Feud On The Mesa (20 page)

After the doctor had marched past, looking neither right nor left, the hostler peeked out, made
certain the doctor was far down toward the general store, stepped forth, and hurriedly came on.

Rufe pretended to be looking the other way when the elfin older man turned and disappeared beyond the spindle doors. Moments later Jud ambled out, lighted cigarette trailing smoke, his eyes narrowed in thought, and said: “They got surprisingly good beer in there. You should have come in and had one.”

Rufe frowned. “Where’s Chase?”

“Not there. Neither is the gunfighter. But the barman told me they’re due any minute.” Jud’s eyes lifted to the faraway tawny barranca where they had seen that flash of brilliant light of someone’s silver cheek piece or
concha.
“What’s botherin’ me, Rufe, is that maybe they took off from town, heading back for the cow camp.”

Rufe also turned to gaze out across the flat country in the direction of Cane’s Mesa. If Jud’s worry was valid, then there was going to be some serious trouble, because, sure as hell, when Chase got to his camp and found it empty, he was going to ride for the Cane place—with his gunfighter.

“Luck might be runnin’ out,” muttered Jud, and spat out the cigarette. He rallied then, and said: “You take the yonder side of the road, I’ll take this side, and by God we’d better find those two fellers by the time we get down by the livery barn, or, sure as hell they’ll be on their way back, and we’ll have to go hightailing it after them.”

Rufe shoved off the log wall and, without speaking, ambled out into the morning warmth bound across the dusty roadway.

From now on, they could not afford to be secretive and clever; they had Tomake their determination
about Chase and his man killer the quickest way possible, and that meant they might also come up against exactly what Rufe did not want them to come up against—a head-on meeting, two for two. He was not a professional gunman and neither was Jud. They were fast, and they were also accurate with handguns, but they were no better than most range men, which meant they were not in the same class Bull Harris was in.

Rufe’s side of the road had about a dozen business establishments, and most of them had front windows allowing someone outside to look the length and breadth of the inside counters and shelves. One place, the harness and saddle works, had that same kind of a big window, but it had been so cluttered with heavy sets of leather and chain harness, fine driving harness, saddlery, boots, bridles, and odds and ends that it was impossible to see through.

Ruff stepped back to the doorway and sauntered into an atmosphere wonderfully fragrant of leather and harness oil and pipe smoke. The bald, grizzled man in the canvas apron at the cutting table peered over the tops of his steel-rimmed eyeglasses, puffed smoke a moment, then removed the stubby pipe to say: “Welcome,
amigo.
Don’t just stand there, come right on in. Don’t make a damn whether you buy anything or not.” The old man’s shrewd, light blue eyes studied Rufe thoughtfully, then made a common enough misjudgment. “There’s work to be had around the Clearwater country, and some of the out-fits stick notices on the wall in here…except that there ain’t none stuck on the wall today. But if you care to set and talk a little, maybe someone’ll come in looking for a rider, and you’ll get hired on.”

Rufe went over and leaned upon the counter,
looking at the harness maker. “I’m hunting for a man named Arlen Chase,” he said.

The old man’s face showed the faintest of very fleeting shadows of disapproval, but if Rufe hadn’t been looking squarely at the old man, he wouldn’t have seen it come and go.

“He don’t come in here much,” stated the saddle maker, wiping palms upon the canvas apron and looking down at the flat-out half hide of skirting leather atop his cutting table.

“But you know him?” asked Rufe, watching closely.

This time the shadow came and went more slowly. The old man was hostile to the name of Arlen Chase, no question about it.

“Yes, I know him. Known Mister Chase many years. Knew him when he first elbowed his way in atop Cane’s Mesa.” The pale eyes glinted behind the shiny glasses. “And I can tell you, son, if old Amos Cane was still above ground, he’d have Arlen Chase for breakfast, and afterward pick his teeth with Mister Chase’s buckle tongue.”

Rufe smiled. “I believe you. I’m not looking for him for a job. I just want to find Chase, and right quick.”

The old man reached and slowly dragged off his glasses, staring steadily. Finally he softly inclined his head. “All right, mister. All right. I seen Mister Chase and some bushy-faced, ornery-lookin’ cuss go into the abstract office down the road below the general store a couple of doors about fifteen minutes ago.”

Rufe nodded. “Thanks.” He turned and walked out into the roadway, looking southward across the road, and saw Jud just entering the general store.

There was more traffic now, both in the roadway and along both plank walks. In fact, Rufe was delayed
in reaching the general store because of the traffic. Over across the road a heavy-set, raffish-looking man was rattling the jailhouse front doorway Rufe saw this, and also saw the stranger turn away with a curse and go stamping along in the direction of the livery barn.

Rufe entered the general store, looked over the heads of half a dozen browsing women until he caught sight of his partner, then worked his way along as far as the steel goods section where Jud had just finished speaking with a man wearing alpaca sleeve protectors up to his elbows. As the store-keeper walked briskly in pursuit of a customer, Jud saw Rufe coming, and relaxed against a pistol case, shoved back his hat, and looked forlorn.

“They’re not in town,” he said before Rufe had stopped moving. “Nobody’s seen’em. Sure as hell they’ve headed back to the mesa.”

Rufe gestured. “Down a couple of doors…in the abstract office.”

Jud straightened up without a word and followed his partner back out into the bustling roadway. Southward, the first shop was a bakery; the second store front had gold letters arched across a window which announced that it was the Abstract Office.

Jud studied the window, the lettering upon it, the front door, which was closed, then looked quizzically at Rufe. “You sure they’re inside?”

“The harness maker saw them enter,” Rufe explained, and pointed. “I’ll go stand down there, south of the place, and, when they come out, you try to get him to hire you on…and cut him loose from Harris like we figured.”

Jud nodded, hitched at his trousers, waited until Rufe was down the walkway a short distance where
he would be in a position to flank Harris and Chase if shooting erupted, then Jud stepped up close to the bakery’s front and started rolling a smoke.

People came and went, and so did the time. Jud had his cigarette half smoked, ready to drop and trample underfoot, before the door of the abstract office opened. He held his cigarette poised to drop, watching intently. A tall, raw-boned, granite-jawed woman with iron-gray hair and a choker-type neckline to her white blouse stepped out and closed the door, looked up and down the plank walk as though she were seeking a challenge, then she turned northward and, with her formidable jaw tilted like the bow of a battleship, marched past Jud without looking at him, and kept right on marching.

Rufe glanced into the busy roadway, glanced at the sun, which was coming close to the rooftops finally, and eventually looked up where Jud was standing—and got a high shrug from his partner, which indicated that Jud was willing to wait a bit longer, but which also indicated he thought they were wasting more time.

Rufe was beginning to think this was so when the office door opened again. This time five men walked out. Bull Harris was identifiable by his black beard and the way he was dressed and wore his ivory-stocked Colt. Arlen Chase was also identifiable be-cause one of the other men, older, heavy-set, wearing a vest and holding a pen in one hand, was very earnestly speaking, using Chase’s name now and then. But the other men were completely unexpected. It had not crossed either Jud’s or Rufe’s mind that Chase and Harris would not come out together, just the pair of them.

Jud leaned and watched, and did not make any move at all when Chase and Harris, along with two of the other men, broke off the discussion in the doorway, and started walking northward, like the woman, without looking left and right.

Bull Harris was silent. Arlen Chase was also silent, most of the time, but the pair of men with him were leaning and talking, one on each side of Arlen Chase, as though their lives depended upon explaining something to him.

The cavalcade passed; Jud glanced down at Rufe with an ironic little smile, and the partners strolled to a meeting out front of the abstract office where they stood and watched Chase and Harris head for the saloon, still with those other two men flanking them.

T
he sun was now over the eastern rooftops of Clearwater. The few remaining, diluted shadows vanished in a twinkling. Those heavy clouds that had been overhead the afternoon and night before were distantly visible here and there, torn to shreds by the high wind that had ripped them apart the previous night. The last threat of rainfall was gone.

Rufe, studying the saloon in the midday sun, was not aware of the heavens at all. Neither was Jud, who had a hunch about those two men who had accompanied Chase and Harris to the saloon from the abstract office.

“Land peddlers, or maybe they got a ranch they’re trying to work off on him.”

The purpose of those men did not interest Rufe. His concern had to do with how much longer they would be at the bar with Arlen Chase. He said—“Hell.”—in deep disgust, and straightened up. “Let’s go get a beer.”

They went up to the saloon, entered, found about a dozen or fifteen other men already lined up for a noonday drink or two, and took a position at the lower end of the bar, watching the men at the upper end, which included Chase and Bull Harris.

The gunfighter acted bored. He had a thick sandwich in one hand and a tall, sticky glass of amber beer in front of him atop the bar. He was looking out over the room. His piercing, sweeping glance reached down as far as the lowest end of the bar, paused only momentarily upon a pair of faded cow-boys down there, who looked as run-of-the-mill as it was possible for range riders to look, and swept elsewhere.

Eventually Chase turned upon the pair of fast-talking men and spoke tersely. Afterward, the two strangers pulled away from the bar, exchanged a few more words with Chase, then departed.

Rufe sighed and nudged his partner. Jud let the strangers get completely out of the saloon before he stepped back and started up the room.

Rufe made some hard calculations. Jud would have to get Chase outside, out into the roadway, without Harris trailing along, before anything could be accomplished.

But Rufe decided Harris would probably drift right along with them, and with a firm conviction that he was not going to allow this to happen, if he could possibly prevent it, he picked up his beer glass and also shuffled up in the direction of the upper end of the bar, except that he turned in midway, just below the food dishes, and leaned there.

Jud made his approach casually. Rufe saw Chase look around as Jud addressed him. Harris, too, looked around, but Harris had already made his assessment of Jud, the worn-looking, down-and-out range rider, and Harris turned back to the bar to hoist his beer glass and drink.

Chase listened to Jud. Rufe saw the cowman’s harsh brutish profile relax as he listened, the heavy
mouth begin to tilt slightly with condescension, with scorn, and finally Chase gave a short answer to Jud, and Rufe’s partner smiled. Evidently the cow-man had either agreed to hire Jud, or offered that kind of encouragement. Jud then spoke again, and this time Chase finished his drink, and turned away from the bar—and Rufe held his breath.

Chase was going to walk out of the saloon with Jud. Harris looked around, eyed the pair of men a moment, then turned back to finish his beer. Rufe’s right hand sank gently down to his hip holster. He braced himself to keep Harris inside—then the gun-fighter casually reached for another pair of bread slices and went to work making another sandwich, while Chase and Jud crossed the room.

It was going to work!

Rufe forced himself to turn very gradually, very indifferently, to watch the pair of men heading for the door.

Outside, someone let off a high yelp. Several other loud voices suddenly erupted too. Rufe could feel perspiration popping out beneath his shirt. Bull Harris, half-made sandwich in one hand, twisted to look toward the door. So did just about everyone else inside the saloon.

Arlen Chase took two swift strides, grabbed the doors, and shoved through, then stopped dead in his tracks. Rufe could not see much past the cowman’s frame, but he saw enough. Several excited men were leading a pair of filthy, limping, utterly bedraggled men down the center of the roadway. Rufe recognized them both. Ruff and Abe Smith!

Rufe felt like swearing. Evidently Jud had recognized the rescued prisoners from the bootleg hole, too, because, without warning, he suddenly reached
and gave Arlen Chase a violent punch, knocking him out through the doors and into the roadway.

Rufe was turning when he saw Bull Harris drop his sandwich and suddenly whip around to lunge clear of the bar to face Jud. Rufe stepped away and called.

“Harris!”

The gunfighter whirled, struck instantly by the menace in that shout. Somewhat southward, behind Rufe, two quick-thinking men, lunging frantically to be out of the line of Harris’s fire, knocked over two chairs and a table.

Harris was reaching for his gun as he whirled on Rufe. No one could fault Bull Harris’s draw. Rufe was already drawing when he shouted, and, although his Colt was clear of leather and tilting into position, the gunfighter’s weapon was coming around to bear even faster—then Harris’s Colt with its shiny ivory handle slipped in his palm, just as Rufe fired.

Bull Harris was knocked half around by solid impact. He fell against an iron stove, knocking it away from the stovepipe. Soot billowed around as the gun-fighter went down and rolled half under a card table.