to Tame a Land (1955) (14 page)

Gesturing toward the crowded saloons, I said, "Thi s won't be easy. Suppose somebody gets hurt?"

"We'll back you. Organize vigilantes if you want them."

"We won't need them."

Murdock took some badges from his pocket and hande d them to me. I shook my head. "These are all right, bu t I want a signed paper, appointing us. Signed by all thre e of you."

They gave it to me and I was the new marshal of Alta , with Mustang Roberts as deputy.

They walked away and we stood there getting use d to the idea. Mustang, he looked over at me and grinned.

"Like 'em tough, don't you?" Then he added, "Now w e can really look for your girl."

"What I was figuring," I said, "so let's get busy."

He hitched his guns. "What's first?"

"We fire the marshal. Rather, I fire him. You stand by."

So we turned around and walked down the street toward the marshal's office and I was glad Mustang Roberts walked beside me.

Chapter
12

IT WAS a square frame building in front of the ston e jail. It had two rooms: the outer office, and an inne r room where the marshal slept.

John Lang was sitting behind the desk with his feet o n it, and there was another man, a bearded man, wh o sat on an iron safe against the wall.

The floor was dirty, a few scattered cigar and cigarett e butts lying around, and some old papers, flyspecked an d yellow. There was a rack holding several rifles and shotguns.

Pushing the door open, I stepped in. Lang looked u p at me, then looked again. He saw that badge on my shir t and his face set and his eyes grew wary.

"Where you?"

"The new marshal. I'm to tell you you're fired."

The bearded man chuckled. "You git out'n here, kid , whilst you're able. Ain't nobody firin' us. They don e tried. Ain't they, Hal?"

With some people you don't talk, you don't explain. I'
d told 'em; now it was up to me to fire 'em.

Before Lang knew what was happening, I grabbed th e boots on the desk and slammed them to the floor. Hi s boots hit the floor and he came up with a lunge, but th e advantage was mine, and I kept it. As he clawed for hi s gun I hit him in the mouth and he sat back down in th e chair so hard it toppled over backward.

It happened so fast the deputy scarcely got his mout h open, and he had just started to move when I turned wit h the punch and hit him in the teeth, slamming his skul l against the wall with a dull thud.

He was stunned when Mustang grabbed him. As I s wung back, Lang's gun was coming free. So I palme d mine and shot him. He took the first bullet in the throa t and the second in the chest, and he just lay back on th e floor and stayed there.

Then I turned on the deputy, whom Mustang had disarmed. "You're fired, too. You want to take a chance an d draw, or do you want to get out of town?"

He wanted to draw but he didn't want to die. H
e stared hard at me, sweating it out for a full minute, an d then he said, "Soon's the storm's over I'll ride."

"You'll ride now. Storm or no storm. If you're in tow n an hour from now, you can die or go to jail."

He swallowed, backing off. "Wait'll you hear fro m Billings! You won't get away with this! Why, he'll brea k you! He'll break that damn town council, too."

So I hit him again. "Beat it," I said, and he beat it.

Mustang, who had been holding the deputy's gun, read y to return it if he decided to gamble, put it in a des k drawer.

He took out the makings and rolled a smoke. "Yo u know," he said, "when you first joined up back there i n Texas, some of the boys thought you were a sure-enoug h tenderfoot. They should have seen what I seen."

I looked around the dirty little office. It was nothin g that would make a man respect the law. I looked ove r at Roberts. "You, you're my deputy. We enforce the law.

We enforce it tough. We don't shoot anybody unless w e have to, we don't hit anybody unless we have to. But w e only give an order once.

"No card cheating. No robbery. No burglary. No robbing drunks. No beating up innocent people. No gu n fights. No women molested. "

"Fist fights?"

"As long as they don't bust up property. If the matc h looks pretty even, let 'em have it out. If it gets one-sided , stop it.

"We protect the helpless, the innocent, and the folk s who are doing legitimate business."

"All right." He glanced at Lang's body. "I guess I b etter get him out of here."

"No. We'll let Billings do that."

"Who?"

"Billings. From what the deputy said, he figures he'
s boss. We'll let him take Lang out and dig the grave. We'l l let him mop up the floor."

Mustang Roberts drew a deep breath. He looked at m e to see if I was serious, but he needn't have. He'd know n me long enough to know I didn't talk idle.

"This will be something to see." He hesitated. "I ain'
t told you before, but this here Billings may know somethin g about your girl."

That stopped me. I felt myself getting sick inside. I n town only a few hours, I'd heard enough to know tha t Billings ran the houses where the red-light women were.

I knew he ran two of the toughest saloons. Men leavin g those saloons with money seldom got far.

"Don't get me wrong," Mustang added. "It's nothin g definite. Only he was seen talking to her, and he wa s taking a powerful interest in her. That was right afte r she got off the stage."

"All right. First things first. We'll let Billings bury hi s dead."

Billings was a big man. He was a man with black, plastered-down hair on a round skull, a wide face, florid o f complexion, and a black walrus mustache, but trimme d more neatly than most. He stood about three inches ove r six feet, and he must have weighed well over two hundred pounds. He wore a striped silk shirt with sleev e garters and black pants. He smoked a big black ciga r and he carried his gun in a holster shoved down in hi s waistband. It was good for a fast draw.

His place was smaller than some and dirtier than most , but there were a dozen games going when we pushe d through the door bringing a blast of cold, fresh air int o the stuffy interior. I walked over to him. "Billings?"

He turned to look at me and his eyes dropped to th e badge, then lifted. "You show that to John Lang?"

"Yes." I spoke quietly. "It was the last thing he eve r saw."

You could have heard a feather drop in that room.

You couldn't hear a breath drawn. The idea was beginning to work its way through their heads. That Texas gunman was gone. John Lang was dead.

Mustang Roberts was obviously another Texan. Abou t me, they didn't know. They were going to learn fast.

Billings took the cigar from his teeth. "I see. Let's g o into my office and have a talk."

"We haven't time. Lang is lying on the floor in my office and he needs burying. Also, the floor needs mopping?
, He looked at me, his hard pale-blue eyes measurin g me. He didn't like what he saw.

"So?"

"So you'll do it."

Somebody swore. I saw a man with cards in his han d lay them down. I saw his smile begin to grow, and I sa w his eyes wrinkle with humor. All this I saw from the corners of my eyes. I was watching Billings.

He looked at me. Never had I seen a pair of eyes lik e that. They were careful eyes. Very hard eyes, but careful. This was the most dangerous man I had seen. Yet I d oubted if this man would kill. He would see that it wa s done by someone else. He' was too careful to risk it.

That was what I thought then. I was wrong, but i t seemed like that.

"Kid, you don't know what you're talking about. Joh n did all right in this town. He could have got rich. Yo u can, too. Together, we can run it."

"I don't need you," I said. "I'm running it now, an d I'm running it honest."

He looked at his cigar. He was doing some fast thinking.

"The council wouldn't stand for this," he said. "I kno w they wouldn't."

"It will be too late for them to object. You're startin g now."

His temper exploded then. "Like hell I am! Why yo u damn fool, I "

Right then I hit him. My fist cut his words off, and before he could get set, I hit him again. This he had no t expected. Gunfighters rarely used their hands, and h e was a powerful man who outweighed me by a good fift y pounds.

My second punch knocked him back against the bar , and then I kicked him on the kneecap with a boot heel.

He went down then. He hit right in his dirty sawdust.

I reached a hand for him and he grabbed at it with bot h of his, as I'd expected. And then I hit him on the cheekbone with a short right.

The skin split as if I'd used a knife, and blood starte d to trickle. Then I stepped back for him to get up. Hi s hand started for his gun but a voice stopped him. "Don'
t try it, Ben. That's Ryan Tyler."

Something inside him seemed to relax and he sat bac k down on the floor. It bothered me, because he was a man who could control his emotions. He hated me. H
e wanted me dead. But he was a careful man.

It was ten to one his games were rigged.

"All right," I said, "you've got a dirty job to do."

Mustang had two guns out and he was looking acros s them at the room, smiling that tough, reckless smile o f his.

"Get used to him, boys. It'll be easier for you. I cam e up the trail from Texas with him. I seen him kill Lee t Bowers. I seen him trim Ollie Burdette down to size an d run him out of town. Get used to the idea. He mean s what he says."

Ben Billings got up slowly and carefully. Can't we tal k this over?"

"No," I said, and motioned him to the door.

"I'll get my coat."

"You won't need it. You'll be warm enough, workin g the way you will be."

We went, but we weren't alone. Half the place cam e along to see this. Ben Billings had been boss of the town.

He had been the big boss. He had been his own bouncer , often throwing two men out of his saloon at once. H
e had ordered men killed. He had ordered men beaten. A f ew he had beaten thoroughly and cruelly with his ow n hands.

They saw him take the body of John Lang outside.

They saw him get water and mop the floor of the marshal's office. And by the time he was through there wer e three or four hundred people in the street.

This was more than a cleanup job. This was to sho w the people of Alta that Billings wasn't as big as he ha d made them believe. It was to show them that a ne w system had been born. And there were few disapprovin g looks in the crowd, even from his own followers.

There was an old coat that had belonged to Lang i n the office. There were gloves and a hat, "Put these on,"

I said. "You'll need them digging the grave."

"The ground's frozen!" he protested. "You couldn'
t dig a grave in a week."

"I hope it doesn't take you that long," I said, "because you'll be mighty tired by that time."

He dug the grave. It was cold and brutal work, wit h the pick just breaking the ground in tiny flakes. It too k him two days and two nights, with time out for meals , and an hour's sleep I allowed him at three intervals. H
e dug it with Mustang and me spelling each other in tw o hour tricks.

By the time that grave was dug, the town knew wh o was marshal. Me, I went back downtown and started checking the gambling joints. We found a controlled wheel in on e of Billings' joints, and when Mustang brought in an a x I busted the table right in front of their eyes.

Two more wheels showed evidence of hasty correction.

I let them go. "Just keep 'dm that way," I said "You ca n live on the percentage."

Key Novak was sitting behind his table waiting for us.

He looked up at me out of those cold, almost white eyes.

Only the look in them was different now. It is one thin g when you look at an unknown stranger who is scarcel y more than a boy. It is another when you look into thos e same eyes and know the man is fast with a gun, perhaps faster than you.

Key Novak looked up at me and waited. He hated me , and he was a gunman. He was also a sure-thing operator.

"You got a horse?" I asked him.

"Ye
e
"Use him, then, or sell him and take the stage. You r game is closed as of now."

He looked up at me, and I saw his eyelids tighten, th e comers of his mouth grow white. He wanted to draw, an d he had killed men.

But John Lang had tried it, and John Lang was dead.

"It'll be different with you." I spoke quietly, but ther e was no mercy in me for the man who had killed a mine r and would have shot into him as he lay on the floor.

"I'll take your gun away and snake you dig your ow n grave."

He looked at me, his face whiter than I had believe d a man's face could be. And then his hands started to shak e and there was a glisten of sweat on his brow and uppe r lip. He got up Shakily, and then he walked quickly fro m the room.