by Matt Braun
McCluskie didn’t know whether to laugh or curse. Somehow neither one seemed appropriate, so instead he just shook his head in mild wonderment. Plain to see, the kid had snuck out of Belle’s and covered his back the whole time he was pussyfooting down the street. Like as not, the little wiseacre had it planned all along. But it proved one thing nobody was likely to question any more.
The kid had grit, clean through.
Chuckling to himself, McCluskie turned and started back across the street.
“Keep ’em covered, bud. I’ll have a looksee and make sure our friend is out of his misery.”
Kinch just grinned and kept his pistol trained on the Texans. There wasn’t any need to answer.
It had all been said.
THIRTEEN
McCluskie got the word over his second cup of coffee. Seated in the kitchen, watching Belle slap together some bacon and eggs, he was congratulating himself on last night’s little fracas. It had been a nice piece of work. Bailey laid out on a slab and the Texans sent packing. That was one Anderson and his boys could paste in their hats and think about while they were out herding cows. Letting a slick-eared kid get the drop on them. They’d be a long time living that down.
Sweet Jesus! It was a sight to warm a man’s heart. The way the kid had stood there, grinning, holding that Colt steady as a rock. Just like if someone had run up and primed his pump, he’d have hauled off and spouted a pail of ice water. Nervy didn’t hardly describe it. The kid was ironclad and brass-bound. More guts than a bulldog with a new bone.
The thought brought his mind back to Belle. Last night had been something extraordinarily special. Maybe she was so glad he’d come out alive she just naturally put her heart into it. But whatever the reason, he felt like he’d been put through the wringer and hung out to dry. The lady knew what pleasured a man, and she flat turned into a wildcat once she came unwound.
Like this breakfast. Belle Siddons hadn’t cooked a meal in all the time he’d known her. Hell, maybe never. But here she was, bustling around the kitchen, cursing every time the bacon grease spit the wrong way, determined to make this a very special day for him. All because he’d come through last night with his hide still intact.
He smiled and suddenly winced, reminded that his hide wasn’t exactly intact after all. The swelling over his eye had gone down a bit, but he could scarcely stand to blow his nose. If he ever sneezed, he was a goner for sure.
That was more of Belle’s doing. Pitching a fit till he’d agreed to let Doc Boyd stitch him back together. That old quack had the touch of a butcher, and with a needle he was nothing short of a menace. Still, the eyebrow was back in one piece, and seemed to be healing, so he had little room for complaint. Actually, he couldn’t blame anybody but himself.
He should’ve learned to duck better.
Reflecting on that bit of wisdom, he had just started on a second cup of coffee when the kid burst through the door. He was breathing hard, as if he’d been running, and as he slammed to a halt before the table it suddenly caught up with him. He began to choke and a moment later his lungs gave way. McCluskie grabbed a bottle of whiskey and in between coughs forced a jigger down his throat. The liquor took hold slowly, trickling down through his system, and after a few more heaves and shudders, the spasm petered out. Gulping wind, blinking furiously to clear his eyes, the kid began sputtering in a hoarse, wheezing rattle.
“Slow down, goddamnit!” McCluskie barked. “The world’s not comin’ to an end. Just take your time, for chrissakes.”
His gruff tone brought a withering look from Belle, but she didn’t say anything. Bacon and eggs now forgotten, she moved around the table and eased Kinch into a chair. The boy nodded, still sucking air, and made a game attempt at smiling. Presently his color returned, and he seemed to have caught his breath, but his voice was still shaky.
“Mike, they’re after you. It’s all over town.” He gasped and took another long draught of wind. “Soon as I walked into the cafe ever‘body and his brother started givin’ me the lowdown.”
“Bud, you’re not makin’ sense. Who’s after me?”
“The Texans. That’s what I’m tryin’ to tell you. They sent word in this mornin’.”
“What d’ya mean, sent word? Who to?”
“I don’t know. But it’s all up and down the street. They aim to run you out of town or kill you. Cause of what you did to Bailey.”
“Now is that a fact?” McCluskie tilted back in his chair and pulled out the makings. “Y’know, I always heard that pound for pound a Texan would assay out to about nine parts cowdung. Maybe we’ll just find out before the day’s over.”
“You thickheaded Mick!” Belle squawled. “That’s just what you’d do, isn’t it? Sit there and wait for them to come kill you.”
“Cripes, Belle, what d’ya want him to do?”
Kinch gave her the look men reserve for hysterical women. “He can’t back down or his name’d be mud.”
“Sport, you hit it right on the head!” The Irishman slammed his fist on the table so hard his coffee mug bounced in the air. “Once a man runs he’s got to keep on runnin’. You mark what I tell you. Them Texans are all hot air and taffy. Anybody that gets hisself in a swivel over that needs his head examined.”
“Men!” Belle stamped her foot and glared down on them. “There’s no end to it, is there? Just have to go on proving how tough you are.”
McCluskie put a match to his cigarette and gave her a wry grin. “Belle, I don’t like to bring it up, but you’re burnin’ my breakfast to a cinder.”
Belle screeched and turned back to the stove. Kinch and the Irishman exchanged smiles as she commenced slinging smoking skillets in every direction. Just then the door banged open and Dora, the colored maid, came rushing in. The whites of her eyes were flared wide and she was waving a scrap of paper in her hand.
“Miz Belle! Miz Belle! Some man near broke the door in an’ tol’ me to give this to Mistah Mike. Said it was a mattah o’ life and death.”
Sugar raced into the kitchen before the others had time to collect their wits. “What’s all the commotion about? Honest to Christ, Dora, you could wake the dead.” All of a sudden she stopped and glanced around uneasily. “Well land o’ Goshen, why is everybody staring at me like that?”
McCluskie took the piece of paper from Dora’s hand and unfolded it. Inside was a scrawled message, and as he started reading the others scarcely dared to breathe. Finished, he flipped it on the table and let go with a sour grunt.
“Seems like Mr. Spivey has called a meetin’ of the Town Board. Says for me to get up there pronto.”
The room went still as a tomb and everyone just stared at him for a moment. Sugar gave a rabbity little sniff and wandered over behind Kinch. She leaned down and put her arms around his neck.
“Sweetie, what’s going on? Everybody looks like they’ve just come from a wake.”
Kinch took her hands and drew her down closer, but he kept his eyes on the Irishman. After a while McCluskie climbed to his feet and gave Sugar a grim smile. “Little lady, you’re pretty close to right. Only thing is, the wake’s just gettin’ started.”
“Sure’n begorra, the great Mick has spoken.” Belle shot him a scathing look. “Now why don’t you take a peek in your crystal ball and tell us who the corpse will be.”
“Why Belle, that’s simple,” McCluskie grinned. “He’ll be wearin’ big jingly spurs and a ten-gallon hat, and after they kick all the dung out of him, they’re gonna bury him in a matchbox.”
“Very funny,” Belle snapped. “I suppose you do song and dance, too.”
“Just on request. Weddings and funerals and such. But in your case, I’ll make an exception. Like tonight, maybe.”
He chucked her under the chin, still smiling, and headed for the door. Then, struck by a sudden thought, he turned and looked back. “Say, you still keep a greener around the house?”
Belle stiffened and her eyes went wide with alarm. “What—what do you want
with a shotgun?”
“Why, hell’s bells, I didn’t get no breakfast, that’s what. Thought I might scare up a covey of birds on my way uptown.”
“With buckshot?”
“There’s all kinds of birds, honey. Some are just bigger’n others, that’s all.”
Belle moved past him without a word and stepped into the hall. She opened the door of a linen closet, reached inside, and pulled out a sawed-off shotgun. When she returned, McCluskie took it from her, broke it open, and checked the loads. Satisfied, he snapped it shut and thumbed the hammers back to half-cock. Looking up, he smiled, trying to lighten the moment.
“Jesus, I hope you never have to shoot this thing. With what you weigh a ten-gauge would knock you on your keester.”
Her eyes went glassy with tears and she turned away. The others watched on in frozen silence, struck dumb by the Irishman’s jovial manner. Sugar and Dora couldn’t make heads or tails of the whole affair, but the look on Belle’s face sent cold shivers racing through them. The girl clutched tighter at Kinch, as if some unseen specter might suddenly snatch him away.
The kid pushed her hands off and started to rise. Then he caught McCluskie’s eye and slumped back in his chair. “I guess I don’t have to ask. You want me to stay here and suck my thumb.”
“Sport, you’re gettin’ to be a regular mind reader.” The Irishman smiled, but there was something hard about his eyes. “If that’s not plain enough, lemme give it to you straight. You pull another stunt like last night and I’ll swap ends on this scattergun and paddle your rump. Savvy?”
Without so much as a backward glance, he wheeled about and marched off down the hall. The sound of his footsteps slowly faded and moments later they heard the front door slam shut.
Kinch just sat there, grinding his teeth in quiet fury, while Sugar stroked his hair with the soft, fluttering touch of a small bird.
The shotgun didn’t draw a crowd, but all along the street people rubbernecked and gawked as if the circus had come to town. McCluskie’s appearance brought them out of stores and saloons like flies to honey, and as he strode past they gathered in buzzing knots to discuss this latest wrinkle. Word of the Texans’ threat had spread through town only within the last hour, but already the gamblers were giving six-to-five that the Irishman wouldn’t run. His tight-lipped scowl, and the double-barreled greener, seemed to reinforce those odds substantially.
Far from running, it appeared McCluskie had declared war.
The sensation created by his passage left the Irishman grimly amused. There was nothing quite like a killing, or better yet the chance of a massacre, to bring the fainthearts out of their holes. Not that they wanted to risk their own necks, or in any way get involved. They just wanted to watch. It spoke eloquently of man’s grubby character.
But while he ignored the townspeople, McCluskie’s eyes were busy scanning the street. Oddly enough, the hitchracks stood empty and there wasn’t a cowhand in sight. That in itself was a sign. More ominous, perhaps, than the warning delivered to Spivey.
Passing Hamil’s Hardware, he noted that the doors were locked, and at the next corner Hoff’s Grocery was also closed. Plain to see, the buzzards had come to roost at their favorite watering hole. Probably squawking and bickering among themselves while they waited for him to rout the bogeyman and lay all ghosts to rest.
Cursing fools and fainthearts alike, he crossed the tracks and headed for the Lone Star.
When he came through the door of Spivey’s office the talk ground abruptly to a halt. The room was filled with smoke, and a sense of something queer, not as it should be, suddenly came over him. The men gathered there stared at him with eyes that were flat and guarded, and as his gaze touched their faces, he saw part of it. Apprehension and alarm and maybe even a little panic. Yet there was something more. Something he couldn’t quite put his finger on. Mistrust, perhaps, or just a tinge of hatred. Whatever it was, it eluded him, and for the moment he set it aside. He shut the door but advanced no farther into the room. Someone coughed, and as if the spell had been broken, he nodded to Spivey, who was seated behind the desk.
“I got word you wanted to see me.”
“Well, not just me, Mike.” Spivey smiled and waved his hand at the others. “The boys here thought you ought to sit in on this. Sort of kick it around and see where we stand.”
The rest of the men looked glum as undertakers, and Spivey’s smile was far short of convincing. McCluskie felt the hair come up on the back of his neck. “Kick what around?”
“This goddamn mess you’ve got us in!” Perry Tuttle snarled. “What the hell’d you think we’d be meetin’ for?”
The Irishman looked him over with a frosty scowl. “Mister, lemme give you some advice. Talk to me civil or don’t talk to me at all. Otherwise you’ll wind up with a sore head.”
“Judas Priest, what’d I just get through tellin’ you not ten minutes ago?” Val Gregory threw his cigar to the floor and glared around at the other men. “You can’t say boo to him without gettin’ your skull caved in. Or shot dead. Hell, it’s no wonder the Texans are on the warpath.”
“Gentlemen, please!” Judge Muse stepped to the center of the room, motioning for silence. “We have enough trouble on our hands without fighting among ourselves.”
“You can say that again,” Sam Horner muttered. “What beats me is why you go on jabbering about Texans. Newton’s dead as a doornail anyway.” His glance flicked around to the Irishman. “Case you haven’t heard, we lost the referendum. Wichita will get its railroad.”
Everyone fell silent, watching for his reaction. He let them stew for a minute, then pursed his lips. “Sorry to hear it.”
“Yeah, sure,” Perry Tuttle rasped, “we can see you’re all broken up.”
“Tuttle, I warned you once. Don’t make me do it again.”
“For Chrissakes, can’t you fellas stick to one problem at a time?” Harry Lovett sounded as exasperated as he looked. “That railroad’s a year down the line. Today’s right now, and I’m a sonovabitch, it seems to me we ought to be thinkin’ about the Texans.”
“You’re right, Harry. Dead right.” Spivey looked over at the Irishman, but he was no longer smiling. “Mike, we got ourselves some powerful trouble this time. Anderson sent one of his boys in with a message. Short and sweet and to the point. Either you’re on the noon train or they’ll kill you and burn Newton down to the ground. I don’t think they’re foolin’ either.”
McCluskie shrugged, his expression wooden, almost detached. “Maybe. Leastways they might try. But they won’t get very far.”
“What makes you so sure?”
“This.” McCluskie raised the shotgun, and in the closely packed room it was like looking down a cannon. “Double-ought at close range has a way of discouragin’ a man.”
“Who’re you kiddin’?” Gregory inquired acidly. “Puttin’ a couple of loads of buckshot into that crowd’d be like spittin’ on a brush fire. Hell, there’ll be a hundred of ’em. Maybe more.”
“So you can hire yourself a new marshal. Thing is, they won’t do nothin’ to the town. That’d bring the army down on ’em, and not even Anderson’s that dumb.”
Judge Muse hawked and cleared his throat. “Mike, I’m afraid that’s a risk some of these men feel they can’t afford to take.”
McCluskie sensed it again, the queer feeling that had come over him when he’d entered the room. “Care to make that a little plainer?”
“Yes, I suppose it’s time. Understand, there is nothing personal in this. It’s just that we have to consider what is best for the town.”
Spivey broke in. “Mike, what he’s tryin’ to say is that we’re between a rock and a hard place. If we keep you on, the Texans are gonna pull this town up by the roots.”
McCluskie gave him a corrosive stare. “What you’re sayin’ is that I’m fired—”
“Now I didn’t say that, Mike.”
“—and if I don’t hightail it you’ll throw me to the wolves
.”
“Damnit, you’re puttin’ words in my mouth. Fact is, I don’t know what we’d do without you. We’re damned if we do and damned if we don’t.”
“If you wanted another Tonk Hazeltine that’s what you should’ve hired.” The Irishman tapped the badge on his shirt. “As long as I’m wearin’ this it’s up to me to pull the fat out of the fire. I’ll handle Anderson and his bunch my own way. You boys just get yourselves a good seat and sit back and watch. It’ll be worth the price of admission.”
He turned to leave but the judge’s voice brought him up short. “Mike, before you go, let me ask you one question. You have every right to get yourself killed. That’s your privilege. But if you face that mob of Texans other people will get caught in the crossfire. Now, do you really want the blood of innocent bystanders on your hands? Won’t you agree that’s rather a high price to pay for one man’s pride?”
McCluskie just glared at him and after a moment the judge smiled. “I suspect you’re too decent a man to take that chance. And it’s not like you were running. I mean, after all, once things have calmed down there’s nothing to stop you from coming back.”
“Judge, that’s the trouble with this world. There’s too many runners and not enough stayers. Looks to me like it’s time somebody drew the line.”
The door opened and closed, and the men were left to ponder that cryptic observation. Nobody said anything, but as the silence deepened they found it difficult to look one another in the eye.
Belle gave a little start and jumped from her chair as he entered the parlor. Kinch and Sugartit also came to their feet, but none of them said a word. The dark rage covering his face was unlike anything they had ever seen, frightening in the way of a man touched by the sun. He stalked across the room and halted in front of Belle, thrusting the greener at her.
