A Colt for the Kid (2 page)

Never had he seen or dreamt of any creature half so beautiful. He had no words to describe to himself the soft cloud of dark hair that framed and set off the browned, demure face, neither could he have assessed in words the trim figure seated so gracefully on the hard seat of the rig, but he knew it was all breath-takingly lovely.

The girl became conscious of his stare and gave a sudden shift of her head that made Johnnie gaze self-consciously at his boots, then Carlen called him over. Carlen made a
heavy-handed
introduction, then Johnnie stood silent while Sam Stevens appraised him with keen blue eyes.

‘Is that right?’ Stevens asked, ‘you’re willing to work for us for ten dollars a month?’

‘That’s right, Mr Stevens.’

‘It’s not much pay but it’s all we can afford. By the time you get some clothes from Mr Carlen here, you’ll have very little left.’

‘It’ll be more than I’ve ever had before.’

Stevens stared at him for a moment then fished in his back pocket and brought out a slim roll of bills. He peeled off ten dollars and handed them to Carlen.

‘See that he gets value,’ he said briefly.

‘I’ll take him over to Joe’s place.’

As Carlen moved away taking Johnnie with him, Lucy got down from the wagon and stood her five feet two inches square in front of her brother’s six-feet-one: ‘That was a fine, smart thing to do, Sam.’

He looked at her good humouredly: ‘What was, Luce?’

‘You know very well what I’m talking about. Taking on that boy for ten dollars a month when he could hire out anywhere for thirty. I’m ashamed that you should do such a thing.’

Sam pushed back his Stetson and scratched at his stubborn red hair: ‘Didn’t altogether cotton to the notion myself, Luce, but the kid seems to be pretty near starving and in need of a job mighty quick. And of course it’s all right you saying he could earn thirty a month. The fact is he couldn’t. Who else but us would hire a sheepie and I did tell him it was all we could afford.’

‘Well, I think it’s terrible, and that Mr Carlen will swindle him every way he can.’

‘Well, whichever way it is, the kid’s better off than he was ten minutes ago. At least he’ll have a meal and clothes and more meals to come. Now suppose you ’tend to what stores we want while I go along and see Carter about that loan?’

Lucy smiled: ‘All right, sorry for blowing my top.’

She was still in the store when Carlen came in with Johnnie and affected to take little notice when the pair went to the far end of the long counter and Carlen began throwing jeans and shirts in front of Johnnie. However, she was forced to take notice ten minutes later when Johnnie came out of some back part of the store dressed in a new outfit and walked straight to her.

‘Be all right if I carry these things out to the rig, ma’am?’ Johnnie indicated the growing pile of stores on the counter.

‘Yes, I guess it will, Johnnie.’

She watched discreetly as he handled heavy packages and bags with a certain amount of awkwardness but with undoubted strength. He was a boy yet, she decided, with all her seventeen years of woman’s wisdom, but with a few months of real feeding and range work he would be man enough.

Stevens came back by the time the rig was loaded, a frown on his usually sunny face. He helped his sister to the seat of the rig then climbed up himself and took the reins. As they moved off with Johnnie riding behind them she asked the question to which she already knew the answer:

‘Did you get it, Sam?’

‘Not a dime. I practically got down on my knees to Carter, blast him, but I reckon he’s scared of Donovan. Wouldn’t say, of course, but he kept hinting that the best way out of our troubles was to sell to Donovan.’

‘Damn Donovan,’ the girl muttered, then aloud, ‘Why should he want our tiny spread, a thousand acres against his hundreds of thousands?’

‘He could do with our water,’ Sam said morosely.

‘Yes, the water father fought for and against Donovan, too. I tell you, Sam, I’d shoot it out with Donovan before I’d let him have an inch of our land.’

‘You forget we have law now, Luce.’

‘Yes, Carter’s law and he’s scared of Donovan. Oh, for a man big enough to clean up on him.’

‘Well, I don’t reckon to be a coward, Luce, but cleaning Donovan up means taking on a whole bunch of gunslingers at the same time.’

‘Oh, I didn’t mean it that way, Sam, you’re brave enough for anything, but I feel as if there ought to be someone big enough for Donovan and his gunslingers too.’

‘Johnnie Callum maybe,’ Sam laughed.

‘Johnnie Callum,’ Lucy repeated. ‘Yes, some day,
Johnnie’s going to be a very big man. Perhaps big enough for Donovan.’

‘Ah, now, Luce, quit kidding.’

‘But I’m not kidding.’

In his office at the back of the Silver Dollar Carter sat moodily in front of his desk. A whiskey bottle and a part emptied glass was near his hand and the smoke from a long cigar curled upwards from an ashtray. The ashtray was silver, like the lamp that stood close to it. The desk was mahogany, so was the chair Carter sat on. The remaining furniture, four easy chairs, a side table and a couch were of the same richly coloured wood and stood on a thickly piled carpet. Mirrors in gilt frames covered a large area of the walls and a final tribute to Carter’s wealth was a small iron safe in one corner of the room.

Carter barely lifted his head as the room door opened and a woman entered, though the entry of Belle Clancy into a room was sufficient to make most men turn and stare. With a head of honey coloured hair dressed in small tight curls, a generous exposure of a creamy neck and bosom and a good figure moulded in wine coloured velvet, Belle carried her forty years with ease and grace. And if powder and paint did cover a few age lines on her face, the green eyes were still youthful and the mouth full and rich. A man would have to be very keen to see that about both eyes and mouth was a certain hardness.

Belle gave a glance at Carter: ‘Worrying about Donovan again?’

‘In a way, Belle.’ Carter stood up, a tall, thin man with a wispy black moustache pomaded to pointed ends. He straightened his frock-coat, smoothed down the black waistcoat and satisfied himself by a glance at one of the mirrors that his black, waved hair was still tidy.

‘In a way,’ she said half mockingly. ‘Don’t tell your partner anything right away, will you? Make me guess like I’ve always had to do.’

Something of a smile came to Carter’s face. ‘Well, you usually guess rightly, Belle.’

Swiftly the amusement in her eyes faded. ‘Usually – yes.’

‘Now, Belle. You don’t have to keep on remembering.’

‘Don’t have to? No, I don’t have to, but how the hell can I ever forget? Eight years and it’s as clear as yesterday. You and me riding high and handsome. The saloon doing well. Then Donovan came in the place and got into the poker game you were running. If only he’d quit when the running was against him like the others did. But no, he has to finish it out with you in the office, me serving the pair of you drinks.’

‘Stop it, Belle,’ Carter snapped. ‘You’re getting hysterical. Donovan took a mighty big chance when he put all he had against the saloon.’

Belle fought down her hysteria. ‘Sure, he was a good gambler, I’ll give the devil that much. But I had a stupid hunch that he was bluffing. If I hadn’t given you the nod you could have refused his raise and let him get away with a few thousand dollars. You would have refused that raise, wouldn’t you? His ranch against the saloon?’

‘I don’t know, Belle. Maybe I would, maybe I wouldn’t. Anyway, it’s done with now. Let’s forget it.’

She nodded. ‘All right, pour me a drink, and I’ll try to forget that I made you Donovan’s man of work and that you
dare hardly breathe without consulting him. Now tell me what it was that worried you before I started.’

‘Sam Stevens came in to see me about a loan, and of course I had to refuse him. Donovan would have been down on me like a herd of stampeding bulls if I’d helped Sam out.’

‘Poor Sam. Lucy too, I guess. It’s going to hurt them like hell when Donovan does finally squeeze them out.’

‘I wouldn’t have felt so bad about it if Sam’s father hadn’t been a friend of mine.’

‘Well, we’ve troubles enough of our own, I reckon. Those two are young and strong, maybe they’ll make out. Anyway, it’s time we showed in the saloon, things’ll be starting to brisk up, and who knows? Donovan might give us a visit. He’s not been near for almost a month.’

Carter nodded and held the door open for her to pass in front of him. He passed a quick eye over the large room and saw that the place was moderately full. Two poker games were in progress from which the house would take ten per cent, and a dozen or more men were already drinking at the bar. All very satisfactory, Carter thought bitterly, except that three-quarters of the profits went to Donovan. He moved to the bar and one of the two bartenders poured him a whiskey from his own special bottle. Belle, he noticed, had gone straight to one of the poker games and was watching the play intently. It was one of her favourite occupations and had been one of his own at one time. Now he never glanced at a card, let alone touched one. The game with Donovan had been his last.

Hennesey pushed through the batwings and held them open for Judge Bohun, and the pair came and stood by Carter.

‘On me,’ Bohun puffed. ‘Whiskey for both of you gents?’

Both men nodded and the bartender set up the drinks.

‘We had a stranger in town this afternoon,’ the judge told
Carter. ‘Didn’t stay long though. Ed here told him to be on his way and the kid was just moving when Sam Stevens came in. As far as we could see from the veranda Sam gave the kid a job. He got some new clothes from the store as well,’ Bohun chuckled. ‘We all reckon Carlen fixed that and took a good rake off the kid’s pay.’

‘Kid?’ Carter questioned idly.

‘Yeah, a fair haired youngster, about eighteen, I guess,’ Hennesey put in. ‘Said his name was Callum. Been workin’ for a sheepie.’

‘Callum,’ Carter said sharply.

‘That’s right, Johnnie Callum. Why, have you heard the name before?’

‘I heard there were some homesteaders of that name way out on Donovan’s range. That’d be about six or seven years back.’

‘Sure, there was a whole bunch of families squatted about thirty miles east of Sam Stevens’s spread,’ Bohun said. ‘Donovan cleared the lot out. That’d be a couple of years before your time, Ed.’

‘Before we had any kind of law,’ Carter said. He leaned towards the bartender. ‘Better light the lamps, Morgan. Those fellows won’t be able to see their cards soon.’

Bohun drained his glass: ‘I reckon I’ll sit down, gents, my feet are killing me. How about a hand of cards, Marshal, just to pass the time?’

‘Not me, Judge, here’s your man now, coming through the batwings.’

Bohun turned his head and glimpsed the figure of Donovan. ‘Too high for me,’ he muttered as he shuffled away from the bar.

Donovan entered with Stone, his top-hand, treading close behind him. A big man in every way, Donovan topped everyone else in the room and his great width of shoulder
made the other men seem puny by comparison. The voice too was big, and boomed as he called out:

‘Hello, Judge, where are you scuttling to? Come on up to the counter, man. Hello, Marshal, Carter and the rest of you. Morgan, set them up five, no, six. Hell, I nearly forgot you, Belle.’

Belle turned slowly from the poker game she was watching, gave Donovan a cool stare, then said:

‘I’ll have mine over here. Gin if you don’t mind.’

‘Just as you like, Belle, though if you were a man I’d make you step up to the bar lively enough, like the judge here.’

‘But I’m not, so you can’t.’ There was a sharpness in her voice that made Donovan stare for a moment, then he turned to Carter.

‘Something bitten her?’ he demanded loudly. ‘If so, you’d better keep her under control.’

Carter whitened but made no reply.

‘I’m talking to you,’ Donovan boomed. ‘You heard what I said. Keep her under control.’

Belle walked to the counter, a seductive, swaying cat-like walk: ‘You’re discussing me, Mr Donovan and making it so the whole saloon can hear. I don’t like that.’

Carter put in a ‘Now, Belle—’ and was cut short by Donovan’s bull-like: ‘What the hell if I am discussing you? Who’s to stop me?’

‘No one,’ Belle said coolly. ‘There’s no one to shut you up, Mr Donovan, and there’s no one to shut me up either. I can say what I like to you and you can’t do a thing about it. You’re a loud-mouthed range bully with less manners than any one of your steers. I’ll drink your gin because I don’t give a hoot who pays for liquor. So remember that next time you call me to the counter.’

She drank the gin in one gulp and walked back to the poker game.

Donovan turned a brick red then said thickly: ‘Carter, I’ll have a word with you in your office.’

Without waiting for a reply he strode towards the office. Stone made as if to follow but Donovan barked: ‘I can handle this alone. You just see no one interrupts.’

Carter gave a shrug of his shoulders that was significant of something neither the judge nor Hennesey could understand, then followed Donovan into the office.

‘I guess I’ll take a walk,’ Bohun said to Hennesey as Stone planted himself with his back to the office door.

Hennesey’s gaze was directed at Belle whose eyes were fixed either on the closed door of the office or else on the hard jawed, thin lipped face of Stone in front of it.

‘Yeah, Judge. You do that. Keep right out of any trouble.’ Hennesey’s voice was full of sarcasm.

Bohun rolled his bulk towards the batwings, making the only movement in the now silent room. A few eyes watched his crossing of the floor but most were directed either at Stone or Belle.

Belle fingered the locket she wore at the end of a long gold chain, then moved towards the office door, the velvet of her skirts making a soft swishing. She stopped within a foot of Stone then said softly:

‘You’re in my way, Stone.’

‘Donovan doesn’t want to be interrupted.’ Stone did not look at her as he spoke but kept his gaze fixed on Hennesey, who with his back to the bar, had a significantly clear space to each side of him.

Belle turned her head: ‘Marshal, I want to go into the office. I’m Carter’s partner and have a perfect right to go in and out when I choose.’

‘You’d better stand aside, Stone, and let the lady do what she wants,’ Hennesey said quietly.

Stone’s right hand lifted and the fingers hovered over the
butt of his gun. Then he relaxed.

‘OK, Marshal. Have it your own way. Donovan said we weren’t to buck the law. Maybe he’ll change his mind some day.’

He turned quickly and flung the office door open: ‘The Marshal says I’ve got to let her in, boss.’

The words were flung past Belle as she walked into the room and closed the door behind her.

Donovan’s face was choleric: ‘So you figure to buck me, Belle? Well, you know what happens to people that do that?’

‘Pretty well, Mr Donovan. Some gets hounded off their land, a few get killed, but in any case there’s a raw deal coming to them. Just what kind of a hand do you figure to serve me?’

‘He wants to drive you out of town,’ Carter said thickly. ‘I’ve told him that if you go, I go as well.’

‘Which doesn’t suit Mr Donovan at all. Does it, Donovan? No, you’re all right as a range bully. A sort of Emperor, but when it comes to keeping a town going, even a small town, you don’t measure up. And you need this town, don’t you? Need it for its stores and its freight line and its saloon to keep your boys happy when they’re tired of stamping round your mighty empire. Well, I’m just plain tired of seeing all the dollars going in your direction and I’m pulling out on the morning coach. Carter can come with me or stay and slave for you. Whichever he pleases.’

‘And a hell of a way you’ll get on your own,’ Donovan sneered. ‘Do you suppose for a minute that Carter’ll go with you? No damn fear, he’s got it soft here and he—’

‘I’ll be with Belle, wherever she goes,’ Carter said in a tired voice.

Donovan moved towards the door: ‘Then the more fool you, if you want to starve with her.’

He had his hand on the knob of the door when Belle said,
in an entirely different voice:

‘Mr Donovan. I don’t think I’d like the idea of starving. Just what have I to do to please you?’

Donovan turned and stared at her, seeing a light in her eyes that he had never before noticed. It came to him, that with the light of the lamp turning her bare arms and shoulders to a delicate cream, she was a very desirable woman.

‘Just keep the sting out of that tongue of yours,’ he said gruffly.

‘I could try, but a woman feels a lack of money and things more than a man does. This dress for instance. I’ve had it more than four years. Maybe it looks all right to you but—’

Carter stared at her with unbelieving eyes. Belle, playing the traitress after all the years they had been together. Yet there was no misreading the look of invitation she was giving to Donovan or the lascivious acceptance in his hard, grey eyes. Carter’s hand fumbled at a drawer in the desk but Donovan saw the move and read its significance.

‘If that’s a gun you’re after, Carter, drop the idea. I could shoot you before you had it half out of the drawer.’

Carter drew away from the desk and stood rigidly. He had made his play, a feeble enough attempt, and failed. Now he could only watch Belle sell him down the river.

Donovan said, as if Carter was no longer in the room: ‘Belle, if new dresses and falderals will keep you sweet, then get the darn things.’

Belle did the next to impossible, she simpered: ‘Now, Mr Donovan, a girl has to keep some pride, you know.’

‘Pride, hell! What do you want, woman? Listen, take over the running of the saloon and I’ll promise not to poke into the expenses too much.’

‘And be a kept woman again like I am now?’

Carter burst forward: ‘Belle! Whatever are you saying? You
know we’ve always split things even, you and I.’

Belle did not even turn her eyes away from Donovan’s flushed face and as Carter fell back again, she went on:

‘You know, Mr Donovan, I think on the whole I’d rather take a chance on starvation. After all, I’m not bad looking and pretty women are not exactly ten a penny in the West. You got this place by a gamble which would have left you pretty poor if you’d lost. I think perhaps I’ll take a gamble on my looks. Yes, I’ll take the morning stage.’ She turned to Carter. ‘Sorry the break had to come this way, Luke, but I guess it had to be. Maybe we’ll do better apart.’

Carter started to say something but Donovan got in first: ‘Belle, you say you’ll take a gamble. How about having one with me? The saloon against yourself?’

Belle’s blue eyes filled with caution. ‘Now wait a minute, those stakes need explaining.’

Donovan came towards her and took hold of her arms, holding her so that she was forced to look into his burning eyes: ‘I’ll stake the saloon and everything that’s in it against yourself. If you lose, you run this place and the town for me as I want it run. Do I have to make things any clearer?’