Quitting Time

by Robert J Conley

  “Damn,” he said in a barely audible whisper.

  It was a clear boot print. It was small, right-footed, and it had a slash across the sole.

  Haskell Gibbs was standing at the bar inside the Railhead. He was putting down his third glass of whiskey. Adrian Channing was at the front window, nervously watching the action at the jail. It appeared to be a standoff between the mob and the two men who had moved to stop them.

  “Deputy,” he said, “you’ve got to go over there and help those two men.”

  Gibbs took another swallow of whiskey.

  “Deputy. Damn you, it’s your job.”

  “I ain’t going to get myself killed for no throat-cutting murderer,” said Gibbs. “Just leave me alone.”

  Channing turned back to the window in disgust and despair, and Gibbs tipped his glass for another slurp, just as a high-pitched and horrified scream ripped through the silence. Gibbs dropped his glass. Channing turned and ran toward the lobby of the hotel. Behind the front desk a startled Monroe Bates gestured wildly as he saw Channing.

  “Upstairs,” he said.

  Channing took the stairs two at a time, and as he reached the landing at the top, Alma Dyer ran hysterically into his arms. He clutched her to him, looking wildly over her shoulder.

  “What?” he said. “What is it?”

  “In my room,” said Alma. “Oh, God. It’s Dixon.”

  Gibbs stood halfway up the stairs, weaving slightly, and watched as Channing moved down the hallway toward the room.

  Youngblood saw the two men sitting on the log by the dead ashes. Even when he recognized them, he kept moving slowly into the camp. He didn’t call a halt until he was close, just across the ashes from Lanagan and Dort. The two men still sat on the log, but they were looking at Youngblood and his crew.

  “You’re pretty brave, old man,” said Youngblood. “You and your pet lawman. Coming up here like this all alone.”

  “Not alone,” said Lanagan. “Step out, boys.”

  Armed cowboys emerged from their hiding places all over the camp. All held guns pointed at the five rustlers.

  “We’ve got you dead to rights this time,” said Dort. “Drop your guns and climb down out of them saddles.”

  “And then what?” said Rondo Hughes.

  “No,” shouted Youngblood, reaching for his six-gun. From his spot beside a tree, Boyd Gruver fired a Henry .44 rifle. The shot hit Youngblood in the sternum knocking him out of the saddle. Hughes made a dive off his horse and ran toward the trees, but a shot tore through the back of his knee, smashing the kneecap as it exited. He roared in pain and fell to the ground rolling, just as Jonsey pulled his revolver out and sent a shot tearing into the left biceps of Billy O. Link, standing in the doorway to the tent just behind Lanagan and Dort, raised a rifle and fired. The bullet smashed into Jonsey’s forehead, causing his head to jerk backward. Then it slumped forward, and Jonsey’s body sagged lifeless in the saddle. The two remaining rustlers lashed their mounts and headed into the river crossing. Halfway across, they were knocked from their saddles by a hail of bullets from the guns of several cowboys in the camp. Sheriff Dort walked over to where Rondo Hughes lay. Hughes had dropped his Colt when he fell. He was reaching out for it when Dort stepped on his hand. Suddenly there was silence, and then the lifeless body of Jonsey slipped from the saddle and fell to the ground with a dull thud.

  Colfax had managed to tear his attention away from the telltale boot print in the Wheelers’ corral to get the hackamore on one of the Wheeler horses. As important as the boot print was, there was something about to happen up ahead that was more urgent. He had gotten the horse saddled and out of the corral and had replaced the rails that served as a gate, when he heard the shots. Damn, he thought. He was too late. He kicked his heels into the horse’s sides and lashed at it with the long ends of the reins. It sounded like a small war up ahead, and Colfax knew that he would be a fool to race headlong into something like that, yet he felt a desperation to get there, to try to stop it. He wasn’t sure Why. The ride seemed longer than it had before, in spite of the fact that Colfax was riding it much faster than he had before. He hadn’t gone far when the shots had ceased. He knew it was over. Yet he continued to race up the trail.

  When he reached the camp, two cowboys were dragging two bodies out of the river. Two more bodies, one he recognized as that of Youngblood, were lying near the cold ashes of what had been the campfire. Link was tying a red bandanna around the bloody left biceps of Billy O., and Boyd Gruver, on horseback, was slipping a noose over the head of Rondo Hughes, who was mounted, his hands tied behind his back, blood running freely from a wound in his knee. Sheriff Dort was standing behind the horse on which Hughes was mounted.

  “God,” said Colfax, and he urged his borrowed horse toward the group beneath the hanging tree. Lanagan stepped toward him.

  “It’s over, Colfax,” he said. “Go on back down to the ranch. You’l1 get your pay.”

  Colfax rode past Lanagan, moving with more urgency, and Rondo Hughes saw him coming.

  “Colfax,” shouted Hughes, his voice a desperate plea. Dort slapped the horse hard across the rump, causing the surprised animal to lunge forward carrying Rondo along with it until the slack was gone from the rope. Hughes was jerked out of the saddle, his feet well forward and high off the ground. Colfax heard the awful choking sound that escaped from Hughes’s throat, saw the body swing gracefully and grotesquely backward, watched as its arcs grew shorter and shorter, saw it spin simultaneously with the swinging, witnessed the changing expressions and complexion on the painfully contorted and horrified face as the life was slowly choked out of Rondo Hughes.

  Colfax felt a sudden dull revulsion welling up from the depths of his guts, as if in the very bottom of his stomach there was a small, stale pool of water stagnating, its fetid fumes rising and bringing into his mouth a bitter taste of bile. He felt like there was something in there he would like to vomit forth in order to cleanse himself of its taint. But he had no physical urge to retch, so the unwelcome intruder in his body continued to lie there and fester.

  Lanagan walked up to stand beside Colfax, who still sat on the back of the horse from Wheeler’s corral. Both men stared at what had been Rondo Hughes, still spinning and swinging ever so slightly.

  “You didn’t even break his damn neck,” said Colfax.

  “That’s too bad,” said Lanagan, and the irony was that he sounded as if he meant it. “We didn’t have time to build a scaffold.”

  Maybe Lanagan was right. The end would have been the same. There was no doubt of that. Where had Colfax developed this need for propriety? What difference would a trial have made? Colfax knew that if he had been there, the gunfight would have occurred, probably just about the same way. The rustlers would have resisted, and he would have helped to kill them. That part he could easily understand. But the hanging—he wouldn’t have done that, wouldn’t have allowed it to be done. He’d have taken Hughes down to Pullman and put him in jail. There would have been a trial. It would have been handled—properly.

  “Your black horse is down in Wheeler’s corral,” he said, not looking at Lanagan as he spoke. “She’s got a stone bruise. You can have one of your cowboys pick her up and tend to her. I’ll stop by your ranch later to get my pay.” He rode down the hill back to Wheeler’s place and put the borrowed horse back in the corral. Then he started walking toward Pullman.

  Haskell Gibbs tried to strut as he headed for the mob outside of the jail, but he had poured too much whiskey down his throat to manage it effectively. He staggered and swayed, but he did manage to get himself there. Spud Wheeler still held his shotgun leveled at the mob. Lark still stood with his revolver in hand, pointed at the chest of MacGowan. The mob still stood in a horseshoe shape half surrounding Lark. No one was speaking as Gibbs stepped into the horseshoe.

  “You can all put your guns away and go on home,” said Gibbs. “There’s been another killing. That man in there ain’t guilty. I’m turning him lo
ose.”

  “Another killing,” said MacGowan. “When?”

  “Just now. Well, anyhow, since we put him in there. He couldn’t have done it.”

  Lark lowered his revolver, eased the hammer down, and tucked it back into his waistband. Taking his cue from his older brother, Spud eased down the hammers of the long shotgun and lowered it.

  “Who’s been killed?” asked someone in the crowd.

  “One of them actresses,” said Gibbs. “Her throat’s cut.”

  Lark turned to his brother. His face was grim. He took Spud by the arm and started to walk away from the crowd.

  “Where the hell’s Tommy?” he said.

  “Gibbs,” said MacGowan, “that’s four killings in our town. You got any idea who’s responsible for them?”

  “Not a clue,” said Gibbs.

  “Well, you’re the law. You better damn well get to the bottom of this. We pay you to protect us here.”

  “You all got any complaints,” said Gibbs, “you take them to Sheriff Dort. He’s my boss. He’s in charge. I ain’t. All I do isjust what the sheriff tells me to do.”

  “Well, where the hell is Dort?” said MacGowan.

  “He’s out taking care of rustlers right now. He’ll be back in here soon. You can take all this up with him when he gets back.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Colfax was limping when he walked into the Railhead. He stopped at the desk where Monroe Bates was on duty.

  “Mr. Bates,” he said, “I want you to close out the account for Tiff Lanagan right now. My job for him is finished. I’ll pay the bill from here on.”

  “Yes, sir,” said Bates.

  “And have your man draw me a bath as quickly as possible.”

  Colfax made his way slowly up the stairs. It was dark out. He hadn’t seen anyone as he walked into town. Nor had he seen anyone in the lobby of the hotel other than Bates. Inside his room, he left the door opened, sat on the edge of the bed, and pulled his boots off. Then he took off his hat and tossed it toward the table which stood to one side of the door. He missed, and it fell to the floor. He sat for a moment, staring across the room. Then he got up and pulled off his jacket, then his shirt. He felt old, old and tired and just a little sad.

  “What a piece of work is man,” he said to himself in a low voice.

  He wanted a drink of good brandy. No. He wanted a bottle. He wanted to get drunk and to pass out and to drift away into oblivion—at least for a while. Then he remembered the boot print in Wheeler’s corral and his promise to find the murderer of the actors. He had sworn off the booze until the job was done. Well, one job was done, but the other remained. The brandy would have to wait. When the bath was finally prepared, he shut and locked the door, then undressed and lowered himself into the hot water. Soon he was asleep.

  Colfax surprised himself by waking up early the next morning. His feet were still tender from the long walk down the mountain trail, but otherwise he felt much better than he had the night before. He dressed and went downstairs for breakfast. As he moved to find himself a table, he saw Adrian Channing stand up and motion to him. He walked over to where Channing was at a table with Alma Dyer.

  “Would you like to join us, Mr. Colfax?” said Channing.

  Colfax looked down at Alma and took off his hat.

  “With the lady’s permission,” he said. “It would be a pleasure.”

  “Please do,” said Alma.

  Colfax and Channing sat down.

  “Mr. Colfax,” said Channing, “while you were out yesterday, a terrible thing happened.”

  “Not—” Colfax began, but he was interrupted by Channing.

  “Another murder,” said the old man.

  “My God,” said Colfax. “Who?”

  “Mrs. Lindsay,” said Channing. “Dixon Lindsay.”

  “It was awful,” said Alma. “I found her in our room.”

  “Oh, no,” said Colfax. He put his head in his hand, his elbow on the table. “How—may I ask?”

  “Her throat had been cut,” said Channing.

  “And Mr. Chase?”

  “Was in jail. He couldn’t possible have done it.”

  “I didn’t think so,” said Colfax. “I found a boot print made by the boot we’re looking for. It was in a place Mr. Chase would not likely have been. But what was Chase doing in jail, and why was Mrs. Lindsay allowed to be alone?”

  Channing told Colfax about the session among the actors that had led to the arrest of Chase, how it had been Dixon Lindsay who had let it out that Chase was suspected. He also told him about the would-be lynch mob and the Wheelers and how, if Alma Dyer had not discovered the body just when she did, there would likely have been more killings in Pullman that day.

  “Dixon was sure that Sammy was the guilty party,” said Alma, “so once he was locked up in jail, she felt safe. What with the murders and then the incident with Sammy, I’m afraid that we all were a bit testy. We were sniping at each other, and Dixon got rather nasty. She got up and left in a huff to go to the room. I should have gone with her. I thought of what you had said as she was leaving, but I suppose I was too angry at her at the moment to care. That’s an awful thing to have to admit. Anyway, I let her go.”

  “Don’t blame yourself,” said Colfax.

  The waiter appeared and asked what he could bring Colfax. Channing and Alma had already had their breakfast and coffee. Colfax was hungry, but with the news he had just received, he didn’t really feel like eating—not just yet.

  “Just coffee for now,” he said. “Refills for these two.”

  As the waiter walked away, Channing leaned across the table toward Colfax and spoke in a low, confidential voice.

  “Do you have any new ideas on this business?” he asked.

  “No,” said Colfax. “I’m afraid not, but I do have a new clue to follow up. I intend to pursue that today.”

  “The boot print?”

  “Yes.”

  “Can you tell us where you found it?”

  Colfax thought about the slipup with Chase and the more fatal one with Dixon Lindsay.

  “It was up on the mountain,” he said. “A way from town. I hope I’ll know more this evening.”

  What Colfax wanted to do would be touchy. He wanted to go back to the Wheeler place and look around. He wanted to look for more bootprints and anything else he might find that would relate to the man who wore the boot. He couldn’t just go to the Wheelers’ home and start nosing around. They would want to know what he was up to. He wished that he had taken the time while he was there and they were still in town, but he had been in a hurry to get to Youngblood’s on the way up the hill, and on his way back down his thoughts had been occupied with what he had seen at the camp. Well, he thought, he would just go up there and tell Lark Wheeler what he had seen, ask him if any strangers had been around who might have left the print, and ask him if he could look around. The Wheelers surely had nothing to fear from such an investigation.

  Colfax drank two cups of coffee and decided that he should go ahead and eat. He didn’t really feel like it, but he knew that he would need the energy before the day was up. He ordered a breakfast and ate it.

  “Mr. Colfax,” said Alma, as Colfax was getting up to leave, “are you going back up the mountain to look for more—evidence?”

  “Yes, I am.”

  “Could I ride along with you?”

  “Well,” said Colfax, “I don’t—”

  “I’m going crazy in this town. I’d really like to get out. I can ride a horse.”

  “Mrs. Dyer,” said Colfax, “I’m not sure what I’ll find up there. I don’t want to take you into any possible danger. But I don’t suppose there’s any great hurry for me to get up there this morning. Why don’t we take a ride together right now. I’ll go up the mountain after we get back.”

  They rode out of town toward the mountains alongside the river. Soon they were on range either owned or used—Colfax wasn’t sure which—by Dierks. The terrain was still
flat, but it was getting more rocky. Colfax stopped beside an outcropping of boulders on the bank of the river. They dismounted and walked to the water’s edge. Alma Dyer sat on a boulder facing the river.

  “It’s beautiful here,” she said. “I’ll carry mixed memories of this country around with me the rest of my life.”

  “Yes,” said Colfax. “I imagine you will.”

  He walked over to stand beside her. The water was rushing past them. He knew that it was cold, and he recalled the two bodies he had watched being dragged from this same river the day before up the mountain. He, too, he thought, would carry mixed memories of this country.

  “Where will you go from here, Mr. Colfax?” asked Alma.

  “I don’t know. I have a friend. When I last saw him he was in Iowa. He was a town marshal there, but he was talking about going to Texas to a ranch. He said I would always be welcome. I may look him up.”

  “That sounds nice.”

  “What about you, Mrs. Dyer? What will you do?”

  “It’s Miss Dyer, really. Adrian thinks that it looks better on the tour to list the ladies as Mrs. But won’t you call me Alma?”

  “Thank you,” said Colfax. “I will.”

  “And must I continue to call you Mr. Colfax?”

  “Well, uh, I don’t really fancy my first name. Sarge—that’s my friend—he called me Cole. No one else ever did, but I guess that you could—call me Cole.”

  “I like that,” said Alma. “I shall call you Cole.”

  “You didn’t answer my question, Alma.”

  “Oh? What was it?”

  “What will you do when this is all over?”

  “I don’t have anyplace to go but back to New York. I don’t have anything to do but act. I suppose I’ll go back and look for another job.”