[Texas Rangers 05] - Texas Vendetta (17 page)

Rusty said, “Like Rangers always handle things: straight-ahead on.”

Andy had no quarrel with that.

Andy pointed down the street toward the courthouse. “The jail is on the other side. Hard to see it from here.” He drew his pistol to be certain it was fully loaded.

Rusty said, “I’d leave that thing in the holster, was I you. It’s always better to try and talk your way through. There’s time enough later to shoot your way out.”

Andy holstered the weapon, but only after inserting a cartridge in the chamber he customarily left empty for safety.

Rusty warned, “Remember, we’re here on our own. We don’t have authorization from the captain, or even Sergeant Holloway.”

“Any reason we have to tell anybody that?”

“None at all. We might even lie a little if it helps.”

Andy could not see that they were attracting any particular attention as they rode down the hoof-scuffed street, stirring a little dust with their passage. The few people they encountered had no reason to know they were Rangers. Neither wore a badge, for the state had not yet adopted an official design. Some Rangers fashioned their own, most often from Mexican silver pesos. Neither Andy nor Rusty had chosen to do so. Silver was hard to come by.

The stable keeper stood outside the big doors of the livery barn. Recognition made his jaw sag. He started to raise his hand in greeting but withdrew the gesture before it was completed.

Rusty asked, “Friend of yours?”

Andy explained that the hostler seemed to be neutral in the Hopper-Landon feud, accepting business from both sides. “He was some help to me and Farley, but nobody saw it except us. I suspect he’d duck in his hole like a prairie dog if things started to pop around him.”

“I notice a lot of the store signs have got the name Hopper on them. I haven’t seen a one that said Landon.”

“There’s considerable more Hoppers than Landons. That’s why the Hoppers have control of the county. Dick Landon was right to join the Rangers and get away from here. If I was a Landon I’d leave too.”

“There’s not much logical about a feud. Family pride gets tangled up in it, and hate twists people to where they can’t see straight.”

“I don’t understand that. I guess it’s because I don’t belong to a family. Not a white family, anyway.”

Rusty’s face pinched with a momentary sadness. “Neither do I. But maybe that helps me understand it better. I’d give all I’ve got to be part of a family.”

Andy knew Rusty was thinking of the Monahans, especially the lost Josie. He said, “We’ve got one another.”

Rusty nodded. “Two orphans thrown together by the luck of the draw. That’s not quite the same.” He forced a half smile. “But it’s the best we’ve got.”

Andy tensed as the jail came into view. “How about we barge in there like we had the whole Ranger force behind us? Catch them standin’ on their left foot.”

Rusty made no argument. “You’ve been here before and know the layout. You do the talkin’ and I’ll follow your lead.”

Andy had long been used to following Rusty. It struck him as strange now for Rusty to be the follower.

I can’t keep leaning on Rusty all of my life, he thought. But there was still much he did not know. It would be easy to make a costly mistake. He had made several in the course of growing up, mistakes that had brought trouble to others as well as to himself.

Well, if I make a mistake again, it won’t be for standing back.

He did not knock on the jail door. Finding it unlocked, he pushed it open and stepped inside. Sheriff Truscott sat at a desk. Startled, he dropped papers he had been reading and jumped to his feet. Andy made several strides, stopping so close that he could have reached across the desk and grabbed the sheriff by his shirt. Truscott was not wearing his pistol. It and its belt and holster lay at the edge of the desk. He made no move to reach them.

Andy summoned the strongest voice he had. “You don’t need that gun. We’re Rangers, and we’re here on official business.”

The lawman seemed slow to gather his wits. “I know you. You and your partner Brackett was the ones helped my prisoner get aloose.”

“We had nothin’ to do with that. I think you know it. Now you’ve got Farley Brackett locked up here on false charges. This is Rusty Shannon. Him and me, we’ve come to get Farley.”

“That’s easy said.”

“Either we leave here with him or you’ll have the state adjutant general and his headquarters Rangers down here. You’ll feel like you been tromped by a buffalo herd.”

Truscott’s face reddened as he struggled for a reply. “Everybody and his damned dog has been tryin’ to tell me what to do lately.”

Andy had bitten off a big chunk with his bluff, but there was no backing down now. “What do you say, Sheriff? Do you turn him loose or do we go in and take him?”

Big’un Hopper walked in from the back room where the cells were. “What in the hell’s goin’ on out here?”

Truscott pointed his chin at Andy and Rusty. “These men are Rangers.”

Big’un grunted. “I know them. That young one anyway.” He pointed at Andy. “I can spot a Ranger half a mile away. Further sometimes.”

Truscott said, “They’ve come for Brackett.”

Big’un’s jaw dropped. “You better not let them have him. Uncle Judd would bellow like a bull.”

Judd. Andy remembered that was the judge’s given name. Judd Hopper had survived the hazards of the vendetta to become patriarch of the clan.

Truscott turned on Big’un with sarcasm. “Maybe your Uncle Judd would like to come talk to these Rangers. They claim to have the state law behind them.”

“Us Hoppers are the law here.”

“Here, maybe, but nowheres else. You want Austin sendin’ a force down here to poke around? Me and you and your uncle Judd would likely wind up in the penitentiary. And some of your other kin, besides.”

“I say we ought to secede from the state of Texas like Texas done from the Union.”

Truscott shook his head impatiently. “Big’un, I wish you was twice as smart and half as loud.”

Rusty spoke for the first time. “You remember what happened to that other secession. Texas lost.”

The deputy seemed to swell up to a couple of sizes larger. “I don’t see but two of you.”

Rusty said, “We’re Rangers. Two is enough.”

Truscott looked away from the big deputy “I guess we can give up the Ranger. We still got Jayce’s woman.”

Big’un said, “And givin’ her three meals a day at county expense. You know what I favor givin’ her.” He turned into the light. Andy noticed a ragged cut and discoloration around his right eye.

The sheriff snapped, “I told you to stay out of her cell. She gave you just what you had comin’.”

“Yeah, but I’d have given her somethin’ too if you hadn’t come in there raisin’ hell. I’d show her again why they call me Big’un.”

Truscott’s eyes betrayed concern as he glanced at Andy and Rusty. “Damn you, Big’un, keep talkin’ and some folks in this town will peel your hide with a horsewhip. Won’t matter if you are a Hopper.”

Andy had an ugly mental image of Big’un forcing himself on Flora Landon, or trying to. Fighting down his anger, he demanded, “Now, what about Farley Brackett?”

The sheriff gave Hopper a go-to-hell look. “Go on, tattle to Uncle Judd, but I don’t care to have the Texas Rangers on my neck. I’m givin’ them Brackett.”

Big’un scowled. “You’d better hold on to that woman. We ain’t done with her.”

“Don’t you be tryin’ to tell me what to do, even if you are the judge’s pet nephew. Yes, we’ll keep her for now. I’m spreadin’ the word that I’m willin’ to trade. If Jayce Landon will come and surrender himself, I’ll let his wife go.”

Big’un’s square jaw dropped. “You wouldn’t do that.”

“Damn right I’d do it. We ain’t all lost our sense of decency.”

Big’un glared. “You’re a poor excuse for a Hopper.”

“I ain’t a Hopper at all. I made the mistake of marryin’ one, but my name is still Truscott. And I’m still the sheriff of this county.”

“We’ll fix that, come next election.”

Andy told the sheriff, “Looks like you need to move to some county where there ain’t any Hoppers.”

“I’ve thought about it. A lot.” Truscott jerked his head as a signal to Andy and Rusty. “Come on back.”

A set of keys lay on top of the desk. Big’un grabbed them to keep them from Truscott. “If I was runnin’ this office, a lot of things would be different.”

Truscott jerked the keys from Big’un’s hand. “You ain’t, no matter how many times you kiss Uncle Judd’s ass.” He unlocked the door to the cell block. “Brackett, you got company.”

A blanket hung in front of one cell. Andy realized it was a concession to Flora Landon’s privacy. The builders of the jail had not considered female prisoners. From behind the blanket came a woman’s angry voice. “Oscar Truscott, if you let Big’un in this cell again I swear I’ll kill him. Even if you hang me for it.”

Truscott said, “I’ve told you I’m sorry, Flora. If he ever tries it again I’m liable to kill him myself.”

Rusty vented his anger. “A man who would abuse a helpless woman ought to be shot. Or at least tarred, feathered, and run out of the county on a rail.”

Andy suspected Rusty was thinking about Josie Monahan.

The sheriff said, “Whatever else you might say about Flora, you can’t call her helpless. She fights like a cornered wildcat.”

Rusty added, “Big’un ought to be in jail instead of helpin’ run it. I don’t see how you can keep him as a deputy.”

“The judge don’t give me no choice. I have to try and keep peace in the family. Most of the Hoppers think Flora deserves anything that happens to her. I’ve thought about shuckin’ the whole business and leavin’ here for good.”

From inside another cell came Farley’s grumpy voice: “I’d be willin’ to pay for your train ticket.”

Farley stood hunched, one hand gripping a bar to steady himself. He seemed not to see well. “Who’s that out yonder? If it’s Big’un come to beat on me again …”

Truscott said, “It’s a couple of Rangers, fixin’ to take you out of jail. And out of the county, I hope.”

Farley squinted to recognize Andy and Rusty. “Badger Boy, you took your sweet time gettin’ here.”

Farley’s face was bruised and skinned, one eye swollen almost shut. Andy turned angrily on the sheriff. “How could you let somebody do that to him?”

“Like I said, I don’t call all the shots. I can’t be here all the time.”

Farley’s good eye seemed afire. “You don’t try any too hard. When that good woman was hollerin’ her head off, you was awful slow in comin’.”

“She took pretty good care of herself.”

“But if she’d been a weaker woman, Big’un would’ve got what he went in there for.”

Truscott unlocked Farley’s cell and pulled the iron door open. Its hinges squealed. “Come on out. You’re leavin’.”

Farley was unsteady but waved off Andy’s instinctive move to help him. “They ain’t managed to cripple me yet.” He held one hand to his ribs, where he had taken the bullet.

Andy demanded of Truscott, “Have you had a doctor come and look at him?”

“Once, when we first got him here. He gave old Doc such a cussin’ that he won’t come back.”

Farley muttered, “Damned quack done me more harm than good. Like to’ve killed me, pokin’ with his fingers. Then Big’un come and tried to finish the job.”

In the outer office, Big’un watched darkly as the sheriff took Farley’s belongings from a desk drawer. They amounted to little: a pocketknife, a few coins, a leather wallet. Farley looked in the wallet and grunted, “Empty.”

Truscott shrugged. “There’s people in and out of here all the time. I can’t watch everybody.”

Farley turned to Andy and Rusty. “Oscar stays out of the office a right smart, like he don’t want to know everything that’s goin’ on. And what does go on around here would gag a buzzard.” He gave Big’un a blistering look.

Big’un declared, “If it was up to me you’d stay in yonder and rot.”

Farley pointedly ignored him. “I had a six-shooter. I ain’t leavin’ this place without it.”

Reluctantly Truscott opened another drawer and withdrew a pistol, belt, and holster. “It’s empty. Leave it that way as long as you’re in this county.”

Farley strapped the belt around his waist. He checked the pistol and found it empty of cartridges as the sheriff had said. He took a step toward Big’un. “If this was loaded I’d shoot you right now.”

“You might try. Once.”

“Even unloaded, it’s heavy enough to make a hell of a weapon. If I wasn’t inclined to be peaceful I’d hit you up beside the head with it, like this.” He swung the pistol so quickly that Big’un had no time to dodge. The heavy barrel struck just behind the deputy’s temple. Big’un went to his knees.

Farley said, “It’s a good thing I’m of a forgivin’ nature. If I wasn’t, I’d hit you again, like this.” He swung the pistol and knocked Big’un to the floor. He gave the sheriff a challenging look. “Any charges?”

Truscott made a poor effort to hide a smile. “I reckon not. But get out of here before he comes around.”

Andy and Rusty hustled Farley outside. Rusty said, “If you’d hit him one more time you’d probably be up for murder.”

“He deserved it. What a roastin’ he’s got comin’ when the devil gets ahold of him. And the sooner the better.”

Andy asked, “Do you think you’re strong enough to ride?”

“I’m strong enough, but I ain’t goin’ nowhere. I’m stayin’ right here till I see that poor woman set loose.”

Andy said, “That ‘poor woman’ sounded pretty strong to me.”

“Not strong enough to keep beatin’ off the likes of Big’un. She took him by surprise the first time. Next time won’t be as easy.”

“I heard the sheriff tell him not to try it again.”

“Oscar and Big’un hate one another’s guts, but Oscar ain’t goin’ to stay and face him in a showdown. He’d leave town before he’d stand up to Judge Hopper and the rest of his kinfolks.”

Andy said, “This Uncle Judd must be a ring-tailed panther.”

Farley said, “He came into the jail once and looked me over like I was a beef bein’ dragged to the slaughter. I could see why folks are scared of him. Even Big’un.”

“But they’re kin.”

“Big’un has got plenty to be scared of besides Judd Hopper. When the Landons hear what he tried to do to Flora, he’ll be lucky to see another sunrise. I’m stayin’ here and make sure the word gets out.”