Culling the Deadwood, Part 2
.
A/N: Al and Dan return to Cheyenne and find how their group fared in their absence
Cheyenne swelled with would-be miners that winter.
Stupid ones, gold-blind, struck out during lulls in the weather, giving too much credit to a handful of sunny winter days. They would be found come spring. Some would inspire tales to be told by the fireside one day, others would lay alone and forgotten. Smart ones read between the lines of the newspapers, gathered equipment, and bided their time until they had a chance to live long enough to dip their pans.
Al and Dan had strode into the mid-sized saloon like conquering heroes, straight-standing and thick-muscled, their clothes stinking of dried sweat and forest dirt. Al's stomach was clenched against hearing how the others had fared in his absence. He'd not forgotten the wreckage he'd found last time.
"We don't allow savages in here, cocksucker." Al turned to the red-faced saloon-keeper, white-haired and grinning. The grin faded as the man took in the weathered, unsmiling face. "Sorry, Al…just makin' a joke, is all. Drink?" He unconsciously moved back a step, wishing he'd kept quiet until the bar was between them.
"Not in a jocular mood, Joe. But I will take that drink." He leaned against the bar as Joe made his way around to pour. Dan downed his in a flash and started scanning the room until Al handed him a small pouch.
"Go secure three rooms at the Warren Hotel down the way. And get the location of the nearest decent bathhouse."
The white-haired man waited until Dan had cleared the door before speaking again, watching him part the crowd with his bulk.
"Well, you look fit enough, Al. Pioneer life must suit you."
Al grimaced and downed his first shot out of the cleanest glass he'd seen in weeks.
"Pioneer life can suck my dick. We worked our balls off, I can tell you that. Cocksucker Crooke and his men chased us out of the Hills last week, but we got a hell of a lot cleared."
Joe raised the bottle and an eyebrow. Al nodded and pushed his glass forward.
"Hope you weren't just making the red man's way easier, doing their work for 'em."
Al smirked at this. "They don't seem interested in all that's laying underfoot, just waiting to be picked up. Don't like whites around their fucking sacred dead or shooting their game, but the heathens I saw up close didn't show any signs of gold fever."
Joe chewed on that a second. "They say anything about gold deposits, yellow rocks or the like?'
Al downed his second shot. "Ones I was close to were past talkin'."
"I need a bathhouse and a real bed," he continued. "And news of my people. What can you tell me?"
Joe poured for himself this time. "Johnny's doing a good job as box herder. Gets more done with less violence than any box herder I've seen. He can't run a game worth shit, but he does fine with keeping the girls in line. I been giving him his split regular, like we said."
"Go on." Al's fingertips tapped with impatience on the stool beside him, out of Joe's sight.
Joe wondered if Al had had that killing stare, dead-eyed and hot at the same time, before he went to the Black Hills. It didn't look new on him, but Swearengen was giving him a chill that he hadn't before leaving out with Dority. Time in the Hills must've wore down whatever masked that look before, he thought.
"Jewel…she tries hard, I can say that. If things get rushed…well, she's a fuckin' disaster, to tell the truth."
"Truth would be what I'm after, Joe." The words were casual enough, the tone collegial. If Al hadn't opened his barlow knife, and started digging reddish-brown flecks from under his fingernails as he spoke, Joe might've missed the implied threat.
"Sure, Al. Anyways, I set her to workin' in the kitchen, out of the way, like. Cook says it hurts her own hands to look at her work, but if she leaves her alone, there's pots of cut potatoes, trimmed beans and the like when Cook's ready for 'em. Of a morning, she'll put her hand to baking before the joint gets stirrin'. Same with cleaning. Slow but gets it done, if nobody's around to hinder her way."
"Earned her keep?"
Joe nodded. "I'd say so. I'm willin' to give back half what you paid me to watch after her.
"And Dolly and Wanda are good girls, sweet-natured, got repeaters the first week. I've not seen 'em be quarrelsome, or holdin' money back, you know, like the sneaky ones'll do. Dolly sucks cock like it was candy, times I've made use of her. And Wanda's got some fuckin' tricks about her, got the boys standing in line. Their cuts are in the safe, waiting on you."
Joe spun out the update as long as he was able, knowing he was talking too much, not looking forward to the conversation's continuance.
Al's stomach tightened again. Joe mirrored his tense demeanor. Both knew there was one left to discuss.
Al closed up his knife, clenching it in his fist, thumb still on the catch. "And what of Trixie?"
Joe raised the bottle to pour again, putting the bottle back down when a callused hand stilled his arm.
"We're done drinking for now, Joe. What of her?"
Joe toyed with his bar rag. "She's not been any trouble, really. Most of the time, she takes her turn without complaint." He looked down, then at Al's hooded eyes. "She can be a real pretty girl, when she's cleaned up and got some color to her. I'd say…I'd say she's earned her way okay. I got no complaints, Al. Her cut ain't as big as the others, but it's all there waitin' for you."
Al opened his knife again, started cleaning his nails of his other hand, studying the knife point.
"I suggest you cough up what you're avoidin' telling me, Joe." His hot green eyes darkened as he looked back at Joe. "We neither of us'll be happy if I have to go digging for it."
Joe could smell his own fear-sweat starting. Goddamnit, he wasn't a fucking doctor or soul-saver. Girl was like she was when Al left her here.
"Trixie…well, you know she hits laudanum regular-like."
"Yeah. I know. So?"
There's some stuff around town, mixed stronger than back east. Seems to hit the girls harder, the ones that use it." He looked away. "I had to let one girl go, her being insensible half the time. Before, though, she and Trixie seemed to take to each other."
Joe could hear his pulse in his ears through the silence.
"Trixie's earnings seemed to fall off after that. Johnny…he's not one for keeping up with numbers, but even he thought we should be seeing more coin off her."
"She was holding back on you? And you let her?" Al kept the anger out of his voice, but his grip on the bar was white-knuckled.
Joe wiped at his brow. "She's got a sharp tongue on her when she's mad. Said the last pimp that fucked with her, you…put down without lifting a finger. Said I'd find out the truth of that if I didn't leave her be."
"So you let the whore set the rules. Jesus, Joe…is thathow you run your joint?"
"Al, I don't want to get crossways with you…I've heard about Virginia City, here and there. She does work some…but most won't go more than once. Guy last week said if he wanted to fuck a corpse he could go rob a grave and save his money."
Al shoved his knife in his pocket. "Tell all of 'em to clean up and meet me over at the Warren in an hour. And I'll take their cuts now." Joe nodded, glad to escape for a few minutes to his office.
He studied the back of a drooping blonde head at a table near the back. The head would slowly drop, hair falling over the side of her face, still, then jerk back up, the drowsy whore trying to stay awake and not fully succeeding. The space around her was empty, customers keeping clear of her. She turned enough for him to see her profile, the sharp chin, the classic nose.
He helped himself to the bottle on the bar as he waited for Joe, pouring into a larger glass this time. The whiskey roiled in his guts as pictures of another blond doper whore ran though his mind. A weathered wooden marker was close enough in his mind's eye that he could feel the rough carved name under his fingers.
A sharp "crack!" and sudden pain in his right hand brought him back to the present. He shoved the shattered glass to one side, wrapping the bar rag around his bleeding palm as Joe lay the money pouch on the bar. He shoved it into his pocket next to his knife, called out "One hour, the Warren," as he headed for the door.
Joe pulled another rag from underneath the bar, wiping up Al's blood and the remaining glass shards. He was still looking at the nodding-off whore as Johnny came up behind him.
"Jesus, Joe, what happened here?"
"Your boss, Swearengen, wants you and your crew cleaned up and over to the Warren in an hour. Her, too." He nodded at Trixie.
"Okay…but what happened with the blood and all?"
Joe sighed as he wiped. "Tell me something, Johnny…what about her could set a man to such anger that he'd bust a glass in his fighting hand, spilling his own blood, just lookin' at her?"
Johnny shook his head. "There's been blood between 'em before. They got years together, way before I set eyes on either of 'em." He picked up a large shard of glass and turned it in the light, watching the light bounce off the sharp edges. "I've seen him set his mind to killing them that hurt her, and I've seen the two of 'em set straight at each other like bobcats."
He set the glass down and looked at Trixie, shaking his head. "Sometimes I think they're just too fuckin' much alike, some ways, to get along in peace."
He started rounding up Al's folks, sending the girls to wash, giving instructions. He saved dealing with Trixie for last.
A/N: Comments, reviews, concrit, a couple words of yay or nay will be appreciated :-)
