Gunsights

by Elmore Leonard

  Maurice Dumas, who was present, asked himself when Moon's wife had visited him in the eight hours Moon was in jail. Maurice thought about it and shook his head. She hadn't.

  Bruckner said Moon had pulled the gun and locked him in the cell, not knowing-Bruckner patting his pocket now-he always carried a spare key. He had then grabbed his six-shooter, run out to the street and would have shot Moon dead had not Bren Early gotten in the way, Early having come just then to visit Moon.

  The news reporters gave Bruckner narrow looks while some of them laughed out loud, which was a mistake. It shut off Bruckner's trust of them and willingness to talk. After that it was like pulling teeth to get information from him.

  Grimly he stuck to his story that it was Moon's wife who'd given him the gun and had brought the horse some of the newsmen had actually seen running down Fourth Street toward Mill with Moon aboard. Yes, in fact Moon had sneered at him and actually told him, when he was being locked in the cell, that it was his wife had brought it. Also, he knew for a fact Moon's wife had left Mrs. Pierson's house about the time of Moon's escape. She was no longer in town, was she? “Now get your asses out of my office.” Bruckner didn't have any need for these grinning, smart-aleck out-of-towners. He had work to do. First thing, post the wanted dodger on Dana Moon. It showed Moon's face, taken from a C.S. Fly photo, and said:

  $5,000

  REWARD

  (Dead or Alive)

  for information leading to

  the arrest or seizure of

  DANA MOON

  Escaped Fugitive

  37 years of age, dark hair, dark-

  complected. Former United States

  Government Indian Agent at White

  Tanks Sub-agency. Approach with

  caution. If whereabouts known,

  notify Deputy Sheriff R.J. Bruckner,

  Sweetmary, Arizona Territory.

  Brucker hung the dodger outside the jail on a bulletin board for all to see. On the same board were:

  A LaSalle Mining Company notice warning hunters and prospectors to avoid posted areas where survey crews were working with dynamite.

  And, a recruiting poster-“HIGH PAY-INTERESTING WORK”-calling for individuals who were experienced in the handling of firearms and owned their own horse to apply for a position with the LaSalle Mining Security Division. “$20 A WEEK TO START. SEE P. SUNDEEN.”

  Maurice Dumas looked at the board for several minutes, the thought striking him, wasn't it strange the company posters were right there with the Moon “wanted” dodger? Like the company was footing the bill for all three enterprises. They surely looked alike in appearance. He could write an article about that, posing the question: Was the company paying for Dana Moon's arrest…or death? (Bruckner had refused to answer that directly, saying it was county business.)

  But first, locate Early, if possible, and see if he was willing to chat about things in general. Maurice Dumas was still feeling intuitive as well as pretty lucky.

  Was it because he had not yet been pushy, but had politely given his name and said he was sorry to have disturbed her? Maurice couldn't believe it when she said come in. Look at that. The first news reporter to be invited into the house of the mysterious Mrs. Pierson. He entered hesitantly, cap in hand, looking around with an expression of awe, for this place could some day be of historical interest.

  She did not invite him to sit down, but immediately said, “You're the one he talks to, aren't you?”

  “Well, we have spoken privately several times, yes,” Maurice said. “I mean he's told me things he hasn't told the other journalists, that I know of.”

  “Like what?”

  “Well…how he feels about things.”

  “He does? He tells you that, how he feels?”

  “I don't mean to imply I have his complete confidence, no, ma'am.” He didn't realize until now that she was upset. Judging from her tone, more than a little angry.

  “Well, the next time you see him,” Janet Pierson said, “tell him to quit acting like a spoiled brat and grow up.”

  “Mr.Early?”

  “Like he got out of bed on the wrong side every morning. Tell him to make up his mind what he's mad at. If it's me, if I'm to blame, I'll gladly move out. Ask him if that's what he wants. Because I'm not taking any more of his pouting.”

  “Bren Early?”

  “Or his silence. All day he sat here, he didn't say a word. ‘Can I get you something?…Would you like your dinner now?’ Like walking on eggs, being so careful not to bother him too much. He'd grunt something. Did that mean yes or no? He'd grunt something else. Finally I said, ‘Well, if you're gonna act as if I'm not here, one of us might as well leave.’ No answer. Can you imagine living with someone like that?”

  She did not seem too mysterious now.

  “Bren Early?” Maurice said, puzzled. “No, I can't imagine him like that. He's so…calm. Are you sure he wasn't just being calm?”

  “God,” Janet Pierson said, “you don't know him, do you? You believe the one in the photograph with the revolvers is the real person.”

  “Well, what I do know about him is certainly real and impressive enough to me,” Maurice said.

  “It is, huh?” Mrs. Pierson said something then that Maurice thought about for a long time after. She said, “That C.S. Fly, he should take all pictures of famous people in their underwear, and when they're not looking.”

  He found Bren Early where he should have looked first, the Chinaman's: Early sitting in the quiet room, though near the front this time, by one of the windows. He was sipping whiskey. On the table in front of him was a handwritten menu, in ink, and one of the Dana Moon “wanted” dodgers, Moon's face in the photo looking up at Bren Early.

  Maurice Dumas left his cap on and pulled up a chair. “The Chicago Kid,” some of the others were calling him now. Or “Lucky Maurice.” Lucky, hell, it was sensing a story and digging for it, letting nothing discourage or deter. Go after it.

  “Moon's wife didn't bring him the gun,” Maurice said. He was going to add, flatly, “You did,” but softened it at the last second. “I have a feeling it might have been you.”

  Bren Early was looking at the menu. He said, “Did you know this place is called The Oriental?”

  “No, I didn't think it had a name.”

  “The Oriental,” Early said.

  Maurice waited a moment. “I also believe the company put up the five-thousand reward. Because I don't think the county would spend that kind of money on something that's-when you get right down to it-company business. Am I right or wrong?”

  Early said, “Are you gonna have something to eat?”

  “No, I don't think so.”

  “Well, if you aren't gonna eat, why don't you leave?”

  Maurice felt a chill go up the back of his neck. He managed to say, “I just thought we might talk.”

  “There's nothing to talk about,” Early said.

  “Well, maybe I will have something to eat, if it's all right.”

  Maurice ate some kind of pork dish, sitting there self-conscious, feeling he should have left and tried the man at a better time. Though Early did say one thing as he sipped his whiskey and then picked up the Moon “wanted” poster. He said, “A man who likes his front porch hasn't any business on one of these.”

  “No,” Maurice said, to agree.

  “Sometimes they put the wrong people on these things.”

  Early didn't say anything after that. He finished his whiskey and walked out, leaving the young reporter sitting there with his pork dish.

  12

  1

  Sundeen appeared in Sweetmary, picked up fresh mounts and supplies and went out again with twenty men, some eager new ones along. He'd hinted he was close to running Moon to ground, but would not give details. This time Maurice Dumas and several news reporters trailed after him, keeping well behind his dust.

  There were saddle bums and gunnysackers who came up from around Charleston and Fairbank with Moon's “wa
nted” dodger folded in their pockets.

  These men would study the pictures of Moon in Fly's gallery a long time, pretending to have keen looks in their eyes. They would drink whiskey in the saloons-all these ragtag chuck-line riders turned manhunters-talking in loud voices how they packed their .45-70's for distance or how an old Ballard could outshoot a Henry. They would go out to their campsites along the Benson road, stare up at the Rincons and talk about dogging the man's sign clear to hell for that kind of reward money, come back here and buy a saloon with a whore-house upstairs.

  Best chance, everyone agreed, squat down in a blind and wait for the shot. Moon was bound to appear somewhere, though not likely to be snared and taken alive. Yes, it was up to chance; but some lucky bird would get the shot, come back with Moon wrapped in canvas and collect the $5,000; more money than could be made in ten years of herding and fence riding.

  The saddle bums and gunnysackers straggled out in pairs and small groups, those who had soldiered saying they were going on an extended campaign and would forage, live off the country. Most of them came dragging back in four or five days, hungry and thirsty, saying shit, Moon wasn't up there-like they had expected to find him sitting on a stump waiting. Wasn't anybody up there far as they could see.

  How about Sundeen?

  Him either.

  The news reporters who had trailed out after Sundeen came back with sore legs and behinds-all of them except the Chicago Kid-to say Phil Sundeen had not found anything either. All he was doing was pushing his men up one draw and down another, finding some empty huts but not a sign of the mountain people.

  Days went by. What seemed to be the last of the manhunters came limping in with the same story-nothing up there but wind and dry washes-and looked around for old chums who had gone out in other parties. A rough tally indicated some had not returned. Were they still hunting? Not likely, unless they were living on mesquite beans. Were they dead? Or had they gone home by way of Benson?

  Ask Moon that one.

  Ask him if you could ever find him. Or if he was still up there. Maybe he had left here for safer climes.

  Like hell, said a man by the name of Asa Bailey from Contention. He had seen Moon, close enough to touch the tobacco wad in the man's jaw.

  The news reporters sat him down at a table in the Gold Dollar with a full bottle, got out their note pads and said, O.K., go ahead.

  Asa Bailey told them there had been three of them in the party and gave the names Wesley and Urban as the other two-last seen headed south-east, having sworn off manhunting forever.

  They had come across Sundeen and his bunch at the Moon place and Sundeen had run them off, telling them to keep their nose out of company business. They had stayed close enough to watch, though, and observed Sundeen riding off with most of his men, leaving two or three at the burnt-out house. Yes, Sundeen had set a torch to the place, though the roof and walls seemed in good shape.

  Asa Bailey said he had been a contract guide out of Camp Grant some years before and knew Moon and his Apaches surely weren't going to stand around nor leave directions where they went. Moon would use his Apaches as his eyes and pull tricks to decoy Sundeen out of his boots: let him see a wisp of smoke up in the high reaches and Sundeen would take half a day getting up there to a cold fire set by some Apache woman or little kid. Let them wear themselves out and go home hungry, was Moon's game, all the time watching Sundeen.

  “So we would play it too,” Asa Bailey said, “pretend we was Moon and hang back off Sundeen's flank and sooner or later cross Moon's sign. Sundeen'd camp, we'd camp, rigging triplines, and making a circle around us with loose rocks we'd hear if somebody tried to approach.

  “We were the stalkers, huh? Like hell. Imagine you're sitting all night in what you believe is an ambush. Dawn, you're asleep as Wesley and Urban are over a ways gathering the horses. You feel something-not hear it, feel it. And open your eyes in the cold gray light and not dare to even grunt. The man's hunched over you with the barrel tip of his six-gun sticking in your mouth. There he was with the kindly eyes and the tobacco wad you see in the pictures.”

  There wasn't a sound at that table until one of the newsmen said, “Well, what did he say?”

  “What did he say? Nothing.”

  “Nothing at all?”

  Asa Bailey reached across an angle of the table, grabbed the newsman by the shirtfront, drew his revolver and stuck it in the man's bug-eyed face, saying, “You want me to explain things to you or do you get the picture?”

  2

  Franklin Hovey, the company geologist, came in with a survey crew and two ore wagons of camp gear and equipment. Noticeably shaken, he said he would quit his job before going out with another survey party. “You don't see them,” he said, “but there they are, like they rose out of the ground.”

  The news reporters finally got hold of him coming out of the telegraph office and practically bums-rushed him to the Gold Dollar. “Here, Franklin, something for your nerves.” The reporters having a glass also since they were here.

  “Whom did you telegraph?” they asked him.

  “Mr. Vandozen. He must be apprised of what's happened.”

  The reporters raised their eyebrows and asked, “Well, what did happen out there?”

  Franklin Hovey said his crew of eight had been working across a southwest section of the range at about seven thousand feet. One morning, three days ago, a tall nigger had appeared at their camp, came walking his horse in as they were sitting at the map table having breakfast. He gave them a polite good morning, said his name was Catlett and asked if they planned to blast hereabouts.

  “I told him yes, and pointed to an outcropping of ledge along the south face that looked promising. I can't give you his exact words as the darkie said them, but he took off his old hat, scratched his wooly head and said, ‘If you disturbs that rock, boss, it gwine come down in de canyon where de tanks at. Is you sure you wants to do that?’”

  A couple of the reporters looked at each other with helpless expressions of pain, but no one interrupted the geologist. Franklin Hovey said, “See, there was a natural water tank in the canyon where they grazed a herd of horses. I told the darkie, ‘That might be; but since the canyon is part of the company lease, we can blow it clear to hell if it strikes our fancy.’ The darkie said something like, ‘Strike yo fancy, huh?’, not understanding the figure of speech. He said, ‘Boss, we sees that rock come down in there, we-uns gwine strike yo fancy clean off this mountain.’ I said, ‘And who is the we-uns gwine do sech a thing as that?’”

  Franklin sat back, beginning to relax with some liquor in him, glancing around the table to see if everyone appreciated his dialect. There were a couple of chuckles.

  “The darkie himself smiled, knowing it was meant only as good-natured parody, and said, ‘If y'all be so kind, jes don't mess the graze and the water. Awright, boss?’

  “Now one of our powdermen went over to the wagon where we kept the explosives, got a stick of Number One and pointed it at the darkie, saying-this was not good-natured, though I'll admit it was funny at the time. The powderman pointed the stick and said, ‘How'd you like it if we tie this to your tail, Mr. Nig, with a lit fuse and see how fast it can send you home?’ The darkie, Catlett, said, ‘Yeah, boss, that would send a body home, I expects so.’ He smiled again. But this time there was something different about his smile.”

  There was a silence. Those around the table could see by Franklin Hovey's expression he was thinking about that time again, that moment, as though realizing now it should have warned him, at least told him something.

  “Did you blow the ledge?” a reporter asked.

  “Yes, we did. Though we set off a small warning charge first to indicate our intention. I insisted we do that.”

  The reporters waited, seeing the next part coming, remembering the story Asa Bailey, the former contract guide, had told only a few days before.

  “Our party was well armed,” Franklin Hovey continued, “and we set a wa
tch that night around the perimeter of the camp. As I've said, we were at about seven thousand feet on bare, open ground. With night guards on four sides and enough moonlight to see by, we were positive no one could sneak up to that camp.”

  “They hit you at dawn,” a reporter said.

  Others told him to shut up as Franklin Hovey shook his head.

  “No, we arose, folded our cots, ate breakfast…discussed the darkie's threat while we were eating and, I remember, laughed about it, some of the others imitating him, saying, ‘Yessuh, boss, ah's gwine strike yo fancy,’ things like that. After breakfast we went over to the dynamite wagon to get what we'd need for the day-you might've seen it, a big ore wagon with a heavy canvas top to keep the explosives dry and out of the weather. One of the men opened the back end”-Franklin paused-“and they came out. They came out of the wagon that was in the middle of our camp, in the middle, our tents and the two other wagons surrounding it. They came out of it…the same colored man and another one and two Indians.” Franklin shook his head, awed by the memory of it. “I don't even see how there was room in there with the fifty-pound cases, much less how they got in to begin with…Well, they held guns on us, took ours and threw them into the canyon…tied our hands in front of us and then tied the eight of us together in a line, arm to arm…while the one named Catlett took a dynamite cartridge, primed it with a Number Six detonator and crimped onto that about ten feet of fuse, knowing exactly how to set the blasting cap in there and gather the end of the cartridge paper around it tight and bind it tight up good with twine. This man, I realized, knew how to shoot dynamite. I said, ‘Now wait a minute, boy, we are only doing our job here, following orders.’ The darkie said, ‘Thas all ah'm doing too, boss. Gwine send y'all home.’ I said to him again, ‘Now wait a minute,’ and the other members of the crew began to get edgy and speak up, saying we were only working men out here doing a job. The darkie said, ‘Y'll doing a job awright, on our houses.’”