“Evenin’, Jeremy,” Madden drawled with deceptive courtesy. His voice had a thin overlay of Virginia plantations, Southern aristocracy, and trained politeness. He said, “Billy tells me you ran Drake Ivy in.”
“That’s right,” Six said.
“He didn’t do anything bad, now, did he?”
“I guess he’ll be locked up for quite a while this time,” Six said. “Don’t count on having him back for a spell.”
“Looks like he beat up on you a little,” Madden said mildly.
Gutierrez said, with a dry amusement that matched Madden’s own, “He got his own share of grief, Madden.”
Madden’s eyes opened a little wider. The smile did not disappear. “Think of that,” he said.
Beside Madden, Billy Hatfield and Creed Bolton were beginning to get restless. Aware of that, Madden made his voice harder, “I can’t afford to have any of my boys put away Jeremy.”
“Afraid it’s not up to you,” Six answered. He talked to Madden, but much of the time his attention was on Billy Hatfield. Billy was the most unreliable one of the bunch; if trouble came, he would be the likely one to start it. Just now Billy’s eyes were hot and wide and there was the glisten of sweat beads along his upper lip. His hands were slowly clenching and opening.
Madden spoke in a dry voice, as if he were trying to reason with Six, “Look at it my way, Jeremy. If I let one of my own boys get locked up, think what it could do to my reputation. Word would go around. Madden can’t protect his men. Steer clear of Madden, boys; it’s not healthy to hang around him. Why, in no time at all I’d lose my whole crew. Now, you can see I can’t let that happen, Jeremy. It would be bad for business.”
Gutierrez said, “We’d be all broke up if that happened, Madden.”
For just an instant Madden’s eyes went dead-cold when they flicked to Gutierrez, but it was only fleeting, and instantly the smile returned to guard his expression. He said gently to Six, “It would be much easier for all of us, Jeremy, if you saw fit to let him loose.”
“I guess not,” Six murmured. He was conscious of the hard serrated tips of the shotgun’s twin hammers under his thumb.
It was Faro Price who spoke then. His fingers hung an inch from the leather-bound hilt of his knife. He said, “Hell, Six, you got your satisfaction out of beatin’ up on Drake. What more you want? He made some trouble, he got some trouble. I’d call it even-steven. Let him out.”
With his free hand, Six touched the dull metal badge on his vest. “The star says no,” he answered.
“Brave, ain’t he?” Billy Hatfield said, with a sneer, poising his body forward, leaning anxiously, hands curled by his two silver-butted Colts.
Six aimed a flat warning at Billy, “You’ve got a lot of years ahead of you, chico. Don’t throw them away on Drake Ivy’s account.”
“Ivy’s a friend of Billy’s,” Madden put in, drawling imperturbably. “Naturally Billy’s concerned. We all are. You see how it is, don’t you?”
“You boys,” Six told them, “are making more dust than miles. I’d say it’s time you decided what to do. Either back off and go home, and we’ll call it a night, or show your hand. Gutierrez and I will be glad to accommodate you.”
“And,” Gutierrez added, “that includes Jed Bolton, back in the shadow there.” He did not look in any particular direction, but Six saw Billy Hatfield stiffen, and knew that Gutierrez had hit a target with his stab. Jed Bolton must be out there now, a gun trained on them. It didn’t sit comfortably. Six was strongly aware of the scent of danger and of the painful hurts of his battered body.
Gutierrez added, “You ever see what a ten-gauge charge of double-ought can do to a man at ten feet, Billy?”
The shotgun moved an inch in Gutierrez’ fists, and Billy straightened up warily, casting an uncertain glance toward Oakley Madden.
In the thick silence of that moment, Six eared back the hammers of his shotgun. The clicks rasped in brittle echoes across the dark street. In the corners of his vision he could see knots of men gathered, watching from far enough away to be beyond bullet range.
A hard challenge rolled up behind Madden’s eyes, but he did not speak; in a moment he resumed his crooked smile and brought one hand up slowly to twist the points of his mustache. He said, “I reckon this hand’s yours, Marshal,” speaking with an exaggerated Western drawl, and smiling more widely. “But I’d sleep lightly, if I were you.” With that he put his back to the jail. The others followed suit and began walking slowly toward the Drover’s Rest, quartering up the street.
Still cautious of treachery, Six did not relax his vigilance; and it was good he didn’t. He saw Billy Hatfield start to swing around, saw the curling rise of Billy’s thin hand toward the left-hand gun. Six said sharply, “Billy!”
But Billy did not heed. The lean young body was wheeling, crouching, the gun coming up; and Six had no choice but to close his finger around the shotgun triggers.
The double charge took Billy squarely in the midriff. He jerked backward, jackknifing as if struck in the belly by a cannonball. He had no time for expressions to register on his slack face; he merely fell fast and hard, and lay with half his insides scattered around him in the dust.
“God!” whispered Madden. “You cut him in half!”
The shotgun empty, Six had let go of it in favor of his revolver, which he drew and cocked while the three toughs were still suspended in shock. He saw Faro Price’s jaw drop open in disbelief. Echoes of the round blast of the shotgun hung in the air. There was a surge of voices from the knotted crowds on the fringes of the street. Then Six caught something amiss: Creed Bolton was looking around him, frowning.
It was as if Creed expected something to happen, and was puzzled that it did not happen.
Of course: Jed Bolton was out there somewhere, armed and poised. Six cursed himself for forgetting that fact, if only for an instant.
But there was no gunfire from the shadows. There was only Gutierrez, walking forward to kneel by the dead youth. When Gutierrez stood up his face looked slightly sick, even Gutierrez, who was as dispassionate and cool a man as Six had even known.
Oakley Madden said with soft wickedness, “That was a mistake, Jeremy.”
“He gave me no choice,” Six said, not by way of excuse but just as a statement of fact. Though he kept his face flat, he felt weak.
“He asked for it,” Gutierrez said. “He was a fool. Nobody with any sense expected him to live this long.” Gutierrez was back at his post by now, his shotgun ready.
Six gathered himself with an effort; he made his voice hard. “Pick him up and take him home. If you boys come into Spanish Flat again, leave your guns behind. If you come armed, I’ll take it as a challenge.”
“We’ll come,” Madden said, making it a promise. “And when we do, we’ll be armed.” Then, more softly, he added, “I’ll be sorry to see that happen, Jeremy. But you leave me no alternative.” With that he turned and gestured to Price and Creed Bolton, who went forward to pick up the shattered body of Billy Hatfield.
That was when two figures emerged from the shadows of an alley to the left of the jail. When they came closer, Six saw that the first figure was Jed Bolton. Oddly, Bolton had no gun …
Then Six saw why that was so. Behind Bolton, holding Bolton’s gun in an idle hand, walked Ben Sarasen.
Bolton came into the little circle of men and looked wide-eyed at Billy’s corpse. He said to Madden, “I tried to back him up, but this hairpin got the drop on me.”
“Just as well for you,” Sarasen said. His eyes were brittle. “Otherwise you’d be a dead man, friend.” He had stopped on the sidewalk, just beside Six.
Madden was looking at them, at Six and Ben Sarasen; Madden said in a level but heated voice, “I’ll remember this. Both of you.”
“Leavin’ me out?” asked Gutierrez. “I’d be disappointed, Madden.”
Madden pointed a stiff finger toward Gutierrez. “Your day’s not far off either, Manny.” With a jerk of his head Madden swung away. The others followed, Creed Bolton and Faro Price carrying the dead man. Jed Bolton, his holster empty, walked sideways, keeping a murderous eye pinned on Ben Sarasen.
Sarasen reversed Bolton’s gun in his fist and handed it to Six. Then the gunfighter touched his hat brim and turned away, pointing himself toward the hotel. Six said, “Sarasen.”
Sarasen stopped and looked back. Six said, “I’m obliged to you. Mighty obliged. But this can’t change anything.”
“I understand,” Sarasen said, without feeling, and went on, up toward the hotel.
Gutierrez came forward to stand beside Six. There was a wide dark stain in the dust where Billy Hatfield had lain. Gutierrez’ eyes were following Ben Sarasen’s tall shape, striding in lonely pride across the street and up the hotel porch. Gutierrez said in a funereal tone, “If you have to face him in the morning, you won’t live through it. You know that, I expect.”
“He’ll be gone before morning,” Six said. He was watching Madden’s bunch get mounted, down the street the other way at the saloon. Presently, with Billy lashed down across his saddle, they lifted their horses to the lope and drummed from town, not looking back. Moonlight dappled the street and in time the dust settled from their passage.
Very weary, and throbbing with innumerable hurts, Six entered his office. He plugged fresh shells into the shotgun and racked it, too tired at the moment to clean it; he sat down in his chair and said, “I wouldn’t mind if you made the rounds for me, Manny,” and Gutierrez went out, after giving him a glance of friendly concern.
Six wanted to take off his clothes and bathe. He wanted to go home, to his Spartan room in Mrs. Duffy’s boarding house, and slide between the fresh sheets, and sleep the clock around. He wanted to drink half a bottle of whisky and he wanted to laugh. But his code did not allow him to drink while he wore the star; there was nothing to laugh at; and he could not bathe or sleep while the town was still awake, while there was still the threat of trouble, and while Ben Sarasen still stalked the streets awaiting the midnight stagecoach from El Paso.
He folded his arms on the desk and lowered his head against them and sat that way, utterly exhausted, until he heard the door open softly.
Instantly alert, he came erect in the chair. His hand dropped off the edge of the desk. But then he relaxed.
It was Clarissa. She shut the door and came forward. Unaccustomed to revealing her feelings, she nevertheless showed a certain anxiousness when she faced him.
She said in a practical voice, “You’re hurt.”
“A little,” he admitted.
It made her smile. “Men are all the same,” she said. “Why is it so wrong to let anyone know you’re hurt?”
“Habit, I guess.”
She went over to the little table in the corner, where stood a metal pitcher and porcelain washbasin. She looked inside the pitcher, found it empty, and took it outside. When she came back she poured water from the pitcher into the basin, found a clean towel in a drawer underneath, and brought the pitcher and towel over to Six’s desk. While working she talked.
“I heard the shotgun, and then Manny came by and told me what happened. He said you licked Drake Ivy. Is that true?”
“Drake was a little drunk on beer.”
“Just the same,” she said, “you’re lucky to be able to walk.” She dabbed at his face with the damp towel and then, after a moment, said, “Take off your shirt.”
After a moment’s complaints he slid out of vest and shirt and allowed her to minister to his wounds. She was calm and businesslike about it, but afterward she said, “You’ve got a good build, Jeremy. It’s silly to waste it by letting people crush you and hit you.”
“And shoot at me,” he finished for her. He smiled slightly. “Where does all this concern come from?”
“Why,” she answered, “were both grown-up people, Jeremy.”
“Sometimes I almost believe that,” he said. “Most of the time I think all of us are kids. Good kids and bad kids. The good ones live by the rules, the bad ones make up their own rules.”
She laughed. “I wish Ben could hear that.”
“Why?”
“He keeps trying to make things more complicated than they are.”
“He’s got his reasons,” Six said.
“I suppose so.” Her tone was more distant, it seemed touched with a faraway regret. He was sorry she had brought up Sarasen’s name between them; it had spoiled a moment of near-closeness. Because of that, he found himself saying gruffly,
“I could wring his neck.”
“Whose?”
“Ben Sarasen’s.”
“Why,” she said, “whatever for?”
He was standing by the desk, his wide flat body bare from the waist up. Abruptly he reached out for her, gathered her toward him; she walked into the circle of his arms, looking up. Her eyes were direct and, he thought, very beautiful. He put his hands on her hips, swayed her toward him, and kissed her gently on the mouth. For a moment her response was strong, she pressed her supple body firmly against him and answered his kiss with heated passion; but then he felt her go slack and cool, and he drew back. He said, “That’s whatever for. For standing in my way.”
She stepped a pace back. Her hand lifted hesitantly and hung halfway to her face. Her eyes had gone wider. She said, “That was sudden, Jeremy.”
“I guess it’s been growing a long time.”
“I never thought I mattered to you.”
Feeling awkward, he turned his side to her, looking for his shirt. He found it, across the back of his chair, and put it on. Buttoning up, ramming the tails into his trousers, he collected himself and looked at her once more. He found that she also had regained her composure. He put on his vest and said, “Maybe you’d rather I hadn’t done that?”
She made no answer; she regarded him levelly. In a taut thin whisper he said, “Damn Ben Sarasen.”
“No,” she said. “It’s not his fault, Jeremy. Maybe it’s mine.” She came to him, tilted her face up and brushed his cheek with her lips; she turned and left the place quickly, leaving him standing there, very puzzled.
In a little while he walked to the door and looked out. There was a fair-sized crowd outside the Drover’s Rest, buzzing with excited conversation, several men talking at once, now and then gesturing toward Six’s office; they would be resurrecting the battle, retelling it, building up the story. One day perhaps it would become one of the wild legends of the Myth of the West. Right now, though, Six didn’t feel like a legendary character. He felt like a very tired man, weak and a little unsettled in the stomach. As he had before, he wondered if he was really cut out to be a lawman: he hated death and he despised himself for having killed.
The moon was moving westward. The stain was still there, in the dust, where Billy Hatfield had bled. It was like a warning poster for the town. Oakley Madden would be back to exact retribution, to have his revenge upon Spanish Flat and upon Jeremy Six, and incidentally on Sarasen and Gutierrez if they happened to be around; but Six had no illusions but that he was to be Madden’s prime target
He felt like a clay dish in a shooting gallery.
His mood just now was as dark as the night itself. He lifted his gun out of its holster and went back into the office, laying out cleaning equipment. When he thought about it, he brought the big watch out of his vest pocket and had a look at the time. Eleven-thirty. He put the watch away, trimmed the wick of the lamp on his desk, and started to clean the dust out of his six-gun. He did a quick and expert job, reloaded, and then took down the shotgun with which he had killed Billy Hatfield. His hands were reluctant to touch it, but he forced himself to break it open, kick out the expended shells, and ream the bores with a cleaning rod before he reloaded the gun and racked it. Then he went back to his desk and sat, folding his hands across his stomach, feeling the aches and weariness of his body and waiting for the rattle of the midnight stagecoach.
There was a hoarse call from behind him. He turned and frowned, and went into the cell block.
Drake Ivy was standing in his cell, his meaty face peering out through the tiny barred window high in the thick door.
Six went up to the door and looked at him. “Want something?”
“What was all that racket?”
“Billy Hatfield,” Six said. “He came to the end of the road.”
“You cut him down with a shotgun,” Ivy said. “I could tell by the noise.”
“His mistake,” Six said, shrugging. “He should have known better than to try beating the drop. What do you want?”
Ivy licked his lips and his eyes moved around in a circle. “Billy’s dead, eh? Hell. You won’t get away with that. Listen, I’m hungry. Get me some food.”
Six turned away. Ivy’s voice followed him up the aisle, “My belly still hurts. You’re goin’ to pay dear for that.” Six went into the office, locked the cellblock door behind him, and went outside. He would get a few bar sandwiches from the Drover’s Rest. That should hold Ivy till morning. He stepped down and went through the ankle-deep dust toward the saloon.
He was almost there when he heard the distant clatter of the stage.