Read Online Scenarios - A Collection of Nameless Detective Stories by Bill Pronzini - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Bill Pronzini
Tags: Mystery & Crime
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after me, didn't you? That's why you didn't give me away when the two of you were together."
"Not exactly." I started the engine and got us under way at a good clip upstream. "I didn't have any idea who you were or where you'd come from until I looked inside Jackson's—or Saunders' - boat. He told me he was alone and he'd put in after crayfish. But he was carrying one rod and there were two more casting outfits in the boat; you don't need all that stuff for crayfish; and no fisherman alone is likely to carry three outfits for any reason. There was a heavy sheepskin jacket there, too, draped over the seat; but he was already wearing a heavy mackinaw, and I remembered you only had on a short-sleeved jacket when you came out of the water. It all began to add up then. I talked him into leaving as soon as I could."
"How did you do that?"
"By telling him what he wanted to hear—that you must be dead."
"But how did you know where I was hiding?"
I explained how Saunders had triggered the answer for me. "I also tried to put myself in your place. You were hurt and scared; your first thought would be to get away as fast as possible. Which meant by boat, not by swimming. So it figured you hid nearby until I was far enough away and then slipped back to the skiff.
"But this boat—like Saunders'—starts with a key, and I had it with me. You could have set yourself adrift, but then Saunders might have seen you and come chasing in his boat. In your condition it made sense you might burrow under the skiff, with a little space clear at one side so you could breathe."
"Well, I owe you a debt," McGuinn said. "You saved my life."
"Forget it," I said, a little ruefully. Because the truth was I had almost got him killed. I had told Saunders he was on the island and insisted on a two-man search party; and I had failed to tumble to who and what Saunders was until it was almost too late. If McGuinn hadn't been so well hidden, if we'd found him, Saunders would probably have jumped me and I might not have been able to handle him; McGuinn and I could both be dead now. I'm not a bad detective, usually; other times, though, I'm a near bust.
The channel that led to Whiskey Island loomed ahead. Cheer up, I told myself—the important thing is that this time, 120 years after the first one, the red-haired Irish bludgeon victim is being brought out alive and the man who assaulted him is sure to wind up in prison. The ghost of O'Farrell, the Gold Rush miner, won't have any company when it goes prowling and swearing vengeance on those foggy nights in Dead Man's Slough.
The Ghosts of Ragged-Ass Gulch
1.
T he name of the place was Ragged-Ass Gulch.
That was the name the town had been born with anyway, back in the days of the California Gold Rush when gold fever raged up in Trinity County as well as in the Mother Lode and a group of miners discovered nuggets in Musket Creek north of Weaverville. Nobody seemed to know any more why the town that sprang up along the creek's banks had been so colorfully dubbed. But it wasn't unusual for miners, who were themselves a colorful lot, to give their camps unconventional names; Whiskeytown , Lousy Ravine, Rowdy Bar, Bogus Thunder, and Git -Up-And- Git were just a few of their other inventions.
At any rate, Ragged-Ass Gulch had flourished for three or four years, with a population of fifteen hundred at its peak, until the gold in the vicinity petered out and the miners left for other diggings. Then, slowly, it had begun to die. By the mid-1850s, only a hundred or so people remained and the town was renamed Cooperville , after the largest of the families that came to settle there. Those hundred had shrunk to less than thirty by the turn of the century, which made it a virtual ghost town. It was still a virtual ghost town: at last count, exactly sixteen people lived there.
I had my first look at it on a bright morning in mid June. Beside me in the car, Kerry said, "Good Lord, it's beautiful," in a
"Not exactly." I started the engine and got us under way at a good clip upstream. "I didn't have any idea who you were or where you'd come from until I looked inside Jackson's—or Saunders' - boat. He told me he was alone and he'd put in after crayfish. But he was carrying one rod and there were two more casting outfits in the boat; you don't need all that stuff for crayfish; and no fisherman alone is likely to carry three outfits for any reason. There was a heavy sheepskin jacket there, too, draped over the seat; but he was already wearing a heavy mackinaw, and I remembered you only had on a short-sleeved jacket when you came out of the water. It all began to add up then. I talked him into leaving as soon as I could."
"How did you do that?"
"By telling him what he wanted to hear—that you must be dead."
"But how did you know where I was hiding?"
I explained how Saunders had triggered the answer for me. "I also tried to put myself in your place. You were hurt and scared; your first thought would be to get away as fast as possible. Which meant by boat, not by swimming. So it figured you hid nearby until I was far enough away and then slipped back to the skiff.
"But this boat—like Saunders'—starts with a key, and I had it with me. You could have set yourself adrift, but then Saunders might have seen you and come chasing in his boat. In your condition it made sense you might burrow under the skiff, with a little space clear at one side so you could breathe."
"Well, I owe you a debt," McGuinn said. "You saved my life."
"Forget it," I said, a little ruefully. Because the truth was I had almost got him killed. I had told Saunders he was on the island and insisted on a two-man search party; and I had failed to tumble to who and what Saunders was until it was almost too late. If McGuinn hadn't been so well hidden, if we'd found him, Saunders would probably have jumped me and I might not have been able to handle him; McGuinn and I could both be dead now. I'm not a bad detective, usually; other times, though, I'm a near bust.
The channel that led to Whiskey Island loomed ahead. Cheer up, I told myself—the important thing is that this time, 120 years after the first one, the red-haired Irish bludgeon victim is being brought out alive and the man who assaulted him is sure to wind up in prison. The ghost of O'Farrell, the Gold Rush miner, won't have any company when it goes prowling and swearing vengeance on those foggy nights in Dead Man's Slough.
The Ghosts of Ragged-Ass Gulch
1.
T he name of the place was Ragged-Ass Gulch.
That was the name the town had been born with anyway, back in the days of the California Gold Rush when gold fever raged up in Trinity County as well as in the Mother Lode and a group of miners discovered nuggets in Musket Creek north of Weaverville. Nobody seemed to know any more why the town that sprang up along the creek's banks had been so colorfully dubbed. But it wasn't unusual for miners, who were themselves a colorful lot, to give their camps unconventional names; Whiskeytown , Lousy Ravine, Rowdy Bar, Bogus Thunder, and Git -Up-And- Git were just a few of their other inventions.
At any rate, Ragged-Ass Gulch had flourished for three or four years, with a population of fifteen hundred at its peak, until the gold in the vicinity petered out and the miners left for other diggings. Then, slowly, it had begun to die. By the mid-1850s, only a hundred or so people remained and the town was renamed Cooperville , after the largest of the families that came to settle there. Those hundred had shrunk to less than thirty by the turn of the century, which made it a virtual ghost town. It was still a virtual ghost town: at last count, exactly sixteen people lived there.
I had my first look at it on a bright morning in mid June. Beside me in the car, Kerry said, "Good Lord, it's beautiful," in a
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