Gomer’s face whitened, and his eyes shifted.
“You’ve got no call to start trouble!” he said. “I’m doin’ my duty.”
“Let it ride,” Caradec told Tex. “There’s plenty of time.”
“Yeah,” Tex drawled, his hard eyes on Gomer, “but just for luck I’m goin’ to mount and trail you into town, keepin’ to the hills. If that bunch of Shute riders gets fancy, I’m goin’ to get myself a sheriff, and”—his eyes shifted—“maybe another hombre.”
“Is that a threat?” Barkow asked contemptuously. “Talk is cheap.”
“Want to see how cheap?” Tex prodded. His eyes were ugly and he was itching for a fight. It showed in every line of him. “Want me to make it expensive?”
Bruce Barkow was no fool. He had not seen Tex Brisco in action, yet there was something chill and deadly about the tall Texan. Barkow shrugged.
“We came here to enforce the law. Is this resistance, Caradec?”
“No,” Rafe said. “Let’s go.”
The three men turned their horses and walked them down the trail toward Long Valley. Tex Brisco threw a saddle on his horse and mounted. Glancing back, Pod Gomer saw the Texan turn his horse up a trail into the trees. He swore viciously.
____________
CARADEC SAT HIS horse easily. The trouble would not come now. He was quite sure the plan had been to get him away and then claim the Shute riders had taken him from the law. Yet he was as sure it would not come to that now. Pod Gomer would know that Brisco’s Winchester was within range. Also, Rafe was still wearing his guns.
Rafe rode warily, lagging a trifle behind the sheriff. He glanced at Barkow, but the rancher’s face was expressionless. Ahead of them, in a tight bunch, waited the Shute riders.
The first he recognized were the Blazers. There was another man, known as Joe Gorman, whom he also recognized. Red Blazer started forward abruptly.
“He come, did he?” he shouted. “Now we’ll show him!”
“Get back!” Gomer ordered sharply.
“Huh?” Red glared at Gomer. “Who says I’ll get back! I’m stringin’ this hombre to the first tree we get to!”
“You stay back!” Gomer ordered. “We’re takin’ this man in for trial!”
Red Blazer laughed. “Come on, boys!” he yelled. “Let’s hang the skunk!”
“I wouldn’t, Red,” Rafe Caradec said calmly. “You’ve overlooked somethin’. I’m wearin’ my guns. Are you faster than Trigger Boyne?”
Blazer jerked his horse’s head around, his face pale but furious.
“Hey!” he yelled. “What the devil is this? I thought—”
“That you’d have an easy time of it?” Rafe shoved the black horse between Gomer and Barkow, pushing ahead of them. He rode right up to Blazer and let the big black shove into the other horse. “Well, get this Blazer! Any time you kill me you’ll do it with a gun in your hand, savvy? You’re nothin’ but a lot of lynch-crazy coyotes! Try it, cuss it! Try it now, and I’ll blow you out of that saddle so full of lead you’ll sink a foot into the ground!”
Rafe’s eyes swept the crowd.
“Think this is a joke? That goes for any of you! And as for Gomer, he knows that if you hombres want any trouble, he gets it, too! There’s a man up in the hills with a Winchester, and if you don’t think he can empty saddles, start somethin’. That Winchester carries sixteen shots, and I’ve seen him empty it and get that many rabbits! I’m packing two guns. I’m askin’ you now, so if you want any of what I’ve got, start the ball rollin’. Maybe you’d get me, but I’m tellin’ you there’ll be more dead men around here than you can shake a stick at!”
Joe Gorman spoke quickly. “Watch it, boys! There is an hombre up on the mountain with a rifle! I see him!”
“What the blue blazes is this?” Red Blazer repeated.
“The fun’s over,” Rafe replied shortly. “You might as well head for home and tell Dan Shute to kill his own wolves. I’m wearin’ my guns and I’m goin’ to keep ’em. I’ll stand trial, but you know and I know that Bonaro got what he was askin’ for.” Caradec turned his eyes on Blazer. “As for you, stay out of my sight! You’re too blasted willin’ to throw your hemp over a man you think is helpless! I don’t like skunks and never did!”
“You can’t call me a skunk!” Blazer bellowed.
Rafe stared at him. “I just did,” he said calmly.
CHAPTER X
The Trial
For a full minute their eyes held. Rafe’s hand was on his thigh within inches of his gun. If it came to gunplay now, he would be killed, but Blazer and Barkow would go down, too, and there would be others. He had not exaggerated when he spoke of Tex Brisco’s rifle shooting. The man was a wizard with the gun.
Red Blazer was trapped. White to the lips, he stared at Rafe and could see cold, certain death looking back at him. He could stand it no longer.
“Why don’t some of you do somethin’?” he bellowed.
Joe Gorman spat. “You done the talkin’, Red.”
“Tarnation with it!”
Blazer swung his horse around, touched spurs to the animal, and raced off at top speed.
Bruce Barkow’s hand hovered close to his gun. A quick draw, a shot, and the man would be dead. Just like that. His lips tightened, and his elbow crooked. Gomer grabbed his wrist.
“Don’t Bruce! Don’t! That hombre up there.…Look!”
Barkow’s head swung. Brisco was in plain sight, his rifle resting over the limb of a tree. At that distance, he could not miss. Yet he was beyond pistol range, and while some of the riders had rifles, they were out in the open without a bit of cover.
Barkow jerked his arm away and turned his horse toward town. Rafe turned the black and rode beside him. He said nothing, but Barkow was seething at the big man’s obvious contempt.
Rafe Caradec had outfaced the lot of them. He had made them look fools. Yet Barkow remembered as well as each of the riders remembered that Rafe had fired but three shots in the street battle, that all the shots had scored, and that two men had died.
When the cavalcade reached the National, Rafe turned to Pod Gomer.
“Get your court goin’,” he said calmly. “We’ll have this trial now.”
“Listen here!” Gomer burst out, infuriated. “You can do things like that too often! We’ll have our court when we get blamed good and ready!”
“No,” Rafe said, “you’ll hold court this afternoon—now. You haven’t got any calendar to interfere. I have business to attend to that can’t wait, and I won’t. You’ll have your trial today, or I’ll leave and you can come and get me.”
“Who you tellin’ what to do?” Gomer said angrily. “I’ll have you know—”
“Then you tell him, Barkow. Or does he take his orders from Shute? Call that judge of yours and let’s get this over.”
Bruce Barkow’s lips tightened. He could see that Gene Baker and Ann Rodney were standing in the doorway of the store, listening.
“All right,” Barkow said savagely. “Call him down here.”
Not much later Judge Roy Gargan walked into the stage station and looked around. He was a tall, slightly stooped man with a lean, hangdog face and round eyes. He walked up to the table and sat down in the chair behind it. Bruce Barkow took a chair to one side, where he could see the judge.
Noting the move, Rafe Caradec sat down where both men were visible. Barkow, nettled, shifted his chair irritably. He glanced up and saw Ann Rodney come in, accompanied by Baker and Pat Higley. He scowled again. Why couldn’t they stay out of this?
Slowly, the hangers-on around town filed in. Joe Benson came in and sat down close to Barkow. They exchanged looks. Benson’s questioning glance made Barkow furious. If they wanted so much done, why didn’t someone do something besides him?
“I’ll watch from here,” drawled a voice.
Barkow’s head came up. Standing in the window behind and to the right of the judge was Tex Brisco. At the same instant Barkow noted him, the Texan lift
ed a hand.
“Hi, Johnny! Glad to see yuh!”
Bruce Barkow’s face went hard. He saw Johnny Gill and, beside him, Bo Marsh. If anything rusty was pulled in this courtroom the place would be a shambles. Maybe Dan Shute was right, after all. If they were going to be crooked, why not drygulch the fellow and get it over? All Barkow’s carefully worked out plans to get Caradec had failed.
There had been three good chances: resistance, which would warrant killing in attempting an arrest; attempted escape, if he so much as made a wrong move; and lynching by the Shute riders. At every point they had been out-guessed.
____________
JUDGE GARGAN SLAMMED a six-shooter on the table.
“Order!” he proclaimed. “Court’s in session! Reckon I’ll appoint a jury. Six men will do. I’ll have Joe Benson, Tom Blazer, Sam Mawson, Doc Otto, and—”
“Joe Benson’s not eligible,” Caradec interrupted.
Gargan frowned. “Who’s runnin’ this court?”
“Supposedly,” Rafe said quietly, “the law. Supposedly, the interests of justice. Joe Benson was a witness to the shootin’, so he’ll be called on to give testimony.”
“Who you tellin’ how to run this court?” Gargan demanded belligerently.
“Don’t the defendant even have a chance to defend himself?” Caradec asked gently. He glanced around at the crowd. “I think you’ll all agree that a man on trial for his life should have a chance to defend himself, that he should be allowed to call and question witnesses, and that he should have an attorney. But since the court hasn’t provided an attorney, and because I want to, I’ll act for myself. Now”—he looked around—“the judge picked three members of the jury. I’d like to pick out three more. I’d like Pat Higley, Gene Baker, and Ann Rodney as members of the jury.”
“What?” Gargan roared. “I’ll have no woman settin’ on no jury in my court! Why, of all the—”
Rafe said smoothly, “It kind of looks like your honor does not know the law in Wyomin’. By an act approved in December eighteen sixty-nine, the first territorial legislature granted equal rights to women. Women served on juries in Laramie in eighteen seventy, and one was servin’ as justice of the peace that year.”
Gargan swallowed and looked uncomfortable. Barkow sat up and started to say something, but before he could open his mouth, Caradec was speaking again.
“As I understand, the attorney for the state and the defense attorney usually select a jury. As the court has taken it upon himself to appoint a jury, I was just suggestin’ the names of three reputable citizens I respect. I’m sure none of these three can be considered friends of mine, sorry as I am to say it.
“Of course,” he added, “if the court objects to these three people—if there’s somethin’ about their characters I don’t know, or if they are not good citizens, then I take back my suggestion.” He turned to look at Bruce Barkow. “Or maybe Mr. Barkow objects to Ann Rodney servin’ on the jury?”
Barkow sat up, flushing. Suddenly, he was burning with rage. This whole thing had got out of hand. What had happened to bring this about? He was acutely conscious that Ann was staring at him, her eyes wide, a flush mounting in her cheeks at his hesitation.
“No!” he said violently. “No, of course not. Let her sit, but let’s get this business started.”
Pod Gomer was slumped in his chair, watching cynically. His eyes shifted to Barkow with a faintly curious expression. The planner and schemer had missed out on this trial. It had been his idea to condemn the man in public and then see to it that he was hanged.
“You’re actin’ as prosecutin’ attorney?” Gargan asked Barkow.
The rancher got to his feet, cursing the thought that had given rise to this situation. That Rafe Caradec had won the first round he was unpleasantly aware. Somehow they had never contemplated any trouble on the score of the jury. In the few trials held thus far the judge had appointed the jury and there had been no complaint. All the cases had gone off as planned.
“Your honor,” he began, “and lady and gentlemen of the jury. You all know none of us here are lawyers. This court is bein’ held only so’s we can keep law and order in this community, and that’s the way it will be till the county is organized. This prisoner was in a gunfight with Lemuel Boyne, known as Trigger. Boyne challenged him—some of you know the reason for that—and Caradec accepted. In the fight out in the street, Caradec shot Boyne and killed him.
“In almost the same instant, he lifted his gun and shot Gee Bonaro, who was innocently watchin’ the battle from his window. If a thing like this isn’t punished, any gunfighter is apt to shoot anybody he don’t like at any time, and nothin’ done about it. We’ve all heard that Caradec claims Bonaro had a rifle and was about to shoot at him, which was a plumb good excuse, but a right weak one. We know this Caradec had words with Bonaro at the Emporium and almost got into a fight then and there. I say Caradec is guilty of murder in the first degree and should be hung.”
____________
BARKOW TURNED HIS head and motioned to Red Blazer.
“Red, you get up there and tell the jury what you know.”
Red strode up to the chair that was doing duty for a witness stand and slouched down in the seat. He was unshaven, and his hair was uncombed. He sprawled his legs out and stuck his thumbs in his belt. He rolled his quid in his jaws and spat.
“I seen this here Caradec shoot Boyne,” he said, “then he ups with his pistol and cut down on Bonaro, who was a-standin’ in the window, just a-lookin’.”
“Did Bonaro make any threatenin’ moves toward Caradec?”
“Him?” Red’s eyes opened wide. “Shucks, no. Gee was just a-standin’ there. Caradec was afraid of him an’ seen a chance to kill him and get plumb away.”
Rafe looked thoughtfully at Barkow. “Is the fact that the witness was not sworn in the regular way in this court? Or is his conscience delicate on the subject of perjury?”
“Huh?” Blazer sat up. “What’d he say?”
Barkow flushed. “It hasn’t usually been the way here, but—”
“Swear him in,” Caradec said calmly, “and have him say under oath what he’s just said.”
He waited until this was done, and then as Red started to get up Rafe motioned him back.
“I’ve got a few questions,” he said.
“Huh?” Red demanded belligerently. “I don’t have to answer no more questions.”
“Yes, you do.” Rafe’s voice was quiet. “Get back on that witness stand!”
“Do I have to?” Blazer demanded of Barkow, who nodded.
If there had been any easy way out, he would have taken it, but there was none. He was beginning to look at Rafe Caradec with new eyes.
Rafe got up and walked over to the jury.
“Lady and gentlemen,” he said, “none of you know me well. None of us, as Barkow said, know much about how court business should be handled. All we want to do is get at the truth. I know that all of you here are busy men. You’re willin’ and anxious to help along justice and the beginnin’s of law hereabouts, and all of you’re honest men. You want to do the right thing. Red Blazer has just testified that I shot a man who was makin’ no threatenin’ moves, that Bonaro was standing in a window, just watching.”
Caradec turned around and looked at Blazer thoughtfully. He walked over to him, squatted on his haunches, and peered into his eyes, shifting first to one side and then the other. Red Blazer’s face flamed.
“What’s the matter?” he blared. “You gone crazy?”
“No,” Caradec said. “Just lookin’ at your eyes. I was just curious to see what kind of eyes a man had who could see through a shingle room and a ceilin’.”
“Huh?” Blazer glared.
The jury sat up, and Barkow’s eyes narrowed. The courtroom crowd leaned forward.
“Why, Red, you must have forgot,” Rafe said. “You were in the National when I killed Boyne. You was standin’ behind Joe Benson. You were the first person I saw when I
looked around. You could see me, and you could see Boyne—but you couldn’t see the second-story window across the street!”
Somebody whooped, and Pat Higley grinned.
“I reckon he’s right,” Pat said coolly. “I was standin’ right alongside of Red.”
“That’s right!” somebody from back in the courtroom shouted. “Blazer tried to duck out without payin’ for his drink, and Joe Benson stopped him!”
Everybody laughed, and Blazer turned fiery red, glaring back into the room to see who the speaker was, and not finding him.
Rafe turned to Barkow and smiled.
“Have you got another witness?”
CHAPTER XI
Case Dismissed
Despite herself, Ann Rodney found herself admiring Rafe Caradec’s composure, his easy manner. Her curiosity was stirred. What manner of man was he? Where was he from? What background had he? Was he only a wanderer, or was he something more, different? His language, aside from his characteristic Texas drawl, and his manner, spoke of refinement, yet she knew of his gun skill as exhibited in the Boyne fight.
“Tom Blazer’s my next witness,” Barkow said. “Swear him in.”
Tom Blazer, a hulking redhead even bigger than Red, took the stand. Animosity glared from his eyes.
“Did you see the shootin’?” Barkow asked.
“You’re darned right I did!” Tom declared, staring at Rafe. “I seen it, and I wasn’t inside no saloon! I was right out in the street!”
“Was Bonaro where you could see him?”
“He sure was!”
“Did he make any threatenin’ moves?”
“Not any!”
“Did he lift a gun?”
“He sure didn’t!”
“Did he make any move that would give an idea he was goin’ to shoot?”
“Nope. Not any.” As Tom Blazer answered each question he glared triumphantly at Caradec.
Barkow turned to the jury. “Well, there you are. I think that’s enough evidence. I think—”
“Let’s hear Caradec ask his questions,” Pat Higley said. “I want both sides of this yarn.”
Rafe got up and walked over to Tom Blazer. Then he looked at the judge.
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