A Century of Great Western Stories Read online

  Doane looked at the point of his nose. “You haven’t done anything, Jordan. Except get drunk. Nothing to break the law.”

  “I haven’t done nothing,” Jordan said, his eyes squinting away at one of the small, tilting tombstones. “By God, I’ll do something. Whadda I got to do?” He drew his head back, as though he were farsighted, and squinted. “Whadda I got to do to make you fight, huh?”

  “Don’t do anything,” Doane said quietly, keeping his voice even. “Just go back and have another drink. Have a good time.”

  “You think I ain’t sober enough to fight?” Jordan slipped his right gun out of its holster, turning away from Doane. Doane stiffened. “Wait, mister,” Jordan said.

  He cocked the gun. “See that bird?” He raised the gun into the air, squinting along the barrel. The bright nickel of its finish gleamed in the sun. The lark wheeled and fluttered. Jordan’s arm swung unsteadily in a small circle.

  He pulled the trigger and the gun blasted. The lark jumped in the air, flew away about twenty feet, and began circling again, catching insects.

  “Missed ’im,” Jordan mumbled, lowering his arm and wiping sweat off his forehead. “Damn it, I can’t see!” He raised his arm again. Again the heavy blast cracked Doane’s ears. Down in the town near the Mexican huts, he could see tiny figures run out into the street.

  The bird didn’t jump this time, but darted away out of sight over the hill.

  “Got ’im,” Jordan said, scanning the sky. His eyes wandered over the graveyard for a moment, looking for the bird’s body. “Now you see?” he said, turning to Doane, his eyes blurred and watering with the sun’s glare. “I’m going down and shoot up the damned town. Come down and stop me, you old—”

  He turned and lurched sideways a step, straightened himself out, and walked more steadily toward his horse, laughing to himself. Doane turned away, his face sick, and trudged slowly up the hill, his eyes on the ground.

  He stopped at one of the newer graves. The headstone was straight on this one. He looked at it, his face changing expression. “Here lies Cecelia Doane, born 1837, died 1885, the loyal wife …”

  He stooped and pulled a weed from the side of the grave, then pulled a bunch of withered stems from a small green funnel by the headstone, and awkwardly took the fresh flowers out of the newspaper. He put the flowers into the funnel, wedging them firmly down into the bottom, and set it down again. He stood up and moved back, wiping sweat from his eyes.

  A sudden shout came from the gate, and the sharp crack of a quirt. Doane turned with a befuddled look.

  Jordan was back on his horse, beating Doane’s. He had looped the reins over its neck so that it would run free. It was tearing away down the slope headed back for town.

  Doane stood with his hat in his hand, his face suddenly beet red. He took a step after Jordan, and then stood still, shaking a little. He stared fixedly after him, watching him turn into the main road and toward the main street again. Then, sighing deeply, he turned back to the grave. Folding the newspaper, he began dusting off the heavy slab, whispering to himself. “No, Cissie. I could have gone. But, you know—it’s my town.”

  He straightened up, his face flushed, put on his hat, and slapping the folded paper against his knee, started down the path. He got to the Missouri gate, closed it, and started down the ruts again.

  A SHOT CAME from the town, and he stopped. Then there were two more, sharp spurts of sound coming clear and definite across the sage. He made out a tiny figure in a blue shirt running along a sidewalk.

  He stood stock-still, the grasshoppers singing in a contented chorus all around him in the bright yellow glare. A train whistle came faint from off the plain, and he looked far across it. He made out the tiny trailed plume of smoke.

  His knees began to quiver very slightly and he began to walk, very slowly, down the road.

  Then suddenly there was a splatter of shots from below. The train whistle came again, louder, a crying wail of despair in the burning, brilliant, dancing air.

  He began to hurry, stumbling a little in the ruts. And then he stopped short, his face open in fear. “My God, my empty horse, those shots—Toby, no!” He began to run, shambling, awkward and stumbling, his face ashen.

  From the end of the street, as he hobbled panting past the tight-shut Mexican shanties, he could see a blue patch in the dust in front of the saloon, and shambled to a halt. It wasn’t Toby, whoever it was, lying there facedown: face buried in the deep, pillowing dust, feet still on the board sidewalk where the man had been standing.

  The street was empty. None of the faces he knew looked at him now. He drew one of his guns and cocked it and walked fast up the walk, on the saloon side.

  A shot smashed ahead of him and he stopped, shrinking against a storefront. Inside, through the glass door, he could see two pale faces in the murk. Blue powder smoke curled out from under the saloon porch ahead of him.

  Another shot smashed, this time from his office. The spurt of smoke, almost invisible in the sunlight, was low down in the doorway. Two horses were loose in the street now, his own, standing alert up past the saloon, and young Jordan’s, half up on the boardwalk under one of the porches.

  He walked forward, past young Jordan’s horse, to the corner of the saloon building. Another shot slammed out of his office door, the bullet smacking the window ahead of him. A small, slow smile grew on his mouth. He looked sideways at the body in the street. Young Jordan lay with the back of his head open to the sun, crimson and brilliant, his bright nickel gun still in his right hand, its hammer still cocked, unfired.

  The train whistle moaned again, closer.

  “Doane,” Toby called from the office door, invisible. “Get out of town.” There was a surge of effort in the voice, a strain that made it almost a squeal. “I’m shot in the leg. Get out before they get together.”

  A door slammed somewhere. Doane glanced down between the saloon and the store beside it. Then he saw, fifty yards down the street, a figure come out of another side alley and hurry away down the walk toward the station. From the saloon door another shot slammed across the street. Toby held his fire.

  Doane peered after the running figure, his eyes squinting thoughtfully. The train’s whistle shrieked again like the ultimatum of an approaching conqueror at the edge of town, and in a moment the ground under his feet began to vibrate slightly and the hoarse roar of braking wheels came up the street.

  He turned back to young Jordan’s horse, petted it around the head a moment, and then took it by the reins close to the bit. He guided it across the street, keeping its body between him and the front of the saloon, without drawing fire, and went on down the alley beside his office. At the rear door he hitched the horse and went inside.

  Toby was on the floor, a gun in his hand, his hat beside him, peering out across the sill. Doane kept low, beneath the level of the window, and crawled up to him. Toby’s left leg was twisted peculiarly and blood leaked steadily out from the boot top onto the floor. His face was sweating and very pale, and his lips were tight.

  “I thought he got you,” Toby said, keeping his eyes on the saloon across the street. “I heard those shots and then your horse came bucketing back down the street. I got Jordan. Colby got me in the leg before I got back inside.”

  “Never mind about that. Come on, get on your feet if you can and I’ll help you on the horse in back. You can get out of town and I’ll shift for myself.”

  “I think I’m going to pass out. I don’t want to move. It won’t hurt no worse getting killed than it does now. The hell with the horse! Take it yourself.”

  Doane looked across the street, his eyes moving over the door and the windows carefully, inch by inch.

  “I’m sorry I shot him,” Toby said. “It’s my fault. And it’s my fight now, Doane. Clear out.”

  Doane turned and scuttled out of the back. He mounted the horse and rode down behind four stores. He turned up another alley, dashed across the main street, down another alley, then back u
p behind the saloon.

  He dismounted, his gun cocked in his hand. The back door of the place was open and he got through it quickly, the sound of his boot heels dimmed under the blast of a shot from the front of the saloon. From the dark rear of the room, he could see Pierce, crouched behind the bar, squinting through a bullet hole in the stained-glass bottom half of the front window.

  There was a bottle of whisky standing on the bar beside Pierce; he reached out a hand and tilted the bottle up to his mouth, half turning toward Doane as he did so. Pierce kept the bottle to his lips, pretending to drink, and, with his right hand invisible behind the bar, brought his gun into line with Doane.

  The tip of Pierce’s gun came over the edge of the bar, the rest of him not moving a hair, and Doane, gritting his teeth, squeezed slowly and painfully on his gun trigger. The gun flamed and bucked in his hand, and he dropped it, his face twisting in agony. The bottle fell out of Pierce’s hand and spun slowly on the bar. Pierce sat there for a moment before his head fell forward and he crashed against the edge of the bar and slipped down out of sight.

  Doane picked up his gun with his left hand and walked forward to the bar, holding his right hand like a crippled paw in front of him. The bottle had stopped revolving. Whisky inside it, moving back and forth, rocked it gently. He righted it and took a short pull at the neck, and in a moment the pain lines relaxed in his face. He went to the batwing doors and pushed one of them partly open.

  “Toby!” he called.

  There was no answer from across the street, and then he saw the barrel of a revolver sticking out of his office door, lying flat, and behind it one hand, curled loosely and uselessly around the butt.

  He looked down the street. The train stood across it. A brakeman moved along the cars slowly, his head down. There was nobody else in sight.

  He started to step out, and saw then two men coming up the opposite walk, running fast. Suddenly one of them stopped, grabbing the other by the arm, and pointed at him. He stared back for a moment, seeing Jordan clearly now, the square, hard face unchanged except for its pallor, bleak and bony as before.

  Doane let the door swing to and continued to watch them over the top of it. They talked for a moment. Then Colby ran back down the street—well out of effective range—sprinted across it and disappeared. Down the street the engine, hidden by some buildings, chuffed angrily, and the cars began to move again. Jordan stood still, leaning against the front of a building, fully exposed, a hard smile on his face.

  Doane turned and hurried to the back door. It opened outward. He slammed and bolted it, then hurried back to the front and waited, his gun ready. He smiled as the back door rattled, turned, fired a shot at it, and listened. For a moment there was no sound. Then something solid hit it, bumped a couple of times, and silence came again.

  From the side of the building, just beyond the corner where Pierce’s body lay, a shot crashed. The gun in the office door jumped out of the hand and spun wildly. The hand lay still.

  He heard Jordan’s voice from down the street, calling, the words formed slowly, slightly spaced.

  “Is he dead?”

  “Passed out,” Colby called back.

  “I’m going around back to get him. Keep Doane inside.” Jordan turned and disappeared down an alley.

  Doane leaned across the bar, knocked bottles off the shelves of the back bar, and held his pistol on the corner of the wall, about a foot above the floor.

  “Pierce,” he said.

  “Throw out your guns,” Pierce answered.

  Doane squinted at the corner, moved his gun slightly, and fired. He heard a cry of pain, then curses; saw the batwing doors swing slightly. Then he turned and ran for the back door. He threw back the bolt and pushed on the door. It wouldn’t give. He threw himself against it. It gave a little at the bottom. Pierce had thrown a stake up against it to keep him locked in. He ran back to the front.

  Across the street, he could see somebody moving in his office, dimly, beyond the window. Suddenly the hand on the floor disappeared.

  “Come on out, you old—,” Pierce said, panting. “You only skinned me.” His voice was closer than before, somewhere between the door and the corner of the building, below the level of the stained glass.

  Then Doane saw Toby’s white shirt beyond the window opposite. Jordan was holding him up, and moving toward the door. Jordan came out on the porch, hugging Toby around the chest, protecting himself with the limp body. With a heave he sent Toby flying down the steps, and jumped back out of sight. Toby rolled across the sidewalk and fell into the street, where he lay motionless.

  Doane looked stupidly at Toby, then at young Jordan, still lying with his feet cocked up on the sidewalk.

  “He ain’t dead, Doane,” Jordan called. “Come and get him if you want him alive.” He fired through the window. Dust jumped six inches from Toby’s head. “Come on out, Doane, and shoot it out. You got a chance to save him.” The gun roared again, and dust jumped a second time beside Toby’s head, almost in the same spot.

  “Leave the kid alone,” Doane called. “This fight’s between you and me.”

  “The next shot kills him, Doane.”

  Doane’s face sagged white and he leaned against the side of the door. He could hear Pierce breathing heavily in the silence, just outside. He pushed himself away from the door and drew a breath through clenched teeth. He cocked his pistol and strode out, swinging around. Pierce fired from the sidewalk, and Doane aimed straight into the blast and pulled as he felt himself flung violently around by Pierce’s bullet.

  Pierce came up from the sidewalk and took two steps toward him, opening and shutting a mouth that was suddenly full of blood, his eyes wide and wild, and then pitched down at his feet.

  Doane’s right arm hung useless, his gun at his feet. With his left hand he drew his other gun and stepped out from the sidewalk, his mouth wide open, as though he were gasping for breath or were about to scream, and took two steps toward Toby as Jordan came out of the office door, firing. The slug caught Doane along the side of his neck, cutting the shoulder muscle, and his head fell over to one side. He staggered on, firing. He saw Toby trying to get up, saw Jordan fall back against the building, red running down the front of his shirt, and the smile gone.

  Jordan stood braced against the building, holding his gun in both hands, firing as he slid slowly down. One bullet took Doane in the stomach, another in the knee. He went down, flopped forward, and dragged himself up to where Toby lay trying to prop himself up on one elbow. Doane knelt there like a dog, puking blood into the dust, blood running out of his nose, but his gray eyes almost indifferent, as though there were one man dying and another watching.

  He saw Jordan lift his gun with both hands and aim it toward Toby, and as the hammer fell, he threw himself across Toby’s head and took it in the back. He rolled off onto his back and lay staring into the sky.

  Upside down, he saw Toby take his gun and get up on one elbow, level it at Jordan and fire, and then saw Toby’s face, over his, looking down at him as the deputy knelt in the street.

  They stayed that way for a long moment, while Doane’s eyes grew more and more dull and the dark of his blood in the white dust grew broader. His breath was coming hard, in small, sharp gasps.

  “There’s nothing in it, kid,” he whispered. “Only a tin star. They don’t hang the right ones. You got to fight everything twice. It’s a job for a dog.”

  “Thank you, Doane.”

  “It’s all for free. You going to quit, Toby?”

  Toby looked down at the gray face, the mouth and chin and neck crimson, the gray eyes dull. Toby shook his head. His face was hard as a rock.

  Doane’s face suddenly looked a little surprised, his eyes went past Toby to the sky. Toby looked up. A lark was high above them, circling and fluttering, directly overhead. “A pretty bird,” Doane mumbled. “A very pretty bird.”

  His head turned slowly to one side, and Toby looked down at him and saw him as though fast aslee
p.

  He took Doane’s gun in his hand, and took off Doane’s star, and sat there in the street while men slowly came out of stores and circled about them. He sat there unmoving, looking at Doane’s half-averted face, holding the two things tightly, one in each hand, like a child with a broken toy, his face soft and blurred, his eyes unwet.

  After awhile the lark went away. He looked up at the men, and saw Mettrick.

  “I told him he should have resigned,” Mettrick said, his voice high. “He could have taken his horse—”

  “Shut up,” Toby said. “Shut up or get out.” His eyes were sharp and his face placid and set. He turned to another of the men. “Get the doc,” he said. “I’ve got a busted leg. And I’ve got a lot to do.”

  The man looked at him, a little startled, and then ran.

  Born in Michigan, Dan Cushman has lived most of his long life in Montana and intimately knows the state and its history, as he demonstrates in “Killers’ Country!”, a stirring action tale of a range war in the eastern Montana cattle country. He began contributing to the Western and pulp magazines in the late forties, and in 1951 turned to the writing of Western novels such as The Ripper from Rawhide and paperback adventure novels such as Savage Interlude and Timberjack. But it was his novel Stay Away, Joe, published in 1953, a hilarious yet moving story about a group of Native Americans in his adopted state that brought him his greatest success as a bestseller and book club selection and later, as an adapted musical, Whoop-Up. Several of Cushman’s other novels have Montana settings, among them The Old Copper Collar; The Silver Mountain, winner of the 1957 Spur Award for Best Novel; and Rusty Irons.

  Killers’ Country!

  Dan Cushman

  1. First Blood for the Sagers

  It was before dawn when the eight men rode from Colton’s place, and still only midmorning when they topped the ridge beyond Squawblanket Springs and caught their first sight of the town of Maverly.

  There Hooks Colton brought his horse around with a hard twist of the brutal, half-breed bit he always used, and sat with his heavy legs ramrodding the stirrups. He rolled a cigarette while his narrow, pale gray eyes roved the limitless sage flats broken by the bright-shining roofs of Maverly and the long line of the Northern Pacific railroad.