Beyond the Pale —Part 119
Aug. 6th, 2007 12:08 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
secret_historyAnd here, gentle readers, is the second instalment I promised you for tonight!
Until next time, happy trails to you!
*****
At Stone’s suggestion, they appealed directly to Fort 51’s base commander, Captain Kyle, for access to medical help. For the first time Victoria was grateful for Stone’s connections to the government. It took only the waving of a few official documents and a couple of thinly-veiled threats and allusions to “higher powers” before Stone was whisked away to the fort’s infirmary. There the doctor, a cheerful man with a florid face, a bedside manner that left much to be desired, and breath that reeked of expensive whiskey, administered the highest dose of morphine at his disposal to the wounded Pinkerton, all the while muttering to himself about the ‘terrible things’ that seemed to take place in the desert.
“He’ll be fine in a few days,” he assured Vicky and Monroe cheerfully, ushering them out of his infirmary. “I can’t have the two of you hanging around getting in my way. I’ll stitch him up and have him good as new by the end of the week, apart from the leg, of course. Even that’s not as bad as it seems, I promise you. Now get along and let me do my work.”
Somewhat at a loss, Vicky and Monroe found Blanton awaiting them just outside the gates of the fort. He had wound a handkerchief around the cut on his wrist inflicted by Abelard’s bullet, and was still seething with barely-contained anger at the humiliation he’d suffered.
“I oughta go back in there and teach that son-of-a-bitch a lesson!”
Vicky rolled her eyes. “All you’ll accomplish is to get yourself killed. Wait until you’re a little more seasoned before you go off challenging experienced gunfighters, all right?”
Blanton’s spine straightened, and he awarded her a glare that could have peeled the paint off a wall. “And just what is that supposed to mean?”
She patted him on the shoulder, which only served to infuriate him more. “It means, kiddo, that you’re not good enough with those guns to be a credible threat to our dandified friend. He’ll make mincemeat out of you.”
“Hey, I’ll have you know I’m pretty good with these things!”
Monroe rolled his eyes. “You can’t hit the broadside of a barn.”
“Can too!”
“You’re also not that quick,” Vicky said, not unkindly. “You’re still a kid, Elijah, it’s normal. You’ll get better with time and practice, as long as you don’t go challenging people who are so much better than you that you’ll end up dead before you can hone your skills. Pick your fights, like I said, and eventually you’ll get there.”
“You don’t get it, do you? Fine, I’ll show you!”
Blanton stamped off, still fuming. For a moment Victoria thought of going after him, then decided against it. Let the kid vent his frustration elsewhere, just so long as he wasn’t going to try taking Abelard singlehandedly, and he was going in the wrong direction if that was his intention. She sighed, and glanced at Monroe, who was also staring morosely at the kid’s retreating back.
“Hard to believe we were ever that age, isn’t it?”
Monroe nodded. “I was thinking of checking the train schedules,” he said, apparently irrelevantly. “We ought to be planning our next move, and that means getting to Salt Lake City as soon as that ba— I mean, as soon as Stone’s recovered enough to travel.”
Vicky grinned at her friend’s lapse. “I hope they have a place we can stay near the station. God knows, we’ve got nearly no money to speak of except what Stone’s got, and we don’t have access to that until he’ll be conscious again, supposing he’s in a sharing frame of mind. While we’re at it, you can tell me what the hell happened after I blacked out back there in the desert. What the hell was that about dynamite that Abelard was talking about?”
They strolled down to the small train depot which served Fort 51 and picked up one of the train schedules, which Monroe pored over, carefully avoiding her question.
“Come on, now, Monroe. You owe me an explanation. What the hell happened out there?”
Monroe pushed back his hat and ran a hand distractedly through his hair. “Well, I don’t know how much you remember about the whole thing.”
“Not much,” she admitted. “I just remember it was dark and really confused, and it sounded like they had about a thousand guns shooting at us.”
“You’re only half-wrong. Turns out they had a gatling gun concealed in one of their wagons, and a bunch of dynamite in another. Enough to do some serious damage if they decided to use it against us.”
“So you shot at it? What kind of fool notion was that?”
Monroe shook his head. “No, that’s his mistake. I managed to crawl around to the wagon with the dynamite in it, and I took most of it for us. I figured we’d probably need it more than them, if we ran into a Rattler or something. Turns out I was right, too,” he added defensively.
“Uh-huh.” Vicky kept her tone carefully noncommittal.
“So anyway, I took one of the sticks, and shoved it into the wheel of the gatling gun. I lit the fuse and hightailed it out of there. The whole thing exploded, and we were able to get away in the ensuing confusion.”
Vicky expelled a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding in. “Well, that’s not as bad as I expected. Still, it was damned foolish of you to try that. You could have gotten shot, or killed, or captured.”
“It was either that or get torn to pieces by that piece of artillery.”
“Hindsight, I guess. Looks like Abelard got off pretty lightly, all told.”
Monroe grinned. “I’m pretty sure the only wound he’s got is the one you inflicted on him. He was trying to dodge your shots, but from the looks of it you clipped him pretty good. In fact, from the way he was sitting back there, I wouldn’t be surprised if you got him right in the backside.”
Vicky let out a peal of laughter at that. “Oh, Lord! No wonder he’s so put out.”
“Looks like there’s a train out of here at the end of the week.” Monroe squinted at the schedule. Vicky peered over his shoulder at the crumpled paper. “If Stone’s up to travelling by then, we could be out of here by Friday afternoon, and in Salt Lake City by Monday morning.”
“Here!” an exclamation from behind them made them turn simultaneously in their seats. Elijah Blanton was standing behind them, his arms full of empty beer bottles. “I told you I would prove to you that I could shoot!”
Vicky stifled a groan. “Elijah, you don’t need to—”
He interrupted her. “I told you I would!” he said a bit shrilly. “Just watch me!”
He stepped out of the depot and carefully lined up the bottles on a crumbling old wall a few dozen yards away. Her heart sinking, Vicky nonetheless followed him and perched on a large rock, watching him set up his improvised shooting range. Monroe joined them a few minutes later, having procured (Vicky wasn’t sure how) a large pitcher of beer.
“I figure we’ll be needing this one way or the other,” he muttered, and she laughed, earning herself a glare from Blanton.
“Okay, kid,” she said resignedly. “Show us what you got.”
Blanton acquitted himself reasonably well. He cleared his gun from his holster pretty fast, although nowhere near fast enough to qualify in a real quickdraw contest, and fanned his pistol at the bottles. On his first try he managed to shatter one bottle, and on his second two bottles fell off the wall. Vicky nodded. It was a pretty fair display, although in a real gunfight he’d never have even cleared leather, and Monroe made no bones of telling him so.
“Yeah? I’d like to see you do better!” Blanton’s eyes flashed angrily.
Monroe shrugged. “I ain’t fast either, which is why I don’t get into gunfights unless I have to. You want to see what you’re really up against, ask Vicky to show you.”
The glare shifted to Victoria, who threw Monroe a reproachful look for putting her on the spot. Then, with a shrug, she stood up, and walked to a spot fifteen paces further from the bottles than Blanton had been standing, and turned her back on the setting sun. If she was going to make a point, she might as well make sure he understood it. She paused, hand near her holster, and concentrated on breathing steadily for a moment, a little surprised at how easy it was now. Then she snatched her pistol from its holster, levelled it, and fired off six shots, taking six of the bottles neatly off the wall. She blew the smoke from the end of the barrel, and calmly reloaded before holstering her pistol again. Blanton was staring at her in disbelief, his mouth hanging open.
“Blanton, you look like a fish.” Blanton closed his mouth with an audible clicking together of teeth at that, his eyes still wide.
“I’m not the best in the game, either,” she said to him truthfully. “Taft is much better, probably the best there is, and there are plenty of others who could easily take me on. I’m probably a match for Abelard, but it would be chancy. Do you understand now why we’re telling you you’re not ready?”
Blanton didn’t get the chance to respond. As the last rays of the setting sun disappeared over the horizon, a small figure hurried through the train depot toward them. It was the blond woman from the saloon. She quickened her pace upon catching sight of them, and ran directly to Monroe, lifting her skirts daintily with one delicate hand. She stopped before him, glanced furtively behind her, and turned pleading eyes toward him.
“Please, you must help me!”
*****
Until next time, happy trails to you!
At Stone’s suggestion, they appealed directly to Fort 51’s base commander, Captain Kyle, for access to medical help. For the first time Victoria was grateful for Stone’s connections to the government. It took only the waving of a few official documents and a couple of thinly-veiled threats and allusions to “higher powers” before Stone was whisked away to the fort’s infirmary. There the doctor, a cheerful man with a florid face, a bedside manner that left much to be desired, and breath that reeked of expensive whiskey, administered the highest dose of morphine at his disposal to the wounded Pinkerton, all the while muttering to himself about the ‘terrible things’ that seemed to take place in the desert.
“He’ll be fine in a few days,” he assured Vicky and Monroe cheerfully, ushering them out of his infirmary. “I can’t have the two of you hanging around getting in my way. I’ll stitch him up and have him good as new by the end of the week, apart from the leg, of course. Even that’s not as bad as it seems, I promise you. Now get along and let me do my work.”
Somewhat at a loss, Vicky and Monroe found Blanton awaiting them just outside the gates of the fort. He had wound a handkerchief around the cut on his wrist inflicted by Abelard’s bullet, and was still seething with barely-contained anger at the humiliation he’d suffered.
“I oughta go back in there and teach that son-of-a-bitch a lesson!”
Vicky rolled her eyes. “All you’ll accomplish is to get yourself killed. Wait until you’re a little more seasoned before you go off challenging experienced gunfighters, all right?”
Blanton’s spine straightened, and he awarded her a glare that could have peeled the paint off a wall. “And just what is that supposed to mean?”
She patted him on the shoulder, which only served to infuriate him more. “It means, kiddo, that you’re not good enough with those guns to be a credible threat to our dandified friend. He’ll make mincemeat out of you.”
“Hey, I’ll have you know I’m pretty good with these things!”
Monroe rolled his eyes. “You can’t hit the broadside of a barn.”
“Can too!”
“You’re also not that quick,” Vicky said, not unkindly. “You’re still a kid, Elijah, it’s normal. You’ll get better with time and practice, as long as you don’t go challenging people who are so much better than you that you’ll end up dead before you can hone your skills. Pick your fights, like I said, and eventually you’ll get there.”
“You don’t get it, do you? Fine, I’ll show you!”
Blanton stamped off, still fuming. For a moment Victoria thought of going after him, then decided against it. Let the kid vent his frustration elsewhere, just so long as he wasn’t going to try taking Abelard singlehandedly, and he was going in the wrong direction if that was his intention. She sighed, and glanced at Monroe, who was also staring morosely at the kid’s retreating back.
“Hard to believe we were ever that age, isn’t it?”
Monroe nodded. “I was thinking of checking the train schedules,” he said, apparently irrelevantly. “We ought to be planning our next move, and that means getting to Salt Lake City as soon as that ba— I mean, as soon as Stone’s recovered enough to travel.”
Vicky grinned at her friend’s lapse. “I hope they have a place we can stay near the station. God knows, we’ve got nearly no money to speak of except what Stone’s got, and we don’t have access to that until he’ll be conscious again, supposing he’s in a sharing frame of mind. While we’re at it, you can tell me what the hell happened after I blacked out back there in the desert. What the hell was that about dynamite that Abelard was talking about?”
They strolled down to the small train depot which served Fort 51 and picked up one of the train schedules, which Monroe pored over, carefully avoiding her question.
“Come on, now, Monroe. You owe me an explanation. What the hell happened out there?”
Monroe pushed back his hat and ran a hand distractedly through his hair. “Well, I don’t know how much you remember about the whole thing.”
“Not much,” she admitted. “I just remember it was dark and really confused, and it sounded like they had about a thousand guns shooting at us.”
“You’re only half-wrong. Turns out they had a gatling gun concealed in one of their wagons, and a bunch of dynamite in another. Enough to do some serious damage if they decided to use it against us.”
“So you shot at it? What kind of fool notion was that?”
Monroe shook his head. “No, that’s his mistake. I managed to crawl around to the wagon with the dynamite in it, and I took most of it for us. I figured we’d probably need it more than them, if we ran into a Rattler or something. Turns out I was right, too,” he added defensively.
“Uh-huh.” Vicky kept her tone carefully noncommittal.
“So anyway, I took one of the sticks, and shoved it into the wheel of the gatling gun. I lit the fuse and hightailed it out of there. The whole thing exploded, and we were able to get away in the ensuing confusion.”
Vicky expelled a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding in. “Well, that’s not as bad as I expected. Still, it was damned foolish of you to try that. You could have gotten shot, or killed, or captured.”
“It was either that or get torn to pieces by that piece of artillery.”
“Hindsight, I guess. Looks like Abelard got off pretty lightly, all told.”
Monroe grinned. “I’m pretty sure the only wound he’s got is the one you inflicted on him. He was trying to dodge your shots, but from the looks of it you clipped him pretty good. In fact, from the way he was sitting back there, I wouldn’t be surprised if you got him right in the backside.”
Vicky let out a peal of laughter at that. “Oh, Lord! No wonder he’s so put out.”
“Looks like there’s a train out of here at the end of the week.” Monroe squinted at the schedule. Vicky peered over his shoulder at the crumpled paper. “If Stone’s up to travelling by then, we could be out of here by Friday afternoon, and in Salt Lake City by Monday morning.”
“Here!” an exclamation from behind them made them turn simultaneously in their seats. Elijah Blanton was standing behind them, his arms full of empty beer bottles. “I told you I would prove to you that I could shoot!”
Vicky stifled a groan. “Elijah, you don’t need to—”
He interrupted her. “I told you I would!” he said a bit shrilly. “Just watch me!”
He stepped out of the depot and carefully lined up the bottles on a crumbling old wall a few dozen yards away. Her heart sinking, Vicky nonetheless followed him and perched on a large rock, watching him set up his improvised shooting range. Monroe joined them a few minutes later, having procured (Vicky wasn’t sure how) a large pitcher of beer.
“I figure we’ll be needing this one way or the other,” he muttered, and she laughed, earning herself a glare from Blanton.
“Okay, kid,” she said resignedly. “Show us what you got.”
Blanton acquitted himself reasonably well. He cleared his gun from his holster pretty fast, although nowhere near fast enough to qualify in a real quickdraw contest, and fanned his pistol at the bottles. On his first try he managed to shatter one bottle, and on his second two bottles fell off the wall. Vicky nodded. It was a pretty fair display, although in a real gunfight he’d never have even cleared leather, and Monroe made no bones of telling him so.
“Yeah? I’d like to see you do better!” Blanton’s eyes flashed angrily.
Monroe shrugged. “I ain’t fast either, which is why I don’t get into gunfights unless I have to. You want to see what you’re really up against, ask Vicky to show you.”
The glare shifted to Victoria, who threw Monroe a reproachful look for putting her on the spot. Then, with a shrug, she stood up, and walked to a spot fifteen paces further from the bottles than Blanton had been standing, and turned her back on the setting sun. If she was going to make a point, she might as well make sure he understood it. She paused, hand near her holster, and concentrated on breathing steadily for a moment, a little surprised at how easy it was now. Then she snatched her pistol from its holster, levelled it, and fired off six shots, taking six of the bottles neatly off the wall. She blew the smoke from the end of the barrel, and calmly reloaded before holstering her pistol again. Blanton was staring at her in disbelief, his mouth hanging open.
“Blanton, you look like a fish.” Blanton closed his mouth with an audible clicking together of teeth at that, his eyes still wide.
“I’m not the best in the game, either,” she said to him truthfully. “Taft is much better, probably the best there is, and there are plenty of others who could easily take me on. I’m probably a match for Abelard, but it would be chancy. Do you understand now why we’re telling you you’re not ready?”
Blanton didn’t get the chance to respond. As the last rays of the setting sun disappeared over the horizon, a small figure hurried through the train depot toward them. It was the blond woman from the saloon. She quickened her pace upon catching sight of them, and ran directly to Monroe, lifting her skirts daintily with one delicate hand. She stopped before him, glanced furtively behind her, and turned pleading eyes toward him.
“Please, you must help me!”
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Date: 2007-08-06 01:39 pm (UTC)And of *course* the lady comes to Monroe ^-^ Now we just wait to see if it is a trick :D
(See how I read one last night and one this morning? That's self control that is! ^-^)