The Best Rootin' Tootin' Shootin' Gunslinger in the Whole Damned Galaxy (13 page)

He was the leanest meanest killer of them all!
 

—from “The Ballad of Billybuck Dancer"

 

      
On Pelegoris II, the Dancer faced forty-seven different opponents from that barren world's dominant species of gold-skinned humanoids, disarming each of them without incident. Flint had holographic films taken of the contests, and forwarded them to the next four worlds on their agenda.

      
When the carnival hit Aguella VI, the Dancer began facing his foes three at a time. Again, the performance went off without a hitch, and the demand for tickets was so great that Flint finally negotiated a deal to air a pair of his shows on local video.

      
By the time they touched down on Delta Zeta III, they had international networks bidding for the right to broadcast the notorious gunman's fights.

      
The Dancer responded by facing six Delta Zetans at once, and emerging unscathed, as usual.

      
The small, four-armed green beings inhabiting Klokanni II gave the Dancer the key to their capital city, then requested the right to face him with pistols in two of their hands. He insisted that they use four guns apiece, took on three of them at once, and disarmed them before they could get off more than two shots, both wild.

      
On Leonachim, a hot, humid world circling Pi Delta, he allowed five opponents to hide behind various barriers, took them all on at once, and won the contest before they could fire a single shot.

      
Flint had watched the young sharpshooter continue stacking the odds against himself with a growing sense of unease. Someday the Dancer had to show up for work with a headache or an upset stomach, someday he had to get a cramp in his hand or a cinder in his eye, someday he simply had to miss— but he never did, and so Flint continued to collect the huge amounts of money that entire populaces were shelling out to watch his gladiator in action, and idly wondered if the gravy train would end when the Dancer inadvertently killed an opponent or when the gunslinger himself lay dead on the sawdust floor of the specialty tent.

      
Not that the Dancer was his only problem. The Null-Gravity Ferris Wheel wasn't working properly; two of the Cinbellites had quit with no notice, leaving the games crew shorthanded; Julius Squeezer had come down with something resembling the flu, and wouldn't be able to wrestle for at least a week; Max Bloom's schnauzer, Schnoozle, was slowing down almost as much as his owner; and the officials of Roboden III, where the ship had just touched down, had presented Mr. Ahasuerus with a number of highly restrictive regulations concerning the way the Midway was to be constructed.

      
Even payday, he reflected, was getting to be a problem. Most—but not all— of the crew were content to have the money credited to their accounts. But Diggs insisted on getting his pay in cash every week so he'd have a little something to bet with, Lori and Barbara didn't trust the blue man's computer, Monk and Batman wanted cash so they could continue to spend every last penny of it buying balls at the Bozo cage, and even Stogie preferred hiding his wages in his compartment to leaving them in the carnival's bank.

      
Flint walked out of the ship and stepped into the cool, dry Robodenian air, a number of pay envelopes stuck in his pocket.

      
He found Barbara and Lori setting up their booths, handed them their money, then walked over to where Diggs was screaming in exasperation at one of the robots.

      
“Thaddeus, I want you to fire this bastard!"

      
“We can't fire him,” said Flint. “We
own
him."

      
“Well, have him work somewhere else from now on,” continued Diggs. “Ten worlds in a row, I've told him that this tent takes five goddamned support posts, and ten worlds in a row he keeps using eight."

      
“Big deal."

      
“It's a big deal when we reach the last tent and come up three posts short."

      
“We've got more posts in the ship,” said Flint wearily.

      
“It's the
principle
of the thing!” snapped Diggs. “Either he takes orders from me or he doesn't."

      
“You,” said Flint to the robot. The machine turned and faced him. “Buzz off.” The robot turned on its heel and walked away. “Talk to Mr. Ahasuerus about it,” said Flint to Diggs. “He's in charge of the robots."

      
“Things worked a lot better when
you
were,” said Diggs.

      
“Damn it, Rigger, I can't keep my finger on
everything
!” said Flint irritably. “When we came out here, we had twelve humans and six game booths and nothing else. Now we've got ninety people of various shapes and sizes, and maybe fifty booths. What the hell do you want me to do—drop everything else and spend my whole fucking day giving orders to robots?"

      
“Take it easy, Thaddeus,” said Diggs, startled by Flint's outburst. “I'm mad at the robots, not at you."

      
“Just keep it that way,” said Flint. He withdrew an envelope, checked the name on it, and handed it over to Diggs. “Here's your pay.” He paused.

      
“Should I hand Jiminy's over to you, too?"

      
Diggs smiled. “Nope. I'm all through gambling with him."

      
“Don't tell me he beat you?"

      
“No. But he's making so much money selling snake oil that I want to keep him happy."

      
“Yeah. The skeleton told me he was doing pretty good."

      
“He's a born con man, Thaddeus,” said Diggs. “I haven't heard someone with a line of gab like his since the old days, back when you were barking for the meat show."

      
Flint stared at the distant horizon. “I
was
pretty goddamned good, wasn't I?” he said wistfully.

      
“The best,” agreed Diggs.

      
He stared off into the distance for another moment, then turned back to Diggs. “That was a million years and a trillion miles ago."

      
“It doesn't alter the fact that you were the best of them all,” said Diggs. “But this Jiminy Cricket, now, he's no slouch either. I think if we ever run out of junk for him to hawk, I'll stick him in a Psychic game, or maybe let him run an auction scam.” He looked out across the Midway and saw Tojo laboriously walking toward them. “Good afternoon,” he said pleasantly. “Don't tell me
you've
joined the ranks of people who don't trust the carny's bank?"

      
“Okay, he won't tell you,” said Flint. He turned to Tojo. “What's up?"

      
“I think we've got another little problem with the Dancer,” stammered the hunchback.

      
“What is it
this
time?” demanded Flint.

      
“He wants to face five Robodenians at once, and—"

      
“He's taken on five at a time before,” interrupted Flint.

      
“But he wants to do it with just three bullets,” said Tojo.

      
“He may be crazy, but he can count,” said Flint. “What's the catch?"

      
“He says he'll use two knives."

      
“In a pig's asshole he will!” exploded Flint. “If any of those bastards can shoot straight, he's going to be dead before he pulls either knife. And even if they can't shoot, how the hell do you knock a gun out of a man's hand with a knife? For all we know, Robodenians are chronic hemophiliacs.” He shook his head, stared at the ground, and spat on it. “What the hell's the matter with him, anyway? If he's so goddamned set on committing suicide, why doesn't he just put his gun against his head and pull the trigger?"

      
“I don't think he wants to die, Thaddeus,” offered Tojo. “I don't think he can even conceive of himself dying."

      
“Then what is it?"

      
“He wants to prove that he's the best,” continued the hunchback. “He sits in his room and stares at pictures of Doc Holliday and Billy the Kid and Bat Masterson all day and all night, and he feels cheated because he never gets to prove himself in a gunfight."

      
“What are you talking about?” said Flint. “He proves himself every night."

      
“More to the point,” added Diggs, “he does it under conditions that none of his heroes ever faced. They went out to kill or be killed; he goes out to
disarm
or be killed."

      
“Yes,” admitted Tojo. “But he does it because no one has ever presented a real challenge to him, so he keeps trying to even the odds."

      
“I don't understand a man like that,” said Diggs. “He's got money, he's got fame, he could have any woman in the show he wanted—no offense, Thaddeus, but it's the truth—and he sits around and mopes because he's not shooting it out with Billy the Kid."

      
“Sometimes it takes more than sex and money to make a man happy,” said Flint.

      
“I can't imagine why,” replied Diggs.

      
“Be that as it may,” said Flint, turning back to Tojo, “you tell him that he walks into the ring with six shells in each pistol or he doesn't walk into the ring at all. You got that?"

      
“Yes, Thaddeus.” The little hunchback sighed. “I feel so sorry for him."

      
“Because he's not allowed to go on a killing spree?” asked Diggs sarcastically.

      
“That was a pretty stupid thing to say, even for you, Rigger,” said Flint.

      
“Weren't
you
the one who was bitching because he's crazy?” demanded Diggs defensively.

      
“Yeah. But that doesn't mean I don't feel sorry for him too—when I'm not wishing he was someone else."

      
“Well, that's a new one!” laughed Diggs. “Thaddeus Flint with feelings. God must have dropped everything else He was doing to come up with that one!"

      
Flint glared at him silently for a moment, then turned back to Tojo. “Tell him what I said."

      
“I will, Thaddeus,” replied the hunchback, heading off toward the ship.

      
“Three bullets and a pair of knives,” mused Diggs as he watched Tojo walk away. “Do you think he'd have won?"

      
“In a walk,” said Flint. He began walking over to the Bozo cage, stopped off long enough to give Stogie his pay, and was soon standing next to Monk and Batman as they erected the huge chainlink enclosure. “Payday,” he announced, handing an envelope to the winged Sabellian. “Don't spend it all in one place,” he added sardonically.

      
“Got mine too?” asked Monk, taking his shirt off and mopping his face with it.

      
“Yeah,” said Flint, handing it over. “You look a little short of breath, Jupiter."

      
“I'm getting a little old for this,” panted Monk.

      
“Then why not have the robots do it?"

      
“Don't trust 'em,” said Monk. “Besides, it's the only exercise I get."

      
“Except for throwing balls and falling into the water,” remarked Flint.

      
“That's not exercise,” replied Monk. “That's business."

      
“A subtle distinction.” Flint lit a cigarette and offered one to Monk, who refused it and instead pulled a cigar out of his shirt pocket. “Did the galley robots make that?"

      
Monk nodded. “Same shitty tobacco as your cigarettes, but this way I remember not to inhale it."

      
“Take a five-minute break while you're smoking it, Jupiter."

      
“Any particular reason?"

      
“We're going to have a little talk."

      
“If it's about that fight in the gymnasium, talk to
him
,” said Monk, jerking a thumb in Batman's direction. “All I was doing was defending myself."

      
“That is a lie,” replied the Sabellian coldly.

      
“It's not about the fight in the gymnasium,” said Flint. He turned to Batman. “Take a walk."

      
“Why should I?"

      
“Because what I want to talk about doesn't concern you."

      
“How do I know that?” demanded the Sabellian.

      
“You don't,” said Flint. “Now, beat it."

      
Monk caught Batman's eye and nodded, and the Sabellian walked off toward the Midway. “Okay, Thaddeus,” said the burly former lion tamer, stroking his long handlebar mustache. “What's on your mind?"