The Gunfighter

by Robert J Conley

  “Naw, Happy,” I said, “you come on along with us.

  Hell, they’re locked up good. They don’t need no watching.

  “You sure, Baijack?” Happy said.

  “Come on,” I said.

  The three of us went on outside, and I seen Lillian and Sly coming outa the doc’s office. We met them in the middle of the street.

  “Well,” I said, “what’d Doc say?”

  “He says I’m in real good shape for a man that just got himself hanged,” Sly said.

  Lillian was holding on to his left arm like she thought he might get away from her. It didn’t seem to bother her none that I was right there.

  “Well,” I said, “that whole bunch is locked up. They won’t be causing no more trouble.”

  “I want to thank you, Marshal,” Sly said. “All of you.”

  “Hell,” I said, “me and Happy, we was just doing our jobs. The ladies here, well, they’re something special now. Both of them.”

  “I still thank all of you,” said Sly. “If there’s anything I can do for you —”

  “There is one little thing,” I said.

  “Name it,” said Sly.

  “How would you like to be a depitty for a little while?” I said.

  Well, now, let me tell you, you shoulda saw the faces on that bunch of prisoners whenever I walked back into the jailhouse with ole Sly, and I told them that I had just appointed him a special depitty, and he was a-going to be watching over things for the night. Their eyes all got as big as saucers, and then ole Sly, he pulled out his both six-guns, and he commenced to twirling them on his trigger fingers, and tossing them in the air and catching them, and tossing them from one hand to the other. I never seen such carrying on with a couple of six-guns as what he was a-doing. I guess that bunch thought that whenever I left outa there, ole Sly just might commence to shooting off their ears one at a time or something. I never did see such a skeered bunch. It done my heart good to leave them like that with Sly a-standing guard. I headed on to the Hooch House to join Bonnie and Happy. Sly and me had done walked Lillian home before we went back on over to the jail. When I went into the Hooch House and found Bonnie and Happy a-setting together in there, ole Happy, he said, “Where you been, Baijack?”

  “Well, Happy,” I said, “I got to thinking about what you said, and I figgered you was right. That many prisoners in the jail, there really had ought to be a guard on duty. So I hired us a new guard for the night.”

  “Oh, yeah?” he said. “Who’d you hire?”

  “Why, I hired the only man in town besides you that I can trust, ole pardner,” I said. “I hired on ole Sly.” Happy and Bonnie both looked at me for a few seconds with kinda blank expressions on their faces, and then it come to them both at about the same time, and they burst out a-laughing.

  Chapter Ten

  Well, I had to keep that bunch of assholes in my damn jailhouse for two whole entire nights before the stage come into town with a scheduled run for the county seat and no passengers in it. I bought up all the space and paid for it with town money and crammed them bastards into the coach. Then, whenever it was time for the stage to roll on out, I dumb up on top with the driver, ole Goose Neck, and Ash Face, the shotgun guard, and we all rid on over to the county seat. I turned them prisoners over to Dick Custer, the county sheriff there, and made my charges, and he promised to let me know whenever they was scheduled for trail. I’d have to go back over there for that, and I’d likely have to take along ole Happy and ole Sly both as witnesses. I decided to spend the night there and go on back to Asininity the next day.

  I got good and drunk that night and bought myself a whore and had a whale of a good time and charged it all to the town of Asininity. After all, I was over at the county seat on town business. Then it turned out I had to wait another day before the stage would make another run back to my town, so I played around some more on town money. When I final got my ass back home, everything was real quiet. The stage rolled into town in the late afternoon. I got off and went right straight on into the Hooch House and found Happy and Bonnie setting there together. They acted right tickled to see me back as I set down with them, and ole Aubrey brung me a tumbler of my favorite whiskey.

  “Where’s ole Sly?” I asked them.

  Happy kinda ducked his head, but ole Bonnie piped right up, “He’s likely over at the White Owl. He’s been spending a lot of his time over there the last couple of days. Ever’ night, he walks Lillian home. From what I can tell, he ain’t gone into the house with her yet, though.”

  “Hell,” I said, “I don’t give a damn if he does. Me and Lillian is quits. You know that, Bonnie. What she does and who she does it with is her business.”

  “It don’t bother you none?” she said.

  “Not a damn bit,” I said.

  She glommed onto my arm and snuggled up to me then, and she had a big grin on her face. “I’m glad to hear it, Baijack,” she said. “You’re all mine again.”

  “Ever’ damn bit of me,” I said.

  Just about then ole Peester come in, and his face was red, and he was a-puffing. He stalked right over to where I was a-setting, and he said, “Baijack, I need to talk to you.”

  “Talk away, Mister Mayor,” I said.

  “It’s business,” he said. “You might want to make it more private.”

  “I don’t need no secrets from Happy and Bonnie here,” I said. “Go on ahead and say whatever it is you want to say. Set down and have a drink.”

  “No, thank you,” Peester said. He stood there a-glaring at me for a few more seconds before he could bring hisself to say anything serious. Then, “Well, you finally did it, didn’t you?” he said.

  “What’re you talking about, Peester?” I said.

  “You finally got someone arrested,” he said, “but you got the wrong people. You got some of our best citizens locked up over in the county jail on serious charges, and that professional killer is still free and walking our streets.”

  “Peester,” I said, “you better go on back to pettifogging school and take a refresher course. We been all over this before. Herman Sly ain’t broke no laws here. There ain’t no reason to run him outa town nor to arrest him. That bunch I took over to the county jail was attempting to kill him, and I charged them all with attempted killing, and that’s what they’re fixing to get tried for. What’s more, one of them got killed in the process, and according to what I was told over at the county seat, they’re most likely going to be charged with aiding and abetting that killing — or something like that. And they attacked a officer of the law — me. Now, you take your fat ass on home and mind your business and let me mind the marshaling business before I get to asking you some questions about ole Singletree.”

  “What? Why —”

  He went to blustering around like that for a bit, and he spit all over the front of his vest. Final, he got his tongue again, and he said, “What do you know about Singletree?”

  “I know enough,” I said, but of course, that was a lie. The way things had worked out, I never had got a chance to set down with ole Bonnie and get her to tell me the whole story. But I knowed from the way ole Peester was a-taking it that I was onto something all right. “Just go on home and settle your ass down,” I said.

  He turned around and hurried on outa there. Then I said, “Bonnie, I reckon now’s a good time for it. Tell me about Peester and Singletree.”

  “Oh, well,” she said, “ole Peester got a bunch of money out of poor ole Jonsey for Singletree. Got Jonsey’s store too, and then, sold it. Jonsey left town, and so did Singletree, but I think that Peester wound up with most of the money.”

  “I done heard all that,” I said. “But I also heard there was something to do with ole Singletree’s wife.”

  “Well, yeah, in a way,” she said.

  “What do you mean, in a way?” I said. “What happened?”

  “Well, best I can recall,” she said, “while Peester still had ever’thing in court, he got to
spending some time with Agnes. That was Singletree’s wife, Agnes. But then something happened that embarrassed all of them, and there’s a couple of different stories about it. I ain’t for sure which one is the right one.”

  “Tell me all of them,” I said.

  “The first one was that Peester couldn’t get it up,” Bonnie said. “Him and Agnes was both embarrassed over that, and Singletree was embarrassed that Peester was knowed to be messing with his wife, and that even a man who couldn’t get it up had took his wife away from him. Right after that, Peester won the case, got the money and the store, and the Singletrees left town. Peester was supposed to sell the store and send the money on to them, but if he ever sent any money, it wasn’t near what he got for the store.”

  “Well, that’s a pretty good one, all right,” I said. “What’s the other’n?”

  “The other story’s total different,” Bonnie said. “The way the other story went, it weren’t Peester and Agnes at all what was messing around.”

  “Oh?” I said. “Who, then?”

  Bonnie looked around to make sure no one else was a-listening to her, and even then she leaned in real close to me so that I could smell her hot breath whenever she talked. “It were Peester and Singletree,” she said.

  “What?” I said.

  “It were Peester and Singletree,” she said.

  “You mean, ole Peester and this here Singletree was a-doing it together — in bed?” I said.

  “That’s the story,” she said. “And whenever Agnes found out about them, she threatened to tell the whole town if Singletree didn’t cut it off.”

  “You mean the stuff what was going on with Peester,” I said. “You don’t mean his thing?”

  “No,” Bonnie said, like as if she was kinda disgusted with me. “I mean that Agnes told Singletree if he didn’t stop messing around with ole Peester, she was a-going to tell on them, and she was a-going to tell it ever’where, too. Well, he musta agreed to her terms, ‘cause they left town right after that.”

  “And you don’t know which story is the true story?” I asked her.

  “No,” she said. “I don’t, but them was the two stories what got told all around town. After Singletree and Agnes left, folks eventual kinda forgot about it all after a while.”

  I scratched my head. I rubbed my chin. I drunk all of the whiskey outa my tumbler and then poured me some more.

  “So,” I said, “if ole Peester is a-skeered that Sly mighta come to town to kill him, and if the first tale is the true one, Peester might be a-thinking that ole Singletree hired Sly on account of him stealing his money and his wife.”

  “That could be,” said Bonnie.

  “It’d make sense,” Happy agreed.

  “But if the second story is the real one,” I said, “then Peester could be a-thinking that it was Agnes what hired Sly. Either way, it could very easy be the whole damn Singletree incident what has got him running so skeered.”

  “From what all I know,” said Bonnie, “that’s what I’d say.”

  “Yeah,” said Happy. “Me too.”

  “There’s another possibility in all this what just come to me,” I said. “That Jonsey feller could be a-trying to get even for what Peester done to him.”

  “Yeah,” said Happy. “That’s right, Baijack.”

  “I hadn’t thought of that,” said Bonnie, “but it could be.”

  “What I mean,” I said, “is that them is all the different things what Peester could be a-thinking. We know ain’t none of them true, ‘cause we know that Sly never really come here to kill no one.”

  Well, I let all that soak into my head real good while I sipped me some more good whiskey. It come to me then that our troubles over ole Sly being in town was just about all behind us now. Now that I knowed all about the Singletree business, I could keep ole Peester shut up. There wasn’t no question about that. The ranchers’ feud was over, and now all the serious troublemakers was in jail over to the county seat. I figgered that things was going to get real quiet again and stay that-away, and that was the way I liked it. Sly come walking in just then. I waved at him, calling him on over to our table. He come on and set down with us.

  “You want some whiskey?” I asked him.

  “I think I’d best leave it alone,” he said. “That last episode taught me a lesson. I seldom drink like that. I guess I had gotten a little too relaxed around here.”

  “Hell,” I said, “that’s all over and did with. There ain’t no danger here now. Let me buy you a drink.”

  “I suppose one drink won’t hurt anything,” he said.

  I called out to ole Aubrey to bring Sly a drink, and he did, but I noticed that ole Sly just kinda sipped at it, taking it real easy and staying cautious like. Thinking about how he damn near got hisself hanged, I guessed that I couldn’t really blame him none too much for a-taking that there attitude. Anyhow, I was feeling pretty damn good, and I figgered we had plenty of cause for celebrating, and I meant to get my own self good and damn drunk.

  I was a-thinking about ole Sly and my Lillian and the way they was a-getting so tight and how folks was a-talking about them all over town. It kinda tickled me how Sly was being such a gentleman, a-walking her home in the evening and not going inside the house and all, and me knowing Lillian the way I done, I figgered that his gentlemanliness was just driving her up the damn walls. I knowed that she was inviting him in ever’ night, and he was too much of a gentleman to accept her invite. I knowed that was making her crazy too, and that was what was tickling me so much about it all. I was a-getting me a lotta satisfaction over Lillian being frustrated thataway. Far as I was concerned, she deserved it.

  Well, by and by ole Happy opined as how he’d had enough and needed to get hisself some sleep before it was time for him to be at the office in the morning, and I never tried to stop him, ‘cause I sure didn’t want to have to be there too damn early. He went on then, and that left just only me and Bonnie and Sly. Bonnie excused herself and went over to the bar to tell one of the girls something, and so while it was just me and Sly a-setting there, he decided to talk at me about something.

  “Baijack,” he said, “you know that there’s no one who can make me leave a town if I don’t want to go.”

  “Yeah,” I said, “I reckon I kinda had that one all figgered out.”

  “But if you want me to leave your town,” he said, “just give me the word, and I’ll leave.”

  I wrinkled my face up some, ‘cause I sure as hell didn’t know what the hell he was a-talking about. “Why the hell would I want you to go?” I asked him. “Hell,

  I’m the one what’s been defending your right to be here.”

  “I know that,” he said. “You’ve been upholding the law. But it should be pretty obvious to you by now, as well as to everyone else in town, that I have an interest in Mrs. Baijack. More than a passing interest. You say the word, and I’ll leave.”

  “Mr. Widdermaking Sly,” I said, “your interest, as you put it, in ole Lillian ain’t no concern to me. Ole Lillian throwed me outa the house, a-shooting at me as I went, and I figger that me and her is quits for good. So whatever she does is her business and none of mine.”

  The truth of the matter was that I had a couple a good strong reasons for wanting ole Sly to stick around. One a them reasons was Lillian. I really and truly liked what was a-going on between them two, ‘cause if it was to persist, that would mean that Lillian was for sure all done with me, and I didn’t want to have no more attachments with her. I didn’t want her changing her mind and trying to get her clutches back into me. The other reason was that there was so many people in Asininity a-wanting Sly to leave, and I had said that he could stay, so the longer he stayed, and I was a-showing them that it was my word what meant something around our town, the better it was making me feel.

  “Baijack,” Sly said, “if you really mean that, then would you consent to giving Lillian a divorce?”

  “A dee-vorce?” I said. Hell, I hadn’t even tho
ught of nothing like that, but of course, a fine gentleman like Sly would. “Well, hell, if that’s what she wants, then we’ll take keer of it right away. I’ll go over and see ole Peester about it first thing in the morning. I reckon he can take keer of that all right. I’ll go over and see him about it first thing, on one condition.”

  “What’s that, Baijack?” he said.

  “I want you to go over there with me,” I said. “There’s another little matter that I want to kind of finish up with that little runt, and I need you along to make it work just right.”

  “I’ll go with you,” he said. “Certainly.”

  “All right, then,” I said. “It’s settled, and I think we had ought to have a drink on that.”

  “I agree,” Sly said.

  I poured us each another one, and he wasn’t quite so cautious with this one as he had been with his first one. ‘Course, this here was more than just my second one. I had drunk me a few while he sipped on that first one. I was beginning to feel pretty good too. Chester Filbert walked in just then, and it took me a couple of seconds for the sight of him to really soak into my brain, ‘cause he was a-carrying a six-gun in his right hand. He walked straight at the table where I was a-setting with ole Sly, and he raised that gun up and aimed it right smack at Sly’s chest.

  “You grave digger,” Chester said, “I’m tired of waiting. I’m here to kill you.”

  “If you think you can pull that trigger faster than I can pull mine,” Sly said, “go on and try it. I have a Colt Peacemaker under the table, cocked and aimed right at your belly button.”

  “I don’t believe you,” Chester said. “You’re bluffing.”

  “Call my bluff,” Sly said.

  “Chester,” I said, “put down that damn gun. Even if you was to kill Sly, which I don’t think you can do, then I’ll kill you. There ain’t no sense in this.”

  “The sense in it,” he said, “is that I’m tired of waiting for him to come after me. I’m tired of waiting, and I mean to finish it right here and now, even if it does kill me. I can’t stand it any longer.”