Blood Duel

Chapter 8

Chester and Winifred were in their rocking chairs under the overhang in front of the saloon. They rocked and drank and gazed at the dusty haze to the south. It was the middle of the afternoon. Seamus Glickman had left the afternoon before, anxious to get back to Dodge before dark.

“So much for your brainstorm,” Win said. “All that trouble you had Anderson go to building those coffins and Placido painting those signs on the livery, and for what?”

“It was Adolphina’s idea, not mine,” Chester responded after first glancing at the general store to ensure that she could not possibly hear him.

“They should have come by now, if they are coming at all. The story was bound to be in yesterday’s newspaper.”

“The shootings, yes,” Chester said. “But not the rest of it. Glickman promised to spread the word, but something like that takes time. Today’s paper will likely have it.”

“Those bodies will start to stink by tomorrow,” Win remarked.

“We can stand a few days of stink if we have to,” Chester said. “Why do you think I had them put in the livery?”

“I wouldn’t let you keep them in the saloon.”

“Yes, well, the Mexicans agreed, so everything worked out as we wanted it to,” Chester said.

“As your wife wanted,” Win said. “And they have names, you know.”

“Who?”

“Placido and Arturo.”

“I know what their names are,” Chester said testily. “I just can’t ever seem to remember them.”

“Ah,” Win said.

Chester shifted in his chair. “Don’t take that tone with me, Winifred Curry. I resent what you are implying. I don’t think any less of them because they are Mexican than any other white man would.” He grunted. “Hell, the only reason you know their names is because they come in for a tequila every now and then.”

“I like them,” Win said. “They mind their own business and keep to themselves, yet they were ready to help you when you asked them.”

“Placido was. I’m not so sure the other one, Arturo, liked the idea.”

“To keep four bodies in their stable until the bodies are ready to rot?” Win said. “I can’t imagine why he had to be persuaded.”

“You are much too critical today, do you know that?” Chester shifted away from him and gloomily regarded the expanse of prairie that surrounded Coffin Varnish.

“If I am,” Win said, “it is only because I can’t ignore the truth any longer. I have finally come to terms with it.”

“With what?”

“Coffin Varnish won’t last another year. You and I will be forced to close. Placido and Arturo, too. What good is a livery in the middle of nowhere? Without a store handy to meet their needs, the Giorgios will be forced to move, too. That will leave Anderson and his wife all alone. They might stay on a while, given they can live off the land. But they will be all that’s left. The buildings will slowly rot away. Five years from now Coffin Varnish will be a ghost town.”

“God, you are depressing.”

Win stood. “My glass is empty.” He started to turn but stopped, his keen eyes narrowing. “Can it be? Maybe that harebrained plan of your wife’s will bring in some business, after all.”

Chester shot out of his chair and moved from under the overhang. He squinted against the glare, but all he saw were heat waves. “What do you see? A rider?”

“A wagon.”

Chester strained his eyes until they hurt and still did not see it. “You must be part hawk. Instead of running a whiskey mill, you should scout for the army.”

“I’m allergic to arrows in my hide.”

Winifred went in and Chester sat back down to await the wagon. But he was so nervous he could not sit still. A lot was riding on his wife’s idea. They could hold out in Coffin Varnish longer if it worked. Or it could give them the money to buy freight wagons and move somewhere they could earn a living. So long as it was not Dodge City. He would live anywhere on earth but there.

Chester yawned. The heat and the whiskey were making him drowsy. Summers in Kansas were too hot for his liking. It had to be one hundred there in the shade. It was almost enough to make him consider filling the washtub with water and soaking in it for a while to cool down, but he had had a bath a month ago, and filling the basin was a chore.

Chester stared out over the sea of dry grass. At last he could see it, a spindly spider lumbering toward Coffin Varnish, or so it appeared thanks to the shimmering haze and the distance. How in God’s name Winifred had seen it that far out, he would never know.

The spider grew and became a team pulling a carriage. A carriage, not a buckboard. Chester could not remember the last time he saw a carriage. The well-to-do owned them. City and town dwellers, as a rule. Farmers and ranchers made do with buckboards. You could haul crops and dirt and manure in a buckboard. All you could haul in a carriage was people.

Winifred emerged, his glass refilled. “They aren’t here yet?” He took a sip, then asked, “Have you seen what it is?”

“I’m not blind,” Chester snapped.

“Your wife says you need spectacles but you are too stubborn to get them,” Win commented. Adolphina had a list of complaints about Chester as long as Win’s arm. Why Chester stayed married to her, Win never could figure out.

“My eyes are fine, I tell you,” Chester said, galled that Adolphina had trampled on his trust.

“Maybe it is the mayor of Dodge, come to pay his respects,” Win teased.

“Go to hell.”

“What was it you called him the last time you and him locked horns?” Win snapped his fingers. “Now I remember. You accused him of stealing the railroad out from under you. Which was some feat, seeing as how the railroad never showed any interest in laying tracks here.”

Chester swore. He knew that. Knew damn well that the Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe railroad had been laying track in a beeline for Fort Dodge, and the post commander, the post quartermaster, and the post sutler pooled their finances and bought a plot of land directly in the track’s path. Two saloons and a general store were up and ready to cater to the work crews when the tracks got there. Dodge City was born, spelling Coffin Varnish’s eventual doom. “Do me a favor and quit bringing up old history.”

Win did not help Chester’s mood by chuckling.

Fortunately, the carriage arrived in a cloud of dust and the thud of hooves. The driver was a black man in expensive livery. He expertly brought the team to a halt and quickly climbed down to open the near door, announcing, “We have arrived, sir.”

From the carriage stepped a man of middle years dressed in a sartorial splendor that put Chester, and most everyone else in Kansas, to shame. His tailored jacket, vest, and pants were a light shade of gray, his bowler slightly darker. He carried a cane with the gold likeness of a hound for a knob, and his boots practically gleamed. He looked about him with an air of amusement and spotted Chester and Win.

“Might I impose on you gentlemen for information?”

“Only after you introduce yourself,” Chester said. “This may not be Dodge, but we have manners here.”

“My apologies, sir. I daresay that was remiss of me. I am Charles Nelek. Perhaps you have heard of me? I own several establishments in Dodge.”

Win’s interest perked up. “I have heard of you. You own the Kitten Club, among others.” He had long wanted to pay the establishment a visit, but it would cost more than he earned in a year. Hell, two years. “Your girls are supposed to be the loveliest in Dodge.”

“I thank you, sir. They thank you, too. Those I brought with me, at any rate.”

From within the carriage came giggles and titters.

Chester came out of his chair. He, too, had heard all about the Kitten Club. The women were exquisite, the food excellent. An experience to remember forever, as one friend put it. “Permit me to formally welcome you, sir. I am the mayor of Coffin Varnish, Chester Luce.”

“You don’t say?” Charles Nelek said while turning to the carriage. “You may come out now, ladies. Watch your step. And be advised the sun is a furnace.”

Out they came, three of them, a blonde, a redhead, and a black-haired beauty, all three perfection, from their pale complexions to their china-smooth skin to their ample busts and pencil-thin waists. Their dresses were marvels of color and fit. Each wore a style of hat currently fashionable back East, with flared brims and a lot of lace. They also had parasols, which they immediately opened to protect their face and neck.

“Oh my,” Winifred breathed.

“May I introduce Sugarplum, Sasha, and Leah?” Charles Nelek said, with dips of his chin. “Ladies, we have the honor of addressing the mayor, so be on your best behavior.”

Chester sensed that Nelek was poking fun at him, but he didn’t care. Doffing his hat, he went up to the ladies to shake their hands. “Pleased as can be to make your acquaintance, ladies. Anything you want during your visit, anything at all, you need only say the word.”

Win was a step behind him. “That’s right. We may not have as much to offer as Dodge, but whatever we have is yours.”

“Such gracious hospitality,” Nelek said. “What we would like most is to get in out of this sun and have something to drink.”

Win gestured at the batwings. “After you, then.”

Sugarplum twirled her red parasol, her golden hair shimmering under the lace. “Is it possible to get some ice cream anywhere?”

Chester and Win shared pained glances and Chester said, “I am afraid not, young lady. There is no ice to be had anywhere in Coffin Varnish.”

“How do people survive in this awful heat?” Sasha asked.

Nelek wrapped his arms around her and Sugarplum. “Ladies, we must remember we are roughing it. Dodge is an oasis of luxury compared to the rest of this godforsaken territory.”

Chester could not let the slur go unchallenged. “I wouldn’t know as I would go that far.”

“Oh, really?” Nelek said. “Tell us. Can Coffin Varnish boast of a water closet anywhere in its limits?”

“A what?” Win asked.

Nelek smiled smugly and gave the women on his arms a playful squeeze. “See what I mean, my dears? But don’t be disheartened. On the contrary. It will make the story of our adventure all the more entertaining.”

They repaired to the saloon and Win offered them his best whiskey. It earned a quirk of the lips from Charles Nelek. The ladies, Win noted, drained their glasses in a gulp.

“Now that we have wet our parched throats,” Nelek said, “we would very much like to view the display Undersheriff Glickman told me about.”

“Oh yes!” Sugarplum squealed. “The dead people!”

“You will be the first to see them,” Win mentioned.

Leah giggled and squirmed in her chair. “We will? Did you hear that, girls? We will be the envy of everyone.”

“I can’t wait to tell Claudia,” Sasha said. “Her and her two-headed snake she saw once.”

Chester had been so entranced by the three visions that he was slow to rouse and say, “I trust that Undersheriff Glickman also mentioned it is a dollar a person for the privilege?”

“Yes, he did,” Nekel replied. “A bit exorbitant, wouldn’t you say?”

“Not at all,” Chester said. “These aren’t ordinary dead people. They are the handiwork of a notorious desperado. A killer who has his own penny dreadful. Jeeter Frost is halfway to famous.”

“Or will be after this,” Win said.

“Still, a whole dollar…,” Nelek quibbled.

Sugarplum showed her less than sugary side by snapping, “Damn it, just pay the man, Charley. We didn’t come all this way to listen to you haggle. And it’s not as if you haven’t hoarded every cent you ever earned.”

“That tart tongue of yours will get you in trouble one day,” Nelek warned.

“Oh, please. All I have to do is cross my legs and you will come begging for it,” Sugarplum said. “If you want to act all tough and important, be my guest. But don’t threaten me or I will be on the next stage for San Francisco. McCabe has been after me to come to his place.”

“Now, now,” Nelek quickly said. “Let’s not talk rashly, shall we? Did I say I wouldn’t pay this gentleman? Do you think I would bring you all this way and then not view the deceased?”

Chester accepted the money with the air of a man accepting the Holy Grail. He ushered them outside and down the street to the livery, the ladies chattering like chipmunks the whole while about the perfectly vile heat and the hideous dust everywhere and the awful smells, and wasn’t it all just grand fun?

Win accompanied them, and at a nod from Chester, helped open the double doors.

“Oh my!” Sugarplum exclaimed.

The four bodies had been propped upright in coffins built by Dolph Anderson. Each bore a crudely scrawled sign with the name of the victim. The three Blights had their arms folded across their chests. But it was Edison Farnsworth who drew the ladies like buzzing flies.

“He is blown all apart!” Leah squealed in delight. “Oh, it is hideous! You can see his organs and bones and everything!”

“Wait until we get back and tell everyone!” Sasha gushed.

Charles Nelek did not realize it, but he made Chester and Win extremely happy when he remarked, “Gentlemen, I do believe you have a gold mine on your hands.”