[Texas Rangers 05] - Texas Vendetta (31 page)

“For all I know, Jayce Landon is waitin’ out there in the dark. All he needs is for me to open this door and give him a clean shot.”

“Have you lost all your guts, boy?”

“Havin’ guts is one thing. Bein’ stupid is another. You know Jayce won’t give me a fightin’ chance.”

“And I know why. Just about everybody in town knows.” The judge cursed softly to the man who was with him. “On account of Big’un, the Hopper name doesn’t mean what it used to around here. Before long every dog in town will be hiking its leg at us.”

The two men walked away, the judge still grumbling.

If the situation had not been so serious Andy might have laughed at the irony of Big’un Hopper having made himself, in effect, a prisoner in his own jail.

Knowing the effort would probably be futile, he knocked on the door with the butt of his pistol. “Big’un, open up.”

Big’un hollered, “I told you, Uncle, I’m done talkin’ to you.”

“This is Andy Pickard. Texas Ranger. You’re under arrest.”

Big’un did not answer for a moment. “Arrest? Are you crazy? I’m in here, and you’re out there. You ain’t comin’ in, and I ain’t comin’ out.”

“Give up to me and I’ll take you somewhere that Jayce can’t get to you.”

“I ain’t afraid of Jayce.”

“Looks to me like you are. Else you wouldn’t have locked yourself up in there.”

“Go to hell.”

“I’m just tryin’ to give you a chance.”

“I’ll make my own chances. Now git!”

Andy had not expected Big’un to surrender, at least not right away, but maybe this would get him to thinking. “If you decide you want my protection, send somebody to find me. I’ll be around.”

Andy thought that Big’un was not likely to go anywhere for a while, not until he was sick and tired of self-imposed imprisonment. He rode down to the livery stable. The hostler showed surprise. “You all by yourself, Ranger?”

“There isn’t anybody else. The other two Rangers got wounded.”

“I heard about that. Good news is a long time comin’, but bad news spreads in a hurry. Which one are you after, Jayce or Big’un?”

“Both. I know where Big’un is at, for now. Got any idea where Jayce might be?”

The hostler shook his head. “I’ve got to live with both sides. Wouldn’t want anybody accusin’ me of bein’ a gossip. But if it was me lookin’, I’d say go where the Landons are the thickest. Maybe out to Walter Landon’s farm.”

“Have you seen Jayce yourself?”

The hostler let the question die unanswered. “You want me to put your horse up?”

“That was my first intention, but now I think I’ll go to Walter Landon’s.”

“You’d better either sing out loud or tiptoe like you was walkin’ on eggs. Them Landons don’t appreciate surprises, and they are uncommon good shots.” He paused, staring at Andy with some apprehension. “They ain’t the kind that forgives easy. I’d rather you never told them you even talked with me.”

“I’m not a gossip either.”

There was probably not a bigger gossip in town than the stableman, but in this instance Andy felt that he would keep his mouth shut. He could not mention having seen Andy without being asked what they talked about. Andy had rather his return to Hopper’s Crossing not be noised around before he had time to size up his options. He had not seen many so far.

He knew the way to Walter Landon’s farm, though he lost it in the moonlight a couple of times where lesser wagon roads split off from the main one. As he began to discern lamplight in the front windows he wondered which of the hostler’s recommendations he should choose: to ride in announcing himself or to sneak in and observe quietly.

His first instinct was to see before being seen, but three hound dogs took the decision out of his hands. As they began barking and trotted to meet him, the lamplight winked out. He suspected that one or more rifles or shotguns were aimed in his general direction. He shouted, “Hello, the house.”

No one immediately shot at him, so he felt hopeful.

A voice answered, “Who’s that out yonder?”

“Andy Pickard, Ranger. You-all remember me.”

“Are you by yourself?” The voice sounded familiar, though he could not identify it.

“There’s nobody but me.” He rode up almost to the front porch, hoping the moon provided enough light that they could see he was alone. He raised his hands.

A match flared, and the lamp burned again. A man stepped out onto the porch. The light was at his back so Andy could not see the face. He thought he knew the man by his shape and his stance.

He said, “Howdy, Jayce.”

He heard a chuckle. “Sorry, Andy. Come closer and look again.”

Moving up, he recognized Jayce’s Ranger brother. “Dick?” He recalled how much the Landon brothers resembled one another. At a distance it would be difficult to tell which was which. “I thought you were still in camp on the San Saba.”

“I took a leave of absence to be at my brother’s trial. But it seems like you-all can’t hold on to Jayce long enough for him to get a shave.”

“He had a close shave at the jail. We all did.”

“I know. I’m grateful that you-all got him out.”

Andy suspected Dick had heard about it from Jayce. “He took care of himself. I’ve got no credit comin’.”

“So now you’re here hopin’ to take him back.”

Andy nodded. “Him and Big’un Hopper both.”

“Just you?”

“I’m all there is.”

“It might get you killed.”

Andy suggested, “You’re still a Ranger. You could help me.”

“I already turned my brother in once. It’s weighed on my conscience ever since. I wouldn’t do it again for anybody.” Dick jerked his head toward the door. “Tie your horse and come on in. We’re all friends here.”

For the moment perhaps, but Andy knew that attitudes would change in a hurry if he tried to take Jayce back to jail. He wrapped the reins around a post and went up onto the porch. He asked, “Can you look me square in the eye and tell me Jayce ain’t here?”

Dick smiled. “If I tell you where he ain’t, you might figure out where he is. My duty as a Ranger is on leave till I go back to camp.”

Andy stopped abruptly in the open door. Flora stood in the front room with a couple of men, one of them Walter Landon, and a woman he guessed was Walter’s wife.

Dick said, “You know Flora, of course.”

Getting over his initial surprise, Andy told her, “I’m bettin’ Jayce himself brought you here.”

She said, “I didn’t need Jayce to show me the way. My home is just over the hill, what’s left of it.” It was the kind of answer that said neither yes nor no.

He said, “I thought you were takin’ care of Scooter.”

“Tom Blessing’s wife took him out to their farm. Big’un wouldn’t dare do him harm out there, even if he could find the place.”

Dick said to Andy, “I didn’t know you-all had the boy. What’re you goin’ to do with him?”

“When Rusty is ready to travel we intend to take Scooter up north to the Monahan family.”

“I couldn’t think of a better place for him. I know you and Rusty have shared some hard times with the Monahans, and some good times too.”

“I’ve seen them go down bruised and bloody, but they always got up and went on with their lives.”

“That’s like us Landons.” Dick rolled and lighted a cigarette, his eyes narrowed in thought. “You’re takin’ on too much of a load to tote by yourself. You’d best forget about catchin’ Jayce. I’d be tickled to help you with Big’un, though.”

Andy wondered if anyone had told Dick of the outrage Big’un and his brother Ned had forced on Flora. It was not his place to do so. Gunning for Big’un would be legal for Dick so long as he did it within his duty as a Ranger, but to do it for personal vengeance would outlaw him, as killing Ned Hopper had outlawed Jayce.

Dick asked, “Have you got a plan?”

“Not a trace. I’m hopin’ somethin’ will break in my direction.”

Andy had a strong hunch Jayce was somewhere within shouting distance. He ventured a few probing questions that yielded him nothing. He realized that if he captured Jayce he would have to do it somewhere else. These people protected their own.

Dick said, “It’s time to hit the soogans. I’ve been rollin’ my blankets out here on the porch.”

Andy took that as an oblique invitation to stay the night. It seemed a good idea if he was right about Jayce being near. Dick accompanied him to a corral, where he unsaddled his horse and turned him loose. He removed a blanket rolled and tied behind the cantle of his saddle. Back at the front porch he lay looking at the stars, crisp and sparkling in the chilled fall air. He caught the faint odor of Dick’s cigarette.

He asked, “Why do you reckon it is that so many people can’t find a way to live together? If they haven’t got somethin’ to fight about, they’ll make up a reason. I’ll bet you’ve got no notion how the feud started in the first place.”

“I’ve always laid it on the stubbornness of the Hoppers, but I can’t truthfully say they’re more stubborn than us Landons. If one of us didn’t start a fight, the other one would. I remember us young‘uns jumpin’ on the Hopper boys and fightin’ when they hadn’t even done anything to us.”

“Maybe a Landon and a Hopper ought to marry one another. Things might get peaceful if everybody was kin.”

Dick grunted dissent. “Things would just turn meaner. You ever watch a bunch of in-laws get together?”

Andy had never seen much of family life except among the Indians. There, just as in the white community, relationships could be fragile as glass. He said, “I get the idea that Big’un is the main one keepin’ the feud stirred up.”

“Him and his brother Ned. Ned’s gone now, but Big’un is still a bad apple spoilin’ the barrel. And behind Big’un is old Judge Hopper. He never gets his knuckles bloody, but he keeps stirrin’ the pot. While everybody watches the fightin’, he dips his hands into the county treasury.”

“I’ll bet if the Rangers got to lookin’ around they could clean the judge’s plow.”

“Probably. But I can’t put a halo around Jayce’s head either. Even if he is my brother, I have to admit that he’s done a lot to keep the fight goin’.”

Andy thought before he asked, “Do you think Flora saw that side of him before she married?”

“I tried to tell her, but she wasn’t ready to listen. After they went to the preacher it wasn’t my place to tell her anything anymore. I tried to get Jayce to leave here when I did, to take her away from this part of the country and let the old fight die. But he didn’t want to turn aloose. It had got in his blood like whiskey does for some people.” He snubbed out his cigarette. “Flora deserves better than that.”

Andy had guessed wrong. Big’un did not stay put.

Big’un was wary about going out the jail’s front door, which faced the town’s main business street. Even the back door could not be considered safe, but at least it was darker on that side of the courthouse square. Staying in the shadows as much as he could, he headed for the wagon yard. He had left his horse there in an open corral. He wished he could get his mount and go without the stableman seeing him, but that was not to be. The skinny hostler watched him saddling his horse and asked, “Where you goin’ this time of the night, Big’un?”

“Vacation.” Damn a man who asked personal questions, he thought. This nosy dickens’s jaw would still be moving a week after they buried him.

“Ain’t you afraid you’ll run into a booger, travelin’ in the dark?”

“The boogers we’ve got around here, they’re even worse in the daylight.”

Big’un tied his blankets and war bag on the saddle. As soon as he got his hands on a chunk of his uncle’s money he would be gone. He was not sure how he would fit in Mexico, but if he liked it he might be a long time coming back. At least he wouldn’t have to keep looking over his shoulder for that back-shooting Jayce Landon. And he would have a border between himself and the Rangers.

He reined his horse toward a quarry where workers cut building stones a few hundred yards from town. He had watched them use dynamite from a wooden shed. He had not learned much about handling dynamite beyond how to set a fuse and touch it off without blowing himself up. He figured that was enough in this case.

He had no idea how much he needed for the job, so he made a guess and tucked a box under his arm. It was about half full. He rode back to town and tied his horse to the fence behind the courthouse on the side opposite his uncle’s office. Carrying the dynamite, he tried the back door and found it locked. He watched and listened before he drew his pistol and broke a pane. Reaching inside, he freed the lock. He waited and listened again until he was confident nobody had paid any attention to the sound of breaking glass.

The courthouse was almost pitch dark, but he had been to Uncle Judd’s office so many times he could have found it in his sleep. He bumped into a desk on his way in, then felt his way along until he came to the safe. By feel more than by sight, he set the fuse and placed the stick back in the box with the others. He propped the box against the safe door, lighted the fuse, and moved out into the hallway to escape the blast.

The hallway was not far enough. The concussion lifted him off his feet and hurled him down the hall. His ears drummed with pain. Papers and pens and other small objects went flying. Windows shattered, and dust billowed like a dry fog.

Choking, he made his way back into what remained of his uncle’s office. He saw a gaping hole in the outer wall. Glass crunching beneath his brogan shoes, he made his way to it and saw the safe lying outside. It was turned over, the door pressed against the ground. It would take several men to turn it.

Big’un did not know words strong enough to express his exasperation, but he tried all the ones he could think of. They didn’t help. He could imagine his uncle Judd going into a mouth-foaming fit over this. Well, the money-grubbing old son of a bitch had it coming. It was his own fault.

Discretion told him he had better be moving before a curious crowd swarmed the damaged courthouse. He hurried out the back door and around the building. He feared the blast had frightened the horse into running away, but it was still straining against the tied reins. He patted it on the neck in an effort to calm it. As soon as he could get it to quit faunching around he mounted and set it into a long trot.