Riding With the Devil's Mistress (Lou Prophet Western #3) (23 page)

‘
You’ll have to ask my friend that question.’

A phosphor flared in
Prophet
’s
hand. He raised it, shedding a gaunt, flickering glow over Louisa,
who saw that the stableman had gone. She heard him shuffling around
in the tack room—doing what, she had no idea.

Prophet looked around, then at
Louisa.
‘What friend?’

She
’d never been so happy to see a man
before in her life. She could have run to him and hugged him.
Retaining control, she merely holstered her revolver and shrugged.
‘He must have had some other business to tend to. How did you know
I was here?’

‘
I saw
you pass on the street awhile ago. Me and the deputy were at the
undertaker’s. I got my horse and followed you.’ He looked around
again, the heavy brows under the crown of his weathered hat
puckered in a frown. ‘What the hell’s goin’ on?’

‘
The
proprietor of the barn and myself were just discussing terms for
sheltering the Morgan and myself.’

‘
In
the dark?’ Prophet had found the lamp on the post. He raised the
window and lit the wick.

‘
Well,
after he’d had his fill of the devil’s bile, it seems he decided he
wanted—’

A loud throat-clearing sounded from the tack
room, and the stableman appeared, tucking his shirt in his pants.
His face was drawn and flushed.

‘
Now
just wait a minute here, Little Miss—I was just funnin’ ye, see?’
He was gazing impatiently at Prophet. ‘Who might you be and what in
the hell do you want?’

Prophet
’s eyes dropped to the man’s open
fly. Instantly knowing the score, he jerked a wry look at Louisa,
then back to the stableman. He chuckled and shook his head. ‘Name’s
Prophet. I’d like to stable my horse for the night, and if your fly
was a barn door, amigo, all the horses would be headin’ for the
Dutch clover by now.’

Louisa snickered. The man looked down,
winced, and turned away as he buttoned his fly.

Prophet opened the big doors,
led Mean and Ugly inside, and told the man to stable the horse with
plenty of oats and water, gave him the customary warning about the
horse
’s
predilection for biting and kicking when bored, and turned to
Louisa.

‘
Come
on.’

‘
Where
we going?’ she asked, following him northward on
Broadway.

‘
I’m
gonna locate the biggest damn steak and bottle of whiskey I can
find this time of the night in this backwater hellhole, and you’re
gonna tell me what we’re doin’ here.’

‘
I
already ate,’ Louisa said, jogging to keep up with Prophet’s
long-legged stride.

‘
I’ll
buy you a sarsaparilla.’

They walked through ankle-deep mud toward a
long tent paralleling the railroad tracks. The tent was lit from
within, and the smell of charred beef issued through a tin
stovepipe. The silhouettes of reveling men danced behind the
canvas.

Louisa said,
‘Who’s the deputy
you mentioned, and what were you two doing at an
undertaker’s?’

Prophet did not reply. Following him into
the tent, Louisa stopped by the door and looked around at the dozen
or so tables occupied with big, dark, hard-looking men in coveralls
and stovepipe boots. They were railroaders, she knew, of just about
every nationality you could think of, including Chinamen and
Negroes. Probably just getting off the day shift or about to start
the night shift. In spite of the grease and sweat stench of the
men, the smell of the steaks being grilled over barrels at the back
of the tent was heavenly.

Several men looked at her with
surprise and their customary, automatic lust. Wrinkling her nose,
Louisa hurried toward Prophet, who
’d gotten in line with a tin plate. She
followed him, feeling the eyes of the crowd on her. When Prophet
had a big T-bone on his plate, smothered with potatoes and onions,
he turned to her.

‘
Sure
you don’t want a steak?’

When she shook her head, he ordered a shot
of whiskey and a mug of beer from a wiry, apron-clad Chinaman
tending the keg.

‘
You
have sarsaparilla?’ he asked the apron.

The Chinese looked at him, too puzzled to
frown.

Prophet turned to
Louisa.
‘I
don’t think they have sarsaparilla. You’ll have to have a
beer.’

‘
I
don’t like beer.’

‘
It
ain’t American not to like beer,’ he said. To the Chinaman, he
nodded. ‘Give her a beer.’

They found an unoccupied bench and sat at a
table. Prophet wasted no time throwing back the whiskey, then
plunking the empty glass down and sawing into the T-bone draped
across his plate, buried in the greasy potatoes and fried
onions.

Louisa sipped her beer and made
a face. Licking the foam from her mouth, she said,
‘Leave it to men to
like such a putrid concoction.’

‘
What’s that?’ Prophet said with his mouth full.

Louisa sipped the brew again,
not liking the taste any better but not minding the headiness it
instantly offered. She admonished herself to go slow, however. She
certainly didn
’t want to become one of the boisterous apes rousting about
the tent, many of whom still watched her, glassy-eyed. One such
gent caught her eye, stuck his fat, wet tongue out, and ran it
slowly along his mustachioed upper lip.

Louisa rolled her eyes and looked away.

‘
Shoot,’ Prophet said between fork loads of food, oblivious
to the stares Louisa was getting.

‘
Huh?’
she said, taking another dainty sip of her beer.

‘
Tell
me what in the hell we’re doin’ here.’

Above the din, she told him
about the Red River Gang
’s plans for a raid on Fargo.

‘
So
what are they plannin’ to hit?’ Prophet asked.

‘
I
don’t know,’ Louisa replied, glancing around the room, absently
wondering why God—if there was a God, which she’d seriously come to
doubt—had ever come up with the idea for men. ‘I figured we’d find
that out once we got here.’

‘
Any
ideas?’

‘
I got
in too late to see much—much of any importance, that is. They must
be gonna hit a bank or something. I can’t think of anything else
here. As a matter of fact, I can’t think of any reason why anyone
would want to come to a town-sized privy like this. Why, if I had
my druthers and access to a good wagonload of dynamite,
I’d...’

‘
All
right, Miss Bonny-venture—thanks for the commentary. These boys may
not look like much at the moment, but they’re what built this
country. They and others like ‘em. Breakin’ their backs while their
rich employers back East rake in millions while swilling Eye-talian
wine and eating duck ala whatever.’

‘
No
wonder everything’s going to hell in a hand basket. Anyway, tell me
about the deputy and the undertaker’s.’

Prophet told her about the three deputy
marshals two of the Red River Gang ambushed between Luther Falls
and Fargo, and how only one survived.

‘
His
name’s Mcllroy, and we hauled the other two here to town and
dropped them off at the undertaker’s before reporting the whole
bloody mess to the sheriff. The bodies will ship back to Yankton
when the undertaker’s done with them—along with Mcllroy, I hope.
He’s still in shock over the whole thing, and he was too young to
be sent here, anyway. They all were. I’d like to find the senior
marshal that sent them, and thrash the living daylights out of the
son of a bitch.’

‘
Where’s the deputy now?’

Prophet swallowed a mouthful
and washed it down with a long swig of beer.
‘We parted at the undertaker’s.
I hope it’s the last I’ve seen of him. I think he headed for a
sawbones to get his face cleaned and sewn.’

‘
Did
you tell the sheriff about the gang?’

‘
I
told him they were in the area. He just shook his head, turned a
little peaked, and said he’d put a few more deputies on the
streets. I’ll talk to him again in the morning. Maybe he has some
idea about what the gang might have targeted here in
town.’

Prophet forked more steak in his mouth and
looked at Louisa, who sat staring at her beer, a third of which was
gone. Her cheeks were flushed.

‘
Grows
on you, don’t it?’

‘
It’s
awful. I’m just drinking it to be polite.’

‘
Your
manners are right impeccable. How was your trip up from
Wahpeton?’

Louisa shrugged and grinned
wistfully.
‘Lovely. And the gang has dwindled by two more.’

Prophet looked at her with his
jaw hanging.
‘How in the hell... ?’

‘
A
lady doesn’t give away her secrets.’

Prophet sighed, shook his head,
finished the last couple bites of food, and drained his beer in a
single gulp.
‘Come on,’ he said with a belch, wiping his mouth with his
sleeve. ‘Let’s get the hell out of here.’

‘
Wait—I haven’t finished my beer.’

Prophet got another beer and finished it
about the same time Louisa finished hers. Then they got up—Louisa a
little unsteadily—and left the tent.

‘
Where
we goin’, anyway?’ Louisa asked him.

‘
I got
a hotel.’

‘
I
don’t waste money on hotels. I’m sleepin’ with my
horse.’

‘
You’re not sleeping with your horse. Besides that, you need
a bath. You smell as bad as I do. Come on.’ He tugged on her arm,
but she resisted.

‘
Wait—I need my saddlebags.’

Prophet looked at her,
frowning.
‘I
reckon you do,’ he grumbled. ‘All right...’

When they
’d retrieved her saddlebags
from the livery barn, where a mild-mannered half-breed Indian sat
playing solitaire in the office, they headed for the hotel Prophet
had checked into after riding into town earlier.

They were taking a shortcut between two
clapboarded warehouses when two figures appeared at the end of the
alley. From their dark outlines, they were big men, and they were
holding something in their arms—either guns or clubs.

‘
Uh-oh,’ Prophet said.

‘
I
don’t think we should have taken your shortcut,’ Louisa
grumbled.

‘
I
don’t, either. In fact, I think I’ve changed my mind.’ Prophet
turned around and froze. ‘Shit,’ he rasped, seeing two more figures
at the alley mouth.

They were walking this way.

‘
Throw
down your guns and knife, buddy,’ a man called from before them.
His accent was distinctly Irish.

‘
And
no one gets hurt. All we want is the pretty little lass at your
side.’

‘
Now
you’ve done it,’ Louisa snapped at Prophet. ‘I’d have been a lot
better off with my horse!’

READING
LOUISA
’S
MIND, Prophet grabbed her arm. ‘Keep your pistol holstered. They
have us dead to rights.’

‘
The
hell they do!’

‘
Do as
I say!’

Prophet watched the two men approach in the
darkness. Light glanced off something in the arms of the man on the
left. Probably a shotgun. The other man tapped a club in his open
left palm.

Turning around, Prophet watched the other
two approach—big, burly types in overalls and smelling like
breweries. Railroad men fueled by forty-rod and out for some fun.
Prophet thought he recognized them from the food tent.

‘
Drop
that knife and pistol in the dirt, laddie,’ one of them ordered. He
was aiming what looked like a snub-nosed, small-caliber pistol at
Prophet’s solar plexus. Now he clicked the hammer back, and the
bounty hunter’s stomach tensed. He winced as he removed his bowie
and Colt and stooped to set them on the ground.

‘
Listen, boys,’ he said, straightening, ‘you don’t want to
mess with this girl. She’s not as innocent as she
looks.’

‘
She
not, eh?’ one of the railroaders said, this one in a German accent.
‘Maybe she give goot time, then, no?’ He chuckled. ‘Rolf—I think
thiss girl give goot time in the repair shop, no?’

‘
Ah,
she’s a fine little lassie, Peder,’ agreed the Irishman, reaching
to brush a lock of hair from Louisa’s face. ‘Yessir!’ Turning to
Prophet, he said, ‘We’re just gonna tap ye on the head now, laddie,
nice and sweet-like. You won’t feel a thing till
mornin’.’

Out of the corner of his eye,
Prophet saw the man with the shotgun move up on him from behind. As
Prophet crouched to duck the blow, he heard an anguished cry
followed by two sharp pistol cracks. The commotion distracted the
man with the shotgun enough that the butt of the sawed-off weapon
merely grazed the back of Prophet
’s head.