York tied his gun down and headed there.
Pushing through the batwing doors, York found a very lively crowd for a weeknight at the town’s only saloon. The clientele included menfolk of Trinidad, mostly merchants and clerks and those who cleaned up for them, and a good number of cowboys whose workdays this time of year were finished by late afternoon and who, unlike trail hands, drew regular pay.
The gambling hall that took up much of the big room was hopping, roulette, chuck-a-luck, wheel-of-fortune stations, faro, twenty-one, and poker. At the far end of the saloon, its gold brocade walls decorated with saddles, spurs, and steer horns, rose a small boxlike stage with a piano by a skimpy dance floor, where locals and cowboys approximated dancing with silk-and-satin saloon gals.
Between the casino and the little dance floor was another major draw of the Victory: free food at lunch and supper. Right now a long narrow table seemed to separate gambling from dancing. It was covered in linen to rival the hotel’s dining room and arrayed with cold cuts, yellow cheese, rye bread, celery stalks, pretzels, peanuts, smoked herring, and dill pickles. Such salty fare would lead inevitably to a thirst that needed quenching. And customers were drifting over to get plates of the stuff with beer steins in hand.
He found an opening at the bar, exchanging nods and greetings with his constituency, and ordered a beer, which hadn’t arrived yet when he heard a throaty purr of a female voice behind him.
“Don’t tell me they’re charging you to eat over at the hotel, Sheriff! A man of your standing shouldn’t have to go to a saloon to get a free meal.”
The beer came, and he sipped it, tossed the bartender a dime, then turned with a smile and asked, “How’s business, Rita?”
Dark-haired Rita, her slender, full-breasted frame well served by an emerald satin gown, said, “Middle of the week? Not bad. Not shabby at all.”
He never tired of looking at that heart-shaped face with its big brown eyes, turned-up nose, and lush, red-rouged lips. The young woman had inherited the Victory from her murdered sister, who had also been a beauty, though a hardened one. Rita still had life left in her, and ahead of her, with any luck.
Raising an eyebrow, she said, “You have your badge on, I see.”
He often played poker here and left his badge behind.
“Maybe I just forgot to take it off,” he said.
“Or maybe you’re here on business.”
She slipped her arm in his and walked him to a table for four and sat herself down beside him. Over by the wall, Tulley was sitting with a sarsaparilla, trying to get York’s attention with the subtlety of a mule-train driver whipping his team.
“I think your friend wants you,” Rita said with a mocking smile.
“I think that sugar juice has gone to his head.” He gave his deputy a sharp look, and the old boy settled down, looking a little hurt.
“He’s been here all afternoon,” she said.
“Maybe he likes the free lunch.”
“And the free supper?”
“Why not?”
“He’s had so much of that sarsaparilla,” she said, “he’s worn a path out to the privy.”
“As I recall, that was already a pretty well-worn path.”
She set her elbows on the table and folded her lace-gloved hands and rested her chin on them. Judging by her wicked little smile, she might have been propositioning him. But what she said was, “He’s been keeping an eye on Alver Hollis.”
“Has he now?”
“Ever meet the Preacherman?”
“Can’t say I have.”
“First for me, as well. Never saw those other two, neither, but it’s too soon.”
“Causing any trouble?”
She shrugged her satin-encased shoulders. “They’ve been drinking and playing cards all day — more or less behaving themselves.”
“More or less?”
“I had to step in when one of them, the one missing his two front teeth, tried to get Molly to go upstairs with him. He didn’t understand the new policy.”
Rita’s late sister, Lola, had run the upstairs as a brothel. Now the dance-hall girls were strictly that, and the upstairs had been transformed into fairly lavish living quarters for the young woman who owned the place. Her girls lived in a rooming house now, two to a room. If they wanted to see a man they met at work, they were free to. They could even charge those men for their favors. But not on these premises, and not at the rooming house, where she paid their rent.
York’s jaw clenched. “Did he get tough with you?”
She gave him half a smile. “No. He wanted to, but Hollis stepped in and shut it down. Apologized to me. Took off his hat to do it. Real gentleman, if not quite a preacher.”
“Interesting.”
“You make something of that?”
“Maybe he’s turned over a new leaf. Maybe he’s not the bad man his reputation says he is.”
“You mean, the way your reputation is undeserved? How you never hurt a soul? Never pulled that gun, never—”
“That’ll do.”
She leaned back. Folded her arms over the generous bosom. Cocked her head. Narrowed her eyes. “How many men have you killed, Caleb York?”
“I don’t exactly know. Lost count at some point.”
“How did you get that bad reputation?”
“I never killed for money, no matter what they ever said about me. I never killed a man who didn’t draw down on me first...” He knew that wasn’t quite true, and amended, “Or who didn’t need killing so’s somebody could be rescued, say.”
Hub Wainwright, the head bartender, came over to personally deliver a mixed drink to Rita. He was a big, skimpily mustached man who did his own bouncing. He leaned down for a private word.
“Miz Filley,” he said, “I’m keepin’ an eye out. No trouble so far.”
“Thank you, Hub.”
“I’ll wade right in, need be.”
“I know you will, Hub. Thanks.”
Hub went back to the bar, like a bear heading for its cave, but without hibernation in mind.
She sipped the drink — a Sazerac. One of the fancy drinks that were popular because their rotgut base was so unpalatable. “So... you never saw the Preacherman?”
“No.”
“Not even on a circular?”
York shook his head. “He’s never been wanted for anything. He’s careful about his kills.”
With just a tiny toss of her head, Rita indicated the poker table over by the stairs. “That’s him in the middle there, facing us. And on either side of him are his disciples.”
Moving his chair a little, York got a good view of the men, all of whom studied cards in hand. Two of the players were scruffy, like if you hit them with a carpet beater, dust clouds would rise; they sat on either side of the man York figured they’d ridden in with.
The wiry saddle tramp at left had the missing front teeth Rita had reported, a week’s growth of beard, and pop eyes that gave him a demented look. He wore a frayed work shirt, canvas pants, and a bandana that hadn’t been washed any more recently than he had.
Similarly garbed, the guy at right was stocky and rough bearded, with shaggy brown hair and a piggy look. His fingernails were black with dirt, though York couldn’t imagine this character ever working hard enough to get them that way. Digging somebody’s grave he robbed, maybe.
The man who had to be Alver Hollis was dressed in preacher black, not unlike York — a black suit and hat, white shirt with a loose ribbon-style bow tie. Of average size, Hollis had an oval face with hooded light blue eyes, a narrow hook nose, a well-trimmed black beard, and a somber expression.
York shifted his gaze back to the lovely saloon owner. “Doesn’t seem to be a need to make my presence felt. They’re not causing any ruckus that I can see.”