Chance thought it was none of her business and besides she was too shrewd. His face got heavy and mulish.
“Not to change the subject,” he said, “how does a girl get herself on a dodger?” He pulled it out of his pocket and slapped it on the bar. He expected her to be angry but she was not.
“She gets married,” she said.
“To a cheat?”
“No.”
He poked the handbill. “This says he was.”
Still she refused to let him rouse her. He did not know why he wanted to but he did, and it graveled him that she was remaining so obstinately calm.
“He wasn’t when I married him. That came later when his luck turned. Probably it was my fault. He liked to buy me things.”
“Why did you leave him?”
She shook her head, just a little, and now there was a look around her mouth he had not seen before, tender and sad with the memory of an old pain.
“I didn’t,” she said. “He left me, very suddenly. He was caught just like that man tonight, only his luck had run clear out. We buried him the next day.”
Chance felt ashamed. His ill temper faded. He poured her another drink. “I guess you had a rough time.”
She shook her head again, firmly, and smiled. “No I didn’t. It was fine while it lasted. It mightn’t have been if I’d known—but he never let me know, right up to the end.”
“How long ago?” Chance asked.
“Four months. Since then I’ve been working to get enough money for stage fare.”
“Going home?”
She said, as though it was a question she had answered so many times that it no longer had any meaning. “I haven’t any.”
Chance was about to ask her where the devil she was going then, when Carlos came in from the dining room. He and Consuela had their rooms at the back there where it was handy to everything downstairs. He looked surprised when he saw Chance.
“I did not know you had come in, amigo. Why did you not call me?”
“Why should I call you?” asked Chance, puzzled.
Carlos reached down behind the desk and pulled out a big revolver. “Who but myself should stand watch while you sleep?” He waggled the gun at Chance, smiling.
“You stay out of it,” Chance said. He wanted no risk of Carlos getting shot like Wheeler. He started to explain this, but Carlos glared at him, offended, and cut him off short.
“You are under my roof. And I will not be told what I shall do and what I shall not do.”
Chance said apologetically, “But there isn’t any need for you to watch, amigo. I’ll lock my door and hook a chair under the knob. If anyone tries to get in I’ll hear ’em.”
Carlos stood stubbornly holding the gun.
“Look,” said Chance, “the place to keep watch is down here. Your room is right under mine. If you hear anyone breaking into the hotel pound on the ceiling and I’ll have more warning than if you were upstairs.”
Carlos muttered something, but he could not deny that there was sense in what Chance said. Chance smiled.
“Buenas noches, amigo. Do me one favor. If I’m still sleeping at sunup, wake me.”
Carlos nodded. “Sleep well,” he said. He went back into the dining room.
Chance turned to the girl. “If I don’t see you in the morning, Feathers, so long. By the way, where are you going?”
She answered wryly, “Somewhere where there aren’t any handbills. That thing keeps popping up. That’s why I’m so touchy about it.”
Chance picked up the handbill. “I know the sheriff that got this out. I’ll write him a letter and get it called in.” He tore the paper across and dropped the pieces on the floor. “Then you won’t have people like me making trouble for you.”
He walked past her to the stairs, but not so quickly that he did not see the sudden tears that glistened in her eyes.
TWELVE
Chance woke with the bright sun shining in his face. He threw the blanket off and sat up, cursing. It was late, long after sunup. He felt much better for the sleep, but a sense of guilt and alarm prodded him.
He stamped his feet into his boots—they were all he had taken off, besides his hat—picked up his rifle and went charging downstairs.
Carlos sat peacefully at the desk, going over his accounts.
Chance stopped and glared at him. “Why didn’t you wake me?”
Carlos made an elaborate shrug. There was a curious smile lurking under his drooping mustache. “The girl,” he said. “The one with the feathers.”
“What about her?”
“She say no, you need your sleep. She was very determined. I do not like to fight with women.”
Chance said, “I don’t savvy. What did she have to do with it?”
“Why,” said Carlos innocently, “she was sitting outside your room in a chair all the night long. She was there two, three minutes ago. Did you not see her?”
“For God’s sake.” Chance shook his head. “Well, you tell her for me—” He broke off, shaking his head again. He was deeply touched. “Damned fool.”
“You wish me to tell her she’s a damned fool?”
“Don’t bother,” Chance said. “I’ll do it myself.”
He ran back up the stairs. Carlos watched him, laughing silently. Consuela appeared in the dining-room door where she had been listening. They looked at each other and nodded, laughing.
Chance strode down the upstairs hall and rapped on Feathers’ door.
“Who is it?” she called.
“Me. The sheriff.”
“Just a minute.” He heard scampering sounds inside. The key turned. “Wait till I tell you, now,” she said. There were more scampering sounds and the creak of the bed as she jumped into it. “All right, come on in.”
Chance went in. Feathers was in bed with the covers pulled up tight around her neck. She yawned and blinked her eyes and said, “Hi.”
“Did you have a good sleep?” he asked.
“Who, me?”
“There’s nobody else in the room.”
She tried to stare him down and then dropped her eyes. She sat up, throwing the covers back irritably. She had managed to get her dress off but no more.
“Carlos had to talk.” She spread her hands wide, shrugging. “I couldn’t sleep, anyway. I was just as well off out there in the hall.”
“And if somebody had come you’d have yelled before they shot you, is that it?” Her shoulders were white and strong and beautifully shaped. So was her breast, as much as he could see of it, which was quite a lot in the close-fitting low-cut garment she had on. He thought of that whiteness torn and splashed with blood, for his sake. And why? Because he had said he would get a handbill called in, which was no more than simple justice.
“Fool women,” he said, consigning the whole sex to blazes. “Didn’t you hear me say …?”
“I know, I know. You don’t want anyone to help you. I heard.”
“Then why did you do it?”
“You weren’t supposed to know,” she said, raising her voice a little. “Why didn’t you just go out and not talk to Carlos?”
Feeling like an ungracious bastard but madder than ever because of the risk she had taken, thinking how he would have felt if anything had happened, he yelled at her, “Because he didn’t wake me like he was supposed to.”
“That was my fault, too,” Her eyes were hot, rimmed with shadows. “All right, nothing happened, nobody got hurt, you got some sleep, and I lost some. Now I’m tired and you’re mad and I’m getting mad. You better go.” She got up as though to chase him to the door. “I’m going to get some sleep too.”
Chance said lamely, “It was a nice thing for you to do but—”
She glared at him. “I wouldn’t have done it if I’d known you’d make all this fuss, get mad and start acting like this.”
“I’m not mad!”
“Well I am!” she made pushing motions at him with her hand. “Go on about your business.” He didn’t,
and she said, “You’d better, because I’m going to bed.”
She started to unhook herself up the front, daring him to stay.
Chance said, “You can’t go to bed now.”
“I can’t?” Her fingers moved faster. “Well, you just stay here and you’ll see whether I—”
“You have to get on that stage.”
She stopped unhooking. “What?”
“It leaves in an hour.”
“Oh Lord,” she said. She hooked two hooks back up the wrong way and then cried, “Get out then and let me get a bath and pack my things. I can’t do it if you stand around talking.”
“You’re doing most of the talking,” Chance said. His ears were ringing with it.
“That’s right, I am, and I can’t do that and bathe and pack too, so go on and go.”
It looked as though she might throw something at him. He said, “I’m going,” and backed toward the door. “I just wanted to—”
“Then do it. Don’t talk any more. Like you said, I’m doing enough and neither of us is saying anything, so just get out and let me get on that stage.”
“Oh, hell,” Chance said, knowing that he had fouled things up, regretting it and resenting it at the same time. He tried again to say she was a damned idiot and he was grateful for it, but all he said was, “Good-by.”
“Good-by,” she said politely, “to you.” And slammed the door in his face.
He went downstairs. Carlos smiled at him blandly. “The girl, she is going on the stage?” he asked, in a tone that said he knew perfectly well she was not but would pretend to be surprised when he was told.
“Good and damned right she’s going,” Chance said. Carlos’s eyes popped open. Just to make them pop a little wider, he added. “You see that she does.”
He strode to the door. Carlos ran after him, upset.
“But Juan, if she is going, why must I …?”
“You see that she does, that’s all.” Chance didn’t know himself why he had said that. The girl certainly had not mentioned staying. But all of a sudden it seemed highly important for somebody to make sure she did not. So he told Carlos, “I hold you responsible.”
“Responsible,” Carlos said. “Me. Yes.” He looked unhappy.
They had come out on the porch of the hotel. Chance could see Dude already at his post down the road, at the edge of town. There was a bunch of men hanging around the jail. Some were from the town and some were in from neighboring ranches. They were not armed and they were not doing anything, just standing around smoking and talking in quiet tones. They appeared to be waiting for something.
“Lots of people in today,” Carlos said.
Chance felt a tightening of the nerves. He said carefully, “Did you hear why?”
Carlos nodded. “Someone say he has heard that Nathan Burdette comes today to see you.” He looked at the crowd. “Most likely they are here to watch.”
Chance took a deep breath and weighed the rifle in his hands. He smiled. “Well, if he does come,” he said, “maybe they’ll see something.”
He left Carlos and walked toward the jail. Down the road Dude was disarming two men who had ridden up, making them hang their gunbelts on the posts of an old corral fence. He already had quite a collection.
Chance shouted a warning to Stumpy, unlocked the door, and went into the jail.
The two cowboys rode in and joined the crowd. Dude sat down again on his rock at the side of the road. The sun rose higher and hotter. Up on the cliffs the horsemen watched. Behind the hotel Jake Myers saw to the harnessing of the team, his mustache bristling as he eyed the newly repaired wheels. The crowd opposite the jail grew slowly larger. Otherwise there was almost no one in the street. The Mexican quarter had the appearance of a deserted town. Chickens and a few goats moved in the blazing dusty lanes, but every door was barred and every window shuttered. It was uncannily quiet. The only normal sound was the clattering of the piano in the Rio Bravo Saloon, where Raton played his stated number of hours even if the world should fall in broken pieces all around him.
Suddenly Dude stood up.
A long white plume of dust was coming swiftly up the road to Rio Bravo.
THIRTEEN
Nathan Burdette on his blue roan horse rode at the head of the party, and Matt Harris was beside him. There were only four others. It pleased Nathan to come into town with no more than what might be called an honor guard. It was symbolic of his strength. If he had brought many men with him it would have appeared that he was unsure of himself, afraid of attack.
He rode easily, a large solid man with straight, heavy features that were neither cruel nor kind, but merely obdurate. His eyes were intelligent and calculating, indicating a steel-trap mind behind them. He was not in any hurry. There was a job before him to be done but he would do it in his own way, in his own time. He had no intention of winding up where Joe was now, in the shadow of the rope. He had six days. It was more than enough.
Things had gone rather badly last night, but not too badly. He had lost a hired gun, but the man had died without talking and there was no way he could be definitely traced to Burdette. He was an outsider, and Nathan had been very careful about the arrangement. Several of his own men, including Charlie, had been run out of town, which was an inconvenience. On the other hand, he had gained his purpose. Wheeler, whose loud mouth was stirring up the citizens and who might just possibly have provided Chance with a number of men, was dead and everybody knew why even if it could not be proved. Few men would be likely now to throw in with the sheriff and risk a shot in the back that might come from anywhere, at any moment.
Even more important, Nathan had revised his opinion of Dude. Apparently El Borrachin could still be dangerous when he was sober and this was valuable knowledge. It might avoid some serious mistakes in the future.
As of this morning Nathan was interested only in Chance. He had given Chance plenty of time to understand the situation, plenty of time to think it over. Now he wanted to know what Chance had thought and what he proposed to do about it. He did not underestimate Chance. He did not consider Chance’s intelligence to be of the same order as his own. Neither was he in any way a fool. And he was tough, and monumentally stubborn. Nathan had dealt with tough stubborn men before. He had learned to respect them.
He rode with his men through the silent Mexican quarter. The hoofs of the six horses made an arrogant thunder on the stony road. Matt Harris looked around and smiled. He liked fear. He liked to inspire it. Nathan did not. To him fear was only a tool to be used for a purpose, like a branding iron or a shovel, and just as impersonal.
He saw Dude ride into the road in front of them. He had been expecting that, and when Dude ordered them to stop Nathan stopped.
Dude said, “I got orders to take your guns.”
Nathan had expected this too and his men had been told what to do. But he was curious about Dude. So he said pleasantly, “Suppose we don’t want to give them up. Could you take them against six of us?”
Dude smiled. His face was haggard and he still had not shaved or cleaned himself. In spite of this confidence radiated from him. His eyes shone with it. He looked at Nathan as though he really wished they would try something.
“That’s a pretty stupid question, Mr. Burdette,” he said. “You know I’d get some of you, and you know the first one would be you.”
Nathan nodded. “All right,” he said to his men. “Give him your guns.”
Dude pointed to the remains of the corral fence, already festooned with gunbelts.
“Hang ’em over there with the others. You can get ’em back when you leave.”
Nathan himself was not wearing a gun. The others filed past the fence, hanging their belts on it. Dude watched them alertly, his right hand resting idle on his thigh, his whole body expressing pleasure and excitement. Nathan could guess exactly what was going on in Dude’s mind. He imagined him spending the whole night shooting the man in the saloon, doing it over and over, feeling the perfect respon
se of his muscles, the gun bucking in his hand, the pride, the sense of triumph as the body came crashing to the floor. Instead of being drunk on whisky Dude was drunk now on the rediscovery of his own skill, which had been a mighty thing in the old days. He was wild to use it. Nathan took yet another look at his inward concept of Dude, added, and subtracted.
When the last gun was hung on the post he rode on up the street with his men, to the jail.
Chance was on the porch waiting for him, with his rifle in his hands.
“Morning, Sheriff,” Nathan said.
Chance nodded curtly. “Morning, Nathan. I’ve been expecting you.”
“I want to see my brother.”
“Come ahead.”
Nathan swung down out of the saddle. So did Harris and the others. He started toward the steps and the men came with him.
The rifle barrel glinted in the sun as it moved in Chance’s hands.
“He’s not your brother,” he said to the men. “Go on across the street and wait with the others.”
“Go on,” said Nathan. “Do as he says.”
Matt Harris had an ugly look in his eye and Nathan knew he was dreaming of some future time when things would be different. But he turned and went across the street and the other men went with him, leading their horses.
Nathan examined the crowd. “What are they all doing here?”
“I didn’t ask them,” Chance said. “But I think they’re watching to see what you’ll do. You don’t like too many witnesses, do you, Nathan?”
Nathan shrugged. He went up onto the porch and into the jail. Chance came behind him and shut the door.
Nathan had been in here before when one or another of his men had got into trouble. Now he looked at everything with a new interest. The barred door into the cell corridor was locked now. Usually no one bothered with it. Old Stumpy Anderson stood on the other side of it with a shotgun.
“Open up,” Chance said.
Stumpy looked at Nathan. “Don’t know as I will,” he said. “We got too damned many Burdettes in here now. The place stinks.”
Rio Bravo Page 9
