The Complete Western Stories of Elmore Leonard

by Elmore Leonard

  Where's your sporting blood?"

  "Down in Bisbee with my wife and three youngsters," Scallen told him without smiling, and moved around the table.

  There were no grips on the window frame. Standing with his side to the window, facing the man on the bed, he put the heel of his hand on the bottom ledge of the frame and shoved down hard. The window banged shut and with the slam he saw Jim Kidd kicking up off of his back, his body straining to rise without his hands to help. Momentarily, Scallen hesitated and his finger tensed on the trigger. Kidd's feet were on the floor, his body swinging up and his head down to lunge from the bed.

  Scallen took one step and brought his knee up hard against Kidd's face.

  The outlaw went back across the bed, his head striking the wall. He lay there with his eyes open looking at Scallen.

  "Feel better now, Jim?"

  Kidd brought his hands up to his mouth, working the jaw around.

  "Well, I had to try you out," he said. "I didn't think you'd shoot."

  "But you know I will the next time."

  For a few minutes Kidd remained motionless. Then he began to pull himself straight. "I just want to sit up."

  Behind the table Scallen said, "Help yourself." He watched Kidd stare out the window.

  Then, "How much do you make, Marshal?" Kidd asked the question abruptly.

  "I don't think it's any of your business."

  "What difference does it make?"

  Scallen hesitated. "A hundred and fifty a month," he said, finally, "some expenses, and a dollar bounty for every arrest against a Bisbee ordinance in the town limits." Kidd shook his head sympathetically. "And you got a wife and three kids."

  "Well, it's more than a cowhand makes."

  "But you're not a cowhand."

  "I've worked my share of beef."

  "Forty a month and keep, huh?" Kidd laughed.

  "That's right, forty a month," Scallen said. He felt awkward. "How much do you make?"

  Kidd grinned. When he smiled he looked very young, hardly out of his teens. "Name a month," he said. "It varies."

  "But you've made a lot of money."

  "Enough. I can buy what I want."

  "What are you going to be wanting the next five years?"

  "You're pretty sure we're going to Yuma."

  "And you're pretty sure we're not," Scallen said. "Well, I've got two train passes and a shotgun that says we are. What've you got?"

  Kidd smiled. "You'll see." Then he said right after it, his tone changing, "What made you join the law?"

  "The money," Scallen answered, and felt foolish as he said it. But he went on, "I was working for a spread over by the Pantano Wash when Old Nana broke loose and raised hell up the Santa Rosa Valley. The army was going around in circles, so the Pima County marshal got up a bunch to help out and we tracked Apaches almost all spring. The marshal and I got along fine, so he offered me a deputy job if I wanted it."

  He wanted to say that he started for seventy-five and worked up to the one hundred and fifty, but he didn't.

  "And then someday you'll get to be marshal and make two hundred."

  "Maybe."

  "And then one night a drunk cowhand you've never seen will be tearing up somebody's saloon and you'll go in to arrest him and he'll drill you with a lucky shot before you get your gun out."

  "So you're telling me I'm crazy."

  "If you don't already know it."

  Scallen took his hand off the shotgun and pulled tobacco and paper from his shirt pocket and began rolling a cigarette. "Have you figured out yet what my price is?"

  Kidd looked startled, momentarily, but the grin returned. "No, I haven't. Maybe you come higher than I thought."

  Scallen scratched a match across the table, lighted the cigarette, then threw it to the floor, between Kidd's boots. "You don't have enough money, Jim."

  Kidd shrugged, then reached down for the cigarette. "You've treated me pretty good. I just wanted to make it easy on you."

  The sun came into the room after a while. Weakly at first, cold and hazy. Then it warmed and brightened and cast an oblong patch of light between the bed and the table. The morning wore on slowly because there was nothing to do and each man sat restlessly thinking about somewhere else, though it was a restlessness within and it showed on neither of them.

  The deputy rolled cigarettes for the outlaw and himself and most of the time they smoked in silence. Once Kidd asked him what time the train left. He told him shortly after three, but Kidd made no comment.

  Scallen went to the window and looked out at the narrow rutted road that was Commercial Street. He pulled a watch from his vest pocket and looked at it. It was almost noon, yet there were few people about. He wondered about this and asked himself if it was unnaturally quiet for a Saturday noon in Contention . . . or if it were just his nerves. . . .

  He studied the man standing under the wooden awning across the street, leaning idly against a support post with his thumbs hooked in his belt and his flat-crowned hat on the back of his head. There was something familiar about him. And each time Scallen had gone to the window--a few times during the past hour--the man had been there.

  He glanced at Jim Kidd lying across the bed, then looked out the window in time to see another man moving up next to the one at the post.

  They stood together for the space of a minute before the second man turned a horse from the tie rail, swung up, and rode off down the street.

  The man at the post watched him go and tilted his hat against the sun glare. And then it registered. With the hat low on his forehead Scallen saw him again as he had that morning. The man lying in the armchair . . . as if asleep.

  He saw his wife, then, and the three youngsters and he could almost feel the little girl sitting on his lap where she had climbed up to kiss him good-bye, and he had promised to bring her something from Tucson. He didn't know why they had come to him all of a sudden. And after he had put them out of his mind, since there was no room now, there was an upset feeling inside as if he had swallowed something that would not go down all the way. It made his heart beat a little faster. Jim Kidd was smiling up at him. "Anybody I know?"

  "I didn't think it showed."

  "Like the sun going down."

  Scallen glanced at the man across the street and then to Jim Kidd.

  "Come here." He nodded to the window. "Tell me who your friend is over there."

  Kidd half rose and leaned over looking out the window, then sat down again. "Charlie Prince."

  "Somebody else just went for help."

  "Charlie doesn't need help."

  "How did you know you were going to be in Contention?"

  "You told that Wells Fargo man I had friends . . . and about the posses chasing around in the hills. Figure it out for yourself. You could be looking out a window in Benson and seeing the same thing."

  "They're not going to do you any good."

  "I don't know any man who'd get himself killed for a hundred and fifty dollars." Kidd paused. "Especially a man with a wife and young ones. . . ."

  Men rode into town in something less than an hour later. Scallen heard the horses coming up Commercial, and went to the window to see the six riders pull to a stop and range themselves in a line in the middle of the street facing the hotel. Charlie Prince stood behind them, leaning against the post.

  Then he moved away from it, leisurely, and stepped down into the street. He walked between the horses and stopped in front of them just below the window. He cupped his hands to his mouth and shouted, "Jim!"

  In the quiet street it was like a pistol shot.

  Scallen looked at Kidd, seeing the smile that softened his face and was even in his eyes. Confidence. It was all over him. And even with the manacles on, you would believe that it was Jim Kidd who was holding the shotgun.

  "What do you want me to tell him?" Kidd said.

  "Tell him you'll write every day."

  Kidd laughed and went to the window, pushing it up by the top of the
frame. It raised a few inches. Then he moved his hands under the window and it slid up all the way.

  "Charlie, you go buy the boys a drink. We'll be down shortly."

  "Are you all right?"

  "Sure I'm all right."

  Charlie Prince hesitated. "What if you don't come down? He could kill you and say you tried to break. . . . Jim, you tell him what'll happen if we hear a gun go off."

  "He knows," Kidd said, and closed the window. He looked at Scallen standing motionless with the shotgun under his arm. "Your turn, Marshal."

  "What do you expect me to say?"

  "Something that makes sense. You said before I didn't mean a thing to you personally--what you're doing is just a job. Well, you figure out if it's worth getting killed for. All you have to do is throw your guns on the bed and let me walk out the door and you can go back to Bisbee and arrest all the drunks you want. Nobody's going to blame you with the odds stacked seven to one. You know your wife's not going to complain. . . ."

  "You should have been a lawyer, Jim."

  The smile began to fade from Kidd's face. "Come on--what's it going to be?"

  The door rattled with three knocks in quick succession. Abruptly the room was silent. The two men looked at each other and now the smile disappeared from Kidd's face completely.

  Scallen moved to the side of the door, tiptoeing in his high-heeled boots, then pointed his shotgun toward the bed. Kidd sat down.

  "Who is it?"

  For a moment there was no answer. Then he heard, "Timpey."

  He glanced at Kidd, who was watching him. "What do you want?"

  "I've got a pot of coffee for you."

  Scallen hesitated. "You alone?" "Of course I am. Hurry up, it's hot!"

  He drew the key from his coat pocket, then held the shotgun in the crook of his arm as he inserted the key with one hand and turned the knob with the other. The door opened and slammed against him, knocking him back against the dresser. He went off balance, sliding into the wardrobe, going down on his hands and knees, and the shotgun clattered across the floor to the window. He saw Jim Kidd drop to the floor for the gun. . . .

  "Hold it!"

  A heavyset man stood in the doorway with a Colt pointing out past the thick bulge of his stomach. "Leave that shotgun where it is." Timpey stood next to him with the coffeepot in his hand. There was coffee down the front of his suit, on the door, and on the flooring. He brushed at the front of his coat feebly, looking from Scallen to the man with the pistol.

  "I couldn't help it, Marshal--he made me do it. He threatened to do something to me if I didn't."

  "Who is he?"

  "Bob Moons . . . you know, Dick's brother. . . ."

  The heavyset man glanced at Timpey angrily. "Shut your damn whining." His eyes went to Jim Kidd and held there. "You know who I am, don't you?"

  Kidd looked uninterested. "You don't resemble anybody I know."

  "You didn't have to know Dick to shoot him!"

  "I didn't shoot that messenger."

  Scallen got to his feet, looking at Timpey. "What the hell's wrong with you?"

  "I couldn't help it. He forced me."

  "How did he know we were here?"

  "He came in this morning talking about Dick and I felt he needed some cheering up; so I told him Jim Kidd had been tried and was being taken to Yuma and was here in town . . . on his way. Bob didn't say anything and went out, and a little later he came back with the gun."

  "You damn fool." Scallen shook his head wearily.

  "Never mind all the talk." Moons kept the pistol on Kidd. "I would've found him sooner or later. This way everybody gets saved a long train ride."

  "You pull that trigger," Scallen said, "and you'll hang for murder."

  "Like he did for killing Dick. . . ."

  "A jury said he didn't do it." Scallen took a step toward the big man.

  "And I'm damned if I'm going to let you pass another sentence."

  "You stay put or I'll pass sentence on you!"

  Scallen moved a slow step nearer. "Hand me the gun, Bob."

  "I'm warning you--get the hell out of the way and let me do what I came for."

  "Bob, hand me the gun or I swear I'll beat you through that wall."

  Scallen tensed to take another step, another slow one. He saw Moons's eyes dart from him to Kidd and in that instant he knew it would be his only chance. He lunged, swinging his coat aside with his hand, and when the hand came up it was holding a Colt. All in one motion. The pistol went up and chopped an arc across Moons's head before the big man could bring his own gun around. His hat flew off as the barrel swiped his skull and he went back against the wall heavily, then sank to the floor.

  Scallen wheeled to face the window, thumbing the hammer back. But Kidd was still sitting on the edge of the bed with the shotgun at his feet.

  The deputy relaxed, letting the hammer ease down. "You might have made it, that time."

  Kidd shook his head. "I wouldn't have got off the bed." There was a note of surprise in his voice. "You know, you're pretty good. . . ."

  At two-fifteen Scallen looked at his watch, then stood up, pushing the chair back. The shotgun was under his arm. In less than an hour they would leave the hotel, walk over Commercial to Stockman, and then up Stockman to the station. Three blocks. He wanted to go all the way. He wanted to get Jim Kidd on that train . . . but he was afraid.

  He was afraid of what he might do once they were on the street.

  Even now his breath was short and occasionally he would inhale and let the air out slowly to calm himself. And he kept asking himself if it was worth it.

  People would be in the windows and the doors, though you wouldn't see them. They'd have their own feelings and most of their hearts would be pounding . . . and they'd edge back of the door frames a little more. The man out on the street was something without a human nature or a personality of its own. He was on a stage. The street was another world. Timpey sat on the chair in front of the door and next to him, squatting on the floor with his back against the wall, was Moons. Scallen had unloaded Moons's pistol and placed it in the pitcher behind him. Kidd was on the bed.

  Most of the time he stared at Scallen. His face bore a puzzled expression, making his eyes frown, and sometimes he would cock his head as if studying the deputy from a different angle.

  Scallen stepped to the window now. Charlie Prince and another man were under the awning. The others were not in sight.

  "You haven't changed your mind?" Kidd asked him seriously.

  Scallen shook his head.

  "I don't understand you. You risk your neck to save my life, now you'll risk it again to send me to prison."

  Scallen looked at Kidd and suddenly felt closer to him than any man he knew. "Don't ask me, Jim," he said, and sat down again.

  After that he looked at his watch every few minutes.

  At five minutes to three he walked to the door, motioning Timpey aside, and turned the key in the lock. "Let's go, Jim." When Kidd was next to him he prodded Moons with the gun barrel. "Over on the bed.

  Mister, if I see or hear about you on the street before train time, you'll face an attempted murder charge." He motioned Kidd past him, then stepped into the hall and locked the door.

  They went down the stairs and crossed the lobby to the front door, Scallen a stride behind with the shotgun barrel almost touching Kidd's back. Passing through the doorway he said as calmly as he could, "Turn left on Stockman and keep walking. No matter what you hear, keep walking."

  As they stepped out into Commercial, Scallen glanced at the ramada where Charlie Prince had been standing, but now the saloon porch was an empty shadow. Near the corner two horses stood under a sign that said EAT, in red letters; and on the other side of Stockman the signs continued, lining the rutted main street to make it seem narrower. And beneath the signs, in the shadows, nothing moved. There was a whisper of wind along the ramadas. It whipped sand specks from the street and rattled them against clapboard, and the sound was
hollow and lifeless. Somewhere a screen door banged, far away.

  They passed the cafe, turning onto Stockman. Ahead, the deserted street narrowed with distance to a dead end at the rail station--a single-story building standing by itself, low and sprawling, with most of the platform in shadow. The westbound was there, along the platform, but the engine and most of the cars were hidden by the station house. White steam lifted above the roof, to be lost in the sun's glare.

  They were almost to the platform when Kidd said over his shoulder, "Run like hell while you're still able."

  "Where are they?"

  Kidd grinned, because he knew Scallen was afraid. "How should I know?"

  "Tell them to come out in the open!"

  "Tell them yourself."

  "Dammit, tell them!" Scallen clenched his jaw and jabbed the short barrel into Kidd's back. "I'm not fooling. If they don't come out, I'll kill you!"

  Kidd felt the gun barrel hard against his spine and suddenly he shouted, "Charlie!"

  It echoed in the street, but after there was only the silence. Kidd's eyes darted over the shadowed porches. "Dammit, Charlie--hold on!"

  Scallen prodded him up the warped plank steps to the shade of the platform and suddenly he could feel them near. "Tell him again!"

  "Don't shoot, Charlie!" Kidd screamed the words.

  From the other side of the station they heard the trainman's call trailing off, ". . . Gila Bend. Sentinel, Yuma!"

  The whistle sounded loud, wailing, as they passed into the shade of the platform, then out again to the naked glare of the open side.

  Scallen squinted, glancing toward the station office, but the train dispatcher was not in sight. Nor was anyone. "It's the mail car," he said to Kidd. "The second to last one." Steam hissed from the iron cylinder of the engine, clouding that end of the platform. "Hurry it up!" he snapped, pushing Kidd along. Then, from behind, hurried footsteps sounded on the planking, and, as the hiss of steam died away--"Stand where you are!"

  The locomotive's main rods strained back, rising like the legs of a grotesque grasshopper, and the wheels moved. The connecting rods stopped on an upward swing and couplings clanged down the line of cars.

  "Throw the gun away, brother!"