Sudden (1933)

by Oliver Strange

  "Odd, that," the marshal mused. "Well, I reckon I better look into it. Yu boys comin' along?"

  The reply was an immediate scattering in quest of mounts and rifles; hot as it was, they were not missing anything that promised a little excitement. In less than a quarter of an hour, the men, headed by the marshal and the bringer of the news, were riding rapidly for the scene of the outrage.

  "Redhead with a grey hoss huh?" Slype remarked, his crafty little eyes on his companion. "Curious yu didn't know him."

  "Ain't it?" Was the sardonic retort. "My sight is mebbe not so good, an' it's powerful glary out on the range." The marshal grunted his disbelief in this explanation and became more confirmed in his suspicion, which, had he but known it, was just what Riley intended. The Circle B man's admiration for the officer would have been hard to discover.

  In the West of that day representatives of the law were seldom popular. There were among them men who did their work fearlessly and honestly; whose efforts to establish and preserve order in an untamed land laid the foundation stones of the great and flourishing cities which have replaced the huddles of huts they knew. But many were, as the common phrase put it, "as crooked as a cow's hind leg," and held their places only because they were more ruthless, and could shoot quicker than the ruffians they had to rule. Slype belonged to neither of these groups; he had been put in power by the Circle B, and though he talked loudly in public, it was generally known that when King Burdette whistled, the marshal had to come to heel.

  He now rode in silence, trying to fathom what lay behind this latest development. Beyond a plain intimation that Luce was no longer to be regarded as one of the family, the Burdettes had told him nothing, but the marshal had means of obtaining information, and little happened in the neighbourhood that he did not hear. He knew, for example, that King Burdette's belt had been left at "The Lucky Chance" by his youngest brother, and had slapped his thigh in unholy glee at the news. For though he served them--or perhaps, because of that--he hated the Burdettes with all his mean, shrivelled soul. Riley's voice interrupted his speculations.

  "Yonder's the knob where the shot come from. Green must 'a' bin pretty close to here."

  They had reached the canyon and were riding along the edge, slowing in order to search it thoroughly. Riley, bending down in his saddle, was scanning the ground closely. Presently he dragged on his reins and jumped off.

  "Thisyer's the spot," he said. "See where the hoss r'ared?" He pointed to several hoof-prints deeply indented in the short turf. A tiny reddish-brown splash on a blade of grass caught his eye, and he stepped to the brink of the precipice. At his call, the others left their horses and came clustering round. He was pointing to a little crevice, a notch in the rim of the canyon wall, the long grass in which was flattened, broken, and stained in several places with dried blood.

  "He dropped here, shore enough, but where the devil's he got to?" Slype queried.

  "Rolled over, I'd say," one of the party offered. "That crack goes plenty deep, I'm thinkin'."

  "Hell's delight, it's a long ride to git down there," the marshal said disgustedly. "S'pose we gotta do it."

  A further search revealing no sign of the missing man, the posse retraced its steps to the entrance of the canyon.

  "We'd oughta come here first," said one when they reached it.

  "If everybody done what they oughta, somebody would 'a' bumped yu off for a chatterin' fool years ago, Pike," the marshal said savagely.

  The offender subsided; he owed Slype money, a fact that worthy had not forgotten when he uttered the insult. Since the rest of the party, save Riley, were in the same predicament, the journey along the gorge was made in silence. It was the Circle B man who first saw the hat, and spurring his pony, leant over, lifted it from the ground and waited for the marshal. The broken buckle and jagged hole with bloodstained edges appeared to tell a plain story.

  "Got him good, 'pears like," Slype decided. "But where the blazes is the body? Even if the bullet didn't do the trick, the fall would break every bone in him."

  They scanned the grim, overhanging wall above them, and the man Pike ventured an opinion. "That crack in the rim comes down a consid'able ways; mebbe he slipped into that 'stead o' droppin' clear."

  It appeared to be the only solution; seen from below, the fissure in question seemed more than capacious enough to conceal a corpse. The marshal grudgingly accepted the explanation.

  "Likely enough," he said. "Well, if he's there it's as good a grave as we could make him. Let's git outa this damn gully--it gives me the creeps."

  Once more they retraced their steps, and emerging into the open, headed for the knoll from which the shot had been fired. It was a mere mound, covered on the side facing the canyon with a thick screen of spruce, catclaw, and cactus, being therefore an ideal spot for the purpose to which it had been put. Hoof-prints showed where a horse had been tied, and lying near the top of the hillock was an old grey Stetson. The marshal pounced on it; in the sweatband were the letters "L. B."--done in ink--but nearly obliterated by time and wear.

  "Luce Burdette," he muttered. "But how come he to leave this behind?"

  The spot where the hat had lain was littered with cigarette stubs. "Squatted here some time, an' took his lid off while he waited," Slype went on. "Then when he's did what he come to do, bolts off an' forgets it." He picked up a shining brass object. "She's a .38 shell. I reckon that settles it; we gotta find Mister Luce, an' right speedy."

  "Huh, I'll bet he's throwin' dust an' yu won't see that hombre no more," Pike said.

  The marshal eyed him speculatively. "How much yu wanta lose?" he asked. "I got ten dollars that says we'll find him in town. Yu takin' it?"

  "Betcha life," the man replied. "Easy money, marshal."

  "Don't think it," warned a friend. "Coin yu collect from Sam ain't ever that."

  The trip back to Windy was made at speed, and the whole party piled into the hotel, where, as the news spread, they were quickly followed by others. They found the man they were in search of calmly eating a meal in the dining-room. The marshal shot a triumphant glance at Pike and then turned abruptly upon Luce.

  "Where yu bin this afternoon?" he inquired.

  The young man did not need to be told there was trouble in the air; the fact stuck out like a sore thumb. "Prospectin' south o' the river, if it's any o' yore damn business," he replied.

  This was in the opposite direction from where the ambushing had occurred, and the officer's thin lips curledin a sneer as he went on, "Anybody with yu to prove that?"

  "No, I didn't see nobody. What's the idea?"

  "That can wait. Still usin' that .38 o' yores?" and when the other nodded, "Have it with yu to-day?"

  "Shore I did--don't aim to be caught out on a limb if I can help it," Luce said, adding scathingly, "Bushwhack-in' is too prevalent around here."

  "Yu said it," the marshal agreed, and held out the second hat they had found. "Know who owns this?"

  The boy's eyes opened in surprise. "It's mine," he said. "I left it behind..."

  "Yeah, we know; when yu downed Green," Slype put in.

  Luce Burdette sprang to his feet, eyes wide with amazement, and every gun in the room instantly covered him. But he made no attempt to draw his own.

  "Green downed?" he cried, and there was deep concern in his voice. "An' yu think I did it? Yu must be loco; he's about my on'y friend."

  "He was got with a .38 shell, by a fella ridin' a grey hoss, an' we find yore hat on the spot," the marshal said incisively.

  "That lid's an old one which I left at the Circle B when I cleared out," Luce explained. He pointed to the chair beside him. "There's the one I'm usin'."

  Slype laughed nastily. "Bright boy, ain't yu?" he sneered. "But it don't go this time. Twice yu bin lucky an' got away with it, but this is yore finish." He surveyed the crowded room, narrowed lids hiding the malevolent triumph in his gaze. "Some o' yu mebbe ain't got the straight o' this; here it is," he said, and went on to give a
brief summary of the facts as he knew them. His concluding words were, "I reckon that's good enough for us to go ahead an' try this fella right away."

  "Try him?" echoed a hoarse voice. "Oh, yeah, an' give him a chance to lie hisself out of it again. Yo're mighty fussy, marshal, 'bout stringin' up a cowardly coyote who kills from cover. Mebbe it's 'cause he's a Burdette, huh?"

  The speaker was Goldy Evans, still sore at the loss of his dust, and a chorus of approval showed that he had plenty of support. The marshal drew himself up with a farcical attempt at dignity.

  "A Burdette gets the same treatment from me as any other man," he announced. "I represent the law, an' there'll be no necktie party--if I can prevent it." The pause and the lowered tone of the last few words told the turbulent element in the crowd all it wanted to know. Slype had made his protest; if they forced his hand . . .

  Magee, who, arriving late, had only contrived to make his way just inside the door, threw up a hand.

  "Aisy, bhoys, give the lad a hearin'," he shouted. "Shure it's agin all nature he should do this thing--Green saved his life, ye mind. Lavin' th' hat behind looks purty thin to me."

  But for once the saloon-keeper, popular though he was, found himself powerless; only a few voices backed him up, and these were drowned by the opposition.

  "Aw, Mick, one customer won't make much difference," a miner gibed, and the Irishman's protest ended in a burst of laughter.

  The brutal witticism, typical of a land where tragedy and comedy frequently stalked hand in hand, conveyed no hope to the accused. He knew that these men, having decided by their own rough and ready reasoning that he was guilty, would hang him with no more compunction than they would have in breaking the back of a rattlesnake. The old Biblical law, "An eye for an eye," was perhaps the only ordinance for which they had any respect. Nevertheless, the boy faced them boldly, making no resistance when two of them grabbed his arms and hustled him towards the door.

  "Hand the prisoner over to me," Slype blustered, and made a belated attempt to draw his gun, only to find that some cautious soul in the press behind him had already removed it.

  "Best not interfere, marshal," the fellow--a red-jowled, stalwart teamster--warned. "Yu can have yore shootin' iron when this business is settled."

  The officer shrugged his shoulders resignedly; he had put up a bluff, but with no intention of trying to make it good. He saw the condemned youth vanish through the door in a medley of heaving bodies, and presently followed, to make a final effort, not to save the victim's neck, but his own face. The fools, he reflected; they thought they had beaten him, and were only doing just what he wanted them to. He strode after the jeering, shouting crowd, and like peas from a pod, men popped from the buildings on either side of the street and joined the procession. By the time it stopped, nearly every man in the place was present.

  The halt was made at a cottonwood which shaded the last shack--going east--in the settlement, and had the distinction of being the one tree the actual town could boast. It was a giant, only its great girth having saved it from transformation into building material. Round it the spectators milled, jockeying to get a good view of the tightlipped, grey-faced boy who flushed a little and then proudly straightened up when the rope, with its running noose, was dropped over his head. The other end was pitched over an outflung branch above him and three men gripped it.

  "Anythin' to say, Burdette?" ripped out Goldy Evans, who had constituted himself leader of the lynching party, and added, "Yu might as well tell where yu cached my dust--it won't be no use where yo're goin'."

  The prisoner looked at the ring of threatening, ghoulish faces thrust eagerly forward to see him die. "I never had yore dust, Evans, an' I didn't shoot Green," he replied firmly. "Yo're hangin' an innocent man."

  Magee and several of the more solid citizens believed him, but could do nothing against the overwhelming odds. The bulk of the crowd received the statement with ornate expressions of unbelief; the lust for blood was in their nostrils; nothing short of a miracle would stop them now. The marshal knew it; this was not the first Western mob, with its weird ideas of justice, its mad desire to destroy, that he had seen. He voiced one more feeble protest.

  "Boys, I can't let this go on--it ain't reg'lar. Yo're robbin' the law of its rights."

  "Git to hell outa this an' take yore law with yu," snarled the teamster who had threatened him in the hotel. "That there branch'll bear two, an' we can easy find another rope."

  Slype turned away with a well-simulated gesture of despair, and the teamster plunged again into the jostling throng, anxious not to miss the climax of the drama. Every eye was now fixed on the slim, youthful figure waiting tensely for the word which would hurl him into eternity. No one noticed the approach of two riders who, about to enter the town, had pulled up at the sight of the gathering. Evans was about to give the fatal signal when another command rang out :

  "Drop that rope, yu fellas!"

  Heads turned and oaths sprang from amazed lips when it was seen that the speaker was none other than the man whose murder they helieved themselves to be avenging. The C P foreman's face was of beaten bronze, and out of it his slitted eyes gleamed frostily upon the executioners; they let go the rope as though it had been red-hot.

  "What's Burdette been doin' now?" Sudden asked.

  A dozen voices told him the story, and as he heard it, the cow-puncher's lips curled in a sneer of disgust. Then he drawled, "Seein' as I ain't dead none to speak of, I reckon the prisoner can shuck that rope an' stand clear."

  In a flurry of dust Mrs. Lavigne pulled her pony to a stop at Sudden's side. Returning from a ride, she had only just heard the news. When she saw the puncher's contemptuous smile and Bill Yago's broad grin, the colour crept slowly back into her cheeks.

  "They told me you were--dead, and that they were going to hang Luce," she said breathlessly.

  "All a mistake, Mrs. Lavigne," Sudden said lightly. "As yu see, I ain't cached, an' the lynchin' will--not--take place."

  The marshal fancied he saw a chance to reassert his authority. "Hold on, Green," he snapped. "What right yu got to call the turn? If this fella didn't bump yu off, he tried to, an' I'm holdin' him on that." A murmur from the rougher element in the assembly encouraged him, and he went on, "As marshal o' this yer burg..."

  "Yo're a false alarm," came the acid interruption. "Yu stand there like a bump on a log while a man who ain't been tried is strung up." The speaker's quick eye saw the empty holster, and he laughed aloud. "Cripes! So they took away yore gun?" He turned to the crowd in mock reproof. "Boys, that warn't noways right--it don't show a fittin' respect for the law. How'd yu know he don't want to argue with somebody--or somethin'?"

  This brought a cackle from one of the audience, and the merriment spread. Conscious that they had nearly committed a terrible blunder, the men were willing to forget it in ridiculing Slype, whose sallow face grew more sour as the jesting voices rose.

  "Give the man his gun," someone cried. "Whats a good of a marshal without a gun?"

  "Huh! Whatsa good o' some marshals with one?" another wanted to know.

  Sudden had one more thing to say. "Someone tried to get me to-day, marshal, but it wasn't this Burdette," he said meaningly. "Don't let anyone persuade yu different. It's mighty lucky for yu I came along in time; yu sabe?" The marshal did, and the chill in the quiet voice made him shiver. The foreman turned to Luce. "I'm a-goin' to the hotel; yu better come with me, if there ain't no objections."

  There were none; this satirical, long-limbed young man who had beaten Whitey to the draw was clearly not a person to take chances with, and the squinting, hopeful eyes of Bill Yago, who was known as a willing and enthusiastic fighter, did not add to the attractiveness of the proposition. So the crowd opened to let through the man it had come to hang, and, with the volatile spirit of the time and place, was grimly humorous.

  "We was plenty near puttin' one over on you, Luce," grinned a miner. "Yu shore oughta sell that grey; what'll yu take?"

/>   "Damn good care yu don't get him," retorted the youth, and looked at the marshal. "Yu can tell yore boss, King Burdette, that yu've fallen down again on the job o' gettin' rid of me. I'm stayin'."

  Without waiting for a reply from the rageful, stuttering officer, he joined Sudden, Yago, and Mrs. Lavigne, walking beside them as they paced up the street. At the door of "The Plaza" the girl spoke,

  "Didn't you get any warning?" she asked.

  "Yes, an' I'm thankin' yu, ma'am," Sudden replied. "I allow I was plumb careless--an' fortunate."

  "A man can play his luck too long," she said, and with a wise little nod, left them.

  Yago's gaze followed her. "She's too good for that skunk," he remarked. "Got guts, that gal has."

  Which inelegance, coming from a confirmed misogynist, was indeed a compliment. The foreman regarded his friend with surprise, and then a mischievous twinkle danced in his eyes.

  "Pore of Bill," he murmured. "It's wuss'n measles when yu get it late in life, love is. Look at him a-blushin,' Luce." Which was an obvious libel, since Yago's leathery skin was as incapable of blushing as a boot-sole. "Rotten trick for Master Cupid to play on a fella what's been damnin' women all his life," the tormentor went on. "Yu ain't got a chance, ol'-timer, but never yu mind, slick yoreself up, buy a new shirt--yu can do with one, anyway--an' --"

  "Aw, go to hell, yu--yu blatherskite," Yago shouted.

  "Let's make it the hotel--they tell me drinks ain't too plentiful where yu said, an' I'm as dry as the Staked Plain," his foreman smiled.

  Chapter XIII

  THAT same evening, on the verandah at the C P, Sudden related the day's happenings to an interested audience of two. The rancher's brow grew black when he learned of the attack on his foreman. Angrily he struck in on the story,

  "By God ! I've a mind to round up the boys an' go clean up the Circle B right away," he said.

  "Which is just what they're hopin' for," Sudden pointed out. "No, we gotta lie doggo an' let them do the movin'. Yu ain't heard all of it."

  He went on to tell of the attempted lynching, and though Purdie did not interrupt again, he exploded when the tale ended.