The Fighting Edge Read online

  “Do we have to have witnesses?” asked Bob helplessly. Getting married was a more formidable and formal affair than he had supposed.

  “Sure. I’ll dig ’em up.”

  The justice waddled to the door of the saloon adjoining and stuck his head inside. A row of cowpunchers were lined up in front of the bar.

  “Y-you, Dud Hollister an’ Tom Reeves, I’m servin’ a subpoena on you lads as w-witnesses at a w-weddin’,” he said in the high wheeze that sounded so funny coming from his immense bulk.

  “Whose wedding?” demanded Reeves, a lank youth with a brick-red face, the nose of which had been broken.

  “N-none of yore darned business.”

  “Do we get to kiss the bride?”

  “You h-hotfoot it right to my office or I’ll throw you in the c-calaboose for c-contempt of court, Tom Reeves.”

  The puncher turned to Hollister, grinning. “Come along, Dud. Might ’s well learn how it’s done, ol’ Sure-Shot.”

  The range-riders jingled into the office at the heels of the justice. Blister inquired for the names of the principals and introduced the witnesses to them. The gayety and the audacity of the punchers had vanished. They ducked their heads and drew back a foot each in a scrape that was meant to be a bow. They were almost as embarrassed as June and Bob. Which is saying a good deal.

  June had not realized what an ordeal it would be to stand up before strangers in her dingy dress and heavy cracked brogans while she promised to love, honor, and obey. She was acutely conscious of her awkwardness, of the flying, rebellious hair, of a hole in a stocking she tried to keep concealed. And for the first time, too, she became aware of the solemnity of what she was doing. The replies she gave were low and confused.

  Before she knew it the ceremony was over.

  Blister closed the book and dropped it on a chair.

  “Kiss yore wife, man,” he admonished, chuckling.

  Bob flushed to the roots of his hair. He slid a look at June, not sure whether she would want him to do that. Her long dark lashes had fallen to the dusky cheeks and hid the downcast eyes.

  His awkward peck caught her just below the ear.

  The bridegroom offered the justice two dollars. Blister took it and handed it to June.

  “You keep it, ma’am, an’ buy yorese’f somethin’ for a p-pretty. I’d jes’ b-blow it anyhow. Hope you’ll be r-real happy. If this yere young s-scalawag don’t treat you h-handsome, Tom an’ Dud’ll be glad to ride over an’ beat him up proper ’most any time you give ’em the high sign. Am I right, boys?”

  “Sure are,” they said, grinning bashfully.

  “As j-justice of the peace for Garfield County, S-state of C-colorado, I’m entitled to k-kiss the bride, but mos’ generally I give her one o’ these heart-to-heart talks instead, onloadin’ from my chest some f-free gratis g-good advice,” the fat man explained in his hoarse wheeze. “You got to r-remember, ma’am, that m-marriage ain’t duck soup for n-neither the one nor the other of the h-high contractin’ parties thereto. It’s a g-game of give an’ take, an’ at that a h-heap more give than take.”

  “Yes, sir,” murmured June tremulously, looking down at the hole in her stocking.

  “Whilst I n-never yet c-committed matrimony in my own p-person, me being ample provided with t-trouble an’ satisfied with what griefs I already got, yet I’ve run cows off an’ on, an’ so have had workin’ for me several of this sex you’ve now got tangled up with, ma’am,” Blister sailed on cheerfully. “I’ll say the best way to keep ’em contented is to feed ’em good, treat ’em as if they was human, an’ in general give ’em a more or less free rein, dependin’ on their g-general habits an’ cussedness. If that don’t suit a p-puncher I most usually h-hand him his hat an’ say, ‘So long, son, you ’n’ me ain’t c-consanguineously constructed to ride the same range; no hard feelin’s, but if you’re w-wishful to jog on to another outfit I’ll say adios without no tears.’ You can’t g-get rid of yore husband that easy, ma’am, so I’ll recommend the g-good grub, s-seventy-five s-smiles per diem, an’ the aforesaid more or less f-free rein.”

  Again June whispered, “Yes, sir,” but this time her honest eyes lifted and went straight into his.

  “An’ you.” The justice turned his batteries on the groom. “You w-wanta recollect that this r-road you’ve done chose ain’t no easy one to t-travel. Tenderfoot come in the other day an’ w-wanted to know what kind of a road it was to S-stinking Creek. I tell him it’s a g-good road. Yesterday he come rarin’ in to f-find out what I told him that for. ‘Fellow,’ I says, ‘Fellow, any r-road you can g-get over is a good road in this country.’ It’s t-thataway with marriage, son, an’ don’t you forget it a h-holy minute. Another thing, this being u-united in wedlock ain’t no sinecure.”

  “Ain’t no which kind of a sin?” inquired Reeves.

  Dud Hollister grinned admiringly. “Blister sure ropes an’ hogties a heap of longhorn words.”

  The justice scratched his bald poll and elucidated. “A s-sinecure, boys, is when a f-fellow rides the g-grub line habitual an’ don’t rope no d-dogies for his stack o’ wheats an’ c-coffee.” He wagged a fat forefinger at Bob. “You gotta quit hellin’ around now an’ behave yorese’f like a respectable m-married man. You gotta dig in an’ work. At that you ’n’ the little lady will have yore flareups. When you do, give her the best of it an’ you’ll never be sorry. Tha’s all.”

  Blister slid a hand furtively into a drawer of the desk, groped for a moment, then flung a handful of rice over bride and groom.

  The newly married couple left the office hurriedly. They did not look at each other. An acute shyness had swept over both of them. They walked to the buckboard, still without speaking.

  June opened a perspiring little brown palm in which lay two warm silver dollars. “Here’s yore money,” she said.

  “It’s yours. He gave it to you,” Bob answered, swallowing hard. “For a weddin’ present.”

  “Well, I ain’t no pockets. You keep it for me.”

  The transfer was accomplished, neither of them looking into the eyes of the other.

  Blister Haines, flanked on each side by one of the witnesses, rolled past on his way to the bar of the Bear Cat House. His throat was dry and he proposed to liquidate his unusual exertion. He always celebrated a wedding by taking a few drinks. Any excuse was a good excuse for that. He waved a hand toward the newlyweds in greeting.

  Bob answered by lifting his own. He had not taken three drinks in his life, but he felt that he would like one now. It might cheer him up a little.

  What in the world was he to do with June? Where could he take her for the night? And after that what would they do? He had not money enough to pay stage fare to get them away. He did not know anybody from whom he could borrow any. Yet even if he found work in Bear Cat, they dared not stay here. Houck would come “rip-raring” down from the hills and probably murder him.

  Anyhow, it would not do for him to act as though he were stumped. He managed a smile.

  “We’d better take the team to the corral, then go get something to eat, June. I’m sure enough hungry. Ain’t you?”

  She nodded. Even to go to the hotel or a restaurant for dinner was an adventure for her, so little of experience had her life offered.

  As they walked from the barn to the Bear Cat House, the girl-bride was still dumb. The marriage ceremony had brought home to her the solemnity of what she had done. She had promised to love, honor, and obey this boy, to care for him in sickness and in health, till death came to part them.

  What did she know about him? What manner of man had she married? The consequences of the step they had taken began to appall her. She would have to live with him in all the intimacies of married life, cook for him, wash his clothes, sit opposite him at the table three times a day for fifty years. He was to be the father of her children, and she knew nothing whatever about him except that he was gentle and friendly.

  From under long curving lashes she stole a shy
look at him. He was her husband, this stranger. Would she be able to please him? June thought of what Blister Haines had said. She was a pretty good cook. That was one thing. And she would try not to let herself sulk or be a spitfire. Maybe he would not get tired of her if she worked real hard to suit him.

  The hotel was an adobe building. In the doorway stood a woman leaning against the jamb. She was smoking a cigar. June looked twice at her before she believed her eyes.

  The woman took the cigar from between her lips. “Are you the children Blister Haines just married?” she asked bluntly.

  “We—we’ve just been married by Mr. Haines,” Bob replied with an attempt at dignity.

  The blue eyes of the woman softened as she looked at June—softened indescribably. They read instantly the doubt and loneliness of the child. She threw the cigar into the street and moved swiftly toward the bride. A moment before she had been hard and sexless, in June’s virgin eyes almost a monstrosity. Now she was all mother, filled with the protective instinct.

  “I’m Mollie Gillespie—keep the hotel here,” she explained. “You come right in an’ I’ll fix up a nice room for you, my dearie. You can wash up after yore ride and you’ll feel a lot better. I’ll have Chung Lung cook you both a bit of supper soon as he comes back to the kitchen. A good steak an’ some nice French frys, say. With some of the mince pie left from dinner and a good cup of coffee.” Mollie’s arm was round June, petting and comforting her.

  June felt and repressed an impulse to tears. “You’re mighty good,” she gulped.

  The landlady of the Bear Cat House bustled the girl into a room and began to mother her. Bob hung around the door. He did not know whether he was expected to come in or stay out, though he knew which he wanted to do.

  Mollie sent him about his business. “Scat!” she snapped. “Get outa here, Mr. Husband, an’ don’t you show up till five o’clock prompt. Hear me?”

  Bob heard and vanished like a tin-canned pup. He was the most relieved youth in Bear Cat. At least he had a reprieve. Mrs. Gillespie would know what to do and how to do it.

  If being a married man was like this, he did not wonder that Dud Hollister and Blister Haines felt the way they did toward that holy estate.

  * * *

  CHAPTER IX

  THE WHITE FEATHER

  At the appointed time Bob sneaked back to the hotel. He hung around the lobby for a minute or two, drifted into the saloon and gambling annex, and presently found himself hanging over the bar because he did not know what else to do with himself.

  Was he to go to the room after June and bring her to supper? Or was he to wait until she came out? He wished he knew.

  Mollie caught sight of him and put a flea in his ear. “What d’ you think you’re doing here, young fellow, me lad? Get outa this den of iniquity an’ hustle back to the room where the little lady is waitin’ for you. Hear me?” she snorted.

  A minute later Bob was knocking timidly on the door of room 9. A small voice told him to come in. He opened the door.

  June shyly met the eyes of her husband. “Mrs. Gillespie said maybe you’d want to wash up before supper.”

  “I reckon that’d be a good idee,” he said, shifting from one foot to the other.

  Did she expect him to wash here? Or what?

  June poured water into the basin and found a towel.

  Not for a five-dollar bill would Bob have removed his coat, though there had never been a time in his young life when he would have welcomed more a greenback. He did not intend to be indelicate while alone with a young woman in a bedroom. The very thought of it made him scarlet to the roots of his red hair.

  After he had scrubbed himself till his face was like a shining apple, June lent him a comb. She stole a furtive look at him while he was standing before the small cracked mirror. For better or worse he was her man. She had to make the best of him. A sense of proprietorship that was almost pride glowed faintly in her. He was a nice boy, even if he was so thin and red and freckled. Bob would be good to her. She was sure of that.

  “Mrs. Gillespie said she reckoned she could fix you up a job to help the cook,” the bride said.

  “You mean—to-night or for good?”

  “Right along, she said.”

  Bob did not welcome the suggestion. There was an imperative urge within him to get away from Bear Cat before Jake Houck arrived. There was no use dodging it. He was afraid of the fellow’s vengeance. This was a country where men used firearms freely. The big man from Brown’s Park might shoot him down at sight.

  “I don’t reckon we’d better stay here,” he answered uneasily. “In a bigger town I can get a better job likely.”

  “But we haven’t money enough to go on the stage, have we?”

  “If there was a bull team going out mebbe I could work my way.”

  “W-e-ll.” She considered this dubiously. “If we stayed here Mrs. Gillespie would let me wash dishes an’ all. She said she’d give me two dollars a week an’ my board. Tha’s a lot of money, Bob.”

  He looked out of the window. “I don’t want trouble with Jake Houck. It—it would worry you.”

  “Yes, but—” June did not quite know how to say what was in her mind. She had an instinctive feeling that the way to meet trouble was to face it unafraid and not to run away from it. “I don’t reckon we’d better show Jake we’re scared of him—now. O’ course he’ll be mad at first, but he’s got no right to be. Jes’ ’cause he kep’ a-pesterin’ me don’t give him no claim on me.”

  “No, but you know what he is an’ how he acts.”

  “I’ll go where you want to go. I jes’ thought, seein’ how good to us Mrs. Gillespie has been, that maybe—”

  “Well, we’ll talk it over after supper,” Bob said. “I’m for lighting out myself. To Laramie or Cheyenne, say.”

  As they had not eaten since breakfast they were a pair of hungry young animals. They did full justice to the steak, French frys, mince pie, and coffee Mrs. Gillespie had promised.

  They hung for a moment awkwardly outside the dining-room. Both of them were looking for an excuse to avoid returning to their room yet.

  “Like to look the town over?” Bob asked.

  June accepted eagerly.

  They walked up the single business street and looked in the windows. The young husband bought his bride a paper sack of chocolates and they ate them as they strolled. Somehow they did not feel half as shy of each other in the open as when shut up together between the walls of a bedroom.

  Dusk was beginning to fall. It veiled the crude and callow aspects of the frontier town and filled the hollows of the surrounding hills with a soft violet haze.

  Bob’s eyes met the dark orbs of June. Between them some communication flashed. For the first time a queer emotion clutched at the boy’s heart. An intoxicating thrill pulsed through his veins. She was his wife, this shy girl so flushed and tender.

  His hand caught hers and gave it a little comforting pressure. It was his first love gesture and it warmed her like wine.

  “You’re right good to me,” she murmured.

  She was grateful for so little. All her life she had been starved for love and friendship just as he had. Bob resolved to give them to her in a flood. A great tide of sympathy flowed out from him to her. He would be good to her. He wished she knew now how well he meant to look after her. But he could not tell her. A queer shame tied his tongue.

  From a blacksmith shop a man stepped.

  “Say, fellow, can I see you a minute?” he asked.

  It was Dud Hollister. He drew Bob back into the smithy.

  “Big guy in town lookin’ for you. He’s tankin’ up. You heeled?”

  Bob felt as though his heart had been drenched with ice water. Houck was here then. Already.

  “No, I—I don’t carry a gun,” he replied, weakly.

  “Here’s mine. Shoots just a mite high, but she’s a good old friend.” Dud pressed a six-shooter on Dillon.

  The boy took it reluctantly. Th
e blood in his veins ran cold. “I dunno. I reckon mebbe I better not. If I talked to him, don’t you think—?”

  “Talk, hell! He’s out for blood, that guy is. He’s made his brags right over the bar at Dolan’s what all he’s gonna do to you. I’m no gunman, understand. But a fellow’s got to look out for number one. I’d let him have it soon as I seen him. Right off the reel.”

  “Would you?”

  “Surest thing you know. He’s a bad actor, that fellow is.”

  “If I went to the marshal—”

  Dud’s eye held derision. “What good’d that do? Simp ain’t gonna draw cards till after some one’s been gunned. He don’t claim to be no mind-reader, Simp don’t.”

  “I’m not lookin’ for trouble,” Bob began to explain.

  “Fellow, it’s lookin’ for you,” cut in Dud. “You hold that gun right under yore coat, an’ when you meet up with Mr. Hook or whoever he is, don’t you wait to ask ‘What for?’ Go to fannin’.”

  Bob rejoined June. His lips were bloodless. He felt a queer weakness in the knees.

  “What did he want?” asked June.

  “Houck’s here—lookin’ for me,” the wretched boy explained.

  “What’s that you’ve got under yore coat?” she demanded quickly.

  “It’s a—a gun. He made me take it. Said Houck was tellin’ how he’d—do for me.”

  The fear-filled eyes of the boy met the stricken ones of his bride. She knew now what she had before suspected and would not let herself believe.

  If it was possible she must help him to avoid a meeting with Houck. She could not have him shamed. Her savage young pride would not permit the girl to mate with one who proved himself a coward at a crisis of his life. It was necessary to her self-respect that she save his.

  “We’d better go back to the hotel,” she said. “You can stay in our room, and I’ll send for Jake an’ talk with him downstairs.”

  “I don’t reckon I’d better do that,” Bob protested feebly. “He might—hurt you. No tellin’.”