CHAPTER 9
“Sorry to keep you waiting—Perley, was it?” Tom Tuttle said when he approached him standing at the hitching rail before the stable. Perley had separated the horses, with Buck and his packhorse at one end of the rail and the flea-bitten gray and three Indian ponies at the other. “I buy a lot of hay from those two fellows you saw me with, so they wanted to buy me a drink,” Tuttle said.
“I ain’t in a hurry,” Perley said. “There’s the two horses you bought, those two with the saddles on ’em. One of ’em’s an Indian pony; the other one’s the gray you see there. I was listenin’ to the trade you were makin’ with Liz, and I thought you were mighty generous with your offer. But I wouldn’t be honest if I didn’t tell you that gray ain’t got many days left in him. The Indian pony’s a pretty good horse, but you gave more than that gray’s worth. So, if it’s all the same to you, I’ll throw in those other two Indian ponies, so you don’t get skunked on the deal.”
His offer astonished Tuttle. “Well, that’s mighty decent of you. Did those two belong to the women, too?”
“Well, no, sir, those two belong to me. I was aimin’ to sell ’em if I could, since I ain’t got no use for ’em. But I think it would only be right to turn ’em over to you to make the deal a fair one.”
Tuttle was more than a little confused. He wasn’t sure he was hearing Perley correctly. “Are you connected to those women in any way? Married to one of ’em, or something?”
Perley chuckled. “No, sir. I just met ’em a few days ago, and they were stranded back this side of Ogallala—fellow they’d hired to take ’em here ran off with their packhorse. So, I rode to Cheyenne with ’em. They’re whores, but they’re nice folks once you get to know ’em. You seemed like a reasonable fellow, so I didn’t like to see you get skunked with a lame horse.”
Tuttle looked as if he didn’t know what to say. Perley continued. “And I’d like to give you a little business to boot. I told the women I’d let ’em buy my supper, so I’d like to leave my bay and my packhorse here till mornin’.”
“Perley, that’s the damnedest thing I’ve ever heard, and I appreciate your honesty.” He thought about it for a moment, then made an offer. “Tell you what, why don’t I give you thirty dollars for the two extra horses, so you don’t lose out on everything? And I won’t charge you to board your other horses for the night—or you, either, if you wanna sleep with ’em. How’s that?”
“That’s fair enough,” Perley said. “I ’preciate it. I hope you don’t think Liz was tryin’ to skunk you. Fact of the matter is, I don’t think she knows enough about horses to tell if one is young or old or stout or frail.”
“I think you’re right,” Tuttle said as he took a look in the gray’s mouth. “I’ve got to be more careful when I do any tradin’ with women.” When Perley started to walk away, Tuttle said, “I lock the barn and the stable at seven o’clock.”
“I’ll be back before then,” Perley assured him, then headed for the saloon.
When he got to the Cattleman’s, he didn’t see Liz or Stella anywhere in the room, so he walked up to the bar.
“Howdy, Perley,” C.J. sang out. “Stella said to tell you she and the other woman are upstairs—top of the steps, first room on the left.”
“Much obliged,” Perley said and turned toward the stairs.
C.J. said first room on the left, but Perley was sure he remembered Stella saying first room on the right. He decided Stella most likely knew which room she had used when she lived there before, so when he reached the top, he went to the door on the right and rapped lightly. There was no response to his knocking. He waited a few seconds and rapped again—still no response. Obviously it was an empty room and C.J. was right, Stella’s room must be on the left. Perley decided to look inside anyway, just to be sure, so he turned the knob and found the door unlocked. Since it was open, he walked on inside, thinking maybe it was Stella’s room after all, and they had gone to the kitchen or maybe the outhouse. The room was dark, so just to make sure he wasn’t catching them by surprise, he sang out cheerfully, “Everybody decent?” He was not prepared for the picture he saw when his eyes adjusted to the darkness in the room.
“What the hell?” the voice of an irate man erupted, obviously in the midst of a contract with the equally irate woman in the bed with him.
“Get the hell outta here!” Cora Burke yelled.
Another cow pie was the thought that flashed through Perley’s mind, and in a matter of seconds, he found himself confronted by what he considered at that moment to be the biggest human being he had ever seen.
“Pardon the interruption, folks. My mistake, wrong room. Just carry on with your activities—I’ll let myself out.” He backed hurriedly toward the door, only to be followed by the enraged beast. “I don’t blame you one bit for being irritated,” Perley said in an attempt to calm the man. “I apologize one hundred percent, and I’ll let you get back to your business.”
Evidently, he had intruded at precisely the wrong moment, for the giant he could now see clearly, since the man had followed him into the hallway, showed no tendency to forgive. Cora’s encouragement from inside the room didn’t help the matter. “Kick his ass, Brady!” she yelled.
“There ain’t really no need for that,” Perley said, thinking to calm the brute. “I made a mistake and I said I’m sorry, so let’s let that be the end of it and I’ll be on my way.”
Brady’s response was an evil smile on his broad face.
“I don’t wanna keep you out here in the hall without your clothes on,” Perley continued. “You might catch pneumonia or something, with no more’n that little towel wrapped around you.”
“I’m fixin’ to break your back for you,” Brady threatened, his voice a low growl. “Come bustin’ in the room like that. I paid Cora for the whole night, and she ain’t cheap.”
“Kick his ass, Brady!” Cora repeated, her voice resembling the screech of a buzzard fighting over a corpse.
“She sounds charmin’,” Perley couldn’t resist commenting. “So, I’ll let you get back to her now.”
Behind him, he heard doors opening, as sounds of the altercation were transmitted down the hall. One of them was directly opposite the room he had mistakenly entered, and he heard a familiar voice.
“Perley! What’s goin’ on?”
“I walked in the wrong room and interrupted this fellow, and now he’s wantin’ to break my back, so he says,” Perley answered while maneuvering warily, anticipating the big man’s charge.
“He don’t look like he’s dressed for a fight,” Liz said as she walked out to join Stella in the hallway. She took a moment to evaluate the situation, then stepped forward and grabbed the towel knotted around Brady’s massive waist. With one quick jerk of the knot, she pulled the towel away, causing a chorus of snickering from the small audience that had come out into the hall to watch.
Shocked, the embarrassed brute tried to cover himself with his hands and fled back into the room to escape his humiliation. Liz popped him on his rear with the towel just as he disappeared through the doorway. The door slammed shut behind him.
“I’ll leave the towel on your doorknob in case you wanna come out again,” Liz yelled. Then she looked at Stella. “You ready? Let’s get the hell outta here before he gets his clothes on.”
“I’m ready,” Stella replied, still giggling. She grabbed Perley by the elbow. “Sorry, Perley, I’m always mixin’ up right with left. Come on, let’s go eat supper.”
He hurried down the stairs with the two women, running from a savage attack once again, just like their ride from Ogallala, only this time they were all laughing.
“What was all the fuss upstairs?” C.J. asked when they passed by the bar on their way out.
“Nothin’ much,” Stella answered, “just Cora and one of her gentlemen friends. If anybody wants us, we’ll be at the dining room in the Inter-Ocean Hotel.”
Once outside, they turned in the opposite direction and headed to Katie’s Diner, next to Dyer’s Hotel.
* * *
“Say howdy to Katie Taylor and her cook, Myra Long,” Stella said when they walked into the diner.
“I declare, gal, where in the world have you been?” Katie asked Stella. “I thought you musta found one of Myra’s fingernails in the stew and started eatin’ at that fancy dining room at the hotel.”
“Nope,” Stella answered. “I’ve been outta town for a spell. Got to missin’ your cookin’ so bad I had to come back to Cheyenne.”
“I see you brought a couple of friends with you,” Katie said. “And who’s this handsome young feller?”
Stella introduced Perley and Liz. “I told ’em how good the cookin’ is here, so don’t go and make a liar outta me.”
“We’ll just let them decide that for themselves,” Katie said. “I’m mighty pleased you dropped in,” she said to Liz and Perley. “Everybody drinkin’ coffee?” When she received three affirmative nods, she went to the coffeepot on the stove in the back of the room.
“I guess she doesn’t mind servin’ prostitutes,” Liz commented when Katie was out of earshot, “or does she not know you’re a workin’ girl?” They were not welcome in the two diners in Ogallala.
“Hell, if it wasn’t for the business she gets from whores, she wouldn’t make it,” Stella said. “She don’t tolerate bad behavior, from whores or anybody else. She’ll ask you to leave quick enough if you don’t behave yourself. And if askin’ ain’t enough, Myra limbers up her shotgun.”
Katie returned with their coffee and placed the cups around. “This young feller must be a big spender,” she said. “He’s buyin’ your supper. Ain’t many of your customers that’ll spring for supper, too.”
Stella laughed. “He ain’t buyin’ our supper—I’m buyin’ his, and he ain’t a customer. He’s a friend, and a damn good one.”
Katie raised her eyebrows at that. “Well, I beg your pardon, young man. I didn’t know there was any such thing as a damn good man.”
“Sounds like you’ve run into too many of the other kind,” Perley said.
“You can say that for a fact,” Katie replied. “Now, whatcha gonna have? I’ve got beef stew or bean soup, or a little of both, if you want it.” Stew was the unanimous choice, so Katie yelled the order out to Myra in the kitchen.
The cooking was good, just as Stella had promised, and had it not been for the four biscuits Perley polished off, he might have ordered seconds on the stew.
“It’s a little better eatin’ than we’ve had for the last four days, ain’t it?” Stella commented. “I reckon this is the last time we’ll break bread together, and I want you to know how much I appreciate you takin’ your time to make sure me and Liz got here alive.”
“That goes for me, too,” Liz said. “You’re a good man, Perley. I hope you find your grandpappy.”
Perley was touched by their words, and more than a little embarrassed. He found himself feeling guilty again for having wished he had not been so unlucky as to have run into them on the South Platte. He decided at that moment that he was now glad that he had met the two women.
The feeling was not long-lasting, extending only past the fried apple pie, when the door of the diner was suddenly filled with the bulk of Brady Ennis. He said nothing for a long moment while he looked the room over, trying to recall what the man who had walked in on him looked like. His vision may not have been as sharp as it normally would be, due to the amount of whiskey he had imbibed during his search. There were not that many people in the diner, so his gaze kept returning to the table where a man and two women sat. A slow smile began to form on the broad, hairy face as he settled on the two women and decided one of them, the one wearing men’s clothes, was the one who had jerked the towel from him. So, that meant the man sitting at the table was the man who had walked into the room and caused all the trouble. Brady stood there, grinning with the anticipation of exacting his revenge and taking his time about it.
He ducked his head to keep from bumping it on the lintel and walked over to stand in front of the man and the two women, all of whom were staring at him in total shock. Even Liz was not prone to move.
“I’ve been lookin’ for the three of you. You ran outta the Cattleman’s before I had a chance to get my clothes on—been lookin’ all up and down the street for you.” His eyes locked on Perley’s. “I promised to give you something.”
“A broken back?” Perley guessed. “But there’s no need to trouble yourself, I won’t hold you to it.” He gestured toward Liz and Stella. “We’ve forgotten all about it, so you might as well, too. Have yourself a slice of this pie and a cup of coffee. That’ll make you feel better.”
Brady, confused for a moment, couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “Are you tryin’ to make a fool outta me?”
“No, sir, I’m a little late for that job,” Perley replied. “I’m just tryin’ to keep you from makin’ a bigger fool outta yourself. Everybody in the Cattleman’s is laughin’ at how you were runnin’ around the hall upstairs buck naked. Pretty soon that’s gonna be all over town. I’d think you wouldn’t wanna hang around for that, but hell, I ain’t sayin’ I know what’s best for you.”
“What’s it gonna be?” Brady demanded, his patience exhausted. “Knives? Guns? Bare hands? Are you gonna fight or not?”
“Well, given a choice and being a sensible man, I’d ordinarily say I’d rather not. But if you’re tellin’ me I’ve got to pick, then I pick guns for me and bare hands for you. And I think it’s mighty damn sportin’ of you to offer that choice. Now, when do you wanna have this contest? Next Thursday is good for me. How’s your schedule?”
Confused and unable to believe the prattle coming from the man sitting at the table, Brady seemed stunned for a few long moments. Then his face and neck appeared to glow red beneath his beard as the frustration progressed to a state of uncontrolled rage, until it finally erupted like an explosion of dynamite and he dived across the table at Perley.
Stella and Liz screamed as the table collapsed under the weight of the brute, and they scrambled to escape the assault. Perley went backward, but unlike the women, he had counted on an insane attack, figuring that was most likely his only chance against the monster. While Brady was still in midair over the table, Perley had taken a firm grip on the handle of the heavy iron skillet that held half of a fried apple pie, which he learned later to be a favorite with Katie’s customers. The heavy skillet sounded a dull thud when it bounced off Brady’s skull on the first blow. The second seemed more like the clang of a bell. It was difficult to guess which one was the strike that knocked the beast senseless, to lie sprawled on the broken table.
The room was dead silent, as the few customers to have witnessed the attack were speechless. Katie and Myra, holding her shotgun, were just as stunned as they watched Perley knock Brady cold.
“Have you got any rope?” he asked Katie.
She shook her head.
“We’ve got a spool of clothesline,” Myra volunteered.
“That’ll do,” Perley said, and she went immediately to fetch it.
Brady had not stirred when she returned with the clothesline. Perley took it from her, pulled Brady’s arms behind his back, and tied his wrists. Then he tied his ankles, and while he worked, he asked a young man, one of the diners, to go and fetch the sheriff.
“Is he dead?” Liz wondered aloud.
“No, I don’t think so,” Perley replied, “but he’s gonna have a helluva headache when he does come to.”
“Well, I hope you tied him real good,” Stella said, “’cause he’s gonna be madder’n hell when he does.”
“I expect so,” Perley agreed. He turned, talking to all the spectators in the place. “You all saw what happened. He came in here after me. I tried to talk him into sittin’ down and havin’ some pie and coffee, but he insisted on attackin’ me. All I did was try to defend myself.” He wanted to make sure they all saw the same thing, for when the sheriff got there.
“Ain’t no doubt about that,” Katie said. “I think everybody agrees on that.”
In a little while, the young man returned with a deputy, the sheriff having already gone home for supper. The deputy, a no-nonsense individual named Bill Snipe, stood for a long moment over the prostrate body draped across the tabletop before he questioned Katie.
“What is that? Is that his brains spillin’ outta his head?”
“No,” Katie answered. “Them’s fried apples.”
“Oh,” Snipe said. “Then he ain’t dead.”
To confirm it, Brady stirred as he began to come back from his sudden nap, growling drunkenly about killing someone. It was not hard to guess who started the trouble.
“Brady Ennis,” Snipe said with a generous measure of disgust, “you ain’t been in town two whole days yet and I’ve already had half a dozen complaints about you. I think a little time in jail is gonna be the cure for what ails you.”
He untied Brady’s ankles so he could walk, and with Perley’s help, he got the huge man on his feet. Although groggy and unsteady when he stood up, Brady tried to resist when Snipe pushed him toward the door. Snipe drew his .44 and threatened him. “I ain’t got time to fool with you, Ennis. I’m gonna fetch you another rap on the head if you don’t start walkin’.”
He held the pistol up, ready to deliver another blow to Brady’s skull. It was enough to convince the huge man that he couldn’t risk taking another one.
“Perley Gates,” Brady mumbled as he stumbled out the door. “I ain’t gonna forget that name.”
“Perley Gates?” Bill Snipe echoed and looked at Perley. “Is that you?”
“Afraid so,” Perley answered.
“You figurin’ on bein’ in town awhile?” Snipe asked.
“Nope, hadn’t planned on it—figured I’d be leavin’ in the mornin’.”
“Good,” Snipe said. “’Cause I won’t hold Brady more’n two days. That’s about as long as we hold anybody for fightin’ when nobody gets shot.”
With Brady out the door, Perley turned to help the women clean up the mess Brady had caused. “I’m real sorry about the damage,” he said to Katie as he rolled the tabletop out of their way. “Top’s okay, but the legs are broke down pretty bad. I reckon I owe you for the cost of fixin’ ’em. Sorry ’bout the pie, too. I’ll pay for that, too. Shame to see it go to waste, though.” He pointed to a fair-sized piece of it on the floor next to the wall. “There’s a piece that could be salvaged.”
Katie had to laugh. “Is that right? Well, how ’bout I serve it to you with another cup of coffee?” When he hesitated, not sure if she was joking or not, she said, “Don’t worry about payin’ for this mess. We’ll clean it up, and I’ll get Myra’s husband to fix the table. He’s handy with things like that.”
“That’s about all he’s handy at,” Myra said, causing the women to chuckle.
When the food and coffee were all cleaned up off the floor, Perley, Liz, and Stella walked back down the street to the Cattleman’s. They paused at the door when Perley said he was going to say good night to them then.
“I reckon I’ll go on back to the stable. I’m thinkin’ I’ll head out early in the mornin’, so I’d best get some sleep.”
“Well, I reckon this is good-bye, till you happen through this way again,” Liz said. “I’ll tell you one thing, Perley, there’s always somethin’ happenin’ with you around. But speakin’ for myself, I’m gonna miss you, and I wish you were gonna be around from now on.”
On cue, Perley blushed.
“That goes for me, too,” Stella said. “You take care of yourself—trouble seems to have a likin’ for you.”
He wished them good fortune and walked away. He had to admit that he had taken kind of a liking to them in the short time he had spent with them. But there was also the feeling that he had just lifted his foot out of a cow pie.
He got back to the stable to find Tom Tuttle waiting for him.
“I was just fixin’ to lock up,” Tuttle said. “Supper’s waitin’ at the house, and I thought you musta changed your mind about sleepin’ in the barn.”
“I got held up a little longer’n I figured on,” Perley said. “What time will you open up in the mornin’?”
Tuttle said he’d be in at six for sure, maybe five-thirty, so Perley decided he’d get on the trail to Denver as soon as Tuttle showed up and worry about breakfast when his horses needed a rest. In his brief exposure to Cheyenne, he hadn’t seen anything that would cause him to want to tarry there. To the contrary, the prospect of Brady Ennis getting out of jail was reason enough to make him eager to leave. He felt no fear of Brady, but it always suited him to avoid trouble if he possibly could.
After Tuttle left, Perley decided to help himself to Tuttle’s oats, with a portion for both of his horses. He thought about whether or not to tell Tuttle about it in the morning. After making sure his packs were ready to load onto the sorrel in the morning, he decided to sleep in the stall with Buck instead of in the barn hayloft as Tuttle had suggested. The big bay gelding probably needed the company.
The night was passed peacefully enough, and Perley was pleased to see Tuttle arrive on time. After telling Tuttle the saga of his grandfather, he saddled Buck, loaded the packhorse, and told Tuttle he owed him for two portions of oats.
“You don’t owe me anything,” Tuttle insisted. “I hope you find your grandpa alive and well.”
“Much obliged,” Perley said and stepped up into the saddle. “Follow the railroad straight south, right?”
“That’s right,” Tuttle replied. “The Denver Pacific Railway—runs straight south for about a hundred miles. You’ll strike the South Platte about halfway there, and the railroad follows it right into Denver.”
Perley touched his finger to his hat brim and turned Buck toward the railroad that the people of Denver had caused to be built when the Union Pacific ran their track through Cheyenne, one hundred miles to the north, instead of Denver.