The Bullwhip Breed Read online

  “Which same don’t surprise me none,” the girl answered. “I bet every time a gal’s been found, your fellers started chasing around in the bushes looking for the jasper who done it, going every damned which-ways and getting no place ‘cept all over the Strangler’s tracks. Then there’s the folks who use the Park each day, they walk about in hell’s chance of laying nose to a trail and holding to it—more so when you wouldn’t know what tracks to lay ‘em to.”

  “You sound as if you know what you’re talking about,” smiled St. Andre, thinking of how accurate Calamity’s description had been of what went on after the finding of other Strangler victims, and seeing why the bloodhounds failed to assist the police’s search for the killer.

  “Dobe and the boys are hound-running fools when they’re not on the trail,” Calamity explained. “They taught me some about it.”

  “Is there any chance of your friend following the Strangler’s tracks?”

  “As long as they haven’t been trampled under-foot and the feller stays off the paths, ole Tophet’ll follow him. I don’t want you to expect Tophet to trail the Strangler to his home, but he’ll point you the direction that bastard went off after killing the gal, and maybe tell you a mite more that could help.” For a moment St. Andre did not reply. As an avid student of the flood of Western fiction currently appearing in the popular press, he had read of Indians and a few white men who possessed the ability to follow a human trail by using their eyes. St. Andre had discounted the idea as being no more than another joke foisted on the stories’ authors by Westerners. Knowing Calamity would not joke at such a moment, St. Andre wondered if her friend could help the police by following the Strangler’s tracks.

  There was one small detail to be remembered by St. Andre. The Strangler case had been assigned to Lieutenant Caiman, an older man, shrewd, tough and capable, but sadly lacking in imagination. Maybe Caiman would not care to have outsiders interfering in the investigation. Somehow St. Andre could not see Caiman taking to a newfangled notion like using a visual tracker.

  “Why not bring on your tracker tonight?” he asked, deciding that what the eye did not see caused no worry to the heart of Lieutenant Caiman.

  “Tophet’s good,” Calamity replied, “but he can’t track at night, even in moonlight this good, or when he’s all likkered up. Which same he’s likely to be by this time. Leave it until daylight and he’ll read you some sign.”

  “We’ve nothing to lose. However, it’s Lieutenant Caiman’s case and it will have to be his decision.”

  “Reckon Lou Caiman’s about ready to try anything, Lootenant,” put in one of the patrolmen. “The Intelligencer’s been roasting his hide over the killings.”

  “What’s that?” asked Calamity.

  “A newspaper,” St. Andre replied in a tone that suggested he did not care for the New Orleans Intelligencer. “We’ll leave it to Caiman to decide. One of you stay here and don’t let anybody touch the body, the other one take care of that man and the girl. Take them to the station house until Lieutenant Caiman’s seen them.”

  Giving a distasteful grunt and a shrug, the older patrolman said he would stay on the spot and allow his partner to escort the witness to the station house. Long service had its privileges, but it also bore responsibilities. So the older man took the more unpleasant of the two assignments.

  “Say, do either of you boys know her?” Calamity asked, not looking at the body again.

  “It’s hard to say, ma’am,” the older patrolman answered. “From her clothes she worked the streets, but that covers a helluva an area. From Latour Street down to the river-front you’d find hundreds like her.”

  “We’ve never managed to identify one of the victims yet, cherie,” St. Andre went on. “The girls don’t often live with their parents. In many cases only their mac would miss them. That’s their—.”

  “I know. We call ‘em the same, or say they’re blacksmithing, out West,” Calamity interrupted.

  “No mac would come near the police, he’d merely figure his girl ran out on him and go looking for another. Let’s get going, Calam, we can do no more here.”

  Already the younger patrolman had joined the blonde and was helping a very pale, portly man rise. Calamity looked at the blonde for a long moment, then walked towards her.

  “Look, blondie,” Calamity said. “Reckon you could face up to taking a peek at that gal.”

  An expression of shock and fear came to the blonde’s face. While she had never seen one of the Strangler’s victims, her instinct told her the sight must be real unpleasant.

  “N—No!” she gasped. “Why should I?”

  “Because that gal’s the eighth to be killed. The man who killed her’s got to be stopped.”

  “Then let the police stop him!” croaked the blonde, backing away a couple of steps and staring with horror at what she could see of the body.

  “They want to,” answered Calamity. “Only they’ve no place to start looking. Maybe if they knew who the girl was, they could make a start at finding the Strangler. Only they don’t know who she is. You might.”

  St. Andre looked first at Calamity, then turned his eyes to the blonde. While the Strangler was not his case, the detective wanted to see it solved. Yet he knew that girls like blonde would never volunteer to help the police once clear of the crime. If she did not try to identify the body right then, the blonde would most likely be nowhere to be found the following day, unless held as a prisoner which would not make her feel in a co-operative mood on her release.

  “It’s possible you could help us a great deal, my pet,” he said gently.

  Shaking her head, the blonde tried to turn away. “I don’t want to look!” she gasped, the fear of death strong on her.

  “I could tell you that it’s not too bad,” Calamity said gently, “but I won’t. That gal there looks bad.” She laid her hand on the blonde’s arm, stopping the other girl backing away. “It’ll not be easy. Only she might be somebody you know. A pard, a kid you like.”

  “I don—!” began the blonde.

  “Listen to me, gal,” Calamity interrupted, still quietly. “The man who killed her has to be stopped. The law don’t know him. Maybe if they know who the girl is they could find out who she’s been with tonight, and that’ll take ‘em to the man who killed her.”

  While Calamity had no idea of how a detective worked, she figured the method she outlined might be as good a way as any of finding the Strangler. Something in Calamity’s voice and touch reached the blonde, sank through her fear of what she would see and give her courage.

  “I—I’ll take a look.”

  “Good gal!” Calamity answered.

  “You—You come with me,” the blonde went on.

  There were many things Calamity would rather have done than taking another look at that hideous body, but she kept her hand on the girl’s arm and led her to the side of the corpse. The elder patrolman had covered the face with his bandana handkerchief and the sight did not look too bad. While it still retained the slightly awe-inspiring look that death always gives a human frame, the main horror stayed concealed.

  “I don’t know the clothes,” the blonde stated, after sucking in a deep breath and looking down. “They’re the sort of thing a whole heap of us girls wear.”

  “Try the face, Sherry,” Calamity said.

  Throwing a look at Calamity, St. Andre bent down. His hand touched the bandana, then he looked at the pallid-faced blonde.

  “Go ahead, Sherry,” Calamity ordered. “She’ll take it.”

  With a pull, St. Andre exposed the face. He saw the blonde girl stagger and Calamity support her. For a moment St. Andre thought the blonde would faint, but a street-walker’s life made her tough and hard. She mastered her emotions and looked at the face.

  “N—No!” she ejaculated in a strangled voice. “I—I don’t know her.”

  St. Andre covered the face again and came to his feet. “You’re sure, my pet, that you don’t know her?”

>   “Can’t tell, the way her face is, not for sure. But I don’t think I know her,” answered the blonde, turning away.

  “You’ve done well,” said St. Andre. “Go with the patrolman to the station house.”

  Suspicion sprang to the blonde’s face. “Are you arresting me?”

  “No. You’ll be given a cup of coffee, and sent home. See she goes by a hack and charge it to me.”

  “Sure, lieutenant,” replied the younger patrolman. “Come on, Sally. And you, mister.”

  Watching the patrolman assist the portly man and blonde away, Calamity gave a shrug. “It might’ve worked.”

  “Certainly, cherie,” replied St. Andre. “Now I must take you to your friends and then go to make my report.”

  “Does that feller allus jump gals?” asked Calamity as she and St. Andre walked along the path and away from the body.

  “He does, if it is the same man,” the detective answered. “And the same method is used, so we believe it to be the work of one man.”

  “I sure wish he’d try it on me,” remarked Calamity, her right hand stroking the butt of her Navy Colt.

  Following the direction of the girl’s gesture, St. Andre remembered his duty as a policeman bound by the rules, ordinances and laws of the city.

  “You’d best let me keep your gunbelt, cherié,” he said.

  “Why?”

  “It’s against the law to wear a gun in New Orleans—and it will give me an excuse to come and see you in the morning.”

  “Land-sakes, do you need an excuse for that?” grinned Calamity, but she unbuckled the gunbelt and freed the pigging thong at the bottom of the holster. “See you get it back early in the morning, mind. I want to clean the gun.”

  “How early is early?”

  “Come as early as you like—as long as it’s not too early. Say by seven, I ought to be wake by then.”

  “Seven? And you say that’s not too early!”

  “Sure ain’t, back west of the Big Muddy. Ain’t it here?”

  “I mostly get into my office by nine o’clock,” smiled St. Andre, not bothering to mention the numberless occasions he had worked for eighteen to forty-eight hours at a stretch without going home, when involved in a difficult case.

  “Shuckens,” Calamity gasped. “You city folks sure have an easy life.”

  Then she thought of the girl lying back on the path and decided that not all city folks had an easy life.

  However, Calamity had never been one to brood on or mope about the past. Knowing there to be no chance of nailing the Strangler’s hide to the wall that night she forced the memory of the dead girl from her mind and prepared to buckle down to helping her friends enjoy their first evening in New Orleans.

  On leaving the Park, Calamity found herself on Latour Street, an area apparently given over almost entirely to entertainment Saloons, a theatre, a couple of cafés, billiard halls, a dancehall and gambling houses flanked a wide street, each giving out with its own blare of noise. In many ways the street made Calamity feel at home for the first time since reaching New Orleans. This was her part of town, tough, boisterous, rowdy, like the main drag of a trail end or mining city back in the West. Maybe the buildings looked a mite more permanent, being built of brownstone instead of adobe or timber, but the noises and sights reminded Calamity of the kind of places she knew and loved.

  A couple of bouncers heaved a drunk from one saloon, sending him flying across the pavement to narrowly miss landing in one of the large horse-troughs that lined the street. Calamity ignored the drunk and studied the water-filled troughs.

  “You sure have some thirsty hosses down here,” she remarked.

  “Not really,” St. Andre answered. “We use them in case of fire. There’s the Cheval D’Or now.”

  Coming to a halt before the largest, noisiest and most garish place on the street, Calamity looked it over with critical gaze. “Sure looks fancy. Say, are you coming in for a drink?”

  “I have work to do, cherie,” the detective replied, taking her hand in his, carrying to it his lips and kissing it.

  “First time anybody ever kissed my hand,” Calamity stated. “I sure hope that ain’t the only place you fellers kiss.”

  “That,” St. Andre told her with a grin. “Is something you will have to wait to discover. Au revoir, cherie.”

  “I don’t know what it means,” replied Calamity, “but the same to you, and many of them.”

  With that Miss Martha Jane Canary turned and entered the Cheval D’Or.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Miss Canary At The Cheval D’Or.

  DESPITE its fancy-sounding name, the bar-room of the Cheval D’Or appeared to be little or no different from the kind of place Calamity had looked upon in a whole heap of top-grade saloons throughout the West—with one exception. A small but rowdy band played music at the left side of the room and instead of performing on the stage, the saloon’s show girls whirled and kicked their legs in the centre of the open space mostly left free for public dancing. The crowd lining the long bar, or seated at the various tables, lacked cowhands, buckskin-clad plainsmen, yet seemed to be little different from a Western saloon’s customers in class or social standing; except for the folk at a couple of the tables on a small raised section close to the band. From the expensive clothing of the people on the dais, the fact that a couple of waiters showered attention on them full-time, and that champagne appeared to be the popular tipple served, Calamity figured them to belong to the richer class, the women of the party included.

  Out West the ‘good’ women only very rarely entered a saloon, and ladies of the upper classes more than most stayed out of the places of entertainment. However, in New Orleans, and other Eastern cities, the desire to see how the other half relaxed and played became fashionable and brought parties of socialites to better class saloons to do so. Or course the socialites did not wish for too close contact with the revelling hoi polloi, so the obliging saloon-owners—always eager to satisfy the whims of well-paying customers—erected little segregated areas, often with their own private entrances, on which those who had the right background, and could afford it, might sit in comfort and see the fun. From their little raised sanctums, the ladies looked down on the herd enjoying its pleasures, watched shows which they regarded as being thrillingly naughty, and left with a sense of having improved their knowledge of life.

  After a tolerant glance at the champagne-sipping upper-crust, Calamity forgot them and scanned the room for her friends. Sure enough the boys sat right where she figured they would be, at a table slap-bang on the edge of the dance floor and from where they could have an uninterrupted view of all that went on. Big, burly, white-haired Dobe Killem, her boss; lean, dark and tough looking Tophet Tombes, who acted as scout for the outfit; Chan Sing, the Chinese cook whose lapse from grace first gave Calamity acceptance to the outfit, and the other boys sat at ease, or as near at ease as their shop-bought, city-style clothes allowed, drinking whisky, squiring half-a--dozen or so saloongiris and ogling the waving black-stockings and exposed white thighs of the dancers.

  Calamity gave the dancing girls a casual glance as she walked across the room to join her friends. With one exception, the girls dancing looked nor performed no better than she had seen in Western saloons. Mind you, that exception danced a heap more fancy than Calamity could ever remember seeing anywhere. The exception was a girl Calamity’s size, with a slim, but shapely figure in an abbreviated white outfit that left her arms and legs bare and who wore—although Calamity did not know them as such—ballet slippers on her feet. Showing far greater grace, agility and style, the girl whirled, spun and kicked her well-muscled legs in a manner that made the others look heavy-footed as a bunch of miners at a hoe-down. Her red hair was taken back and pinned up at the rear in a severe fashion, and her rather pale but pretty face held an expression of rapture as if she enjoyed every minute of her dance.

  A man, engrossed in watching the red-haired dancer’s gyrations on the points of her ball
et slippers, felt Calamity bump into him as she crossed the room, glanced at her, turned back to observe the dancer, then swivelled his head hurriedly to Calamity’s departing figure. For a moment he stared after Calamity and rubbed his eyes. Deciding that he had better stop drinking, for he could not possibly have just seen a pretty girl dressed in men’s clothes pass him—although, if it came to a point, the feller who bumped into him sure walked fancy—the man emptied his glass and left the room.

  “Hey, Calam gal!” whooped Dobe Killem, eyeing his protege. “Come and get sat down, gal. Damn it, where’ve you been to?”

  Suspicion gleamed in the saloon-girls’ eyes as Calamity took the offered seat. Unlike the man Calamity bumped into, they knew for certain the newcomer was a woman and did not care for the idea of an outsider moving in on what showed signs of developing into a real humdinger of a party.

  “They’re my brothers, all of ‘em,” Calamity remarked, reading the signs as if the other girls bore them painted on their bosoms. She reached for the drink Killem poured and went on in explanation. “My mother had a fast hoss.”

  Then she grinned at the men of the outfit, wondering if any of them would have dared walk into a Western saloon dressed in those derby hats, white shirts, fancy neck-ties and town suits. Dared might not be the correct word, for those freight-hauling Sons feared nothing but their boss.

  “Where’ve you been to, Calam gal?” asked Tophet Tombes, who looked about as at home in his new clothes as a skunk would in a church hall. “We waited, but you didn’t show.”

  “I got lost,” admitted Calamity. “Then I ran into a young feller as needed some help from four jaspers who was walking all over his face.”

  “Trust you!” said Killem dryly. “There’s time I reckon we should ought to call you ‘Trouble’, not Calamity,”

  “Calamity!” giggled one of the girls. “That’s a funny name.”