Clay Nash 24 Page 7

He was just under six feet tall but seemed taller: due to his reputation, folk claimed ...

  Marriner swung off Main and into a side street that led to a blacksmith’s forge. The smith was hammering and shaping horseshoes at his anvil but paused when he saw Marriner.

  The smith’s name was Skip Hanna. He had short-cropped hair and it was glistening with sweat as he looked at the lawman then nodded slowly.

  Marriner stepped around the forge and Hanna moved into the deeper shadows at the rear of the shop. He paused, picking up a piece of flat steel and examining it. Under cover of the action, he looked up and down the street, as far as he could see through the open door.

  “Okay, Skip,” he said and the smith tossed a shoe onto a pile of others then hung up his tongs. As he did so, he pulled hard on a large nail hammered into the wall and a section of the rear wall opened in a narrow door.

  Sheriff Marriner slipped through and found himself in a narrow alley. He moved along it to the door of a big building, fronting Main.

  Then he gave a complicated series of knocks. Shortly, the door opened and he stepped swiftly inside.

  He was in the rear of Lonetree’s plushest whorehouse, The Pepper Tree. The bald and scarred-face bouncer who had let him in nodded curtly.

  “Miss Nettleton’s waitin’ for you in the Red Room, Sher’f.”

  “Thanks, Skull.”

  The sheriff didn’t need to be shown the way up a narrow steep stairway that led to a hall above.

  Directly opposite the stairway which had a concealed entrance and exit, was a door painted red. Marriner waited while a pair of whores and a sweat-stained, bearded cowboy staggered into one of the other rooms down the passage, then crossed to the door, turned the knob and entered without knocking.

  It was like walking inside a railway guard’s danger lantern, he thought. Everything was red: even the table lamps had ruby glass chimneys. The velvet on the plush chairs was red, as was the bedspread and its canopy and counterpane. Even the pillows and sheets.

  The only relief was the gold knobs on the bed ends and the polished brass door handles and spittoons.

  The girl who waited in one of the chairs—wearing a red robe—had red hair. Her alabaster skin stood out starkly against the bloody colors.

  She smiled as Marriner walked in and tossed his hat accurately onto one of the bed knobs, unbuckled his buscadero rig and draped it over the end of the bed. Then he began to remove his boots and his clothes.

  The girl watched without interest.

  “Better slow down, Myron,” she said in a husky voice. “When I said I had something special for you, I’m afraid I didn’t mean a new Negro or Chinee gal this time ...”

  Wearing only his trousers, his shirt half removed, the sheriff stopped and his hard face took on a dangerous look.

  “You know better than to play games with me, Laurie Nettleton,” he growled. “You know I won’t hesitate to mark up that face or body of yours. An’ that’ll kinda cramp your style, won’t it?”

  The girl paled even though she tried not to let her fear show. “I run things at the Pepper Tree, Myron. You know the owner can pick and choose.”

  “Not if she makes a fool of me,” he gritted, ripping off his shirt. He shook a finger at her. “You sent for me. I’m here. You deliver.”

  “Of course. I’ll have one of your regulars sent right in—after we conclude our business.”

  He stopped fumbling with his belt and snapped his chill gaze to her face. “Business?”

  Laurie Nettleton smiled faintly. “Said I had something ‘special’. It’s real special. But I need your help.”

  “That’s nothin’ new,” he said curtly. “What you on about?”

  She reached into a pocket of the robe, brought out a crumpled telegram form and held it out to him. Marriner took it and frowned as he read the brief message.

  “On the way. Shell ... What’s special about that message? And who’s Shell?”

  “Only hombre I know called that is Shell Shannon,” the girl told him quietly and her smile widened as she saw the interest show on his face. “We’re old friends. One-time lovers. Fact, I guess if a man like Shell Shannon has any weaknesses at all—I’d have to say that I’m it.”

  “He’s on his way? Here? Is that what the message means?”

  “That’s it. Likely he wants me to hide him out or help get him away. I’ve worked for—the people who sometimes employ his talents. I know the ropes. He’s got half the country looking for him. I’d say I’m one of the few people he trusts and will come to for help.”

  “With that gold he stole up in Colorado, of course,” Marriner added.

  Laurie’s smile widened. “Of course. The official word given out by Wells Fargo is 10,000 dollars’ worth. I happen to know it was over a hundred pounds of pure, extracted gold. Worth a helluva lot more than Wells Fargo will admit to.”

  “A hundred pounds weight.” Marriner was as near awe-struck as Laurie had ever seen him and she couldn’t help but laugh.

  “I always liked Shell,” she said. “But I simply love his gold, and I won’t mind at all separating him from it.”

  “With my help,” Marriner said.

  “With your help,” she agreed, soberly. “He won’t be any pushover, Myron. He’s the most dangerous man I know. And you’re the next most dangerous ...”

  “Then it’s about time I climbed to Number One place, ain’t it?”

  “Exactly what I was thinking,” the girl replied. “But I think we’re going to need some help. Skip Hanna and Skull at least. Probably the others, too.”

  The sheriff frowned. “More we drag in, the more we have to share with.”

  She looked at him levelly. “Not—necessarily,” she said and after a moment he gave her one of his rare smiles, nodding in understanding.

  “Except for the color of your skin Laurie, you’re my kinda woman, you know that?”

  “You always were my kind of gal, Laurie,” said Shannon, leaning on one elbow and grinning into the girl’s face as she pushed back a strand of hair from her forehead.

  It fell languidly onto the pillow and Shannon moved back out of reach as she lifted her naked arms towards him. “Uh-huh ... I’ll be back for more later.”

  He threw back the sheet and got out of bed, reaching for his pants where he had flung them over the back of a chair. Laurie pulled the sheet up to her chin and frowned as he began to dress.

  “Hey! Shannon. It’s been three years. And you’re ready to quit? I don’t believe it.”

  She lifted the edge of the sheet, trying to entice him back with movements of her body. He looked at her, hesitated then shook his head regretfully.

  “Later,” he said. “I got things to do.”

  Laurie pouted and looked disappointed, but, behind the girlish look she was really getting alarmed.

  It had been part of the plan that she keep Shannon with her all night, in the mirrored room, while Marriner and the others removed the gold the killer had stashed in Laurie’s suite next door.

  She had been confident that her charms would hold him, but he was already buttoning his shirt and preparing to pull on his boots. Next would be the gun rig, and that strange-looking rifle he had propped in one corner.

  “What the hell have you got to do that’s more important than coming back to me right now?” she demanded, trying to sound like the injured lover. She was convincing enough, for, in truth, she was a trifle hurt that he wasn’t paying her any more attention.

  Shannon buckled on his gun rig and settled the Colt comfortably on his right hip. “I can’t afford to dally too long hereabouts, Laurie. I only really stopped by to see if you’d come with me. We could maybe even—get—hitched.”

  That surprised her—and the shock showed on her face. “Are you serious?”

  The look on his face was answer enough. “You know how I feel about you, Laurie. How I’ve always felt about you.”

  She sat up in bed.

  “But, good grief, I have my ow
n business here. I’ve worked hard to make it what it is. I don’t aim to give it up.”

  “I’m headed for Mexico, Laurie. Have to get out of the States. Why, with that gold, we could live like king and queen in mañana land for the rest of our lives. We could go to Europe, anyplace you want ... I figured half the fun of spendin’ that gold would come from buyin’ you pretty things, Laurie. I—I figured you’d jump at the chance to come with me.”

  The red-haired girl sighed. She knew how dangerous Shannon could get and she wasn’t about to offend him by telling him straight out to go to hell.

  “Shell—three years ago, I would’ve. I had nothin’ then. I was just another—gal in a gal parlor. I’ve come up since then. I can’t turn my back on all this.” She swept her arm around the mirrored room and met his gaze in one of the glasses, swiftly looking away. “I—I never knew there was anythin’ as serious as you’re making out between us, Shell.”

  “Was on my side,” he said curtly, jamming his hat on his head and adjusting his gunbelt. “Why, I even ...”

  He broke off and the girl tensed. She knew he’d heard a sound from her suite. A cupboard door had jammed and been wrenched open impatiently, making a thudding, jarring noise. She knew it was on the cupboard in the back of the closet where Shannon had stashed his tarp-load of gold.

  “Well, I s’pose we might come to some arrangement if you really want me along,” Laurie said swiftly, hoping to distract him, mentally cursing Skull or Hanna or whoever it was who had scraped that door.

  She started to get out of the bed, deliberately allowing the sheet to slip down on one side. But Shannon wasn’t even looking at her.

  He strode towards the mirrored wall, his Colt palming up.

  “Shell, what is it?” Laurie cried, hoping to stall him but he shoved her roughly aside so that she bounced back on the bed.

  “Goddamn it! Where’s that lousy door,” he snarled, bewildered by the array of mirrors and unable to spot the handle because of the many reflections.

  His gun hammered abruptly and Laurie screamed involuntarily as bullets starred two oblong mirrors with a shattering of glass. Two more stars appeared and then Shannon scooped up a velvet-padded chair and swung it in a violent forward movement. It shattered several mirrors on the wall and as the shards of glass fell, the door was revealed. He leapt forward, snatching up the big Remington rifle as he went.

  “Shannon,” Laurie screamed.

  But he ignored her, charged at the door and kicked it open with a savage swing of his leg. He went through headlong, throwing himself to one side, catching a glimpse of the men inside with guns in their hands.

  The weapons roared and lead whined over his head as the massive Remington boomed like a thunderclap in the confines of the room.

  Skull, the bouncer, lifted clear off the floor and jarred against the opposite wall, his head hanging by a shred. Shannon hurled the heavy weapon at the other three men. It took them side on, the heavy brass butt prong catching one man on the temple. He fell, groaning. A gun was struck from the hand of a second man.

  The third was Hanna, the blacksmith.

  He reared up, swinging the heavy tarp loaded with the gold in sacks. It caught Shannon in the chest and sent him whirling across the room to slam into the wall with a violent shudder.

  The breath gusted from him and his Colt fell from his groping hand. He dropped to his knees, gagging for breath.

  But his instincts drove him on and his hand groped again for his six-gun.

  Meanwhile, Hanna dragged the other two men to their feet, emptied his Colt in Shannon’s direction, then bulldozed his way into the passage.

  The place was in an uproar: women were screaming and men were shouting—demanding to know what the hell was going on.

  Others grabbed as many of their clothes as they could and beat a hasty retreat out of windows and side doors.

  Shannon staggered to his feet, scooped up his Colt and lurched to the door. He had struck the back of his skull against the wall and his legs were rubbery.

  “Shell, wait. Let them go.”

  Laurie, pale and frightened, ran to him from the wreckage of the mirrored room, trying to hold him back as the passage filled with a curious crowd.

  He rounded on her savagely. “Bitch. You talked me into leaving the gold in your suite. I wanted to keep it with me. You kept me busy while they robbed me. You set me up.”

  She backed off, the guilt and the fear plainly showing on her face.

  Shannon curled a lip and brought up his Colt. She cried out but her voice was drowned in the roar of the two shots and her slim body was hurled back through the doorway to crumple to the floor of the mirrored room—her dying convulsions reflected from the starred shards of glass in a grotesque dance of death.

  Then Shannon spun towards the door, reaching for fresh cartridges in his belt.

  But Sheriff Myron Marriner lunged forward and smashed his Colt full force into the center of Shannon’s face. The nose pulped and the lips spread and split and blood sprayed as the man grunted and started to fall. Marriner clubbed him behind the ear.

  The killer sprawled on the floor, and Marriner kicked him in the ribs, his face ugly and tight.

  He turned to the crowd that had pushed into the room behind him from the passage. “You folk are witnesses to the murder of Laurie Nettleton by this son of a bitch, Shannon. He’s killed Skull, too. Went berserk. Help me get him into a cell, and I guarantee the first Circuit Judge that comes through’ll put a hemp necktie on him.”

  As men moved to lift the unconscious Shannon, the lawman glanced only briefly into the other room at the corpse of the girl. One less to share with, he thought. Two, counting Skull. That only left Hanna and the others. They would be easy enough to take care of, he figured—and he would also collect the bounty on Shannon.

  A mighty good night’s work, Marriner allowed. Mighty good.

  Seven – Dead As They Come

  Clay Nash dismounted stiffly from his dust-coated horse at the hitch rail outside the Lonetree law office. He looped the reins over the end of the bar, tied up his packhorse, then stomped across the boardwalk into the building.

  Sheriff Marriner was seated at his desk, studying a pile of wanted dodgers. He half-hipped in his swivel chair as Nash entered. Suddenly, his eyes narrowed and his shoulders tensed.

  The sheriff didn’t know the man by name or even sight, but he recognized a hard hombre when he saw one—a man who had that indefinable quality that set him apart from the ordinary citizen. Marriner knew he was looking at a fast gun—on which side of the law he didn’t know ...

  “What can I do for you, stranger?” Marriner stood and hitched at his buscadero rig, hooking his thumbs in the wide, burnished leather. He didn’t aim to take any chances.

  Nash dug some papers out of his shirt pocket and held them out as he spoke.

  “Clay Nash, Wells Fargo. I hear there was some kinda fuss last night and you managed to throw Shell Shannon into a cell.” Marriner looked up from studying the identification papers. He nodded curtly.

  “Little trouble. Shannon went berserk in one of our whorehouses. Killed the madam and a bouncer, shot up the place considerable before I was lucky enough to gun whip him.”

  Nash looked at the man sharply as he took back his papers. “You took a chance, gun whipping a man like Shannon. Would’ve been easier to shoot first and ask questions later.”

  “If I’d had a sawed-off, likely that’s what I would’ve done. But as it was, I kind of got crowded into the room by a bunch of fellers who’d come along to see what was goin’ on. There was Shannon standin’ before me with an empty gun.” Marriner shrugged. “Could hardly gun down an unarmed man, could I?”

  Nash’s eyes drilled into the other’s face. “Heard tell it wouldn’t be the first time it’s happened.”

  Marriner stiffened. “You sayin’ I shoot unarmed men?”

  Nash shrugged.

  “Easy. No skin off my nose either way, but there are storie
s.” His voice hardened as he added, “Like a U.S. Marshal was s’posed to’ve been through here the day before Shannon showed, and let it be known that no more bounties would be paid on fellers found shot ‘while trying to escape’ from your cells. Or back shot in an alley where you just ‘happened’ to stumble over ’em.”

  Marriner’s hands were at his sides—the fingers clenching and unclenching. His eyes were deadly as they drilled into Nash. “You got a lot to say for a man who’s just hit town, mister.”

  Nash smiled crookedly. “Happened to run up against that U.S. Marshal I was talkin’ about. Knew him. Old pard of mine. He was headed north. Told me he had to make a special trip out here to see you about all those bounty claims.”

  Marriner said nothing but he seemed about ready to reach for his guns, if Nash showed any inclination to do the same. However, the Wells Fargo man had made his point, and was prepared to let it rest.

  “So, could be it was lucky you did take Shannon alive last night,” the Wells Fargo man said abruptly. “Save a heap of trouble with the Federal Marshals when you claim the bounty. It is for dead or alive.” He gestured to the handbills on the sheriff’s desk. “See you was checkin’ on that.”

  “I’ve been hearin’ about you for years, Nash,” Marriner said quietly, between his teeth. “I just wonder how come you’ve managed to live so long.”

  Nash gave him a mirthless smile. “You figure it out,” he said, almost challengingly, but the lawman chose to ignore it.

  “Well, hell, what you think about me or what other folk say about me makes no never mind. I know I do my job, best I can. You ask the folk of this town. They’re glad I’m here, totin’ badge, keepin’ law an’ order. Results is what counts.”

  “Sure. You got the gold in there?” Nash pointed to the big Gunderson-Raffe iron safe in a corner of the office.

  Marriner was momentarily taken off guard but he recovered swiftly. “Gold? I ain’t got no gold. What you talkin’ about, Nash?”

  The Wells Fargo man moved towards the desk and Marriner tensed, taking a step backwards. But Nash strode past him, and picked up the handbill about Shell Shannon.