Ragtime Cowboys by Loren D. Estleman

knee with one hand as he climbed back onto the chair.
    â€œYou okay?” The old detective looked at Hammett.
    â€œYeah. Just swallowed another piece of lung.” He studied the white lawn handkerchief folded in his hand, then stuck it into an inside pocket. “Who’s your partner, Feeney? Don’t say Fanny Brice. She’s too picky for the likes of you.”
    â€œGo fuck yourself.”
    Hammett scooped up the pitcher to give him another douse. Siringo touched his arm.
    â€œDon’t waste it. I got a better idea.”
    As the young man watched, Siringo unplugged the electric lamp on the table next to the bed, picked up the lamp, and broke the cord near the base with a yank. He put the lamp back down and took his bowie from the valise. He stripped two inches of fabric insulation from the two strands of wire, one copper, one silver, put them on the bed, then laid the wires aside while he opened the room’s only window and used the knife to slash the screen free of its frame. It peeled away with a shower of rust.
    At a nod from him, Hammett held the prisoner at bay with the big pistol while Siringo snatched up each of his feet and stripped it of shoe and sock. Then he lifted them again to slide the screen under his bare soles. There was black dirt between his toes and his nails were as thick and yellow as old isinglass. Finally Siringo connected the strands of electrical wire to the edges of the metal screen and got up, holding the plug out for Hammett to take.
    The young detective had caught on by this time. He belted the automatic, took the plug, and knelt by the baseboard outlet, waiting for his cue.
    Feeney grasped the arms of his chair, prepared to spring to his feet, but was restrained by Siringo’s stubby revolver trained on his sternum. When Siringo picked up the pitcher of water, he knew what was going to happen, but before he could cry out, he was soaked once again from head to feet. Hammett, grinning, lined up the prongs of the electric plug with the slots in the outlet.
    â€œJesus!” It was a shriek. “You’ll fry me alive!”
    â€œWhy are you trailing me?” Siringo asked.
    â€œI don’t know!”
    â€œPlug it in,” Siringo told Hammett.
    â€œJust follow you wherever you go and report back, that’s all I was told! Nobody ever tells me nothing. Oh, God, don’t kill me!”
    Siringo looked at the other detective. “You know him. He that good a liar?”
    Hammett remained kneeling, poised with the plug a quarter-inch from its connection. “Take a whiff. You tell me.”
    The stink of corruption rose to Siringo’s nostrils. He lowered the pitcher. “We had a saying: ‘If he shits—’”
    â€œâ€˜â€”he ain’t shittin’.’ It was still around when I came on. But I told you Clanahan doesn’t confide in a mutt like Feeney.”
    â€œI believed you. I just wanted his measure. Your turn.”
    Hammett blew on the end of the plug, brushed an imaginary piece of lint from a prong, bent again to his task. “Who’s your partner? Say George M. Cohan. It isn’t every small fry can say he blew out all the fuses in a ritzy joint like the St. Francis.”
    Feeney hyperventilated.
    Siringo thought. “What was the name of that first fellow they electrocuted, back in ’89?”
    Hammett touched the prongs to his lip, thinking. “Kemmler: killed his girl. Something went wrong with one of the electrodes. He crackled for ten minutes. They said it smelled like a barbecue in a shithouse. Nobody consulted Kemmler on his point of view. He was black enough there was some discussion about burying him in the colored section of the Auburn Prison cemetery.”
    â€œThat was a fluke. They used too big a jolt, that being the first electrocution and they wanted to make sure, and they didn’t wet him down properly. That won’t be a problem here. Feeney looks like he just