The Dublin Detective (3 page)

“I'll find him,” McBeth said. “It's what I do. I hunt men.”

“Like a bounty hunter?”

“I told you,” McBeth said, “I am a lawman.”

“Not here, you're not,” Clint said.

“That's true enough,” McBeth said, “but I don't intend to take any money when I find Jamie Dolan.”

“What do you intend to take?” Clint asked.

“His life.”

After coffee they went out to the front desk and Clint got McBeth a room. The desk clerk—a young man named Ben who looked just like Billy, the waiter, because they were brothers—knew that Clint was friends with the owner, Lucky Hansen. So when Clint told him to give McBeth a room, he did it.

“Stow your bag in your room,” Clint said, “and we can go and get you a gun.”

“Why you doin' this for me, Clint?” McBeth asked.

“You're a visiting lawman from another country,” Clint said. “I'm just trying to show you some hospitality.”

Clint remained in the lobby while McBeth went up to his room. During Clint's wait, Lucky Hansen came out of his office. Hansen, who recently turned fifty, had been a gambler all his life. Now he was trying his hand at running a hotel—not that he was giving up the gambling.

“Where you been?” he asked Clint.

“Me?” Clint asked. “Why, Lucky, I've been out making a new friend.”

“Ain't you got enough friends?”

“How many is enough, Lucky?”

“Well,” Lucky said, “considerin' you'd go to the wall for a friend, I'd say you got too many already. Where'd you pick this one up?”

“The docks.”

“What was he doin' there?”

“Getting off a boat from Ireland.”

“An Irishman?”

“That's who usually comes from Ireland.”

“And what did he do to earn your friendship and help?” Lucky asked.

“He needed a friend,” Clint said. “I just decided to give him the help.”

Lucky shook his head.

“Always buyin' into other people's trouble, Clint,” he said. “That's gonna get you killed one of these days. I'll lay odds.”

Clint laughed.

“That's not a bet I'm willing to take, Lucky,” he said. “I'm going to die from a bullet before I die in bed. I resigned myself to that a long time ago.”

“Me,” Lucky said, “I'm gonna die at a poker table. I prefer it to either of your options.”

Jamie Dolan flipped the girl over on her back. He didn't know what excited him more, her big tits or her split lip. He finally decided it was the split lip. God had given her the tits, but he'd given her that.

He reached down with his big hands and grabbed her breasts. He pinched her nipples, hard enough to make her bite her lip, to force tears from her eyes.

His huge penis was poking her. Her eyes were afraid. She thought he was too big for her. Surely, if he tried to put it in her it would hurt and maybe even damage her.

“Please . . .” she said.

“Please what?”

“Please . . . don't . . .”

He squeezed her breasts tighter, grinning.

“I like when they beg.”

He removed one hand from her breast, slid it down her body. Even though she was small—barely five feet—she had a voluptuous body. She was like a child and a woman at the same time.

He slid his finger into her, wiggled it around. She became wet in spite of herself.

She was barely nineteen, but he knew she was no virgin for the simple reason that she had been sent over from the whorehouse. Unless this was her first time—but he doubted it. Sure, she felt tight, but she'd been fucked before.

Only not the way she was about to be.

He grabbed her thighs, spread them open, and drove his rigid penis into her. Her eyes widened and she screamed—not from pleasure but from pain.

Which was his pleasure . . .

 

Later, he flipped her over again. She was limp, but it didn't matter to him. He withdrew from her, glistening with her juices. He pressed the wet tip of his penis to her ass, spread her cheeks and pushed. The spongy head spread her anus, entered, and then was followed by the hard shaft.

“Oh, God . . .” she moaned, because she was too weak to scream anymore.

He lifted her up onto her hands and knees, grabbed her hips, and began to fuck her brutally.

“There ya go,” he said, with glee. “Come on, lass. Love it!”

She moaned again . . .

 

Dolan stood at the window of his room, looked down at the Barbary Coast. As soon as he'd gotten off the ship that had brought him here, he recognized the coast as his kind of place. Behind him the girl lay curled up on the bed, crying softly.

“Finish yer cryin', gal, then get dressed, and get out.”

“I-I can't walk.”

He laughed.

“I figured I fucked you stupid,” he said, “but now you can't walk either?”

“N-no.”

He turned to look at her. There was some blood on the sheet. Perhaps she had been a virgin, after all. Or maybe he'd just torn her up inside. He thought about killing her, but that would have started him off on the wrong foot in this new country.

“I'll go and get somebody to help you,” he said. Then he laughed and added, “Wait here.”

He got dressed and left the room.

 

In the lobby the desk clerk shuddered when he saw Jamie Dolan coming down the stairs. The man frightened him to death.

“You!” Dolan said.

“Y-yes.”

“Send for someone from the whorehouse,” he said. “The poor bitch can't walk.” He laughed and cupped his crotch. “Ya ever fuck a gal so she can't walk, lad?”

“N-no sir.”

“I didn't think so.”

The clerk was about thirty, but looked younger. He also—as far as Dolan was concerned—was so slight he looked more like a girl than a man.

“I need somebody to get that gal outta my room . . . quick.”

“Yes, sir.”

Dolan pointed a thick finger at the clerk.

“Don't make me wait too long, boy.”

“No, s-sir.”

“I'm goin' back up,” Dolan said. “If somebody ain't here in ten minutes ta get her, I'll toss her out the window. And then I'll come back for you. Understand?”

“I-I understand.”

Dolan grinned.

“There's a good lad,” he said, and then went back up the steps.

“It feels odd,” McBeth said.

He was talking about the Western rig sitting around his waist.

“Wear it a little lower,” Clint said.

“Like this?”

“You'll be able to get it out more quickly,” Clint said.

McBeth touched the Peacemaker in his holster and said, “I can see that.”

“And you can stop wearing the empty rig around your shoulders.”

“Yes. That would be good.”

“It's getting late,” Clint said. “You probably want to get some rest.”

“Yes,” McBeth said, “I've been on the move for a very long time.”

“Tomorrow you can get some new clothes,” Clint said.

“I won't need to take up any more of your time for that,” McBeth said. “You must have . . . a life?”

“Well, yes, actually, I do,” Clint said. “I was planning on leaving tomorrow, since the person I was supposed to meet has apparently changed his mind.”

“Then you should go,” McBeth said. “I'll start my huntin' tomorrow.”

“Well,” Clint said, “if your hunting leads you out West, we may meet again.”

“And if it leads me out East?”

“Much less likely,” Clint said.

“Well, then,” James McBeth said, “I hope it'll lead me out West.”

 

Jamie Dolan slammed the door to his room. The two men who had come from the whorehouse to retrieve the girl had barely gotten through the doorway in time.

He turned, looked at the bedsheet with some of the girl's blood on it. That didn't bother him. Back in Ireland he had bathed in the blood of his victims. It wouldn't bother him to sleep in it. In point of fact, he enjoyed the smell. It was sweet to him—especially the scent of a young girl's blood.

Dolan was naked. He hadn't bothered to cover himself when the men from the whorehouse arrived. Hell, they worked in a cathouse. They'd seen naked men before.

Of course, probably not like him. He looked in the mirror at himself. His chest was covered with a mat of black hair. He looked down. His penis jutted from a mass of black hair, and hair covered his legs as well. A woman had once—affectionately—called him a bear. That was before he'd fucked her and killed her.

He turned and went to the bed, lay down on his back. His penis stood straight up. Maybe he should have sent for another woman. But no, he needed to get some sleep because tomorrow he'd start his journey. The Barbary Coast had been nice, but he knew James McBeth would be on his trail, and he wasn't quite ready to face him. Not yet. There was still a lot to be done.

He reached down, stroked his thickening manhood. He didn't have time to send for a woman, so he'd have to take care of the thing himself. That was okay. He wouldn't have to get rid of the woman after.

He took care of his need, then rolled over. He hoped he'd fall asleep before the damn thing started demanding attention again.

He really had no control over it.

No control, at all.

 

Clint looked out the window of his own room, thinking about what Lucky Hansen had said to him about getting involved in other people's troubles.

When he saw what was happening on the dock—four against one—there was no way he could have just sat by and watched. So he dealt himself in. Then, when he found out that McBeth was a lawman—the man had shown him credentials over their meal, even though they meant nothing in this country—he felt the need to get the man properly outfitted to deal with America, and to get him a room so he could get some rest.

So that was it. He was all done. Heading out tomorrow, back to Texas. McBeth seemed to be very confident in his abilities as a manhunter. And he was old enough and experienced enough to know his own abilities. There was no need to try to help the man any further, especially since he didn't seem to want it.

Clint didn't know for sure, but he thought there was more behind McBeth's hunt than a lawman's desire to do his job. But McBeth had not confided anything to him, and why should he? They'd only known each other for one day.

So tomorrow he'd saddle Eclipse, and he and his Darley Arabian would get on with their lives.

Clint Adams sat at a back table in Rick's Place, enjoying a quiet beer. It was early afternoon and, other than him, there was only the bartender and another man standing at the bar. Rick Hartman himself—Clint's friend and the owner of the saloon and gambling hall—was nowhere to be seen. Clint knew that Rick was seeing a new woman he had hired, so it was very likely the two were still in bed in the saloon owner's room upstairs. He was tempted to go up and bang on the door, but decided to just sit and quietly enjoy his beer instead.

The man at the bar was talking loudly with the bartender, who looked bored.

“So this fella who talks funny says he's lookin' for this other fella with a funny name . . .”

“So one guy talks funny, and the other one's got a funny name?” the bartender asked.

“That's what I said,” the patron said. “Ain't ya listenin', Paul?”

Clint didn't know Paul. The bartender had been hired by Hartman while Clint was out of town.

“I'm listenin', I'm listenin', Andy,” Paul said. He looked over at Clint, saw him watching, and shrugged.

“So this guy, he talks real funny—”

“How funny?”

“Ya know, like he was . . .”

“What? A Chinaman?”

“Naw, not a Chinaman,” the other man said. “He said stuff like
boyo
, and
ye
instead of
you
. What's that? Like . . . a . . . whatayacallit . . .”

“An Irishman?” Clint asked

Both the man and the bartender turned and looked at Clint.

“Yeah, that was it,” the man said. “An Irishman.”

Clint got up and carried his beer to the bar.

“And was he looking for another Irishman?”

“Well . . . yeah, he was,” the man said. “Said he was trackin' him, but I didn't see this Irish guy as much of a tracker.”