By Starlight Page 7

  “This place ain’t much more than a hole in the ground,” Ross sneered as he looked out the window. “If someone’s sellin’ booze here, I hope to hell they make a mistake and accidentally poison half the town. Ask me, they’d be doin’ these sad sons-a-bitches a favor…”

  Angrily, Jack slammed down on the car’s brakes hard enough to make the tires screech; the back end fishtailed a bit before coming to a sudden, jerking halt in the middle of the street. Through the windshield, he noticed that a few heads had turned in their direction, but just then he didn’t much care.

  “Watch your damn mouth,” he hissed at his partner.

  “What’s the matter, ‘Lucky Jack’?” Ross smirked mischievously. “Did I hit a little too close to home?”

  From the glint in the man’s eye, Jack saw that Ross had been baiting him, challenging his sentimentality. All the older agent had wanted was to get under his skin, to goad him until he got the reaction he desired, and Jack, like a fool, had willingly given it to him.

  Keep it together, Jack…Don’t give him the satisfaction…

  “Truthfully, I don’t much care what you think of me,” Jack began, measuring his words, “but disrespecting them,” his arm waving across the inside of the windshield, “isn’t going to do either of us any good. We have to be both believable and liked if they’re going to buy the story we’re selling. You approach someone with contempt written on your face and in your words and you aren’t going to learn a thing.”

  “Don’t you tell me how to do my job, boy.” Ross chuckled, though his eyes narrowed threateningly. “I’ve been doing this since before you were born in this nowhere town, spending your days sucking on your mother’s tit.”

  Jack struggled to keep his rapidly growing anger from boiling over. “Then I suggest you start acting like it. If you screw this up before we even have a chance to find out where the speakeasy is, there’s going to be hell to pay. Pluggett wants results and won’t stand for failure.”

  “Quit worryin’,” Ross said dismissively. “Gettin’ answers outta rubes like these will be easier than stealin’ candy from a baby. Leave it to me and Pluggett and the Bureau will be kissin’ both our asses. If you ask me, it’d probably be best if you just left me at the hotel and went vistin’ your fine family and friends.” He smiled, his voice dripping with sarcasm. “I bet there’s even some old flame of yours been pinin’ away the years, hopin’ you’d come back to town so you could take her to bed and ravish her just like the good ole days.”

  Faster than a rattlesnake, Jack grabbed Ross by the neck of his shirt and practically yanked him out of his seat. Both of Jack’s fists were balled tight and the desire to pound the older man in the face was hard to resist. Jack’s heart thundered and he could hear his blood pounding in his ear. Fear flickered in Ross’s wide eyes for only an instant before he regained his composure, a thin, sly smile slowly spreading across his face.

  “Another word like what you just said and a gut ache will be the least of your concerns,” Jack said menacingly.

  “I’d think about that if I were you,” Ross answered. “I reckon it wouldn’t look too good for a fella’s chances of promotion if he were to rough up a fellow agent. The Bureau frowns on that sort of thing.”

  Jack hated to admit that Ross was right, but he still hoped he’d made his point. Stewing in his remaining anger, he gave the man a slight shove backward as he let go of his shirt. Almost instantly, Ross’s face twisted up in a grimace of excruciating pain, his teeth bared and his eyes clenched shut, his hands grasping his stomach. Jack noticed beads of sweat dotting his forehead and upper lip.

  “Are you all right?” he asked, putting a hand on Ross’s arm.

  The older man immediately shrugged it off. “Get your damn hands off me!” he snapped. “It’s just my stomach flarin’ up.”

  “Do you need a doctor? Steven Quayle’s been here since—”

  “Just take us to the hotel!” Ross shouted, cutting him off mid-sentence. “Between whatever it was I ate, your whinin’ and bellyachin’ ’bout pleasin’ the Bureau, and the pitiful state of this town, it’s a wonder I ain’t keeled over dead yet!”

  Jack sighed; that’s what he got for showing some concern. Without another word, he did as Ross said and drove toward the hotel.

  The Belvedere Hotel sat across the street from Colton’s train depot on the north side of Main Street near the banks of the Lewis River. It’d been built in the exciting times just after the railway had first come to town, days filled with wishful predictions of frequent tourists and rare goods shipped from all over the country. Unfortunately, what had followed was nothing like what had been hoped for, and far from profitable. Colton had remained what it always was: far off the beaten path. Consequently, the hotel had seen better days.

  Standing two stories tall, with a long porch lined with thick columns befitting a wealthy businessman’s home, how majestic it had once looked. With ornate carvings framing the beveled glass of the upper windows and crisp grey and maroon paint on the building that made the unmarred white of the columns stand out, the Belvedere had been the talk of the town, a jewel to be marveled at. But now, its paint chipped bald in places, with rotted wood on the steps and a few windowsills, and even a cracked piece of glass just below where the sign hung, that former glory had long since faded.

  Jack parked the car and stepped out into the early morning sun, wiping sweat from his brow with the back of his forearm. A burr of shame nagged at him that he felt relieved no one was watching his arrival.

  Get over it; “Lucky Jack”…you’re going to have to talk to someone if you expect to get to the bottom of this booze-running business.

  When Jack pulled the two suitcases from the Plymouth’s trunk, he found Ross leaning back against the closed passenger’s door, his hands pressed against his belly and his face contorted in agony. Sweat soaked the open collar of his shirt and his skin had gone as pale as the moon.

  “Listen, Ross,” Jack said. “This is more than a bellyache. It’d be best if we went to—”

  “Don’t you know by now I don’t give a damn what you think!” the older man snapped, snatching his suitcase from Jack’s hand and wobbling toward the hotel’s steps. “All I need is to lie down for a bit! You’re carryin’ on like you was my mother!”

  Watching Ross make his way unsteadily up the Belvedere’s steps, Jack considered saying more but knew that anything he suggested would be turned down. Shaking his head, he followed along behind.

  The inside of the hotel had the same run-down opulence as the outside; the crystal chandelier was coated in a thick layer of dust, the carved wooden ball that was supposed to be on top of the newel post at the bottom of the long staircase banister had been broken off, and the ornate carpet that led to the hotel desk was spotted with stains and laced with runs in the stitching. Once again, Jack’s memories were of something far grander.

  But there was one thing about the Belvedere that hadn’t changed in the years he’d been away; Virginia Benoit still stood behind the front desk. She and her husband, a former fur trapper in Canada, had opened the Belvedere, but an unfortunate heart attack made Virginia a widow before the first guest had checked in. Though her features were a bit grayer, her face lined with a few more wrinkles, she looked up at them with a smile he found warmly familiar.

  “Good morning, gentlemen,” she said. “Will you be checking…,” but her voice faltered as she looked at Jack.

  “Hello, Mrs. Benoit.”

  “Jack…? Jack Rucker…? Land sakes alive…is that you…?” she stammered, eyes wide with surprise.

  “It’s been a long time,” he answered.

  “I…but…I never expected to see you in Colton again.”

  Mustering up a warm, friendly smile, Jack took a deep breath as he prepared himself for the first telling of his Bureau-supplied story. It was important for him to get it right, to start laying the groundwork that explained his return to Colton and would eventually lead to whoever was circumv
enting Prohibition.

  But before Jack could say a word, a bloodcurdling scream filled the Belvedere as Ross Hooper fell onto the stained floor, his hands desperately clutching his belly, his teeth bared in a grimace of pain.

  Chapter Seven

  JACK STOOD FROZEN in place, unable to believe what he was seeing. He’d been in dangerous, difficult situations more times than he cared to remember, moments that required quick thinking and a cool, collected head, but this was too much. Sure, Ross had complained during the long drive about his stomach bothering him, but whatever this was, it was much more than whining. Tentatively, unsure of what, if anything, he could do, Jack knelt beside Ross as the man writhed in pain.

  “Oh, my land sakes!” Virginia shrieked from behind the Belvedere’s front desk. “What’s the matter with him?”

  Given Ross’s current state, there was no point in asking him. Sweat dotted his pale white skin and ran in streaks down his cheeks, pooling in the recesses of his neck. The Bureau agent’s hands were pressed against his stomach so tightly that the tendons stood out, his nails dug in deeply as if he were clinging to a crumbling cliff side. Sounds hissed through his clenched teeth; there were no words, only guttural noises that spoke of hurt. Frighteningly, his eyes had rolled back so far in their sockets that Jack could no longer see the pupils. Ross looked to be in such agony that Jack began to fear he was about to die right before his eyes.

  It was that thought, that his partner might die if he didn’t do something, that finally spurred Jack into action.

  “Call Dr. Quayle and tell him it’s an emergency!” he shouted at Mrs. Benoit. “Tell him he needs to get here right now!”

  Without hesitation, the Belvedere’s owner hurried into the small room beside the front desk. A moment later, Jack could hear her frantically dialing the operator. Thankfully, he remembered that Dr. Quayle’s office was nearby, only a couple of blocks away; if he was in, he’d arrive at the hotel in minutes.

  But if he isn’t there…

  Even in the short time since Ross had fallen to the floor, his condition appeared to have worsened; in addition to groaning louder, he’d begun to shake, his limbs twitching with every tremor. Unable to do more than watch, Jack felt completely helpless. He might not have liked Ross Hooper, not a lick, but the last thing Jack wanted was for the man to suffer.

  “Doc Quayle’ll be here just as quick as he can,” Virginia explained, setting a pitcher of water and some old rags on the floor. “In the meantime, I reckon he needs to be cooled down a bit.”

  Dipping a rag into the water, Jack began wiping the sweat from Ross’s brow; at the first touch, Ross reacted as if he’d been struck by lightning, his body spasming before he moaned deeply. Jack didn’t know if he was helping or making things worse.

  “What do you reckon’s the matter with him?” Virginia asked.

  “I don’t know,” Jack answered truthfully.

  “Doc Quayle’ll know what to do.”

  “I sure hope so.”

  No sooner had Jack spoken than Steven Quayle raced through the Belvedere’s front door. The doctor was a wisp of a man, short and so thin he’d blow away in the first stiff breeze. Getting on in years, with severe glasses that made him look even older, he had thin white hair that barely covered a forehead well known around Colton for wrinkling whenever he considered a diagnosis. He mended children’s broken bones, tended pregnant women’s broken waters, and even, on rare occasions, offered advice to those suffering from a broken heart. He was a good physician as well as an honest man, sometimes brutally so, but everyone in town would put their lives in his hands.

  Hurrying over to the fallen man, Dr. Quayle hesitated for an instant, surprise fading from his face as he recognized who was kneeling down beside his new patient. “What happened to him, Jack?” he asked calmly, opening his medical bag.

  Jack answered by telling him about Ross’s many complaints during their drive, about how he’d thought it must’ve been something he ate, all the way up until he’d screamed, collapsing on the floor in agony. Dr. Quayle listened, occasionally nodding, his brow furrowed.

  “He only complained about his stomach?” the doctor asked.

  Jack nodded.

  Dr. Quayle leaned over and placed his hand against Ross’s lower stomach, just above his belt. He only gave a light push, but Ross practically leaped off the floor, a howl of agony bursting from his mouth as if a knife had been slid into his belly. Jack couldn’t help but recoil from the sound.

  “It’s his appendix,” Dr. Quayle said matter-of-factly.

  “Is that bad?” Virginia asked, hovering behind the two of them, one hand on her chin, poised as if she were about to stifle a gasp.

  “If I don’t operate,” the doctor answered, “he’ll die.”

  “You’re going to cut him open?” Jack asked, stunned by how quickly events seemed to be spiraling out of control.

  “It’s the only way.”

  “Have you ever done this before?”

  “Twice,” Dr. Quayle answered. “Both a long time ago.”

  “Did they make it?”

  “One did, but the other didn’t, but this man will definitely not survive if we spend much longer talking about it.”

  Jack took a deep breath. “All right,” he said. “Let’s get him over to your office.”

  “There isn’t time,” the doctor said, shaking his head. “We’re going to have to do it here if he’s to have any sort of chance.”

  “Here?” Virginia echoed. “In the hotel?”

  “I need a room that’s close and unoccupied,” the doctor answered, paying no mind to Mrs. Benoit’s obvious displeasure at learning her home and place of business was about to be used as an operating theater.

  “The first one on the right,” Virginia said, pointing toward the short hallway leading away from the bottom of the staircase. “I was about to give it to them anyways; least I was ’fore all the commotion.”

  “Grab his feet,” Dr. Quayle ordered.

  Jack did as he was told and was just about to lift Ross from the floor when the doctor stopped him.

  “You’re going to have to hold on to him just as tight as you can,” Dr. Quayle explained. “He’s in a lot of pain and moving him is only going to make matters worse. He’ll be fighting us every step of the way, but the last thing we want to do is drop him.”

  “I won’t let him fall,” Jack replied.

  “Then let’s move him,” Dr. Quayle said, positioning himself behind Ross’s head and sliding his hands beneath the man, hooking them in his armpits; even with that slight touch, the man reacted as if he’d been pinched, squirming in discomfort as he issued a painful moan.

  “Now.”

  No sooner had Jack lifted Ross from the floor than the doctor’s words of warning proved to have been well-founded; another anguished scream exploded out of Ross’s mouth as his body shuddered and shook, desperately trying to pull free from their grasp. Jack struggled to hold on to the man’s legs as they wildly kicked and thrashed.

  Virginia hurried ahead of them, holding the doctor’s medical bag, and pushed open the door to the room before getting out of their way. As gently as they could, they laid Ross onto the bed. Settled, his protests subsided to a low whimper and fitful shivering. Tears leaked from the corners of his eyes. His hands never left his aching belly.

  Turning to Mrs. Benoit, Dr. Quayle said, “Bring me plenty of boiled water and as many clean sheets as you can carry.”

  Though clearly distressed by the thought of what was about to happen to her linens, she went about her tasks.

  Dr. Quayle immediately set about placing the instruments from his medical bag onto the night table beside the bed: a scalpel, a thin, long-nosed pair of scissors, as well as several other medical tools, bandages of all shapes and sizes, and a stoppered brown bottle. He placed each item meticulously, arranging them exactly as he wanted, even as Ross continued to thrash around beside him.

  “What can I do?” Jack asked.


  “Close the curtains,” the doctor answered.

  Jack pulled the drapes and turned back to the room. Two beds sat against one wall amidst sparse furnishings: a pair of tables, a dresser, and a rickety shelf only partially filled with dusty books. What decorations there were appeared to have been unchanged for decades. To combat the gloom, the doctor turned on every light and lamp in the room, throwing odd shadows against the faded wallpaper. The thought struck Jack that it would be a poor place to die.

  “What now?”

  “He needs to be given anesthesia if I’m going to operate,” Dr. Quayle said. He took the stopper out of the bottle and, while holding a cloth against the top, turned it over. Almost immediately the room was filled with a strong, noxious smell. “Hold this against his nose and mouth and let him breathe it in,” Dr. Quayle explained, handing the cloth across the bed to Jack. “It won’t take long before he’s under. Then I can get started.”

  Taking the cloth, Jack was just about to do as he’d been instructed when Ross suddenly, shockingly, grabbed him by the wrist, his grip as tight as a vise, momentarily rising out of the churning pain in which he was drowning. His eyes were wild and wide, his mouth pulled into a grimace.

  “Damn…damn you…Rucker…,” he spat. “Damn…​you and that…​blasted luck of…​yours if you don’t…​find…​the booze…”

  Ross’s last word had trailed off into little more than a whisper, but Jack quickly looked at Dr. Quayle nevertheless. Jack had no way of knowing if the doctor had heard what had been said or, even if he had, if he understood its meaning. Fearful that Ross might say more and accidentally give away the real reason the two of them were in Colton, Jack placed the cloth against his fellow agent’s mouth and nose and watched as the anesthetic slowly but surely took hold; Ross’s eyes fluttered a couple of times, then his shoulders slumped, and he finally quit twitching. When Jack removed the cloth, Ross was unconscious.

  Mrs. Benoit came back carrying a large pile of sheets and cloths, her distaste at their impending fate still clear on her face.