Fiddlefoot (23 page)

He inched ahead now into the room and knelt, listening. Not a sound. Nunnally was waiting somewhere in the house, the same as he was, for a sound to shoot at. He opened his mouth and breathed through it and was utterly still listening. This was a fool's game, he knew beyond thought. Nunnally was in another room already, but the house was surrounded, and he would fight till he was killed. Why follow him? He had moved upstairs, or to another room, and there were a thousand places he could hide, waiting to put a bullet into whoever followed him.

But a hot and stubborn anger held Frank where he was. Nunnally was his, and his alone, and he would not turn back.

And then the thought came to him,
What if he doesn't know the house?
Hugh had been here only a few days, and he'd been grimly busy. He wouldn't care enough about the house to look at it. Then if he didn't know the house, and the placement of the furniture, he would be too wise to blunder around in the dark.
Then he'll be here, in this room
, Frank thought. A faint chill touched his back when he considered that.

The firing outside continued. Here, there was an unrelieved blackness that seemed to breathe all around him. He knew now that he had to move, to end this tension that was building here. Remembering the room now, he took a quiet step to his left and then felt slowly with his hand. It touched a table. Gently, gently, he moved it, and presently his hand touched the lamp. He stopped, remembering this lamp. It was the plain one, not the one with the glass-bead fringe.

He grasped it firmly around the base and waited. It was silent outside. He wanted the sound of gunfire to cover what he would do next.

Suddenly, there was a crash of gunfire just outside the room. Frank lifted the lamp and silently heaved it across the room now. Its crash against the far wall was hard and brittle and startling. Instantaneously, only five feet to his right, Hugh's gun opened up in the direction of the lamp's crash. Frank pivoted and shot three times, waist-high, pulling his gun in a tight arc.

And then he moved forward swiftly.

He crashed into Hugh's body, which was turned to him. Frank slashed out with his gun, raking it across Hugh's face, and he heard the grunt, and Hugh's arm came down across his shoulder like an axe. Then there was a deafening roar behind him, as Hugh's gun went off in his hand.

Frank rolled away from the arm and drove his left hand into Hugh's midriff, as he was brought up abruptly by the wall. His fist smacked solidly in Hugh's belly, and then skidded wetly off. Frank raised his gun and hacked down savagely at Hugh's head, but his gun met nothing, and he was carried off balance.

And then the thudding crash of Hugh falling on the floor followed. Frank fell into a tangle of legs and he clawed up onto Hugh's body, slashing again with his gun. But Nunnally did not move under him.

Frank rolled away and waited. He heard a thin sigh, and that was all.

Now he rose, fumbling for a match with his left hand in his shirt pocket while he held his gun ready with the other hand. His hand was set. Cautiously, he circled around Hugh's head and wiped the match alight on the wall.

There at his feet, lying on his back, with open eyes and arms outstretched, was Nunnally. A great ragged gash angled down his face. The whole front of his shirt was stained with blood. Slowly, Frank raised his own left hand and saw the blood on his fist, and he knew that Nunnally had been dead on his feet when he hit him.

The match died, and he moved around Hugh and felt his way into the corridor. A wavering light showed under the door, and when Frank palmed it open he saw Hannan kneeling in the outside doorway, holding a match. There, lying on the steps, one tremendous leg in the room, was Rhino. He was face down.

Frank walked across the room and Hannan rose. There were two bullet holes in Rhino's back, and the stains from them had merged to soak his shirt.

Hannan looked at Frank blankly. “The damn fool ran. I had a gun on him, and he tried to break.”

“So you'll never know about Rob?” Frank said bitterly.

“Why, he told me all about it,” Hannan said wonderingly. “Faraday did it and Rhino paid him. That's why I thought he'd quit. I thought he'd given up.” He looked down at the massive; still form of the gray-haired man at his feet. The firing at the bunkhouse had ceased, and it was quiet now, and still Hannan looked at Rhino. “You know,” he said then, “I'm a sucker. That's just what Rhino wanted me to do.”

They rode into town next day about noon, four of Rhino's disarmed crew riding ahead. Two of the crew lay dead by the corrals at Saber, and the rest had made a successful break for the hills. The four were Hannan's loot, and he seemed satisfied.

As they swung into the main street, Frank asked, “Where'll you be, Buck?”

“At the hotel, I reckon. Why?”

Frank only said, “I'll see you later,” and fell away from the group and turned up the side street toward Tavister's house.

Now he slowed his horse to a walk, and looked up the quiet tree-shaded street to the big brick house. It was all the way he pictured it last night as he lay in his room, only last night he hadn't gone beyond here. In his mind, he had turned up the side street, and the rest of it wouldn't come.

He saw Carrie in the porch chair as he reined up at the stepping block. He swung out of the saddle now, and tied his horse, and then moved through the iron gate up the walk.

Carrie had put her book down, and now she rose and came to the top of the steps. She was wearing his favorite dress, he saw, and before he glanced up to her face he thought,
She's pretty in it
, and then he looked closely at her.

She knows it
, he thought then. She didn't say anything, although her face was tight and unsmiling as he came onto the bottom step and halted. Her arm was around the porch pillar, and for a moment they just looked at each other, neither offering to move closer.

“I don't know how to begin it,” Frank said then.

“It wasn't fair, Frank,” Carrie said bitterly.

“I didn't know any other way to do it,” Frank said humbly. “You see, I'd run out my rope, Carrie. I'd lied to you, I'd lied to everybody. I'd given Rhino half of Saber to keep it from you, and I still couldn't keep it from you, so I had to tell you.”

“And I still don't care if you did it,” Carrie said.

“No, you care about me being steady, and staying put, and owning something big. You care enough about that to wait six years to see if I'll do it, don't you, Carrie?”

She didn't answer.

“Don't wait any more,” Frank said gently. Still she didn't say anything, and he turned and went down the walk and through the gate to his horse. She wouldn't call him back, he knew. He mounted and put his horse in motion and glanced over at the porch. She hadn't moved, and he looked away.

He went down to the main street which was almost empty at noon hour, and he saw the horses out in front of McGarritys' gate, where Hannan and his men were gathering in Pete Faraday. There weren't any people standing around watching, so he knew the news wasn't out yet.

He put his horse in at the tie-rail of the hotel, and walked around the rail and into the lobby, crossing it to the dining-room door.

When he saw Tess there, he took off his hat and went over to her table, where she was eating with Mr. Newhouse.

He grinned down at her and said, “You've had enough to eat. Come along.”

She smiled and rose, not even excusing herself, and he held her hand as they walked through the dining room and lobby.

Outside, she said, “You look different.”

“I am different,” he said. They turned down the cross street toward McGarrity's. The Saber crew and Faraday were mounting now, and Frank, still holding her hand, stopped and waited as they passed him, Faraday riding sullenly amongst them.

Cass said, “Hello, Boss.”

Frank grinned, and now he saw Hannan walking toward the hotel, leading his horse. He was mopping his brow with a soiled handkerchief as he came up to them, and he touched his hat to Tess, his handkerchief still in his hand.

Frank looked down at Tess, and then glanced at Hannan. “Buck, I'm not scared any more. You want me, along with those four and Faraday, for impersonating an Army officer.”

He felt Tess's hand squeeze his.

Buck said mildly, “I wondered when you were goin' to tell me.”

“You knew it?” Frank said blankly.

“Yeah. Rhino told me last night.” He looked closely at Frank. “I think he's a liar.”

“No, he didn't lie.” He told Hannan then how he and Nunnally had worked it, and Hannan listened with an increasing irritation.

When he was finished, Hannan said, “What do you want me to do about it?”

“Whatever's in the book.”

Hannan looked at him, and then at Tess, and he snorted, “I haven't heard the Army kick.” When Frank didn't answer, Hannan just shook his head, touched his hat and walked on.

Frank turned to Tess, bewilderment in his face.

“Maybe he thinks you've paid enough,” Tess said gravely.

“Do
you
think it was wrong?” Frank asked.

“Yes.”

“Tess,” Frank said slowly, “I'm a fiddlefoot. I don't want Saber for a while. I want to see some country, Utah first. I want to take five thousand dollars, my own, and go through those Utah towns with Rhino's bills of sale for those horses. I want to hunt up those men and pay them what I owe them.” He paused, “I want you with me. I want to marry you. I—”

“Haven't you something else to do first?”

“I've done that. I told her.”

She smiled proudly then, and she said, without shyness, “I think I'm really a fiddlefoot, too.”

They turned then, walking contentedly back toward the hotel, and it was a minute before Frank spoke. Then he said, with a gay and veiled derision in his voice: “First, though, I'm going fishing. Up in Wells Canyon there's a big trout as long as my arm. He's been there six years, the same pool. Fat, dumb, and happy. I'm going to catch him.”

About the Author

Luke Short is the pen name of Frederick Dilley Glidden (1908–1975), the bestselling, award-winning author of over fifty classic western novels and hundreds of short stories. Renowned for their action-packed story lines, multidimensional characters, and vibrant dialogue, Glidden's novels sold over thirty million copies. Ten of his novels, including
Blood on the Moon
,
Coroner Creek
, and
Ramrod
, were adapted for the screen. Glidden was the winner of a special Western Heritage Trustees Award and the Levi Strauss Golden Saddleman Award from the Western Writers of America.

Born in Kewanee, Illinois, Glidden graduated in 1930 from the University of Missouri where he studied journalism. After working for several newspapers, he became a trapper in Canada and, later, an archaeologist's assistant in New Mexico. His first story, “Six-Gun Lawyer,” was published in
Cowboy Stories
magazine in 1935 under the name F. D. Glidden. At the suggestion of his publisher, he used the pseudonym Luke Short, not realizing it was the name of a real gunman and gambler who was a friend of Doc Holliday and Wyatt Earp. In addition to his prolific writing career, Glidden worked for the Office of Strategic Services during World War II. He moved to Aspen, Colorado, in 1946, and became an active member of the Aspen Town Council, where he initiated the zoning laws that helped preserve the town.

All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 1946 by Frederick D. Glidden

Cover design by Andy Ross

ISBN: 978-1-5040-4083-9

This edition published in 2016 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.

180 Maiden Lane

New York, NY 10038

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