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  The young Bosgravnian’s improved humor prior to being told of the advance payment had stemmed from it having become obvious that the Comtesse had failed to learn anything worthwhile from the big Texan, or his companions. While he appreciated that her association with members of the Crown Prince’s escort could prove beneficial to their purposes, he had found a certain satisfaction in discovering that it had not yet produced any positive results.

  “For two excellent reasons,” Charlene answered, still contriving to sound much less irritated than she was feeling, but she could not prevent the fingers of her right hand from drumming on the table near the fan. “Firstly, ‘Breakast’ assures me that there is no better man than ‘Clint’ available in Corpus Christie. Secondly, which is even more important, some of those anarchist scum are here and have already offered to hire him. Not only must we prevent that from happening, we can use him to find out if they have anybody working among us and to get rid of them for us.”

  “How do you know they have offered to hire him?” von Farlenheim challenged, in spite of appreciating that the second point made by the Comtesse would be particularly advantageous.

  “He told ‘Breakast’ as much when they were discussing terms,” Charlene explained, clearly struggling to retain her friendly tone and drumming her fingers more sharply. “And ‘Breakast’ is convinced he wasn’t just making it up to get a higher price. Don’t forget that the Council said we could rely implicitly upon his advice when hiring any assistants we require.”

  “I remember,” the young Bosgravnian conceded, watching the movements of her fingers. He was aware that she had a violent temper and a proclivity for lashing out at anybody who antagonized her, but felt reasonably confident that she would have sufficient self-control to behave sensibly in a public place. “However, I can’t recollect hearing you were authorized to pay for a task before it was completed satisfactorily.”

  “The decision is mine!” Charlene gritted out, barely able to control her asperity. Then, making an obvious effort of will, she raised the right hand in a placatory gesture and adopted a demeanor which she felt would attain the result she desired. “If necessary, when we return to report to the Council I will absolve you of all blame and take the full responsibility.”

  “If it becomes necessary, I wouldn’t advise you to return and report,” von Farlenheim answered, taking note of the woman’s changed attitude and puzzled by it. Having come to know her well during their acquaintance, he realized that only something of importance could have produced such meek and conciliatory behavior. “So I hope, for your sake, this man ‘Clint’ justifies the high opinion of his abilities.”

  “It appears that he does,” Charlene replied, knowing the young Bosgravnian was expressing her own thoughts on the subject. However, she had another reason for trying to win him over in addition to her awareness of the price of failure. “‘Breakast’ says that he not only escaped from the kind of snake in a box trap which was used to kill Walter Scargill in Brownsville, but he also survived being ambushed on the street one night. There were three men against him. He killed two and the third ran away. That suggests he is a competent gun-fighter.”

  “Or that he was lucky,” von Farlenheim sniffed.

  “Very lucky, if it was luck alone kept him alive,” the Comtesse answered, refusing to be goaded. “There are few who have survived when Beguinage set out to kill them—And I’ve never heard of anybody doing it twice.”

  “Twice?” von Farlenheim repeated.

  “Twice,” Charlene confirmed. “Leaving a snake in a box to be opened by his victim was how Beguinage killed Scargill and, according to what ‘Breakast’ has heard, it was Beguinage who hired the three men who tried and failed to kill ‘Clint.’”

  “Beguinage,” the Bosgravnian said pensively, disturbed by what he had been told. Then, adopting what he hoped would be an off-hand manner, he went on, “So he’s here in Corpus Christie now, is he?”

  “He is,” Charlene declared.

  Shrewdly assessing the real emotion behind von Farlenheim’s attempt to sound indifferent, the Comtesse felt a sense of elation. It was what she had hoped to hear and she was now convinced that she could win him over to her way of thinking. Much as she hated to admit the necessity, she accepted that she must have his wholehearted support and might even have need of his protection.

  Being a very good judge of character, especially where members of the opposite sex were concerned, Charlene had been compelled to revise the opinions she had formed before sailing from Europe. It had been upon her advice that the proposed assassination of Crown Prince Rudolph was left until he arrived in the United States. She had assumed that, apart from his small retinue, his escort would consist of poorly disciplined soldiers under the command of uncouth and far from efficient officers. So the killing could be more safely and easily accomplished here than while he remained in the Old World. She was now aware that such was not the case.

  Already impressed by Dusty Fog’s intelligence, the Comtesse had found that Mark Counter and his companions were far from being the dull-witted, easily led country bumpkins she anticipated and required. None of them had struck her as potential dupes to be manipulated for her ends. So she wanted to make sure of having at least one willing ally. No matter how little regard she might have for von Farlenheim’s tact and acumen, she knew him to be a man of courage and considerable skill in the use of weapons. What was more, he shared her determination to succeed in their nefarious enterprise. In fact, she was willing to concede that he had as much to gain and even more to lose from the outcome.

  Although Charlene was not a native of Bosgravnia, she stood to make a considerable financial gain from the assassination. That, rather than a desire to retain near feudal rights, was her motivation. So she was ready to use any means to bring about the desired result.

  A woman of great ambition, Charlene was also a realist. Knowing how much she depended upon her physical charms to make men do her bidding, she was equally aware that the attraction would not remain indefinitely. Of late, she had become increasingly aware that her skin was growing coarser. It was only slight as yet, but needed more and more attention to hide. What was more, only by being careful in her eating habits and carrying out a daily routine of exercises could she retain the magnificent figure which formed her major asset. So she was determined to establish her fortune before she lost the means to acquire it. That was why she had become an agent for the Council of Noble Birth. The reward she had been offered would be sufficient to set her up for life. Provided that she was able to earn it, of course.

  The latter point was the reason for Charlene’s desire to win over von Farlenheim. Beguinage’s involvement was jeopardizing her chances, but it could be to the young Bosgravnian’s advantage. He could achieve his own ends without danger to himself by allowing the assassin to kill the Crown Prince, but the same did not apply to her.

  “Alex!” the Comtesse gasped, having paused to convey the impression that a thought was just occurring to her. “Who is Beguinage working for?”

  “The anarchists, of course,” von Farlenheim answered. “We haven’t hired him.”

  “You and I haven’t,” Charlene agreed, looking straight into the young man’s face and speaking in tones of great earnest. “But if he was hired by the anarchists, why did he kill Scargill, who was one of them?”

  “Gott in himmel!” von Farlenheim ejaculated, giving thought for the first time to the reason Scargill had been killed. Although not overburdened with imagination, he began to appreciate the implication behind the Comtesse’s question. “Do you mean that he has been hired by the Council?”

  “Somebody has hired him, he wouldn’t be here otherwise,” Charlene pointed out, far from dissatisfied by the response she was eliciting. “You haven’t and I certainly haven’t. So, if the anarchists didn’t either, who else is there?”

  “I can’t think of anybody,” von Farlenheim admitted, showing his puzzlement. “But why should the Council hire him after
they agreed we should do it?”

  “Perhaps it wasn’t a Council decision,” Charlene hinted.

  “But you said—!” von Farlenheim began.

  “The Council as a whole wouldn’t have any need to lure him,” the Comtesse answered. “But one of them might be acting on his own behalf.”

  “You mean one of them plans to have Beguinage kill the Crown Prince instead of leaving us to do it?” the Bosgravnian growled.

  “Somebody has hired him,” Charlene repeated, confident that she was establishing the required train of thought. “And whoever did would know of his reputation where anybody else who has designs upon the life of his victim is concerned. He warned me and killed Scargill as proof to both us and the anarchists that he has been hired to assassinate Rudolph and would brook no interference.”

  “That’s true,” von Farlenheim growled and anger suffused his face. “Then whoever hired Beguinage must have known that he might try to kill us when he found out that we had the same thing in mind.”

  “Perhaps that is what whoever hired him hoped he would do, even though he wasn’t told to do it,” Charlene suggested, eager to press home the suspicions she had aroused as a means of ensuring von Farlenheim would support her. “So now you know why I decided to accept ‘Clint’s’ terms.”

  “Huh?” the Bosgravnian grunted, frowning and showing a complete lack of understanding. “What do you mean?”

  “We don’t need ‘Clint’ to kill Rudolph,” Charlene elaborated. “Our own plan will do that. But he will keep Beguinage’s attention from us. And, after the way he has escaped twice, he might even—”

  “What’s wrong?” von Farlenheim inquired, as the woman—having glanced through the open door of the dining room into the hotel’s front lobby—stiffened slightly and stopped speaking.

  “It’s ‘Clint’!” Charlene breathed excitedly, before she could prevent the words from being uttered. “He’s at the reception desk.”

  A desire to see the man who had survived two attempts by Beguinage to kill him had been the Comtesse’s reason for selecting the Portside Hotel as her rendezvous with von Farlenheim. Although she had led “Breakast” to assume that she wanted to hire “Clint” to assassinate the Crown Prince, her motives had been those which she explained to the Bosgravnian. However, she had had misgivings over having parted with six hundred dollars as an advance on the larger sum which the go-between declared “Clint” was demanding. Nor had she been enamored of “Breakast’s” refusal to let her meet the local killer personally. So she and her maid had followed the go-between when he set off to deliver the money to “Clint.” She had been too far away to hear the name he mentioned to the desk clerk, but had seen the note he left placed in a pigeon-hole on the key-stand. Sending her maid to ask von Farlenheim to join her, she had picked a table in the dining room which commanded a view of the reception desk and had waited in the hope of satisfying her curiosity.

  At first, seeing that a man had arrived and was being given “Breakast’s” note, Charlene had been delighted by the opportunity to impress von Farlenheim with her acumen. However, even as she was drawing the young Bosgravnian’s attention to him, she began to form an uneasy impression that doing so might prove ill-advised. There was, she realized just a fraction of a second too late, something familiar about him.

  Opening the note he had accepted, the newcomer turned away from the desk.

  While the hair which showed from the pushed back hat and the clothing might be different from their previous meetings, Charlene was in no doubt regarding the identity of the man who was reading the message that had been awaiting the return of “Rapido Clint.”

  Nor was von Farlenheim.

  “How very clever of you, Comtesse!” the young Bosgravnian hissed, his attitude reverting to the near hostility he had been exhibiting before Charlene had distracted him with her discussion of Beguinage. “You’ve hired Dusty Fog!”

  Chapter 5

  YOU COULD’VE GOT ME KILLED

  FACED WITH WHAT APPEARED TO BE AN ATTEMPT upon his life, Crown Prince Rudloph of Bosgravnia was unable to control an involuntary and instinctive reaction which caused him to step backward. With his retreating foot missing the trunk of the tree upon which he was standing, he lost his balance. Even as he was starting to fall, his eyes were registering a comprehensive description of the person who was responsible for his predicament.

  Writing about the incident later, the Crown Prince would comment upon how amazed he was at the amount of detail the human mind was capable of absorbing in a fleeting instant and despite being under considerable stress.1

  Slightly over six foot tall and possessing a powerful physique that had not yet filled out to full manhood, the cause of Rudolph’s sense of alarm was a blond-haired youngster whose pleasantly handsome features hardly seemed to accord with his apparently hostile actions. His Texas-style black J.B. Stetson hat, having been dislodged by the speed with which he was moving, had slipped backward as he was springing from his place of concealment, and dangled by its fancy barbiquejo chinstrap on the shoulders of a brown and white calfskin vest. Tightly rolled, a flaming red bandana trailed its long ends over the front of an open-necked dark green shirt. The legs of his well-worn Levi’s pants hung outside tan-colored boots of the kind the royal visitor would come to know were peculiar to working cowhands.2 The brown leather of the buscadero gunbelt from the tied down holsters of which he was drawing a pair of staghorn-handled Colt 1860 Army revolvers had clearly been cut and shaped by a master craftsman.

  Subconsciously taking in the particulars of his apparent assailant’s appearance while tumbling backward, Rudolph began to wonder if his apprehensions might be baseless. Moving with a speed that he could barely believe was possible, the seven-and-a-half-inch-long “Civilian” pattern barrels3 of the youngster’s weapons were turning into alignment as soon as they cleared the lips of the holsters. Just as they roared, practically simultaneously and in about a second from the first movements of their owner’s hands toward the butts, the Crown Prince realized that they were pointing downwards and had not been elevated sufficiently to endanger him. There was further evidence to support his supposition, but the youngster had passed beneath his range of vision before he could notice it.

  On the point of accepting Mark Counter’s offer of help to climb over the tree after Rudolph, the beautiful young Englishwoman stared at the blond youngster. The gasp she gave was one of surprise and alarm rather than fright. Rising swiftly, her right hand disappeared into the outside pocket of her jacket and closed upon something. However, before she could bring out whatever she was grasping, she halted the movement. It was becoming obvious that in spite of appearances, no assassination bid had been intended by the newcomer.

  Having fired, the youngster brought his hands upward and extended his arms as in a gesture of surrender. Furthermore, as the Colts were being raised, he twirled them upon his trigger fingers so that the barrels pointed at the ground and he grasped them by the cylinders in such a fashion that he would be unable to shoot.

  Because Colonel Wilhelm Liebenfrau and Major the Baron von Goeringwald were following some yards behind the Crown Prince’s party, their view was impeded by the Lady and the blond giant. So they could only see part of what was happening. Thinking that their ruler had been shot, the Personal Attendant spat out a furious oath in Bosgravnian. Sending his right hand to the hilt of the saber, he changed his marching gait into a lumbering run.

  Equally alarmed by the possibility of a successful assassination, the aide-de-camp grabbed at the closed flap of his awkwardly positioned holster. Instantly, he discovered the disadvantages of such a rig which had been obvious to Mark when he had referred to it earlier. Fumbling in his haste, he found difficulty in even freeing the flap from its retaining pin as he sprang forward on the Colonel’s heels to help avenge the attack upon their royal master.

  Hearing the shots from his position at the head of the small advance guard, Captain Fritz von Farlenheim spun around. To hi
s consternation, he discovered that the rest of the party were out of sight beyond the bend in the trail he had just turned. Concern for the Crown Prince’s welfare led him to act impulsively and without considering the consequences. The three sailors who were accompanying him were also turning. Although each was carrying a loaded Springfield single-shot carbine more readily accessible than his revolver, he shoved between them as he went back to investigate. Nor was he any more successful than von Goeringwald in drawing the weapon.

  By the time the First Taster came into view of the tree, with the sailors running on his heels, his revolver was still held in the grip of the holster. In spite of the youngster raising the Colts in a way that showed he did not mean to use them again, von Farlenheim continued to advance, trying to extract his weapon at the same time. Before he could achieve the latter, he was confronted by a man who bounded swiftly from behind a bush at the left side of the trail.

  Slightly shorter than the blond youngster and with a more slender, yet wiry, build, the newcomer was clad from head to foot in all black cowhand-style garments. However, while the toes were pointed, his boots had low heels which would make them more comfortable when walking. The somber hue of his attire was relieved only by the brown walnut handle of an old Colt Second Model Dragoon revolver which rode butt forward in a low cavalry-twist holster on the right side of his belt, and the concave ivory hilt of an enormous James Black bowie knife sheathed at the left. His hair was as black as the wing of the crow and his handsome face as dark as that of an Indian. However, in spite of the latter having an aspect of almost babyishly innocent youth, there was something in his red hazel eyes that suggested he was older than he looked, and not a man with whom it would be wise, or safe, to trifle. Carrying a Winchester Model of 1866 rifle, he handled it with the deft ease of one well versed in its use.