Ralph Compton - Bounty Hunter

Langford came into the room, and Muldoon said, “First Willie Sullivan, now your sailor. It would seem that Sprague is covering his tracks well.” He looked at the sergeant and said, without pushing too hard, “One might wish that you’d guarded Evans a little better.”

Langford nodded miserably but said nothing.

“Well, what’s done is done.” Muldoon sighed. “I’ll send a detective and later have the body picked up.” He smiled, unwilling to sting the sergeant again. “We’re making quite a habit of this, are we not? I must remember never to spend the night here.”

Langford was not to be cajoled, prodded or coaxed into a lighter mood. A perceptive man, the inspector put a hand on his sergeant’s shoulder. “Don’t feel bad, Thomas. We’re dealing with powerful enemies, and perhaps”—Muldoon struggled to find the right words—“with forces beyond our understanding.”

Seeing the confusion on Langford’s face, he said, “I walked on your bedroom floor, and every board of it creaks and groans. How could a man as heavy as Blind Jack walk on that noisy floor without alerting Mr. Tone?”

Langford shrugged. “He’s light on his feet, I guess.”

“Yes, that’s a possibility.” Muldoon frowned, carefully weighing his words. “Or like the rest of Sprague’s bunch, he’s in league with the devil.”

Tone smiled. “I believe I’ll go with light on his feet, Inspector.”

Muldoon nodded. “As you wish. But a man doesn’t serve twenty years as a police officer in San Francisco without seeing things, evil things, that he can’t explain. That creaking floor is one of them.”

“Maybe I’m in league with Blind Jack,” Tone said. “That would explain it. After all, I was here alone.”

“I’ve considered that already, Mr. Tone,” Muldoon said. “I sense recklessness in you, a distant, cold reserve, an inclination to violence certainly, but not evil.”

Tone made a little bow. “You flatter me, Inspector.”

“None of what I said was meant as a compliment, Mr. Tone.”

Muldoon stepped to the bedroom door. “I’ll be leaving now, Sergeant Langford,” he said. “I’m sure you wish to return to your duties. Tone can handle things here.”

After Muldoon left, Langford smiled at Tone. “Recklessness, violence . . . if only he knew what tomorrow night has in store.”

Tone returned the sergeant’s grin. “I wonder if I can drop the devil with a .38.”

Chapter 33

Bandy Evans’ body had been removed and Tone was alone in the house.

As the wind hustled around the eaves of the old building he closed his eyes and remembered a cleaner wind, in a more beautiful place. He saw a sea of long grass, swaying gracefully, first one way, then the other, a dance to commemorate the hushed stillness of a prairie that was never still. In the distance, where the lightning gathered, the blue mountains shouldered against the sky and the morning smelled fresh, coming in clean on the breeze, like the first day of creation.

Tone felt a sudden sharp pang of longing for the western lands, where a man could sit his horse and look out and see forever and wonder about his God, who had shaped indifferent matter into such glorious beauty.

His eyes blinked open and he returned to Langford’s shabby kitchen and the lingering smell of violent death and its somber handmaiden, the sense of evil that hung in the air like a foul mist.

Tone rose to his feet, coffee cup in hand, and pushed open the window, staring into a night as black as coal, spangled not with stars but with the distant lights of the waterfront.

He turned as three sharp raps beat on the front door. He laid down his cup and slid a revolver from the holsters hung on the back of a chair.

Gun in hand, he stood at the closed door and asked, “Who is there?”

“My name is Lizzie Granger, like that means anything to you.”

Without dropping his guard, Tone opened the door.

“Don’t look so surprised, Mr. Tone,” the woman said. “You’re not getting lucky. I’m here to deliver this.”

She was small and dark-haired, and possessed pretty brown eyes that peered out from under the brim of a straw boater that was perched atop her curls. She was holding out a long envelope.

Tone took the envelope and saw his name on the front, written in a woman’s hand. “Who gave you this?” he asked.

The girl had an impudent grin. “She didn’t tell me her name. She just gave me the envelope and told me where to deliver it. ‘Give it to Mr. Tone, and no one else,’ she said. I figure you have to be Mr. Tone. You look the kind who would know a fancy-got-up lady like her.”

The girl waved. “So long, Mr. Tone.” Then she turned and walked quickly into the night.

Tone waited until the click-clack of the girl’s heels faded before he closed and locked the door and stepped back to the kitchen.

He laid the envelope on the table, then poured himself more coffee. He sat and for a few moments turned the envelope over in his hands. It had probably come from Chastity Christian, perhaps a plea from a lady in distress, designed to lure him into a trap.

Well, there was one way to find out.

Tone opened the envelope.

It contained a single page torn from a Bible. Drawn in black ink on the page was a skull and crossbones, and under that, his name.

Sprague had passed sentence. It was John Tone’s time to die.

Tone rose, strapped on his shoulder holsters, and got himself a cigar. He sat at the table again and smoked, thinking.

Langford’s house was now a death trap. He couldn’t cover the door and every window and the idea of forting up inside a bedroom did not appeal to him. It would take away his freedom of movement.

How many would Sprague send? He knew the answer to that: enough.

And it was only a matter of time before they came calling.

Tone got to his feet and shrugged into his peacoat. He left the page on the table where Langford would see it, then stepped to the back door, a revolver in his hand. The door, badly in need of oil, opened with a loud creak and Tone froze, listening into the night.

He heard nothing but the wind prowling like a cougar among the trees. There were shadows everywhere, dark, mysterious and dangerous, that could suddenly band together and become the shapes of men.

His heartbeat thudding in his ears, Tone followed pavers toward a low picket fence at the rear of the yard.

Even in the gloom, he saw that the garden was well tended, planted with a large variety of desert blossoms and shrubs, bordered by yarrow, iris and red and yellow lupine.

Langford, a hard, unrelenting man who was exposed daily to the filth, degradation and violence of the waterfront, obviously spent time among the flowers for the good of his soul.

Stepping over the fence, Tone found himself in another yard. He melted into the shadows next to a garden shed as he heard roars of anger from the house, followed by the thud of boots and the crash of slamming doors.

Tone smiled slightly. Sprague’s gentlemen of fortune had left it too late and were now stumbling around in the dark house, palpitating in every pulse with rage, as they blamed each other for their tardiness.

Getting down on one knee, blanketed by darkness, Tone drew both his guns. No longer the prey, he was now the hunter. His breath coming fast, he watched the house . . . and waited.

Slow minutes ticked by, and then, one by one, rectangles of light appeared in the windows. Tone allowed himself another smile. The idiots were lighting the gas lamps!

A fine rain started to fall and the wind bustled. There was no moon, no stars, only a gunmetal sky that stretched away on all sides forever.

The back door creaked open.

Tone held his breath. A man appeared and was briefly silhouetted against the light of the kitchen. He let the door close behind him and stepped onto the paver path. The iron blade of the cutlass in his right hand gleamed as he walked warily toward the fence.