Butler turned and started walking in the direction of the Dodge House. He decided to have it out with Ryerson tomorrow. If the man wanted to play a game of nerves, Butler didn’t have the time to indulge him. He couldn’t concentrate on poker and Ryerson at the same time. He’d managed it tonight, but Ben Thompson had been right. As skillfully as he played, he’d had a good run of luck the past couple of days. But most of the time he depended on his skill, and for it to work for him he had to give the game all his attention.
But what would he do—what should he do—if he found out that the bounty hunter was in Dodge for Hank? Warn him, sure, but back his play? He hadn’t known the man very long, but long enough for Hank to confide in him —sort of. And long enough for him to tell Hank his own story.
No, there was no way he could just throw Hank to Ryerson.
And there was still Jim Masterson and Neal Brown. They had probably been watching each other’s backs for years. Did they really need him? Well, the other night they had. If not for him at least one of them would probably be dead.
But Butler’s game was poker, not gunplay. His skill with cards led him to believe he was not really gambling. Gambling meant there was a chance you could lose. At the poker table he might come up short one night, but in the long run he always won.
When it came to guns, though, that was Butler’s gamble. So far he’d been able to handle himself every time, but when would his luck run out? When would they finally send enough men after him that he wouldn’t be able to handle?
Halfway to the Dodge House he stopped short and listened. If somebody wanted to take him, now would be the easiest of times. In the dark. He’d never seen it coming. He waited, muscles tensed in case he had to move. Maybe the first shot would miss, and he’d be able to react. It had happened before.
When he was sure it wasn’t going to happen he continued on, and eventually he made it to the safety of the still lit lobby of the Dodge House Hotel.
Kevin Ryerson watched from the darkness as Butler walked to his hotel. He’d enjoyed the game he’d play that evening with Butler, but tomorrow the games would be over. He’d have to do what he came to Dodge City to do.
Once Butler entered the Dodge House, Ryerson turned and did what he’d told Butler he was going to do. He headed for his own hotel for the night. As he walked, though, he replayed the scene where the other gambler walked by him in the Long Branch. He’d heard him called Corbin by someone, but that name didn’t fit the face, not in his mind. He couldn’t put his finger on it, but he knew him. The question was, did he know him because there was a price on him? Ryerson was always up for a little extra work if it meant a lot of extra money.
Tomorrow, he thought, he’d work it out tomorrow.
When Corbin got back to his room he poured himself a whiskey from a bottle he kept in his saddlebags. He didn’t know Kevin Ryerson, had never seen him before, but he new the type of man he was. The type who had gunned his older brother down years ago because of a two hundred dollar bounty. Bounty hunters always brought those memories back for him, and he knew it’d be in his dreams that night, too. But in the safety of his room, maybe enough whiskey would keep him from dreaming.
Butler locked his door, removed his jacket and his gun belt. He sat on the bed and took a deep breath. All he wanted was to be left alone to play poker. Why couldn’t he have that? He’d almost convinced himself that he would never go back to Philadelphia. There was nothing he could do to bring his family back, and he still didn’t know who had killed them, or had them killed. Not directly. He knew it had to do with his father’s politics, though.
On a couple of occasions he’d managed to keep alive one of the men who tried to kill him for the money. He asked them who sent them, but they never knew. All they knew was that there was a lot of money waiting for the man who killed him. He’d let one of those men go, and he had come back at him a second time, almost succeeding. He killed him, and after that he learned his lesson and killed them all.
Maybe one day somebody would get the message, and it would all stop. Until that time he lived as well as he could on jacks and queens and stayed alert.
CHAPTER 47
When Butler woke the next morning it was a beautiful day. From his window he could see that the sky was clear, the sun was out, everything looked fresh and clean—well, as fresh and clean as it could look in Dodge City. Buckboards and horses kicked up enough dust to choke a horse, but that was to be expected. All things considered it was a fresh, new day and anything was possible.
He dressed and left his room for breakfast. As he did a door opened further down the hall and Trixie stepped out. She didn’t see him and headed for the stairs, looking a bit rumpled but beautiful, in the same dress she’d worn last night. As he passed the room she’d come out of he saw that it was Ben Thompson’s.
“Good for you, Ben.”
He took breakfast in the hotel dining room again, eating alone this time. Ben Thompson did not come down the entire time he was there. He probably needed some extra rest this morning, which Butler could well understand.
He still had not had a chance to talk to Thompson about the possibility of watching each other’s back while they were in town. There were just too many possibilities now: Ryerson, somebody who didn’t want him to help Masterson and Brown or—if the bounty hunter wasn’t there for him—somebody else trying for that payday.
He stepped outside, looked up and down the street. Normal hustle and bustle, the kind that a man could easily get lost in if he didn’t want to be seen.
Butler decided to take it easy today. He looked around, found a straight-backed wooden chair and sat in front of the hotel, watching the morning go by. On a rare occasion he’d smoke a cigar, and this morning he felt like one. He nabbed a boy of about ten going by and promised him a quarter if he’d go to the general store and buy a couple of cigars.
“What kind?” the boy asked.
“The kind that are three for a nickel will do.” That way the boy wouldn’t run off with the nickel if he knew he was getting a quarter for making the purchase. “Get me three of them and I’ll give you your quarter.”
“You got a deal, Mister.”
He gave the boy a nickel and sat back in his chair to wait.
The man known as Hank opened his trunk and stared down at the gun and holster. It had been part of his life for such a long time that even now, when he had convinced himself that he’d put it down for good, he couldn’t get rid of it. And now with Ryerson in town he might have to put it back on, or die.
And what about Butler? Should he really have trusted him? What if he went to Ryerson? No, he wouldn’t do that. He wasn’t that kind of man. If it came down to it he’d be able to trust Butler. He’d back the gambler, and the gambler would back him. Of that he was sure.
He closed the trunk and went to fire up the stove.
The gambler Corbin woke and wondered if he ought to quit Dodge. There were opportunities to make money, but there were also opportunities to get killed.
One really wasn’t worth the other, was it?
Ryerson woke in a bad mood. His tongue tasted bad, his head ached, and he wished he’d spent money the night before on women, not on beer and whiskey.
He washed quickly, but took his time over his ritual with his guns. He did his pistol this morning, and his rifle. Before the day was out he’d probably need both.
He went down to the street, found a small cafe—a different one than last time—and had breakfast. Halfway through his meal he remembered two things.
He remembered that Corbin, the gambler, had a price on his head in Missouri.
And he remembered who the cafe owner was from the day before.
Suddenly, Dodge City was a treasure trove of bounty money. All he had to do was figure out how to go about getting it all.
