The Devil and Lou Prophet (27 page)

As he neared the left rear of the
girl’s horse, he eased his gun arm out before him, carefully aiming
the pistol. He thought he could plug the girl through her head at
this range—the trail was fairly straight, his gun hand moving with
his horse’s stride.

Thumbing back the hammer, he started
increasing the tension on the trigger. He stopped, frowning with
surprise, when a man suddenly appeared along the trail, to Brown’s
left. He was holding something out from his body, like a club.
Billy didn’t have time to identify the object before it smacked his
face so hard he felt his lips and teeth break. Before he knew what
had happened, he was sailing ass-over-head backwards off his
saddle.

Owen McCreedy stood holding his rifle
by the barrel and gazing down at the half-conscious Brown. Billy
lay face down in the grass along the trail, moaning as he rolled
slightly from side to side, his face in his hands. Even though his
wounded arm throbbed mercilessly, McCreedy grinned. He had the son
of a bitch. He finally had him. He knew it wasn’t a very
professional sentiment, but boy had smacking that man in the mug
felt good!

Hooves thumped behind him. He turned
to watch the girl ride toward him, a cautious set to her face. He
raised a placating hand. “It’s all right, miss. I’m Owen McCreedy,
sheriff of Johnson City.”

“
How,” she said, shaking
her head, “how did you find us here?”

McCreedy winced from the pain in his
arm. Before he could reply, Lola shook her head again, as though to
nullify her question. “Lou needs help,” she said urgently. “They
have him pinned down back there, about two miles!”

“
Shit,” McCreedy said,
exhaling and staring down at Brown, a pained expression on his
face. “Okay, I tell you what we do,” he told her. “You stay here
with him. You have a gun?”

She nodded and patted the rifle boot
housing the Sharp’s on the other side of her Appaloosa.

“
All right—I’ll get my
horse,” he said, turning and starting for the aspen grove behind
him.

He hadn’t walked more than ten feet,
when Lola said sharply. “Wait!”

McCreedy turned to her. “What is
it?”

She pointed back the way she’d come.
“Someone’s coming.”

McCreedy turned. Sure enough, a lone
rider was approaching at a gallop. McCreedy brought the rifle to
his chest, but checked himself. The man came on, but seeing them,
he slowed to a canter.

“
It’s him!” Lola fairly
screamed. “It’s Lou!”

She gigged her horse out to meet him.
McCreedy watched as the two came together, the girl throwing
herself around Prophet’s neck and Prophet doing nothing to
discourage the attention. McCreedy gave his head a
shake.

That dog ...

At length, the girl turned her horse
around and followed Prophet, who approached McCreedy with his
trademark shit-eating grin, cantering his horse sideways and
checking him down when he was about ten feet away. “Howdy, Owen,”
he said, noticing the sheriff’s bloody arm and frowning. “What in
the hell are you doing out here?”

“
I followed Billy and his
thugs out from town,” the sheriff said, lowering his gaze to Brown,
who had crawled onto his hands and knees, spitting blood and teeth
in the grass. “They bushwacked me about three miles
back.”

“
I see that,” Prophet said.
“You’re gonna need some attention there.”

“
So’s he,” McCreedy said,
regarding the thug with a grin. To Prophet, he said, “What about
the others?”

“
Dead.”

McCreedy was incredulous.
“All?”

Prophet turned to Lola and smiled.
“Never turn your back on a girl and a Sharp’s Big Fifty,
Owen.”

Brown lifted his enraged eyes to
Prophet and cursed. The bounty hunter could only tell from the tone
it was a curse, for the man’s mouth was so full of broken teeth and
blood, his speech was garbled.

Brown jabbed a finger at McCreedy and
gummed several more unintelligible phrases. “Save it, Billy,”
McCreedy said, reaching down with his one good hand and jerking the
man to his feet. “Save it for the trial.” He looked at Lola.
“You’ll testify?”

Lola gave an unequivocal nod, glaring
hot hate at the crime boss, who returned her stare. Her voice was
steel. “‘Sheriff, I’ll testify to him slashing Hoyt Farley’s throat
while his gunslicks held the poor man’s arms”—she swung her
confident gaze to McCreedy—”and to a whole lot more.”

“
Okay,” McCreedy said, nodding.
He turned to Prophet. “Let’s get this son of a bitch on a horse and
haul him off to the hoosegow ... and a hangman’s noose.”

Two weeks later, in his big,
canopied bed in the Nuremberg, Prophet rolled over to wrap Lola in
his arms. He got an armload of pillow instead. Groggily lifting his
head, hair mussed and eyes narrowed, he looked around the
room lit by golden
morning rays slanting through the thin, crocheted curtains. He
turned to the dressing room. “Lola?” No response. He hadn’t really
expected any. The door was open, and he could see she wasn’t there.
Casting another glance around the room, he saw that all her
clothes, recently purchased over the past two weeks in Johnson
City, and which, during their lovemaking, had been strewn about the
carpeted Moor, were gone. Gone, also, were the new carpetbag and
portmanteau she’d bought for traveling.

Planting his elbows on the bed and
running his hands through his hair, he heard the words she’d
whispered the other night, as they lay entangled in the darkened
room. “One of these mornings I’m going to wake up and go— okay,
Lou?” she’d said.

“
What?”

“
It’ll be easier that
way.”

He’d looked at her,
baffled.

She pressed her cheek to his chest.
When she spoke, her voice was small and far away, like a little
girl’s. “Let’s not pretend this is anything more than what it
is.”

“
What is it?”

She shrugged her naked shoulders. He
could feel the warmth and wetness of her lips on his chest. “A
fling. A wonderful, wonderful fling ...”

He’d sighed. She was right. How could
they be anything more than what they were right now? She was a
showgirl aiming for the big time. A man would only stand in her
way. He was a reclusive bounty hunter, bound to the mountains and
plains, the wild places in the West, a saddle tramp more at home
atop a horse than even a saloon chair.

Her shoulders jerked twice. The
spreading wetness on his chest was tears. He ran his hands slowly
up and down her narrow back and supple hips. She pushed herself
onto her hands and knees, and straddled him, gazing smokily into
his eyes. Slowly, and for one of their last times, their most
passionate time ever, they made love....

Now he rolled out of bed with a sigh,
feeling hollow and lethargic, and climbed into a new pair of
denims. He shaved at the commode stand. He wet his hair down and
combed it, then shrugged into the shirt she’d picked out for him at
the dry-goods store—a soft chambray with red piping. Everything
they’d bought had been on the expense account Owen McCreedy had
arranged for them, tapped directly from Billy Brown’s assets, in
payment for all they’d gone through getting here.

Prophet didn’t mind taking the
handout, since it was Brown’s money. Brown sure didn’t need it. The
town had hanged him two days ago, and sent his disbarred attorney
packing. They’d had a street dance afterward.

When he’d buttoned the shirt and
stomped into his boots, he packed his saddlebags, draped them over
his shoulder, and headed downstairs, lighting a cigarette. He felt
distracted and lonely and just plain sad. The carpeted lobby was
too bright for his mood. Sourly, he paid his bill but managed a
feeble wink when thanking the porter for the extra attention—food
and drink at all hours, extra pillows and baths. He slipped a gold
eagle into the lad’s shirt pocket, and headed outside.

Looking to his left, he saw the
morning stage to Cheyenne sitting outside the station, passengers
milling near its open door. Lola stood near the rear, watching the
driver load her bags into the boot. She looked lovely in her new
blue traveling dress and feathered hat which contrasted with the
red of her hair. She carried a ruffled parasol in one hand and a
smartly beaded reticule in the other. As though she felt his gaze,
she turned his way, and crossed her hands before her.

He adjusted the saddlebags on his
shoulder and, puffing his cigarette, strolled across the street.
She smiled as he approached, and inclined her head. “You’re going
to make this hard for me, aren’t you?”

He shrugged. “Just wanted to say
goodbye, that’s all.”

“
I hate
goodbyes.”

He let the saddlebags fall down his
arm and into the dust at his feet. He took his cigarette in his
right hand, stepped forward, and engulfed her in his arms. He held
her tightly for a long time, sniffing her neck. He
smiled.

He held her at arm’s length to gaze
into her eyes. “We had one hell of a ride, didn’t we?”

Her eyes were veiled with tears, but
she was smiling.

She nodded. “I had a wonderful time
with you, you big lout. Even when things were looking desperate.
But it’s all over now.” She gazed up the street, where several men
were slowly dismantling the gallows from which Billy Brown had been
hung. “I could stay another week, but why? We have to part
sometime.”

Prophet nodded. “Headin’ for
Denver?”

She nodded.

He squinted at her. “Good luck to you,
Miss Diamond.”

She threw herself into his arms and
kissed him. Her lips were full and supple; they clung to him for
several seconds.

“
Goodbye, Lou. I’ll never
forget you.”

“
I couldn’t forget you if I
tried, Lola.”

“
All aboard, ma’am,” the
driver said.

She glanced at Prophet once more, then
turned to the stage, lifting her skirts as the driver helped her
board. When the door closed, and the driver climbed up to the box,
Prophet stepped forward and said through the window, “Hey, you
never told me your real name.”

She looked at him, giving a defiant
smile. “And I never will, either.”

Prophet chuckled as the driver yelled
at the horses and the stage jerked away. When it was halfway down
the block, steering through the crowd of horseback riders and
wagons, Lola poked her head out the window, looking back at
him.

“
It’s Margaret Jane Olson.”
she yelled.

Prophet walked forward, cupping his
ear. “What is it?”

“
Margaret Jane Olson, and
don’t you dare tell a soul!” She watched him, smiling brightly. She
threw him a kiss. Then the dust thickened between them. She waved,
the stage turned a corner, and she was gone.

Prophet stuck his cigarette between his
lips and stared after the thinning dust plume, swallowing a dry
knot in his throat. “Good luck, Margaret Jane,” he said, exhaling
smoke.

“
Too bad,” someone said
behind him. “She’s as pretty as a Georgia sunset.”

Prophet turned to see Owen McCreedy
standing in the shade outside the sheriff’s office, his left arm in
a sling.

“
You noticed, did you? What
would Alice think?”

The sheriff grinned and shrugged his
shoulders. “Alice ain’t here. She’s home making a rhubarb pie. I
was about to head that way for another cup of coffee and a slice of
that pie. Join me?”

“
Nah,” Prophet said,
feeling churlish, wanting a drink.

“
Might cheer you up,”
McCreedy said enticingly. “Besides, I figure I owe you a piece of
rhubarb pie—your favorite, ain’t it?—after nearly getting you
killed. Again, I sure am sorry about that, Proph. I guess I
underestimated the length of ole Billy’s tentacles.”

“
Wasn’t your fault, Owen.
Someone got word to him that you found the girl—that’s
all.”

“
Yeah, but who the hell
could that have been? The only ones who knew were you, me, Perry
Moon, the sheriff who found her in the first place, and Sheriff
Fitzsimmons up to Henry’s Crossing. I didn’t tell another
soul.”

Prophet had been studying the dust at
his feet. Now he turned his gaze to McCreedy, a dim light in his
eyes, as though a thought had just occurred to him. At length, he
stopped to pick up his saddlebags.

“
Well, I’ll take my rifle
and shotgun off your hands now, Owen,” he said. He’d left both
weapons with the sheriff for safekeeping.

“
That mean your declining
my offer of a slice of Alice’s pie?” McCreedy asked as he stepped
inside the jail.

“
I reckon I’ll be headin’
back up to Johnson City,” Prophet said behind him.

When the sheriff appeared in the
doorway with his shotgun and Winchester, Prophet laid the barrels
of both across his shoulder.

“
What business do you have
up in Johnson City?” McCreedy asked with a probing gaze.

“
I left my ugly horse up
there,” Prophet said. “I better get him back before someone shoots
the son of a bitch.” He turned and started for the livery barn,
where he’d stabled the horse he’d borrowed from old man Hill at the
Backwater station.