Tanglefoot

by Paul Lederer

  He would find the time; he must.

  There was that, and studying the town ordinances, of which he had only the thinnest knowledge so far. He wondered idly if old Ben Cody would be willing to help him. But the man, if not embittered, had nothing to profit by tutoring his sudden replacement. Chad would have to manage on his own.

  Then there was familiarizing himself with surrounding country. He needed to know who the landowners were there, as well as in town. It was a lot to try to absorb in a few days. Ben Cody had years of experience with everyone in the town and its environs. It was too bad that the transfer of authority had not taken place in a more measured way. The old man must know much that he could have taught to Chad.

  Why had he even taken the job, Chad wondered? Partly out of loyalty to Glen Walker, certainly, and because with no other prospects – as Starr had reminded him – they could have found themselves now out on the desert, living off rattlesnake meat.

  Chad could not shake the gloom he felt. With the adobe house now in sight, he slowed the buckskin horse rather than riding up to it in triumph. He had been shot at, overwhelmed with doubts about his own capabilities, and was carrying heavy misgivings. He had much to do, and little time to accomplish it.

  Under these circumstances he should have felt annoyed at what he discovered waiting for him when he arrived at the adobe, but Candida’s appearance on the front porch gladdened his heart and made the other concerns of his day seem irrelevant.

  Her mood, however, was not cheerful as he swung down from the buckskin, hitched it and stepped up onto the porch. She still wore her pink dress; her eyes were still wide, uncertain.

  ‘Did you have a good day?’ she asked. ‘Did the job…?’

  ‘Everything went all right,’ he said, stepping toward her, which caused her to back away. Frowning, she said:

  ‘I ask because we thought we heard some gunfire from down the road.’

  ‘It wasn’t me,’ Chad said, trying to defuse the girl’s anxiety. Just why should it cause her to worry?

  ‘I am glad,’ Candida said with a calmness that was fabricated. ‘It won’t be the end of it, Chad,’ she said in a rush of words, ‘It is only the beginning. You should not stay in this town. You should travel far and fast. You have a horse now, I see … go before they trap you into their web of deceit and fraud.’

  He couldn’t understand her. What was the woman talking about?

  ‘Does this have something to do with what your cousin told you last night?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes.’ She took the fabric of the arms of both sleeves of his shirt in her hands, stepped forward and stared up with star-bright eyes. ‘You do not see it.’ She struggled to find the right English words and told him most solemnly, ‘You are their sacrificial lamb, Chad Dempster.’

  As Chad struggled to find a response to this odd statement, the front door of the adobe swung open wide and Aunt Margarita appeared in the doorway. With a firm voice, but understanding smile, she told Candida,

  ‘A young girl should not be left alone in the moonlight with a young man for too long, Candida.’

  ‘No, Tia Margarita,’ Candida answered.

  After the door had closed, leaving them alone in the darkness, Candida said, ‘I must talk to you, Chad. About what I had mentioned.’

  ‘Yes, about Glen Walker? You need to make that clear.’

  ‘It is my cousin who told me – she and Walker are very close.’

  ‘I know that. When can we talk? Tonight, in my room?’

  Candida laughed. ‘No, I am afraid not! If my aunt doesn’t like me standing out here with you for so long, she will certainly notice if I were to dare to come to your room.’

  ‘I suppose you’re right. You could try coming by the marshal’s office tomorrow.’

  ‘No, not there! Then everyone would know that I had business with you. It would get back to Glen Walker.’

  ‘I don’t know, then,’ Chad said. ‘I have to be back at the office by eight o’clock to relieve Starr. If you rise earlier than that, I can meet you in the canyon beyond the pasture – I have business there.’

  ‘In the canyon?’ Candida asked curiously.

  ‘Yes, there is something I must do there. Every morning, I think. Come there if you can get away from the house.’

  Candida nodded, shrugged her thin shoulders and bit gently at her lower lip. She turned to start toward the door, but took the time to add, ‘I think you are a strange man, Charles Dempster.’

  ‘Yes, I’m beginning to think that myself,’ he replied.

  Candida slipped into the well-lighted house then. Beyond her Chad could see both of the guardian aunts watching her with folded arms. He gave them time to clear the room by stabling his horse before he opened the door again and went in, striding toward his bed. Aunt Rosa stopped him, a worried look on her round face.

  ‘Don’t you wish to eat tonight, Señor Dempster? I have fresh-made enchiladas in the oven.’

  ‘Not tonight,’ Chad told the obviously disappointed woman. He touched her shoulder. ‘Thank you for being concerned about me.’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ she said, looking directly into his eyes. ‘I am concerned for you in many ways.’ Then she turned and walked away toward the kitchen.

  What was going on around here? Everything was going well for Chad, but everyone had fear that he was in over his head. Well, maybe he was. He knew that he had at least two armed enemies out there – Domino Jones and Deacon Forge. He knew he had no experience as a law officer, but had been given an entire town to watch over, a town he knew nothing about. He tossed his hat aside and sat on his bed, wishing he were more like Byron Starr, who was undoubtedly keeping his watch on the town from a table at FitzRoy’s where the leggy redhead – what was her name? Peggy? – worked. So long as it was done, it probably made no difference, at least the residents of Las Palmas knew that the law was still being maintained there.

  After kicking his boots off, Chad lay on his back, removing his copy of the town ordinances from his shirt where he had tucked it. By lantern light, he read until he could not keep his eyes open any longer.

  One paragraph caught his eye because Ben Cody had scrawled numerous notes and exclamation marks beside it. Most of the pencil-scrawled notes were indecipherable and there was a lot of profanity included in them. The paragraph read:

  Section 2, Point 7: The right of landholders and every tax-paying citizen to free law-enforcement protection under the constitution of this town is hereby guaranteed, the cost of such law-enforcement to be liened against said property taxes.

  It was an awkward sentence, written by legal minds which seldom dabble in plain English, but Chad took it to mean, if you lived in Las Palmas and paid your taxes, you got law enforcement paid for by your taxes. That seemed plain enough. Why then had Marshal Cody been concerned enough or angry enough to scribble profanity-laced notes all over the borders of the ordinance book? It was one more item he thought he should talk to Cody about – if the man would agree to see him.

  When he could not keep his eyes propped open any longer, Chad turned the lantern down, undressed and climbed into bed. He tried to sort through his problems, real and imagined, for a while as he turned and twisted on the bed, but he had little luck. His thoughts kept returning to the wide-eyed woman with the easy smile, and at last he fell to sleep, still thinking of Candida.

  There was the faintest glimmer of light through the bedroom window when a distantly barking dog brought Chad awake. The barking should have annoyed him, but he had been eager to start the new day early.

  Yawning, he rose. No one else could be heard stirring in the house. Chad dressed and snatched up a box of .44 cartridges that Starr had left behind – he could be paid back later. How were the office supplies, Chad wondered inconsequentially, and who should he see to ask for funds if needed? He shook his head and wondered again at a man who would take a job about which he knew so little.

  He managed to slip out of the house without waking anyone. In the dawn li
ght he walked toward the canyon beyond the pasture. He could see the crowns of the cottonwood trees – called alamosa in the Southwest – and picked his way over the broken ground toward them. A single, somewhat belligerent white goat made a few nervous rushes toward him, but they were only for show.

  Finding a spot in the shade of the cottonwood trees, he checked his weapon and eyed a few possible targets on the sandy bank. He was determined to get better at shooting, no matter how late he was in trying to acquire the skill. Speed and accuracy – he wanted to learn both, although an old man down on the Kansas line had told him once, ‘There’s those with speed and those with accuracy. All I can say is that those with accuracy are the ones who are mostly still alive.’

  It was good advice, Chad thought, but he had seen the slick, easy draw of Byron Starr, seen the accuracy of his shooting. He might never be that good, but he meant to try. His first attempt at a quick draw opened his eyes to the reality of matters. He very nearly shot himself in the foot, having drawn back the hammer too soon. When was the proper instant to do that? Maybe Starr could give him some pointers.

  It was not warm, but perspiration was in Chad’s eyes after he had banged off twenty or thirty rounds, missing his target almost every time. He hadn’t expected to become instantly expert in this, but it was frustrating. He had fired at a hand-sized chalky rock on the bank of the canyon dozens of time, and not even creased it. Still, he thought he was getting smoother with his draw. Maybe that was all a man could expect on his first day.

  Reloading, he noticed that he was no longer alone in the canyon.

  She wore blue jeans and a red-checked shirt – unusual garb for a Spanish woman. Where she had come from, Chad could not say, but she had slipped up behind him to stand behind the trunk of one of the old cottonwood trees, from where she had been watching. He studied her, feeling foolish.

  ‘If that rock was Glen Walker, you would be dead, Charles Dempster.’

  ‘Is he good with a gun? I’ve never seen him shoot.’

  ‘He is the best, my cousin says.’ She shrugged, ‘But then Carmalita thinks he is the best at everything.’

  ‘I guess this must look silly to you,’ Chad said as he reloaded his pistol again.

  ‘What? Trying to learn how to survive?’ She shook her head. ‘No, I think it is only wise.’

  ‘But not as wise as running away would be?’

  ‘Ah, you are a man – I knew I could not persuade you to run away from trouble,’ she said with a little shake of her head. ‘So this is the next best thing for you to do, I think.’

  ‘I’ve a long way to go,’ Chad said, looking down at his revolver as he snapped its loading gate shut.

  ‘Yes, I think so as well,’ Candida said frankly, ‘but you are trying, as you are trying to learn a new and difficult job. Even if they do not really want you to learn it.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ he asked testily. ‘Of course they do. They want strong law enforcement in Las Palmas. Does this have something to do with that “sacrificial lamb” business you mentioned?’

  ‘It does, according to Carmalita,’ she answered softly, leaning her back against the trunk of the tree.

  ‘And how would she know?’ Chad growled.

  ‘Because she is closest to the ring-man. How do you say it?’

  ‘The ringleader?’ Chad suggested.

  ‘Yes, that is it.’ She had one leg drawn up behind her as she tilted her body back against the tree. ‘Glen Walker is that man, the ringleader.’

  ‘I don’t understand you,’ he said impatiently as angrily he thrust his pistol into its holster. ‘You must have misunderstood something you heard.’

  ‘No, my cousin and I both speak very good Spanish. Carmalita has told me all. You are a victim here, Chad Dempster, and when they are through with you they will kill you.’

  SEVEN

  It wasn’t easy to find the small clapboard house, and it was still early in the day, an unlikely time for an unwelcome visit, but Chad had left Starr snoring on his office cot and ridden to Ben Cody’s house. It was time they spoke. The old lawman likely knew more of what was going on around Las Palmas than anyone.

  Chad felt that there was much more he had to learn. He was lost, adrift in things he did not understand. If Cody would deign to speak with him, perhaps much could be cleared up. He owed it to the town, to himself, to Candida who had urged him to dig deeper into matters in Las Palmas. Hell, he owed it to the citizenry he was now sworn to protect.

  There was a cottonwood tree standing in front of Ben Cody’s modest house, and a buggy with its traces dropped near a hitch rail. The buggy did not surprise Chad. What would have been more surprising would be the sight of the corpulent former marshal sitting a saddle horse. After tying his horse to the hitching rail with a loose slip knot, Chad stepped uneasily up onto the shadowy porch of the small cottage. If Cody had reason to dislike anyone in town, Chad’s name was certainly at the top of the list. He rapped twice on the door and waited, expecting anything.

  The door was swung wide suddenly and Ben Cody stood there, wearing an apron, a wooden spoon in his hand. The former marshal smiled.

  ‘Come in, young man! I was just making breakfast. If I have to say it myself, I’ve gotten to be a fair cook since my wife passed away three years ago. Can I offer you anything?’

  Chad was taken aback by the former marshal’s joviality. ‘No,’ he stammered, ‘though if that’s fresh coffee I smell.…’

  ‘It is. I just ground the beans this morning. It’ll be ready before you can sit and make yourself comfortable – Dempster? That’s right, isn’t it?’

  ‘That’s right.’ Chad said, holding his hat in his hand, looking around the small comfortable-appearing room.

  ‘I’ve scrambled some eggs,’ Cody said. ‘Eight of them, though I usually only eat six. You’ve never had them the way I fix them – a little cream, a few diced onions, a tomato and just a tablespoon of brown sugar. I wish I could talk you into trying some.’

  ‘Well, maybe I will,’ Chad said, since he had been on the road before the aunts were up and about.

  Cody stirred the eggs cooking in the black skillet on the stove, then poured them each a cup of coffee. ‘Cook them slow,’ Ben Cody said, ‘that’s the trick to it. Now then,’ he asked, putting his heavy forearms on the table and looking across at Chad, ‘what brings you out here so early in the morning?’

  On this day, the old man with the round face and the small nose seemed almost cherubic, far from Chad’s first impression of him. He rose again to check his eggs. ‘Go ahead and eat,’ Chad said. ‘We can talk around it.’

  Cody scraped the contents of his skillet onto a plate and brought it steaming to the table. The mound of eggs on Cody’s platter seemed almost enough for two men, but then, Chad reflected, the bulky ex-marshal was nearly the size of two men.

  Chad began hesitantly. ‘I was wondering about a few things. For instance, I’ve been reading the county ordinances and something I saw in there worried me.’

  ‘Section two, point seven?’ Cody asked, his mouth full of scrambled eggs. ‘You know, I have to admit my wife did a better job with this than I do.’ He pointed at his platter. ‘It takes some time to learn every skill, I expect.’

  ‘Maybe she put butter in it,’ Chad said for something to say before returning to his main point.

  ‘You know – that may be it. You might be right, Dempster. I’ll try it next time.’

  ‘Marshal Cody, why did you immediately think I was talking about Section two, point seven. It drew my eye at first only because of all your pencilled remarks. But why that one sentence?’

  ‘Because, son,’ Cody said, pushing away his plate and leaning back to stretch, ‘that’s where all your trouble lies. It’s why I was fired and you were hired.’

  ‘I don’t understand you,’ Chad was forced to admit. The marshal rose and put his dishes in the sink. When he turned back again, his eyes were much more serious.

  ‘I was hoping that yo
u didn’t,’ Cody said. ‘Because if you did …’ He paused and seated himself, starting again. ‘It’s plain theft that they’re planning. A clerk I know in the courthouse showed me a copy of the revised town statutes last week. They have amended it to say that every landowner and businessman in Las Palmas must now pay a five per cent surtax if he wants protection from the town marshal’s office.’

  ‘But that’s…!’

  ‘Taxation by decree. And if you’ll remember your history it’s one of the reasons this country chose to break free of England. But once that is on the books, it’ll be the law whether people like it or not.’

  ‘Will people pay it?’

  ‘Let’s just say there will be some reluctance. To put it mildly,’ the former marshal said with a faint smile. ‘After all, no one voted on this, no one was told in advance. Yes, there will be some reluctance.’

  ‘What will the mayor, the town, do?’

  ‘Well, they’ll have to send someone to collect the money, won’t they? I told them flat out that I would have no part of it, and so they found themselves a new man to become a bill collector – that’s you, my young friend. They’ll have you out intimidating people in town, or trying to. Which is not my idea of law enforcement, and is why you find me sitting contentedly at home in my own kitchen with a full belly.’

  Chad was silent for a long minute. Beyond the house a cow lowed. The sun, seen through the kitchen window, rose higher. ‘I’ll have to quit,’ Chad said suddenly. His hands were clenched tightly.

  ‘Can you?’ Cody asked. ‘These people have put you in their debt, and you know it. You’ve taken their money, haven’t you?’

  ‘A little,’ Chad said numbly.

  ‘They’ll try to convince you that you should take more. They want you as a hired thug. One who wears a badge and has the law behind him, but a thug all the same.’ Cody looked wistfully at the badge Chad was wearing, as if he had worn it proudly and was about to see it shamed. Cody rose, turning his eyes away.