The Old Colts Page 8

  “Shank of the evening.” Bat took Wyatt’s arm. “And listen, Wyatt, this is New York—don’t get cute.”

  “Why go at all?”

  “Knuckles Grogan pays the fiddler, friend, so he calls the tune.”

  “I don’t dance.”

  They ease in through the dark cigar store on 43rd Street and through the swinging door into the race room and some long-shot surprises. The joint looks like after a raid. The bettors are gone, the bums have vamoosed, even Eddie the Cuff and the other bookies are conspicuous by their absence. Knuckles Grogan and the two muscular mugs are draped around behind the desks awaiting the bell. But you have to double-take the mugs because instead of caps and leather jackets they are all spruced up in pinstripe suits and felt fedoras and shoes up on the desks with spats. Bat comes out of his corner like a has-been with hungry kids.

  “These your dogs, Grogan?” He scowls at the mugs. “Well, call ‘em off. They tried to rough me up the other night—my friend here hadn’t come along and reminded me of my age, I might have hurt ‘em.”

  “Not my idea, Bat. The guy I work for.”

  “Rothstein.”

  “You said it, I didn’t.”

  Grogan has the kind of voice he should have his adenoids out. He has a broken nose and he leans back in his chair, squeaking.

  “Listen, Bat. You’re into us for over three of the big ones. You got two days.”

  “Two days!”

  “You’re behind the eight-ball, Bat.”

  “I couldn’t raise three grand in three weeks!”

  The two bruisers rise from their chairs and circle the desks and a wary Wyatt and move across the room to take stands on either side of the swinging door. Grogan moves a big black Havana from one side of his mouth to the other.

  “Two days,” he says. “The other night was just a prelim. You don’t cough up, you’re gonna be in the main event.”

  Bat shoves up his hat. “What happened to Auntie Tan in the first at ‘Gansett? I had fifty on the nose with Eddie.”

  “Finished fourth.”

  Sweat sparkles on Bat’s forehead. “All right, listen. Here.” He fishes in his pants and unfolds a bill on the desk. “I got paid yesterday. There’s a hundred. That cleans me out. Put that on account and take the heat off. Gimme a week.”

  Grogan leaves it lay. “Sorry. Tell you what, though. There’s a fight coming up—why don’t you start touting McLaglen in the paper?”

  “Your money’s on the Sailor, huh?”

  “We’ll maybe forget the three grand.”

  “No deal. I don’t do that. White’ll massacre ‘im.”

  Grogan salivas the Havana out of his mouth and produces a large silk handkerchief and blows his nose loud enough to wake a freighter in a fog off Sandy Hook. He tucks away the hanky and looks at the loser with sad, bloodhound eyes. “Sorry.”

  “Be reasonable.”

  “It’s your funeral.”

  “Gimme a fair shake!”

  “See you around, Bat.”

  Bat starts for the door, Wyatt after him. Suddenly they haul on the reins.

  The two hoods have unbuttoned their pinstripe double-breasted coats and laid back the lapels to show off their armament. Each carries a snub-nose .38 automatic in a shoulder holster.

  To their credit, the plainsmen appear to be unperturbed. Their jackets, too, are unbuttoned, their right hands free.

  Bat had once written the following: “Never try to run a bluff with a six-gun. Many a man has been buried with his boots on because he foolishly tried to scare someone by reaching for his hardware. Always remember that a six-shooter is made to kill the other fellow with and for no other reason on earth. So always have your gun loaded and ready, and never reach for it unless you are in dead earnest and intend to kill the other fellow.”

  After a minute of silence, as though for the national anthem, Bat turns to Grogan.

  “I don’t scare, Knuckles. In my day I’ve stood up to redskins and cowhands too drunk to give a damn and guys really good with a gun. I don’t scare.”

  “Rothstein don’t either.”

  “You said it, I didn’t.”

  That gets a smile out of Grogan. He nods at his nephews. “Okeh, let ‘em go.”

  The Bruiser Brothers button up, smirking, and move aside. Bat and Wyatt mosey through the swinging door as though on the way to a tea dance at the Astor.

  But as soon as they reach the cigar store Bat wraps an arm around the wooden Indian and hangs on. “Jesus,” he breathes. “That was too close for comfort.”

  Wyatt doesn’t hear. He has turned back through the door to face the foe again. Bat can hear his words to the hoods, and waits for the war to start.

  “You better get permits for those poppers, boys. What d’you think this is—the Wild West?”

  “Why taunt ‘em?”

  “I told you. I don’t dance.”

  “Yeah? Who says I do?”

  The great gunfighters conferred in whispers in the sanctuary of the cigar store.

  “Goddammit,” rued Bat, “I left the hundred on Grogan’s desk—I could’ve run it up to a thousand at five-card. He’d have let me off the hook for a thou, maybe. My last chance—now I’m broke again.”

  “Speak for yourself. Your buddies back there at the saloon chipped in for a hundred twenty.”

  “For what?”

  “My expenses. Tomorrow night.”

  “Eureka! Let’s have it!”

  “With your luck?”

  “But I’m bound to—”

  “Find me a game,” said Wyatt.

  “You!”

  “I never lose.”

  Bat huffed and puffed, then knocked wood on the Indian’s nose.

  Poker was a popular pastime in the metropolis. Certain suites in the leading hotels were permanently reserved for the recreation, and there were other cloistered nooks too myriad to mention. The friendly game Bat located on this occasion was in progress in a back room at Doyle’s Billiard Academy, an institution on 47th just off Broadway, and the dramatis personae at three ayem included Billy Jerome, Dumb Dan Morgan, Henry Blossom, and William J. Fallon. Bat knew them all, hence they were perfectly amenable to his companion from Kansas, “Mysterious Dave” Mather, sitting in. Fresh blood, they said, was always welcome. The game was five-card draw, open if you dared, raise if you could. Wyatt pulled up a chair. Bat hovered. The pace was leisurely, and there was desultory conversation about the shellacking the French were taking at Verdun. Morgan confided that he cared not a fig how many million Frogs were wiped out. He’d taken a welterweight and a light-heavyweight to Paris and been robbed by the ref both times, plus his rightful piece of the purse. Dumb Dan was a manager inclined to straight talk and crooked fights, his proteges being notorious for doing nose-dives when the price was right, and Bat had often cut him up in his column. The subject switched to Pershing’s futile pursuit of Villa. Bat declared that ten thousand cavalry to catch one Mexican was crazy; given a three-man posse consisting of himself, Wyatt Earp, and Charlie Bassett, he’d have Pancho in the pokey in a week. Wyatt folded twice, won a hand on a pair of sevens, and lost one on two pair vs. a trio of ladies.

  Fallon dealt. Wyatt opened on a pair of aces. Everyone stayed. Keeping a jack for a kicker—much to Bat’s dismay behind him—Wyatt drew two cards and caught another ace and another jack. When he glimpsed the full house, aces over jacks, Bat had all he could do to keep from singing “Oh You Beautiful Doll!” at the top of his voice. Wyatt checked.

  Henry Blossom opened the festivities. He was a playwright, but he hadn’t had a hit since his All For The Ladies eked out a year at the Lyric in 1912. Since then, economically, he had run on his rep. He’d been bounced, the word was, in the company of a number of his checks, from membership in the Century Club.

  Billy Jerome saw Blossom’s bet.

  Morgan raised.

  Fallon stayed.

  Wyatt raised.

  Blossom folded.

  Jerome staye
d. William Jerome was a tunesmith and jack-of-all-theatrical-trades, having turned out “Sweet Rosie O’Grady,” the books for several smash musical comedies, and many sketches for Eddie Foy. He was a faithful Masterson fan, and would one day pen a poetic farewell to Bat which Lewis would print on the front page of the Telegraph.

  Morgan raised.

  Fallon stayed.

  Wyatt raised.

  Jerome folded.

  The pot was now of a scope to cause strong men to take stock. A wistful Blossom counted—there was just over six hundred dollars on the table.

  Morgan raised.

  It was now up to William J. Fallon, the original underworld “mouthpiece.” He was a prominent criminal lawyer, having toiled in the vineyards of the courts for Herman Rosenthal until his client was gunned down at the Metropole. He had a high forehead and a Homburg. He looked again at the evidence in his hand, removed his chapeau, ran long white fingers through his long white hair, replaced the Homburg, and quit the case.

  Two duellists remained—Dumb Dan Morgan and Earp, alias Mather.

  Wyatt wagered his last twenty dollars.

  Morgan saw the twenty and raised a hundred.

  Wyatt sat like a wooden Indian until Bat forced him from his seat and steered him by the elbow into a corner of the room.

  “We can’t let him steal it!”

  “He’s maybe got the cards.”

  “The hell he has! Morgan’s dumb! He’s bluffing because he thinks you’re a hayseed!”

  Bat swung to the table, appealing to Jerome. “Billy, will you take my IOU for a hundred?”

  Jerome reached for his wallet. “At your service, Bat.”

  “No.” A stern Wyatt stepped back to the table. “I never borrow on a hand of cards.”

  “You’re not borrowing, I am!” Bat was desperate. “I know! Wyatt’s—I mean Dave’s—got a one-way train ticket from New York to Los Angeles—turn it in and get a hundred at least! Will you take it, Morgan?”

  Wyatt stared at Bat.

  “You can’t lose!” hissed Bat.

  Dumb Dan was doubtful. Finally, under the silent pressure of his peers, he nodded. “Okeh. Maybe I’ll go out and be in the movies. Let’s see it on the table.”

  Wyatt continued to stare at Bat. Bat smiled at him. Wyatt found the ticket in an inside pocket, looked at it, placed it in the pot, and sat down again.

  “I’ll see you,” he said to Morgan.

  Fallon was on his feet.

  So was Blossom.

  Ditto Jerome.

  Slowly, as though he were peeling tape from one of his gladiator’s mitts, Dumb Dan peeled onto the table, card by card, four deuces.

  By the third deuce Mr. Earp had risen, tipping over his chair. But by the second deuce, Mr. Masterson was no longer in attendance.

  “He’ll steal it, huh! He’s bluffing, huh!”

  “I thought he was!”

  “Come out of there, goddamn you!”

  In the manner of Samson pulling down the temple by a pillar, so Mr. Earp attempted to pull down Doyle’s Billiard Academy by a toilet door.

  “Come out and take your trimming!”

  Mr. Masterson had taken refuge in a cubicle, and pains to lock the door.

  “How’d I know he’d have four of a—”

  “Every goddamn cent gone!”

  Walls and floor of the pissoir were tiled, so that their voices volleyed and thundered.

  “Now my ticket! I can’t even go home, you tinhorn, stumblebum bastard!”

  “I’ll think of something! Trust me!”

  At that, Mr. Earp went off like a black-powder bomb under a box. Hauling the Peacemaker from his armpit, he thrust it over the cubicle door, aiming low. Mr. Masterson’s hands appeared on high.

  “For God’s sake, Wyatt—don’t shoot! We can’t pay for a crapper!”

  Bat had gone to the Telegraph to whip out another column lambasting the White vs. McLaglen mismatch and pointing his trigger finger at a possible fix. Also, he’d told Wyatt he had to buy blanks and do some casting for the big show at the Knickerbocker Bar tonight. Under the buffalo butt, and wrapped in a quilt, his sidekick sat stiff as a board on a straight-backed chair, trusty Colt and holster hung over the back of the chair. Emma had done his laundry, and stood now at a board ironing his shirt and longjohns. She seemed to Wyatt to be less prickly today, even amiable almost, which meant, if he were any judge of horseflesh, that she wanted something.

  “I can’t thank you properly, ma’am.”

  “You were looking a little roady.”

  His curiosity was roused by what seemed to be an electric cord looped from the end of her flatiron across a table and up under a lampshade. “That’s a new iron on me. Does it really run on juice?”

  “The latest thingumajig—an electric flatiron. Plug it in anywhere long’s you got an adapter. It was my present from Bat last Christmas. He claimed the Chinese laundry was robbing him blind.” She turned the shirt collar. “Well, how d’you like New York?”

  “Not much. It’s wearing me down.”

  “That’s not New York, that’s Bat. He’ll wear a body to the bone. I long ago gave up trying to traipse after him— I had to make a life of my own.” She indicated the suffragette and W.C.T.U. posters. “So I did. Got my own causes and I’m my own person—as much as I can be.” Out of habit she wet a finger with her tongue and touched it to the flat of the iron as though it had been heated on a wood-burning stove. “Can you imagine being married twenty-five years to a man who never grew up?” She finished the shirt and draped it over a chair. “Now fetch me your coat and trousers. They need a lick and a promise.”

  “I do appreciate it.” Wyatt quilted into the bedroom. The woman was lonely. She liked to talk, seldom had anyone to talk to, and if she was agreeable to doing his domestics, he was agreeable to a listen.

  “You did, though,” she said through the door.

  “Did what?”

  “Grow up. You’re not ‘Mysterious Dave’ Mather. You’re Wyatt Earp, aren’t you?”

  He stood a moment in the bedroom, studying how to respond, then gathered up coat and pants, carried them back, and laid them on her board. “Yes, ma’am, I am,” he admitted. “How did you know?”

  “Woman’s intuition. And Bat goes on about you so much. And I remember you from Denver, dimly. There was always something dangerous about you. Still is. Bat’s mellowed. I don’t notice you have. I expect you still attract trouble the way he attracts drinks.”

  “Now ma’am, I don’t believe—”

  “Don’t tell me, Mr. Earp. You’re in town a couple of days and already the both of you are carrying guns.” She gave the ponderous weapon on the chair a sharp eye. “And I don’t suppose either of you could hit the broad side of a barn if you were inside it with the door closed. Not any more.” She shook her head. “Playing blood-and-thunder again, at your age. Shame. Oh, well, no fools like old fools.”

  Wyatt took to his chair.

  “They your doing or Bat’s? The guns.” Wyatt wrapped himself in his quilt.

  “His probably. He’s in a bind, isn’t he?” Wyatt set his jaw.

  “It’s money, isn’t it?”

  Wyatt sat like the Sphinx.

  “I thought so.” She went to work on his pants, separating the legs over the board at the crotch. “Well, I’ve been poker-poor and horse-poor all my married life, so I wouldn’t know any difference.”

  Wyatt looked through her and through the brick wall behind her and all the way down to Times Square.

  “I didn’t go to Coney Island,” she said, making small talk before she got around to the large. “The other day, I mean, after Bat made me so mad, dragging you in here like the cat.”

  “No?”

  “I went to a matinee—I do a lot, the cheap seats. Once a song-and-dance girl—you know. Anyway, I saw ‘Stop! Look! Listen!’ I’m crazy about Marion Davies.”

  After this irrelevance Emma Masterson pressed for a spell in silence. She wore a plai
n long skirt and a white blouse with leg-o’-mutton sleeves and looked very presentable. Spotting the slopjar under the sofa on which her guest made his bed, she pushed it out of sight with her shoe.

  “Mr. Earp?”

  “Ma’am?”

  “Please take care of Bat, will you?”

  “If I can.”

  “I couldn’t bear to be a widow.”

  The windows were open to the morning, and garbage-men were banging cans around on 49th Street.

  “I love him,” she said unexpectedly. “And he loves me—in his way.”

  She creased the trousers and folded them neatly over a table and took up the coat.

  “One thing I’m sure of,” she said. “Bat’s not a womanizer. I know he’s true to me, as I have been to him. So at least I’ve got that.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” said Wyatt.

  They assemble in a small anteroom off the Knickerbocker lobby at a quarter of midnight: Masterson, Earp, and three hotel bellhops in snappy green uniforms with box caps braided in gold.

  In a corner, away from Wyatt, Bat talks through the action with the bellhops. “Got that straight? You be outside that bar door at midnight on the dot and ready to move in—okeh?”

  “Yessir,” they nod.

  Just then there arrives a well-dressed elderly gent toting a black bag.

  “Ah, here you are,” Bat greets him. “Wyatt, here’s our doc.”

  “Our doc?”

  “You all clear, Doc?”

  “I think so, Mr. Masterson.”

  Bat pep-talks the doc and the bellhops. “Now listen, everybody, spread out around the lobby and look natural. Do whatever you’d be doing—Doc, you read a newspaper, you three smash bags, hustle a dime, anything—but act natural, don’t stick out like sore thumbs waiting. Then, afterwards, get back here fast, to this room, and I’ll pay you off. Okeh?”

  “Yessir,” they nod.

  Wyatt butts in. “Our doc?”

  Bat ignores him. “Okeh, places everybody. And let’s do it right the first time because that’s the last time. So let’s break a leg!”

  Alone in the anteroom with Wyatt. Bat refers to his turnip. “Ten of. I’ll go in there now and find Runyon and have a drink. I guaranteed him I’d be there. Now, you walk in at midnight on the nose. I’ll be standing down the bar, hoisting one.”