Blood on the Verde River Read online

  “Damn. Is she always that loud?” he asked a man in a dust floured suit beside him who was watching her antics.

  The suited man looked mildly back at Chet. “That’s Ruby Jo. She sings and does several other things. Yeah, she’s that loud most of the time.”

  “Hurts my ears.” Chet turned away from the bar when he heard a ruckus break out over someone cheating at cards. Chairs scraped the floor. He saw one man pop up, reach over for another, jerk him facedown on the table, and slam him in the head with his knuckles. Once, twice—that was enough.

  Upset that no one had moved to stop him, Chet moved in and jerked the two men aside and caught the beater’s arm. “That’s enough.” Eye to eye, he read the man’s defiance.

  “Who says so?”

  “Me.” Chet gave him a haymaker to the chin with his right hand. His blow left the man sprawled on his back among the onlookers and he remained limp on the floor.

  “Holy cow, mister. You knocked him plumb out.” One mouthy guy wanted him to look at the downed gambler. Chet didn’t give a damn about the guy. He watched the crowd for someone who wanted to take up his war. No one made a move.

  A bartender brought over a bucket of water and without even a grin, poured it in the man’s face. The liquid spread out underfoot on the floor. A ragtag bum came and began mopping it up. Two men carried the unconscious man out the front door and came back too fast to have delivered him anywhere else but the boardwalk.

  When satisfied he had no threats for his actions, Chet turned and the bartender had a whiskey bottle in one hand and a glass in the other. “How much do you want of this?”

  “I don’t drink whiskey.”

  “This one is on the house.”

  “You want to buy me one, make it a beer.”

  The barkeep shrugged. “Whatever. I’ll get you a beer.”

  Chet spoke to the man next to him. “Who was he—the man I knocked out?”

  “Billy Bragg.”

  “Who’s he work for?”

  “Old man Newt Clanton.”

  Chet nodded. “Might as well break in my first day in Tombstone society with a guy like him.”

  “What’s your name?”

  “Chet Byrnes.”

  “I heard of you. You’re the guy ran down some rustlers and hung them?”

  “I never saw my name in the paper.” With a sip of the beer, Chet studied himself in the mirror back of the bar. He’d knocked out one of the most powerful men in the territory. What a good start he’d made the first day.

  “I heard of your name,” the guy beside him said under his breath. “They say you’re tough. In the next few hours, you’re going to learn how tough you are. His men will gather up to go home and when they hear that you knocked out one of their own, they’ll come looking for you with their teeth bared.”

  “How many?” Beer in his hand. he turned to study the crowd. “How many of them in here worked for Clanton?”

  “A half dozen, maybe more,” the guy said. “They consider if anyone hurts one of theirs, they have to even the score or better it.”

  “Anyone ever stopped them?”

  The man tossed his head. “You come in here over Boot Hill?”

  “Sure.”

  “It’s full of folks picked a fight with old man Clanton.”

  Chet downed his beer and grimaced. It didn’t taste that good. Next thing to do was to locate his men and get a plan working. Damn. He could get himself in the damndest deals. He set the empty mug on the bar and headed outside through the batwing doors. On the boardwalk, he had to sidestep the crowd gathered near the downed man. Lying in the back of a wagon, he was surrounded by people trying to revive him.

  In a few steps, he was lost in the masses and headed back toward the O.K. Livery, stopping at the saddle repair shop on the corner to wait. His two would show up sometime.

  Jesus showed up first. “I didn’t learn anything, but I made some friends among the Mexicans who live here. They say she might have been sold into slavery and taken to Mexico City. But they did not know who kidnapped her—most of them did not know her.”

  “But someone did know her?”

  “One boy had seen her on the street several times and said she was real pretty.”

  Chet nodded. “There was a fight in Big Nose Kate’s. This guy had another facedown on the table and was hitting him in the head with his fist. Made me mad and I tried to separate them. The puncher kept trying to break by me, so I cold conked him with a haymaker.”

  “Wow. What happened?”

  “Last I saw him, they had him laid out on his back in a wagon bed, trying to revive him.”

  “You kill him?”

  “I don’t think so. But his name is Billy Bragg and he works for old man Clanton.”

  Jesus opened his brown eyes wide. “That is the big outlaw, huh?”

  “Clanton is.”

  “What should we do?”

  “When JD comes back we’ll talk about it. I never asked, but does that six-gun of yours work?” Chet nodded toward the well-oiled looking side arm.

  “Oh, sí. I can hit tin cans with it. I have practiced much with it.”

  “I hope you don’t ever need it, but these people we face will be mean and would kill you for ten cents.”

  “Oh, I know that, señor.”

  They lounged on the porch waiting for JD. Jesus saw him coming. “There he is.”

  JD shook his head when he reached them. “I found Eclare. She had some cock and bull story how Bonnie Allen ran off with a cowboy.”

  “You didn’t believe her?” Chet asked.

  “Aw, she was so sold on herself, I really found her a boring liar.”

  “Tell him about the fight,” Jesus said.

  Chet explained the incident in the saloon and JD agreed they’d have to be on their guard.

  “Let’s go find this famous diner and eat supper. You talk to anyone else in the parlor house besides Eclare?”

  “No, they were all sleeping, except her. And I couldn’t shut her up.” JD shook his head in defeat.

  Chet and Jesus laughed at his obvious disgust over the experience.

  Nellie Cashman’s restaurant was impressive. Chet would have expected to find such an establishment in a major city. The hostess put their hats on a wall rack and promised they would be there when they were through with their meal. They filed to their table behind her. Grizzly-faced, dust-floured prospectors and men and women in formal dress ignored their passage, all busy eating or reading the fancy menus.

  Seated across from Chet, Jesus peered around from behind the menu. “I will have what you order.”

  Chet agreed amused, but he was somber when he realized that Jesus could not read.

  “Says here, oysters when available,” JD said. “How would they get them here?”

  Chet shook his head. Obviously the most sought after delicacy in the west, he once saw where such seafood was twelve dollars a pound when they made it to Preskitt. “Better ask the waiter.”

  They ordered sliced roast beef, potatoes, and sweet corn. Chet offered a short prayer before they ate and Jesus crossed himself after “Amen.” The rolls were made with yeast in the dough and they melted in their mouths. The coffee served in china cups was delicious and the cherry pie mouthwatering. The meal went smoothly.

  “We better eat at a street vendor after this,” JD said, after wiping his mouth on a linen napkin.

  Chet laughed. “I was celebrating the three of us getting here.”

  Both of his men nodded that they approved of this place. Chet paid the bill for seven dollars and they went back to sleep in the livery their first night in Tombstone. A few gunshots woke him once and he decided that some drunk cowboy was taking target practice at the moon and went back to sleep in the sweet smelling alfalfa hay.

  In the morning, they saddled up and went to look for a place to stay. They found a rancher out on the flats west of town. His windmill by the corrals creaking in the wind, he shook their hands.

/>   “Ira Hampton’s my name.”

  “My name’s Chet Byrnes. These are my nephew JD and Jesus. Ira, we’re down here looking for a young lady who disappeared and no one seems to know where she went. I wondered if we could board here, pay for our horses’ feed, and sleep under a tree.”

  “You’re ranch folks?”

  “Yes, our ranch is outside of Camp Verde. Quarter Circle Z is the brand. This girl is a daughter of a lady who befriended me when I came to Arizona to find a ranch.”

  Ira nodded. “I wouldn’t charge you three a damn thing.”

  “Oh, we’ll do something for you.”

  “Come meet the boss. She’s up at the house.” He smiled at them and shook his head. “Someone has to be the boss on the place.”

  They agreed. A slender attractive woman in her thirties came out to meet them. Her hair tinged in gray was braided and piled on her head. She wore an apron over her dress.

  “Bee, these cowboys need a place to stable their horses and spread their bedrolls.”

  “Why lands, Ira, what did you tell them?” The woman frowned at him. “Land’s sakes, we can sure board them.”

  “Mrs. Hampton, we just need a place to drop,” Chet argued.

  “My name’s Bee, and you make yourself at home.”

  “Thank you, ma’am. My name’s Chet, that’s Jesus and he’s JD.” Chet pointed at the two young men.

  “Nice to meet you all.” To Chet, she added, You have a ranch?”

  “Yes, up north of Preskitt, ma’am.”

  “Cooler up there, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, it is usually cooler. We won’t be any trouble to you.”

  “Put that pack gear in the shop. It rains here every year or so.” Bee Hampton grinned.

  They laughed then set out to unload the panniers and put up the packhorses. When the job was complete, they rode back to Tombstone, stabled their horses at the O.K. and split up again.

  Chet went to find Marshal White who was in the jail office with his boots parked on the desk. He put them down when Chet walked in the open door.

  “Marshal, I’m Chet Byrnes of Preskitt. I want to talk to you about a young lady who disappeared down here.”

  The marshal sat up, straightened his vest and bushy mustache then he nodded. “Bonnie Allen.”

  “That’s who. Anything you know would help me.”

  “I wrote her mother I had nothing on her disappearance.”

  “Jenn showed me your letter. She thanks you.”

  “Take a chair. No need to thank me. I couldn’t find out a thing about the girl’s disappearance. Sorry I won’t be any help Byrnes. Most those girls don’t leave forwarding addresses.”

  “People say there is big trade in white slavery with Mexico.”

  White did spider push-ups with his hands and nodded. “That’s a tough business, but no one reports it when it happens. There is only whispering. Few people know where any of the girls are, and no one really cares about them when they’re gone except their mothers.”

  “Any idea who would know?”

  “Not really. But friend, if you found anyone, they would be tough to get to talk. You could probably burn their soles off torturing them and never learn a damn thing. ’Cause they have associates back home who would shoot them if they said a damn word.”

  “Sworn to secrecy?”

  “Worse than that.” White shook his head to show his stern impression of such men.

  “Who heads it?”

  “I don’t know. That is how secret they are.”

  “Old man Clanton?”

  The marshal shook his head again. “He ain’t no angel, but I don’t think he trades in white slavery.”

  “If you learn anything, I’m staying out at Ira Hampton’s ranch.”

  White stood up. “Nice to meet you, Byrnes. I wish you good luck, but be careful. There’s cut-throats on this border that are meaner than sidewinder rattlers.”

  “I will, thanks. You ever get to Preskitt go by Jenn’s Café. She’ll feed you good.”

  “I’d do that if I ever get up there. Tell her I’m sorry I found out nothing about her daughter’s disappearance.”

  “Sure, thanks.” Chet offered his hand.

  Marshal White shook it. “Watch your back is all I can say.”

  “I will.”

  Chet left the marshal’s office and stopped in a narrow café that produced a fine aroma of the sign’s contents STEW 30 CENTS A BOWL. He found a place to sit on a stool in the long bar that went way back in the café full of customers.

  “What’ll you have?” The short blonde in her mid-twenties wore a tough look as she waited for his answer.

  “Stew, I guess. Coffee.”

  She wiped the counter in front of him. “You’re new here, ain’t ’cha?”

  “Yes, I live up in Preskitt. Name’s Chet.”

  “Glad to have you here, Chet. You don’t like our stew, don’t pay us.”

  “That’s quite a deal.”

  “It’s a real deal that we do here.”

  “Thanks. A friend of mine,” he lowered his voice, “lost her daughter, Bonnie Allen. Can you help me?”

  She looked around as if checking if they could speak, then she whispered sharply, “I get off at seven. Back alley. Talk to you then. Too many ears in here.”

  He nodded. Settled back on the stool, he waited for his mug of steaming coffee and the bowl of stew that filled his nose with its rich aroma. In a few minutes, she was back and left him a ticket for thirty cents.

  “Pay before you leave.”

  He stood up and dug out two quarters from his pocket. “Here. Keep it.”

  She looked at the money in her hand and nodded. “Thanks.”

  He sat down and lifted the spoon.

  “You must be rich,” the guy beside him said.

  “No, just figured she could use it.”

  “I could have used it to buy two beers.”

  Chet nodded, took his first sip of coffee, grimaced, and agreed with the man’s comment. But the stew tasted wonderful. “For two beers, what could you tell me?”

  “What do you need to know?”

  The man beside him had not shaved nor changed clothes in several days. He appeared to be a derelict. But street trash knew more than cleaned-up people about things.

  Chet said, “I am looking for a young woman who disappeared awhile ago.”

  The man slurped another spoonful of stew and looked at him. “What’s she look like?”

  Chet put her picture in the case on the counter.

  The man picked it up and studied it in the shady light of the café’s interior. “Her hair red?”

  “Yes. You know where she is?”

  He put it down and shoved it toward Chet. “What would you give me to know where she’s at?”

  “You really know where she is?” This guy could be lying to simply get money out of him.

  “I might.”

  “What do you want?”

  “I could use some money.”

  “If I tear two twenty dollar bills in half and you take me to her I’ll give you the other halves.”

  “That might be hard. To take you there, I mean. I might know where she’s at, but hell, there might not be any way to get her out.”

  “If I can find her on your directions, I’ll pay you a hundred dollars.”

  The man whistled. “Where you staying?”

  “At the Hampton Ranch west of town.”

  “I can find you.”

  “How long will it take you to get me the exact location of her?”

  The man shrugged his shoulders. “Maybe a week, ten days.”

  “What name do you use?”

  “Don.”

  “I’ll be waiting for it, Don.”

  “You may have to move fast if I find out.”

  Chet gave the man a ten dollar gold piece.

  He looked hard at the coin the size of a dime then pocketed it. “See yah.” The man stood and lumbered out the door
of the café.

  Chet finished his stew and drank a second cup of coffee the waitress had brought him. The place had thinned.

  She looked at him hard. “You serious about meeting me tonight?”

  “Serious. I’ll be there.”

  She nodded that she heard him.

  He left the café and went on to the Palace Saloon. When he took a place at the sparsely populated bar, he wondered what his cohorts were busy doing. He ordered a beer and sat on a stool to take things in. He’d made two connections, Don, the lost soul and the blond waitress. Could they connect him with Bonnie Allen? Maybe. Or was it simply a plan to squeeze him for more money. Still, someone had to know something about her disappearance.

  He talked to an old man who had a rich mine that needed funds to develop. The whiskered guy showed him chunks of raw silver from the mine.

  “I guess mine development is expensive,” Chet said to the man who called himself Sam Yooter.

  “But you could make millions on this one.”

  Chet agreed, but had no wish to get into the mining business.

  Yooter soon moved on to another prospect. The bartender came by and told Chet about a lovely girl he knew was available at that time of day for a special price.

  Chet shook his head, thanked him. He finished his beer and crossed to the Occidental Saloon. A patent medicine salesman there told him he had the latest invention to make him live to be a hundred. Chet frowned. If things went on like his life had lately, he wasn’t certain that he wanted to stay around that long.

  A finely dressed tubercular victim coughing in a bloodstained linen handkerchief and washing it all down with straight whiskey introduced himself in a deep Southern accent. “I’m a dentist. My name, sir, is Doc Holliday. You look new here.”

  “I am. My name’s Byrnes. I live in Preskitt.”

  “Do you like rooster fights?”

  “Not really.”

  “Well, we will have a big, ass-kicking cockfight right here next Sunday afternoon. Yes sir, we have some man-eating roosters coming from Mexico to supplement the local birds. Hellfire man, the feathers will fly.”

  “You must be a breeder of them.”

  “I am sir. I have some of the best.”

  “Good luck.”

  Holliday laughed. “You sir, need a diversion.”