Riding With the Devil's Mistress (Lou Prophet Western #3) (13 page)

Glancing to his right, Prophet
saw that there was no light on in the sheriff
’s office, and he was grateful
for that. He hoped the sheriff and his deputy had gone home for the
evening. He didn’t want them getting in his way or fouling up his
plan to remove the girl from the rooms above the saloon. From the
fear he’d seen in their faces earlier, he didn’t think he had
anything to worry about.

Now, little Miss Bonaventure
was another problem altogether. Not having seen her since
she
’d headed
for the room she’d wrangled from the woman who ran the general
store, he had no idea what she was up to. But sure as rabbits
hopped, you could bet she was up to something. He just hoped she
realized what a pit of perdition that saloon was tonight, and
stayed away from it. If she did not, she could tie Prophet’s plan
in one hell of a knot and probably get herself killed to
boot.

The bounty hunter scanned the area around
him for several minutes, trying to spot a good location from which
to keep an eye on the saloon and to wait for a couple more hours to
pass. Finally, he headed for the alley paralleling the main street,
hung a right, and came up behind the general store.

Seeing that the roof over the
store
’s rear
was fairly low, he used a couple of shipping barrels to help hoist
himself on it. Adjusting the shotgun hanging down his back, he made
his way toward the front, hoisting himself onto the store’s second
story, and hunkered down behind the false front, which jutted up a
good six feet and offered perfect cover from the saloon as well as
the quickening spring breeze.

Standing, Prophet could peer
over the top of the facade at the saloon, from which tinny piano
music prattled
above the Red River Gang’s raucous revelry. Bright lantern
light spilled onto the boardwalk and the heads of the horses
stationed there. Shadows flickered in the windows and occasionally
the sounds of breaking glass rose.

One of the second-story rooms, whose windows
he could see from this angle, was lit, and he fairly shuddered as
he imagined what could be happening to the Luther Falls girl in
there.

As the minutes passed, the laughter in the
saloon grew louder, the yells and shouts more and more boisterous.
Someone tried playing a banjo for a while, and gave up amidst a
barrage of wild complaints and several gunshots. At one point, a
girl screamed, and Prophet, who was sitting with his back to the
facade and smoking a quirley, jumped. But then the girl laughed
harshly, and he realized it was one of the whores.

The minutes passed slowly. To
stretch his legs and stomp the chill from his bones, Prophet rose
occasionally and walked around the general store
’s roof. Then he sat down again
and rolled another quirley.

About two hours after
he
’d begun
his vigil, he heard the slow thud of hooves and the tinny clatter
of a bridle bit. Standing, he saw the boy from the livery barn
leading Mean and Ugly this way down the main drag. The boy tied the
horse to the hitch rack directly below Prophet, then, tossing a
wary glance at the saloon, slipped slowly off in the
darkness.

The sounds in the saloon had
grown into a constant, muffled roar, the piano not so much being
played anymore as pounded, its discordant notes punctuating the din
of the yelling, drunken men. It was time. The noise would cover any
made by Prophet, and the senses of the men would be sufficiently
dulled that even if they did happen to see or hear him,
they
’d be
less effective at doing anything about it.

He made his way carefully off
the roof, trying not to
make any noise and wake any dogs on this side of
the main street. The night was black as pitch, for clouds had moved
in to cover the stars. He had to be extra methodical in finding the
barrels he’d used to hoist himself onto the roof. He got only one
foot on one of them, and went down hard on his side, the barrel
falling on his right leg.

Fortunately, the barrel was
empty and didn
’t do any damage, but Prophet still cursed his clumsiness
as he adjusted the shotgun, made sure his revolver was still on his
right hip, the bowie on his left, and headed down the alley. When
he came to the main drag, he paused beside the general store,
making sure none of the gang was outside, then headed for the
saloon.

He was no more than halfway across the
street when the saloon door opened and several men started onto the
boardwalk under the awning, their voices loud in the quiet night,
the piano music and din pushing out behind them.

Prophet froze, his veins filling with
adrenaline. He crouched, looked around, and headed for the
boardwalk across the side street from the saloon, hoping the
shadows of the shop there would conceal him.

Making the boardwalk at a
shuffling, crouching run, holding the shotgun across his chest, he
pressed his back against the wall of the store and gritted his
teeth, watching the three silhouettes of the men across the street,
and listening. From their conversation, if you could call their
drunken blather conversation. Prophet could tell they
hadn
’t seen
him. He knew from experience that men who’d been drinking as long
as they had were experiencing the world from a thick, gauzy
curtain, their senses deadened.

They were grumbling and cursing
about something as they milled before the horses. Prophet waited
there in the shadows, frozen, watching and listening, trying to
figure out what they were up to. Surely they
weren
’t
leaving town at this hour, after all they’d had to
drink.

At last, it became obvious they were
gathering up the reins of all the horses at the hitch rack, and
were leading the horses off somewhere.

‘
Shit... I don’t see why this is my job,’ one of them
complained.

‘
Shut
up, Price.’

‘
I’m
gonna miss my turn with that girl upstairs.’

‘
You
rather have a dead horse to ride tomorrow?’

Price said something in reply,
but Prophet couldn
’t hear it because the three men and the eight horses had
drifted off down the street, apparently heading for the livery
stable. He’d heard enough, however.

So the girl really was upstairs... .

Prophet watched the saloon to
see if anyone else came out, then took a breath and ran northward
down the side street. After about fifty yards, he stopped, took
another gander at the saloon, then headed across the street to the
saloon
’s
rear.

There was a slender staircase running up the
back of the building to the second story. Peering around in the
dark to make sure no one was around or using the privy, which was a
pale splotch in the darkness twenty yards north, Prophet put his
hands on the railings, trying to cushion his steps, and began
climbing.

He took it slow, for the stair
planks were badly rotted in places and squeaked like rusty hinges.
When he made the second-story landing, he peered into the
frost-edged window in the door
’s top half. Before him was a narrow hall with a
shabby rug, faded, peeling wallpaper, an askew picture frame, and a
single lantern in a wall bracket. In each wall there were two
closed doors. Opening the outside door carefully, Prophet stepped
inside.

When all appeared clear, he
closed the door behind him and moved forward, hearing the
thunderous noise below, laced with the piano
’s cacophony and a drunk man
singing an Irish drinking song Prophet had heard once or twice
during the war. It was a lusty song Prophet had liked, but he
suddenly didn’t like it anymore. Through the soles of his boots, he
felt the vibration all the racket made in the floor.

He moved forward, peering at the cracks
under the doors. No light escaped the cracks of the first two doors
he passed. When he came to the second set, the set closest to the
door leading to the stairs to the floor below, he discovered lights
bleeding from the cracks under both doors.

He stopped between the doors, breathing
shallowly, his heart beating slowly but powerfully, his pulse
throbbing in his neck. Now, how in the hell was he supposed to
figure out which room the Luther Falls girl was in?

The answer came a few seconds later, in the
form of a giggle behind the door to his right.

Okay, she
wasn
’t
behind that door, he thought with a sigh, turning to the door on
his left. He took another deep breath, lifted his hat, and ran a
hand through his sweat-damp hair. He replaced the hat, produced his
bowie from the scabbard on his left hip, knowing that, in spite of
the revelry below, there was no way he could use the revolver and
not bring the whole gang down on top of him.

He began twisting the doorknob
but stopped suddenly when he heard boots scuffing inside the room
and a deep male voice say,
‘Shit, she’s about as fun as a dead
fish.’

The man
’s voice had grown as he neared the
door, as did the sound of his footfalls. Obviously, he was about to
exit the room.

Prophet looked around, finding nowhere to
hide, his heart leaping into his throat.

PROPHET STEPPED TO the left of
the door, pressing his back to the wall and praying for all he was
worth that the man wouldn
’t see him.

Shit, shit, shit, shi—

The door opened. A tall, broad
figure appeared, placing his hat on his head as he stepped through
the doorway. Fortunately, he
’d put his hat on with his right hand, and that
arm had blocked his view of Prophet.

As soon as his hat was on, he
turned to his left, pulling the door closed behind him, then
continued leftward down the hall. Prophet watched the
man
’s back
as he sauntered drunkenly to the door at the end of the hall,
opened it to the rabble below, walked through, and flung it angrily
closed behind him.

Prophet sighed, tears of relief
moistening his eyes.
‘You know, I don’t deserve to be that lucky,’ he
whispered to himself.

Stepping before the door once again, he
dried his right hand on his pants, then placed it on the knob and
turned it. The door opened, and Prophet quickly entered, drawing
his bowie.

As he had suspected when the other man had
spoken, another man was there, but fortunately he was sitting on
the other side of the bed, facing the outside wall.

The man was pulling on his
boots. Without turning to Prophet, he said,
‘Wait your goddamn turn,
damnit!’

Prophet stood there, his back
to the door, glancing from the nude girl on the bed, her wrists and
ankles tied to each of the four bedposts with strips of cloth, to
the man pulling his boots on. When Prophet didn
’t say anything, the man turned
a scowling look at him over his left shoulder.

The scowl grew when the man saw
Prophet. His face flushing, the man bolted to his feet, reaching
for the pistol on his hip. The gun hadn
’t cleared leather before Prophet’s
bowie, spinning end over end, thunked blade first into the man’s
broad chest.

The man grunted, dropping his
pistol and stumbling back against the wall. He raised his hands to
the knife as if to remove it, but he didn
’t have the strength. Lifting his
exasperated gaze to Prophet, the man slid down the wall, making a
low hissing sound, and died about the same time his butt hit the
floor.

Prophet quickly closed the door and went to
the bed. The girl, who appeared about thirteen or fourteen, stared
up at him with shock-dulled brown eyes. She had a round, cherubic
face, and sweat-soaked, sandy blond hair. Her face was bruised, one
eye nearly swollen shut. Her cracked lips moved but no words
escaped her mouth.

‘
It’s
all right,’ Prophet said. ‘I’m a friend, and I’m going to take you
home.’ He hadn’t finished the last sentence before he’d begun
slicing the cloth tethering her arms and feet to the
bedposts.

When he was through, he drew a quilt and
sheet up from the bottom of the bed, covering her. Then he lifted
her off the bed and swung around to the door.

‘
No,’
the girl sobbed quietly, shaking her head, shuddering.

‘
Sh.
It’s all right. I’m taking you home.’

Cracking the door, he peered into the hall.
All was clear. Behind the door opposite, bedsprings squawked, and a
man and a woman moaned.

Hurriedly, Prophet slipped out
of the room and started down the hall, the girl inert in his arms.
He was about ten feet from the door when a figure appeared in the
window of the door
’s upper half. Prophet froze.

The door opened, and Louisa stood there,
gazing at him expectantly.

‘
Well,
what are you waiting for?’ she hissed. ‘Come on!’

Prophet was incredulous.
‘What the hell are
you doing here?’

‘
I was
waitin’ under the stairs when I saw you. I’ll cover you while you
get her on your horse and get out of here.’

‘
What
were you doin’ under the stairs?’

‘
Waitin’ for opportunities—what the hell do you think I was
doing?’ The girl’s face widened with anxious impatience. ‘Will
you
go?’