Ralph Compton - Bounty Hunter

“Ah, well, he’s a shy lad an’ no mistake. But he’s gold dust, Sergeant Langford, pure gold dust.”

“And if he’s a sailor, I’m the queen of England,” the big officer said. His cool eyes fell on Tone. “A week ago, probably in the late afternoon or the early evening, three men were shot to death down by the Pacific Street docks. Would you know anything about that?”

“He’s been here in his room the whole week, Sergeant, quietly a-reading his Bible an’ thinking pious thoughts, God bless him,” Hogg said, smiling at Tone like a pleased parent.

“You do answer his questions for him, don’t you?” Langford looked at Tone again. “Do you know anything about that?”

Tone caught Hogg’s imperceptible shake of his head. He shrugged. “Not a thing, Sergeant.”

“The man who killed those men knew how to use a gun exceptionally well,” Langford said. “I’ve been a police officer for a long time, Mr. Tone, and to me, you look like a man who can use a gun exceptionally well.”

“I get by,” Tone said.

“Uh-huh,” the big cop said. He lifted his nose and sniffed. “You’ve had a woman in here. Was she reading the Bible with you?”

“Instruction,” Hogg said quickly. “Mr. Tone was instructing a poor fallen woman, as you so rightly observed, on the Christian virtues.”

“Hogg,” Langford said, “don’t answer another question for Mr. Tone.” His face hardened. “Not one.” And to Tone: “Is that right? You were instructing a whore on the finer points of Christianity?”

Tone’s expression did not change. “I was instructing her, yes.”

Langford looked around the room. “Where’s your Bible?”

“The poor soul took it with her,” Hogg said. “She was that grateful, like.”

Hogg saw Langford’s scowl and said quickly, “Beggin’ the sergeant’s pardon, but I’m just so happy when I see a sinner return to the good Lord.”

“Then maybe you should practice what you preach, Hogg,” the cop said. He got down on one knee, then looked up at the two other men. “Did either of you search him for identification?”

“Not us,” Hogg said.

Langford went through the dead man’s pockets and then hefted five double eagles in the palm of his hand. “Nothing, except this. Same for the one downstairs.” He rose to his feet. “I’m confiscating the money as evidence. I’ll send someone to pick up the bodies.”

“Please do, Sergeant,” Hogg said. “Bless ye, it’s bad for business, having stiffs lying around all over the place.”

“You should know, Hogg,” Langford said. “We’ve carried enough of them out of this dive. As I recall, at least one with your knife between his ribs.”

“Ah yes, all unfortunate circumstances, Sergeant, and no mistake.”

“Mr. Tone, it would be another unfortunate circumstance and a big mistake if you should try to leave San Francisco. We have more talking to do, you and me.” His eyes bored into Tone’s. “And I do plan to find out who John Tone is, what he does and where he comes from.”

“He’s just a poor sailorman, to be sure,” Hogg said, smiling.

“That’s the one thing I know he isn’t,” Langford said. “I have the feeling in my gut that he’s one of Lambert Sprague’s sworn men. I also have a suspicion that a war is brewing along the waterfront, and I don’t intend to let that happen. I may have to break some heads before all this is done.”

For that, Hogg had no answer.

Chapter 8

After the bodies had been taken away and Hogg had had a swamper mop the floor, Tone lay on top of the bed, sleepless in the dead of the echoing night.

The attempt on his life had not been a case of mistaken identity. He had been targeted. But who had given him away? Only Simon Hogg and Luther Penman knew who he was and why he was living on the waterfront, and he trusted both of them implicitly.

Then who?

Tone had no answer for that question and it troubled him deeply.

Restlessly, he rose to his feet and looked out the window. It was four in the morning and the maelstrom of vice and sin that was the Barbary Coast was winding down for the night. Discordant music still came from the Chinese gambling houses where a sailor could rent a thirteen-year-old girl from Canton or Shanghai for a couple of dollars a night or buy her outright as his slave for four hundred, cash on the barrelhead.

A few whores still patrolled the misty street, among them stately Spanish American women in solemn black, wrapped to the eyes in their rebozos, who gave passing men bold, promising glances but said nothing

In a couple of hours the first blue light of dawn would stain the sky over the Contra Costa hills to the east and the whores, Chinamen and sailors would vanish, melting into the day like enchanted villagers, to reappear again only after darkness fell.

Tone moved away from the window, lit the gas lamp and retrieved an oily cloth wrapped around cleaning patches and bore brushes from his carpetbag.

He cleaned and oiled the long-barreled Colt and reloaded five chambers with ammunition he had specially made for him by a Reno gunsmith. The powder charges were slightly less than in regular rounds, but he was willing to give up some hitting power in exchange for reduced recoil.

He laid the revolver on the bedside table and turned out the lamp.

After a while he slept and he dreamed of Molly O’Hara. She was in her father’s pub, but she was wearing a rebozo and he could not see her face.

Daylight was streaming through Tone’s window when he was wakened by a pounding on his door. Instantly alert, a habit of men who live by the gun, he grabbed his Colt and yelled, “Who’s there?”

“Me, Simon Hogg, as ever was.”

Tone told the man to step inside, and when he was certain that his visitor was in fact Hogg, he eased down the hammer of the revolver.

“Damn your eyes, Hogg, what the hell time is it?”

“Beggin’ your pardon, but it’s gone noon and I bring news.”

Tone shook his head. “Coffee first, then your news.”

“Ah, a wise decision, Mr. Tone. Coffee soothes a man’s soul, an’ no mistake.”

The big innkeeper vanished and when he returned after a few minutes he carried in a tray with a coffeepot and a cup.

Tone was sitting at the table, already dressed. He lit a cigar as Hogg passed the steaming cup to him. The man watched anxiously as the level in the cup lowered; then, when he considered Tone had drunk a sufficient amount, he said tentatively, “Are you ready for my news now?”

Tone nodded. “News away, and be damned to you for getting a man up at this time of the morning.”

“Ah, well, yes, it is early as you say, but my news can’t wait, lay to that.” Hogg rubbed his hairy hands together. “I was speaking to Officer Frank Welsh this morning, he’s one of Sergeant Langford’s right-hand men, you might say, and he claims he knew one of the men you shot last night.” Hogg pointed at the floor. “The one who lay right there, a-coughing up his liver, poor soul.”

Now, despite his irritation, Tone was interested. “Who was he?”

Happy to be the center of attraction, Hogg beamed. “His name was Mason Tucker.”

The name came as such a shock to Tone that he almost dropped his cup. “You mean Mason Tucker, the El Paso gunfighter?”

“That’s what Frank Welsh says.”

“How would he know?”

“Frank was a deputy sheriff in El Paso before he quit and signed on with the San Francisco police. He says when he saw Tucker’s body he recognized him right off.”

Lost in thought, Tone absently refilled his cup. Mason Tucker had been a named man, a gunfighter who had killed more than his share, and his services didn’t come cheap. The hundred dollars Langford had found in the man’s pocket was probably a down payment on his fee, the balance to be paid when the job was done and Tone was dead.