Sudden Troubleshooter

by Frederick H. Christian

  Randy remembered what he had been told to say.

  ‘There was some talk that Harris might be behind it.’

  Lafe Gunnison looked as if his son had just offered to sell him the moon.

  ‘Yu must be plumb loco!’ he grated. ‘Why for would Harris hire his neighbors killed?’

  ‘I’m sure I don’t know,’ said Randy cunningly, ‘unless he was trying to get control of their land for some reason.’

  ‘I can’t see it, just the same,’ the rancher said.

  ‘Well … who gets the land? Answer me that!’ snapped Randy.

  ‘It ain’t logical—’ Gunnison began, but his son did not allow him to continue his sentence.

  ‘No, not to you,’ sneered Randy. ‘You’ll wait until it’s too late, hoping that in the end they’ll turn out to be decent fellows and live and let live. If Harris gets control of all that land up there you’ll never shift him off it! And if you think we’re losing stock now you wait until he’s got a hard-case crew up there. This Cameron, that other one, Green, they’re the same breed.’

  Old Lafe Gunnison looked at his son with a strange light coming into his eyes.

  ‘Yu don’t think much o’ me, do yu, boy?’

  ‘My dear father, what has that got to do with what we’re discussing?’

  ‘Let me ask yu a question, Randy.’ There was an intent gleam in Lafe Gunnison’s eyes. He rose from the chair and stood tall, facing his sprawling son. ‘Whyfor’re yu so keen to make me get into a fight with Jake Harris?’

  Randy stood up and faced his father.

  ‘Because if you don’t, then one of these days he’ll bring a fight here and that will be the end of Saber!’

  Lafe Gunnison shook his head. ‘It ain’t that yo’re chewin’ on, Randy. Yo’re just a shade too anxious to shape my thinkin’, an’ a shade too shore I’m stupid enough to be swayed by yu.’

  Randolph Gunnison’s eyes began to shift warily. What was the old fool leading up to?

  ‘Another question, then,’ continued Lafe Gunnison remorselessly. ‘What makes yu so shore I didn’t hire Cameron myself?’

  The panic welled into Randy Gunnison’s eyes and he shrank back in his chair.

  ‘Why … I know you didn’t … wouldn’t do anything like …’ Randy licked his lips desperately. ‘You’re mad! What’s wrong with you? Why are you asking me all these questions? You’ve no right …’

  Lafe Gunnison advanced upon his cringing son. Muscles swelled in his neck and shoulders as the anger built in him.

  ‘Tell me, damn yore eyes!’ he roared. ‘How are yu so shore?’

  ‘I’m … you’re not … I don’t know what you mean,’ squealed the younger man. ‘You’re mad! What are you saying? I only said what I heard …’

  Lafe Gunnison grabbed his son’s shirt in a hand like a side of beef, and hauled Randolph Gunnison up until his son’s toes were almost off the ground, handling him as if he were a small boy. The old man’s face was suffused with anger.

  ‘Who told yu?’ he thundered. ‘Who said it?’

  His ham-like hand slapped Randy’s face, leaving a red weal across the cheekbone. Randy’s head swung to the left, to be slashed back again by the returning hand. Another right, and then backhand left brought tears of rage into Randolph Gunnison’s eyes and a spittle of hatred formed at the corners of his split mouth.

  ‘Tell – me – damn – yu! How – are – yu – so – shore?’

  Hatred and venomous fear boiled in the younger Gunnison’s heart. ‘He’ll kill me!’ was his desperate thought as he struggled ineffectually to free himself from his father’s iron grasp. ‘Damn you, let go of me!’ he shrilled. Lafe Gunnison ignored his son’s protests, shaking him like a rat, and his right hand rose again to deliver yet another series of those stunning blows. It never landed. With a snake-like twist Randy reached beneath his coat and whipped from beneath his arm a deadly little snub-nosed Derringer pistol. Almost without volition he thrust it against his father’s body and pulled the trigger. The noise of the shot was muffled, but the old man lurched backwards as if he had been hit with a sledgehammer, and fell with a crash which seemed to rock the house. Smoke rose from the scorched shirt. He did not move.

  Like a trapped animal, sobs tearing at his throat, Randy leaped towards the window. His first hasty glance at the open yard revealed no sign of any of the men, and he realized with a thrill of fear and excitement that they were out on the range, that apart from the cook there was no one around. He stood stock still, listening like a hunted beast. There was no sound from the kitchen. The cook was probably in one of the other buildings. If … his mind cast wildly about for ideas while his eyes fell upon the sprawled body of his father on the floor.

  ‘Yu damned interfering old fool,’ he snarled. ‘Now we’ll see who’s going to run the Saber!’

  He had hardly said the words when the sound of hoof-beats struck dread into his black heart. Mouthing a terrible oath, he sprang once more to the window. There, cantering into the yard, he recognized the Marshal of Yavapai, Tom Appleby.

  Chapter Sixteen

  THERE HAD been a grim council of war at the Harris ranch. After Appleby had left, Sudden had learned for the first time of the murder of Johnstone and Newley. Harris was deeply distressed not only by the terrible blow that the news of his friends’ death had been but by the behavior of the Marshal, which had resulted in Sudden expelling the lawman from the JH.

  ‘I ain’t suggestin’ yu didn’t do the right thing, Jim,’ said Harris, a deep frown on his face. ‘On’y now we ain’t even got a friend in court. If Saber chooses to ride all over us in Yavapai I’m bettin’ Tom will turn a blind eye.’

  ‘That being so, I’m thinkin’ he was no friend in the first place,’ put in Taylor.

  ‘Alex is right,’ added Kitson. ‘If Tom Appleby is the kind o’ man to let an affair o’ this nature interfere with the way he does his job, then we’re a sight better off on our own.’

  ‘I’m just a wee bit concerned about Terry sendin’ his man into town to bring back the bodies’ Alex Taylor said after a pause. ‘If Tom Appleby is as mean as ye all seem to think, then the poor chap oughtn’t to go in alone. That Cameron would find him easy meat, I’m guessin’.’

  Jake Harris got to his feet and replenished his cup from the pot on the stove.

  ‘Those boys was my friends,’ he announced. ‘I’ll go in for their bodies myself. I want to see they’re buried decent.’

  There was a chorus of disagreement and much dismay at this statement. Harris shook his head.

  ‘If I don’t go, folks are goin’ to say we was too yeller to bury our dead,’ Jake said. I got my pride, too.’

  ‘That’ll look right handsome on yore tombstone,’ Sudden interjected flatly.

  Harris flushed. ‘Yu ain’t got no call to talk to me like that, Jim,’ he protested.

  Sudden nodded, a smile making his next words disarming.

  ‘Jake, yo’re tryin’ to do the right thing, an’ I respect that. But yu got to admit that Philadelphia in there could probably give yu a head start an’ outdraw yu. What chance do yu reckon yu’d have agin someone like Cameron?’

  Alex Taylor nodded in agreement with Sudden’s words. ‘Aye, they’re a breed o’ scum, these gunfighters. All the same. Cold killers, without so much as a breath o’ decency in their bodies. Yon Cameron’ll no doubt be struttin’ about Yavapai, free as air, boastin’ his deeds. An’ no doubt cuttin’ a couple more notches on his gun butts.’ He spat loudly. ‘Scum!’

  Sudden’s face was cold and hard, and he stood abruptly. There was, had any of them noticed it, a hint of pain in his eyes, but he quickly concealed it beneath hooded lids and spoke to his employer.

  ‘Yu talk to Shorty. Get the full story outa him. He can prove Randy an’ Dancy is up to their necks in somethin’, but I ain’t quite figgered what, yet.’

  Harris looked at Sudden in surprise. ‘Yu goin’ somewhere?’ he asked.

  A faint smile touched the c
orners of Sudden’s mouth. ‘I’m goin’ to play a hunch. If what I think is right, then we’re going to be mighty close to knowin’ who’s behind all this trouble.’

  ‘Yu mean Gunnison?’ asked Taylor.

  ‘Lafe Gunnison? I don’t know for shore,’ replied Sudden. ‘I’m thinkin’ he knows as much as yu do, Alex, about the whole thing. Mebbe less.’

  With those words he left Taylor staring at his retreating back with open mouth. When Sudden had closed the door behind him he turned to the others.

  ‘I’ve heard some things said in my time that I’ve not understood,’ he complained. ‘But if Lafe Gunnison knows less than I do about what’s been happenin’ in this valley, then I reckon he must be one step short o’ deaf! ’Cause I don’t know a thing!’

  Chapter Seventeen

  SUDDEN’S FACE was set as he left the Harris house, walking around the side of the building to the corral where Midnight awaited. Gradually his tension eased, and he managed a smile. ‘Oughta be used to bein’ called names by now,’ he told himself ruefully. ‘Still gets under my skin, somehow.’ He paused as he approached the window of Philadelphia’s bedroom, and after a moment’s thought, tapped on it. It was opened from inside by Susan Harris. Sudden could see Philadelphia leaning outwards from the bed to see who it was. He grinned at the cocked revolver in the youngster’s hand.

  ‘Don’t shoot,’ he smiled. ‘I’m one o’ them friendly Injuns.’

  ‘All look the same to me,’ scowled Philadelphia. ‘Where yu gallivantin’ off to now, Jim?’

  ‘Got me a mite o’ ridin’ to do,’ he told them both. ‘How’s the patient, ma’am?’

  ‘Insists he’s well enough to walk,’ she said, a touch of asperity in her voice. ‘Such nonsense. I actually found him up, out of bed, when I came in this morning.’

  Philadelphia grinned unabashedly. ‘Heck, I c’n stand if I got to. I shore ain’t in no hurry, though.’ His teasing smile brought roses into Susan’s cheeks and she made a playful slap at his head which he ducked without ceasing to smile.

  ‘Afore I go,’ Green said. ‘I forgot to tell yore Pa somethin’, an’ I’d ruther not go back in … tell him not to send the Swede into Yavapai. Tell him I’ll bring Reb an’ Stan’s bodies home.’

  Philadelphia sat up, his eyebrows high on his forehead.

  ‘Jim, yu can’t go in alone. Let me come with yu. Or take some o’ the others-’ He trailed off as Sudden shook his head.

  ‘Don’t tell yore Pa till I’ve left,’ he admonished Susan.

  She nodded acceptance of this condition, with only a murmured, ‘Good luck, Jim.’

  He smiled at her. ‘I’ll be back around nightfall,’ he said. ‘Tell ’em in there not to shoot afore they see the whites o’ my eyes.’

  Then he was gone, leaving the girl biting her lip. She closed the window slowly and turned to ask her patient a question.

  ‘Don’t yu worry none,’ he told her. ‘Jim’s a good man. If he says he’ll be back at nightfall, he’ll be back.’

  And to himself he added, ‘I shore hope I’m right.’

  It took Sudden less than half an hour to get to Johnstone’s place. Dust lay thick on the furniture and shelves, and a rat scurried across the floor as he entered the back room. The Virginian’s house was a small one, with a large living-room, a bedroom, and a lean-to at the back of the house where Johnstone had kept all his bridles, saddle, and other implements for use on the farm. With the shovel which he had brought along Sudden tested the dirt floor. Across the room in parallel lines he moved, slowly chunking the blade of the tool into the ground as deeply as he could, repeating the process every six inches or so. He worked away steadily for nearly an hour before the sound of the shovel entering the earth changed slightly. He straightened, nodded, bent to his task. The sweat poured off him as he turned the earth, hard packed from years of pounding. In another hour he had found what he wanted, filled in the hole, and sluiced cold water over his grimy face and arms. Then, his face grim, he saddled up again and pointed Midnight south for Yavapai. The recent rains had washed the prairies emerald green, and larks caroled their way to heaven as he passed threateningly close to their hidden nests. The puncher saw none of this. His mind was occupied with dark thoughts that blinded him to the beauty of the day.

  He reached the town of Yavapai shortly before two o’clock. His eyes were narrowed and his air preoccupied. A pattern of villainy so immense was appearing that it seemed almost unbelievable, and yet it was the only theory which fitted the events and the facts he knew.

  He rode directly to the squat adobe building which housed the Yavapai Valley Bank, spending almost an hour in the locked office of Granger, the manager. Granger accompanied Sudden to the door when he left, a worried expression on his normally bland face.

  ‘I do hope I’ve done right, Mr. Green,’ he said, wringing his hands.

  ‘Yu write them letters to the men whose names I gave yu,’ the puncher told him. ‘Yu’ll find they’ll back me up. I’m obliged for all yore help. In the meantime, yu’ll keep what I told yu to yoreself, o’ course.’

  ‘But of course, Mr. Green,’ protested Granger. ‘It has always been our policy to.’

  ‘That’s fine, seh,’ Sudden broke in. ‘Yu’ll excuse me.’

  His jaw set. Rarely had he ever set out to deliberately push another human being beyond the borderline, to provoke him deliberately into a fight; but he knew that there would be no other way. Cameron was a festering sore, and he had to be excised. Sudden knew it, but the thought gave him no pleasure. With a measured stride he walked up the street towards Tyler’s.

  Chapter Eighteen

  TYLER BUSTLED up the length of the bar as Sudden entered the saloon, drying his hands upon the striped apron he always wore.

  ‘Green, ain’t it?’ he asked. ‘Ain’t seen yu in town since yu collided with Jim Dancy. Yu been workin’ up on the Mesquites, I heard.’

  ‘Yu heard right,’ Sudden told him as the bartender poured him a drink.

  Tyler’s hand was unsteady, and with his head down he murmured, ‘Take my advice an’ walk out o’ here, Green. There’s a feller in here run in with a couple o’ yore people. If he knows yo’re one o’ them there’ll be trouble.’

  ‘Shucks, I ain’t huntin’ no trouble,’ Sudden told him. ‘I just come in to take the bodies back.’ His voice had risen slightly as he spoke, and carried far enough for the men at the far end of the bar to hear his words. Sudden noticed a man look up suddenly at the sound of his voice, and from the description Jake and Philadelphia had given him, knew that this was Wes Cameron. He did not reveal that he had noticed the gunman, however, but remained staring down into his drink.

  Cameron’s voice cut coldly through the low murmur of conversation which stilled abruptly at his words.

  ‘Well, well, a pilgrim! Step up, stranger, an’ I’ll buy yu a drink.’

  Sudden shook his head. ‘I got one,’ he said shortly.

  Cameron’s expression changed, and his cronies backed away uneasily as he bent his cold gaze upon the unconcerned cowboy.

  ‘When Wes Cameron offers yu a drink, mister, yu better take it!’

  Sudden turned slowly to face Cameron. Then, as if thinking better of something, he shrugged, and returned to gazing moodily into his glass. The sheer effrontery of his gesture was not lost upon the spectators, most of whom awaited Cameron’s reaction with bated breath. One or two, however, remembered this tall, slow-smiling man. One such leaned over to his neighbor and whispered, ‘That’s the jasper had the run-in with Jim Dancy.’

  ‘He must be crazy, talkin’ that way to Cameron!’ the other said.

  ‘Mebbe,’ retorted the first speaker. ‘He don’t look it, though.’

  Indeed, the puncher looked the complete picture of unconcern as he leaned, elbows on the bar, frowning into his drink.

  Cameron elbowed his way through the knot of men at the bar and stopped two feet from Sudden.

  ‘People usually look at me when I’m talk
in’ to them,’ the gunman snarled poisonously.

  Green half turned, insolently eyed Cameron from head to foot, and said, with a brutal clarity which carried right across the room, ‘Must be ’cause yu got such charmin’ manners.’

  There was a scrabble of feet and chair legs as the onlookers in the bar moved hurriedly out of the possible line of fire. Surely this insolent cowpuncher could not continue to talk to Cameron thus and live?

  ‘Ain’t I seen yu somewheres?’ Cameron said. He was puzzled by the complete lack of response to his name that this saturnine individual was snowing, and somewhere in his brain a faint warning bell was ringing. There was something familiar about the man, but what? He shrugged away the feeling as Sudden replied:

  ‘Not if I seen yu first.’

  A murmur arose from the onlookers, and Cameron swelled with rage as he heard it. Cameron’s face was livid with rage; all of Yavapai hung on his next words.

  ‘Yu better watch yore lip, stranger! Yu know who I am?’

  All sound stopped as Sudden replied, ‘On’y Wes Cameron I ever heard of was a lily-livered coyote who shot down farmers, kids, an’ young girls. I heard he was the kind who’s sell the straw outa his mother’s kennel.’ He turned to face the gaping gunman, all trace of his former lounging stance gone. ‘Now that wouldn’t be yu, would it?’

  For a single instant Cameron stood stock still. Then the rage roared into his brain and with an oath he clawed for the gun at his side. What happened next was to become a legend in Yavapai. Cameron’s gun was not even clear of the cut-away holster when the barrel of Sudden’s revolver touched the gunman’s nose, while the puncher’s left hand stopped the reflex upward action of Cameron’s unfinished draw. Cameron froze, a cold slimy finger of fear probing his heart. He knew that if he so much as blinked an eyelid this cold, slit-eyed devil who had outdrawn him so incredibly could, with every justification in the world, shoot him down. The killing light in his opponent’s eyes confirmed it. Cameron did not move as the puncher gritted, ‘Let go o’ yore gun!’