CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
A man’s finger pulls the trigger, but instinct tells him when to load the gun.
Late as it was, Chris Mercer fully expected that something prophetic, something fraught with danger, would occur that night. And he was ready.
The British Bulldog .450 was not a Colt, but he was confident enough of his shooting skills that he was sure he’d acquit himself well with the unfamiliar weapon if and when a gunfight came down.
He sat in the doctor’s office, its open door giving him a good view of the entryway corridor. Gunslinging monks. He could drop all four before they reached him . . . of course, they’d be shooting back, and that was a great unknown. How good were they? If they were professionals, they’d be good enough.
Dr. Bradford stepped out of his office, looked down the shadowed hallway, and said, “Mr. Mercer, you’re still awake? What time is it?” He consulted his watch. “Twelve midnight. The witching hour. Good heavens, have I been studying this long?”
“Since sundown, Doc,” Mercer said.
“Have I dined?”
“Not as far as I know,” Mercer said.
“Have you?” Bradford said.
“No.”
“Then I’ll make us a sandwich,” the doctor said. “I have a loaf of good sourdough bread and some Bavarian ham. Do you like ham?”
“Sounds good to me,” Mercer said.
“Coming right up, my faithful Heimdall,” Bradford said, smiling.
“Heimdall? What is that?” Mercer said.
“You mean, who is that?” the doctor said. “Heimdall is the watchman who guards the halls of the Norse gods. It is said that he can see for a hundred leagues, night and day, and can hear the grass growing. He also keeps his horn handy to announce the end of the world.”
“Well, let’s hope he doesn’t sound it tonight before I eat my sandwich,” Mercer said. “I’m sharp set.”
Heimdall’s horn didn’t sound that night, but as Ben Bradford walked into the kitchen, knuckles rapping on the front door did.
The doctor stepped back into the hallway. “Oh dear, sounds like an emergency.” He addressed himself to Mercer, but when he looked down the hallway toward his office the man was not in sight.
More knocking. Urgent. Demanding.
“All right, all right, I’m coming,” Bradford said.
He opened the door.
Two robed monks stood in the gloom, one supporting the other. “Our brother is very sick, Doctor,” Kirill Kuznetsov said. “It’s his belly again.”
“Bring him inside,” Bradford said. “I’ll examine him in my surgery.”
The big Russian was pleased. The doctor asked no questions and that bode well for tomorrow morning. Then, a flash of inspiration. Why wait that long? Kill him now and hide the body where no one would find it? He and the others could still ride out of town at dawn as planned. Then he suddenly heard the Irishman’s buts . . . But what if the body is found early? Then anyone trying to ride out of town would be suspect, even monks. But suppose the doctor has a gun, decides to fight for his life and cuts loose. The sound of shots would bring just about everybody in the rudely awakened town running to his house. But why not follow our agreed-upon plan so we don’t bungle things and face a hangman’s noose?
Kuznetsov was not an imaginative man, and his thoughts were jumbled enough that he decided to wait until morning and do the thing quickly and silently with a knife. The Irishman was clever and had it all figured out, so his way was the right way.
And then, if the Russian had any lingering doubt, his mind was made up for him.
As Helmut Klemm groaned in pretend pain and Kuznetsov tried his hardest to look concerned, Chris Mercer stood in the doorway of the surgery, the British Bulldog in his waistband. He leaned a shoulder on the frame, his eyes on the Russian.
Dr. Bradford looked up and said, “Oh, there you are, Mr. Mercer. I wondered where you’d gotten to.” He glanced at Mercer’s revolver but said nothing more.
“How is the reverend monk?” Mercer said. “Nothing too serious, I hope.”
Kuznetsov lowered his head and stared at Mercer from under his shaggy eyebrows. The Russian’s blue eyes were narrowed, full of murder.
“I still suspect an ulcer,” Bradford said. And then to Klemm. “We’ll try something a little stronger to reduce the acid. But if you don’t feel better by tomorrow, I may have to consider surgery as a last resort. Dr. Theodore Billroth is a brilliant pioneer in that field, and he’s had good results. I have studied his methods and . . .”
Bradford talked on and on as Klemm tried his best to look like a man in pain who was interested in what the doctor told him. But not Kuznetsov. He and Mercer locked eyes, each fully aware of what the other would bring to a gunfight and liking none of it.
In 1903 it was left to historian Bernard Loss to sum up that confrontation as “a clash of killers, made all the more peculiar by the frail appearance of the gunfighter Chris Mercer who was small and slender, his mild brown eyes revealing not the slightest tendency to malice or hostility. The Russian Kuznetsov on the other hand was tall and burly and much given to violent episodes. He was also a gunman of considerable skill. Mismatched as they were physically, each considered the other a man to be reckoned with, and the result of their suppositions would all too soon be fatal for a number of parties in Fredericksburg.”
Dr. Bradford mixed a powder in water and then filled it into a brown bottle. “Take this as soon as you return to your hotel,” he said to Klemm. “Drink the whole bottle.”
The German nodded, groaned convincingly, and Kuznetsov helped him from his chair.
“Nothing more pathetic than a monk with the croup, is there?” Mercer said to the Russian.
“Maybe it’s fatal,” Kuznetsov said, his eyes hard. “Like lead poisoning.”
“No, that’s not the case,” Dr. Bradford said, shaking his head. “If it was lead poisoning, I’d expect headache and joint and muscle pain. Your brother monk does not have those symptoms. No, it’s undoubtedly an ulcer, and that’s quite serious enough.”
Kuznetsov smiled and said to Mercer. “Heed what the doctor said. Lead poisoning is a serious business.”
“Indeed, it is,” Bradford said. “Now, remember, drink the whole bottle. Come back tomorrow if you still have pain.”
“How much do we owe you, Doctor?” the Russian said.
“At the moment, still nothing,” Bradford said, “Seeing as how you’re members of the clergy and all that. We’ll see how the patient is feeling tomorrow.”
“Seems like we’re all waiting for tomorrow,” Mercer said.
Kuznetsov nodded. “Maybe we should start praying now,” he said.
“As a physician, I don’t discount the power of prayer,” Bradford said.
“Listen to the doctor,” the Russian said to Mercer. “Start saying your prayers, little man.”
For a moment Bradford seemed puzzled by that statement, but when Klemm groaned horribly, he forgot all about it as he helped the doubled-over German to the door.
* * *
“Yes, I agree with the Russian,” Helmut Klemm said. “The little man is a problem. The doctor called him Mr. Mercer.”
“Why the bloody hell is he there?” Sean O’Rourke said.
“I think someone knows the doctor’s life is in danger and supplied him with a bodyguard,” Klemm said.
“Can he be dealt with?” O’Rourke said.
“Of course, he can be dealt with,” Kuznetsov said. “But he’s a gunman. He’ll get work in with his revolver.”
“Bang! Bang!” O’Rourke said. “Too noisy. As soon as the door is opened, can you rush him and the doctor, take them both down at the same time before a shot can be fired?”
“Perhaps,” Klemm said. “It depends where Mercer is standing. He’ll draw and shoot in a split second.” The German shrugged. “And hit what he’s aiming at.”
“I don’t like this,” O’Rourke said. “I don’t like this at all. And I especially don’t want to think that someone knows the reason we’re here. Any ideas? I need ideas.”
“Yes, I have an idea,” Kuznetsov said. “And we should have done it days ago.”
“Then speak, my Russian friend,” Klemm said.
Kuznetsov said, “I’m not your friend, German. I’m nobody’s friend. A professional assassin is what I am, and I’m paid to take chances and risk my life if need be to get the job done.”
“So, Kirill, your idea is dangerous?” O’Rourke said.
“An idea that’s not dangerous is unworthy of the name idea,” Kuznetsov said.
“Then let’s hear it,” O’Rourke said.
“Let me say first that the four of us are more than a match for any serfs this town might assemble to stop us,” the Russian said.
“This is true,” O’Rourke said. “Go ahead. Let’s hear you.”
“Then I say at first light tomorrow we ride to the doctor’s office and shoot him as soon as he opens the door,” Kuznetsov said. “The man called Mercer will be careful and won’t rush out of the house, giving us time to gallop out of town.”
“They might come after us,” O’Rourke said. “With what the Americans call a posse.”
“Yes, and as I said, we can take care of any . . . posse,” the Russian said. “Come after us and the peasants of this town ride into a nightmare they can’t imagine.”
There was a silence after Kuznetsov spoke, then finally O’Rourke said, “Right. I say we do it. What about you, Klemm?”
“We do as the Russian says.”
“Salman el Salim?”
The Arab nodded, but then said, “We have knives and pistols.” He looked at Klemm. “We’ve lost our expert rifleman.”
O’Rourke smiled. “Pistols are all we need for a bunch of bumpkins. Kirill, how do you say peasants in Russian?”
“Krest’yane is the Russian word for peasants,” Kuznetsov said.
“That’s it . . . pistols for a bunch of krest’yane.” O’Rourke said.
And the others laughed.