Beyond the Pale —Part 18
Aug. 16th, 2005 07:30 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
secret_historyHola, faithful readers. As promised, here is Part 18, which was missing only about 100 words and some tweaking before being posted. Heck, if I'm lucky, I might even try to post Part 19, but I haven't started that one yet, so don't hold your breath.
*****
Predictably, Victoria slept badly that night. The nightmares were no worse than usual, but the cold and damp seemed to seep in through the cracks in the floorboards, and between the thin planks that made up the hotel walls. She lay awake, coughing and shivering, and finally rummaged in the small cupboard standing in one corner of the room for an extra blanket, trying not to think that for the next few nights she’d be sleeping out of doors. Finally, she drifted into a restless doze, filled with images of sanatoriums and the vision of Robert Quarrie bleeding on the floor, a look of mingled surprise and horror etched on his face.
She awoke well before dawn, and found that she had no desire to go back to sleep after that. She crawled out from under the blankets, shivering in the frigid morning air, and reached for the warmest clothes she owned. Once she was dressed and fortified for the day with a shot of whiskey, she made her way to the hotel’s bar, where Otto was just beginning to prepare for the day.
“Guten Morgen, Miss Victoria,” he nodded to her, his walrus mustache bobbing slightly out of time with the rest of him.
“’Morning. Got any coffee, Otto?” Vicky tried to smile pleasantly, and managed a pale imitation of a smile. It was to damned early to be awake.
“Sure I got coffee. I am brewing some now. It vill be ready in a few minutes. You vill haff to vait a bit.”
“I reckon I’ll survive a few minutes without coffee.” This time the grin was real. “Any news of the Mayor, Otto?”
An expressive shrug. “Man weiss nicht. Ve don’t know yet. Ze gut doktor, he says that ze pullet didn’t hit anyting vital, but zat ze Mayor lost a great deal of blut. Time vill tell.”
“Well, I suppose that news is about as good as we could have hoped for.”
“Jawohl.”
“Monroe been around yet?”
“Nein. It iss early. But I think he has not had success in finding a posse, yes?”
Victoria shook her head. “I’m not sure. Not unless he’s found some others since I saw him last night, anyhow.”
Otto made no comment, but silently poured two steaming cups of coffee. About half an hour later, when the pot was almost completely empty and Otto had put another on the boil, there was a small commotion on the stairs. Turning to see what the fuss was, Victoria caught sight of Trevor Davis Fletchley coming down the stairs, talking loudly and gesticulating. His interlocutor, a few steps behind, was if anything dressed even more like a tinhorn than Fletchley would be dressed on his worst day. He was taller than Fletchley, with mousy brown hair and light brown eyes, with a bowler hat perched uncertainly on his head, and a suit that looked like it had aimed to be aquamarine and missed. He was also struggling with a large box marked, mysteriously, “Equipment,” which he was trying to get down the stairs without dropping it.
Victoria stared for a moment, until Fletchley’s words registered on her ears.
“I’m telling you, Marcus, it’s going to be fantastic! Pictures direct from the frontier. People will love it! They’ll be eating out of our hands, I promise.”
Oh, no.
Victoria got up from her seat and strolled over, trying to look more casual than she felt. “Morning, Fletchley. You going to introduce your friend here?” she cast a dubious glance at the young man, who was now cursing fluently at his box.
“Oh, uh, sure thing deputy.” Fletchley ran a hand through his hair, and made a vague flailing motion with his other hand, obviously meant as a gesture of introduction. “ Deputy, this is my colleague from the Epitaph, Marcus Beauregard. He’s a top-notch photographer. Best of the best, in fact. Marcus, this is Deputy Victoria James.”
“Delighted, I’m sure,” said the photographer, not sounding it in the least. “Have you got any spare pack animals? I came by stage, and I don’t have the extra beasts to carry my equipment. There’s two more boxes upstairs, too, if someone could help with those.”
Victoria stared incredulously for a moment, then found her composure. “You won’t be able to bring all that, err, stuff with you, Mr. Beauregard. If you want to be a part of this posse you’ll have to travel as light as you can. We’ll be travelling fast and hard, and we won’t have time to drag pack horses with us.”
Beauregard turned an angry look on Fletchley. “Look, I can’t work like this! It’s bad enough I’ve been sent out of the big cities to this godforsaken, scummy little backwater, but for God’s sake, Trev, I have to have my equipment to work properly. God Almighty,” he added seemingly speaking to no one in particular, “what did I ever do to deserve this kind of punishment?”
Fletchley tried to placate him. “Now, Marcus, the Deputy has a point. We’re going after real honest-to-Betsy bandits here! You won’t have time to set up all your shots the way you’re used to anyway, so maybe an imperfectly-framed shot’ll make it look more, you know, authentic or something.” He quailed under Beauregard’s fierce glare, and turned a pleading eye toward Vicky. “I don’t suppose we could see our way to having maybe just one pack horse? Might come in handy, after all...”
Victoria lost her temper then. “Look, we’re going in pursuit of a criminal, not on a goddamned sight-seeing tour! We will not be bringing pack animals, nor will we be stopping at any point to admire the view or attend to stragglers. The fact alone that the Marshal is allowing the two of you to come is a favour, call it a professional courtesy. However, do not let that fool you into thinking that we’re going to stop to haul your sorry behinds out of trouble if you can’t keep up.
Now, it’s cold out there, and neither of you are dressed for it. Take my advice and go put on your warmest clothes. Take only the strict minimum. Don’t even bother bringing your razors, I can guarantee you you won’t have time to shave. We leave at first light, which is in slightly less than an hour by that clock. Be ready, or be left behind.”
With that, she turned on her heel and stalked back to the bar for another cup of coffee, leaving behind a shamefaced Fletchley, and a Beauregard whose complexion was turning purple with anger and indignation. Fletchley quickly propelled his colleague up the stairs before he did anything foolish, for which Vicky was grateful. The last thing she needed this morning was to get into some long, drawn-out disagreement with a foppish photographer. She leaned back against the bar, cradling her cup of coffee in both hands, and waited for the rest of the posse to turn up.
Liza Jane was the first to show up, dressed in warm and comfortable and obviously fairly expensive riding clothes, at least by the standards of the Wild West. She carried her shotgun in a sling on her back, and had two pistols in a gunbelt round her waist. Her red hair was all but completely hidden by a hat made of rabbit fur. She grinned and hopped up onto the stool next to Victoria.
“Howdy, deputy. All ready to go?”
Victoria nodded, and watched as the saloon doors swung open again, revealing Monroe, with two men in tow, neither of whom looked particularly reassuring far as Victoria was concerned. By the look on the Marshal’s face, he was none too happy with the latest additions to his posse, either. Of course, Victoria was never altogether happy when Old Eli was anywhere in the vicinity, even if he was pretty harmless as old coots went. He was also not a bad hand with a gun, when push came to shove. However, he was also usually three sheets to the wind, and largely incoherent, not to mention that he reeked unpleasantly at all times. Not even the winter cold could entirely mask the stench that rolled off him in waves. The other man was known about town as “Shakes” O’Malley, an Irishman with a head shaped rather like an oversized potato, with cauliflower ears and a nose broken in a saloon brawl long ago. Another one who was overly fond of his liquor, although he looked sober enough now, which was more than could be said for Eli.
Victoria gave Monroe a despairing look, which Monroe returned, albeit more discreetly.
“Marshal, don’t you think we’d be better off leaving at least some of these folk behind?” she asked quietly.
Monroe shrugged. “Apart from them two greenhorns, there ain’t a man among that can’t shoot straight, even Old Eli. We’ll probably lose him along the way, anyhow. I’m not sure he really knows he volunteered for the posse.”
Victoria shook her head and refrained from further comment. She rounded up the two journalists, stripped Beauregard of about twenty pounds of “essential equipment,” and got them on their horses. At least the other three had formed posses before, from the looks of it, and she and Monroe didn’t have to mollycoddle them through the process. Considering the two wet-behind-the-ears members of the posse, they were ready to get underway in short order.
“All right. We’ll be following the tracks until we catch up with them, or until night catches up with us,” Monroe called out as the sun began to creep up over the horizon. “Anyone has second thoughts, now’s the time to act on ‘em.
“After this, there’s no turning back.”
*****
Predictably, Victoria slept badly that night. The nightmares were no worse than usual, but the cold and damp seemed to seep in through the cracks in the floorboards, and between the thin planks that made up the hotel walls. She lay awake, coughing and shivering, and finally rummaged in the small cupboard standing in one corner of the room for an extra blanket, trying not to think that for the next few nights she’d be sleeping out of doors. Finally, she drifted into a restless doze, filled with images of sanatoriums and the vision of Robert Quarrie bleeding on the floor, a look of mingled surprise and horror etched on his face.
She awoke well before dawn, and found that she had no desire to go back to sleep after that. She crawled out from under the blankets, shivering in the frigid morning air, and reached for the warmest clothes she owned. Once she was dressed and fortified for the day with a shot of whiskey, she made her way to the hotel’s bar, where Otto was just beginning to prepare for the day.
“Guten Morgen, Miss Victoria,” he nodded to her, his walrus mustache bobbing slightly out of time with the rest of him.
“’Morning. Got any coffee, Otto?” Vicky tried to smile pleasantly, and managed a pale imitation of a smile. It was to damned early to be awake.
“Sure I got coffee. I am brewing some now. It vill be ready in a few minutes. You vill haff to vait a bit.”
“I reckon I’ll survive a few minutes without coffee.” This time the grin was real. “Any news of the Mayor, Otto?”
An expressive shrug. “Man weiss nicht. Ve don’t know yet. Ze gut doktor, he says that ze pullet didn’t hit anyting vital, but zat ze Mayor lost a great deal of blut. Time vill tell.”
“Well, I suppose that news is about as good as we could have hoped for.”
“Jawohl.”
“Monroe been around yet?”
“Nein. It iss early. But I think he has not had success in finding a posse, yes?”
Victoria shook her head. “I’m not sure. Not unless he’s found some others since I saw him last night, anyhow.”
Otto made no comment, but silently poured two steaming cups of coffee. About half an hour later, when the pot was almost completely empty and Otto had put another on the boil, there was a small commotion on the stairs. Turning to see what the fuss was, Victoria caught sight of Trevor Davis Fletchley coming down the stairs, talking loudly and gesticulating. His interlocutor, a few steps behind, was if anything dressed even more like a tinhorn than Fletchley would be dressed on his worst day. He was taller than Fletchley, with mousy brown hair and light brown eyes, with a bowler hat perched uncertainly on his head, and a suit that looked like it had aimed to be aquamarine and missed. He was also struggling with a large box marked, mysteriously, “Equipment,” which he was trying to get down the stairs without dropping it.
Victoria stared for a moment, until Fletchley’s words registered on her ears.
“I’m telling you, Marcus, it’s going to be fantastic! Pictures direct from the frontier. People will love it! They’ll be eating out of our hands, I promise.”
Oh, no.
Victoria got up from her seat and strolled over, trying to look more casual than she felt. “Morning, Fletchley. You going to introduce your friend here?” she cast a dubious glance at the young man, who was now cursing fluently at his box.
“Oh, uh, sure thing deputy.” Fletchley ran a hand through his hair, and made a vague flailing motion with his other hand, obviously meant as a gesture of introduction. “ Deputy, this is my colleague from the Epitaph, Marcus Beauregard. He’s a top-notch photographer. Best of the best, in fact. Marcus, this is Deputy Victoria James.”
“Delighted, I’m sure,” said the photographer, not sounding it in the least. “Have you got any spare pack animals? I came by stage, and I don’t have the extra beasts to carry my equipment. There’s two more boxes upstairs, too, if someone could help with those.”
Victoria stared incredulously for a moment, then found her composure. “You won’t be able to bring all that, err, stuff with you, Mr. Beauregard. If you want to be a part of this posse you’ll have to travel as light as you can. We’ll be travelling fast and hard, and we won’t have time to drag pack horses with us.”
Beauregard turned an angry look on Fletchley. “Look, I can’t work like this! It’s bad enough I’ve been sent out of the big cities to this godforsaken, scummy little backwater, but for God’s sake, Trev, I have to have my equipment to work properly. God Almighty,” he added seemingly speaking to no one in particular, “what did I ever do to deserve this kind of punishment?”
Fletchley tried to placate him. “Now, Marcus, the Deputy has a point. We’re going after real honest-to-Betsy bandits here! You won’t have time to set up all your shots the way you’re used to anyway, so maybe an imperfectly-framed shot’ll make it look more, you know, authentic or something.” He quailed under Beauregard’s fierce glare, and turned a pleading eye toward Vicky. “I don’t suppose we could see our way to having maybe just one pack horse? Might come in handy, after all...”
Victoria lost her temper then. “Look, we’re going in pursuit of a criminal, not on a goddamned sight-seeing tour! We will not be bringing pack animals, nor will we be stopping at any point to admire the view or attend to stragglers. The fact alone that the Marshal is allowing the two of you to come is a favour, call it a professional courtesy. However, do not let that fool you into thinking that we’re going to stop to haul your sorry behinds out of trouble if you can’t keep up.
Now, it’s cold out there, and neither of you are dressed for it. Take my advice and go put on your warmest clothes. Take only the strict minimum. Don’t even bother bringing your razors, I can guarantee you you won’t have time to shave. We leave at first light, which is in slightly less than an hour by that clock. Be ready, or be left behind.”
With that, she turned on her heel and stalked back to the bar for another cup of coffee, leaving behind a shamefaced Fletchley, and a Beauregard whose complexion was turning purple with anger and indignation. Fletchley quickly propelled his colleague up the stairs before he did anything foolish, for which Vicky was grateful. The last thing she needed this morning was to get into some long, drawn-out disagreement with a foppish photographer. She leaned back against the bar, cradling her cup of coffee in both hands, and waited for the rest of the posse to turn up.
Liza Jane was the first to show up, dressed in warm and comfortable and obviously fairly expensive riding clothes, at least by the standards of the Wild West. She carried her shotgun in a sling on her back, and had two pistols in a gunbelt round her waist. Her red hair was all but completely hidden by a hat made of rabbit fur. She grinned and hopped up onto the stool next to Victoria.
“Howdy, deputy. All ready to go?”
Victoria nodded, and watched as the saloon doors swung open again, revealing Monroe, with two men in tow, neither of whom looked particularly reassuring far as Victoria was concerned. By the look on the Marshal’s face, he was none too happy with the latest additions to his posse, either. Of course, Victoria was never altogether happy when Old Eli was anywhere in the vicinity, even if he was pretty harmless as old coots went. He was also not a bad hand with a gun, when push came to shove. However, he was also usually three sheets to the wind, and largely incoherent, not to mention that he reeked unpleasantly at all times. Not even the winter cold could entirely mask the stench that rolled off him in waves. The other man was known about town as “Shakes” O’Malley, an Irishman with a head shaped rather like an oversized potato, with cauliflower ears and a nose broken in a saloon brawl long ago. Another one who was overly fond of his liquor, although he looked sober enough now, which was more than could be said for Eli.
Victoria gave Monroe a despairing look, which Monroe returned, albeit more discreetly.
“Marshal, don’t you think we’d be better off leaving at least some of these folk behind?” she asked quietly.
Monroe shrugged. “Apart from them two greenhorns, there ain’t a man among that can’t shoot straight, even Old Eli. We’ll probably lose him along the way, anyhow. I’m not sure he really knows he volunteered for the posse.”
Victoria shook her head and refrained from further comment. She rounded up the two journalists, stripped Beauregard of about twenty pounds of “essential equipment,” and got them on their horses. At least the other three had formed posses before, from the looks of it, and she and Monroe didn’t have to mollycoddle them through the process. Considering the two wet-behind-the-ears members of the posse, they were ready to get underway in short order.
“All right. We’ll be following the tracks until we catch up with them, or until night catches up with us,” Monroe called out as the sun began to creep up over the horizon. “Anyone has second thoughts, now’s the time to act on ‘em.
“After this, there’s no turning back.”
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no subject
Date: 2005-08-16 11:47 pm (UTC)I'm curious as to how Eli will be when he runs out of booze, or if that's likely to happen.
no subject
Date: 2005-08-17 09:59 am (UTC)