McAllister shook his head.
Tallin said: “Larned, you yellow bastard. I ought to bust you in the mouth.”
“Tallin,” Larned yelled suddenly, fury bringing him to life, “one more word out of you—”
“Aw, Christ,” said Tallin, “you don’t aim to fire me, do you? I wouldn’t work for you …” He turned and begged McAllister: “Get this garbage out of my sight before I kill him.”
McAllister said: “You’d best go, Larned.”
The man changed tones again. “Let me stay. I have to know how she is. You can see that.”
From behind McAllister came Mary Larned’s voice.
“Go back to town, Edward. You can’t do anything here. I’ll send word to you in the morning.”
He stared at her for a moment as if he would rave at her, but he turned and meekly walked to his horse, climbed into the saddle without looking at them and rode away. Tallin spat into the dust. Mary Larned went back into the house again.
Tallin looked at his boot toe for a moment, then said: “I’d take it as a favor, McAllister, if I could stick around for a while.”
McAllister said: “Sure.”
Twenty-Five
The wagon raised no dust when it came along the Black Horse trail and turned in at the cut-off, because it had rained the night before. There was a moist and sparkling, almost spring-like freshness in the air. The morning had a happy feeling which did not fit with McAllister’s mood. He sat atop the horse-pen fence and smoked, waiting, and his pipe tasted as foul as it smelled. He knocked the dottle out of it and put it in his jacket pocket. Tallin leaned against the fence looking glum.
“Wa-al,” Tallin said, as much to himself as McAllister, “this is it, I reckon.”
McAllister said: “Yup.”
The girl had been shot three weeks before. That now seemed another world and another lifetime away. McAllister could see that behind the wagon was the Larned buggy. Larned himself was driving, his wife beside him. It was odd to see them together, but, he supposed, under the circumstances it was understandable. He wondered how long they would stay together now.
“You pullin’ out, Si?” McAllister asked. He found himself liking the man, in spite of himself. They had shared the last three weeks. Maybe that was the reason.
“Naw,” Tallin said. “Startin’ my own outfit. This’ll maybe give you a laugh.”
“I could do with a laugh,” McAllister said.
“You see that pinnacle yonder?” He used the word “pinnacle” in the Texas sense. McAllister looked east and picked out the rise in the plain that Tallin pointed to. “That’s the south-west corner of my claim. I’m your neighbor.”
“Larned range,” said McAllister, and that did raise a smile. “Larned’ll have his work cut out to throw you an’ me both off the range.”
“I had thought of that,” Tallin said.
Together they watched the two vehicles approaching the house. There were two or three Bar Twenty riders flanking them. They came quietly into the yard, scarcely making a sound. Everybody was subdued. The Bar Twenty boys did not look at McAllister or Tallin. They tied their horses on the far side of the yard and stayed there, not speaking. Larned shoved the whip away and got down wearily.
“Well, McAllister,” he said. “Tallin.”
Neither man said anything. McAllister helped Mary Larned down and she thanked him with a wan smile.
Larned called to the men: “All right, you men, bring her out.”
McAllister said quietly: “No. I’ll do this.” He used that voice which he had never known to be disobeyed. They obeyed him this time. The men halted at once. Not even Larned protested.
McAllister walked into the house.
Her presence seemed strangely to fill it. It would never seem anything to him but the place where she had been. He realized with a shock that this had never happened to him before. He had been entirely possessed by a woman.
He walked to her pale still form on the bed and looked down at her. The lashes still lay dark against the pale ivory of her face. Her expression was one of absolute peace.
“I’ll miss you,” he said, and slid his hands under her to lift her. As she came off the bed, she seemed to weigh nothing.
The hand behind his neck exerted the faintest of pressures and he lowered his head so that he could softly kiss her.
“What’s it going to be, McAllister?” she asked.
“It’s your turn to deal,” he said. “Get strong. I’m not goin’ anywhere. Let me have the word one way or the other. Don’t hurry. Neither of us is the lightly marryin’ kind.”
She smiled.
“That’s nice to know. I don’t have to say anything else, do I? We both know it all”
“If we didn’t,” he said, “it would be no-never-mind.”
He carried her out and found that a mattress had been laid in the wagon-bed and blankets spread there. He put her down and Mary Larned made her comfortable. Tallin was there, saying his piece. He became quite eloquent and McAllister almost blushed for him. Almost but not quite. Then, he would be damned if Greg Talbot did not come to the tail gate and, hat in hand, waxed wordy, and Helena never once showed that she was downwind of him. Which proved to McAllister that there was no substitute for quality.
Mary Larned settled herself in the wagon beside her daughter, Helena smiled and the driver clucked to his horses. Slowly, delicately, the wagon pulled away from the house. They all stood and watched it until it was out of sight.
Then they all looked at each other.
McAllister and Tallin could find no words, nor wanted to. Greg Talbot said in a kind of awe: “By God, there goes a fine lady.”
McALLISTER 3: McALLISTER NEVER SURRENDERS
By Matt Chisholm
First published by Hamlyn Books in 1981
Copyright © 1981, 2017 by Matt Chisholm
First Smashwords Edition: June 2017
Names, characters and incidents in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons living or dead is purely coincidental.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information or storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the author, except where permitted by law.
This is a Piccadilly Publishing Book
Series Editor: Mike Stotter
Text © Piccadilly Publishing
Published by Arrangement with the Author’s Agent
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