The Flimflam Affair

7 Quincannon

At three A.M., dressed in layers of clothing and his buttoned-up Chesterfield, Quincannon slipped out of the hotel’s side entrance. In one gloved hand he carried the dark lantern, its wick already lit and the shutter tightly closed. A thickening layer of clouds deepened the night’s blackness, which suited his purpose well. The few scattered night-lights in business establishments along Main Street, pale by contrast, were oil lamps with their wicks turned down low; electric lights had been installed in Jamestown, but not here as yet.

Main Street was all but deserted at this hour; even the saloons had closed. He avoided the one man he saw, a lurching individual obviously under the influence of strong drink, as he made his way through the town to the side street that led to Icehouse Road. Here he had the night to himself. The darkness was unbroken except for distant flickers of lamplight that marked the locations of the mines and cabins at the higher elevations.

The road in both directions was deserted when he neared the icehouse. He veered over to the tall cottonwoods that bordered it on the south. Under the trees and along the nearby creek, the shadows were as black as India ink. The stone building was likewise shrouded, as were the shedlike office, the livery barn and corral. He stood listening for half a minute. A night bird’s cry, a faint sound from the direction of the corral that was likely the restless movement of a horse. Otherwise, silence. Even the mine stamps were temporarily still.

Quincannon picked his way through dew-wet grass to the rear entrance to the icehouse. Naturally, the pair of heavy wooden doors were secure. He opened the lantern’s shutter a crack, shielding the light with his body, and quickly examined the iron hasp and padlock. Well and good. The padlock was large and looked new, but it was of inferior manufacture.

He closed the shutter, set the lantern down. The set of lock picks he carried, an unintentional gift from a burglar he’d once snaffled, were the best ill-gotten funds could fabricate, and long practice had taught him how to manipulate them as dexterously as any housebreaker. The absence of light hampered his efforts here; it took him three times longer, working by feel, than it would have under normal circumstances to free the padlock’s staple. Not a sound disturbed the stillness the entire time.

He removed the lock, hung it from the hasp, and opened one door half just wide enough to ease his body through. The temperature inside was several degrees colder. When he opened the lantern’s shutter all the way, he saw that he was in a narrow space that sloped downward and was blocked on the inner side by a second set of doors. These, fortunately, were not locked.

The interior of the icehouse was colder still, as frigid as a ward politician’s heart. Quincannon opened the lantern’s eye to its fullest, shined the light around.

This was an old-fashioned ice-harvesting business, without benefit of an expensive modern compression refrigeration unit. The stone walls, he judged, were at least two feet thick and the wooden floor set six feet or so below ground level. Large and small blocks of ice lined both walls, cut from the creek or more likely from the Stanislaus River during the winter months. Thick layers of straw covered the floor, and more was packed around the ice blocks; the low ceiling would likewise be insulated with straw to help keep the sun’s heat from penetrating. A trapdoor in the middle of the floor doubtless gave access to a stone- or brick-walled pit that would also be ice-filled, a solid mass ready to be broken by ax and chisel into smaller chunks as needed.

He played the light beam around more slowly, looking for a likely hiding place. None presented itself. The cold had begun to penetrate his clothing, to numb fingertips inside the fleece-lined gloves; he hurried to the far end and began his search, stamping his feet to maintain circulation.

By the time he had covered three-quarters of the space, finding nothing but ice and straw, he was chilled to the marrow. But the high good humor with which he had embarked on this nocturnal quest remained intact; so did his confidence. The Schneider brothers had committed the robbery and the stolen gold was hidden somewhere in here. Logic dictated that it couldn’t be anywhere else.

A few minutes later, his faith in his deductions was amply rewarded.

At the base of one wall not far from the entrance, he uncovered a cavelike space formed by ice blocks and a thick pile of straw. The bullion and sacks of dust were piled under the straw — the entire booty, from the look of it.

A satisfied smile creased his pirate’s beard. He pocketed one of the sacks, heaped straw over the rest of the gold. Quickly, then, he made his exit from the building, with the intention of replacing the padlock and then hastening back into town to locate Constable Teague.

The intention, however, was thwarted. No sooner had he stepped outside than something like an angry hornet whizzed past him, smacked into the wall, and dislodged a stone chip that stung his cheek.

Quincannon had been fired upon often enough in his professional career to react instantly and instinctively. All in one motion he dropped the lantern, pulled his head in, and threw himself forward and down as the crack of the shot split the night. He struck the ground flat on his belly, slid through the wet grass. He was turning onto his side, tearing the Chesterfield open and groping within to free the Navy Colt from its holster, when the second slug came humming by. Wherever it hit was nowhere near him.

This time he spied the muzzle flash. The shooter was over by the barn some forty yards away, his weapon evidently a handgun. But the absence of any kind of moonlight or starlight made it difficult to distinguish shapes among the clotted shadows; Quincannon couldn’t tell if the man had moved or was still in the same place.

One of the Schneider brothers, no doubt. Damn and damnation! What had drawn him here in the middle of the night? And the other one... was he present, too?

Quincannon had the Navy out now. With his teeth, he pulled the glove off his right hand and took a tight grip on the weapon. Then he lay motionless, the dark night his ally; Schneider couldn’t see him any better than he could see Schneider. But the man still had an advantage: the barn was closer to the road than Quincannon’s position before the icehouse. To attempt an escape in that direction would be folly.

Lie here and wait to see if Schneider came to investigate his marksmanship? No. Not without knowing if the man had a lantern of his own, or if his brother was somewhere nearby, possibly sneaking around behind the icehouse. The creek, then? It ran between banks five or six feet high, the near bank some twenty yards from where he lay; if he could get down into the cut, he ought to be able to make his way back toward town unseen. The grass was tall enough to cover a squirming crawl to it as long as he was quiet about it.

He began moving, slowly at first, propelling himself with his free hand. Fear was a stranger to him, but he could feel a thin ooze of sweat on his brow despite the cold and the dampness. A short distance from the bank, his extended hand struck and loosened something smallish and solid. The noise the bump and roll made seemed loud in his ears, froze him into immobility. But the sound must not have carried, for no third shot came, nor did any movement from the direction of the barn break the heavy silence.

Quincannon resumed his crawl. The bank’s edge was all but invisible; it was the gurgling murmur of creek water close below that told him when he’d reached it. But he had no way of knowing how steep it was until he wiggled forward, twisted his body, and commenced a sliding descent. It was not strictly vertical, fortunately, but still steep enough so that he had to clutch at vines of ivy and clumps of fern to keep from tumbling into the stream. The slithering sounds his body made were muted by the water’s quick-running passage.

Near the bottom, a section of brush and root-tangled earth ended his slide. He dug one boot heel into the bank; the other foot slipped into the icy water before he could brace himself. He yanked it out and managed to shove himself erect, the brush tearing at his coat. And he bit back a sharp oath when he attempted to step gingerly into the creek.

The water was only ankle-deep, but the rocks in the streambed were not pebbles; most were large, the size of baseballs, and packed loosely together. Walking on them in daylight would have been difficult enough; in the inky dark you couldn’t see where you were putting your feet. Even moving at a retarded pace would be risking a fall, serious injury.

A mistake, coming down here, he thought grimly. He might well have trapped himself.

But there was still a chance if the bank remained slanted and not too overgrown ahead, so that he could ease along it far enough and silently enough to get past the icehouse. Then he could crawl out, make his escape. If the Schneider brother by the barn hadn’t realized where he’d gone and didn’t come hunting him meanwhile. And if the other Schneider brother wasn’t hidden, waiting, somewhere near the icehouse.

Two hands were necessary to feel his way along the bank; that meant holstering the Navy. Best to do that anyway, for if he tripped or fell, the weapon might be jarred out of his hand and lost in the darkness. More brush, roots, vines, clumps of fern impeded his progress, and more than once one foot or the other slid into the water, chilling him even more. Every few feet he paused to strain his ears. Still nothing to hear but the voice of the creek and the thin, labored plaint of his breathing.

He’d gone an indeterminate distance when light suddenly flashed on the flat above. It arced, bobbing this way and that — Schneider, with a lantern of his own or the one Quincannon had carried, searching for him.

Quincannon attempted to increase his speed, only to come upon a mass of something that blocked his way. One groping hand touched a cold surface just in time to prevent him from falling over whatever it was, but not in time to avoid kicking a loose stone that clattered metallically against its surface — surely a carrying sound. Cursing under his breath, he stood motionless, head tilted upward. The light still sliced the darkness above, but in the same dancing arc rather than steadying toward where he was. Schneider was too far away to have heard the noise.

The obstruction on the bank was mounded earth split by something thick and thigh-high that extended at a downward angle into the creek. Quincannon ran his ungloved hand over its ridged surface, identified it: a section of drainpipe some three feet in diameter and covered with stalks of ivy. Hell, damn, and blast! In order to get over and around it he would have to risk stepping into the treacherous stream. And for all he knew, there was more obstruction on the far side.

One other choice: climb out here, on the hope that the light wouldn’t pick him out before he could pinpoint Schneider’s location. The fact that only the single beam swept the grassy flat, and that there was still nothing to hear, indicated that the man was alone up there. Just the one brother and himself in this tense duel.

The cutbank here was not quite as steep as it had been farther down. Ivy grew thickly here; using the thick stalks, Quincannon was able to pull himself upward with relative ease. Partway to the top he thought he heard something, halted to listen again.

Swishing, sliding sounds above and not far away: stealthy footfalls in the wet grass.

In the next second the light steadied. He couldn’t be certain, but it seemed to be pointed off to his left.

He moved just enough to draw the Navy again. The sounds above continued, the light holding steady; it was difficult to tell in the darkness, but Schneider seemed to be moving at an angle to his left. Quickly, then, Quincannon eeled his body the rest of the way up, left hand clinging to the ivy and knees digging into the soft earth.

As soon as his head cleared the top edge, he spied Schneider less than fifteen feet away, creeping forward now in a half crouch, the shape of the weapon extended in his right hand visible in the lantern’s glow. Not heading in Quincannon’s direction but straight ahead to the cutbank, which meant he was looking that way, too.

Quincannon braced himself, took a firm grip on his right wrist with his left, and drew a bead. And when Schneider paused near the bank, he squeezed off three rounds in rapid succession.

Shooting in the dark was tricky business, even at relatively close range and with the lantern outlining his quarry, but he prided himself on his marksmanship even under such adverse conditions as these. One and possibly two bullets struck Schneider, brought forth a surprised outcry and knocked him off his pins. The lantern, popped loose from his grasp, had bounced to one side and remained burning at an angle that revealed Schneider where he lay.

The wound was not a mortal one — Quincannon could see him thrashing around in the grass, hear him moaning — but it was incapacitating enough to keep him down with no attempt to rise up and return fire. Long seconds passed before Quincannon was sure that Schneider wasn’t shamming, then he levered himself up over the rim and onto his feet. The Navy at arm’s length, he cautiously approached the fallen man.

Schneider lay on his back, still thrashing, though more feebly now. His moans ceased when Quincannon snapped out, “Raise up with your weapon, Schneider, and you’re a dead man.”

“I ain’t got it no more, I dropped it.” The gruff Teutonic voice was thick with pain.

“That better not be a lie. Where are you hit?”

“Arm, hip. Shattered a bone, damn you, I can’t feel my leg.”

Quincannon moved close enough to determine that both hands were visible and empty. Then he sidestepped to where the lantern lay, picked it up, shined the beam on Schneider. He was a big one, to be sure, at least fifty pounds over two hundred. His bearded face contorted into a squinting grimace and long straggly hair glistened blackly in the light.

“Where’s your brother?”

“Home. I come down here alone.”

“Why, at this hour?”

No response.

“Worried about the gold, is that it? Arrived just in time to see me breaking into the icehouse.”

“Goddamn flycop. How’d you know Bodo and me stole it, where we had it hid?”

“Never mind that. You’ll find out soon enough.”

A grunt, another moan. “Gott im Himmel, man, get me the doctor before I bleed to death.”

Quincannon hunted around until he found Schneider’s dropped sidearm, a large-caliber Colt. He slid it into the pocket of his mud-caked Chesterfield. He had no qualms about leaving the wounded man here in the wet grass; criminals, especially those who would have had no qualms about putting a lethal bullet in him, deserved to suffer for their sins.

With the lantern guiding him, he hurried to the road and back to town — to fetch Constable Teague, first, and then Dr. Amos Goodfellow.