Funeral By The Sea Read Online Free PDF Page B

briefly in various areas of the square, low-ceilinged, smoke-filled room. Until the newcomer had threaded his way among the half dozen tables to reach a gap in the line of men at the bar counter. When he was ignored by everyone except for the tall, thin, gaunt-faced Mexican bartender.
    ‘My woman, she is heating supper for you, senor. You want a drink while you wait?’
    ‘Rye whiskey with a beer chaser should go down well.’
    ‘My pleasure, señor.’
    He set down a shot glass and a fresh bottle in front of Gold then began to draw a beer. Gold rested his saddle on the sawdust-strewn floor and delved into a pocket for money.
    ‘The greaser is paid by the month by Hal, stud,’ a beefily-built man with a scar on his bristled cheek said dully from Gold’s right. ‘Just to serve up the liquor and beer that Hal buys in with money we steal. Ain’t nobody but greasers have to pay for anythin’ in Oceanville.’
    ‘Appreciate the information, mister,’ Gold answered as the glass of foaming beer was placed in front of him.
    ‘You’re welcome, stud.’ He emptied his own brimful shot glass and added, ‘That includes the tail around here. But you won’t want none of that. Since Miss Eve has got you lined up to serve her.’
    ‘Here, stud! Sit yourself down to eat! Build up your strength for what you’re gonna have to do!’
    This from one of two men in their mid-forties who sat at a table in a corner alcove formed by a side wall of the cantina and the short section of the L-shaped bar counter. Like the scar-faced man, they showed no sign of enjoying their sarcastic taunts.
    ‘Appreciate it,’ Gold said evenly as they rose from the table and he carried his saddle over there.
    The scar-faced man brought him his drinks and said again, ‘You’re welcome, stud.’ Then injected a rasping note into his voice to add, ‘On account of that’s what Hal said you have to be.’
    Gold took the chair that kept his back to the wall and relit the cheroot that he had partially smoked at the ford where Harrow had watered his team. Then he used the beer to chase two shots of good quality rye whiskey. Was ignored again until a Mexican woman - as fleshy as her man was skinny - delivered a dish of chili and a plate of dry bread to his table.
    She was a match for her man’s age of something over fifty. And her dark eyes shot Gold a brief glance which expressed pity as she muttered a few words of Spanish.
    ‘I don’t understand your language, lady,’ he said.
    A whore with dyed red hair who was doing some clumsy needlepoint at the next table growled, ‘She said you’re just a good-lookin’ young kid who oughta have listened to Seth Harrow.’
    Outside, a man shrieked in terrified tones, ‘No, Miss Eve! Please don’t!’
    It was Seth Harrow.
     

CHAPTER FIVE
     
    THE exodus from the cantina was as unhurried as that which marked the arrival of Barnaby Gold in Oceanville. Drinks were finished and cigarettes and cigars were stubbed out before the men and whores rose from their chairs or turned from the bar counter to move toward the batwings.
    This despite the fear-filled pleas that the old-timer was shrieking and which would have caused a headlong rush by curious citizens in any normal town.
    Only the stranger to Oceanville and the Mexican bartender remained in the fetid, crudely furnished room after the batwings flapped closed.
    Gold began to eat the food while the gaunt-faced Mexican attended to washing dirty glasses in a basin beneath the bar.
    The old-timer’s tearful pleas subsided into a series of body-wracking sobs.
    The fat Mexican woman shouted something in her native tongue in a tone of query from the kitchen. And the bartender snapped an angry response that silenced her.
    Barnaby Gold asked, ‘Do you think this has anything to do with me?’
    The skinny shoulders were shrugged. But he answered, That is not likely, señor. That woman has cause to be grateful to the unfortunate man for bringing you here.’ Another