by Steve Hayes
Stadtlander had chosen to build his home atop the grassy knoll for two reasons: at first, in the early days, so he could see his enemies coming; and later, when with Gabriel’s help he’d forced out all the other ranchers and could afford to replace the original modest, single-story ranch house with a fancy three-story mansion, to let the rest of the world see how rich and important he’d become.
Now, as Gabriel nudged the Morgan up the long grassy incline, he knew a dozen or more unfriendly pairs of eyes were watching him. But he felt perfectly safe. Stadtlander was many things, most of them bad, but he was no backshooter or bushwhacker. Unlike his sly, mealy-mouthed son, Slade, if the Old Man was going to kill you he wanted to look you in the eyes as he pulled the trigger.
As Gabriel rode slowly uphill, his gaze fixed ahead on the familiar ranch house and various outer buildings surrounding it, he felt a sense of coming home. Mixed emotions came with the feeling. Despite his deep-rooted anger at Stadtlander for wrongfully branding him a horse-thief and destroying any chance he had of a normal future, Gabriel felt a strange, warm attachment for the irascible, gruff rancher.
He knew he owed him a lot.
Since that bleak wintry morning almost ten years ago, with the ground frosted rock-hard and covered in patches with snow, when as a raw, quick-tempered youth ‘Gabe’ had hired on as a hand at the Double SS, he had felt he belonged there.
It didn’t take long before other people felt the same way. The fact that he could sign his name rather just make a mark, like most of the semi-illiterate hands, set him apart. It also brought him to Stadtlander’s attention.
‘I hear you can read’n write, boy?’ the short, powerfully built rancher said to him a few days after he’d been hired.
‘Yes, sir.’
‘I also hear you got a mighty quick temper – that true?’ Gabriel shrugged.
‘Speak up, boy. When I ask you a question I expect an answer.’
‘I stand up for m’self, sir, that’s all.’
Stadtlander studied him, a hand-rolled smoke protruding from under his brown, droopy, gunfighter’s mustache.
‘I got no quarrel with that,’ he said gruffly. ‘But I checked around, an’ accordin’ to Sheriff Forbes and his deputies it goes a mite further than that. Seems, they think you’re carryin’ a chip and just itchin’ for someone to try an’ knock it off.’
Gabriel shrugged again.
‘I’m not responsible for how folks think, Mr Stadtlander. I mind my own business an’ I expect others to do the same.’
‘An’ when they don’t, you’re happy to teach ’em some manners, that it? Don’t answer that,’ Stadtlander added wryly. ‘I don’t possess the sweetest disposition myself so I know all about learnin’ people manners. But what I do want to know, boy, is if that iron on your hip is for show or to back up what your fists can’t handle.’
‘So far,’ Gabriel replied, ‘I ain’t found nobody these fists can’t handle.’
Stadtlander chuckled. ‘Modest son-of-a-buck, aren’t you?’ As he spoke he suddenly went for his gun. His draw wouldn’t have scared Hickok or Clay Allison but it was still plenty fast – which is why he was surprised to find himself staring at the old Walker Colt held by the youngster in front of him.
‘That modest enough for you, Mr Stadlander?’
For a second Stadtlander didn’t respond; then he laughed, loud and hearty, and lifted his hand from his still-holstered six-gun.
‘I like a man who can best me,’ he said. ‘Just so he’s workin’ for me an’ not agin me.’ He waited for Gabriel to holster his gun and then drove his fist, with all his might, into the youth’s jaw.
Gabriel went sprawling and lay there, flat on his back on the cowhide rug, stunned.
‘Next time you point a pistol at me, son,’ Stadtlander said without rancor, ‘be ready to shoot it.’
‘I’ll remember that,’ Gabriel promised, groggily getting to his feet. ‘Don’t think I won’t.’
Now, as Gabriel rode past the outer corrals and on between the barn and two bunkhouses, he thought about his promise and gripped the butt of his Peacemaker as if to remind himself not to be caught off-guard again.
Meanwhile the Morgan, as if aware that it had returned to familiar surroundings, pricked it ears and snorted uneasily.
‘Easy,’ Gabriel told it softly. ‘Don’t sunfish on me now, horse.’
Ahead, a war party of some twenty armed ranch hands waited for him in front of the mansion. Behind them, standing on the top step of a wide veranda that ran all the way around the big square house, was Stadtlander’s son, Slade.
‘He’s here, Pa,’ Gabriel heard him call out.
Gabriel rode closer, now trapped in the giant shadow cast by the mansion.
The front door opened and out limped Stillman J. Stadlander.
Thinner than Gabriel remembered, the seventy-one-year-old rancher’s thick, wavy brown hair had turned all white and his square, jut-jawed face was now deeply lined, especially around the eyes and down-turned mouth. He’d also become stoop-shouldered and was plagued by gout, needing a cane to help him walk.
But as he stood beside his son on the top step, Gabriel barely noticed any of those things: it was the old man’s eyes that grabbed his attention. Once burning with fire and defiance, they now looked dim and sad as if years of sorrow and disillusionment had finally worn him down.
But despite his appearance, Gabriel knew he was still tougher than most men.
The cowhands parted as Gabriel drew near, allowing him to ride up to the front steps. They then closed ranks again, forming a half-circle behind him, rifles held ready.
Gabriel reined up the Morgan and remained in the saddle as he confronted father and son.
‘See you finally brought my horse back,’ Stadtlander said making no attempt to greet him.
Gabriel smiled mirthlessly. ‘Just wanted him to see what he was missin’.’
Stung by his sarcasm, Stadtlander thrust his jaw out belligerently. ‘An’ you, boy, look about you, see what you gave up too.’
‘Not gave up, was took from.’
‘Aces’n eights,’ Stadtlander said with a hint of regret. ‘Two pair beats a pair every time. How well I remember.’
Slade cut in angrily. ‘Don’t waste your breath on him, Pa. Just say the word an’ I’ll get a rope. Show him what we do to backshooters.’
Stadtlander impatiently motioned for him to be quiet and then turned back to Gabriel.
‘You know me, Gabe. I’ve never hung anybody without first lettin’ him have his say. So speak your piece. Tell me true how it played out between you’n the Iversons.’
‘You haven’t seen their bodies?’
‘Ain’t been off the ranch in nigh on a week.’
‘Then I reckon you don’t know your son’s a damn’ liar.’
There was silence. The cowhands looked expectantly at Slade.
Seething, he inched his hand toward his six-gun. But, as always, fear of Gabriel stopped him from drawing.
‘You ain’t baitin’ me into a fight,’ he told Gabriel. ‘I’m gonna have too much fun watchin’ you swing.’
Embarrassed for him, the cowhands looked at their feet.
Stadtlander scowled contemptuously at Slade and then told Gabriel: ‘I’m still waitin’ to hear your side.’
Keeping an eye on Slade, Gabriel described how Cory, Mace and Slade had ambushed him outside the Copper Palace.
Several times Slade tried to interrupt, but always his father waved him silent.
When Gabriel was finished, Stadtlander eyed his son suspiciously.
‘You told me he came up behind Cory an’ Mace in the alley beside the Copper Palace.’
‘He did, Pa. I swear. Sneaked up an’ shot ’em ’fore they even knew he was there. Ask anyone. They’ll say how it happened.’
‘If that’s true,’ Gabriel said quietly, ‘then maybe you can explain how the entry wounds are in their chests, not their backs.’
The last thre
e words were addressed to Stadtlander, who looked disgustedly at his son.
‘You tellin’ me fish stories, boy?’
‘No, Pa. I ain’t. Honest. Am I, boys?’ he said to the men gathered before him. ‘Some of you were in town this mornin’. Tell him how it happened.’
The men hesitated and shifted uncomfortably on their feet. Stadtlander glared at them. Under his steely-eyed gaze they all wilted and quickly looked away.
Enraged, Stadtlander grabbed Slade by the shirt front and shook him.
‘Damn you, you snivelin’ pup! Ain’t you ever gonna quit lyin’ to me?’
‘Pa, don’t ride me like that in front of—’
Stadtlander backhanded him across the mouth.
‘Bite your tongue, boy! ’Fore I take a whip to you!’ He pushed his son roughly away. ‘You’re mighty tough when it comes to bullyin’ whores an’ folks who can’t fight back—’
‘Pa, I’m warnin’ you—’
‘Come up against a real man an’ most likely you’d piss your pants.’
Pushed to a fury, Slade reached for his six-gun.
But Stadtlander was too fast for him. Knocking the gun from Slade’s hand, he slapped him, kept slapping him, hard vicious blows that spun his head from side to side until the men couldn’t watch any more.
‘That’s enough,’ Gabriel said at last.
Stadtlander went to slap his dazed son again, then stopped and looked around as if suddenly realizing where he was and what he was doing. As he rage subsided he shoved his son aside, saying:
‘All mouth, that’s what you are, boy. Kind of snake who spends his life whistlin’ ’round gravestones.’
‘Pa—’
‘Gutless to the bone. Always have been. Why, even your ma, God rest her soul, knew that. That’s why she protected you – why I’m protectin’ you now.’
‘From what?’ Slade whined. ‘I didn’t do nothin’ to need no protectin’.’
‘Except rape an’ kill a decent woman,’ Gabriel said grimly. He kept his eyes on both father and son as he spoke, ready to shoot whichever man drew first.
Stadtlander turned to him. ‘So that’s why you’re here? I been tryin’ to figure out your reason ever since I heard you was back.’
‘Well, now you know,’ Gabriel said. ‘So you can quit actin’ surprised.’
‘What I know,’ Stadtlander said, ‘is you’ve made a long ride for nothin’. My boy’s innocent.’
‘Quit wastin’ time, Pa,’ Slade said picking up his gun. ‘Let me get a—’
‘Button it,’ Stadtlander told him angrily. Then to Gabriel: ‘All you got to do is read Sheriff Forbes’s written statement: says clear as day there wasn’t any reason to accuse Slade or the Iversons of rape or murder since they were right here, at the ranch, playin’—’
‘Five-card stud, yeah I heard,’ Gabriel said. ‘But we both know that’s a day’s ride from the truth.’
‘Pa, ain’t you heard enough?’ Slade said. ‘Let me go get a rope.’
Stadtlander looked at him with withering disgust.
‘Are you loco as well as a liar?’
‘Pa, cut it out! Quit proddin’ me.’
‘Or what – you’ll kill me? That’ll be the day.’ Stadtlander turned to Gabriel. ‘See what I’ve raised? Boy’s got squirrel fur for brains. Don’t even know when death’s starin’ him in the face.’
He glared at his son as if hoping he had the guts to shoot him. But Slade never moved.
‘Hell’s fire, boy,’ Stadtlander barked at him, ‘don’t you get it? I’m all you got. I move aside or let you take one step toward a rope an’ the next voice you’ll hear will be a minister readin’ over your grave. You want that, boy? Huh? You want him to shoot you? ’Cause if you do, just say the word an’ I’ll order the men back to work an’ let you two make your play. I didn’t think so,’ he said when Slade looked away. ‘Well, maybe I was wrong about you. Maybe you do have some brains after all.’ Turning back to Gabriel he added: ‘Come inside. I’ll build you a drink.’
‘I’d sooner not—’
‘I ain’t askin’ you, dammit, I’m tellin’ you. Let’s talk this over like men. You owe me that, Gabe, at least.’ Without waiting for a reply, he stormed indoors.
Gabriel, his eyes never leaving Slade, slowly stepped from the saddle and followed him.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Stadtlander’s study took up a whole corner of the mansion. The huge oak-paneled room had windows on two sides, one facing the scrubland on which his vast herd grazed and the other with a panoramic view of the distant Rio Grande. Western paintings and deer and elk trophy heads adorned the walls, and grizzly pelts covered the stained-wood floor.
The massive furniture was covered in brown-and-white cowhide and there was enough room in the stone fireplace to spit-roast a whole steer. Above it hung an imposing painting of Stadtlander astride the Morgan in an ’empire builder’ pose, while facing him across the room hung an equally impressive painting of his deceased wife, Agatha. A pale, delicate, sweet-faced Easterner of obvious fine breeding, she seemed out of place in this testosterone-filled atmosphere.
Hanging beside her, one on either side, were smaller portraits of Slade and his deceased sister, Elizabeth, both in their early teens.
Stadtlander limped behind the bar that stretched along one wall and poured them both tumblers of J.H. Cutler.
‘To better times,’ he said.
Gabriel ignored the toast, drank and looked around at all the familiar memorabilia. Much as he hated to admit it, he loved this room and had always hoped that one day he would build one of his own just like it.
Stadtlander pushed a humidor of expensive Cuban cigars in front of Gabriel, who shook his head. Ignoring the rebuff, Stadtlander took one himself, snipped off the end with a fancy clipper, wetted it between his lips and took his time lighting it.
‘I’ve missed you, Gabe. I won’t deny that.’
He waited for Gabriel to respond in kind. When he didn’t, Stadtlander spat out a thin stream of smoke and contemplated the ash forming on his cigar.
‘That boy I raised – he’s a daisy, ain’t he?’
Gabriel sipped his whiskey in silence.
‘Big, good-lookin’ kid … can get any woman he wants just like that.’ He snapped his fingers. ‘Hell, any stranger lookin’ at him would think he had the world in his fist….’
Gabriel still said nothing.
‘Thing that riles me most is, he’ll take over this spread one day an’ then what? Instead of buildin’ it up, makin’ it grow like I did, he’ll run it into the ground in two, maybe three years. Maybe less.’
He again waited for Gabriel to respond and again Gabriel sipped his whiskey in cold silence.
Stadtlander looked deflated. Using the sleeve of his leather jacket to wipe a wet spot from the polished bar, he gulped his drink and poured himself another.
‘I’ve tried to raise him right,’ he said, as if trying to convince himself. ‘Taught him to know the difference ’tween right and wrong, but so help me Jonah, he’s no closer to bein’ a man now than he was when you took off five years ago.’
‘Won’t matter where he’s goin’,’ Gabriel said grimly.
Stadtlander started to erupt, but thought better of it and said: ‘Got a question for you. An’ I want a straight answer.’
Gabriel sipped his whiskey and waited.
‘What went wrong between us, Gabe? I’ve asked myself a thousand times but I never could figure it out.’
‘I got tired of doin’ your dirty work.’
‘After almost ten years? Moses on the mountain! By then you’d run everybody off. What was left was more maintenance than work.’
‘There were other things.’
‘Name one.’
‘You demanded too much.’
‘No more than I demanded of myself.’
‘Yeah, but it was your spread.’
‘Could’ve been yours, too. Mine, yours and Slade’s. There wa
s more than enough land to go around. Cattle, too. I told you that many times.’
Gabriel couldn’t deny that and kept silent.
‘Hell, I thought we were a matched pair. I even groomed you so you could take over when I got too old to run the place. Figured my boy could watch how you did things, see the way you treated people, earned their respect and got the most out of a crew – hopin’ that way he’d learn from you before finally takin’ over himself.’
Gabriel swirled his whiskey around in the tumbler, held the glass up in front of the window and watched the amber-colored liquid change colors in the sunlight.
‘God dammit,’ Stadtlander said angrily, ‘we ain’t gonna get anywhere, Gabe, unless you speak your mind; tell me what you think.’
‘I think,’ Gabriel said evenly, ‘you’re doin’ exactly what you accused Slade of doin’: whistling ’round gravestones.’
‘How so?’
Gabriel studied Stadtlander, remembering as he did how once he would have jumped into the fires of hell to please him.
‘ ’Cause all this talk about yesteryear is just another way of stalling, of duckin’ the truth.’
‘That’s a damn’ lie an’ you know it! I never ducked the truth or told a lie in my whole life.’
‘That include callin’ me a horse thief?’
‘OK, once. An’ I was wrong to do that. I admit it now. You won Brandy fair’n square. But goddammit, Gabe, you gotta take some responsibility for this split. You shouldn’t have come at me like that. You know my temper. How’d you expect me to react when the man I’ve treated better’n my own son threatens to walk out on me – is willin’ to throw away everything I’ve given him on account of some doe-eyed widow in a cantina—’
‘Keep Cally out of this,’ Gabriel warned, his hand drifting to his gun.
Stadtlander bristled for a moment. Then he saw the deadly, unwavering look in Gabriel’s ice blue eyes and subsided.
‘As for all the things you say you gave me,’ Gabriel continued, ‘that’s another lie. You gave me nothin’. I earned everythin’ I got around here.’
‘I ain’t denyin’ that. That’s why I made you top hand.’
