Bounty Hunter

Chapter 8

After the bodies had been taken away and Hogg had had a swamper mop the floor, Tone lay on top of the bed, sleepless in the dead of the echoing night.

The attempt on his life had not been a case of mistaken identity. He had been targeted. But who had given him away? Only Simon Hogg and Luther Penman knew who he was and why he was living on the waterfront, and he trusted both of them implicitly.

Then who?

Tone had no answer for that question and it troubled him deeply.

Restlessly, he rose to his feet and looked out the window. It was four in the morning and the maelstrom of vice and sin that was the Barbary Coast was winding down for the night. Discordant music still came from the Chinese gambling houses where a sailor could rent a thirteen-year-old girl from Canton or Shanghai for a couple of dollars a night or buy her outright as his slave for four hundred, cash on the barrelhead.

A few whores still patrolled the misty street, among them stately Spanish American women in solemn black, wrapped to the eyes in their rebozos, who gave passing men bold, promising glances but said nothing

In a couple of hours the first blue light of dawn would stain the sky over the Contra Costa hills to the east and the whores, Chinamen and sailors would vanish, melting into the day like enchanted villagers, to reappear again only after darkness fell.

Tone moved away from the window, lit the gas lamp and retrieved an oily cloth wrapped around cleaning patches and bore brushes from his carpetbag.

He cleaned and oiled the long-barreled Colt and reloaded five chambers with ammunition he had specially made for him by a Reno gunsmith. The powder charges were slightly less than in regular rounds, but he was willing to give up some hitting power in exchange for reduced recoil.

He laid the revolver on the bedside table and turned out the lamp.

After a while he slept and he dreamed of Molly O’Hara. She was in her father’s pub, but she was wearing a rebozo and he could not see her face.

Daylight was streaming through Tone’s window when he was wakened by a pounding on his door. Instantly alert, a habit of men who live by the gun, he grabbed his Colt and yelled, “Who’s there?”

“Me, Simon Hogg, as ever was.”

Tone told the man to step inside, and when he was certain that his visitor was in fact Hogg, he eased down the hammer of the revolver.

“Damn your eyes, Hogg, what the hell time is it?”

“Beggin’ your pardon, but it’s gone noon and I bring news.”

Tone shook his head. “Coffee first, then your news.”

“Ah, a wise decision, Mr. Tone. Coffee soothes a man’s soul, an’ no mistake.”

The big innkeeper vanished and when he returned after a few minutes he carried in a tray with a coffeepot and a cup.

Tone was sitting at the table, already dressed. He lit a cigar as Hogg passed the steaming cup to him. The man watched anxiously as the level in the cup lowered; then, when he considered Tone had drunk a sufficient amount, he said tentatively, “Are you ready for my news now?”

Tone nodded. “News away, and be damned to you for getting a man up at this time of the morning.”

“Ah, well, yes, it is early as you say, but my news can’t wait, lay to that.” Hogg rubbed his hairy hands together. “I was speaking to Officer Frank Welsh this morning, he’s one of Sergeant Langford’s right-hand men, you might say, and he claims he knew one of the men you shot last night.” Hogg pointed at the floor. “The one who lay right there, a-coughing up his liver, poor soul.”

Now, despite his irritation, Tone was interested. “Who was he?”

Happy to be the center of attraction, Hogg beamed. “His name was Mason Tucker.”

The name came as such a shock to Tone that he almost dropped his cup. “You mean Mason Tucker, the El Paso gunfighter?”

“That’s what Frank Welsh says.”

“How would he know?”

“Frank was a deputy sheriff in El Paso before he quit and signed on with the San Francisco police. He says when he saw Tucker’s body he recognized him right off.”

Lost in thought, Tone absently refilled his cup. Mason Tucker had been a named man, a gunfighter who had killed more than his share, and his services didn’t come cheap. The hundred dollars Langford had found in the man’s pocket was probably a down payment on his fee, the balance to be paid when the job was done and Tone was dead.

Only the six men on Sprague’s death list had those kinds of funds.

“Seems obvious who hired Tucker,” Hogg said. “It could only be the men who want the cap’n dead.”

Tone rose, reached into his coat hanging in the armoire and returned to the table. He spread out the list and told Hogg to sit opposite him.

“I’ll read out a name and you tell me what you can about the man,” he said.

“It won’t be much, Mr. Tone. The cap’n don’t confide in me like he does you.”

“Just try your best, Hogg.” Tone’s eyes dropped to the paper and he read: “John T. Moylan.”

“He owns the Bucket of Blood saloon here on the waterfront and has shares in some of the Chinese opium and whore businesses. He lives in Silver City, but I don’t know what he does there.”

“They all live in Silver City,” Tone said. He read again: “Mickey Kerr.”

“He strong-arms for Moylan. That’s all I know, ’cept he’s a bad ’un.”

“Edward J. Hooper.”

“He owns a couple of boardinghouses along the Barbary and specializes in shanghaiing sailormen and importing opium and young Chinese gals as whores. He can buy a girl for four dollars in Canton and sell her for hundreds along the waterfront.” Hogg brightened. “I know what he does in Silver City. He owns a bank and he’s a church deacon. The cap’n told me that.”

“Luke Johnson.”

“I don’t know nothin’ about him except I’ve seen him with the others.”

“Joseph Carpenter.”

“Joe Carpenter owns a couple of waterfront dives and he has a small steam yacht he keeps at the docks. He’s real good with a gun. About a year ago he shot two of his customers dead for roughing up one of his whores.”

“Last, but probably not least, Maxwell Ritter.”

“He owns as much of the waterfront as the cap’n and he’s just as rich. He doesn’t go anywhere without two or three bodyguards.”

Tone sat back on his chair, lilac cigar smoke curling over his head. “It’s not much to go on, but at least I know where to find . . . what’s his name?” He looked at the paper. “Edward J. Hooper. How many churchgoing bankers can there be in Silver City?”

“You’re going there?” Hogg asked, surprised.

“Better than staying here and making myself a target for any two-bit gunman who wants to earn fifty dollars.”

“Mr. Tone, I don’t think the cap’n—”

Knuckles pounded on the door. Luther Penman shoved it open and stepped inside. He seemed to be in an evil temper, his death’s head face set and scowling.

He ignored Tone and looked at Hogg. “Simon Hogg,” he snapped. “What an unpleasant surprise.”

“I was just leaving, Mr. Penman,” the innkeeper said, almost bowing to the man who represented all the wealth, authority and power of Lambert Sprague.

“Then go, and be about your business, nefarious though it no doubt is.”

Hogg shuffled his feet, suddenly uncomfortable in his own crawling skin. “Begging your pardon, Mr. Penman, but Mr. Tone here says he plans on leaving for Silver City. That’s what we was about to discuss, like.”

“If Mr. Tone wishes to discuss his future actions, he’ll discuss them with me and me alone.” His empty eyes fell on Hogg and the man squirmed worse than before. “Why are you still here?”

Hogg knuckled his forehead and headed for the door, a man relieved to be anywhere but in Tone’s room.

“Coffee?” Tone asked after the man was gone.

Penman shook his head and took the chair recently vacated by the innkeeper. “Why did you tell Hogg you were leaving for Silver City? Be brief now, and to the point.”

“I’m tired of making myself a target. Do you know what happened here last night?”

“I heard about it.” Penman let his shark eyes rest on Tone. “The whole point of your agreement with Mr. Sprague is that you do make yourself a target. You will remain on the waterfront, draw the six men to you that you’ve been contracted to kill and then deal with them.”

“I think—”

“Don’t think, Mr. Tone; it doesn’t become you. We hired your gun, not your brain.”

“I want to take the fight to the men who paid to have me killed last night.”

“You will let them bring the fight to you. Those are your orders and you will abide by them.” There were pinpoints of flickering blue in Penman’s eyes. “A word of warning: don’t take the Pirate’s Oath lightly, Mr. Tone. The last man who did was taken to an island off the coast, his belly was ripped open and his intestines were strung out and tied around a tree. I have it on good authority that he screamed for three days before he succumbed.”

Penman smiled with all the warmth of a python regarding a wounded rabbit. “That man’s name was Jim Riley, one of Mr. Sprague’s most trusted crewmen. I recall that he was a stout, jolly fellow. He was not so jolly when he tried to tear loose from his own guts.”

“I won’t break the oath,” Tone said, angry that he heard a catch in his voice.

“Good, it’s settled. Mr. Sprague will be in San Francisco in a week, and you can report to him personally then. Like me, he’s going to say that it’s high time you earned your first thousand dollars. And speaking of money”—Penman pulled a slip of paper from his pocket—“this is Hogg’s bill for your keep, and quite frankly your expenses are horrendous.

“Five dollars a night for whores . . . champagne . . . Havana cigars . . . it goes on and on. For instance, here—why did you feel the need to buy five dozen roses?”

Tone shrugged. “To go with the whores, champagne and cigars.”

“My dear fellow, this can’t continue. I’ve instructed Hogg that your per diem allowance for bed and board will be three dollars a day. Anything above that amount must be cleared by me or met out of your own pocket.” The lawyer sniffed. “Who buys roses for whores?”

“I do.” Tone smiled.

“Well, no longer. Roses for whores . . . pearls before swine, indeed.”

As Penman rose to his feet, Tone smiled and said, “Anyone ever tell you that you’re a likable man, Luther?”

“No.”

“Then I won’t either.”

“Remember,” the lawyer said as he stepped to the door, “Mr. Sprague will be here in a week.”

“I’ll do my best to stay alive until then,” Tone said irritably.