Sundance (17 page)

“You ever been to a pageant?”

“Not with white people.”

“Seems like they're going to a lot of trouble.”

Han Fei nodded. “Seems.”

“They say they could have ten thousand people.”

Han Fei nodded. “Ten thousand.”

“Where will they put them?”

Han Fei shrugged. “Not at my place.”

“I know this is a silly question, but how did you know I was here?”

“Looked for you.”

“And ended up here.”

“You came here before. And they have nurses.”

A few of the Settlement girls had heard rumors on the street that someone had been shot and stabbed by the Black Hand, but he must have been some kind of supernatural spirit because he hadn't died. Longbaugh figured Han Fei may have heard the same and somehow put it together. Longbaugh thought it was possible Siringo could make a similar leap. Siringo had been by to speak to Lillian Wald about Etta, but as far as he knew, he had not been back.

“The other one, the one like me. He still around?”

“Still around.”

“At the boardinghouse?”

“Sometimes.”

“You know when he's not there?”

“I can find him if I look.”

“He's good.”

“I can find him if I look, cowboy.”

“It wasn't an insult.”

“Okay.”

Longbaugh tried to find a safe topic.

“How are they doing, the Levis?”

“She's happier.”

“No more meetings with tall Chinese haters?”

“You said something to him.”

“What would I say?”

“He doesn't curse me now. Just acts like I'm not there.”

“Maybe he's reformed.”

“No. You said something.”

“How about Levi? How does he seem?”

“Saw him smile. Right after she smiled at him.”

“She smiled at him?”

“He took her hand.”

“And she smiled.”

“She smiled.”

“Well.” Longbaugh was pleased.

The noise stopped. The lack of activity made them both turn their heads and wait. Then it started again.

Longbaugh nodded. “Pageant. Funny thing.”

“Yeah.”

“Songs and skits?”

“So they say.”

“For the twentieth anniversary of the Settlement.”

“Twenty years is forever,” said Han Fei.

Longbaugh smiled and wondered how old he was. Another quiet moment, then something on the street, out of sight, crashed. Han Fei's eyes went wide. “
That
didn't sound good.”

“If you go back and you're sure there's no Siringo, I left something.”

“I brought everything.”

“Statue of Liberty toy.”

Han Fei wrinkled his nose in disbelief.

“They sell those off carts. I can lift one faster than blow my nose.”

“This one's special.”

“Those aren't special, cowboy. They're ugly as sin.”

“You're right. It's not important.”

An immigrant looked up from the courtyard below and spotted Han Fei. He elbowed the man nearest him and pointed.

Han Fei sat back, and Longbaugh stood up and stared at the man below, and the man looked surprised and turned away.

“What's that about?”

“The little Chink.”

“Yeah, and everyone comes here, so why do they care?”

“Good question.” Han Fei looked away, bitterly.

“She accepts anyone, I mean, she accepts former slaves, and you know how popular they are.”

“Almost as popular as Chinks.”

“So why don't they hate her, didn't she help start that negro association?”

“National Association for the Advancement of Colored People,” said Han Fei. “You have faith in people, cowboy. But they don't care what she thinks. Just glad someone's lower on the totem pole.”

Han Fei looked at the way he was standing. “You're doing better. Moving around.”

Longbaugh realized it was true. The pain was such that, although still present, he had begun to ignore it.

•   •   •

T
HE NEXT NIGHT,
on the night of the Henry Street pageant, Han Fei brought him the Statue of Liberty toy. He also brought Siringo.

The streets around Henry Street were so busy with the pageant that Han Fei had missed seeing Siringo follow him in the crowd.

Longbaugh wondered how Han Fei had managed to get in. “House chiefs,” chosen from the students and staff, were at every door on the block, strictly monitoring the crowd and admitting a maximum of
five people per window to watch the pageant down on the street. The whole building had been buzzing and busy for more than two hours. Longbaugh considered himself lucky that his room was on the other side, so he was undisturbed.

Han Fei came in with the toy, proud that he'd gotten through. Longbaugh took it and looked at the point of the flame, and thought there might be a fleck of dried blood in one of the folds. Longbaugh was trying to think of some way to show his gratitude when the nurse Jennifer opened his door, walked in, and began to pack his clothes.

“There's a man downstairs looking for you,” she said.

He watched her pull his extra shirt from a drawer.

“You left your post, Jennifer. You're a house chief, and you left your post,” said Longbaugh.

She added his shaving gear, closed up his bag, and held it out to him.

“I put one of the little ones in charge. You know how the little ones are, no one gets by. Hey,” she looked closely at Han Fei for the first time, “how'd
you
get in?”

“What man, and why are you sure it's for me?”

“Because men like him don't come here for our services, and he's not interested in the pageant. Time for you to go.”

“Oh, cowboy,” said Han Fei miserably, knowing what must have happened.

Jennifer was in control. “I have him searching the ground floor. A lot of people here, Mr. Longbaugh. You've got time. At least thirty seconds.”

“Thank you, Jennifer.” She closed the door as she went back to her post.

“It's all right, Han Fei, not your fault.” Longbaugh lifted his bag.

Han Fei's expression said he believed it was.

“I've been here too long already.”

Han Fei was determined. “I'll get you out.”

“Not this time.”

“I can do it.”

“Yes you can, but I need you to do something else.”

•   •   •

C
HARLIE
S
IRINGO
moved from room to room, casing the second floor, having satisfied himself that Longbaugh was not on the ground floor. The rooms facing Henry Street were difficult, as he had to check every celebrating person watching the pageant while hanging out a window in a group of five.

He moved fast, but it was unlikely to be fast enough. If Longbaugh was there, someone was bound to warn him. He took the stairs two at a time and on the third floor he saw an open door at the far end. There he found a sickroom with someone under covers. He crossed to the bed and yanked back the sheet. The small Chinese boy he had followed rolled over to look up at him, fully clothed with his shoes on. The boy offered a false look of surprise, but Siringo was already moving back to the hallway. He considered throwing open every door, but knew it was already too late. His one chance was to go to work on the Chinese kid.

He returned to the boy on the bed, a Statue of Liberty toy in his hands.

“Where?”

Han Fei's eyes darted up over his head for a second, then glared at him with stubborn defiance. “Downstairs.”

“The roof.”

Han Fei looked stricken. “Yes, that's it,” he said finally, as if Siringo might assume the opposite.

“Yes,” Siringo said, smiling, “that's it.”

Han Fei made a halfhearted effort to get around Siringo to block his path, but Siringo was quick, down the hall, taking the stairs up, two at a time. He found the door to the roof and hesitated, thinking a forewarned Longbaugh might be armed. He drew his gun from his holster, and pushed through the door into the night air.

A crush of onlookers lined the Henry Street side of the roof, watching the pageant below. He walked behind them, occasionally tapping a man on the shoulder who would turn and prove to be someone other than Harry Longbaugh. He looked down and saw the street filled with people, thousands and thousands of them, surrounding a staging area in
the middle of the street with a large fire built there. The history of lower Manhattan was being played out, Indian squaws meeting the incoming Dutch. The Dutch were portrayed in fanciful costumes that included windmills, wooden shoes, and tulips. The lighting was bright, as if the sun was setting between the buildings.

Siringo turned away, disappointed. He walked back to the door to the inside, then scanned the open space, his gaze falling on the roofs across the way that also flanked Henry Street. He stopped when he saw Longbaugh. He crossed to the back corner of the building and put a hand on top of the cornice. The street below was quieter than the one on the other side, where the pageant played out, but this street was also powerfully lit, jammed with actors in costume awaiting their cues to join the festivities, some quietly singing, some rehearsing their lines, some laughing in anticipation of their big moment. Siringo looked up at the moon, near full, two hands above the tenement roofs. He looked over to where Longbaugh grinned at him, and there wasn't a thing Siringo could do about it, as Longbaugh stood on another rooftop across the street.

“Hello, Harry.”

“Hello, Charlie.”

“So it is you.”

“You came a long way to find out.”

“Pretty long.” Siringo couldn't help but smile. The hunt would go on.

“You want to shoot me, Charlie?”

“Wouldn't be very satisfying, that.” Siringo saw he still had his gun in his hand and slid it back under his jacket.

“What you got planned?”

“Arrest you.”

“Do it, then.”

“You're under arrest.”

“Feel better?”

“Nope.”

“Any particular crime?”

“Boy in Wyoming. Billy . . . something. But you knew that.”

“Funny how no one remembers his name.”

“Unless you've done something lately.”

“You mean like to freshen my offense? Naw. Just him.” He didn't consider his encounter with the Black Hand boys to be pertinent.

“Well, that's why I'm here.”

They shared a quiet moment looking down at the well-lit street.

Siringo pulled on the soft drop of his ear. “Something bothering me.”

Longbaugh laughed in spite of himself. “Something I can help you with, Charlie?”

“It's just not like you. Shooting that boy.”

“Maybe I've changed.”

“Could be. Either way, I'm going to have to catch you.”

“Expected nothing less.”

“Of course, you were always faster than I was.”

“Fast enough.”

“On the other hand, we're both older. Never can tell who's deteriorated the most.”

“Who told you I'd deteriorated?”

Siringo smiled. That sense of humor he had always enjoyed when he was Charles Carter and they were outlaws together. Then he was serious again. “There's something else.”

“I've got time.”

“Back in the nineties, when Butch found out about me—what happened there?”

“You got away.”

“He had me cornered, had me dead to rights, and he was mad.”

“Changed his mind.”

Siringo watched him across the way. It was too far to read his eyes. He wondered why Longbaugh didn't know. Or if he did know, why he wasn't telling. But he clearly wasn't going to get an answer tonight. Still, he hated mysteries.

Siringo changed the subject. “What if I get
you
in a corner. You going to shoot it out?”

“There is that possibility.”

“I don't believe it.”

“Ask the sheriff's boy.”

“Wish I could.”

Longbaugh nodded thoughtfully. “So do I.”

Siringo heard the tone of his voice and again fingered the soft part of his ear. “Like I said. Just not like you.”

“It happened, Charlie, I can't change it.”

“If I had to guess, I'd say you didn't mean it.”

“He's dead, isn't he?”

“If it was self-defense, you can say so.”

“Will you believe me, Charlie?”

“I might.”

“Will you believe me and stand up for me and convince the judge and the jury?”

“I can try.”

“Then I best keep running.”

“Fair enough.”

They stood under the big moon and stared at each other, trying to read the other's face in the light from below.

“I did what I had to,” said Longbaugh. “And now you're doing the same. Don't lose sleep over it.”

“I hope you find her before I find you.”

“That would be all right.”

Siringo watched Longbaugh step away from the edge of the roof and slip off into the shadows. He considered rushing down the stairs into the street, to see if he might make the hundred-to-one right guess as to his escape plan and then have the luck of Theoderic to catch him in the crowd.

He did
not.

L
ongbaugh had a new appreciation for roofs. In the West he'd been leery of them, even of the bank roof with Etta, as a roof was an elevated dead end offering limited escape, and in a chase could end only in a shoot-out or step-off-the-edge-and-drop. Western buildings rarely stood above two stories, so off-the-edge-and-drop was an acceptable option, although with four outdoor walls, any smart posse should have been able to surround him. But seeing Siringo confined to a neighbor roof with no way to reach him had brought unexpected pleasure. And here, in the tenement heat of summer, where whole families abandoned their steaming rooms and carried sheets and pillows up to the roof to sleep under stars, he had stayed long enough to become part of the landscape and now blended in with the masonry.

He took his place, a corner he had made his own, and scanned the street below. Streetlamps glowed and gradually took over from the setting sun. He had been watching the front entrance to the Tall Boot Saloon. Every day he spent watching, he felt his side hurt a little less.

He had become more patient. The time spent recuperating had retrained him to accept the value of waiting. It helped that Lillian had told him he likely had lost no time. “You were learning new
information,” she had said, “so it seemed urgent, but it was fresh information only for you. Wherever she is, she's far enough ahead that Giuseppe and anyone else looking can't see her. She doesn't know you're trying to catch up, she's just moving and hiding.”

Moving and hiding. Rather than reassuring him, it made him question how actively Moretti and his men were hunting. The presence of a newly discovered husband may have spurred them to intensify their search. At times he doubted his patience, fearing he was employing it as an excuse to be cautious. But, coming back around, he decided that caution was warranted, it would be devastating to blunder into a situation he had not anticipated and accidentally give her away.

And there was the problem. He was no longer certain of the edge delineating action from prudence. His hesitation unnerved him. He knew he was not the same since the stabbing. He pressed himself to heal mentally as well as physically. He caught himself reviewing his responses, comparing them to the past to see if his actions were consistent with those of the man he had been. His timing was off. He was thinking rather than reacting, and that was making him slow. While the one who draws second often wins, what if you fail to react? What if you fail to draw at all?

He thought about courage. It was a topic that had never before occurred to him, but then, he had never had cause to distrust it. With his courage in doubt, he began to question its source. These days courage seemed to come from a thing or a state of mind, a bottle or a full belly, for example, or maybe a good night's sleep when he didn't remember his dreams. He wondered if he could bank his courage for future access, to balance the grim moments when the pain in his side sucked it out, or when he doubted his judgment, his quickness, his aim. Was courage a pose? It never had been. Could he simulate courage and thereby bring it back? Did he dare test it now that it was no longer second nature?

He had neglected a chore, and that troubled him as well. He had planned to replace his bandanna, but so far he had not. He told himself it was due to time constraints, as he was busy hunting for Hightower. But he feared it was one more manifestation of his uncertainty. Without
the bandanna, he might be less willing to go into action. He watched the street below. He was of two minds, and wondered which man he would be when the bear showed his face.

He did not know if Hightower frequented the Tall Boot, or if it merely served as the occasional meeting place. The bear might have been more likely to enter through the back, but there was no spot in the alley from where Longbaugh could watch without being seen. He was betting there was nothing to keep Hightower from using the front door if he happened to come from that direction. Longbaugh had been on the roof close to a week, convinced that sooner rather than later that day would come.

He did, on occasion, see Moretti's messenger, the slick in the good suit, but he was not interested in Moretti at this time.

Living on a tenement roof offered one other advantage in that it put time between Siringo and himself. Siringo was unlikely to give up, but he might be convinced, if his vanishing act carried on long enough, that Longbaugh had found his wife and left the city or had given up in order to evade arrest. Not likely, not even truly plausible, but maybe not impossible. He also appreciated the value of this location in that Han Fei had yet to find him.

Longbaugh had taken advantage of early mornings to scout the neighborhood. Gangsters were nowhere to be found at that hour, when the rising sun lit the faces of skyscrapers. Those boys were too busy dragging themselves home or sleeping it off. He learned the surrounding streets and alleys. He had tried to find the building where he had initially met Giuseppe Moretti, but so far had failed.

The day came when Hightower rambled down the sidewalk. No one could mistake that walk, those wide arm swings, and that deep, furry, uninhibited voice. Longbaugh smiled with his quarry in view, admiring the man's gregarious charm.

Longbaugh went down the narrow stairs and out onto the street. He watched passersby and looked for an appropriate candidate, one not yet inebriated, so that when Longbaugh threatened him, the threat would have the desired impact. He also wanted someone who was not a Tall
Boot regular, and therefore could not be a Hightower ally. Longbaugh cut his choice out of the herd, and bribed the man to go in and tell the bearlike creature at the bar that Mr. Place was outside. The candidate grinned, took the offered coin, and made a merry step toward the saloon where he would now drink for free. Longbaugh grabbed his shoulder in a calculated display of ferocity, drew him close, showed him the gun tucked in his belt and met his eye. The candidate returned his look with appropriate solemnity, and his sincere promise to fulfill his task convinced Longbaugh he would do that for which he had been paid.

•   •   •

A
FTER
H
IGHTOWER
verified that the man had said Mr. Place rather than Mrs. Place, he hurried out the back of the saloon into the alley, not bothering to look both ways as he hustled toward the side street where Longbaugh stepped out to block his path.

“You tip him?” said Longbaugh.

Hightower gurgled in fear, almost losing his balance.

“The man who told you I was waiting, did you tip him?”

Hightower shook his head no and collected himself enough to do a serviceable imitation of steadiness. He affected a blustery smile and shrugged. “These are the times that try men's souls.”

Longbaugh resisted the urge to break his arm. There would be time for that later. He felt akin to his old self at that moment, but something held him back, and he hoped it was expedience rather than reticence. He hoped the bear would go for his gun or throw a punch or run, so he could test himself, so he could react. He reminded himself that this man had led him into a trap. He tried not to overthink it.

He took hold of Hightower's arm and led him to the street, down the block and around the corner, down another two blocks, and into a creditable saloon, one that Longbaugh had found during his early-morning scouts. He was not surprised that Hightower made no effort to get away. By now, he would be curious and working out his own plan. He guided Hightower to a small booth in back and used force to sit him
down. He was immediately sorry, as his display of aggression had done nothing to frighten Hightower, while Longbaugh felt resurgent pain in his side. He frowned to cover his wince and sat opposite.

“Cozy,” said Hightower, looking around. “I should get out more.”

Longbaugh waited.

“Looks like you got a little stitch in your side.”

Longbaugh stared and gave away nothing.

“So. Can I get a drink?”

Longbaugh glanced toward the bar and nodded. The bartender brought whiskeys. Hightower drank his and after it was gone, Longbaugh pushed over the one meant for him and Hightower drank that as well. Longbaugh imagined Hightower had his hand on a gun under the table.

Longbaugh continued to wait. He chose not to mention the night Hightower had set him up with Flexible and his friends. He was therefore surprised when Hightower brought it up himself. Of course, if pressed, he could deny it had been a trap. He could say those boys had it in for the tourist all along and had simply disobeyed him.

“There's a story making the rounds. Funny story, maybe you heard it. Got most of the boys on edge, so maybe not so funny to them. Of course, they're superstitious louts. You probably remember those punks, the ones jumped you in the alley?”

Longbaugh listened.

“The ones I pulled off you? You remember that, right? The way I saved your hide?”

Longbaugh listened.

“Well, something happened later that same night. With the timing, I thought maybe you would know something about it. But how could you? After all, here you are, flesh and blood.”

Longbaugh listened.

“Can I get another drink?”

Longbaugh did not react.

Hightower shrugged and his thick-tongued words came out archly.
“If one isn't offered, I shall not pout.” He took one of the empty glasses, drained the last drops into the other glass and angled that over his mouth for whatever dregs would fall.

“So those boys, Flexible and friends, said they'd had this encounter. Didn't name names, although they could have been embarrassed, considering how it turned out. They did say he wore some sort of mask. So they met this fellow in the street and made him an offer. But
this
fellow, well, he was different. He seemed somewhat put out and decided to resist. They did not find much to like in that. It's an intolerance they should probably be made aware of, one of their many faults. He drew a gun, this fellow, and before you say anything, let me point out it was their Christian duty to defend themselves. But here is where the story gets interesting. The boys said they shot him before he even fired. Not just shot him, but riddled him, dozens of hits, with their automatics, and you know those things don't miss much, but I tell you this and I am sincere, he just would—not—die. They did not believe their eyes. They had guns smoking in their hands, and there he stood on his own two feet. They were beginning to think there was something supernatural at play, and they were also beginning to feel a wee bit of the nerves.”

Longbaugh listened.

“You could help here, a little grunt, a little nod, just to show you're paying attention.”

Longbaugh offered neither.

“Well, there they were, practically unarmed as they had already emptied their guns into him, and he retaliated, he actually opened fire on them. How many spirits do you know carry a gun, much less know how to use it? It makes as much sense as, say, someone like you doing it. And this fellow, he was a deadeye, took them out one by one, a bullet apiece, and when he was done, they were in sore need of medical attention.”

Longbaugh said nothing. At least one of them had been uninjured, but to correct him would be to give himself away. Maybe that's what Hightower had in mind.

“But that is not how the story ends. You remember Flexible? Well, he swears on a skyscraper built of Bibles that he got close enough to stab that fellow in the belly, and the fellow didn't flinch, didn't bleed, just lifted his finger and broke Flexible's nose and two front teeth. Flexible woke up to find his knife blade in the wall. Here he thought he'd stabbed a man in the flesh and he found out he'd stabbed a brick wall instead. Now they're all convinced he had to have been a ghost.”

“A ghost,” said Longbaugh.

“Otherwise they'd have made him one, if he'd ever been human in the first place.”

“You know who they were after?”

Hightower was innocence incarnate. “Not a clue.”

“A mystery,” said Longbaugh.

“Better than a mystery, it's a damn spook story. He's a new legend, got the rest of the gang sleeping with their eyes open and cricks in their necks from looking over their shoulders, expecting the specter to come for them. Although with the ghost laying low the last few weeks, they're starting to get brave again.”

Longbaugh considered him. Hightower knew. But he couldn't be sure, as the story made no sense, not if he'd survived bullets and stabbings. Until Hightower could make it make sense, he couldn't swear it had been Longbaugh.

Hightower also knew that Longbaugh knew Hightower had set him up.

“Why tell me?” said Longbaugh.

“No reason.”

“Uh-huh.”

Hightower chuckled. “I only know I'm not their ghost. Innocent as a puppy's nose.”

That was the second time Hightower had used that expression, and Longbaugh could not decide if a puppy's nose was innocent by virtue of its curiosity, or, considering where it ventured and what it encountered, the least innocent thing on the planet.