you weren’t. Don’t be too damn’ sure they’re still your men.” “I bought ’em an’ paid for ’em,” Stowe said contemptuously.
“If you think that, you’ve come a lot further from the old days than I figured. You can’t buy men like that. They work for gun wages, all right, but they ride for the man. Right now you’re only somebody in an office somewhere. Mike Shevlin is out there sitting his saddle with them.
He’s rained on when they are, and when they’re cold, he is. I can tell you one thing, Ben, if I hadn’t got shot up I’d be out there with him right now.” Ben Stowe stayed by the window for a moment longer, then came back to the middle of the room. He went to the counter, where the long bundle that had been behind his saddle lay.
Unrolling it, he took out two double-barreled shotguns, Express guns. Coolly, he loaded them. Beside the bundle lay his Winchester and he took it up, checking to see if there was a cartridge in position.
Nobody spoke, they simply watched him; and he ignored them, as if they did not exist.
Indeed, Laine decided, they did not exist for him, for he was wholly concentrated on what was to come; she could see it in his every movement. He was pointed even as one of his guns would be pointed, toward the moment of decision.
But the moment did not come.
The minutes ticked by, and suddenly Laine noticed that Stowe was perspiring–the sweat stood out in beads on his forehead. A slight sound came from outside, and Stowe turned sharply. Something rattled on the roof.
Suddenly, several horses passed by, moving swiftly. Outside, somebody laughed, and it was a shocking sound to those in the room.
Several minutes of stillness passed, and then a door slammed. The telegrapher looked up.
“That was my door,” he said, and added, glancing slyly at Stowe, “I wonder if any of those men can use a telegraph key? That Shevlin now, he’s been around.” “Don’t be a fool!” Stowe said sharply.
“I’ve known him since he was a kid.” “You mean you knew him when he was a kid,” Babcock said, “but that man’s covered a lot of country since then. You don’t know a damn’ thing about him!” The real question in Stowe’s mind was: Where was the gold at this moment? Had it been loaded into the waiting car?
He swept the room with a quick glance. “All right, Red. I’m going out there. You keep these people sitting just where they are.
“Babcock, I’ll send one of my men for Doc Clagg. I’ll see no man suffer, and we shared a blanket a couple of times in the old days.” He looked from one man to another. “Every move I’ve made in arranging this shipment has been legal,” he said. “I wouldn’t want anybody to try stopping me now. I’d have every right to suspect them of trying to steal company gold.” He moved to the door and stepped outside.
CHAPTER 21
The clouds had broken and the stars were out, but water still dripped from the eaves of the railroad station and Murray’s Saloon at Tappan Junction.
At the hitch rail stood half a dozen horses with empty saddles, and another horse had just come down from the mountains, riderless since the afternoon’s shooting. It stood now, bridle trailing, close beside the tied horses.
Light from the saloon windows fell across the wet platform outside, across the glistening steel rails, and almost met through the darkness the light from the telegraph station windows. Beyond those windows one of the men was brewing a fresh pot of coffee in the operator’s pot, which they had quickly emptied.
Mike Shevlin, leaning against the corner of the loading pens near the chute, saw Ben Stowe come outside. His right arm was straight down by his side, which meant that he was carrying a weapon close against him where it could not be easily seen.
Mike, who knew all the subterfuges, watched thoughtfully.
Ben was looking around warily. He was like an old grizzly that senses trouble, but has failed to locate it. Suddenly he stepped off the platform and strode across the tracks to the station.
When Stowe opened the door, Mike could hear his voice. “Where’s Shevlin?” The reply was muffled, then Stowe spoke again.
“All right. I’m payin’ you boys top wages -comlet’s go get him!” Evidently one of the men had come to the door, for the words were plain–it sounded like Billy Daniels.
“We’d like to see you go get him yourself. There’s only one of him, and he’s right around close.” “So it’s like that, is it? Well, you’re fired -come last one of you! Now take yourvs out of here!” “We like it here,” Also’s voice drawled. “We’re stayin’ on for the show. We got us gallery seats.” Ben Stowe turned away without speaking, then he halted. “Look,” he said, “Babcock needs Doc Clagg or he’ll lose an arm. One of you boys ride after him, will you?” There was a moment of silence, and then one of the men detached himself from the group. “I’ll go. I’ll see no man lose an arm if I can help it.” Ben Stowe walked to the middle of the tracks and stopped there, waiting until the hoof-beats died away in the distance.
Now, just where would Shevlin be? At the pens?
Or at the car where the gold should be? Probably at the car. He took a moment longer to get his eyes accustomed to the darkness, and then he walked along the track.
Mike Shevlin knew every thought that was going through Stowe’s head. He knew what he was thinking, because he knew what he himself would be thinking at such a time.
Far away, he heard a distant echoing sound– the train whistle. It was going to be as close as that.
Mike Shevlin rolled the dead cigar in his teeth and looked toward the dark figure of the big man coming toward him. Well, Ben, it’s been a long time coming. Did you ever figure it would be like this? Just you and me in the black, wet night?
There had been neither saloon or station here in the early days–only the stock pens and the loading chute. They had loaded Rafter cattle from here… how many times?
Ben Stowe stepped aside suddenly and disappeared. Mike held himself very still.
Now what? Had Stowe just stepped aside and crouched down in the blackness; or was he coming on along beside the track? He was out of range of the lights, and probably was in the shallow ditch alongside the roadbed.
Suddenly cold steel touched Shevlin lightly behind the ear, and a cool voice said, “I could let him kill you, but it’s easier this way.” Clagg Merriam!
Mike Shevlin had one boot on the lowest bar of the pen, and as that voice spoke, he threw himself back, shoving hard with his boot.
He staggered the man behind him, and a shot bellowed right alongside Mike’s ear. They hit the ground together, and instantly Shevlin threw himself clear, rolled into the ditch, and scrambled under the loading chute.
Ben Stowe, believing he had been shot at, shot quickly; and almost with the sound of the second shot, a rifle bellowed from the top of a cattle car, and a bullet struck sparks from a rail near where Ben lay.
“What the hell’s goin’ on?” shouted a voice from the station.
Mike Shevlin held himself tight against the lowest part of the loading chute, partly protected by the posts of its underpinning. Clagg Merriam was out there… and the other one with the rifle–that must be Burt Parry.
Why hadn’t Merriam simply fired, instead of opening his mouth? And Parry should have held his fire until he had Ben Stowe outlined. It would have been simple enough, with a little patience.
A cold drop of water fell on Shevlin’s head behind the ear and trickled slowly down his neck and under his shirt. His leg was cramping but he waited, holding his six-shooter ready.
Suddenly, from behind the stock pens, Ben Stowe shouted, “Mike! Let’s get ’em! They butted into a private fight!” Just then a gun flashed and a bullet spat slivers into Mike’s face–a gun not a dozen feet away. He lunged from his cover, firing as he went, and he heard the thud of a bullet’s impact on flesh, and a muffled grunt.
Again a gun flashed, but this time it was not pointed at him, and he shot into the dark figure as he ran by with a bullet whipping past his face.
He lifted his pistol to fire again, and as he did so two guns barked, almost together. The first was Merriam’s, wounded but not dead; the other was Ben Stowe’s almost instant reply.
Shevlin heard a gun fall into the cinders, and then he thrust his hand into the cattle car and triggered three fast, spaced shots through the roof of the car where Burt Parry was lying.