Silver Moon
Adventurer
Chapter Ten, “Busy Night at the Lone Star”, Thursday January 5th, 1882:
The atmosphere at the Lone Star was decidedly different than it had been the last three nights. Usually the patrons were mostly dedicated gamblers. They kept their drinking down to the point where they could keep their minds sharp for the game and paid little heed to Katherine as long as they had their drinks when they wanted them.
The ad in the paper had attracted the men who were more interested in getting drunk and ogling Ruby than in betting. Kate was too busy weaving from table to table to pay attention to the bundle of nerves in her stomach. On one of her busy trips past the slightly out of tune piano, Jake motions with his head for Katherine to come over an talk to him. She slipped between the tables and over to the piano.
He tells her "There's four things I don't like about this. First off, I don't like having my back to so many people. Second, I'm more accustomed to playing after the listeners are more liquored up. Third, I am right offended that they need to offer free beer for folks to come hear Ruby sing. Make sure you say something nice to her. Get her to really show these saloon rats what a fine singer she really is." "You said there was four things?" replies Katherine with more than a little impatience while eyeing the rabble waiting for her to return with drinks. "Oh, right." Replies Jake with a turn of his head and a sly grin. "You haven't brought me a drink yet."
Katherine replies, "Believe me, they're plenty liquored up. And they won't need to offer free drinks again. Word about Ruby will spread and this place will be full every night. I'm not sure that's all to the good. I don't like the feel of this crowd." Katherine looked around at the gaggle of men. "I'll bring you something when I can," she said, and hurried away.
A few hours later the crowd has started to thin out. Most of the chairs and barstools remain occupied but with only a handful of people standing. Ruby’s tip cup is close to overflowing and the tip cup that Cook put atop the piano has a good dozen coins in it. Both gamblers are each now on their third table full of players, having effortlessly beaten the players. There has been surprisingly little trouble thus far. Around ten minutes earlier Tom and Maggie got into an argument out in the kitchen, but Ruby sang louder during it to keep the patrons from noticing.
“It has been a crazy night,” Ruby thought to herself. She was not prepared for such a large crowd and from the looks of it neither was Katherine. Truthfully she loved the spotlight and was used to it from other jobs she had in the past. But her promise to herself was that coming to Promise meant staying out of trouble and she knew that large crowds always meant trouble, especially for her. It was just too tempting and too easy, it had always been that way, and trouble just always found her. She already started down that path by being involved in the altercation earlier that week. And it would have been so easy to take advantage of all the drunken men with their wallets hanging out of their pockets. But from now on she was going to stick to her plan and be a respectable lady. A promise is a promise after all.
Job Kane winds up the current game at his table and announces “Time for a break”. Most of his players head out towards the outhouse while Kane heads into the kitchen to talk to the Whipples. A few minutes after that Maggie approaches Silver Jake Cook and says “Thanks for helping out, I’ll take over now. Tom wants to talk to you out in the kitchen.” Cook empties his tips cup into his pocket and heads through the swinging door into the other room.
Tom Whipple looks exhausted. He says to Cook “Are you interested in taking over Job’s table for the rest of the night? The house gets twenty percent of any winnings.” Cook quickly agrees and looks at Job Kane. The gambler responds to the unanswered question “The crowd scared off our regular players and playing with these guys is like catching fish in a barrel. Tony seems to be enjoying it but I’m getting bored. I’ve also got to take care of something upstairs.”
Job leaves the kitchen and Silver says to Tom “What’s happening upstairs?” Tom replies, “Too much. Earlier today I rented out a room to a young lady named Susie Foreman. Turns out that she’s a strumpet, and she just brought upstairs her third guy tonight. Maggie doesn’t approve of that sort of thing here and is mad at me for renting the room to her. Job said he’d go take care of it.”
Most of the players have returned to the gambling table. Tom escorts Cook over to it and announces “New dealer.” Since all of the players had been loosing to Kane none of them object. Silver starts to shuffle the cards and is dealing the first hand when a pair of gunshots rings out. A bullet flies down through from the ceiling above, passing through the end of a card still being held at the other end by Silver's hand and then into the table. Jake manipulates the card in his hand turning it over and around while examining it. "Gentlemen, let's take another short break. If you will excuse me I need to go get a fresh deck this one will no longer due."
He pushes away from the table and quickly looks around to make sure that Ruby & Katherine are fine, wiggles his Colt in it's holster to make sure it's loose and heads for the stairs. "Damn," he mutters under his breath, "I hope none of them gets tired of waiting for the game to start."
From the stage Ruby saw Jake sit down at the card table then stand up and go upstairs, leaving his table empty. Ruby walked off the stage to keep the gamblers company. She would flirt with them and make them buy more drinks then they had planned. Surely that would make Tom happy. As she walked past Katherine she gave a quick whisper, “What’s going on tonight? What were Tom and Maggie fighting about? And where did Jake go?”
Katherine could only shake her head. "I don't know what the fight was about. Tom sat Jake down at the table to be the new dealer, but he then got right back up again. He held up one of the cards and it had a hole in it, then he ran upstairs." Whatever was going on up there couldn't be good, and she had grown fond enough of Jake to dread seeing him hurt. She tried to shake of the feeling of trouble that had been hanging over her all night.
She smiled at Ruby. "You've been wonderful tonight. And lucky not to be down here. I think my backside is going to be black and blue tomorrow morning. I wonder how Mrs. Whipple feels about the slapping of drunken patrons?" Ruby replies "Thank you for the compliment Katherine. If there is one thing I know it's drunken patrons deserve to be slapped, no matter what the owner says. Sometimes you have to stand up for yourself! I'm going to keep that rabble under control," Ruby says nodding towards the gamblers. She starts to walk away then pauses, looking up the stairs. "But I am worried about Jake..." Kate put her hand on Ruby's arm and leaned forward to whisper in her ear. "I have my Derringer just in case. If he needs help..... Do you...have anything?" "Darling, I'm always prepared," Ruby says winking.
Silver Jake Cook has reached an opened door to an upstairs room. He peers. First he sees Job Kane kneeling behind a dresser, gun in hand. He then notices movement and someone behind a bed points a gun towards the doorway. Jake ducking his head back as the gun goes off.
Downstairs, Katherine smiled as Ruby moved over to Jake's table and began to weave her spell over the patrons. Kate hadn't made it more than halfway back to the bar when another gunshot rang out from upstairs. The tray clattered to the floor as Kate hitched up her skirts and dashed for the stairs. Maggie stops playing the piano and most conversations end as well, the customers wondering what is going on. Another gunshot sounds from upstairs, this one heard by all of the occupants of the now quiet saloon. A panic immediately follows, with most of the intoxicated patrons now charging out the front door and a few running through the kitchen and out the back. Somebody yells out "Go Get the Marshall!".
From outside the doorway Cook sees Kane take aim towards the bed and fire down into the featherbed itself. "You there behind the bed." Says Jake loudly from around the corner while quietly drawing and cocking his revolver. "Not only are you going hurt someone, but you are messing up Tom's profits tonight. Any chance we can talk about this, or are you gonna make us blow your head off? You are kind of outnumbered and your odds are getting worse."
The hand reaches out from behind the bed and takes another shot at the door. It also makes a great target for Job Kane, who stands and fires point blank into the arm. A man screams and drops the gun onto the bed as the bullet passes through his arm. A woman screams too, and Jake's gaze shifts over towards a closet in the room, where a young lady is standing, attired only in a bedsheet.
Jake moves quickly into the doorway and points his gun at the man behind the bed. "Freeze!" He yells while quickly looking around to make sure that there is no other hazard. He keeps half an eye on the woman in the closet to make sure she doesn't reach for a hidden weapon.
Ruby was just as fast as Kate. They ran up the stairs side by side as Kate pulled the Derringer from her bodice. She stopped at the top of the stairs as another shot rang out, splintering a doorframe. Kate pushed herself against the back wall of the hallway as Jake moved up to the doorway. She peeked inside the room and saw a woman hiding in the closet, covering herself with a bedsheet. She blushed even as she tried to keep her hand steady on the Derringer.
"Job, is he the only one?" Jake asked. Kate kept her eyes fixed on the woman. If there was only the one man Jake and Job could handle him, but she feared they might ignore the woman.
The wounded man is bleeding on the floor and howling in pain. "It's just them," Job says. "What is going on?" Ruby asks. "He tried to kill me!" the man yells, pointing at Job with his unwounded hand. The gambler replies, "I was just delivering a message from the hotel owner and he started shooting at me." "You shot first," the wounded man replies. "Only after you reached for your gun," Job answers. "Can I get dressed now?" the woman in the closet asks. Kate swallowed and kept her voice as even as possible despite her blushes. "I think you'd best stay very still. If you wanted to be dressed you should have stayed that way."
The atmosphere at the Lone Star was decidedly different than it had been the last three nights. Usually the patrons were mostly dedicated gamblers. They kept their drinking down to the point where they could keep their minds sharp for the game and paid little heed to Katherine as long as they had their drinks when they wanted them.
The ad in the paper had attracted the men who were more interested in getting drunk and ogling Ruby than in betting. Kate was too busy weaving from table to table to pay attention to the bundle of nerves in her stomach. On one of her busy trips past the slightly out of tune piano, Jake motions with his head for Katherine to come over an talk to him. She slipped between the tables and over to the piano.
He tells her "There's four things I don't like about this. First off, I don't like having my back to so many people. Second, I'm more accustomed to playing after the listeners are more liquored up. Third, I am right offended that they need to offer free beer for folks to come hear Ruby sing. Make sure you say something nice to her. Get her to really show these saloon rats what a fine singer she really is." "You said there was four things?" replies Katherine with more than a little impatience while eyeing the rabble waiting for her to return with drinks. "Oh, right." Replies Jake with a turn of his head and a sly grin. "You haven't brought me a drink yet."
Katherine replies, "Believe me, they're plenty liquored up. And they won't need to offer free drinks again. Word about Ruby will spread and this place will be full every night. I'm not sure that's all to the good. I don't like the feel of this crowd." Katherine looked around at the gaggle of men. "I'll bring you something when I can," she said, and hurried away.
A few hours later the crowd has started to thin out. Most of the chairs and barstools remain occupied but with only a handful of people standing. Ruby’s tip cup is close to overflowing and the tip cup that Cook put atop the piano has a good dozen coins in it. Both gamblers are each now on their third table full of players, having effortlessly beaten the players. There has been surprisingly little trouble thus far. Around ten minutes earlier Tom and Maggie got into an argument out in the kitchen, but Ruby sang louder during it to keep the patrons from noticing.
“It has been a crazy night,” Ruby thought to herself. She was not prepared for such a large crowd and from the looks of it neither was Katherine. Truthfully she loved the spotlight and was used to it from other jobs she had in the past. But her promise to herself was that coming to Promise meant staying out of trouble and she knew that large crowds always meant trouble, especially for her. It was just too tempting and too easy, it had always been that way, and trouble just always found her. She already started down that path by being involved in the altercation earlier that week. And it would have been so easy to take advantage of all the drunken men with their wallets hanging out of their pockets. But from now on she was going to stick to her plan and be a respectable lady. A promise is a promise after all.
Job Kane winds up the current game at his table and announces “Time for a break”. Most of his players head out towards the outhouse while Kane heads into the kitchen to talk to the Whipples. A few minutes after that Maggie approaches Silver Jake Cook and says “Thanks for helping out, I’ll take over now. Tom wants to talk to you out in the kitchen.” Cook empties his tips cup into his pocket and heads through the swinging door into the other room.
Tom Whipple looks exhausted. He says to Cook “Are you interested in taking over Job’s table for the rest of the night? The house gets twenty percent of any winnings.” Cook quickly agrees and looks at Job Kane. The gambler responds to the unanswered question “The crowd scared off our regular players and playing with these guys is like catching fish in a barrel. Tony seems to be enjoying it but I’m getting bored. I’ve also got to take care of something upstairs.”
Job leaves the kitchen and Silver says to Tom “What’s happening upstairs?” Tom replies, “Too much. Earlier today I rented out a room to a young lady named Susie Foreman. Turns out that she’s a strumpet, and she just brought upstairs her third guy tonight. Maggie doesn’t approve of that sort of thing here and is mad at me for renting the room to her. Job said he’d go take care of it.”
Most of the players have returned to the gambling table. Tom escorts Cook over to it and announces “New dealer.” Since all of the players had been loosing to Kane none of them object. Silver starts to shuffle the cards and is dealing the first hand when a pair of gunshots rings out. A bullet flies down through from the ceiling above, passing through the end of a card still being held at the other end by Silver's hand and then into the table. Jake manipulates the card in his hand turning it over and around while examining it. "Gentlemen, let's take another short break. If you will excuse me I need to go get a fresh deck this one will no longer due."
He pushes away from the table and quickly looks around to make sure that Ruby & Katherine are fine, wiggles his Colt in it's holster to make sure it's loose and heads for the stairs. "Damn," he mutters under his breath, "I hope none of them gets tired of waiting for the game to start."
From the stage Ruby saw Jake sit down at the card table then stand up and go upstairs, leaving his table empty. Ruby walked off the stage to keep the gamblers company. She would flirt with them and make them buy more drinks then they had planned. Surely that would make Tom happy. As she walked past Katherine she gave a quick whisper, “What’s going on tonight? What were Tom and Maggie fighting about? And where did Jake go?”
Katherine could only shake her head. "I don't know what the fight was about. Tom sat Jake down at the table to be the new dealer, but he then got right back up again. He held up one of the cards and it had a hole in it, then he ran upstairs." Whatever was going on up there couldn't be good, and she had grown fond enough of Jake to dread seeing him hurt. She tried to shake of the feeling of trouble that had been hanging over her all night.
She smiled at Ruby. "You've been wonderful tonight. And lucky not to be down here. I think my backside is going to be black and blue tomorrow morning. I wonder how Mrs. Whipple feels about the slapping of drunken patrons?" Ruby replies "Thank you for the compliment Katherine. If there is one thing I know it's drunken patrons deserve to be slapped, no matter what the owner says. Sometimes you have to stand up for yourself! I'm going to keep that rabble under control," Ruby says nodding towards the gamblers. She starts to walk away then pauses, looking up the stairs. "But I am worried about Jake..." Kate put her hand on Ruby's arm and leaned forward to whisper in her ear. "I have my Derringer just in case. If he needs help..... Do you...have anything?" "Darling, I'm always prepared," Ruby says winking.
Silver Jake Cook has reached an opened door to an upstairs room. He peers. First he sees Job Kane kneeling behind a dresser, gun in hand. He then notices movement and someone behind a bed points a gun towards the doorway. Jake ducking his head back as the gun goes off.
Downstairs, Katherine smiled as Ruby moved over to Jake's table and began to weave her spell over the patrons. Kate hadn't made it more than halfway back to the bar when another gunshot rang out from upstairs. The tray clattered to the floor as Kate hitched up her skirts and dashed for the stairs. Maggie stops playing the piano and most conversations end as well, the customers wondering what is going on. Another gunshot sounds from upstairs, this one heard by all of the occupants of the now quiet saloon. A panic immediately follows, with most of the intoxicated patrons now charging out the front door and a few running through the kitchen and out the back. Somebody yells out "Go Get the Marshall!".
From outside the doorway Cook sees Kane take aim towards the bed and fire down into the featherbed itself. "You there behind the bed." Says Jake loudly from around the corner while quietly drawing and cocking his revolver. "Not only are you going hurt someone, but you are messing up Tom's profits tonight. Any chance we can talk about this, or are you gonna make us blow your head off? You are kind of outnumbered and your odds are getting worse."
The hand reaches out from behind the bed and takes another shot at the door. It also makes a great target for Job Kane, who stands and fires point blank into the arm. A man screams and drops the gun onto the bed as the bullet passes through his arm. A woman screams too, and Jake's gaze shifts over towards a closet in the room, where a young lady is standing, attired only in a bedsheet.
Jake moves quickly into the doorway and points his gun at the man behind the bed. "Freeze!" He yells while quickly looking around to make sure that there is no other hazard. He keeps half an eye on the woman in the closet to make sure she doesn't reach for a hidden weapon.
Ruby was just as fast as Kate. They ran up the stairs side by side as Kate pulled the Derringer from her bodice. She stopped at the top of the stairs as another shot rang out, splintering a doorframe. Kate pushed herself against the back wall of the hallway as Jake moved up to the doorway. She peeked inside the room and saw a woman hiding in the closet, covering herself with a bedsheet. She blushed even as she tried to keep her hand steady on the Derringer.
"Job, is he the only one?" Jake asked. Kate kept her eyes fixed on the woman. If there was only the one man Jake and Job could handle him, but she feared they might ignore the woman.
The wounded man is bleeding on the floor and howling in pain. "It's just them," Job says. "What is going on?" Ruby asks. "He tried to kill me!" the man yells, pointing at Job with his unwounded hand. The gambler replies, "I was just delivering a message from the hotel owner and he started shooting at me." "You shot first," the wounded man replies. "Only after you reached for your gun," Job answers. "Can I get dressed now?" the woman in the closet asks. Kate swallowed and kept her voice as even as possible despite her blushes. "I think you'd best stay very still. If you wanted to be dressed you should have stayed that way."
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