Buchanan 21

by Jonas Ward

  “What’s she saying, anyhow?” Hynman asked querulously.

  “She says to let her go,” Buchanan answered him quietly, moving to the bottom of the stairs with the vet. “She says she don’t want to be in here.”

  “That’s too bad,” Hynman said. “Step aside, bucko, I’m going upstairs.”

  “But she don’t want to.”

  Hynman glowered at him, dumbfounded for an instant. “What the hell is it to you?” he growled dangerously.

  Buchanan was looking down into the girl’s terrified face, glancing at the hard grip the man had on her bare shoulders.

  “Turn the lady loose, mister,” he said. Hynman’s right hand fell away, snaked the gun free of its holster. He jammed it into Buchanan’s flat stomach.

  “Get outta here,” he said, and Buchanan felt the doctor beside him stiffen with fear, start to sway perilously. The cold water-and-coffee treatment wasn’t going to sustain him much longer.

  “Take that shooter out of my belly,” he told Bull Hynman. “I got other business.”

  “Damn well told you have,” Hynman said, pulling the gun back but holding it in his fist. “Beat it.”

  Buchanan walked Allen on out of the bordello, took him to the livery stable where Birdy Warren was waiting as promised with the hurting mustang. The man looked to be hard put upon.

  “Godamighty!” he complained. “This critter don’t mind at all. Meanest animal I ever been near.”

  “She gets notions sometimes,” Buchanan admitted. “But she sure can run.”

  “I’ll bet she can,” Doc Allen said admiringly, a new sound in his voice as he approached the wall-eyed horse unhesitatingly. “What’s wrong, girl?” he asked, stroking her cheek and lower jaw with the flat of his hand. “Hurt to stand on that hoof, does it?” And whatever it was about the man, the horse responded immediately, relaxed and grew docile before their eyes.

  “She’d’ve bitten me twice by now,” Birdy said. “And kicked me to boot.”

  The vet bent down, still talking soothingly, took the filly’s pastern and fetlock between his cupped hands and lifted the injured hoof for an examination. “Well, no wonder,” he said. “Can’t run much with that stone in there, can you, girl?”

  “Serious, Doc?” Buchanan asked.

  “Would’ve been,” Allen said. “By tonight. Glad you took strong measures like you did,” he added drily, looking Buchanan squarely in the face. “All right, let’s get her into the rig. About time she had some comfort.” What he spoke of as ‘the rig’ was a special harness, homemade-looking and suspended between the sides of the end stall. Attached to the top of the harness was a thick rope which ran through a pulley in an overhead crossbeam, then across to a second pulley nailed to the side of the stable. Buchanan helped guide his horse into the harness, tightened the cinches on the extra-thick breast collar, bellyband and breeching. The vet himself put on the restraining knee irons that would discourage any leg thrashing.

  “Haul away,” he said then and Buchanan pulled on the free end of the rope, raising the horse a good five feet off the ground with surprisingly little effort. “High enough,” Allen told him and he snugged the rope fast to a cleat.

  “Need me for anything else?”

  “Nope. Where you going?”

  “For a walk.”

  Allen laughed at him. “Don’t tell me a big galoot like you owns a queasy stomach?”

  “Could be, Doc.”

  “Well, come back in half an hour,” Allen said. “And when you do, have a bottle in your hand. I got to get caught up on my schedule again.”

  “Will do,” Buchanan said and left the stable with Birdy. It had been dark and cool in there; it was bright and hot outside. He pulled his hat brim down low to shield his eyes from the glare.

  “You sure handled Doc good,” Birdy said admiringly. “He can be an ornery customer when his snoot’s full.”

  “Quite a way with a horse,” Buchanan commented. Their steps had carried them to the saloon entrance and Birdy started in, then stopped in surprise.

  “Ain’t you comin’ inside, mister? Stand you a drink.”

  “In a while, Birdy. Got a date down the street.”

  Birdy Warren leered at him, man-to-man fashion. “In the middle of the day?” he asked him. “You must be some primed.”

  “Some,” Buchanan agreed, walking off alone in the direction of the bordello, indifferent in his own mind as to what the saloonkeeper thought he was about. His long-legged stride was measured but unhurried, his arms swung easily at his side, and only when he was standing before the door of the place again, when he squared his broad shoulders for the briefest instant, did he seem to be anything else but a puncher out on the town. He knocked three times on the door.

  “Now what do you want?”

  “I came back for the little lady,” Buchanan said without raising his voice. “Open up.”

  “Get away, y’hear? Get out! I spotted you for a trouble maker from the start.”

  “Open the door.”

  “Bull!” she cried then. “Come down here! Take care of this saddle bum outside!”

  “What the hell does he want?”

  “Trouble!” she bawled and Buchanan could hear the man inside the place laugh.

  “Trouble he’ll get,” Hynman promised. “Let him in.”

  “And get myself killed? I will not!”

  So be it, Buchanan decided, hitting the door hard with knee and shoulder. He felt it sag in its frame, heard the wood around the metal bolt splinter.

  “Come and get it, bucko!” Bull Hynman roared from the other side and Buchanan had a picture of the man standing atop the stairs, gun drawn. Buchanan stepped back, raised his booted foot and launched a powerful kick at the door. It sprung open, and he threw himself aside as three booming shots came winging down from above. Buchanan triggered two covering bursts of his own into their echo, charged low through the doorway and kept going until he had the semi-protection of the stairwell itself.

  “Get him, Bull! Get him!” Maude screamed from the safety of the parlor and there followed a moment of tense quiet. Buchanan waited, listening, and then he heard the man above him begin to make a furtive movement to gain the landing directly overhead. He matched steps with him, kept edging forward.

  They stood revealed to each other in the same instant, fired together. Buchanan’s snap shot blew the man’s gun right out of his hand, sent him reeling back against the wall. Buchanan himself was spun halfway around by a slug that seared his rib cage, but he kept his balance, gained the stairs and mounted them a pair at a time.

  “Pick yourself up, Deputy,” he told the dazed Hynman, seeing no wound, marveling at the fellow’s luck that he wasn’t dying on the floor. He retrieved the fallen gun, examined the bullet-smashed cylinder and hammer in disbelief, wondered what the odds would be against such a thing happening.

  “Now what?” Hynman asked, his voice sullen but unafraid.

  “Here’s a souvenir for you,” Buchanan said, tossing the busted .45 to him. “Keep it around to remind you you’re on borrowed time.”

  Hynman took both the gun and the advice in bad grace, didn’t seem impressed at all with his narrow brush. The gaze he leveled at Buchanan was truculent, still-threatening. Buchanan shrugged, turned his back to him and started down the second floor corridor. First one door opened, then a second, and the two girls he had seen before put their frightened heads out. A third door stayed closed and Buchanan opened it himself.

  The terror-stricken Mexican girl cowered in the furthest corner of the shabby little room. It was plain in her eyes that she expected no better from him than she’d gotten from the other man.

  “It’s all right now,” Buchanan said gently but she only stared at him, arms crisscrossed in front of her body in pathetic defense. “¿No habla ingles?” Buchanan asked her then and she shook her head slowly. “No tiene miedo,” he said, his voice reassuring. “I won’t hurt you. I’m taking you out of here.”

  She
heard and wanted to believe—but there was such a wildness to him.

  “Are you,” she asked, “a man of honor?”

  “I mean you no harm, señorita.”

  She took a step toward him, another, then stopped abruptly. “You are hurt,” she told him. “You are bleeding.”

  “I know,” he said. “That’s why we ought to get out of here now.”

  She nodded, came all the way out of the room and Buchanan escorted her back down the hallway. Waiting for them at the top of the landing, barring their way like a mastiff, was Bull Hynman. The girl saw him, faltered, and Buchanan moved out in front of her. When they were some thirty feet from Hynman he spoke to him.

  “We’re coming through,” he said. “Stand aside.”

  “Not her,” Hynman said. “She’s bought and paid for.” In his hand was the gun, held by the long barrel.

  “Coming through,” Buchanan told him again.

  “You don’t know what you’re buckin’ here!” Hynman snarled. He swung the gun at Buchanan’s head, club-fashion, and Buchanan seemed to be stepping right into its murderous path. But all at once the big man’s torso swerved, right to left, taking Hynman’s blow on his enormous shoulder, then swerved back again and Hynman was lifted clear of the floor by the fist that exploded against his chin. That finished Hallett’s deputy and Buchanan guided the girl around his sprawled, unconscious figure, took her down the flight of stairs. Maude awaited them there, her harridan’s face venomous.

  “You’ll be back!” she shrilled, pointing a finger at the girl, then turned her eyes up to Buchanan. “And they’ll get you,” she told him. “They’ll get you good.”

  “¿Qué ella dice?” the girl asked Buchanan worriedly.

  “Nada,” he said, moving her on out the door.

  “Tell her!” Maude yelled at their backs. “Tell her she’ll be back in here tonight. And you’ll be dead!”

  “¡Qué los malos!” the girl said.

  “Forget them,” Buchanan said, but he was thinking himself of this Sidney Hallett, the so-called High Sheriff who preached the wrath of God and helped stock a crib house, all in one day. It took all kinds to fill up a world, he supposed, and then had his musings interrupted. The gunplay, brief but startling, had lured the barflies out into the street. They stood clustered in front of the saloon, blinking like so many owls in the unaccustomed sunlight as they marked the progress of the man and his companion.

  “What in hell you been up to now?” Birdy Warren asked, his voice strung with excitement and a measure of concern. “What happened down there?”

  “By damn,” cried another, “the drifter’s raided the lupanar! Plucked one of Maude’s chippies right outta the coop!”

  Buchanan caught that one’s eye. “She ain’t a chippie,” he told him flatly, “and she wasn’t volunteering for the work.” Then his glance roved the group of faces. “Anybody here the barber?” he asked.

  “That’s me.”

  “I need a bandage, friend. Can you fix me up?”

  “You bet.”

  “Godamighty, you are hit,” Birdy chirped. “Come on upstairs and get off your feet. Fred,” he said to the barber, “bring your stuff back here.” He had Buchanan by the arm, began leading him inside. Suddenly the big man stopped in his tracks, swung around. The girl was still standing there, forlorn-looking.

  “What are you going to do?” he asked in her own language.

  She shook her head. “I do not know, señor.”

  “Where are your people?”

  “My father is in Salinas.”

  “Salinas?” he echoed, frowning, thinking that she was a hell of a way from home. “How are you going to get to Salinas?”

  “I do not know,” she said again.

  The frown deepened into a scowl. Sacramento was that way, Salinas the other. He looked down at Birdy.

  “Anybody going to Salinas?” he asked him.

  “Next stage through here is Wednesday,” he said.

  Buchanan rubbed at the stubble on his chin, sighed unhappily. “You better stay with me for now,” he told the girl. “We’ll figure out something.”

  She smiled for the first time, came forward without hesitation. “Yes,” she said, “I will stay with you.”

  Birdy Warren spoke to him then in an undertone. “I don’t savvy the lingo between you and her,” he said, “but you better watch yourself.”

  There was a sudden racket down the street and everyone turned to see a fast-driven covered wagon hurtling away from the bordello. High on the seat was Bull Hynman, his face bruised and furious, and as the wagon raced by he raised his fist to Buchanan.

  “I’ll be back, you sonofabitch!” he roared. “I’ll be back!”

  They watched him move on, raising a cloud of dust behind him, then swing right at the end of River Street and disappear.

  “I guess you better watch yourself,” Birdy Warren said to Buchanan. “What’d you want to tangle with that rat for?”

  “Mister,” he answered, “I don’t want to tangle with anybody ever. Leave it to me and I’d be halfway to Sacramento.”

  “What’ll you do up there?”

  “Work,” Buchanan said. “The Central Pacific is getting ready to lay tracks.”

  The other man nodded his head. “That’s work with a future in it,” he said. “You’re more than I figured you for.”

  Four

  From the single window in her little room on the top floor of the hotel, Ellen Booth looked down on Salvation and tried to see it as another person might, a total stranger. Such a quiet little town, so neat and peaceful—a wonderful place to settle in, to get married and raise a family. Nothing unpleasant could ever happen in law-abiding, God-worshiping Salvation.

  Her glance took in the bank building, and the game she was trying to play abruptly ended. For it was there she had first seen Frank Booth, the new teller that Mr. Martin had hired. It was a Saturday morning and she’d come down from the ranch with her father. It was only because he was so ill that she’d gone into the bank with him while he made another payment on the loan. Mr. Martin was in conference with Sheriff Hallett, but the transaction was a routine one and Mr. Booth could handle it.

  He was courteous and businesslike, spoke knowledgeably to her father of ranching. In answer to his questions he’d explained that he was from San Francisco, that he’d come down here with the hope of acquiring some cattle land himself. Ellen was sitting off to one side, noticing that he was of medium height, slim, that he dressed and talked quite differently from the other young men of the region, and that he was quite good-looking when he smiled. He was even more good-looking when her ever-curious father asked if he were married and he said no, not yet. Ellen didn’t think he’d even noticed her until, just as they were leaving, he asked permission to call at the ranch the next evening. Her father had looked to her, she’d nodded, and that was how the courtship began.

  Booth became a regular visitor for Sunday supper after that, took her to the rare dances that Sheriff Hallett permitted—July the Fourth, New Year’s Eve, Drover’s Day—and when it was announced that Ellen Henry was marrying Frank Booth no one in Salvation was surprised. Excepting, of all people, Sidney Hallett, and his reaction to the betrothal disturbed the bride-to-be considerably. He made a special trip to the ranch in that fine black buggy of his, but whether he was there as minister or sheriff neither she nor her father could figure out.

  But he was very angry when he spoke to old Tom Henry and his voice carried throughout the small house.

  “What do you know, Brother Henry, of this city slicker?” Hallett demanded. “What kind of life has he led in that den of iniquity, San Francisco?”

  And her father had answered that the bank must have checked his references, looked into his past, and pointed out that Hallett, himself, was a director of the bank and a major stockholder.

  “I’m talking of this stranger’s morals, not his business credentials!” Hallett said very harshly. “How do you know he hasn’t
left a wife and family in San Francisco?”

  “Has he?” Tom Henry asked.

  “You’re the girl’s father. That’s for you to find out! It’s your duty, Brother!”

  Ellen’s father said then that he thought Hallett was searching for trouble where none existed, that he was satisfied with Frank Booth as a son-in-law.

  “Well, I am not,” the sheriff told him. “My advice to you is to postpone this marriage, to keep Booth away from your daughter until you’ve searched his background.”

  That was when Ellen had come out of her room and walked into the parlor. Just a single lamp burned in there, and the shadow of Hallett’s tall, craggy figure seemed ominous and overpowering to the seventeen-year-old girl. But she found the courage to speak to him.

  “What do you know of Frank Booth?”

  “That he comes from a sinful place,” Hallett said. “That you would do better to marry someone you have known nearly all your life.”

  “But I’m not in love with anyone like that.”

  “Love?” he’d said, the word an abomination on his lips. “Love? What can you know of love?”

  “Only that I love Frank Booth,” she answered simply and that seemed to feed fuel to his wrath.

  “Physical love!” he shouted down at her. “Carnal love! That is what you feel for this simpering, grinning fool with his citified ways! He has seduced you—”

  Her father had intervened then, considerably wrought-up himself, and in the sharp exchange between them Tom Henry had ordered Hallett from his home. Hallett had stormed out, but not without threats and a vague warning that they would both regret it if Ellen married Booth. And hardly was he gone but Tom Henry had another seizure, a serious one that took his life three short days later. So the young girl had a funeral before a wedding. Though her father’s health had been quite frail she could not help but feel that Sid Hallett’s night visit had considerably shortened his life. She also had time to think of the things he said-that night, especially about marrying someone she had known all her life. Among those would have been Hallett himself—a man more than twice her own age.