Kill or Die (22 page)

Brewster Ritter stood by his saddled horse under a pale blue sky and said to Charlie Crowhurst, “I'll ride over to the swamp and see if there's anything worth salvaging. The big ripsaws got struck by lightning but maybe they can repaired.”

Crowhurst, always a sour-faced man, looked troubled. “Brewster, the bank”—he looked around him—“is broke. When I liquidate I'll be able to pay twenty cents on the dollar, if that.”

“And get yourself lynched,” Ritter said. “Just hang on. We'll get the logs rolling again very soon.”

“That's impossible,” Crowhurst said. “We'll need to hire loggers, replace the freight wagons and draft horses, get the saws up and running . . . all that takes money.”

“There's always Simon Luke. He told Mathias Cobb that he'd buy all the cypress logs we can send him. I think he might agree to put up money in return for a lower price.”

“Do you think he'll bite?”

“I'll wire him when I get back and we'll take it from there. In the meantime you sit tight and keep your head, Charlie. This thing isn't over yet and it won't be until, from here to New Orleans, every damned cypress in the swamp is cut.”

“Talk is cheap, Brewster. Cutting trees isn't,” Crowhurst said.

Ritter swung into the saddle and then said, “Unlike Cobb I can get things done.” He opened his coat and showed the Colt in a shoulder holster. “And I'll kill anybody who gets in my way. That includes you, Charlie.”

“Are you threatening me, Brewster?” Crowhurst said.

Ritter, small, stocky and mean as a caged cougar, smiled and said, “I sure am, Charlie. I sure am.”

 

 

The logging site was what Ritter expected, a wasteland of flooded ground and scattered wreckage. The great steam saws stood in water but had no visible damage. Ritter dismounted and inspected them closely. He was not an engineer but it looked to him that they could be salvaged. Everything else was wrecked. Even the steam launch that had so recently terrified the swamp dwellers lay on its side, its boiler, furnace and yards of copper and brass pipes spilled into mud like the guts of a savaged animal.

Ritter walked to the edge of the swamp. It looked surprisingly serene in the morning mist and apart from the stumps of the already sawn cypress revealed no damage. Ritter smiled. All that would change when the lumber operation began again. He was about to go back to his horse when he caught movement out of the corner of his eye.

A canoe, a woman paddling at the stern, had emerged from the mist. She stopped, leaned over the side and picked up a dripping piece of canvas. She made a face and dropped it into the bottom of the pirogue.

Ritter recognized her as the woman who'd been with the Indians during the attack on the camp. She wore a tight corset over a white shirt and a long black skirt. She had fingerless leather gloves on her hands and wore a shiny black top hat.

She was an enemy and Ritter saw no reason why he shouldn't enjoy her before he killed her.

He drew his Colt and fired a round into the water inches from the prow of the canoe. Evangeline turned and Ritter saw recognition in her eyes. “Bring that scow over here, lady, or the next shot scatters your brains,” he said. Ritter's next bullet knocked the top hat off Evangeline's head. “That's the only chance you get.”

Evangeline accepted the inevitable and paddled to the swamp's edge. She hiked her skirt up as she climbed out of the canoe and onto drier land.

“Come here,” Ritter said. “Come slow.”

“Mister, I know what you want,” Evangeline said.

“Well, that makes it easier, doesn't it?” Ritter said. The woman's perfume filled his head and he studied the swell of her breasts above the corset.

“You're name is Brewster Ritter and you always get what you want, don't you?”

“That's right, little lady. And now I want you.”

“Suppose I say you can't have me?”

“What you say doesn't matter a damn. I take what I want.”

“You didn't get the swamp,” Evangeline said.

“But I'll get it eventually,” Ritter said. “Now, enough talk. Get over here and lie down. Over there on the grass will do.”

Evangeline said, “Now you'll die like all the rest, Ritter. And like Mathias Cobb you'll die screaming.”

The man's face changed from grin to grimace. “What the hell are you talking about?”

“Behind you. His name is Basilisk and for as long as I'm alive he's my protector.”

Ritter would normally have dismissed that as an old trick that no one fell for any longer, but he read something in Evangeline's eyes that scared him. He swung around and got a shot off before the monster was on him. Screaming, shrieking, screeching, Ritter hung from the alligator's jaws as Basilisk dragged him to the swamp. For a moment his terrified eyes turned on Evangeline, but she watched impassively as Ritter died a more terrible but mercifully quicker death than Cobb.

Basilisk was not to be trusted. Having removed a danger to Evangeline he might decide to then go after her.

She hurried to her canoe, scrambled inside and paddled away from the churning, scarlet water that marked Ritter's death throes.

Unlike the debris from the storm, Basilisk would not leave enough of Ritter to untidy the swamp.

As he'd done so many times in the past, Sam Flintlock scratched the word
FLINTLOCK
on the wall of his cell. “O'Hara, you want your name up here?” he said.

“If it's all the same to you, Sammy, I'll pass.”

Flintlock stepped down from his bunk and said, “What did that lawyer feller mean when he talked about bank robbery being a hanging offense in Austin?”

“He was just blowing smoke, Sam,” O'Hara said.

“I don't know about that. He had sneaky eyes.”

“You can't become a lawyer unless you have sneaky eyes,” O'Hara said. “Everybody knows that.”

“Before now I never heard of a man getting hung for bank robbery,” Flintlock said. “Hell, one time I saw a man get hung for being a damned nuisance, but I never saw one get stretched for robbing a bank.”

“He was blowing smoke, that lawyer, Sammy, all gurgle and no guts.”

A key clanked in the cell's iron lock and a Ranger stepped inside. “You boys come with me,” he said.

“You can't hang us,” O'Hara said. “We haven't had a trial yet.”

“Come with me,” the Ranger said.

Flintlock and O'Hara were led outside to a stone wall that stood by itself in the middle of the exercise yard. The wall was about ten foot high and thirty foot long. Two buckets of whitewash and couple of brushes stood at its base.

“I want that wall whitewashed on both sides,” the Ranger said. “We got important visitors coming soon and want the place looking nice.”

“It's a jail,” Flintlock said. “You can't make a jail look nice.”

“Then do your best,” the Ranger said. He carried a Winchester and wore a belt gun, and his gray eyes were as hard as chipped flint.

“See, what you don't understand, Ranger—”

“Smith.”

“Is that Sergeant Box told us we'd get a cushy job in jail while we wait for our trial, Ranger Smith,” Flintlock said.

The Ranger nodded. “Yeah, I know all about that. This is a cushy job, or would you rather clean out the outhouses?”

“We'll whitewash the wall,” O'Hara said.

“Thought you might,” Ranger Smith said.

 

 

At first Flintlock thought that the deserted yard might hold opportunities for escape, but a Ranger with a white beard down to his belt buckle carried out a chair, a yellow parasol and a Greener shotgun. He sat in the chair, opened the parasol above his head and laid the scattergun across his knees. He then lit his pipe and from behind a cloud of smoke said, “Carry on, boys.”

“The whole wall?” Flintlock said.

“Yup. Both sides. And after it's done you'll get supper.”

“This will take all damned day,” Flintlock said.

“Then you'd better get started,” the Ranger said.

“And suppose I don't want to?” Flintlock said, irritated.

“Well, under those circumstance I reckon a barrel of birdshot up the ass would make you change your tune right sharpish,” the Ranger said. He stared at the glowing coals in his pipe. “It sure as hell would me.”

O'Hara said, “You fit Comanches, didn't you?”

“Yes, son, I certainly did.”

“They rubbed off on you,” O'Hara said. He picked up his bucket and brush. “Let's get to work, Sammy,” he said.

Flintlock did the same and then said, “I've run across some mean jaspers in my day, but there's nothing meaner than a Texas Ranger with a scattergun.”

“And that's a natural fact, son,” the old Ranger said. He adjusted the angle of his parasol and said, “Seems like we're in for a hot one.”

 

 

Sam Flintlock and O'Hara looked like a couple of ghosts as they stood at dusk in the jailhouse yard covered from head to toe in whitewash.

“Damn it, we could have finished the last few feet of the damned wall tomorrow,” Flintlock said.

“Yup, you could have,” the old Ranger said. “But my orders was to make sure you finished all of it.” He waved a hand to the two skinny black men who'd carried a couple of buckets of water and some rags. “This here is Cyrus and Maxwell. They're serving ten days for being drunk and disorderly. They'll help get you cleaned up.”

“Well, let's get it done,” Flintlock said. “I'm hungry for supper.”

“Too late fer supper, sonny,” the Ranger said. “But you'll get a nice early breakfast.”

Flintlock opened his mouth to object but Cyrus threw a bucket of water over his head and began to scrub him with a rag that felt like a roll of barbed wire.

 

 

Sam Flintlock lay in the dark cell with his hands locked behind his head and said, “For the first time in my life I feel like a prisoner.”

“Me too,” O'Hara said. “And we haven't even been found guilty yet.”

“You think we'll be found guilty?”

“Of course we will, Sammy. We've got nobody to give evidence on our behalf. Ritter and that bank manager feller will put our heads in a noose.”

“What about me saving the Ranger's life? That's got to count for something.”

“Sure it will. The judge will call you a real stout fellow and true blue and take two years off your twenty-five-year sentence.”

“All right, then we have to find some way to escape,” Flintlock said. “We'll break out of here and make our way to the Arizona Territory.”

“Without horses?”

“We'll have to steal back our own.”

“From the Texas Rangers?” O'Hara said. “You're dreaming.”

“Damn it all, O'Hara, you've got to be the most depressing Injun I ever met.”

“Go to sleep, Sammy,” O'Hara said.

“Hell, we'll have twenty-five years to sleep,” Flintlock said.

“I'll have twenty-five, you'll only have twenty-three,” O'Hara said.

“Maybe when we get to Huntsville we can dig a tunnel,” Flintlock said.

But O'Hara made no answer. He was already asleep, or pretending to be.

United States Senator Jeffrey Boatwright watched nervously as his new Rapide steam car was unloaded from his private train. Beside him and equally nervous, Evangeline and Cornelius shouted advice to the six laborers who eased the automobile down the ramp from the flatcar.

Finally, to everyone's relief, the Rapide reached solid ground unharmed. Boatwright, at considerable risk, had lit the boiler while the train was still in motion and by the time it reached Budville the steam car was ready to go.

Designed by Amédée Bollée of Le Mans, the boiler was mounted behind the passenger compartment with the engine at the front of the vehicle, driving the differential through a shaft with chain drive to the rear wheels. The driver sat behind the engine and steered by means of a wheel mounted on a vertical shaft.

Everyone who set eyes on the Rapide declared it was a wonderful machine and Senator Boatwright confidently predicted that all horse-drawn vehicles would be obsolete by the year 1900, replaced by steam cars.

Boatwright, a distinguished-looking man who bore more than a passing resemblance to Andrew Jackson, encouraged that comparison by his thick mane of white hair and lofty stature. Like Cornelius he wore a cream-colored motoring coat, trimmed at the lapels and pockets with tan leather. A large floppy cap, goggles above the brim, and a pair of English riding boots completed his attire. Evangeline wore the same type of coat but her headwear was a broad-brimmed straw hat held in place by a white chiffon scarf that tied under her chin. She wore high-heeled ankle boots and carried a parasol. The fourth car passenger was a little cock sparrow of a man wearing a brown tailcoat and a bowler hat of the same color. He was afflicted by a permanent head cold, and a pair of pince-nez perched at the tip of his red nose. Despite his unprepossessing appearance, Lucas Bardwell was one of the federal government's top accountants, and his evidence had helped put the head of the notorious swindler and wife murderer Reverend Hugh Lowe into a noose.

Bardwell was a bloodless, prying, tenacious little man with no friends and no known vices except for the occasional pinch of snuff. He made a bad enemy.

“Well, shall we drive to the bank?” Senator Boatwright said. “Yes, I think so. The day is too hot for walking. All aboard!”

Evangeline settled into the front seat beside Boatwright and Cornelius and Bardwell climbed into the rear. The Rapide lurched into motion and the senator yelled above the racket of the chain drive, “Mr. Cornelius, do those fellows look like Texas Rangers to you?”

Cornelius peered through his goggles and saw two tall, lanky men with big mustaches standing beside their horses outside the bank. Each carried a belted Colt and a Winchester rifle. At that time in the West Rangers didn't wear a star, but they were unmistakably lawmen.

“That would be my guess, Senator,” Cornelius said.

“Good, excellent,” Boatwright said. “One can always depend on the Texas Rangers. That's what I always say. What do you say, Miss Evangeline? Good, I knew you'd agree with me.”

Boatwright braked the Rapide to a steaming, hissing halt and said, “Everyone out.” And then to Evangeline, “But not you, my dear. I myself will assist you to alight.”

As the senator helped Evangeline onto the dusty road one of the tall men approached him and said, “Senator Boatwright?”

“Indeed, I am He,” the politician said, managing to put an uppercase on the
h
by tone alone.

“Name's Sergeant Box and this here is Ranger Clover. We were sent here to make an arrest.”

“Indeed you were, my stalwart, steadfast sons of the Frontier Battalion. And there will be work for you to do ere this day is done, I'll be bound. This gentleman here is Mr. Lucas Bardwell, accountant, you will stay near him at all times lest there be desperadoes at hand.”

Box said, “Howdy,” and Boatwright said, “These young friends of mine are Miz Evangeline and her husband, Mr. Cornelius.” He placed a hand on Cornelius's shoulder. “This is the gallant who saved the life of President Grant, and although we can't see it, the golden wreath of hero encircles his noble head. But more of that later. Mr. Bardwell, shall we step into the breach and be damned to the cannon fire?”

Bardwell settled his pince-nez onto his little beak of a nose and produced a steel pen from his pocket. “The pen is mightier than the sword, Senator.”

“Yes, yes, indeed it is, well said. Ho, you there, boy! Yes you, the urchin with the bare feet. Guard this car well and when I come out of the bank I'll give you two bits.”

“Sure, mister,” the boy said. “But I ain't gonna guard that thing too close. It looks like it's gettin' ready to blow us all to kingdom come.”

“What a disagreeable child,” Boatwright said to Sergeant Box as they entered the bank. “Thanks to our magnanimous government the poorer classes are now able to buy butcher's meat, and that has been their undoing.”

 

 

“The assets of this bank will not cover the amount of deposits,” Lucas Bardwell said. “There's in excess of fifty thousand dollars of customers' money unaccounted for, Mr. Crowhurst. In short, your books are a disgrace.”

“There was the bank robbery . . .” the manager said. His Adam's apple bobbed in his throat.

“Ten thousand dollars that was returned to you. Where was it entered in the ledgers? I don't see it.”

“When Mr. Ritter gets back he can explain everything. You see, he borrowed money from Mr. Cobb for a logging operation that was destroyed in the recent storm. I'm sure Mr. Ritter plans to replace the fifty thousand he borrowed.”

“Where is this Mr. Ritter?” Bardwell said.

“He's dead,” Evangeline said. “The same alligator that killed Cobb also killed Ritter. That speaks well of the reptile's sense of justice, but not its palate.”

Crowhurst was stunned and held on to the corner of a desk for support. “Ritter . . . is . . . dead?”

“I'm afraid so,” Evangeline said. “The alligator carried his body into the swamp.”

“Oh God,” Crowhurst said. He buried his face in his hands. “Oh my God, I am undone.”

“Where is the missing ten thousand dollars?” Bardwell said, an unfeeling, relentless inquisitor.

“Mr. Ritter took it,” Crowhurst said.

“He didn't have it when he tried to rape me,” Evangeline said.

“A terrible ordeal, dear lady,” Boatwright said. “And to see a man die like that . . . horrible.”

“Where is the ten thousand, Mr. Crowhurst?” Bardwell said.

“I don't know. Mr. Ritter may have hidden it somewhere, even buried it.”

“You were a willing accomplice to all this chicanery, Mr. Crowhurst. You and Mathias Cobb walked hand in hand and swindled many people out of their hard-earned money. There is no way this sorry excuse for a bank can cover fifty thousand dollars. Those deposits are lost forever. I warn you, Mr. Crowhurst, you are facing trial and imprisonment.”

“Wait, wait, let me show you something,” Crowhurst said. “It's a letter, a letter from Mr. Cobb that will clear my name.”

“Where is it?” Bardwell said.

“It's in my desk. I'll go get it.”

“Yes, go bring it,” Bardwell said.

The Rangers didn't go with Crowhurst. In their minds he was just a cowed little man and he'd nowhere to run. But they'd made a big mistake.

A couple of moments later a shot rang out. The Rangers hurried into the manager's office and found Crowhurst sitting slumped in his chair, a gun in his hand and a bloody hole in his right temple.

“Killed himself, by God,” Senator Boatwright said, stating the obvious. “Damned lily-livered coward couldn't face the music.”

“He's helped ruin a lot of people in this town,” Lucas Bardwell said. “I have no sympathy for him.”

Sergeant Box said, “Budville will die now. People will move out, trying to restore their fortune elsewhere. I've seen it before after a bank goes broke. Towns just give up the will to survive and pretty soon become ghosts.”

“Let's hope it doesn't happen here,” Senator Boatwright said. “I will assure this fair city that the federal government will do all in its power to help its citizens survive this disaster. What's the name of this burg again?”

“Budville,” Box said.

“Yes. I will pledge on my word of honor that Budville . . . will . . . survive!”

Boatwright frowned. “Unfortunately we have to get back to the train and set out for Austin. But Ranger Box, tell the folks that I will return soon. Tell them that our government never breaks a promise to its citizens. They can depend on that.”