by Frank Bonham
He strode outside, his rage like a wild horse. In the pallid sunlight he stood with his fists closed. His eyes trailed down the street to where Roth’s buckskin pony stood at the Pima Bar hitch rack. Roth, waiting for his $3,000 before he would move …
Desperation taught a man things about himself. I’d kill Saddler if he ever set foot on my place, Jackson thought. I’ll cut those homesteaders down like trees if they try to stop me.
But right now Red Roth was blocking him. OK, mister, he decided grimly, you and I are going to have a little talk.
He crossed the side street to the saloon. Dim and chilly as a mine, the saloon ran back, the bar on the right, tables on the left. A stout log in the middle of the room supported the ceiling. There was a little barbershop set up in one corner, and on the bar two kegs of whiskey rested in wooden trestles.
The saloon, run by Jackson’s brother-in-law, had a good patronage of cowboys, teamsters, and a group of men in linsey-woolsey pants standing at the bar with Red Roth. Jackson heard poker dice rattle in a leather cup as Roth rolled with his teamsters. After a moment Jackson went up to him and laid a hand on his shoulder. When the logger glanced around, he said with a smile: “That all you got to do, Red?”
“It’s enough”—Roth winked—“if you keep on doing it.”
“Ready to travel?” Jackson asked.
“Ready when you are,” Roth said pointedly.
Nate Croft, the saloonkeeper, came along with a bar towel in his hand, a short, strongly built, cigar-smoking little man given to fancy sideburns and pleated shirts. Below his rolled sleeves, his arms were short and stubby.
“Nate, two glasses and bottle of the special,” Jackson said. “This is my brother-in-law, Red.”
Jackson had staked Croft, his wife’s brother, when he came to this country broke, had tried to make a rancher out of him. But in the end Croft had sold the land Jackson gave him and bought a saloon.
“You two practically own this town, eh?” Red Roth remarked.
Nate smiled at Jackson. “We did at one time, eh? You should have come along when Jim was riding high, Red. He’d buy sirloin steak for those huntin’ dogs of his. How many pairs of boots did you used to have that you’d never worn, Jim?”
Jackson said: “I’ve got some business with Red, Nate.”
Croft poured the whiskeys but remained nearby, dipping glasses in a bucket of soapy water. Roth picked up his drink.
“I’ve got a hunch I’d better drink this now,” he said, “or my pride will interfere. Never like taking liquor from a man who can’t afford to buy.”
“I’m going to need more time, Red,” Jackson said.
Roth disgustedly thudded the glass down. “Now, couldn’t you’ve waited till I drunk it?”
“Red,” Jackson said patiently, “somebody’s going to mistake one of your remarks for an insult someday, and break your jaw. I want those trees to start falling tomorrow.”
The big room made no more noise than a fine watch. “How can you raise in a week what you can’t raise in an hour?” Roth argued. “Either your credit’s good, or it ain’t. Maybe you can sell some of them sirloin steaks and boots, Big Jim. How big was this burg when they started calling you that?”
Nate Croft laughed. Jackson’s eyes snapped at him. Nate’s brown face was slick with perspiration, and he tried to stop grinning as Jackson glowered. He came to the counter as Red Roth turned his back on the rancher. “Was that cash for the whiskey?” Nate suggested.
Jackson snapped: “Put it against what you never paid me for the land I gave you.”
Nate chuckled. “Seems a title like Big Jim costs money, eh?”
Suddenly, like a coin dropping on a marble counter, ringing sweetly and persistently, a thought glittered in Jackson’s mind. As if Croft had seen it, his features began to alter. He turned to walk away, but Jackson said: “Nate, I want to talk to you. Upstairs.”
Jackson smiled at Croft’s blank face. He sauntered down the bar to the rear door. After a moment Croft followed, up a short stairway to a hall with cracked plaster walls, a door on either side, and a door at the end. Croft unlocked the end door and walked in, Jackson close behind him. It was a small, ill-smelling bedroom with a leather-slung cot, a clothespress, a deal table, and two chairs. A green blind was drawn on a window over the street. Cigar butts lay on the floor by the cot. A small Salamander safe squatted lumpily in one corner, and both men glanced at it as Jackson kicked the door closed.
He stood before the brother of his dead wife, big and puncheon-built. A queer, wiry excitement ran through him. Suddenly his shoulder moved, and his fist crashed against the side of Nate’s jaw. Nate stumbled and went down on all fours. His head clearing, he blinked up at the rancher.
“What the hell was that for?”
“That was for fun. You just had yours,” Jackson said. He smacked his fist against his palm. “Get up, Natey. Let’s do it again.”
Croft rose slowly and began to back away, but Jackson caught him by the arm and threw another punch at his face. There was a shameful joy in the rancher as he saw Croft, blood trickling from his mouth, reel against the cot and fall back on it.
Croft sat there, his face the color of chamois. “Damn it, Jim, I’ll swear out—”
“No,” Jackson said, “this is just a family squabble. You and I never did get our business finished about the land I gave you. Open the safe and get me three thousand dollars, gold. I’ll write you a receipt.”
He stared down at the saloonkeeper, hating the cheapness of him, the tricked-up flourishes of diamond stickpin and ring and a gold cap over a sound tooth.
“I paid you,” Croft panted. “I gave you all the cattle I’d raised when I sold the land.”
“Scabby longhorned culls. I sold them for two hundred dollars. You got three thousand for the land. Come on, Nate.”
“You know this is robbery, don’t you?”
“If you say so. Just don’t say it where anybody can hear you, because they’ll laugh in your face. Come on!”
Croft took a deep breath, glaring furiously at Big Jim Jackson. At last he got up. He walked to the safe.
V
Cameron and Mike Saddler had left the roundup camp at sunup. At the last minute Saddler had decided to go with Troy and take care of some business. They had now been in Frontera an hour, and Troy Cameron had left Saddler at the bank, where he had his mysterious personal business. He had worn that self-important, secret smile on his face as he went in.
Not long before, as they were looking for Jim Jackson at the mercantile, Cameron had seen the rancher come from the bank with the air of an angry bull, stare a moment at the saloon, and cross over to it.
Despite himself, Cameron was growing pessimistic over his chance of achieving anything with Jim Jackson. He had left marshaling with a stiff wrist and a great patience with angry people, and because of that patience Colonel Edwards had picked him to be the peacemaker. But it took two men wanting peace for peace to be possible.
Standing there, he saw Serena come from a store, a small, sauntering, dark-haired girl twirling a serif-striped parasol. Seeing her gave him a sudden thrill of excitement and need. He watched the movements of her slender waist and slim shoulders, the swing of her gown from the hips.
Against his will, because he was a practical man, Troy had fallen in love with her. Although he was not humble about being a baling-wire cowman, he was pessimistic about rich girls who married poor husbands. He knew he could not keep Serena in coal oil for the lamps she’d leave burning; what he would save on homemade harness, she’d waste in the kitchen. But love had deaf ears for logic. He was in love with a girl who had probably never asked the price of anything in all her life. And now her father was trying to sustain his own position at the expense of Troy and his friends.
Troy sighed and started to follow Serena. But then he thought of her father in th
e saloon. Whatever had happened at the bank, a few whiskies would make Jackson impossible to reach. He sighed, stepped into the street, and crossed to the Pima Bar.
As he pushed through the slatted doors, he remembered Tom Doyle and stepped away from the door, from old dislike of being outlined in doorways. He stood against the rough, unplastered wall, very tall, relaxed, and looking a little tired, like a marshal making a half-bored tour of the saloons. There was nothing to distinguish him from any other cattleman except a certain carefulness in his manner. He wore a denim jacket and faded denim trousers. His gray Stetson was tilted to one side, and on his thigh hung a plain cedar-handled Colt. After a moment he moved into the saloon.
At the bar Jim Jackson was rolling poker dice with Red Roth. Roth saw him first and murmured: “Company. Mister Troy Cameron to see you.”
Jackson turned without haste. His hard features were composed. “Have a drink?” he invited.
“Thanks. Maybe a beer.” Troy put his elbow on the bar, and he and Jackson were face to face. “I heard you were wanting to dicker for some timber.”
Jackson’s wide mouth relaxed. He glanced at Roth. “Maybe. What’s your proposition?”
Behind Jackson, Roth grinned at Cameron. His self-confidence was like a chip on his shoulder. A chamois coin bag rested on the bar by his glass. “The same one I made Roth last night,” Troy said stiffly. “Come legally, or don’t come at all.”
“Coming legally won’t be any trouble,” Jackson said. “I thought I might do better by you than that, though. Something like you keeping the land and me taking the timber.”
The concession surprised Troy. But in the end it would come to the same thing. Jackson would spoil their range and eventually they would go under anyway.
“Taking the timber,” he said, “and spoiling our springs and graze. I suppose you know we’re scraping the bottom of the barrel up there.”
Jackson let his full dislike come into his eyes. Troy saw the purest contempt there that he had ever seen in a man’s face.
“I should think you’d know by now,” Jackson said dryly, “that I don’t give a damn how many of you go broke. I feel about homesteaders like a dog feels about fleas.”
Roth chuckled and some cowboys of Jackson’s laughed. Troy’s fist closed. “I didn’t come to you for sympathy. I came to warn you. Don’t try to move in on us without something signed by a judge.”
The rancher leaned toward him, his big jaw jutting. He tapped Troy’s arm. “I’ll give you something signed by Jim Jackson, mister. Write this down and I’ll sign it. I’m starting proceedings against every man I’ve got on the books! You can pay up, sign over your timber … or get out. Whichever it is, I’m coming in.”
Troy shook his head. “Not yet you aren’t. Foreclosures take something you haven’t got … time. By the time you get through foreclosing, we’ll have logged out enough tie timber ourselves to pay you off. So I figure we deserve a better shake than you’ve offered.”
Jackson’s eyes were cold as a wolf’s. “Such as what?”
“Splitting the timber with you. It will clear us and give you something to buy land with. But the logging won’t be done by Roth.”
Jackson rattled the dice in the cup. “I hear you were a pretty important fella down in Eagle Pass or somewhere, Cameron. For some reason my daughter seems to fancy you, too. That’s fine. But as far as I’m concerned, you’re just a man who used to be good with a gun. Tom Doyle’s good, too, so that cancels you out … if that’s why your friends sent you to lay the gad to me. You can be glad I kept him at the ranch today. He was spoiling to come in town and lay you down in rock salt. Understand me, now. I’ve made my offer, and it stands. Take it or leave it.”
“I told you,” Troy said, “that we aren’t taking it.”
After an instant Jackson straightened. “Then we understand each other,” he said. Turning, he laid a hand on Red Roth’s shoulder. “Red,” he said, “you ought to be seeing to your provisions. I want you to haul out at noon. Come on over to the store and pick out what you need.”
Roth finished his drink in a gulp. He swept up the chamois poke and dropped it in his pocket. “Sure,” he said. He signaled to his men and they started from the saloon. Jackson walked beside Roth. At the door, the others crowded out ahead of him and the rancher turned back. The light shadowed his face harshly as he stared at Troy.
“By the way,” he said, “it’s a mighty long ride from your outfit down to mine. So don’t bother riding down on my daughter’s account. She told me to tell you that.”
“You’re a liar,” Troy said. Jackson had begun to turn away but he swung back. Troy unbuckled his gun belt and laid it on the bar, holding Jackson’s eyes. He was furious but he knew what he was doing. A bluff was only as good as the man who made it. It was better to call Jackson’s bluff here, man against man, than in the woods where it would be army against army.
In the saloon everything stopped. Beside the door, Red Roth watched Troy come toward Jackson, listened to the soft chinking of his spurs. The bartenders gazed at the tall man in worn ranch clothes walking toward Big Jim Jackson. Jim Jackson was older, but he was three inches taller and built like a log wedge. Jackson’s eyes gleamed and he began unbuckling his bone-handled Colt. He handed it to Roth, still meeting Cameron’s gaze.
“I didn’t get that,” he said.
“I said you were a liar,” Troy repeated. “And since you ask, I’ll tell you your brag is cheaper than a fifty-cent watch. Hiring gunmen and wood lice like Roth to protect you.”
Jackson removed his Stetson and waited. His jaw was set. He outweighed the Defiance rancher by twenty pounds. Frowning at him, Troy thought: You could break your fist on that jaw. All at once something made him glance down at the gray Stetson Jackson had removed but not dropped, then he knew what he was going to do. Suddenly Jackson whipped the sombrero up into Troy’s face. He charged in behind it like a bull.
Troy slapped the hat away, and Jackson was wide open before him. He moved aside, light as a cat, and, as Jackson tried to move with him, he sank his fist deeply in the rancher’s belly. When Jackson gasped and hunched over, Troy brought his left in a short, hard uppercut to his face. Jim Jackson fell back, groped for support, but stumbled through the doors into the street.
He was getting up off the boardwalk as Cameron batted the doors open and stepped outside. The sunlight cut at his eyes like a knife. Across the street he saw Mike Saddler, a cigarette half rolled, staring at the Pima Bar. On the porch of the mercantile a girl rose swiftly from a chair, and he knew it was Serena. The horses at the rack began to lunge against each other. Jim Jackson stood up with blood on his mouth. He wiped it away with the back of his hand and looked at the red smear. Then he looked at Troy and his eyes were black.
Holding his fists at his belt, Jackson walked toward him. Troy waited. He had not wanted the fight. He had come here to get away from fights and memories of fights, of men with blood on their faces and guns in their hands. But this was one of the things you had to fight over, even if the girl you wanted was watching across the street.
Jackson swung at his face. Troy blocked it, and Jackson hauled up a roundhouse left that smashed into his shoulder. It felt like a kick of a horse. Troy’s neck arched. Jackson brought in his right and the pain in Troy’s head was sharp and sudden as glass breaking. Then the big rancher was on top of him like a cougar dropping on a horse. He stamped on Troy’s foot and held him there while he chopped at his face, and, when Troy tried to roll aside, Jackson caught him by the throat and drove him against the adobe wall so that his head jarred against it. Troy was hurt and breathless. He saw Jackson’s shoulder roll and knew that with the wall at his back Jackson’s fist would break his jaw. He sprawled forward, catching him around the shoulders. Jackson’s knee gouged at his groin as they fell against the hitch rail. They sprawled across it while the horses shied away. Then they stumbled into the roa
d, dusty, blood-smeared, and wary, circling like pit bulls.
Somewhere a copper bugle blared. On the edge of his mind Troy remembered that it was stage day. But his head remembered the power of Jackson’s blows. You could block his swings but you could not stop them. Yet he had to stop them. He and Jackson were making policy with their fists, establishing how it was going to be in the Defiances.
Suddenly Jim Jackson, tiring of sparring, buried his chin and waded in. He found Troy’s chin with a swing, and Troy sat down. Numbly he stared up at Jackson. The sleeve of the rancher’s coat was torn at the shoulder. Jackson’s teeth showed in a bloody grimace.
“Come on, you Texas gunslinger!” he taunted. “Show me how you tamed Eagle Pass.”
“Dad!”
Troy heard Serena call it from the porch of the mercantile. Jackson gave no sign of hearing. He loomed over Troy, waiting for him. Troy shook his head. He came up on one knee and rested a moment. Then he rose and waited for the rush he knew Jackson would make. Jackson’s men were shouting from the walk as Big Jim Jackson moved in to finish it. He cocked his right, and it looked to Troy as hard as a horse’s hoof. He drove at Troy’s head and Troy ducked under it. Jackson tried to throw his left and just then Troy saw his unguarded belly. He ripped at the slack muscles above Jackson’s belt buckle. Then he smashed his left with full power up under the rancher’s chin. Jackson tottered back, his features loosening. He fell, but immediately got onto his hands and knees.
Troy became aware that the stage from Picacho had stopped a few feet away. The horses snorted and stomped, lathered and nervous. Suddenly a door of the coach opened. The conductor leaned over the side to call: “Just a minute, folks! Keep your seats!”
A girl—a young woman—got out nevertheless. She was tall and blond and very trim in a close-fitting gown and a gray cape. A small black hat clung to the side of her head. With one hand on the door, she stared at the fighters, at Jackson on his hands and knees, and at Troy waiting with his fists clenched.
