Dead Man's Poker Page 7

  They gave me a good welcome when we came in. Justa had been over while I was sleeping and told them we’d be coming up to visit. Ben and Norris got up to shake hands. The old man started to make a struggle with the rocking chair, but I got over to him and said, “Keep your seat, keep your seat,” and we shook.

  Justa said, “Ben, go look in the liquor closet and find Wilson a jug of brandy. He don’t drink whiskey.”

  I waved away the idea. I said, “No, no. Whiskey is my regular drink. Justa seen me drinking brandy one time when I couldn’t lay my hands on nothing else and got crosswise of the entire matter.”

  “Liar,” Justa said. “You lie worse than Howard does about them drinks he sneaks.”

  The old man said, “Here! What kind of talk is that? Mr. Young, you’ll pardon these rowdies. Their mother and I done our best, but you see what it’s come to. Grown son callin’ his father a liar.”

  Ben got me and Justa a glass, and then we poured out all around, the old man included, said, “Luck,” and then knocked them back as befits the toast. After that Ben refilled our glasses, and me and Justa found seats along the back wall. Ben set the bottle of whiskey on a handy table, and we settled down for a visit.

  It was easy to see that Ben and Justa were brothers. Except for Ben being closer to my size, they favored in nearly every way including both of them looking like there was some Indian blood in their past. And I could see they took their looks from their daddy, even though the flesh was starting to sag around his face. Norris must have took after the mother because he wasn’t a thing like Ben and Justa. Where they were dark, he was fair; where they were muscled up and hard-looking, he sort of had a soft appearance. Of course it could have come from the clothes he was wearing. He had taken off his tie, but he was still dressed in a linen sack suit and was wearing shoes instead of boots.

  The senior Mr. Williams said, “How is your wound coming along, Mr. Young?”

  “It’s fetching up right nicely,” I said. “Course it wasn’t much to start with.”

  Justa must have told them something of what had happened because Ben said, “How did this man in Galveston come to shoot you, Mr. Young?”

  I said, “Well, I guess it was over a matter of some twenty thousand dollars.”

  Ben said, “That don’t sound very smart to me. Not unless he set a hell of a store on money.”

  “Why not?”

  He shrugged. He said, “Hell, Justa says he knew who you were. Unless he knew he was going to kill you, I’d think shooting you would be a mighty risky business.”

  I said, “Maybe he thinks he did kill me.”

  Justa said, “I thought you said he just took the one wild shot at you and run through the door back into the warehouse?”

  “He did. I didn’t have but one cartridge left in the wheel, and I kind of took a wild shot at him. But he was through the door by then.”

  Ben said, “He might not have even thought he hit you.”

  I took a drink of whiskey. “One thing for damn sure, he wasn’t sticking around to find out. But he might have thought that one of them other three had hit me even though I was still shooting. I was just starting to raise up when he shot. But I’d been down on my knees.”

  Mr. Williams leaned forward in his rocking chair. He said, “Justa said there were three others, so-called vigilantes, with hoods over their heads. He said they came in with drawn pistols. Did they come firing?”

  “Yes, sir. They come through the door Phil Sharp opened for them and let off a barrage the minute they were in the room. But I was on the floor by then.”

  Ben said, “Did you fan?”

  I shook my head. I said, “No. I fan sometimes, but I couldn’t then. The corner of the desk was in the way, and if I’d lowered my revolver to fan it, I couldn’t have got at them. I was drawing when I went to the floor, and I had my revolver cocked. I shot the first one that way and then fired three shots double-action at the other two. There was one still standing, and I cocked my pistol and shot him in the chest because, even as close as they was, you know a man can’t get no real accuracy pulling the trigger double-action. Too much barrel deviation.”

  Ben said, “I still think the man was a damn fool to try and kill you over money, even twenty thousand dollars. That’s too big a risk.”

  Justa said, “Ben, there were four of them.”

  “Yeah, but it was Wilson Young they were planning to shoot. If Sharp had had any sense, he’d ’ve given you the money and then shot you in the back when you were leaving.”

  I half smiled. I said, “That wouldn’t look too good for a vigilante committee. Besides, they might figure I still got friends.”

  Norris said, “He should have paid you. I have heard of Phil Sharp, and twenty thousand is not that much money to him.”

  I said, “He took on like it was.”

  Norris said, “Maybe it was because he considered you fair game.”

  Ben said, “What do you mean by that?”

  I answered for Norris. I said, “Well, Ben, I ain’t exactly clear of the law throughout the whole state. We got us a kind of Mexican standoff right now in certain areas. I don’t do nothing illegal and they leave me alone. But I reckon Sharp figured I could still be considered a wanted man, especially that far off my range, and it wouldn’t be no hardship on him to bring in three of his bully boys and gun me down. Give them a little practice, impress the sheriff with what a good outfit they were. And if he could save twenty thousand dollars in the bargain, why so much the better.”

  Ben said, “And get known as the man who brought Wilson Young down.” He sipped at his whiskey. He said, “Wonder what he thinks of the idea right now.”

  I said, “If I get the chance, I intend to find out.”

  Norris said, “Would you expect him to go to the law on the matter? Make some claim that you broke in and were threatening him?”

  I looked over at Justa. Neither one of us knew for certain, but I was curious as to what Justa thought. He said, “Well, Phil Sharp has already acted like a fool once. Nothing to keep him from doing it again. But he is going to have a hell of a time explaining how Will broke in on four of them and shot the three who didn’t owe him money and let the least likely man with a gun get away.”

  Norris said, “Can’t we get Lew Vara to look into this matter? Communicate with the Galveston sheriff in some way or go see him and find out what he knows?”

  Mr. Williams said, “1 reckon we better let Mr. Young do the deciding about what he wants to do. If we can help him, we will, just like he helped Justa. Until then we better just set back.” He held out his glass to Ben. He said, “Son, if you’d fill me up here again, I’d like to make a toast to Mr. Young in appreciation for helping to get Justa out of that mess he got himself in down there in Del Rio.”

  Ben started to pick up the whiskey bottle, but Justa said, right quick, “Hold on there, Ben. Howard, you slippery devil, that was a mighty nice effort, but if you want to toast Wilson, you’ll be doing it with water.”

  The old man said, “Now, Justa—”

  Justa said, “Listen, old man, you might can fool Ben with that tomfoolery, but you ain’t going to catch me out that easy. Now, you want to toast with some water?”

  The old man frowned and rocked back in his chair. He said, “Well, them things is always getting overdone, toasts and such.”

  The old man really was a pistol. If Justa hadn’t jumped in, Ben, without thinking, would have poured him out a tumblerful of whiskey. It near made me laugh.

  Justa said, to me, “You can see now how this ranch got started. With stolen cattle. Forty years ago Howard showed up out here with nothing more than a running iron and a chaw of tobacco. I think he wore the running iron out before he did the chaw.”

  We had another drink and then left. Walking back, Justa said, “Norris is right. This matter ought to be looked into as quick as possible. We can’t go on operating in the dark.”

  I said, quickly, “There ain’t no ’we’ to
it, Justa. There was killings involved in this. Two at least. I ain’t letting you get mixed up in that.”

  Justa said, “There was more killings in my trouble in Del Rio.”

  “Yes, but that was my home ground. This is different. Galveston is as much off your range as it is mine.”

  Justa said, “Well, we’ll talk about it tomorrow. How’s your side?”

  “It’s doing better. But we ain’t going to have any more to talk about tomorrow than we do tonight.”

  Justa said, kind of to himself, “You know, now that I think about it, I wonder why Phil Sharp would try and have you killed. Pretty goddam dumb play when you think about it.”

  I said, “Have you folks all gone deaf? It was twenty thousand dollars.”

  “Norris said that wasn’t big money for him.”

  I said, “If it wasn’t big money, how come he didn’t pay me in Del Rio? Write me out a bank draft? He said he needed his cash for some business inside Mexico, but a big operator like him would have his checkbook with him. Or why didn’t he wire the money when he got back home? Hell, if I’m recollecting correctly, was a man named Justa Williams almost went to war over a matter of thirty-two thousand dollars. Which ain’t a hell of a lot more than the twenty Sharp owed me.”

  Justa said, “That was different.”

  “Oh. I see. It was you and now it’s me. Yeah, that is different. All right, why do you think he tried to kill me?”

  It was a well-lit night and I could see him shrug. He said, “Hell, maybe he wanted your whorehouse.”

  In the dark and over the uneven ground I stumbled. Justa put out a hand to steady me. I said, “It ain’t no whorehouse. I mean I don’t run it like a whorehouse. It is mainly for the use of the big gamblers, to keep them playing. Just like the saloon part. Hell, if a man is betting enough, win or lose, I seldom charge for the girls or the whiskey. It’s a cathouse. I keep telling you.”

  “He have anybody with him this last time?”

  “He always come with a couple of what looked to be hired hands. I couldn’t say if they was pistoleros, but they looked capable. But you’d expect that of a man that was going into Mexico with cash, a lot of cash.”

  “Did they gamble?”

  “Not so you’d notice. Mostly they just stood around and watched Sharp.”

  “Even when he went upstairs with the girls?”

  I gave him a disgusted look. I said, “Now, don’t talk like you’ve got a stick of peppermint candy in your mouth. Besides, the cathouse wouldn’t have done him no good. Evita and Lupita run that part, and they got the girls. They wouldn’t have worked for Sharp. And they damn sure wouldn’t have worked for him if he’d shot me.”

  We had got to the back of Justa’s house. I could see a dim light burning inside. We let ourselves in through the kitchen door and then went into Justa’s office, the little room off the parlor where he’d disappeared to sweeten up his lemonade. The office was where he kept his drinking material. I got myself a tumbler of brandy, and Justa poured himself some whiskey. We went into the parlor, where the lamp was burning. Nora had already gone to bed, it being about half past ten. I was feeling a little wore out myself in spite of the long nap I’d had. Losing blood will do that to a man. Takes him a while to get it all back.

  When we’d got settled, Justa said, “How was your business doing?”

  I said, “Hell, I couldn’t believe it. I thought I’d discovered a money tree. I was way ahead of my loan.”

  “Then maybe he wanted your casino. He was a gambler. He could see the business you were doing.”

  “Killing me wouldn’t have got him my place,” I said. “Not unless the bank took him in as a partner.”

  Justa said, “Banks ain’t naturally in the casino business. Kill you and all the bank has got is an empty building. Maybe Sharp figured to get you out of the way and open a place of his own.”

  I said, “You’re throwing a long rope now. With a little loop.”

  He said, “Whatever possessed you to think of such a thing in the first place?”

  I said, “Hell, Justa, you know Del Rio. There’s a lot of money around that place, loose money what with the outlaws and the illegal cattle being brought across from Mexico. You couldn’t find a better place than Del Rio to put up that kind of joint. Hell, you saw the turnout for the horse racing. Tell you the truth it was the horse racing put the idea in my mind. First time I saw one of those race meets and saw all that money changing hands, the idea come to me that there ought to be better ways to gamble than on something as chancy as a racehorse. I got to thinking a man would want to lose his money in elegant surroundings while he was sitting in a plush chair with a good glass of whiskey and a pretty woman to console him later when he lost. So the idea just kept on growing until it seemed like the thing to do.”

  Justa drained his glass and got up. He said, “Well, I better get to bed. You know where your room is. Can I trust you to put the lamp out?”

  “If you’ll show me how to work it first.”

  He said, “I’ll be gone when you get up. You sleep late, you hear? Juanita or Nora will fix you some breakfast. I’ll be in around noon, but you take it easy. You still ain’t as strong as you think you are.”

  I’d throwed out most of what Justa had said, but, laying in bed that night, I got to thinking about Phil Sharp and my casino and about Del Rio. Del Rio was a kind of odd place, even for the border, which was pretty strange country in a state, Texas, that wasn’t exactly known for being normal. Del Rio’s commerce was based on the smuggling of illegal cattle across the Rio Grande and then holding them on the lush ranches around the area, to fatten them up before shipping them on up north as regular Texas beef. The cattle were illegal because they hadn’t been held in quarantine for the ninety days or whatever the time was, while they were checked to see if they were carrying infectious diseases. Of course there was no profit in that. Even if the cattle were stolen, the price of feeding them while they were being held by border customs officials would eat up all the profits. Nearly all Mexican cattle were poor on account of the condition of the land in northern Mexico. The Mexican ranch owners, with all the cheap labor they could need available, could just never get on to the idea that they had to clear the land of the mesquite and huisache and greasewood and whatnot if they wanted to grow good grass and hay. And, hell, they didn’t have to look very far for proof of the fact. A man could stand on a bluff on the south side of the Rio Grande and look over his shoulder back into Mexico and see barren, hardscrabble grazing land. Then he could look north and, not a half a mile away, see pastures with foot-high grass and fat cattle. It wasn’t no accident, and it wasn’t because God just didn’t like Mexicans; it was because they didn’t understand that you had to feed cattle if you wanted them to get fat. So because there was so little grass in northern Mexico, there were too many cattle. Half as many would have been too many. Hell, a man didn’t even have to steal them. Hiring the men to rustle the cattle probably cost more than what it took to just outright buy them.

  I never knew what the workings of the bribery was that allowed the rich ranchers around Del Rio to bring the cattle over without benefit of official papers or stamps or approval or whatever was necessary. I figured a lot of money changed hands. But there was big money to be made. The ranchers around Del Rio just brought them poor little old Mexican cattle across, stuck a brand on them, fattened them up for about six months, and then sold them to the northern market for about ten times what they’d had to invest in them. Was nearly as good a game as playing poker with a trusting blind man.

  That’s loose money, money that’s too easily made, and there’s nothing a gambler likes better than to get the chance at a bunch of folks with loose money. The folks that have it don’t seem to think as much of it because it come so easy. And as a consequence they don’t seem to mind taking chances with it. Not, of course, that there’s much chance involved when you play against a professional gambler. In fact a man can generally save himself some ti
me if he just goes ahead and hands over his money and don’t even bother to play.

  And of course it was all that loose, easy money around that had caused me to make Del Rio my headquarters when I’d changed professions. It really wasn’t much different than robbing banks except you used a gun less and the customers were usually more satisfied.

  But I still couldn’t see Phil Sharp wanting to kill me so as to get me out of the way so he could set up his own casino. It ain’t all that easy to learn the ins and outs of gambling. Oh, it’s easy to learn how to gamble; the hard part is to learn how to win more money than you lose. I’d been lucky in running across an old riverboat gambler who’d cut a deck or rolled dice for fifty years and knew every trick and every set of odds there was to know. I’d met him when I was laying up in Mexico recuperating from my last bad wound and deciding I was through with the owlhoot trail. I’d paid him, and he’d taught me that gambling didn’t have a thing to do with luck; it had to do with skill. The old man didn’t cheat, but he knew how and he knew how to spot a cheater. I worked with him for a year, and when I was through, I had me a whole new profession.

  Maybe Phil Sharp did want to get into the casino business. Maybe there was something wrong with his shipping operation. Maybe he’d found him a man that could run a casino like I could, and he figured there was some heavy money in it. God knows, there wasn’t no letup in the stream of Mexican cattle coming across the Rio Grande.

  But laying in Justa’s house and speculating wasn’t going to fill a straight. I had to get well and go and find Phil Sharp and have a conversation with him. That was the only way I was going to get any answers, or any answers I would be ready to believe.

  I didn’t get up until going on nine. When I come out of my bedroom, Nora showed me where I could wash up and shave. They had a regular bathroom there, just like the hotel. Of course the main facilities were out back, but there was a built-in washbasin and a bathtub and a big mirror and nearly everything you wanted including running water, even though it was cold. Nora offered to heat me up some hot water to shave with, but I thanked her and said it had never made that much difference to me and I could just make do with the cold.