“NOT LONG AFORE I was good enough to let Cap’n Hart have my invaluable services, my uncle, who was an undertaker, died,” Thorny Bush stated gravely. Holding a schooner of beer and hoping he looked as if doing so was an everyday event in his life, he was standing in front of the Ysabel Kid at the Arizona State Saloon, at the end of the bar opposite to where his boss and Dusty Fog were concluding their discussion. “Comes the will-reading time, which all the family goes to natural’, families being what they are, turns out he left the whole shebang to my cousin Zeb. Well, Daddy says to Cousin Zeb, ‘Are you going to take it on?’ ’n’ Cousin Zeb says right back, ‘Why, sure, I’ve done got me my first customer’!”
“Sounds like your cousin Zeb was a real slick hombre,” the black-dressed Texan drawled soberly, his Indian-dark face giving no indication that he was enjoying the account. However, he continued, “So did said Cousin Zeb make a go of his undertakering?”
“Had a mite of trouble at his first funeral,” Bush claimed, delighted to have found a fresh and apparently receptive audience for the jokes he had been telling on numerous occasions since joining the Wedge crew and starting the drive. “The corpse got throwed out of the back of the hearse, and you’ll never guess where they found it.”
“Which being, I won’t even try,” the Kid declared, noticing that Silent Churchman, Dude, and some of the other temporary Wedge hands were gathering behind the youngster. “Where did they find him, or her, whichever said corpse might be?”
“In the doctor’s,” Bush replied. “It was saying, ‘Have you got anything to stop me coffin’!”
“That does it!” the stocky Wedge hand bawled at the top of his voice. “Let’s send him to find some place where he’ll be ’preciated, which he sure’s hell ain’t in here!”
Giving the youngster no time to even realize what was coming, much less resist, Silent and Dude grabbed him by the arms. A moment later, the Welsh cowhand, David Montgomerie, and one of the others caught hold of his ankles. Lifting him with the deft skill acquired by helping to throw and hold down cattle of various sizes for branding during a roundup, they kept their holds as, Bush’s body bucking and writhing in futile attempts to get free, he was carried to the front entrance.
Bush also cut loose with a flow of blistering profanity that caused Dusty Fog to remark to Stone Hart—as they watched what was happening with amused tolerance—that he must have been receiving instruction in more than just working on a trail drive from Silent and Peaceful Gunn. In fact, the small Texan said he figured that Chow Willicka must have added to his vocabulary as well. For his part, having joined the two bosses on seeing they had concluded their business, Mark Counter said he felt sure the youngster must have made an extensive and more than platonic acquaintance with Calamity Jane, whose repertoire along those lines he had good reason to know. xxiv There was considerable encouragement being given to the extemporized bearer party. Even the garishly dressed and not too bad-looking young women hired by Angus McTavish to offer female company for the customers were joining in the clamor and showing no sign of being offended by the copious flow of bad language from the victim.
However, neither the struggles by the youngster nor the invective were to any avail. The batwing door that Mark Counter had ripped off to throw at Alastair Beaton had been replaced, but it proved to pose no obstacle for Bush’s captors. He was carried across the sidewalk and dumped unceremoniously in the dust at the center of the street. With this done, Silent informed him that they had put him where he belonged, and his assailants trooped back into the saloon.
“Blast those no-account wall-eyed, spavined bunch of hard-winterers!” Bush declaimed, but there was neither malice nor annoyance in his voice. Without realizing he was speaking aloud, he came to his feet and instinctively began knocking the dust from his “go-to-town” clothes. Remembering what he had been taught from his early childhood, he had halted the obscenities on finding himself being removed from the saloon to where there might be “good” women present. “I’ll pay ’em all back, see if I don’t.”
Wondering how he could bring about his threat to the best advantage, the youngster heard a snicker redolent of mocking amusement from his rear. Thinking it must be originating from one of his tormentors, he elected to ignore it. Then the sound turned to a bitter and unfriendly laugh.
Despite his professed Scottish reluctance to waste money on nonessentials, McTavish maintained enough lamps outside to illuminate the front of the saloon in a most adequate fashion. Because of the lighting, Bush, wheeling in the direction from which the derisive sound came, was able to see a figure he recognized coming around the corner of the building. There was a mocking leer on the face of the man whose horse had been shot from under him by Silent during the gathering of C Over M cattle for rebranding. What was more, his right hand was suspended by its thumb over his gunbelt, close to the butt of the off-side Colt.
The youngster knew that such a posture of readiness was sometimes adopted when trouble was expected, or the one behaving in such a fashion was ready and eager to start some.
“Do the other beef head bastards pick on you regular, sonny?” Skinny McBride asked in a voice devoid of all humor.
Bearing in mind his boss’s strict instructions against becoming involved in trouble during the visit to town, although his lips compressed to a thin line white against the tan of his face, Bush forced himself to continue the dusting-off process without offering any reply.
But the scrawny man was not to be put off by the lack of response.
The additional mockery to which McBride had been subjected after having returned on foot from his self-appointed mission of vengeance had added to the hatred he had developed for the Texans, especially the one he regarded as being responsible for his latest fall from grace. Nor had he been enamored of the orders he had recently received. Although the other four and a half-breed who had remained behind during the abortive attempt to cut the Wedge herd were going to carry out a scheme thought up by Jeremy Korbin, he had been told curtly to return to the ranch where they were staying as soon as he had seen Sheriff Amon Reeves leave accompanied by Deputy Alvord to investigate his supposed complaint about the incident resulting in the loss of his horse. Instead of following the instructions, and despite knowing they were a precaution against his being questioned for lying about what took place when the lawmen returned, he had spent the time until nightfall at the small “house of ill repute” that operated in the partial concealment offered by a grove of trees.
From what McBride had been told by one of the prostitutes, most of the Wedge crew had arrived in Child City toward sundown. Hoping to find an opportunity to take revenge on the stocky cowhand who had shot his mount, he had decided to do so by firing into the barroom from the sidewalk and then making good his escape on the horse he had left tethered at the rear of the saloon. With that in mind, he had passed along the alley separating it from the next building.
Peering around the corner, the scrawny hard case had seen the eviction of the youngster from the saloon. The main object of his spleen was among one of the quartet doing the carrying, but—imbued with a strong streak of caution—he had felt disinclined to press his advantage at the moment: as soon as he fired, the other three Texans would be well-placed to take action. Instead, he saw a far safer course of action, even though it would have a detrimental effect upon his main ambition.
Thinking fast, the hard case told himself that killing the youngster would provoke a hunt that might offer an opportunity to pick off the stocky cowhand. But there was an even more important point than the possibility of achieving his vengeance to take into account. He was not disinclined to commit murder, but as there was a chance that somebody might see what happened—although he saw no possible witnesses along the street and most of the nearest business places were already closed for the night—he felt it advisable to kill the youngster in what could be regarded as a fair fight. He did not think that doing so would be hard to achieve regardless of how the other was armed. Not only did he believe that the two Colts worn by his intended victim were merely an attempt to create a sense of toughness, but he felt he knew enough about cowhands in town for a celebration to be confident that the other had already taken enough drinks to make himself an easy mark.
“I’ve heard tell folks sometimes make glue from dead hosses,” Bush countered, goaded into replying by the derogatory reference to men from his home state. “And conclude you’d maybe know something about that!”
“I said I’ve heard tell as how all you goddamned beef-heads like picking on fellers littler’n themselves ’cause it’s easier ’n’ safer’n trying to take on somebody their own size,” the hard case snarled. He continued to be provocatively insulting, since he was determined to provoke the youngster into a move that could be considered hostile. “Do they get at you regular on account of that?”
“Oh, just about as often as you lose a hoss, I reckon,” the youngster countered.
“You talk real big for a wet-behind-the-ears beef head button who reckons he’s a man growed,” McBride asserted, the memory of the loss of his horse and the long walk back to where he had left his companions still rankling enough to make him want to force the issue. “How’s about seeing if you can act like one?”
“Anytime you want to give it a whirl at finding out,” Bush found himself answering before he fully appreciated the consequences, “make your play!”
“Don’t you draw on me!” the hard case snapped, trying to pitch his voice at a level that would be heard by anybody on the street but not by the occupants of the saloon.
Having supplied what he thought sufficient inducement for the response he required, and despite his assertion about the lack of ability his opponent would show, McBride had no intention of leaving it to chance. He sent his right hand to close about the butt of his Colt Peacemaker so as to bring it from the holster. He was completely confident of success and was already planning how he would make his escape when he had achieved his purpose. Regardless of all he had done to give a spurious justification for his behavior, he had no intention of allowing any of the Texans in the saloon to be the ones to whom he would explain it. Knowing how he would react to such a situation, he did not doubt that they would be just as quick to do the same and that he would be subjected to fatal summary justice on the spot.
With a feeling of something close to alarm, Bush realized that he was involved in a life-or-death situation. Fortunately for him, however, he did not allow this feeling to numb him into a condition of inactivity. Rather, he behaved with a coolness he would later view as remarkable. What was more, despite the urgency of the situation, he did not forget the advice he had received since becoming accepted as a member of the Wedge trail crew.
Having taken a liking to the spunky youngster when satisfied he would make a hand, Dude, like the rest of the men on the trail drive, had decided to steer him in the right direction where one aspect was concerned. While he would not class himself anywhere close to Dusty Fog and Mark Counter in matters pistolero, the dandy dresser considered himself competent enough to be able to proffer sound advice. Therefore, with the consent he had requested being granted by Stone Hart, he had set about passing on the wisdom he had acquired over the years, and he found he had a ready pupil with a natural flair for gun handling.
At this, the first moment of serious trial in his young life, Bush put to use without conscious thought what was probably the best of the advice given by Dude. From the beginning he had been taught that, although he was wearing the two ivory-handled Colt Civilian Model Peacemakers in the same manner he had heard attributed to his hero, Captain Dusty Fog, very few men could duplicate the handling of the weapons with the facility displayed by the Rio Hondo gun wizard. Therefore, at Dude’s instigation—and the rest of the crew’s approval—he had concentrated on drawing the left-side weapon while retaining its mate for use in case more than six shots should be required in an emergency.
McBride drew his gun at the best speed he could achieve. But, his gunbelt not being of a quality that would allow the rapidity a top hand in such matters could attain, he was assailed by a sudden and sickening realization that things were not going the way he had expected. Until that moment, he had been convinced he was dealing with nothing more than a dressed-up and probably part-drunk kid who would prove easy meat. That his intended victim had not displayed any of the signs that he had been on the liquor prior to being evicted from the saloon had failed to strike the hard case until too late.
With the speed he had acquired as the result of practice taken during the drive, even though later he could not remember having consciously given himself the order to do so, the youngster’s right hand closed on the butt of the left side Colt. At that moment, the insistence of his father on purchasing a well-designed rig to carry his weapons paid its dividend. Sliding free and turning outward almost of its own volition, it seemed to its owner, the revolver was placed at waist level and in instinctive alignment on his tormentor. However, having brought this about, Bush hesitated before completing the movement.
The hesitation almost cost the youngster his life.
Granted the opportunity, and although he realized he had been beaten to the draw, McBride got off a shot.
However, in his state of alarm, the hard case failed to make a hit.
Refusing to be deterred or thrown into a panic by hearing for the first time the sound of lead whizzing by very close to his head, Bush reacted instinctively. The Colt roared and bucked in his hand. Although he was momentarily dazzled by the sudden glare resulting from the lead being emitted, he sensed that he had made a hit. Nor were his faculties at fault. Flying as directed by his subconscious instructions, the .45 bullet took his tormentor in the left breast. Flung backward with his own weapon flying from his suddenly inoperative grasp, the hard case went down in an untidy sprawl to the street.
The shots were heard inside the saloon, and all thoughts of celebrating immediately left the heads of the Texans, although the same did not apply to the three members of Ole Devil’s floating outfit. The Texans were certain the youngster would not have forgotten the instructions given by their boss and fired off his gun in the street as a way of avenging himself for the way he was treated. Therefore, headed by Dusty and Stone, there was a concerted rush for the front door. After emerging from the saloon, they found Bush standing with his Colt dangling by his side and a look of dawning realization coming to his face.
“I—He—I—!” the youngster gasped, turning toward his boss and other hero.
“We know, boy,” Stone said gently, then swung around to look at the others who were coming out of the barroom. “It’s over, boys, go back to your funning.”
“Sure, boss,” Waggles Harrison assented, realizing why the order had been given and wanting to help grant the time Bush needed to recover from what he knew must be serious concern over what had happened. “Come on, fellers, Silent’s promised not to tell us how he saved his pride ’n’ joy from all them swarms of mean critters’ as was fixing to eat it.”
“Sheriff’s coming,” the Kid drawled in a laconic fashion before Stone could speak with the clearly shaken youngster, he and Mark having remained on the street while the rest were returning.
“What happened?” Reeves inquired on arriving. He had been making his usual rounds of the town when he had heard the shooting.
“H-he come up and start bad-mouthing me,” Bush replied, taking comfort from seeing his boss standing supportively by his side. “We drew and—!”
“Looks to me like a case of slow,” the Kid suggested as Bush’s explanation came to an end. “Why’d he come after you, boy—? Sorry, Sheriff, I know it’s you as should be doing the asking.”
“I thought all you Injuns was the strong ’n’ silent kind,” Reeves declared, showing he felt no resentment over the usurping of his duty. Gesturing toward the body, he went on, “This is the feller who came in with the complaint about Silent, Stone. I was wanting to meet up with him and ask why-for he told me such a pack of lies. Well, looks like I’ll never get the chance. Looks like he was hunting for evens over losing his hoss and picked on you ’cause Silent wasn’t around, young feller.”
“Y-yeah,” Bush agreed, having reached the same conclusion. “He got off the first shot, Sheriff.”
“I heard the two shots,” Reeves replied, guessing how the youngster must be feeling. He noticed a crowd of people approaching from a civic meeting they had attended, having been attracted by the disturbance. “Now you go back inside and wait for me there.”
“What has happened here, Sheriff?” a man in the forefront of the crowd demanded in an Illinois accent that had a lilt Stone thought sounded vaguely familiar.
“Some trouble, Mr. Eisteddfod,” Reeves replied. “There’s nothing any of you good folks can do, so I’d suggest you went about your business.”
“This is the only killing we have ever had in town, look you,” the man said loudly instead of heeding Reeves’s words. “It will reflect badly on the way people elsewhere will think of our county.”
Stone had been looking with some interest at the man he had heard was called Egbert Eustace Eisteddfod. Tall, lean, and gaunt, with sharp features and a somewhat large hooked nose, he looked more like a circuit-riding preacher for one of the lesser and more strict religious denominations than the owner of the Vertical Triple E ranch. There was no sign of a weapon anywhere about his person. On the other hand, his features had an expression that suggested he had no liking for Texans and could be using the shooting to turn the local population against them. With that in mind, Stone put to use his knowledge of the Comanche language to say something that caused the Kid to go back into the saloon.
“I haven’t found out what caused it yet, Mr. Eisteddfod,” Reeves stated, wondering what the boss of the Wedge had said.
“Then shouldn’t you be doing it, look you?” the gaunt rancher asked. “We can’t have anybody thinking killing will be condoned in Spanish Grant County.”
“Nothing’s been ‘condoned’ and never will be, so long’s I wear this badge,” Reeves replied coldly. He had always sensed that the man he was addressing did not approve of his appointment as sheriff.
“And that is how it should be, look you,” the rancher asserted. “We have never had such a thing happen—!”
“Afore us Texans moved in?” Stone inquired, noticing that the Kid was returning accompanied by one of his hands.
Before the question was answered, Montgomerie, teetering on his heels as if far more drunk than was the case, cut loose with a flow of language that nobody gave any indication of being able to understand. Pausing for a moment, he swung on his heel and strolled into the barroom once more. However, after doing so, he remained near the front entrance instead of continuing to the counter.
“That wasn’t said, nor meant likely,” the sheriff pointed out in his official tone, but he did not believe the second part of his declaration. Then his voice grew more authoritative and he went on in the same fashion, “So I’d be obliged if all you good folks’d go about your business and let me ’tend to mine.”
“I was right, boss,” Montgomerie declared with confidence, coming from the saloon as the crowd was dispersing. “That jasper’s not Welsh no matter what he calls hisself and tries to make it sound like he is.”
“How do you know?” Stone asked, and he could see Reeves listening with interest.
“Well, now, boss,” the cowhand replied. “What I said in Welsh about how he looks and what he should be doing to his mother’s butt end would have made him show it had he understood it.”
Before any more could be said, the sounds of rapidly approaching hooves drew everybody’s attention away from Montgomerie.
“Sheriff!” gasped the cowhand who came up afork a lathered horse, showing signs of having ridden fast and far. “Ed Leshin sent me in to tell you how we’ve found Mr. Hayes lying dead on the range with his neck bust by what looks to’ve been a riding accident.”
“Hot damn!” Reeves breathed, reaching a conclusion from the way in which the information was worded, since he knew he and the foreman of the Arrow P ranch shared certain thoughts on the matter of recent riding accidents. “That makes three of them!”
“You mean that’s how Uncle Cornelius Maclaine was killed?” Stone asked, not having thought to raise the subject earlier.
“And Doug Loxley of what he called the Lazy Scissors, but has now been turned to the AW by all accounts,” the sheriff supplemented. “I know coincidences happen, but this’s pushing ’em further than I’m willing to stand back for. Can I take Kiowa Cotton with me to help Burt Alvord cut for sign, Stone? Because I’m going straight out there to have it done so careful comes daylight, I’ll know for certain whether it did come off by accident this time.”
“Sure,” Stone assented without hesitation. “I know I didn’t care much for Uncle Cornelius Maclaine, but I’ll be interested to see if he got made wolf bait by accident or done deliberate.”