Borden Chantry (8 page)

“Around here?” She turned her back to the stove. “No. Was there something?”

“Don't mention it, but I thought Billy might have gone out.”

“Billy? Of course not! Well…I didn't see him go out.”

They discussed it quietly, keeping their voices low. Did Billy know something he did not? He should ask him, but now was not the time. Sometime when he wasn't playing with Tom and when they could be alone, man-to-man style.

“Oh!” Bess suddenly remembered. “Kim Baca wants to see you, and Hyatt Johnson asked for you to drop in when you could. He said to tell you he'd had a talk with the judge.”

Kim Baca…?

Chapter 8

B
ORDEN CHANTRY WALKED slowly out to the street, then turned left and was passing the restaurant when Lang rapped on the window. He went in.

Prissy was there, over a cup of tea with Elsie, and Borden sat down opposite Lang.

“You should be in bed,” Lang said. “I'm waiting for Blossom.”

“She coming in?”

“She's in. She's got a sick hand out to the place and wanted to talk to Doc about him.” Lang looked at him. “Man, you must've taken a rap. Who would ever think anybody'd be in an old barn?”

“I knew there was somebody there,” Chantry said, absently, “but I wasn't expecting to get rapped on the skull.”

“You
knew?
”

“Sure. Trouble was there were two somebodys there, and I don't think one of them knew the other was there.”

“I'd stay out of dark corners if I were you, Bord. Somebody is out to get you, that's plain enough.”

He paused. “If you need help, Bord, I'd be glad to serve. So would some of the others. That way you could get some rest and the town would be protected, too.”

“I've got help.”

“You have? Who?”

“The killer himself. He's scared. Something I've done, or something he thinks I am about to do has him running scared. He killed McCoy before he could talk to me. Johnny was sobering up. Now you know Johnny. He's been hitting the bottle hard, so if he was sobering up there had to be a reason. He knew something, and he was going to tell me, but if I know Johnny, he wouldn't trust himself to remember or not to get drunk again, so he'd have written it down.”

“Or told Billy.”

“No, he wouldn't tell Billy. Kids talk too much, and then he wouldn't want the boy in jeopardy. He would have left a record, somehow.

“You know Johnny and I worked together, and Johnny worked for me a time or two, also. A couple of times when he could feel the urge coming on, he got in touch with me or with somebody, or left written word so we'd be able to take care of the cattle.

“He might have had a weakness, but along with it he had a sense of responsibility…And Johnny knew how I feel about the law.”

“You'd better get to his house before the killer does, then.”

“I'll get there. Don't worry about that.” Chantry pushed back from the table. “I've got to get up the street. I've got to see Hyatt.”

Prissy stopped him at the door, and said, very softly, “Borden, old Mrs. Riggin was asking me to have you stop by. She's mighty poorly these days, and you know she and George always had a warm feeling for you.”

He felt a sharp sense of guilt. “I know…and I haven't been by to see her. I'll do that…today.”

“Now, Borden. Do it now. She's quite worried about you, and she was insistent that you come by.”

“Well,” he hesitated, irritated by the necessity. He had to see Hyatt. If the banker had sent for him it almost certainly meant that he was willing to tell what he knew. Moreover, he did not feel like walking and was not up to saddling a horse. “All right, I'll go.”

As he walked outside, Time Reardon was standing on the walk in front of his Corral Saloon. He took the cigar from his mouth and watched Chantry up the street, and Borden was aware of his gaze. There was no sign of Kern or Hurley, but without doubt they were close by.

Big Injun was sitting in front of the jail, and that reminded Borden of Kim Baca, who also wished to see him. Yet there was only so much a man could do. Reluctantly, he crossed the street to the bank side, then walked across the lot south of it and past the Jenkins house, which was the next one to Hyatt's own home, which was almost half a block further along, and by itself.

Mrs. Riggin's house was a small, pleasant and flower-girdled house on the edge of a small patch of woods. He opened the gate and went up the walk. When he rapped on the door he heard her steps, quite slow and feeble now, as she came to the door.

He removed his hat, and stood waiting, hoping his hair wasn't mussed. She opened the door and smiled weakly. “Borden Chantry, you naughty boy! You haven't been by to see me!”

“I reckon not, ma'am. I been busy, but I was figurin' on—”

“Bosh! You'd forgotten all about me! Well, come in an' set. I've got some of those ginger cookies you used to set store by. Can't make 'em like I used to, but when I had to see you I just put together a batch of 'em, just like I used to when you was a boy.”

She put a blue and white dish with a dozen cookies on the table, and sat down in her old rocker with the antimacassar on the back. Borden lowered himself gingerly into a chair opposite her.

George Riggin had been a tall, thin old man, forty or fifty pounds lighter than Chantry, and Borden never trusted the chairs. They always seemed too flimsy.

“Borden, you're a busy man so I'm not about to waste your time with chitchat. Folks tell me you're huntin' the man who killed that stranger, and who now has prob'ly killed Johnny McCoy.

“Johnny was a good boy, a real good boy. Used to run errands for me, like you done. He rode with George a time or two, too. George trusted him…used to talk to him some. More'n he ever talked to me, even.

“George never felt like crime was a woman's affair, but he talked of some of his cases with Johnny. Johnny knows a good bit of what George was thinkin', too.

“Like that Pin Dover killin'. George was sure it was murder. He done tol' me that much. Murder, he says, out-an'-out murder! And I heard him say as much to Johnny.

“Why should anybody kill Pin? He was harmless enough. Given to driftin', never much account 'cept as a cowpuncher. Tried mindin' other jobs here and yon but he never done much good at 'em. Yet there he was…murdered.

“George said it was done a-purpose by somebody Pin didn't even know. So why should he be killed? George asked himself that question and the only answer he could get was that Pin had been killed for something he knew, or something somebody thought he knew.

“George was a pretty good detective, you know. He had the patience for it. He always said there was no such thing as a perfect crime, just imperfect investigations, and he was determined to stay with the Pin Dover case until he had found the guilty man. He was gettin' close, too. That's why he was killed.”

“You think he was murdered?”

“I know it. I tried to tell them but they thought I was just a silly old woman. And then, when they finally went out to look around, the ground was all trampled up…right up to the edge of that bank.”

She put her cup down. “Borden, you've been working with cattle since you were big enough to straddle a horse. Did you ever see a herd of twenty or thirty head go right up to the edge of a bank unless they were driven?

“It was cattle wiped all those footprints out, and whatever sign there may have been, cattle hooves, obviously driven by somebody, because you know cows would walk along the rim if they had to. But a herd of them would never go right up there unless somebody was pushing them…No reason for them to go. The grass was all et off up there, and the cow trail led around the foot of the cliff where George rode.”

Borden put down his cup. George Riggin was no fool. A mighty cool head, and so was his wife. He'd known Ma Riggin since he was knee-high and she'd never been addled…a bright, interested, lively old lady. When you came to think of it, getting hit by a falling rock in this country was about the last way you'd expect a man to die.

“Did he ever give you any idea who he suspected? Or had he gone that far?”

“I think he had a mighty good idea. No, he never talked about his cases at home, on'y once in awhile he'd say something. If anybody knew what he thought, it was Johnny McCoy. That was why Johnny came to me the other day.”

“Came to
you?
Johnny did?”

“Yes, sir! He surely did. He come in here in a hurry. He said he was wishful of talking to you, confidential, and could I get you up here so's he could meet you accidental-like. He said he had reasons for not wanting to walk right up to you.”

“Was he sober?”

“Well, he was comin' off a drunk, if you know what I mean. You know, Johnny started to sober up right there before he was killed. He was right worried about something but he wouldn't tell me what it was. He said George never wanted to get me involved and he had no right to. But he had to see you…right off. I mean, he was in a hurry, Borden. And then he was dead. Right after he left here.”

Borden shifted uneasily in his chair, and it creaked under him. Warily, he took up his cup. Dover, Riggin, the stranger, and now McCoy…Four unexplained killings in less than a year, and two of them right close together.

“I wish George was here,” he said. “I'm no detective. I'm not really much good as a lawman, Ma. I just keep order and throw a drunk in jail now and again, so's he can sleep it off.”

“Don't fret, son. George thought you were just the man for the job. Said you were persistent, and that was what it took.”

He put down his cup. There was so much he did not know. So many things were more important than just walking the streets with a badge.

Men had been murdered here. True, it was a violent time, yet that was passing, and this town was evidence of it. The dusty streets, the few scattered buildings, already weatherbeaten while yet so new, these were a bulwark against desolation. This was a place where people met to trade, to exchange ideas, to pray, to learn. Even this shabby little trail town had its civic pride, its love of home, its desire to become better.

For death to occur was natural, and in a violent land a violent death was more to be expected than otherwise. This did not necessarily mean a death by the gun or arrow, but one might die in a multitude of other ways, all violent.

To fall ahead of stampeding cattle, to be gored by an angry steer or a cow, to be thrown and trampled by a wild mustang, to be frozen to death or to die of thirst, these were the order of the day. Yet there were dozens of other ways in which a man might die on the plains or in the mountains, and men accepted these ways.

It was customary to settle disputes between men with weapons. The pistol was the most prevalent weapon and the one most often used.

Murder was quite another thing. It was more than a crime against an individual, it was a crime against society, against its accepted customs, its way of thinking. To permit such a killer to go unpunished would be a blow to the world they were struggling to build.

“Ma,” he said wearily, “I want to do my job. If I find the murderer he will have to stand trial. I wouldn't want to arrest a man without sufficient evidence, but I'm worried. Whoever he is, something's bothering him, and I think he will kill again, and I think he's one of us…somebody right here in town.”

“Can't never tell. Way I heard it, that dead man had money when he come to town…Where is it now? You can bet that whoever has it will want to spend it. What Pa always said. ‘You let a thief have money,' he used to say, ‘and there ain't one in fifty can keep it hid. They got to go out an' live high on the hog…All you got to do is watch.'”

“I can't wait. Somebody else will die. Anyway, Time Reardon hinted that if the dead man was who he thought it might be, we might have somebody comin' in here huntin' him. Somebody who would set the town on its ear.”

“You let 'em come. We got Winchesters enough in this town to fight us a war, and there's enough fightin' men here to handle 'em.

“This here town is like most western towns. Hyatt Johnson, now, he was a major in the Rebel cavalry. Sure, he's a banker now, but he's got him a rifle hung up back of his desk and he's got a thirty-six Navy in his desk drawer.

“Blazer over at the express office was a sharpshooter with Sherman, and he fit in three, four Indian battles. Ain't hardly a man in any western town who wasn't in the war on one side or t'other, and most have fit Injuns since they were boys…An' most of them shot meat for the table. Anybody comes into one of these towns huntin' trouble, he's askin' for a stakeout on Boot Hill.”

Mrs. Riggin paused. “Borden, you should talk to young Billy McCoy. Now there's a quick-witted youngster. Like his pa used to be, maybe more so. He sees nearly everything goes on around town, and believe me, Johnny knew something he was itching to tell you. It was something that scared him.”

“I'll talk to him.” Chantry got up, turning his hat in his hands. “You've got no idea who George suspected?”

“No, I don't, but George was a painstaking man, Borden. You remember that? He was not a man to leave things to chance, nor was he a trusting man.

“I mean, George liked people, but he expected little from them. He often said all people were human, all could make mistakes. And many people had a little larceny in them, given the chance. George trusted no man to be free from error, and most particularly, himself.”

Borden got up and moved toward the door, yet something in her words caught at his attention. He turned slowly. “Ma? Did George ever keep any notes? I mean, when he was working on a case? Did he keep it all in his head?”

“Well…mostly. But not always, Borden. And on this last case I think he kept notes, but I never saw them. Like I said, he never talked much about his cases around home. Only once in awhile he'd come out with something or tell me where he was going. Like the day he was killed.”

“Where was he going?” Even as Chantry asked the question it came as a shock that he had no idea…that so far as he knew nobody had ever inquired. He himself had not yet been appointed marshal and he had heard of Riggin's death only at secondhand. He'd been busy trying to save something on his own ranch.

“Out to see Blossom. They were old friends, you know. He and Ed Galey rode the trail together, bringing cattle up from Chihuahua, and he'd been studying about seeing her for some time, then finally decided on it. He was riding to see her when he was killed.”