Robert B. Parker's Revelation Page 11

  Driggs removed a pillowcase from one of the pillows as he watched the princess. He wondered about her being dead and what it would feel like if she were dead and gone. He folded the pillowcase and put it in his pocket, then opened the door and closed it behind him as he left the room.

  When he came down the stairs, he stopped in the saloon and ordered a whiskey from Wallis.

  “Same as before?” Wallis said.

  Driggs nodded.

  “Your best,” Driggs said.

  “Coming right up.”

  Wallis pulled the bottle from the top shelf and poured Driggs a drink.

  “There ya go, that’s the Kentucky Gold, best I got, and it’s just for you.”

  “Thank you, kind sir,” Driggs said.

  “You bet,” Wallis said, then went to replace the bottle on the shelf.

  “This time I wouldn’t put that away just yet,” Driggs said with a grin.

  Wallis smiled in return and set the bottle back on the bar.

  “It is there for your consumption, my friend,” Wallis said.

  “Thank you.”

  “Are you enjoying your stay here in Appaloosa?” Wallis said as he put his big hands on the bar in front of him.

  “I am,” Driggs said.

  “Good, good,” Wallis said. “Been seeing you come and go.”

  “You have?”

  “Coming and going,” Wallis said with a warm smile. “Going and coming, I trust the Boston House is treating you favorably.”

  “Everything has been dandy,” Driggs said.

  “What brings you to Appaloosa?” Wallis said.

  “Oh, I’ve come to do some rearranging of sorts,” Driggs said. “Readjustment of assets, so to speak.”

  “Banking is a bit over my head,” Wallis said. “They get mad at me here when I don’t add my bar numbers correctly. Which is often, I might add. No pun intended.”

  Driggs smiled.

  “Money in the wrong hands can become a very dangerous commodity,” Driggs said.

  “Well,” Wallis said with a chuckle, “I knew there was a reason that I can’t hang on to it and don’t have any.”

  Driggs laughed and Wallis moved on down the bar.

  After a few more shots of whiskey, Driggs paid up, then moved on and out into the night. He had always liked the dark better than the light. He felt more comfortable in the dark, maybe because he could move about, to some degree, unseen.

  It was well past midnight and there was hardly anyone on the streets, and he appreciated that. He liked the loneliness the evening brought. He knew where he was going this evening. He’d made this trip twice before, but those ventures were strictly for reconnaissance, so now he knew exactly what he would encounter. Tonight, however, was different. Tonight his plan was to get closer than he’d been before, much closer.

  He had just one stop to make first and he knew this stop would take only a moment. It was a place he’d read about in the newspaper and had already checked out in his reconnaissance runs before tonight. He knew where he was going and exactly what he was looking for. This stop was not in a nice part of town. In fact, it was in the worst part of town, near the tracks on the far south side. When he found the building he was looking for he made sure no one was around to see him as he slipped along the side of the building to the back. Within a few moments he was on the inside. It was dark and he lit a match so he could find his way, find what he was looking for, and then he saw them. He studied them, then settled on one. A nice big one. He removed the pillowcase from his pocket, then carefully snatched the big one, then stuffed it in the pillowcase and quickly headed to his final destination.

  He walked the back alleys as he crossed to the far side of town on the northeast. This was the nicest part of Appaloosa, with the biggest homes, and when he got to the home of his choice he stood across the street in the shadows and watched the place for a while. It was a beautiful three-story Victorian, with a front porch that spanned from one side of the house to the other. He found a few trees across the way that clustered together on a slight berm where he could sit. He lit a cigarette. Somewhere in the distance he heard a dog barking nonstop. He wondered what it could be barking at. Was he agitated because he was locked up, locked out, or locked in, or was he barking at an intruder, a thief, or was he just barking at the moon? He finished the cigarette, then lit another and after a while the dog tired and very slowly stopped barking. Driggs finished his cigarette, then calmly walked across the street to the house. He set the pillowcase at his feet, then pulled his picking tools from his pocket. In the dark, under the overhang of the front porch, he quietly picked the lock, scooped up the pillowcase, and silently entered.

  34

  By the following morning it had stopped raining in Yaqui, but there was still heavy cloud cover that kept the sun from showing through and drying up some of the wetness.

  After a quick breakfast of eggs and ham, Virgil and I loaded our horses and boarded the train for Las Vegas. We left the young deputies, Hart and Flower, in Yaqui. They were both eager lawmen and good at their jobs, but Virgil figured both to be more of a liability than an asset for the job at hand.

  The train ride from Yaqui to Las Vegas was a pleasant journey, and by midday the clouds had separated some and the sun offered up a welcoming appearance.

  When we arrived in Las Vegas the sun was out and the wet landscape was drying up quickly. We did not bother to enter the streets of the town so that we could make it to the Montezuma by dark. We mounted up at the depot and rode straightaway to the hotel, and arrived about an hour before dark.

  The hotel was a spectacular structure. Virgil and I had been to the hotel before, just after it was built, but had not seen the place in years. It was elaborately constructed with stone blocks and fancy woodwork inside and out and from top to bottom. The entrance of the hotel had a dome and spire that was more than five stories high. There were three restaurants, a number of bars, and hot-springs bathhouses built on the back side of the hotel, where guests soaked away their aches and pains. It was by far the nicest, most lavish hotel in the entire western expanse.

  We were not sure just how long we would be in the Montezuma, so we did not stable our horses but left them saddled and looked after by the stable hands. We asked the hands if they had noticed three men come in that stood out in the manner of being less put together than what they’d expect of doctors and such. All of the stable hands said they’d not seen anyone who met that description.

  We entered the hotel at just about sunset, as the evening light came through the celestial stained-glass windows high above the central atrium, scattering a kaleidoscope of colorful rays in every direction.

  The central area under the atrium dome was filled with separate seating areas where numerous well-dressed guests sat visiting and sipping tea. The sound of the cups on saucers and the voices echoing under the great expanse resonated with an odd loudness that was the opposite of pleasant.

  “You feeling what I’m feeling?” I said.

  “We stick out like a sore thumb.”

  “Yep.”

  “Don’t see anybody staring at us yet, though.”

  “Not as of yet, no,” Virgil said. “I don’t, either.”

  “Matter of time.”

  “Well, there is one thing for certain,” I said. “If they’re here, in this place of all places on high, there is a good chance they’d have to have got some clothes.”

  Virgil nodded.

  “You’d think,” he said.

  “But then you have to think, how the fuck would three dumb-ass no-good hardened criminals even have an inkling of an idea how to function in an environment like this in the first place, clothes or no clothes.”

  “Ravenscroft is a lowlife and mean,” Virgil said. “And no good, but he was a town member before he got to killing people and got his ass in a sling.”

  I nodded a little, thinking about that.

  “Well, without some refinement they’d stick out like a cete of
badgers amongst this gaggle of geese.”

  “They would,” Virgil said.

  “Hell,” I said. “The idea of them just walking across this polished floor would be enough to cause concern.”

  We just stood and watched and listened for a moment before we made a move.

  “Since we got no real idea of what to do exactly,” I said, “or where to go, I figure we check out the most obvious possibilities first.”

  Virgil nodded.

  “Whiskey,” Virgil said.

  “Yep,” I said. “Don’t think we’d find them among this bunch sipping tea.”

  “No,” Virgil said. “I don’t, either.”

  Virgil looked over to the front desk.

  “Maybe we have a visit with the man in charge first,” Virgil said. “Gotta be a man in charge.”

  We walked toward the long, wide desk, where a well-dressed woman and two men wearing matching vests were helping a handful of guests.

  The woman was the first to look to us, and she came over to where we were standing. She was a nice-looking dark-haired woman with even darker eyes. She walked with her shoulders back and her head held high, as if she were in charge.

  “Good evening, gentlemen, and welcome to the Montezuma Hotel. How can I be of service?”

  I smiled and I tipped my hat, then Virgil ever so slightly showed his badge as he said quietly, “I’m Marshal Virgil Cole. This is Deputy Marshal Hitch and we would like to have a talk with the person in charge of this outfit.”

  Her eyes worked back and forth between us, and then she nodded. She walked out from around the counter and smiled.

  “Right this way,” she said.

  We followed her as she walked across the polished floor toward a set of double doors off the main atrium. Above the doors was a sign: STATE ROOM. She stopped just before the door and turned to us.

  “I’m not allowed inside,” she said as she opened the door, “but you will find Mr. Havenhurst sitting back there on the side of the bar, having his dinner.”

  “Thank you,” Virgil said.

  “My pleasure,” she said.

  I smiled at her and entered behind Virgil, and the door closed after me.

  It was a dark room with a low ceiling, and it was full of cigar smoke. Scattered throughout were a lot of men sitting on stuffed wingback chairs and couches. At the far end of the room there was a long bar with a mirror that extended the length of the bar, making the room appear to be twice its size. Virgil and I weaved between the tables and chairs and walked up to the bar. We were met by a heavyset bartender with arms the size of hams. He had slicked-back graying hair and was stuffed into a formal black suit with a white starched shirt and a silk tie.

  “May I help you?” he said in a deep voice.

  Then we saw him, a tall, slender man with white hair. He was sitting off to the side of the bar with a napkin tucked over the collar of his shirt, sipping soup from a large spoon.

  “Mr. Havenhurst?” Virgil said.

  He lowered his spoon into the soup bowl and shifted his eyes between Virgil and me.

  “Yes?” he said.

  Virgil and I moved down the bar toward him and Virgil showed his badge.

  “I’m Marshal Virgil Cole and this here is Deputy Marshal Everett Hitch and we are looking for three men. We believe they could be here at your hotel.”

  “I see,” he said. “And I assume these men you are looking for are wanted men?”

  “They are,” Virgil said.

  “We will do what we can to assist you.”

  “Pardon me,” the big heavyset bartender said, interrupting as he held up his hand like a schoolboy, then looked to Mr. Havenhurst.

  “Sir, I believe I know exactly who they are looking for.”

  35

  “Who is it, Tony?” Havenhurst said.

  “At least I think I know, or I suspect.”

  “Go on,” Virgil said.

  “Well, they were in here last night and again this afternoon,” he said. “Last night they were okay. I thought them to be odd men, though. Not the kind of men that come in here, anyway. I’ve had three presidents in here. But today they were drunk, and I don’t put up with drunks. Not in the State Bar. This is a respectable establishment I run here.”

  “Know where they are?”

  “Not at the moment I don’t, but I told them they needed to leave,” he said. “Told them they’d had too much, that they needed to sober up. I told them if they sobered up that I would let them come back, but not until then.”

  “What’d they look like?” I said.

  “All about forty, I’d say. Wearing fairly nice clothes, nothing too fancy. Two were pretty skinny and the third was bigger, strong-like, bald, had a crooked nose.”

  I looked to Virgil and Virgil looked to Havenhurst and nodded.

  “That’s them,” Virgil said. “That’s for certain the men we’re looking for.”

  “This is the first I have heard of these men,” Havenhurst said. “I know you wired last night inquiring, and I’m sorry, but we had no way of knowing. But it seems now we do.”

  “Does,” Virgil said.

  Havenhurst removed the napkin stuffed into his collar, folded it, set it on the bar, and said, “How can we help you?”

  Virgil looked to me and I looked to Havenhurst.

  “I know you have other bars and saloons here,” I said. “Where are they located?”

  “Across the atrium there is the Aztec Billiard Room and on the second floor there is another, the Canary Lounge. A small, more intimate place where women are allowed, a romantic couples place, mostly.”

  “You got whores that work here?” Virgil said.

  “I do not,” Havenhurst said in a defensive tone of voice.

  “None around here? No whores?” Virgil said, looking back and forth between the bartender and Havenhurst. “You mean there is no place here where men can get some comfort from a woman friend?”

  “Not really,” the bartender said.

  “Not really, meaning yes or no?” I said.

  The bartender looked to Havenhurst.

  “We just need to know where to look,” I said.

  “If there is a place here where ladies sell their goods,” Virgil said. “Just let us know.”

  “There are a few ladies who work here,” Havenhurst said reluctantly. “They live elsewhere, not on the premises, but do service the guests on occasion.”

  “And how would a guest know about this service?”

  The bartender looked to Havenhurst, then back to us.

  “Through me and the other barkeeps,” Tony said.

  “They didn’t ask you, did they,” I said. “About where to get some company?”

  “No,” he said. “But they could have asked the others.”

  “And the women come to the rooms?” I said.

  Tony nodded.

  “They do.”

  “Do the men visit them outside of the hotel,” I said, “at another location?”

  “No.”

  “And how do you get in touch with the whores?” Virgil said. “To let them know they have a paying client?”

  “We have a runner.”

  “How many whores in all are there?”

  “Five to seven,” Tony said. “Unless things get real busy, then they bring in some friends from Las Vegas.”

  “Good,” Virgil said.

  “Good?” Havenhurst said.

  Virgil nodded.

  “The work we do, Mr. Havenhurst, is a matter of de . . . de . . . what’s the word I’m looking for, Everett?”

  “Deduction.”

  Virgil nodded.

  “That’s right,” Virgil said, “deduction. You understand that, don’t you, Mr. Havenhurst?”

  “It’s just that I run a respectable business here.”

  “Well, I know you got a tall steeple up top, but you ain’t operating no church here, Mr. Havenhurst . . . Presidents, doctors, escaped convicts all need to get a little pussy now and a
gain, just how it is. It’s nothing personal, we just need to know the lay of the land, that’s all.”

  36

  Havenhurst walked with us across the atrium toward the Aztec Billiard Room.

  “We’ve been fortunate not to have much trouble here, thank God,” Havenhurst said as we walked. “For a time I had two security guards on full-time. They were retired deputies from Las Vegas law enforcement, but after a period of complete calm I let them go. They are on call, though, so to speak. They live near here, should trouble arise, but thankfully I’ve not had to request their services. That is until now, so I can certainly send for them if you’d like.”

  “Everett and me will be okay,” Virgil said as we arrived at the doors of the billiard room.

  We stopped shy of entering and Virgil turned to Havenhurst.

  “You should remain out here, though, Mr. Havenhurst. Never know how things might go down and I would not want you to get summed up on the wrong end of some kind of weapon wielded by a goddamn escaped prisoner who has no intention of being locked up again.”

  “Yes, yes . . . I understand, Marshal . . . Please know, I do my best to run a tidy ship here, so hopefully when and if you do find the men you are looking for you can settle this with decorum.”

  Virgil looked at me and nodded a little.

  “We will do our best,” I said as Virgil and I both pulled our Colts. “Decorum is our business.”

  We both checked the chambered loads, and with our Colts close to our sides I opened the door and followed Virgil inside. As the door closed behind me Virgil leaned toward me and said, “Decorum?”

  “Good behavior,” I said as we both scanned the stately dark billiard room for our three men.

  There looked to be twenty, maybe thirty, people in the wide room with ten billiard tables, and it appeared there was a game happening at each table.

  “Full house,” I said.

  “Is.”

  Like the previous saloon, this place was full of cigar smoke, but unlike the previous place, this room was noisy with the sounds of pool balls, laughter, and game commentary.