Gunsmoke Justice

by Louis Trimble

  “Hungry,” Brad said.

  “Your friend got that way yesterday,” she said, “and he’s up and about already.” She bustled out.

  “Yesterday!” Brad said to Olaf.

  “Yah,” Olaf agreed. “It’s three days now.”

  Brad lay back, shutting his eyes. Three days! It was three days more before he found himself a whole man again. But once he had awakened, his strength returned rapidly. Molly Teehan’s food was good and nourishing, and Brad had a constitution as strong as Olaf’s. Once he was up and walking, he made good progress.

  From Olaf he learned the details of Newt’s coming. Olaf had been splitting firewood when they had ridden up. The sound of his ax had dulled the noise of their approach, and they had thrown a loop on him before he could move.

  “I break the rope,” Olaf explained. “One man hit me with a gun. That broke.” He shrugged and his face clouded in memory. “But they are four. I get beat.”

  And so they were run out, Brad thought. Their gear would have been disposed of, and who was to say they had not thought better of things and left the country. Quarles was shrewd and had not chanced a killing on his hands.

  Now Brad felt strong enough to travel, and he told Molly Teehan so. “I’d like to pay,” Brad said.

  “Pay!” She put her hands on her hips and glared at him. “‘Tis Double Q you ride against, isn’t it? Pay!”

  Tim Teehan put in a cautious appearance. “Faith McFee was up the day before you came. You’re riding for Split S. That’s pay enough.”

  Brad thanked them, and he and Olaf went out to their horses. They had been given good care, and even the bay looked fairly fit. Saddling, Brad mounted slowly. His body still pained him, and the wrapping Molly Teehan had put on his ribs made his movements none the easier. But he found pleasure in the feel of a saddle.

  The Teehans came to the door. “If you need help,” Molly Teehan cried, “‘tis here.”

  Brad saw the withdrawal on Tim Teehan’s face, and so he only waved, and reined toward Sawhorse Valley. From Molly he would find help, he knew. But her husband was like McFee, a man afraid of cutting short the last of his life.

  They rode slowly in the morning sun, down the trail to the flats and along to the town. They had no guns, and so there was no reason to stop at the sheriff’s office. Instead, Brad drew up before the mercantile and dismounted stiffly.

  There was no more than a handful of people on the street — but as one they stared as Brad and Olaf rode up and stopped. The blacksmith’s boy left the livery at a quick run, darting off to carry the news.

  So their going had got around, Brad thought, as he went into the store. He came out, his money belt flatter, but with a pile of goods on the freight dock waiting for him. At the livery, he rented a team and wagon, saying no more than he had to. Jube’s father required a deposit on the horses and wagon.

  “Might get hurt in the hills,” he explained.

  Brad took it as meant and paid. When the goods were loaded, he and Olaf climbed onto the wagon and started off, the saddle horses tied behind. Faith McFee ran out, calling to them, and Brad stopped.

  She came up to the wagon, her face flushed with heat from the cookstove. “I just heard,” she said. “It’s almost dinnertime, and the restaurant is open.”

  “Eat,” Olaf said in a pleased voice. Brad turned the team and silently put the wagon alongside the restaurant. He and Olaf followed Faith inside.

  Brad did not want to take the time for this. But besides not wanting to antagonize the girl, his common sense told him that it might be a good idea to find out a few things that had happened while he and Olaf were gone.

  It was still too early for the regular diners and, for the moment, they had the place to themselves. Faith put soup, thick with beans, in front of them and added generous slices of bread. Olaf dipped in at once. Brad waited, watching the girl.

  “I heard you’d left the Sawhorse,” she said. Her eyes lingered on the bruises still mottling Brad’s face. It was too tender yet to run a razor over, but she seemed not to notice his crop of reddish whiskers. “Now I understand.”

  “Then the news got around that we’d gone?” Brad asked.

  “Dave Arden brought it,” she answered. “He rode to see you four or five days ago and everything was gone.”

  “So I thought,” Brad nodded.

  Just then the dealer from the Sawhorse Saloon walked in. He stared for a while at Brad and Olaf, and then quietly took a seat. Addressing Faith, he said casually, “Nick Biddle just rode out. He’s been in town an hour.”

  “Thanks,” she said, and took his plate to him. When she looked again at Brad he was eating, a faint smile on his face.

  “That goes for me, too,” he murmured to her.

  “You were foolish to come to town like this,” she said softly. “Biddle and Quarles will have men over there before you get back.”

  “So I figured,” he said.

  She gave up all pretense. “Must you go back?”

  “I have a score to settle,” Brad said quietly. His eyes flickered. “So does Olaf.”

  “Is it worth another beating to settle a score?” she cried. She saw the dealer looking at her, and she fought to lower her voice. “Or more?”

  “More this time,” Brad agreed gravely. “The news is out. If Quarles does anything to us, he’ll have to break the law openly this time. He’ll order us shot.”

  “And you’re willing!”

  “To take a chance?” He nodded. “He made a mistake. Or Newt did. It was foolish for them to think we would keep running.” As he lifted his coffee cup, he felt the wrapping over his ribs pull. “Or they thought we were too beat to come back.” He shook his head and the faint, cold smile she had seen the day he roughed Newt was on his lips. “Quarles can’t afford to make mistakes.”

  Others came in then, and she turned her attention to serving them. Brad and Olaf seemed to be objects of curiosity but, outside of casual nods, the men carefully refrained from taking open notice of them. It was, Brad knew, the safe way to act. If ever a showdown came, the ones who had displayed friendship would be pointed out by others.

  Finally there was a lull. Brad had waited patiently until he could speak to Faith again. Now he said, “How was the news taken?”

  “June Grant thought — ”

  “I can guess what she thought,” he interrupted. “What about the sheriff?”

  “He thought you’d run, too.”

  “They all would,” Brad agreed. He reached for his money, but she refused it. Thanking her, he and Olaf went back to the team and wagon. Brad directed the horses onto the road north.

  “Get guns out now?” Olaf said, as they passed the town limits.

  Brad squinted into the distance. There was no sign of anyone except a few men that he could faintly see working at cutting native grass hay off to the east.

  “Good a time as any,” he said.

  Olaf delved into the supplies in the wagon bed and came up with two .44’s and two carbines. Brad put his .44 in the holster and the carbine on the floor at his feet. He wished for the familiar feel of his old guns back. With a new .44 or carbine a man never knew how they would shoot, and this was no time to have to learn the eccentricities of a weapon.

  Olaf sat with his carbine held loosely across his knees. In his eyes and on his face was the look Brad had first noticed at Teehan’s. Sometimes there was the old pleasure in Olaf’s smile, but more and more of late Brad had seen this grimness creeping up on him so that now he rode with his eyes sharp, squinting into the distance.

  “We’ll go home now,” Olaf said.

  Brad hesitated a moment. That had been his idea until he had talked to Faith in the restaurant, but now he decided against the move. “Not yet,” he said. Looping the reins over the whipstock, he rolled a cigarette, holding the paper between his legs to cut off the slight wind rippling the air.

  “That’s where they’ll expect us,” he said. “It might be a good idea to go to the
Split S first.”

  Olaf studied that, and Brad realized that for the first time Olaf had an active, understanding concern of things in this valley. “So. Good,” Olaf agreed.

  At the turn Brad noticed the hay on either side. It was still uncut though, as he last remembered it, some could have been salvaged by cutting. As it stood now it was a strong yellow and beginning to turn brown at the edges. He looked disgustedly up toward the ranch. If Arden was not willing to make a fight, the least he could do was to save what he could for June Grant.

  Brad’s irritation grew as, from the bridge, he could look out and see the great stacks of first cutting Biddle and Quarles had built up. And already there was promise of second cutting showing green on their hayfields.

  Going into the yard at the Split S, he left the team by the rear door, and went up to the kitchen. Olaf stayed on the wagon seat, the rifle still lying across his knees.

  It was June Grant who let Brad in, and the coolness he saw in her face vanished as she became aware of the marks of the fight still on him.

  “So that was it!” she said. She threw the door open. “Come in, both of you.” There was a surge of hope plain in her voice. As if, Brad thought, his coming had renewed her faith in something.

  “That was it,” Brad said soberly. He signaled to Olaf. The big man made no move; he was looking across the fields as though he were seeking something.

  “Olaf, coffee!” June Grant cried. And reluctantly Olaf climbed from the wagon and came into the house.

  She poured it for them, took a cup for herself, and sat with them at the kitchen table. She waited expectantly. “I see,” Brad said to her, “the hay’s gone for good.”

  “Dave’s been trying,” she said defensively. “First the old mower needed parts. And then when they came, the frame broke apart. We had to order a new machine.”

  Brad scratched at the wiry red beard he had grown. “Some of your neighbors across the valley should be through cutting by now. Coe, for instance. Or isn’t this borrowing country?”

  “It used to be,” she said, “when Dad was alive.” There was a faint flush creeping up her cheeks. “You’re just the same, Brad. Do you take a delight in badgering me?”

  He noticed her use of his first name, and took it as an acceptance of his presence that had been missing before. “I like to get things done,” he said. “Maybe Arden never thought of it. You might try, though, and at least get that cut and out of the way.”

  He shifted the subject, feeling that it was disposed of. “I’d better tell you that my being here might make Quarles move in.”

  “I know that,” she said.

  “It’d be best if we went then,” he said.

  She answered as Faith had. “Must you go back?”

  “I’ve got a score to settle,” he told her.

  Her answer came in the words he wanted, though he had held small hope of hearing them. “Then settle it here!” Her head lifted defiantly. “After what they must have done — what it looks like they did — ”

  “Beat us up and drove us off,” he said shortly.

  “There’s no good in waiting longer,” she finished.

  “It’s up to Arden, isn’t it?”

  He saw the flush again. “When Dave hears, he’ll be willing,” she stated flatly.

  “Unless,” Brad said, “he’s afraid of this same thing happening to you. Quarles ran us out because we were close to the water up there. He might figure it’s a good way to get you over and done with. He’s about where he can’t wait much longer.”

  “It won’t happen to me,” she said. “And what is a little more grief, anyway, if it means a chance of saving something?”

  Something, he thought. She no longer hoped to save it all — just some part of it. He stood up. “In that case,” he said, “I’ll see to the team and wagon.”

  Brad and Olaf ran the wagon into the big, unused barn, and made their beds close by it. The team they put in the other barn where there was still a little hay and feed from the winter before. That done, Brad made up two packs such as men could carry behind a saddle and use to camp in the open. The supper call came before he was finished, and when he went to the house, he saw that Arden had come in and was at the table. June Grant stepped to the door.

  Brad said, “We ate big in town, and I’ve got more to do. We’ll set in after the rest are done.”

  She nodded, and Brad went back to the barn. The hunger of a man still healing was strong in him when he started for the house again. Olaf walked along beside him saying nothing, and with the wary look still about him.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  THE MEN were still at the table, but nearly finished, and Brad stood just inside the door waiting. He had met the three Split S hands before, but so casually that there had been little chance to study them. Now he looked at them carefully and hopefully, but it took little time for him to realize that what he sought was not here.

  They all glanced at him, then returned quickly to their eating. By their acceptance of his and Olaf’s presence, Brad knew June Grant had prepared them.

  Andy Toll was tall and lank, loose in the joints, and with the quiet smile of a man without brains enough to know when he was in danger. He acknowledged the greeting to Brad and Olaf with indifference. Jake Banhon and Nate Krouse reacted differently. And it was to them that Brad turned his interest. Of the two, Bannon was the younger and seemed to offer more encouragement — if any was to be had. He was a settled man in his thirties, but there was a light in his eyes that Brad had seen in others. Settled or not, men like that could only be pushed so far. Brad did not relish this kind when the chips were down. Too often a sudden recklessness could ruin things. But, even so, Bannon was worth more than a satisfied hand like Andy Toll.

  Nate Krouse was a gray-haired veteran of many a range drive. It was stamped on him, as though the dust and grime from Texas to Montana had ground deep into his weathered skin. Yet in him, too, there was something lacking. It was not any particular thing that Brad could put a finger on, but it was there — a feeling of emptiness in the man. He would have no drive left, and few desires. This was his home now, and he would ask only to be left alone to run out the rest of his life in peace.

  Andy Toll chose to begin a conversation as he forked pie into his weakly smiling mouth. “Something ripped up three rods of fence in the north pasture, June. We found it this morning. Looked like grizzly work.”

  Nate Krouse snorted his disgust. “A grizzly or men. And there wasn’t no grizzly tracks around.”

  Arden said, “Were there man tracks?”

  “Hard ground,” Krouse answered. “Close clipped grass that’s been trampled. I couldn’t see any sign at all.”

  “So it could have been a grizzly I” Andy Toll announced. He looked with pleased triumph around the table.

  “You’d rather it was,” Jake Bannon said sourly. He had a harsh face, whiskered nearly to the eyes. It was strangely emotionless, so that most of his expression lay in his eyes.

  “Stop that!” June Grant ordered. The weariness in her voice told Brad this had gone on before.

  He looked now toward Bannon, measuring him. He got a full stare in return. “You figure it was Nick Biddle, Bannon?”

  “I figure so,” Bannon said quietly. “If it was, he won’t stop just because we fixed up a piece of fence.”

  Dave Arden was sitting silently at his place. Brad glanced his way quickly, and saw that Arden’s hands had a piece of bread nearly squeezed in two. But whatever was upsetting him, he was saying nothing about it. Brad probed Bannon further, watching Arden as much as the man he spoke to.

  “You think he’ll come back soon?”

  “He ain’t hurried before,” Bannon said. “He’s working on us slow. We can’t make no tally this time of year. When we do start the roundup he’ll have plenty of time to cut us down short.”

  Arden spoke then, his voice jerky. “We can’t prove that.”

  Bannon looked at him in faint surprise. “I d
on’t need to prove it,” he answered. “Our fence lays against those gullies of his that work into the rimrock. Once the stock is in them, it ain’t found easy — but that don’t mean he didn’t move it there.”

  Krouse took it up, talking as much to Brad as to Arden. “Cougar losses run high some seasons. There’s cougars in them hills. If we yell short tally, Biddle can always blame them.”

  “He can’t get our beef out of the valley,” June protested. “What good would it do him?”

  “I’ve seen more spreads busted by draining off the stock slow than were ever hurt by big rustlers,” Brad answered. “If Quarles wants to weaken you, this is one way of doing it. Even if he ran the cattle into the mountains and left them to starve, you’d be out that much sooner.”

  Andy Toll raised unbelieving eyes to Brad. “That ain’t human,” he objected.

  Arden pushed back his chair. “If you men are right,” he said, nodding toward Krouse and Bannon, “then it’s time to do something. That means Quarles has started in on us.” He headed for the door. “I’m going to do a little looking myself.”

  Brad said dryly, “Want help?”

  “I’ll make it easier alone,” Arden answered shortly, and walked out.

  Brad grinned faintly. Nate Krouse made another snorting sound. “Means Quarles had started in on us,” he repeated after Arden. “He’s been on us for a year now!”

  “Not openly,” June said.

  “This ain’t open, either,” Krouse reminded her. “And it ain’t the first time we had fence cut.” He got up, muttering about mending saddle gear, and went out the door. Bannon followed him at once. Brad rolled a cigarette and smoked thoughtfully.

  It didn’t make sense the way Arden had acted. Krouse’s news had upset him a lot more than a man accustomed to such things should get. And if it had happened before, Brad could see no reason why Arden should choose this particular time to make an investigation. Brad started out on the impulse that not all was right.

  “Don’t hold supper,” he said abruptly. Nodding to Olaf to come along, he went to the bunkhouse. He found Krouse sitting crosslegged in tailor fashion and working on a piece of bridle. Jake Bannon was smoking by the stove and throwing cards down in a desultory game of solitaire. Both men looked up.