El Sabueso spoke up over the syncopated fiddle and bones coming from the musicians. “So I hear there’s been trouble downtown. Something about the governor?”
One of the other players grumbled something about stolen elections and the ‘White League’. El Sabueso had stopped listening. She leaned forward in her chair, eyes attached to the dealer’s hands like nails in a wall. The other players reached for their cards, but El Sabueso’s fingers shot out from under her poncho to clamp around the dealer’s wrist, yanking it up at a painful angle. “¡Tramposo! You’re cheating!”
A very well dressed gentleman walking past the table adjusted one of his white gloves calmly, muttering to her quietly between his teeth. “Silvia, we don’t need the distraction yet.”
“No but he’s actually cheating! He’s been dealing from the bottom!” The other men at the table were on their feet in an instant. Chairs were knocked over. The dealer started to sweat through his dress shirt and vest as the four of them grouped around him.
“Is he tellin’ the truth? You been bilking us?”
“Um, I, my boss…”
“The little guy’s right, he has been cheating!”
“Hey who you calling little, cabrón!”
The well dressed gentleman moved away from the table, adjusting his other glove. It would have bothered him for hours if he’d only touched one of them and not the other. Looked like the job’s schedule was being moved up. Hopefully Ishi and Jeanne had gotten the security out of the way. He moved quickly towards the back of the building, reaching the employee door at the same time as one of the casino’s dancers. She shot him a grin. “Hey, Maximilian. Where ya’ headed?”
He gathered up his most enchanting smile, and returned fire. “Your room tonight, I hope.”
She giggled, covering her mouth with a fan. He held the door for her, waiting several moments before surreptitiously following into the back halls of the casino. The technique tended to work, but he always dreaded finding himself cornered by an expectation to follow through on his flirtatious banter. The very idea of such a liaison had always made him uncomfortable.
Right. Left. Right again. The vault should be just around the next corner.
“Thomas!”
“It’s Maximilian today, Jeanne. What the devil are you doing back here?” He lowered his voice. “Have you dealt with the guards? ...Jeanne are you drunk?”
The elderly woman laughed, jangling the numerous bits of gold hanging from her wrists, ears, and her tattered old jacket. “Not as drunk as the guards, mon ami!”
Maximilian stared at her for a second. How had she gotten back here in the first place?
“Don’t question my methods, mon garçon,” she said, catching her breath between bouts of laughter. “I have been relieving people of their valuables since your father’s father was learning his letters! Let’s do the job.”
Maximilian and Jeanne exited quietly back into the main casino, several bags of money hidden in a small drinks cart.
The front room of the building was one gigantic brawl. Shouts, fists, and the occasional bullet were flying every which way as customers and casino staff alike cursed and slugged one another. El Sabueso stumbled out of the chaos, her hat gone, one eye already forming a dark bruise, and with a massive grin on her face. “Max! Jeanne! Everything’s fine here, you two get the actual?”
Maximilian attempted and failed to properly take in the massive ruckus. “You call this fine?”
“Better than expected!”
Jeanne slapped her on the back. “My kind of party, ma fille! But it’s time we were gone, go find Ishi.”
“We’ll take the stage exit!” Maximilian shouted after her as she vanished back into the fray.
Silvia ducked fists, dishing out several of her own. This wasn’t no fight for bullets, so her revolver stayed where it was at her hip. She threw open the door into the small side room where the casino security was normally stationed. Ishi was sitting cross legged on the floor, three unconscious guards sprawled throughout the small room.
“Hello, Silvia. Sit with me.”
“Are you deaf?” Another few gunshots cracked through the wild brawl outside of the door. “Come on, time to get outta here.”
Ishi smiled. “Zen master Ikkyu once said, if you think you really come and go, that is your delusion. Let me show you the path on which there is no coming and no going.”
Silvia, rolling her eyes as loudly as she could manage, had yanked the man to his feet mid-sentence and was already pulling him out of the room. “Shut your bazoo, you know what I think of your damn sayings.”
Silvia dragged Ishi up to where Maximilian and Jeanne were waiting on the stage. “I got your stupid buddha. Let’s cut stick.”
The performers had scattered except for one dark skinned youth, trying to make himself as small as he possibly could in a corner of the stage. Silvia made a beeline for him, still scowling.
“Woah sir I don’t want any trouble-”
Silvia extended an arm, connected with the wall behind him, and shoved it open. “You’re in front of the door, niño.”
“Oh, uh, sorry.”
“I’d high tail it outta here if I were you, things are getting crazy in this place. Let’s go, everybody! Vámonos!”
Maximilian raised his eyebrows at Ishi as they shoved the cart full of money towards the stage door. “Did you start quoting your absurd zen proverbs at her again?”
Ishi grinned, not turning to face Maximilian. “Maybe.”
“You’re a proper rogue, you know that?”
“So I have been told, on several occasions.”
The drinks cart was too wide to fit out the door, so the four thieves quickly slung the bags of cash over shoulders and from belts, booking it out into the hot New Orleans evening.
As they ran, Maximilian’s long legs caught up to El Sabueso.
“It is alright that we call you Silvia, yes? I worry, sometimes.”
“I don’t mind, it’s nice to be reminded of who I actually am when I have to cover it all the damn time to get any respect.”
“Maximilian, Silvia, stop.” Jeanne trotted up behind the two of them. “Listen.”
Silvia frowned. “When there are more gunshots outside than there are in a dustup like that back in the casino, something is very very wrong, amigos.”
A group of six men rounded a corner, whooping and shouting. Several had rifles, and three were wearing old confederate army uniforms. The man in the front, a bearded fellow a few inches past six feet, gestured with his rifle. “Look what we have here boys! Where d’you think you’re going?”
Maximilian took a step forward. His nervousness was hidden under layers of practiced calm. “Evening sirs. We’re just on our way to the docks. We aren’t from Louisiana, and wouldn’t want to make any sort of bother.”
“Yeah I never woulda guessed, limey. But this city’s already got trouble, and the White League’s cleaning it up. Why don’t ya leave the Africans here, and we’ll deal with them for you.”
Africans, plural? Maximilian glanced over his shoulder. Ishi caught up from behind, one hand on the shoulder of the young performer, who was holding onto his fiddle like it was all he had.
Max turned back, keeping his head high. “We aren’t leaving anybody.”
One of the other men spoke up. “Yeah and we ain’t strangers to taking.”
“I would reconsider doing that, sir,” Maximilian cautioned.
“Yeah well this is our city and we’ll consider whatever we damn well please!”
“Your city!?” Jeanne shouted, stepping past Maximilian. “You crétins puérils come to the blackest city américaine, built on the shoulders and steps of my Haïtiens frères et sœurs, and point your stupid guns at Jeanne la Saignante!? You dare threaten me in the city des gens de couleur libres!? You satanés bâtards should take your vil président Jackson, et allez vous noyez dans le bayou, bande de canailles dégoûtantes!”
The small mob of aggressors stared at the shouting pirate, generally unsure of what to do about her. The man in the front spat on the cobbled street, raising his gun. “Shut your damn mouth you-”
“Oh no you don’t.” El Sabueso’s revolver cleared its holster in the blink of an eye, six shots in succession cracking out from the barrel as she fanned the hammer of the gun. All six bullets found their mark, one per aggressor. She had decided to give the other rioters the benefit of the doubt (a philosophy she had accepted only begrudgingly). For El Sabueso, this meant that most of the shots entered arms, shoulders, and legs. They’d be fine. The man pointing his gun on the other hand, took a bullet right in the center of his ugly chest. The members of the White League scattered with various levels of mobility. El Sabueso shouted after them, “The war is over, pendejos!”
Two stayed behind, red staining their confederate greys. The man with the bullet in his sternum coughed. “You bastard…” he raised his rifle once again. “You’re gonna pay for-”
With a clack of wooden sandals Ishi covered the distance to the man in an instant. There was a flash of silvery blue steel. Ishi slowly sheathed his blade as the front half of the man’s rifle fell clattering to the ground.
The second man, bleeding from his leg, cocked the hammer of his gun and opened his mouth to spout some further invective.
“Oh merde, that’s enough!” Jeanne yanked her massive wide-barreled flintlocks from her sash, gold filigree shining in the light of the gas street lamps, and pulled both triggers. She shoved the two guns back into her clothes and waved away the smoke suddenly filling the air, ignoring her ringing ears. “Come on. Let’s get to the ship.”
Maximilian fell back to join Ishi and the young musician, pulling aside the samurai. “Why did you bring the boy along?”
“Why did you leave him?”
“Well uh. We were in a hurry.”
Ishi smiled as they half-ran through the city. “Joseph.”
The performer nodded. “Yeah?”
“Tell him what you told me, about where you are from.”
“I’m not really from anywhere.”
Maximilian nearly tripped mid-stride.
“Sound familiar?” Ishi grinned at Maximilian, jogging forward to catch up with El Sabueso and Jeanne.
“So, Joseph?”
“Yeah, I mean I’m just Joe usually.”
“Joe, then. We’ll get you out of here safe.”
There was another man in confederate garb standing on the docks near the ship Le Corbeau. Ishi ran forward, grabbed the larger man’s arm, and hurled him over one hip and into the water before the man was even fully cognizant of what was happening to him.
“Damn. I wish I could do that,” Joe said, stopping to catch his breath on the dock as the others ran onto the old ship.
“I will always accept a willing pupil.”
Joe blinked at the samurai, still holding his fiddle. El Sabueso shouted from the boat. “Ishi! ¡Avanza, let's go!”
It took Joe a minute to find his tongue in his mouth. “What? Are you serious?”
Ishi extended a hand to the young man. “You said that you had no family. Maybe you have found one.”
