The Bandit Princess (7 page)

Authors: J. Roberts

BOOK: The Bandit Princess

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As Clint and Deputy Eads left his office, Sheriff O’Neal stood up, strapped on his gun, then sat back down again. He wasn’t sure what to do. He had a vague idea where Pearl Starr and her men might be camped, but not a good enough one to ride directly to them with the news. It could take him days to find them.

On the other hand, did he want to give the Gunsmith a reason to take personal affront with him? Give the man an ax to grind with him?

The two men Clint Adams had described sounded to him like Del and Tate, two of Pearl’s men. Maybe he should just find them, give them the word, and get them out of town. But he’d have to do that without Adams finding out—without him
ever
finding out.

He stood up, sat down, stood up, sat down again. He was undecided about what to do, but in the end it was self-preservation that took hold.

Adams probably knew he was lying about Del and Tate. That meant the gunman was looking for them right now.

Sheriff O’Neal decided to stay right where he was, in his office . . . where it was safe.

EIGHTEEN

As they approached the whorehouse, Clint could feel Alice Eads pulling back.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

“I-It’s like you said,” she answered. “I’ve never been inside a whorehouse before.”

“They’re just women, like you,” he said. “You can’t catch anything from them.”

“I know I can’t catch anything,” she said peevishly, “but they’re not women like me. I’m nothing like they are!”

Clint wondered why she was protesting so vehemently. “Okay, Alice,” he said, “they’re nothing like you. Do you want to stay out here and wait?”

She considered it, but in the end she decided to go in with him.

“No, that’s okay,” she said. “I’ll come in. You might need me. There’s two of them.”

“You’re right,” he said. “I might need you. Thanks. Let’s go.” He decided to keep a close eye on her once they were inside.

Once Clint was able to convince the madam he was not there to sample her wares, she answered his questions.

“Yes, we did have two men who fit those descriptions,” she said.

“Had? They’re not here now?” he asked.

“No, they left a little while ago.”

“Did they say where they were going?”

“I heard them saying something about whiskey.”

“So to a saloon, then.”

“I guess so.” The madam looked at Alice, who glared back at the woman with obvious distaste. “Doesn’t the deputy talk?”

“When she has something to say,” Clint said. “Can we talk to the two girls they were with?”

“Is this official?” she asked.

“Yes,” Eads said, “it is.”

“Then we’ll cooperate. I’ll bring the girls here.”

They waited in the entry foyer while she went to fetch them.

“Are you okay to talk to one of the girls while I talk to the other?” he asked Alice. “It’ll save us time.”

“Yes.”

“Just find out what she knows about the man she was with,” Clint said. “Anything he might have said.”

“All right.”

The madam returned with two girls, a small, slender blonde and a taller, more full-bodied brunette. Clint let Alice take the blonde, as she would have had to look up at the brunette, and he didn’t want to give her any more reason to be uncomfortable.

Clint moved into an alcove with the big brunette, and Eads went into another room with the blonde.

“He didn’t talk much, mister,” the brunette said, “except to call me a dirty bitch—but that ain’t so unusual.”

“Because most men call you that?”

She grinned at him and said, “No, because I
am
a dirty bitch. That’s why men like me. Especially married men.

They don’t get from their wives what they can get from me.”

“I’ll bet.”

“You got a wife?”

“No.”

“You wanna play?” she asked.

“I don’t have time,” he said, “and besides, I don’t pay for sex.”

“That so?”

“It is.”

She looked him up and down and said, “Yeah, I bet you don’t. I can see giving you a free ride.”

“Thanks, but like I said,” he replied, “no time.”

“Too bad.”

“Did the man say anything else?” Clint asked, getting back to the subject. “Maybe you heard him talking to his friend?”

“Yeah, I did, as a matter of fact,” she said. “But if you don’t pay for sex, do you pay for information? I mean, my time’s worth money, you know?”

Clint took out some money, thought a moment, then passed her three dollars.

“Thanks.” She shoved it into her cleavage before the madam could see it. “I heard them talking about three things—whiskey, supplies, and a big horse.”

“A big horse?”

“Yeah, some great big horse that one of them liked,” she said.

“Did they say where they saw this big horse?”

“Nope.”

“Or where they were going to buy the supplies?”

“Nope. At least, not that I heard.”

Maybe the girl Alice was talking to had heard more.

“Okay, thank you.”

“Don’t you wanna know my name?” she asked. “I mean, in case you change your mind—”

“Like I said,” he repeated again, “no time. Sorry.”

“You should be,” she said. “You don’t know what you’re missin’.”

He tweaked her butt as she walked back into the entry foyer ahead of him. Alice Eads was already there, looking uncomfortable.

“You done?” he asked her.

“Yes.”

“Let’s go.”

Outside he stopped and asked, “What did you find out from the blonde?”

“Her name’s Wendy,” Alice said, “she twenty-two, been working here for—”

“I don’t care about any of that,” he said. “What did she know about the two men?”

“Not much,” she said. “She heard them talking about a horse.”

“That was it?”

“A big horse,” Alice said.

“How big?”

She shrugged.

“Maybe,” he said, “as big as mine?”

NINETEEN

Del and Tate walked into the livery, looked around. Several of the stalls were occupied by horses, but the liveryman was nowhere to be found.

“Check out back,” Tate told his partner.

“Right.”

Del ran to the back, looked out the door at an empty corral.

“Nothin’,” Del said. “He musta went to get somethin’ to eat.”

“Here’s the horse, over here,” Tate said, standing in front of a stall.

The big black was easily the largest horse in the barn. He was standing facing in, so he wasn’t paying the two men any attention.

“Whataya wanna do?” Del asked, keeping his voice low.

“We can saddle ours, then put a bridle on him and take him out,” Tate said. “Or I could just put my saddle on him and ride him out.”

“And what about your horse?”

“We could lead ’im—but maybe the first way’s better. We don’t know how this big fella will react to a strange rider.”

“Okay, so saddle up, and then put a bridle on him,” Del said. “What about the guy’s saddle?”

“No,” Tate said. “Why steal his saddle?”

“The horse is used to that saddle,” Del said. “Might make him easier to handle.”

Eclipse turned his head at that point to stare balefully at the two men as they continued to debate their best course of action.

“Okay, make up your mind, Tate,” Del said finally. “We gotta go.”

“Yeah, okay,” Tate said. This was why he wasn’t a leader of men. Same for Del. It was also why they had never accomplished anything together until they joined Pearl. They needed somebody to tell them what to do so they wouldn’t spend so much time discussing matters.

“Okay, let’s saddle our horses, and then we’ll take care of this big fella.”

“Finally!” Del said.

Clint and Eads got to the livery in time to see the two men go in.

“They’re going to try to steal your horse?” she asked.

“Looks like it,” he said.

“Well, let’s arrest them!”

“No,” Clint said.

“Why not?”

“Because we could follow them.”

“But . . . why?”

“I think they’re buying supplies for Pearl Starr,” he said. “The girl I talked to told me they said something about supplies.”

“But that doesn’t mean they’re buying them for Pearl Starr.”

“The sheriff reacted when I described these two men,” Clint said. “He knows who they are. I think he knows they’re part of Pearl’s gang. That’s the only reason he’d be so nervous.”

“So what do you want to do?”

“I’ll go in and keep them from stealing my horse, but I’ll let them go.”

“Then what?”

“Then we track them.”

“Follow them?”

“No,” Clint said, “if we follow them, we might be seen. We track them. That way they’ll be far enough ahead of us that we won’t be seen.”

“But what do I do?”

“Right now, nothing,” he said. “You wait out here while I go in.”

“I thought I was supposed to watch your back.”

“You can watch it from out here,” Clint said. “If the sheriff comes along, stop him. Don’t kill him, just stop him.”

“I would never kill a fellow lawman.”

“I doubt Sheriff O’Neal thinks of his badge the same way you think of yours, Alice—but you’re right. Don’t kill him.”

He started away and she grabbed his arm.

“Are you sure I can’t come in with you?”

“Next time, Alice,” he said. “I really need to do this alone. I don’t want anybody getting shot.”

“All right,” she said, “but if there’s shooting and you don’t come out—”

“Alice,” he said, “this is important—don’t come in unless I call you. Understand?”

She sighed heavily and said, “I understand.”

TWENTY

Clint walked into the stable as if he thought it was empty. The two men had just finished saddling their horses and were turning toward Eclipse’s stall. One of them was holding a bridle in his hands.

“Hello,” Clint said, stopping. “I was just checking on my horse.”

“Oh, yeah?” the one with the bridle asked. “Um, which one is it?”

“That one,” Clint said. “The one you’re standing in front of with a bridle.”

The man with the bridle looked down at it, as if he was surprised to see it in his hand.

“You fellas look like you’re riding out pretty late,” Clint said. “You, uh, weren’t planning on taking my horse with you, were you?”

“Tate,” the other man said.

“Easy, Del,” the man with the bridle warned.

“Let’s all take it easy,” Clint said. “After all, it’s not every day I find two men trying to steal my horse.”

“We weren’t trying to steal it,” Tate said.

“What were you doing, then?”

“We were . . . admiring the horse.”

“Yeah,” Del said, “admiring.”

“Well, that’s okay, then,” Clint said. “We don’t have a problem, do we?”

“No,” Tate said, “we don’t.”

“Then why don’t you put down the bridle,” Clint suggested.

Tate dropped the bridle to the ground.

“And make sure your friend stays calm,” Clint said. “He looks nervous.”

“Del, stay calm,” Tate said.

“We can take him, Tate,” Del said.

“No, Del,” Clint said, “you can’t.”

“What makes you think so?” Del asked with as much of a sneer as he could muster.

Clint did something he hated to do, but it was in the interest of not having to kill these men.

“Because my name is Clint Adams.”

“Adams?” Del asked.

Tate looked at Del and said, “The Gunsmith?” “That’s right,” Clint said.

“How do we know that?” Del asked.

“There’s one way to find out,” Clint said. “Go for your guns and die over a horse.”

Then came that tense moment when a decision had to be made.

“Tate, you seem to be the smarter one,” Clint said. “You call it.”

It took him only a few seconds.

“Del, don’t go for your gun. I don’t wanna die here—and neither do you.”

“What do we do?” Del asked.

“What do you want us to do?” Tate asked Clint.

“Get on your horses and get out of here.”

“That’s it?” Tate asked.

“That’s it.”

“You’re not gonna get the law?”

“No. Just go. I don’t want to get mixed up with the law any more than you do.”

Tate looked at Del, who gave him a helpless look.

“Okay,” Tate said, “we can do that.” He looked at Del again. “Come on!”

The two men mounted their horses. Clint moved out of the way, but kept his eyes on the two of them until they were out the front door. Then, after hearing the sounds of their horses’ hooves fade as they rode away, he walked out.

“Alice?”

She came running, gun in hand.

“Put the gun away.”

“They rode out.”

“Right.”

“Now we follow them?” she asked.

“Track them, remember?”

“In the dark?”

“Just for a while,” Clint said. “They’ll camp soon.”

“So we saddle?”

“Yep,” Clint said, “we saddle up.”

They saddled their horses and left Briartown without ever having picked up additional supplies.