Slip Gun (21 page)

Anger sent a red flush rising
through Yorck
’s pallid cheeks as he forced himself to admit that,
despite his legal training, he had been outmaneuvered by Smith. On
hearing of the agitators’ arrest, he had come along expecting an
easy time and no great difficulty in enforcing his will upon the
peace officers. Instead, he had been out-talked and forced into a
corner. Against Marshal Caster and his deputies, Yorck would have
held a powerful weapon. Such tactics would avail him nothing when
dealing with the men who stood around the desk. None of them had
anything to lose if he should bring pressure to bear and cause
their dismissal. So he could only yield and comply with Smith’s
suggestion.

‘
Why
didn’t you hit him with one of those fancy rulings you spout, Wax?’
Frith inquired, after Yorck had departed with Ottaway and
Jeffreys.

‘
I only
use them on folks who don’t know better, but won’t be likely to
admit it,’ Smith replied. ‘You can bet a son-of-a-bitch like him
knows every damned law and ruling, Federal or local.’

‘
You
sure got him all turned about and which-ways,’ Frith stated,
grinning with admiration. ‘Say. Just what kind of game’ve we got
sat in on?’

Hooking a boot up on to the
desk, Smith told the burly man why Wil wanted them in town instead
of her regular officers. Although he felt sure that Frith could be
trusted, he made no
mention of the display of jewelry which would be arriving.
That had been Wil Jeffreys’ secret and Smith figured that she
should be the one to make the news of it public. One thing was
certain. After the fight with Lily Shivers, the lady mayor was in
no condition to carry out her duties that day.

‘
Have
you found out who slashed your girths?’ Frith inquired.

‘
Nope,’
Smith admitted. ‘Except that it was somebody who didn’t want me
getting here ahead of him—or her.’

‘
Lily?’
Frith suggested.

‘
It
could be. Her and the mayor’ve one helluva hate for each other,’
Smith replied ‘And I ran into a fuss in her place this
morning.’

‘
So
Ottaway told me. But the Sheppey boys’ve been putting word around
that they aimed to make wolf-bait of you first time seeing. It
could’ve been chance they was in the Bull. Or they might’ve figured
you travelling up with Lily, you’d get good enough friends to go
visit her and wouldn’t be expecting trouble.’

‘
Like I
said, Ric, Lily and Miss Jeffreys hate each other. They locked
horns tooth-and-claw this afternoon over a new sign— Hell, no.
Lily’d already had that sign busted and burned. So why the hell did
they fight?’

‘
Who
won?’

‘
Miss
Jeffreys, looked like,’ Smith answered. ‘Only there’d be nothing
for them to fight over. Damn it! There’re questions that need
answers and the two gals who can give them’ll not be able to afore
morning at the earliest.’

‘
One
thing’s for sure,’ Frith said. ‘Somebody don’t want us here.
They’ve tried to gun both you and me down. How about
Ottaway?’

‘
If
they have, he hasn’t mentioned it to me,’ Smith replied. ‘’Course,
him and me’ve never been what you’d call
bueno amigos.’

‘
I
wouldn’t. I only speak French, German and good old U.S.,’ Frith
replied. ‘Maybe we should ask him. Trouble is, I’m not sworn in
yet.’

‘
I’m
taking you on,’ Smith declared. ‘But you’ll likely have to wait
until morning to talk money with Miss Jeffreys.’

‘
What
brought Yorck down on us?’ Frith inquired, apparently accepting the
situation and satisfied that he would find the conditions of
employment suitable.

Smith explained about the
meeting and the two young men
’s abortive attempt to disrupt it.

‘
Up to
them, I wondered if either the ranchers or a homesteader had heard
about me coming and thought the other side’d sent for me,’ the
Texan concluded. ‘I don’t anymore.’

‘
Or
me,’ Frith admitted. ‘But those Free Land bastards might not want
us around if they aim to make trouble during the fair.’

‘
It’s
something to think on,’ Smith agreed. Would they have the money and
means to find out we’d been sent for and hire men to come after
us?’

‘
I
don’t know about the means. But they’d have the money. There’s some
rich fellers backing them. Damned if I can see why a feller with
plenty of cash ties in with that kind of trash.’

‘
Makes
’em feel like they’re doing good for the less fortunate folks,
maybe,’ Smith guessed. ‘Or they aim to be sure that they’re running
things if folks like the Free Land bunch should manage to take
over. Sounds like the Counselor’s done talking to his
clients.’

Stalking into the office ahead of Jeffreys
and Ottaway, the lawyer glared indignantly at Smith.

‘
I wish
to state my complete dissatisfaction at the way in which those two
young men have been treated!’ Yorck announced.

‘
Mr.
Ottaway, can you and Mr. Jeffreys go and make a rounds across the
river?’ Smith asked, without sparing the speaker as much as a
glance. ‘The Counselor’s clients had them farmers so stirred up
that there might be trouble. It’d be best if they saw some law
around.’

‘
Yo!’
Ottaway answered. ‘Let’s go, Stan.’

‘
What
was you saying, Counselor?’ asked Smith.

Yorck drew in a deep breath and
let it out again before answering,
‘They, my clients, claim they were
assaulted as soon as they tried to walk peaceably into the
meeting—’

‘
It was
a
private
meeting,’ Smith corrected. ‘And they bust in like crazy
men. So I stopped them before real bad trouble could
start.’

‘
And
what are they being charged with?’

‘
Nothing.’

‘
Nothing?’

‘
I
wasn’t figuring on it. If the doctor finds that they hadn’t been
driven crazy by that
marijuana
they was smoking, but was only drunk and
acting
loco
through it, I’ll leave them asleep it off for the night and
turn them loose in the morning.’

‘
But—But—’ Yorck croaked.

‘
It’s
always been the way,’ Smith went on. ‘If a feller gets wild when
he’s drunk, he spends the night in pokey and pays for any damage
he’s caused. Crazy folks, now, no matter how they got that way,
they get took off to some place where they can be looked after
proper.’

‘
Are
you implying that my clients are insane?’ Yorck barked.

‘
I’m no
doctor, Counselor,’ Smith replied. ‘All I know is that fellers’d
have to be drunk, or
loco,
to act the way they did.’

‘
Was I
you, Counselor,’ Frith put in. ‘I’d go down and ask your clients
which they are, crazy or drunk.’

Escorting Yorck down to the basement, Smith
and Frith stood outside the steel-barred door while he explained
the position to his clients. Startled exclamations broke from the
two young men when the lawyer warned that a doctor had been asked
to come and check upon their sanity.

‘
That’s
the most outrageous thing I’ve ever heard!’ blustered the taller of
the pair. ‘Philo and I are as sane as you.’

‘
Then
you must’ve been drunk,’ Smith drawled. ‘It’s one or the
other.’

‘
Not
necessarily,’ Philo Wymar snorted.

‘
You’ll
find Doctor Riley at his office, Ric,’ Smith said calmly. ‘Go fetch
him. And show him those cigarettes we took from this pair afore he
makes his examination of them.’

Watching the young agitators,
Frith could see from their expressions that Smith had won. Deprived
of their cigarettes, the two young agitators had already lost
their
marijuana-induced
courage. Back East, the location of their previous
trouble-making activities, they had always been supported by
lawyers and politicians who could wield influence over the local
peace officers. They had no such advantage in Widow’s
Creek.

Given time to think, the pair
could see how their
behavior would appear to people who did not sympathize with
their lofty ideals. They were all too aware of the revulsion felt
by ordinary men and women towards the use of narcotics. Let the
local doctor announce in court that they had been smoking
marijuana
and the jury would
find against them without hesitation. While a term in jail might
cloak them with an air of martyrdom, neither was willing to make
such a sacrifice.

‘
We’d
been drinking and thought it would be a bit of sport to burst in on
that meeting,’ Wymar admitted sullenly. ‘Now can we go?’

‘
Not
until morning,’ Smith replied.

‘
I fail
to see why not,’ Yorck put in.

Teller don
’t get over being drunk that
quick,’ Smith answered. ‘And if I let them loose, what’ll I do with
some cowhand, or farmer, who gets brought in drunk, then says he’s
sober and should be let out?’

‘
These
two young gentlemen are hardly in the same class as a drunken
cowboy or farmer,’ the lawyer pointed out.

‘
All
the more reason for holding them, Counselor,’ Frith commented
dryly. ‘I seem to recall you whooping up a storm in Cheyenne last
year ‘cause some rich feller’s son was let out of the jail and the
cowhands he’d been drinking with got held all night. You reckoned
then that the law should be the same for everybody, rich or
poor.’

‘
We’ll
let them out if
you
say so,’ Smith went on, delighted with the information
Frith had just given. ‘I don’t know what other folks’ll say,
though, when they read why I did it in the newspapers.’

‘
Newspapers?’ gulped the lawyer, knowing he was
trapped.

‘
Had
the feller who runs the Widow’s Creek News in about the fuss at the
meeting,’ Smith elaborated. ‘I asked him to come around later and
he should be here soon. What do
you
say I should do, Counselor?’

‘
I
think that you young men will have to stay for the night,’ Yorck
declared, avoiding meeting the prisoners’ or the peace officers’
eyes. ‘If you aren’t released in the morning, I will take action.
And I warn you, marshal, that I will report your behavior to the
mayor in the morning.’

‘
That’s
your privilege, Counselor,’ Smith drawled, feeling sure that Wil
Jeffreys could straighten out the matter—if not to Yorck’s
satisfaction. ‘Now, if you’re all through here, I’ve got other work
to do.’

‘
Miss Shivers
to
see
you, Miss Jeffreys,’ Ryall announced from the door of the banker’s
private office.

‘
Show
her in, please,’ Wil replied.

Wearing her grey travelling
costume and hat, instead of the garish dress which had been her
attire on other visits to the bank, and with a veil covering her
face, Lily Shivers limped into the office. She glanced at the clock
on the wall, which showed the time to be nine o
’clock, then turned her eyes to
the other girl.

Seated at her desk, Wil had her
hair down and looked more feminine than was usual during working
hours. In fact, she would have been out-and-out attractive but for
the marks left by the fight on her face. Studying two eyes which
resembled Blue Point oysters peeping out of their shells and other
indications, Lily found some faint satisfaction
.

‘
You
look a mess,’ Lily commented, shoving up her veil to expose
features even more bruised and swollen. ‘And, before you tell me, I
look worse.’

‘
Sit
down, please,’ Wil said, coldly formal, then looked by the blonde
to where her teller stood at the door. ‘If anybody else wants to
see me, I’ll not be more than ten minutes.’

‘
Yes,
ma’am,’ Ryall answered and left, closing the door.

‘
All
right,’ Lily said, sitting down with some care due to the bite she
had received on her rump during the wild rolling tangle on the
floor. ‘You licked me. How long do I have before I get out of
town?’

‘
Do you
want to get out of town?’ Wil countered.

‘
Do I
have any choice? You’re calling the play.’

‘
As
you’ve pointed out several times, I am a pretty good
business-maw—’