The Sporting House Killing by G. Powell (free ebook reader for pc .TXT) 📗

an indictment of a college boy for gunning down a whore who made the fatal mistake of laughing at his manhood, or lack of same. Eighteen-year-old Cicero Sweet, a freshman student at Baylor University, now cools his heels in the county calaboose, the district judge having denied bail. Locals report he is remorseless.’”

“What locals?” Papa peered up at Brann over his specs.

Brann shrugged.

Papa read on. “‘A twenty-two-year-old soiled dove, known as Georgia Virginia Gamble, was found dead in her own bed, covered in her own blood, while her assailant lay prostrate on her boudoir floor, too drunk to flee. The smoking derringer was still in his hand.’”

Papa huffed and shook his head.

“Hyperbole, perhaps?” Brann said.

“Just dead wrong,” Papa answered. “‘The madam, Miss Jessie Rose, described Sweet as a fellow who couldn’t hold his liquor and couldn’t control his temper. According to witnesses, minutes before the blast resounded through the Reservation, the whore laughed at him, and that set him off.’” He lowered the paper, scowling. “Who are the witnesses to this nonsense that she laughed at him? Miss Jessie have a peanut gallery in that room?”

“Have you spoken with the madam herself?” Brann asked.

Papa snickered. “When I questioned her, she shut tighter than a virgin at a camp meeting, which I believe is generally contrary to her nature.”

Brann pulled a White Owl from the box on the table.

“This public attention probably interrupts her otherwise lucrative trade,” he said between puffs, “and she doesn’t appreciate that. Washington Avenue, as far as I’ve been able to discern, is your city line between Gomorrah and Waco proper. You have the sin sirens on one side and the sinners itching to backslide on the other. Miss Jessie straddles the best whoring real estate in the whole Reservation, and that makes it the best in the state.”

Papa nodded.

“It must be one of the whores who’ll say the girl laughed at him,” Brann suggested.

Harley made a note of it. They’d need to be ready for whoever it is. “The madam didn’t say anything about that at the inquest. They were all downstairs when it happened.”

Papa continued reading. “‘Reaction among Waco residents is indifferent. No one cares that this unfortunate child of legal licentiousness fell at the altar of public profit. The mayor refused to speak with this reporter. Baylor President Rufus Burleson was quick to disclaim the murderer and denounce the whore. Also refusing to discuss the case was Sweet’s lawyer, the prominent Waco defense attorney William “Catfish” Calloway, whose courtroom skill as a cross-examiner is legendary. His sleight of hand has secured the acquittals of a notorious bank robber, a wealthy wife beater, and an impecunious pilferer of the public treasury.’”

Papa curled his mustache. “Has it occurred to him that just maybe they weren’t guilty?”

“The reporter himself is guilty of awkwardly artless alliteration,” Brann said.

“‘Locals who know him contacted this reporter to inform him Sweet has a short temper and a taste for a long drink. Just months before this murder, he beat another Baylor student after drinking beer on campus’—that’s a lie—‘and he and his consort in debauchery, fellow college freshman Jasper Can—’ God damn it!”

The colonel’s head shot up.

Papa flung the paper into the trash bin. “That’s the last straw.”

Brann and Harley exchanged glances.

“Jasper’s just an East Texas farm boy,” Papa growled. “He didn’t even know it was a sporting house. It’s all goddamned lies. Sorry goddamned bastard’s out to make six bits off two decent youngsters’ bad luck. Even purgatory won’t take reporters like him.” Papa vented steam like a locomotive in a railyard. “And I’d like to know who’s telling the goddamned reporter those goddamned lies. And why.”

Harley hadn’t seen him this worked up in years—since Houston’s case. But he acted more concerned about the mention of Jasper than the fight with Peter DeGroote. If Captain Blair didn’t know about the fight before the article, he sure did now. It would be harder than ever to get him to agree to a plea deal.

Papa pulled out his pocket watch, inserted the key, and began winding.

No one spoke.

After the clicking stopped, he tucked the watch back in his vest pocket.

“Gonna be a fight, boys.”

He clasped his hands behind his back, strode away from them, then turned. “I’ll not let those boys pay the price for other men’s sins.”

He spoke in a voice Harley knew well. It must be the same voice Papa’s cavalry troopers had heard back during the war.

His steel-blue eyes met Harley’s. “Come two weeks from today, Calloway & Calloway go to trial.”

Papa had just issued the order to mount for the charge.

It was folly, but Harley didn’t challenge him. Papa wasn’t in the listening mood.

Harley’s place was not to make reply. Not to reason why. Lord Tennyson had it right.

Forward, into the Valley of Death.

Chapter 22

Catfish ruminated over the newspaper article and underlined things to follow up on. Bud Orman must be feeding false information to that reporter, who didn’t have the good sense to see it for what it was. Henry’s son deserved a trial in court, where Catfish could cross-examine his accusers, not a trial by newspaper. It just galled him. He reached for the White Owl box he kept his trial gear in and removed the minié ball, fingering it so intently he didn’t even notice Miss Peach come in.

“Mr. Calloway, here’s the mail.” Miss Peach placed a rectangular package on the table behind him. “Did you order something from Montgomery Ward & Company?”

He dropped the bullet back into his trial box and swung his chair around with delight. “Oh, that’s the new Iver Johnson. Been waiting for that.”

He tore into the package.

“What’s an Iver Johnson?”

“Pistol. Brand new model, not even in the catalog yet.”

“Oh,” she said, betraying some disappointment. “It must be small.”

“That’s why I ordered it.” He chuckled at the advertising slogan on the inside of the pasteboard box lid: Hammer the Hammer! Then he stood up and pulled off his shoulder holster. “This Smith & Wesson’s getting too heavy for an old