Blood Duel Read online

  The other players froze.

  “Are you implying I cheat?” Club Caine asked in a deceptively mild manner.

  Aces Weaver forced a laugh. “He’s not saying any such thing, Club. The cards won’t come his way, is all, and he’s fit to be tied. We’ve all had days like that.”

  “Just so he is not implying I cheat,” Club replied. “I will not have my reputation tarnished by the likes of him or anyone else.”

  “What do you mean by the likes of me?” Paunch Stevens asked. “I take that as a slur.”

  “Take it however you like so long as you make it clear you were not suggesting I cheat.”

  Paunch Stevens had been drinking since the game began, drinking heavily. He tilted the glass to his thick lips to drain it, let out a sigh, and then said so politely and matter-of-factly that it was a full ten seconds before the import sank in, “I will do and say as I damn well please, you lime-sucking son of a bitch.”

  Aces Weaver saw Club Caine redden and sought to avert a catastrophe by exclaiming, “Don’t take him serious, Club! He has been sucking a bottle down since he came in.”

  Paunch did not help any by immediately saying, “I am nowhere near drunk, thank you very much.”

  “You bloody bastard,” Club said.

  Joe Gentile thrust both hands out, blurting, “Gentlemen! Gentlemen! Let’s not forget this is a friendly game. No slinging insults, if you please.”

  “Tell that to him,” Club said stiffly.

  “I will insult who I want,” Paunch asserted.

  Aces Weaver was sweating profusely. He had been in too many saloons when revolvers were resorted to, and he had witnessed too many bystanders take stray lead due to escalating wars of words. Again he tried to defuse the situation by turning to Paunch. “What’s gotten into you? You have never acted this way before.”

  “Maybe I don’t like Brits. Did you ever think of that?”

  “Tell him the truth,” Club Caine said.

  “What truth?” From Joe Gentile.

  “This isn’t about cards. This isn’t about where I am from,” Club said. “It is about Harriet Fly.”

  “Oh Lord,” Aces said.

  Joe Gentile pushed his bowler back on his thatch of curly brown hair. “Who?”

  Aces answered him. “Harriet Fly. She works over to the Birdcage. The tall redhead with hair down to her knees.”

  “The one who was on Bat Masterson’s arm for a while?” Joe Gentile said. “And took up with Six-Toed Pete after Masterson moved on to greener pastures?”

  “That’s the one,” Aces said.

  “What does she have to do with our card game?”

  Club Caine placed his hand on the edge of the table close to the Webley revolver in the holster next to his belt buckle. “I can tell you. You see, the popsie in question gave Pete the brush-off. Paunch tried to move in, but Harriet did not want anything to do with him. He was most persistent. It got so bad, she told him to sod off or she would go to the marshal.”

  “May you rot in hell,” Paunch Stevens growled.

  “I still don’t get what she has to do with our card game,” Joe Gentile admitted.

  Club Caine’s ruggedly handsome face split in a triumphant grin. “It is simple, young man. Harriet Fly has had me around to her apartment every night for the past week, and Paunch can’t stand the thought of her favoring me over him.”

  “Is this true?” Joe asked Stevens.

  Paunch Stevens’s jaw twitched and his hands opened and closed. “Harriet Fly would have been mine if this randy goat had not come along and begged her to be his.”

  “I have never had to beg a woman in my life,” Club Caine said, and smiled. “I can’t help it if she thinks I have more to offer her than you do. In every respect,” he stressed.

  Pushing his chair back, Paunch rose. “Enough. Let us settle this like men should.” He swept his jacket aside to reveal his Smith & Wesson. “That is, if you have the sand.”

  “I have more sand than you do,” Club Caine said. “More sense, too. Whoever prevails is bound to wind up behind bars. The marshal has been making a point of late of cracking down on malefactors.”

  “On who?” Aces Weaver asked.

  “Lawbreakers,” Club said, enlightening him. “Especially those who break the ordinance about not wearing firearms in the city limits.”

  “Which no one abides by,” Joe Gentile mentioned.

  Paunch Stevens sneered at Caine. “Your excuse won’t wash. If you were half the man Harriet thinks you are, you would go for your gun, ordinance or no ordinance.”

  “Not when there is a better way,” Club said. “A way to satisfy our honor and not be arrested afterward.”

  “I am listening.”

  “Coffin Varnish,” the Brit said.

  “I saw the newspaper, the same as everyone else,” Paunch responded. “It’s a lot of bother to go to when we could walk out into the alley and get it over with here and now.”

  “Coffin Varnish,” Caine repeated. “We might as well do it legally. Unless it is you who does not have a spine.”

  “Oh, I have backbone,” Paunch spat. “More than you will ever have.” He motioned. “Let’s go. We can be there by dark if we hurry.”

  “Tomorrow morning. Will ten do?”

  “What is wrong with right this minute?” Paunch Stevens asked. “I will never be more ready.”

  Club Caine stood and grinned. “I want to spend the night with Harriet.” He gathered up his chips. “You would do well to find someone you care for to keep you company, Yank, for tomorrow you breathe your last.”

  “I care about me,” Paunch said.

  Joe Gentile was a study in anxiety. “I wish you two would reconsider. An insult is not worth dying over. Nor is a woman.”

  “What is, in your estimation?” Paunch demanded, and did not wait for an answer. “You are, what, twenty? That’s the problem with the young today. You are not willing to die for anything.” He turned and tromped off, saying over a shoulder, “See you in Coffin Varnish, Brit. I will be there promptly at ten. Don’t keep me waiting.”

  “I can stop this, you know,” Aces Weaver said. “I bet if I go to the sheriff he will send deputies to arrest the two of you.”

  “You do that,” Club Caine said, “and the first thing I will do when I am released on bail is come looking for you, and it won’t be to shake your hand.”

  Aces Weaver gestured in resignation. “You try to help some people and that is the thanks you get.”

  Chapter 13

  For Coffin Varnish the day started like any other.

  Out at the Anderson farm, Dolph was up before sunrise to trudge to the barn to milk the cows. Filippa was dressed by first light and went out to the chicken coop to gather eggs. She had breakfast ready when Dolph finished milking and let the cows out to pasture. After breakfast he always hitched up the wagon and took their surplus milk and eggs into town to sell to Chester Luce.

  In the Giorgio household, Gemma was a firm believer in early to bed and early to rise. She always roused Minimi and their sons out of bed as dawn broke and insisted they wash up and dress before sitting at her table. Their breakfasts were small, as was the Italian custom. Coffee for her husband, milk for her sons, and eggs and a roll for everyone. The milk and eggs she bought each day at the general store.

  Placido and Arturo were seldom out and about before ten. Arturo always swept out the stable while Placido fed and watered the horses. They owned three, which they rented out on those rare occasions when someone wandered in wanting to rent one.

  At the general store, the mornings started punctually at seven whether Chester wanted them to or not. Adolphina was always first up but not for long. She would wake him and, after he dressed, send him to the kitchen to make breakfast. It was a secret only they shared, since the woman was expected to do the cooking, but Adolphina hated to cook. By eight breakfast was done, Adolphina usually went back to bed, and Chester hung the OPEN sign in the front window. Usually Dol
ph arrived to sell his eggs and milk by eight thirty.

  Winifred Curry did not stick to a routine. He got up when he felt like it, usually between eight and ten, and opened the saloon. Then he treated himself to his first drink of the day and ate if he was hungry.

  Sally Worth slept in as long as she wanted. Some mornings she was up early; other times she did not appear until early afternoon. Whether she had plied her trade the night before had a lot to do with when she stirred.

  On this particular morning Sally couldn’t sleep, so she was up and dressed by nine. She had Win pour her a drink and went out and sat in one of the rocking chairs to enjoy the relative coolness while it still lasted. She was peacefully rocking and sipping when a rider came up the street from the south and drew rein at the hitch rail. He had a big belly and wore nice clothes, which told Sally he made a decent living at whatever he did, which piqued her interest. “Good morning, there, handsome.”

  Paunch Stevens smiled. “I have been called a lot of things, lady, but that is not one of them.” He stiffly dismounted and swore. “Why can’t someone invent a comfortable saddle? My backside is killing me.”

  “Would you like it massaged?”

  Paunch blinked, and regarded her with renewed interest. “A fallen dove, here? You must be rich and do it for the fun.”

  Sally laughed. “I wish. I scrape by, barely, and only by the good graces of the gent who owns this saloon.”

  “Ah. He is your man,” Paunch said.

  “Not how you mean, no. He is a friend, a good friend. Him and me go a long ways back.”

  “You don’t say.” Paunch came under the overhang and swatted dust from his suit. “Perhaps after I conclude my business here today, you and I can get together. I will be in a mood to celebrate.”

  Sally came out of the rocking chair as if she had been shoved. Beaming, she hooked her arm in his. “Mister, I am all yours.”

  “Not until I conclude my business.”

  “What would that be, if you don’t mind my asking?”

  “I am here to shoot someone,” Paunch informed her, and headed into the saloon. He wanted to fortify himself before Caine arrived. His anger of the day before had faded and been replaced by a cold dash of reality. “I understand it is legal in this town.”

  “Oh my,” Sally said. “I was beginning to think the mayor wasted money on that notice in the newspaper.”

  “How is that again?” Paunch asked as he steered her toward the bar.

  “You are the first person to come here to kill, mister. Congratulations, I guess.”

  Win was wiping the counter. He greeted Paunch Stevens, poured him a rye, and listened to him explain why he was there. “So it has come to pass. You better go fetch the mayor, Sally.”

  Grumbling, Sally went out.

  Chester Luce was rearranging the dry goods when the bell over the door tinkled. He liked to rearrange. When business was slow, which was practically always, he sometimes spent entire days moving items from one shelf to another and back again. Turning, he hid his surprise at seeing Sally. She rarely came into the store, in large part because Adolphina made no secret of her disdain for loose women. “Miss Worth. What can I do for you?”

  “I have brought news, Mayor,” Sally said, casting a worried glance at the door to the Luce living quarters.

  “Is that ornery pig making a nuisance of himself again?” Chester asked. “I keep telling those Mexicans to keep it penned up.”

  “It is not the pig,” Sally said. “It is your wish come true. There is a man over to the saloon who has come here to kill somebody.”

  “Really and truly?” Chester said, excitement coursing through him like rapids through a chasm. “I had about given up hope.”

  “Better hurry on over there before he changes his mind,” Sally Worth suggested.

  “I take it you do not approve?”

  “Not of killing, I don’t. I have seen my share, heard about a lot more, and if there is one thing I have learned, it is that no good ever comes of taking a human life.”

  “Oh, come now,” Chester said. “No good comes from taking the life of outlaws? No good comes from taking the lives of marauding Indians? Your argument is specious.”

  “I don’t even know what that means,” Sally said. “And I’m not arguing, Your Honor. I am telling you God’s gospel truth.”

  “With all due respect, Miss Worth, what do you know of the Almighty? You, a blatant sinner.”

  Sally Worth appraised him critically, then said, “Well, now. I always thought you were different from your wife, but I was wrong. Yes, I am a sinner, but who among us isn’t? Just because I part my legs for money does not mean I don’t know the difference between what is right and what is wrong, and what you have done is wrong.”

  “I didn’t hear you object when all those people came to town to view the bodies,” Chester noted. “You about wore yourself out those three days, which is quite a feat considering you were flat on your back. How much did you earn?”

  “That was low, Chester,” Sally said.

  “It was God’s gospel truth, to quote you. So do not presume to take on airs with me. You stand to benefit as much as the rest of us off the killing you so despise.”

  “At my age I can’t afford not to,” Sally said. “But that does not mean I have to like it.”

  “Whether you do or you don’t is of no consequence,” Chester said flatly. “And for your information, you and I are in the same boat as everyone else in Coffin Varnish. Our town is in desperate need of an influx of money or it will wither and die. If it helps, think of the killing as a civic necessity.”

  “You have air between your ears,” Sally said.

  Chester walked toward the pegs on which his jacket and hat were hung. “I thank you for coming to tell me. You may go now.” He did not turn around until the bell tinkled and the door closed. Before leaving he went to the full-length mirror and checked that his suit was dust-free. In politics, impressions were everything.

  The sun’s glare made Chester squint. He hurried across the street, noticed a sorrel at the hitch rail with a fairly expensive saddle. Its owner was at the bar, drinking. Win was behind the bar. There was no sign of Sally Worth, which suited Chester just fine. He liked her but she had a tendency to forget her station in the scheme of things.

  Introductions were made.

  Paunch Stevens got right to the point. “In a little while a gent by the name of Club Caine will show up. He and I are at odds. We have agreed to shoot it out and came to your town to do the deed.”

  “I commend you on your decision,” Chester said. “You will find that we bend over backwards to make this as easy as we can.”

  “What is the first step?” Paunch asked.

  “Maybe it would be best to address both of you at the same time,” Chester said. “So I do not need to repeat myself.”

  “I suppose that makes sense.” Paunch emptied his glass and asked Win Curry to refill it.

  “Haven’t you had enough?”

  “I will decide whether I have or I haven’t,” Paunch said. He smacked the glass down on the counter.

  Win shrugged and poured. Long ago he had learned not to argue with belligerent drunks.

  Chester asked for a whiskey, then went out and sat in a rocking chair. No sooner was he comfortable than a rider appeared. He guessed who it was. With growing excitement he waited for the next participant to arrive, and when the rider finally drew rein, Chester studied him with interest. He noticed how the man limped when he turned from the hitch rail, and noticed, too, the unusual revolver the man wore. “You would be the other duelist.”

  “The what?” Club Caine said. “Oh. Yes. I guess I am, at that, although I do not regard this as a duel in the strict sense of the term.” He nodded at the other horse at the hitch rail. “Paunch Stevens is already here, I gather?”

  “He showed up about an hour ago,” Chester said. Rising, he extended his hand and revealed who he was. “Now that you are here, I can expl
ain to both of you exactly how this works.”

  Club Caine flexed his bad leg a few times. “There is really only one thing I want to know. Who sees to the burying, afterward? I will be damned if I lift a finger in his behalf.”

  Chester stepped to the batwings and called out for Paunch Stevens to join them.

  Paunch took his time. He had heard the horse ride up. He finished his drink, paid, and strolled out, not at all concerned that the liquor had him feeling as if he could walk on clouds. “So you actually came?”

  “Did you hope I wouldn’t so you could go around telling everyone I am afraid of you?”

  Chester moved between them. “Gentlemen, if you please. Save the barbs for later. We have business to discuss. How about if we repair to the bar as this might take a while?”

  “I wouldn’t mind another drink,” Paunch Stevens said.

  “None for me,” Caine declared.

  Paunch snickered. “Any man who can’t hold liquor usually can’t shoot worth a damn, either.”

  “You will find out just how well I shoot soon enough.”

  Chester waved his hands. “Enough of this bickering. Mr. Stevens, you go first. I will follow with Mr. Caine.”

  “Make sure he doesn’t shoot me in the back,” Paunch said. “That would be his style.”

  “You despicable pig,” Club said.

  Paunch Stevens laughed.

  To Winifred Curry, the advent of the three into his saloon was immediate cause for worry. “No shooting in here! It took me half a day to clean up the blood from the last mess.”

  Chester puffed out his chest and grandly sauntered to the bar. “The shooting will take place in the street. We must first discuss the preliminaries.”

  “The what?” Paunch Stevens said.

  “The permit fee, the burial costs,” Chester recited. “All those must be dealt with before you can draw your guns.”

  “The hell you say?”

  “Didn’t you read our notice in the Times? Mention was made of all of it,” Chester said.