Oliver Strange - Sudden Westerns 02 - Sudden(1933) (44 page)

 
          
“Cut
along an’ see the cook,” Purdie smiled. “Two breakfasts never did hurt a boy
yet.”

 
          
He
turned to his foreman. “What’s back o’ this caper?”

 
          
Sudden’s
face was set. “I sort of expected it,” he said. “Slippery is puttin’ up his
last bluff, an’ I aim to call it.”

 
          
“Get
Bill an’ half a dozen o’ the boys,” the cattleman said. “Where’s Luce?”

 
          
“Gone
ridin’ with Miss Nan,” Sudden replied, and waited for the explosion.

 
          
It
did not come. Purdie just nodded, and said, “Reckon we can manage without him.
I had that boy figured up all wrong, Jim; there’s times he reminds me powerful
o’ Kit.”

 
          
Whereat
the foreman smiled covertly and was wisely dumb.

 
          
Windy
had not attained the dignity of a court-house, and meetings of any public
importance took place in a large room adjoining “The Lucky Chance” which had
been originally created for a dance-hall. Here, lolling on forms or leaning
against the walls, the C P contingent found most of the citizens. Seated behind
a table borrowed from the bar was the marshal, with his deputy near at hand.
His face darkened when he saw that Sudden had not come unsupported.

 
          
“Mornin’,
Purdie,” he greeted. “Was there any need to fetch along a young army?”

 
          
The
rancher looked around. “Where is it?” he asked. “My boys got as much right to
be here as yu have. What’s the fuss about?”

 
          
“No
fuss a-tall,” Slype returned.
“Just a friendly meetin’ to
investigate the passin’ o’ two prominent citizens.”

 
          
“One
bein’ a common thief an’ hold-up,” Purdie said caustically.

 
          
“That
ain’t
no
way to speak o’ the dead,” the marshal
reproved. “Fact
is,
the evidence ‘pears to show
Burdette warn’t as bad as his reputation.”

 
          
“Huh!
He musta had a hell of a reputation, then,” the rancher retorted. “All right;
get on with the whitewashin’.”

 
          
“This
meetin’ would like to hear yore foreman’s account o’ what happened yestiddy,”
Slype began.

 
          
Sudden
told the story, plainly and briefly. The marshal’s cunning eyes glinted with
satisfaction when it was finished.

 
          
“Yo’re
admittin’ that the killin’ o’ the woman warn’t intentional?”

 
          
“Shore—the
shot was meant for me. She ran into it.”

 
          
The
marshal nodded sagely. “I knowed it,” he said. “So did everyone else, yu damn
fool,”

 
          
Purdie
told him, and several of those present smiled audibly.

 
          
“Why
should she protect yu, Green?” was the next question.

 
          
“She
cared for King, an’ I figure she didn’t want to see him commit murder. His guns
were out when he came into the saloon, so he had the drop on me from the
start.”

 
          
“Yu
had threatened to shoot him on sight.”

 
          
“That’s
not true.”

 
          
The
questioner shrugged his shoulders. “Yu claim King’s hoss throwed him—one o’ the
best riders hereabouts,” he went on, incredulity patent in his tone.

 
          
“He
was twisted in his saddle to fire at me when his bronc went down.”

 
          
“An’
instead o’ givin’ him a chance, yu rode over him?”

 
          
“What
chance was he givin’ me in `The Plaza’?” the puncher retorted. “An’ he buzzed
four bullets at me when I overtook him, without waitin’ to warn me too.
Allasame, I tried to avoid the tramplin’ I wanted to shoot him.”

 
          
“Yu
meant to kill King although yu knowed what he had just done was an accident?”
Slype said quickly.

 
          
“I
certainly did,” Sudden said, and there was a flicker of a smile on his grim
lips. “Did yu suppose I wanted to congratulate him?” The faint amusement faded
from his face. “Listen to me, Slype; this was Burdette’s fourth try at puttin’
me outa business. First, King sends his gunman, Whitey, an’ when he fails to
turn the trick, Mart bushwhacks me at Dark Canyon, an’ yu nearly hang Luce for
it. Then another of his men, Riley there, pushes me in the Sluice an’ sends a
couple o’ slugs after me for company.”

 
          
The
deputy sprang to his feet. “That’s…”

 
          
“The
truth—an’ yu know it,” Sudden said sternly. “On the top o’ that, King carries
off Miss Purdie.”

 
          
“Bah!
She warn’t in
no
danger,” the marshal sneered. “He was
just usin’ her to collect his debt from her father.”

 
          
Purdie
stepped forward, his face flaming. “There yu lie in yore throat, Slippery,” he
cried.

 
          
“All
I owed the Circle B could be paid with a bullet. Burdette’s word to me was that
unless I made over my ranch an’ cattle to him he’d throw my daughter to his
men.”

 
          
The
statement brought forth oaths of surprise and indignation from the audience.
Rough, uncultured, hard-shelled as these men were, they possessed the instinctive
respect of their type for the weaker sex, be she never such a poor example of
it. The marshal saw the effect created and hastened to destroy it.

 
          
“Sheer
bluff,” he asserted. “Burdette wanted to git yu on yore knees without a battle.
But we’re driftin’ from the point, which is this; ever since this fella Green
appeared this town’s had trouble, an’ he’s bin the hub of it. I reckon yu gotta
git a new foreman, Purdie.”

 
          
“Meanin’
yu aim to run him out?” the rancher asked. “I’ll see yu in hell first.”

 
          
The
marshal stood up, his thin, rodent-like jaws working. “I’m lettin’ yu down
easy,” he rasped. “This yer town stood for Burdette’s bullying, but it ain’t
goin’ to stand for yores.
Sabe?”

 
          
A
confirming growl told him he had struck the right note. Sudden, sardonically
scanning the coarse, savage faces around the
room,
saw
that, for the moment, the marshal was on top. He knew the shallow minds of
these men, easily stirred to passion, and jealous of their rights as free and
independent citizens. He knew too the swift certainty with which they would
strike when once they had come to a decision. He glanced at Purdie and guessed
his thought; the C P owner was wishing he had brought more of his outfit. Ere
the stinging retort which might have precipitated a fracas could leave the
rancher’s lips, the foreman interposed.

 
          
“How
long yu givin’ me to leave, marshal?” he quietly asked.

 
          
The
puncher’s friends could scarcely believe their ears. Slype’s expression was one
of mingled triumph and amazement; he had not looked for so easy a victory. The
fellow was a four-flusher after all. He laughed evilly.

 
          
“Yu
got till sundown; after that, yore stay is liable to be plenty permanent,” he
answered.

 
          
Someone
sniggered at the gibe. Bill Yago opened his mouth and closed it again without
speaking when he caught his foreman’s eye. Weldon, the blacksmith, moved as
though about to say something, but changed his mind when Sudden shook his head.
Leaning indolently against the wall, his thumbs tucked in his belt, the man who
had been so unceremoniously told to “pull his freight” looked at the ring of
faces. Many of them were hard and hostile, others contemptuous, while all
expressed curiosity. Deliberately he got out his “makings,” rolled a cigarette
and lighted it. He dropped the match, placed his foot upon it, and straightened
up as though he had reached a decision.

 
          
“Good
enough, marshal, that’ll give me time to complete what I came to these parts to
do,” he said. Holding open one flap of his vest, he disclosed a metal star sewn
on the inside. “Yu know what that is?” he questioned. They all did, and a
ripple of surprise ran through the spectators. What was a United States
deputy-sheriff doing in Windy? Upon Slype the appearance of an officer whose
authority far exceeded his own fell like an avalanche. Half-dazed, he heard the
C P foreman explain that he had been sent to investigate the Black Burdettes,
tales of whose plunderings for a hundred miles round had come to the Governor’s
ears. This statement restored the marshal to normality; the Battle Butte gang
was broken, the deputy’s work was done; he, the marshal, had nothing to fear
from him. Satisfied on this point, he began to bluster.

 
          
“Why
didn’t yu come to me right away an’ declare yoreself?” he asked. “I could ‘a’
helped yu.”

 
          
Sudden
smiled mirthlessly. “Yu did, but I ain’t thankin’ yu,” he replied. “When yu
bumped off Mart Burdette …”

 
          
The
marshal jumped as though jerked with a string. “Why, I was in the bar there
when the fight ended,” he protested.

 
          
“Yu
left before he did, an’ turned my hoss loose so that I’d be delayed, which
would help when yu tried to throw suspicion on me,” Sudden replied evenly.
“Raw work, marshal.”

 
          
“All
damn nonsense,” Slype sneered. “Mart was a friend.”

 
          
“An’
so was Sim, huh? Yet yu shot him down under a flag o’ truce in the fight at the
Circle B,” the cold voice continued.

 
          
The
hiss of indrawn breath betokened the amazement of the spectators of this
strange scene. Save for the scuffle of restless feet as men leant forward,
there’ was little sound. All eyes were focused on the man in the chair, who
from being accuser had so swiftly become the accused.

 
          
The
marshal’s laugh was not convincing. “Musta bin a wonderful shot,” he said,
“seein’ I was in town an’ asleep at the time, Purdie not havin’ asked for my
assistance.”

 
          
This
remark caused some merriment, but the puncher’s next statement stilled it.

 
          
“I
saw yu at the moment yu fired,” he said.

 
          
“That
goes for me too,”
came
the wheezy, cracked voice of
California. “Shore thought yu was on Purdie’s side an’ that mebbe yu didn’t
notice the flag.”

 
          
The
marshal’s agile brain was racing. How much did this damned interloper know? He
must gain time to think.

 
          
“Might
as well claim I wiped out King too while yo’re about it,” he sneered.

 
          
“Not
exactly, but yu had to do with it,” Sudden returned. “He came straight from
yore office tòThe Plaza,’ an’ I figure you sent him in search o’ me, hopin’
we’d kill one another.”

 
          
Slippery
shrugged his shoulders disdainfully; the needed flash of inspiration had come,
and he thought he saw a way out. He turned to the waiting, breathless company.

 
          
“Well,
boys, I s’pose I gotta explain,” he began. “For quite a while I’ve knowed the
Burdettes was bad medicine —robbers, rustlers, an’ killers.”

 
          
“But
friends o’ yores,”
came
the acid reminder.

 
          
The
marshal achieved a passable chuckle. “I let ‘em
think
so,” he said. “A fella what represents the law don’t allus have to show his
hand; yu didn’t yoreself, Green.” A sly glance at his hearers told him he had
scored a point. “I kept cases on ‘em an’ waited for opportunities.