Waco's Badge (17 page)

“Who are you?” Sarah demanded, raising her right hand clear of the Merwin & Hulbert and turning slowly until facing the door.

“You've lost your Southern drawl,
you-all,
” replied the genuine Belle Starr. “It wasn't very well done, at that.”

“I said who are you?” Sarah hissed, although she was beginning to suspect the truth.

“I'm Belle Starr,” the lady outlaw answered. “And, as I told a very good friend just recently, I don't take kindly to lobby-lizzies trying to have me blamed for their crimes.”

“What do you intend to do with me?” Sarah challenged, despite feeling
very
uneasy as she listened to the softly spoken words. “Take me into Marana and turn me over to the sheriff?” She paused, then continued. “But,
if
you did that, I would just as quickly turn
you
over.”

“You'll be in no condition to turn
anybody
over,” Belle claimed. “Fact being,
Summer Complaint,
by the time I'm through with
‘you-all,'
you're not going to be doing
anything
for longer than it will take
me
to be long gone to where the sheriff, or anybody else, can't find me.”

“You talk
big
for somebody with a gun in her hand,” Sarah countered, employing all her considerable strength of will to prevent her trepidation showing. She was helped by the timber of disdain with
which the words,
“Summer Complaint”
were said. Glaring defiantly at the visitor, she continued, “Which is about
all
I could expect from a ‘mother-something' peckerwood tail peddler like
you
!”

“Come on out here and close the bedroom door behind you,” Belle instructed, gesturing with the Manhattan and showing no sign of the annoyance she felt over being referred to by the derogatory names for a Southron and a prostitute. Moving backward as she was speaking, although not sufficiently to prevent her from keeping the weapon lined on the other girl, she concluded, “Then we're going to see just how much I
need
a gun to hand you your needings!”

“Now what?” Sarah demanded, having done as she was instructed.

“I'm going to give you the licking of your life,” the lady outlaw declared, crossing to open the center drawer of the sidepiece. Placing the Manhattan in and closing it, she went on, “But you can make things a whole heap easier for yourself if you hand over the pocketbook you took from Senator Twelfinch.”

“Can I though?” Sarah said disdainfully. “Now isn't that a
pity,
peckerwood. I burned it as soon as we got back here. So I'll just have to pass up having things made ‘a whole heap easier' for me.”

“I'm pleased to hear it,” Belle claimed, the attitude of disinterest assuring her that the other was speaking the truth and also unaware of the potential value
offered by the incriminating contents of the book. “I'd hate not to be able to give you
everything
you have coming.”

With that, the lady outlaw started to cross the room!

Watching Belle approaching, a surge of elation flowed through Sarah. Until she had seen the revolver put away in the drawer, she had had fears for her life or at least her future liberty. Now she believed both were secure. Clearly the “peckerwood” believed there was nothing to fear at her hands. In which case, she was confident she could cause a most painful disillusionment.

Bringing up her fists as she had learned when boxing, but without eliciting a similar posture of readiness, Sarah danced rapidly to meet her opponent. Out shot her right fist, for a jab to the “olive brown” face of the beautiful Southron. Such a punch, she felt sure, would come as a complete surprise and be sufficiently disconcerting and hurtful to render its recipient open for more punishment.

Disillusionment came quickly!

Not, however, as had been envisaged by the Summer Complaint!

Warned by Waco of Sarah's competence at boxing, Belle was not taken unawares and was ready to defend herself. Rising, her hands caught the approaching wrist before the knuckles could make contact. Raising the trapped arm, she pivoted beneath and jerked it downward. A wail of alarm burst from
Sarah as she felt herself suddenly being spun in a half somersault through the air. Coming down on the dining room table, it collapsed under her weight and sent her rolling across the floor. Before she could recover her wits, two hands sank into back hair and, with a wrench which threatened to rip hanks out by their roots, jerked her erect. Swung around by it, she had hurtled across the room on being released. This time, however, she was more fortunate and her spinning rush ended with her sitting on the well padded sofa by the side of the room.

Following the Summer Complaint, Belle concluded she was far from finished. Bouncing from the sofa, she was ready to take action before the lady outlaw arrived. Knotting her fists, Belle shot out a right, a left and another right in rapid succession. Showing she had recovered from the surprise received on her opening attack, Sarah deftly blocked each blow in turn. On the heels of the third thwarted attempt, the Summer Complaint retaliated by hooking two punches into the unguarded midriff of the lady outlaw. Gasping, the blows having been hard, Belle was driven back a couple of steps. Before she could pass beyond reaching distance, a backhand slap to the side of the head sent her spinning to land on hands and knees facing away from her assailant.

Hissing in triumph, Sarah advanced spraddle-legged to sit on Belle's back as if riding a horse. Having gained the position, she used each hand in turn to box the other's ears. Such tactics were all very well
when used in a friendly rough and tumble with Fiona, as they had proved on two occasions, but they were less effective against an opponent whose intentions were far from friendly. Letting out a squeal of pain at each slap, Belle thrust upward against the straddling legs. Such was her strength, she raised the Summer Complaint from the floor and, by tilting over, sent Sarah back to it in a far from triumphant sprawl.

Although the pair separated, this only lasted for a moment!

Coming to their knees, the lady outlaw and the Summer Complaint faced each other from less than two feet apart. Acting as if upon a signal, they thrust inward and, with a thwack of colliding flesh, they flung their arms around one another in a violent embrace. Tumbling sideways, locked in that fashion, they went across the floor in a rolling mill which made them appear to be one misshapen human form trying to destroy itself. Skill was forgotten and pure instinct as primeval as the beginning of time prevailed. Fingers clawed at flesh, but neither had nails of sufficient length to inflict scratches. However, cloth tore and buttons flew from masculine shirt and female blouse as they were grasped and wrenched at mindlessly. Involuntary grunts and moans burst through clenched teeth as arms and legs squeezed with savage power, sounding louder in the otherwise silent room.

Having attained the upper position, straddling
Sarah with fingers sunk like talons into the bosom now bared by the loss of the shirt, Belle gained the first serious advantage; but only momentarily and she paid for it. Pure chance rather than deliberate intent caused Sarah to drive her wildly flailing right fist against the temple of the lady outlaw. Toppling sideways, hand clutching at the point of impact, Belle rolled desperately away from the Summer Complaint. The blow had been devastating, a “shot to the head” of the kind which frequently won boxing bouts. Nor was the lady outlaw unaware of the danger.

Could Belle recover, she wondered as she was struggling to rise, or would Sarah attack again before her strength returned?

The answer came quickly!

Coming up fast, the Summer Complaint pounced like a chicken hawk stooping to take an incautious hen. Still with none of the skill she possessed, she grabbed and flung Belle to the floor. Going forward, she caught hold of the lady outlaw's right leg as it and its mate kicked in a futile attempt to fend her off. Raising the limb, she gave a squeal more animal than human and sank her teeth into the calf. Even through the riding breeches, Belle felt the pain. It galvanized her into a reprisal which her condition might otherwise have failed to produce. Kicking with all her strength, she was not too bewildered to ensure the contact was made with the top and not the toes of the left foot. The force of the impact sent the Summer
Complaint spinning against the wall, from which she flopped to the floor.

Once again, the embattled pair rose almost simultaneously. Legs trembling under the exertions, they paused for a moment to re-marshal their strength for the next confrontation. Then they rushed at one another with a fury which was astonishing and not a little frightening to behold, if there had been any spectators. For close to ten minutes without a pause, they twisted, grabbed, yanked, punched and generally mauled each other without mercy. Soaked in perspiration, each shedding blood from nostrils, lips and grazes, they went at it as if their lives depended upon it. In one respect, at least where Belle was concerned, it did. Should she fail, she believed Sarah would kill her out of hand.

Coming to their feet, still without releasing their clutches, the girls reeled heedlessly across the room. Locked in the same fashion, they crashed through the window taking glass and sash with them. By some miracle, neither was cut by the shattered shards. However, tumbling to the porch served to jolt them apart. Not for long, however. Lurching erect, they closed. Slightly faster, Belle delivered a kick which sent the ball of her foot into the pit of Sarah's stomach. Gasping for breath and badly hurt, the Summer Complaint began to double over. Her throat descended into the clutching hands of the lady outlaw and she was forced upright once more.

Now Sarah was in jeopardy!

Held by the savage constriction of the strong fingers wrapped around her throat, the Summer Complaint squirmed in desperation to free herself and to breathe. Flailing with her fists and trying to kick, she beat at her assailant's head and body with a decreasing force. For her part, the lady outlaw took the blows and devoted every ounce of her will power to keeping up a pressure which grew harder to maintain by the second. Feeling her fingers trembling from exhaustion, as the clutching efforts strained at her muscles, she suddenly thrust Sarah away. Colliding with the wall of the house, what small relief the Summer Complaint experienced was short lived.

Swinging around to give it more force, Belle's clenched right fist buried its knuckles into the mound of Sarah's left breast until seeming to force it into her chest. As the fist withdrew, the left hand crossed to force the right breast outward. Torment too great to be fought off flooded through Sarah. Her eyes rolled until only the whites showed and her mouth opened in a soundless scream of agony. Such was her pitiful condition, she did not feel the right cross to the jaw which flung her half naked body as flaccidly as if its bone structure was removed to measure its length on the hard planks of the porch.

Stumbling with the force she had exerted, right hand feeling as if it was broken so hard had she delivered the final blow, magnificent—if now raw looking and bruised from the punishment it had taken—bosom heaving as she struggled to replenish
her lungs, Belle caught the rail of the porch for support. Through the whirling mists of pain and exhaustion which assailed her, although she had not heard anybody riding up, she heard a drawling masculine voice.

“I told you she was good!”

Raising her head, despite her right eye being swollen almost shut and the vision through the left impaired by tears of pain and exhaustion, the lady outlaw could not envisage any sight more pleasant at that moment than Waco and Doc Leroy hurrying toward her from where they had left their horses—brought after the stagecoach by William “Fast Billy” Cromaty and the other cowhand—standing ground-hitched and hurried toward her. Opening her mouth to make some response, she felt her legs buckling and she crumpled unconscious alongside the girl she had beaten.

“T
HE SHERIFF'S GOT THAT DEPUTY OF HIS LOCKED IN
the pokey along with those two gals and the one yahoo who come through alive,” Peter Glendon said, at the completion of the report he was making. “It was him, not the gals who told us about Martin. Fact being, the big 'n's got a busted jaw and isn't talking and the lil blonde's so worried about her being beat up the way she is, she won't say nothing.”

It was noon of the day following the attempted stagecoach hold up which had seen the brief criminal career of the Summer Complaints brought to an end.

On regaining consciousness, after having had her injuries attended to by Doc Leroy—who had also diagnosed and treated Sarah Siddenham for the jaw
broken by the final blow of the fight—Belle Starr had made arrangements for her future. She had spent the night at the ranch house and, at sun up that morning, took the best of the available horses and, wearing some of her opponent's clothing, set off to by-pass Marana and report to Pierre Henri Jaqfaye in Tucson. However, she had not mentioned this to the Texans; claiming only she had to collect the property left on the stagecoach. As she was confident she would arrive before the vehicle, she would allow the Frenchman to repossess it. They had brought her skirt and reticule and, as none of her own property was in the portmanteaus, she was not unduly worried in case he was unable to do so.

Delivering Sarah to Marana, Waco and Doc had found Sheriff Anstead was in charge. He accepted the reason they gave for the “French woman” not having accompanied them, being pleased to have the whole of the Summer Complaints either in jail or awaiting burial at the undertaker's establishment. He had, he claimed, been on the point of going to the ranch to take their leader into custody and was saved the ride.

On leaving the sheriff's office, the Texans had been met by Glendon with an offer to join him for lunch. Arriving in the dining room of the Pima County Hotel, they had found they were not the only guests. Looking very pleased with himself, having just received a chance to achieve his ambition to become a peace officer—although he did not mention this—
Jedroe Franks was sharing a table, set apart from the other occupants, with Major Bertram Mosehan.

“What did you say the name of that lady Pinkerton agent was?” Mosehan inquired, looking from Doc to Waco and back.

“‘Magnolia Beauregard,'” the young blond supplied, knowing this was a favorite alias of the lady outlaw.

“But she didn't show you anything to prove she was what she claimed?” the major asked, face as lacking in emotion as if it was carved from stone.

“Well, no sir, she didn't,” Doc replied. “Fact being, she wasn't in any shape to do more than lay quiet and let me 'tend her hurts when we got there.”

“She told us her name was ‘Magnolia Beauregard' and she was a Pink-Eye though,” Waco supplemented, having asked Belle to do this so he would not be speaking untruthfully—as far as it went—by giving the information. “And, her being a lady and all, it wouldn't have been right to make out we didn't believe her.”

“I suppose not,” Mosehan said dryly. “Well anyway, Belle Starr's name has been cleared.”

“I reckon she'll be right pleased when she hears about it,” Waco drawled, with such innocence it seemed butter would be hard put to melt in his mouth.

“Could the OD Connected spare you boys for a while longer?” Mosehan inquired, deciding enough had been said upon the subject regardless of his very
accurate suppositions about the true identity of “Magnolia Beauregard.”

“I reckon they could, hard as
that
is to believe,” Waco affirmed. “About
me,
anyways.”

“What he means,” Doc commented, in tones of patient martyrdom. “I reckon Ole Devil and Dusty would reckon they could do without
me
and be a whole heap better off if somebody close by I could name wasn't around, happen there was a good cause for us staying away.”

“I'm beginning to wonder if it's worth it!” the major informed Glendon somberly. Becoming more serious, he quickly explained the task he had been appointed to carry out and then went on, “So I'm organizing a small force of State Police who'll be able to go everywhere in Arizona and I could use a couple of fellers like you.”

“Us!”
Doc breathed. “In the
State Police
?”

“I mind what Davis's carpet-bagging State Police did in Texas during Reconstruction,”
¹
the young blond growled. “And, much as I'd like to take cards in your game, major, there's no way I'd wear a badge with
State Police
on it!”

“Or me!” the slender cowhand supported.

“All right,” Mosehan replied, considering that gaining the services of the two extremely competent young men would be worth making the adjustment.
“We'll have ‘Arizona Rangers' on our badges and warrants of authority.”
²

“That being so,” Doc declared. “You've got yourself two men!”

“Better than that,” Waco stated. “You've got yourself two
Texans
!”