Mankiller, Colorado

CHAPTER 22

The Fan-Tan was a smallish building made of chunks of red sandstone, with a red slate roof. It was located between a couple of larger buildings, a whorehouse much less fancy than Bella’s Place to the right and a barn with a wagon yard behind it to the left. The door to the Fan-Tan was painted a surprising shade of green. It stood a couple of inches ajar, indicating that the place was open. There were no windows in the front wall. As far as Bo and Scratch could tell, it didn’t have any windows at all, but that was all right because the people who frequented the gambling den weren’t really interested in seeing the light of day.

Bo pushed the door back and went inside. Scratch followed close behind him. Both men had their hands near their guns, ready to hook and draw.

The air inside the Fan-Tan was stale with a mixture of smells. Tobacco smoke, beer, bay rum, and unwashed human flesh were dominant, under-laid with the mingled reek of vomit and piss. The place was dimly lit by a couple of hanging lanterns that flickered as the open door made the air stir sluggishly. Bo saw poker tables, a roulette wheel, faro and keno layouts. A short bar ran along the left wall. The chunky, bald-headed man behind the bar wore a dirty apron and stifled a yawn as he looked at the two newcomers.

“Somethin’ I can do for you?” the bartender asked.

The poker tables were empty, except for one where a pair of men in seedy suits sat playing a desultory game of showdown. They weren’t betting, just turning over cards, and neither man seemed to give a damn whether he won or lost each hand.

Scratch kept his eye on the two card players while Bo went over to the bar. “You know a man called Duke Mayo?” he asked.

The bartender shrugged beefy shoulders. “Sure, I know Duke. He plays in here sometimes.”

“Seen him lately?”

“Why’re you lookin’ for him?” The bartender gazed pointedly at the badge pinned to Bo’s shirt. “He in some kind of trouble?”

“Not a bit,” Bo answered honestly. Duke Mayo was beyond ever being in trouble again. “Was he in here last night?”

“Yeah. He sat in on a game that lasted most of the night. Cashed in and left here maybe three hours ago.”

“Won quite a bit, did he?”

The bartender shrugged again. “I’m busy servin’ drinks most of the time. I don’t keep up with how the games are goin’.”

Bo’s gut told him the man wasn’t telling the truth. Not all of it, anyway.

Before he could ask any more questions, a door in the back of the room opened, and a man came out carrying a bucket and a mop. He was short and frail looking, with wispy gray hair and a face ravaged by time and liquor. He wore gray striped pants and a shirt that had once been white, and he kept his head down and muttered to himself as he set the bucket down and started mopping the floor.

Bo turned back to the bartender and asked, “Did anybody leave out of here right after Mayo?”

The man scowled. “Look, Deputy, I told you, I do my own work and mind my own business. I didn’t see nothin’ or hear nothin’ and I don’t know a damned thing except that I’m sleepy. I can’t help you, understand?”

Bo inclined his head toward the two men at the poker table. “Were they part of the same game as Mayo?”

The bartender blew out an exasperated breath. “Why don’t you ask ’em yourself?”

“All right, I will,” Bo said. “What’s your name?”

“Ashton. Mike Ashton.”

“You own this place?”

“That’s right.”

“Might be a good idea for you to start being a little more observant about what goes on in your business, Ashton.”

The man shook his head. “That just shows how much you know, mister.”

Bo turned away from the bar, stepped around the elderly swamper, and went over to the table where the game of showdown continued. The two gamblers deliberately ignored him and Scratch until Bo said, “We’d like to talk to you gents.”

Without looking up, one of them said, “Go ahead and talk.”

The other snickered. “That don’t mean we’ll listen, though.”

Bo leaned forward and used his left hand to sweep the cards off the table, onto the floor. His right palmed out the Colt, and as he eased back the hammer, he said, “This means you’ll listen…and that you’ll talk, too.”

Both men had reacted to Bo’s sudden, unexpected action. They stiffened in their chairs and started reaching under their coats. The sound of Scratch’s gun being cocked was loud in the smoky silence. Caught between the two weapons, the men froze, then slowly moved their hands back into plain sight.

“On the table,” Bo ordered.

They placed their hands on the ratty green felt and glared up at the Texans with murderous hatred.

“What do they call you?” Bo asked.

“I’m Stansbridge,” said the one who had spoken first.

“Keegan,” the other man added.

“All right,” Bo said. “Were either of you in the game Duke Mayo was playing in last night?”

“We both were,” Stansbridge said.

“How did he do?”

“He cleaned up,” Keegan replied with a sneer.

“Took your dinero, did he?” Scratch drawled.

Stansbridge’s narrow shoulders rose and fell. “You win, you lose. That’s the nature of the game.”

“Did you take it unkindly when you lost?” Bo asked.

“Didn’t bother us a bit,” Keegan said.

“If you’re accusing us of something, Deputy, why don’t you just come right out with it?” Stansbridge said.

“All right, I will. Did you follow Mayo when he left here, cut his throat, and steal back the money he won?”

“Of course not,” Stansbridge said in a cool, unruffled voice. “We’ve been right here. We haven’t set foot out of the place in more than twelve hours.” He raised his voice a little. “Isn’t that right, Mike?”

Ashton ran a filthy rag over the scarred wood of the bar. “That’s right,” he said. “They been sittin’ right there, Deputy.”

Bo glanced over at the Fan-Tan’s proprietor. “I thought you didn’t pay any attention to what was going on in here.”

“Some things I see, some things I don’t,” Ashton said. “But I know those two haven’t left, just like they told you.”

Bo didn’t believe what the three men had said, but he couldn’t disprove it, and he sensed that they wouldn’t budge from their stories. He had a strong hunch that he was looking at the murderers of Duke Mayo. There was a matter of proof, though.

“All right,” he said heavily as he lowered the hammer of his gun and then pouched the iron. “I’m putting you on notice, though, Ashton. If we hear about any trouble in this place, we’ll shut it down. You understand?”

Ashton looked like he wanted to come over the bar and tear into the Texans, but he controlled his anger. “I heard about you two. Comin’ into town and actin’ like you’re runnin’ things now. The Deverys’ll settle your hash. You just hide and watch.”

Bo ignored that. “Don’t forget what I said.”

As he and Scratch turned toward the door, the swamper’s foot suddenly bumped against the bucket and upset it. Dirty, soapy water spilled out on the floor. The old man jumped back, crying out in alarm.

“You damned old fool!” Ashton bellowed at him. “Clean that mess up! Right now, you hear me?” He leaned forward over the bar and spat in disgust at the swamper’s feet. “I don’t know why I keep you around here in the first place.”

“I’m sorry, Mike, I’m sorry! I’ll go get another bucket of water and clean it up right now!”

The swamper grabbed the bucket and headed for the back door. Ashton swatted at him with the bar rag but missed.

Bo could tell that Scratch wanted to go to the old-timer’s defense. He caught his friend’s eye and shook his head. They had more important things to deal with at the moment.

Back out in the street, they paused in front of the Fan-Tan. Scratch said, “Bo, you know damned well those two killed that fella Mayo.”

“I expect you’re right,” Bo admitted. “As long as Ashton backs their story, though—”

The sound of someone hissing at them caught the Texans’ attention. They turned to see the old swamper standing at the corner of the building. He beckoned to them with a palsied hand.

Bo and Scratch looked at each other and frowned. Then Bo shrugged, and they went over to see what the swamper wanted.

“What can we do for you, mister?” Scratch asked.

The old man licked his lips nervously. “Are…you boys really lawmen?”

“Yeah, but I ain’t sure you could call us boys,” Scratch said. “Hell, I’ll bet you ain’t that much older than us.”

The swamper shook his head. “It ain’t the years so much as it is the miles.”

“We’ve put plenty of those behind us, too,” Bo said. “Now, what was it you wanted to tell us?”

The old man’s fingertips rasped on the white beard stubble that poked from his chin. “I heard you askin’ about Duke Mayo. I was in there when he cashed in from that game and left. It was just a couple o’ minutes after that when them other two, Stansbridge and Keegan, left, too. They lied to you about that, and so did Ashton.”

Bo felt his heart beat a little faster in anticipation. “You’d swear to that in court?” he asked.

The swamper hesitated. “I dunno…I knocked that bucket over a’purpose so’s I could come tell you about it, but I don’t like the idea of standin’ up in court and sayin’ the same thing.”

“You don’t have to worry about Ashton and those gamblers,” Scratch told him. “They’d be arrested by then. They couldn’t hurt you.”

“Yeah, but what if they was to get loose for some reason? A jury might set ’em free, even though ever’body would know they was guilty.”

Bo couldn’t dispute that. It wasn’t uncommon for the members of a frontier jury to ignore the facts of a case and just do what they wanted to do, whether it was convicting an innocent man or acquitting a guilty one. He didn’t want to let Stansbridge and Keegan get away with murdering Duke Mayo, though, and he was certain that was what had happened.

“Tell you what,” he said. “We’ll arrest the three of them and tell them we have a witness, but we won’t say anything about who it is. Maybe once they’re behind bars, they’ll go ahead and confess.”

“Maybe…” the swamper said, but he sounded doubtful.

“We’ll do everything we can to protect you,” Bo promised. “Sooner or later, somebody’s got to stand up for what’s right. That’s the only way we can bring law and order to Mankiller.”

The swamper took a deep breath, then nodded his head. “All right. Lemme get back in there before you come in, though, so’s they won’t have as much reason to think it was me you been talkin’ to.”

Bo nodded and said, “Sure, we can do that.”

Scratch added, “How come you want to see them get what’s comin’ to them? They treat you bad?”

“Ashton’s a jackass, and pizen-mean. The other two ain’t much better. But Duke, he always had a kind word for me and slipped me a little dinero now and then. For a tinhorn gambler, he weren’t a bad sort. He had a wife, too, a gal named Janey, and she was pretty nice for a whore.” The swamper shook his head. “Folks go down some wrong trails sometimes—I done it myself, more often than I like to think about—but that don’t mean they’re bad sorts.”

Bo put a hand on the man’s shoulder. “You’re right about that, amigo. Now get back in there with your bucket, and we’ll wait a few minutes before we arrest those varmints.”

The swamper nodded and turned to hurry toward the back of the building. He disappeared behind the Fan-Tan.

“I just thought of somethin’,” Scratch said. “We’ve only got two cells in the jail, and they got prisoners in ’em already. If we arrest Ashton, Stansbridge, and Keegan, where’re we gonna put ’em?”

Bo frowned. “That’s a problem, all right. If we’re going to clean up this town, we’ll need more space for prisoners. I’ll have to talk to Lucinda and some of the others about that. For now, though, I think I saw a smokehouse with a pretty sturdy door on it. We can put them in there and lock it up.”

Scratch nodded and hitched up his gun belt. “Sounds good to me. Let’s go educate those hombres about how they hadn’t ought to go around cuttin’ people’s throats.”