by Lauran Paine
“Where’s your paw, Miss Judy?”
“He left a few minutes ago, Sheriff. He went to talk to the Kings.”
Bannion’s tightness began to atrophy. He sighed and leaned upon the wall saying: “You talked to him?”
“Yes. He wanted to hear the story from the Kings, about how they brought me back to town.” Judy smiled. “I think your troubles are over, Sheriff Bannion.”
“I sure hope so,” Bannion responded. “I sure hope so. Well, I’ll go see my prisoners.”
Judy’s level dark gaze twinkled. “Did you arrest them...really, Sheriff?”
“Well, sort of. I made them promise not to leave their room.”
Judy’s twinkle softened. She was quiet for a moment, putting a sentence together, then finally said: “Maybe Ray could come see me. I mean, as you said, I should thank him, shouldn’t I?”
“Oh,” Bannion answered at once, “of course you should, Miss Judy. That’d only be good manners.”
“Uh...you could tell him, Sheriff?”
Without showing anything on his face, Bannion made a little gallant bow. “It’d be my pleasure,” he answered, and left the room. Outside the door, Bannion stood still for a minute, letting an understanding small smile form around his lips. Then he went forward where his five deputized range men loafed before the door of the room of the King brothers.
As Bannion came up, the roughest-looking of those deputies cocked an eye at him. “Say, Sheriff,” he said in a lazy drawl, “why didn’t you tell us them fellers inside were the same ones who shot McAfee?”
“What’s the difference? You agreed to do a job, didn’t you?”
“Yeah, we agreed. And we’re doin’ it. Only John Rockland come a-stormin’ up here a little bit ago, an’ when we refused to let him in, he exploded.”
“Exploded?”
“Yeah. He said regardless of what the Kings done for his daughter they were cowards to hire men to guard them.”
“You told him I put you here, didn’t you?”
The cowboy shrugged. “He never give us that chance. He went stormin’ along the hallway like we’d personally insulted him.”
“I just came up,” Bannion said, “and I didn’t meet him.”
“He went along to the rear staircase and down the back way, Sheriff.”
Bannion whirled, went trotting to the yonder stairs, and descended them two at a time. He passed hurriedly across the lobby and hit the sidewalk just in time to hear Rockland and his Texas Star riders go rushing northward out of town.
Bannion was standing there, his expression congealing with anger, when the doctor came strolling along on his way upstairs.
He said: “Doyle, this world’s full of men who operate on snap judgments. I just saw John Rockland ride past at a lope and his face was all red with what looked to me like indignation.”
“He,” Bannion pronounced shortly, “is a big damned fool.”
“Oh,” the doctor agreed, “you’d never get an argument from me on that score. But I’ve often wondered how long it would be before John Rockland got his humbling.”
“Did you now,” Bannion said, turning his wrathful look upon the medical man. “Well, let me tell you something...he won’t get it in my town, if I can prevent it. And that, Doctor, is a fact!”
The medical man shot his rheumy eyes up the roadway. He pursed his lips, and after a time he said: “Doyle, you’re a good man. But the good men in this world rarely win...unless they happen to be the strong men, also.” He lowered his gaze. “And there’s something odd about strength...whether it derives from wealth or plain power, it corrupts the good men. Now John Rockland’s had wealth and power a long time, Doyle. He’s not a bad man, really, but power has corrupted him. If I were in your boots, I’d just stand aside a little and let him get his humbling. It just might make a human being out of him again. Hell, I’ve a notion to get together a posse and go after Rockland myself.”
“Go take care of your confounded patients,” Bannion growled, and he stood, waiting until the doctor had gone into the hotel before making some very grisly statements under his breath. He then struck out for the telegraph office.
The telegrapher was a stolid, middle-aged man imbued with great dignity, great esteem for himself as Perdition Wells’ keeper of the talking wire. His ethics were unimpeachable, his sense of duty was unassailable, and his mind was as hidebound and narrow and tight as the minds of transplanted New Englanders usually are. He viewed Sheriff Bannion askance as the lawman burst into his office, continued at his work the prescribed amount of time so that Bannion would be properly impressed, then he eased back in his chair and peered upward from beneath a green eye-shade.
Bannion said bluntly: “I want to see every telegram John Rockland has sent from here in the past week.”
The telegrapher sat on, saying nothing and firming up his look of outrage. “Messages are confidential information, Sheriff. No one has the right to....”
“Mister, you dig those telegrams out right damned now or I’ll come around this counter and get them myself.”
The telegrapher’s neck turned turkey red. He clenched a pale fist and glared. “Without a court order you wouldn’t dare,” he said, and started to get up. A sharp little snippet of sound froze him in mid-motion. He was looking head-on into the solitary black, eyeless socket of Bannion’s cocked six-gun.
“I’ll count to three,” Bannion warned, and pushed his gun over the counter. “One...two....”
Angrily the telegrapher began to sort through the pale yellow slips of paper. He put aside three messages as he came to them. “Here,” he said, choking with indignation. “My home office will hear about this, Sheriff. By God, no man can....”
“Shut up,” Bannion snarled. Then he holstered his weapon and placed the copies of the telegrams side-by-side. “One to someone named Brady Elam at the Porter House over in Round Rock. One to a man named Butch Hobart at the same address, and a third one to a man named Hodge Fuller at Flat Rock.” Bannion looked up. “Same messages in each case. ‘Come at once. Two thousand dollars your pay.’ They’re all signed by Rockland.” He looked steadily at the telegrapher. For several minutes neither man said a word.
Then Bannion repeated those names: “Elam, Hobart, Fuller.” He pushed the telegram copies away. “Thanks,” he said with hard irony. “Now you go ahead and wire your head office, if you like. Tell them you’re a party to planned murder, too. Those three men are professional gunfighters John Rockland is bringing here to kill four men.”
Bannion left the office.
Behind him the telegrapher sat staring. Then he rose up, leaned upon the counter, and studied each of the three wires he had sent. After that he sank back down in his chair and thought over what had happened. He decided not to forward any complaint against Sheriff Bannion after all.
Bannion went to his office, heated water on his iron stove to shave himself. After he was finished, he sat for a long time smoking at his desk. He kept thinking over what the doctor had said about John Rockland needing a humbling. Bannion had considered getting together a posse and riding to Texas Star to arrest Rockland. He considered this very seriously.
What deterred him was the realization that in his absence Rockland’s hired killers would arrive in Perdition Wells. They’d had ample time to get here, even allowing for the delay no doubt caused by the Santa Ana.
Bannion also considered going to see Rockland alone, of telling Rockland exactly what he thought of a man who would deliberately prosecute his vendetta even after the men he was angry at had saved his daughter’s life.
But again, that idea involved leaving town since Rockland and his men had headed back to the Texas Star. So Bannion sat there, thinking fierce thoughts that were slowly coming to a steady boil, while around him in the night Perdition Wells, considering the recent windstorm its only threat, celebrated its passing wit
h excessive exuberance at the saloons and dance halls.
Bannion looked at his watch, made himself a cup of coffee, and decided he would, after a while, go over and join his deputies outside the hotel room of the King brothers.
He had one thing in his favor. He did not really believe that Rockland would now go through with his plan to have the Kings gunned down. Besides, none of those telegrams had named the men Rockland meant for the gunfighters to seek out. The hired killers, therefore, had to go see Rockland before going after the King boys, and, if Bannion’s hunch was right, he thought Rockland would pay them for their time and send them on their way again.
What annoyed him most was the way Rockland had ridden out of town without even thanking him for his part in saving Judy. If he’d done that, if he’d made any attempt at all to see Bannion before departing, the sheriff could have, he thought, clinched what Judy had told her father concerning the great debt of gratitude Rockland owed the four men from west Texas.
“He’s too big,” Bannion said aloud in the emptiness of his office. “He’s just too damned big and uppity, like Doc says. He’s the center of the universe and all the rest of humanity is the herd of little stars that revolve around him. For a plugged copper I’d go release those Kings and tell them what he’s gone and done. I think John Rockland would get taught one helluva lesson real fast.” Bannion finished his coffee, hit the floor hard with his booted feet as he rose up, and said savagely: “Damn!”
He dragged on his hat and went slamming out into the cool, early night, scuffing at the roadway dust on his way to the hotel.
Chapter Thirteen
The five deputies outside the King door were hungry, bored, and restless. Bannion could and did alleviate the first of these problems by sending the cowboys two at a time to eat. He and the rough-looking, oldest of these men were the last pair to go.
They went to the Shafter Café, had their supper, and sat talking over coffee and a smoke.
“Seems to me,” said the deputy, as he leaned upon the table replete and pensive, “you’d ought to just let them fellers be on their way, Sheriff.”
“Day after tomorrow,” Bannion said sarcastically. “One way or another they’ll probably be traveling day after tomorrow.”
“Day after tomorrow?”
“Haven’t you seen them?”
“No. They don’t come out. When they wanted food, they hollered an’ we brought it.”
“Well, their eyes are bad off from rescuing Rockland’s daughter during the Santa Ana. Doc’s orders. They have to keep out of bright light for a few days.”
This appeared to amuse the cowboy. He said: “That’s pretty sound advice at that, for when John Rockland comes for them, they’re goin’ to need lots of darkness to maneuver around in.”
“Let’s go back,” Bannion snapped, leading the way out of the café. Outside, he squinted, then he said: “You’re making a pretty common mistake, pardner. You’re judging men before you know anything about them.”
“Yeah? You mean them King boys?”
“I do. And the reason I’m keeping them in their room is because Rockland, not them, might need a lot of darkness, if he goes after them.”
They walked along slowly and were almost to the hotel before the cowboy said: “Hell, Sheriff...are they really that rough?”
“Stick around,” Bannion informed the man. “I’ve got a bad feeling you’re going to find out.”
Upstairs, the deputies spelled one another so they could rest. They accomplished this by the simple expedient of going down to the lobby, selecting the most comfortable chair, stretching themselves out there, tilting up their hats, and going to sleep. The clerk was less than elated over this arrangement of Bannion’s, particularly since two of these rough men proved to be prodigious snorers, but he was a prudent man and said nothing.
In this fashion the night passed.
Bannion left the hotel and went to his office about dawn. He fell onto a pallet in one of his little cells and slept like a baby until, near noon, the doctor appeared to awaken him, brew up and help himself to some of Bannion’s coffee, and preempt Bannion’s desk chair.
While the sheriff washed, the medical man mused aloud, comfortable where he sat and pensive. “You know, Doyle, I put in a long two hours with your prisoners over at the hotel.”
“Did you, now.”
“Yep. I talked until my tongue ran dry. Did you know those boys hardly even knew their pappy?”
“I guessed that, yes.”
“They pumped me dry about him.”
“And you told them everything?”
“Well.... Almost everything.”
Bannion and the doctor exchanged a look, then Bannion resumed washing.
“I also told them there’s another old gaffer from King’s Confederate Raiders hereabouts.”
This time Bannion put aside the towel and looked hard at the older man. “Name him,” he ordered.
“Rufus Paige.”
“Doc, how long’ve you known about Rufus?”
“Four, five months. Why?”
Bannion said curtly: “Nothing. Forget I asked.”
“Be glad to,” chirped the doctor, not the least curious. “I also told those boys something their paw said to me once. ‘Henry,’ he says to me, ‘wars don’t end with the last shot or the last bugle call. They live on, dying out very gradually, and in their wake all manner of hateful things happen. Our war has been especially bad that way...Rebs still hate Yanks. Our children grow up with that. If I had my way every veteran would have to take an oath never to talk of the war. He’d have to swear on the Good Book never to cuss a Yank where children could hear him.’”
Bannion was standing perfectly motionless. He said softly: “You told his sons that?”
“I did.”
“And what was their reaction?”
“They just sat there looking at me, Doyle. Never said a word...just sat there looking at me.”
Bannion put his hat back on. He walked slowly over in front of the doctor. He said solemnly: “That’s the only wise thing that’s come out of this whole blessed affair, Doc. I’m obliged to you. I think you’ve made my job easier.”
The medical man nodded. “Thought it might do that,” he said, and got up. “I need a drink. I’ve talked more this morning than I’ve talked in five years and it makes me dry as a bone.”
Bannion thought of something, and said: “Doc, would you do me a favor?”
“It’s possible,” replied the old man, beginning to look cautious. “It’s possible, Doyle. What is it?”
“Get in your buggy, ride out to Texas Star, and tell John Rockland I want him to come here and stop those gunfighters he hired. Tell him....”
“Gunfighters?”
Bannion nodded and parted his lips to resume speaking. The doctor’s face turned dark and thunderous. He cut across the sheriff’s voice with a reedy, wrathful tone of his own.
“Gunfighters? Did that hawk-nosed devil actually hire gunfighters? Why damn his lights, Doyle Bannion, damn his lights! You mean to stand there and tell me that after those four boys saved Judith’s life, he still has the gall to hire them killed? Now I’ll not stand for that. Come hell or high water, I’ll not stand for that.”
“Listen, Doc....”
“Listen nothing. That’s all I’ve been doing...listening. First to you, then to Judith, then to the King boys. Now I’ve listened all I’m going to. Doyle, I have friends hereabouts. Good friends, too. I saved a few lives here and there in my time. Doyle Bannion, you bet I’ll go out to Texas Star, damned if I won’t, and I’ll take twenty armed men with me, too, and we’ll see about this hiring gunfighters business.”
Then the doctor stormed out of Bannion’s office, shaking his head fiercely, as Bannion tried to reason with him. The medico didn’t stop, just kept stomping along the boardwalk, s
till raging aloud in his squeaky old voice.
Bannion stood in front of the jailhouse watching. He stepped back as far as a wall bench and sank down there. He was disgusted with himself. He’d known the doctor was an old firebrand. He’d seen him roiled up before, but never like this, never actually making threats and plans to carry them out. This, he told himself, is just what I needed—a band of hot-heads storming the Texas Star and reading the riot act to John Rockland. He would have to stop the doctor before he got under way, even if that meant locking him in a cell. Bannion got up, and started forward.
“Hey, Sheriff!”
Bannion halted and turned. It was Sam Ryan from the livery barn. Sam was walking hurriedly—a very unusual thing for him—and his face was very solemn. He came up to the sheriff and halted, breathing hard and speaking in a low tone.
“Sheriff, three fellers just put up their horses at the barn. They come into town from different directions, but that didn’t fool me none. You could tell they knew one another...only they tried to act like they didn’t. Sheriff, they’re gunfighters if ever I seen any, and believe you me in my sixty-six years I’ve seen plenty of ’em. More’n enough to know ’em when I see ’em, and that’s a fact.”
Bannion forgot all about the doctor. “Three of ’em, eh?” he said, throwing a look along the roadway. “Where are they now?”
“When I left the barn, they was standin’ outside talkin’ to Carl Arnold.”
Bannion was surprised. “Carl Arnold? You mean that rider from Texas Star?”
“The same. Him an’ old Rufus Paige just come into town with the supply wagon from Rockland’s.”
Bannion left Ryan standing there. He went along as far as the general store, past it, and then around to the rear alleyway where he espied the Texas Star wagon backed up to a doorway. The process of loading was already in progress.
Bannion squeezed over the tailgate, entered the store, and walked all the way out front before he saw old Rufus standing with the proprietor, his face puckered up as he struggled to read the long list in his hands. Rufus was holding this paper as though by sheer strength alone he would compel it to disgorge its written words.