either.”
“Oh, stop worryin’ so much,” Scratch told him. “We’re not gonna go tell your old lady what you been doin’.”
The man started to edge away. “I better be going now…”
Bo let the man go. He said to the other bystanders, “Somebody needs to help this lady.”
That caused the crowd to break up even faster. Bo muttered in disgust. He wasn’t sure what they were going to do with Janey, or Jenny, or whatever her name was.
“Let me take her.”
The Texans turned and looked back along the alley. They saw Lucinda Bonner standing there, trailed by her daughters. Holding out a hand, Lucinda came closer and went on, “We’ll take her back over to the cafe and see if we can’t calm her down.”
“I don’t know if you want to do that,” Bo said.
“Don’t tell me what I do or don’t want to do, Bo Creel,” Lucinda said. “I’m sure that you and Scratch have business to attend to, so let me help.”
Scratch gently disengaged himself from the soiled dove and turned her around, steering her toward Lucinda. He was obviously glad to be free from the responsibility. “We’re much obliged, ma’am,” he told Lucinda. “If you wouldn’t mind, could you see to it that somebody fetches the undertaker? We got to find out what happened to this fella.”
“We’ve got a pretty good idea what happened,” Bo said. “What we need to do now is find out who did it.”
Lucinda got an arm around the woman’s shoulders and led her away, helped by Callie and Tess. Bo and Scratch went the other way, stepping out onto Grand Street.
“We gonna have a talk with folks at the Fan-Tan?” Scratch asked.
“That’s where we’ll start,” Bo said grimly.
CHAPTER 22
The Fan-Tan was a smallish building made of chunks of red sandstone, with a red slate roof. It was located between a couple of larger buildings, a whorehouse much less fancy than Bella’s Place to the right and a barn with a wagon yard behind it to the left. The door to the Fan-Tan was painted a surprising shade of green. It stood a couple of inches ajar, indicating that the place was open. There were no windows in the front wall. As far as Bo and Scratch could tell, it didn’t have any windows at all, but that was all right because the people who frequented the gambling den weren’t really interested in seeing the light of day.
Bo pushed the door back and went inside. Scratch followed close behind him. Both men had their hands near their guns, ready to hook and draw.
The air inside the Fan-Tan was stale with a mixture of smells. Tobacco smoke, beer, bay rum, and unwashed human flesh were dominant, under-laid with the mingled reek of vomit and piss. The place was dimly lit by a couple of hanging lanterns that flickered as the open door made the air stir sluggishly. Bo saw poker tables, a roulette wheel, faro and keno layouts. A short bar ran along the left wall. The chunky, bald-headed man behind the bar wore a dirty apron and stifled a yawn as he looked at the two newcomers.
“Somethin’ I can do for you?” the bartender asked.
The poker tables were empty, except for one where a pair of men in seedy suits sat playing a desultory game of showdown. They weren’t betting, just turning over cards, and neither man seemed to give a damn whether he won or lost each hand.
Scratch kept his eye on the two card players while Bo went over to the bar. “You know a man called Duke Mayo?” he asked.
The bartender shrugged beefy shoulders. “Sure, I know Duke. He plays in here sometimes.”
“Seen him lately?”
“Why’re you lookin’ for him?” The bartender gazed pointedly at the badge pinned to Bo’s shirt. “He in some kind of trouble?”
“Not a bit,” Bo answered honestly. Duke Mayo was beyond ever being in trouble again. “Was he in here last night?”
“Yeah. He sat in on a game that lasted most of the night. Cashed in and left here maybe three hours ago.”
“Won quite a bit, did he?”
The bartender shrugged again. “I’m busy servin’ drinks most of the time. I don’t keep up with how the games are goin’.”
Bo’s gut told him the man wasn’t telling the truth. Not all of it, anyway.
Before he could ask any more questions, a door in the back of the room opened, and a man came out carrying a bucket and a mop. He was short and frail looking, with wispy gray hair and a face ravaged by time and liquor. He wore gray striped pants and a shirt that had once been white, and he kept his head down and muttered to himself as he set the bucket down and started mopping the floor.
Bo turned back to the bartender and asked, “Did anybody leave out of here right after Mayo?”
The man scowled. “Look, Deputy, I told you, I do my own work and mind my own business. I didn’t see nothin’ or hear nothin’ and I don’t know a damned thing except that I’m sleepy. I can’t help you, understand?”
Bo inclined his head toward the two men at the poker table. “Were they part of the same game as Mayo?”
The bartender blew out an exasperated breath. “Why don’t you ask ’em yourself?”
