falcon and wolf 21

 

Chapter 21

 

“Seventeen left,” said Luke, when Nelson had gone. “I want to take out Blackjack Berlin and Croaker Pennyman. I’m tempted to put a bounty on them.”

Wolf sniggered.

“Why not? It would bring them out of the woodwork,” he said. “You want to get that fellow, Tarney, the photographer, to photograph your sketches.”

“Good point,” said Luke. “I’ll skip over and see him.”

 

An hour later, Luke had paid for a full page advertisement in the newspaper, emblazoned with the faces of Berlin and Pennyman, and the declaration that they were wanted for the assault and wounding of Thomas Abbott and manslaughter in causing his death through the wounding, also arson, and murder of his wife by fire.  Luke set a bounty of three thousand dollars on each.

He could easily cover it; but he doubted he would have to.

He also had the posters Tarney had had printed off for him.

He set to work with a will, pasting them up all around the casino, as well as outside the sheriff’s office.

Nelson came out to look.

“All very well, but I doubt that the state will pay.”

“I’m paying. I’ve put the money with the editor of your local rag.”

“You know what this will mean?”

“Things will be noisy for a while as every two-bit gunsel tries to take them down, and you lose a few potential troublemakers.”

“Odd attitude from a bounty hunter.”

“Not really. I’m a conscientious man and I have my code; but many do not. If they go against prey too tough for them and die, I’ll lose no sleep over it. If they kill them, I’ll willingly pay up.  And Tommy will press charges and I’ll be asking for there to be no bail.”

“Under the circumstances that seems fair.”

 

 

It may not be supposed that Big Freddy was doing nothing. He was concerned about the disappearance of eight of his men. Six had gone to deal with the impudent candy man, who was undoubtedly soft; he was said to dress like a dude, an easterner, was very young, and must be a cissy both for selling candy and for being an easterner. He had somehow managed to shoot two of his men, though maybe he had had help. They said he had an Indian with him, presumably some species of bodyguard.  That was why he had sent three more men to the back, to handle the Indian, whilst the three at the front beat the candy man. They had not returned.

Freddy thought there might have been some noise, but the music in his establishment mostly drowned out most external noise, and he had not heeded the odd dull crump!.  Then, there had been that other very innocent looking dude… could he be the same one? But a candy man surely would not gamble like a seasoned veteran? And had that last hand dealt him been accidental, or some kind of message? He shuddered. Aces over eights, the dead man’s hand. But surely that young dude, scarcely more than a schoolboy, could not have dealt it deliberately? He hoped it was not an omen.  But, there again, it should not have taken his bouncers long to beat the little snot up, and return with the money. Money he was in sore need of, since someone had torched the contents of his safe!

Freddy had a bank account; but he liked having the greater part of his assets on hand, available. But who in their right mind would torch tens of thousands of dollars?

Yet there were a sufficiency of scorched corners to make it plain that this is what had, indeed, happened. Freddy had no understanding of a man like Luke, who would scorn to steal, but who wished to enact on Freddy some of the misery enacted on Tommy and Annie-Beth, and who saw the torching of the money as somehow ironic.

He frowned to see the ‘Wanted’ notices of his right-hand men outside, and pulled them down. What a tasteless joke!

Freddy sauntered along to the Sheriff’s Office, and frowned to be greeted by the unpurchasable Dan Nelson. There were posters here, too; this was beyond a joke!

“Where’s Young?” he asked.

“Resigned,” said Nelson. “You lost your patsy.”

“Dear me, I am sure I do not know what you are talking about,” said Freddy.  “I, ah, wondered if any of my, ah, associates were in your lock-up over any sort of misunderstanding.”

Nelson raised an eyebrow.

“Believe me, if I put any man in my lock-up, it won’t be for any misunderstanding,” he said. “But, no, I have none of your murderous thugs in custody, though as you can see, a private citizen has taken out a bounty on two of your worst men. Young Tommy Abbott having been a witness to their actions regarding his father. And to having your name mentioned.  Now, I don’t have enough yet to lock you away, but if you wanted to surrender voluntarily until a trial to keep yourself safe, I’ll be happy to accommodate you.”

“There seem to be a number of bad jests floating around, including the wanted notice on my men.”

“Oh, it’s no joke. Tommy apparently described them well enough to be drawn by a stranger,” said Nelson, relishing this. 

“And what stranger is this?” asked Freddy. “Not that little cissy of a candy man?”

Dan Nelson stared. Then he began laughing. He laughed so hard he had to sit down, slapping his own thighs in amusement.

“I fail to see what is funny,” said Freddy, frostily.

“Doncha? Well, far be it for me to shut you outta the joke,” said Nelson, sniggering. “That ‘little cissy of a candy man’ only happens to be The Black Falcon. I guess an owlhoot like you will have heard of him?”

Freddy had heard of him.

“But dadburnit!” he said. “How can some schoolboy of a candy man be a dangerous man like that?”

“He ain’t a schoolboy and he’s put ten of your men in the morgue so far,” said Nelson. “And his partner took the other couple.”

“But what has he against me? There’s no price on my head. And you imply he’s putting up the money on Berlin and Pennyman.”

“Yup,” said Nelson. “But then, Thomas Abbott Senior was something to him; and he takes it personal.”

Freddy paled.

“Why don’t you have him behind bars for killing my men?” he demanded.

“He hasn’t broken any laws. Displayed his intent to use the second amendment. Your men showed intent to commit grievous bodily harm. They were… neutralised.”

“They were murdered!”

“So were Thomas and Elizabeth Abbott,” said Nelson. “It’s coming time for retribution. And until or unless, he breaks the law, ain’t nuthin’ I can do to protect you. Save lock you up for your own good and try you for murder and racketeerin’.”

“But I’m an upright, honest citizen! Can’t you give me protection?”

“You have the same protection that everyone else has,” said Nelson. “If you stay within the law, you’ll be jus’ dandy. But a word to the wise. If you go pokin’ about the Abbott Hotel lot, you’d be a fool, no matter what rumours you hear of young Tommy havin’ some hide-out in the cellar. Is that clear?”

“As mud,” said Freddy.

“Well, on your own head be it,” shrugged Nelson, who could claim to have warned Freddy to take no notice of whatever rumours Luke might spread.

He had no idea that Luke assessed him a fair enough man to warn Freddy off, thereby being the one to start the rumours.

Luke had fencing put up around the lot, with ‘No trespassing’ and ‘Exercising right to use the 2^nd amendment’ notices. He had Tommy walk back and forth to a supposed cellar trapdoor, to provide a beaten path, with some obvious small footprints. Around the rest, he buried dynamite with its .45 trigger under boards. The stone ‘trapdoor’ Luke installed worked slightly differently. The moment it was lifted, it relinquished its hold on the end of a piece of two dollar patent elastic braces, the power off which, in becoming unstretched, slammed its own bullet into its piece of dynamite. Luke chuckled happily. He looked, had Freddy been there to see him, anything but an innocent dude, even if he did look even more like a schoolboy.

“I wager Freddy’s going to try to get you himself,” he said to Luke. “Shall I add a box of fireworks just for kicks?”

“Oh, yes,” said Tommy.

 

And then the newspaper hit the newsstands, and the pictures of Berlin and Pennyman went out all over the district.

As Luke predicted, this enflamed a number of amateur gunsels, who would never have thought of trying their hands at bounty-hunting if there had not been a fat prize right under their noses.

Three young hotheads got themselves killed that evening.

Luke sighed, and prayed for their souls. They knew the men were dangerous to have such a price on their heads; life is about choices.

He was surprised the next day to get a visit from Sheriff Nelson.

“You’ll have to pay out on Berlin,” he said.

“I will?” said Luke. “Fine. Who?”

“Girl called Lucy Bates. That pair crippled her pa, and drove him out of his shop for not paying protection. She took a shotgun to him. Twelve bore.”

“That would do it,” said Luke. “Appropriate, really, that he should have been well stitched up by a woman.”

“How so?” asked Nelson.

“What, have you never heard of ‘Berlin work,’ which is a type of embroidery?”

“I can’t say I have,” said Nelson.  “But Miss Bates can call her shotgun ‘bodkin’ from now on. Nice girl; in protective custody, and your money will set us up nicely when she becomes Mrs. Daniel Nelson.”

“Congratulations!” said Luke, with genuine pleasure. “A lass worthy of a sheriff, by the sound of it. A woman who can hold a weapon with fortitude is beyond the price of rubies. My own lady is especially good with a pair of long whips.”

“Do I want to know?”

“Vengeance on as nasty a man I have ever known for an acknowledged righteous man who whipped her for the sins of his own lusts, and broke the spirit of her sister whom he had married,” said Luke, in disgust. “My Ida ran away and took refuge with my folks, until we went back to collect her sister.” He sighed.  “My ma reckons the poor woman’s life has been shortened by his cruelty.  I advised her against marrying him, but no, she would go by the contract she had signed as a mail order bride, rather than come to my family and see if we couldn’t break the contract. Wouldn’t take charity.”

“Some women are jus’ plain fools,” said Nelson. “Not that there aren’t men as foolish.”

“You have three of them in the morgue,” said Luke. “I feel half responsible for them.”

“You didn’t make them take up gun against a pair; that price should tell them that they ain’t amateur killers.”

“I know,” said Luke, “But it still stirs my conscience.”

“Well, that makes you a better man than most.  Mr. Sokolov, I warned Freddy not to go messin’ around the Abbott lot, whatever he heard. I had to do so, you know. Why are you grinning?”

“When a man like Frederick Muller is warned not to do something, what do you suppose he’d do?”

“Shit, yes,” said Nelson.

“I rather hoped you would warn him,” said Luke. “Well, we shall see. I imagine he will send someone else against me tonight. I’ll stick to firearms, though.”

“Did I want to ask?”

“A Gatling gun in the back yard shouldn’t create collateral,” said Luke. “See, the way I read it is that he can’t afford to leave me alive. Nor Tommy. So I reckon he’ll take one or two men to the Abbott lot, have two or three shoot at the front of the candy store to pin me down, and rush me from the back with the rest,” said Luke.

“Land sakes! How will you split yourself?”

“I won’t. I’ll deal with the boys at the back.  I might go track down the ones at the front, or maybe I’ll let you arrest them, so the city has some stake in it,” said Luke. “He’ll have Pennyman with him.”

“You got him all sussed out.”

“Yes, I’ve been talking to other shopkeepers and finding out what he’s like; and I played poker with him. He plays a risky and bold hand.”

“One way of readin’ a man, I suppose,” said Nelson, impressed. “I’ll bear it in mind.”

“You might want some men available,” said Luke. “I might have a few other surprises. Got any feral dogs in the city?”

“Too plum many,” said Nelson.

“That might change,” said Luke, with a whoop of delight. “Remember, right now, I’m a confectioner.”

He went to the butcher, to negotiate a few choice morsels to attract dogs, and made up some special cartridges for a shotgun he purchased. A hole drilled through the upstairs false front well to one side of the window gave a firing loop, and he briefed Tommy.

“When the firing starts at the front, you fire that shotgun with the special cartridges once towards the muzzle flash. Never mind if you hit. Just fire the gun, you have four cartridges. After that, you get back down the stairs, you hear?”

“Yes, Luke,” said Tommy. “But why?”

Luke told him, and Tommy was duly filled with the giggles.

He was even ready to sleep all afternoon for a busy night ahead.

Luke went out with a bag of goodies from the butcher – goodies, at least, from the point of view of stray dogs – and trailed it on the ground until every feral dog in the city found the scent.

He left them working on getting down a bag suspended just within reach, to keep them busy. It had a number of juicy ham bones in it for long chewing. It kept them at their post. He retrieved the Gatling gun and set it up; then he and Wolf took turns sleeping until the evening turned into night, and Freddy might be supposed to act.

“It’s thinking about sleeting,” grunted Wolf.

“Let it think, as long as it holds off a few hours,” said Luke. “I don’t want it to dampen the ardour of my fireworks.”

“Shouldn’t stop the dynamite,” said Wolf. “But it might stop Freddy.”

“No; he has to kill the witness,” said Luke. “He’ll curse it with his mangled blasphemies, because he can’t curse in the good, full-bodied way of unwholesome scatology any good Cossack – or Cherokee Cossack – can manage, but he’ll come anyway.”

Wolf nodded.

Luke had a way of getting under the skin of his enemies, and Wolf respected that deeply.

“How’ll he split it?” he asked.

“Pennyman with him. Three at the front.  And the rest at the back, which to my reckoning should be around a dozen.”

“And we have the Gatling gun and they do not,” said Wolf, happily.