The Floating Outfit 34 Read online

  Seventeen – I’m Not Sorry Sabot Escaped

  ‘They’ve all got clean away, Miss Boyd,’ Colonel Manderley announced grimly as the girl entered his office at one thirty in the morning. ‘My men raided the theater, but it was deserted. By that time, the Texarkana Belle had left and they didn’t even get Sabot.’

  ‘How about my uncle and his friends?’ Belle demanded anxiously.

  ‘They’re safe. If the thing was planned as you suspected, they didn’t carry it out. Probably because Brandt wasn’t there to lead the others.’

  ‘Yes. They’re weren’t likely to have two “officers”. Your men didn’t locate the arms, I suppose?’

  ‘Not yet. I’ve got them scouring the woods around the city. It’s possible the Brotherhood have them hidden somewhere in Shreveport, I suppose.’

  ‘I doubt that,’ Belle objected. ‘It’s my belief that they wouldn’t want to take a chance on losing their weapons. So they’ll have held them somewhere that would allow them to be moved to safety if anything went wrong. Either out in the woods, or along the river.’

  ‘That’s how I see it,’ Manderley admitted. ‘I hope we do find them. A hundred repeaters, even old Henrys, in the hands of men like the Brotherhood isn’t something I care to contemplate.’

  Having invited Belle to accompany him and Szigo into his office, Manderley had checked her documents. He had read Handiman’s letter of introduction, then asked the girl how he might best be able to help her. Making her suggestions, she had told the officers about the Brotherhood’s activities. Szigo had not been pleased to learn that he had been duped, but he had been wise enough to keep his opinions to himself.

  Although much of Belle’s summation had been speculative, she had come close to the truth in her explanation of the night’s events.

  Having stirred up considerable ill feeling against the Union, amongst the audience at the free show, the Brotherhood had planned to keep tempers at boiling point. If their next move had worked, it would have probably resulted in open conflict between the citizens and the soldiers.

  Disguised as members of the United States’ Army, in uniforms taken from the Dragoons’ equipment bales, Brandt’s party were to have ‘arrested’ Winslow and his companions for their part in the treasonable activities at the theater. With them all collected, they would have been murdered. Not only would their deaths—apparently at the hands of men under Szigo’s command—have inflamed the town’s people with a desire for revenge, it would have removed the restraining influence which Winslow and the others might have exerted.

  A man like Szigo could have been relied upon to add further fuel to the fires of hatred by his attitude. Probably he would have refused to even investigate the accusations. Faced with what he would have been only too pleased to call an open rebellion, he would strike back. There would have been fighting, with Southrons and soldiers killed.

  Such an incident could not have been kept out of the newspapers. Once the story got out, it would spread like a brushfire. Agitators in both the North and the South would pounce on to it. Perhaps it would not lead immediately to a second secession, but the seeds would have been sown. The Brotherhood would have made sure that they developed and blossomed into an open break from the Union.

  The plan had started to go wrong when Brandt had punished Selima. Bitter at the treatment, she had been determined to take her revenge. Leaving the theater, she had visited the rooming house in which she was boarding. After collecting her portable belongings, she had set out to lay her information. That had presented her with a problem. She wanted to benefit financially from her treachery and had wondered who might best suit her needs. Knowing little about the Brotherhood, other than that its members claimed to be well-supported in their activities, she had decided against consulting the local civilian authorities. They might have been in league with her employers. So she had elected to take her news to the Army. She had known Szigo and other officers, which would ensure that they granted her an interview.

  What the girl had not known was that her departure had been discovered. Brandt and the two soldiers had gone to the rooming house and learned that she had already left. Guessing which way she would go, Brandt had sent Mick to the theater with orders not to start the plan until he returned. Then he and Andy had made for the post, hoping to find her before she arrived. Missing her, due to taking a more direct route, they had been interviewing the sergeant of the guard when they had seen her coming. So they had made their way to the Headquarters building and lain in wait for her. Her arrival with an escort had presented no problems. Brody had been clubbed insensible as he entered and the girl silenced. At Brandt’s suggestion, Andy had taken Selima into the room and dealt with her. A ‘captain’, even one who was not a regular member of the garrison, would have been less likely to have his presence in the building questioned. So he had left the silencing to his companion while he kept watch.

  When Brandt had not returned, Sabot the Mysterious had taken it upon himself to cancel the rest of the plan. Dismissing the men and sending a warning to de Richelieu, who was waiting with the arms at a farm five miles from Shreveport, the magician had made his departure as planned on the Texarkana Belle. Assuming that the horse which Belle had taken had pulled free its reins and wandered off, the conspirators had attached no greater significance to its disappearance. Most of them, indeed, had been so eager to make good their escapes that they had not given the matter a second thought. Before the Army had commenced its search, the Brotherhood For Southron Freedom were well on their way to safety.

  While being very eager to capture the agitators, Manderley had also been aware of how delicate the situation was. He had approved of Szigo’s decision to place the town off limits that night, so did not want to alarm the population—or permit accusations of failure to keep his word—by sending a large armed force in search of the Brotherhood. Compromising, he had sent a dozen picked men under the command of his most trustworthy officer; a major who had never approved of Szigo’s handling of the civilian population. Reinforcements had stood to arms, ready to follow the patrol if there should have been any shooting. The major had returned from his abortive mission and reported to Manderley. Having sent to the room where Belle was catching some badly needed sleep, the colonel had brought her up to date with the events of the night.

  ‘We found that feller you told us about,’ Manderley went on. ‘He was still unconscious and the doctor says his skull is fractured. So he might not remember anything when, or if, he recovers. That must have been a hell of a crack you gave him.’

  ‘It seemed like a good thing to do at the time,’ Belle answered. ‘I hope that he can talk, though.’

  ‘Yes. It might help us to locate the others,’ Manderley growled. ‘Damn it, ma’—Colonel Boyd, if you’d—’

  ‘I’ve been thinking the same thing, Colonel,’ the girl answered, without sounding apologetic. ‘But I acted as I thought best at the time. Everything at the theater pointed to Sabot being in cahoots with the intruders. It was too much of a coincidence that he would have selected a trick that fitted their requirements so perfectly. To say nothing of it being highly unlikely that they could have substituted their portraits for whatever he had hidden behind the curtain. Then there had been Selima’s behavior. She acted as if nothing was wrong. It caused her death in the end, poor little fool. On top of it all, the orchestra had been ready to play “Dixie” at just the right moment.’

  ‘None of which would have been remembered, or considered, if they’d succeeded in their plan,’ Manderley admitted.

  ‘It wouldn’t,’ Belle agreed. ‘I went back to the theater to see if there was any way I could prove what I suspected. Then, when I realized what they must be planning, I had to warn Uncle Alburgh and his friends. He sent word to them and I came here as quickly as I could.’

  ‘I’m not blaming you, Colonel,’ Manderley stated. ‘There’s few enough would have realized what was being planned.’

  ‘Thank you, sir. Do you thin
k that your men will find the arms?’

  ‘It’s not likely. The Brotherhood must have become suspicious when Brandt didn’t return. If so, they won’t have lingered in this neck of the woods. If I make too big a fuss, searching for them, it’s going to arouse a lot of comment. The truth about what’s happened could get out, and neither of us wants that.’

  ‘Nor do our superiors,’ Belle commented wryly. ‘We’re safe as far as the civilian population is concerned. Uncle Alburgh will have his newspaper pass off the business at the theater as a stupid, ill-advised, but unimportant piece of foolishness. Handled that way, people will have forgotten it by the end of the week. But not if the truth gets out. Yankee radicals will make a big thing of it and the Brotherhood will suggest that the Army really intended to arrest and murder Uncle Alburgh as an example to other Southrons not to attend treasonable assemblies.’

  ‘You’re right,’ Manderley conceded.

  ‘I’m not sorry Sabot escaped,’ Belle remarked.

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Aren’t there two Navy steam-launches here in Shreveport?’

  ‘Yes. They come under my command and are used for policing the river.’

  ‘One of them could easily take me to Mooringsport,’ Belle said thoughtfully.

  ‘Not before the Texarkana Belle arrives,’ Manderley warned. ‘I had thought of sending one of them after her to arrest Sabot.’

  ‘I’m pleased that you didn’t,’ Belle drawled. ‘With luck, and a little planning, he’s going to take me to the rest of the Brotherhood—and the Frenchman.’

  How Belle Boyd followed the Brotherhood for Southron Freedom in search of the Frenchman will be told in The South Will Rise Again.

  THE FLOATING OUTFIT 34: TO ARMS! TO ARMS, IN DIXIE!

  By J. T. Edson

  First published by Corgi Books in 1972

  Copyright © 1972, 2019 by J. T. Edson

  First Digital Edition: April 2019

  Names, characters and incidents in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons living or dead is purely coincidental. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information or storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the author, except where permitted by law.

  This is a Piccadilly Publishing Book

  Series Editor: Ben Bridges

  Text © Piccadilly Publishing

  Published by Arrangement with the Author’s Agent.

  About the Author

  J.T. Edson was a former British Army dog-handler who wrote more than 130 Western novels, accounting for some 27 million sales in paperback. Edson’s works - produced on a word processor in an Edwardian semi at Melton Mowbray - contain clear, crisp action in the traditions of B-movies and Western television series. What they lack in psychological depth is made up for by at least twelve good fights per volume. Each portrays a vivid, idealized “West That Never Was”, at a pace that rarely slackens.

  The Floating Outfit Series by J. T. Edson

  The Ysabel Kid

  .44 Caliber Man

  A Horse Called Mogollon

  Goodnight’s Dream

  From Hide and Horn

  Set Texas Back on Her Feet

  The Hide and Tallow Men

  The Hooded Riders

  Quiet Town

  Trail Boss

  Wagons to Backsight

  Troubled Range

  Sidewinder

  Rangeland Hercules

  McGraw’s Inheritance

  The Half-Breed

  White Indians

  Texas Kidnappers

  The Wildcats

  The Bad Bunch

  The Fast Gun

  Cuchilo

  A Town Called Yellowdog

  Trigger Fast

  The Trouble Busters

  The Making of a Lawman

  Decision for Dusty Fog

  Cards and Colts

  The Code of Dusty Fog

  The Gentle Giant

  Set A-Foot

  The Law of the Gun

  The Peacemakers

  To Arms! To Arms, In Dixie!

  ... And more to come every month!

  But the adventure doesn’t end here …

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  Issuing new and classic fiction from Yesterday and Today!

  More on J. T. EDSON

  1 Why and how Smethurst was killed is told in The Hooded Riders.

  2 Told in The Colt and the Saber, The Rebel Spy and The Bloody Border.

  3 Told in Back to the Bloody Border.

  4 Details of Marshal Solly Coles’ career are given in Calamity Spells Trouble.

  5 Details of Belle’s association with Dusty Fog are given in The Colt and the Saber, The Rebel Spy, The Hooded Riders and The Bad Bunch.

  6 Despite its name, the Colt Cloverleaf House Pistol is a revolver.

  7 The reasons why Mephisto was searching for Simmy Lampart, along with details of ‘the town for outlaws’ are given in Hell in the Palo Duro and Go Back to Hell.

  8 Told in Cold Deck, Hot Lead.

  9 Pink-Eye: derogatory name for a member of the Pinkerton National Detective Agency.

  10 Swish: derogatory name for a male homosexual.

  11 Told in The Rebel Spy.

  12 Conjuneero: a confidence trickster.

  13 Details of Lieutenant St. Andre’s career are given in The Bullwhip Breed.

  14 Soft-shell: a crusading liberal-intellectual.