Using an overturned dresser drawer for a desk, Henry scribbled a message for John Manion: “Interesting error by telegrapher: Gunman for gunsmith. Visiting ranch tomorrow.”
Then, tormented by the supper smells, he hurried to wash up, using the nice flowered porcelain washbowl attached to the wall. He walked down the hall to the dining room and glanced inside. He saw that Alice Gary set a nice table. On a clean white cloth rested cut-glass cruets for vinegar and oil, silver napkin rings, even a decanter of red wine and cut-glass goblets. As Henry stood behind his chair, Allie introduced the other boarders.
“Miss Leisure? Arthur B. Cleveland?” her hand pointing, huge golden eagle flashing on her wrist. “This is Mr. Henry Logan, from Kansas City.”
At Henry’s left sat a very old lady in a black dress with jet buttons. She sat on a pillow that enabled her to reach the table. Tiny, frail as a thistle, she looked as though a puff of wind would blow her away. She offered a yellow-toothed smile and a brittle hand protected by a lace mitt.
“So nice to meet you, Henruh,” she said in a soft accent.
“Pleased to meet you, ma’am.”
“What church d’y’all go to?” Miss Leisure asked.
“Well ... I haven’t gotten settled as yet, but—”
Sensing that he might be a backslider, Allie hastily introduced the old man, also in black and nearly as old as Miss Leisure. He was a retired bookkeeper from Portland who had come here for his asthma. He had a long skinny neck, a small head, and an oversize beak, and made Henry think of a baby eagle. His watery eyes were red-rimmed under bald brows.
Everyone seemed to have wine at his place, so Henry poured himself a couple of fingers—remembered what Frances had said about alcohol and hesitated—but decided a good time to start self-denial would be tomorrow, after a night’s sleep.
It seemed to him, as serving dishes were passed, that they all stole looks at him as though he were a magician and they didn’t want to miss a move—that his hand might be quicker than their eyes. Allie seemed troubled. He still heard her laughter as he had left, but now she was quiet and sober.
Henry finally asked her: “Anything wrong, Allie? Was my money counterfeit?”
“No, Henry. I’m just thoughtful.”
“Uh-huh. Well, penny for your thoughts,” he said.
“Pshaw. I’m not sure you’re going to like the story the Globe ran on you tonight. At least I don’t....”
The old man eagerly thrust a folded newspaper at him. “God’s Gunman!”
“What?”
Henry opened the paper, saw the banner line, NOTED GUNMAN IN TOWN TO DRAW BEAD ON KILLER OF MISSING MAN. He looked out the window. “My God,” he muttered. “Is this man—what’s-his-name, Ambrose?—insane?”
Allie thumped her brow with the heel of her hand. “He’s a snake,” she said. “But, Henry! I didn’t pry, but I couldn’t help seeing the guns in your luggage—and I have to say that, that if you plan any thing—”
“Let me read this first....”
“God made me a sharpshooter,” Henry Logan told the Globe this morning, “and Colonel Roosevelt recognized my unusual gift and made me a sniper in his regiment. Shooting ability like mine is given to few men, and I am one of the fortunate. I can take the ash off a mosquito’s cigarette at a hundred yards. I lost count of how many Spanish soldiers I drilled. But gunman? Well, I wouldn’t say that....”
Henry raised his eyes from the paper, gazed through a window down upon the business district. Streetlights were coming on, haloed by dust. He whistled and resumed reading.
Logan, fronting for a Kansas City attorney, is in Nogales to investigate the disappearance last year of Richard I. “Rip” Parrish, owner of the Spider Ranch north of town.
Friends of Parrish have long feared that his cattle-buying trip to Sonora ended in tragedy. The popular young man has not been seen or heard from in approximately eight months.
Parrish’s wife, Frances Wingard Parrish, daughter of the controversial physician, William Makepeace Wingard, has so far not reported him missing. An official investigation of his mysterious disappearance must await such an action on her part, or a decision on the part of County Sheriff G. H. “Whispering George” Bannock, not yet forthcoming, to look into the matter. Certainly there appear to be grounds for an assumption of foul play.
Asked whether his rare shooting ability had anything to do with his being picked to smoke out the missing man, Logan merely winked. We wish him well.
Henry returned the paper to Arthur, who was waiting greedily for his reaction. “Poor fellow,” he said. “He’s mad as a hatter. I did meet him, but I didn’t realize he fancies himself rather comical. I reckon this is supposed to be a real knee slapper.”
“Oh, no, Henry! You don’t know Ben Ambrose,” Allie exclaimed. “He’s not being funny—he’s playing a mean trick on you. In a town like this, every man under ninety thinks he’s a sharpshooter, and a few claim to be gunmen. You’ll be challenged, Henry. It’s unfair. That terrible man!”
“Well, fine—I’ll give ’em a show. Would you pass the turnips, Allie?”
“Are you as good as all that?” asked Arthur. “Did you really drill a lot of enemy soldiers?”
“Never killed a man in my life, Arthur. And I couldn’t see a mosquito at a hundred yards, let alone hit its cigarette.”
“My brothuh was with Beau-regard,” said Miss Leisure. “And he told me he killed a whole pahrcel of Yankees. If y’all were a sharpshooter,” she added, “I don’t see how y’all could avoid—”
“Easy: I missed them on purpose,” Henry stated. “I’ll swat flies and trap mice, but otherwise ... Not that I don’t love guns, ma’am—don’t get me wrong. Actually, I had my own way of making war, which I won’t go into now, but I don’t have a lot of blood on my conscience.”
But in Arthur B. Cleveland’s knowing grin he saw doubt. “You musta said more than that to Ambrose,” he suggested. “I don’t reckon he’d flat out lie.”
“Well—first time for everything,” Henry said.
“Heard of General Miles Stockard, Henry?” Arthur asked. “I’ve seen him do tricks with a rifle that you wouldn’t believe. He always insisted that every man in his outfit have a sharpshooter’s medal.”
“Why don’t you tell him about me?” Henry said. “Set up a match. Anytime.”
“Arthur,” Allie said reprovingly. “Naughty.”
Mr. Cleveland laughed. “Nope—no match. He lost the sight of his right eye in a shooting accident last year. Can’t match-shoot at all now.”
“What happened?”
“A shell blew up in the chamber, he said. Burned his face a little, blinded one eye. So we’ll never know whether you coulda took him.”
Henry winked at Allie. “Sit tight, Arthur—I’m going to show you something. Then you can kind of draw your own conclusion—”
He loosened his shoulders, shot his cuffs, sat straight up in the chair like a clairvoyant, and fished Allie’s Mexican pesos from his pocket. He selected one without milling, with a good sharp edge, pulled the vinegar cruet to his place, and examined it. The cut-glass stopper had a perfectly flat top about the size of a nickel. Henry made sure the stopper was tight and level, then raised the cruet in his right hand and with care set the fat silver coin edgewise upon the stopper. The coin balanced there as though he had cast a spell on it.
“Merciful heaven!” whispered Miss Leisure. Henry rose and backed a couple of paces toward the window. The silver peso gleamed on the cruet. Allie chortled.
“Henry! Are you a stage magician?”
Henry said, “It’s just a gift, like juggling. So it would be foolish to brag about it.”
Then everyone started as a chiming crash like that of a bullet striking a church bell came from the porch. Miss Leisure’s teacup clashed into her saucer, Arthur hissed a mild oath, and Allie, Henry was sure, gasped,
“Jesus!”
They all looked at Henry, who stood perfectly still with the peso still balanced on the vinegar cruet. He grinned, flipped the coin, and caught it.
“I reckon somebody hit your triangle a wallop with a gas pipe, Allie,” he said. But then, through the vibrating echoes, he heard a small popping sound, familiar to anyone who knew guns.
Some prankster had hit the triangle with a .22 rifle slug.
As Allie moved to rise, he chuckled, then said, “Keep your seat, Allie. I imagine that’s for me”
Wiping his lips, he went to the window and moved a curtain to peer out into the dusk. On the high ground across the road, silhouetted against a whiskey-colored sky, four men armed with rifles stood in a vacant lot. All appeared to be wearing the same style of black hat, and they were watching the house intently.
“Yes, ma’am—it’s for me,” he said. “I’ll just pin notes to these boys’ shirts and send them home to their wives.”
“Aren’t you going to take a gun?” Arthur asked.
“Why, I don’t think I’ll have to kill anybody, Arthur. We’ll see.”
As he stepped onto the porch, one of the men on the low cliff bawled, “Bang! You’re dead, gunman!” Then they all began yelling, “Bang! Bang! Bang!” “Make yer play, gunman!” “God’s gift, hey?” and other nonsense.
Way out West, Henry thought, chuckling.
He walked into the rutted street and waited there while the men picked their way down the bank, laughing and hooting. One of them was Budge Gorman, the hound-faced man from the stable, still shirtless, his arms hairy as a tarantula’s legs. The men lined up like rookies, guns pointed this way and that. The breeze brought Henry a light fragrance of spirits.
“Make your play, gunman!” the stableman said, pretending to make a hip-shot with his huge-bored rifle. All of the men wore black Grand Army hats with gold braid and the G. A. R. insignia on the front. Sears, Roebuck sold them for a dollar-ninety or so, Henry thought. Evidently they belonged to a shooting club.
“Took you long enough to get here, men,” Henry said. “Still, the word in Kansas City is that Nogales men can’t shoot for sour owl shit.”
Budge Gorman bawled: “That’s a goddamn lie!”
“As you were, Budge,” Henry said firmly.
“Detail—attention! Inspection—arms!”
Evidently all had been in the Army at some time, because they dressed their four-man line properly, went to port arms, and then to inspection arms.
One of the shooters, short, square-headed, and built like a stump, rattled open the bolt of his carbine. He was coatless and wore a tie and lavender sleeve garters.
“What’s your name, soldier?” Henry asked.
“Leo Lucas—sir!”
“I want you all to watch as I perform the manual of arms, Black Jack Logan version dated 1885, per A. R. twenty-seven dash eighty-nine. I expect each and every one of you to be able to do it word-perfect tomorrow....”
He smacked his palms up under the weapon to lift it off the stableman’s hands, whirled the stock into the sky, and peered through the barrel, catching a circle of amber sunset. He tipped it this way and that to make the light run through the steel tunnel like a cleaning patch. The gun looked clean enough, but the barrel was slightly pitted. Henry worked the bolt rapidly, and the man grabbed at the fat brass shells as they flew.
Then, while they watched, he did his manual of arms, using the weapon as a drum major’s baton, twirling and spinning it and finishing by throwing it high in the air and catching it. Then he smartly returned it.
“Detail—at ease!”
They burst into laughter, and Lucas pounded him on the back while introducing the others. “You know Budge Gorman—you left your horse at his stable. That’s Elmo, the bean pole with the ’95 Winchester and the beard, and the Model 90 takedown is Arnie. Henry, are you really the son of Captain Black Jack Logan of the Second Cavalry?”
“Yes, but I don’t trade on his gifts. I’m my own man, Leo.”
He gripped each man’s hand, looking into his eyes as iff or something important he had been seeking. Then he would smile briefly, pat his shoulder, and move on to the next.
“Well, gentlemen, it’s a pleasure to meet some serious sharpshooters,” he said. “But I’m flabbergasted that the marshal allows shooting in the streets.”
“He don’t! And we don’t allow bragging, either!” Budge shouted.
“A disgusting habit,” Henry agreed. “Who’s been bragging around here?”
“You!” the stableman shouted, poking a finger at him. “Ben Ambrose says you call yourself—you claim that you— How’d it go, Leo?” He squirmed with eagerness or a need to relieve himself.
“Yes, I was just reading it,” Henry said “Your ed. and pub. seems to be a bit shell-shocked. What I told Ambrose was that I was a gunsmith—not a gunman.”
“But you’re looking for a killer, ain’t you?”
“No. Simple telegrapher’s mistake. But how Mrs. Parrish’s telegram wound up in the hands of the newspaper editor, I don’t know. That astonishes me.”
“In this town,” Leo Lucas said, “you have to come to grips with your astonishment. Word does get around. So you’re a gunsmith, Henry. Don’t you shoot at all?”
“Oh, indeed. I believe I’m a fair shot, and sometime when the light’s better, let’s tear up some targets.”
Then he brought them to attention again and asked Budge: “What kind of gun you got there, trooper? I don’t remember ever seeing anything quite like it....”
Henry saw Elmo nudge Arnie, who was standing next to him, as Budge roared, “This here’s a Remington Creedmoor, idiot! I paid fourteen seventy-five for it!”
“That’s about right. What I meant, though, it’s been altered.”
He put his hands out and took the man’s gun. Budge’s face had reddened and he looked like a humiliated schoolboy as Henry inspected the Creedmoor.
“I’d be careful with that gun,” Henry said, returning it.
“What’s wrong with it?” Budge demanded, almost weeping.
“Well, what do you like to hunt? Baldwin locomotives on the wing? A .44 would have stopped anything you’re ever going to meet. Now you’re packing a gun that really isn’t safe to fire.”
“That’s what I told him,” the stumplike man said. “The metal’s too thin, right?”
Better to have a friend than an enemy, Henry decided. He said, “I exaggerated a little, Budge. What I meant is that you’d better not use smokeless in this. Gunsmiths think twice before they modify a gun that’s really about right to begin with. It’s in my book, The Law of the Gun, which I’ll give you all a copy of before I leave.”
He inspected the other weapons, gave the shooters the compliments they were waiting for, but perceived that they were disappointed. They did not want the show to be over without a villain’s having been dealt with. And now that he was no longer the villain, they needed someone else to hiss at.
“Tell you what, boys,” he said. “I’d like to shoot with you someday, but first I’ve got some business to tend to. I’ll tell Budge when I’m free.”
Leo Lucas scratched his neck. “Then I’d say you’ve got a problem, Henry. Because if you don’t take care of this gunman business first, you won’t get much other business done. Every time you go through a door, you’re going to hear snickering. All I’m trying to say is, Ambrose has you in a box. We just shoot for fun, but other men are going to take it more serious. Like you’d insulted them. It’s foolish, but you’re going to have to do something, Henry. Show them you ain’t a braggart—but you ain’t afraid, either.”
Henry sighed. “Yes, I suppose you’re right. What if I were to challenge Ambrose to a shooting match? Would that—?”
“No, because Ben don’t claim to be a marksman.”
“Ah. Then maybe I should give him a lesson in journalism. If this was a joke, I think I ought to have a chuckle or two myself, don’t you?”
The men perked up. “That’s the ticket!”
“Wait here a minute,” Henry said. “I’ll tell my landlady where I’m going, and I’ll get my rifle.”
“What kind you carry?” Budge shouted after him, unable to wait.
Henry called, “Same as yours, Budge. The Model E, though—thirty-four-inch barrel, .44-105 bottleneck shells. Take the ash off a mosquito’s cigarette at a hundred yards....”