Chapter Two

Friday nights in a mining town had to be the worst, Louise thought hearing the background cacophony of the saloons and brothels that lined the main street in Deadwood.  It seemed like just about everybody and his brother came into town on Friday night.  Granted the miners had to collect their weekly pay, but even those who weren't miners or interested in a good time seemed to crawl out of the woodwork at the beginning of a weekend.  The rest of the week, the town was almost like a ghost town except for the newcomers who drifted through.  It was a rough, dirty little scrap of a town.  Much rougher than a lot she'd seen in her travels.  It had actually been a nice place to live for a while, but now, Deadwood had reverted back to the state it'd been in when she'd first arrived.  Before Jimmy.

She sat in the darkness behind the Soiled Dove saloon watching out over the dozen to twenty tents in the tent city stretching behind the buildings on Main Street.  Main Street, ha!  That was a laugh because there was only one street in town.  Louise was on her break and as always intended to use every minute of it to just sit and think.  Here in the dark, she didn't have to be nice to anyone, didn't have to answer to drunken calls for more liquor, or defend herself from wandering hands and crude remarks.  In the dark, she could watch life and not have to be forced to participate in it.  Didn't have to listen to people she'd never met give their condolences, people who'd never really known Jimmy or her.

She was tired, so tired of everything.  She'd been tired for a long time, especially when she thought about how her life had turned out -- a far cry from the what she'd planned it to be all those years ago.  Before though, there was Jimmy to bring her through.  They'd had each other, come what may, and if they didn't like the way life was somewhere, then they'd pack up and head somewhere else.  But now....now Jimmy was dead almost three months and there was no one for her to depend on but herself.

Louise jumped slightly as a loud slap sounded through the darkness from the tent city followed by raised voices in argument.  It was a sound she was all too familiar with from her childhood, a sound that even now startled her.  She imagined some child huddled in the corner of the tent or beneath the covers of their little bed, trying to drown out the sound of arguing parents by putting his or her fingers in their ears.  It was what she'd done as a little girl and what she'd sworn no child of hers would ever have to go through.  Of course that thought brought on another whole chain of morose thoughts and she shied away from them, shied away from the memories of a sweet little girl with auburn curls and bright blue eyes who died long before her time.

A door opened and light and noise flooded out from the saloon.  "Louise!  Louise, where are you?" a man's voice called harshly.

His voice shattered the night like a rock through a windowpane, grating on her nerves.  Lou sighed and walked around the side of the leanto that had leant her its shadowed anonymity.  "Jesus, Harvey, I'm right here!" she said, her voice hard with annoyance.  "Ya needn't bring down the mountains lookin' for me."

"I need you on the floor," the barkeep said, without acknowledging her annoyance.  "Peg's got a customer and we're swamped.  You've got her section 'til she's done."

"We're always busy on a Friday night and Peg's always got a customer," Louise replied peevishly.  "Don't know why you don't just give me her section and let her fill in.  Let her make her money on her back like she wants.  Lord knows you get more work outta me, than her any day, unless you count her bitchin' 'bout just about everythin' under the sun."

Harvey looked her over with a practiced eye before turning his had slightly to spit tobacco juice off the porch.  "You'd make more than Peg any day if you'd take to entertainin'," he said appreciatively.  "Peg's good at what she does, but she's been doin' it too long.  You still look like a real live woman and not those painted corpses they call whores.  Besides, men'd be willin' to pay double or triple to be pleasured by Hickok's widow."

Louise's dark eyes hardened and she took two steps closer to him, an empty smile on her lips.  To the casual observer, it would look like two lovers meeting in the dark, but Harvey, for all his experience with Wild Bill Hickok's widow, knew to be on his guard.  Her fingers brushed reflexively against the knife she kept hidden in the waist of her dress between two layers of cloth.  "Don't even think about it, Harvey," she warned in a low voice.  "I've never been and never will be anyone's whore.  You go back on our deal, and men'll be payin' double and triple to see how many pieces I carved you into.  Comprende?"

"I've made a lotta exceptions for you, Louise.  Don't be expectin' me to make too many more," he warned, a pointed finger placing distance between them.

She smiled as she walked slightly past him, stopping when she was even with his shoulder.  "Believe me, there's no love lost between us on my side of it.  It's purely business.  You need me to keep the girls and the customers in line and I need the money.  One day, I won't need the money anymore and you can be damn sure I won't let the door hit my ass on the way out," she said softly.

The barkeep watched as Louise walked back into the saloon.  When the door had shut behind her, he let out the breath he'd been holding and shook his head in admiration.  He'd rather deal with Hickok's guns any day than Louise's words.  Of the pair of them, Harvey Stone could swear history had the wrong one as the legend.
 
 

~*~*~*~*~*~

Okay, Kid you are officially out of your mind, he told himself wryly.  Kid sat atop his horse watching men and women scurry down Deadwood's one and only street going between saloon and cathouse.  The town was more crowded than he'd expected for a weekend and he'd gotten lucky to have found a room at one of the two hotels in town.  How in the world was he supposed to find Lou in all this?  Was she even still here?  Would she even see me if I found her, he thought, or would she just shoot my ass?  He couldn't blame her if she did really with him showing up out of the blue after fifteen years.

The sullen and bored desk clerk at the hotel had become much more hospitable after Kid had passed him five dollars.  Kid had kept his distance as the man with horrible breath gave him information as to where he might find "the marshal's wife."  Although hardly anyone saw her anymore, she was believed to be working at the Soiled Dove Saloon halfway down Main Street between Ruthie's and the bath house.

Carefully, Kid manipulated the horse around people and down the street until he stopped in front of what had to be the Soiled Dove.  Dismounting, he took a good look at the place.  The building was lighted and lively but dilapidated.  The wooden sign was old as well and depicted what was supposed to be a well endowed, dark haired beauty leaning forward to show off the endowments beneath her low neckline.  However, the sign's old paint and weathered look ensured that most patrons never saw the sign.  Having spent time in some seedy saloons in his travels, Kid couldn't help but feel almost sick at the idea of Lou, the Lou he knew, working at such a life-stealing place.  He forced himself to remember that not all saloongirls worked the rooms upstairs and braced himself to head inside.

A drunk stumbling out the door nearly mowed Kid down on his way in.  Luckily, the reflexes honed during the war had stayed with him and Kid successfully lunged out of the man's way in enough time to avoid being vomited on.  Grimacing in disgust, he went inside to find the place crowded and very noisy.  Luckily, most of the patrons were at the bar or closer to the small stage where several girls were dancing the burly-q amid hoots and hollers as well as the occasional over enthusiastic man who tried to cart one of them off.  Finding a small table in a corner as far away from the action as possible, Kid sat down reading over the menu written on a board behind the bar.  He kept his hat low and shifted most of his money from his pocket into his boot as a precaution.  No use taking any kind of chances if he wanted to observe the place in peace.

"You're new in town, ain't ya?"

Kid looked up from adjusting his pantleg beneath the table to find himself about two inches from a rather large bosom.  The boy he'd been fifteen years ago would've been absolutely speechless at the sight and blushed furiously.  The man he was now, regarded the woman's assets cooly, his eyes pausing just a second before journeying up to the woman's face to see who was addressing him.  The woman's made up face lit as she unashamedly perused his form, approval in her eyes.  She had the same careless, blase attitude about her that Kid had discovered in most women in her line of work.  Not much excited them anymore after the hard lives they'd lived.  They were just bodies taking up space and air in many cases.

"Well, well, what brings a good lookin' thing like you out to such a piss poor tumbleweed like Deadwood?  You come lookin' to see where Wild Bill spent his last days like most of the rest of those drifters comin' through here?" she asked curiously.

Kid felt his body tighten with tension at the mention of his friend.  "I'm just passin' through," he said quietly.  "I'm looking for someone."

The woman laughed.  "Ya found me," she replied, hinting.  She moved to run a hand up his arm and dropped her voice to what she must have thought was a seductive tone.  "Name's Carly and for the right price I can be anyone you want me to be."

Kid reached for her hand and held it, his eyes hard in annoyance.  You'd think a woman who seemed to have been in this line of work longer than six months would be able to read potential customers' body language better, he thought to himself.  "'For the right price' can I get a bowl of chili and a sarsparilla?  Or does this place not serve food like other saloons?" he said sarcastically.

Her eyes fell and her smile seemed plastered on her face.  "Yeah, sure.  One chili and a sarsparilla comin' up.  You sure you don't want nothin' else, sugar?" she asked in one last attempt to entice him.

He had to give her credit for bouncing back quickly.  Many a working girl got clingy and irritated when you turned down their "wares".  This gal, however, was all business and treated him the same way she would have if he'd taken up her offer.  Kid couldn't help the half grin on his face.  "No, nothin' else, but if I change my mind I'll be sure to let you know," he replied.

The woman smiled genuinely at the stranger's handsome grin and opened her mouth to flirtatiously answer back, but was cut off by a short half-squeal, half-scream from the stage at the other end of the room.  "Oh, shit," she said.  "Bauer's at it again."

"What's goin' on?" Kid asked his waitress.

She gestured toward the stage where a large, burly and obviously drunk man was trying to toss one of the dancers over his shoulder.  It was pretty plain that the girl didn't want any part of him and was struggling.  "Oh, Bauer comes in here and thinks he's God's gift to women.  Tries to take liberties with all of us.  I heard he beat some girl who worked here before up so bad, she lost the sight in one eye," the woman said.

Kid stood where he was when it looked like none of the other male patrons was going to help the girl.  He'd taken one step forward, his hand on his gunbelt, when a shrill whistle pierced the chaos and a voice called out from somewhere Kid couldn't see.  When he could finally see the source of the voice, it was all he could do to remember to breathe.
 

~*~*~*~*~*~

Louise grabbed her tray and started through the kitchen and back room that served as a break room for the girls.  Automatically, she checked over who was on break and who was out on the floor.  The patrons at the Soiled Dove had a reputation for being rough and ever since Louise had taken over the position of overseeing the waitresses, she always liked to know where her girls were, even if they were upstairs with a customer.

"Is Carly back?" she asked of one of the two sitting at the small table.  One, a blonde a few years younger than Louise, was rolling a cigarette while her dark haired counterpart was rubbing her feet.

"Yeah, she's out on the floor," the blonde replied.  She lit the smoke with a match and took a quick puff.  "Ooooh, you should see the nice piece I saw her waitin' on in her section.  Tall, lean, blue eyes to die for."

The brunette leaned her elbow on the table and smiled wickedly.  "I bet you he knows what to do with that gun of his," she commented, "unlike the rest of those yahoos out there.  A girl'd do him for free, wouldn't she, Abbie?"

"Mmmm, oh, hell yes!" Abbie replied, enthusiastically.  She opned her eyes and looked to Louise who'd dramatically rolled her eyes heavenward.  "Say Louise, why don't you take a shot at him?  Seems you're probably gettin' a little lonely by now.  It's been what, two months since he died?" she asked not unkindly.  Despite what some of the other girls thought about Louise's rules and sometimes standoffish nature, Abbie couldn't help but like the woman who'd been grieving for the dead marshal.

Louise laughed bitterly, touched though at the younger woman's concern over her sexual appetites.  Little does she know that it's been a lot longer since I felt that fire for someone, she thought.  The last one had had blue eyes, too, came the unbidden thought just a moment before Louise squashed it within again.  "Last thing I need in my life right now is another man," she said aloud.  "Besides, you girls keep me busy enough for two men."  The last was said as she chucked both girls under the chin in a motherly fashion.

All three women were stratled alert the next moment as another of the saloon's girls ran into the break room.  "Louise, Louise!  Come quick!  Bauer's after Shannon again!" she said, panicking.

Case in point, Lou thought, referring to her last comment to Abbie.  Her eyes hardened as her ears picked up poor Shannon's squeals over the din from the main room.  Her tray still in her hand, Louise ran into the main room, following the panicked girl.  Ever since Harvey had hired her to serve drinks and clean up his girls, they'd become her girls.  She'd done everything possible to ensure that these girls had a safe place to work.  Granted she didn't agree with the way some of them made extra money, but she'd be damned if any of them would have to fear abuse from any of their customers or being cheated.  She was the barkeep's liason between him and the women that worked for him.  The girls came to her with problems they could never take to their male employer.

No one touches my girls, Lou thought viciously as she observed the scene and the way the crowd was beginning to egg the large man on in his attempts to literally sweep Shannon off her feet.  Bracing herself, she stopped within the doorway between the backrooms and the main room, put two fingers to her lips and blew a shrill whistle that pierced the cacophony.  "Bauer, what the hell are you doin'?" she hollered, moving towards him.

Bauer's dark eyes brightened and a flirtatious smile crossed his features.  "Aww, Miss Louise I was just havin' some fun," he said.  "Wasn't we, sweetheart?"  He tightened his grip on Shannon's waist and tried to kiss the squirming girl.

Lou crossed her arms in front of her maintaining a tight grip on her tray.  "You may've been havin' fun, but Shannon here wasn't.  Now let her go, Bauer.  You know the rules -- the girls touch you if you're interested, not the other way around."

Bauer laughed, his long, dirty blonde hair shaking on his shoulders.  "You wanna take her place, then woman?" he asked.  When Lou didn't respond, the man let go of Shannon and turned his full attention onto the diminutive woman before him, his eyes raking in her curves like poker chips.  He stepped closer to her, thinking his height would intimidate her.  When it didn't he found himself excited by her boldness.  "I got an itch.  You wanna scratch it for me?  You know I'm twice the man Hickok was -- in more ways than one."

When Bauer grabbed her hand and held it firmly against himself, Louise was disgusted, insulted, but more importantly she was mad.  She steeled herself against showing him any reaction and continued staring into his dark, lustfull eyes.  "You may be twice the man my husband was," she said softly, "but it sure as hell ain't there."  She gestured to the paunch that threatened to overflow his beltline.

The rest of the saloon that was watching the exchange broke in laughter and Louise wrenched her hand from Bauer's grasp. "Look, don't touch, Bauer," she said loudly as she laughed with the rest, trying to diffuse the situation.  "Obey the rules or you and your friends won't be allowed to come play here anymore."

With a swiftness that belied his large size, Bauer brought a hand up and backhanded Louise across the face, catching her offguard and causing her to fall against a table behind her, the tray in her hands clattering noisily to the floor.  The saloon girls gasped or screamed in reaction to seeing their protector hit.  Bauer laughed while the rest of the saloon became hushed. Several patrons moved to help Louise but Bauer and his associates, eight of them in all, pulled their guns and trained them on the patrons.

"Anyone moves to help her and my boys here'll shoot ya," Bauer called.  "No one insults Mick Bauer like that, especially no marshal's whore."

The hit had exploded lights behind Lou's eyes and she berated herself for being caught offguard.  She should know better than to turn her back on the likes of Bauer.  How many times had she learned that?  How many times had Jimmy drilled it into her after she'd started working the saloons?

Half dizzy, Lou took her time regaining her feet as Bauer talked and postured.  Knowing he was too angry and stupid to be observant, Louise slowly slid her hand up her skirt and removed the tiny four-shot derringer she carried strapped to her thigh.  She hid the gun in the folds of her skirt as she rose to her feet.  When she was standing, she swung the gun up into Bauer's face and pulled the hammer back.  "I am no one's whore," she ground out tightly.

"What're ya gonna do with that little pea shooter, princess, tickle me?" Bauer laughed.  "It's only got four shots and there's eight of us.  You'll be dead before you squeeze off a second shot."

"I only need one shot to kill you, Bauer.  I was a hell of a shot before I met Hickok.  How much better do you think I am now after being with him for fifteen years?"

"You're bluffin'!  No woman's that good."

Louise pulled the hammer back into the second position so that the gun was fully cocked.  "I only bluff in poker, boys and this ain't poker," she said calmly.  "Of course, maybe I won't put a bullet between your eyes.  Maybe I'll just maim ya real good."

Bauer's eyes widened at the cold look in the small woman's dark, empty eyes as she moved the barrel farther south -- strategically.  Weighing his options quickly, Bauer raised his hands with a lascivious smile, a signal to his men to put their weapons away.  Damn that woman fires me up, he thought.  He made a sweeping bow toward Shannon who'd moved to cringe at Lou's side.  "Sorry, Miss Shannon," he said.

"Stay away from my girls, Bauer," Louise said in a low voice, "or so help me God, no woman will come near you again, you understand?"  She gestured with the derringer to emphasize her point.

At the bar, Harvey breathed a sigh of relief that there'd be no shooting in his saloon.  He clapped his hands for attention.  "Alright, gents, this round's on the house," he said, trying to salvage what little dignity he had left.  Maybe if his patrons drank, they'd forget how he'd cowered behind the bar while a mere scrap of a woman took on a man twice her size.

As the saloon patrons returned to their chatter and drinking, Bauer stepped closer to Louise and bent his lips to her ear.  "One of these days, Miss Louise, I'm gonna give you toss between the sheets that you won't never forget.  You can count on it," he whispered.

Louise shuddered at the implication, despite her resolve to remain fearless in front of him.  She watched his back as he and his men returned to their table to drink.  Her eyes turned toward the bar, glaring at the coward Harvey behind it, knowing that he'd find her later and somehow the whole situation would become her fault.  The least the little troll coulda done was back her up with that shotgun he keeps underneath the bar, she thought bitterly.

The adrenaline rush gone, her face began to throb painfully as she felt her lip swelling.  Oh, she'd be good and bruised tomorrow, she knew.  Bruises were bad for business.  She knew that from her experiences with Wicks and the countless saloon owners she'd worked for since then.  Most of them weren't the hypocrite harvey was though.  He'd send her home because she was bruised and then yell at her the next morning for missing work, she knew.  At the thought Lou suddenly had had enough that night.

Angry at the thought of the confrontation she'd undoubtedly face tomorrow, she picked up her tray off the floor.  Striding purposely to the bar, she slammed the wooden tray hard down on top of the counter.  She glared at Harvey, the little weasel.  "I'm done tonight," she growled before striding right out the front door, her head held high.

~*~*~*~*~*

Kid smiled in relieved amusement as Lou walked out the swinging doors.  He'd had to hold onto the table edge tightly to keep himself from interfering and revealing himself to her too soon, that protective instinct kicking right back in even after fifteen years.  But she hadn't needed his help and he couldn't help the pride and awe he'd felt watching her take on someone twice her size.  Looks like some of Jimmy rubbed off on her, Kid thought.

"I swear to God one day that woman's gonna get herself killed," Carly commented under her breath.  "And then where would the rest of us be?"

Kid's ears perked up.  "Who was that?" he asked nonchalantly as he sat back down and pushed a chair out for Caarly with his foot.  He indicated that she should sit and with a relieved half smile she took his invitation, grateful for a chance to get off her feet.

She leaned towards him to be heard over the din.  "That was Louise.  She's Wild Bill Hickok's widow, though we're not supposed to advertise that too much," Carly said.  "Harvey, the owner, hired her to clean the place up a bit, especially us girls.  Before Louise came, we'd had four girls beat pretty badly by customers.  We was fightin' each other and the men.  Louise, she's got rules she set up to keep us safe and happy.  She takes care of us when we need doctorin' for women troubles and such, too, or when Harvey hires the young ones, she watches out for them and shows 'em the ropes."

"Pretty big shoes for such a little thing," Kid commented quietly.  That was just like his Lou to be working for the underdogs, he thought.  No, not his Lou.  Just Lou.  Louise, he corrected his thoughts, Louise Hickok.

Carly laughed at Kid's assessment of Louise.  "Don't let her size fool you, mister.  She's as tough as they come, but fair which is more than I can say for Harvey," she said.  "Feel bad for her though."

"Why?"

The woman sighed.  "Well, her husband, the marshal, he....  Well, he liked the ladies ya see.  Ran around on her a bit, he did.  Used to gamble somethin' fierce too.  That's why she's had to work in saloons, to make enough money to keep them afloat while he was out paintin' the town red so to speak."  Carly quickly looked up.  "Don't get me wrong, he was a good marshal, the best at what he did.  Just not a good husband I guess.  Some men ain't.  Anyway, his gamblin' debts were so bad, the town had an auction and sold all their things after the marshal died to pay 'em off."

Kid was shocked to say the least.  His heart ached for what he knew Lou'd gone through watching her things be sold so shortly after Jimmy's death.  "So she has nothing?  Where's she live, if the town sold everything?" he asked, hoping Carly wouldn't notice the slight catch in his voice.

"Oh, she lives upstairs on the third floor.  Says it's quiet up there 'cause no one else will stay up there other than her.  A girl killed herself up there a couple years ago and it's haunted.  Only Louise will sleep there, even though every once in a while one or a couple of us goes up to see her in her room.  Me, I don't think it's haunted one bit, but it gives her a place for some peace so who am I to complain that she's got the whole floor," Carly said.

She continued to chatter for a few moments before excusing herself to return to work before Harvey came after her.  Kid sat quietly after she'd left, his thoughts drowning out the room's noise.  Jimmy'd been right, Lou needed someone to get her out of this place before she pissed off the wrong customer or got hit one too many times.  This was no place for her, working in some dingy saloon on the outskirts of civilization.  She was grieving, she was family and damn it she should do that grieving with family and away from this place that looked so much like the Wild West's version of Purgatory.

Now, how do I convince her of all that? Kid asked himself.  This was your idea, Jimmy, so you'd better help me.  Or so help me God, I'm gonna kick your ass all over eternity, he thought grinning ruefully as his eyes nonchalantly rolled toward the ceiling.  Don't make me come up there!