Steve Quick sat in the ranch house parlor, dragging suicidally on a cigarette, pulling from the mouth of a bottle of whiskey, and staring sightlessly across the room.
Antonia came in through the front hall. Her big breasts thrust defiantly against her blouse. “Here you are.”
“Thinking,” he said.
“About what?”
“The old man, in there.”
“The old man,” Antonia said. “Is he still alive?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
It made him turn his sour glance on her. He groaned. “I’m all shot to shingles, you know that?”
“You’ve lost your guts,” she said contemptuously.
The front door banged open. Race Koenig came in, deposited his tally book on the desk, and went back toward the front door. He gave both of them a look through his eyeglasses and said, “Better turn in, Steve. Lot of work tomorrow.”
“I’ll be along.”
Koenig nodded. “’Night, ’Tonia.”
When the door closed behind him, Antonia said, “You want to look out for him. He’s twice as tough as he looks.”
“You ought to know,” Quick said.
“Stop that. He’s never laid a finger on me.”
“Sure.”
She sighed with mock patience. “Have it your own way, then. But have you thought about what you’ll do about him afterward?”
“I’ll double-cross that bridge when I come to it,” Quick said, and snickered at his own bad joke.
“You’re drunk.”
“No. I haven’t done much damage to this bottle yet.”
“Put it away,” she said. “You’ve had enough. It’s got to be tonight. Remember? That’s what you said.”
He snapped, “You’ve been batting your gums so much I’m surprised you ain’t got bunions on your lips.”
“I’d shut up fast enough if you’d get out of that chair and go in there after the old man.”
“I need a little more whiskey first,” he said. “It ain’t every day you shoot a cripple dead.” He made a bitter face and turned to stab out the butt of his cigarette in the pottery ashtray.
He was like that, half-turned in the chair, when he saw Mike Warrenrode roll into the room in his wheelchair.
Hot anger flashed in Warrenrode’s eyes. “So,” he said, biting his words off short, “you aim to kill yourself a cripple, do you?”
Antonia said icily. “You’re worth more dead than alive, you old son of a bitch. And I’m glad you gave me the chance to say it to your face before you die. I’ll bet nobody’s ever enjoyed anything as much as I’m going to enjoy watching my own father die.”
Warrenrode just sat there for a long stretching moment while the blood drained out of his face and he stared, disbelieving, at Antonia.
Then his face regained its color, and he roared, “You are not, and never have been, any blood kin of mine. Don’t ever call me your father. You’re a worthless slut, and if it hadn’t been for a promise I made your old man before he died, I’d have thrown you out years ago.”
“My old man?” she said in a small voice.
“Yes, by God. Your old man was a cowhand that worked for me. A common cowhand, no better, but I liked him. He got stomped by a horse he was trying to break. I promised him I’d look after you as if you were my own daughter.”
Antonia’s lip curled into a sneer. “And all these years you let me go right on believing I was your bastard daughter.”
“You could believe what you wanted to believe. I never said a word to make you think anything of the sort.” Warrenrode whipped his leonine head around and fastened his steel glare on Quick. “And you. Of all the lily-livered, backstabbin’ cowards I’ve met in my life, you take top honors. Why don’t you go ahead and murder yourself a cripple? Here he is, right in front of you. Or is your chicken-boned hand shaking too badly to hit me at this range?”
Quick was watching the blanket that covered the old man’s knees. Under that blanket, he was sure, was the same gun the old man had used to shoot Ben Scarlett. For all Quick could tell, it was pointed right at his heart right now.
And so Quick said in a weak voice, “I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”
“You know, I’d have bet my last dollar you’d say that.” Warrenrode gave him a look of arch contempt. “Now I’ll tell you what I’m going to do. I’m going to have the two of you stripped naked and tarred and feathered and ridden off this ranch on a rail. And if I ever get wind of either one of you within five hundred miles of here again, I’ll turn the dogs loose on you.”
Warrenrode turned his face toward the front of the house and dragged in a deep breath. It was clear he intended to yell out. Koenig and the others would come charging in hell-for-leather.
An instant’s vision, of all his dreams collapsing like broken glass, flashed through Steve Quick’s mind; and it was desperation that sent his hand whipping down to his gun, brought the gun up, and tightened his finger in spasm on the trigger.
Half in awe, half not believing his own act, Quick watched Mike Warrenrode look around at him with vast surprise. For a heart-stopping instant Quick was sure he had missed; he stared, as if mesmerized, and waited for Warrenrode to blast him down in his tracks.
And then Warrenrode slumped forward and fell out of the wheelchair.
The blanket fell away. Warrenrode’s spindly legs were tangled up in the chair; it capsized on him.
Quick took four paces and knelt by the old man. He said in a muffled tone, “No gun. He never had no gun under the blanket. The old bastard was bluffing all the time.” He cackled harshly like a hen.
“Is he dead?” Antonia asked in a tiny voice.
“See for yourself.”
“Tell me. Is he dead?”
He looked up. She was backing away with her hand to her mouth. The table brought her up short and she stood there, face like chalk.
“He’s dead,” Quick said. He got up, glanced at the front door, and wheeled to the desk. Warrenrode always kept a six-gun in there, a .44-40, same as Quick’s gun. Hurriedly Quick yanked the drawer open, took out the gun, and put it into his holster. He put his own gun into the drawer and slammed it shut. Then he stepped away from the desk and said in a taut voice, “When they come in, let me do the talking, and back me up, no matter what I say.”
She stammered. “Any—anything you say.” She began to chew on her lower lip like a little girl caught in the cookie jar.
Quick said angrily, “Get a goddamn grip on yourself.”
He didn’t have time to add anything. The door slammed open, and Koenig charged in. Koenig skidded to a stop on his boot heels and looked down with broad wonder at the corpse all tangled up in the overturned wheelchair.
“What—?”
Quick held out both hands, empty. Koenig straightened up, his frown narrowing, and reached slowly toward his gun. Quick snapped his own gun out and said, “Wait a minute. No need to fill the air with bullets, Race. I didn’t shoot him.”
“Then, who did?”
The crew began to crowd inside. Quick said, “Here, take a look at my gun. You’ll see it ain’t been fired.” He thrust the gun eagerly under Koenig’s nose. Koenig took the gun, peered down the barrel, sniffed at it, and opened the loading gate to check the loads. “Sure enough,” he said in bewilderment. He gave it back, and Quick dropped it into his holster.
Someone said, “Who did it, Steve?”
Quick took a ragged breath. “It was that Buchanan fellow. The crowd-sized hairpin that was here before, the one Mike sent after Marinda.”
Koenig said, “Buchanan? What would he shoot Mike for?”
“I dunno,” Quick said. “I only heard a snatch of it. Buchanan must’ve sneaked inside the back way. When I came in, him and the old man were arguing hot and heavy. Buchanan was sayin’ the Apaches had killed Marinda, but he wanted his money anyway, the money the old man promised him if he brought Marinda back alive. The old man refused to pay him. Said Buchanan hadn’t delivered and didn’t have no gold coming. Buchanan said he’d taken a big risk on Mike’s account and he figured that was worth some money. It got pretty hot and heavy, like I said. Buchanan finally dragged out his gun and shot the old man. I came in with ’Tonia, there. We was just in time to see Buchanan duckin’ out through the back hallway, there.”
Koenig cursed. “By now he’s a mile away.”
Quick risked a sidewise glance at Antonia. She had regained her composure; she was looking at him as if she were pleasantly surprised, as if she were proud of his ingenuity.
One of the hands headed for the door. “I dunno about the rest of you gents, but I’m going to slap a saddle on a bronc and see if I can’t pick up the bastard’s trail.”
“Yeah,” another man said.
“Damn right. Come on, Pete.”
The crew filed out quickly. Koenig’s voice reached after them. “A couple of you stick around. Somebody’s got to tend to Mike’s body and keep Antonia company.”
Quick said, “Antonia’s the boss now, Race.”
“What?”
“Sure. With Marinda dead and the old man dead, Antonia’s the only blood relative left to claim the Pitchfork.”
Koenig’s puzzled frown shifted to the girl. “I never heard nothing about you being Mike’s kin.”
“It’s true,” she said. She was making a good act of being grief-stricken.
Quick said calmly, “You calling the lady a liar, Race?”
“I’ll have to have more than your word on it,” Koenig said stubbornly.
“Sure, easy enough,” Quick said. “Check with that lawyer in town, Ford. He’ll testify for ’Tonia.”
“I don’t know,” Koenig said, scratching his jaw.
Quick laughed and said placatingly, “It’ll all work out, Race. You’ll see. You and me, we’ll make peace between us.”
“You’re asking a lot of a good hater.”
“We’re friends, Race. Remember?”
“Maybe,” Koenig said. “But the next time you pull a gun on me, one of us will be a dead friend.” With that he swung with a snap of his wide shoulders. “We’ll talk it out later. Right now I’m going after Buchanan.”
“I’ll stick around here and keep an eye on things,” Quick said.
When Koenig left, Quick turned his enigmatic glance toward Antonia. She came up to him and hooked her arm in his. She said, “I can be very affectionate if you know how to treat me, Steve. And I think you’re learning how to treat me.” She smiled up into his face.