the Outlaws Of Mesquite (Ss) (1990) (24 page)

Ruth Hadlin had stopped in her tracks, and now Leo stepped back and wiped the blood from his face with a jerk and some of it spattered on Ruth's handkerchief. She cried out. He turned around and then he turned colors.

"Miss Hadlin," he said with a grin on his face, "I'm right sorry. I'd no intention getting blood on you, but"-and he grinned-"it's good red blood, even if it isn't blue."

She looked at him without turning a hair, and then she said coolly, "Don't stand there with your face all bloody. Go wash it." And then she added just as coolly, "And next time don't lead with your right. If he hadn't been so all in, he'd have knocked you out." With that she walks off up the street and we all stood there staring.

Leo, he stared most of all. "Well, I'm a skinned skunk!" he said. "Where do you reckon she ever heard about leading with a right?"

Mary Ryan, she heard about it, but she said nothing, just nothing at all, and that wasn't Mary's way. Of course, we all knew about Mary. She was plumb crazy about Leo but he paid no particular attention to any one of the girls. Or all of them, for that matter.

There was talk around town, but there always is. Some folks said this was as good a time as any to get shut of Leo Carver and his like. That it was time Canyon Gap changed its ways and spruced up a bit. Mort Lewand was always for changing things. He even wanted to change the name of Canyon Gap to Hadlin. It was the judge himself who stopped that.

So we sat around now and listened to the hammers and thought of how big an occasion it was to be. Some of the folks from the creek were already in town, camped out ready for the big doings tomorrow.

Ruth Hadlin was not around and none of us gave it much thought. All of this was so far away from the Hadlin folks. Ruth bought a horse, I remember, about that time. It was a fine big black. The Breed done sold it to her.

Funny thing, come to think of it, because I'd heard him turn down five hundred for that horse-and that in a country where you get a good horse for twenty dollars-but Ruth had ways and nobody refused her very much. What she wanted with a horse that big I never could see.

Editor Chafee, he hoisted his britches and was starting back toward the shop when Ruth Hadlin came down the street. She stopped nearby and she looked at that gallows. Maybe her face was a little pale, but the fact that all those roughnecks were around never seemed to bother her.

"Tom," she said right off, "what do you believe Leo Carver did with that money?" Chafee rubbed his jaw. "You know," he scowled, "I've studied about that. I can't rightly say."

"What has he always done with it before?"

"Why, he spent it. Just as fast as he could."

"I wonder why he didn't use it to hire a better lawyer? He could have had a man from El Paso for that. Or for much less! A good lawyer might have freed him."

"I wondered about that." Chafee looked a little anxiously at Mort Lewand. Mort was a power in town and he disliked Carver and made no secret of it. Lewand was looking that way, and now he started over. "It doesn't really matter now, does it?"

Chafee added.

Lewand came up and looked from one to the other. Then he smiled at Ruth. "Rather noisy, isn't it, Ruth? Would you like me to escort you home?"

"Why, thank you," she said sweetly, "but I think I'll stay. I've never seen a gallows before. Have you, Mr. Lewand?"

"Me?" He looked startled. "Oh, yes. In several places."

She stood there a few minutes watching the carpenters work. "Well," Ruth said slowly, "it's too bad, but I'm glad no local people lost anything in that holdup."

We all looked at her, but she was watching the gallows, an innocent smile on her lips.

Editor Chafee cleared his throat. "I guess you weren't told, Miss Hadlin. The fact is, that money belonged to Mort here."

She smiled brightly. Women are strange folk.

"Oh, no, Tom. You've been misinformed! As a matter of fact, that money was a payment on Mr.

Lewand's ranch, and when he consigned it for carriage it became the property of the former owner of the ranch. That was the agreement, wasn't it, Mr. Lewand?"

For some reason it made Mort mad, but he nodded.

"That's right."

Ruth nodded too. "Yes, Mr. Lewand was telling me about it. He's very farsighted, I think. Isn't that wonderful, Tom? Just think how awful it would have been if he had paid that whole twenty thousand dollars and then lost it and had to pay it over! My, it would take a wealthy man to do that, wouldn't it now?"

Editor Chafee was looking thoughtful all of a sudden, and Old Pap had taken the pipe from his lips and was staring at Ruth. Mort, he looked mad as a horny toad, though for the life of me, I couldn't see why. After all, it had been a smart stunt.

"Those awful shotguns!" From the way she was talking you wouldn't have believed that girl had a brain in her head. "I don't believe people should be allowed to own them. I wonder where Leo got the one he used?"

"Claimed he never owned one," Chafee commented slowly.

"He probably borrowed one from a friend," Mort said carelessly. "I suppose they are easy to find."

"That's just it!" Ruth exclaimed. "The man who loaned him that shotgun is just as guilty as he is.

I think something should be done about it."

"I doubt if anybody loaned him one," Mort said, offhand. "He probably stole it."

"Oh, no! Because," she added hastily, "if he did, he returned it. Everybody in town who owns a shotgun still has it. There are only six of them in Canyon Gap. Daddy has two, Editor Chafee has one, Pap here has an old broken one, and Mitch always carried one."

"That's only five," Old Pap said softly.

"Oh!" Ruth put her fingers to her mouth. "How silly of me. I'd forgotten yours, Mr.

Lewand."

There was the stillest silence I ever did hear, with nobody looking at anybody else. Suddenly Ruth looked at a little watch she had, gasped something about being late, and started off.

Editor Chafee began to fill his pipe, and Old Pap scratched his knee, and all of us just sat there looking a lot dumber than we were. Mort Lewand didn't seem to know what to say, and what he finally said didn't help much. "If a man wanted to find a shotgun," he said, "I don't suppose he'd have much trouble." With that he turned and walked off.

You know something? The sound of those hammers wasn't a good sound. Editor Tom Chafee scratched his chin with the stem of his pipe. "Pete," he says to me, "you were supposed to ride shotgun that night. Whose shotgun would you have used?"

"Mitch always lent me his. I was feeling poorly and Mitch took over for me. Leo, he called my name when he first rode up, if you recall."

That shotgun business was bothering all of us. Where did Leo get a shotgun? This was rifle and pistol country, and shotguns just weren't plentiful.

Ruth Hadlin could have narrowed it down even more, because everybody knew that Judge Hadlin wouldn't let anybody touch one of his guns but himself. They were expensive, engraved guns, and he kept them locked up in a case.

Where had Leo picked up a shotgun? What had he done with the money?

Editor Chafee looked down at Old Pap all of a sudden. "Pap," he said, "let's walk over to my place. You, too, Pete. I want you to look at my shotgun."

We looked at that gun and she was all covered with grease and dust. That shotgun hadn't been fired in six months, anyway. Or for a long time. It certainly hadn't been the gun that killed Mitch and Doc.

"Just for luck," Chafee said seriously, "we'd better go. have a look at the judge's guns."

Behind us we could hear those hammers a-pounding, and we could hear O'Brien rehearsing his German band. From where we walked we could see six or seven wagons coming down the road, all headed into Canyon Gap, for the hanging.

Certain things happened that I didn't hear until later. I didn't hear about Ruth Hadlin, all pretty as ever a picture could be, walking into that jail to see Leo Carver. When she got into the office the sheriff was standing there looking down at a cake on his desk. That cake had been cut and it was some broken up because he had taken two files from it.

Mary Ryan was standing by his side.

Sheriff Jones looked mighty serious. "Mary," he was saying, "this here's a criminal offense, helping a man to break jail. Now, where's those other two files? No use you stalling-I know you bought four of "em."

"You're so smart," she said, "you find 'em!" She tossed her head at him and gave him a flash of those saucy eyes of hers.

Sheriff Jones leaned over the table. "Now look, Mary," he protested, "I don't want to make trouble for you, but we just can't have no prison break.

Why, think of all those folks coming for miles to see a hanging! They'd be mad enough to string me up.

"Why not?" she said, short-like. "He's no more guilty than you are."

Jones started to protest again and then he looked up and saw Ruth Hadlin standing there in the door. Her face was cool as she could make it, and, mister, that was cold! In one hand she held Leo's guitar.

The sheriff straightened up, mighty flustered. Here he was, talking confidential-like with a girl from the Street! Suppose that got around among the good folks of the town. Be as much as his job was worth, and election coming up too.

He flushed and stammered. "This here-this young woman," he spluttered, "she was trying to smuggle files to the prisoner. She-was Ruth Hadlin interrupted, her eyes cold and queenlike on the sheriff. "I can assure you, Sheriff Jones, that I am not at all interested in your relations with this young lady, nor in the subject of your conversation.

"I have brought this guitar to the prisoner," she continued. "I understand he enjoys singing, and we think it cruel and inhuman that he be forced to listen to that banging and hammering while they build a gallows on which to hang him. It is cruel torture."

Jones was embarrassed. "He don't mind, ma'am," he protested. "Leo, he's-was "May I take this instrument to him, Sheriff Jones?" Her voice was cold. "Or do you want to examine me? Do you think I might be smuggling files too?"

Sheriff Jones was embarrassed. The very idea of laying a hand on Ruth Hadlin, the daughter of old Judge Emory Hadlin, gave him cold shivers.

"No, no, ma'am! Of course not." He gestured toward the cells. "Just you give it to him, ma'am!

I'm sorry. I-was "Thank you, Sheriff." Ruth swept by him and up to the cell.

"Young man,"-her voice was clear-"I understand that you play a guitar, so I have brought you this one. I hope the music that you get out of it will make your heart free."

Leo looked startled, and he took the guitar through the bars. "Thank you, Miss Hadlin," he said politely. "I wish-was He broke off, his face a little flushed. "I wish you didn't have to see me in here. You see, I didn't-I never killed those men. I'd like you to believe that."

"What I believe," Ruth said sweetly, "is of no importance. The music from the guitar will be pleasant for you, if played in private." She turned abruptly and walked out, and she went by Sheriff Jones like a pay-car past a tramp.

Mary told it afterwards, and Mary said that Leo plunked a string on that guitar and then he looked at it, funny-like."... It sure didn't sound right," Mary said. I shouldn't wonder.

That was late Monday afternoon. By sundown there was maybe two hundred people camped around town waiting for the big hanging next afternoon. Old Pap, he wasn't around, nor was Editor Chafee. Some said that when they left the judge's house, the judge himself was riding with them.

When next I come across Old Pap, he was standing on the corner looking at that gallows. That was near the jail, and from the window Leo could see us.

"Folks would be mighty upset if they missed their hanging, Pap," Leo said.

"They won't!" Pap was mighty short and gruff.

"They'll git their hanging, and don't you forget it."

That gallows looked mighty ghostly standing there in the twilight, and it didn't make me feel no better. Leo, well, he always seemed a right nice feller. Of course, he had rustled a few head, but I wouldn't want to take no oath I hadn't, nor Old Pap, nor most of us. Leo, he was just a young hellion, that was all.

Even when he stuck up those stages he just done it for drinking money. Not that I'm saying it's right, because I know it ain't, but them days and times, folks excused a lot of a young man who was full of ginger, long as he didn't hurt nobody and was man enough.

Especially of Leo's sort. If you was in trouble you just let him know. Come prairie fire, flood, stampede, or whatever, Leo was your man. No hour was too late, no job too miserable for him to lend a hand. And never take a dime for it.

So we all went to bed, and the last thing Leo said was, "I never did cotton to no rope necktie. I don't figure it's becoming."

"Wait"'11 tomorry," Old Pap said.

The sun was no more than up before the lid blew off the town. Somebody yelled and folks came a-running.

I slid into my pants and scrambled outside. The crowd was streaming toward the Plaza and I run down there with "em. The bars was out of the jail window, filed off clean as you'd wish, then bent 197 back out of the way. Tied to one of them was a sheet of paper. It was a note: