Aces Weaver was sweating profusely. He had been in too many saloons when revolvers were resorted to, and he had witnessed too many bystanders take stray lead due to escalating wars of words. Again he tried to defuse the situation by turning to Paunch. “What’s gotten into you? You have never acted this way before.”
“Maybe I don’t like Brits. Did you ever think of that?”
“Tell him the truth,” Club Caine said.
“What truth?” From Joe Gentile.
“This isn’t about cards. This isn’t about where I am from,” Club said. “It is about Harriet Fly.”
“Oh Lord,” Aces said.
Joe Gentile pushed his bowler back on his thatch of curly brown hair. “Who?”
Aces answered him. “Harriet Fly. She works over to the Birdcage. The tall redhead with hair down to her knees.”
“The one who was on Bat Masterson’s arm for a while?” Joe Gentile said. “And took up with Six-Toed Pete after Masterson moved on to greener pastures?”
“That’s the one,” Aces said.
“What does she have to do with our card game?”
Club Caine placed his hand on the edge of the table close to the Webley revolver in the holster next to his belt buckle. “I can tell you. You see, the popsie in question gave Pete the brush-off. Paunch tried to move in, but Harriet did not want anything to do with him. He was most persistent. It got so bad, she told him to sod off or she would go to the marshal.”
“May you rot in hell,” Paunch Stevens growled.
“I still don’t get what she has to do with our card game,” Joe Gentile admitted.
Club Caine’s ruggedly handsome face split in a triumphant grin. “It is simple, young man. Harriet Fly has had me around to her apartment every night for the past week, and Paunch can’t stand the thought of her favoring me over him.”
“Is this true?” Joe asked Stevens.
Paunch Stevens’s jaw twitched and his hands opened and closed. “Harriet Fly would have been mine if this randy goat had not come along and begged her to be his.”
“I have never had to beg a woman in my life,” Club Caine said, and smiled. “I can’t help it if she thinks I have more to offer her than you do. In every respect,” he stressed.
Pushing his chair back, Paunch rose. “Enough. Let us settle this like men should.” He swept his jacket aside to reveal his Smith & Wesson. “That is, if you have the sand.”
“I have more sand than you do,” Club Caine said. “More sense, too. Whoever prevails is bound to wind up behind bars. The marshal has been making a point of late of cracking down on malefactors.”
“On who?” Aces Weaver asked.
“Lawbreakers,” Club said, enlightening him. “Especially those who break the ordinance about not wearing firearms in the city limits.”
“Which no one abides by,” Joe Gentile mentioned.
Paunch Stevens sneered at Caine. “Your excuse won’t wash. If you were half the man Harriet thinks you are, you would go for your gun, ordinance or no ordinance.”
“Not when there is a better way,” Club said. “A way to satisfy our honor and not be arrested afterward.”
“I am listening.”
“Coffin Varnish,” the Brit said.
“I saw the newspaper, the same as everyone else,” Paunch responded. “It’s a lot of bother to go to when we could walk out into the alley and get it over with here and now.”
“Coffin Varnish,” Caine repeated. “We might as well do it legally. Unless it is you who does not have a spine.”
“Oh, I have backbone,” Paunch spat. “More than you will ever have.” He motioned. “Let’s go. We can be there by dark if we hurry.”
“Tomorrow morning. Will ten do?”
“What is wrong with right this minute?” Paunch Stevens asked. “I will never be more ready.”
Club Caine stood and grinned. “I want to spend the night with Harriet.” He gathered up his chips. “You would do well to find someone you care for to keep you company, Yank, for tomorrow you breathe your last.”
“I care about me,” Paunch said.
Joe Gentile was a study in anxiety. “I wish you two would reconsider. An insult is not worth dying over. Nor is a woman.”
“What is, in your estimation?” Paunch demanded, and did not wait for an answer. “You are, what, twenty? That’s the problem with the young today. You are not willing to die for anything.” He turned and tromped off, saying over a shoulder, “See you in Coffin Varnish, Brit. I will be there promptly at ten. Don’t keep me waiting.”
“I can stop this, you know,” Aces Weaver said. “I bet if I go to the sheriff he will send deputies to arrest the two of you.”
“You do that,” Club Caine said, “and the first thing I will do when I am released on bail is come looking for you, and it won’t be to shake your hand.”
Aces Weaver gestured in resignation. “You try to help some people and that is the thanks you get.”
Chapter 13
For Coffin Varnish the day started like any other.
Out at the Anderson farm, Dolph was up before sunrise to trudge to the barn to milk the cows. Filippa was dressed by first light and went out to the chicken coop to gather eggs. She had breakfast ready when Dolph finished milking and let the cows out to pasture. After breakfast he always hitched up the wagon and took their surplus milk and eggs into town to sell to Chester Luce.
