Ralph Compton West of the Law

by West, Joseph A. ; Compton, Ralph

  ‘‘Damn it, Chester, stop.’’ Win bobbed his chin at the stick figures. ‘‘Not with them almost here.’’

  ‘‘It will be minutes yet,’’ Chester said. He stepped to the edge of the overhang. ‘‘You can’t blame me for feeling as I do. No one can. I had high hopes for Coffin Varnish.’’

  ‘‘Oh, hell. When you get formal I am in for a speech.’’

  ‘‘Mock me all you want,’’ Chester said. ‘‘The facts speak for themselves. Dodge City and Coffin Varnish started about the same time. We can thank Santa Fe traders for that. Dodge and Coffin Varnish were a bunch of shacks and tents. Then you built your saloon and I built my store and for a while there we were bigger than Dodge and—’’

  ‘‘Before you prattle on,’’ Win interrupted, ‘‘I have heard this probably a million times and I do not care to hear it a million and one. We both know what did Coffin Varnish in. The Santa Fe Railroad decided to run through Dodge and not through us. Dodge prospered and we withered. It is as simple as that.’’

  ‘‘I hate trains to this day,’’ Chester said vehemently, and shook a pudgy fist at an imaginary rail line. ‘‘I will walk before I will take a train. I will crawl!’’

  ‘‘Here we go,’’ Win said.

  ‘‘It’s just not fair,’’ Chester lamented. ‘‘I put all I had into my store, stocked it so I could outfit traders and emigrants and anybody else under the sun. And what happened? People stopped coming. They went to Dodge.’’ He glowered in the general direction of the offending municipality. ‘‘Want to know what my mistake was?’’

  ‘‘God, not that again.’’

  ‘‘My mistake was in not blowing Dodge to bits and pieces. I could have, back when they were the same size as us. I could have bought a wagonload of powder and snuck into Dodge one night and blown it to Hades and back.’’

  ‘‘You can’t sneak around in a wagon,’’ Win said.

  Chester did not appear to hear him. ‘‘I could have disguised myself as a trader and they never would have suspected. I’d have waited until they were all abed, then lit the fuse and got out of there.’’ Chuckling, he rubbed his palms together. ‘‘Oh, to see the looks on their faces when their precious town was in ruins!’’

  ‘‘You worry me sometimes, Chester. You truly do.’’

  ‘‘Dodge would have been no more. Coffin Varnish would be what Dodge is today. Prosperous, booming, with a stage line and the cow trade and more customers than a store owner can shake a stick at.’’

  Win sadly shook his head. ‘‘You could move to Dodge City and open a store and have all the customers you would want.’’

  Chester turned, his pie face mirroring shock. ‘‘Move to Dodge? Are you addlepated? After what they did to us?’’

  ‘‘You take things much too personal,’’ was Win’s opinion.

  Sniffing, Chester hooked his thumbs in the pockets of his vest. ‘‘And you don’t take them personal enough. As your mayor, I can’t say I am pleased by your lack of civic devotion.’’

  Win sat up. ‘‘Don’t you dare take that tone with me. If that means what I think it does, I have as much devotion as the next gent.’’

  ‘‘Who are you kidding?’’ Chester rebutted. ‘‘You are perfectly content to laze away the rest of your days in that rocking chair. You don’t care one whit about making money.’’

  ‘‘I am not as devoted to being rich as you are, no,’’ Win conceded.

  ‘‘Where is the sense in starting a business if you are not out to make a profit? It is blamed silly.’’

  ‘‘I won’t be insulted.’’

  Before Chester could respond, hooves drummed. Into Coffin Varnish trotted the two newcomers. They were not dressed as cowhands or farmers but in the dandified attire of city dwellers. The taller of the pair had on a fine blue coat and white pantaloons; the other’s suit was gray. Both wore derbies. They came to a stop near the hitch rail and the tall man gave the mouse dun close scrutiny. ‘‘Where is he?’’

  ‘‘Where is who?’’ Winifred asked.

  ‘‘The rider of this animal,’’ the tall man in the white pants said, with a jerk of his finger at the gruella.

  ‘‘You are from Dodge, aren’t you?’’ Chester inquired.

  ‘‘Oh Lord,’’ Win said.

  The tall man glanced from one to the other in some annoyance. ‘‘What of it? I happen to be Edison Farnsworth.’’ He waited, and when he did not get a reaction, he snapped, ‘‘Surely you have heard of me? I write for the Dodge City Times.’’

  ‘‘The what?’’ Chester Luce said.

  Edison Farnsworth jerked back as if he had been slapped. ‘‘What foolishness is this? You can’t stand there and tell me you have never heard of it, either.’’

  ‘‘Why can’t I?’’

  ‘‘For one thing, this dreary hamlet of yours is only a two-hour ride from Dodge City,’’ Farnsworth said. ‘‘For another, the Times is the leading newspaper in the entire county, if not all of Kansas. There isn’t a living soul within five hundred miles who hasn’t heard of my newspaper.’’

  ‘‘You own it, then?’’ Winifred asked.

  Farnsworth shook his head. ‘‘Didn’t you hear? I said I write for it. I am the best journalist on their staff.’’

  ‘‘We haven’t heard of the Times here,’’ Chester assured him. ‘‘And Coffin Varnish is a town, not a hamlet.’’

  Farnsworth shifted in his saddle toward his younger companion. ‘‘Do you believe what you are hearing, Lafferty?’’

  ‘‘If I hear it I guess I do.’’

  ‘‘Pay no attention. Go inside and confirm he is in there and let him know I will be conducting an interview.’’

  Lafferty started to climb down.

  ‘‘Hold on there,’’ Winifred said. ‘‘What is this about? I won’t have my customers bothered.’’

  ‘‘I plan on writing an article about the gentleman in there for the Times,’’ Edison Farnsworth revealed. ‘‘I tried to interview him in Dodge but he slipped away and left town.’’

  Chester snickered. ‘‘Anyone who wants to be shed of Dodge has my blessing. What has he done worth an interview, anyway?’’

  Farnsworth leaned on his saddle horn. ‘‘Can it be? You have no notion of who he is?’’

  ‘‘He’s not the governor,’’ Win said, and turned to Chester. ‘‘Who holds the office these days? Is it Anythony? Or did St. John beat him in the last election? I don’t pay much attention to politics.’’

  ‘‘Which is fine by me or you might take it into your head to run for mayor.’’ Chester stared at the newspaperman. ‘‘What was that about the runt inside?’’

  ‘‘I would not let him hear you say that,’’ Farnsworth advised. ‘‘That runt, as you call him, is one of the deadliest killers alive.’’