotted the yellow flimsies and knew the replies to his wires had come in.

“Over here, son,” he called to the boy as he stood up. “I'll take those.”

“You're Marshal Morton?” the boy asked.

“That's right.” Now that
was
an outright lie, but Scratch figured he could be forgiven for it, since he was just trying to help Bo as quickly as he could.

“Here you go, then,” the youngster said as he held out the telegrams. Scratch took them and flipped a half dollar to the kid, who snatched it out of the air and stared at it in awe as he realized how rich he was. He turned and ran out of the café, no doubt headed for the nearest place that sold licorice whips and penny candy.

Scratch unfolded the first telegram, thinking that he'd been lucky to hear back from both Parker and Brubaker. Their word ought to carry enough weight to get Bo out of jail. At least Scratch hoped that would be the case.

His spirits plummeted as he read the words printed on the paper.

A growl of disappointment came from Scratch. That was bad luck, pure and simple. But maybe Brubaker's wire would be enough to help clear Bo's name.

So both messages had been delivered to Pennington at the big redbrick courthouse in Fort Smith. Scratch bit back a curse as he read the second reply, then impulsively crumpled both flimsies in his fist. He had known there was a possibility he wouldn't be able to get in touch with Brubaker, but he had been counting on Judge Parker's help.