Ralph Compton the Law and the Lawless

by Ralph Compton

  “Was that a threat?”

  “You know better.”

  Boyd closed his eyes and rubbed them. What he wouldn’t give for six or eight hours of sleep. He looked at the blacksmith and nodded. “You’re bein’ honest, so I’ll be honest with you. I’ve been pushed to the brink. Yes, I want those sons of bitches dead. Wouldn’t you? But I give you my word I won’t act recklessly and get us all killed. I still have my wits about me.”

  “That’s good to hear,” Vogel said. “And for what it’s worth, I want them dead too. So when we catch up, I’ll pick off as many as you want me to and swear under oath, if need be, that it had to be done even if it didn’t.”

  Boyd realized what the man was offering to do on his behalf, and was moved. “I’m obliged.”

  Vogel nodded and walked off.

  Wanting a few minutes to himself, Boyd moved to the edge of the clearing and sat. He couldn’t stop thinking about Cecelia, couldn’t stop worrying about her. The outlaws would have to be loco to harm her, but they were outlaws. He doubted that Mad Dog Hanks, in particular, had any qualms about murdering a woman. He could only pray the others wouldn’t let it come to that.

  Boots crunched and spurs jingled, and Sherm Bonner and Lefty ambled up, and Sherm nodded.

  “We need to talk,” Lefty said.

  “Now you two too,” Boyd said.

  “Pardon?”

  “I’m listenin’,” Boyd said.

  “My pard and me want to be clear on somethin’,” Lefty said. “Namely what do you aim to do when we catch up to these polecats?”

  “And by that,” Sherm Bonner said, “we mean do you aim to arrest them or shoot them or what?”

  “You wear that badge and you have to abide by the law,” Lefty said, “but we want you to know we’re fine with not abidin’ by it.”

  “Is that a fact?” Boyd said. First the blacksmith, and now the cowboys.

  “This is personal with us,” Sherm said.

  Lefty nodded. “They sent that McGivern to kill us, didn’t they? So long as they were just bank robbers, we didn’t much care how they met their end. But now we’d just as soon do to them as they tried to do to us.”

  Boyd went to speak, but Lefty raised a hand.

  “I know what you’re goin’ to say. That it’s wrong to want them dead. That we have to go by the letter of the law and take them into custody so you can take them back to town and they can be put on trial. But we’d be just as happy if it was otherwise.”

  Sherm nodded.

  “I’m glad I’m not the only one,” Boyd said, and chuckled.

  “Marshal?” Lefty said.

  “I have no objections to otherwise, as you put it,” Boyd informed them. “In fact, between you and me, I’d prefer it.”

  “You do?”

  “That makes things easier,” Sherm Bonner said.

  “Oh, I doubt they’ll die easy,” Boyd said.

  Sherm shrugged and placed his hand on his Colt. “Easy or hard, it’s all the same to me.”

  The sudden crackle and crash of undergrowth brought Boyd to his feet with his own hand on his six-gun. Within moments a horse and rider burst into the clearing, and the man drew sharp rein.

  “It’s the scout,” Lefty said, stating the obvious.

  Harvey Dale looked around and spotted Boyd. Alighting, he came right over.

  “I have bad news.”

  “I don’t want to hear you lost their trail.”

  “About half a mile ahead is a lot of caprock,” Dale reported. “I looked and I looked and I rode in circles, and I couldn’t find any sign.”

  “I told you I didn’t want to hear that,” Boyd said.

  “I’m sorry. What else can I say? They’ve gotten away.”

  Boyd stared to the north, and scowled. “Like hell they have.”

  • • •

  Cecelia Wilson was beside herself with worry. Not for herself. For her brother. When she’d asked Cestus Calloway about Sam, she sensed that he was hiding something. The only thing she could think of that he’d want to keep from her was that Sam was dead.

  Her heart grew heavy with dread. She lay as one dead, numb in mind and body. She hardly noticed the pain from her wound, and it was considerable. She thought of Sam, of how good a brother he was, of the many pleasant times they’d had, and her eyes dampened with tears.

  Turning her face away from the fire and the outlaws, Cecelia started to weep, then caught herself. No, she thought. She wouldn’t be weak. She would be strong for Sam’s sake. Time enough for crying later. Right now she must keep her head and find a way out of her dire predicament.

  For it was dire. Cecelia had no doubt of that. Cestus Calloway was kind enough, and the dandy, Bert Varrow, treated her with cordial respect. But the others were cause for concern.

  First there was the Attica Kid. He showed no kindness toward her at all. She was nothing to him. Or, to put it differently, she didn’t amount to much more than the dirt under his boots. He’d shoot her as quick as look at her if it wasn’t for Cestus Calloway.

  Ira Toomis had hardly spoken two words to her. He wasn’t cold or mean, but her woman’s intuition told her Toomis regarded her as a liability they were better off without. He didn’t trust her not to turn on them, and of all the outlaws, he kept the closest watch on her.

  Then there was Mad Dog Hanks. Now, there was a genuinely scary man. The looks he gave her, and his comments to Calloway, left no doubt he’d just as soon kill her where she lay and be done with her.

  Outside the cave, twilight had fallen. The outlaws were preparing their supper. To her surprise, Hanks did the cooking. Pork and beans, it turned out, and the aroma set her stomach to growling.

  “Ma’am?”

  Cecelia dabbed at her eyes and turned her head. “Yes, Mr. Varrow?” She hadn’t heard him come over.

  “Are you hungry? I’ll bring you a plate and some coffee to wash the food down, if you’re of a mind.”

  “That’s considerate of you,” Cecelia said. She wasn’t all that hungry, but she needed to keep her strength up. “I’d be ever so grateful.”

  Varrow smiled and returned to the fire.

  Cecelia wondered why the gambler was treating her as kindly as Calloway.

  For that matter, she wondered about Cestus Calloway too. Calloway puzzled her. He seemed like a nice person. He acted nice, talked nice, treated her as nice as anyone ever had. Yet he was a notorious outlaw. Sometimes the world just made no sense at all.

  As if he was aware she was thinking about him, the outlaw leader sauntered over and hunkered. “How are you feelin’?”

  “Tolerable,” Cecelia answered.

  “That’s better than before. I’m glad, awful glad. By mornin’ you should be feelin’ fit enough to ride, I hope.”

  “You do?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Cestus said, bobbing his chin. “The sooner we get you back to Alpine, the better it will be for all of us.”

  “We are in agreement there,” Cecelia said. Every moment she spent in their presence heightened the risk of her coming to harm. She could see that even if Calloway couldn’t.

  “I must say, you’re takin’ this with less fuss than I reckoned you would,” her captor mentioned. “A lot of gals would be cryin’ and screamin’ at us to take them home along about now.”

  “I’m not prone to hysterics, Mr. Calloway,” Cecelia informed him.

  “I can see that, ma’am,” Cestus said, and grinned. He glanced at the others and bent toward her. “Mind if we gab awhile?”

  “About what?”

  “Anything you’d like. I can’t recollect the last time I got to be with a lady like you. It’s a treat, you might say.”

  “You’re awful peculiar,” Cecelia said.

  Cestus laughed. “Not that again.” He grew serious and reg
arded her while gnawing on his bottom lip. “It’s like this, ma’am. We don’t ever have females here. Or with us at all. It’s a rule of mine. If the men are randy, they’re go find a dove in a town somewhere.”

  “Your love life couldn’t interest me less,” Cecelia said harshly.

  “Sorry, ma’am. I’m not makin’ love to you. I promise. If I was, I’d have brought flowers.”

  Despite herself, Cecelia smiled.

  “It’s just that female company is like apple pie. I’m powerful fond of both and I don’t hardly get either these days.”

  “Whose fault is that?” Cecelia asked bluntly. “You chose the life you lead. No one twisted your arm to turn you into an outlaw. Or did they?”

  “No, ma’am, you have me there,” Cestus conceded. “I reckon we are what we make of ourselves.”

  Bert Varrow returned with a tin plate heaped with pork and beans, a tin cup brimming with coffee, and a wooden spoon. Without saying a word, he set them down next to Cecelia, touched his derby, and went back to the fire.

  “I’m grateful for the hospitality you’ve extended,” Cecelia remarked.

  “Be sure and tell the marshal that when you see him, will you?” Cestus requested. “I reckon he’s out for our blood after Mad Dog went and shot his deputy.”

  “That won’t be the only reason,” Cecelia said as she picked up the plate and placed it in her lap.

  “Oh?”

  Her belly aching with hunger, and intent on her food, Cecelia said without thinking, “Have you forgotten he’s been courting me? True love, I think you called it back at our farm.” She dipped the spoon into the beans, raised it to her mouth, and stopped.

  Cestus Calloway was staring at her in shock. “Lord in heaven. I’ve been as dumb as a stump.”

  “In what regard?”

  “This courtin’? How serious is he about it?”

  “As serious as anything. I wouldn’t let him come calling if he wasn’t,” Cecelia said. “Why are you so upset? What difference does it make?”

  “The difference, ma’am,” Cestus Calloway said, “is that it changes everything.”

  Chapter 25

  The posse was in a surly mood. They all knew that Harvey Dale had lost the trail, and many of them resented being forced to continue north into the wilderness with little hope of finding it again.

  By nightfall, Boyd was forced to admit to himself that if he didn’t change his mind and turn around, he’d likely have a mutiny on his hands. The scout and the two cowboys and Vogel hadn’t complained, but the rest were giving him hard stares and talking in hushed tones among themselves.

  They had three fires going.

  Boyd guessed what to expect when a grocer by the name of Malcolm and several others left their fire to come to his.

  “We’d like a few words with you, Marshal,” Malcolm said. He was portly from an addiction to sweets, and always smelled of lilac water.

  “Do you, now?” Boyd said, and took a sip of coffee.

  Some of the others nodded. Malcolm took courage from that and said, “You bet we do. We’ve spent most of the day riding ourselves ragged, and for what? Your scout has admitted he’s lost the sign. What can we hope to accomplish by pushing on?”

  “We might find their trail again.”

  “Might,” Malcolm stressed, and gestured. “These mountains go on forever. It’s like looking for a needle in a haystack.”

  “He’s right, Marshal,” another man said.

  “We have families,” Malcolm declared. “We have livelihoods. It upsets us to be away from both for little practical purpose.”

  “You volunteered for this posse,” Boyd said. “I didn’t force you.”

  Malcolm nodded. “We volunteered, yes, out of a sense of civic duty. For the benefit of the town, and because a woman was taken. But it seems to us that now all we’re doing is for the benefit of you only and to the detriment of us.”

  Containing his temper with an effort, Boyd said, “You need to be plainer.”

  “You have a personal stake in this that is affecting your judgment.”

  “Plainer still,” Boyd said.

  “Very well. Since you’re forcing me.” Malcolm paused. “Cecelia Wilson.”

  “Are you sayin’ she doesn’t matter to you?”

  “Don’t put words in our mouths,” Malcolm said. “Of course she does. But she matters more to you, to the point where you aren’t thinking clearly.”

  “We’re wasting our time,” another townsman complained.

  “We want to go home to our families,” said a different man.

  All of them nodded.

  Boyd swirled the coffee in his tin cup. He was mad enough to hit each and every one of them, but that wouldn’t get him anywhere. A good lawman had to know when to be forceful and when to be diplomatic, as the politicians liked to say. “I don’t blame you for bein’ upset.”

  “You don’t?” Malcolm said.

  “If I had a family, I’d want to be with them too. And you’re right. It’s no secret, I reckon, that I’m fond of Cecelia.”

  “It’s decent of you to admit it,” Malcolm said.

  Boyd saw his opening. “How decent would it be to abandon her? Or any woman, for that matter? What if it wasn’t someone I cared for? What if it was a woman you cared for? Or a woman none of us knew? Would that change things?”

  “I don’t see—” Malcolm began.

  “It could just as well be any woman from Alpine. Would we be right in abandonin’ her because we don’t know her?”

  “It’s not abandoning that’s the issue,” another man said.

  “It sure as hell is,” Boyd said. “You want to give up. You want to leave a woman taken against her will to God knows what fate. Who she is doesn’t matter. She’s alone, helpless, in the hands of a pack of curly wolves. And you want to turn your backs on her?”

  “You’re twisting our words against us,” Malcolm said.

  Boyd didn’t relent. “I’m tellin’ you the truth. But if you want to turn back, if you can find it in your hearts to let an innocent woman be murdered, or worse, I’ll bow to your will and we’ll head back at daybreak.” Inwardly he held his breath at the gamble he just took.

  “When you put it that way,” a man said.

  “But we can’t go on forever,” Malcolm said uncertainly.

  “I’m not askin’ you to,” Boyd said, and smothered a smile that he had won. “I’m willin’ to compromise. Give me half a day. Until noon tomorrow. We’ll keep lookin’, and if we don’t come across any sign of them, I give you my word we’ll head back to Alpine. Is that fair?”

  “I suppose,” Malcolm said.

  “More than fair,” another man admitted begrudgingly.

  “Thank you,” Boyd said. “Let the others know, would you? And you better turn in early. We’re all pretty beat.”

  They returned to their own fire, only to be replaced by a figure in a buckskin shirt who made no more noise than a Sioux or Blackfoot warrior would.

  “You handled that real well,” Harvey Dale said as he took a seat.

  Boyd grunted.

  “What happens if noon rolls around and we haven’t come across the owl-hoots’ trail?”

  “I’ll cross that bridge when I get to it,” Boyd said. “But I’m countin’ on you not to let that happen.”

  “I appreciate the confidence,” Dale said. “I truly do. But I can’t work miracles. And I’ve plumb lost them. They could have gone in any direction.”

  “South?” Boyd said.

  Dale snorted. “Hardly. That would take them back to town.”

  “Southwest? Southeast?”

  “Why would they go south at all when they headed north before and now this time after takin’ Miss Wilson?”

  “That narrows it down, don’t you reckon?”


  “Not nowhere near enough. We’re still lookin’ at hundreds of square miles of some of the most rugged country on God’s green earth.”

  “Think, then,” Boyd said. “If you were them, which way would you go? To the northeast?”

  Dale considered a few moments, and shook his head. “No. You’d run out of mountains too soon. And there are a lot of valleys with people, ranches, and homesteads and the like. Wherever they hide, it’s probably somewhere no one hardly ever goes.”

  “So that leaves north or northwest.”

  “I see what you’re doin’,” Dale said. “And if you’re askin’ me to pick, I’d say northwest. Only a few ore hounds have ever been out that far, to the best of my recollection.”

  “Northwest it is, then, at first light,” Boyd said. And with any luck at all, they’d strike the trail again. They had to.

  For Cecelia’s sake.

  • • •

  By midnight the fire in the cave had burned so low so that the faces of the five men ringing it were partly in shadow.

  “What’s so damn important that we all had to stay up for this palaver?” Mad Dog Hanks griped.

  “I wanted her to be asleep,” Cestus said, “so she doesn’t hear.”

  “Ain’t you considerate?” Mad Dog said.

  “Don’t start on him,” the Attica Kid warned. “I’ve had my fill of you and your carpin’.”

  Bert Varrow asked. “What’s this all about anyhow?”

  “Her,” Cestus said, with a nod at the sleeping woman. “I learned somethin’ that changes things.” He had been mulling it over ever since, and come to a decision he hoped the rest would go along with. “But before I get to that, there’s somethin’ else on my mind.”

  “This ain’t goin’ to take all night, is it?” Ira Toomis asked, and yawned. “I’m old and I need my sleep.”

  “Hear me out,” Cestus said. “We’ve robbed the Alpine Bank. We’ve robbed the Cloverleaf Bank. We’ve robbed the bank in Red Cliff. We’ve robbed all the stages at one time or another, and that mine payroll besides.”

  “We’ve robbed just about everybody,” Toomis said, and chuckled.