Sheriff on the Spot (9 page)

Then he noticed a sheet of paper lying on the bare table-top, weighted down with a .45 cartridge. He stepped close and glanced down at it, read the heavy penciled scrawl:

“Dere Pat. Sam and me are takin out. Its to bad jeth cudnt of bin sherif. Dont try to foler us.

Ezra”

Pat picked the sheet of paper up and crumpled it in his hand as though it were of no importance. Watching him from the doorway, Morgan asked eagerly, “You got a clue, Pat?”

Pat shook his head. “Nary a clue.” He thrust the note in his pocket and turned to the cot, picked up the roll of bedding and slung it over his shoulder. “I reckon I'll tie this on behind my saddle an' be headin' out.”

Morgan followed him around to an iron hitching post where Pat's saddled horse was tied. He helped Pat adjust the roll behind the saddle, asking nervously, “What should I do about those two dead men?”

“Might as well tell the undertaker about them an' get 'em gathered up.” Pat tugged a tight knot into a leather tie-string, then went on in a constrained tone, “I'd take it kindly if you don't talk too much about what you've seen an' heard tonight. I'll stop by the hotel on my way out of town an' tell Deems an' Kitty not to say very much. I reckon they'll be glad to keep the whole thing quiet.”

“You mean about—Sam?”

“Yeh.”

“But if you're going to bring him back—”

Pat said, “Maybe I won't bring him back.”

There was a little silence while the two men finished tying on the bedroll behind Pat's saddle. Then Morgan said, “I don't blame you none, Pat. Whatever you do, I'll keep things mighty quiet here.”

Pat said, “Thanks.” He went to the hitching post and untied his horse's reins. Morgan came to stand beside him, and Pat held out his hand. “I got a lot of thinkin' to do,” he said slowly. “I dunno, Harold, what's right an' what isn't.”

“You want I should stay deputized and keep hold of things till you get back?”

“If I come back.” Pat's voice was low and brooding. He drew the reins over his horse's neck.

“Do you mean—” Morgan's voice was also low.

“I don't know what I mean,” Pat said savagely. “I swear to God, I don't know. How can I come back if I don't bring Sam back with me? I'll be worse than him, Morgan. You know I will. I'm the sheriff an' there's been two murders in Dutch Springs tonight.” He put his foot in the stirrup and lifted his body into the saddle.

Harold Morgan stood by the hitching post and watched him ride away. He was sorry as Hell for Pat Stevens. Like Pat said, how did a man know where his duty lay when friendship was involved?

Pat trotted slowly up Main Street, past the Gold Eagle and on to the Jewel Hotel. He had a funny feeling in his stomach as he rode past the familiar buildings. This might be the last time he'd ride down the main street of Dutch Springs. Tomorrow, men might curse the name of Pat Stevens as a betrayer of their trust. The same men who tonight were his best friends.

He stopped his horse in front of the hotel and got off heavily. In the lobby, he stopped at the desk and asked Tom Forrest: “What did Miss Kitty an' Joe do tonight after I run out after the bank robbers?”

Old Tom shook his head and frowned. “I dunno, Sheriff. I run out the door, too, an' stayed out while the shootin' was goin' on back of the bank. By Gosh, Pat,” he went on eagerly, “what's goin' on upstairs? Won't nobody tell me nothin'.”

Pat said, “There's a dead man up in Kitty's room.” He turned away from the desk and went to the door leading into the saloon.

Kitty Lane and Joe Deems were standing with their heads close together near the bar. Kitty saw Pat, and he beckoned to them.

“You find out anything from Jeth Purdue?” Joe asked eagerly as he approached with Kitty.

Pat shook his head. “Purdue ain't talkin.” He paused a moment, then asked Kitty harshly, “Just what did you say about fixin' things with Purdue when you talked to Ezra?”

She wet her lips nervously and avoided his boring gaze. “I don't know exactly. I begged him not to worry too much. Told him I thought maybe Jeth would help us.”

“Did you tell him you'd talk to Jeth?”

“I don't know. I can't remember what I said, I was so excited and frightened.”

Pat sighed and asked, “How much have either of you told anyone about things?”

“Nothing,” Deems said quickly. “We thought we'd let you handle it.”

“Good. The less you talk about things for awhile, the better it'll come out. I'm leavin' Harold Morgan in charge. He'll bring the undertaker up for the body pretty soon. All anybody has to know is that the man is dead. Let 'em think he stabbed himself.”

Kitty put her hand on his arm. She breathed, “What are you going to do?”

“I'm ridin' after Sam an' Ezra—alone.”

“You're not—you're not going to—?” she faltered.

Pat's face remained inscrutable. “I don't reckon anybody knows what they'll do till the time comes, Ma'am. There's one more thing. I never did finish searchin' through your bureau after I found out you were Mrs. Ralston.”

Kitty flinched at mention of the name. But she said bravely, “You're welcome to finish searching now if you want.”

“I reckon I'd better. You want to go up with me to make sure I don't steal nothing?”

“Of course not.” Kitty laughed shortly. “Go right ahead.” She turned and went back to the bar.

The door of Kitty's room stood open and the lamp was still lit. The body of Fred Ralston had not been touched. Pat stood on the threshold for a moment, then went to the bureau to which his attention had been directed by Joe Deems, and pulled out the second drawer.

There were neatly folded handkerchiefs with perfumed sachets between them, and many other dainty articles of feminine underclothing which brought a slow blush to Pat's sunburned face as he poked among them awkwardly with a hard forefinger.

He closed that drawer with a sigh of relief after finding nothing. The bottom drawer held a heavy-stayed corset and several pairs of slippers, along with several pairs of very thin and very long (it seemed to Pat's uninitiated eyes) pairs of lady's stockings.

He felt around the drawer dubiously, and then pushed it shut with a sigh of relief. He straightened up and mopped sweat from his face, wondered irritably what the hell he was looking for anyway.

Yet, somehow, he was loath to leave the death-room. He had an uneasy feeling that he hadn't done all a sheriff should, that he might be overlooking an important clue.

He moved around the room slowly, scratching his head and looking in the corners and under the bed. He finally went into number 15, carrying the lighted lamp from Kitty's room, and dumped out the contents of Fred Ralston's suitcase in the middle of the bed.

He had been a mighty dudish dresser, all right. Right down to his skin. Silk underclothes, by golly, and bright colored socks and ties. Even a little thing that squirted sweet-smelling perfume when you pressed a rubber bulb.

But there wasn't any writing in the suitcase, not a single thing that Pat recognized as a clue except the evidence of the dead man's dudish taste in clothes. Pat even looked in the empty bureau drawers and the clothes closet, but it was evident that Ralston hadn't done any unpacking whatsoever.

That fact, in itself, Pat mused, might be a clue. Generally, when a man checked in at a hotel, the first thing he did was to unpack his suitcase. But Ralston hadn't taken a single article from his bag. It almost looked like he knew that death was planned for him, and hadn't thought it worthwhile to unpack.

Pat pondered over that theory for a time, but in the end had to discard it. No man would plan his own death, though he knew definitely that Ralston did have some plot up his sleeve when he got off the stage in Dutch Springs.

Pat sighed and picked up the lamp and went back into the room with the dead man. There were a lot of questions that had to wait until he caught up with Sam and Ezra, and he could only hope that they would have the answers for him.

He set the lighted lamp down on the bureau and turned for one more final survey of the room. His gaze lighted on the bottle of whisky, and he realized that he could use another drink before starting the ride to his ranch. The thought of going into one of the bars didn't appeal to him because he knew the questions that would inevitably be asked.

He picked up the bottle and took another drink from it, set it down carefully and recorked it.

His gaze was caught by a strip of sheer white cloth hanging half in and half out of a metal wastebasket by the side of the oilcloth-covered washstand.

He moved over slowly and stooped down to pick it up. His gray eyes narrowed as he recognized the top portion of a lady's white lisle stocking. There was a little black clock along it, with an arrow pointing upward, considered very daring and sporting in the West.

The foot of the stocking had been cut off with a pair of scissors at a point well above the ankle.

Pat frowned down at the gauzy material in his hands, wondering why any woman would ruin an expensive stocking like that by cutting off the foot. He examined it closely, found that it was quite a new stocking, perhaps never even worn.

He carried it back to the bureau and pulled out the lower drawer again, began poking dubiously among the other stockings he had seen there previously. Most of them were black, either of cotton lace or sheer lisle. There was only one other pair of white stockings in the drawer.

Then Pat's eyes glinted at sight of a small ball of white lisle rolled up and tucked back in one corner of the drawer. He shook it out, found it to be the exact twin of the stocking he held in his hand except that it still had the foot attached. And he had been right about the other piece. The whole stocking was in perfect condition, certainly had not been worn more than a few times.

This puzzled Pat more than ever. He knew enough about women's clothing to know that such stockings were quite expensive, and that the ruining of one stocking meant that a pair had been ruined.

Why had Kitty Lane cut the foot off an expensive stocking?

Pat Stevens didn't know, but he had a feeling that the answer might be important.

He stuffed the cut-off stocking in a pocket of his jacket and put its unharmed mate back in the drawer and closed it. Then he went out and downstairs to take the road north-eastward toward the Lazy Mare ranch where his wife would be waiting for him.

9

Riding east from Dutch Springs, Pat Stevens pulled his horse up at the crossroads where he had sent the posse in the wrong direction earlier in the evening. He hesitated there for a time, his face bleak and uncertain. He finally shook his head and turned his horse in the same direction the posse had ridden. His ranch lay along that road. It was too late, now, to hope to overtake Sam Sloan and Ezra on the southern road. Better to ride on home and change horses, prepare for a long trail ride. He knew where Sam and Ezra would head for. Just as well as though he were with them, he knew how their minds would work, the trails they would choose in riding south from Powder Valley.

He could cut straight down across country from the Lazy Mare ranch and it would be a shorter ride than from here at the crossroads to a point where he could cross their trail.

The lumpy moon was high in the heavens, now, casting a golden glow down upon the peaceful valley, limning remembered landmarks to Pat as he rode along at a slow lope.

Everything that he saw in the bright moonlight, all the memories they brought to him, seemed to hold a special significance to Pat on this homeward ride tonight. For, though he refused to give it place in the forefront of his thoughts, there rode with him the realization that he might never look upon these familiar things again.

He kept putting the thought away from him, but he could not put away the depressed mood that gripped him. He wasn't sorry for what he had done back in Kitty's room in the Jewel Hotel, and in the back door of the bank building. He was merely sorry that it had been necessary for him to do those things. He didn't blame Sam and Ezra for what had happened. They, too, had become enmeshed in a tangle of circumstances that had forced them to act as they had.

The dull rumble of many horses' hooves approaching him from the road ahead brought Pat's thoughts back to reality with a jerk. He stiffened in the saddle, and his features settled into grim lines as he realized that it must be the posse returning from a hard and fruitless ride.

He saw them soon in the moonlight, a close-packed group of riders moving at the slow trot of thoroughly winded horses. He pulled up in front of them and signaled out Mark Johnson to ask, “Any luck, Mark?”

“Not a damn bit, Pat. Didn't see hide nor hair of that critter though we rode the legs off some of our hawses. You shore he went this way, Pat?”

“I don't make many mistakes on a thing like that,” Pat reminded him curtly.

“I know you don't.” Johnson lifted his hat and doubtfully scratched his head. “Mighta turned off some place, I reckon. But we looked for signs an' never saw none. What's doin' back in town that kep' you from ridin' with us?”

“Plenty.” Pat hesitated, reminding himself that they would find out soon enough anyhow. “Two killin's.”

“Two killings?” The members of the posse began to cluster around him excitedly. “Who was it? How-come? Who done it?”

“A dude from Denver. Got knifed up in the Jewel Hotel. An' Jeth Purdue.
He
got it while I had him locked up in jail.”

“You had Jeth Purdue locked up?”

“That's right. I ain't got time to explain it all now,” Pat went on swiftly. “I locked Jeth up because I figured he had somethin' to do with the other killin'.”

“You reckon it was the same feller held up the bank, Pat?”