Death Rides the Night (3 page)

“Well now, that's a funny thing. Seems like no one don't rightly know. There's bin word passed around there'd be free beer, an' they do say Eustis Harlow is footin' the bill.”

Pat stiffened as he heard that name. He wasn't surprised though. He'd known all along it had something to do with Harlow. He asked quietly, “What's the purpose of the meeting, Ezra?”

“That's … what I didn't wanta tell you.”

“I figgered that,” Pat said angrily. “What is it?”

“I've heered some talk about mebbe it was time we wuz 'lectin' a new sheriff here in thuh Valley,” Ezra admitted unhappily. “I don'
know
fer shore that's what the meetin's about tuhnight, but it'd be my guess it is. That's why I reckoned you wouldn't wanta come.”

“Why not?” Pat's voice was bleak. “Looks to me like I'm sort of a int'rested party.”

“Don't you do it, Pat,” Ezra begged him. “Me an' Sam Sloan an' some of the other boys figger on settin' in. We'll see you git a square deal.”

Pat shrugged his shoulders slowly. He turned away without another word and started back to the ranch house. Ezra stared after him, shaking his shaggy red head worriedly. Danged if you could tell about Pat Stevens. Now, Ezra would have thought Pat would be mad as a wet hen when he learned how some of his neighbors were meeting to vote on taking the sheriff's badge away from him. That's why Ezra didn't want him to go. He was afraid Pat might kick up a rumpus and there'd be shooting. Instead of that, Pat was walking off with his tail between his legs. It shore was hard to figger him out.

Ezra sighed and swung into the saddle. He rode to the bunkhouse and called out gruffly, “You yahoos ready tuh ride?”

Pete came to the door. “We got our hawses saddled an' tied down to the fence. Didn't want thuh boss to ketch us ridin' off.”

“He won't ketch you,” Ezra grunted. “Hit thuh saddle and le's ride. Pat'll need all thuh friends he's got in town tuhnight.”

Sally was clearing up the supper dishes when Pat walked back in the front door. She whirled to look at him with startled eyes, then smiled when she saw the quiet look that had driven the grimness from his face. “Everything's all right,” she guessed happily. “Oh, Pat, I was so afraid when you went out looking like that.”

“What were you afraid of?”

“I don't know,” she confessed miserably. “After the way Ezra acted. What
is
it about a meeting?”

“Nothin' much. Some of the boys gettin' together to sop up some beer. Know where my badge is, Sally?”

“Are you ridin' in to town, Dad?” Dock stuck his head in through an inner doorway. “Can I go with you?”

“No, Dock,” Sally said firmly. “A bunch of men will be drinking beer. I don't know about your badge, Pat. You're
supposed
to wear it all the time, you know,” she added in mild reproof.

Pat said gently, “I reckon I better take it in with me tonight.”

“I'll look in the bedroom and see if I can find it.” Sally turned away. She hesitated and asked in a different tone, “Do you think there'll be trouble?”

Pat said, “Why no, Sally. I don't reckon so.” He waited in the living room while she went to see if she could find the shining silver star which Mr. Winters and other staunch friends had pressed on him that black night a few years ago when Ed and Maria Grimes were foully murdered.

There was a bloodstain on the silver star that night when Pat accepted it and pinned it on his vest, and he didn't wash the blood off until Ed Grimes' death was avenged.

Sally came back with the gleaming symbol of lawdom in her outstretched palm, and Pat looked at it queerly as he took it from her.

A lot of things had happened since he'd cleaned Ed Grimes' blood off the star and agreed to keep on wearing it as long as his neighbors felt he was the best man to continue maintaining peace in the Valley.

He took it from Sally and absently blew his breath on the shining silver surface and then rubbed it off on his sleeve. He smiled down at her, noting the look of pride on her face as he carefully pinned the star to his shirt.

It meant a lot to Sally. Women were sort of funny about things like that. Now him, he'd be glad to be rid of it. He had never felt quite right being a lawman. Seemed like he was sort of setting himself up to be better than his fellow men, and he didn't feel like that at all.

He put his arm about her shoulders and tightened it there. He promised, “I won't be late.”

“I'm glad you're not wearing your guns,” she breathed. “I never worry until I see you buckle them on, Pat.”

He tipped her face up and kissed the lips that had grown sweeter to him as the years went by, then turned away and went down to the corral to rope out his gray saddle horse.

3

The hitching rail in front of the new Powder Valley courthouse was lined with saddle horses. Down the street the rail in front of the Gold Eagle Saloon was similarly lined. This was unusual for an evening in the middle of the week and was in response to the word that had been quietly passed around about an important meeting of all male citizens in the Valley. A lot of the riders had drifted in out of curiosity, and others were drawn to the meeting by the rumors of free beer in the courthouse yard. Others, who were indebted to Eustis Harlow in one way or another had received instructions practically amounting to orders for them to be present with all their hands.

No one seemed to know exactly why the meeting had been called, nor what it was about. There were all sorts of rumors going the rounds. The most persistent of these was that Pat Stevens had decided to resign as sheriff and the meeting had been called to select his successor. A lot of the ranchers didn't believe that, because they knew Pat well and hadn't heard him say anything about resigning, but everyone seemed agreed that the meeting had something to do with the office of sheriff or the enforcement of the lax laws of the community.

At this stage of its development, Powder Valley had a rather peculiar system of self-government based on expediency rather than on a strict interpretation of state laws. There were no actual defined boundaries of the county, nor were there any duly elected county officials. Powder Valley was an isolated community separated from its neighbors by mountains on all sides, and for years past it had been customary to settle any differences of opinion among its inhabitants by a meeting such as had been called for tonight. With no complex questions of law to vex them, a majority vote was all that was required to make a decision, and the minority always swung into line with the rest when they found they were defeated. It was actually a practical demonstration of pure democracy in action, and the people of the Valley had lived together peaceably a good many years with no real cleavage of opinion.

The crowd around the two barrels of beer set up in front of the courthouse was orderly and good-natured. Most of the men had known most of the others for years and they made the meeting into a sort of social occasion for exchanging news about their families and information about the condition of pasturage and the new calf crop.

Eustis Harlow was very much in evidence among the group around the beer barrels. He was a big man with a hearty voice and a genial manner. He wore a big white Stetson and a red silk shirt with a leather vest decorated with heavy conchos of Mexican gold. He had a wide hand-carved belt with a big gold buckle in front, and the bottoms of his pants were tucked into small hand-made boots with figures formed on them by ornamental white stitching. His big-roweled spurs had little copper bells on them that tinkled as he moved, and a big, square-cut diamond glistened from a ring on his hand.

Yet all this display in contrast to the shabby workclothing of the other ranchers didn't make Eustis Harlow seem affected or overdressed. He was a man who could wear that sort of thing and get away with it. He had broad shoulders and big, strong hands, and his face was weather-beaten by the Texas sun and wind. He looked like a man who had fought hard and worked hard to reach his present position at the top, and like one who intended to stay there. His gray eyes had a look of cold appraisal even while he was laughing heartily, and his blunt chin was aggressively square.

There were some who didn't like Harlow, and a few who feared him, but mostly the citizens of Powder Valley felt they were lucky that such a man had sold out his huge holdings in Texas and come to Colorado to re-establish himself. As they said approvingly to one another while they waited for the meeting to open, he was the kind of man who made things hum when he was around. He didn't sit back and let any grass grow under his feet, by golly. Even those who owed him money and didn't know how they would pay off their mortgages thought it had been a good thing for the Valley when Harlow decided to settle there.

When they began drifting into the courthouse to take seats on the long wooden benches in the big meeting room, Harlow was at the door with a handshake and a brief word for each one who entered.

Somehow, he managed to give the impression that he was the host and that it was
his
courthouse,
his
meeting. All of them knew they had been drinking his beer, of course, so it wasn't difficult to go a step further and accept his leadership in Valley affairs.

Even the old-timers like John Boyd and Mr. Winters who resented Eustis Harlow and felt he was a menace to their Valley found it impossible to put their finger on anything Harlow said or did to put him in the wrong. There wasn't any reason why he shouldn't stand at the door and shake hands with them as they went in if he wanted to. It was all open and aboveboard. But it put them at a disadvantage, and they felt it and Harlow knew they felt it. The only thing you could do if you didn't like it was to stay away from the meeting, and that would be playing right into Harlow's hands. So they all went in and sat on the benches, inwardly writhing at the masterly way in which Harlow handled the situation but not knowing how to circumvent his tactics.

When the last booted and sweaty rancher was inside, Eustis Harlow left his place at the door and went up to the long pine table in front of the room. He stood negligently with his fingertips touching the table, and he addressed them bluntly:

“I'm not an orator and I don't aim to do any orating tonight. I called this meeting to find out what we're going to do about a new sheriff in Powder Valley.”

Mr. Winters was sitting in the front row. He ran the general store in Dutch Springs and was the postmaster, and for years he had sort of unofficially run things in Powder Valley. John Boyd, Pat's nearest neighbor, sat on Winters' right. He was a stringy, taciturn man who would have gone to hell and back for Pat Stevens. Ezra was on Winters' left, and beyond him was Sam Sloan. Sam was one of the few men in the room who had packed a gun to the meeting. As Pony Express rider, Sam always rode his route armed, and he didn't take his .45 off while he was in town because he would have felt undressed without it.

Ezra and Sam and Boyd stirred uneasily and looked at Mr. Winters when Harlow made his blunt opening statement.

The storekeeper got to his feet at once. He said mildly, “I reckon most of us didn't know we were going to do anything about getting a new sheriff. I hadn't heard about Pat Stevens turning in his badge yet.”

There was a shuffling of feet and a murmur of agreement from the benches behind him.

“Perhaps he hasn't turned in his badge,” Harlow assented. “I've been checking up and I don't believe we have to wait for Stevens to resign. The way I see it, he was put in office by a majority vote and I guess he can be put out the same way. By a majority of us that are here tonight.”

Winters had remained standing. “Why, I guess that's right,” he agreed. His voice was incredulous. “Do you reckon we're going to vote Pat Stevens out of office? After all he's done for the Valley?”

“That's exactly what I hope you're going to do. I know you're all friends of Stevens'. I like him myself. He's a fine man and I don't deny he's done some mighty fine things in the past. But that's in the
past.
We can't afford to keep a sheriff on his past reputation. We need one that will do things
now.”

John Boyd got up angrily. “Are you hintin' that Pat ain't makin' us a good sheriff?”

“I'm not hinting at anything,” Eustis Harlow told him equably. “I'm saying it right out loud in meeting.” He showed his white teeth in a wide smile. “I'm not the kind of a man that makes hints. I believe in coming straight out and saying my piece.” He thudded his right fist into the palm of his left hand for emphasis. “I'm losing cattle off my ranch every day. Expensive, blooded stock. Sheriff Stevens hasn't done a single thing to stop the rustling though I've appealed to him time and again. I can't stay here and go on with my plans to build this up into a real cow-country if that sort of thing goes on.”

“It was purty good cow-country before you stuck yore nose in here,” Boyd told him angrily.

Harlow smiled tolerantly at the old cowman. “You mean you were satisfied. You and the rest of you. But do you think I got where I am today by being satisfied?”

“Where are you right now?” Sam Sloan spoke up caustically.

Harlow told him evenly, “I'm not riding a Pony Express route to earn my living.” He turned his attention away from the men on the front bench as Sam's face darkened angrily. He lifted his voice and went on, “If we're to have any real progress in this valley we've got to wake up and organize things on an orderly basis. In the first place, I understand that Pat Stevens doesn't even draw a salary as sheriff. No wonder he hasn't the time nor inclination to run down the rustlers stealing my stock. We've got to put a man in the sheriff's office who'll devote his full time to the job of maintaining order in Powder Valley. I'm here to make a fair offer. Out of my own pocket I'll pay half of the salary of a new sheriff.”