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  The small Texan knew his interrogator to be the owner of a small, but prosperous shipping line. By all accounts, his reputation for honesty and courage had been earned the hard way and was well deserved. So he was unlikely to let himself be frightened or browbeaten, even by somebody he might have heard was dangerous to cross. However, Dusty had no intention of telling any more than was absolutely necessary, and thought that he might be able to avoid the need to do so.

  “Those two that night on the street were figuring to rob me,” the small Texan countered. “At least, that’s what the marshal told me after he’d been asking around town about them.”

  “That’s true,” the clerk supplemented, as the shipowner gave a sniff that was redolent of anything but respect for the peace officer’s judgment. The clerk, hoping to act as a peacemaker and avert any further disturbance on the premises, continued. “And he said that the snake must have been left by somebody who was trying to kill the man who had the room before Mr. Stormont.”

  “That’s the way the marshal figured it out,” Dusty went on, pleased with the interruption and continuing to press home what he hoped would be an advantage. “Which, from what that hombre by the wall told me just afore he died, it could be right.”

  “What did he say?” the shipowner asked.

  “Something about them being sent to this room by a woman so’s they could gun down her husband,” Dusty replied. “And, mister, I’m not married, nor ever have been.”

  “Then they couldn’t have been after you!” the clerk stated, throwing an imploring look at the shipowner and hoping his declaration would be accepted.

  “They couldn’t,” Dusty agreed, but he was wondering what the truth of the matter might be in spite of his apparent sincerity.

  “Where are you going, Lady Winifred?” Colonel Wilhelm Liebenfrau asked, glancing behind him as he and Waco walked away from the livery barn.

  “With you,” the beautiful young woman replied and, although she did not continue with, “of course,” the words were implied by her demeanor.

  “That is out of the question!” the Personal Attendant declared, exuding an equal determination and halting to turn with military precision. “Whoever killed Hoffmeyer—!”

  “He might not be dead,” the Lady interrupted.

  “Was it das?” Liebenfrau almost bellowed, so startled by the suggestion that he made the inquiry, “What is this?” in his native German and swung a furiously accusing gaze at the tall blonde youngster.

  “There is a slender chance he might be alive,” the Lady asserted, before the Texan—who was also facing her—could think of a comment. Raising her right hand in a placatory gesture, she went on, “No offense, Waco, but you aren’t a qualified doctor. Nor, from what you told us, were you able to make a close examination in the darkness.”

  “That’s for sure,” the youngster admitted, sounding worried. “But he looked and even felt dead ’cepting that I couldn’t find much of a wound to show how it was done.”

  “There are some kinds of poison which induce such a deep stupor that it can be mistaken for death,” the Lady explained. “If one of them was used, I might be able to help Hoffmeyer. So let’s not waste any more time talking, the delay could prove fatal.”

  “It’s worth a chance, Colonel,” Waco stated, swinging on his heel. As he and the Bosgravnian set off with the Englishwoman between them, he continued, “Anyway, it’s not likely whoever put him down’ll chance coming back. Not real close, at least and, even if he’s got more of them fancy knives, he’s lost the doohickey that he threw the other with. Hey though, where is it?”

  “I left it and the knife with my maid,” the Lady replied.

  “Is that wise?” Liebenfrau asked. “To leave her alone, I mean. There is nobody at the barn.”

  “Don’t worry about Florence,” the Lady answered, with complete confidence. “She’s going to stay in the wagon. Your shotgun is there and she knows how to use it. So she can take care of herself.”

  “Bueno,” Waco drawled, wondering if all English maids had a similar competence. “Will you-all take the lantern, Colonel, and I’ll go ahead to scout around and make sure that hombre hasn’t come back.”

  “Very well,” the Personal Attendant consented stiffly.

  Relieved of what would have been a dangerous encumbrance, the youngster went forward at a faster pace. On reaching the place where the orderly had fallen, although sure that he had been correct in his diagnosis, he could not resist the urge to repeat the test. It came almost as a relief to feel the flesh was colder than on the previous occasion and once more to be unable to detect the throbbing of the vein in the neck. Straightening up, he carried out the task for which he had left his companions. When satisfied that there was no danger, he returned to the corpse and called Liebenfrau’s name.

  Even though Waco had been convinced that life was extinct when he had conducted his first examination, what he saw in the light thrown by the lantern gave him a shock. It also provided indisputable evidence that Hoffmeyer had indeed been dead and not merely in a deep stupor. While there was only a small hole in the left side of his throat, from which a minute trickle of blood had run, his face was contorted by an expression of unspeakable agony.

  “Gott in himmel!” Liebenfrau gasped.

  “Son-of-a-bitch!” Waco growled. “I’ve seen a fair slew of dead men, but never one who looked like that!”

  “I have!” the Lady said, in barely more than a whisper. “The wound and facial expresson are identical to those of an uncle of mine who was murdered by that assassin you told us has been hired to kill Prince Rudolph.”

  “Beguinage?” the Personal Attendant spat out and seemed on the point of saying something more, but did not.

  “If it was him that tried to put you down, you was lucky, Colonel,” Waco drawled. “What I’ve heard, ’cepting for Dusty, everybody else he gone after’s wound up dead.”

  Chapter 10

  DOESN’T HE EVER SHOOT ANYBODY

  “HOT DAMN, DUSTY!” WACO BURST OUT, OBLIVIOUS of the distinguished company who were listening, as the small Texan concluded a description of his side of the day’s events. “What in hell’s going on? From what you say, whoever made wolf bait1 of poor old Hoffmeyer must be the one’s put the marshal under.”

  Events had moved rapidly since Dusty had suprised the two men in his room. The desk clerk had been ready and willing to accept that Dusty Fog’s mistaken identity, or at least wrong information about him, had caused the shooting at the Portside Hotel; but the shipowner had been less obliging. However, in view of the next development, he had seen the difficulty facing him if he should attempt to press the issue further.

  Being experienced in his duties despite his pomposity, the clerk had not wasted time when he had heard the disturbance upstairs. Before coming up to investigate, he had sent the bell boy to summon the town marshal. Returning alone, the youngster brought the news that Digbry had been murdered and said all the deputies claimed they were too busy to come to the hotel.

  Sharing Dusty’s unexpressed sentiments with regard to the municipal peace officers’ incompetence and venality, the shipowner had not considered their absence would be of any great loss. He had also been surprised by the small Texan’s suggestion that, as the local authorities were unavailable, the two of them should go to the Blaby mansion and put the matter in the hands of Governor Stanton Howard’s staff. Realizing that he was not sufficiently skillful with a gun to impose his will upon a man he had heard was a very proficient pistolero valiente, he had seen no objections to agreeing.

  Once they were in the privacy of the shipowner’s carriage, Dusty had disclosed his true identity. Telling him something of his assignment, he had requested and been granted cooperation. On reaching their destination and finding that other guests were already beginning to assemble, he contrived, with the shipowner’s assistance, to reach the owner of the mansion’s ground floor study unnoticed. At the Governor’s request, he had waited until the royal vi
sitor’s retinue arrived before telling his story.

  Almost two hours had gone by before the meeting could commence. It was comprised of the Ysabel Kid, Waco, Howard, Colonel Wilhelm Liebenfrau, the sheriff of Neuces County—of which Corpus Christie was the seat, although he had not yet taken up his duties—and, out of courtesy, the shipowner. Their host, Senator Cornelius Blaby, Crown Prince Rudolph of Bosgravnia, Major the Baron von Goeringwald, Captain Fritz von Farlenheim and Mark Counter were not present, it having been considered that their absence from the reception could arouse unwanted attention.

  “It looks that way,” Dusty admitted to Waco, seeing that most of the party appeared to be in agreement with the blond youngster’s comment. “Or it’s one hell of a coincidence.”

  “Too much of one for my liking,” the Ysabel Kid declared and, once again, there was general concurrence. “Anyways, likely the Colonel can tell us something about Beguinage.”

  “What do you mean?” Liebenfrau growled, swinging a glowering gaze at the black-dressed Texan.

  “Going by what the Prince told me on the way into town, you’re the head he-hooper of his police force,” the Kid explained, puzzled by the vehemence of the question. “So I figured’s you’d find out all you could about any hired killer’s might get paid to take his scalp.”

  “I try to,” the Personal Attendant conceded, his voice retaining its brusque timbre although his ramrod-straight posture relaxed a trifle.

  “Then you’d maybe know what kind of sneaky meanness he uses to do his killing,” the Kid went on. “He put a copperhead into the soft-shell’s2 room in Brownsville, same’s he tried here on Dusty, and he used poisoned wine to put down Dink Sproxton. Then there was the knife he used to give ‘Sharpshooter’ Schindler another mouth under the chin and figured on doing the same to Dusty with. That was poisoned as well. Doesn’t he ever shoot anybody like a good red-blooded American hired gun?”

  “I’ve never heard of him doing so,” Liebenfrau stated. “From all the reports I’ve seen, he prefers more subtle methods.”

  “The Lady allows he made wolf bait of her uncle in the same way that Hoffmeyer and the marshal were killed,” Waco remarked. “Which, happen it isn’t subtle’ll do for me until something comes along that is.”

  “There’s just one thing about that, though,” the sheriff pointed out. “Captain Fog had killed Beguinage hours before either of them died.”

  Tall, well made and in his early forties, Elvis Tragg belonged to a family who were prominent in Texas law enforcement.3 He had only recently been appointed sheriff of Neuces County, but had gained a reputation for scrupulous honesty and efficiency elsewhere. Although he had not yet made a start, he had known that his primary task would be to purge the corruption that was rife in the Corpus Christie town marshal’s department. The opportunity to investigate Digbry’s death would make it easier for him to obtain evidence against the no less venal deputies. However, being conscientious, he could not overlook the serious set of events he had heard mentioned in the study.

  “He only asks the fool questions,” the Kid drawled, throwing a mock derisive look at the blond youngster. “Then he sits back and lets the folks with brains come up with the smart answers.”

  “Which let’s you-all out of ever giving ’em, you blasted slit-eyed quarter Pehnane4 war-whoop,” Waco countered, directing an equally well simulated disdainful glare at his Indian-dark amigo. Then he became more serious as, swinging his gaze to the leader of the floating outfit, he went on, “Could it’ve been Beguinage who sent those three yahoos’s tried to bushwhack you that night, Dusty?”

  “I’ve been thinking some on those lines myself,” the small Texan admitted. “And I haven’t been able to come up with anybody else who could have. It wasn’t somebody with an old grudge against ‘Rapido Clint,’ because he didn’t exist until I got here and he didn’t make any other enemies in town.”

  “Might it’ve been somebody who recognized you and figured it gave a good chance to get evens?” Tragg suggested.

  “That’s possible, although I don’t recall seeing anybody who I’d had a run in with somewhere else,” Dusty conceded. “Word has it that they’d got friendly with a foreign girl in a saloon they used on the night they came after me. She’d only started there that afternoon, left with them and never went back. Did you ever hear of Beguinage having a woman for a partner, Colonel?”

  “No,” the Personal Attendant answered. “Why?”

  “If he did, it could explain some of the things that haven’t been setting right with me,” Dusty replied, wondering if he was imagining that there was something almost defensive in the Bosgravnian’s attitude each time he was called upon to supply information about the assassin. “Like who would Digbry have let come close enough to kill him the way it must have happened.”

  “Hell, yes!” Waco ejaculated. “It’d have to be somebody he knowed real well, or figured wouldn’t—or couldn’t—do him any harm.”

  “Are you-all saying that a woman could’ve killed Digbry the way it was done?” Tragg protested. In spite of his general competence as a peace officer he had something of what would come to be referred to as a “male chauvinist pig” attitude where members of the “weaker” sex were concerned.

  “There haven’t been many owlhoots who could touch the Bad Bunch when it come to out-and-out ornery meanness, sheriff,” the blond youngster answered, mentioning a band of vicious and murderous female criminals who had nearly killed Dusty and Mark before their activities were brought to an end.5 “And, by all accounts, Bat Gooch was a better’n fair bounty hunter. But he got himself killed ’cause he took a fool chance with a woman that he wouldn’t have had he been up against a man.”6

  “I’ll float my stick along with you, may Ka-Dih7 have mercy on me for doing it,” the Kid drawled. “Look at all the things Beguinage was pulling at a time both here and down to Brownsville. Unless he had help to do ’em, he’d need to be livelier’n a one-legged man at a butt-kicking contest. Which he couldn’t ask for better’n to have a woman for a sidekick. Dressed and acting right, most places she’d draw less notice than a man. And, like Waco said, being a she-male don’t make her harmless, or less capable of doing ornery meanness.”

  “I never said that,” Waco objected, the banter coming instinctively in spite of his awareness that the situation was extremely serious. “So don’t you-all go putting words into my innocent lil mouth, even if I aimed to say ’em and didn’t.”

  “I’ll ram my boot into your innocent big mouth happen you don’t stop horsing around,” Dusty warned, although he knew the youngster was taking the matter anything but as light-heartedly as appeared on the surface. “So, happen you’ve got anything that’s useful to say, spill it.”

  “Thing being,” Waco obliged, looking far from abashed by the rebuke. “Happen Beguinage had a woman for a sidekick, they could’ve been a whole heap closer ’n’ more cozy than just two folks earning a living together killing for hire. Which she wouldn’t take it kind that you’d gunned her loving man down, Dusty. They do say that sort of thing can rile a gal up a mite when it happens.”

  “You said that feller you shot at the hotel reckoned they’d been sent there by a woman, Captain Fog,” the shipowner commented, having listened to all that was being said and growing increasingly impressed by the shrewd assumptions drawn by the three young Texans.

  “Not in so many words,” Dusty corrected. “But they came out to mean it.”

  “Then you think that Beguinage’s woman could be trying to take revenge on you, Captain Fog?” the Governor suggested.

  “Maybe not just on me,” the small Texan replied. “She might be fixing to get evens with everybody who she reckons had a hand in him getting killed. That could have been why she made wolf bait of Digbry, unless all she wanted from him was to get back Beguinage’s knife and the pot of poison.”

  “It could’ve been some of both,” Waco pointed out, darting a glance at Liebenfrau and wondering how the revenge theory
could have provoked the attack at the livery barn. Drawing no conclusions, he continued, “This being their first time over here from all accounts, she likely wouldn’t know where to get any more of that poison. It’s not something to come off just any old general store’s shelves. And she could’ve took along the knife to remember him by.”

  “How would she know Digbry had them?” the shipowner asked.

  “The same way she found out that I’d killed him,” Dusty supplied. “She was hiding somewhere close by. Not in the warehouse, likely, but got in after we’d left. In that case, when she found his gear was missing, thinking I was just a hired gun, she’d figure as Digbry was a lawman it would be him who’d taken it.”

  “I’ll tell you one thing, though,” Waco drawled, indicating the weapon that had been thrown at the Personal Attendant and lay with the hooked stick on the study’s desk. “This knife didn’t kill Hoffmeyer, nor one like it.”

  “Neither did the one Beguinage tried to use on me,” Dusty went on, appreciating the point raised by the youngster. “Whatever it was had to be sharp and thin—”

  “And something that didn’t look dangerous,” Waco interjected.

  “And which a woman could have in her hand without it looking suspicious,” Dusty continued as if the interruption had not occurred.

  “A hat pin?” the Governor offered.

  “The hole in Digbry’s neck was a mite too big for that,” Dusty objected.

  “How about a knitting needle?” Waco suggested, anticipating his amigo’s thoughts on the subject.

  “Why sure,” the Kid put in dryly, despite considering that the youngster’s suggestion could be correct. “And he didn’t think maybe it was a mite strange that a gal he’d never seen afore’d come sitting on his desk knitting a pair of socks.”

  “She’d only’ve been knitting one sock,” Waco corrected, then made it clear he was addressing his next remarks to everybody except his challenger. “Way I see it, she went to Digbry allowing she’d got something valuable and was scared of having it wide-looped so would the nice, kind marshal look after it for her. And, being the good-hearted gent he was—or ’cause she offered to pay him, which’s more likely—he said ‘yes’ and opened up the drawer. Soon’s she saw what she’d come after was in it, she rammed the knitting needle into his neck and that was that.”