The Shotgun Arcana Read online

“Mrs. Stapleton, Maude … It’s been well over a year and a day and I do see you’ve stopped wearing your black and … I was wondering if … I was hoping you’d do me the honor of … Shit,” he muttered the expletive under his breath, and Maude, wide-eyed and blushing, laughed softly with him.

  “You’re doing fine,” she said.

  “Would you do me the honor of accompanying me to Mrs. Proctor’s tonight for supper? Please.”

  “Nothing would please me more,” Maude said. “Thank you, Deputy.”

  Mutt smiled and Maude thought, if it was possible, he even blushed a little.

  “Good deal,” Mutt said. “I mean, thank you, ma’am. I’ll pick you up here at six?”

  “That would be splendid,” Maude said, a little of her South Carolina belle accent slipping out. “I shall count the minutes.”

  “Six,” Mutt said.

  “Don’t be late,” Maude said.

  The Three of Swords

  Boyle “Liver-Eatin’” Douglass was a trapper, tracker and trader along the Kicking Horse Pass in the Canadian Rockies. Douglass gained his nickname for his reputation of eating the livers of the Nakoda Indians who made their home in the Pass. Douglass, a true physical giant of a man, murdered whole Nakoda tribes in their sleep and literally bathed in their blood during a feeding orgy. He told a reporter from Montreal that he hated the Nakoda for murdering his wife and infant daughter and that he took the natives’ own practice of eating the livers to give you your mortal enemies’ strength and power.

  This was mostly a lie. Douglass had never married or had a child and the Nakoda had never wronged him. However, it was true that he gained strength with each liver he ate—growing taller, physically stronger and hardier. He also craved them the more he ate. In the fall of 1870, having consumed over 120 human livers, Douglass was seven foot two, 450 pounds of muscle, madness and hunger. He was so strong now that he could rip the livers out of his victims with his bare hands. His invitation to head to the United States for a true feast was given to him out of the still, dead mouth of one of his latest victims. Douglass possessed one and it was number thirty-one.

  The Queen of Pentacles

  A few clients drifted into the Dove’s Roost during the lazy, hot hours of the late afternoon. Many had favorites, others were just passing through. Day customers were mostly out-of-towners, drifters or cowboys. The locals came under the cloak of darkness, so their wives and family, church mates, business partners and neighbors wouldn’t see them.

  Deputy Jim Negrey walked into the entrance hall of the Dove’s Roost. He looked around as if something were going to jump out of the walls and bite him. Several of the Doves muttered and giggled at his entrance.

  “Well, hello, handsome,” one girl said, laughing. “It your first time, darlin’?”

  “Oh my, what a sweet young deputy,” another woman said. “I hope he’s not here to arrest me. I ain’t got no weapons on me, see?” She leaned forward and Jim blushed at the view.

  Madam Ham greeted Jim at the entrance to the main parlor. She was an imposing woman, a good head taller than Jim, and while she was older, she was still very striking.

  “Deputy Jim,” Ham said. “Is this business or pleasure?”

  “B-business … ma’am,” Jim said. “I was hoping to get a little more information about the unfortunate events last night. Sheriff asked me to look into it.”

  “Well, I’m glad to see Sheriff Highfather is giving Molly’s death the attention and resources it deserves,” Ham said blandly.

  Jim looked at her.

  “I know I’m not exactly the biggest toad in the puddle, ma’am,” he said. “But I aim to find the devil that done did this and make him pay. Miss Molly was always very kind. I figure I owe her for that kindness to see this man hang.”

  “Kind?” Ham said. “She was kind. Did you and Sweet Molly…”

  “Oh, no!” Jim said, shaking his head and growing as red as the belly of a rooster. “I’ve never … I mean, she and I didn’t…”

  Ham patted the young man on the shoulder. “It’s all right, Deputy, don’t have a fit. How can I help?”

  “Well,” Jim said. “I had some questions about Miss Molly’s, um, work.”

  “Yes?” Ham said as she led Jim to an empty sitting room slightly down the hall from the entrance. Jim pulled out the chair for Ham and she sat, smiling and shaking her head, as Jim sat across from her.

  “Ah, you Southern boys,” she said. “Chivalry is very attractive. Shame you graycoats go madder than a pissed-on hornets’ nest when you get riled, but at least you don’t go mad like that cockchafer that did in poor little Molly.”

  “I’m real sorry for your loss,” Jim said, and Ham was amazed to see the boy meant it.

  “How old are you?” she asked.

  “Sixteen,” Jim said. “Just turned in September.”

  “Well, late happy birthday, Deputy,” Ham said. “You’ve never seen a girl torn up like that before, have you, sweet boy?” Jim shook his head. “I’m very sorry a boy like you had to. What’s Jon Highfather thinking, pinning a star to your chest?”

  “I earned it, ma’am,” Jim said. “Molly have any kin hereabouts? Regular clients? Soldiers, by any chance? Ex-soldiers? Anything might mean something to help us find who done this.”

  Ham was about to answer when one of the girls from the front parlor entered. “I’m sorry to interrupt, Ham, but that lady you talked to from San Francisco last month, she’s back, asking for you.”

  Ham stood and Jim rose as she did.

  “Excuse me, Deputy. I’ll be back shortly.” The madam and her charge walked down the hall. Jim sat back down, ran a hand through his hair and looked around the shadowed parlor.

  “You here about the girls that done got killed?” a voice said from the darkness of a French-styled couch. “Mean to catch him or you jist trying to make the mayor and the sheriff look like they give a damn?”

  Jim stood and turned. A woman was stretched out on the couch, languid. She was dressed in inexpressibles—long striped stockings of red and black, a black stay with red garters clipped to the stockings. She was the same woman from last night, in the alley. The one who had taken such an interest in the footprints.

  Jim swallowed, hard. He’d never seen a woman stretched out like that before, moving almost like a cat, sunning herself. He wanted to keep watching but he figured the sheriff wouldn’t do something like that, so he looked off to the side of her.

  “You’re … you’re Miss Warren, aren’t you? Nice to meet you, ma’am. I was going to ask Mrs. Ham if I could talk to you for a spell.”

  “Well, ain’t I jist a lucky girl,” she said, her eyes shining and just for him. Her voice had a familiar twang to it; it reminded him of home, of Ma and Lottie, though he felt very uncomfortable thinking about his mom and sister in a cathouse. Miss Warren’s accent sounded like home. “Please,” she said, “call me Kitty, and may I call you Jim?”

  She stretched out on the couch, on her belly. She was a handsome woman, Jim couldn’t ignore that. Slender, with curves in all the places he liked best for girls to have, and in the clothes she was half wearing, her curves were very evident. Her eyes were brown and they held you, as if she had reached out and taken your hand. It wasn’t so much her physical appearance that was magnetic, as was her bearing. It was comforting and exciting all at once. A very heady mix. Jim sat back down in the chair. Kitty smiled.

  “Talk away,” she said.

  “Are you from West Virginia?” Jim asked. “’Cause you sure sound like it.”

  Kitty nodded, sat up and clapped her hands. “I jist knew you sounded like you were from over there. Whereabouts you from, sugar?”

  Jim started to answer, and then remembered exactly why he wasn’t at home anymore and that he had a price on his head.

  “Lots of places,” he said. Kitty nodded.

  “Been through there a few times myself,” she said. “Nice view.”

  Jim laughed, as did Kitty. “You sa
w me the other night, didn’t you?” she said. “Over by poor old Molly, bless her soul.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Jim said. “You were looking at those shoe prints. I was wondering why exactly?”

  “Your momma raised you real good, Jim,” Kitty said. “You treat me real fine and that is rare, make a woman feel like a lady.”

  “Thank you, ma’am,” Jim said.

  Kitty climbed off the couch and walked slowly toward Jim.

  “I had to leave home young too,” she said. “Got married way too early. Cart ’fore the horse. Didn’t want it, but he was a real gentleman with me and I have no complaints. He passed and I had to leave to find work out here. Couldn’t stay home, some bad things happened. Left our only baby with my mama to raise. Had to.”

  Kitty was in front of him and Jim could smell the sweet aroma of her skin. He looked up into her warm, dark, compassionate eyes.

  Kitty nodded. “Little one was sick when I left a few months ago,” she said. “Frets me to no end, not knowing if she’s well or…”

  “I understand,” Jim said. “I had to leave when my little sister Lottie was … hurt, real bad. I haven’t been home in about two years. Just thinking about it…”

  Kitty ran a hand over his cheek. “You poor thing. I knew it was something similar to my miseries. You had that look about you. Jim, may I ask you a question, please? And please be honest.”

  “Sure, Miss … sure, Kitty, anything,” Jim said.

  “Why didn’t Sheriff Highfather come out to investigate himself? I know it’s not uncommon for a public girl to get herself killed, but I heard he was a decent man.…”

  “Oh, he is,” Jim said, standing. “He sent me because he had to go deal with some train robbers, up at the mining camp.”

  “Train robbers?” Kitty said.

  Jim nodded. “Yeah. He is a good man, ’bout as good as they come. He just got a lot of irons in the fire, Kitty.”

  “He’s up there facing those robbers all alone? Goodness!” She was very close to Jim. It was hard to think of other things when she was so intently focused on him, and he really liked the attention, he had to admit.

  “Naw,” Jim said. “I don’t think it’s a whole gang. He mentioned just one fella named Vellas. Sheriff can handle it. He’s a hard case, Sheriff is.”

  “That’s what I heard too,” Kitty said, and then she blinked. “Wait, did you just say ‘Vellas,’ Nikos Vellas?”

  “Yeah,” Jim said. “How did you … Hey, what happened to your voice, your accent? You joshin’ me?”

  Kitty’s whole posture had changed. Gone was the slow, languid, seductive gait in her body and voice. She was more like a coiled spring now, full of purpose and energy.

  “Damn it to hell!” she said in a very non–West Virginia sounding way. “He’s here? Okay, listen to me, Deputy. Your sheriff is in a world of danger. You need to get him help as quick as you can. I’m headed to him now. Where is the meet happening?”

  Jim narrowed his eyes. The way she spoke now, the earnestness was still there. He wanted to believe her, what she was saying.

  “Who are you?” Jim asked. “And why should I trust you, if all you been saying to me is put on?”

  “I’m here to help.” Kitty took Jim by the shoulders. “And yes, some of what I said was lying, but most of it wasn’t—those are the best lies, the ones with truth in them. And I swear on my baby and my husband’s graves that if you don’t help me get to Jon Highfather, he’s going to die. He has no idea what Vellas is and what he’s capable of. I do. Where are they, Jim?”

  Jim looked into her eyes. They had changed, but at the core of them she was still the same woman with whom he had felt such an immediate connection. The distrustful part of his brain, which on occasion he called his “Mutt brain,” whispered that she had fooled him once with her seemingly endless sincerity, and she could be doing it again. But Jim decided he couldn’t risk the sheriff’s life on that.

  “West slope of Argent,” he said. “Old prospector’s shack near Backtrail Road. Sunset.”

  “Thank you, Jim,” she said and started to sprint from the room. Jim grabbed her arm; they were both surprised at how firm his grasp was.

  “Hold it,” he said. His voice was much deeper and more forceful than he imagined he could be. “Now you answer my question that you fancy-danced all over. Molly James.”

  A newfound appreciation and respect showed in Kitty’s eyes. “Molly was freelancing for the Nail—Niall Devlin—behind Ham and the Scholar’s back.”

  “Devlin? That sidewinder up at the mining camp? He’s mixed up in everything dirty.”

  Yes,” Kitty said. “The Nail has been stealing away some of Bick’s girls and getting them to work for him up at the camp. She was working away from the house last night, without any backup. Now hurry up, Jim! Time’s wasting.”

  She ran off toward the back of the Roost and up a narrow flight of stairs. Jim watched her ascend and rubbed his hair and then shook his head.

  Madam Ham came back, looking troubled. “Deputy, I’m sorry. I have some business I need to address. Might we talk again tomorrow?”

  “That will be fine, ma’am. I actually need to run myself. I’ll be back in touch.”

  “She wasn’t troubling you, was she?” Ham asked. “Kitty? I’ve had a bad feeling about that girl since she came to us a few months back.”

  “No, ma’am, she was fine. Just keeping me company for a spell,” Jim said. “Now if you’ll excuse me, please. Sheriff needs me.”

  Jim opened the ornate front door to the Dove’s Roost and was halfway off the porch when he was suddenly grabbed and spun about. It was Becky, she of the yellow ribbons, the girl Jim and Mutt had rescued last night from the Elysium’s dining room and the goat-sucking creature. She hugged Jim fiercely.

  “Oh, Deputy Jim,” Becky said. “The girls told me you were here to help us, to find who killed poor Molly. You are a good man, Jim Negrey.”

  She pulled him closer and Jim’s arm just slid around her waist, like it was supposed to, like it had a mind all its own.

  “You are my hero,” Becky said, and kissed him softly on the cheek. “Come visit me.”

  Then, as quickly as she had grabbed him, she was gone back into the house and Jim could hear the laughter of the girls that greeted Becky.

  Jim stood, looked back at the closed door and then turned toward the street. Constance Stapleton, Maude’s daughter, was standing near the edge of Bick Street, about twenty feet away from him, a wicker basket of laundry on her hip.

  Jim had first noticed Constance in the days after the horrible events of last year—the plague of the Wurm. Constance had been tending to the ill, helping with the bereaved of the dead. She was beautiful. The devil would dance in her wide, dark brown eyes, a wicked intelligence and humor, but there was a wisdom and a sadness in the darkness as well. Her mouth was small but she had full lips and an almost demi-smirk most of the time, like she knew a joke you didn’t. She had thick lashes and expressive arched eyebrows. Her skin was pale and perfect, like fine china, and her thick, straight, long brown hair fell below her shoulders, pulled back into a simple ponytail. Jim had been trying to get up the nerve to talk to her for months. They saw each other often, but neither seemed to find the ability to cross the gulf and say more than just hello. Now, Constance had that slightly amused look on her face and one raised eyebrow.

  “It’s not…,” Jim stammered, jabbing a thumb back toward the door. “I wasn’t … I … Official business.”

  “Mmmhhhmm,” Constance said, her smile widening at the deputy’s blush and discomfort. “She sure looks like she could conduct official business.” Constance walked up Bick Street toward Prosperity. Jim watched her go, still flustered. Constance stopped and looked back at him. They both looked away quickly.

  Jim whistled and rubbed his face. He suddenly snapped his fingers.

  “Sheriff!” he exclaimed to no one and ran off in the direction of the jail. The sun was a red-lidded eye, slow
ly closing in the west. If Kitty Warren were telling the truth, when it closed, it could spell the end of Jon Highfather’s life.

  Justice

  The approaching night’s cold crept up the ridge of Argent Mountain, settling into the ground and the stones, as the sun retreated behind the distant mountains. Jon Highfather’s legs were cramping from his hours of sitting in wait. He had tied his horse, Bright, to a safe spot in the small stand of cottonwoods about a half-mile from the spot where the criminals were to meet.

  A few weeks ago, the Central Pacific Railroad line had got hit by bandits. It was a new kind of crime, robbing a train, but it harkened back to the days of the old highwaymen and their modern descendants, the stagecoach robbers. This, however, was much grander a payoff than any coach. The gunmen had taken over $40,000 in gold off the train.

  Charley Pegg, the sheriff over in Washoe County, had contacted Highfather by telegram that the man responsible for masterminding the train robbery was coming out of hiding and headed toward Golgotha looking for a fresh horse and supplies.

  Highfather aimed to interfere with that transaction.

  The weather had turned, as it often did in Nevada in the late fall. One day would be unseasonably hot, the next day you might find frost on the ground or even snow. The night was turning bitterly cold and Jon wished he had a campfire and a pot of hot coffee. Instead, he had an old army blanket wrapped around him, a loaded 12-gauge short-barrel shotgun, his new Winchester rifle, and his old Colt .44 revolver on his hip. The two rifles rested, propped on his saddlebags to insure that they didn’t swell or jam because of the cold. Mrs. Proctor had prepared him a cold lunch of shaved ham, cheese, some hard bread and a bull’s-eye canteen of water. The remains of the meal resided in his bag.

  He had settled into his hidden roost on the western slope by early afternoon, after tending to his usual daily duties. The site for the criminals’ rendezvous was a rotting abandoned miner shack from the days of Argent’s first boom. It resided a few hundred yards off the narrow rutted path the locals called Backtrail Road—the only road granting access to the Argent Mountain on its western side. Backtrail was also synonymous with dirty deals because it gave parties access to Golgotha without having to ride down any of the primary well-observed roads. It was the outlaw’s preferred entrance and exit point for the town.