Monte Walsh

by Jack Schaefer

  "Shucks, no," said Monte. "Things were so damned peaceful, seemed to make sense disturbing them."

  Justice Coleman unfolded his hands and folded them again with fingers reversed. "So you proceeded to disturb them," he said. "Logical. From your point of view. But, alas, not legal. So it becomes my duty to disturb you."

  "Go right ahead, Judge," said Monte and shoved his left hand into left pants pocket.

  "I intend to," said Justice Coleman. "That will be ten dollars-" He stopped. He straightened in the swivel chair and pushed it with his feet against the floor as far back as possible butting against the rolltop desk. Monte Walsh was halfway to him, hands out to grab, before intercepted by one of the freighters in a flying dive, followed close by the bartender and the other freighter. Justice Coleman tucked his feet out of the way under the swivel chair and watched a repetition of the original disturbance. He began to be worried. Reinforcements sprang from along the wall. He sighed in relief. He pushed his feet out again and settled to a more comfortable position and looked down at Monte Walsh flat on the floor with a man sitting on each leg and arm. "-or ten days," he said.

  * * *

  The last light of the sun low to the horizon shone through the one high window in the rear wall of Harmony's new shack. The bright patch it cast on the front wall was marred by four perpendicular shadow lines made by four iron bars set into the window frame. There was no glass in the window. An outside shutter had been swung back and hooked to the outside wall. The door to the shack stood open. A grillwork of iron bars filled the doorway, hung on heavy outside hinges at one side and fastened with a heavy padlock on the other. A plump graying pear-shaped man in old dungarees and plaid shirt stood by the grillwork peering through at Monte Walsh inside on the edge of the cot along one wall.

  Monte lay back on the cot and put his hands up behind his head and regarded the ceiling.

  "Shucks," he said. "How was I to know they'd got a jail too."

  "Don't go getting snooty," said the pear-shaped man. "It ain't just for you."

  Monte continued to regard the ceiling. "Now me," he murmured. "I'd be plumb ashamed to be running a jail."

  "It's a job," said the pear-shaped man. He turned away and disappeared from view. Monte waited a moment. He came to his feet in one motion and made a quick circuit of the shack. It was firm and solid. He stopped by the grillwork door. Near the bottom, between two cross-strips, a segment of bar had been removed leaving an opening about ten inches square. "Have to be a circus freak," he said, "to wiggle through that." He put the one chair in the room under the one window and stood on it and looked out. A hundred yards away Chet Rollins sat easy and casual on the chunky gray holding a lead rope fastened to the bridle of the short-coupled pinto. He saw Monte's face between the bars and waved his free hand in cheery salute and took hold of his reins and swung the horses away. Monte watched him jogging into distance. "Why that low-bellied snake," he said. "Leaving me here." He returned to the cot and lay back again and regarded the ceiling.

  The bright patch on the front wall faded and the diffused light of dusk crept through the shack leaving darkening shadows in the corners. Monte heard slight sounds by the doorway and turned his head. A plate heaped with beef stew was coming through the small square opening near the bottom and being set on the floor just inside. "Wandered what that was for," he murmured. A large tin cup of coffee followed the plate. He sat upright on the cot. The hand holding the cup was small and feminine. He came to his feet, light and quick, and was over by the doorway. Outside a neat figure, plump and pleasing, was rising upright from a stooping position. It filled out an old gingham dress with satisfying completeness and the head above the dress was young and healthy with a broad glowing good-natured face and a quantity of darkish hair pulled back and tied behind with a small ribbon.

  "My oh my," said Monte. "Where'd you come from?"

  She stepped back a pace and looked him over. "You don't seem so much," she said. "I thought you'd be horrible. Beating up three men ... Oh. From that house next door. That's where we live. We've been here three weeks already."

  "No," said Monte. "All that time and I've missed you?"

  "You wouldn't see me," she said. "Not the places you'd go. Just put those dishes outside when you're through." She started away.

  "Hey," said Monte. "You married to him?"

  She stopped and swung at the waist to turn her head back toward him. "I don't see as that's any of your affair. But it's no. He's my father."

  "Lovely," said Monte. "Just plain lovely."

  She turned around to face him, hands on hips. "Listen, mister cowboy. This is business. See? You mean a dollar a day to us on the feeding and that's fifty cents profit if you don't eat too much."

  "Shucks," said Monte. "I'll just nibble a little." He was talking to her back as she departed. He squatted on the floor and sniffed the stew. He cleaned the plate and finished the coffee. He set the dishes outside through the square opening and retired to the cot and the ceiling. The dusk deepened into darkness and a thin sliver moon emerged in the sky. He heard soft sounds at the window and rolled his head to look. In the faint light of the moon he made out fingers tying a rope to one of the bars. He came to his feet, light and quick, and stepped up on the chair by the window. The round stubbled face of Chet Rollins beamed at him through the bars. "Nice evening," said Chet. He was standing on his saddle on the back of the chunky gray. The short-coupled pinto, ground-reined, waited patiently thirty feet away. Chet's face sank from sight as he dropped down into the saddle.

  "Hey," whispered Monte. "Don't-"

  "Nothing to it," came Chet's voice from below the window. The gray moved out from the rear wall and the rope stretched taut between the bar and the saddle horn. Chet tickled the gray with his spurs and it plowed forward, head low and straining, and the window frame, complete with bars, ripped out of the wall and bounced to the ground.

  "Why that double-crossing jackass," murmured Monte. He watched Chet dismount and amble over to the fallen window frame and start unfastening the rope. He heard running footsteps coming from the house next door. He jumped off the chair and stepped over by the grillwork door. The pear­shaped man appeared in a nightshirt, a shotgun in his hands,

  eyes wide and popping as he tried to see into the dark interior. "What's going on in there?" he said.

  "Nothing much," said Monte. "I tripped over the damn bucket."

  "Well, quit it," said the pear-shaped man. "I need my sleep." He bent down and took the plate and cup and departed toward the house. Monte retired to the cot and lay back and closed his eyes.

  "What're you doing in there?" said Chet Rollins from the window opening. "Packing a trunk?"

  "Go fly a kite," suggested Monte.

  Chet shifted his feet to firmer position on the saddle and leaned on the edge of the window opening. "That judge can't boss outside of town," he said. He waited. There was no response. He sighed. "Who's the girl this time? How'd you meet her stuck in there?" He waited again. He sighed again and pushed out from the window edge and dropped down into the saddle.

  Monte opened his eyes and raised his head, listening. He heard soft hoofbeats, muffled in the dust, fade away. He settled his head back down and wriggled into a more comfortable position on the cot. "Three times a day for ten days," he murmured and was asleep.

  The thin sliver moon arched downward and dipped below the horizon and the first faint glimmers of the light before dawn crept into the shack. There were small scraping noises in the neighborhood of the window opening. Monte Walsh stirred and wriggled on the cot and suddenly was still, eyes wide open. He had company. He rolled his head and saw Chet Rollins a few feet away, flanked on one side by Dally Johnson and on the other by Shorty Austin.

  "I could yell," said Monte.

  "We could ram a gag down your throat," said Chet.

  "Coming peaceable?" said Dally. "Or do we have to truss you like a dressed chicken?"

  "Better had," said Shorty. "One of those dollars was min
e."

  "My oh my," said Monte. "Where'd you come from?"

  "Did you think," said Chet, leading the way to the window, "I was going to finish topping those broncs all by my lonesome?"

  * * *

  The unorganized town of Harmony was wide awake in the afternoon glaze. Curtains were pulled at some of the houses to shut out more than the sun. The street doors of the livery stable and the blacksmith shop were wide open. New signs offering new bargains were tacked on the front of the general store under the awning. Cow ponies in rows stood patiently twitching tails along the tie rails. Down the brief length of the main street floated the sound of voices and chinking glass emanating from all four saloons. The temporary harmony of the beginnings of serious drinking reigned in Harmony. And out beyond the last close rise of the rolling plain, skirting around it and staying below the skyline, jogged a deep-chested leggy dun.

  "Got to be cagey about this," murmured Monte Walsh. He circled and came in behind the livery stable and swung down and rapped on the rear door. He rapped again and it opened and disclosed a short hunchbacked man holding a pitchfork. The man stepped aside as Monte led the dun in. "Keep this thing for me and my gear," said Monte. "Likely some days before I'll be needing 'em."

  "Sure thing, Monte," said the man. "Grain 'im any?"

  "Shucks, no," said Monte. "Don't go giving that thing fancy notions." He started back out the door and stopped. "You ain't seen me," he said. "I ain't in town."

  "Sure thing," said the man, staring at him. "If you say so."

  Monte moved out the door and along the rear of the stable. Part of a month's pay burdened his left pants pocket. He ducked across the alley between the stable and the barber shop and rapped on the rear door of the shop. It opened partway and the upper portion of a thin little man in old checkered trousers and a once-white shirt peered around it.

  "Any one in there?" said Monte.

  "Not right now," said the barber. "Only me."

  "That's plenty," said Monte. He pushed in past the little man and settled himself in the one barber chair. Twenty-five minutes later, shaved, hair cut and shampooed, he strolled out the way he had come and back across the alley and on past the livery stable to the rear kitchen door of the combination hotel and office building. He went in and tossed a greeting at the combination cook and waiter who was pounding chunks of beef with a hammer and strolled on through and around and along a hallway to an open doorway with a board nailed above it marked Sheriff. He leaned against the doorframe and regarded the broad back of a big curly-headed man sitting at a desk by a window busy shuffling papers and tucking them away in pigeonholes.

  "Howdy, Mac," said Monte. "Heard they gave you a badge."

  The big man turned his head and saw Monte. "I ain't proud," he said. "Somebody had to take it." He returned to his papers.

  "Well," said Monte. "I'm here."

  The big man did not look up. "So you are," he said. "Looks like you anyway."

  "Mighty quiet," said Monte. "Ain't you after me?"

  The big man shifted his chair around and put a hand on each knee and looked up. "What is it you've been doing now?"

  "Nothing much," said Monte. "Finished a batch of horses and got straight with the boys. But I got ten days to do."

  The crinkles around the big man's eyes deepened and he leaned back in the chair and put both hands up behind his head, elbows wide. "Ain't anybody told you?" he said. "Judge inquired around the next day. Figured why you did it and killed the charge. He ain't through laughing at it yet." The big man hitched his chair back around and returned to his papers.

  "Shucks," murmured Monte. "That ain't fair. I was counting on those days." He studied his blunt fingers and pulled a match out of a pocket and began cleaning dirt from under a fingernail. He flipped the match at the big man's broad back and strolled out along the hallway and out the front door of the building and along the street to the small house beside the jail. He took off his hat and held it in his left hand and rapped with his right on the front door. He waited and rapped again. The door opened and he saw a neat figure, plump and pleasing, which filled out an old brown skirt and a faded frilled shirtwaist with satisfying completeness.

  "It's you," she said and started to close the door and caught it and held it open a little way and peered around it. "Why aren't you over at one of those saloons?"

  "Shucks, ma'am," said Monte. "They're all right when there ain't anything better to do. There's a nice little buggy over at the livery stable. I thought you and me'd take a ride."

  "After what you did?" she said and started to close the door again. Monte's left boot was in the way. "Well, now, ma'am," he said. "I know I did kind of run out on you back there a bit."

  She pushed on the door. The boot was still in the way. "On me?" she said. "Well I never! It took Father half a day to fix that window!"

  Monte transferred the hat to his right hand and fished in his left pants pocket and pulled out a five-dollar bill. "Kind of like to make that right," he said. "Fifty cents profit for ten days. That's what you'd have made on me. Here it is."

  "Why-why-you-" With quick movement she pulled the door further open and slammed it back against the boot and Monte tottered hopping on his right foot and she closed the door with a vigorous snap. It opened again a few inches, almost on the rebound, and her voice came through. "And don't you ever try to come near me again!" The door closed with a definite click.

  "Now ain't that a girl," murmured Monte. He tried to feel his left toes through the boot leather. They seemed to be intact. He put his hat on and pulled it down and limped across the street and sat on the edge of the plank sidewalk and stud­ied the house across the way.

  "Can't let any of the boys beat me to her," he murmured. He looked up the street. Something had been added. Two freight wagons now stood at one side, their ox teams chewing cuds in placid endurance. A slow grin spread over Monte's face. He uncoiled onto his feet and limped up the street. A small jingle sounded from his left pants pocket. He slapped his left hand over it. "Got to unload that," he murmured. "Might get in the way."

  He limped into the saloon opposite the freight wagons. Lined along the bar were Chet Rollins and Dally Johnson and Shorty Austin and the rest of the Slash Y crew. At a table by the wall sat two freighters with a half-empty bottle between them. There was a neat hole through the crown of one of their hats.

  Monte limped to the bar. He pushed in between Chet Rollins and Powder Kent. He looked sideways at Chet and Chet looked at him and grinned a sheepish little grin.

  "Have trouble shaking the sheriff?" said Shorty Austin.

  "Check your hardware," said Dally Johnson down the line. "There's a jailbird loose in here."

  "Shucks," said Monte. "Some of you might have told me."

  He beckoned to the bartender. He fished in his left pants pocket and laid a fistful of crumpled bills and change on the bar. "Keep your damn count," he said. "But they're all on me long as that lasts."

  "Well, whatta you know," said Dally Johnson, reaching quick for a bottle. "He's celebratin'."

  "Addled," said Powder Kent. "But in a mighty encouraging way."

  Chet Rollins said nothing. He sighed. He picked up his glass and added another drink to those already behind his belt. His eyes began to brighten. Color was climbing up his cheeks. "Finished that bunch," he said. "Nothing really pressing for a while." He started to turn toward Monte.

  "No," said Monte. "You ain't even here. Remember?" He pulled a bottle toward him and leaned over the bar and reached under and found a small glass. He drained one, two, three, four. He set the glass down with a little flourish and stood rocking on his boot soles, letting the whisky settle some. "Feel about right," he murmured and strolled out into the middle of the floor. He took off his hat and sent it skimming and it smacked into the bottle on the table between the two freighters and the bottle fell gurgling into the lap of one of them.

  "Yow-eeee!" yelled Monte Walsh. "I'm a-howling!"

  * * *

  "G
ood Lord, Brennan, what's happening over in the bunk­house? Sounds as if someone was being murdered!"

  "That? That's just Shorty blattin' 'cause he's lost a hand. Probably tried to run a bluff."

  "Poker?"

  "In a way. Somethin' Monte thought up this winter. They got some beans in there. Pinto beans. They divvy 'em around, fifty each. A right cutthroat game. First man out's got to help Skimpy next day, with wood, dishes, slops an' such. Without skippin' his reg'lar work any. No playin' a waitin' game. They got a stiff ante. Five beans. Second man out's got to rub everyone's boots. Winner gets a whole pie. Skimpy antes that 'cause without playin' he wins anyway."

  XY Z

  1883

  THIS WAS a bad year at the Slash Y. Oh, the days rocked along about as usual most of the time, strenuous and full of the hard rough work that stiffened the spines of the men and made them proud they could do it with the swift seeming careless ease of old hands at the game, and nothing much really drastic happened except in one brief burst of bitter activity. Even the weather cooperated, kicking up a fuss only often enough to keep life interesting. The shareholders of the Consolidated Cattle Company had no complaints when they saw the annual audit and when the dividend checks came from the Chicago office. From their point of view it averaged out a good year.