Sliphammer (16 page)

Her eyes were open wide; her breasts lifted and fell with her breath. Her lips were parted, moist and heavy in repose. She wrenched her eyes away, walked quickly to the door, and went.

When it came time to perform, Macklin and Gant did better than he had expected of them. They were like garrison soldiers who only griped when there was nothing better to do. Once the action started, they did fine.

The operation was as simple as it was desperate. Because of its boldness, and because of the strength of the Earps' defenses, Tree gave it a fifty-fifty chance to succeed: the Earps were so well defended that their sentries were less alert than they would have been had the situation seemed precarious. Their complacence was a formidable weakness.

The Earps expected a night raid; because they expected it, they didn't give its success much credence. The Inter Ocean was guarded at every entrance by Cooley's strike-breaker-thugs. Men were posted on the staircase landings, front and back, and two armed guards stood outside the bedroom doors of Wyatt and Warren Earp, covering the corridor between them in cross fire. It had been no great task to leam that; the whole town buzzed with word of the Inter Ocean's fortifications, and while Tree made a point of being visible and nonagres-sive all day Saturday, Macklin and Gant gathered intelligence. Once it became clear that there was no way to get into the Inter Ocean by any ground-floor entrance, and that even if somehow such entrance should be achieved there would still be no way to get upstairs undiscovered, Tree knew he had a good chance. They had made it so difficult for him to get at the Earps that they must believe, by now, that he probably wouldn't even try.

Wyatt and Josie slept in the bedroom of the big second-floor suite at the back corner of the building. Their windows gave out onto gingerbread balconies which overhung alleys at the side and back of the Inter Ocean. Two sentries stood guard in the alley under bright lights. They were expertly posted—too far apart to be taken together, too close to each other to be surprised one at a time. The chance of silencing them simultaneously, to prevent one of them from seeing the other attacked and giving the alarm, was too remote to consider. Nobody was going to get past those two; thus, clearly, nobody was going to climb to the balconies and get in through the windows.

Earp's generalship was excellent. But the world boasted very few impregnable fortresses, and the Inter Ocean had not been designed with the idea in mind of repelling invasion. There was an obvious chink in Earp's defenses—Tree hoped it wasn't so obvious that Earp was waiting for it.

By three in the morning the Saturday night crowds had broken up. Obie Macklin strolled past the front of the Inter Ocean, acting like a drunk on his way home. He peered in the windows as he went by, and ambled the long way around several blocks to report to Tree and Mordecai Gant, who stood in a dim alley at the foot of the two-story Gunnison Bank's fire stairs.

Macklin said in a businesslike tone, “They all gone up to bed. Cooley was makin' the rounds to check on his bully boys. Barkeep was puttin' out the lights when I come by.”

Tree said, “We'll give them forty-five minutes to get to sleep,” and they did.

At the end of that interval the three men went up the bank's outside staircase. Over his shoulder Mordecai Gant carried a heavy ten-foot plank that would have staggered a smaller man. From the landing, Gant gave Tree a boost up onto the roof. Tree flattened himself by the edge and hauled up the plank. Gant boosted Macklin up, then lifted both arms; Tree and Macklin hauled him up by the arms.

The bank's roof was six feet lower than the roof of the Inter Ocean, which stood faintly silhouetted above the far end of the bank roof. An eight-foot alley separated the two buildings.

The night, like most Rocky Mountain nights, was clear and starlit. Tree would have preferred a cloudy night but that might have required a month's wait. The chill air had a bite in it. Tree felt an involuntary tremor. He picked up one end of the ten-foot plank and led the way, crouched to half his normal height, toward the far corner of the roof, with Gant carrying the other end of the plank and Macklin crawling on the right flank with his gun drawn.

There was, of course, a sentry on the roof of the Inter Ocean; that was taken into account. Crossing the roof of the bank, Tree kept his attention riveted to the hotel's roofline, ready to freeze if a man's head appeared. It did not; they crossed the bank without alarms and reached the corner which stood directly opposite the south corner of the back of the Inter Ocean. The Earp suites were up at the farther end of the hotel; the guards would not be watching this end with as much care. Tree sat down, removed his hat and both boots, and lifted his head, carefully to look down into the alley. He had time to glimpse the two sentries, fifty feet apart below the far corner of the hotel under gaslights which stood under the Earps' balconies and threw heavy shadows across the windows above. Obie Macklin suddenly hissed and grabbed Tree's arm. Turning his head slightly, Tree saw the red button-tip of a cigarette on the far roof corner, above the Earps' balconies. View of the balconies themselves would be cut off to that sentry's view by the deep overhanging window cornices. With that man above, and the two alley sentries below, nobody could get onto the balconies from overhead or from underneath; but once a man was on one of the balconies, none of the guards would be able to see him. That was the trick: to reach the balcony without discovery. Tree had considered the idea of a diversionary attack but assumed it wouldn't work. Earp was smart enough to instruct his men to keep their posts. He had discarded the notion in favor of silence and subterfuge.

The cigarette alternately glowed and dimmed on the far corner, six feet above Tree and a hundred feet away down the length of the eight-foot-wide alley. He didn't withdraw his head; he knew the guard with the cigarette couldn't see him against the black mass of the bank roof. The downward angle of the sentry's view would keep Tree invisible unless he stood up to his full height.

The cigarette moved back and forth; the rooftop sentry was pacing. Tree squinted toward him. After a few minutes the cigarette went flicking over the edge of the hotel roof. Wind made it flare angry red; it hit the alley floor in a shower of sparks. The sentry's silhouette, heightened by a tall-domed hat, moved back and forth against the sky with shoulders raised against the chill. Gant whispered in Tree's ear, “Maybe he won't move away again.”

“Maybe he will. We'll give it a few more minutes.”

“Better move now—dawn gonna start to gray up pretty quick.”

“We'll wait.”

“You got balls,” Gant remarked.

That was when the sentry's hat receded. “Move,” Tree breathed. Gant got on the other side of the plank and they slid it out across the alley. Against the dark mass of the mountain beyond, the alley sentries a hundred feet away wouldn't be able to see it. With the long end of the plank hanging in space both Tree and Gant had to use all their weight to keep it level. Macklin put his lesser weight on the tip of the board, behind them. Tree's shoulders and biceps bunched. With a cramped muscular strain they horsed the far end high enough to siide across the top of the balcony rail opposite. The plank was inclined downward from the bank roof at a twenty-degree angle. They slid it forward until it rested snug against the dark frame of the balcony door. It barely reached.

Braced at the lower end, the plank wasn't going anywhere. But too much weight on it would bow it enough to make it fall. It was thirty feet to the ground. Tree cursed silently, wishing he'd brought a plank six inches longer. They'd have to make sure not more than one person at a time had weight on it.

There was no need for conversation. Tree palmed a sliphammer gun in his left hand and crawled out onto the plank. He watched the roofline of the Inter Ocean and he watched the two brightly lit sentries below. The bright light down there was in his favor; it didn't carry this far, but it would make it hard for the sentries to see into the shadows beyond their own circle of light.

He was halfway to the balcony when a fist struck his boot softly. He froze and glanced up, not moving his head. The sentry's hat appeared at the hotel roof, moving slowly from right to left: the sentry was walking a square around the whole building. The hat rose higher as the sentry came closer to the edge. Tree held his breath and curled his thumb over the cut-down six-gun hammer. The sentry stood not more than ten eet away. It was impossible to tell what he was looking at. Blood pounded in Tree's temples. The sentry's head dipped sharply, as if he had seen something, and Tree tensed—there was the brilliant, exploding flash of a match. He saw the sentry's face in the harsh light—one of Cooley's thugs, lighting another cigarette. The match would blind him for quite some time: only a fool lit matches or smoked on night guard—it spoiled night vision. Tree was thankful for fools. After a moment the cigarette moved on toward the farther corner and Tree resumed his crawl.

He stepped down onto the balcony, held up his hand to hold the others back, and moved the plank to one side, pushing it back a few inches toward the bank, lodging the end against the masonry of the doorjamb. It gave them four extra inches and made it far less likely the plank would give way. Then, not waiting for the others, he turned to the end of the balcony and put one sock foot up on the rail.

The balconies across the back of the Inter Ocean were separated by not more than two feet; they ran the length of the second story in a series of scallops. He tested his weight to make sure the wood would not snap and creak, and climbed across to the next balcony, and so on, balcony to balcony, toward Warren Earp's room. There was an armed sentry somewhere above him and two more down below; along these balconies he was in deep shadow—no windows were lighted at this hour; the only thing that could give him away would be noise, and he moved with extreme care, as an Apache would move.

The latch that joined Warren Earp's balcony-doors together was easy prey to his knife blade, which slipped between the doors and lifted the catch soundlessly. He scabbarded the knife and pulled one door open with slow caution. Through the inset windows he could see the mounded shape asleep on the rumpled bed.

The sleeping man had no chance. Tree was versed in a modicum of handholds designed to silence, paralyze, even kill. By the time Warren Earp was awake enough to resist, Tree had thrust a wadded bandanna in his mouth to gag him and had pinned both hands together with a one-hand lock which expertly applied finger and thumb pressure to wrist points so sensitive that struggle produced instant agony—Warren was game but half asleep and gave up fast.

Tree murmured, “Gently, kid. I don't want to put you out.” He tied Warren's hands together with rawhide string and secured the gag with another length; he looked up and saw Obie Macklin's sharp, small silhouette against the open balcony door. Macklin came inside and Tree said, “Get his clothes and take him out.”

Macklin nodded. “Meet you back there. You handle the rest with Mordecai?”

“Yeah. On the move, now.” Tree slipped past him and went out onto the balcony. Gant was there waiting, his big feet like paddles in dark socks. Tree stepped across the space to the big suite's long balcony, gun in hand, looking down; neither of the sentries below him was looking up when he made the crossing.

When Gant came across and there was no outcry, Tree took a deep breath. Gant was looking at him with a glance of strain and anxiety. This one wouldn't be so easy.

Tree was halfway to the bed when something, maybe the legendary eyes in the back of his head, brought Wyatt Earp awake. Tree saw the tiny flicker against the eyeball and knew Earp was awake and watching him—and then, with speed startling in so big a man, Earp's naked body was hurtling toward the chair where his guns hung.

Tree came at him on the run, cracking the sliphammer gun down with full force against Earp's extended forearm. He could tell from the sound that he hadn't broken any bones but it numbed Earp, probably clear to the shoulder, and the arm dropped limp, flapping, and when Earp tried to use the other arm Mordecai Gant had reached the bed and Gant's sharp, whispered words reached starkly across the dimness:

“I'll kill her.”

It made Earp hesitate long enough to look past Tree at Gant. The blade of Gant's knife rested against Josie Earp's throat, silver edge glittering against the pale skin. Josie was awake, swallowing in spasms. In the minimal light Gant's greasy, heavy face looked hooded and satanic.

Gant whispered sibilantly, “You make one more move, friend Arp, or just speak one word loud, and she's dead. Hear?”

Mute, barely concealing his tremendous rage, Wyatt Earp nodded his head once. He straightened up and contented himself with a glare straight against Tree's eyes. Tree thought,
If looks could kill.
He took care when he tied Earp's big hands and fitted the gag into his mouth. Gant trussed Josie, stopped her mouth with a tied bandanna, and went around the room on padding feet to gather up clothes and boots. He wadded them all into a pillowcase, stuck it under his arm and prodded the girl to her feet. Wyatt Earp was stark naked. Josie wore a robe which Gant allowed her to don: Gant's eyes eyed her body hungrily before she put it on, and Tree noted that Gant's lustful attention didn't escape Wyatt Earp's silent notice: Earp was. chalking it up.

It couldn't be helped. Tree said to Earp, “Just do what you're told. You know what I want. Nobody gets hurt unless you force it.” He spoke soft against Earp's ear.

Gant went out first, tugging Josie by the arm. Tree glanced at her briefly. She was looking back at Wyatt. Tree caught on her dimly lighted features, in that briefest unguarded instant, a look of savage satisfaction. It was gone so swiftly he might have imagined it; but the thought grenaded into his mind that she was happy about this. He had seen it before in other women. It irritated a woman to see her man having too much success, having things go too much his own way; it made her uneasy, unsure of her hold over him.