The Collected Short Stories of Louis L'Amour, Volume 2 (42 page)

Hurriedly bundling the roll together, he tossed it into a corner. The door opened almost in his face, and Ellen, the freckles dark against the paleness of her face, stood there.

“Oh, Mr. Bowdrie! Please be careful! They're after you!”

“Who is?”

“They were talking out in back of the restaurant. They did not guess anyone was around. One of the men said they would get you when you left the office.”

“Then they saw you come to the door. That's bad, Ellen!”

“I thought of that. If they ask, I'll tell them you forgot to pay for your meal and I came after you.”

“Good!” He reached into his pocket and counted out some money. “There! That'll pay for what I ate and the next two meals, if I should forget again.”

He put the money in her hand. “Now, do something for me. If you see that lantern-jawed blond drifter they call Rip, get to him and tell him what is happening. Tell him where I am but not to come here. Understand?”

She turned away quickly, clutching the money in her hand. She paused an instant, flashing him a quick, frightened smile. “Good luck, Chick!”

He listened to the click of her heels on the walk, hoping she would not be stopped. He watched her enter the restaurant, from which she would be able to watch the trail into town.

They would not wait long now. If he did not appear on the street, they would come here. They had proved themselves to be impatient men. Somehow they had discovered the sheriff had finally found the solution and had killed him. Now they must kill Bowdrie.

Chick took stock of his position. The sheriff's office was separated from the saloon by a gap of about thirty feet. On the other side there was nothing but an open slope.

The building comprised four rooms. Two solidly built cells on one side of a narrow hall, on the other the office itself, and farther along, the sheriff's living quarters.

Bending over the dead man, he removed his gunbelt and pistol. The pistol was fully loaded. From the gun rack he got down the sheriff's old Sharps and his Spencer as well as a double-barreled shotgun. From a drawer he took ammunition for these guns and arranged it in neat rows on the desk.

Then he took up the body and carried it to the bed, where he straightened it out and covered it with a blanket.

Bowdrie knew that in this situation he could not depend on Rip Coker. The Ranger would go through hell and high water to do his duty, but the telegraph operator might be a friend of the Bishops or of Young. He would undoubtedly send his message both to McNelly and to Major Jones, who was actually in charge in this area.

The wise course was to depend on neither. The problem was his, to be solved here and now. Even if the message got through, there was small chance they would arrive in time. If they did, an arrest might be made without a fight through sheer numbers, but considering the type of men he was facing, even that was doubtful. Chick Bowdrie preferred to make arrests without trouble, but such occasions were rare in a land where the border was so near, escape so possible.

Undoubtedly the robbery had been pulled off by Red Bishop and the Decker-Latham outfit. John Bishop and Hardy Young had no doubt planned it, knowing of the money in the bank and choosing the time. Riders would attract no attention on Bishop's ranch, and there was plenty of cover for going and coming.

Due to the sheriff's recollection, Bowdrie knew how the bandits had arrived as well as where the shot came from that was meant to kill him.

The afternoon was warm and still. No breath of wind stirred the thick dust in the long, hot street. The false-fronted buildings across the street looked parched and gray.

Bowdrie mopped sweat from his face, loosened his neckerchief, then sat down behind the desk. There was a bucket of water in the shadowed bedroom, but no food.

Food did not worry him. This fight would be history before he had a chance to be hungry again.

He hoped to kill no one, but he was alone against five or six desperate men who had shown their style in torturing Phillips.

Nor could he expect help from the town. None of them would believe Bishop was a thief. Nor did they know Borrow was murdered. There was a pot of coffee on the stove. Hot though it was outside, he poured a cup. It was strong and bitter, but he liked it.

Down the street he heard a few steps on the boardwalk, then silence. Well, if he got himself killed, he had no family to worry about it. He was a loner. His family was the Rangers, his world was his job.

Ellen … now there was a likely lass. But even if she were interested in him, how could he ask any girl to marry a man who might end up on a slab at any moment? Still, a lot of the Rangers were married, and happily, too.

Bowdrie walked back to the cells, and keeping his head from in front of the small window, he peered out. There was a pile of scrap lumber back there, and watching it, he saw the grass stir. So they had a man out there, too.

He walked back to the office, and at that moment Bishop called out, “Bowdrie? Step over here a minute, will you? I've got something to show you.”

“Bring it over here, John,” Chick called back. “I'm not going to make it that easy for you.”

He was impatient for them to get on with it. He had lain for hours without moving when stalking someone, but when the chips were down, he disliked waiting.

“Whoever fired that shot from the rocks gave you away, John!” he called out. “I know all about that old watercourse now!”

Somebody swore and Bishop stepped back out of sight. Then there was silence.

Bishop was handling this all wrong. He had the total sympathy of the townspeople, but now they would begin to wonder. Why was John Bishop, their mayor and leading citizen, trying to kill a Texas Ranger? Bowdrie had yelled, hoping others would be listening, and wondering now.

In the midst of the stillness Bowdrie had a sudden inspiration. Taking a couple of rawhide riatas Borrow had hanging on the clothes tree, he knotted one over a nail over the door to the bedroom, and crawling across the floor, knotted the other end over a nail near the outside door.

Crawling back, he took a turn around the doorknob, rigging a crude pulley. Then he fastened the end of his riata through an armhole of Borrow's poncho in such a way that by pulling on the riata he could make it move by the window. The light was such that anyone outside would see movement but could not detect who or what it was unless standing right outside.

He pulled the poncho opposite the window, then pulled again. Instantly the poncho jerked and a rifle bellowed. Bowdrie was watching, and when the rifle flashed, he fired.

There was a crash of glass and a startled yelp. If he hadn't hit somebody, he had at least scared him. His shot was followed by a scattered volley that broke much of the front window.

Keeping the Spencer in his hands, Bowdrie waited. Sweat trickled down his chest under his shirt. He wiped his hands on his pants. A searching shot struck the wall over his head, but he knew they could not see him, although given time, they might figure out his position. Bishop and Young must both have seen the inside of this office many times.

He refilled his cup, sipped coffee, and sat back in his chair, waiting. He had two front windows and a side window, and the glass in the front windows was more than half gone. By now the people around town were wondering just what was going on.

He waited, not wanting to waste a shot and hoping they would believe he had been hit.

Nothing happened. Chick yawned. If they waited long enough, the Rangers would be here. Of course, they could not know that. Yet even if he left the office somehow he was handicapped in not knowing the men he was fighting.

A shot rang out and a bullet cut a furrow in the desk and buried itself in the wall. Another struck the floor and ventilated the wastebasket. They were probing with fingers of lead.

He reached for his cup and caught a glimpse of movement from the window on the second floor of the harness shop across the street. There was a curtain inside that window, but he could detect a reflection of movement.

A man was inching his way along the rooftop to fire from behind the false front of the building next to the harness shop and directly opposite. The man was getting into position to fire down into the office. He was out of sight behind the false front but dimly reflected in the window over the harness shop.

Bowdrie took a swallow of coffee, put the cup down, and took the Spencer from his lap. He studied the window and then the roof. Taking up the Spencer, he took careful aim, drew in a breath, and let it out slowly and then squeezed off his shot.

The heavy rifle leaped in his hands, firing right into the false front of the building. A pistol bullet would penetrate several inches of pine at that distance, and the .56-caliber Spencer would not be impeded by the half-inch boards on the front opposite.

He heard a rifle clatter and fall into the dirt; then a man slid to the roof edge, clawing madly to keep from sliding on the steep roof, then falling.

The man scrambled up, obviously hurt but moving. As he started to run, Bowdrie, with only the wide posterior for target, squeezed off another shot. There was an agonized yell and the man disappeared.

Bowdrie thumbed two shells into the Spencer, then hit the floor as a hail of bullets riddled the windows and the door. One bullet ripped through the desk, leaving a hole in a half-open drawer right in front of his face.

The shooting died down and he got up just in time to see a man sprinting across the street. Bowdrie fired and the runner drew suddenly to his tiptoes, then spilled over into the dust. “If you weren't one of them,” Bowdrie said aloud, “you used damn poor judgment!”

He slipped down the hall to the back cell. There was still a man behind the lumber pile, but there was no chance for a shot.

Returning to the office, he stood well back in the room and searched the line of buildings opposite. He could see nothing.

He put down the Spencer, mopped his face, and reached for the gun. Dust stirred on the floor and he wheeled, his grasp closing on the shotgun. Comanche George Cobb stood in the side door, his pistol in his hand.

Bowdrie saw the man's eyes blaze, and the pistol thrust forward; he saw the man's thumb bend as it pulled the hammer back, and Bowdrie squeezed both triggers on the shotgun.

Cobb's body jerked as if kicked by a mule, and he took a staggering step backward before he fell, a spur hooking itself on the doorjamb.

“Two gone,” he muttered, “and maybe one wounded.”

He started to move, then froze in mid-stride as his nostrils caught the faintest smell of smoke.

Smoke, and then the crackle of flames!

Grabbing up shotgun shells, he jammed them into his pockets; then he reloaded the shotgun itself. Testing the sheriff's pistols for balance, he thrust them into his waistband.

Flames crackled outside and smoke began to curl up from the floor and into the windows. Evidently they had gotten under the building and set fire to it.

Outside, men waited to cut him down the minute he showed himself. He might get some of them, but they would surely get him.

Suddenly he remembered something seen earlier. He glanced up. A trapdoor to the loft over the office. Now, if there was only a second trapdoor to the roof, as was often the case when access was left for possible repairs …

Leaping atop the desk, he shoved the trap aside, and grasping the lip of the opening, he pulled himself up. Though smoke was gathering even there, Bowdrie made out the square framework of a trapdoor in the roof. Closing the trapdoor behind him, he raced along the joists, shotgun in hand, unfastened the hasp, and lifted himself to the flat roof.

The rooftop slanted down slightly to allow rain to run off. Bowdrie looked over the edge. There was no one in sight, as they evidently believed Comanche George was still there.

Swinging his legs over, he hung for a minute, then dropped, knees bent to absorb the shock. He hit the ground, staggered, recovered, looked quickly around, his shotgun poised for firing.

There was nobody in sight.

A quick dash and he was behind the Longhorn Saloon. Opening the back door, he stepped in. A half-dozen men stood near the wide front window, watching the street. Opposite, plainly visible in the window across the street, was John Bishop.

The bartender turned his head, and when he saw Bowdrie, his face paled. He drew back, his hands falling to his sides.

Bowdrie walked quickly to the front door. The fire destroying the sheriff's office could be plainly heard.

“Hope it don't burn the whole town!” somebody commented.

“What started Bishop on a rampage? Who're those fellers with him?”

“Don't know any of 'em. Strangers. Somebody said that Ranger killed Walt Borrow.”

The roof of the building collapsed suddenly, and John Bishop stepped into the street, a red-haired man beside him. From down the street Hardy Young was approaching.

“Stand aside, men!” Bowdrie said, and as they turned, he said quietly, “Red Bishop robbed your bank. John Bishop murdered Borrow because your sheriff had found him out. The dead man out there is Jack Latham, the outlaw. Keep out of this!”

He stepped into the street as Hardy Young came up to the Bishops. Where was Decker, the man Bowdrie had shot when he fell from the roof?

Bowdrie stepped off the walk. “Bishop! I arrest you for robbing the Bank of Kimble, for the murders of Josh Phillips and Walt Borrow!”

The three men turned, staring as if at a ghost. John Bishop had an instant of panic. “How in …!”

“Drop your guns. You will get a fair trial!”

“Trial, hell!” Red Bishop's gun started to lift, and Bowdrie fired the shotgun. One barrel, then the other. The group were close together, the distance no more than sixty feet.

Red Bishop was shooting when he took the shotgun blast. John Bishop caught a good half of a load of buckshot and toppled back against the hitching rail. He was fully conscious, fully aware.