The Lawmen (14 page)

26

Essex staggered across the saloon. Somebody tripped him and he fell to his hands and knees. He felt blood and liquor running down the side of his face.

Before he could get up, somebody else kicked him in the face. The force of the blow knocked him over on his back. As it did, other men began kicking and stomping him. “Get him!” they cried. “Kill him!”

Essex had dropped the shotgun. He searched for it with his hands but could not find it. Covering up as best he could, he tried to get to his feet, warding off the blows, swinging wildly to drive his tormentors back, now and then connecting. But he couldn’t protect himself from every direction. A boot thudded into his ribs. He grunted and lurched sideways. He momentarily shoved his assailants away from him and stood upright. He saw a ring of men around him—Mayor Price, Dunleavy, Harding the clerk who had brought him here, others he did not know—businessmen, lawyers, the backbone of the town. They were red-faced, screaming and yelling, their words strangely disconnected with the movements of their mouths.

Essex focused on Price and charged him. As he did, somebody hit him in the back with a chair. He stumbled but kept going, seeing Price’s eyes widen in terror. More blows landed on his face and sides. He swung and felt his fist crunch into the mayor’s well-fed features. He tried to hit Price again, but several men jumped him, grabbing his arms.

He threw the men off. Price was gone, so Essex turned, slugged a bearded face, and tried to reach the front door.

Somebody cracked him across the back of the head with his own shotgun. His head snapped back; his knees buckled. He tried to keep his feet, but blows rained down on him. Pain shot through his skull, and he fell to the sawdust-covered floor.

He was helpless now against the beating. He seemed to be outside his body, as if this were happening to someone else and he was viewing it from above. His assailants took turns, running in and hitting or kicking him, then darting back again, as if he were a wounded beast, still dangerous. Bottles bounced off his head and upper body. Some missed and smashed on the floor, and he was crawling around in whiskey and broken glass.

Then it stopped. Essex didn’t know why. Through the blood and his swollen eyes, he could barely see. His body contracted in spasms. He heard inarticulate sounds of pain and realized they were coming from him. He tried to get up but couldn’t. Then he fell unconscious.

* * *

In the marshal’s office Clay was worried. Something had gone wrong—he could feel it. He looked out the broken window. The town was still quiet, save for some yelling down in the Triangle—the noise must be coming from the Lucky Tiger.

Clay paced around the boiling hot room. He looked out the window again. If he left the office now, Wes’s men were sure to know. They would break into the jail to free Vance, and learn that Vance wasn’t there after all. If that happened, would they figure out where Vance really was? It might not be too hard—Julie Bennett was Clay’s only friend in town. The move that had seemed clever earlier was now starting to look stupid, another of his many failures. He had gotten himself into a no-win situation. If he went after Essex, he might put Julie in danger. Could he risk her life for a man he hated—and who hated him just as much?

What should he do?

* * *

 “Did you have to beat him so badly?” an accented voice asked out of the reddish fog. Essex thought the voice belonged to the Scottish banker Cruickshank.

“I just wish it had been Chandler,” said another voice, and Essex recognized Mayor Price.

“What should we do with him?” That was Judge Saxon, with his forked beard and glasses.

“Trade him for Vance,” Dunleavy suggested. “We’ll be the ones that got Vance back. Wes’ll owe us big for that.”

Essex rolled over. His eyes swam into focus. Above him Mayor Price was breathing hard. There was a lump on Price’s jaw where Essex’s fist had struck home. “No,” Price told Dunleavy. “Chandler would never surrender Vance for a Negro. Hell, Chandler wouldn’t make the trade if this were a white man—he wouldn’t make it if it were his own brother. He’d give a speech about doing his duty, and about how it’s the deputy’s job to take chances, and too bad if he gets killed in the process.”

Essex started to get up but discovered he was being covered by the young clerk Harding, holding Essex’s shotgun. Harding looked nervous, like he might pull the shotgun triggers by accident, so Essex decided to stay where he was.

“So what do we do?” a man in the crowd asked.

Price hesitated. “Kill him.”

“Must we kill him?” asked Cruickshank. “Why can’t we hold him here, then let him go after Wes has gotten Vance back?”

“Wes will kill him anyway,” Price explained. “If he doesn’t, this bastard will come back and kill us for what we’ve done to him.” He paused to let that sink in. “Now who’s going to do it?”

There was a reluctant shuffling of feet. The well-dressed men in the saloon looked at each other. No one stepped forward.

“Hell, I’ll do it myself,” Price said. He turned to the barkeep. “Give me your pistol, Bobby.”

From under the bar the barkeep handed Price a six-gun. The mayor pointed the pistol at Essex’s head and cocked the hammer.

“Don’t pull that trigger,” a voice warned. “Not if you want to see tomorrow. “

Everyone turned. Clay Chandler stood in the rear doorway, with the Henry repeater aimed at Price.

The mayor paled.

“Let the hammer down,” Clay told him, looking down the rifle’s sights. “Then back off, slow.”

Price did as he was ordered.

“Lay the pistol on the floor and kick it this way.”

Again the mayor complied. The pistol scraped across the floor.

“All of you—against the bar. Those who have weapons drop them on your way. Hurry up! It won’t bother me to kill any of you. Just give me an excuse.”

The crowd of men moved to the bar. Harding laid down Essex’s shotgun, trying to be inconspicuous about it.

Clay picked up Price’s pistol and stuck it in his belt. Holding the rifle with one hand, he covered the men at the bar. With the other hand, he helped Essex to his feet. The black man was bloodied and bruised. His clothes, already torn from the desert, were ripped even more. He smelled like a distillery from all the spilled whiskey.

“You all right?” Clay asked him.

“What the hell you think?” Essex mumbled through swollen Ups. He winced as a wave of pain passed over him. He hurt in so many places it was hard to tell which was worse.

Clay leaned Essex against a table. Retrieving the shotgun from the floor, he handed it to his deputy. He viewed the men along the bar with contempt. “Is this how low you people will sink to get in good with Wes Hopkins?”

Emboldened, Price stepped away from the bar. “We’re doing what’s best for Topaz, Chandler. We’re doing what’s best for our families and businesses. You don’t care about us.” Price looked around, as if seeking the support of the others, then added, “You don’t care about anything except proving what heroes you are, you and your nigger friend.”

Clay’s jaw muscles worked. He crossed the room with slow, purposeful strides. The crowd moved aside for him. Price took a step back, but there was nowhere to run. Clay poked the mayor’s ample gut with the rifle barrel. “His name ain’t ‘nigger,’” Clay said. He poked Price’s gut again, this time drawing a grunt of pain. “And it ain’t ‘Rufus,’ or ‘Sambo,’ or ‘boy.’” He poked Price harder with each name, until the mayor bit his lip to avoid crying out. “You call him ‘Deputy Johnson’ or ‘Mister Johnson’—you got that?” This time he jammed the rifle barrel into Price’s solar plexus with such force that the mayor doubled over and dropped to his knees, holding his stomach. When he looked up, there was fear in his eyes.

“You got it?” Clay repeated.

Price nodded, gasping. “I—I got it.”

“All of you got it?” Clay said, looking around.

The men along the bar nodded.

“Make sure you do.”

Clay took Essex by one arm to steady him. The two men backed out of the Lucky Tiger, glancing over their shoulders to be sure that the way was clear. They stepped out of the saloon into the hot, deserted street.

“Thanks,” Essex said.

“It’s all right,” Clay told him.

“You gave up a lot to come down here.”

“I said it’s all right.”

Essex wasn’t done. “How come you told them to stop calling me ‘nigger,’ and ‘boy’ and them other names, but you call me that yourself? How come you never call me ‘Deputy’ or ‘Mister’?”

Clay looked embarrassed. “Maybe I . . . maybe I should.”

Essex stared. “You mean that?”

“I said it, didn’t I?”

“Damn. You get hit by lightning on the way over here or something?”

“Something like that.”

Clay turned to go, but Essex stopped him. “Look, I—I’m sorry what I said about your brother. “

Clay shrugged. “Forget it.”

They started back to the marshal’s office. There was no one else on the street, but the two lawmen knew they were being watched. They could feel it. They kept their eyes on doorways, windows, rooftops—anywhere Wes’s men could be hiding. They waited for die gunshots, for the jarring impact of bullets against flesh and bone.

Each time they reached a comer, Clay glanced right and left to make sure the way was clear. He covered Essex with the rifle while the battered black man hustled as best he could across the open space. Then Clay ran across while Essex covered him with the shotgun. This was crazy, Clay thought. It was like being in the war again, moving through enemy territory.

At last they reached the office. The office seemed quiet from the outside. Clay pushed open the door with his foot and went in with his rifle leveled, ready for anything.

The office was empty, untouched. “They haven’t been here,” Clay said with relief. It meant that Julie was still safe.

Essex ladled water from the bucket and sat to ease his pains before he might pass out. “Why didn’t they come to free Vance?” he wondered.

“I guess they didn’t know we were gone,” Clay said.

Essex gave him a look. “You don’t think Wes is that stupid, do you?”

Clay was starting to get worried again. “I don’t know. They must have had a reason.”

“Maybe they knew Vance wasn’t here.”

“How could they? Nobody saw us drop him at Julie’s, I’m sure of it.”

Essex had found an old cloth, and he began using that to clean his face, dabbing it gingerly. “I got enough broken glass in me to start a bottle factory.”

Clay paced back and forth. The minutes dropped away. “Why don’t they come after us?” Clay said. “Why don’t they get it over with?”

Then he realized that the town was no longer quiet. From down the street came laughter and shouting—the sounds of celebration. Cautiously Clay craned his neck out the broken window. “Sounds like it’s coming from the Equity.”

He and Essex looked at each other.

“I think we been foxed,” Essex said.

There was a sinking feeling in Clay’s stomach. “Come on,” he told Essex. But the black man had already started for the door.

They headed for the Line, running this time. Gone were thoughts of personal safety. Clay didn’t care if he was ambushed. All he could think about was what would happen to Julie if the Hopkins brothers got hold of her again.

No one challenged them. The only activity on the street was farther down, where mules were being led out for the daily stagecoach run. The two men reached the Triangle, then Grant Street, then the Line. They halted at the end of the shabby lane, breathing hard. All seemed quiet.

Clay motioned Essex forward. They reached Julie’s crib and Clay rapped on the door. “Julie?”

No answer. Clay glanced at Essex, then opened the door. As the two of them stepped inside, Clay’s shoulders slumped. “Oh, no,” he moaned.

The shack was empty. Vance was gone, and so was Julie.

27

Clay’s worst fear was realized. “Wes has Julie. And it’s my fault. What was I thinking of, leaving Vance with her? I should have known Wes would figure it out.”

“He didn’t,” Essex said.

Clay stared. “What do you mean?”

Essex gestured around the room. “Look at this place. Ain’t no sign of no fight. And look here—remember how messed up the top of this dresser was? Well, it’s all cleared off now.” He pulled open the chest’s drawers. “Her clothes is gone, too. She packed up. A woman don’t do that if she’s being carried off by the Hopkins boys. Miss Julie left here of her own free will.”

Clay looked around. Essex was right—all of Julie’s personal effects were gone. “What are you saying?” he asked Essex.

“You tell me,” Essex said.

Clay tilted his hat back on his head.

“Where you think she went?” Essex asked him.

Clay tapped the barrel of the Henry repeater against his leg. Then it hit him. He pulled his hat back down. “Come on,” he told Essex.

The two men hurried along the back streets, so that they wouldn’t have to pass the Equity Saloon. Essex struggled to keep up after his beating. “Where we going?” he puffed.

“To catch the stage.”

They emerged on Tucson Street, four blocks from the bridge. Both of them were breathing hard from the run. The only sounds on the deserted street were the laughter and celebration from Wes’s men in the Equity.

“I hope we’re not too late,” Clay said.

As he spoke, there was a rumble of wheels and creak of leather thoroughbraces, and a stagecoach pulled out of the station driveway farther down the street. The coach turned and started toward them. It was a lightweight, open-sided celerity coach, drawn by mules, which were better suited to the desert heat and terrain than horses.

“Earliest I ever seen that coach leave,” Essex said, amazed.

“I think they were paid to leave early,” Clay told him.

As the coach came closer, its young driver cracked his whip, and the coach began picking up speed. Clay stood in the middle of the street and waved the vehicle down. The driver cracked his whip again and tried to drive around Clay, but Clay grabbed the nigh leader’s traces, digging in his heels and struggling to halt the team. Essex did the same with the off leader, and the coach slowed to a halt.

The strongbox guard aimed his shotgun at Clay, but Essex ran alongside the box and pointed his own weapon up at the man. “Don’t even think about it,” Essex told him.

The guard lowered his weapon. At this distance, a blast from Essex’s scattergun would kill both guard and driver, and Essex—beaten and bloodied—looked more than willing to pull the trigger.

“You got no right to stop us,” the driver protested.

“This badge gives me the right to do whatever I want,” Clay said. “Now brake this thing.”

The driver looked from Clay to Essex, then he stepped on the brake. While Essex covered the two men in the box, Clay walked around to the side of the coach. Someone had pulled the leather curtains shut. Clay ripped them open. There was only one passenger inside.

“Hello, Julie,” Clay said.

Julie Bennett lowered her eyes. She wore an old gray traveling outfit and the hat with the tired peacock feather.

“Why did you do it?” Clay asked her.

 She didn’t answer.

He raised his voice. “Why, Julie?”

She looked at him, with her crooked nose and scarred cheeks. “Money. I did it for money, all right? I knew Wes would pay good for Vance’s return, and he did.”

“How much?” Clay demanded.

Again no answer.

“How much!”

“Five thousand,” she said at last. “Enough for me to start my own business. Enough for me to have my dream.”

“Was that the only reason?”

“Yes,” she said, and her face hardened. “Oh, hell, don’t look so surprised. I’m a whore, remember? Money’s my business. It ain’t like you and me was going to get married or nothing.”

Clay let out his breath and looked away.

Julie reached out the coach window and took his arm. He turned, and she said, “No, that wasn’t the only reason. It wasn’t even the main one. Don’t you see, I did it for you, Clay—so you wouldn’t get hurt. Before I told them where Vance was, I made Wes swear that they wouldn’t harm you.” She looked into his eyes, searching—and Clay was suddenly reminded of the swamper Pompey’s dying look. Julie said, “It’s over, Clay. Let it be. You’ve done everything a man could. It’s not worth dying for.”

Essex broke the ensuing silence. “You gonna arrest her?” he asked Clay.

“No,” Clay replied. To the stage driver he said, “Go on. Get out of here.”

As the driver let off the brake and shook out his reins, Clay took his rifle by the barrel and whacked the nigh wheeler’s rump with the stock. “Yah! Yah! Go!”

“Yah!” the driver yelled, and the coach started down the street. Julie leaned out the window, looking back at Clay. He watched her through the dust until the stage was lost behind the trees at the end of the street.

The two men stared toward the Equity, where the sounds of laughter and revelry were growing louder. “They’re laughing at us,” Clay said. “Having a good time at our expense.”

“Why not?” Essex replied. “We’re losers, you and me. We always was, we always will be.”

“So what do you think we should do, Deputy Johnson?”

Essex considered, then grinned. “I think we should go over to that goddamn saloon and get our prisoner back.”

 Clay smiled. “You know, for once I think you’re right.”