Promise of Revenge

by Lauran Paine

  Tom continued to regard the glass of whiskey. Roy probably had not told anyone else; barmen were notoriously close-mouthed. Still, what one man had noticed, others might also have noticed. He suddenly felt no desire for more liquor.

  “Maybe we’d ought to keep it like that,” he said, arising.

  Roy smiled. He raised one hand and touched the graying hair over his ear.

  “See that there gray,” he said. “A man in my job don’t live that long unless he learns damned early to button his lip.”

  Tom nodded and started to move past.

  “Mister Barker?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Clint’s still around.”

  “Making fight talk is he, Roy?”

  “Not that I know of, but just the same you’ll want to grow an eye in the back of your head.”

  Tom gazed steadily at the bartender. “He didn’t strike me as a bushwhacker, Roy.”

  The barman shrugged. “Who knows what a man’ll do? You beat him fair with your hands, Mister Barker, and he’s heard the talk by now of how you handle a gun. Them things’re usually enough to make a man do a little figurin’ . . . if he’s plumb set on killin’ somebody.”

  Tom fished a $20 gold piece out of his pocket and put it in the bartender’s hand. “Thanks, I’ll take your advice,” he said, moving off toward the door.

  Outside, the plank walk was nearly deserted and heat waves arose in dancing ranks from the roadway. Tom was walking north, past a bench in front of Beach’s store, when Sheriff Tim Pollard came through the doorway and met him.

  Tom nodded. The sheriff’s eyes pinched down suddenly and he caught Tom’s arm. “Set on the bench with me a minute,” he said. “I know somethin’ that might interest you.”

  Tom sat. Pollard fished for his pocket knife, opened it, and began leisurely to pare his fingernails. “You seen Doc Spence today?” he asked.

  “No.”

  “Seen Gorman, the banker?”

  “A couple of hours ago. Why, what of it?”

  “Well, a real strange thing happened this mornin’. Doc Spence calls it a medical miracle.”

  “Then it surely must be,” Tom said dryly.

  The sheriff chuckled. “I take it you don’t much cotton to

  Doc Spence.”

  Tom put both hands palms down on the bench. “Is that what you stopped me for . . . to talk about Spence?”

  “No. Everything in good time, boy. Just relax.”

  Tom’s glance sharpened. The old devil knew something; there was no mistaking that look on his face. Tom settled back and stifled an impatient curse.

  Pollard clicked the knife closed and turned to gaze at Tom. “Moses Beach got his voice back this morning.”

  XI

  In the stifling silence of his room Tom sprawled on the bed thinking. Moses Beach knew, somehow, that he had given Finnerty the money to redeem his note at the bank. The proof that he knew was in the way he had sent immediately for Elihu Gorman when he could talk. To warn Gorman about him. What would Gorman’s reaction be? He would of course refuse to loan money on the options, for one thing, and he might even suspect that Tom had met Evan Houston and had learned from the cowman that Gorman had offered Houston Finnerty’s ranch before the bank had been in a position to foreclose. He gazed fixedly at the ceiling. Well, let Gorman think what he wished; it did not change anything. Gorman and Beach still had less than ten days to repay their loan and the thirty percent interest. Tom’s lips curled. Beach would have another stroke. He smiled more broadly and leaped up, went to the window, and gazed down at the road.

  The shadows were moving in. There was a faint and acrid breeze blowing in from the range. Far out the hills squatted in faded patience awaiting dusk, and surcease from the blinding sun rays and moonlight. Somewhere, beyond town, a bull roared and mules whinnied. There was a freight outfit camped there somewhere. He thought immediately of Clint Ingersoll. What a fool he’d been; he should have killed him. Why hadn’t he?

  He crossed to the washstand, mopped at his face, combed his hair, and hunched into his coat. He hadn’t, he told himself, because of Tex. He hadn’t wanted to lose the respect he’d kept these past years. No, that wasn’t altogether the reason, either. Antoinette Montgomery was mixed up in it some way. Kissing her under the cottonwood tree had done something to him that night, had somehow softened the resolve in him.

  He moved to the door, opened it, and passed through. Tex had been only partly right when he had told Ingersoll he had saved his bacon. Toni had been responsible, also, for Ingersoll’s remaining alive.

  The lobby was empty when he passed through and halted briefly in the swift-falling dusk beyond. Summer night air was good, he thought, drawing his lungs full of it. He was moving, turning south on the plank walk, when the shot came. He heard it clearly for the fleetingest part of a second before the hammer blow knocked him forward to his knees, pushing his breath out in a loud grunt. His mind said to go flat and roll, to get away from there. He went fully down and scrabbled through the roadway’s dust, automatically drawing and cocking his gun as he did so.

  There was no immediate sense of pain, only breathlessness. It was not a new sensation; he’d had it once before, when he’d fought a wild Mexican in Wichita. The result of that battle still bothered him occasionally, a sliver of deeply embedded lead in his right hip. There was a frothy mist forming before him. He strained to see through it. It widened, deepened, turned crimson. He shook his head irritably, struggling to find the peril lying beyond. Dimly men’s voices came, raised in excitement. His head began to roll forward. He fought to hold it up; it went slowly downward despite his heroic efforts; then a wonderful feeling of pleasant drowsiness came.

  “It’s Barker, Sheriff. He’s shot, by God.”

  Pollard came up and stopped, looking down. “Uhn-huh,” he conceded. “Damned if he isn’t. Jack, fetch Doc Spence. Couple you other boys give me a hand packin’ him to his room upstairs.”

  “Nasty-lookin’ wound,” someone said, with much more interest than sympathy. “Wonder who done it?”

  Pollard was grunting under Tom’s weight. He twisted an upward look at the crowd. “Any one of you could’ve done it. I expect there’s probably a pretty fair price on his hide by now.” He straightened up with an effort. “Come on, dammit, lift, don’t drag.”

  “He’s heavier’n a horse-mule, Sheriff,” said a man in grunting protest.

  “Well, what’d you expect? Feller’s got as much money as he has, eats good an’ eats regular.”

  Eleven men trouped up the hotel stairway to Tom’s room. Sheriff Pollard stopped all but those carrying Tom with a scowl at the door. “Go on,” he rasped. “Go wet your fangs.”

  They put Tom on his bed. Pollard dismissed the remaining two men and closed the door behind them. Then he removed Tom’s gun, hat, and coat, opened his shirt, and bent forward, squinting at the hole in his chest. “My, my,” he said aloud, but softly. “That bushwhacker was a fair to middlin’ shot at that, what with there bein’ shadows an’ all. He only missed by about six inches.”

  Dr. Spence entered, methodically removed his derby, pursed his lips, and advanced upon the bed. The sheriff moved back.

  “Right through the lights,” he said.

  “I got eyes, Tim.”

  “Humph!”

  “Get the clerk to send up some hot water.”

  Sheriff Pollard went to the door, opened it, and bawled out for hot water. He closed the door and went back over to watch the doctor work.

  “Went clean through him, Tim.”

  “I know.”

  Spence straightened up. “Who did it?”

  “Dunno. He was a fair shot, though, wouldn’t you say?”

  Dr. Spence’s neck swelled. “No I wouldn’t say,” he snapped. “When the day arrives that people look on shooting more as a crime than a test of marksmanship, this country’ll be a lot better off.”

  “Uhn-huh. The judge’s been talkin’ about an ordinance against fir
earms in town.”

  “Fat lot of good that’ll do, what with the high-powered rifles they make nowadays. Dammit, what’s holding up that water anyway?”

  “I’ll go see, Doc. You just simmer down.”

  Spence tossed aside his coat, rolled up his sleeves, and bent over the unconscious man. Pollard returned with the water, a clean basin, and several old towels. “Everybody’s talkin’ about it, Doc,” he said, drawing forward a table and filling the basin.

  “They have to talk about something, don’t they?”

  “What I meant was, I got to leave you for a while.”

  “Why?”

  “Trouble. It isn’t that folks care about Barker gettin’ shot. They just don’t approve of bushwhacking.”

  “Who’re they after? Dammit, light the lamp, Tim.”

  Sheriff Pollard put the lamp on the table and canted the mantle so the doctor could see. “Clint Ingersoll. How’s that?”

  “Fine.”

  “Adiós, Doc.”

  Spence grunted. When he was alone, he worked faster. Finally he drew back, examined his handiwork, went to his coat, withdrew a pony of bourbon, drank deeply, and coughed. “There, Mister Mysterious Barker, you’ll probably live . . . only I’m not sure you ought to, after what you did to Moses.”

  Tom spoke in a quiet tone and Spence’s eyes popped wide open. “What did I do to Moses, Doc?”

  Spence pushed the bottle into his coat quickly and cleared his throat. “Mustn’t talk yet,” he admonished. “You got a bad thing there.”

  “What’d I do to Beach?”

  “Well, he had a stroke, didn’t he?”

  “You think I’m a magician, Doc?”

  “Mister Barker, I was there when he came around and started talking. I know what you did. He told me.”

  “And that’s what caused his stroke?”

  “I would say it was, yes.”

  “Then he’s got only himself to blame, Spence. He’s the one who wanted to bust Gerald Finnerty so bad he got greedy. It wasn’t me. I just came along in time to help a hard-working man keep what’s his.”

  Dr. Spence had fully recovered from the shock of hearing a man he had thought totally unconscious speak to him. “No more talking,” he ordered. “That ball pierced your lung. You’ve got to lie perfectly still and be absolutely quiet for at least a month.”

  “A month. You’re crazy, Doc.”

  “Am I? Then go ahead and get up, and bleed to death internally. It’s your life. Damned if I care what you do with it.”

  Spence was donning his coat when Tom said: “Who did it?”

  “Tim Pollard said a bushwhacker.”

  “Of course it was a bushwhacker,” the man on the bed said impatiently. “If he’d been out in the open, I’d have seen him. But who was he?”

  “Don’t know yet.” Spence picked up his hat, his bag, and crossed to the door. “I’ll look at you a little later. Lie still and be quiet.”

  Tom waited until the door closed, then explored the bandaging with his right hand. He felt slightly feverish but aside from that there was no sensation of illness or shock, not even a headache.

  Daylight waned beyond the window. By turning his head to the left he could see the darkening sky. Below him, Beatty was turning quiet; it was the supper hour. A soft knock echoed from the door.

  “Come in,” he said softly, and raised his head.

  “Tom! We just heard.”

  She floated across the room. Lamplight made her large eyes smoky in the shadows; it reflected off a rapid pulse in the V of her throat.

  “You shouldn’t have come here,” he said, feeling more than uncomfortable, feeling strangely guilty of something.

  She drew up a chair, sat down, and took his hand in both hers. “If I didn’t come, Tom, who would?”

  He heard the reproach and steeled himself to ignore it.

  “Didn’t you have any warning?”

  “None,” he said shortly, looking out the window at the sky.

  “But you think you know who did it, don’t you?”

  His eyes swiveled to her face. “I think I know all right, Toni. Want me to tick ’em off for you? Pollard, Clint Ingersoll, the judge, Elihu Gorman . . .”

  “How can you say that!” She let go of his hand.

  He watched redness fill her cheeks and under other circumstances he might have smiled. “They’re the ones who’d like to have done it, Toni. But a couple of them haven’t got the guts.”

  She was staring into his eyes with her back rigid and her mouth thinned out by disapproval. Suddenly she said: “I shouldn’t have come.”

  “That’s right . . . you shouldn’t have. But since you did come, tell me something. Does the judge want his twenty tons of hay at eleven dollars yet?”

  She had control of herself now, but the smokiness remained in her eyes. He thought he saw a sob tear at her throat and looked quickly away.

  “Tom, please . . .”

  “You’d best go, Toni.”

  “I’m not ready to go yet. Look at me, Tom.” His head did not move on the pillow; his dark stare was stonily fixed on the brightening stars beyond the window. “Tom . . . ?”

  “Listen to me, Toni. Last night you practically called me . . .”

  “That was last night. You’re hurt now.”

  “Nothing’s changed. I’ll be up and around again in a few days.” He faced her with a quick turn of his head. “Toni, I can’t change. I came here for a purpose. I’m going to stay until I do it. Do you understand me?”

  “I understood you last night, Tom. I know what you’re here to do. Ruin Mister Beach and drive the judge out of the livery business. And there’ll be others, too, won’t there?”

  “Yes.”

  She drew back in the chair. Her body softened and settled lower. After a time she said: “Is it completely useless to try and reason with you, Tom? Are you that far gone?”

  “I think so, yes.”

  She got up suddenly, stood there gazing down at the bed. “Can I get you anything?”

  “Yes. Please hand me my gun.” When she had complied, he said—“Thank you.”—without looking up at her.

  “Shall I send up something to eat, Tom?”

  “I’m not hungry, thanks.”

  “Tom . . . ?”

  “Good night, Toni.”

  “No,” she said in a voice that had to be swift to be steady, “not good night. Good bye!”

  The pain started then. He could feel it spiraling upward and locked his jaws against it. It pulsed in cadence to her steps as long as he could distinguish them, and continued in the same way when he no longer could.

  The hours passed. Dr. Spence came and went; they exchanged no more than ten words. Spence was gruff and Tom was silent. Down below in the road he heard riders jingling past, their light, carefree voices raised in merriment. Nostalgia touched him; it had been good to ride into a town like that, full of laughter and thirst and sticky with sweat. Then he heard booted feet slamming up the stairs two at a time, ringing spurs mingling in their echo. The door burst open and Tex stood framed in the opening, eyes wide with disbelief.

  “Hell, Tom. We just heard . . . out at the ranch. You going to make it?”

  “I’ll make it. When’re you and Finnerty taking that drive out?”

  “Finnerty, pardner, not me. You need a nursemaid.”

  “Like hell I do.”

  “Well, now,” Tex said, straddling the chair Toni had vacated and grinning from ear to ear. “Like hell you don’t. But do or don’t, you got one. Want to jump up and whip me so’s I’ll go away?” When Tom glared in deep silence, Tex’s grin threatened to tear his face. “Just what I thought. Can’t do it, can you?”

  XII

  Tom earned Albigence Spence’s eternal disapproval by walking down to the Queens & Aces Café nine days after he had been shot, and eating a steak breakfast. But his arrival at the Royal Antler Saloon to some extent ameliorated Spence’s dire prophecies; there, he was greeted wi
th broad smiles and congratulations by men he knew only by sight. He bought a round of drinks, sat for a while at the wall table, then crossed the road to Pollard’s office.

  “You know who did it, Sheriff?” he asked.

  Pollard eyed him laconically and said: “Nope. There’s more’n one would like to see you dead. I don’t know which one to start with.”

  “Ingersoll?”

  “I talked to him. I don’t figure Clint’s a good enough actor to fool me. He swore he didn’t do it. He also said he wished he had . . . only he didn’t shoot from hiding.”

  “I believe that,” Tom agreed.

  “He also told me about your fight.”

  “Well?”

  “Nothing. Just proves I’m right. I said Clint wasn’t a bushwhacker. I told the crowd that the night you got shot. I was right about another thing, too.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “You aren’t out to kill anyone for the hell of it.”

  Tom turned toward the door. “You’re getting wiser by the minute, Sheriff.”

  “Just a second!” Pollard called. “You’ve been out of circulation a few days. I’ve been learnin’ things about you in that time.”

  “Go on,” said Tom, leaning on the door.

  “You got Moses. You about got the judge. Elihu Gorman wasn’t around when you was a kid here in Beatty, but you’ve got him eatin’ out of your hand, too. That leaves only me.” Pollard’s steady faded stare lingered on the younger man. “When you goin’ to call me out, boy?”

  “Would you come?” Tom countered.

  The sheriff considered this through an interval of silence. Then he drew up in his chair. “I reckon I would. I wouldn’t want to, not over anything as silly as what’s eatin’ you, Tom, but I would if I had to.”

  “I’ll let you know,” Barker said, and walked back out into the sunlight.

  He was heading for the bank when Dr. Spence came floating across the road from the Royal Antler. He was moving with the immense and solid dignity of a drunken man who was concentrating very hard on walking erect and straight. “Ah, Barker,” he intoned with greater irony than Tom would have thought anyone in his condition capable of, “the damned walking dead, eh?”