Read The Book of Murdock Online
Authors: Loren D. Estleman
The Book of Murdock (20 page)
Afternoon was well
along; moving into position, our party threw saguaro-shaped shadows halfway across the street. The sun painted crimson stripes on the wrought-iron spikes that crowned the American castle on its manmade hill and reflected in flat sheets off the mullioned windows facing west, turning them into armor plate. There was nothing preposterous about the place now; it might have stood through the Crusades and expected to stand until the end of all things.
along; moving into position, our party threw saguaro-shaped shadows halfway across the street. The sun painted crimson stripes on the wrought-iron spikes that crowned the American castle on its manmade hill and reflected in flat sheets off the mullioned windows facing west, turning them into armor plate. There was nothing preposterous about the place now; it might have stood through the Crusades and expected to stand until the end of all things.
The businesses on both sides of the street were closed for the holy day, but Jordan had sent a manâit was Corporal Thomson, the young Ranger who'd put me up overnight in Wichita Falls, with a wife expecting a childâto roust out the shopkeepers stacking stock and recording inventory and persuade the residents of the houses to stay inside and away from the windows. It had taken him half an hour, but the captain hadn't wanted to alert Freemason by sending a party. He was being overcautious; all our quarry had to do was
look out and see all the merchants locking up at the same time to know something was in the wind. In times pastâTexas being Texasâthe neighbors would have been recruited to serve in the assault, supplying their own weapons and ammunition, but the second generation of pioneers had moved into the protected category, like the people they'd left behind in the cities of the East. In twenty years, maybe less, citizens' posses would be a part of history, and professionals firmly in place to defend the peace unassisted. There would be a policeman on every corner, and no more deputy marshals required to ride circuit over an area the size of New Hampshire. It was progressive, inevitable, but I smelled in it the stink of my own grave.
look out and see all the merchants locking up at the same time to know something was in the wind. In times pastâTexas being Texasâthe neighbors would have been recruited to serve in the assault, supplying their own weapons and ammunition, but the second generation of pioneers had moved into the protected category, like the people they'd left behind in the cities of the East. In twenty years, maybe less, citizens' posses would be a part of history, and professionals firmly in place to defend the peace unassisted. There would be a policeman on every corner, and no more deputy marshals required to ride circuit over an area the size of New Hampshire. It was progressive, inevitable, but I smelled in it the stink of my own grave.
As the light shifted, so did the demeanor of the gaunt house on its unnatural heap. It looked vulnerableâindecently so, as if by design. The heavy siege shutters I'd noticed on my first visit yawned wide, as if Freemason had declared open house. The thought chilled me there in the bright sun, in the hot wind. I felt suddenly as if we were the ones being hunted.
Jordan, directing operations from the deep doorway of the Catholic church, saw what I saw and reached a different conclusion. “Lit out, I expect. If he's forted up at the ranch, I'm going to have to send to San Antonio for more men. It'll take days.”
I said nothing. When the Rangers were all in place, stationed at second-story windows and in narrow alleys, Colleen Bower emerged from the First Unitarian church. She'd put herself back together after the wrestling match in the parsonage, pinned her hat in place, and with her reticule wound around her wrist (without the pistol, which Jordan
had taken charge of), the first lady of Owen might have been returning home from one of her regular errands. When she drew abreast of us, I stepped forward. The captain touched my arm.
had taken charge of), the first lady of Owen might have been returning home from one of her regular errands. When she drew abreast of us, I stepped forward. The captain touched my arm.
“There's nothing for it if she gets hurt,” he said. “The governor don't pay enough pension to look after my crippled cousin.”
“It's the best way to take him alive. If he turns himself in through her, he'll go to his lawyers instead of his gunmen. Anyway, you've seen what happens when someone tries to hold her down.”
I caught up with her and we walked like two strangers bound in the same direction, without speaking.
We climbed the long flight of steps to the front door. She'd asked for five minutes alone with her husband; I'd determined to give her two. I hung back while she twisted the bell, waited, then twisted it again. It rang away back in a place of desertion.
She turned my way. “Fielo only leaves the house when Richard sends him. He can't think it's an ordinary day.”
I didn't know whether she meant Freemason or the servant, but I wasn't sure of that either way. Those spread shutters haunted me. I didn't agree with Jordan that he'd flown to cover at the ranch. The situation was just the one the house had been planned and built for. I'd faced apparent traps before, but now I felt as if I were fighting the urge to walk right into one. The oath I'd taken had said nothing about battling my own nature.
I settled the point. When she untied her bag and fished out a key, I took it from her and moved her aside with a firm
hand on her elbow. I drew the Deane-Adams and unlocked the door.
hand on her elbow. I drew the Deane-Adams and unlocked the door.
No one shot at me when I eased it open, using the thick door for a shield. The foyer was empty except of furniture. So were the adjoining rooms when I prowled through them, the baronial dining hall and a long kitchen with an enormous white-enamel Jewel stove and, suspended from the ceiling, clusters of copper and cast-iron pots and skillets. The air smelled of stale grease and dry herbs, as if no meal had been prepared there in months.
A tiny room off the kitchen contained a cot, a small chest of drawers, and a wash basin on a stand; the servant's quarters, abandoned also. A back door opened on a path worn through grass to a privy out back. I didn't check that. It was no place to hide with a fortress waiting.
There was one door I hadn't tried, but I didn't think it was for me to try it. I returned to the front step where Colleen, obedient for once, waited. She asked me if I'd looked in the study.
“No.”
She read my face. I wished I knew what she saw there. I was behind it and I had no idea.
She said, “He feels safe there.”
I nodded and stepped aside. She looked at me, not so much curious as inviting an explanation. “It's your house.”
She came in and I followed her down the hallway, three steps behind with the revolver pointed toward the ceiling.
She knocked at the stout paneled door, spoke his name. No one answered. She tried the knob. “Locked. He has the only key.”
She stepped away without being asked while I hammered on the door. My fist boomed like cannon practice; no strategic satisfaction. It was the quietest house I'd ever been in. Even a fallen-in shack on the prairie has something scuttling around inside.
I didn't try kicking. It was too much door and it had a heavy brass lock.
One of the sculptures that decorated the house was a bronze casting of a Knight Templar drawing his sword, the inescapable Masonic symbol emblazoned on his shield. It stood three feet high at the end of the hallway on a tall fluted pedestal with a marble base. I pocketed the Deane-Adams, hoisted the statue off its stand, and signaled Colleen to stand clear. I set myself and rammed the lock. It held, but on the second try I put a dent in the knight's helmet and got a splitting sound. A long shard of polished wood came away from the frame on the third. I laid the statue on the floor, fisted the revolver, and threw a heel at the lock. The door flew open with less resistance than expected and I caught the frame hard with my right shoulder to avoid falling headlong. It was the pulpit all over again; pain racked me from front to back, but the muzzle of the .45 found Richard Freemason in his embossed-leather chair as if I'd trained it.
He sat slumped in his shirtsleeves and a scarlet waistcoat, turned a quarter of the way on his swivel toward the tall massive desk. He hadn't moved even when the door exploded against the wall.
I saw why when I approached him and turned the chair my way by its back. He wasn't wearing a red waistcoat, or one of any other color. The knife that had nearly separated
his head from his trunk had opened his jugular all down the front of his shirt. Only the whites of his eyes showed, and they were no more pale than his face.
his head from his trunk had opened his jugular all down the front of his shirt. Only the whites of his eyes showed, and they were no more pale than his face.
I heard a high keening sound, but Colleen wasn't crying. It was my own breath straining to get in and out after another blow to the lungs and the strain of using a hunk of bronze the size of a newborn calf for a battering ram. I found out later the thing weighed a hundred and forty pounds. It took two men to put it back on its pedestal.
No, she wasn't crying, but her voice was tight. “He's taken his own life.”
I didn't mention that there was no knife. For all I was aware, she knew where it was.
Â
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She didn't. The
Rangers found him finally, in the little privy I hadn't bothered to look inside. In my defense I'll add that they only thought of it after they'd searched the house from the upstairs bedrooms, the ballroom with its fabulous chandelier, and water closet to the coal furnace in the basement.
Rangers found him finally, in the little privy I hadn't bothered to look inside. In my defense I'll add that they only thought of it after they'd searched the house from the upstairs bedrooms, the ballroom with its fabulous chandelier, and water closet to the coal furnace in the basement.
He was propped primly with his back against the plank wall, sitting in his white linen uniform on the flipped-down seat, his long brown hands dangling between his thighs, the wrists sliced open almost neatly with what was probably the same knife he'd used to cut Freemason's throat, a butcher's tool with a curved blade still razor sharp after it had done its work; part of a set from the kitchen, it lay on the floor between his sandaled feet. A bottle of Hermitage with a teaspoonful of whiskey left in the bottom stood beside him on the seat. The liquor had thinned his blood, accelerating the process, but he
was an old man and his heart had given out first. Colleen cried when she was told, as she hadn't for her husband. Her affection for the gentle old manservant was genuine.
was an old man and his heart had given out first. Colleen cried when she was told, as she hadn't for her husband. Her affection for the gentle old manservant was genuine.
I guessed what it was about, with intuition pumped up like my strength under pressure and pain, but I kept it to myself. It all came out when they searched him and found the note, in the same pocket where he'd placed the key he'd used to lock his master's body in the study. He'd wanted time to write it and see the thing through. He'd used a sheet of Colleen's notepaper, as if he refused to touch Freemason's Masonic stationery. It was written in a surprisingly fine hand, in Spanish; but the translation could wait. He'd signed it “Fielo Velasquez.”
KILL ZONE
ROSES ARE DEAD
ANY MAN'S DEATH
MOTOR CITY BLUE
ANGEL EYES
THE MIDNIGHT MAN
THE GLASS HIGHWAY
SUGARTOWN
EVERY BRILLIANT EYE
LADY YESTERDAY
DOWNRIVER
SILENT THUNDER
SWEET WOMEN LIE
NEVER STREET
THE WITCHFINDER
THE HOURS OF THE VIRGIN
A SMILE ON THE FACE
OF THE TIGER
CITY OF WIDOWS
1
THE HIGH ROCKS
1
BILLY GASHADE
1
STAMPING GROUND
1
ACES & EIGHTS
1
JOURNEY OF THE DEAD
1
JITTERBUG
1
ROSES ARE DEAD
ANY MAN'S DEATH
MOTOR CITY BLUE
ANGEL EYES
THE MIDNIGHT MAN
THE GLASS HIGHWAY
SUGARTOWN
EVERY BRILLIANT EYE
LADY YESTERDAY
DOWNRIVER
SILENT THUNDER
SWEET WOMEN LIE
NEVER STREET
THE WITCHFINDER
THE HOURS OF THE VIRGIN
A SMILE ON THE FACE
OF THE TIGER
CITY OF WIDOWS
1
THE HIGH ROCKS
1
BILLY GASHADE
1
STAMPING GROUND
1
ACES & EIGHTS
1
JOURNEY OF THE DEAD
1
JITTERBUG
1
THUNDER CITY
1
THE ROCKY MOUNTAIN
MOVING PICTURE
ASSOCIATION
1
THE MASTER
EXECUTIONER
1
BLACK POWDER,
WHITE SMOKE
1
WHITE DESERT
1
SINISTER HEIGHTS
SOMETHING BORROWED,
SOMETHING BLACK
1
PORT HAZARD
1
POISON BLONDE
1
RETRO
1
LITTLE BLACK DRESS
1
NICOTINE KISS
1
THE UNDERTAKER'S
WIFE
1
THE ADVENTURES OF
JOHNNY VERMILLION
1
AMERICAN DETECTIVE
1
GAS CITY
1
THE BRANCH AND THE
SCAFFOLD
1
ALONE
1
THE BOOK OF MURDOCK
1
1
THE ROCKY MOUNTAIN
MOVING PICTURE
ASSOCIATION
1
THE MASTER
EXECUTIONER
1
BLACK POWDER,
WHITE SMOKE
1
WHITE DESERT
1
SINISTER HEIGHTS
SOMETHING BORROWED,
SOMETHING BLACK
1
PORT HAZARD
1
POISON BLONDE
1
RETRO
1
LITTLE BLACK DRESS
1
NICOTINE KISS
1
THE UNDERTAKER'S
WIFE
1
THE ADVENTURES OF
JOHNNY VERMILLION
1
AMERICAN DETECTIVE
1
GAS CITY
1
THE BRANCH AND THE
SCAFFOLD
1
ALONE
1
THE BOOK OF MURDOCK
1
I have glorified thee on the earth: I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do.
âJOHN 17:4
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Beyond some follow-up
questions to my report, Judge Blackthorne and I never discussed my time in Texas again. He went to his grave without another word on the subject. I can't make the same claim, although mine lies open before me. I made mistakes that cost lives, souls too, and while I'm less certain than ever about what's waiting, Owen is one burden I'm determined to leave behind.
questions to my report, Judge Blackthorne and I never discussed my time in Texas again. He went to his grave without another word on the subject. I can't make the same claim, although mine lies open before me. I made mistakes that cost lives, souls too, and while I'm less certain than ever about what's waiting, Owen is one burden I'm determined to leave behind.
I have to include Eldred Griffin among the casualties. The doll's house in the Catholic cemetery was shut up when I went there to return the shabby sheaf of sermons, the shutters fastened and a padlock on the front door. His death, punctuation to the gossip that had hounded him for years, was still lively after two weeks: His wife, Esther, had gone to his study to pour him a second cup of tea and found him dead on the floor, fallen in a heap from his chair, where he'd been seated at his writing table sipping his first and reading an Aramaic text from the third century. Grubs hindered the
growth of sod between the graves, arsenite of lead was discovered in quantity on the premises, and one or two details about the condition of the corpse persuaded a coroner's jury to rule death by misadventure. No suspicion fell upon Esther. The rumor of suicide moved Father Medavoy of the Cathedral of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary to refuse interment in hallowed ground. Esther boxed up the remains and shipped them to her sister in Michigan, accompanying them in a day coach. I never found out if she sought or found reunion with her other relations. I wonder frequently if Griffin's part in my impostiture had deprived him of his last shred of faith, or if he kept it and like Judas in his Easter sermon chose eternal damnation to punish himself for questioning. Either way his fate lies heavily upon me.
growth of sod between the graves, arsenite of lead was discovered in quantity on the premises, and one or two details about the condition of the corpse persuaded a coroner's jury to rule death by misadventure. No suspicion fell upon Esther. The rumor of suicide moved Father Medavoy of the Cathedral of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary to refuse interment in hallowed ground. Esther boxed up the remains and shipped them to her sister in Michigan, accompanying them in a day coach. I never found out if she sought or found reunion with her other relations. I wonder frequently if Griffin's part in my impostiture had deprived him of his last shred of faith, or if he kept it and like Judas in his Easter sermon chose eternal damnation to punish himself for questioning. Either way his fate lies heavily upon me.
Dr. Lawrence Lazarus Little, proprietor of the Traveling Tabernacle, settled in California, and forty years later at the age of eighty-two became one of the first ministers to preach over the ether. On certain nights when the air was clear, his five hundred-watt “Electric Pulpit” came crackling over my set in Los Angeles. The booming voice had grown reedy with time, and I realized then that that astonishing baritone had provided ninety percent of his message, taking the place of conviction. Griffin had seen past it at its peak.
Richard Freemason's eight-hundred-acre sheep ranch was broken up by his widow and sold to satisfy his creditors, including the State of Texas, to which he owed property taxes in the thousands. The largest parcel went to the brother of a bishop in Dublin, who took pleasure in stripping away all the Masonic symbols, including the brand.
I never heard what became of Captain Andrew Jackson
Jordan of the Texas Rangers. I assume he retired, because Governor Ireland transferred the rest of the Wichita Falls office to San Antonio shortly after the last of the Blue Bandannas was captured and sentenced to hang, and Jordan had made no secret of his opposition to committing all the Rangers'best men to the bandit problem on the border at the expense of the panhandle. I picture him living out the rest of his days smoking his pipe on the front porch on some small spread where he looked after his cousin.
Jordan of the Texas Rangers. I assume he retired, because Governor Ireland transferred the rest of the Wichita Falls office to San Antonio shortly after the last of the Blue Bandannas was captured and sentenced to hang, and Jordan had made no secret of his opposition to committing all the Rangers'best men to the bandit problem on the border at the expense of the panhandle. I picture him living out the rest of his days smoking his pipe on the front porch on some small spread where he looked after his cousin.
Its abandonment by the Rangers, together with the bad reputation left by Freemason, took Owen out of the running for a railroad spur from Wichita Falls. It passed south to create Amarillo, which promptly became the principal city in a region the size of many states. That should have been the end of Owen, but it had demonstrated its tenacity before. The sheep trade, with a shot in the arm from the newly passed fence-cutting law, kept the town alive, at the cost of the saloon business; for some reason sheep hands in those days were more conservative carousers than cowboys. Freemason's house, I'm told, still standsâconverted, appropriately, into a county home for the insane.
I'm living out my time in a comfortable bungalow with a view of a swimming pool, the latest in a series of enthusiasms to claim Southern California. I don't swimâone immersion is enough for one lifetime, even if it's a better prospect than a buffalo wallowâbut the improbably blue water is pleasant to look at, a rare luxury for a “movie,” which is a noxious class restricted by many landlords. Movies are employees of the picture business. I make my rent peddling my experience to producers, who admire to include an old frontier lawman in
press releases promoting their westerns. I'm freelancing now. I had a nice billet with United Artists, Chaplin and Pickford's outfit, but they let me go when a newspaper hack in the pay of a rival studio wrote that Page Murdock had been gunned down in Helena in 1884, and that I was an impostor. It wasn't the first time Blackthorne's harebrained ruse cast doubt on my identity; but the place is rotten with frauds, and I manage to avoid eviction by the grace of UA's less discriminating competitors. How long it will last I can't say. I'll be clay soon enough, so I have no worries about corporeal matters. My spiritual condition is something else.
press releases promoting their westerns. I'm freelancing now. I had a nice billet with United Artists, Chaplin and Pickford's outfit, but they let me go when a newspaper hack in the pay of a rival studio wrote that Page Murdock had been gunned down in Helena in 1884, and that I was an impostor. It wasn't the first time Blackthorne's harebrained ruse cast doubt on my identity; but the place is rotten with frauds, and I manage to avoid eviction by the grace of UA's less discriminating competitors. How long it will last I can't say. I'll be clay soon enough, so I have no worries about corporeal matters. My spiritual condition is something else.
I'm writing down my confessions. They'd fill a good-size trunk, and I have to sit on the old Wells, Fargo strongbox I keep them in to lock it. It's bolted to the floor to discourage theft. It's a small town, word gets around, and scenarists are always pestering me for a look, which means they want to loot them for ideas. A safe deposit box would be more convenientâat least I wouldn't have to guard the pages at night with the venerable Deane-Adamsâbut I chased too many bandits in the old days to place much faith in banks. Anyway, I'm writing not to be read, but for the sake of my immortal soul. I search the Bible for comfort, with its pages falling out of the worn-out binding, and I say my prayers every night, mostly for the dead and partly for myself, because I sent more than a few of them to hell and maybe one or two to heaven. My soul isn't pure.
Fielo Velasquez left a stain. I didn't put that knife in his hand, but I might have prevented him from taking it up. He was the right age, the right nationality, and I should have seen something in the mysterious way he came to work for
Richard Freemason, especially after I read that coded message about the son of Blackthorne's old friend who had died a death in prison that should have been Freemason's. I don't know why Fielo waited so long, or why he chose that day of all days to take a father's revenge, except perhaps that he might have sensed that time was running short and that he was about to be cheated out of it. Old men are prescient, I know now. And like Griffin he'd followed the example set by Judas.
Richard Freemason, especially after I read that coded message about the son of Blackthorne's old friend who had died a death in prison that should have been Freemason's. I don't know why Fielo waited so long, or why he chose that day of all days to take a father's revenge, except perhaps that he might have sensed that time was running short and that he was about to be cheated out of it. Old men are prescient, I know now. And like Griffin he'd followed the example set by Judas.
I suppose that puts Freemason's fate on my head as well, but I don't spend as much time praying for him as I do most of the others.
Colleen buried the old man in the cemetery maintained by the First Unitarian church. I don't know who presided, because I'd left by then. Fielo was barred, of course, from the Catholic, but a number of mourners came out for the service in support of the first widow of Owen, whose bereavement under the circumstances seemed to have removed her at least temporarily from that order of women that is accepted because of position but not respected. She had a carriage packed with luggage and left town directly from the graveside. Her late husband's legal firm in St. Louis sent someone out to supervise the disposition of the ranch and the house in town.
Luther Cherry's widow experienced the same social promotion, but of a more permanent nature. After a respectable year she married a Missouri state senator who went on to serve two terms in Congress and may be our next vice president, or a member of a railroad board of directors, which is the logical alternative. She may have been worth the preposterous
expense of writing her by special delivery from Texas, at that. I feel no guilt for what happened to Cherry, but I ask forgiveness for maligning him afterward, necessary as it was to flush Freemason from cover.
expense of writing her by special delivery from Texas, at that. I feel no guilt for what happened to Cherry, but I ask forgiveness for maligning him afterward, necessary as it was to flush Freemason from cover.
These days I spend a lot of time thinking about Colleen Bower. We met a few times after Owen, but I lost her trail after Blackthorne died and Washington sliced his jurisdiction into several easily corruptible pieces. Some years ago I thought I recognized a familiar figure in a
Saturday Evening Post
piece about an old
gringa,
name unknown, who organized arms shipments to Pancho Villa from El Paso and delivered provisions to revolutionists hiding in the caves of Chihuahua from General Pershing's punitive expedition following the raid on Columbus, New Mexico. The artist's rendition taken from an American poster offering a reward for her capture resembled Colleen around the eyes, but her hair had gone gray and the desert sun had cracked her fair complexion, so I wasn't sure. Villa's men called her
Nuestra Madre de la Orilla:
Our Lady of the Border. U.S. authorities called her an enemy of the state. That sums her up in my opinion.
Saturday Evening Post
piece about an old
gringa,
name unknown, who organized arms shipments to Pancho Villa from El Paso and delivered provisions to revolutionists hiding in the caves of Chihuahua from General Pershing's punitive expedition following the raid on Columbus, New Mexico. The artist's rendition taken from an American poster offering a reward for her capture resembled Colleen around the eyes, but her hair had gone gray and the desert sun had cracked her fair complexion, so I wasn't sure. Villa's men called her
Nuestra Madre de la Orilla:
Our Lady of the Border. U.S. authorities called her an enemy of the state. That sums her up in my opinion.
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