The Gun Fight (17 page)

But he didn’t try to convince himself. He stood there worriedly, staring at the crest of the slope where Matthew Coles had disappeared.

Finally, he exhaled a heavy breath and groaned because he knew what he had to do. “Oh . . .
damn!
” he muttered to himself and started in quick, angry strides for his horse.

“I’ll be back as soon as I can,” he told Lew. “Tell Merv and Joe I . . .” Another disgusted hiss of breath. “Tell ’em I have to go into the damn town again.”

“Take it easy, boss,” Lew said and Benton grunted a reply as he started up the slope.

As he swung into the saddle, he ran his right hand across his brow and slung away the sweat drops on his fingers. Then he nudged his spurs into the horse’s flanks and felt the animal charge up the incline beneath him.

What do I do first? The thought plagued him as he galloped for the ranch. Should he try Robby first or his father, Louisa or her aunt or her mother, the Reverend Bond or maybe even the sheriff? He didn’t know. All he knew was that things were too damn complicated. Some stupid little girl makes up a story about him and, in two days, everybody expects him to defend his life.

It was hard not to let them have their way. Certainly he was fed up enough just to let it happen the way they wanted. But then he knew again that killing Robby
wasn’t the answer. Robby wasn’t any villain to be killed; he was only a pawn.

Why did I leave the Rangers? He was asking himself the question again as he rode up to the house and jumped off his horse.

Julia was in the doorway before he’d even tied up the panting mount.

“John,” she said breathlessly, staring at his mud-spattered clothes.

“It’s all right,” he said quickly as she ran to him.

“
Oh.
” She swallowed and caught his hand. “Mud. I thought—” She swallowed again and didn’t finish. “What happened, John?” she asked instead.

He told her briefly as he went into the house, pulling off his mud-caked shirt and starting to wash up at the pump.

“What are you going to do?” she asked, apprenhensively.

“Go into town,” he said. “No, I’m not takin’ a gun with me,” he added quickly, seeing the look in her eyes. “I’ll try talkin’ reason to them again.” He dashed water in his face and washed off the soap. “There must be
one
of them that’ll listen to reason. I sure can’t see shootin’ that kid over nothin’ at all.”

“I want to go with you,” Julia said, suddenly.

“No, I’ll get there faster by myself,” he told her.

“John, I want to go,” she said again and this time it wasn’t just a request. He looked over at her as he lathered his muddy arms.

“Honey, who’s goin’ to feed the boys? They gotta have their chuck, you know.”

“They can manage by themselves one day,” she said. “I’ll leave the food on the table.”

“Julia, there isn’t that much time.”

“Then I’ll leave a note telling them where everything is,” she argued. “If there isn’t much time, it’s even more important that I go with you. There may be a lot of people to see and two of us can do more than one.
And—besides—the women are more likely to listen to me than you.” She spoke quickly, submerging the rise of dread in a tide of rapid planning.

Benton hesitated a moment longer, looking at her intent face. Then he turned away with a shrug. “All right,” he said, wearily. As she sat down to write the note, she heard him muttering to himself about how the ranch was going to go to hell because of all this lost time.

“We’ll tie Socks behind the buckboard,” she said, looking up from the note, “then, when we get into town, we can separate and get more done that way.”

“Well, there isn’t much time,” Benton said, looking at the clock, “it’s almost eleven now. It’ll take till quarter of twelve to reach town even if we push it.”

“He didn’t set a time, did he?” she asked, her voice suddenly faint.

“Three,” he said.

“This afternoon?” She knew even as she said it that it had to be that afternoon. “Oh, dear God.”

Benton grunted, then turned from the pump. “I’m goin’ to change clothes now,” he said. “Will you get Socks and the dark mare outta the barn? I’ll put the other one away before we leave.”

He headed for the bedroom.

“John,” she said suddenly when he was almost out of the kitchen. He looked back over his shoulder.

“John . . . promise me that . . .” she swallowed, “. . . that whatever happens you won’t . . .” She couldn’t finish.

They looked at each other a long moment and it seemed as if the great conflict in their life and marriage were a wall being erected between them again.

Then John said, “There’s no time to talk now,” and left her staring at the place where he’d been standing. She listened to the sound of her pencil hitting the floor and rolling across the boards.

T
he two women sat in the front room. They both had yarn and needles in their laps but only one of them was knitting; that was Agatha Winston. Her sister sat without moving, her limpid eyes unfocused, on her face a look of disconcerted reflection.

Miss Winston looked up. “You’ll never finish the shawl like that,” she said, curtly.

Elizabeth Harper’s hands twitched in her lap and her gaze lifted for a moment to the carved features of her sister.

“I can’t,” she said then, with an unhappy sigh.

Agatha Winston’s thin lips pressed a grimace into her face and she went back to her knitting without another word.

In the hall, the clock chimed a hollow stroke and then eleven more. Elizabeth Harper sat listening, her hands clasped tightly in her lap, her eyes on the calmly moving fingers of Agatha Winston. Noon, she thought, it’s noon.

“How can you be so—?” she began to say and then was halted by the coldness in her sister’s eyes.

Miss Winston put down her work. “What is happening,” she said, “is beyond our control. It had to be this way. John Benton made it so.” She picked up her work again. “And there’s no point in our dwelling on it,” she said.

Elizabeth Harper stirred restlessly on the chair. “But that poor boy,” she murmured. “What will happen to him?”

“He is not a boy, Elizabeth.”

“But he’s not . . .” Mrs. Harper looked upset. “Oh . . . how can he hope to do anything against that . . . that awful man?”

Miss Winston breathed in deeply. “It is what he has to do,” was all she said. “Let’s not talk about it.”

Elizabeth Harper looked back at her hands, feeling her body tighten as she thought about Robby Coles going against a man who had lived by violence for—how many years? She bit her lip. It was terrible, it was a terrible thing. If only her dear husband were alive; he’d have found a way to avoid violence. Indeed, he’d have raised Louisa so strictly that this terrible thing would never have happened in the first place. She’d been unable to control the girl since Mr. Harper died. Oh, why was he dead, why?

She brushed away an unexpected tear, looking up guiltily to see if Agatha had seen; but Miss Winston was absorbed in knitting.

Three o’clock, Mrs. Harper thought. Less than three hours now. It was terrible, terrible.

“You’re . . . certain he said—?” she started.

“What?” Agatha Winston looked up irritably.

Elizabeth Harper swallowed. “You’re . . . sure he said three o’clock?”

“That is what he said,” Miss Winston answered, looking back to her work. She’d met Matthew Coles that morning on the way to her shop and he’d told her that Robby was going to meet John Benton in the square at three o’clock that afternoon. After she’d heard that, she’d gone immediately to her sister’s house to see personally that Louisa remained in the house all day. Naturally, she’d have to leave the shop closed all day too.

“What is it?” she asked, pettishly, hearing Elizabeth speak her name again.

Mrs. Harper swallowed nervously. “Don’t you . . . think we should tell Louisa?”

“Of course I don’t think we should tell her,” Miss Winston said sharply. “Hasn’t she enough to be concerned with without worrying more?”

“But . . . what if Robby . . . ?” Mrs. Harper dared not finish the sentence.

Miss Winston spoke clearly and authoritatively.

“We will not think about it,” she declared.

Upstairs, Louisa was standing restively by the window, looking out at the great tree in the front yard. She’d come up to her room shortly after breakfast when her Aunt Agatha had arrived at the house. Since then, a strange uneasiness had oppressed her.

What was Aunt Agatha doing at their house? She hadn’t missed opening her shop one day in the past twelve years—outside of Sundays, of course. No one was more strict in her habits than Aunt Agatha. No shop owner could have been more religious in his hours. At nine, the shop was unlocked, dusted, and prepared for the day’s business. At twelve it was shut for dinner, at one, reopened, and, promptly at five, it was locked up for the night. Now,
this
—Aunt Agatha sitting down in the front room with her mother. They’d been there almost three hours now . . .

. . .
as if they were waiting for something.

Louisa bit her lower lip and her breasts trembled with a harsh breath. Something was wrong, she could feel it. But what could be wrong? Certainly Robby wasn’t going to . . . no, that was ridiculous, he knew better than that. Maybe something was happening but not that, it couldn’t be that. Maybe Robby and his father were going out to ask John Benton about the story she’d told. That was bad enough—the idea made her sick with dread of what would happen if Aunt Agatha found out she’d lied.

But that was all, that was the worst that could happen.

Then why was Aunt Agatha downstairs with her mother? Why hadn’t Aunt Agatha spoken more than a few words to her that morning, suggesting, almost as soon as she was in the house, that Louisa go up to her room?

Louisa turned from the window and walked in quick, nervous steps across the floor, her small hands closed into fists swinging at her sides. For some reason, her throat felt constricted and she had trouble breathing. For some reason, the muscles in her stomach felt tight as if she were about to be sick—even though there was no reason for it.

She sank down on the bed and forced herself to pick up her embroidery. Then, in a few moments, she put it down on the bedside table again and stroked restless fingers at the skirt of her gingham dress.

No, there was something wrong. No matter how she tried to explain things to herself, she couldn’t find any good reason for Aunt Agatha to be there. Not if everything was all right, not if the story she’d told was being forgotten. No, there was something—

Louisa started as she heard the sound of hooves out front, the rattling squeak of a buckboard. Quickly, heart beating, she jumped up and hurried to the window.

Her breath caught as she saw John Benton’s wife climbing down off the buckboard in front of the house and, unconsciously, a look of apprehensive dread contorted her face. With frightened eyes, she watched Mrs. Benton open the gate and shut it behind her.

Suddenly, she jerked back as Mrs. Benton glanced up at the window. She pressed herself against the wall, feeling her chest throb with great, frantic heartbeats. Why was Mrs. Benton here? Louisa fought down a sob and dug her teeth into her lip. Fear welled over her like rising waters. Mrs. Benton was going to tell Aunt Agatha the truth and then Aunt Agatha would know everything. She brushed away the sudden tears spilling from her eyes.

Then she stiffened against the wall as the front doorbell tinkled. She stood there, petrified, listening.

Downstairs, there were footsteps.

Suddenly, Louisa found herself pressing off her shoes and rushing across the room to open the door, then moving stealthily into the hall. As she edged cautiously for the head of the stairs, she heard the footsteps halting at the front door.

“
Oh!
” She heard her mother gasp and then the footsteps again and the almost inaudible sound of her mother and aunt talking guardedly. Louisa crouched down by the bannisters and listened, her chest twitching with panic-stricken heartbeats.

Footsteps again—her aunt’s; she knew they were Aunt Agatha’s, there was something about the way Aunt Agatha walked. Louisa’s hands froze on the bannister she was clutching and there was a clicking in her throat.

Downstairs, she heard Aunt Agatha clear her throat. Then the doorknob was turned and her aunt was saying, “Yes?” in that cold, unreceptive way she had.

“
Oh.
” Mrs. Benton sounded surprised. Then she said, “Miss Winston, I’d like to talk to your sister.”

“Oh?” Aunt Agatha’s voice was still chilled and unwelcoming.

There was a moment’s pause, then the hesitant voice of Mrs. Benton saying, “May . . . I come in?”

Aunt Agatha drew in a quick breath. “I’m afraid not,” she said and Louisa felt a cold shudder run down her back. “My niece is indisposed,” Agatha Winston added and Louisa felt the skin tightening on her face.

“Miss Winston, please. I don’t believe you realize what’s happening.”

Her aunt’s voice hard and controlled, saying, “I know exactly what is happening.” Louisa didn’t realize that she was holding her breath as she pressed her paling cheek against the hard bannister.
What’s happening?
The words dug at her.

“Well, then, you must know how serious it is,” Mrs. Benton said, “This terrible thing has to be stopped before it’s too late.”

“It
is
too late, Mrs. Benton,” Agatha Winston’s voice said.

“But it isn’t,” Julia Benton said quickly. “It can still be avoided.”

Another pause. Louisa drew in a quick, wavering breath, listening intently.

“Miss Winston, you simply must—”

“Mrs. Benton,” Agatha Winston interrupted, “I’m afraid there’s nothing I can do to help you. The situation is quite out of my hands. I . . . don’t like to say it but—well, your husband should have considered the consequences before he—”

“But that’s the whole point, Miss Winston!” Julia Benton exclaimed, “He didn’t do it! He’s had nothing to do with your niece—
nothing
!”

Louisa’s eyes closed suddenly and she felt herself shivering helplessly. Now everyone would know, now she’d be punished. Oh God, I want to die! she thought in an agony of shame—I want to
die
!