The Killing Season

by Compton, Ralph

  “It’s open,” Hagerman said.

  “This,” said Nathan, dropping the sack on the desk, “I want you to lock in your safe until I’m told what to do with it. Now here’s the telegram I want sent to the Bank of Santa Fe.”

  Nathan left Hagerman’s office and walked around town. They might as well get used to him wearing the badge. Time dragged, and at noon, Nathan went to Delmonico’s to eat. He wasn’t all that hungry; there just was nothing better to do. When he heard the distant whistle of the westbound, he went to the depot to watch the train come in. He recalled the many times Sheriff Harrington had done this very thing, and now he understood the old sheriff’s reason. Two men got off the train, and Nathan sized them up immediately as gamblers. Another reason Sheriff Harrington had always met the train, for a good lawman made it his business to be aware of newcomers and their purpose for being in town. On the frontier, many a man’s purpose for being in town was his having been run out of the last one. At a distance Nathan followed, watching the new arrivals head for the Long Branch Saloon. It was the most popular of all the saloons in Dodge, and generally the less troublesome, insofar as gamblers were concerned. Empty had quickly developed a dislike for the saloons, and like Cotton Blossom, remained outside when Nathan entered one. Some saloon gambling went beyond poker and faro, with cockfights, dogfights, bare-knuckle boxing, and knife fights. The many times Nathan had been in Dodge, he had avoided these “sporting” saloons, because he disliked the cruelty. Now, wearing a badge, he felt he ought to know what was going on there. Some saloons featuring bloody entertainment had lower or “cellar” rooms for that purpose. One such saloon was the Saratoga, and it was near ten o’clock when Nathan arrived. A few men loitered around the bar and there was a poker game in progress, but most of the commotion came from below.

  “What’s going on down there?” Nathan asked.

  “Dogfight,” said the barkeep.

  Nathan descended the stairs, and nobody even noticed him. Every eye was on the circular pit in which a pair of bleeding dogs stalked each other. Men shouted and cursed in turn, depending on which of the desperate animals seemed to have an edge. As Nathan’s eyes grew accustomed to the poor light, he could see that only one of the animals was a dog. The other was a prairie wolf, or nearly so, and the odds clearly favored the wolf. It was gaunt, had likely been starved for the event, and there was more at stake than who won or lost the deadly match. The dog, when it could no longer defend itself, would be ripped to shreds and eaten.

  “This has gone far enough,” Nathan said. “I’m calling on the owners of those animals to separate them.”

  “Don’t be a damn fool,” somebody shouted. “That wolf will tear a man apart. He’ll be shot when this is done.”

  “It’s done now,” said Nathan. He drew his Colt and shot the wolf.

  “Damn you!” a dozen men shouted.

  But Nathan had his back to the wall and had not holstered his Colt. The hapless dog was mortally wounded and would soon bleed to death. Nathan fired again, putting the dog out of its misery.

  “I aim to look in on you gents every night,” Nathan said. “There’ll be no more of this foolishness while I’m wearing the badge in Dodge.”

  “You won’t be wearin’ it much longer,” said a voice, and a dozen others shouted their agreement.

  Nathan said nothing. He backed up the stairs, his Colt steady in his hand. Somebody seized him from behind, and he flung the man over his head, into those who followed him up the stairs. He turned, barely in time to meet the barkeep coming up with a sawed-off shotgun.

  “Don’t!” Nathan warned.

  Slowly the barkeep lowered the weapon, placing it on the bar. The poker game had broken up, and Nathan worked his way toward the door, his back to the wall. Reaching the door, he paused long enough to issue a warning.

  “As long as I wear this badge, there’ll be no more fights-to-the-death. If it happens again, somebody’s going to the calabozo. You, maybe.”

  “It ain’t agin the law,” the barkeep said sullenly.

  “It is now,” Nathan replied. “Spread the word.”

  The word was spread, and more rapidly than Nathan had expected. Foster Hagerman again joined Nathan for breakfast, and his mood was somewhere between embarrassment and aggravation.

  “The town council’s meetin’ tonight, and they want you there.”

  “I’ll be there,” Nathan said. “It wouldn’t have anything to do with what I said and did at the Saratoga last night, would it?”

  “It would,” said Hagerman. “Damn it, you’re enforcing laws that don’t even exist.”

  “They should,” Nathan replied. “Hagerman, I’ve killed men that were needful of it, and I will again, but I won’t see one animal pitted against another to the death. I didn’t want this damn badge, but you insisted. Now you tell Rufus Langley and his gutless council I’ll meet with them for just as long as it takes to drop this badge in their laps.”

  “Nobody’s going to ask for your badge, Nathan,” said Hagerman.

  Nathan said nothing more, and Hagerman departed after finishing his coffee. While the day seemed to drag on forever, there were some gratifying moments. Every woman Nathan met smiled at him, and he believed that was a result of the stand he had taken the night before, in the Saratoga Saloon. One thing bothered him. He felt guilty, as though he had cast Sheriff Harrington in a bad light. Hadn’t Harrington been confronted with the same cruel fights-to-the-death that Nathan had witnessed? Was that what it took to become a successful lawman, overlooking popular but shameful activities that violated one’s sense of right and wrong? With some misgivings he left the Dodge House a few minutes before seven o’clock, bound for the town hall. He had no idea how many members were on the town council, and was surprised to find there were ten, including Foster Hagerman. Most of them—like Rufus Langley— were merchants, and they only nodded. Hagerman stood up and cleared his throat.

  “On behalf of the council, you are to be commended for your action last night. In all due respect to the late Sheriff Harrington, we failed to stand behind him with laws that he could enforce. We’re typical of most towns on the frontier, yielding to the saloons, allowing them to dictate to the rest of us.”

  “You’re all commending me for enforcing laws that don’t exist,” said Nathan, “because none of you have to face up to the responsibility. You never gave Sheriff Harrington a legal leg to stand on, because you were—and still are—intimidated by the saloon. owners. I’m in a position where if I continue what I started last night, every damn saloon owner in town has a perfect right to hate my guts. These fights-to-the-death should be illegal. Are you going to side me, or not?”

  “I am,” Foster Hagerman said. “I’m making a motion that saloon fights of all kinds be outlawed. Do I hear a second?”

  There was no second. Nine men hung their heads, while Hagerman grew furious. He finally spoke, posing a question to the silent council.

  “Why? Damn it, when you have a sheriff willing to enforce the law, you won’t let him do it. Why?”

  “I’ll tell you,” said Max Rucker, owner of the livery. “We all got wives, Foster, and they see what happened last night as the start of a movement that will eventually close the saloons on Sunday and the whorehouses permanent. We can’t do a little without doin’ it all, and that’ll be the death of us. Come spring, when the herds come up the trail from Texas, you want the saloons dark on Sundays and the whorehouses shut for good? If that happens, it’s purely goin’ to ruin business.”

  Hagerman looked helplessly at Nathan, and it was he who spoke.

  “I have nothing against saloons being open all night and all day, every day. If a man wants to drink, that’s his business. I favor whorehouses, because there’s a need for them. The men and women who make them possible are there by their own choosing. But damn it, when two animals are trapped in a pit, being forced to fight for their lives, they have no choice. I can’t reform the world, but I aim to stand up for the dumb b
rutes that can’t speak for themselves. Those of you whose women have you haltered and muzzled, I hope you can bust loose long enough to tell them where I stand. I’m my own man, and if I have to enforce the law according to my conscience, then I’ll do it.”

  “Unless somebody has more to say on the subject,” Hagerman said, “I’m declaring this meeting adjourned.”

  Nobody said anything, and Nathan didn’t linger. He stepped out the door, and with Empty trotting along beside him, returned to the Dodge House. The saloons wouldn’t begin to roar for another two hours, and he intended to rest while he could. There came a knock on the door.

  “Identify yourself,” Nathan said.

  “Hagerman,” a voice replied.

  Nathan unlocked the door, allowing Hagerman to enter. Without waiting to be asked, he took a chair, leaving Nathan the bed.

  “You see how it is,” said Hagerman.

  “Yes,” Nathan said, “but you didn’t come here to say that.”

  “No,” said Hagerman. “I came here to tell you that what you said was exactly right. I don’t agree with the position they’re taking, but I understand it. It all comes back to the old adage that when you give somebody an inch, he’ll take a mile. I never saw it coming to all this when I asked you to take the badge, and if you give it up, there’ll be no hard feelings on my part.”

  “I reckon I’ll just ride this bronc for a while,” Nathan said. “I aim to see that Dodge gets more law than it’s accustomed to. When I’m gone, and it falls back into its old hell-raising habits, your town council will be roasted over a slow fire.”

  Hagerman laughed. “Then you don’t aim to close the saloons on Sunday and board up the whorehouses.”

  “Not until the town council makes them illegal. As a lawman, I’ll try and keep men from killing one another without cause, abusing women, or torturing animals. I reckon the wives of the town council will be disappointed, but it’s unlikely they’ll ever find a man who can enforce the Ten Commandments for fifty dollars a month.”

  The moment Kurt Graves stepped off the westbound, Nathan suspected trouble. On his right hip the newcomer carried a thonged-down Colt and slung over his shoulder was a saddlebag. He was dressed entirely in black, including his hat. A black leather vest was studded with silver conchas. His belt buckle was a silver wagon wheel. His eyes paused on Nathan’s twin Colts, worked their way up to his sheriffs badge, and finally focused on his face. Nathan’s eyes never faltered as he went to meet the stranger. He paused a dozen yards away.

  “You have business here, I reckon,” Nathan said.

  “I do,” said the stranger. “My own. None of yours.”

  “I make it mine,” Nathan said, “when a hombre looks a mite gun-handy.”

  “You got a gun ordinance here?”

  “No,” said Nathan. “I depend on a man’s common sense as far as he’ll let me. If you pull that iron, you’d better have a damn good reason, or I’ll take it away from you.”

  “I’m Kurt Graves, and I’m not wanted by the law. Nobody’s ever took my gun, and nobody ever will. You’d best keep that in mind.”

  Graves turned away and Nathan watched him out of sight. He looked maybe twenty-one or -two, and being well under six feet, he didn’t seem the brawling kind. More likely he relied on his gun, and Nathan wondered how long it would take the little rooster to get himself involved in a shootout. Nathan generally made the rounds of all the saloons before ten o’clock every night, and again shortly before two in the morning, when most of them closed. Reaching the Oasis, he wasn’t surprised to find Kurt Graves involved in a poker game. There was some grumbling when Graves won two pots. Nathan wasn’t sure that Graves wasn’t slick-dealing, but if he was, the little varmint was good at it. Unless somebody called him, it was none of Nathan’s business. He had stepped out the door, bound for the Long Branch, when there was a shot from within the Oasis. Nathan was through the saloon door in an instant. A man was slumped over the poker table, a gun in his hand. Graves stood with his back to the wall, his thumb hooked in his gun belt, above the butt of his Colt. Nathan kept his eyes on Graves as he spoke.

  “Who drew first?”

  “Tidwell did,” one of the gamblers said, “and God, he didn’t have a chance. He had his gun out, but he was shot dead.”

  “Graves,” Nathan said, “I warned you about pulling that gun. You’d better have a damn good reason.”

  “Oh, I do, sir,” said Graves, with exaggerated politeness. “He called me a cheat, and I never touched my gun until he drew his.”

  “Is he telling the truth?” Nathan asked.

  “Yeah,” said one of the gamblers.

  “Do any of the rest of you accuse him of cheating?” Nathan persisted.

  Nobody said anything. Several men cut their eyes at Kurt Graves, but nobody spoke to Nathan. There was nothing he could do except declare it a case of self-defense. Before he reached the door, he heard Kurt Graves laughing. After making the rounds of the rest of the saloons, Nathan returned to the Dodge House. There he and Empty would rest until time for the rounds at two o’clock in the morning.

  When Nathan arrived at Delmonico’s for breakfast, he found Foster Hagerman already there. It had become a ritual, Nathan and Sheriff Harrington meeting there. But now that Harrington was gone, Hagerman seemed to have taken his place, a change of which Nathan didn’t totally approve. While he liked Hagerman, he had become the spokesman for a less-than-adequate town council. Now Nathan was never sure whether he was meeting Hagerman as a friend or as a go-between for the whining town council.

  “Heard about the shooting last night,” said Hagerman. “That sort of thing, if it should happen too often, will play hell with the town’s image.”

  “Is that how you feel, or is it the opinion of your silent town council?”

  “Mostly that of the council,” Hagerman said. “This is the frontier, and you can’t fault a man for defending himself. But there are men who enjoy killing, and they justify it by provoking others into a shootout. Kurt Graves may be that kind.”

  “He may be,” said Nathan, “but I can’t arrest him as long as it’s an even break and there are witnesses. You don’t enforce the law by violating it. What does the council think should be done?”

  “Hell, they don’t know,” Hagerman said in exasperation. “They’re leaving it all up to you.”

  “Tell them I’m obliged,” said Nathan grimly.

  They finished breakfast in silence, but Hagerman had unknowingly touched on the very thing Nathan had been considering. Suppose Kurt Graves continued to antagonize men and gun them down in the name of self-defense? Where would it end? While he was tempted to just order Graves out of town, he had no legal right to do so. Besides, if the gunman refused to leave, it would result in a Mexican standoff, branding Nathan Stone the biggest damn fool between the Trinity and the Yellowstone. There was always a chance that Graves wouldn’t repeat his performance of the night before, and with that slight hope, Nathan made his way to the sheriffs office. But that very afternoon, at the Varities Saloon, Kurt Graves gunned down another man. Again there were witnesses and again the claim was self-defense.

  “The man’s a killer,” said Hagerman. “He’s legally murdered two men. What are we going to do?”

  “You’re going to shut up,” Nathan said, “before you get the town in an uproar. I aim to make my move tonight. If it fails, plant me alongside Sheriff Harrington and feed my dog.”

  Kurt Graves seemed to be making the rounds of all the saloons. His third night in Dodge, he drifted into the Long Branch. A four-handed poker game was in progress, and at the sight of Graves, two men folded and moved hurriedly away from the table. The pair remaining were drummers.

  “I’m settin’ in,” said Graves, hauling out a chair.

  “Hell,” one of the drummers said, “I don’t like three-handed poker.”

  “Keep your seat,” said Nathan, taking the chair across from Graves. “I’m buying in.”

  “I don’t
play poker with lawdogs,” Graves said contemptuously. “Pin a badge on some pelado, and he thinks he’s got an edge.”

  “Don’t let the badge bother you, Graves,” Nathan said. Removing the star, he dropped it into his shirt pocket. “Now, you either play poker or tuck your tail between your legs and get the hell out of here.”

  Sensing a showdown, men lined the walls, careful to stay out of the potential line of fire. It was a ticklish situation for Kurt Graves, and there were beads of sweat on his forehead. Finally he did exactly what Nathan had expected him to do. Keeping his right hand well away from his Colt, he shoved his left hand into his pocket and brought out a handful of double eagles. These he slapped on the table as an act of defiance.

  “Five dollar bet,” said one of the drummers. “Table stakes.”

  Nathan dropped a double eagle on the table and each of the drummers matched it. The first three hands, Nathan drew impossible cards. He took his losses, and when it came his turn to shuffle the deck, he slick-dealt Graves an unbeatable hand: four aces and a king. It took a moment for Graves to understand what had happened, and his face paled, but his money was already in the pot. There were gasps from the onlookers when they saw the cards. It was the perfect setup for Nathan to accuse Graves of cheating, but Nathan spoke not a word. Graves had begun sweating, but all he could do was rake in the pot. He slid back his chair and started to get up, only to have one of the drummers speak.

  “It’s customary to allow the losers a chance to recoup their losses.”

  There were hostile faces all around Graves, and across the table. Nathan Stone’s cold blue eyes never wavered. Graves hunched his chair back up to the table and play resumed. It seemed Kurt Graves couldn’t lose, even without Nathan’s help, and he took the next two pots. After he won a third pot, he had trouble controlling the trembling of his hands. But Nathan decided it had gone far enough, and slid back his chair. He spoke softly, but it had the effect of an explosion.