by Треваньян
He became aware of a soft humming behind him… an old Negro spiritual. He turned his head, and Lieder was standing there, his hat in his hand, his head bowed.
Without looking at Lieder, B. J. rose and took another turn, then he gave the spade to Matthew, who had struck shelf-rock from end to end before Frenchy's turn came again. And all the time, Lieder continued to hum in a soft, plaintive voice, his hands folded on the butt of the cocked pistol in his belt. The grave was only a few inches longer than Coots, so it wasn't possible to lower him in gracefully. Matthew stood in the hole with Coots's feet between his boots, while B. J. 's straddled his head. The face had become uncovered in the handling, so B. J. covered it up again, folding the fabric over tenderly. They climbed out and stood on the edge of the grave until B. J. said, "I guess I should…" But then he shook his head miserably. "No words." He pushed the spade into the newly dug earth and stood with it, but he was unable to dump it onto Coots.
Frenchy took the spade from him and led him back to the Livery, leaving Matthew to fill in the grave.
Lieder stopped humming and followed the departing B. J. with his eyes. "Just look at him. That schoolteacher is a broken man. Broken by suffering and loss. You saw how he couldn't even try to take his revenge on me? That poor old man's so full of grief and self-pity that there's no room left for hate. And a man needs hate. Sometime hate's all that keeps us going. Oh, it's all the old fool's own fault, of course, but still…" Lieder shook his head and sucked at his front teeth. "I hate to see a man's innards all scooped out like that. He won't be any good to anybody until the suffering burns itself out, and that'll take a long, long time. And you know what that means, Matthew? It means you're all alone now. You can thank your lucky stars that you and me, we're cut from the same cloth." He chuckled. "Rough old burlap! That's the kind of cloth we were cut from, right? Eh? What do you say?"
Matthew stood stiff and unresponsive, his eyes defocused, not even feeling the hand that Lieder had laid on his shoulder.
"It wasn't my fault that jig tried to back-shoot me, Matthew. I had to punish him. I didn't have any choice. But you can believe me when I tell you that I wish to God it hadn't happened. I didn't want to harm anybody in this sorry excuse for a town. But people just won't leave me alone!"
Matthew didn't respond. His eyes were fixed on the space where Lieder was standing.
"You listening to what I'm telling you, boy?"
Matthew blinked and brought Lieder's face into focus. "I got to bury Coots," he said dryly.
"All right then, you do that. We'll talk about things tomorrow. I've got plans for you, boy. A shining future!" And he left, humming the old spiritual that he found so comforting.
Matthew reached down until the loaded spade almost touched the blanket, because he wanted to sprinkle the dirt softly over the head and shoulders, but it was sodden and clotted, so chunks fell in, making him wince. Only after the head was covered with a thick layer could he shovel in the rest of the pile at a slow, regular rhythm, his eyes calm and distant.
PROFESSOR MURPHY FELT MISERABLE, both drunk and hung over at the same time. He would have swapped his front seat in hell for a chance to lay his throbbing head down… but no! No, they wanted hot baths… those two stupid animals!.. and he had been obliged to fire up the boiler. The big one had soaked himself for half an hour before climbing out and returning to the Traveller's Welcome. But this little one had demanded more hot water. And now he was wallowing in the tub, the rising steam blending with descending mist.
The Professor rolled his bloodshot eyes and wondered how much longer he would have to stay there, waiting for this damned-Now what?
He watched that Dubchek kid-or whatever his name was-step out from the marshal's office and walk toward the barbershop, a six-pointed badge pinned to the breast pocket of his canvas jacket, and that big old shotgun over his shoulder, barrel in his fist, stock in the air.
Tiny had bent his knees until the water was level with his lower lip and he was blowing bubbles across the scummy surface. He looked up to see Matthew standing between his bath barrel and the wheezing boiler. "You still trying to get shed of that old cannon, boy? I already told you that nobody wants no ten-ton antique that don't even have… any… ammu…" His voice trailed off as he saw Matthew cock back the hammer. His eyes flicked over to the chair where the Colt he had taken from that nigger lay on his pile of clothes, then back to Matthew's face. A weary smile bent Matthew's lips, and his eyes looked gently upon Tiny… or rather, upon the place where Tiny was. When he spoke, it was with the soft burr that Mr. Anthony Bradford Chumms had described as "carrying more menace than any angry snarl."
"I'm sorry, Tiny, but there ain't no other way."
Tiny's twisted face started to spread flat, as though he were going to cry. "Ma-a-a?" he pleaded in a curling whine.
The shotgun roared, blowing the barrel staves asunder, and for a fraction of a second the water retained the barrel's shape with Tiny standing in the middle of it, then pink foam blossomed from Tiny's exploded chest and the water dropped away, leaving him standing alone and naked for an instant, before he crumpled dead to the ground.
Matthew's soft gaze climbed slowly from what was left of Tiny to the façade of the hotel while his hands mechanically broke open the gun, clawed out the shell, wet with molten candle wax, took another from his pocket, and thumbed it in.
He snapped the gun shut and walked toward the hotel, his wrists throbbing from the recoil of the shotgun.
Bobby-My-Boy stumbled out through the bat-winged doors, levering a round into his rifle. "What the shit…?"
"… exploded…" Matthew muttered.
"What exploded?"
"The boiler, I guess. Your pal's a mess. All over the place."
Now, that was something Bobby-My-Boy had to see. He pushed past Matthew on his way to the barbershop.
"Hey?" Matthew said.
Bobby-My-Boy turned back. He never heard the shot that took off his head.
Matthew didn't look at the thing that shuddered convulsively on the ground. Again he had been obliged to shoot from the hip, and he had heard his right wrist pop with the wrench of the recoil. It didn't hurt yet, but it was numb, so he had to cradle the gun over his arm while he snatched the hot shell out and pushed another in.
He snapped the gun shut and mounted the steps to the hotel porch. Pressing his back to the weathered wall beside the door, he wet his lips with his tongue and took two long breaths. Lieder was probably in there, covering the door. But where? In his chair against the back wall? Behind the bar? Kneeling on the kitchen steps, aiming up from the floorboards? The shotgun would blow away a three-foot circle at the distance to the back wall, so he didn't have to hit dead center, but there wouldn't be time to put in another shell if he missed. How would the Ringo Kid-? The kitchen screen door slapped shut on its spring stop! Lieder had gone out the back! But which way? Was he slipping behind the abandoned buildings, up toward the tracks and Reverend Hibbard's depot? Or down the other way, down toward the boardinghouse and the Mercantile?
… Or maybe he was inching around the side of the hotel!
Matthew rushed down the steps and rolled in under the hotel porch, where he could look out between the broken skirting slats and survey the street from one end to the other. He wriggled farther back until his shoulders were against the stone foundation. He faced ahead, but his concentration was on the fuzzy peripheral extremes of his field of vision, hoping to catch any motion.
And what if Lieder had slipped back into the hotel and would soon come out onto the porch overhead? Well… well, then he would do what he did in The Ringo Kid Takes a Chance: he'd shoot up through the floorboards. That hadn't been as "square" as meeting a man face to face in the street, but he'd been lying under that porch badly wounded, and a woman's honor was at risk, so there hadn't been any altern- A blur of movement in the corner of his right eye! Lieder dashed across the street and up the steps to the door of the Mercantile, whose spring bell jangled faintly a
s he snatched it open and burst in.
Ruth Lillian!
Matthew rolled out from under the porch and stood up in the middle of the street. What should he do? Quick! What should he do? "Here I am!" he shouted. "It's me you want! I shot your men, and I'm going to shoot you!" As he walked toward the Mercantile, he fired the shotgun into the air to draw Lieder's attention away from Ruth Lillian and toward him. "Here I am!" He opened the gun and scrabbled in his jacket pocket for another shell, but the fingers below his sprained wrist had swollen to tight-skinned claws that fumbled and dropped the shell into the mud. He kept walking toward the Mercantile, changing the gun to a left-handed grip and clumsily pushing in a shell with his right thumb. When he reached the store, he stopped and called, "Come out here!"
"I don't want to hurt you, boy!" Lieder shouted from within. "You're my crowned prince! The future of the movement!"
"Come out here, you yellow son of a bitch!"
"Now you listen, boy! If I come out there, there's only one way things can end. And that would be a terrible waste."
"I'm coming in!"
The door of the Mercantile slapped open, and Ruth Lillian appeared on the threshold. Her neck was twisted awkwardly because Lieder had the fingers of his left hand tightly entwined in her hair and was keeping her in front of him. "No point in this little virgin getting shot, boy! We got better things to do with her, you and me! Now, I admit that when that Swede girl told me about Miss Kane here, I was mighty put out. Trying to keep this nice piece of girl-flesh all to yourself! Shame on you! But then I got to thinking things out and here's the way I see it. I killed your nigger friend, and you got revenge by shooting my followers. I'm willing to call that even-steven. And because I've always had a tender spot in my heart for young love, you can have this little girl all to yourself. What do you say?" He pushed Ruth Lillian out onto the porch and followed her, keeping her back tight against his chest.
Matthew's glance flicked from Lieder's face to Ruth Lillian's. Her eyes shone with tears, and they looked almost oriental, drawn back at the corners by the tightness of Lieder's grip on her hair. Her lips were parted and her teeth stubbornly clenched to keep from crying out at the pain. "What did you do to Mr. Kane?" he asked.
"He ain't hurt all that bad. Well, what do you say, boy? I don't want to kill you, and I know you don't want to shoot holes in this virgin girl. That'd be a terrible waste." He grinned. "Now, this may look like your classic Mexican standoff, but it ain't. It ain't, and you know why? Because I hold all the aces. You're standing there in the open, and I'm here behind this girl's fine young flesh." The grin faded from his lips. His pale gray eyes chilled. "And we both know-we both know-that you are not going to shoot this sweet young girl to get at me." He cocked his pistol. "So what you'd best do is this, Matthew. You'd best just lay that gun down on the ground and step back. And you'd best do it now, right now! 'Cause I'm through talking, boy, and the messy business is going to start a lot sooner than you think."
"You better look at my gun, mister," Matthew said in that softly menacing burr Anthony Bradford Chumms had so often described.
Lieder glanced down. The trigger was depressed, and the only thing keeping the shotgun from firing was the crook of Matthew's thumb holding back the hammer.
"You're right when you say that I could never shoot first," he said quietly. "But I don't have to. You shoot me, and this old gun goes off. And you're dead."
"And this girl's dead too."
"She'd rather be dead than have you messing with her."
"You're… you are crazy, boy." He started to ease back toward the door.
"One… more… inch, and I drop the hammer." The calm fatality of his voice gave Lieder pause. "And you better know something, mister. I hurt my wrists pretty bad shooting your animals, so I can't hold this hammer back much longer."
Lieder looked over his shoulder, estimating the distance between him and the door. Two long strides. Too far. And this girl's little body wouldn't absorb much double-ought at this range. He glared at Matthew, standing there with that silly-assed badge on his chest; holding that stupid gun!
He grinned.
"Well, I'll be damned," he said with a philosophic shake of his head. "I will be god-good'n-damned!" He raised his hand, letting the pistol dangle from his finger in the trigger housing. "You know, I knew it right from the first. Yes sir, the first time I set eyes on you, I knew you had enough grit and smarts to be my right-hand man."
"Let her loose."
"You bet." His grip on her hair slackened, but strands were still entangled in his fingers, so she had to snatch her head away with pain. She stepped toward Matthew.
"Lie down!" he ordered. And she instantly sank to the porch floor.
Lieder's grin widened. "That was smart, boy. You are really something, you know that? You and me, we're going to make-"
"Just let that gun fall off'n your finger!"
"Well now, if you're going to shoot me anyway, I might as well make a fight of it. And if you don't intend to shoot me, well then…" He started to walk slowly forward toward the porch steps.
"You better drop that gun."
"You reckon? Me, I'm not all that sure. And I'll tell you why."
"Don't come any closer!"
"… I'll tell you why, Matthew. If you really meant to shoot me down in cold blood, I'd already be dead. Now, just a bit ago… when you were trying to save this girl from what you call your 'fate worse than death'… you might of shot me then. Yes you might of. But she's safe now-honey, you go back inside and take care of your pa, like a good girl." Ruth Lillian looked up at Matthew for affirmation. He nodded curtly without taking his eyes off Lieder, and she crawled away from between them, then rose and ran into the Mercantile. "There now! Now it's just me and you standing here looking at one another in the eyes, and I don't think you're the kind of person who could shoot a man who's shown you nothing but friendship and respect. A man who-"
"Don't come down those steps!"
"… a man who respects you enough to make you his successor in the great struggle to save these United States of America from-"
"Don't come any closer. I'm warning-!"
"All right! I'm dropping my gun. There she goes, Plop, right into a puddle. Ain't it a crying shame to treat a gun that way? And now here I am, standing in front of you, feeling naked as a jaybird with no gun to protect myself. But that's all right, Matthew. That's all right. And do you know why? Because this little face-off between you and me is already over. It's over, and I've won. I've won because you are confused and uncertain, weary of heart, and broken of spirit, and I have all the control. That's what happens when you stand against a man who can talk the birds down from the trees. At this moment, Matthew, right at this very moment, you're not exactly certain what's happening, are you? You're not even sure what I'm talking about, or why I'm talking this way, but you sense deep down inside that there's something dangerous in it. Well, don't you worry about it, 'cause I couldn't bring myself to hurt you. Look how I'm holding my empty palms out to you, Matthew. A gesture of peace and submission. And the wrath of Jehovah will descend on the man who offers harm to one who comes in peace and supplication." He grinned boyishly. "As you probably recognize, that's from Paul to the Montanans… 7, 13." He laughed, a thin note. "Oh my, now I almost wish you were going to shoot me, because wouldn't it be thrilling for schoolchildren reading my biography to hear how I joked right up to the end? What a man! And you know what? You're going to become quite a man too, Matthew. You and me, side by side. There ain't nothing or no one in the world that can stop us. Now, boy what I'm going to do is reach out and take the shotgun from you. So I suppose if you really intend to let that hammer drop, this is the time to do it." Still smiling, he reached out and grasped the barrel.
But Matthew held tight.
Lieder glared. "I'm taking the gun, boy!"
Matthew shook his head, his teeth clenched. He growled deep in his throat.
Suddenly, Lieder released the gun. "All
right… all right… you win! Keep the goddamn gun! I mean, after all, it has sentimental value, what with being your pa's and all. As for me? Well, I guess there's nothing for me to do but turn around and walk out of Twenty-Mile." He put his fists on his hips and regarded Matthew. "You really are something, boy! Stubborn. Tough. Ornery." He grinned. "Just like me when I was your age." He shook his head and chuckled. "Who'd have thought it, eh? Me, made to back down by a kid! Well… just goes to show." He pressed his temples between his finger and thumb to relieve his throbbing head; then he loosened the braided leather lanyard that he had taken from the prison guard. "Guess I'm getting old, Matthew. I got aches and pains where I didn't even know I had places. And talk about itches! I swear I have provided a meal for every flea in that hotel." He scratched his side, reaching up under his green-and-gold-brocade waistcoat with his thumb and chasing the itch back toward his spine, his teeth bared in a rictus of gratification. "Yes, sir, I guess I'll just have to find me another town with a treasure of precious metal to pay for my militia of pure-blood Americans who will rid this nation of-"
The shotgun blast penetrated his stomach and blew away the pistol he was slipping from his belt behind his back. Blew it away, hand and all. His hips were driven back faster than his head and heels, so his chin snapped down to his chest and his boots left tracks in the mud. He ended sitting with his forehead on his knees against the steps to the Mercantile, which were splattered with soft bits. Whimpering in misery, Matthew clawed the hot shell out and pushed a fresh one in. He fired again, and the lifeless body jumped. He clawed out the hot waxy shell and put another in and fired, and the chest erupted into pulp. He clawed out the shell and pushed one in and fired, and the head swung loose. He clawed out the shell and thumbed in another, then turned and walked up the street.
Jeff Calder had been peeking around the door of the Traveller's Welcome to see what was happening down at the Mercantile, and now he staggered backward to make way for Matthew as he pushed in through the doors, shrugged off the old soldier's congratulatory pat on the shoulder.