“Sounds more like the T-Bar’s hindquarters, Crayfish.”
“That too. My main worry is that my staff will be too weary to perform its duties adequately. We will need alert and ready men to patrol the streets, guard the courthouse and especially rim your jail with stouthearted stalwarts. A week or two upstairs at Rosie’s might gravely weaken my force, but that is a risk to be endured.”
“Some risk,” I said.
“At any rate, Sheriff, the T-Bar posse will be patrolling Doubtful day and night. We will ensure good order at the Sampling Room and other watering holes. We will ensure that no illicit armies of the night sweep into your understaffed jail and attempt to spirit away the prisoner. We will, of course, frisk all visitors to the jail, making sure that lawyers and such don’t smuggle instruments of violence within. And of course we plan to accompany you on your daily rounds. Henceforth, wherever you go, two of my best men will be serving as your deputies, lockstep with you. Two other trusted men will protect Judge Nippers and the courthouse. Nothing will escape their attention.”
“Thanks, Crayfish, but I’ll just handle it all myself. I don’t need your posse.”
He smiled. “Well, your thoughts are noble, and your skills are unquestioned, and your bravery is legendary, but we’re here, and we’re staying, and we’re protecting Doubtful until justice is served, and you’ll find me at Rosie’s henceforth.”
“How about you just get out of town and leave the peacekeeping to those that got a badge?”
He simply smiled. “See you around, fella,” he said.
Well, that was the damnedest thing I ever did see.
He waved his hand, and all them horsemen wheeled around. A pair of them dismounted and posted themselves in front of the jail, two more headed for the courthouse, while the rest hightailed for the livery barn and Rosie’s. I thought the ones ordered to guard my office and jailhouse drew straws and lost. The rest of that bunch was gonna get acquainted with Rosie’s ladies. That was going to be a hell-raising time, but it was legal and there wasn’t anything I should do about it except maybe try not to be envious.
Well, there they were, two ranch hands smiling at me like they was being friends. Only thing was, I sure didn’t know what direction that pair of bores would be pointing toward.
“You ain’t coming in,” I said, and knocked.
Burtell opened a crack, and I slid in and bolted up.
“What was all that?” he asked.
“Crayfish’s calling it a posse. I’m calling it trouble.”
I filled him in on all that. He just stood there and whistled.
“I don’t know what I’m gonna do,” I said. “Crayfish says he’s putting two deputies, that’s what he called them, on me so I can’t go take a leak without a pair of T-Bar rannies tagging along. It sure’s a problem.”
Burtell laughed. “We’ve been had,” he said.
It was time to put my thinking cap on, which was a futile idea. Truth to tell, I didn’t have no idea what to do. The town got took over. That smart-talking bastard was two jumps ahead of me.
Ruble had taken over. I was a prisoner in my own town. If I stepped out the door, there’d be men shadowing me, seeing what I was up to. If I rode out on Critter, there’d be some of Ruble’s hands following me. If I tried to form a real posse from merchants in town, Ruble’s men would scare them off. There were tough men, strong men in Doubtful, men I’d deputize any time, but no match for the gunslicks on Ruble’s payroll. And it looked like this was going to keep right on for almost two weeks.
I decided I’d just keep on doin’ my duty, do my rounds, keep King Bragg secure inside his cell, see to the safety of them workmen when they put up the gallows, and all. And if anyone interfered, someone was gonna eat some lead.
THIRTEEN
Burtell was shuffling through dodgers, them flyers that come in the mail with pictures of wanted men on them. It was one way of beating the boredom.
“Sheriff,” he said, “you seen these?”
He handed me a couple of old dodgers, printed three years ago. They’d been sent up from Colorado. A sheriff down there was looking for a pair of rustlers and holdup men, Foxy and Weasel Ramshorn. I stared real hard at those drawings, and even if the ink was bad, them two fellers did look a lot like Foxy and Weasel Jonas, the pair that were lying out in the cemetery after King Bragg emptied his revolver into them. But it was pretty tough to say these were the same fellers. That was the trouble with dodgers. A few had photographs, but most had bad drawings and bad descriptions, and it wasn’t easy to make any sense of them.
This pair of bad-asses was wanted for rustling, for robbing a Denver and Rio Grande train, and for holding up a Pueblo state bank. They was also wanted for questioning in the death of a rancher down there named Jarred Bobwhite, who was found in four pieces on his front porch after he’d filed charges against them brothers. That happened in Sterling, out on the plains.
“You think that pair of saints is the same pair as got shot here?” Burtell asked.
“Danged if I know,” I said.
They was described as medium height, dark, thin, and Foxy was missing an earlobe. They were considered armed and dangerous, and there was a thousand-dollar reward dead or alive for each one. That interested me some. I was wondering what King Bragg was going to do with two grand.
I took them dodgers back into the jail and found King Bragg pacing.
“These the pair you shot?” I asked.
He shook his head. “Sheriff, I’ve told you twenty times—”
“Yeah, I know. But do these dodgers remind you of anyone?”
He stared. I held them dodgers on my side of the bars, not wanting him to tear them up.
“Yes. Those are Ruble’s men. I’m sure of it.”
“There’s a reward. You applying for it?”
He glared at me, and whirled back to his metal bunk.
“I guess that wasn’t a good question,” I said.
But he wasn’t talking no more, so I let him stew back there. Maybe his old man would get the reward money if it could be proven. Maybe King Bragg did the world a favor, getting rid of them two Ramshorn brothers.
“I guess I better write that sheriff down there, Carl Cable is his name,” I said. I dreaded writing a letter. I’d written only one or two in my life, and now I was stuck with writing another one. But maybe I could get Judge Nippers to do it. Nippers would know how to string all them words together.
But I thought maybe there was something else for me to do first. I stuffed them dodgers into my pocket.
“I’m gonna show these to Crayfish,” I said. “You hold the fort now.”
Burtell nodded. He was piling through more dodgers. Now that he’d discovered something real interesting in that stack, he was hell-bent to find some more. I knew he was looking for a dodger on that other feller King Bragg dispatched, the one called Rocco whose last name no one knew. He was just Rocco and he was cold in the ground.
I let myself out, and Burtell locked up after me. It sure was a fine spring day. Them two hardcases guarding the place for Crayfish nodded, but didn’t follow me. He’d put them there to keep Anchor Ranch men from busting in, and there they stood.
I was pretty sure I knew where to find Crayfish. He’d be upstairs in Rosie’s Parlor House, along with most of his crew. I guess that was as good a place as any if you’re going to take over a town for two weeks. Rosie’s was actually behind Saloon Row, across the alley, and discreetly out of sight for anyone ridin’ into town. You have to give Rosie credit for that. The less visible she was, the better for her business. Her place was another of them board-and-batten buildings that was so common in Doubtful, the kind of structure that can be gotten up fast, and could be ditched without no pain if Doubtful disappeared, the way most Western towns did. So it was just another weathered brown two-story building hidden away. But Rosie was always a little different. She had a big veranda on the front, and a mess of flowers growing in pots there, makin’ the place look
nice. Her front door was enameled bright blue, and had a little eye-hole in it. There was only a couple of windows downstairs, mostly frosted glass to discourage peepers, but there wasn’t much to be peepin’ at downstairs. A bar-room with a piano and red velvet drapes, a nice little parlor with a few stuffed chairs, and a small kitchen. A feller could go in there and have a drink and sort of meet the help, which drifted through there in little gauzy outfits.
There was a big old stairway going upstairs, and maybe eight or ten little cribs there, and Rosie’s suite, which was two rooms nicely furnished. Like most places in Doubtful, you had to slip outside to the crappers behind there on the alley if you had the need. The ladies had one of their own sort of off to the side, in a private fenced yard. Rosie usually had half a dozen ladies engaged in the trade, plus herself and a barkeep and a clean-up boy or girl.
It was sure a fine day, bright warm sun, and I enjoyed my hike over there. There was a mess of geraniums in pots on that porch. I knocked on the blue door, and pretty soon it got opened up by a maid in black, wearin’ a little white apron. She saw my badge, and hesitated.
“I’m just gonna palaver with Crayfish,” I said.
“He doesn’t want to be bothered, Sheriff.”
“Well, I guess I’ll bother him anyway. Where’s he at?”
“Ah, I’m not supposed—well, you could find him in Miss Rosie’s rooms.”
She looked mighty worried.
I smiled. “I’ll just go knock, and I won’t say who steered me there.”
She nodded, looking real worried.
I could see there was a few of the T-Bar Ranch hands lollygaggin’ around in the parlor and the bar, sipping red-eye and looking bored. The girls was leavin’ them alone. They’d likely had their fill, and was just passing time now. There was a few more of them hardcases upstairs. The doors to half them rooms was open, and about every other room had a T-Bar man lying buck naked in there.
I just waved as I passed, and headed toward Rosie’s rooms, which fronted on the street above the veranda. Sure enough, Rosie’s door was shut tight, so I just rapped.
“Whoever you are, beat it,” Rosie yelled.
“It’s your old pal Cotton,” I replied.
“Come back some other time. I got a customer.”
“I got to talk with Crayfish, and right now, Rosie.”
Crayfish answered. “All right, all right, let me get out of the saddle.”
I waited real polite, and finally Crayfish, he just says to come in.
The pair of them was lying side by side on that fourposter bed. They both had their south half covered with a sheet. She sure was pretty, even if she was twice my age. I’d heard she was on the shady side of forty, but except for some little crow’s-feet around her brown eyes, you couldn’t tell. Crayfish, he was just a mess of curly chest hair and arm hair and neck hair not worth a second glance. They was just lounging there, sort of smirky, waiting for me to present my business to them, and enjoying the whole shebang. Me, I was getting annoyed, not knowing how to do my sheriff business with a half-naked gent and lady staring up at me.
“Well?” said Crayfish.
I could hardly keep my eyes off Rosie, but she was just smiling there, enjoying it, waiting for whatever would happen. I had the itch to escape and do my sheriffing some other day, but now that I was there in Rosie’s Parlor House, I thought maybe I’d just get myself together and get her done.
“I come to show you some dodgers,” I said, trying to be dignified, which wasn’t easy.
“Well, you’re interrupting a business conference I’m having with Rosie,” he said.
“I got some sheriff business,” I replied.
“I’m thinking of buying out Rosie. I always wanted my own cathouse,” Crayfish said. “And you’ve got to know the merchandise. It’s called due diligence. I’ve got to know the merchandise backward and forward, from top to bottom.”
I didn’t have no answer to that, so I just swallered hard and sort of got things pulled together in my head.
“I need for you to look at these dodgers,” I said. “We found them in my office. It looks like these two fellers, the Ramshorn brothers, are the same as got kilt by King Bragg. Only here they was using a different name, Jonas. There’s Colorado warrants on them for rustling and a few items like that. I thought maybe you could tell me for sure whether these fellers in the pictures are the same as got kilt in the Last Chance.”
I handed him the dodgers, and Crayfish, he gets out of the bed and fetches his spectacles and has a look.
“I don’t think so,” he said. “Jonas brothers weren’t so dark and skinny, and younger.”
“They got the same first names, Foxy and Weasel.”
“Well, half the drovers I hire have got strange monikers like that. I’ve got a Tiger and a Blue and a Rabbit and a Bullwhip. No, Sheriff, these are not my boys.”
“Let me see,” Rosie said.
Crayfish handed the dodgers to her, and she studied them real good. “They all come in here sooner or later, you know. I see just about every drover and ranch hand in the valley. And I’ve never seen this pair of Ramshorns. But all I can see on these dodgers are the faces, and I hardly ever look at faces.”
She handed the dodgers back.
“I got wind somewhere that the Jonas brothers, they were picking off a steer now and then from you,” I said to Crayfish.
“From me? They were good men. Reliable men. I’ve felt the loss ever since the Bragg boy killed them.”
“You weren’t losing beeves to them?”
“Go talk to my foreman, Plug Parsons. Tell him I sent you. He’s in one of these rooms in here.”
“You’re pretty sure these Ramshorn boys in the dodgers got nothing to do with the Jonas boys?”
He sighed. “You’re interrupting my business conference, Sheriff. I hoped to find out whether to purchase this place.”
I guess there wasn’t much more to ask Crayfish Ruble. Them two was mighty eager for me to get out. The funny thing is, I didn’t believe Crayfish. It was two Colorado rustlers and train robbers we got in the Doubtful cemetery, even if Crayfish wasn’t admitting it. But there wasn’t much I could do about that. If Crayfish wanted some outlaws on his payroll, that was his business. I thought maybe he was using them two outlaws to lift a few beeves off of Admiral Bragg’s pastures. It sure made sense.
They was waiting there for me to get out, but just to be ornery I stuck around a little.
“Sure a sunny day,” I said.
Rosie, she caught me staring at her, and smiled. “I’d enjoy your business, Sheriff,” she said.
Well, I’d enjoy hers, no doubt about it. But right now there was this thing in my head. I wanted to find out whether Crayfish knew about them Jonas boys. In fact there was a heap of stuff I wanted to find out, and maybe I could worm a little out of Sammy Upward, even if he was some put out with me.
“I reckon I’ll let you get back to business,” I said.
Rosie, she winked at me, but Crayfish, he looked like he was just getting mad.
I sort of strolled slow to the door, not wanting them to think I was in any rush to get out of there, and at the door I turned for a last glance, and they was just staring at me. So I got out, and started looking for Plug Parsons to see what he knew about them brothers. He was still around Doubtful after all in spite of what Upward told me. But Plug wasn’t in the parlor house. I tried most every door, interrupting business here and there, but I never did find Plug. I thought he’d give me some straight answers on the Jonas brothers, and maybe he’d have a word or two for me about that other one King Bragg shot, the one called Rocco.
I got out of the parlor house and sucked in some fresh air. Too much perfume in that place. I headed for the Last Chance, hopin’ to find out a little more, and when I walked in, I knew I was real lucky, because standing at the bar and talking with Upward was Plug Parsons himself.
FOURTEEN
It couldn’t be better. There was Plug Parsons,
the foreman, sipping red-eye along with Upward. Plug was the straw boss of the T-Bar, and also was one of the two witnesses that got hauled in to testify about the shooting.
Upward, he glanced at me like he was none too pleased to see me. But he gave me a fake smile.
“What’ll it be? Sarsaparilla?”
“Naw, Sammy, I’ll buy me a shot.”
“You must be off duty, eh?”
“I’m always on duty, Sammy.”
He set a glass in front of me and pushed the bottle toward me. It had been in front of Plug Parsons.
“Good to see you, Plug. Ain’t hardly seen you in town since the trial.”
Plug eyed me a moment, and then shrugged. “We’re here for the hanging,” he said.
I poured two fingers and sipped. That stuff, it was pure firewater, distilled maybe two weeks ago and left to cure maybe two days. That splash, it attacked my teeth, scraped my nostrils, sandpapered my throat, and needled me all over.
“Mighty fine,” I said. “Best sipping whiskey I’ve had in a while. Probably won some gold medals somewheres. Guess I’ll add a splash, Sammy.”
They smirked. Watering down the booze was a sign of being a sissy, but I didn’t care. Let them think I’m a sissy. It actually would give me an advantage if I needed one in a fight. I hardly had a hair on my chest neither. Not like Crayfish, who was the hairiest man I ever did see, with a mat of it all over his chest and arms and neck. I sure was glad I didn’t grow hair like that. Some fellers thought hairy men was meaner and harder than smooth men, but I never thought so. But I’m pretty smooth myself, and don’t need to scrape my face but once every two or three weeks. I like a little stubble anyhow just to keep the wind off my chops.
Upward, he added a little water while Plug got smirky.
“That’ll be an extra two cents for the water,” Upward said.
Plug got pretty tickled about that, and started watching me sip.
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