Slocum and the Socorro Saloon Sirens (10 page)

She stopped just in front of Slocum and looked up at him.

“Well, you met Hiram,” she said. “What do you think of my uncle?”

“Frankly, Miss Littlepage, not much.”

“It seems he has a low opinion of you, too, Mr. Slocum.”

“Many people do,” he said.

“Do you know what that man does for a living? How he makes his money?”

“Not for sure. I heard talk about him in Silverado a while back.”

“He preys on people. Poor people, mostly. He ruins their lives and rakes in the money.”

“I've heard that, too, ma'am.”

She stepped closer, and some of the color began to return to her recently frozen face. A strip of lipstick dangled from her lower lip. She plucked it off and winced slightly as the loose skin separated from its moorings.

“Call me Linda, please. I'd like to get to know you better.”

“Why, Linda?”

“Because Hiram doesn't like you and neither does Willie Scroggs.”

“You work for Scroggs, don't you?”

“Actually, no. I don't work for Willie. The girls you see in here work for me and I hire them out to this and other establishments in town.”

“I don't get it,” Slocum said.

“My girls pay me a percentage of their earnings. They are paid more than the usual fees for their services. I negotiate their wages and they pay me for higher earnings.”

“Then, you're a kind of madam, I take it,” Swain said.

Linda's face took on a roseate hue as she wheeled on Swain.

“That's an insult, Mr. Swain,” she said. “What the girls do in their spare time is their business. I don't ask, and they don't tell. Some of them are married, with little children. They're here to entertain and be pleasant to the patrons, that's all.”

“That's all?” Swain said.

“The men who come here are lonely. Most of them don't have much money. They seek diversion and a kind word or two. Other girls who work for me are hairdressers and manicurists, secretaries and clerks. Women are not paid as much as men. I can't help that, but I can get them decent wages and decent treatment on their jobs.”

“I think I get it now,” Slocum said.

She turned to him and smiled.

He smiled back.

Then, she put a hand on his arm.

“I knew you had some decency in you, Mr. Slocum. And some understanding.”

“My friends call me John,” he said.

“John. A nice name. I don't like Jack or Johnny. Too many rough men are called by those nicknames.”

“It's just John. It's always been John.”

“Are you planning to stay here long?” she asked.

Slocum looked at Swain, his eyebrows arched like a pair of question marks.

“John, I've got some business to take care of tonight,” Swain said. “I'll put us up in separate rooms at a lodging house in town, Casa Rosa, on Second Street.”

“That's a nice place,” Linda said. “Much nicer than any of the three small hotels here.”

“So, you and Miss . . . er, ah, Linda, have your talk.”

“I was going to invite you both to supper,” Linda said. “Believe it or not, there's a cozy and nice French restaurant on Palo Verde here. The French couple who owns it are very nice, and two of my girls work there. Will you take supper with me, John?”

“Sure,” he said. “It would be a pleasure, Linda.”

“This was our last drink anyway,” Swain said. He downed his drink and his eyes didn't water.

John lifted his glass.

He looked over the rim at the back table. He saw Scroggs lift his hand and make a sign that looked like a man pulling the trigger of a pistol. He tracked Scrogg's line of sight and saw that he was gesturing toward the Swede, Thorson.

Swain said, “Uh-oh,” and turned toward Loomis. Swain stepped away from the bar.

“What is it?” Linda said as Slocum grabbed her and swung her behind him.

“I think Scroggs just told Thorson to gun us down,” he said.

Thorson dropped his arms and stepped into full view at the end of the bar. He looked straight at Slocum.

Swain drew his pistol and held it high. He aimed at Loomis, who still stood there at the L, in shadow.

“You make one move, Loomis,” Swain thundered, “and I'll put one right between your eyes.”

A glitter gal screamed.

Miranda looked at Swain and yelled, “He's got his gun out.”

Men dove under tables and the glitter gals all screamed like schoolgirls and raced for cover.

“Duck,” Slocum told Linda, and pushed down on the top of her head.

Linda went into a squat as Thorson strode toward Slocum.

“You in the black,” Thorson said. “I'm callin' you out.”

Slocum took a step away from Linda and Swain. He squared off to meet the threat. Men fled the bar like quail taking flight until there was only empty space between the Swede and Slocum.

Cal, the bartender, bent over behind the bar. Slocum caught the movement out of the corner of his eye.

“You touch that Greener,” Slocum said, “and you'll wind up six feet under sand and cactus.”

Cal froze and didn't complete his move.

The Swede came on, step by slow step, his arms out to his sides like wings, his right hand cupped to draw his pistol.

“You heard me, mister,” Thorson said. “You got two seconds to shit or get off the pot.”

“One, two,” Slocum said, counting off the seconds.

Thorson went into a fighting crouch and clawed for his holstered pistol.

“Three,” Slocum said, and his right hand flew like a thunderbolt to his pistol. His hand was a blur and time seemed to stop in that split second. There was a hush in the saloon that hypnotized all who were present, buried them as if they were suspended in a deep black ocean of silence.

Swain cocked the hammer of his pistol, and the sound was like a steel door opening on eternity.

Loomis stared into infinity and did not move or twitch.

Linda sucked in a breath and trembled inside as if she were falling earthward from a high steep cliff.

Life hung in the room like a tiptoe on the edge of an abyss.

Slocum's eyes narrowed to dark slits as his fingers closed around the grip of his Colt.

There was no time to think.

There was no time to stop what was going to happen.

There was only death, and it crouched in that frozen split second of time like a slavering animal over its certain prey.

Slocum heard the soft whisper of his pistol as it cleared leather. He thumbed back the hammer of his Colt as his arm floated the pistol upward to waist-high.

Thorson's eyes widened as he drew his pistol, and for the briefest instant, his blue eyes clouded over as he heard the hammer click on Slocum's gun.

Slocum tilted his pistol and squeezed off a shot. The Colt bucked in his hand with its powerful recoil. But the bullet sizzled through the air on a true course and stuck Thorson right between his eyes. There was the smack of the bullet as it plowed into his forehead, leaving a neat black hole. It furrowed through his brain and turned it to mush before blasting out of the back of his head, spraying a mist of blood and brain fluids, along with shards of skull, like shattered pottery.

His hand went slack and his pistol fell from his grasp and clattered on the floor like a chunk of useless iron. Thorson's eyes widened and rolled back in their sockets. He collapsed in a heap, landing like a rag doll on the floor, all of his muscles limp, his massive body a heap of lifeless sinew, bone, and flesh.

Blood spurted from Thorson's nose and leaked from one of his ears. The smoke from Slocum's pistol hung in the air like a breeze-whipped spiderweb, then evaporated. Slocum spun around, pistol in hand, and aimed at first one bartender, then the other. Finally, he walked over to Swain and pointed his pistol at Loomis.

“Better light a shuck, Loomis,” Slocum said. “Thorson's dead and you're next if you even twitch.”

Loomis went pale in his face and shuffled away from the bar. His backside disappeared through the batwing doors, which swung for a few seconds then slowly came to a stop.

Linda stood up. Her hands shook and she fought to keep her knees from knocking together. She glanced at the dead man and then gazed at the table where her uncle and Scroggs were rubbernecking like a couple of parade gawkers. Wu Chen was nowhere in sight. The smell of burnt powder was strong in her nostrils, and she rubbed her nose between thumb and forefinger.

“Lordy,” she gasped. “I never saw anything so fast, John Slocum. Thorson had the drop on you. I saw it clear as day. But you shot first and you hit him right between the eyes.”

“This saloon has turned into a dangerous place,” he said. “Obie, what say we take a walk outside.”

Swain eased the hammer back down on his pistol and shoved it back in its holster.

“Yeah, I've had enough excitement for one night. You'll have a hotel room waitin' for you after you've finished your supper.”

He looked over at Linda, who was clinging to Slocum's arm.

“Or whenever you're good and ready, that is.”

Linda smiled wanly at Swain.

“Yes,” she said, “let's have some supper. I'm shaking inside like a leaf.”

The men under the tables still cowered there. All of them seemed to be looking at Slocum's pistol, which was still in his hand.

He looked over at the two bartenders.

“When we walk out of here,” he said, “I'd better not hear those shotguns cocking.”

“No, sir,” Cal said, and the bartender nodded several times as if trying to make his head fall off.

“Let's go,” Slocum said.

He and Linda followed Swain out of the saloon and into the inky cloak of night. There were no streetlamps. The three of them walked to the end of the block, then turned right down an even darker street.

“Follow me,” Linda said after Swain had left their company. They could see the dim buttery light of the hotel midway in the block where Swain was headed.

She let Slocum take her arm and they walked in silence to a street where adobe buildings snugged up against each other. In one, lamplight shone through and cast a yellowish orange glow on the dirt street outside.

“There it is,” she said, and pointed to the small restaurant near the end of the block.

The sign outside read:
Chez Soleil
.

“What's that mean?” Slocum asked.

“Sunny Place,” she said.

“Good name, but it could have been named Starry Place, too.”

He looked up at the billions of stars, the winding sheet of the vaporous Milky Way. In the clear desert air, the stars seemed closer, or larger. A balmy breeze wafted their way. It tousled Linda's hair, and she brushed strands out of her eyes.

There were tables on a patio outside, and each of them was covered with a large cinnamon-colored parasol.

“Shall we sit outside?” she asked.

“That would be nice, I think.”

“I can ask Pierre to close the umbrella so that we can see the starry sky.”

“That, too, would be nice,” he said.

“You're more comfortable outside, in the open air, aren't you, John?”

“I suppose so,” he said, trying to make his language more sophisticated since he suspected that Linda was an educated woman.

They sat down at a table near the cast-iron railing and soon a man appeared with a lamp and a slate. He wore a dark blue apron and his boots were shiny, his pants creased and pressed, his white shirt starched to a dignified crispness.

“I am André,” the waiter said, his French accent very Parisian, to Slocum's mind.

“André, would you tell Pierre and his lovely wife, Giselle, that Miss Littlepage is here. And we'd like you to collapse the umbrella.”

“But, of course, mademoiselle,” André said. He quickly adjusted the struts of the parasol and collapsed its wings. Linda smiled at him as he handed Slocum the slate.

“Thank you,” Linda said.

“We have the beef cooked in sherry wine,” André said, “with
pommes frites
, the fried potatoes, and buttered peas. You would like a fine wine with your meal,
non
?”

“Yes,” Linda said with a quick glance at Slocum, “if the gentleman agrees, a burgundy or a claret.”

“Burgundy,” Slocum said. “I do have some acquaintance with wines.”

Linda laughed softly.

“Bring us the burgundy, André,
s'il vous plaît
.”

“
Oui, oui
,” André said, and glided off the patio and into the restaurant. A few moments later, Pierre Lachaise, the owner of the café, appeared at their table.

“
Bon soir
, Linda,” he said in the warmest of tones and with a toothy smile. “Giselle is preparing the meals tonight since my cook, Auguste, is indisposed.”

“Oh, is he ill?” Linda asked.

“He is drunk,
ma'amselle
,” he said without missing a beat. “He cooks with the wine and he gulps it like a fish.”

Slocum and Linda laughed, along with Pierre.

“I hope you enjoy your meal, Linda and the gentleman.”

“Pierre, this is John Slocum, a new friend of mine.”

“Do not get up,
M'sieu
Slocum,” Pierre said. “I am happy to make your acquaintance.” His accent was less pronounced than André's, but it was there, like fine oil on the small gears of a good watch.

“How did you wind up in Socorro?” Slocum asked.