by Lon Williams
Where Tallyho Canyon opened from Alkali Flat, he swung off his horse, dug with his fingers beside a boulder and planted his crocus. He watered it from his canteen, reluctantly left it and rode out onto Alkali Flat.
When only a mile south of Forlorn Gap he experienced an unusual sensation, one that suggested transition, as if he were passing out of one time into another. An upward glance at familiar constellations told him that midnight had passed. Bogannon’s saloon, of course, was closed.
At home he found his lovely wife Myra waiting up for him. She had supper, kept oven-warm. When they sat down to eat and drink, she looked at him curiously, somewhat disappointed.
“Lee, don’t you see anything?” she asked.
His eyes came to rest upon a bowl of short-stemmed flowers, some pink, some purple, some saffron. “Yeah,” he said with a gulp. “Flowers.”
“Crocuses,” said Myra happily. “Had you realized it is spring? These are its very first flowers. Lovely, aren’t they?”
Something caused Lee to glance at his fingernails. He had washed his hands, yet under his nails was fresh earth. For a moment he thought he heard distant music. But, he told himself, it was only a whisper of wind.
THE DEADLY SLOWPOKE
Real Western Stories, October 1957
Deputy Marshal Lee Winters, his thoughts on supper with his beautiful wife Myra, rode into one of those lonely, half-deserted northside streets of ghostly Forlorn Gap. He congratulated himself on having returned without a run-in with death or, of comparable terror, some character out of Myra’s books of myths and horrors. But that pleasant state of mind departed suddenly as his big horse Cannon Ball reared, made a half-turn and headed back north.
He gave Winters a hard time for several jumps. Then Winters gave him a hard time by sawing his bit and gigging with his spurs. He was under control though skittish, as he reversed direction.
To Lee, a dog’s growl was not unusual. It was something else when a man moved about an unfenced yard on hands and feet and growled like a dog. That was exactly what he found when he’d got back to where Cannon Ball had made his first turn. They were before a small, unpainted cottage with a porch. A woman in its doorway blocked off part of its lamplight with her slim body.
Lee pulled his horse to uneasy anchorage. “Is that you, Liza Wilkerson?”
“Winters! Yes, I’m Liza Wilkerson.”
“What’s going on here?”
“Oh, Winters, something dreadful has happened to my husband.”
“I figured as much,” said Winters. He stared down at Wilkerson. “Jim, what’s wrong with you?”
“Gr-r-r!” responded Jim. “Bowwow!”
Winters had a nervous chill. “Say, now, you stop that. Why are you acting like a dog?”
“I am a dog,” Jim replied.
“What kind of dog do you figure you are?”
“I’m a great big mastiff. Gr-r-r!”
Winters was puzzled, his resources limited. He studied, then said curtly, “Some dogs are smart and some ain’t; which kind are you?”
“I’m smart,” replied Wilkerson.
Winters scolded angrily, “A smart dog can stand up like a man. Didn’t you know that?”
“No,” said Jim. He walked around on all fours in a circle, snarling meanwhile.
“All right, Liza,” said Winters. “Since he’s a dog, there’s just one thing to do. Get your dog chain and fasten him to a post. Here, I’ll help you.” Winters swung down and ground-hitched his horse.
“Winters, we’ve got no dog chain,” said Liza. “Besides, I don’t aim for Jim to sleep outdoors.”
Lee disregarded her sudden hostility. “How long’s he been like this?”
“If you want to know for other than being curious, I’ll tell you. It’s since last night. He almost scared me to death when he came home growling, barking and walking around like this.”
“Well, I’m not just curious,” said Winters. He grabbed Jim and yanked him up. “You’re a mighty small dog to be thinking you’re a mastiff. But big dog or little dog, it’s time for all dogs to be in bed. Now get in that house or I’ll take you to town and lock you up.” He gave Jim a shove, which landed him sprawling inside.
Be-confound if he’d ever heard of such nonsense. “Liza, treat him like a dog, if he insists on being one.”
* * * *
Farther along his ride, however, he decided that Jim Wilkerson was not acting nonsense but had gone cuckoo. A thing like that gave him creeps, made him want to pull his head down inside his clothes.
Forlorn Gap’s one remaining saloon had its lights going. Its early guests were in fine spirits, except for two or three, who wept over their sorrows.
Doc Bogannon, barkeep and saloon owner, observed his customers nonchalantly. He was big, handsome, with dark hair and fine, impressive features. Privately, he lived contentedly with his half-breed Shoshone wife; publicly, he watched men come and go with detached, tolerant understanding.
Sojourners here were as varied as creation, men who wept, laughed, cursed, or roared in anger. No man, thought Bogie, had enough sympathy in his soul to be sorry for all who had miseries. Nor had Bogie himself enough curiosity to spread over every queer character who came in to drink or otherwise amuse himself. It was enough that he viewed them charitably, without trying to reform them or to separate sheep from goats.
While he meditated, his batwings swung inward and the slim, wiry, weather-beaten deputy marshal strode in. “Winters!” Bogie exclaimed.
Lee strode forward and planked down a coin. “Wine, Doc.”
“Wine it is, Winters.” Bogie filled a glass. “You’re in town early, Winters. This latest wanted monkey you were after, did you catch him?”
Winters glanced at Bogie’s guests and lifted his glass. “Caught him at Pedigo Ranch, Doc. Turned him over to Deputy Tipton of Pangborn Gulch.” He drank, backhanded his mustache, gave his head a sidewise nod toward something which had caught his eye. “Who’s he, Doc?”
A little man in small round hat and dark, dirty suit occupied a corner stool at Bogie’s bar. Bogie flicked him a careless glance. “In some ways, he’s an old friend, Winters. For two months now he’s been coming in every evening at exactly eight o’clock. On his first visit, he announced his name and what he wanted. He has not spoken from that time until now.”
“Do tell!” exclaimed Winters. “Man of few words, eh?”
Bogie crisscrossed his brow with wrinkles. “Winters, he’s truly a man of silence.”
“What’s his name?”
“Poley B. Delong or, I surmise, Napoleon Bonaparte Delong.”
Delong could hardly have avoided overhearing their conversation, yet he gave no sign of having heard at all. His drink was beer; his food, pretzels.
Winters leaned on an elbow. “Doc, did you say you had conversation with him?”
“Incredible as it may seem, Winters, I did.”
“What did you talk about?”
“It’s a story soon told,” said Bogie. “Delong came in and sat where you see him now. He sat there until I was free to ascertain his wants. When I approached and said, ‘What will you have, my good friend?’ he replied. ‘Sir, my name is Poley B. Delong. I shall tell you this once, and I trust it will not be necessary for me to repeat it. Furthermore,’ he added, ‘I shall be coming in at this same time each evening, and this is what I shall want on each occasion: One mug of beer and two pretzels.’ My response was, ‘With pleasure, sir.’ So began and so ended our first and only conversation.”
Winters turned his back and hoisted his elbows. “Reminds me of when I was a yearling calf down in Trinity Valley, Texas. Neighbor of ours named Oslo Carver who lived twenty miles across Trinity Bottoms went out to feed his horse one winter morning. His horse said, ‘Howdy, Oslo.’ And Os, without thinking, said, ‘Howdy, Whizzer.’ So far as anybody knowed, Whizzer never said another word as long as he lived.”
Bogie wrinkled his forehead soberly. “Winters, it’s distressing how people
can let you down sometimes, especially when so much is promised and so little given.”
“Yeah,” drawled Winters, “life in general is pretty much just another horse on Oslo.” He put down a second coin. “Doc, if you can do so without stirring up talk, give our friend Delong some wine—with my compliments. Good-night.”
* * * *
Winters had been gone but a moment when a picture of cool, exquisite villainy came to life at a nearby table and swung easily forward. He was tall, straight, with thin mustache, scholarly face, black, center-parted hair, black suit, and black stovepipe hat which he held under his left arm. He went around, leaned against Bogie’s bar and faced Poley Delong.
“Permit me, sir,” he said in soft, musically beguiling tones, “your remarkable poise under difficulty struck me as truly phenomenal.”
Delong moved his head an insignificant degree and stared at this smoothly talking stranger. Though he said nothing, his eyes betrayed his question.
“Of course,” was his flatterer’s answer. “You are interested in my identity. Very well, sir. I am Doctor Mesmer Ludwig, world-famous authority on mental behavior and thought peregrinations. After years of study, I have learned that silence is not man’s natural state but is a condition induced by some weird experience. In other words, my friend, you have been victimized by some unscrupulous magician who has placed his dark spell upon you.”
Bogannon under pretext of wiping his bar eased closer to hear what was being said. This Ludwig was a rare one, indeed. A glance told Bogie that his man of silence was being charmed as a bird by a snake.
“You are not truly this mild-mannered mouse which you appear to be,” Dr. Ludwig purred on. “You are a strange somnambulist. Without realizing it, you are asleep.”
“Sleep,” Delong whispered, eyes round and staring.
“Yes, sleep,” purred Ludwig. He continued, “Sleep, sleep, gentle, restful sleep.”
Delong’s eyelids grew weary. “Sleep,” he sighed.
“Now,” said Ludwig, “you are becoming your true self. You are not a mouse. You are a cat. You are a wildcat. You are a fierce, dangerous wildcat.” Delong bared his teeth and snarled.
“Now you are your true self,” said Ludwig. “Yet, because I have removed a curse from you, your behavior henceforth is subject to my will. To prove what I have said, you will get down on your hands and feet and walk ’round in a circle.”
Delong promptly got down and did as ordered. Several of Bogie’s guests left their tables and circled around to watch Delong.
“A right scrawny looking cat,” a gold-digger remarked.
“Right high in his hindquarters,” said another. Ludwig threw an appraising glance at his audience, then snapped at Delong, “Growl.”
Delong growled.
“Scream.”
Delong screamed.
“You are a fierce wildcat,” declared Ludwig. “Prove it by tearing these men to shreds.”
Delong crouched, growling. Men moved back.
“No, keep him off us!” one shouted in mockery.
Delong charged. Immediately he was caught and tossed about by thick-shouldered gold-diggers and athletic men. Finally, his own clothing torn to shreds, he struck a wall and sat down at its base. He snarled. Otherwise he was subdued.
Ludwig walked over and said firmly, “You will now resume your former place. You will stop growling and be a good kitty.”
Delong got up, limped back to his stool and stared submissively at his master.
Ludwig began again in his purring voice, “You are no longer a wildcat; you are your true self again: You are Napoleon Bonaparte Delong.”
Delong blinked and looked about as one just awake. He looked at his clothing, groaned in pain from his bumps and bruises.
“What happened?” he asked.
“Nothing at all,” Ludwig advised him gently. “It is merely something you have dreamed. And you are still dreaming. You see, you are asleep. You sleep, sleep, sleep. Now, I shall tell you what you are. You are my pet sheep. You will go with me wherever I go and obey my every command. Now, down on your hands and feet again and follow me.”
Delong obeyed once more.
As they were leaving, Ludwig paused, a door in each hand. “Before we depart, my obedient sheep, you will say goodbye by bleating like a nice little lamb.”
“Baa!” said Delong.
“Splendid,” said Ludwig. “Let us go now.”
* * * *
When they were gone, Bogie’s guests stared at one another. Nobody felt like jesting. Bogie himself was sweating. He’d heard of people being mesmerized, had accepted reports as half-truths. And that was what they’d been. Half-truths. Only half had been told.
His reverie was interrupted by an outbreak of calls for whiskey.
“Whiskey!” men shouted. “Let’s have some whiskey!”
“Whiskey it is,” Bogie responded.
When there was a let-up, he helped himself to wine. He was ashamed of himself, now that he thought seriously of how badly poor Poley Delong had been treated. After all, if a man wanted to keep his mouth shut, that was his own business.
* * * *
Poley himself, being a sheep, had no worries. Two blocks from Bogie’s saloon, he and Ludwig were joined by two friends of Ludwig.
“Be a good sheep,” said Ludwig. “Stand up like a man. There, that’s fine. Now, permit me to introduce my friends, Nelson Ipswitch and Darby Faw. Friends, meet Napoleon Bonaparte Delong.”
Ipswitch and Faw grunted surlily.
“What’s he got?” asked Ipswitch.
“That,” replied Ludwig, “is something Delong will presently tell us. Napoleon, my sheep, where is your gold hidden?”
“Up there,” said Poley, pointing northeast.
“Up there are mountains,” Ludwig reminded him. “You will state in detail where your gold is.”
“Buried,” said Poley.
“Then, of course, you will take us to it,” said Ludwig. “My friends, horses.”
* * * *
Poley took them on a twenty-minute moonlit ride. His shack was against a cliff where a drip spring had filled his wooden water bucket nearby. At Ludwig’s command, Poley brought out a lighted lantern.
“All right, runt, where’s it at?” Ipswitch demanded in a quick, snapping voice.
“Ah, but your procedure is wrong,” Ludwig chided. “You forget that our new friend is an obedient sheep. Where is your gold, Sheep?”
Poley pointed to his water bucket. “Under there.”
“Dig it out, Faw,” Ludwig commanded.
“Ye-e-e-s, sir,” Faw responded with astounding slowness.
He lifted Poley’s bucket with equal slowness and moved away its flat under-stone. Under that were other stones, which he likewise removed. Last was a one-gallon stone jar, which was filled with gold coins. This he dragged and lifted out and left at Ludwig’s feet.
“Not bad,” said Ipswitch. He jerked his head toward Poley. “What do you do with him?”
Ludwig nodded over his left shoulder. “There’s a precipice off there. Sheep sometimes fall over precipices.” He looked unpityingly at Poley. “Get down on your hands and feet, Sheep.”
Poley obeyed.
“Now follow Ipswitch, like a good little lamb.”
Poley followed obediently as Ipswitch walked away.
But when Poley saw danger yawning up at him, he drew back.
Ipswitch moved behind him and gave him a hard shove with his foot. “Over you go, Sheep.”
Poley went over and down.…
* * * *
When supper and dishwashing were over, Deputy Marshal Winters and his wife Myra sat in their living room for their usual hour of talk or reading. This time Winters listened to his wife’s gossip.
“I think,” said Myra, “there’s a thief in town.”
“Was there ever a town without a thief?” he asked.
“But this is different,” Myra insisted. “Sarah and Bart Mellinger have lost
all of their savings. They had their gold in a box buried under their hearthstone. Only those two, presumably, knew where it was. Yet this morning Bart looked, intending to add some money, and all of it—yes, all—was gone. And what is most strange, there hasn’t been a minute since last they looked but one of them has been at home. Still each professes complete innocence of having taken it.”
“Right interesting,” said Winters. Privately he was thinking of his own large store of gold whose whereabouts he alone knew. It was treasure in addition to their jointly-owned supply, to which Myra had free access. Considering that he might eventually be outgunned by some wanted monkey, he had his gold hidden where Myra certainly would find it in straightening up his affairs. Yet so long as she didn’t know where it was, or even that it existed, no thief could trick or torture her into revealing its whereabouts.
“Is that all you have to say?” Myra inquired.
“I can tell you something more exciting than that,” he replied dryly.
“Really? What is it?”
“Jim Wilkerson thinks he’s a dog. He goes around on all fours and barks.”
“No!”
“Sounds cuckoo, eh?”
“It really does. But maybe there’s a reason. Wilkerson’s money is also missing.”
“Well, be-confound!” Winters exclaimed. He had an alarming suspicion suddenly. “Don’t tell me a thief has got our money, too?”
Myra laughed softly. “No, Lee. Of course not. But don’t be surprised if it does turn up missing. You see, Fox Geyger’s money is gone. So is—”
“Say, now, this looks like a disease that’s going ’round,” declared Winters, indignation rising. “Anybody got any idea who’s doing all this stealing?”
“Not exactly.”
“Not even sort of thereabouts?”
“Well, only as to Herb Hanley. His wife, Bonzy, thinks Herb just gave his away. To complete strangers, too.”
“Hmm!” mused Winters. “This ought to be looked into.”
* * * *
But a letter from Marshal Hugo Landers, received next morning by Winters at Bogie’s saloon, sent him on a new manhunt.