CHAPTER 14
The situation hadn’t magically improved by morning. The threat of Snake Bishop and his gang still loomed, although nothing had happened since the attempted bank robbery the previous night.
Miriam Dollinger arrived early at Jonas Madigan’s house to prepare breakfast for Smoke and the former marshal. Smoke had told her before she left the night before that he could rustle up some grub for himself and Madigan, but she’d insisted.
“I’ve gotten in the habit of looking after Jonas,” she’d said. “I don’t see any reason to stop now. Besides, I make excellent flapjacks and bacon.”
“I don’t doubt that for a second, ma’ am,” Smoke had told her with a smile. “And I already know how good your coffee is, so I’m not going to argue with you.”
“You’re a married man, so I suspect you know that arguing wouldn’t do you any good.”
“Yes, ma’ am.”
Madigan insisted on getting up and having breakfast with them at the kitchen table, rather than allowing Miriam to bring him a tray. As they ate, he said, “Have you given any more thought to what we discussed last night, Smoke?”
“You mean about me taking over as marshal? Shouldn’t the mayor and the town council have something to say about that?”
Madigan waved that away. “Roy Trout and the other members of the council will do whatever I suggest when it comes to the law around here. They gave the job to Ted, didn’t they? And he would’ve done fine if . . . if he’d had the chance . . .”
The emotional catch in Madigan’s voice made him look down and clear his throat. After a moment, he raised his eyes to gaze once more across the table at Smoke.
“You can’t honestly believe that there’s anybody in Salt Lick better suited to handle this kind of trouble than you, Smoke.”
“Well, if we’re being honest . . . I’ve probably had to deal with more shooting scrapes than anybody else around here, except for you.”
Madigan snorted and said, “You’ve tackled more badmen than I ever will. Just say you’ll pin on the badge.”
Smoke nodded. “I’ll do it. With some reluctance, I might add. And the town should move quickly on the matter of finding a real lawman to take over.”
“The stagecoach will be coming through tomorrow,” Madigan said. “I’ll get the mayor to write a letter and send it to the governor, asking him to send a Ranger up here until we can find somebody to take the job permanent-like. But it’ll take a week or more for anybody to get here from Austin, and we probably don’t have that long.”
If anybody wanted to get precise about it, Smoke had been a real lawman several times during his life, wearing the badge of a deputy United States marshal for a short while as well as filling in for a few local star packers, as he was about to do here in Salt Lick.
But none of those instances had lasted very long, and he had never considered upholding the law to be his real job. It just coincided with his natural desire to see justice done and the innocent protected.
“If it would make you feel better,” Madigan continued, “you can go see Mayor Trout and get him to appoint you officially, but that isn’t really necessary. You can just pin the badge on and tell folks that you’re takin’ over for Ted, and nobody’s gonna argue with you. Especially once they find out there’s a chance Snake Bishop and his bloody-handed bunch are on their way here.”
Miriam frowned and said, “Should you even tell people about that now, at this point? You don’t know that Bishop is coming, and if you tell people he is, it’s liable to cause a panic.”
Madigan poked his fork in the air a couple of times, toward Miriam, and said, “The lady is smart as well as beautiful. Maybe it would be better to keep that possibility under our hats for now, as much as we can. Some folks have got to know, of course, so we can get ready to defend the town if Bishop does plan on raidin’ it.”
“I agree,” Smoke said with a nod. “But remember, Windy knows about it already.”
Madigan let out a groan. “Oh, for Pete’s sake! I’d forgotten about Windy. If he knows, there’s a chance half the town knows by now. At least half.”
“Maybe not. He was going to stay in the marshal’s office until I stopped by there this morning. Maybe no one came in and he hasn’t had a chance to talk to anybody.” Smoke’s plate was empty. He picked up his cup and drank the rest of the coffee in it. “I’d better go ahead and get down there, though, just in case somebody might come along.”
“Good idea. If he’s got any questions about you takin’ over, or problems with how things are gonna be, you tell him to come and see me.”
“All right, Jonas.” Smoke stood up and dropped his napkin beside the empty plate. “I don’t think he’ll have any problems with it, though.”
“No, I don’t expect he will. Windy Whittaker has never seemed all that ambitious. He won’t want a bunch of responsibility.”
Neither did Smoke, but somebody had to take over. The threat of Snake Bishop loomed as threatening as a storm racing down on a helpless community.
* * *
If there was a storm bound for Salt Lick—an actual storm—there was no sign of it this morning as Smoke walked toward the center of town. In fact, the sky was a clear, dazzling blue, and the breeze had turned around to the south and was warmer than it had been the day before.
Quite a few people were moving up and down the boardwalks. Wagons were parked in front of some of the stores. Men on horseback rode along the street. It looked like a typical day in Salt Lick, despite all the excitement the night before.
However, the bank had a CLOSED sign on its door, Smoke noted as he reached the corner. Abner Hawkins and his employees probably were still cleaning up inside.
“Howdy, Mr. Jensen,” a deep voice rumbled at Smoke. He looked to his right and saw Ralph Warren coming along the street toward him, pulling a small, red-painted wagon with stacks of folded newspapers in it.
“Are you delivering papers this morning, Ralph?” Smoke asked the youngster.
“Yes, sir. Pa and me got up early and put out an extra. It’s all about the bank robbery and the shootin’ and poor Marshal Cardwell gettin’ killed. I’m takin’ copies around town and droppin’ ’em at the stores that sell ’em.”
“Well, I’ll buy a copy directly from you, if that’s all right.”
“Shoot, you ought to get one free! It wouldn’t be near as good a story without you in it. If it hadn’t been for you, those damn bank robbers would’a got away.”
The boy glanced around quickly, as if worried that someone who would report it to his mother might have overheard his profanity. No one seemed to have noticed, though.
“I’ll pay for a copy,” Smoke said as he took a dime from his pocket and handed it over.
“Paper’s only a nickel.”
“Close enough,” Smoke told him. He took the paper Ralph handed him and glanced at the headlines:
MARSHAL SLAIN BY OUTLAWS.
BANK ROBBERY ATTEMPT FAILS.
ESCAPE FOILED BY FAMOUS ADVENTURER
SMOKE JENSEN.
“Everybody’s talkin’ about all the excitement last night,” Ralph said. “This is the biggest thing to hit Salt Lick in . . . well . . . forever!”
If Snake Bishop and his gang attacked the town, that would be an even bigger story, Smoke thought, but for now the possibility of that happening had to remain a closely held secret among only a few people.
“Thanks, Ralph,” he said. “I’ll read this more closely later. Right now, I have things to do.”
“How about if I follow you around so I can tell my pa what you’re doin’ and he can write about it? I’m gonna be a reporter myself one of these days.”
“I’ll bet you will be.” Smoke nodded toward the wagon. “But right now your pa’s counting on you to deliver those papers, I expect.”
“Well, yeah, I reckon. But if you have any exciting news, you be sure to look me up and tell me. I’ll be in the newspaper office or around town somewhere.”
As the boy started to pull the wagon away, something occurred to Smoke. He asked, “Ralph, why aren’t you in school?”
“No school right now. The teacher ran off with a cowboy and they got married. We’re supposed to get another teacher sometime, but they haven’t found one yet. My ma said she’d take over the school temporarily, but folks won’t allow that. They say you can’t be a teacher and have a husband.”
That was the policy in a lot of places, Smoke knew. Sally had been a teacher when they first met, but she had given it up when they got married. As far as Smoke was concerned, the rule didn’t make a lot of sense—he knew good and well Sally would be just as good a teacher now as she had been before they were hitched—but he didn’t decide such things.
Ralph went on his way, and Smoke walked across the street to the marshal’s office. He heard snoring as soon as he opened the door.
Windy had the marshal’s chair tipped back and his legs crossed at the ankles with the boot heels resting on top of the desk. His head hung back and his mouth gaped open as awesome snores issued from it. The white whiskers jutting from his chin quivered in time with the racket.
Under other circumstances, Smoke might have gone on his way quietly and let the old-timer sleep. But they needed to talk about things, so he stepped inside and said, “Rise and shine, Windy. Time to rattle your hocks.”
Windy’s head jerked up hard enough to make his hat fall off backward, but the rawhide chin strap caught it. His feet came up off the desk, and for a moment he was balanced precariously on the chair’s rear legs. Smoke didn’t want him to hurt himself, so he stepped forward quickly and came around the desk to catch hold of the chair. The front legs came down with a thump.
Windy got his feet on the floor and stood up. He pawed through his disarrayed white hair and then jammed the battered old hat back down on it.
“Dadblast it, Smoke, you like to scared me outta ten year’s growth! And an old fella like me ain’t got any extra years to spare!”
“Sorry, Windy,” Smoke said. “I’ll try to be more gentle about it next time.”
Windy raked fingers through his beard and said, “See that you do. Why, ’tain’t safe to spook a dangerous ol’ lobo like me. I might’a whipped out this hogleg o’ mine and commenced to blazin’ away with it.”
He slapped the old cap-and-ball pistol, which now rested in an equally ancient holster attached to a gun belt strapped around the old-timer’s scrawny hips.
“Well, I wouldn’t want that,” Smoke said.
Windy snorted. “Durned right you wouldn’t.”
“So I’ll be more careful in the future. Right now, though . . . was there any more trouble last night?”
Windy shook his head and said, “Nope. I made the rounds two or three times, and everything was quiet as could be. Town seems back to normal this mornin’.” He made a face. “Just wish it’d stay that way.”
“Maybe it will.”
“Not if Snake Bishop is headin’ this way,” Windy said. His weathered face was gloomy now. “Only question is what’s gonna hit Salt Lick first, them bloodthirsty outlaws or that hellacious blue norther that’s bearin’ down on us.”
“What blue norther? The weather’s better out there today. It’s actually almost pleasant.”
“That don’t mean nothin’. That’s just a trick Ol’ Man Winter likes to play on Texas. It’ll be nice and sunny and warm, and folks walk around goin’, oh, lah-de-dee, ain’t this just the prettiest weather, and then the norther comes crashin’ through and the wind howls like a thousand starvin’ wolves and the temperature drops like the bottom come out of it. I’ve seen it happen a heap o’ times, and my bones tell me it’s on the way again.”
“Well . . . that might be a good thing,” Smoke suggested. “If the weather’s really that bad, Snake Bishop might hunt some place to hole up instead of coming here to raid the town.”
“Yeah, but even if he did, that’d just slow him down, not stop him. Once he’s got his mind set on somethin’, he always goes through with it. Uh, so I’ve heard tell, anyway.”
Smoke nodded slowly. “I suppose that’s possible. But even a delay like that would give us more time to get ready. And speaking of that . . . Jonas thinks that I should take over the marshal’s job for the time being.”
“Well, shoot, of course you’re gonna be the marshal. Ain’t nobody else in Salt Lick who’s fit for the job, lemme tell you.” Windy opened the top drawer in the desk and took something out of it. “Teel Wilkins, he’s the undertaker, brung this by a little while ago, along with Ted Cardwell’s other things.”
He held out the marshal’s badge.
Smoke took the badge, studied it for a moment. “Some folks may think you should be wearing this, not me.”
“Now, that’s a real knee-slapper! Everybody in Salt Lick knows I ain’t cut out to be in charge. But they’ll respect you and do what you say, ’specially when they hear that Snake Bishop’s on the way.”
“That’s another thing,” Smoke said as he pinned on the badge. Madigan and Windy were both right: he was the best man for the job, so there was no point in discussing it. “Jonas and I agree that we don’t want to say anything about Bishop right away. That could start a panic. Have you told anyone about Rome and Atkins being part of his gang?”
“Nope. Ain’t really seen nobody to talk to except Teel, and I didn’t say nothin’ to him. But Smoke . . . folks got to know. We got to get ready to fight, and they need to know who they’ll be fightin’.”
“We’ll have to tell them, all right, but I want to get a better idea what we’ll be working with, first. I’ve met some of the people in town already, but I want to meet more of them, especially the ones who might have some experience in fighting. I imagine there are some veterans of the war who live here, and maybe some former soldiers, even if they haven’t been in combat.”
Windy brightened up a little. “Yeah, I can help you with that. I know most of the fellas in town.”
“You probably need to get some breakfast first, though. You haven’t eaten, have you?”
“No, and I am a mite ga’nted. But we can do some of both at the same time. Come on down to the Red Top with me. Fella who runs it, Mickey Shaw, used to be a sergeant in the cavalry. He just retired a couple years ago. He was with Mackenzie down there at Palo Duro Canyon, so he’s seen some fightin’.”
“That’s exactly the sort of man I want to meet,” Smoke said. “Come on.”