“How would you know? You’ve been snoring for the last three miles.”
“Sioux never fall asleep in the saddle,” said Looks Away, offended. “I was contemplating our problem and formulating various plans.”
“Sure,” said Grey. “While snoring.”
“Haven’t you ever heard of Zen meditation? That was a mantra.”
“I don’t know what that is, but it sounded like snoring.”
“You,” said Looks Away, “are welcome to kiss my ass.”
“And you are welcome to—.”
Grey stopped and suddenly stood up in the stirrups.
“What—?” began Looks Away, but then he turned as well.
They both squinted into the distance. There, so far away that it was nearly invisible in the heat shimmer, was something that glittered. Sparks of sunlight flew out from it like they would from fragments of a broken mirror, except these were above the ground.
“What is that?” murmured Looks Away.
“I don’t know. Something metal, maybe? Or glass…?”
Looks Away cupped his hands around his eyes and stared hard. “By Jove,” he exclaimed, “it’s a town.”
“A town? There’s no town way out here.”
“There is now, my dear chap. I can see buildings and one structure that looks for all the world like a theater. Or, perhaps a music hall.”
“A music hall? Out here in the middle of no-damn-where?”
“So it seems.”
Grey shielded his eyes and stared, too, but all he could see were indistinct lumps. And whatever it was that sparkled.
“You can actually see a town?” he asked.
“I can.”
“You have damn good eyes, then.”
“Well, my people didn’t name me ‘Looks Away’ because I was nearsighted.”
Grey thought about that, grunted, shrugged, and sat down in the saddle. “I know we’re on a kind of mission here,” he began slowly, “but—.”
“Oh, absolutely,” said Looks Away and kicked his horse in the direction of the town.
Grey smiled at his retreating back. “Well, okay then.”
He nudged Mrs. Pickles and followed.
Chapter Fourteen
The wooden sign across the town’s main — and only — arch had two words painted in bloodred letters.
FORTUNE CITY
They paused and looked up at the sign. All around those words someone had nailed hundreds of small hand mirrors to the wood, but the glass in every single mirror was cracked.
“Well,” said Looks Away, “I’m not a deeply superstitious chap, but that can’t be good.”
“Someone’s idea of a joke,” said Grey, but his tone didn’t sound convincing even to his own ears.
Beyond the sign, a single street of hard-packed dirt ran between two rows of buildings. There was a livery, a barbershop that also advertised tooth-pulling, a funeral home, a gun shop, a lawyer’s office, six separate taverns, and a brothel that rose like a shimmering tower above the others. The brothel was the only building that was more than a single story, and the top floors had long balconies that wrapped around both sides. There were girls in bright colors leaning on the rails. Down on the street level, hard-faced men and women walked or sat or stood in small groups. Maybe a hundred people. And every one of them was looking at the two strangers on horses.
“Friendly looking,” said Looks Away.
“Yeah,” said Grey, “like a nest of scorpions.”
“Nowhere near as charming as that.”
Grey couldn’t argue. No one was smiling. No one spoke or gestured. They all stood and looked their way.
“Well,” said Grey dubiously, “we’re here… might as well go on in.”
“Said the foolish pilgrim at the outer ring of hell.”
“Is that a quote?”
“No, merely an observation.”
They nudged their horses and entered the town of Fortune. The people on the streets, or up on porches, or standing in windows watched them with hostile and suspicious eyes. Except for the brothel, every store or business in town looked like it teetered on the edge of financial ruin. Windows were cracked, paint peeled from weathered boards, and in the streets there were unshoveled piles of horse dung that were thick with blowflies.
“Charming,” murmured Looks Away.
“Seen worse,” observed Grey.
“Where?”
Grey couldn’t come up with an easy reply and gave it up as a lie.
The people looked no more vital or healthy than the town. They were dirty, their clothes madly patched and mismatched. Warts and dark moles were common among them, and many had scabs or open sores. Several had limbs missing. Hands, arms, legs. Though Grey thought the missing limbs looked more like defective births than injuries. The stumps were smooth. The people were dressed in clothes of black and gray, of desert brown and dried salt. Dead colors for a lifeless town.
Only the whores on the balcony of the brothel looked whole and healthy. They were dressed in frilled silks and satins. Grey and Looks Away stared up at them, seeing every color in the rainbow, from royal purples to soft blues of Pacific evenings to the shocking yellow of new-grown daffodils. Each of the brothel’s ladies smiled down at them. Red, red lips parted to reveal white, white teeth.
“Grey,” said Looks Away quietly, “do you see any children?”
Grey shook his head. “Not a one. Don’t see a schoolhouse, either.”
“I know I haven’t been to as many American towns as you have, but is that normal?”
“Son,” said Grey, “I think we left ‘normal’ behind somewhere out there in the desert.”
“Ah.”
“Keep your eyes open.”
“Yes,” drawled the Sioux. “Capital idea.”
They stopped outside of the brothel. There was a name painted on a silk banner draped elegantly above the big batwing double doors.
Madame Mircalla’s Palace of Comfort
Grey swung out of the saddle and tied Picky’s lead to a post over a water trough. The horse eyed the water cautiously for a moment, sniffed it, nickered in as close to a sound of disapproval as a horse could make, and reluctantly took a drink. The other horses joined her.
Looks Away lingered in the saddle for a moment longer, looking up at the smiling women. Grey followed his gaze. The women were all young, some barely out of their teens. They were all voluptuous, with soft half-moons of enticing flesh rising above the lace trim of their bodices. Their hair was pinned with flowers and feathers. Their skin was totally unmarked by disease or any imperfection.
A voice in Grey’s head whispered a warning.
Get out of here now.
But he ignored it. That voice had spoken too often in his life, and too often he’d listened. Sure, he’d survived… but that survival had always come at a cost.
Doing so took some effort, though, and if he wasn’t sunbaked, thirsty, and hungry for real food, he might have heeded the warning.
“You coming?” he asked the Sioux.
“With great reluctance and trepidation,” said Looks Away as he swung his leg over the horse’s rump and dropped to the ground.
Side by side they mounted the steps. It was cool on the porch. One of the women, a fiery redhead with emerald green eyes, rose from a rocking chair and stood between them and the door. She was a little older than the other girls. Maybe twenty-eight, Grey reckoned. Very pretty and she smelled of roses.
“By the queen’s garters,” murmured Looks Away.
“You fellows are new in town,” said the woman, making it a statement rather than a question.
“Brand new,” said Grey. “Passing through.”
“From where to where?”