No Life of Their Own: And Other Stories (The Complete Short Fiction of Clifford D. Simak Book 5) (16 page)

They sat silent for a moment. Finally Charley asked, “You got any idea, Joe, when they’ll end this tour? It’s been going for a month. That’s the longest so far. The kids won’t know me when I get home if it isn’t soon.”

“I know,” said Joe. “It’s tough on a family man like you. Me, it doesn’t matter. And I guess it’s the same with Al. How’s it with Jack? I don’t know him well. He’s a man who never talks. Not about himself.”

“I guess he’s got a family somewhere. I don’t know anything about it, just that he has. Look, Joe, would you go for a drink? I have a bottle in my bag. I could go and get it.”

“A drink,” said Joe, “is not a bad idea.”

The telephone rang and Charley, who had started for the door, stopped and turned around.

“It might be for me,” he said. “I called home a while ago. Myrt wasn’t there. I asked little Charley to have her call. I gave both room numbers, just in case I was here.”

Joe picked up the phone and spoke into it. He shook his head at Charley. “It’s not Myrt. It’s Rosy.”

Charley started for the door.

Joe said, “Just a minute, Charley.”

He went on listening.

“Rosy,” he finally said, “you are sure of this?”

He listened some more. Then he said, “Thanks, Rosy. Thanks an awful lot. You stuck out your neck calling us.”

He hung up the phone and sat, staring at the wall.

“What’s the matter, Joe? What did Rosy want?”

“He called to warn us. There is a mistake. I don’t know how or why. A mistake is all.”

“What did we do wrong?”

“Not us. It’s Washington.”

“You mean about Ernie. His civil rights or something.”

“Not his civil rights. Charley, he isn’t curing people. He is killing them. He’s a carrier.”

“We know he is a carrier. Other people carry a disease, but he carries—”

“He carries a disease, too. They don’t know what it is.”

“But back there in his old neighborhood, he made all the people well. Everywhere he went. That is how they found him. They knew there must be someone or something. They hunted till they—”

“Charley, shut up. Let me tell you. Back in his old neighborhood they’re dying like flies. They started a couple of days ago and they still are dying. Healthy people dying. Nothing wrong with them, but they’re dying just the same. A whole neighborhood is dying.”

“Christ, it can’t be, Joe. There must be some mistake …”

“No mistake. It’s the very people he made well who are dying now.”

“But it doesn’t make sense.”

“Rosy thinks maybe it’s a new kind of virus. It kills all the rest of them, all the viruses and bacteria that make people sick. No competition, see? It kills off the competition, so it has each body to itself. Then it settles down to grow and the body is all right, because it doesn’t intentionally harm the body, but there comes a time …”

“Rosy is just guessing.”

“Sure Rosy is just guessing. But it makes sense to hear him tell it.”

“If it’s true,” said Charley, “think of all the people, the millions of people …”

“That’s what I’m thinking of,” said Joe. “Rosy took a chance in calling us. They’ll crucify him if they find out about the call.”

“They’ll find out. There’ll be a record of it.”

“Maybe none that can be traced to him. He called from a phone booth out in Maryland somewhere. Rosy’s scared. He is in it up to his neck, the same as us. He spent as much time with Ernie as we did. He knows as much as we do, maybe more than we do.”

“He thinks, spending all that time with Ernie, we might be carriers, too?”

“No, I guess not that. But we know. We might talk. And no one can talk about this. No one will be allowed to talk about this. Can you imagine what would happen, the public reaction …”

“Joe, how long did you say Ernie spent in that neighborhood of his?”

“Four or five years.”

“That’s it, then. That’s the time we have. You and I and all the rest of us, maybe have four years, probably less.”

“That’s right. And if they pick us up, we’ll spend those years where there won’t be any chance of us talking to anyone at all. Someone probably is headed here right now. They have our itinerary.”

“Then let’s get going, Joe. I know a place. Up north. I can take the family. No one will ever think of looking.”

“What if you’re a carrier?”

“If I’m a carrier, my family has it now. If I’m not, I want to spend those years—”

“And other people …”

“Where I’m headed there aren’t many people. We’ll be by ourselves.”

“Here,” said Joe. He took the car keys out of his jacket pocket and tossed them across the room. Charley caught them.

“What about you, Joe?”

“I have to warn the others. And, Charley …”

“Yeah?”

“Ditch that car before morning. They’ll be looking for you. And when they miss you here, they’ll watch your family and your home. Be careful.”

“I know. And you, Joe?”

“I’ll take care of myself. As soon as I let the others know.”

“And Ernie? We can’t let him—”

“I’ll take care of Ernie, too,” said Joe.

Cactus Colts

Cliff Simak’s journals do not mention a story named “Cactus Colts.” I suspect that it is the one named “Boothill Brothers Talk with Bullets”—an ugly title, but that kind of thing was common in the pulp westerns of those days. But I am not too confident of that conclusion due to a discrepancy in dates. At any rate, “Cactus Colts,” which first appeared in
Lariat Story Magazine
’s July 1944 issue, is shorter than most of Cliff’s westerns, meaning that it’s a terse, taut creation.

—dww

Jeff Jones stumbled when a loose board on the steps in front of the Silver Dollar buckled beneath him. Snarling huskily, he reached out and grabbed a porch post to save himself from falling. Savagely, he wrenched his foot free of the broken board and glanced around, waiting for the yell of laughter that would greet his stumble.

There was no laughter. There was no one to laugh. This Cactus City street drowsed dustily in the silent afternoon. The air was heavy with the heat, and the sunlight was something that came pouring from the molten bowl of sky, so brilliant it hurt one’s eyes. Jeff’s pony stood with drooping head beside the hitching post, the only living thing in sight.

Beyond the town marched the glassy plains, tan with sun-scorched grass.

Jeff strode across the narrow porch and through the batwing doors. For a moment he stopped, blinking in the shade that seemed almost like darkness after the sun-washed street.

A bartender, flour sack for an apron, mopped moodily. Three men were lined against the bar. At one of the tables a bearded drunk was sleeping. His battered hat had fallen from his head and lay canted on its brim.

Jeff moved to the bar and flipped a dollar down. The barkeeper set a bottle out and Jeff poured a drink. The liquor slashed down his throat, cutting the dust. His left cheek, the one with the scar, twitched nervously. He poured another drink.

A savage voice snarled behind him.

“Jones!”

Jeff spun around, hand to gun.

One of the men at the other end of the bar had stepped out into the room, stood spraddle-legged, hands above his butts.

Eyes still unadjusted from the blaze of sun outside, Jeff could not see the other’s face. It was no more than a smudgy blue of white. But there was no mistaking the meaning of the hands above those guns.

There was no time for thought, no space for wondering. Jeff’s mind clicked blank with sudden concentration, everything else wiped out but that spraddle-legged figure set for a double draw.

Chill silence had seeped into the room. The two men at the bar were rigid. The drunk was awake, clutching for his hat.

Jeff felt the breath rasping in his throat, wished for one wild moment that the light was better. Then the other man’s hands were moving and his guns were coming out.

With a swift flip of his wrist, Jeff brought his own gun free.

Twin eyes of red twinkled for a moment almost straight into Jeff’s face and he felt his own gun kicking against his arm, its muzzle drooling fire. Behind him glass crashed and tinkled like little silver bells.

The white smudge face twisted in sudden pain and the two guns clattered on the floor.

Jeff flipped his gun toward the silent figures at the bar.

“Anyone else?” he asked and his voice was so brittle he hardly knew it for his own.

One of the men stirred. “It ain’t our fight, stranger.”

The man out in the center of the room had made no move to pick up the fallen guns. He was bent over, like someone with the stomach ache, moaning softly, left hand clutching right wrist.

The man who had spoken stepped away from the bar and paced slowly forward.

“I’m Owen,” he said.

Jeff stabbed the gun at him. “Your name,” he said, “don’t mean a thing to me.”

Owen stopped short. He was a big man, a bear of a man, a sleek bear with shiny black coat and a black cravat in which a stickpin gleamed.

“I own the place,” he said. “Can’t imagine what got into Jim. One minute he was there talking with us. Next minute he was out there calling you.”

The wounded man straightened up. “He’s Peaceful Jones,” he screamed. “I’d know him anywhere by that scar across his face.”

Jeff slid the gun back into its holster. “Meaning which?” he asked.

“You know damn well what I mean,” yelled Jim. “Back in Texas …”

“Shut up,” snapped Owen. “By rights, you should be buzzard bait.”

“I don’t kill no man without he has his guns,” said Jeff.

“You, Buck, pick up them guns,” said Owen, “and put them on the bar. Jim, you better hightail it for the doc and get that wrist fixed up.”

The wounded man mumbled, started for the door, still holding his wrist, fingers stained with red. Buck picked up the guns, grinned wolfishly at Jeff.

“So you’re Peaceful Jones,” said Owen.

Jeff hesitated. His name was Jones, all right, but he wasn’t Peaceful Jones. Leastwise, he’d never been called that anywhere before.

“I been waiting for you,” Owen told him. He eyed Jeff speculatively. “Thought maybe we could talk some business.”

“I’m sort of busy,” Jeff declared. “Looking for someone.”

“Sure,” said Owen. “I know all about that. Come out in the back and kill a bottle with me.”

He reached out and took the bottle the bartender had set out for Jeff.

For a moment, Jeff hesitated. He wasn’t Peaceful Jones and maybe he’d save himself a heap of trouble by up and saying so. But he’d come to Cactus City looking for trouble and now that he’d found it …

“Guess I can spare some time,” he said slowly.

The drunk, he saw, had fallen asleep once more. His hat had fallen off again and lay on the floor.

The back room was a bare affair. An empty bottle, a few glasses and a deck of greasy cards littered the table.

Jeff slid into a chair while Owen poured liquor into two glasses.

“So Banker Slemp hired you,” Owen fired at Jim.

Jeff picked up a glass, twirled it between his hands. Owen stared at him.

“Lay down your cards,” said Jeff. “Face up.”

“You’re making it tough to deal with you,” Owen complained.

“Me,” said Jeff. “I got a job.”

“With Slemp,” said Owen.

Jeff nodded.

“That way you’re bucking me,” Owen told him flatly.

“I don’t know about that,” said Jeff. “Slemp has a job for me. That’s all I know about it.”

Owen drained his glass, thumped it on the table.

“Likely figuring on cheating you out of half your money,” he declared. “Same as he’s cheated all the ranchers.”

“What you figuring on doing about it?” demanded Jeff.

Owen hiked his chair forward, leaned across the table. “What if the bank happened to get robbed and Slemp got killed?”

Jeff stifled his gasp. He bent his head, staring at the glass, brain racing. Trying to figure it out, trying to find the answer.

“Slemp wouldn’t be underfoot any more,” he said.

“You catch on quick,” said Owen. “Quick on the trigger, quick on the savvy. That’s the way I like it.”

“Bank robbing,” Jeff pointed out, “is sometimes downright risky.”

Owen chuckled thickly. “Not the way we’d do it. With you inside and us outside it would be a cinch. Some night when Slemp was working on the books. And it would be blamed on the Hills gang.”

He chuckled again. “No one would even think of us.”

Jeff tilted the glass and swallowed the whisky, put the glass back on the table. He rose and hitched up his gunbelt.

“There’d be something in it for me?” he asked.

Owen guffawed. “Plenty. You needn’t worry. I ain’t interested in the money. Just Slemp.”

“I’ll be in to see you,” Jeff said.

“We’ll be watching you,” warned Owen.

“Just be careful,” said Jeff, “that you don’t crowd me none.”

On the street in front of the Silver Dollar, Jeff stood for a moment, looking down the street. One sign said RESTAURANT. Another said SADDLES. The third one said BANK.

The pony still stood with hanging head, switching lazily. A dog had come from somewhere and lay curled in the shadows at the corner of a building.

Jeff headed down the street. Little puffs of dust spatted around his boots. The dog watched him with sad, half interested eyes.

The bank was one room, divided in half by a counter topped by a black iron netting that formed a cage. There was one window. A man writing at a desk got up.

“You Slemp?” asked Jeff.

The banker nodded.

“I’m Jones,” said Jeff.

What passed for a smile glinted beneath the weedy mustache.

“You must have made good time, Mr. Jones. I hadn’t expected you for a day or two.”

“When I travel,” said Jeff, “I travel.”

“I’ll let you in, Mr. Jones,” said Slemp.

“The name,” said Jeff, “is Peaceful.”

“I’ll lock up,” said Slemp. “It’s almost closing time anyhow. Not much business these days.”

He pulled a chain from his pocket, selected a key and walked to the front door.

Jeff heard a lock click and Slemp was back again, holding open the door that led behind the cage.

“Have a chair,” he invited.

Jeff hooked a chair from under the desk with the toe of his boot and sat down.

“What’s on your mind?” he asked.

Slemp motioned. “Those guns? You handy with them?”

“Might say I was,” admitted Jeff.

“You may have occasion to use them,” declared Slemp.

“What’s the trouble, Slemp? Some of the ranchers on the prod?”

“What do you mean?” rasped Slemp.

Jeff grinned. “Some bankers ain’t too popular. Just a mite particular about foreclosure laws.”

“I’ve never had any trouble that way,” Slemp declared. “Whatever I’ve done was strictly legal. Any foreclosures I might have made were only carried out to protect the loan.”

“Naturally,” said Jeff.

“The man you have to watch,” said Slemp, leaning closer, lowering his voice, “is a man named Owen. Owns the Silver Dollar.”

“Yeah,” said Jeff, “I know. I stopped there for a drink.”

Slemp frowned. “Didn’t meet Owen, did you?”

“Me and him,” said Jeff, “had a drink together.”

“Know who you were?”

“Guess he did,” admitted Jeff. “Hombre in there recognized me. Came gunning for me. Claimed I’d crossed him down in Texas.”

“You killed him?”

“Nope, Just gun-whipped him some.”

Slemp shook his head. “Don’t like that, Jones. You should have come straight here.”

Jeff’s hand shot out and grasped Slemp by the shirt front, pulling the fabric tight with a vicious twist, dragging the man close to him.

“Don’t start telling me what I should of done,” he snarled. “Don’t start figuring you can treat me like a hired hand. Tell me what the layout is and tell me quick. Quit beating around the bush and tell it straight.”

“It’s Owen,” gasped Slemp. “I’m getting afraid of him. He’s planning something. I got ways of finding out.”

“Spies?”

The banker’s face twisted. “Yes, you might call them that. Men in Owen’s gang that tell me things I need to know. I pay them for it.”

“Why are you afraid of Owen?” rapped Jeff. “What’s he got against you?”

Slemp hesitated. Jeff shook him roughly.

“We were in some deals together,” Slemp said, eyes showing white with fear.

“And you double-crossed him?”

“No. No, Jones, it isn’t that. Between us we run this country. But Owen isn’t satisfied with that. He wants it all himself. I’m afraid …”

Jeff released his hold upon the shirt.

“You got a damn good right to be,” he said.

The banker reached out a hand for a chair, sat down in it carefully.

“So I’m supposed to save your hide,” said Jeff. “What do you want me to do? Just some plain and fancy guarding or gunsmoke Owen and his gang plumb out of town?”

Slemp gulped. “Just guarding,” he said. “Just a month or two. I’m fixing up a deal to run Owen out myself. Vigilante committee or a law and order association or something like that.”

Jeff spat in disgust. “You can do it, too. A solid citizen like you.”

“You bet I can,” the banker said.

“Figure all those ranchers you robbed are going to back you up, heh?”

Slemp flared. “I didn’t rob anyone, Jones. The boys all knew when they got their loans they had to have the payments here on time. I told them so before they got the money. Ain’t my fault they couldn’t make it.”

“Have it your own way,” said Jeff. “I’ll start work tomorrow.”

“You’ve already started,” declared Slemp. “From now on you stay with me. Eat with me. Sleep at my place. Stay …”

“Nope,” insisted Jeff. “Tomorrow. Me, I’m likkering up tonight. Never drink while I’m on the job and my throat is dusty.”

“I don’t like it,” protested Slemp.

“I don’t give a damn if you do or not,” said Jeff. “Haul out that key of yours and let me out of here.”

The sun was setting in the bloody welter of the west, throwing powdery blue shadows across the dusty street. A dog trotted between a couple of buildings. Several ponies were tied to the rack in front of the Silver Dollar. A man down the street called out a greeting.

Cactus City was coming to life.

At the hitching rail, Jeff untied the pony and headed down the street toward the livery barn.

There was no one at the barn, but Jeff led the pony in, chose a stall and unsaddled. From the bin he took a measure of oats and poured them in the box, set to work rubbing down his mount.

A shadow fell across the stall and Jeff looked up. A man stood there, staring at him. A man with a bandaged right hand.

Jeff straightened, dropped the brush into the straw.

The man grinned. “No need of reaching for your irons, stranger,” he said. “I made a fool mistake. It was that scar, I guess.”

“You didn’t give me no chance to set you right,” Jeff declared. “There wasn’t nothing left to do but smoke it out.”

“You do look some like Peaceful,” said the man. “But you ain’t. If you had been I’d be stone cold by now.”

He thrust out his good left hand. “I’d be plumb honored to shake,” he said.

They shook.

“Name is Churchill,” said the man. “Jim Churchill. I own this here barn. Got everything you want?”