Riding hard, Andy began hoping he and Daggett would reach the McIntoshes’ ranch headquarters before the Teals. Sporadic gunfire told him they had not.
Daggett said, “Damned knotheads have already opened the ball.”
Andy said, “Maybe nobody’s dead yet.”
He saw that the Teals were spread out afoot, taking refuge behind a wagon, behind a shed, beneath the windmill tower. Lacking clear targets, they fired at the main family house and the bunkhouse. Occasional answering shots came from the shattered windows. The invasion had taken the McIntoshes by surprise, without time to pull together in one defensive position.
Daggett did not hesitate. He held his horse to a hard trot and rode into the line of fire, waving his hat. His shout was like thunder. “Put those guns down! Stop this goddamned foolishness right now!”
Surprised by the older Ranger’s audacity, Andy swallowed hard and followed him, his spine tingling in anticipation of a bullet.
Harper Teal rose up from behind a wagon. He lifted his rifle and yelled, “Git out of the way, Daggett! You want to get shot?”
Daggett’s stern voice resonated with authority. He said, “Harper Teal, you lay that rifle down.” He turned toward the main house. “Ethan McIntosh, you get yourself out onto the porch. I want to talk to you. Right now!” He turned a fierce gaze back at the scattered Teal forces. “Anybody fires a shot, I’ll kill him.”
The combatants were so taken aback by Daggett’s forceful presence that no one raised a protest. Most lowered their weapons, though they did not lay them down.
The front door opened slowly. Ethan McIntosh poked his gray head out and paused as if expecting to be shot.
Daggett said, “Come on out. There ain’t nobody goin’ to hurt you unless it’s me. You hear that, Harper Teal? The same goes for you.”
Teal did not reply, but he stepped from behind the wagon, holding his rifle at arm’s length. Daggett told him to lay it on the ground.
Teal said, “First I want to see that Ethan’s not heeled.”
McIntosh, now farther out on the porch, raised both hands to his shoulders. “I’ve no weapon on me. But lest you take that as an opportunity for treachery, Harper Teal, there are more inside. They can cut out what little heart you have.”
Teal put down his rifle and stepped into the open. “You Rangers have got no business here. This is a private matter.”
Daggett said, “It stopped bein’ private when the first shot was fired. It’s you who’ve got no business here, Harper. You’re trespassin’ on McIntosh land.”
“Ask Ethan about the trespassin’ he did when him and his bunch raided our place after midnight.”
McIntosh looked surprised. “Us? Not a soul left this place save for my son Jake. He sneaked off to town.”
Lanny Teal left his refuge behind the windmill. He shouted, “Damn you, Jake, I’ve told you to stay away from Lucy!”
Jake burst out onto the porch. “You go to hell, Lanny. I’ll see whoever I want to, whenever I want to.”
McIntosh ordered his son back into the house. “There are matters of far greater importance here than your shallow infatuation. Take up your station in case they begin shooting again.”
Jake obeyed resentfully, but only after declaring, “Someday, Lanny.”
Lanny replied, “How about now?”
Harper Teal glared at Lanny. “Boy, I don’t know what I’ll ever do with you. We’ve come here to set things right, and all you’ve got on your mind is that scatterbrained schoolgirl. I’ll bet she’s never scalded a hog or wrung a chicken’s neck.”
Red-faced, Lanny came up with no suitable reply. He muttered under his breath and looked at the ground.
Daggett said to Harper, “Ethan McIntosh swears that whoever raided your place, it wasn’t him or his outfit.”
Teal flushed. “If you believe that, you’re a bigger fool than I thought you was. He’s been tellin’ folks that me and my boys are behind the cattle stealin’ and other such around here. Anybody with a lick of sense knows he’s a liar. That wily old scoundrel’s been tryin’ for years to get my scalp. He’d do better to worry about his own.”
Andy said, “The fight between you two is so old, I’ll bet you don’t even remember what started it.”
“You’d lose the bet. It was over a nice piece of creek land. Him bein’ a Yankee, the carpetbag government seen to it that he got it instead of me.”
“You got yourself a good ranch in spite of that.”
“With Ethan workin’ against me all the way. He figures if he can run me off, he can grab what’s mine. But I ain’t goin’ noplace. I’ll still be here when he leaves, or when he’s lowered into the ground. Either way would suit me fine.”
McIntosh had gradually moved down from the porch, scowling. “You’ll have to live to be a hundred before you see either event come to pass.”
Teal no longer talked to Daggett or Andy. He turned his anger directly on McIntosh. “You damned old land hog, you ain’t got nothin’ I want, and you ain’t gettin’ anything I’ve got. If you don’t quit accusin’ us or sendin’ night riders to shoot up our place, I’ll put a couple more holes in you than the Lord intended.”
Daggett faced Teal. “Everybody’s said enough. Harper, I want you to take your boys and go home. Now!”
Teal seemed torn, but after trying to stare Daggett down, he said, “All right, we’ll go, but this thing ain’t over. It looks to me like you’ve chosen who to crawl in bed with, so I’ll thank you to never come back onto our place. As for Carrie, she’s already had hurt enough in her life. I don’t want you to ever speak to her again.”
Andy started to intervene. “But it was Carrie—”
A dark look from Daggett stopped him from saying more.
Teal said, “You tell your McIntosh friends that the next time they come shootin’, they’d better bring along a minister. They’ll need him to preach the funerals.” He made a sweeping motion with his arm. “Come on, boys. There’ll be another day.”
The Teals mounted up. All three of McIntosh’s sons came out onto the porch, guns in their hands. The old man stood in the yard, where he and Teal had faced each other. He complained, “Is that all you Rangers are going to do? Look what they’ve done to my house. Look at the bullet holes.”
Daggett was trying hard to keep his emotions under control. He gave the old man a look of disgust but choked down whatever he was aching to say. Andy said it for him: “Be glad there’s no bullet holes in any of you. Or are there?”
Ethan said, “Not a scratch. It will be a cold day in July before the Teals ever get the upper hand over us. We’ll wipe out the whole bunch someday.”
Andy said, “You ought not to talk like that. People might get to thinkin’ you mean it.”
“Hell, I do mean it.”
Andy had come to regard Ike as the most sensible of the McIntoshes. He turned to him. “Maybe you can talk to your father.”
Ike was still on edge. He said, “They had no call to come down on us like they done, hollerin’ and shootin’.”
“Somebody raided them. They thought it was you.”
Ike shook his head. “It wasn’t, and that’s the truth. We were all here last night except Jake, and Papa told you where he was.”
“Then maybe you’d better give some thought to who it was, and the reason they did it.”
Ethan declared, “It wasn’t anybody but that old boar hog and his litter. He was lying through his teeth.”
Andy heard the impact of a bullet on human flesh a split second before he heard the crack of a rifle somewhere out in the brush, in the direction the Teals had taken. Ethan doubled over, clutching his side and gasping for breath. Ike rushed to him.
“Papa!” Easing his father to the ground, Ike turned an anguished gaze toward Andy and Daggett. “He’s been hit.”
Daggett wheezed, “Damn! I didn’t think Harper would do it.” He dropped onto his knees beside the old man as two women came rushing from the house. He looked up at Andy. “Let’s get him inside before they fire again. Let’s get everybody inside.”
Quickly they carried Ethan into the house and placed him on his high-backed bed. The bullet’s impact had knocked the breath from him. He struggled to regain it. McIntosh’s wife Agatha tore his shirt open and unbuttoned the front of his long underwear. The bullet had cut a gash across the ribs. It was bleeding.
Ike asked frantically, “Do you think it went into his lung?”
Such a wound was often fatal, if not immediately, then more slowly through pneumonia. Agatha examined the damage. “I don’t think so. It appears to me that he might have a broken rib or two, but nothing he’s apt to die of.”
At the moment she was the calmest of the McIntoshes. She said, “The Indians couldn’t kill him. Rebel bullets couldn’t do it. He’s not about to leave us now because I won’t stand for it.” She pointed to the door. “Patience and me will get him ready. Ike, don’t you and the boys just stand there. Go hitch up the wagon so we can take him to the doctor.”
His face grim, Daggett motioned to Andy. “Let’s catch up to the Teals. We’ll see if they can explain that shot.”
Stepping out onto the porch, Andy said, “We don’t have to catch up. Bud and Lanny are comin’ back.”
The two Teal brothers stopped their horses a little short of the porch. They were clearly agitated. Bud said accusingly, “I thought you Rangers were goin’ to see that nobody shot at us.”
“Nobody did. Not here.”
“Somebody fired a shot. Lucky it didn’t hit any of us.”
Daggett’s voice was severe. “It hit Ethan.”
Bud’s jaw dropped. “Ethan? I swear, Ranger, it wasn’t none of our bunch done it. We figured one of the McIntoshes fired at us.”
Daggett’s fists were clenched. “You wouldn’t lie to me, would you?”
Bud said, “Lyin’ is against our religion. I’ll swear on the Bible in front of all the McIntoshes.”
Andy said, “Maybe another time and place. Right now the McIntoshes wouldn’t believe you if you swore on a whole stack of Bibles. You’d best be goin’ before they decide to take up their guns again.”
Bud hesitated. “How bad is the old man hurt?”
“He’ll live. But this won’t improve his disposition any.”
Watching them leave, Daggett muttered, “I wish I could believe them, but who else would take a shot at Ethan?”
Sheriff Seymour came along shortly. He said, “I met the Teals out yonder a ways. Is the trouble over with?”
Andy said, “For today, it looks like.”
“Anybody hurt?”
“Ethan took a bullet across his ribs. They’re fixin’ to haul him to town. Naturally he blames the Teals. He’s talkin’ crazy.”
“Nothin’ new there. Him and Harper both talk crazy when it’s about each other. Sometimes I’m tempted to go off on a long huntin’ trip and let nature take its course. Things might get quiet around here afterward.”
Andy said, “A graveyard is quiet, too, but who wants a big graveyard?” He considered the shot that came from the brush. He asked Seymour, “Did you see anybody besides the Teals as you rode in?”
Andy reluctantly thought of editor Tolliver and the suspicion he had aroused about the sheriff. Seymour could have fired that shot before he showed himself. He tried to push the thought from his mind, but it would not leave him.
Daggett brooded. “There was a time when I wouldn’t take a cussin’ like the one I got from Harper Teal. I must be gettin’ old.”
Andy said, “He was mad. Maybe when he cools down, he’ll see things different.”
Seymour said, “Old men can be awful stubborn. I know, because I’m gettin’ there myself.”
Just getting there? Andy thought.
Daggett’s eyes widened as a new idea struck him. “I wonder where Rodock was, him and that rifle.”
Andy, Daggett, and Seymour accompanied Jake and Ike as they and the two women carried Ethan to town in a wagon. The doctor gave the old man a preliminary examination and declared, “You probably don’t deserve it, Ethan, but you could live to be a hundred. After I treat your wound, it would be a good idea for you to stay around town a few days. We will want to be sure you’ll not develop blood poisoning.”
Ethan roared, “Stay in town? Hell no. We have no intention of throwing away good money on a hotel room. The boys and the womenfolks are taking me right back home where I belong.”
The doctor said, “It is obvious that the bullet did no damage to your lungs. I am giving you my best advice.”
“And at no bargain price, I’ll wager. What this town needs is another doctor, a good one.”
The doctor said, “It would also need patients with judgment enough to listen to him.”
Agatha said, “Ethan hasn’t listened to anybody but me in all these years, and not always me. Many’s the time I’ve considered divorce, but there’s my family to think of. So I just let him rant and pay no attention to him. We’ll stay in town like you said, Doctor.”
Movement was painful for Ethan. He indulged in heavy profanity as his sons helped him get up and out to the wagon. He complained as they placed him on spread-out blankets and was still complaining as the wagon rolled down the street toward the hotel.
Watching, the doctor commented to Andy and Daggett, “I thought you Rangers came to bring peace. I believe I have seen more bullet wounds, bruises, and abrasions since you got here than before you arrived.”
Sheriff’s Deputy Willis put down a whittling stick and pushed to his feet from a bench outside the saloon as Andy and Daggett approached. He said, “The sheriff asked me to keep an eye on Rodock.” He jerked his thumb toward the saloon door. “He’s in there.”
Daggett asked, “Has he been there long?”
“Not very. He just came out of the hotel a little while ago. He headed straight for here.”
“Can you say for sure that he was in the hotel all night?”
“Well, pretty certain. He was playin’ poker in the saloon early in the evenin’. I got tired of watchin’ him clip a couple of farmers, so I went home about ten, eleven o’clock. I figured he wasn’t goin’ nowhere.”
“You might’ve figured wrong. He could’ve left right after you did.”
Rodock was sitting alone at a table when Andy and Daggett walked in. He was playing solitaire and appeared only marginally interested in the cards. He yawned as Daggett approached him. He said, “Pull up a chair and set yourself down. You can choose the game.”
Daggett remained standing. “Where have you been all day?”
“I indulged in a game of chance till the wee hours. I’ve spent most of the day in bed.”
“Alone?”
A wry smile crossed Rodock’s face. “You don’t think I’d sully an innocent woman’s name by using her for an alibi, do you?”
“If she was with you, she couldn’t be too damned innocent.”
“The fact is, there wasn’t any woman. I was by myself. Is there a reason I need an alibi?”
“The Teal ranch got raided last night. Considerin’ your line of work, I thought you might’ve left some boot tracks out there.”
Rodock betrayed no reaction. Calmly he declared, “One unfortunate result from my so-called line of work is that any time something happens, people jump to the conclusion that I was involved. Why should I raid someone’s ranch? What would be in it for me?”
“That’s a question I’d like the answer to.”
The solitaire game went against Rodock. He shuffled the cards and said, “My horse is in the wagon yard. He was there last night and has been there all day. You can ask that hay shaker, Scanlon. He’ll tell you.”
“Somebody could’ve lent you a horse.”
“Do you intend to arrest me?”
“If I get some proof.”
“In the meantime, I assume that you do not care to join me in a game?”
“I think we’ve been playin’ one right along.”
Rodock gave him a cold smile and began laying out the cards again. Daggett motioned for Andy to follow him outside. Andy said, “You’re figurin’ he could’ve been part of that raid on the Teals.”
“Not for fun. I’m bettin’ somebody paid him. Maybe Old Man McIntosh.”
Andy argued, “He swore that nobody except Jake was away from his ranch last night.”
“That could be the truth, as far as it goes. But the first year I went to school, I learned that two and two add up to four. Ethan vowed revenge right in front of us when we got his cows back. You heard him. He could’ve hired Rodock and some others to do the job for him. That way the only dirt on his hands would come from countin’ out the money.”
Andy could not stop thinking about the sheriff. “It could be somebody else entirely.”
“It could, but right now my money’s on Ethan.”
“If it was Rodock, and Ethan paid him, how come he took a shot at Ethan?”
“Maybe he missed his target. He might’ve been shootin’ at me.”
“Does he hate you that much?”
“Only half as much as I hate him.” Daggett lapsed into a thoughtful silence. He brushed aside some wood shavings and sat on the bench the deputy had vacated. He stared off at nothing in particular. Finally he said, “That damned Rodock. I’ve got half a mind to walk in there and shoot him.”
“You don’t know it was him. You’re only guessin’.”
“Even if it wasn’t, he’s earned a good killin’ twenty times over. The old-time vigilantes had the right idea. Hang them quick and hang them high.”
“You’re not talkin’ like a lawman.”
“I’m talkin’ like a lawman who’s brought in more than my share of bad men, only to watch pettifoggin’ lawyers and judges turn them loose. Put enough lead in one of them, and you’re shed of him for good.”
“The Rangers don’t do it that way.”
“No? Have you never seen a Ranger tell a man to run, then shoot him and claim he tried to escape?”
Andy had, a few times. The incidents had left him shaken, though he understood the frustrations that led to them. He said, “Maybe we’ve moved past that kind of thing. Maybe we’ve come into a better time.”
“Not till they shut down the last jail for lack of business.”
Toward sundown, Carrie Teal came up the street in a buckboard. She had a couple of carpetbags under the seat. Spotting Daggett and Andy on a bench in front of the general store, she reined the horses toward them. Daggett arose quickly, taking off his hat and walking out to meet her. He said, “I thought you went home.”
She was plainly distressed. “I did, but I couldn’t stay.”
“How come?”
“Pa figured out that I sent you Rangers to the McIntosh place. He raised a terrible row. My brothers took up for me, and I saw that there was about to be a fight. I had to get away.”
“What do you plan to do?”
“Take a room in the hotel until he calms down.”
“What if he doesn’t?”
“Then I’ll try to find work here in town.”
“I don’t think he’d stand still for that. He’s liable to come roarin’ in here to drag you home.”
Her voice was stern. “Then there will be a fight.”
Daggett took hold of her hands. “If you need any money . . .”
“I have a little. It wouldn’t look right, taking money from you. People would talk.”
“Let them talk.” Daggett turned to Andy. “I’ll escort her over to the hotel and see that they give her a decent room.”
Andy said, “People will talk, sure enough.”
“It’ll give them somethin’ to do with their idle time.”
Editor Tolliver stepped out of the saloon and watched the buckboard moving away with Carrie and Daggett on the seat. He said, “It appears to me that Daggett has chosen his side.”
Andy said, “Rangers don’t take sides.”
“Almost everybody takes sides. I thought by his reputation that Daggett was made of cast iron, but I see he has a soft spot in his armor. It will not sit well with the McIntosh faction.”
“He’s just tryin’ to be a gentleman, that’s all.”
“Daggett a gentleman? That challenges credulity.”
Andy was not sure he understood what Tolliver had said, but he chose not to ask. Tolliver would probably tell him at considerably more length than Andy chose to hear.
Tolliver said, “What more can you tell me about events at the Teals’ and McIntoshes’ places?”
Andy had told him nothing, but he knew the sheriff had. He said, “Nobody got killed.” He was used to filing terse reports that wasted no words. He saw no need to give Tolliver more. The man would probably fill out the story from imagination anyway. Reading his newspaper, Andy had noticed that his writing was not handicapped by facts.
Tolliver said, “It would appear that events are building toward a violent climax. I suspect I shall soon have much to write about.”
Andy began to anger. “Is that what you’re hopin’ for? More killin’ so you can have a bigger story?”
“Most great literature is grounded in violence and tragedy. This situation could yield a book that would rank my name up there with Irving and Twain. It has Rangers, vigilantes, gunfights, everything but Indians. I might put in a few of those for extra color.”
Andy had not read many books. He had never heard of Irving or Twain. “If I was you, I wouldn’t start countin’ the money just yet.”
He did not see Daggett until he was about to bed down on his wagon yard cot. Daggett was silent as he walked into the little circle of lantern light, his mind on matters far away. Andy waited for him to say something, then asked, “Did you get Carrie settled in the hotel?”
Daggett was jarred back to reality. “Yes, and took her to supper. We had us a long talk afterward.”
“Has she decided what to do?”
“She has, me and her together. What would you think about standin’ up with me in the mornin’ while I get married?”
“Married!” Andy blinked in surprise. “I’d think you were movin’ way too fast. Are you sure you’ve thought this through?”
“I’ve thought on it a right smart. Her comin’ to town just brought things to a head sooner than I expected.”
“Where would you take her, and where would you live? Rangers travel around an awful lot.”
“You’re married.”
“I don’t get much time to spend with my wife.”
Daggett was not moved. “Maybe I’ve been a Ranger long enough. Maybe it’s time I find somethin’ else to do. I could run a ranch for somebody, or open a store in town.”
Andy could imagine Daggett on a ranch, but not running a store. He said, “Have you thought how Harper Teal will take this? You know what he said about you and Carrie, and about not settin’ foot on the Teal ranch again.”
“Once we’re married, there won’t be much he can do.”
“Except maybe shoot you. He’s already had one son-in-law that he hated.”
“He can’t hold a grudge forever.”
“He’s had a grudge against Ethan McIntosh ever since the war. And what about the McIntoshes? They’ll figure you’ve thrown in with the Teals.”
“I can’t help that. It’s high time they put their damnfool feud aside.”
“They’ve got too much invested in it to quit.”
Andy was not convinced that Daggett realized what he was getting himself in for. He said, “You told me you were married once. What makes you think it’ll work out this time if it didn’t before?”
Daggett seemed to retreat back in time. His face creased, and his eyes seemed to be looking at something far away. “It would have worked the first time if I hadn’t been away too much. There came a day when I was gone, and an outlaw I was huntin’ for decided to hunt for me. He didn’t find me at home, but he found my wife.”
Andy guessed the rest from the savage expression on Daggett’s face. “What did you do?”
“What any man would do. I hunted him down and killed him.” Daggett looked away. “But it didn’t bring her back to life.”