Cold Steel and Hot Lead [How the West Was Done 3] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting) (15 page)

Shoving aside gypsies, punch men, and demons, Alameda found the fiery flames Castillo had been painting. Peering into the abyss that Castillo had lined with mirrors for some sort of grand effect, she found the comatose mime that everyone had been ignoring. She rattled him by the shoulder, but his white-gloved hands just dragged across his stomach.

Whipping her head around, she called out, “This man is dead!”

A sudden overwhelming silence fell upon the entire building. But it wasn’t because Alameda had just discovered a stiff. No, every single ridiculous punch man, apparition, and monster had rushed to the stage curtain, peering through it with slack-jawed awe.

What?
A hush had overcome the entire rowdy audience as well.
What did Rudy just do?

Alameda abandoned the mime and rushed to the curtain, too. And looked out onto an ocean of gaping, mute spectators.

* * * *

“My, my!” Rudy shouted so his voice carried over the heads of the audience. “This vaquero certainly knows his knots! There is no way I can escape from these ligatures, now, is there?”

“
No!
” shouted the entire audience.

Derrick was fit to bust with admiration. Rudy had certainly waited until the last possible second to emerge victorious from that canister of snow. That dough-headed mime had attempted to steal the thunder from his triumph, but Rudy had cagily drawn the attention back to himself.

It wasn’t difficult to do. Watching Rudy strutting about in only a pair of nearly-nude and very wet drawers, his hands now bound behind his back by an able vaquero, Derrick could understand the appeal of being a showman. It was very similar to the thrill a politician got when orating. All of those openmouthed, admiring spectators tended to plump up one’s self-image in a very pleasing way.

“Now I will hide in my spirit cabinet to attempt to unbind myself!” Rudy bellowed. A bit softer, he added, “But I need some help, for this strapping vaquero has bound my ankles extremely tightly. Senator Spiro?”

That was Derrick’s cue to assist Rudy to hop to the cabinet, where Derrick would fling open the doors and—

What. In the name of hell. Is that?

Someone was
lying
in the center compartment of their spirit cabinet!

Well, it was certainly a good way to get the audience’s attention. But Derrick didn’t think this was part of the act. At least, Rudy hadn’t warned him that a blonde-haired girl would be lying sprawled on the bench, one bare arm dangling against the floorboard, trailing red paint that dripped from her fingernails.

Oh, pluck the duck.
It was Memphis Kittie. The one glove she had taken with her into “the otherworldly realms of the beyond” lay across her stomach, polka dotted with vermilion paint—or blood. Could she have been stabbed by the knife they had found in the snow? Kittie had definitely not returned safely to this world.

“Kittie Wells!” several audience members shouted. Everyone who had not fainted jumped to their feet. A few made as if to storm the stage, Kittie’s fiancé Bob Freund among them.

Derrick was the first to reach the body, placing two fingers on her jugular to feel no pulse. He shook her, as people who find a body are prone to do. As though she were only asleep. But she was as dead as King Tut.

Rudy, who had easily slipped free of his bonds, kneeled next to Derrick and whispered, “Have mercy. That son of a bitch managed to stick her in here to put the blame on us.”

“Where is he?” Derrick turned to the crowd pressing in on him from behind and bellowed, “Where is Eliazar Castillo?”

Bob Freund tore Derrick aside in order to shake Kittie’s body some more. Her dripping hand left vermilion trails across the bottom of the cabinet, and now a cohort of Bob’s was gripping Rudy by the shoulder and blathering in his face.

“You damned murderer! You’re the one hiding Montreal Jed, and you’re the one who tried to hide Kittie in this cabinet!”

“You yellow-bellied worm!”

“You puking, murdering maggot pie!”

“You damned illusionist!”

Just as it looked as though the jig was up and the fine citizens of Laramie were about to string the magicians up, the oddest thing happened.

A wolf trotted across the stage, sticking his furry face in between the milling legs of the lynch mob. Derrick couldn’t be sure, but he assumed it was the wolf he had earlier seen from the parlor of Albuquerque House. And a wolf probably wasn’t the strangest thing ever viewed at a gathering of a circus troupe, so no one paid attention to him.

This was an obvious omen, and Derrick grabbed the wolf by his ruff. “Where is Eliazar Castillo?” he asked the canine. It didn’t feel a very blockheaded thing to do at the moment, being surrounded as he was with blockheads. Even odder, Ivy Tempest, the beautiful and very pregnant sister of Alameda, shoved her way over, kneeled down, and also talked to the dog.

“Caleb? Is that you, Caleb?”

Derrick asked her, “Who the hell is Caleb? Is this your pet dog?”

“No, Caleb is a friend of mine.”

“This wolf is your friend?”

Ivy said anxiously, “Please follow him. Go, go! My husband is the deputy, but he’s snowed in at our ranch, and believe me when I tell you, these citizens are about to string you up from the telegraph pole. Wherever Caleb leads you is bound to give you the answers you seek. Go, go!”

Indeed, someone was wrenching Derrick’s shoulder, lifting him in the air and rattling him mercilessly. Rudy had his arms pinned behind him by Bob Freund, who was shaking him up and down. Alameda pushed her way into the knot of men and pasted the fellow lifting Derrick in the jaw.

It was a very solid punch, connecting with a satisfying and loud thump, and Derrick was free. Alameda said, “Ivy, you shouldn’t be here in your condition!”

Ivy struggled to her feet, assisted by Derrick and Alameda. “You need to listen to this wolf, Allie. Follow him! I know you didn’t have anything to do with poor Kittie’s murder, and I’m sure Neil knows that, but you’ve got to follow this wolf.”

Ivy shook the dog by his ruff now, too. “Caleb! Show them where to go!” She pointed an arm in the direction of the stage wing, and the wolf squirmed away between the legs of many irate citizens.

It was up to Derrick to wallop Bob Freund in the jaw. Bob collapsed like a sack of flour, muttering, “You beetle-brained murderer!” with a comical cross-eyed glance.

Derrick grabbed Rudy by the arm and yanked him free of the crowd. “We’ve got to follow that wolf!” he cried. The wolf’s hindquarters flashed brilliantly as he weaved his way through the stage curtain, his cunning white feet skittering. Looking over his shoulder, he seemed to be looking directly at Derrick. Derrick imagined he could even hear Caleb’s voice urging, “Follow me!”

Derrick grabbed Alameda’s arm, too. The trio raced through the stage curtain. Derrick paused for only a fraction of a second to snatch up a buffalo robe, as he noticed that Alameda was still clad only in her almost-nude costume.

The wolf howled. He stood on top of the snowbank the fine citizens of Laramie had piled before the door of C. Chang, Proprietor. His unearthly keening raised gooseflesh on Rudy’s neck. Caleb’s sapphire eyes glittered in the moonlight with an obvious intelligence.

Rudy said, “Castillo must be hiding in there. Probably went to get more cinnabar paint.” He slapped the revolver he had buckled around his waist before going like sixty out of the Oddfellows Hall. After his bath in the melted snow onstage, he didn’t really notice he was still shirtless, but he was envious that Derrick had remained clothed. And Derrick held a panting woman wearing a buffalo robe to keep him warm.

“All right,” said Derrick. “You’re staying out here, Alameda. It doesn’t look like anyone followed us from the theater, but I want you to hide behind that cigar store Indian.”

“I’m not hiding behind any damned wooden Indian!” declared Alameda, gripping the buffalo robe around her bosom. “That loco knife-throwing maniac murdered one of my closest friends.” She shook her cunning white rabbit’s fur muff. “I’m going to see justice done!”

Rudy said, “We’ll see to that. You stay put.” He drew his revolver and cocked the trigger. He started to follow the wolf but on an impulse turned and laid a big smooch on Alameda’s face. “We’ll show you justice when we lead that buffoon out, trussed like a mummy.”

Rudy barged up the snowbank. He patted the wolf on the head, and it sure looked as though the wolf smiled at him. “Caleb? We’ve got the right culprit. Right?”

Caleb woofed his reply, so Rudy shoved Chang’s door open and stepped into the shop. Scents of cinnamon and opium seeped into Rudy’s nostrils. It was so dark he practically bumped into Eliazar Castillo, who stood by the counter, flashing a knife in poor Chang’s face.

Castillo was shrieking, “You must have more cinnabar! What else am I supposed to paint my girl’s nails with—blue paint?”

“Cinnabar is deadly!” Chang wailed. “I will not make more paint!”

Castillo flung down his bowie knife in order to grab Chang by the shirtfront, shaking him around over a pile of stuffed rattlesnakes. Poor Chang’s eyeballs rolled about in his skull and his hand grappled to grab the bowie knife, but he only succeeded in grabbing a dehydrated rattlesnake. It probably didn’t hurt Castillo too much when Chang bopped him with the snake.

“You tell me where you got that cinnabar!” Castillo shrieked. “Tell me which Mexicans sold it to you and I’ll leave you alone!”

“All right,” said Rudy. This was a good juncture to press the barrel of his revolver to the middle of Castillo’s back. “Castillo, I’m making a citizen’s arrest.”

Castillo turned to face Rudy but did not let go of the pharmacist. As a result, the hapless Chang was dragged through the pile of reptiles and even had a dung beetle clinging to his arm. “Arrest for what?” Castillo said, a bit calmer now. “For wanting vermilion paint?”

Derrick and Alameda were now behind Rudy. Alameda cried, “For murdering poor Kittie Wells and sticking her in Remington Rudy’s spirit cabinet!”

Castillo frowned incredulously. “Kittie Wells? Who is that?”

“Help,” squeaked Chang. “Let me go and I will tell you where cinnabar is!”

Castillo tossed the riceman down without looking at him. Chang gasped and sputtered, facedown in another pile of beetles, but Castillo was more interested in Rudy now. “I don’t know any Kittie Wells!”

Alameda spoke first. “She’s the vanished gal who suddenly appeared in Rudy’s cabinet while you were watching his act not ten minutes ago! I was standing right in front of you talking to Temperance right around the time. You were there, and then you weren’t. You’re the damned murderer! There was red paint on Kittie’s fingernails!

“Were you the ones who stole my bowie knife?” A knowing look spread over Castillo’s face. He snatched up his knife and pointed it at the wolf, who sat innocently near the stuffed Bengal tiger, looking happy as a clam at high water. “Perhaps you’re going to tell me that this lovely lady is my next victim as well?”

The trio looked at each other blankly. Alameda stepped abreast of Rudy and, to his surprise, whipped a ladylike derringer from her fur muff. “I’m no one’s victim, Castillo!”

“Quiet, Alameda,” Rudy whispered. He placed his hand on her wrist to force her to lower her little pistol, but she was having none of it.

Castillo said, “Who was talking about you? I’m talking about this gorgeous, stunning woman sitting right by the elephant.”

“Elephant?” Rudy could see no elephant, only the innocent Caleb. He gestured. “You mean this white wolf?”

“Hallucinations!” croaked Chang from his position on the floor. “Cinnabar makes hallucinations!”

Castillo shouted, “You’re not arresting me based on some hot gas about cinnabar. It’s not illegal, and there’s nothing you can do about it!” Making a great leap, Castillo wrenched an Oriental cutlass from where it was displayed on the wall.

“Get out, Alameda!” Rudy said with more urgency now.

Derrick dragged her in the direction of the door, but evidently Castillo had no intention of cutting anyone. He was displaying his flair for knives, whooshing the cutlass and bowie knife in swirls above his head, a dramatic stance to his legs. It would have been fairly amusing actually, if Rudy had not already been aware that this Spaniard was a murderer. Castillo had a stylish flair with the knives, and now he was tossing them in the air and catching them by their handles without even looking at the ceiling. His long red-painted fingernails flashed in the dim light of Chang’s one lamp as he twirled the knives about.

“I am the great and magnificent knife thrower Castillo! Why would I want to kill a woman when I command such respect with my knives? I can pin down a human form by the sheerest, tiniest thread of fabric when they are standing over ten yards away. I don’t need to steal a woman from Montreal Jed’s act. It would be trivial of me to hate him and try to make him look bad.”

“Which is what you did,” Rudy mentioned. “And now you’re making me look bad by sticking Kittie in my spirit cabinet—”

“And killing her!” Alameda added.

Castillo blathered on. “The great and magnificent Castillo doesn’t need to kill anyone! Why would I harm a defenseless woman, a woman with cunning little feet, little pinkie toes just dying to be—”