Black Falcon 6 part 2 shunting the shivaree

 I'm keeping ahead of the writing  at the moment but bear with me if I fall apart.

6 Shunting the Shivaree part 2

 

The vicar came to read the wedding service for Mr. and Mrs. Stubbins; he knew the score.  Luke set up his traps whilst the wedding was going on, as the light failed.  He came in and bolted the back door, and set up his little lamp under the brass handle; in half an hour it would be too hot to touch without pain.

“You’d better get back over to the banker’s house, Sam, Mrs. Sam,” said the vicar. “They won’t dare violate that.”

“That, I don’t bank on, Mr. Hill,” said Ruth Spence. “We’re staying in the jail house overnight, account of how it’s stone, like the bank, and less easy to burn. We’re placing our faith in Mr. Sokolov, to whom we owe much.”

“I don’t like the idea of those young fellows being gunned down,” said the Reverend Hill.

“If they don’t draw first, they won’t be,” said Luke. “And then I’ll aim for the gun hand, reverend. There’s something seriously depraved about Redtown, all round, I have to say.”

“I will pray for their souls; it’s about all I can do,” said the vicar, unhappily.

“They need it, and please pray for me to want to pray for them.”

“I will, son. Are you the lad who painted the town red?”

“I am. False accusations I can live with; failure to check up on my story, I object to, also a failure to protect me from citizens angry enough to throw rotten fruit and eggs and worse, but too cowardly to have stood by the banker to defend their own money. And then, ready to see the real gunman killed, and just as ready to condemn the innocent schoolmarm for being raped by him.  They are rotten to the core, and I am afraid I hope the coming bad winter catches them unprepared.”

“Another bad winter? We’ve scarce recovered from the last,” said the vicar, fearfully.

“Another; but if you’re prepared, there should be no problems,” said Luke. “I’m going to help the Spences and Stubbinses to haul hay when this lot of trouble has been chased off, then I’m off home for the winter.”

“And you’re welcome to overwinter with us, and share the food and fuel costs, Mr. Hill,” said Ruth.

“That, I will certainly consider,” said the vicar. “My own house is little more than a shack as yet, like the schoolhouse.”

“Leave it unlocked, with some wood, oatmeal and corned beef, for any poor soul caught out,” said Luke.

“A good idea,” said Hill. “Well, I wish you the best for your married life; I will go and pray for you. And for those misguided youths.”

He left the sheriff’s office as the rowdy band assembled with pots and pans.

“You young folk would be better to get along home and stop this unholy nonsense,” he said. “The sheriff has told you to get out of town already.”

“Get out of here, vicar, we don’t want to hurt you,” said one big lad. “But we deserve to have our way with the bride; it ain’t as if she’s pure.”

“You would be breaking the seventh commandment and have already broken the tenth; thou shalt not commit adultery, and thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s woman.”

“Moreover,” said Luke, coming out of the sheriff’s office, “Mrs. Stubbins is no scarlet woman, but a young woman who was violated because you are all cowards.”

This made the young men mutter angrily.

“Who dares call us cowards? Your badge won’t protect you, we’ll go through you and the sheriff,” shouted the big young man.

“I, the Black Falcon, call you cowards because you are. Did any of you raise a finger to stop Banker Spence being gunned down by the coward I killed in the schoolhouse? Hell no. Did any of you raise a finger to keep him from holing up in the schoolhouse, terrifying those kids, probably giving them nightmares for many a year, as well as the despoiling of Lucy Fiennes? Hell no. You’re cowards. A dozen of you to take on a sheriff and his deputies and a dozen of you to take on a young woman.  Aren’t you scared she might whip you? She’s whipped your britches before, Jed Burrows – aye, I know who you are – and as a woman has the right to privacy with her husband on her wedding night, I’ve taken on the schoolmarm’s place to whip you instead.” He raised one coiled whip in his hand. “Go home. If you stay, you will be hurt.”

 

“He’s diverting us while the bride and groom slip away!” said one of the older members of the party.

“They’ll have gone out the back and round to the banker’s house,” said Jed.

“If you enter the house of Banker Spence, you are a housebreaker, and he is at liberty to gun you down,” said Luke. “Aye, he survived being shot – and he’s as fit as a fiddle now, and just as good a shot as ever. And if any one of you steals, you’ll be on trial for it, if not shot like the thieving dogs you are.  They ain’t in the Spence house so it’s a waste of time you trying it, and a waste of my bullets in killing you for it.”

“Rush him!” said Jed. “We’ll make him talk!”

There was an ugly growl, as the mob moved forward.

And then there were two whips circling, with the characteristic Whup! Whup! noise. It took strength and skill to use two whips, as with using two sabres – or two six-shooters. Luke’s family prided themselves on their ability to use any weapon in either hand.[1] Or both.

The mob hesitated.

“He can’t touch us, messing about with two,” said Jed. “Ned, Bart! You know what to do.”

Two of the youths separated off, and headed for the back of the jail house.

Luke grinned savagely. His whips sang their ominous chant, crossing and re-crossing in front and behind him as he moved forward, and then, once he had them at speed, the first blow fell.

This was across the chest of Jed Burrows, in the hopes that the realities of combat would make the young idiot back off, and realise that discretion was the better part of valour.

Jed’s breath wooshed out in shock as the heavy whip, its far end travelling faster than the sound it made, split open his leather vest, shirt, undershirt, and skin.

He pulled a gun.

A flick of Luke’s hand curled the end of the left-hand whip right round the barrel and flung the gun down the street, near a horseman riding in.

It was Paul Sinclair. He came off his horse with a little more grace than a city man born and bred, and picked up the weapon.

“Luke! Came to see if you need any help!” he called.

“I never turn down a willing hand,” said Luke. “There haven’t been any prosecutions yet, but if you’ll loan a hand to keep any from doing something stupid like shoot me in the back, I’d be mighty obliged.”

“I surely am enjoying the show,” said Sinclair, who had seen rope tricks, but nothing like the lazy, mesmerising interplay of two rawhide whips before.

Jed, undeterred by his setbacks, roared in anger and ran at Luke. Luke looped one arapnik around his calves, cutting clear through the jeans above the boot one side, and pulled. Jed went down heavily on his back. The second arapnik curled around two chests, and the recipients of its tongue squealed in pain and outrage.

“Run, little piggies,” said Luke. “Run home, squealing ‘Wee! Wee! Wee!’ all the way, like the nursery rhyme, go back to playing at being grownups where men aren’t worth a dime anyway.”

Systematically, Luke laid into the ten who confronted him, lashing them about the thighs, chest, and upper arms.

“We’ll get you!” howled Jed Burrows.

“Sure, you will, like you managed to rush me,” jeered Luke. “You might note that I am avoiding the whip on your bellies and your groins, where the lash might cause lasting damage.  Make me angry and my aim might get... less controlled.”

They had not noticed, but it was enough for two of them to skedaddle.

“Some of your fellows have wisdom,” said Sinclair.

Sam strolled out.

“Having fun, Luke?” he asked.

“Moderately,” said Luke. “No, to be honest, actually, not at all. It’s like shooting fish in a barrel, and chastising naughty little boys is not really a pleasure, more of a chore. The art is degraded by the level of opposition.”

There was the sound of tin cans behind the sheriff’s office, which was followed shortly thereafter by a regular fusillade of gunpowder cracks.

“The hell! The sheriff got troopers in and they’ve shot Ned and Bart!” cried one of the young men. Three of them withdrew from the mob.

“And then there were five,” jeered Luke. He kept four at bay with his left-hand whip, and used the other to jerk Jed off his feet again, dragging him through the mud of the street before tugging the whip free. Jed rolled over to protect his face and chest, and Luke laid two hard, painful welts on his backside. His jeans and long underwear split, and red blossomed on the abused skin below. Jed howled.

“Just to remind you how the schoolmarm tanned your jacket for you,” said Luke. “Go home to your ma and pa, naughty little boy. You aren’t old enough for a woman, and you couldn’t make a woman take you seriously. And if you were a man, you’d write her an apology, too,” he added.

There was a sudden howl of anguish at the back of the jail house.

Presently the two known as Ned and Bart came haring back round to the front, one of them cradling his right hand in his armpit.

“Run home, Ned, Bart, and treat your hand for burns,” said Luke. “You’ve made your play to show what naughty children you can be, and you’ve seen the consequences. Git!”

Ned and Bart looked at the groaning, bloodied young men who had dared to defy the Black Falcon, and abandoned them without a backwards glance.

“I’ll get my revenge!” swore Jed Burrows, as he, and the rest, withdrew.

“Revenge!” sneered Luke. “You don’t know what I could do to you that would warrant revenge. You’re sore because I treated you like the naughty little boy you are. If I’d treated you as a man, you wouldn’t have faced a whip with chastisement; but one with a pound weight of lead on the end. And you’d be dead, boy. Now take that thought home, and be glad to have the chance to grow up wiser and to have time to learn.”

Chastened, and hurt, the five remaining celebrants withdrew, in no fit state to form a rape gang, even if they could somehow overcome the sardonic, whip-wielding deputy.

“You gave them a good lesson, Luke,” said Sam.

“I hope they learn from it,” said Luke, soberly. “I worry that they’ll be by again to cause trouble.”

“They’ve had their warning,” said Sam. “If they don’t take their punishment and use it to grow up, then they’ll be men next time they come, and I’ll shoot them like outlaws if they threaten the peace.”

“Stupid boys,” said Luke. “How old are they, anyway, anyone know?”

“Youngest a matter of seventeen; Jed there has been one-and-twenty for almost a year.”

“Really?” said Luke. “Well, that’s a laugh; he’s older than I am.”

“Not where it counts,” said Sam.

 

oOoOo

 

Luke helped to complete the sheriff’s log cabin so the newlyweds could move in. Lucy clung to Sam in a way Luke thought encouraging for their future relations, and he manned the office for the sheriff, to give him time with his new wife. When Sam emerged, rather sheepishly, Luke went with him to cut hay for his horse and the Spence horses.

It wouldn’t do any harm to spend a day or two with good people, advising the town how to prepare for the winter ordeal ahead. And Luke liked the Spence couple, and Sam; and the schoolmarm seemed set to make him a good wife.

Especially if Luke taught her how to make omelettes.

 

---

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T-c64Y5pNaQ