by L. P. Holmes
Brink Carling stirred restlessly. “You suggest something ugly.”
“What I saw wasn’t pretty,” said Bruce bluntly.
Aunt Lucy came over to them, drying her hands on her apron. She was smiling, but there was a shadow far back in her fine eyes. “How is that wounded arm coming along, Bruce Martell?”
Bruce swung the arm in a circle. “Just like that, ma’am.” He smiled back. “I bless you a dozen times a day.”
She studied him intently, nodded at what she saw, then spoke gravely. “I hope I never have to doctor you for a worse hurt.”
She went back to her washing. Brink Carling said, “You’re going into town?”
“That’s right. Aim to give Pat Donovan a hand in getting things ready to handle the beef we’ll be bringing in.”
“Think it’s wise, with the town upset and angry?”
“Rocking A can’t wait until everybody in the basin loves us. We’ve got things to do.”
“More trouble just now won’t help toward an era of good feeling,” cautioned Carling.
“If trouble comes, it won’t be of our making. We’ve got to be as aggressive about this thing as Spelle is. We can’t let him do all the talking and opinion forming. Somewhere along the line the man has to be called off. Might as well be now as later.”
“When I asked you to drop by this morning,” said Carling, “my idea was to suggest that Rocking A keep out of sight until I and the others who were along last night had time to spread a few truths around. Frankly I intended getting hold of Jason Spelle and enlisting his help. I see now that that wouldn’t have done any good. He won’t listen. It leaves me up in the air.”
Bruce looked at the settler gravely. Here, he realized, was a good, sound man, one whose life had been based on decent living and quiet, sane thinking. There was no violence in him at all, only a deep and abiding dislike of it. He was tolerant of other men and would not see evil in them because he did not want to see it. He was the kind who made up the sound balance in any law-abiding community. But there were many things about evil men and their ways that he did not and never would fully understand.
Bruce turned back to his horse. “Let’s not fool ourselves, Mister Carling. The things that are wrong in this basin will never be corrected by soft talk. All we can do is spread as much truth as possible, and then use whatever other tools we have to get results. Those responsible for the death and robbery of Hendee and Dopkins understand only one language. I know. I’ve met up with their kind before. As you know by this time, the decent settlers have not a thing to fear from the Rocking A. The other kind …” Bruce shrugged.
He looked at Tracy Carling. She had ignored his presence completely. She continued to do so now. But what he could see of her face, as she bent over the steaming washboiler, showed a subdued and troubled moodiness.
As the thump of the black’s hooves faded into the distance, Aunt Lucy moved over to the girl’s side.
“There rides a good man, my dear. You could have given him a smile and a cheerful word. He was hoping for it. I could tell that from the way he looked at you.”
The girl brushed back a wayward lock of her lovely hair with a gesture almost angry. “I still think Jason is right … about everything.”
“I wonder,” murmured Aunt Lucy, moving away. “I wonder if you really do. Blind trust and confidence are worthy at times. They can also be stark foolishness.”
* * * * *
Ezra Banks was not at his camp when Bruce Martell rode through. Which suited Bruce all right, for he had no wish to talk with the gaunt settler just now, nor with anyone else. He was thinking of Tracy Carling and the way she had completely ignored him. He had known real eagerness riding into the Carling camp. After last night he had reason to expect a change in her attitude. Surely her uncle had told her the story that exonerated Rocking A. Which should have changed her mood. But it hadn’t.
Just why, Bruce argued with himself, should he give a damn, anyway? What was the opinion of this settler girl to him? Women had counted for little in his life before. If he was smart, he’d keep it that way. So he told himself savagely.
And knew immediately that there was no good in trying to kid himself. Tracy Carling and her opinion did matter—mightily. It mattered more than he could put in words. He was all twisted up inside. The vision of her shining head was before him, always. It was something that had come on him gradually, but now it had him, hopelessly.
That damned faker, Jason Spelle. He was the one who had filled Tracy Carling’s mind with lies and suspicions. Yes, he could thank Spelle for that. Abruptly Bruce knew exactly what he was going to do. He was going to have a talk with Jason Spelle. It wouldn’t be a pleasant one, but there were going to be some blue chips laid on the table. He urged the black to a faster pace.
Chapter Fifteen
A new day’s business had Starlight stirring and active. This time Bruce did not ride to the back of Donovan’s store and leave his horse there. That sort of thing was done with. From now on all roads and trails were his as much as any other man’s, and he intended claiming his share of them. The street of Starlight was no exception. Bruce tied at the rail in front of the store.
Wagons were rolling up and down the street. Groups of settlers were gathered here and there. Bruce felt their glances and, even at a distance, the weight of their animosity. He gave them back, stare for stare, then went into the store. Pat Donovan and his clerks were bustling and busy, but on catching Bruce’s eye, Donovan jerked his head toward his office and, after Bruce made his way there, soon joined him.
“That fool Spelle,” said Donovan bluntly. “He’s at it with every bit of smooth gab he can rake up. The word is out, of course, about Dopkins, and Spelle is making the most of it. Sam Otten and Pete Martin and Ezra Banks are out about town somewhere, doing what they can to switch the tide of talk, but I’ve no idea what luck they’re having. I had a session with Spelle myself this morning, telling him to be careful of making talk, which last night proved to be a lie. He laughed in my face. Bruce, the man is a rascal … and dangerous.”
Bruce nodded. “I’m having a talk with him myself, with the gloves off. I didn’t want to get rough before, Pat. My first chore was to clear Rocking A in the eyes of at least a few sound men. Now that I’ve done that, I can begin putting the pressure on. Yeah, I’m going looking for Spelle.”
He went out into the street again and along the street. He saw Spelle’s buckboard tied in front of the Land Office, so he turned in there. Cashel Edmunds was busy with a couple of late filers, but soon they went out. Edmunds looked at Bruce stonily.
“Where’s Spelle?” rapped Bruce.
Edmunds shrugged. “I wouldn’t know.”
“I think you do. His buckboard is out front. Where is he?”
Edmunds slapped his counter with an angry hand. “Listen, Martell. In this office—”
“No, you listen, Edmunds. In this office or anywhere else, you rate damned small with me. I saw you tip off that settler to throw the rock that downed Hack Asbell. A coward’s trick. Don’t try and stand tall and straight in front of me. You tipped your hand then. So come down off your high horse. Where’s Spelle?”
Cashel Edmunds tried to hold the impact of Bruce’s hard stare. He wasn’t up to it. He licked his lips and looked away.
“In the Frontier, I think,” he muttered sulkily. “I’m not his keeper.”
Bruce turned, started to leave, then paused. Jason Spelle had just stepped out of the Frontier and was headed for the Land Office. Bruce moved back from the door, waited. Spelle was speaking harshly even as he came to the threshold.
“Listen, Cash. I want you to get hold of—!”
Spelle broke off with a start, squaring swiftly around to face Bruce fully. Bruce grinned mirthlessly.
“You sure take in a lot of space, Spelle. The way you give orders! I thought Edmunds was run
ning this Land Office. Could I have been mistaken?”
Spelle’s pale brown eyes, widening in his first surprise, now pulled to a narrowed guardedness. “What do you want?” he rapped thinly.
“What makes you think I want anything?” Bruce retorted. “Something worrying you?”
“You got a hell of a nerve,” charged Spelle, “after last night. I understand you’re now the foreman of Rocking A. Pretty smooth, what you pulled last night. Holding a little get-together in Donovan’s store … putting on a great show of righteousness, while all the time the rest of your damned crew were out murdering that poor devil, Dopkins. You might have fooled some gullible ones, Martell. But you’re not fooling me.”
“That,” said Bruce, “is something I can hand right back to you, Spelle. You’re fooling a lot of people, but not me. And not several other good men who are beginning to get their eyes open. Matter of fact, I did want something when I came in here. I wanted to see you, so that I could tell you a few things, right in your teeth. First is … that you’re a damned, loose-mouthed liar. Do I make that plain? A lousy, snake-in-the-weeds liar. And I hope you try and make something of it.”
For a brief moment, Bruce thought Spelle would try. He saw the blaze build in the man’s eyes, a blaze that seemed to turn them from brown to a moiling yellow, wild and raging. He saw the ripple of fury run up Spelle, clear from his heels, and he saw Spelle’s taut features pull into a beaked, thin-lipped mask. But it went no further.
“I don’t take the bait, Martell,” burst out Spelle hoarsely. “You’re a gunfighter … just a cheap killer. Even if I carried a gun, which I don’t, I wouldn’t be fool enough to let you badger me into going for it, so you’d have an excuse to shoot me down.”
Bruce’s laugh was taunting. “Now you’re lying again. Why do you always wear a coat, Spelle, in weather that puts other men in their shirtsleeves? I’ll tell you why. Because you do pack a gun, and you got one on now … in a shoulder holster. Let’s see you take your coat off and prove me wrong. If I am, I’ll back out of here on my hands and knees and you can kick me in the teeth all the way.”
Jason Spelle fairly trembled with the rage that gripped him.
Bruce laughed again. “You see, I’m right. Once a liar, always a liar. So that’s one thing I wanted to tell you. Here’s something else. You’ve made it a business to spread a lot of poison talk against the Rocking A, an outfit that has never harmed you personally in any way. Now I’m warning you to lay off. Anything that is truth, Rocking A doesn’t mind being said about it. But your kind of lies is something else again. You spill any more of them, and we make you hard to catch. That’s cold crow, Spelle. Chew on it.”
Bruce waited for Spelle to answer. He’d been rough in this thing, deliberately so and for many reasons. Not the least of these was because of a fair-haired settler girl who had, this very morning, refused to consider that Bruce Martell even existed. And, Bruce told himself savagely, this was something he could thank Jason Spelle for.
Spelle held on to himself. He made no answer. He just stood there, hating Martell venomously. Which told something no sane man could overlook. The fact that Spelle had refused to allow himself to be taunted into a violent move proved the dangerous potential of the man. Spelle might be a liar, but he was no fool.
Bruce backed to the door, paused there a moment. “You know, Spelle,” he said, “I’m a great believer in the idea that what every man does, he does for a purpose. I just can’t believe that your apparent fond concern for every settler in this basin springs from the fact that you’re just overflowing with the milk of human kindness. I’m convinced that you want and expect something out of this deal. It’ll be interesting to find out just what that something is. I expect to find out.”
Bruce moved on through the door, stood watching it from outside for a moment, then started down street.
In the Land Office Jason Spelle began to curse in a low, strangled voice. The bottled-up rage in the man came out of him in an ugly tide. It poured across his writhing lips, it came out of his pores in sliming sweat, and it shook him physically, like some bitter ague.
Cashel Edmunds watched Spelle, mixed emotions mirrored on his face. There was some awe, some contempt, some fear. “That’s doing no good,” he said. “Martell can’t hear you. If he could, you wouldn’t be saying it.”
Spelle whirled on him, and for a moment Edmunds thought the man would come clawing at his throat. He backed away, got the counter between him and Spelle.
“You should talk!” raged Spelle. “Don’t forget, my friend, you’re in this as deep as I am. If I go down, you go down. As for Martell, he’ll be dead inside the next half hour. That’s all provided for. And I can wait that long to laugh!”
Chapter Sixteen
Bruce Martell went back to Donovan’s store, and at sight of him, the storekeeper let out a sigh of relief. “You didn’t find him?”
“I found him. I lathered him pretty heavy. He didn’t rise to the bait. The man’s smart enough to be dangerous, Pat.”
“He’s dangerous, all right,” agreed Donovan. “Any man who can sway a lot of fools, and never loses a chance to do it, is always dangerous.”
Donovan had a broad sheet of paper spread on one end of his counter and was laboriously lettering a rough sign. It read:
starting tomorrow fresh beef will be
for sale in this store.
prices fair and quality guaranteed.
He chewed his tongue as he finished it, and then grinned at Martell. “Want to add anything?”
Martell shook his head. “That says everything.” Hammers were clattering and saws whining out back of the store. Here, in one corner of the big storeroom, a smaller, double-walled room was rapidly taking shape. Four men were working furiously.
“Had ’em at it ever since you first offered the beef deal,” said Donovan. “It won’t be perfect, but it’ll do for the time being. I don’t expect to have to hold any of that beef very long.”
They went outside and put up the sign, Martell holding it in place while Donovan drove tacks. A passing settler stared and spelled out the words with moving lips.
“That mean what it says, Donovan?”
“I ain’t putting the sign up just to decorate the store,” Donovan told him.
“Where you gettin’ that fresh beef?”
“Rocking A. Legitimate beef, too. No slow-elked stuff. Spread the word, friend … there’ll be plenty for everybody.”
“Rockin’ A, huh? Well, now … that’s somethin’ I never expected to see. I’ll tell the missus. She’s been wantin’ some.”
The settler went his way. Martell drawled, “You see, Pat? By the time that hombre gets through talking it over with his wife, neither of ’em will be nearly as mad at Rocking A as they were.”
Bruce started back into the store. Pat, following, glanced along and across the street, thinking that, given time, Starlight would be five times the town it now was, thriving and substantial. And any man who, like one Pat Donovan, had his business roots well set and deep would be fixed for life. It was a good future.
And then all of the genial Irishman’s thoughts seemed to freeze into a solid ball inside his head, for, as his glance came back and ran the length of his store porch, he saw there, at the far corner of the building, a leveled gun. Behind the gun was the arm and shoulder of a man, and behind these, the man’s face. A narrow, malevolent face, still showing the effects of violent contact with a beer bottle. Bully Thorpe’s face.
At the same moment, across the street, some twenty yards between them, two other lank, gangling figures moved into view. One held a ready rifle in his hands, half raised. The other two Thorpes, Dyke and Whip. Pat Donovan did not see these two, which was perhaps as well. Else his voice would certainly have strangled in his throat. As it was, he managed a sharp, breaking cry.
“Martell! Look out!”
When a man had walked much with danger, particularly the kind of danger Bruce Martell had known in the days when he had marshaled towns like Rawhide and Ravensdale, he had reactions to it that were instinctive and flashing fast, both mental and physical. Either he had these, or he did not live long. And Bruce Martell had lived.
A man of slower mind and body, less critically trained, might have paused in some wonderment at Pat Donovan’s warning, and so died, then and there. But with Martell the words were hardly past Donovan’s lips before he was into the store doorway in an explosive, spinning leap. And by so doing, avoided the slug that came within inches of taking the whole back of his head off before gouging a long furrow along the face of the store and showering Pat Donovan with stinging splinters. The hoarse rumble of the gun hit the street like a thunderclap.
Pat Donovan was no coward. Neither was he a fool. He knew when discretion was the better part of valor. This exposed porch was no place for him with no weapon in his hand other than a tack hammer. It was farther to the door than it was to the safe end of the porch. So Pat went the way of the porch in a scuttling, scrambling dive, and landed on his hands and knees on the solid earth beyond.
As Bruce Martell flashed to the temporary safety of the store door he had his gun out, and now he whirled to jam his left shoulder against the shelter of the doorpost, his glance raking the street. He had placed the sound of that first shot, but he couldn’t ignore those two gangling figures across the street, especially the one with the leveled rifle.
The rifle leaped in recoil, snarling. The doorpost shivered under the impact of the bullet, and splinters flew. Something tugged sharply at Martell’s hat. The man behind the rifle came two steps forward, levering in another cartridge.
Martell dropped his gun in line, knowing that the wide width of the street made it a long shot for a belt gun, unless a man took the time to judge his sights and distance carefully. Again Martell’s training stood him in good stead. He took that time, even though Dyke Thorpe’s rifle was settling into line again.