A Million Tears (32 page)

Roybal now went down for the first time, blood pouring from his nose and cut lips. He was gasping for breath. Evan stood poised, and then relaxed.

‘Come on, Roybal, that’s enough. There’s nothing to be won by beating you anymore and there’s nothing for you to prove by taking any more punishment. You’re a brave man, nobody will deny that, but I’m twenty years younger and a lot fitter.’

Evan offered his hand, bending towards the prone figure laying in the dust. Roybal accepted the hand and Evan pulled him to his feet. As Evan did so, Roybal’s right hand picked up a load of dust and he threw it into Evan’s eyes, blinding him.

Evan staggered back, Roybal closed in, not as quickly as when the fight started maybe, but still fast enough. Evan groped to clear his eyes. Roybal landed three or four heavy blows to Evan’s stomach. Evan grunted, gasping for air and then he lost his temper.

Evan gave a roar which startled the crowd and startled Roybal too. With his eyes nearly shut, Evan stepped in and took hold of Roybal by the left shoulder, ignoring the two punches Roybal landed on his side, and went berserk. He hit, kicked, kneed so fast that Roybal was probably only half conscious when Evan took hold of his hair and lifted the man’s face up, landing a piledriver of a blow which hit Roybal on his chin and threw him half a dozen feet backwards where he sprawled in the dust. He was an inert bloody mass, though he was still breathing. The crowd, silent during that final onslaught gave a whoop and a yell. Sonny, John, myself and the others forgot about Roybal’s men as we rushed forward to congratulate Evan.

One of the gunslingers with Roybal pushed one of the crowd forward and grabbed the man’s pistol.

‘Griffiths,’ the gunslinger screamed. We all turned to look, the gun was pointing at Evan’s stomach. It was all so clear, time seeming to stand still. There was a shot, the gunman clutched his stomach, shock written on his face, blood oozing between his fingers. The gun slipped from his hand just as he collapsed. We were too stunned to move for a second and then Hans Reisenbach stepped out of the crowd, a pistol in his hand.

‘I know these men,’ he said in his guttural accent. ‘And I do not trust them. It is just as vell, Evan, ja?’ He came forward to shake Evan’s hand. ‘That vos some fight, my friend. I t’ink now ve go for a beer and a schnapps. Vot do you say, James?’

‘I agree,’ I smiled with relief. ‘I thought you said Roybal was a just man, Hans? He’s just as bad as his son.’

‘Ja, it seems that way. But then I have never seen Roybal in any other position than that of vinner. It is easy to be nice when one always vins. Is that not so?’

The crowd was beginning to break up now the excitement was over. Evan walked over to the two Roybal men who now had guns trained on them.

‘You two pick up that hoodlum and your boss and get out of here.’ When the men stood still for a second too long, he shouted, ‘Move,’ and they jumped to pick up their dead comrade. ‘Sonny, do you think you can hold the fort for a while? I sure could use that drink Mr Reisenbach just offered me.’

‘No problem, Mr Griffiths,’ Sonny was pleased at the trust Evan was putting in him. ‘And Mr Griffiths, that sure was some fight,’ he spoke with admiration. The rest of the men chorused an agreement.

‘Thanks, it’s nice of you to say so and I won’t forget what you all did for me today. I really appreciated it.’

We went to the nearest saloon where the tale of the fight had already been told a dozen times and had been exaggerated by the same amount. We never did get back to work that afternoon. The Marshal tried to make something of it but there were too many witnesses for him to do much and finally he was forced to make sure Roybal and his men left town quietly.

Meg was angry when we got home, though I suspected the anger was to hide her worry at how close Evan had been to being killed. Within the community Evan’s standing was higher after the fight and this became reflected in the business. John had returned to New York shortly afterwards, promising to return as soon as he could. He intended to let us know in good time when the
SS Cardiff
was back in New York so that Evan and Meg could visit him.

Over the next month we re-examined our buying policy and the sales of non-food items. Those things that were selling well, like dinner and tea services, glassware and cutlery, we kept on. Other things, like furniture and cheap jewellery, we stopped.

Meg and Evan went to New York on another buying trip and returned with the familiar train load. It was the middle of February and though there was still snow on the ground it had never been really bad. They had been back for three days when Evan was at the bank seeing Fforest and Meg was in town doing a bit of shopping. (Though you’d have thought we had enough stuff of our own, but I guess there is no satisfying a woman . . . any woman). She went under the guise of comparing prices. It was a quiet afternoon, normal for a Tuesday when we had the hold-up.

I was upstairs at the warehouse talking to Sonny when we heard the commotion down below. I rushed out to see what was going on. Three men with guns were lining up the customers and our staff against the wall. Sonny stood at the door watching what was happening while I picked up Evan’s sawn-off shot gun and hefted it in my hands.

Although I was now the proud owner of a pair of gold rimmed spectacles through which I saw the world in a much clearer light, I still wasn’t much of a shot with the pistol Evan had given me. With the scatter gun, though, it was a different proposition altogether. I walked over to the window and threw it open. As I cocked my leg over the sill to get onto the fire escape Sonny stopped me.

‘This is for me to do, Mr Price, not you.’ He took the gun out of my hands.

‘Wrong, Sonny. You’re just the hired help and not paid to risk your life. You know what Evan said if anything like this happened. Just give them the money and let them go. Well that applies to you, not me. Nobody takes from me or mine and the Griffiths are more family than I’ve ever known. So give me the gun, quick; before they get away.’

‘I ain’t arguing with you, Mr Price,’ he said taking hold of my shoulders and pulling me back into the room. I sat ignominiously on the floor as Sonny slipped through the window and down the steps.

I got up, dusted myself down and went to the door to take another look. Two of the gunmen covered the people who were lined up against the wall and the third was making one of the girls stuff money into a sack. I knew there was not much cash there because Evan had taken it to the bank. That being the case I expected their attention to be directed up to me at any moment. Nor was I disappointed. Frightened I was, disappointed I wasn’t – though I wished it had been the other way around.

I don’t know what would have happened if a fourth man had not put his head in and yelled, ‘Junior, it’s the Marshal, with Griffiths.’ The masked man at the tills whirled around. Up until that moment I would not have recognised any of them but now I knew who it was . . . Duke Roybal’s son, Junior.

‘You’re Junior Roybal,’ one of the women customers called, pointing a finger at him. What possessed the damn fool of a woman I don’t know. At that second Sion ran in from a side entrance, and I knew Meg would not be far behind him. Sonny came in from the back and a number of things happened at once. Junior must have panicked when the door burst open and Sion appeared because he whirled and fired, shooting Sion in the head. A woman screamed and the three robbers turned to run for the door. Sonny stepped forward and fired both barrels into the backs of the fleeing men. Roybal was in front and was screened by his two friends. He escaped unharmed while the other two were cut down, almost blown in half by the force of that scatter gun. All this I saw without really looking because I was stumbling and running down the steps to get to Sion.

I was never more scared in my life. He was lying in a pool of blood but when I knelt beside him I saw he was still breathing. The bullet had caught him on the side of the head and though it had furrowed quite deeply there was still a chance. Meg came in, dropped her parcels and ran forward. Typically, she neither screamed nor went into hysterics but instead reached for a roll of cotton, and tried to rip it. I took it from her and used my pocket knife to cut it up. She ordered somebody to go for the doctor.

I tried to stop the bleeding and make Sion more comfortable. I wrapped my coat around him to keep him warm and Sonny got some more cotton to use as a cover for him. Sion was ashen white and though his pulse was feeble at least it was still beating. Evan and the Marshal ran in. Evan knelt by his son, tears in his eyes. He looked at me.

‘Who did it?’ he asked.

‘Junior Roybal,’ I replied quietly. ‘Meg’s sent for the doctor. He shouldn’t be long. We heard Junior’s accomplice yelling that you were coming. Didn’t you see them?’

‘He’s still breathing but that’s about all.’ Evan got abruptly to his feet. ‘Aren’t you going after them, marshal?’ he asked harshly.

‘I’m doing all I can Mr Griffiths. One of my deputies is rounding up a posse right now. We’ll go and see if we can trail them but I don’t have much hope.’ He was a slow-witted man in his fifties, ponderous in his movements and never far from the nearest saloon.

‘You don’t need to trail them. If you hurry you’ll probably get Roybal at his father’s ranch. If he’s left there already then you need to send wires to all the towns along the line to look out for him. That way he won’t get far.’ Evan had already thought everything through, in spite of his anxiety about Sion.

‘Now we ain’t exactly sure it was Junior, Mr Griffiths. After all he was wearing a mask. No one can be sure about him.’

‘Bullshit, marshal and you know it,’ Sonny said angrily. ‘Mr Griffiths let me tell you something about our good marshal here. He has always looked after the interests of the ranchers above those of anyone else because he’s in their pay. He won’t make a move against Roybal until he’s had time to contact him and let him come up with an alibi.’

‘Now Sonny, that ain’t fair,’ the marshal said angrily. ‘I look after everyone’s interests . . .’

‘Shit, marshal, and you know it. Mr Griffiths, remember when you had the fight with Roybal? Who did the marshal try and make trouble for? It was only because there were so many witnesses he wasn’t able to do anything. If he can cover up for Junior I bet anything you like his bank balance will receive a nice little gift over the next few months. It’s a fact, Mr Griffiths, I ain’t joshing you.’

Evan turned his piercing blue eyes onto the marshal.

‘That ain’t true and I’m going to arrest you for saying them things without proof. We’ll soon see whose side I’m on and that’s the fact.’ I thought he was lying. Evan must have felt so too.

He stepped over to the marshal, grabbed hold of his vest and when the man squawked Evan drew his gun, cocked it and shoved the barrel into the marshal’s face. ‘I don’t believe you. Say the words and deputise me, you bastard, before I pull the trigger.’

‘Listen,’ the marshal’s voice was a high pitched squeal. ‘Listen, you can’t do this to me. I’m the marshal. You wait with the . . .’ he suddenly stopped as Evan ground the barrel of the gun into his cheek, saying, ‘I swear by all that I hold holy that if you don’t deputise me right now I’ll shoot you and hang the consequences.’

The marshal mumbled some words. ‘All right, you’re deputised,’ he said in a strained voice. ‘But I don’t have a badge for you to wear and you gotta have a badge.’ There was satisfaction in his voice which quickly changed to a meek protest when Evan ripped the marshal’s own badge off his vest.

‘Now I’ve got one.’ Evan turned to Sonny. ‘Is the buckboard outside and ready to go?’ Sonny nodded. ‘Meg love, will you be all right with the little one? I’ll be as quick as I can,’ he knelt by her side, the harshness gone from his voice.

She nodded. ‘You’d better hurry before he gets away.’

He stood up. Meg looked up at him, tears in her eyes. ‘Take care, Evan, and . . . and kill the swine if you have to.’

‘Mac, you and Frank stay with the marshal until I get back. If he tries to send word to Roybal . . .’ Evan trailed off. After all he could not, nor would he suggest they did something illegal. He didn’t need to.

‘Don’t worry, Mr Griffiths, he won’t,’ Mac assured Evan with a grin.

I had helped myself to a jacket from the warehouse and when Evan ran outside I was with him. He didn’t notice me until he had the reigns in his hands and I clambered alongside him.

‘You aren’t coming, Uncle James. Stay and help Meg.’

‘Nope. I’m coming all right. Meg’s got enough help. Now drive on before we lose any more time.’

‘No, I . . .’ before he could say any more I leaned past him, picked up the whip and flicked it across the rumps of the two horses. They jerked into life and Evan had to concentrate on guiding them. He couldn’t argue at the same time.

Sonny galloped past us and yelled, ‘I’ll show you a short cut, Mr Griffiths. Follow me.’

‘Sonny, come back here,’ Evan yelled, but to no avail. ‘Damn, I’d wondered where he’d got to.’

We kept the pace down until we reached the edge of town. Sonny stayed a hundred yards ahead. Once we were on the country road Evan whipped up the horses and we began racing at a dangerous speed. I hung on grimly for dear life as we bounced over potholes and rocks, but I managed to find time to think about the reception we could expect at the Roybal ranch.

24

We were five miles out of town when Sonny pointed to his right and turned onto a narrow track. We slowed down and followed carefully. We had been going as fast as the horses could manage and now they were badly winded. Mind you, so was I from trying to hold onto that jumping, swaying, rattling buckboard. Sonny dropped back to ride by our side.

‘This road is much rougher than the other way, Mr Griffiths, but it’s half the distance. I figure we got a better chance of getting there faster this way because otherwise you’re just going to run them horses clear into the ground and they’ll be dead affore we gets there.’