Wanted! Belle Starr! by J.T. Edson Read Free Book Online Page A

of ‘guests’ were
concerned. No longer did the young man who was covering them appear
in the least baby faced or innocent. Rather his dark features bore
an expression of cold and relentless savagery which reminded them
of paintings they had seen depicting Indians on the war path.
Crouching slightly behind the short barreled revolver he had drawn
so unexpectedly and already used with devastating effect upon two
of their companions, he gave the impression of being ready, willing
and even eager to kill both of them if offered the slightest
provocation.
    Now was the pose entirely simulated!
    At such a moment, the Ysabel Kid Cuchilo,
‘the Knife’, as he was known to his lodge brothers thought and
reacted like a Pehnane Comanche brave-heart warrior!
    Which meant, where enemies were involved,
the Texan had little regard for the sanctity of human life!
    Being just as alarmed by the transformation
of ‘Manuel’, the attention of the ‘Duke’ was not being given to the
smoking Webley revolver. Instead, he was staring with horrified
fascination from the sharp spike he had plucked out of his cheek to
the hollow wooden tube also held by the Indian-dark young ‘gaucho’.
There was a dark stain on the tip of the former which, he
concluded, was far too extensive to have been caused by nothing
more than blood from the tiny wound it had inflicted. The tube was
decorated by symbols in red, white, blue and green paint such as he
had seen upon Indian artifacts of various kinds which had
‘medicine’ significance.
    Even as he was drawing his unpalatable and
frightening conclusions, Chauvelin heard a hiss of anger from his
wife. Turning his gaze towards her, he found she was rubbing at her
now reddened eyes and glaring furiously at the cause of her
misfortunes. Knowing that her temper when roused was liable to
produce reactions not in keeping with her pose as being a member of
the French aristocracy, he guessed she was on the point of rushing
around the table and attacking the beautiful ‘Brazilian’ woman with
tooth and nail ferocity.
    “ Stay where you are,
Emily!” the ‘Duke’ howled in alarm, realizing what the consequences
of such a hostile action was almost sure to be. “Do it, damn you.
That half breed bastard shot me with this god damned poisoned dart
and she’ll throw the antidote away if you go for her!”
    “ That I will, my dear
‘Duchess’,” Belle supported, starting to tilt the bottle slightly.
“And you have my promise as one with the blood of a Spanish grandee
on it!”
    Regardless of having achieved the purpose
for which the masquerade was intended, at least as far as obtaining
proof of cheating, long experience warned the lady outlaw that she
must keep to the character she had established. Having convinced
the ‘Duke’ and his gang that she and the Kid were the kind of
people who could possess the lethal knowledge and means to use it,
any suggestion of the truth would prevent them from reaching their
desired goal.
    As it was, everything depended upon
Emily!
    “ Oh my good god!” the
‘Duchess’ shrieked, all her aggression departing along with the
‘French’ accent, as she recollected the conversation about the
deadly effect of such a device as was held by her husband. To give
her credit, she loved him enough to care what might befall him as a
result of the small wound it had inflicted. Swinging her now
thoroughly frightened gaze to the lady outlaw, her tone took on a
timbre of pleading as she resumed, “P—Please give Armond the
antidote!”
    “ Certainly,” Belle
answered. “But there is a price, naturally.”
    “ Take all the money on the
table!” Emily offered hastily and the ‘Duke’ nodded an immediate
concurrence.
    “ I was going to take that
anyway,” the lady outlaw claimed, gesturing towards the table with
the bottle. “But I also want the twelve thousand, five hundred
dollars you took from my bueno amigo, Andrew Bullstrode, a few nights ago.”
    “ Do you know him?”