by Bill Crider
When the old man left, Ryan had thought at first it would be good to get back among people again, to hear them talking and laughing, to see them moving around purposefully, going about the daily business of their lives. But he had been wrong. It took him awhile to get used to the noise and the jabber, the scurrying around from place to place. He became a man who kept to himself, said little, bothered no one.
At one time or another, the thought that he might return to Tularosa would come to him, but there were many ways in which that life seemed to him to belong to someone else, some other man that he had known once, long ago.
Now that he had returned, he wondered why he had.
His sister was dead, but he felt no blame for that. Who was to say it would not have happened even if he had been there?
His land was gone, but that had been taken care of while he was still with the old man, hardly able to move, much less to do anything about Kane.
And yet something had stirred in him, something called to the surface by Virginia Burley, something that had made him interfere with Kane's plans for Billy.
Already he was regretting it. After they left the cave, Billy began to complain.
The weather was too hot. He didn't like riding double. He was afraid of what his brother might do to him if they were caught. He was afraid that the posse would catch up to them and lynch him on the spot. He was hungry. He was thirsty.
Late in the afternoon, they went to the shack. Ryan scouted around the area carefully before going to the well.
"They've been here," he said. "But there's no one around now. We can get a drink."
"It's about time," Billy said, his voice whining like a saw in cedar.
Ryan let him drink first, while he looked around at the tracks in the already hardening mud. He couldn't tell much about them, not even that there had been separate visitors after the posse had left.
He considered staying in the shack for the night, but he knew that it wasn't safe. He couldn't trust Billy to keep watch, and he couldn't trust him not to sneak away. Besides, there was something he wanted to do in town. He figured the last place anyone would look for Billy was in town.
Billy didn't like the idea. "You're playin' me for a kid," he said. "You just want to take me back there and turn me in. I won't go."
Ryan tried to appease him. "I could have turned you in anytime, Billy. You're the one who conked me on the head, remember? But I came after you and got you away from your brother's boys. You think you can trust them? It looked to me like they wanted you dead."
Billy could vividly remember Barson sitting on his back and forcing his head down into the mud. He could still smell the mud and feel it blocking his nostrils. He shook his head. "But I ain't goin' into town," he said.
"Yes, you are," Ryan said.
There was something in his look that Billy didn't like. Ryan took a step forward.
"All right, I'll go," Billy said. "I think you're just gonna turn me in or get me killed, though."
"No," Ryan said, "I'm not. There's a place where I think you'll be safe until I can clear a few things up.”
“Where's that?"
"You'll see when we get there," Ryan told him.
Kane's first tendency was to yell at Long and Barson, but even he could see that in Barson's case, at least, it would do no good at all. Barson looked as if he weren't entirely sure what he'd been doing all day.
"Get him to bed," he told Long. "And then get back in here."
Long did as he was ordered. McGee watched him covering Barson.
"What's wrong with him?" McGee said.
"Got hit in the head. Hard," Long said. "Ryan."
McGee's phantom finger hurt, but not as much as his shoulder. It seemed to him like Ryan was gradually wearing them down. He noticed Long's nose.
"He get you, too?" he said.
Long put a hand to his nose, but he didn't touch it. It was still pretty tender. "Yeah. He got me, too."
McGee didn't particularly like Long. He worked with him, but that was different; you didn't have to like a man to work with him. McGee knew that most of the things he did for Kane were on the shady side, and it didn't really bother him much that they were. At the same time he recognized a difference between himself and Long. McGee was a little bit crooked. Long was purely vicious. He enjoyed what he did for Kane. And there were other things he enjoyed even more. McGee had heard about them.
"What are you gonna do about it?" he said.
Long's reptilian eyes glittered. "I don't know," he said. "Yet."
He went out of the room.
McGee lay back in the bed and watched him go. He was glad he'd been shot and wouldn't have to take part in whatever was being planned.
When Long returned to Kane's office, Kane was sitting at his desk. The afternoon sun was getting low, and the office was dim. Kane's pale face looked like the ghost of the full moon.
"You should have gone to the cave earlier," Kane said when Long was standing in front of the desk.
"You didn't say to do that," Long told him.
Kane steepled his fat fingers. "Perhaps not. It doesn't matter now." He pulled the tips of his fingers away from one another one at a time, then touched them again. "There's another thing that's bothering me," he said.
"What's that?" Long said. There was a note of suspicion in Kane's voice that he didn't like.
"You told me that Billy pistol-whipped Barson. I don't believe that."
Damn, Long thought. He had just told McGee the truth of the matter. Had Kane been listening? He wasn't afraid of Kane, but he didn't like to get caught in a lie.
"I think I know what happened," Kane said. "I think that Ryan took both of you, but you were too afraid to tell me the truth."
The truth was that Long had lied to give himself an excuse for shooting Billy, because shooting him would be easier than saving him. But since Kane was giving him an out, he decided to take it.
"I guess you're right," he said. He tried to look ashamed of himself, but he didn't do a very good job of it.
Kane didn't notice. He'd made up his mind, and he was satisfied with Long's admission. He knew Billy didn't have the guts to pistol-whip a housefly, let alone a man the size of Barson.
"It's all right," Kane said. "I think you must have gotten careless, and I can't see how a man in Ryan's condition, if it's anything like I've heard, could whip two men like you and Mack, but we'll let that pass. It's too late to do anything about it now. But we can't afford to let it happen again."
Kane stood up and walked out from behind the desk. Waddled was more like it, Long thought.
"I don't know what Ryan's doing here," Kane said. "I don't know what he wants with Billy, assuming he hasn't killed him already. And I am not a man who likes not knowing. Do you understand me?"
"Sure," Long said. He didn't understand at all, but he wasn't about to say so. Sooner or later Kane would get to the point.
"But I don't care what he's doing," Kane went on. "I don't even care why he wants Billy. He is disrupting my life, whatever his plans are, and I want nothing more than to be rid of him."
Now Long understood. "How are we gonna do that?" he said. Nothing had worked out very well so far, and Long didn't see any way of changing things.
"There is one thing we haven't tried yet," Kane said. "I think you're going to like the idea."
Long listened as Kane explained his new plan. Kane had been right.
Long liked it.
He liked it a lot.
Ryan waited until well after dark, until most of the people who had drifted into town to see the hanging had drifted out again and most of the citizens had long since gone to bed.
It meant that he had to endure Billy's whining and complaining that much longer, but he knew that he would not be safe even in the middle of the night. He couldn't chance going in any earlier.
When they got there, they rode as silently as they could through the back streets, the two or three blocks where there were actually houses,
where people were trying to establish some kind of life for themselves. The houses were small, but several of them had fresh paint, and more than one was surrounded by a fence. There were flowers in some of the yards, though Ryan could hardly see them in the dark. He wouldn't have been able to identify them anyway. One or two of the more ambitious homeowners had even tried to establish a lawn, almost an impossibility in this country without hauling in water in the summertime.
All the houses were dark, their respectable owners asleep. Ryan wondered what kind of lives they must lead. He had difficulty even in trying to imagine what their days and nights must be like—storekeepers, bartenders, preachers, teachers—they all lived in a world that Ryan had never been a part of. He smiled, thinking about what they would make of his own life, of his fight in Shatter's Grove and his stay with the old man. They would understand him no more than he comprehended them.
When they reached Congrady's store, Ryan stopped.
"What're we doin' here?" Billy said.
"I want to talk to the owner," Ryan said. "While I'm doing it, you're going to wait here for me."
They were in the alley behind the store, and he thought Billy would be safe there. He wasn't sure, however, just how much Billy would want to stay.
"If anybody comes along," he said, "you can take off. I won't hold it against you. Or if you just get the urge to move along, take off. If I were you, though, I wouldn't let your brother's men get their hands on me."
"I'll wait," Billy said. He didn't sound too happy about it. "Who're you gonna talk to."
"Pat Congrady."
Ryan felt Billy give a little jump behind him.
"It's not you I'm going to be talking about," he said. "You don't have to worry about that."
He got awkwardly off the horse. It was even harder when there was someone else on with him.
When he was solidly on the ground, he said, "Believe me, Billy, I won't tell him you're here. What I'm going to say to him does have something to do with you, though."
"What’s that?" Billy said.
Ryan couldn't tell if he was worried or not, but he suspected that he hadn't quite gotten over his shock.
"I'll tell you when I get back," Ryan said. Maybe that would hold Billy there, he thought, as he moved off into the shadows.
He moved as quietly as he could up the stairs to the second floor room. One of the boards squeaked, but not loudly enough to wake anyone.
Ryan paused on the tiny landing at the top of the stairs. There was no light inside. He put his hand on the knob of the door and tried turning it slowly. There was no resistance, and he completed the turn. Then he pushed the door. It was not bolted, and it swung smoothly inward.
When he stepped inside the room, he could hear Congrady snoring lightly. He closed the door behind him and walked to the bed, trying not to trip over anything in the darkness.
The bed and Congrady's sleeping figure were merely blacker blobs in the dark room. Ryan reached out and prodded Congrady with his finger.
Congrady snorted and rolled over. Ryan prodded him again.
Congrady spluttered and sat up. "Wha . . . what?"
Ryan made his way to one of the chairs, mostly by feel. He sat down. "It's me, Congrady," he said. "Ryan. You ought to keep your door locked."
"I don't usually have . . . visitors, Ryan. Not at this hour. What on earth do you want."
"To talk a minute."
"Couldn't we talk in the morning?"
Ryan could hear Congrady shifting around in the bed. "Don't bother to get up. This won't take long.”
“All right. What is it?"
"Jack Crabtree."
"What?" There was real puzzlement in Congrady's voice.
"You know him?"
"Of course I know him. I guess everybody in town knows him. What does he have to do with anything?"
"That's what I want to find out. He said some things to me the other day that I didn't like."
Congrady shifted in the bed again. "What does that have to do with me?"
"That's what I'm here to find out," Ryan said.
"I wish you'd say what you mean, then. You come in here in the middle of the night and start questioning me about Jack Crabtree, of all people, for no reason at all that I can see—"
"He stopped by to talk to you right after he said those things to me," Ryan said.
"Oh. Well, what did he say?"
"He said something about Sally. And he called me a liar."
"He ought to be more careful," Congrady said. "But I still don't see how that has anything to do with me."
"He was really eager to see Billy Kane die," Ryan said. "And I wondered why. I know he was fond of Sally, but I got to thinking—what if Sally really did like Billy Kane? And what if you found out about it? You wouldn't be wanting anybody to interfere with Billy's hanging, even if he really wasn't guilty and someone else was."
"And that someone else is me?" Congrady said, his voice tight with fury. "I'll tell you something, Ryan. If I wasn't afraid you might be holding a gun on me right now, I'd get out of this bed and kill you with my bare hands."
"Like someone did Sally."
"You bastard."
"I really wish people around here would quit calling me names," Ryan said. "One of these days I might have to do something about it."
"Let me tell you something, Ryan," Congrady said. "I'd love for you to try. But let me tell you something else first. I didn't kill your sister. Billy Kane did that, like I said."
"You were telling everyone you were going to marry her. That wasn't true."
"It was true. She would have seen that it was the right thing to do sooner or later. It was just taking longer than I expected. She would have come around."
Despite himself, Ryan found himself believing Congrady. "What about Crabtree?" he said.
"Hell, he's trying to get me to give him a job. Everybody in town knows about it. He says he's tired of workin' at the livery and smelling like a horse all the time. Ask around. You'll see."
"I will," Ryan said. "But why did he say those things to me?"
"I don't know. But everybody here knows how much he thought of your sister. He loved her as much as I did, except in a different way. She saved his dog for him, and for Jack that was enough. He would've killed Billy himself if he could."
Ryan was a man who liked to think he knew the truth when he heard it, and Congrady sounded like a man who was telling the truth. "I'm sorry I busted in on you like this," he said. "I had to find out, though."
"I guess you did," Congrady said. "I guess I don't blame you."
"Thanks," Ryan said. "I'll be leaving now."
He made his way to the door. He heard Congrady get out of the bed.
"I think I'll just lock that door," Congrady said.
Chapter Fifteen
As he descended the steps, Ryan wondered what to make of his talk with Pat Congrady. If Congrady was telling the truth, and he seemed to be, then who had killed Sally?
Could it be that everyone was right and Billy Kane was guilty? It didn't seem possible to Ryan. Billy was as convincing as Congrady, not that Ryan had ever really considered Congrady as a suspect in the first place. He didn't seem to be the type to kill, and he obviously hadn't put Jack Crabtree up to talking to Ryan. The story that Crabtree was just trying to get a job was too easy to check if everybody knew about it, as Congrady had said. Ryan didn't think Congrady would say something like that if it weren't true.
Ryan thought that he might have been avoiding one of the more obvious suspects simply because the thought was too unpleasant. It wasn't that Martin Long hadn't presented himself. Long had a reputation for being vicious, a reputation Ryan could certainly vouch for, and he was supposed to be especially rough with women.
And Long had known about Billy's meetings with Sally. Ryan could just imagine Long going to the shack and trying to get Sally to be nice to him in return for not telling Kane about his little brother's visits to Ryan's sister. Sally would not have suff
ered such insults lightly, and if she had showed any sign of fight, Long might have fought back. And he might have enjoyed it. He might even have enjoyed it too much. . .
It was something Ryan would have to check out. Right now, though, he didn't know exactly how he could check it. Besides, he had to do something with Billy first.
"Billy? You still here?" he whispered when he got to the bottom of the steps.
"I'm here," Billy said. He was still sitting on the horse. "Nobody's been by here at all. This whole place is asleep. I think we could just stay here in the alley all night."
"It might be all right for that long," Ryan said, "but come morning it might be a little busier. I've got somewhere else in mind."
"Where's that?"
"I'll tell you when we get there." Ryan started leading the horse.
"Ain't you gonna get on?"
"It's not far." Ryan didn't say that he couldn't get in the saddle with Billy in the way.
"I'm gonna get in the saddle, then," Billy said. "I'm bustin' my butt back here."
"Good idea," Ryan said. He paced with the horse down the dark alleyway. Nothing was stirring. The only sound was the faint clopping of the horse's hooves and the creaking of the saddle.
"This is Wilson's Cafe," Billy said when they stopped again.
"That's right."
"We gonna have us a steak?" Billy laughed softly. He thought he'd made a good joke.
"This is where we'll be staying, I hope," Ryan said.
"Damn, Ryan," Billy said. "We can't stay here. Do you think this woman cares anything about you? Don't you know . . ." He decided not to finish the sentence.
"I know," Ryan said. "That doesn't make any difference now. I have a feeling no one will look for us here."
"What if she won't let us stay? What if she tells someone where we are?" Billy was starting to whine again.
"If she won't let us stay, we'll go somewhere else. At least we should be able to get something to eat here."
Billy remembered suddenly that he hadn't eaten all day. "All right," he said. "It sounds like a good idea."
"I'll go up and wake her. You wait here," Ryan said.