Somehow she had never thought of Jim as a married man. It was true that he had made no advances, but she had been sure of his interest and … yes, she had been interested. For the first time in her life she had found a man who really excited and interested her.
But why was he here? What would such a man be doing in New Mexico, riding the range, engaging in gun battles, and leading a seemingly pointless existence?
“I cannot imagine what James Kettleman would be doing in Alamitos. Or why he would come here alone, if you were his wife.”
Lottie Kettleman did not like being on the defensive. She did not like being called upon to explain her position, and it angered her that this ranch girl should be so poised and sure of herself.
She could not believe that Nancy Kerrigan had not known who Jim Flint was, yet Nancy’s tone was sincere, and she was obviously surprised. Also, the suggestion from Lottie that there might have been something between them had aroused no reaction.
“I can tell you what he is doing here,” Lottie said suddenly. “He came here to die.”
Nancy looked at her but for several seconds the meaning did not register. “To die? You mean, to get himself killed?”
“To die.” Lottie felt malicious pleasure in repeating it. If this girl had been getting cozy with Jim, she might as well know it would do her no good. “He’s going to die. He has cancer.”
Nancy looked across the table at Lottie, and for a moment her mind was blank with incomprehension. “Cancer? Jim?”
“Jim, is it? And you scarcely knew the man?” Lottie smiled across the table at her. “I think you’re in love with him, and a lot of good it will do you. If he lives he is mine, and if he dies, you can have him.”
Jim … he was dying then. He had reason not to care about being killed. She remembered the staggering, beaten man who had gone up the street, gun in hand, smashing into saloons, shooting, shouting, fighting. A man half blind with pain, but driven by a kind of wild desperation such as she had never seen.
Nancy no longer thought of the girl across the table. She no longer cared that only a few hours ago she had dismissed him from her camp at the Hole-in-the-Wall. Hours? Or was it days?
He was ill … he was dying … and he was alone.
She looked across the table at Lottie. “If that is true, your place is with him. He will need help, comfort, nursing, and attention.”
“Let him die.” Lottie got to her feet. This whole meeting had been ill-advised and had come to nothing. She was angry with herself, but more angry with Jim, blaming him for her wasted time and effort. “He is a cold, hard man. He came out here just to keep anyone from knowing when he died or where his body was. Just so he could keep me from getting what is mine.”
“Go to him,” Nancy said. “You are his wife. Go to him and help him. It is not an easy thing to die alone.”
“You are the one interested. You go.” Lottie walked to the street, filled with futile anger.
There was nothing she could get hold of, and she felt she was losing out Jim would die and she would have nothing and would once more go back to dodging the landlord, cadging meals from men who drank too much and just wanted to put their hands on her. Jim had given her a taste of good living, of living without worry, and now he was slipping away.
She had no thought of failure herself, at least no thought of failing as a wife. She did not want to be a wife, now or ever. She did not want to be dependent. She wanted to have the money without the strings attached. And she had her chance in Jim … if he should die or be killed now, here, where he could be seen.
From down the street sounded a tin-panny piano, and suddenly she saw Jim, angling across the street in the dark. She would know his walk anywhere. She felt the weight of her purse where her gun lay. She was a fair shot and he was not far off and if she shot him now there was small chance she would ever be suspected … not with the enemies he had.
She put her hand in her purse and felt the cold steel of the pistol. She looked down the street and saw Jim walking up the opposite side, but toward her.
He seemed unconscious of her presence, and she drew the pistol from her bag, mentally judging the distance. Suddenly the hotel door opened and Nancy Kerrigan came out.
Quickly she put the pistol back into the purse and saw Nancy’s eyes upon her.
“You might miss,” Nancy said. “The dark can be deceiving. And if you missed … what then?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“A man like Jim,” Nancy said, “if he is shot at will shoot back. It is instinctive. You could be killed.”
She would not have fired, anyway. It was purely the impulse of the moment, and her own desperate need.
Lottie turned sharply away and walked down the street, her heels clicking on the walk. She had little cash. She would return to New York with only a check for one hundred dollars awaiting her and bills for twenty times that much. There were jewels she could sell, although precious few of them, and then she would be back to the old hand-to-mouth living with her father’s complaints in her ears.
Suppose she followed Jim down the street, told him she loved him, begged to take care of him? It would not work. She could not do it well and Jim was past believing anything she could say.
There was another way. There was that man of whom she had heard since coming to town. There was Buckdun.
She turned to look after Jim, but he had disappeared.
Suddenly from the shadows near the hotel, not thirty feet away, Buckdun emerged. She caught a glimpse of his narrow, pockmarked face in the light from the hotel window. She started toward him when, from down the street, there was a swift cannonade of gunfire.
Buckdun seemed to merge with the awning post and a tied horse, lean, towering, and waiting.
The gunfire burst briefly again. For an instant there was silence, and then the swinging doors of the Divide Saloon opened and a man lurched out, fell against the hitch rail, rolled around with his shoulder on the rail, and then fell off into the dust. He started to rise, and another man stepped into the doorway and fired, a cool, carefully aimed shot.
Buckdun stood for an instant, then glanced at her, and started toward his horse. He had his foot in the stirrup when she said, “Buckdun! Wait … I want to talk to you.”
Chapter 15
Julius Bent, walking toward the Divide Saloon when the sudden thunder of guns broke the stillness, was the sole witness to the stopping of Buckdun by Lottie.
The gunfire could mean but one thing. Kaybar was in trouble, and he noticed the meeting simply because it was in his line of vision and because Buckdun was a factor in the range war.
In the brief minutes before the outbreak of shooting, Baldwin had entered the saloon, then left, followed by Strett and Saxon. Three other Baldwin riders had gone in.
Julius Bent had not witnessed a brief conversation between Baldwin, Strett, and Saxon. “Flint has gone down the street. There’ll be a fight inside, and when it starts, he’ll come running. Pick your spots and get him when he comes up the street. He’ll never know what hit him.”
Dolan had seen Sandoval come in, and Alcott with him. Sandoval was wanted in Texas and Sonora, a cool, dangerous man. Alcott was poisonous as a rattler.
“Pete,” Dolan said under his breath, “for God’s sake, get your boys out of here. That’s Sandoval — and Alcott.”
Scott and Otero had come in, and there were now five Kaybar riders and seven Baldwin men. “Let’s go,” Gaddis said, to Milt Ryan, “the boss will be ready to go.”
“You go if you want,” Ryan said, “I ain’t a-gonna miss this.”
Gaddis saw that Milt was carrying his Winchester carbine. It hung by the sling from his shoulder, under the knee-length coat, muzzle down, trigger guard to the fore.
A dozen times Gaddis had seen Ryan shoot from that position, whipping the barrel up with his right hand, grasping it with the left and firing from the hip faster than most men could draw a pistol.
It
was Alcott who started it. He was a lean youngster with a wolfish face above a scrawny neck that emerged from a collarless shirt. “Ain’t much of a man,” he said, “who’ll work for a lady boss.”
Sandoval had been watching Milt Ryan. The old wolfer was the man he feared.
As Alcott spoke, the Kaybar riders swung from the bar and a scar-faced kid among the Baldwin riders grabbed for a gun. Ryan’s carbine leaped from beneath his coat, and the shot caught the kid in the belly. He screamed and jumped back, butting into the table which slid along the floor.
It was pure accident that the table slid, but it was to make all the difference.
The scar-faced kid failed to get a shot off and the table staggered two men at the crucial instant. Gaddis got off two fast shots at a range of six feet and saw two men falling, one’s gun going off into the floor. Ryan’s Winchester was firing as fast as he could work the lever.
Alcott had stepped behind the corner of the bar, and in the split second it took for Ryan to fire and the table to slide, Alcott saw he was a dead man if he stayed. Turning he threw both arms across his face and dove through the window, glass and all. He lit on his knees and came up running.
With Ryan’s man down, Alcott gone, and two men down from Gaddis’ bullets the Kaybar men centered their fire on the three remaining. One of them, Sandoval, was already falling from Ryan’s fire.
As suddenly as it had begun, it was over, and the Kaybar riders stared at one another, amazed by their good luck. The shooting had lasted no more than ten seconds, and not one of them was scratched.
“Let’s finish the job,” Ryan said. “There’s still Baldwin men in town.”
One of the men Gaddis had shot tried to rise. “Call a doc!” he said. “I’m hit bad!”
“He’s right down the street,” Ryan said. “Get him yourself.”
As one man they started for the door.
Flint had not come running; contrary to Baldwin’s expectations. He heard the gunfire from the office of Doc McGinnis, where the old Army doctor, veteran of the Civil and Indian wars, had started a checkup.
Doc McGinnis stared at Flint through hard old eyes. “What’s the matter with you?”
“I’ve got cancer.”
McGinnis put down his pipe. “You have, have you? Now, who told you that?”
“Dr. Culberton … Manning Culberton of New York. I don’t suppose you’ve heard of him.”
“You could be wrong, young man. I’ve heard of him, all right Plays wet nurse to a lot of chair-polishers … one himself. I don’t think he’d know a cancer from a fistula or a broken arm from a sore throat. He’s been treating people for imaginary illnesses so long he wouldn’t know what to do if he came bang up against something big. Cancer, eh? You lost any weight?”
“I’ve gained a little.”
“Tell me about it.”
Flint described his symptoms and what Dr. Culberton had said, as well as how he had felt then and now.
McGinnis checked him over carefully, asked a few more questions, then said dryly, “You’ve no more cancer than I have. What you seem to have is ulcers.” He walked to his desk. “You’re Kettleman, aren’t you? Heard you were in town. Ulcers a common thing for men in your business. Too busy, too tense, too much worry, wrong meals at the wrong times.”
McGinnis seated himself on the corner of his desk. “Losing weight at the start, that’s to be expected. From what I hear you haven’t been living a sensible life for a man with ulcers. What you need is rest, sleep, and lack of worry.”
Flint smiled. “Doctor, I’ve had more rest and sleep and less worry since I’ve been out here than ever before. I’ve eaten very little but beef or beef broth, and that almost without any seasoning because I didn’t have it.”
“Seems to me you’ve had plenty to worry about,” McGinnis said ironically. “You mean to say all that fighting didn’t worry you?”
“How could it? Nothing was at stake but my life and I thought that was already gone.”
“You can start worrying then, because I think you’re going to live. Fact is, I’d say you were strong as a mule right now. Most likely all you needed was fresh air, rest, and freedom from all that hassle.” He stuffed his pipe. “Water might help, too. Lots of alkali in some of it. Anyway, I’d say you were a lot better than when you came here, judging by what you’ve said.”
He put the pipe in his teeth. “Nancy had me to see you after that beating, as you’ll recall. Fine girl … known her since she was a child.”
Flint was buttoning his shirt and suddenly his fingers stopped and he stared at the wall.
He was not going to die. He was going to live.
To live … and he was a married man.
“I should have met her a few years ago,” Flint said, “I’m a married man … a very sadly married man.”
“I’ve seen her. Quite a filly.”
Heavy boots sounded on the steps outside. Flint picked up his gun belt and stepped back into the deeper shadows. The other gun he held in his hand.
Outside the floor boards creaked and a shadow showed on the curtain. Doc McGinnis had seated himself and was at work on a ledger, as if alone. Flint waited, holding his breath and watching the door knob, expecting it to turn.
The boards creaked again, gravel scuffed, and then the gate creaked. Whoever it had been, he was gone.
“You know something, Doc? I think I was scared.”
“You’ve got something to lose, boy. Must be something to feel like you’ve been … like you were immune to everything. Knowing it was coming, you’d nothing to worry about.”
McGinnis sucked at his pipe. “Struck me Nancy set store by you, son. Are you sure that wife of yours don’t want you back?”
“She never wanted any man except as a setting, Doc. She wanted money, prestige, and the attention of men, but she didn’t want marriage. She tried to have me killed, and I believe she will try again.”
“There’s divorce. Folks frown on it, but I’d say it was the only answer for some. I’d like to see Nancy happy.”
“So would I.” Flint thrust the gun into his waistband “How much do I owe you, Doc?”
“Two dollars. There’s a back way out if you want to take it”
“I’m not that scared. I’ll go the way I came.”
There was a chill wind off the Continental Divide, but a mockingbird sang its endless songs in a cottonwood tree. It was very late. Only a few lights showed: the Grand Hotel, the Divide Saloon, and the livery stable where he had left Big Red.
One light showed on the second floor of the Grand. That would be Lottie. She always hated to go to bed, and never wanted to get up.
He could see only the lighted window. Inside Lottie sat in a straight chair and across from her, in the rocker, was Buckdun.
He held his hat in his hand, his blond hair plastered tight against his long skull, his wind-honed face sharp under the light.
Lottie had never seen a man who looked so clearly what he was. The narrow face, the eyes that had no depth, the thin lips and the gash that was his mouth.
“Buckdun,” Lottie said, “I want you to do something for me.”
He was looking at her as if he had never seen a woman before. And he never had — not, at least, a woman like this.
Chapter 16
Flint’s boot heels sounded on the gravel, and there was no other sound. Several miles to the south the Kaybar riders headed for the Hole-in-the-Wall.
In the Divide Saloon, Red Dolan cleaned up after the fight. Wearily, he swept up the bloody sawdust, and carted the dead men out to the barn to be buried the next morning.
Seated on his bed in the darkness, Porter Baldwin smoked and waited for Strett and Saxon. But even as he waited for the news that would mean victory, and might mean wealth, he felt regret. Kettleman, or Flint, he was too good a man to go out from a gunshot in the night.
He was a fighter, and it would have been a real pleasure to whip him with fists. It had been a long time since Baldwin fou
nd anyone to stand up to him for more than a minute. To Port Baldwin there were few pleasures greater than a good fight, and Kettleman might have given it to him.
Yet, as nothing happened, he grew impatient. The trap must have failed. Baldwin smoked and waited, becoming increasingly irritable.
Flint reached the livery stable but paused at the corner of the building in deep shadow. There was a light over the huge door, and no one in sight, but inside it was a cavern of darkness, and he liked none of it.
He waited for several minutes, but heard no sound from within beyond an occasional snore from the hostler who slept in the small office at one side of the door. Finally, unable to rid himself of his apprehension, he turned and walked back to the rear of the building where the corrals were.
There, at the corral, he waited. The night was moonless, but his eyes could make out the corral bars, horses standing in the far corral, the gleam of water in a trough, and the bulk of a couple of huge freight wagons standing in the yard near the corral.
There was a back door to the livery stable also, and to this he made his way.
His feet made no sound here for the old corral was soft with dust, hay, old manure, and straw. Near the wall of the building he paused, listening again.
Far off, back in the trees near Doc McGinnis’ house, the mockingbird was still singing, but the distant sound seemed only to emphasize the stillness. In his mind he traced the steps he must take to where the red stallion waited, and it was almost halfway along toward the front door of the big barn.
The door near which he stood was as wide as that in front for the passage of hayracks and other large wagons, but it was in complete darkness. Flint waited a minute longer and then stepped inside the barn.
His feet made a soft rustle in spilled hay. He stood near the wall, waiting for a reaction, and there was none.
He could hear horses munching grain, and occasionally one stamped or blew. Otherwise the stillness was complete. There was the smell of fresh hay, of manure, and of leather. Living with danger had sharpened his senses, and he was uneasy without having justification for it.
Flint (1960) Page 14
