Baldridge stopped at the first cell on the left. A shaft of dying light angled through the single barred window and shone on the stout body of Billy Brown, who lay on his cot, hands behind his head, feet propped on the outside wall, ankles crossed.
Brown was smoking a hand-rolled cigarette with a bored, thoughtful air. He was a peppery little Easterner with coarse, curly gray hair and a bulldog’s face and body—short, skinny legs, broad shoulders, and a hard, round paunch. The sleeves of his white silk shirt were rolled up his meaty arms, revealing the scars and tattoos harking back to the days he’d been a street fighter in Philadelphia.
Billy Brown had come up the hard way: with his fists. Now he owned three saloons and brothels here in Johnson City and two more in Skowfield, twenty miles east. Those were his legal interests. The illegal ones included rustling, horse stealing, whiskey- and gun-running, crooked gambling, and a healthy cut of every saloon and brothel in Johnson City, which he enforced under threat of arson and murder. His army of cutthroats numbered around twenty-five, at least twelve of whom were never allowed to show their faces in either Johnson City or Skowfield. That’s how wanted they were by the law.
“That you, Hart?” he asked now as Baldridge stopped outside his door and fumbled with the keys.
“It’s me, Billy. Had a little trouble with McCreedy.”
“What kinda trouble?”
“Wouldn’t let me in at first.” Baldridge poked the key in the lock and turned it back and forth, jerking the door. “He was just throwing his weight around. He knows we’ve got him by the short hairs, and he’s squirming to beat the band.”
Brown swung his feet to the floor as Baldridge opened the door. “That goddamn McCreedy!” Brown rasped. His voice sounded like sandpaper on hardwood, and he spoke in a staccato, East Coast rhythm, his freckled, blue-eyed face pinched and red with exasperation. “The son of a bitch’ll die tomorrow if I give the order.”
“He knows that as well as we do, Billy,” Baldridge said, tossing the keys on the cell’s single small table. “But like I said before, killing the sheriff would bring the wrong kind of attention. The U.S. Marshals and the governor’s office might get involved. No ... as your attorney, I advise you to let nature run its course.”
“Yeah, yeah, nature,” Brown rasped impatiently, staring at the paper in Baldridge’s hand. “What do you have?”
Baldridge pulled the ladder-back chair away from the table, upon which a game of solitaire had been abandoned, as well as a cup of cold coffee and an ashtray filled with cigarette butts. The lawyer sat down, the chair creaking beneath his considerable girth. A cool smile played over his heavy, shiny face as he handed the papers to his boss.
“Bannon found the girl.”
Brown grabbed the cable. “You shittin’ me?”
“He was the man to send. Said he has a snitch in Henry’s Crossing. We’ll need to send money to pay this snitch for his services.”
Billy Brown grinned at the attorney. He leaned toward the man and pinched Baldridge’s cheeks until the attorney’s eyes watered. “You were right about Bannon—you lard-ass son of a bitch!” He released the attorney and rubbed his hands together eagerly, squealing like a pig. His cheeks were crimson. “He kill her yet?”
“No,” Baldridge said, kneading his sore cheeks. “He cabled from Henry’s Crossing. He’s hopping the stage with her and some bounty hunter who picked her up to bring her back here.” Baldridge smiled with his eyes. “Apparently, McCreedy found her, too.”
“Well, when’s he gonna kill her?”
“Somewhere between Henry’s Crossing and the first stage stop.”
“How’s he gonna do it?”
“Didn’t say.”
Billy Brown stood and walked to the window. One tattooed arm on the ledge, he sucked nervously on the quirley, thinking. His eyes darted around in their tiny sockets, like blue rats in a cage. “We have any other men in the area?”
“Six. Morgan and Price are at the gold camp in Hutton. Dick Dunbar and three others are in El Mora.”
“Send ‘em all over to the first overnight stop on that stage route. What is it—that the Backwater Station?”
“I believe so,” Baldridge said, watching his boss curiously.
“Send them over there.” Brown took a quick, deep drag on the cigarette and turned to his underling, blowing smoke through his nose and mouth. “I want them to make sure she’s dead.”
“I’m sure Bannon knows—”
“Yeah, yeah, I’m sure Bannon knows his job. But Bannon’s only worked for me a few months. He’s the Missouri gambler, ain’t he? Don’t know him that well. You know how I am. I just wanna be sure. Okay, Hart? Is that all right with you?”
The attorney shook his head and held up his hands placatingly. “Sure. That’s fine, Billy. Whatever you say.”
“And tell Morgan and Price to kill Bannon.” The agitated Brown made a slashing motion across his throat. He was breathing heavily now, sweat beading his broad, freckled forehead.
Baldridge feared him when he got this excited. No telling what the squirrely son of a bitch might do. Baldridge nodded, making every effort to appease the man.
“Absolutely, Billy. You got it. I’ll cable them tonight.”
It was a reasonable precaution, he had to admit. Why take a chance on the man getting caught and squawking? Baldridge didn’t think it possible with Bannon, from what he’d heard about the gambling gunman, but if Billy wanted him dead, the man would die.
“That’s more like it. Now tell me who she’s with.”
Baldridge frowned. Billy had gotten him too nervous to follow the broken strands of the conversation. “Who’s with who?”
“The girl!”
“Oh ... uh, some bounty hunter.” Baldridge glanced at the paper crumpled in Billy’s meaty fist. The Irishman had been too agitated to read Bannon’s telegram. “Prophet, I think, is his name.”
“Prophet, huh?” Billy grouched, turning back to the window and taking a sharp drag on the quirley, which was about the size of a thumbnail. He preferred cheap, hand-rolled cigarettes to the expensive cigars he could afford. Probably a habit he couldn’t kick from the old, street-fighting days in the city. One of many, Baldridge speculated, his mind flashing on the men Brown had beaten to death with his fists, their faces pummeled to burger.
“At least Prophet was his name—right, Billy?” Baldridge said, pulling a funny.
When Brown only grunted, staring out at the side street where horsemen and wagons passed and store owners closed their doors and started home for supper, Baldridge stood. “Well, I’ll go and fire a cable off to Morgan and Price, tell ’em you want Bannon dead—if you’re sure that’s what you want. He’s a good man.”
“I want him dead!” Brown barked.
“Then he’s dead, Billy.”
“And Prophet and the girl!”
“And Prophet and the girl—of course, Billy.”
Baldridge turned to the door. He swung it open and stepped through. Locking it, he regarded his boss guiltily, cursing McCreedy for making him lock the door himself. The sheriff knew that Billy Brown, simple barbarian that he was, would hold it against him, never mind that Baldridge had no other choice in the matter.
And that’s just how Billy stared at him now, too, his bulldog’s nose wrinkling, brows lowering, cigarette stub smoldering in the corner of his mouth.
Baldridge tried a smile, tipped his hat, and hurried back toward the office. The hair on the nape of his neck stood straight up in the air.