Rio Bravo

by Leigh Brackett

  Chance swung the door shut and leaned against it. “Go on.”

  “Things really got mixed up then. You should have seen it.” She laughed. “Poor Carlos and Consuela both yelling at the same time and then he dropped me on the floor and I yelled too.”

  She seemed to realize that her voice was getting too loud and shrill. She stopped short. She shook her head irritably and snuffled.

  “Here I am talking again and not saying anything. You want to know why I didn’t go, don’t you, Sheriff? What’s your name, anyway? I don’t even know that.”

  “Chance,” he said. “John T.”

  She smiled. He did not understand why. It was the South-western custom to use the initial and he had never even thought about it. But it seemed to amuse her. “T for trouble?”

  Chance groaned.

  “I always make you mad, don’t I, John T.?” She didn’t wait for an answer. She got up and went to the window, turning her back on him while she talked. “Then don’t make me tell you why I stayed. I won’t get in your way, I won’t make it any harder for you, I’ll just be here. And you don’t owe me a thing. You won’t owe me when it’s all over. When that happens just tell me to go and I’ll go. No. No, you won’t even have to tell me, I’ll know by then and I’ll just go. Is that fair, John T.?”

  The words came in a breathless rush. After that there was silence. Chance stood looking at her. Finally she turned around and the little-girl aspect was all gone and her face was gentle and hopeful and terribly vulnerable. The sunlight from the window caught in her hair, touched one cheek and the side of her neck with gold.

  She said quietly, “You don’t have to answer that if you don’t want to. But just say something!”

  Her eyes were direct and honest. There was no coquetry in them, no sham. Chance looked into them and something very strange happened to him, a shock of feeling that he had never had before. It rocked him. It was like the world turning over. And then from a long distance away he heard the sound of the Deguello and that moment was over.

  Almost.

  He said, “If I weren’t in this mess it might be different. But I am.”

  “That’s what I wanted to hear,” she whispered, and came to him and kissed him on the lips. After a minute she drew back and shook her head at him, frowning. She was so close to him that he could see the fine texture of her skin, the intimate detail of lash and eyebrow, the exact placing of each dark glossy hair that framed her face. He thought she was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. She put up her mouth to his again and this time he closed his ears to the Cutthroat song and forgot about everything but the business in hand. It was a long time before she pulled away, and she was not frowning.

  “I’m glad we tried it a second time,” she said. “It’s better when two people do it.”

  She opened the door and grinned at him.

  “I’ve taken enough of your time. You better run along now. I said I wouldn’t get in your way.”

  He found himself out in the hall. He was shaking. The blood thumped and pounded pleasantly in his veins and he could feel the wide foolish astonished smile on his own face. And he thought, “Oh, God Almighty, as if I didn’t have trouble enough!”

  FIFTEEN

  It was after dark and the Deguello was still coming from the piano in the Rio Bravo Saloon. Chance, sitting with his feet up on the desk, wondered if Raton did not ever get tired.

  Dude was pacing around. He was restless and talkative, circling all around something but not getting at it. Finally he said, “The stage got out all right. I watched. Burdette’s men didn’t make a move.”

  “Why would they? Nathan was here with me and Joe when the stage left. They wouldn’t hardly think I’d be on it.”

  “Um.” Dude walked up and down some more. “’Bout six days for the marshal to get here?”

  “That’s what I figure.”

  Another silence. The notes of the Deguello pounded on, endlessly repeated. Chance squirmed a bit. He was tempted to go over and knock Raton off the stool and then break the piano over his head. Only then Nathan would know that the music bothered him and there would be Deguellos played on every guitar, piano, trumpet and drum in Rio Bravo, and if they gave out more would be brought in. He decided the hell with Nathan, he would not be needled by a piece of music. He pushed it out of his mind. But some of the bass notes reminded him of a drumbeat and that reminded him of Juanito whose pride and duty it was to walk ahead of the hearse thumping on his drum. And that made him think of Wheeler’s funeral. Chance had walked with Colorado and the men of the wagon train out to Boot Hill and watched with the sun beating down on his bare head while the rough pine coffin was lowered into the ground, and up above them all, remote on the clifftops, Burdette’s riders had watched too.

  He had meant what he said to Nathan. Wheeler was only half paid for.

  Dude finally came out with it. He said, “That girl wasn’t on the stage.”

  Chance said, “I know that.”

  “Did you let her stay over?” Dude’s eyes were very bright, very penetrating, watching him.

  Chance said mildly, “I don’t know why you’d put it like that. She’s free, white and twenty-one and she hasn’t broken any laws. It’s up to her if she stays or not.”

  “Oh,” said Dude. “Sure. I see. She tell you why she stayed?”

  Even more mildly Chance asked, “What’s it to you?”

  “Nothing,” Dude said. “Nothing.” He walked over and leaned on the window ledge. “I just remembered one time another girl came through on the stage and stopped over. I just wondered.”

  “Well, you can stop wondering.”

  “You were right about that girl. I didn’t believe you but you were right. So naturally I figure you’re an expert. You know what you’re doing.” Chance threw the paperweight at him and he dodged it nimbly. He laughed. “I hope you have better luck than I did, that’s all.”

  Suddenly Dude’s face became blank and pop-eyed with surprise.

  “Hey,” he said. “Do you know that’s the first time I’ve even mentioned her? Let alone the first time I’ve been able to laugh about it? Maybe there’s hope for me yet.”

  Chance grunted. “Maybe, but I doubt it.”

  Dude laughed again. It was as though the sound was new, strange, and pleasant in his ears. “That’s what I like about you, John T. You’re such an encouraging bastard.”

  Stumpy came through the barred door into the office. “You boys got to quarreling again?”

  “We could, pretty easy,” Chance said. “You want in on it?”

  Stumpy looked at him reproachfully. “Chance, you’d ought to have more respect for my age and gray hairs. You know I’m a peaceful tempered man. A sucking dove ain’t in it with me. But you’re such an ornery devil you keep me constantly riled up and it ain’t good for my digestion. Now if you—”

  “Oh, Christ,” Chance said, “don’t you ever shut up?”

  “There you go. See, Dude? See what I mean? I just came out here to ask a civil question—”

  “Ask it then,” Chance said. “Go ahead. Just don’t drown me in a river of bull.”

  “If it ain’t too much trouble, Sheriff sir,” said Stumpy sweetly, “would you mind bringing some coffee and sugar if you go by the hotel, if it ain’t—”

  Chance laughed. “All right, all right. Is Joe complaining?”

  “Him!” said Stumpy. “He don’t get no sugar, and his coffee’s nothin’ but water poured over the old grounds. I’m teaching him to talk out of turn. Call me a old cripple, will he? He forgot it was up to me to feed him. Better get him strung up fast, Chance, or he’ll be so thin he’ll slip right through the noose.”

  Dude had drawn his gun and was fingering it. “Been meaning to ask you, Stumpy. This gun of yours is stiff. Is it all right if I file the action a bit?”

  “Hell, no!” said Stumpy. “I don’t want no easy action—might shoot myself. You want a faster gun, borrow somebody else’s. You—” He stop
ped short, then turned to Chance. “Come to think of it, why’n hell don’t you give him his own guns?”

  Dude swung around sharply and looked at Chance, who shrugged and said casually, “I forgot all about ’em.” He got up and went to a locked cupboard beside the gunrack, taking a key from his pocket.

  “Your memory ain’t no better than mine,” Stumpy said. “They been locked up there for over a year.”

  Dude watched, standing stock-still with the heavy Colt forgotten in his hand, while Chance opened the cupboard door and reached out a belt of fine tooled leather and a pair of guns. Chance held them out and Dude took them, laying Stumpy’s gun on the desk. His fingers ran lightly over the butts of the guns. He shook his head a couple of times and blinked hard, moving around as though the light was in his eyes.

  “How did you get these?” he asked.

  “Bought ’em from the fellow you sold ’em to.” Chance leaned against the wall and glanced at Stumpy over Dude’s head. The old man’s eyes were warm. He looked at Chance and nodded.

  Dude stripped off the worn plain belt he was wearing and buckled on the other, settling the guns over his lean hips. He took the guns out one by one and examined them lovingly, feeling the balance of them, the fit of the grip in his hand. He spun the cylinder of each one and looked closely at the barrel. “How come,” he said, “if they’ve been locked up there for over a year, they’ve been cleaned and oiled so good?”

  “No use letting them go to pieces too,” Chance said roughly, and picked up his rifle. “Come on, let’s take a look around and get Stumpy his coffee and sugar.”

  Dude smiled briefly. He followed Chance to the door.

  Stumpy said, “Hey! Ain’t you going to tell me to get back in there?”

  “No,” said Chance. “Stay out here and get shot.”

  “Might do it just for spite,” Stumpy growled. He limped back inside and shut the barred door with a ringing clang. “What I put up with for thirty a month!”

  Chance grinned. He went out and Dude covered him while he locked the door, flourishing the guns.

  They moved off down the street. This time Dude walked beside Chance. He kept his hands on his belt as though he could not bear to let go of it lest it should vanish.

  “Am I drawing pay?” he said abruptly.

  “Same as before.”

  “Then you can take out for these guns.” He caught sight of his reflection in a store window and stopped to admire them, running his hands down the tooled holsters, adjusting the weight to an absolute balance on his hips.

  Chance said, “No hurry.” He kept his eye on the street.

  Dude frowned at the wavery picture of himself in the dusty glass. He shifted his attention from the gunbelt to his ragged pants and shirt, poking his fingers through some of the holes. He looked at his boots with the open cracks in them and the hat that was like a broken tent on his head.

  “If you’re feeling so generous,” he said, “I could use an advance. Get myself a pair of pants and a shirt.”

  Chance continued to look at the street. “No need for that,” he said. “You left some things behind when you lit out. They’re up in my room.”

  Dude turned quickly and looked at him. “You been keeping ’em all this time?”

  Chance said, “You could use a bath and a shave, too.”

  Dude laughed. The laugh was a little shaky. He ran his hand over his jaw and down over his Adam’s apple, and then held out the hand and watched it quiver.

  “I’m not so sure about the shave,” he said. “I’m liable to cut my own throat.”

  They walked to the hotel and the notes of the Deguello hounded after them, mixing with the sound of their footsteps, the beating of their hearts.

  An hour or so later Chance knocked at the door of Feathers’ room. She opened the door for him with one hand, struggling with the other to tuck the tail of a bright pink shirt into the top of her skirt. She laughed.

  “I was hoping I’d see you, John T., but not quite so soon. If I can get my shirttail out of the way, I want to …”

  Chance said, “First, have you got anything to stop bleeding?” She looked at him, alarmed. He laughed. “Nobody’s hurt—much. Dude’s trying to shave himself.”

  “Whew,” she said. “I thought for a minute—” She let that drop and began to paw around in her luggage, which was all open now and a lot less neat than it looked when it was closed. “I’ve got some alum somewhere.” She dug away like a puppy, throwing things in all directions. Chance thought she looked adorable, crouched down that way with a lock of hair in her eye and her pink shirttail still flying. She kept grumbling apologetically about how bad she was at packing and how she never could find a thing when she wanted it. “I suppose you’re one of those disgustingly orderly people, John T.—a place for everything and everything in its place. Here it is.” She held up the alum triumphantly. “I found it. Where is Dude? Maybe I can help.”

  “My room,” he said.

  She stopped close to him and stretched up on her toes, rubbing her cheek against his. “You could use a shave too. I found that out this afternoon.”

  He said, “Dude’s liable to cut his throat any minute.”

  “All right,” she said. “I’m going.” She made a face at him and went ahead of him down the hall, swinging her hips with unnecessary vigor until he laughed and said, “Your shirttail’s still out.”

  “I can see you’ve got your hateful side, John T.,” she said, tucking it in. “You can just leave me and Dude alone.”

  “The hell with that,” Chance said and went in with her. Dude was standing in front of the washstand mirror, with a big towel draped over his shoulders. He had had a bath and his hair was still wet, long and ragged-looking. He had succeeded in haggling most of the beard off his face, but the towel had as much blood on it as it did lather.

  “Oh, goodness,” Feathers said. “Sit down!” She pushed him into a chair and went to work with the alum. Dude squirmed and stamped his feet. When she was finished with that she leaned back and looked at him. “Hey,” she said. “Why would you want to keep a face like that hidden in all that sagebrush?” Then she reached out and fingered the ends of his hair. “John T., bring me the scissors.”

  He found a pair and gave them to her and she snipped away, doing a pretty good neat job of it. From time to time Chance caught Dude looking at him in the mirror, with an expression of cynical amusement. Chance could not blame him too much. Here he was threatening to fall into the identical pit that had trapped Dude three years ago.

  Or he would if he let himself. But he couldn’t let himself. Not now. If he was still alive and whole at the end of six days he might consider it, but not now. The Cutthroat Song was there to remind him that death hung over him every minute, choosing with cold patience the exact time to strike. He thought of Wheeler out there in Boot Hill and then he looked at Feathers, and he felt really frightened for the first time.

  Damn women. Damn the things they could do to a man. A man could get along fine without any doubts or fears or worries, until he tangled up with a woman and then God help him.

  Dude got out of the chair and took the towel off. He was dressed in black-and-gray striped pants and a black shirt, all the finest material and cut. His boots had cost him three months’ wages. He looked at himself in the mirror and grinned half ruefully—it was almost the old Dude there but not quite. He buckled on his guns and picked up a fine black hat with a fancy silver band on it. He frowned at the band for a moment, then took it off and tossed it to Chance.

  “I could buy a lot of drinks with that,” he said.

  Chance hefted the silver, nodding. “Sure could,” he said, and tossed it back.

  Dude looked at him. Then he opened a drawer of Chance’s bureau and dropped the silver band inside. “Makes too good a target,” he said. He smiled at Feathers. “Thanks. I may call on you again.”

  “Any time,” she said. “I’ll be here.” She looked at Chance. “Carlos is giving me a job.�
��

  Dude picked up a package containing coffee and sugar that Carlos had brought up earlier. He started for the door.

  Feathers said, “Are you in a hurry, John T.? I’d like to talk to you.”

  “I’ll wait for you,” Dude said, and went out, closing the door.

  Feathers said, “I just wanted to ask if you—”

  Chance frowned at her. All of a sudden the pink shirt seemed gaudy and too low in the neck. “What’s this about a job?”

  “Oh,” she said, “Carlos isn’t sleeping well these nights and he says I can help him out a lot downstairs.”

  “Tending bar?”

  “Among other things,” she said. “Do you think I shouldn’t?”

  Chance shrugged irritably. “Why ask me?”

  “The way you said, ‘tending bar’.” She watched his face closely for a moment. Then she smiled. “All right, John T. I won’t do it.”

  “I didn’t say not to.” He didn’t know why it angered him to think of her tending bar. Maybe if she’d button that shirt up higher … Hell, it was none of his business, and he was damned if he would have it made so.

  “But you don’t like the idea,” she said.

  “Why should I care?”

  “I don’t know,” she snapped. “I don’t know why you get mad when I ask you.”

  “You’d make anybody mad,” he said exasperatedly. “You …”

  “I suppose I would. And as long as you haven’t anything against it, I’ll take the job.” Her cheeks were as pink as her shirt and her eyes were flashing.

  Chance said, “Well, go ahead.”

  She smiled, showing the edges of her teeth. “Thanks.”

  She marched out of the room. He followed her. Dude was not in the hall—he must have gone downstairs to wait, out of earshot. While Chance was locking the door he said to Feathers,

  “What were you going to ask me?”

  “Never mind. You’re in too bad a humor.”

  He straightened up. “What were you going to ask?”

  “Whether you were going to sleep here tonight.”