Broken Star (2006)

by Murphy, Terry

  His clumsy first attempt at drawing his six-gun was a failure that made Walter Randall complain, ‘This is madness, George. Give it up.’

  Ignoring this advice, Harker rehearsed his draw again and again. At last his gun was clearing leather, but in comparison to his old skill it lacked both co-ordination and speed. Without a word, Lin Chua walked to a dresser that held Harker’s clean bandages and medication. She took out a bottle of whiskey and a tumbler, filling it to the rim. Crossing the room in her soft-footed way, she passed the full glass to Harker.

  Raising the glass to his mouth, Harker drank deeply. Pausing for a moment to let the liquor work its magic, he then drained the glass.

  Looking much stronger now, he reached for his gun. This time it was a fast draw, but the men present were only too well aware that what they had witnessed was a shadow of Harker’s former expertise.

  Holstering his gun, the sheriff made his way to the street door. Seeing how dependent Harker was on the support of the broom, Henry Drake made a final plea. ‘Don’t do it, George. I am certain that Vejar is out there somewhere, and he will deal with this.’

  Neither replying nor taking a backward glance, Harker, clinging to the handle of the broom with his left hand, opened the door with his right hand and stepped out into the street.

  Afraid for Mary more than she was for herself, Raya asked, ‘What is going to happen to us, Carmel?’

  ‘My name isn’t Carmel.’

  ‘Sorry. Gloria.’

  Raya had made the name mistake because although the outlaw woman tried to assume a tough, threatening manner, the nice person that Raya had known, albeit briefly, could easily be detected below the surface. Since two of the townwomen had some time ago opened the church door to enquire what was happening in the hall, and Gloria had shouted at them to go back in and shut the door, the three of them had been alone.

  ‘What is going to happen to us?’ Raya tried enquiring once more.

  ‘I don’t want anything to happen to either of you, Raya,’ Gloria confessed.

  Indicating the rifle that the outlaw held in the crook of her right arm, Raya asked, ‘Then why are you holding us captive?’

  Taking some Bull Durham and papers from her shirt pocket, Gloria didn’t respond while she deftly rolled a cigarette. Putting the cigarette in her mouth she flicked a match with a thumbnail to ignite it. Lighting the cigarette, she inhaled deeply, held her breath, and then exhaled a smoky sigh.

  ‘Your lifestyle and mine are very different, Raya,’ she explained quietly. ‘I am an outlaw, and therefore have to rob in order to eat, to live. Unfortunately, you and your friend are a part of our plan to rob the bank, and I am under orders.’

  ‘Orders to do what?’ Raya enquired fearfully, but if Gloria had intended to reply, a fist hammering on the door prevented her from doing so.

  ‘Are you all ready in there if I need you, Gloria?’ a man’s voice shouted.

  ‘I’m ready,’ Gloria called back, then asked with a little tremor in her voice. ‘Has Fallon Vejar shown up?’

  Raya joined Gloria in a suspenseful wait for an answer.

  ‘No,’ the male voice shouted. ‘But what I’d say is Sheriff George Harker has just come out on the street and is heading my way. He’s using a stick to limp along, so he isn’t likely to cause me any bother. But you be ready just in case he doesn’t see sense.’

  Glancing at Raya and Mary, sadness in her eyes, Gloria brought her rifle round in front of her and held it with both hands. Then she called to the man outside. ‘I’ll be ready.’

  Intimidated by Gloria’s stance with her rifle, Raya and Mary reached for and clasped each other’s hands tightly.

  Having got down off the boardwalk into the street with difficulty, George Harker started slowly and painfully across the street. Klugg stood outside the church, his jacket pulled back clear of his holstered gun. Another outlaw stood beside him in the deceptively relaxed stance of a mountain lion about to spring on its prey. The experienced Harker spotted an outlaw who stood holding a rifle up on the flat roof of a building next to the church. The odds were stacked against him, but Harker was undeterred.

  ‘Hold it right there, Sheriff,’ Klugg said, when Harker was in the centre of the street. ‘Where’s Vejar?’

  ‘He’ll be here, Klugg. But right now this is between you and me,’ Harker replied, swaying a little as the effort in crossing the street sapped his already depleted strength.

  Seeing this brought a grin to Klugg’s face. He shifted his hips a little, ready for action, then said quietly, ‘Then I guess you’d better slap leather, Sheriff.’

  ‘This is bad.’

  A grim-faced Walter Randall gave his muttered opinion as he and the others watched from the teashop window. There could be only one ending to what was happening in the street, and it horrified them to think of it. Though unable to hear what was being said, it was plain that the outlaw leader was taunting the courageous sheriff.

  Dr Thurston warned them hoarsely, ‘George Harker is on the verge of collapse.’

  ‘A thousand curses on Vejar for getting us into this position,’ Henry Drake moaned.

  ‘Us?’ Thurston questioned cynically. ‘It’s the sheriff who’s in this position, not us, Henry.’

  ‘No,’ Randall said loudly and resolutely. ‘No, goddammit, it’s time we gave Harker some help.’

  Going to the back of the room, he picked up a shotgun and hurried back to the window. The Chinese couple released an involuntarily duet of squealing as Randall used the butt of the weapon to shatter the windowpane. The doctor and Henry Drake first protested loudly, then begged Randall not to use the gun. Unheeding, he rested the barrel of the shotgun on the bottom of the now glassless window frame and pointed it across the street.

  Everything happened fast from that moment on. Too fast for anyone to take it all in. His damaged body letting him down at last, Sheriff George Harker crumpled on to the dusty street and lay inert. Klugg and the outlaw beside him dropped to the boardwalk and lay flat. With the muzzle of the shotgun menacing them through the broken window across the street, Klugg yelled, ‘Whoever you are, lay down that weapon or face the consequences.’

  Henry Drake pleaded with Randall. ‘You have to do what he says, Walter.’

  ‘Put the gun down, Walter,’ Dr Thurston ordered, but was ignored by Randall.

  Still lying flat, Klugg shot his right leg back to kick the door of the church, calling out, ‘Do it, now!’

  The hysterical screaming of a woman quickly followed the sharp bark of a rifle inside the church. The screaming continued, becoming unearthly as it spiralled higher. It seemed to gain volume in the teashop as it echoed around the room. The white-faced occupants looked at each other in dismay.

  Letting go of the shotgun as he slumped into a sitting position on the floor, Walter Randall groaned, ‘What have I done?’

  ‘You’ve got young Raya Kennedy shot,’ Henry Drake told him accusingly.

  John Thurston silenced them as Klugg started to shout from across the street. ‘You there. If you stay out of this, then nobody else will get hurt.’

  ‘I’m a doctor,’ Thurston called back. ‘The sheriff will die if he’s left lying out there. Will you allow us to bring him in?’

  ‘No. The sheriff got himself where he is, so he’ll have to make his own way back,’ Klugg answered coldly. Then he asked, ‘Where’s Vejar?’

  ‘That’s what we’d like to know,’ Dr Thurston whispered to no one in particular.

  At last succeeding in calming down the distraught Mary Alcott, Raya wiped her friend’s eyes and face with a handkerchief. A sobbing Mary croaked, ‘I thought I was about to die.’

  Raya looked gratefully at Gloria, who had deliberately fired her rifle into the floor. Sensing Raya’s eyes on her, Gloria kept her head turned away as she said, ‘Don’t ride your luck, either of you. That’s probably the last chance I’ll have to do either of you a favour.’

  ‘There was no shooting outside, so I hope th
at George is all right,’ Raya mused anxiously.

  ‘I doubt it,’ Gloria warned, ‘and things are sure to get worse.’ She added worriedly, ‘It would have gone without a hitch had Vejar been here. Do you know where he is, Raya?’

  Raya shook her head. ‘I don’t. I can’t understand it, because Fallon wouldn’t let George Harker down.’

  ‘Fallon isn’t the type to let anyone down,’ Gloria commented softly.

  ‘Do you know him?’ an astonished Raya enquired, surprised to experience a painful stab of jealousy.

  ‘I know him,’ Gloria replied.

  Then she said no more.

  Dismounting at the edge of town when he heard the rifle shot, Vejar continued up the deserted street on foot, keeping in tight to the buildings. There was no sign of any activity at the bank just up ahead. That supported Vejar’s estimation that the sound of the shot had come from further up the street. Guessing that Walter Randall had put the two lads in position inside the bank, he bent over double to avoid being blasted by shotgun pellets as he passed the window.

  To his left, four horses were hitched to a rail close to the church. Recognizing Gloria Malone’s palomino, he knew that the Klugg gang was in town.

  On noticing something odd about the appearance of Wu Chua’s teashop, Vejar backed into a doorway while he studied the place. The movement of a cloud across the sun solved the problem for him by revealing a broken window. Moving out from the doorway, Vejar spotted the figure of a man lying face downwards in the street. Unable to identify the prone figure, he accepted that the danger lay in the vicinity of the Chinese man’s place. His guess was that Randall and the other town councillors had moved into the teashop to be with George Harker when the bank robbers had arrived. There wasn’t a fighting man among them, except for the sheriff, whose gunshot wound had put him out of action. That made the shattered window all the more perturbing.

  Needing to find out the exact situation as soon as possible, he ran across the street. Turning into an alleyway, he made his way to the back of Wu Chua’s premises. Reaching the high fence of the back yard, he stretched his arms upward to grasp the top of the wooden fence, and pulled himself up.

  ‘The town’s wide open,’ a pleased Klugg commented to Mitchell Staley. ‘The sheriff’s lying over there in the dust. Vejar isn’t going to show now. He has abandoned his own people, and those old-timers across the street won’t cause us no more bother.’

  ‘So we move on the bank now?’ Staley, who had been growing impatient at the delay, said hopefully.

  ‘I’ll get Jack down from the roof and we’ll go—’ Klugg shut off in mid-sentence as Jack shouted down from his rooftop position.

  ‘Klugg,’ Jack yelled. ‘Vejar’s just climbed over the back fence of that place across the street.’

  Tanned face instantly losing its pleased expression, Klugg called back ‘Are you sure, Jack?’

  ‘I’m sure.’

  ‘I guess this changes everything,’ Mitchell Staley said. Though made fearless by the harsh life he had led, he found himself longing right then to be anywhere other than in the town of Yancey.

  *

  Vejar’s jaw muscles clenched as he listened to the three councillors. Desperately worried at hearing that Klugg held Raya hostage, he was badly shaken when John Thurston added that they had good reason to believe that she had already been killed.

  ‘You can’t be certain of that,’ Vejar argued, in an attempt at giving himself hope.

  ‘There was a shot and a woman screamed,’ Henry Drake explained.

  ‘So, what are we to do, Vejar?’ enquired Walter Randall, having largely recovered from his distress at causing what was probably a fatal incident. ‘Klugg and one of his men are over there outside of the church, and there’s another man with a rifle up on Mortimer’s flat roof.’

  That meant it was Gloria Malone inside the church. Hopeful for a moment that the opportunity might present itself for him to talk to Gloria, Vejar dismissed the idea. She was an outlaw robbing a bank, and would not be dissuaded from her purpose.

  He answered Randall. ‘The first thing is to get George in off the street to see if there’s anything the doc can do for him. Henry, will you come out with Walter to carry the sheriff back in?’

  Swallowing hard, Henry Drake said, ‘Of course I will, but aren’t we likely to be gunned down once we step out of the door?’

  Not replying, Vejar went to the window. Keeping to one side, he called out. ‘Klugg, this is Fallon Vejar.’

  ‘So, you showed up at last,’ Klugg shouted back.

  ‘I’m coming out, Ken, and bringing two men with me to take Sheriff Harker back inside.’

  ‘Seeing that it’s you, Fallon, I’ll agree to that. But none of your tricks. Your compadres have already forced me to have one hostage shot. It won’t bother me none if you make it so’s we have to shoot the second one. The way I hear it as far as you’re concerned, we’ve kept the important one until last.’

  Learning that Raya was still alive was cold comfort for Vejar in this situation. Any attempt to thwart Klugg’s determination to rob the bank would result in him killing Raya without a second thought.

  ‘We’re coming out,’ he told Klugg.

  ‘Then you keep your hands on your head at all times, Vejar.’

  Doing as Klugg had ordered, Vejar came out of the teashop with Randall and Drake following behind him nervously. Thurston overtook all three of them to reach George Harker and kneel down beside him. After a swift examination, the doctor called to Vejar and the others. ‘He’s alive, but we need to get him inside.’

  ‘Pick him up,’ Vejar told Randall and Drake.

  Struggling with the weight of the heavily built sheriff, the two councillors got him off the ground and Vejar followed as they headed back to the teashop. He halted and slowly turned when Klugg called his name.

  ‘Vejar.’

  Silently waiting, Vejar stared coldly at Klugg.

  ‘I’ll tell you how it’s going to be, Fallon,’ Klugg began. ‘We came into town to hit the bank, and that’s what we’re going to do. You go on back inside. There must be no interference, or that girl in there will die. You understand?’

  ‘I understand,’ Vejar conceded. ‘I won’t risk the girl’s life. But there are two boys armed with shotguns inside the bank. They don’t deserve to die, Ken.’

  ‘Then they shouldn’t have volunteered,’ Klugg replied unfeelingly.

  Lowering his hands to his sides, Vejar said, ‘Then you and me better settle it here and now.’

  ‘Put your hands back on your head,’ an apprehensive Klugg shouted.

  Ignoring the order, Vejar’s right hand hovered above the handle of his holstered gun. He said calmly, ‘This is showdown time, Ken. Either you let me get those two lads safely out of the bank, or you make your play right here and now.’

  ‘You don’t stand a chance, Fallon. If you get lucky and beat me to the draw, Mitch and Jack will fill you with lead.’

  ‘That’s not your way,’ Vejar said, shaking his head. ‘You’re too proud a man for that to happen, Ken.’

  Spreading both hands wide, palms up, in a gesture of resignation, Klugg said, ‘I guess you’re right. Anyway, I’d prefer not to face a couple of scatterguns. Go back inside and leave your gun, then I’ll go with you while you talk those two kids into giving up their weapons.’

  TEN

  Cautiously staying back and to one side of the bank’s door, Vejar called, ‘This is Fallon Vejar. Can you hear me, Jonathan?’

  With Klugg beside him, Vejar waited for a response. Mitchell Staley and Jack had remained outside the church. The empty street had a tense and menacing atmosphere. The three councillors had been against Vejar’s plan for the two lads to give up their shotguns, seeing it as abject surrender to the outlaws. But a rapidly recovering George Harker had agreed with Vejar. They could no more gamble with the lives of the two boys than they could risk Raya’s life.

  Urged by an impatient Klugg, Vejar called o
nce more, ‘Jonathan.’

  ‘I can hear you.’

  ‘I want you and Len to open the door just far enough to throw out your shotguns.’

  ‘Why should we do that?’ Jonathan enquired in a quavering voice.

  ‘Because that’s what I want you to do.’

  ‘How do I know that you are who you say you are?’

  Then Hiram Anstey’s voice came from inside of the bank. ‘I recognize your voice, Vejar, but I won’t leave my bank undefended.’

  ‘No amount of money is worth the lives of those young lads, Hiram,’ Vejar called.

  ‘While they have their guns we still have a chance,’ Anstey argued.

  Exasperated by the delay, Klugg beckoned to Staley and Jack. The two outlaws came hurrying down the street as Vejar tried to negotiate with Jonathan instead of Anstey.

  ‘Jonathan, you and Len will both die very soon if you hold on to your weapons.’

  No immediate answer was forthcoming, but then Jonathan said, ‘Mr Anstey says that Uncle Walter would want me to keep the gun and help save the bank.’

  ‘What’s happening now?’ Henry Drake asked anxiously.

  At the window, Sheriff George Harker reported, ‘The two outlaws who were standing across the street have moved off to the bank. That gives me the chance to go over to the church.’

  ‘Vejar will have a free hand without Raya to worry about,’ Harker said, as he stepped out of the door.

  He planned to go in the door at the rear of the church and surprise the woman outlaw who, according to Vejar, was an expert with a gun. But he would need to be careful not to put Raya or anyone else in more danger.

  Reaching the side of the church, he made his way down to the rear of the building. Inside, he raised a hand for quiet. The threat of violence seemed to have awoken something primitive in the crowd of females. He asked them to stay calm. Making his way to the door into the hall, Harker didn’t risk turning the handle. Drawing his gun he kicked the door open.