The Great West Detective Agency (4 page)

“Your dog?”

“My itty-bitty little puppy.”

“The police wouldn't look for a lost dog?”

“That is right. It is so cruel of them, because Tovarich was stolen. He was spirited away by evil men. I just know it.”

“Was anything else stolen from your room?”

“No, nothing. Only Tovarich.”

Lucas refrained from asking if there was something special about the puppy. The love in Amanda's voice almost approached reverence.

“Do you know anyone who would steal your dog?” He left it unsaid what men on the frontier would have taken rather than the dog if they had sneaked into her bedroom and found her asleep.

“No. I have driven myself quite crazy trying to imagine who might have stolen my puppy dog.”

Lucas held back his opinion that, no matter how lovely she was, Amanda was crazy as a bedbug. The dog had run off or, more likely, become the morning meal for a coyote or a pack of wolves. Although wild animals avoided Denver because of the influx of people, they also came to live off the garbage. Nosing through a pile of rotting meat from a slaughterhouse was easier than tracking down your own four-legged meal. And only the night before he had seen two rats which would prove a match for any small dog.

“Here is my address. It is a boardinghouse.”

She fumbled in her purse, found what she wanted, and passed over a scrap of paper with an address written on it in pencil.

“There might be a neighbor who saw a man or men with your Tovarich yesterday morning,” he said, not believing a word of it. Lucas tucked the paper into his vest pocket and stood. “I hate to be abrupt, Amanda, but I was on my way out.”

Her nose wrinkled, and she dabbed more at her eyes. All the while she studied him from head to toe.

“You are going undercover?”

It took Lucas an instant to realize how disheveled he was after his late-night escape from the rancher and his henchmen. His pants were torn in places, and his once elegant coat had been smudged in more places than he could count. A good cleaning would return it to respectability. And he ought to tend to that right away since he wanted to look sharp for Carmela Thompson's debut that night.

He wanted to look sharp for Carmela. After too many brushes with her in the past, it was time to press his advantage for a lengthier encounter with a woman who didn't sleep with her dog.

“Please don't mention the way I look,” Lucas said, moving behind her and holding the chair as a hint for her to leave. “I sometimes adopt a disguise for the purpose of a case.”

“There won't be any need to do so when you go to find the men who stole Tovarich.”

She preceded him to the door. “Will this be enough for a retainer?” She held out a wad of greenbacks large enough to choke a cow. “It's only a hundred dollars. I can give you that much more when you recover Tovarich and return him to me.”

Startled by the large sum, Lucas instinctively held out his hand. Amanda dropped the greenbacks into it.

“I'm so happy you will take the case, Lucas. You must begin the search as soon as possible. I don't want those thieves to take Tovarich to some faraway place where I will never see him again.”

“The case I intended to work on is quite pressing,” he said. He closed the door behind him and considered locking it. To do so without a key required him to use his lock picks. Amanda might believe he did this to show off. Instead he decided to leave the door open. There wasn't much to steal in the office.

“I feel you are a dependable man, Lucas. You will do your best.” She cast a quick look at the door. “You and the Great West Detective Agency.”

She reached out shyly and put her hand on his arm, then turned away and hurried off. All he could see was the sway of her bustle. He took a couple steps, then stopped to look around the business district for any laundry where he might get his coat cleaned. Something about the man and woman coming toward him made him step to one side. His instinct was vindicated when they stopped in front of the agency door.

They were plainly dressed, nothing too expensive. But clean and neat. Lucas thought they might be wearing their Sunday-go-to-meeting clothes, but not knowing them better kept him from making this assumption. The man's brown suit had been tailored to fit, though his shirt cuff peeking out was worn. He wore a string tie that did not match his coat, though the color difference was subtle. He might not even have noticed, but Lucas did. The man wore no jewelry other than a gold wedding band. He didn't even sport a gold watch chain or fob.

The woman's gray dress was similarly unembellished with even a broach or locket. Her hand moved restlessly, but Lucas caught the golden flash of a wedding ring that matched the man's. Both were of a height a few inches shorter than Lucas's own five foot ten. The man was beginning to sport a beer gut, but the woman was thin as a rail and likely as tough. She had that look about her.

The exact opposite attitude showed in her husband. Lucas had seen men bossed about by women before. There was no question who wore the pants in this family.

He touched the slip of paper with Amanda's address and then the hundred dollars she had given him. He had no reason to look for a lost dog and one likely to have become a meal for a hungry predator, but honor required him to do something about her plight. Hiring the detectives from the agency satisfied his honor and possibly returned the dog to its owner. He started for the couple, then turned and pretended to watch a fight across the street.

“Not here yet. Where can he be, dear?”

“How should I know?”

The woman scowled. If a smile had ever graced her lips, she might have been attractive. Lucas would never classify her as more, not even pretty. Her angular features reminded him of a schoolteacher he had hated. Even the chopping motion made with her left hand was similar. But this was not Miss Draper. That harridan would be sixty now, and this woman wasn't a day past thirty.

“It makes no sense, putting an ad in the newspaper for assistants and then not being here to interview us.”

“You'll make a great detective with logic like that,” she said. The sarcasm flowed thicker than honey but nowhere near as sweet.

“How long should we wait for him, dear?”

“As long as it takes. This is the only job you're qualified for.”

“And since there are two office positions open, we can work together.”

Lucas kept from laughing at the man's tone. He mixed wistfulness with outrage. If his wife noticed, she made no comment about working together.

Lucas took his hand away from Amanda's address and the money she had given him. The two in front of the detective agency wanted jobs; they didn't work for the Great West Detective Agency and would be unable to find the missing dog with any more skill than he had at his disposal. And if Lucas was any judge, skill would have nothing to do with finding the dog. It would be pure luck.

He was willing to use up some of Lady Luck's largesse for a hundred and the promise of more later. Besides, he needed something to keep him occupied while the laundry worked to clean his coat for the evening's tryst with Carmela.

Lucas went off whistling “The Cuckoo's Nest” as he hunted for a shop capable of cleaning his jacket without leaving spots or holes.

W
ith his coat being cleaned and his remaining clothing torn and stinking of garbage, Lucas saw that he would get nowhere in the neighborhood where Amanda lived and the dog had been stolen. Matching the woman's obvious wealth, the well-kept boardinghouses lining the street spoke of society a notch above where he dwelled. Even walking down the middle of the street garnered unwanted glares and more than one woman closing her door. The sound of a locking bar dropping into place quickly followed.

As he walked, Lucas appeared not to be too attentive to the details of Amanda's house. It was a two-story house with a neat lawn and a lawn jockey in front for the visitors to tie up their horses. He suspected only Thoroughbreds were so tethered. A smile crept to his lips. That might describe the occupants of the house, too, but he had no real information about that. Who in the boardinghouse might steal a young lady's puppy dog? Unless he barged in, he would never find out. His quick trip down the street had already drawn the attention of two policemen. As he sped up, so did they, closing the gap between them.

He had dealt with lawmen all over Denver and knew many of them by name. These two might have been employed as specials, guards restricted to patrolling this single neighborhood. The residents might easily pay for the added protection. If so, he needed to speak to them to find what had happened the night Tovarich disappeared. The two guards might be a part of the theft—or had been paid off to look the other way.

He cut down a street to his right. They followed at a run now. Lucas had learned nothing and wasn't going to find out any more without appearing as if he belonged here. He saw no point in being caught and interrogated. He ran faster than either of the policemen, but they seemed determined.

Panting, he finally reached a spot off Larimer Square where he could catch his breath without being beset by men with wooden clubs or slung shot, that nasty piece of iron hung on the end of a chain Lucas avoided whenever he could. As he recovered from his run, he watched the street traffic. Everyone headed in one direction, drawn by a deep bass voice extolling virtue and rectitude. He followed and then moved into the middle of the crowd for further anonymity. Being coshed by the specials was less likely if he hunkered down and seemed as attentive as the others pressing shoulder to shoulder with him. The feigned interest became real when he recognized the man on the crate. The voice was differently pitched, raspy, possibly from some throat injury since the man wore a thick scarf wrapped tightly around his neck, but the tempo and the words themselves became increasingly familiar. Old habits died hard. Lucas pushed closer. He wanted to listen to a real master work the crowd.

Lucas was beholden to the Preacher for staking him when he first arrived in Denver, down to his last dime and in trouble with tinhorn gamblers for cutting into their action. The Preacher had gone through a saloon, preaching of the evils of gambling and illicit sex with the Cyprians working there. The owner had thrown him out, which suited the man just fine. He picked the saloon keeper's pocket and had given Lucas most of it to return to the gambling tables, where he had finally hit a winning streak. He had repaid the Preacher threefold but that hadn't been the only time Lucas had needed to call on the man for his questionable charity.

The man began his spiel, and Lucas found himself caught up in the power and rhythm of the words. He wasn't a religious man and he doubted the Preacher was either, but he had never asked. He might not like the answer.

The collection plate went around and most people added a few dollars to it. If nothing else, the Preacher gave them a fine show, castigating sinners even as he detailed their transgressions in graphic detail. Lucas dropped in five dollars and passed the plate on, watching how the men reacted. At the edge of the crowd he saw one man put in two bits as he palmed the five-dollar bill Lucas had contributed. The plate went on and the man, so tall he stood a full head above anyone else in the crowd, edged away, then turned and walked off briskly.

Lucas pushed his way through the crowd and followed. The tall man set a fast pace, long legs devouring the distance at twice the pace Lucas could comfortably maintain. Only the occasional flash of sunlight reflecting off the man's bald pate kept Lucas on the trail.

He stopped in front of the Merry Widow Saloon and peered into the dim interior. Again came the flash of light off the man's shaven head. Lucas pushed through the swinging doors and paused as he always did when entering a new saloon. A back storage room door was padlocked. A staircase went up to the cribs, but no soiled doves were in the saloon. It was too early for them to begin plying their trade. Only three customers drank. Two were at the bar, and the bald man dropped into the chair situated in the far corner of the room—where the bouncer posted himself.

Lucas walked to a spot directly in front of the seated man, ignoring shouts from the barkeep to order something or leave.

“We don't run a hospitable place,” the man said, stretching out his long legs. Lucas gauged his height at six foot six. He appeared skinny but so much height concealed bulk. The man weighed more than two hundred. From the way he tucked his thumbs in the arms holes of his vest, he wasn't much bothered by anything Lucas might say or do.

“I noticed.”

The man fished in a vest pocket, crumpled what he found, and tossed it to Lucas. He caught it with a quick downward swipe, rolled it about, and then produced the stolen unfolded five-dollar bill.

“I reckon this is my bill.”

“Does it make a difference?”

“Only to the Preacher.”

“He's not hurting much. Fact is, I never heard him in finer form. That story about the sweet little girl from a loving family who was lured into prostitution by the evil Fagin is worthy of Dickens himself.”

Lucas considered shooting the bartender, who continued to shout at him for not ordering any whiskey. That made him wonder if the man intended to drug him and steal whatever he could.

“You always were a reader of things literary,” Lucas said.

“And you weren't. You could learn a great deal reading Charles Dickens.
Oliver Twist
might be retitled
Lucas Stanton
, without much exaggeration.”

“I don't like children.”

“Neither did Fagin.”

“What do you want, Otto? Stealing the greenback from the Preacher's collection plate got my attention.”

The man laughed. He gestured for Lucas to move closer.

“You never learned the art of small talk. We should discuss Frank over there behind the bar and why he's so intent on getting you to drink.”

“Drugs,” Lucas said. “He's never seen me before, so he thinks I am easy pickings.”

“That's why you don't need small talk. You size up people fast. Goes with being a gambler.”

“Little Otto,” he said, “never steals just to talk to me.”

“I saw you in the crowd. You still working at the Emerald City?”

“I am.” Lucas waited but Little Otto didn't expand on the question. Taking the bull by the horns, Lucas said, “I need information about a stolen dog.”

If the request surprised Little Otto, he didn't show it. His blue eyes blazed, but with what emotion? Lucas found himself at a loss to describe it. Otto knew more about the underbelly of Denver thievery than anyone else. For a price he would deliver all Lucas needed to know, wrapped up in brown paper and tied with a pretty bow. But he was a passive source of such scurrilous knowledge. He never offered it for sale.

He wanted something only Lucas could give. The change in supply and demand put him on edge. Anything out of the ordinary with Little Otto always did.

“I can tell you some things but not much.”

“What'll it cost me?”

Otto reached into his vest pocket, took out a small silver ball bearing, and using only thumb and forefinger, flicked it at Frank behind the bar. The man ducked in time to keep from getting a nasty bruise between his eyes. The ball bearing broke a bottle of whiskey.

“You keep quiet,” Little Otto said in a voice low, level and utterly frightening with its promise of real destruction to follow if he wasn't obeyed. The barkeep grumbled and kicked the broken bottle out of his way. Otto turned back to Lucas. “An introduction, nothing more.”

“You're proposing a swap? I need information about a missing dog and you want an introduction to . . .”

Lucas left the sentence hanging for Little Otto to supply the proper name.

“A missing dog? Is this important or are you joshing?”

“I'll give you a hundred dollars for real information.”

“It's real, then,” Otto said, stroking his beardless chin. He looked up. “I can ask. And will you provide the introduction I seek?”

“If I know the person well enough.”

“You do. Introduce me to Carmela Thompson.”

For a moment Lucas struggled for words. Nothing came as his brain jumbled everything. Then he tried to put Little Otto and Carmela into the same mental picture. Still nothing came. The combination was too absurd, and he almost said as much. The expression on Little Otto's face told him that would be a terrible mistake.

“She's scheduled to perform tonight at—”

“At the Emerald City,” Otto finished for him. “I know. Her itinerary is etched in my brain, like words carved into stone.”

Lucas tried to find a reason for the request other than one of pure adulation. Little Otto adoring anyone, even Carmela, struck him as wrong. It went against everything he knew of the man, which, granted, was not much. The only sane reason he could conjure up was that Carmela had information Little Otto could broker for something even more valuable.

“I'll do it,” Lucas said, regretting it even as the words slipped free from his lips. “Here's all I know about the missing dog.” He handed Little Otto the scrap of paper with Amanda's address and related what he could of the theft.

“It does seem that a person or persons stole away the dog. A wolfhound?”

“A puppy, she said.”

“Even a wolfhound puppy is a large dog and to be feared. The thief might be familiar with the animal, or it with him. A battle involving snapping jaws and flowing blood would have occurred otherwise.”

“Find what you can for me.”

Little Otto nodded once. The far-off look in his eyes might have been the result of figuring out where to begin his hunt for the elusive dog and its kidnapper, or it might have been from something more carnal as his imagination swept him away.

Lucas had to believe the sappy look resulted from the promise of an introduction to Carmela. And what man wouldn't be smitten? Lucas certainly was. It would be amusing to see Carmela's reaction to the towering man with the shaved head. For all his book learning, Little Otto was a raw character and nothing like the chanteuse fancied. Somewhat self-consciously Lucas wiped away dirt from the front of his vest, knowing Carmela would immediately notice and wrinkle her nose in distaste.

Or maybe her disregard would be more sophisticated. A
bon mot
, a mocking laugh, and then disdain? Lucas looked forward to seeing the woman's response and then would come to her rescue. How Otto reacted to that would hardly matter since Lucas intended to have his information by then.

Little Otto blinked and his craggy face once more showed no emotion. Beads of sweat dotting his forehead glistened in the saloon's dim light. He made no move to remove the moisture.

“Who is the landlady?”

Lucas shook his head. He had no idea.

“If there wasn't any sign of forced entry and your Miss Baldridge had actually locked her door as she claimed, a key was used.”

Lucas ran his finger over his collar and the two spring steel strips there. Keys were overrated.

“I remember now,” Little Otto said. “She has a friend you might know. Amos Conklin.”

“The gambler? I've been in a few games with him. He's not very good at his trade.”