Play a Lone Hand (4 page)

When her laughter had subsided, she said, “I had that coming, didn't I? Yes, I can whisper, but to hear me you'll have to pick a day that's not before press day and when the printer isn't drunk and the publisher isn't shooting billiards.” She regarded him with friendliness, “Do me a favor, Mr. Dixon. Go over to Henty's and if our printer is standing up, turn him this way and give him a shove, will you?”

“How do I know him?”

“Black hands,” she said flatly. Giff touched his hat and went out. Pausing a moment on the boardwalk to roll a cigarette, he found himself wondering at memory of this girl. His thoughts sobered, however, when he remembered her last words before Earl's entrance. Was it a prediction, or just the flip observation of a harried girl? At any rate, he had part of the information Fiske wanted: the printer's first name was Perry, which would be Albers, and learning it had been done without rousing suspicion.

He identified Henty's saloon on the corner across from the land office, and stepping out into the street, he cut through the late afternoon traffic of wagons and riders and fell in behind two punchers preceding him into the saloon.

It was a big and pleasant place, with the bar directly ahead of the door. In the back were two billiard tables, and the rest of the room was reserved for a faro layout and half a dozen big poker tables. Three separate card games were in progress, and a handful of drinkers stood at the bar.

Giff went to the bar and had his drink of whiskey, the first in more than a month. He could not afford it, but he also could not afford not to, for he did not want it to appear as if he were hunting anyone. In fact, he had no intention of doing the girl the favor she had requested; he simply wanted to see Albers and be able to describe him to Fiske. He was amused at his own sudden interest in this preposterous game of Fiske's.

Finished with his drink, he drifted over to a poker table and, along with another puncher, watched the game a moment. His glance roved the room. Presently, he observed a man at a table in the front corner; he was half stretched out on the table, sleeping on his arms, but across the room Giff could not make out his features.

He moved on, then, to another game at a table next to the corner one, approaching it so that when he turned away he would pass the corner table. Halting, he idly noted the men playing, and then his glance settled on Sebree's foreman across the table. Traff had seen him, and Giff nodded his greeting and had it returned.

He watched Traff a moment, wondering about him. He had a broad face, with wide flaring nostrils and small eyes; his neck was nonexistent, so that his massive shoulders seemed to flow away from his ears, and yet seated, he was inches shorter than the men he was playing with. His very grossness suggested power and drive, and his every move held authority. This was the man who might be his boss.

Raising his glance now, Traff surprised Giff watching him. He nodded to the empty chair next to him and asked, “Like to sit in?”

Giff shook his head and smiled faintly. “I've got my saddle back. I'd like to keep it.”

Traff grinned. Giff watched a hand played out, then idly turned away. With seeming naturalness, he looked at the figure sprawled on the next table. There were the ink-stained hands, all right, cradling the man's head. His face, mouth open, was turned to the room and Giff had his casual look at him on the way out.

Dusk lay over the town when he stepped into the street and the earliest lamps were being lighted. Giff, on his way to the hotel, paused long enough to see if Murray was in, found he wasn't, and walked on. The lobby lamps of the Territory House were already lighted, and the dining room adjoining was open.

Giff had climbed two of the steps to the second story when he stopped abruptly, thought of something, turned and came back to the desk. The elderly clerk had seen him, and came out of his chair as Giff approached the counter.

“That letter you gave me this afternoon. Who gave it to you?” Giff asked.

“Some kid.”

And now he asked the question that had brought him here. “Do you know a girl working in the
Free Press
office?”

“Mary Kincheon, sure.”

Giff turned toward the stairs, turning over the name in his mind, liking the sound of it and wondering why he did. At his knock, Fiske's abrupt voice told him to come in. Fiske had pulled a chair over to a window on the side street; he was sitting in it, feet up on the sill, smoking a huge calabash pipe. Giff walked around the table, noting Welling's absence, swung a straight chair away from the wall, straddled it, folded his arms on the back and sat down.

“Albers works there, right enough,” he reported. “Right now, he's sleeping off a jag on a corner table of Henty's saloon. The April seventeenth copy was missing, so I couldn't check these names.” He extended the slip of paper to Fiske, who took it without comment. When Fiske held his silence, Giff rose. “That's all?”

“Going to sleep in the hayloft again tonight?” Fiske asked mildly.

Giff peered at him in the dusk, and he knew Fiske was watching his face. “Hayloft?”

“While you were checking on Albers, I was checking on you,” Fiske said dryly. “Nobody knows anything about you. Murray seems to think you're all right.”

When Giff didn't answer, Fiske said grimly, “I hope you are.” He rose. “Seen Welling?”

“No.”

“He's taking the weight off the back bar of the saloon across the street. Have you already gathered that's his real career?”

“Yes.”

Fiske turned away from the chair and made a slow circle of the room, his head hung thoughtfully. When the circle touched Giff, he halted. “I've got no authority and you're only a harum-scarum camp swamper as far as I can find out. Something's happening here, though, something big—and we two are the only ones who can do anything about it. Feel like trying?”

“What is it?” Giff asked cautiously.

“That's none of your business. It's none of mine either, but I'm making it mine. Want to take it that way—blindfolded?”

Many things ribboned through Giff's mind then—Sebree and the price he might be eager to pay for information, Mary Kincheon's warning, Fiske's description of Welling. He felt no loyalty to this barb-tongued surveyor who admitted he was snooping in business that didn't concern him. His only loyalty was to Murray, who didn't give a damn about either the agent or his surveyor. But a kind of wary curiosity nagged at him. Beyond that, he sensed the almost desperate tone in Fiske's words.
What's there to lose?
he thought then. Too, the thought that Fiske didn't trust him, and rightly, was upon repetition beginning to smart.

He said tonelessly, “What do I do?”

“Get Albers up here without anyone knowing it.”

Giff thought about that a moment, cautiously turning it over in his mind. That shouldn't be hard, once Albers sobered up. “All right,” he said.

Fiske talked then, pointing out a way to accomplish it. Once the card players came into Henty's after supper and the tables filled, Albers would be moved. The thing to do was wait for his exit, follow him, and bring him up the backstairs fire escape. Fiske, meanwhile, would undertake to get Welling from the saloon.

“Two drunks,” Giff said coldly. “What sense will they make?”

“You'll never know,” Fiske countered tartly. “Just get him here.”

They left the lobby together and parted in front of the stepping block in the new dark. Giff moved down-street to the corner, crossed it, and entered Henty's saloon. The evening crowd was gathering. Without stepping up to the bar, Giff saw Albers still asleep at the corner table. Traff was still playing in his game too.

Giff went out, crossed the street, and took up his vigil in the dark recess of the land office doorway. He did not have long to wait, for within a matter of minutes he saw one of the white-aproned bartenders push open the batwings. He had a man by the arm, and he gently stood him up, balanced him, and then vanished into the saloon. In the light coming over the swingdoors, Giff recognized Albers.

The printer lurched out to the edge of the plankwalk, caught himself, and with a careful steadiness, stepped into the road and cut across it and down the side street west. Giff waited a moment, keeping him in sight, then stepped out and cut down the side street too, keeping to the walk. When Albers turned up the alley that ran behind the
Free Press
, Giff hurried across the street and plunged in after him.

Ahead, he could hear Albers stumbling among the cinders, and could see his vague shape. He called softly, “Albers,” and started to run toward him. Albers moaned softly, and he too began to run, and then he fell heavily. When he rose, Giff was beside him, and Albers struck out blindly, yelling, “No! No! I didn't, I tell you!”

Roughly, Giff pinned the man's arms, and then said through his teeth, “Stop it, you damn fool! I'm from the Land Office!”

Albers stopped struggling, and Giff let him go. “Come along,” Giff said. “Welling sent me for you.”

At that moment, the sound of running feet came to him, and he looked back down the alley. A couple of men rounded into it, running full tilt. Albers heard them, too, and he swore bitterly, drunkenly, and began to run again. Giff ran alongside him, wondering what to do, how to hide him.

Then the shot boomed savagely in the enclosed alley. It was the second one, though, that hit Albers. Giff could tell by the sound of gagging wind driven from him that the bullet had hit him in the back. He fell heavily, loosely. For only a moment, Giff paused, then ran again, the end of the alley in sight.

He pounded around the corner of the building, his foot lifted to achieve the boardwalk, when the thing hit him. It was as if he had run full tilt into an eight by eight timber; it caught him in the belly, and he had time only to see the blurred figure of a man beside him. Then he was down, gagging and retching, while the kicks and blows were rained on his head and body. Finally, mercifully, a kick in his temple seemed to explode the night into pinwheeling fire, and he lost himself in blackness.

2

Although Welling was still sleeping, Bill Fiske made no effort to be quiet as he dressed and shaved the next morning. There were things more important than Welling's sleep, and one of them was Giff Dixon, Fiske thought. He let himself out of the room and tramped down the corridor, heading for the room to which Dixon, beaten up and bloody, had been brought last night.

His soft knock on the door brought no response, and gently he palmed the knob and opened the door. Dixon was gone, and for a moment Fiske stood in the doorway, a gloom settling upon him.
He likely lit out, and I can't blame him
, he thought.

Turning back down the hall, his feeling of guilt deepened. Without even knowing what he was in for, Dixon had volunteered to help last night; and a brutal beating had been his reward. That, of course, finished Dixon; with him gone Fiske could see certain and unpleasant failure on this job, since the only thing reliable about Welling was his thirst.

Tramping down the steps, he nodded good morning to the day clerk at the desk and then turned into the dining room on the right. A scattering of guests and townsmen were at breakfast—and among them, Fiske saw, was Dixon. Even across the room, he could see the purple bruise on Dixon's right cheekbone extending clear to the temple. As he approached, Fiske recognized the man sitting at Giff's table. It was Sheriff Edwards who, of course, would be at Giff again with his questions. Fiske had no notion if the young man would tell the truth to the sheriff. It didn't matter much one way or the other, for the harm was already done.

He halted beside Giff, who looked up at him without much friendliness. “Who helped you out of bed?” Fiske asked gruffly.

“Cass Murray.”

Uninvited, Fiske pulled out a chair, saying, “Morning, Sheriff. Anything new on Albers' killing?”

“Nothing new, and nothing old,” Edwards answered dispiritedly. “Just plain nothing.” He glanced at Dixon now and rose. “The hearing will be in an hour or so at my store. Doesn't make much sense, since you're about the only witness, but we ought to go through with it.”

Dixon nodded, and Edwards moved away. The waitress was waiting, and Fiske gave his order; then put his elbows on the table and glanced at Dixon, who was finished with his breakfast and was now rolling a smoke, his long face morose with suppressed anger. “What'd you tell him?”

“That I was helping a drunk when we got jumped.”

“Think he believed it?”

“He may, but I don't,” Dixon's glance, almost baleful, settled on Fiske. “Your drunken friend was shooting his mouth off in the Plains Bar saloon yesterday evening. He told the whole saloon he was ready to break open a big land swindle—just as soon as we got in contact with a man.”

Fiske asked unbelievingly, “Who heard him say it?”

“Cass Murray. So did everybody else.”

Fiske felt a hot and overwhelming wrath that almost smothered him, and he leaned back in his chair. He was aware of too many things at once—that he could now point to Albers' killer and that Welling's loose talk had brought about the killing. He was also aware that Dixon was still in the dark as to the reasons for his beating; and the memory of his suspicion of Dixon yesterday brought a wrenching shame to him.

The waitress brought his breakfast then, but he regarded it without hunger, ate a little of it and finally pushed it aside. There was a feeling in him that was close to futility; their errand here was useless, even foolish; he was useless, foolish, too.

Glancing up, he surprised Dixon watching him with a sullen, almost bitter, patience. Fiske asked, “How do you feel?”

“I'd feel a lot better if I understood this.”

Fiske grimaced. “You wouldn't, and I'll prove it.” He leaned both hands on the table and said, “You already know it was Albers who sent that note to Welling.”