Ralph Compton the Law and the Lawless Read online

  It was only eleven or so and all the saloons were still open. Except for an occasional burst of laughter, and piano music, you’d hardly know it. That was Marshal Cooper’s doing. Boyd didn’t like rowdy establishments, and had made it plain to each and every saloon owner that so long as they kept things peaceful, he had no objection to how long they served their liquor.

  Mitch had to hand it to him. Boyd had done a good job of maintaining a quiet, orderly town. Until the Calloway Gang came along anyway.

  Something would have to be done about them, Mitch reckoned. The bank robbery aside, it had been as brazen as anything for Butch McGivern to show up the way he did. Even more so for him to sit at the same table as Sherm Bonner and Lefty. The marshal was of the opinion that it wasn’t by accident, that McGivern might have come into town for the express purpose of doing Sherm Bonner in for Sherm’s part in killing that old buffalo hunter.

  Mitch figured Boyd must be right. Boyd usually was. And if so, then it might be, as Boyd pointed out, that the outlaws had embarked on a vendetta; they were out for revenge for Larner and now McGivern.

  Lordy, Mitch hoped not. He hadn’t shot anybody, but the outlaws might figure he had it coming because he was a deputy and had ridden with the posse; plus, he’d been in the very saloon where McGivern was slain.

  Mitch wouldn’t fool himself. He was no Sherm Bonner. When it came to unlimbering his six-shooter, he was molasses. As for shooting, he could hit the broad side of a barn if the barn wasn’t more than twenty feet away.

  Up ahead, a batwing creaked and a man came out with his arm over a dove’s shoulders. They turned the other way and went off whispering and snuggling.

  Mitch envied him. He was too shy to dally with a dove. Shy, and not a little afraid. Women had always scared him, in part because they were so different, and in part because he could never figure out what went through their heads.

  He came to a pitch-black alley and glanced down it. He was still thinking about how strange women were, so he was slow to react at the sound of a metallic click. It sounded like a gun hammer being cocked, but who would be cocking a revolver in an alley in the middle of town so late at night? Then he remembered the marshal’s suspicion about McGivern and how the outlaws might seek revenge. He stiffened in sudden alarm as the dark flared with the flash of a gunshot.

  Pain seared Mitch’s side. Clutching himself, he fell against the wall and clumsily fumbled for his revolver. He heard another click and dropped to his knees a heartbeat before a second shot boomed. The lead blistered the air above his head. By then he had his six-shooter out. He fired at where the flash had been, but his hand was shaking so badly, he’d be lucky to have hit the assassin. Boots pounded, and he thought he glimpsed someone running out the far end of the alley. He fired again to discourage them from returning.

  Shouts erupted up and down Main Street. People spilled from the saloons and yelled back and forth, wanting to know who was shooting, and why.

  Mitch struggled to stand. His left hand, where it was pressed to his ribs, was wet with what could only be blood. Feeling light-headed, he staggered into the street and managed to take half a dozen faltering steps before he collapsed onto his side.

  Another yell brought help on the run.

  His teeth gritted against the pain, Mitch was aware of faces over him, and caught snatches of talk.

  “Why, it’s Deputy Mitchell!”

  “. . . been shot!”

  “. . . fetch the doc!”

  “Fetch the marshal too.”

  A strong hand was slid behind Mitch’s back and he was helped to sit up. He recognized the man holding him, the bartender from the Daisy Mae. “Floyd?”

  “Stay still. The sawbones and Coop will be here soon.”

  “Someone shot me,” Mitch gasped.

  “Did you see who?” Floyd asked.

  “Too dark,” Mitch said weakly. He closed his eyes and would have drifted off, but Floyd shook him.

  “Don’t pass out. Stay with us until the doc gets here.”

  “I don’t feel good,” Mitch said.

  “People usually don’t when they’re shot,” Floyd replied. He was carefully prying at Mitch’s shirt. “You might be in luck. Looks as if it only nicked you.”

  “I don’t feel nicked,” Mitch said. “I feel worse.”

  “Stay with us.”

  Mitch swallowed, and tried. There had to be twenty to thirty people around him by now, all gawking for a look-see. He wanted to tell them to go away and leave him be, but he couldn’t find the energy. His ears were working fine, though, and he heard the next comment.

  “You know who did this, don’t you?”

  “The nerve of those owl-hoots,” someone else said. “Shootin’ somebody as harmless as him.”

  Mitch objected to being called harmless, but he was too weak to argue about it. All he wanted was to sleep, but each time he closed his eyes for more than a few seconds, the bartender shook him.

  Mitch’s head was spinning and everything was a blur when a commotion ensued. Someone gripped his wrist and fingers were pressed to a vein to feel his pulse. “Doc?”

  “It’s me, yes.”

  A hand loosened Mitch’s shirt. “Should you do that out here in the street?” he asked, worried more about being undressed in front of the women present than about the severity of his wound.

  “Hush, Deputy. Leave this to me.”

  Mitch relaxed a little. The town physician was Tom Willowby, fresh out of medical school and as sharp as a razor. Willowby had impressed everybody by saving the life of a miner caught in a cave-in and nearly crushed. Everyone thought the miner was a goner, but Willowby performed over six hours of surgery that saved the miner’s life and let him walk again. “Someone shot me.”

  “He keeps sayin’ that,” Floyd said.

  “The deputy is in shock,” Doc Willowby said. “We must get him to my office. If you and several others will be kind enough to carry him, I believe I can have him back on his feet in no time. The wound appears to be minor.”

  “That’s what I told him,” Floyd replied.

  “He was lucky,” Doc Willowby said.

  “I don’t know what’s lucky about bein’ shot,” Mitch disagreed. “It hurts like the dickens and I’ve lost a lot of blood.”

  “Not as much as you might think,” Willowby said. “Now let’s get to it, men. Each of you take an arm and a leg.”

  Mitch’s stomach tried to crawl out his gullet as he was jostled and lifted. Everything around him went dark and he had to struggle to say, “Doc? Is it all right if I pass out? That darn Floyd wouldn’t let me.”

  “Be my guest,” Willowby replied. “It can’t do any harm.”

  “Thank God,” Mitch said, and sank into nothingness.

  • • •

  Marshal Boyd Cooper had a lot on his mind.

  The morning after the attempt on Deputy Mitchell’s life, Boyd was at his desk, deep in thought, when the office door opened and in came Harvey Dale.

  “Mornin’,” the former scout said. “I just heard about the boy.”

  Time and again, both Boyd and Hugo had asked Dale not to call Hugo that. A twenty-year-old wasn’t a “boy.” This time Boyd let it go, and responded, “The doc says he’s recovering nicely, to use the doc’s own words. It took eleven stitches and Hugo will be hurting for a couple of weeks, but after that he’ll be good as new.”

  Dale claimed a chair by the desk. “Provided those buzzards let him be, you mean.”

  “We don’t know it was them,” Boyd said.

  “Who else? You’re the one who warned everyone they’d be out for our hides. And you were right.”

  “What are you doin’ here, Harve?” Boyd asked. He preferred to be alone at the moment.

  “With Mitch laid up, I figured you’d want me to work more hours,” Dale said. �
�Plus, we need to stick together now that we’re bein’ hunted.”

  “I wouldn’t say that,” Boyd said.

  “What else would you call it when someone is out to plant you?”

  “That was just a guess on my part. Sherm Bonner told me that McGivern didn’t seem to know who they were when he sat down with Sherm and Lefty.”

  “What happened to Mitch proves it was a good guess,” Dale said, “which brings me to somethin’ else we need to talk about.”

  “I’m listenin’.”

  “General Custer used to say that the best tactic in a war was to ride to the sound of the guns. . . .”

  Boyd held up a hand to stop him. “Custer is dead. He and his command were wiped out at the Little Bighorn.”

  “You reckon I don’t know that? I scouted for him for a while on the Plains, and the man impressed the hell out of me.”

  “All right,” Boyd said, “but how does ridin’ to the guns help us here?”

  “Custer didn’t wait for an enemy to come to him. He went to the enemy. We should do the same thing.”

  “How, exactly, since we have no idea where the outlaws hole up?”

  “We will if you’ll let me go out after them. Instead of them huntin’ us, we’ll hunt them.”

  “Go after Cestus Calloway and his pack of lawbreakers by your lonesome?”

  “I’m not aimin’ to tangle with them, only to find them,” Harvey Dale said. “Once I do, I’ll fan the breeze back here and you can rustle up a posse and we’ll put an end to their shenanigans.”

  “It’s too dangerous.”

  “More so than huntin’ the Sioux? Hell, Cestus Calloway doesn’t worry me any. The one hunter and tracker they had, old Ben Larner, is dead. The rest are no-account.”

  “I wouldn’t say that about the Attica Kid.”

  “So he’s quick with a pistol. What else can he do?”

  “Don’t forget Mad Dog Hanks and Cockeye. They’ve each killed more than a few between them.”

  “They don’t worry me any either,” Dale said. “I’d have to get close for them or the Kid to drop me, and with my spyglass I don’t need to.”

  “I don’t know,” Boyd said. Secretly he liked the idea, but the old scout would be taking a terrible risk. “Let me ponder on it some.”

  “Don’t take too long,” Dale advised. “If they are out to get us, they’ll try again real soon. And next time it could be you or me they come after.” Rising, he leaned on the desk. “Now, how about that extra work. Do you want my help or not?”

  Boyd did have a use for him. “Can you hold down the fort for me while I pay someone a visit?”

  “Take as long as you want. I’ll keep a close watch on things.”

  Boyd wasn’t expecting trouble that early in the day. He could make it out to the Wilson Farm and back again without anyone the wiser. “I shouldn’t be more than an hour or two,” he said as he stood. In his eagerness he was half out the door when he realized Dale was talking to him. “What was that?”

  “Tell her howdy for me,” Dale said, chuckling.

  “Who?”

  “Marshal, most everybody in town knows you’re sweet on Sam’s sister. You’ve been spendin’ a lot of time at their farm and it ain’t to milk their cows.”

  “Damn gossips,” Boyd said. “Who did you hear it from?”

  “Sam himself. I was at the saloon and he stopped in and mentioned how happy he was that you and his sis are makin’ cow eyes at each other.”

  “Cow eyes, my ass.”

  “What are you mad about? His sis is a right fine lady. You ask me, you’re gettin’ the better of the deal.”

  “I didn’t ask,” Boyd said, “and I’ll thank you to keep your opinions of her to yourself.” He left before his anger got the better of him. He’d wanted to keep his relationship with Cecelia a secret in case it didn’t work out. One never knew about those things.

  The street was busy at that hour of the day. A buckboard clattered by as Boyd stepped around the hitch rail and forked leather. Smiling and nodding at people he knew, he headed south on Second Street and was soon beyond the town limits. Fields and forest spread before him, with stark peaks in the distance.

  Boyd was so annoyed at Sam that he didn’t think to look over his shoulder until he’d gone pretty near a quarter of a mile. When he did, he received a shock.

  He was being followed.

  Chapter 11

  Boyd wanted to kick himself for not noticing sooner. He told himself that it might be someone bound for a mine or an outlying ranch, or perhaps going up into the mountains to hunt. But it made him suspicious, the way the rider hung back, pacing him.

  To test his hunch, Boyd slowed. The rider slowed too. Boyd brought his chestnut to a fast walk. The rider did the same.

  There could be no doubt about it. He was being followed.

  Boyd never imagined the outlaws would be so brazen. First they’d tried to kill Sherm Bonner and Mitch, and now they were out to do him in.

  It must be because of Larner, Boyd reasoned. He’d never heard of outlaws on a vendetta before, but that was what it must be. He and some of his posse had been marked for death.

  Well, the outlaws wouldn’t find it easy, he vowed.

  Yonder was a bend in the road. Boyd tapped his spurs and trotted around it. Once he was out of sight of his shadow, he slowed and veered into the woods. Drawing his six-shooter, he waited. He would accost the rider and demand to know who he was and why he was there.

  Tense seconds crawled into minutes.

  The rider didn’t appear.

  Puzzled, Boyd broke cover and went back around the bend. The road was empty. “What the blazes?” he blurted. Had the rider suspected what he was up to, and left the road for the forest?

  Jamming his revolver into his holster, Boyd continued on. He didn’t like playing cat and mouse when he was the mouse. Then again, there could be a perfectly logical explanation. He just couldn’t think of it.

  The Wilson farmhouse came into sight, and Boyd smiled. Cecelia would help take his mind off his troubles. He liked being in her company so much it spooked him sometimes. He’d never felt so at ease with a woman.

  He liked so much about her. Her calm nature. How her eyes sparkled when she laughed. How she did her hair. How she carried herself. Living with a woman like her would make every day special.

  Living with? Boyd thought, and chuckled. He was getting ahead of himself. They were courting, nothing more. Maybe something would come of it and maybe not.

  Boyd shifted in his saddle and scanned the road before he went to the door to knock. There was still no sign of the other rider.

  Boyd smiled as the door opened, then said, “Oh. It’s you.”

  “Sorry to disappoint you,” Sam Wilson said, and laughed. Stepping aside, he motioned. “Come on in. She’s in the parlor, sewing.”

  Removing his hat, Boyd entered.

  “How is Mitch doin’?”

  “The doc says he can come back to work in a few days.”

  “Good,” Sam said. “If you need any help until then, you have only to let me know.”

  “I thank you,” Boyd replied. “Harve is helpin’ me hold down the fort, but I’ll keep it in mind.”

  Cecelia smiled on seeing him, and came off the settee with such grace, and looking so beautiful it brought a lump to Boyd’s throat. She hugged him, and he grew warm inside. “Are you all right?”

  Boyd had to cough to say, “Never better.”

  Sam excused himself and went to the kitchen.

  “Have a seat, if you would,” Cecelia said, returning to the settee. “This is an unexpected treat. You don’t usually pay me a visit so early in the day.”

  “It’s this outlaw business,” Boyd confessed as he roosted. “I just wanted to get away for a while.”

 
“And I am your excuse?” Cecelia teased.

  “You’re a lot more than that.”

  “I hope so,” Cecelia said. “After the other night on the porch.”

  Boyd coughed a second time. He was comfortable around her except when it came to that. Or, rather, talking about it. “You have awful sweet lips.”

  “Why, Boyd Cooper, my blushes,” Cecelia said, and laughed.

  Boyd was sure he was blushing himself. To get her off that track, he mentioned how Deputy Mitchell was improving, and that Harvey Dale wanted to track the outlaws to their lair.

  “Do you think he can?” Cecelia asked.

  “If anyone, could, it’s Harve,” Boyd said. “He’s the best at readin’ sign I’ve ever come across.”

  “Then perhaps you should let him. It would be wonderful to rid the territory of those evil men, don’t you think?”

  Boyd couldn’t agree more, and said so.

  “I only ask that when it comes to confronting them, you be careful. I’ve grown quite fond of you, Boyd Cooper, and it would distress me greatly if something were to happen to you.”

  “I am bein’ careful,” Boyd assured her, and he went on to tell how he thought he’d been followed, and his ruse to catch the man at it.

  Cecelia’s brow puckered. “You say this rider disappeared?”

  Boyd nodded. “He probably guessed what I was up to and went into the trees. Searchin’ for him would have been pointless. I’m not the tracker Dale is.”

  “So you came on here?”

  “Where else?” Boyd said, and grinned.

  “You don’t see it, do you?”

  “See what?” Boyd said.

  “If he was still following you, you led him right to our farm.”

  “The outlaws aren’t after Sam or you.” Boyd sought to put any unease she felt at rest. “They’re after me.” But even as he said it, he felt an unease of his own. He remembered that other time he thought he’d been followed. Nothing ever came of it, but that it had happened again was worrisome.

  “I suppose you’re right,” Cecelia said. “They would be foolish to harm a woman. It would cause a public outrage. But I worry about Sam. He was with you that day Larner was shot.”