Читать книгу Starlight Riders Boxed-Set 50 Western Classics in One Edition - Ernest Haycox - Страница 52

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Fancher was reading; he looked up to Jim Chaffee and lowered his feet to the floor, somewhat astonished. "Where in thunder have you been?"

"It wouldn't sound right if I told you," answered Chaffee. "I don't even sound right when I tell myself. It's been sort of an active evening. Here's a little trophy I took into camp. Bring out that biggest tar model and let's see what we can see."

He laid the captured boot on Fancher's table. The latter studied it with professional interest for some moments, then turned to his cabinet and drew out one of the models. Capsizing the boot, he fitted the model to the sole of it. Chaffee rolled a cigarette, his eyes half closed against the light.

"What would you think a jury might say to that, Doc?"

"A coroner's jury could easy hold a man over on that similarity," decided Fancher. "Whether a trial jury would convict on that much evidence, I ain't saying. The heels of the boot are some run over on the outer edges. Seems to show something like that in the model, doesn't it?"

"Now you're talkin' like an officer of the county, Doc. Get out and walk among humble citizens awhile. What's in the back of your head?"

"Boot and model—they fit. Of course it might be some other big man left the same kind of tracks, Jim."

"Yeah. How many fellows in Roarin' Horse with that size footgear?"

"I'm thinkin' of only one in particular."

Chaffee blew smoke to the ceiling. He seemed drawn and strangely hard-faced to Fancher. Nothing easy going, nothing humorous. "Well, Doc, the man you're thinking about is Theodorik Perrine. And that's Theodorik's boot. Put it away with the rest of our relics. I'm satisfied those were the big man's hoofprints. Ain't interested in what a jury would say. This won't get to a jury, Fancher."

"How'd you discover that boot, anyhow?"

"Took it away from Theodorik," said Chaffee, showing the first trace of amusement. It was a grim amusement, marked by a sudden flaring of the still aroused fighting temper. "At the point of a gun."

Fancher was visibly worried. "Jim, that's bad. He won't let you get away with it. You're in a hole. And I'm blamed if I see just how you figure to whistle out of it!"

"He's in town with his playmates right now," was Chaffee's laconic announcement.

"Damnation, why didn't you say that in the beginning! Foolin' away all this time. My boy, it's high time to do some figurin'. Any Stirrup S men around here yet?"

"All gone home."

"Any of your particular friends on hand?"

"None that I know about."

Fancher swore. "You'd better begin to get worried. Luis Locklear won't lift his little finger to stop a bust of gun play. He ain't that kind of a sheriff. He's feedin' out of a different trough. Understand what I mean? And half of the town men are swappin' politics. I know that blamed well. Something's changing things in Roarin' Horse. Rest of the storekeepers and so forth won't dare give you a boost. Ain't you got any ace in the hole, Jim?"

"None."

Fancher studied Jim Chaffee. He had been in the country many years and he had seen good men and bad men take their turn on the stage and depart. Sometimes the good men won out, and sometimes they lost. He had seen them step out to fight; he had pronounced a medical verdict over them after they had gone down in the dust. He knew the meaning of the narrow, fixed expression on Chaffee's lean cheeks. Once a man reached that state of mind he never backed out. Sighing a little, Fancher turned to the wall and reached for his gun belt. He buckled it around him. "All right, Jim. Let's go."

"Did I ask you for help?" snapped Chaffee, suddenly harsh and somber.

"I didn't hear as how you had a monopoly on trouble. Shut up. Come on."

Chaffee shook his head. "It's my fight, Doc. I'm obliged for the offer. But I started this thing solo and I'll finish solo."

"You're the biggest damn' fool I ever knew, Chaffee."

"Maybe. A man likes to rope his own horse. You know what I mean, but you're just tryin' to help. Stay up here. Somebody's got to stick in the background and pull strings. That's your job."

He turned to the door. Fancher raised his shoulders and grumbled; "All right, but I sure would hate to dig bullets out of you."

"What we want to find out now," said Chaffee, "is who owns those other boot prints. What we also want to know is the name of the man behind all this excitement. I could guess, but I might be wrong. He'll overplay his hand pretty soon. So long."

He closed the door and walked slowly down the dark stairs. One step short of the street he paused, resting in the blackness and scanning the opposite walk thoughtfully. A stray puncher passed him at arm's length, cigarette brightly glowing, spurs dragging along the loose boards. Chaffee advanced to the mouth of the stairway and looked right and left. He felt a threat, yet he had no means of placing the origin of that threat. Here and there a townsman moved. Even as he watched the lights of the Red Mill went out at the far end of the town and everything down there was obscured. Somebody talked drowsily and Chaffee heard a phrase: "Well, Billy the Kid had a warp in his system. Any man that shoots a-grinnin'—" The threat was clear, distinct. He could not remain forever in the protection of the stairway. They were waiting somewhere. His hands touched the gun butts; he moved to the sidewalk and started west toward the restaurant.

In the moments of waiting he had watched the porch of the Gusher. Instinct had drawn his attention there. Yet the profound shadows had told him nothing. Now, in motion, he saw a figure coming away from the porch, walking with so slow and swinging a gait that he turned and came to a halt. The other likewise halted, sending on a challenge.

"I want to see you, Chaffee."

He knew then who it was. "Here I am, Sleepy. Ain't you kind of slow on the trigger?"

The crisscross of words floated softly outward. Chairs slammed on another porch. The underground telegraph woke and warned Roaring Horse.

"I could of knocked yuh over by them stairs," admitted Sleepy Slade. "It was orders. But it ain't my style. I figger to be as good on the jump as you are. Any old time. Nobody's ever goin' to say Sleepy Slade had to take the long end o' the teeter to win an argument. Not with you, leastwise."

"Charitable sentiments," drawled Chaffee. He felt the gathering of men along the shadowed building sides. "But maybe you also figured sixty feet was too much distance to take a chance. Better come closer, Sleepy. You know I sort of specialize on long distance."

"I ain't arguin'," droned Slade. His body swayed slightly; he advanced half across the dusty thoroughfare and stood again. "Yuh drilled Ben Gluger. Yuh did same to Jap Ruggles. If yuh ain't cut them notches yet it's too late now."

"Ain't afraid I'll get away and try it again, Sleepy?"

"Yore corralled."

"Thanks for the information. Why don't Theodorik do his own chores?"

"I ain't arguin'," repeated Slade, the words grating more noticeably.

"Take a try," murmured Chaffee. "You're beginnin' to shake a little."

That touched off the powder. Slade yelled: "Like—" and the rest was lost in the roar that shot upward and outward and seemed to suck the echoes into small whirlpools around Chaffee's head. Slade weaved. In the velvet grayness Chaffee saw the man's feet spread wide and his arms stretched ahead as if he groped for his target. Roar ran into roar. Chaffee turned half around. A woman screamed, lights flashed on, a lantern made a series of hurdles against the night's background. "Try again," murmured Chaffee. But there were no more shots. Slade was sprawled grotesquely in the street, his gaunt and saturnine features marked by death. Luis Locklear held the lantern.

At once the street was alive with spectators. Jim Chaffee stuck fast to his place, watching the sheriff, watching the crowd. Theodorik Perrine kept clear of all this, nor did the rest of the giant's gang come into the light. They were still waiting out beyond the furor and babble, waiting for a second chance with a patience that somehow took away all the reassurance of the fight he had won. Luis Locklear turned. "Chaffee, I'll have yore guns."

"What for?"

Locklear's stubborn, bigoted countenance could not hold back the triumph that was his. "Stirrup S don't run the town no more. Pass the guns."

"Your manners are poor," drawled Chaffee. "Likewise your memory. Don't you know what happens when another fellow draws first?"

"How could he draw first and be dead?" scoffed Locklear. "You ain't no Annie Oakley. Yuh was pleased to shoot yore face the other night in the stable. Mebbe Stirrup S had a mortgage on the county one time. Not now. I'm goin' to learn yuh some manners down at my padlocked schoolhouse. Pass the guns."

"I believe I'll keep my guns," decided Chaffee. "Now whose bluff is the best?"

He felt solid metal press into his ribs from behind. "Yores ain't," said some unknown gentleman, briefly. Locklear grinned, sour satisfaction shining out of his red-rimmed eyes. He advanced and jerked Chaffee's revolvers clear. "Now, damn yore soul, I'll do the talkin' for a spell. Promiscuous shootin' ain't stylish here no more. Neither is Stirrup S. Yore goin to stand trial for the killin'. I lay ten dollars yuh get roped for it. Ain't very scared of losin' that money, either. Mush toward the jail."

More lanterns danced along the walks. The lights of the Red Mill burst through the windows again, and Jim Chaffee, walking silently ahead of the sheriff, wondered if that temporary darkness had been arranged for. Here and there he saw faces that not so long ago had been friendly and now were noncommittal or openly hostile. It still was puzzling to him to understand how men could change opinions so quickly when Locklear pushed him down into the basement cell of the county jail, locked the door, and walked away with a sullen oath trailing behind. What power could shift public opinion, or a good part of public opinion at least, so effectively and with so little outward display?

Men were gathering in the sheriff's office overhead. He heard the shuffle of their boots and the mutter of their conversation and the booming of a voice he knew very well. Theodorik Perrine had at last come out of the darkness.