“There’s not a man among ye!” Old Billy Murphy told the drinkers lining the bar of the Lucky Cuss Saloon. He tried to make a contemptuous gesture and almost fell, for he was very drunk. “Ye let a pair of gunnies walk right over the top of ye, then ye go runnin’ off with your tails betwixt your legs.”
None of the men at the bar had been at the gates of the Motherlode earlier that day, but that didn’t worry Billy.
“It’s enough to make a decent man want to be sick,” Billy went on. “Two men—two men made ye run—a big oaf of a clown and a fancy-mouthed dandy in a whorehouse vest.”
“You’d show ’im if you was of a mind, wouldn’t you, Billy?” a hatchet-faced cowboy called out derisively. “You’d cut Benedict right down to size if you just had the time, wouldn’t you?”
“I would only for this,” Billy said, raising his crutch. “I’d shame all of ye ...”
His voice trailed off and his stare went blank, whisky and pain and rage overcoming him so that he couldn’t recall what he’d been so angry about, even when he bent to his drink and the butt of Tommy’s rusty old Colt stuck into his ribs.
“Fancy-mouthed dandy,” he muttered, and wished he could remember who he meant.
Brazos turned at Bullpup’s growl to see Cole Kingston coming along the lamp lit gallery.
“Make a fine couple dancing, don’t they, Hank?” the young man said with a nod at the window.
Brazos looked through the window and saw Rhea and Benedict moving gracefully across the floor to the strains of a Spanish love song. It was some time after nine, and it seemed to Brazos they’d been dancing for a hell of a long time. He’d quickly become bored and had quit the room to get some air. But Foley Kingston didn’t look bored. He was clapping time to the music, smiling at the dancers and taking down one drink after another.
“I’ve seen worse I guess,” Brazos grunted. He twirled his hat by the throat strap for a minute then turned his back on the brightly lit room. “This ain’t really my speed, kid. I’m headin’ back to the hotel. Say goodnight to the folks for me, will you?”
“Sure.” The young man smiled engagingly as Brazos moved to go. “Say, I wonder if you’d mind doing something for me, Hank?”
“What’s that?”
“You haven’t met Miss Tricia Delaney yet, have you?”
“Reckon not. She kin to Shamus Delaney, the pilgrim we was talkin’ to at the mine today?”
“His daughter. They live on Bonanza Street, next to an old bakery. I don’t like asking you to do this, Hank, but I was supposed to see Miss Delaney tonight, only Dad decided to have this evening for you and Duke, and I haven’t been able to get a message to her that I can’t come. I’d go myself but Dad might notice me missing.”
“Say no more, Cole, it’s good as done.”
“Thanks, Hank.” Kingston glanced back at the house. “And don’t mention this to anybody, eh? You see, Tricia and I were planning to get married. Then all the trouble started with the miners and Dad ordered me not to see her again because she’s Shamus’ daughter. You understand?”
“Sure.”
“Good ... Come on, I’ll walk to the gate with you.” The sounds of the music faded behind them as they strolled towards the wrought-iron gates that were emblazoned with a scrolled K. The night’s full moon etched the yard’s pines and cottonwoods darkly against the sky.
Brazos had a hunch that Cole Kingston hadn’t said all he had to say. Then, when the young man halted at the gates, Brazos learned he’d guessed right.
“How long do you and Duke plan to stay on?” Cole asked.
Brazos shrugged. “As long as it takes, I reckon. Why?
“Well, I—I guess I wouldn’t say this if I didn’t feel you were both good men, but ... well, I wish you’d pull out. Now.”
“Why?”
Cole gestured at the house with one hand and the town with the other. “Because this whole thing’s a dirty mess, Hank. There’s no wrongs and rights here in Spargo. There’s faults on both sides and things are going to get worse than ever when news of the strike-breakers gets around.”
Brazos hazed a grin. “You’re not sayin’ your pappy’s at fault here, are you, Cole?”
“I’m not saying anything more than what I’ve said—that you and Benedict should ride out, Hank, before it’s too late.”
“Sorry, kid. Benedict’s here to do a job of work for your pappy and I’m helpin’ him do it. But thanks, anyway.”
Cole Kingston sighed as he watched the heavy-shouldered Texan walk down the moonlit trail with his ugly dog trotting before him. Cole looked at the moon and thought of nights when he and Tricia Delaney had strolled arm-in-arm down Johnny Street. But that was before the air of Spargo became infected with the poison stink of hate and violence.
“I’m not made of glass, Duke.”
“Pardon?”
Rhea Kingston’s slanted green eyes glittered challengingly. “I mean you can hold me a little closer without fear of my breaking.”
Benedict glanced at Kingston as he whirled Rhea past the corner where the three Mexican musicians played.
Rhea laughed. “Foley doesn’t care. He’s not the jealous kind. Besides, you’re his friend.” She moved closer and he felt the pressure of her magnificent body against him. “See? It doesn’t hurt, does it?”
That wasn’t exactly true, Benedict mused as he glanced down at the deep, mysterious cleft between her breasts, but he felt it would be less painful all around if they maintained a discreet distance between them.
Rhea pouted prettily when he moved her away from him. From then on, Benedict tried hard to keep his eyes from straying further south than Rhea Kingston’s lovely chin.
Bonanza Street was a narrow lane with houses lined on each side like rabbit hutches. Down here it was hessian at the windows, potholes in the street and patches in the pants. The odor that hung over Bonanza Street was the smell of poverty, a scent Hank Brazos recalled from his threadbare Texas childhood.
He found the Delaney house without any trouble. As he went up the short path to the front door, he noted the neatness of the yard and the porch.
Darkly attractive Tricia Delaney answered the door. She startled Hank by inviting him in for a cup of coffee after he delivered Cole Kingston’s message.
Turning his battered hat in his hands, Brazos grinned ruefully in the weak yellow oil light drifting from the hall. “I reckon you didn’t get my name, Missy. I’m Hank Brazos and I’m workin’ for—”
“I know who you are, Mr. Brazos,” she said in a voice that had just a touch of Irish in it. “You and Mr. Benedict were pointed out to me on the street this morning. You’re still welcome.”
She stepped aside and gestured down the hall, but Brazos stood there uncertainly. Then a voice called, “Who is it, honey?” and Shamus Delaney appeared with a pipe in his mouth.
“This is Mr. Brazos, Father,” the girl said with a smile. “I believe you two have already met. Mr. Brazos has just brought a message down from Cole that he can’t see me tonight, but he doesn’t seem to want to come in for a cup of coffee in return for his kindness.”
“What’s the matter, son?” Delaney said. “Don’t you like coffee?”
Brazos shuffled his feet. “Why, I guess I like coffee better’n just about anythin’, but—”
“Son,” the Irishman cut him off, “I’m not for holdin’ any grudge about what happened at the Motherlode today if you’re not. The truth is, I was never in favor of us takin’ over the mine in the first place and I’m damned glad Mr. Kingston took it back. Now will you share our hospitality?”
“I surely will,” Brazos grinned. “Bullpup, set and wait.”
“Oh, no,” Tricia Delaney said, then she reached down and patted Bullpup’s head. She further surprised Brazos by smiling when Bullpup licked at her hand with a fat pink tongue that had the texture of sandpaper. “He’s such a beautiful, manly dog. Let him come in and I’ll give him something to eat.”
If there was one certain way of getting on the friendly side of Hank Brazos it was by making a fuss over his dog, an animal so ugly he’d been known to cause full-scale panic amongst womenfolk just by making an appearance. “I thank you kindly, Missy.” Brazos smiled and entered the parlor.
He was still there an hour later with four cups of good black coffee and about a dozen fat sourdough biscuits in him. Shamus and Tricia Delaney, drawn out by Brazos’ questions, proved to be mines of information as well as gracious hosts.
Brazos learned that Paddy Clancy bossed the miners, not because he was popular, but because he could lick any three good men with his fists and was ready to prove it at the drop of a challenge. At first, Delaney was unofficial leader of the miners, but then Clancy took over, started the strike and kept it going. Delaney made it clear that, though most of the strikers disliked and feared Clancy, they supported the idea of the strike because the Motherlode, due to years of improper maintenance, was a deathtrap for miners.
When Brazos asked how the men could strike for so long and still eat, Delaney said there was an “angel” in Spargo who helped pay the miners’ food bills at the store. Delaney didn’t know the identity of this philanthropist nor the reason for his generosity, but he had a strong suspicion that it was Ace Beauford, owner of the Silver King Saloon and close friend of Clancy.
Mental agility not being his long suit, Brazos found the situation perplexing. But Delaney had more for him to think about. The Irishman, supported by his daughter who sat off to one side feeding Bullpup left-overs, insisted that none of the rank-and-file miners had any knowledge of the ambush attempt by Billy Murphy’s son, though Delaney conceded that Paddy Clancy’s hand could be in it somewhere.
It was then that Brazos steered the conversation around to the standoff between the strikers and Foley Kingston. Brazos understood Kingston’s angle, following disclosure of his plan to bring in cheap labor, but he couldn’t figure out why Clancy seemed so dead set against finding a solution.
Delaney could throw no light on that, but, knowing Clancy, he said that gain had to be in it somewhere. “He might be big and foul-mouthed and hot-tempered, Hank,” he warned, adding a little whisky to his coffee, “but Paddy Clancy is no fool. There’s them who’ve thought he was and they’ve paid a heavy price for it.”
Waving aside Tricia’s offer of a fifth coffee, Brazos rolled a cigarette and sat smoking in silence for some time, going over what Delaney had told him. Uppermost in his thoughts was the certainty of bloodshed in Spargo when Kingston brought in his strike-breakers from the south, and the fact that he and Benedict were going to be in the thick of it. Were the miners in the right? Had Kingston driven them to strike? Was Kingston wearing the black hat? And, most important, was the mine too dangerous to work or wasn’t it?
He eventually put this question to Delaney who shrugged. “I suppose there’s only one way you could be knowin’ that for sure, Hank, and that’s to see for yourself.”
Brazos pursed his lips thoughtfully for a moment. “Mebbe you’re right at that, Shamus. And mebbe that’s just what I’ll do.”
Delaney studied his face, then shrugged. “Well, there’s nothin’ stoppin’ you takin’ a look, I suppose, though I doubt if Foley Kingston would want you sniffin about down there.”
“Mebbe I won’t bother tellin’ him until I’ve had me a look-see.” Brazos glanced at the clock on the wall. It was eleven-thirty. “Mebbe I’ll mosey on down to the Motherlode now while I’m in the mood. Want to come along, Shamus?”
“Me?”
“Sure, why not? I could get Shadie or somebody there to take me down, but if things are as bad as you say, mebbe they’d make sure I didn’t see the bad parts.”
Delaney looked at his daughter and she nodded her dark head. “Well, all right, why not? Sure, we’ll go along to the Motherlode together and you’ll see for yourself that things are just like I say.”
Foley Kingston’s voice, thick with whisky and anger, drifted down the corridor and seeped under the door of the room where Duke Benedict was taking off his coat and loosening his four-in-hand tie.
“Rhea, damn you, open your door!”
If Rhea Kingston replied, Benedict didn’t hear it. He hung up his coat and was unbuckling his heavy double gun rig when Kingston’s voice sounded again:
“All right, you cold bitch, sleep by yourself then! Who cares!”
Benedict heard a door bang with an impact that rocked the house. He grinned without humor as he hung his gun rig on the bed post and unbuttoned his waistcoat. That was the risk you ran staying overnight with people: you were likely to hear and see more than you wanted to. He would have returned to the Spargo Hotel, but Foley had insisted that he stay, and Kingston had been too drunk to take a refusal without an argument.
Benedict felt weary but not sleepy. In his shirtsleeves, he stretched out on the bed in the guest room and locked his hands behind his head. The evening had been pleasant enough, though Foley had drunk too much and Rhea had been a little indiscreet in flirting with him. She was certainly a looker. She had the loveliest pair of ... eyes ... he’d seen in too many months.
He wondered where Brazos had got to. Cole had told him that Brazos had left around nine. Bored, no doubt. He’d probably gone off to a saloon to get a bellyful of beer and talk about the price of beef with cowboys. That would be more his speed.
He got up to light a last cigar from the lamp, then turned it out. Angling bars of moonlight came through the French doors giving onto the upstairs balcony. Pacing the floor and smoking, he had the feeling sleep was going to prove elusive. Too many things to think about. Like what was going to happen when Foley brought in his strike-breakers.
Time passed. His cigar was smoked out and he was stretched out on the bed again, staring at the ceiling, more wide awake than before. Out in the mountains, wolves were howling.
Finally Benedict swung his boots to the floor and went onto the balcony, the night wind rippling his shirtsleeves. All around him the great house was quiet, and few lights burned down in Spargo.
He drew back from the balustrade at a sound from below. Peering through the columns, he saw a cloaked figure hurry across the lawn. A cowl hood prevented him from seeing the night walker’s face, but when a gust of wind pressed the cloak’s dark folds against a richly curved figure, he had no trouble at all in recognizing Rhea Kingston.
He straightened slowly as the woman disappeared in the direction of town. Was it any business of his if Rhea Kingston was sneaking to town at one in the morning?
That raised a second question. Wasn’t anything and everything connected with Foley Kingston his business now that Kingston had hired his guns?
Quickly he put on his coat, hat and gunbelt.