The Crack in the Lens Read Online Free PDF

like Bales was at their beck and call.”
    The bartender shook his head and snickered as some will when admiring the audacity of particularly naughty boys. “Bales is at their beck and call…though no more than for anyone else in town. You see, Ragsdale and Bock had to close the Eagle, sure, but they still owned the building fair and square. So what did they open there a couple weeks later but a wallpaper store! Nothing illegal about that. Meanwhile, at the very same time, them two rascals was puttin’ up a whole new cathouse—only this one’s half an inch over the city line, out where the law’s not beholden to no bluenoses. So if Marshal Bales so much as sets foot in the place, Ragsdale and Bock could have the sheriff arrest the meddlin’ SOB for trespassin’! Ever since then, they’ve been rubbin’ the town’s face in it, struttin’ around in top hats like a couple Vanderbilts on their way to the opera!”
    Mr. B laughed. I joined in out of common courtesy.
    My brother, being uncommonly uncourteous, frowned.
    “Sounds like Ike Rucker’s still county sheriff,” he said.
    The barkeeper nodded. “Will be till the day he dies, so long as the cattlemen and cowboys have the votes. Ol’ Ike’s never come between a man and his fun. Hell, he’s too busy havin’ fun himself!”
    Old Red’s already sour expression curdled even further. “This new bawdy house…how would we get there?”
    Mr. B cocked his head to one side and said nothing. Then he sighed, reached under the counter, and produced an ancient carbine that looked like it was already rusted out when it saw service at Gettysburg.
    I put up my hands. “You’d rather we bought a map?”
    The barkeep snorted, then laid the rifle on top of the bar. “This ain’t for you. It’s for them.” He jerked his head toward the door. “Sometimes I have to remind ’em to stay outside.”
    “Remind who?”
    Gustav shushed me, and I finally heard it, too.
    The sound of distant singing.
    “Them?” Old Red said.
    The barman nodded. “If you’re wonderin’ how your old buddy Bales got elected—and why my tavern’s empty—just look outside and you’ll find your answers.”
    As the singing grew louder, a feeling of familiar dread draped over me. Even before I could make out any words, I knew it was a hymn I was hearing—the drony, groany moans of the choir told me that.
    Why is it, I wonder, that so many songs meant to lift up praise to heaven sound so much like the wailings of the damned in hell? You’d think folks on their way to paradise would sound a mite more cheerful.
    Certainly there was little cheer to be found in the hymn we were being subjected to: that peppy little ditty known as “There Is a Fountain Filled with Blood.”
    There is a fountain filled with blood
    Drawn from Emmanuel’s veins.
    And sinners plunged beneath that flood
    Lose all their guilty stains.
    Lose all their guilty stains.
    Lose all their guilty stains.
    After that, the lyrics get really depressing. “Camptown Ladies” it is not.
    “The new brothel—where is it?” Old Red asked again. The choir was right outside now, and he practically had to shout to be heard above the dreary din.
    “Just follow San Antonio Street west till it turns into a trail. You’ll hit the place soon enough. The Phoenix, it’s called.”
    Old Red nodded and stood up. “Alright. Let’s go.”
    And off he went.
    Mr. B didn’t seem particularly sad to see us go—though I think he would’ve preferred it had more of our money stayed behind.
    Night was falling, and we found maybe twenty people, men and women alike, crooning away in the dusky gloom outside the saloon. All of them were draped in flowing robes that glowed faintly gold in the dim light.
    As we walked past, a tallish fellow separated himself from the rest of the choir, one arm stretched out before him. His robes and hair—even, it seemed, his eyes—were coal black, and as he moved closer I could see a frown chiseled so deep into