Free The Book of Murdock by Loren D. Estleman Page B

blood, from the meat shop. Matthews put it in a fish bladder. All I had to do was hang it around my neck under my shirt and give it a smack when I heard the shot.”
    â€œHe’ll keep silent?”
    â€œHe’d better. Half his business comes from the jail, and there are other markets in town. Where’s Bullard?” Roy Bullard was the mail robber who was supposed to have been gunning for me.
    â€œCalifornia, last I heard. That was Deputy Leffler behind the Winchester. He’s a crack shot.”

    â€œHe’s too confident. The slug took a piece out of a porch post not two feet away. If he misjudged the wind, or I dove the wrong way, that’s money wasted getting Griffin to make me a reformed character.”
    â€œIt had to look convincing, and blank cartridges lack the authoritative report of a live round. We discussed all this. You need to be dead on the off chance someone recognizes you in Texas. The more witnesses the better, to make him doubt his own suspicions.”
    â€œIf you wanted to make it credible you should have had ten men ambush me with shotguns.”
    â€œYou’ve been reading dime novels about your exploits when you should have been studying Holy Writ.” He unslung his watch and sprang the lid. “Ten minutes from now, the doctor will announce your demise to your admirers outside.”
    â€œTwenty,” put in Alexander. “I have a reputation as well.”
    â€œTwenty it is. You will then be carried under cover of a sheet to Wilson’s New Method Undertaking Parlor, where you will spend the next eighteen hours out of sight; the jail does business with Wilson as well, so his discretion is reasonably assured.”
    â€œ Where out of sight?”
    â€œThe preparation room. I’m told there are no corpses there at present, but should the situation change, your natural stoic disposition will see you through any discomfort. I’m scheduling your services for tomorrow morning at nine: closed coffin, of course. By then you’ll be in the baggage car of the eight-forty to Denver. After you change trains, you
can ride to Amarillo with the rest of the human cargo, under the name Sebastian. Brother Bernard Sebastian of the Church of Evangelical Truth.”
    My lips twisted. I couldn’t help it. “Saint Bernard?”
    â€œTwo saints, to be precise. Double the benediction.”
    â€œYour faith in numbers is misplaced. You’ve already dealt too many in on the hand.”
    â€œDeath is a committee affair; but we must trust the cards. Rumors fuel the West. The deceased walk, the quick are dead. Last month Jesse James was seen coming out of an ice cream parlor in Chicago, and he’s been worm fodder for two years. No one eats what’s set before him without seasoning it heavily with irony. A bit of gaseous legend can only contribute to verisimilitude.”
    â€œI don’t know that word, but if it means going off half-cocked, I agree with it.”
    He traded his watch for a thick wallet and held it out. I took it from habit; people had been giving me things for days. It was made of shoddy brown leather, fraying through at the fold. “Banknotes?”
    â€œPersonal effects: a letter from the fictitious Sebastian’s dear dead mother, scribbled accounts of travel expenses, receipts for provisions, the usual mortal debris. They’ll address questions about your identity. The devil is in the details.” He smiled, lips tight.

EIGHT
    As it happened, Bucephalus Wilson, the undertaker, had a rush job, to improve the complexion of an old man who’d died of jaundice, and do it in time to ship him to Denver in the same baggage car Blackthorne had reserved for me. Since I had nothing better to do while waiting I helped out by handing things to Wilson, chiefly a pot of aluminum paste he applied as a sort of primer and a tin of pink powder to lend his customer the glow of health. It was interesting work, and the