Stringer and the Deadly Flood Read Online Free PDF

refined Spanish, or surely a more polite form, than he heard in passing. But since his .38 was packed in his gladstone and he’d left the goddamned travel bag in his hotel room, he thought it wiser to pretend he didn’t understand some of the remarks he heard about his hat, his mother, and obvious sexual orientation.
    He’d just about made it back to the more brightly lit and more populated Main Street around Union Depot when he heard a feminine scream behind him. He knew it was dumb to look back in a neighborhood like this one, but the lady in distress sounded sincere. So he turned just in time to see a teenaged Chicano jogging his way, laughing, with the purse he’d snatched in one hand and the knife he’d used to cut the carrying strap in the other. Stringer couldn’t make out his victim at the end of the darkened street, but her voice came loud and clear as she called out, “Stop, thief! Oh, lord, somebody stop that thief!”
    So Stringer stopped him, knife and all, by stepping aside as a prudent gent in these parts was supposed to, and then rabbit-punching the purse snatcher as he passed.
    The Chicano youth belly-flopped to the brick wall and stayed there, moaning soft and low, as Stringer scooped up the eight-inch knife and purloined purse. He’d just risen back to full height when a lady ran up to him, gasping. “That’s my purse, sir.”
    He handed it to her, saying, “I noticed. Now stick tight as a tick and we’ll see if this is over yet.”
    It wasn’t. As Stringer and what he now saw to be a pretty young miss in a travel duster and straw boater atop her pinned-up hair moved on toward the brighter lights, a trio of Chicano toughs who’d cat-footed it down the other side of the dark street suddenly darted across to block their way. The girl made the mistake of stopping, forcing Stringer to do the same. This gave two others who’d been tagging behind time to get into the act. The girl was trying not to cry as she clung to Stringer’s left arm. Stringer didn’t feel at all like crying, but he didn’t feel too optimistic either.
    â€œLet go my arm and let me handle this, ma’am,” he muttered to the terrified girl.
    One of the gang snickered, then said, “That’s right, puta, let the big caballero handle us. Didn’t you know any gringo can take on any number of us poor greasers?”
    In her fear, the girl couldn’t answer, and Stringer saw no reason to. It was the usual set-up for a street gang. He knew the one doing all the talking was the last one he had to keep an eye on. Once they worked themselves up, it was usually the biggest bozo in the gang who’d wade in first.
    The talker seemed to feel it was his duty to draw more of a response from them, so he asked Stringer, “Hey, vaquero, where is your horse? Do the putas of your kind admire big hats and spurs on a shop clerk? For why did you take the side of this one, here? Are not the girls of this barrio good enough for you?”
    Stringer smiled thinly, not taking his eyes from the bigger one to the left of their tormentor as he answered, in Spanish, “I have never seen your mother. So you would know better than I whether she is any good in bed or not. Why don’t you trot her out and let us have a look at her if you are pimping for her?”
    The spokesman gasped in stunned indignation while some of the others laughed in spite of themselves. But as Stringer had so wisely assumed, it was the big one who growled, “That is no way to speak about my friend’s mother.” Then, as the muscle of the gang interposed his bulk between Stringer and their offended taunter, Stringer grabbed the girl’s elbow with his left hand and charged first, the knife blade in his right fist coming up low and dirty to rip the big one’s guts from groin to breastbone.
    The bully of the bunch could see he meant it, as he leaped backwards with a