Savage Guns

by William W. Johnstone

  I heard the bunch collecting outside the door, and then someone yelled. I knew that voice. It was Plug Parsons, who was probably leading this bunch, while Crayfish hung back a little.

  “Open up, Sheriff. Open up, and you won’t get hurt,” Parsons said. “We’ve got some business to do.”

  THIRTY-TWO

  I turned to the judge. “You stand back, over there,” I said. “I’m going to open that door, and there might be some lead flyin’ through.”

  “You’d open up to them?”

  “I don’t know what they want. They’re armed and violating my order. No guns in Doubtful this day. And if they’re up to no good, I’ve got to put a stop to it.”

  “It’s dangerous,” Nippers said.

  I nodded. A man wearing the badge has to put himself in harm’s way now and then. I waited until he shuffled off to one side, over near the jail door, and then I lifted the bar and opened up.

  They didn’t have any weapons pointed at me, at least for the moment. But there was plenty of fingers hovering over holsters, and itchy eyes.

  There must have been fifteen, twenty of them, all T-Bar men. And Plug Parsons was leading the pack, and standing in front. Crayfish was there, but at the rear, like he wanted to be as safe as he could get. I saw Carter Bell back there some, but most of those fellers were simply T-Bar riders and gunslicks. I thought maybe I knew what they had in mind, which was an early hanging just to make sure it got done, before crowds around the gallows might change things.

  I looked the lot over, but it was Plug Parsons who caught my eye. He was standing there, solid as a bull, wide as a beer barrel, and smug as a bridegroom.

  “Where is he?” Parsons asked. “We’re going to push this necktie party ahead, just so nothing much goes wrong today. The law won’t mind.”

  “There’ll be no hanging today,” I said. “I got a stay of execution right here, signed by Judge Nippers. You fellers go on out to your ranch and call it a day.”

  That sure rocked them back on their heels.

  “A stay? What are you talking about?” Crayfish yelled.

  “There’ll be no execution. There’s new evidence the boy didn’t do it. And that’s what the judge is going to be looking at. Now go home. You’re all violating my order. No guns in Doubtful today. So get out, before I get a little pissed off.”

  They sure were taking their time absorbing that, but I wasn’t seeing anyone turn around and walk away, neither.

  “What evidence?” Crayfish yelled.

  “That’s for the judge to look over. But there’s a witness sprung up.”

  Carter Bell looked pretty solemn, but he wasn’t shaking in his boots neither. Still, Crayfish had three lying witnesses: Bell, Parsons, and my friend Sammy Upward, the sneakin’ bastard that slid them knockout drops into the boy’s booze. I looked for him in that mob, but he wasn’t there. This was all T-Bar men.

  Things seemed to teeter like that for a moment, and I thought maybe they’d pull out, but then Axel Nippers himself showed up beside me, huffing and puffing and trying to control the shakes from a hard night of sipping.

  “Here now,” he bellowed. “You quit this place. There’ll be no hanging on this day. I’ve heard new evidence and I’ve issued a court order. I’m holding a hearing in my chambers in one hour, and I want every witness who testified at the trial there. That includes Parsons there, and Bell there, and you fetch Upward too. I’ll expect you there, and I’m going to be asking some questions and you’d better be giving me the right answers, or you’ll be facing the music.”

  “What questions?” Crayfish asked, real quiet.

  “You won’t be there. You’ll just wait and see. You’re going to deliver Mr. Parsons, Mr. Bell, and Mr. Upward, and then you can wait for the verdict.”

  “I asked what questions.”

  “And I told you.”

  “It seems that justice won’t be done this day, unless we do it,” Crayfish said softly.

  Nippers pushed pugnaciously into that crowd. “You’ll have your justice. You’ll have it every which way. And those who are guilty will hang. And those who lied will spend a long time thinking about their crimes. And this mob is going to disperse right now. You heard the sheriff. No guns. I’ll throw every last skinny-assed cowboy into the slammer until you’re all feeling sorry if you don’t get yourself out of town right now.”

  “You won’t hang King Bragg?” Crayfish asked.

  “I’ll hang the man who murdered those three men, and you can count on it, Mr. Ruble.”

  “And who would that be?”

  “You’ll know when the time comes,” the judge snapped.

  “I guess we’ll have a couple of hangings today,” Crayfish said.

  He nodded at Plug, who manhandled the judge.

  “You varmint, take your fat paws off me or face the music,” Nippers roared.

  I got my revolver in hand real quick and aimed it at Parsons.

  “Let him go,” I yelled.

  “You piece of pig manure, get your hands off me,” Nippers snapped.

  Parsons and the judge was wrestling some, but the beefy foreman sure had the upper hand. He swung the judge around between my Colt and himself, and putting a bullet in him and not in the judge would have been like shooting two dogs in heat. So I hunted out Crayfish, but he was already racing toward the gallows, and out of range.

  I fired in the air, but that didn’t slow anyone down.

  I waded in, but there was a mess of T-Bar riders blocking the way, and I sure enough got into a brawl with three or four, and they were piling on me from all sides, and them fat fists were landing on me. One knocked my revolver into the clay. I slugged back, and kneed one of them boys in his basket, and he whoofed and doubled up, but every time I got ahead, two more came at me. I could feel my blood up, pounding in my head, and I gave more than I took, because I use all of me in a fight, including my thick skull, but I was plain outnumbered, and in a bit they had me down and was kicking my ribs real hard.

  I heard a shout and they all quit pounding me and was running toward the gallows on the courthouse square. I tried to get up, but there was something tore up in there. They’d quit me and was hell-bent to get to the gallows. I crawled to my feet, hunted around for my revolver, but it wasn’t there. Someone had took it. I got to standing, and stared at the open door of the sheriff office, wondering how many of them T-Bar men was in there, and what they were doing to my prisoners.

  I could hardly stand. I made myself stand. I raced back to the office, and up the steps, and entered. There wasn’t a soul in there, and the jail door was locked tight. So I grabbed a double-barrel scattergun and limped out, closing that office door behind me, wishing a few deputies would show up, now that a shot or two had been fired. But I knew they wouldn’t because they were prisoners somewhere.

  Up ahead a block, that mob was propelling the judge straight toward the gallows. There was a few town people running for cover, and a few more who had come to see the show. I could hear Judge Nippers bellowing up there, but couldn’t make out what he said. I knew it was ferocious, whatever it might be. But words don’t cut into a man the way a bullet does, and they were paying him no heed.

  I trotted along, feeling pain in my ribs and a lot of other places. I had two loads and that was it. But they were double-ought buckshot, and that always gets some respect. They seen me coming and one tried a potshot, but he was most of a block away. This was shaping up into a real bad mess. I followed along, but now Crayfish himself was turning some of them boys my way and they was popping their six-guns at me, and they was going to hit me pretty quick.

  The rest, led by Plug Parsons, was manhandling that judge forward, dragging him when he quit walking. They sure was going to hang the judge, unless I could stop them. And Crayfish was urging them on. Kill the judge before the judge got any more curious about what happened that afternoon in the Last Chance Saloon.

  I could see I was losing out. They’d reached the gallows, and were hoist
ing Nippers up them steps. Now there was two or three of them cowboys who just plain halted to shoot at me, and one bullet sizzled through my sleeve. I veered toward the doorway of Maxwell Funeral Parlor, and got into the entryway, where I was safe for a moment, but a couple of bullets splintered wood right where I’d been a moment before.

  I was trapped. They had me penned. I crouched low, and sneaked a peek or two around that corner, only to see what I sure didn’t want to see, and could hardly stand seeing. They was shoving the judge up, and pushing him toward the trap, while some ranny was tying the judge’s hands behind him with a borrowed belt. The judge, he wasn’t taking it lying down, and once in a while I could hear him yelling.

  Down below, Crayfish was quietly pointing a few of his rannies into a perimeter, their six-guns pointed at the spectators. He didn’t want no town folk messing up the death of the judge. Up on that gallows, Plug Parsons was calm as could be, lowering the noose over Axel Nippers’ old neck and tightening it some. Down below, a couple of them cowboys was keeping an eye on the doorway where I was crouched. I wished old Maxwell would open up. I might get a shot at them hangmen from a window. But Maxwell always waited politely for death before he ventured out, and he wouldn’t show up until there was a body and someone wanted to pay him to do something about it.

  I heard Nippers bellow out his last words: “You baboons,” he said.

  That was his final observation on life in Doubtful, Wyoming. Plug Parsons swung that lever. The trap dropped. The judge dropped hard and fast, with a loud crack. He shuddered once and then went limp.

  The thing was, the whole place went quiet. Even the wind quit. After all that ruckus, there was no noise, no movement except for the swinging body up there, and no talk. Them T-Bar men just stared at the judge. Even Crayfish just stared. I wondered what was going through their heads. Every last one of them was engaged in murdering a district judge of the Territory. A judge who knew something, and who had stopped an execution, only to trigger his own. He just swayed up there, limp and twisting slowly. The spectators didn’t move neither. It was too much to absorb, so they just stared. There was no law in Doubtful. There was no justice, no decency, no safety.

  I was mad at myself because I couldn’t get in there and make it quit. But I didn’t, and now it was too late, and I was still pinned in that entryway.

  And the sheriff office and jailhouse stood unguarded.

  I edged out, heading toward my office. I had other lives in my care. I heard a shout behind me, and a couple of pistol shots sailed by, but nothing came close, so I just kept on going, my hurt ribs pretty near torturing me, along with a mess of bruises. But I was going to get back there and defend that boy, defend that boy with my life if it came to that.

  I made it back all right. The T-Bar men didn’t try to catch up. They probably thought they could tear the place apart any time they chose.

  There wasn’t a soul in my office, and the jail door was still locked. I closed and barred the front door, laid out some scatterguns on my desk, and a box of shells, and drank a tumbler of water since I was parched. There was blood on my shirt and arms, but I didn’t know whether it was mine or someone else’s.

  I thought maybe I had a few moments, so I unlocked the jail door and headed in there.

  It was real quiet. Old Man Bragg stared at me. The boy was simply lying on his iron cot and waiting for the end. The sadness was so thick I could feel it chill my heart.

  I unlocked the cell door and swung it wide. The kid glanced at me and lay quiet. I didn’t know what time it was; it might seem like eleven to him.

  “King,” I said. “It’s not gonna happen. You’re free to go.”

  He stared at me.

  “You’re free, boy. No noose.”

  The young man closed his eyes. “Don’t try to make it easy for me,” he said.

  He didn’t get the message. I dug around in my shirt. The stay was folded in there, so I pulled it out. It was bent some from all that fighting.

  “Read,” I said.

  He eyed it, and the paper dropped to the floor. I picked it up and stuffed it at him. He took it and read.

  “It’s just some legal stuff,” he said.

  “Get up, get washed. I need you. We’re in trouble. You’ll need to defend yourself, maybe.”

  He stared at me like I was nuts.

  Now his father, Admiral Bragg, was up and rattling the cage. “What’s this? What’s this?”

  I thought about letting him out, but he would do some damnfool thing, like trying to shoot me.

  “I’ll tell you later,” I said.

  “Let me out, damn you.”

  The kid was dazed. I pretty near shoved him out of the jail and locked up behind him.

  “You’re free. Judge Nippers heard some evidence of what really happened. You were knocked out with some stuff, and Crayfish borrowed your gun. There’s a lot more, but we got trouble. You can vamoose if you want, and if them T-Bar men don’t kill you. They’re coming. You’re free, but I need you.”

  He stared at me.

  “Take this scattergun, boy. You may need it,” I said.

  He hesitantly lifted the shotgun, wondering whether I’d shoot him, I guess, and stood there in the middle of the office, freed but not knowing it, and neither of us knew what would come through that door.

  THIRTY-THREE

  I sure get itchy behind walls, forted up. Sooner or later someone’s gonna bust in or starve me out. And this was going to be soon, since it was me against fifteen, twenty T-Bar men ready to tear the place apart and drag the kid to the gallows. I had only moments before that bunch quit staring at Judge Nippers dangling out there on the courthouse square, and started coming for the next ones, namely the Bragg kid and me.

  “King, we’re going to get out of here. You hear? I’ll unlock your pa. I’m going out with my scattergun and I’m turning left and heading straight for the courthouse. After a moment, you and your pa slip out and turn right and get out of sight fast. You’re on your own. Try to hook up with your sister and your Anchor Ranch men. That’s all I can do.”

  King, he still was trying to get all this straight. Minutes before, he was waiting to be hanged. But he nodded.

  I plunged into the jail and unlocked his pa.

  “Get out of here. King will tell you where to go,” I said.

  “Are you giving me orders?” Admiral Bragg snapped. “You haven’t even fed me. I’ll hang you from the nearest street lamp.”

  “Move. If you want to live, move.”

  “What’s all this?”

  “Judge Nippers is dead. He stayed the execution and got hanged for it. Now move.”

  “Dead? Well, he deserved it, sentencing my boy to be hanged.”

  That did it. I pushed him back into the cell. He tumbled onto his bunk while I slammed the door shut and locked it. That lock snapped like a rifle bolt.

  “You’re leaving me to that mob?” he howled.

  “Not if I can help it,” I said.

  I locked the jail door, thinking maybe that would slow down the T-Bar mob, and I picked up a few buckshot cartridges. Enough to fire until my trigger finger went dead.

  “You ready, boy?”

  “What about my father?”

  “He wants his breakfast.”

  “But—”

  I ignored him. “Do what I say. I’m going to slow that mob. You go the other way. Find your sister, and get out of town.”

  King stared at me, and nodded. “Thank you,” he said.

  “Thank Judge Nippers.”

  “If there’s any way we can help you—” he said.

  We were out of time. I raced to the front door, opened it a bit, and saw the T-Bar men staring at that limp, twirling body up on the gallows. I nodded to the kid and stepped out, leaving the door wide. It would shield the boy if he was smart enough to jump off the steps and skirt the building.

  I moved slowly down them steps, and turned left just as I said I would, and started straight toward that
mob on the courthouse square, my shotgun cradled under my arm. I thought I heard the boy slide out, a soft drop to the grass, and then he was crawling back along the wall. Good. He figured it out. Now that bunch out there on the square saw me, walking slow, in no hurry because I wanted the kid to move his butt far away.

  I was going to do what I had to do, which don’t mean I wasn’t scared. I’d end up a piece of Swiss cheese, or maybe they’d pull the noose free of Judge Nippers and fit it to my scrawny neck. But I didn’t have time to worry about that. The square was empty except for all them T-Bar men, who were mostly watching Nippers dangle and twirl. Everyone had fled. It felt sort of funny, walking right into that bunch, but I kept on, one foot at a time, that side-by-side shotgun ready.

  They saw me coming. Crayfish was staring, and so was Plug Parsons, and so was Carter Bell. They stayed bunched up, not spreading out in a skirmish line, just staying tight around those gallows, with that body dangling there real quiet. I just kept on walking, one boot at a time, and they just kept on staring, first at me, then at Crayfish, and then at Judge Nippers, slowly swaying there, looking testy.

  It was odd. I was all alone in the world, but there were people everywhere, watching from every window and doorway, ready to duck when lead started to fly. I wished my deputies would show up, but they’d been taken hostage or they’d be here at my side. I glanced at the hotel, and thought I saw Queen in a shadow there. Then she moved swiftly, and there was some commotion over there. But I was still walking, and getting close to revolver range now, but still too far for a short-barreled shotgun.

  Me, I just kept walkin’. There wasn’t anything else to do but to walk. Now they was all staring at me, and a few had their paws sort of hovering over their six-guns. I was real interested in Crayfish, who simply stared, not moving a muscle. He didn’t give me a clue. He stood like a statue on the outer edge of that bunch, his hands at his sides. I thought maybe the T-Bar would wait for him to make the call. So I slid my barrels a little his way. You don’t have to aim a shotgun full of buckshot. All you got to do is point.