When the buggy drew abreast, Reilly Meyers hooked a leg over the saddlehorn. He watched the man holding the reins and caught the sudden shock that was quickly smothered.
Reilly said, “Max, friend. The last time I saw you was at Winehaven’s slaughter house when I shot a man. As I remember it, you didn’t show up at the trial and tell the good folks how it really happened.”
“I like to stay out of courtrooms,” Max Horgan said. His face was blocky, with high cheekbones and deep-set eyes. Reilly studied Horgan, searching for some small sign around the lips and eyes. He saw no change there.
In Horgan, humanity had been pushed aside, leaving him coldly methodical and without friendship for anyone. “You were a damn fool to come back,” Horgan said. “Be careful what you get into now. The next time you’ll get your hands slapped a lot harder.”
“A little lecture, Max?”
“Personally, I don’t give a damn one way or another,” Horgan said. “Just leave the bunch alone and you’ll live to be an old man.”
Shifting his Winchester, Reilly pointed it casually toward the buggy. “Once I thought some of the men in this country were gutless because they didn’t step on you a long time ago, but now I’ve learned to mind my own business. Paul was tellin’ me that you’ve been using my place. If there’s any of your boys there now, you better get ’em off, because I don’t like squatters.”
“Maybe they’ll move you instead,” Horgan suggested quietly. “There’s no one there now, Reilly, but it wouldn’t worry me if there was. You’re a restless man and you like to move around. It could be that you won’t be staying here long.”
“I’ll be staying, Max. I’m goin’ to get married and settle down so don’t do anything now to make my plans go cockeyed.”
“Married? To Sally Isham?” Horgan grinned.
“Does that strike you as funny?”
Max Horgan began to laugh. It started with a chuckle and blossomed into a wild gale of mirth. Reilly sat his horse, his puzzlement turning to sharp anger. Finally Max Horgan wiped tears from his eyes and said, “Reilly, I wouldn’t dream of changin’ your plans.” He lifted the reins to slap the horses into motion.
“Wait a minute!” Reilly snapped and wheeled the buckskin. “Let me in on the joke, Max.” His voice was low but brittle.
“You wouldn’t think it’s funny,” Max said softly, all humor fading from his dark eyes.
“That’s all right,” Reilly said. “I’ll watch you and laugh when you laugh. I mean it, Max—better tell me.”
Raising his hand, Horgan pawed his face out of shape. “Remember that you asked me, Reilly.” His smile widened behind his flowing mustache. “You can’t marry Sally Isham because she up and got married to someone else.”
For a moment, Reilly stared at him. “If you’re making a joke of this, I’ll kill you, Max.”
“Go ask her yourself,” Horgan said, and lifted the reins.
“Hold on! Who did she marry, Max?”
“Uh, uh,” Horgan said. “You go find out from her. If your foster pa and sister wouldn’t tell you, I don’t guess I will either.”
“I could make you tell,” Reilly said softly.
Horgan’s smile faded slightly and he brushed his coat away from the short barreled Colt in a cross-draw holster. “Easy now, Reilly. I’m a lot better than that fella you shot at Winehaven’s.”
For a moment a strong feeling moved back and forth between them and then Reilly relaxed. “If this is a joke, Max—”
“I told you you wouldn’t think it was funny,” Horgan said, and clucked to his team. Turning in the saddle, Reilly followed the retreating buggy until Horgan had gone a half mile down the road. Seeing Horgan again brought back a flood of half-forgotten memories. Reilly could still smell Winehaven’s slaughter house as he rode toward it that spring day. The smell of blood and manure was strong and in spite of the fact that he had been there a dozen times before, he still disliked the place. Horgan had stood to one side during the argument, not speaking, and after the quick crash of gunfire he had stepped up to the dead man, rolled him over with his boot, and said, “You ought to have let him draw first, son.” Horgan’s eyes were cold and without feeling and Reilly mounted his horse and rode away.
Horgan had been with Sheriff Henderson and the posse that came to Paul Childress’ ranch the same night and it had been Horgan who coldly, implacably insisted that he be given a trial and then hanged. Reilly remembered the sound of Horgan’s voice, soft, demanding. No one had argued, either. Horgan had much power over men.
Moving on toward town, Reilly felt no inclination to hurry. Within an hour he saw another spiral of dust approaching and in a few minutes he recognized Al Murdock with Mrs. Childress. Jabbing the horse into a run, Reilly was in the buggy and embracing the plump woman before the rig stopped. Mrs. Childress cried a little and patted his cheek, saying, “I’m being silly.”
Murdock leaned across Mrs. Childress to shake hands with Reilly. He was tall, with shoulders like a spreading oak. His face was flat and somewhat square, but he smiled easily and the smile made people forget his homeliness. Hair lay in dark chunks across his forehead and his eyes were bold and stabbing, the eyes of a man who gives orders with the complete knowledge that they will be obeyed.
Mrs. Childress dabbed at her eyes with the corner of a handkerchief. “I was afraid you wouldn’t come back, Reilly.”
“I almost didn’t,” Reilly admitted. He sighed and looked around at the land. “I met Max Horgan a few miles down the road. He mentioned Sally Isham’s gettin’ married.”
Between Al Murdock and Mrs. Childress there passed an embarrassed glance and the awkward silence when there is nothing to say.
“Yes,” Murdock said flatly, “she did.” He studied Reilly with a certain reserve for he was in the delicate position of becoming a brother-in-law to a man he couldn’t be sure of. Reilly understood Murdock well and knew that the man would hew to a line of moral exactitude, offering only as much friendliness as his position dictated, nothing more. Murdock spoke again. “You’re takin’ it good, Reilly. I figured you’d be killin’ mad.”
“Jail cools a man off. All I want to do is to be left alone.”
“That’s nice to hear,” Murdock said, obviously relieved. “You know, there’s been some speculation goin’ around that you’d come back just to blow Burk Seever’s head off.”
Reilly said slowly, “Sally married Burk?”
“Lands sake, I thought you knew!” Mrs. Childress raised a hand and pushed a strand of gray hair from her face. “You just said Max told you.”
“He just said she was married,” Reilly murmured, and recalled Paul Childress’ deft handling of the subject. He thought I’d kill Burk, Reilly reflected, and sat quiet for a moment.
“Don’t blame her too much,” Mrs. Childress said quickly. “Reilly, you was in bad trouble and she had to make the best of things, with her pa dead and her sister to take care of.”
“Sure,” Reilly said. “Sure.”
Murdock stirred on the buggy seat and rolled a smoke. “Burk’s come up in the world, Reilly. He’s moved his law office from the feed store to above the bank and he wears fancy suits and smokes ten cent cigars. Times have changed. The government’s built a big Piute reservation about fifty miles east of here. Now there’s big beef contracts and Burk’s got himself appointed to handle all of it. You do business with him or none at all.”
“I’ll have to go look him up,” Reilly said with deceptive softness.
The dancing light in his eyes provoked Mrs. Childress to worry. That was the way it went with a woman who had raised a son. The knowledge was too complete, the signs all too familiar. “Don’t be a hothead now, Reilly. Turn around and come home where you belong.”
“Can’t,” he said. “Ma, Paul and I don’t agree on a lot of things. You know it wouldn’t work out.”
/> “You’re the son we never had, Reilly. Can’t you see that?”
“I’d have never let a posse take him,” Reilly said.
Murdock grunted something unintelligible, then said, “Go on then. Get yourself in another jam. For some reason the wild bunch is really after you. Seever would like to whip a horse out from under you and he just may do it if you get too big for your pants.”
“Seever and I have something to talk over—and I don’t mean his wife. Four years is a long time to spend for something I didn’t do. That wasn’t manslaughter, Al. That was self-defense.”
“Reilly,” Mrs. Childress said, “give it time. Sometimes that’s the best.”
“Time is something that I don’t have much of,” Reilly said.
He lifted his hat and goaded the buckskin into a trot. A hundred yards down the road he looked back and found them still sitting there. Finally Al Murdock slapped the team with the reins and Reilly continued across the flatlands toward the town barely outlined five miles away.
He rode at a faster pace now. He was seeing a big man, a handsome man with a booming voice and a driving ambition that crushed other men without afterthought. Burk Seever stood out bold and clear in Reilly’s mind. Seever was an easy man to hate, and Reilly wondered if he could hate Seever enough to kill him.
CHAPTER 2
Buckeye sprawled along the southern tip of Duck Lake, and although bracketed on three sides by mountains, the town itself reared up from the desert flatness, unpainted, a monument to hurry and unconcern. Other than being the focal point for trade in a fifty mile radius, it had little excuse for existence. The town had been born full-grown during the Civil War, eleven years ago, and now gave no indication of ever growing further.
Riding down a main street that was little more than a strip of dust flanked by boardwalks and building overhangs, Reilly Meyers found little that had changed during his absence. Selecting a shaded spot by the hardware store, he dismounted and tied his horse. A few mounts stood three-footed along the street, switching flies. A rig was parked before the feed store and a half dozen men cruised along the walks. In the distance a blacksmith hammer tolled like a church bell.
With his hat brim shielding his eyes, Reilly sauntered down the street, drawing no more than a casual glance from anyone. At the far corner he turned, walking on until he came to the alley. Traveling the length of it, he stopped when he came to the rear of a small bakery. The sweet smell of bread and pastries was thick and inviting when he opened the back door and stepped inside.
In the front of the building a young woman waited on a customer, but she was shielded from his view by a wall separating the rooms. The bell on the cash drawer tinkled musically and a moment later the front door opened and closed. Reilly leaned his Winchester against a baker’s bench and waited for the girl to come into the back room.
“Just put the flour on the floor, Herbie,” she called, and when she received no answer she came to the separating archway. She halted suddenly when she saw Reilly, her mouth dropping open in surprise. Then she dashed across the distance between them and threw her arms around his neck, kissing him soundly.
“Hey,” Reilly said. “Where did you learn to do that?”
She laughed, a happy, musical sound, and cocked her head to one side, studying him. “You look older,” she said. “I think I like you better this way, a little more serious and not so full of hell.”
Tess Isham was a foot shorter than Reilly, but she had an hourglass figure with the sand settled in the right places. Her hair was a pale brown with definite reddish tints in it. She had green eyes and a peppering of freckles across the bridge of her nose.
“Where’s your loving sister, Tess? The one who was going to wait for me?”
The ends of her eyebrows drew down and she placed a hand flat against his chest. “Reilly—damn it.” The small bell over the front door rang and she said, “Customer. Wait here for me.”
“Sure,” he said, and watched the switch of her hips as she went into the other room. A moment later the low run of voices filtered into the back but he paid no attention to it. Leaning against a bench, he looked at the long baking ovens, the hanging pots and utensils. The bare floor had been scrubbed so often that the grain of the wood was upraised ridges. He had scrubbed this floor when Sally worked here because he wanted to be with her, even on his hands and knees with a scrub brush in his hands. He remembered Tess, skinny and flat-chested, but then he saw only Sally. Memory was like a silver thread that kept going back and farther back. He couldn’t recall when he had not been in love with Sally Isham or when Burk Seever had not been around.
The voices in the other room grew sharper and Tess’ became firm, almost overriding the man’s deeper tones. Reilly, listening with half an ear, felt memory and reality blend; and then he stiffened, for he knew that voice. The man was saying, “Tess, I don’t know what’s got into you. It seems that you’re always trying to make a case against me.”
“Just get out of here and leave me alone,” Tess said flatly, and Reilly Meyers stepped toward the arch.
“You’re being very childish about this,” the man said. Then he stopped, his head coming around quickly as Reilly filled the archway. A heartbeat passed before the man regained his poise.
“Well, Reilly, I see that you find the back door’s still the handiest.”
“You seem to like ’em yourself, Burk,” Reilly said. “What are you trying to sell this time?” He gave the big man a going over with his eyes, detecting no bulge that would indicate a gun. Burk Seever was very tall and carried the weight to go with it. He was a year younger than Reilly, near thirty, but his eyes were a lot older. They were quick eyes, moving like the rapid play of sunlight through the spokes of a wagon wheel. Seever had a thick mane of blond hair and a mustache to match. His face was unscarred and handsomely cast.
Catching a glimpse of the Remington in Reilly’s waistband, Seever placed his hands flat on the glass showcase and stood motionless. He was like a runner waiting for the starting gun.
“I’m not carrying a gun,” he said.
“You never did,” Reilly said softly, sagging against the door frame. “I hear you got married since I’ve been in the pen. I’ll have to drop around and kiss the bride.” He smiled without humor. “Anyone I know, Burk?”
“Stop playing cat and mouse with me,” Seever said tightly. “You got shut out and you might as well get used to the idea. You cause me any trouble and I’ll bend you out of shape.” The big man snowed his vexation through the slight movements of his lips, but his close cropped mustache hid most of it. “You’ve come back asking for trouble. All right, Reilly. We’ll give you all you can handle and then some.”
“Some other time,” Reilly said. “All I’m looking for is a little peace and quiet and for people to leave me alone. You tell that around to the bunch, Burk. Just leave me alone!”
“We’ll see how that works out,” Seever said, and he whirled, slamming the door behind him before stalking down the street.
“That’s a nice thing to have for a brother-in-law,” Reilly muttered.
“Don’t remind me,” Tess said, and led him into the back room again. She took a fresh pie from the rack and cut a generous slice. Coffee was on the large range and she poured a cup, placing this on the long rolling bench. When he scraped a chair around and sat down, she took a seat across from him, leaning her elbows on the edge.
“Why did you have to come back, Reilly? Sally?”
“That’s one of the reasons,” he said between bites. “The others are hard to explain. When the judge handed me four years, all I could think about was gettin’ out and puttin’ a bullet in Burk Seever. But then I began to cool off. Gunnin’ him would only put a rope around my neck because the wild bunch is in too solid for one man to break up with a six-shooter. No, I’ve thought it out. I’m goin’ back to ranchin’ and mindin’ my own busines
s. However, if someone starts to shove me around, there’ll be trouble.”
“All right,” she said. “We’ll let that pass, but why does Burk hate you so?”
“Does there have to be a reason? We just don’t like each other. Hell, you can remember how we fought when we was ten years old.”
She shook her head in disagreement. “That was kid stuff, Reilly. At the trial he wanted to put a rope around your neck and whip the horse out from under you. Why, Reilly?”
“I don’t know,” Reilly admitted.
“Do you have something on Burk or Winehaven?”
“Nothing. Do you think I’d have served four years if I had?” He lowered Ills voice. “Tess, what’s the matter with everybody? I said I’d come back and yet everyone seems so damned surprised when I do show up.”
“Because no one believed it except me,” she said. “People are going to remember how you were friendly with the bunch, Reilly. I’m sorry I had to tell you that, but you always put a great store in the truth even when it pinched.”
“Winehaven’s man stood up in court and lied me into the pen,” Reilly said. “Don’t that prove that I wasn’t in on their dirty work?”
She shook her head. “I’ve heard some say that you had a falling out with them—that’s why they tried to get you the hard way.” She pressed her hands together and moved the palms against each other. “You can’t stop people from talking, Reilly, and it’s like you used to say: ‘When you’re catching hell, they’re leaving some other poor devil alone.’ Everything’s changed some since you went away, even me. Since Sally and Burk got married, I’ve had to get along the best I can. Burk wants me to sell out the bakery and move in with them, but it wouldn’t work. I’m not sure I’d like it if it did.”
“Where are you living now?”
“Here,” Tess said, and gave him a tight-lipped smile. “Don’t look so shocked, Reilly. I’m a grown woman and I have a gun. There’s a good lock on the door and I put the key under my pillow every night.” She saw that he had finished the pie and patted his arm. “Wait here,” she said and went out the back door. A moment later she came back and opened the door of a small side room. “This is my home now. Make yourself comfortable while I lock the front door. Business was slow anyway.”
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