Oliver Strange - Sudden Westerns 03 - The Marshal of Lawless(1933) (33 page)

 
          
“Pete,”
came
a whisper.

 
          
The
deputy spun round to find Green sitting up, and standing near was the familiar
form of Black Feather. The Indian, it appeared, divining that Raven and his men
spelt trouble, had slipped out of the window of.
the
kitchen, and, finding the place surrounded, climbed to the flat roof of the
shack. As soon as the coast was comparatively clear he had dropped on one of
the guards, knocked him senseless with his gun-butt, and re-entered the
building.

 
          
“Good
work. Black Feather heap big chief,” Pete commented. “What do we do now, Jim?”

 
          
“Go
out the way he come in, get out hosses, an’ head for the Box B,” the marshal
decided.

 
          
According
to the redskin, there were only four guards. The one on the kitchen side had
already been disposed of; the man at the back was their danger. The marshal
devised a plan.

 
          
Cautioning
the others to await his signal, he climbed out and helped himself to the
revolver off the still form lying in the shadow of the wall. Then he walked
towards the rear of the building. In a few moments a man appeared dimly in the
gloom, approaching him.

 
          
“All
quiet, yore side?” the stranger queried.

 
          
The
voice told the marshal who it was. “Shore, Parson,” he mumbled. “There’s on’y
one thing—”

 
          
“What’s
that?” asked the other, and came closer.

 
          
The
moment he was near enough the marshal leapt, his fingers closing round the
man’s throat and choking the cry of alarm before it was born. The steady,
strangling pressure soon reduced the victim to helplessness and a tap from the
marshal’s pistol-barrel tumbled him, a limp heap, to the ground. His sombrero
deadened both, the noise and force of the blow, but Pardoe would be harmless for
some time. Having ascertained this, and collected the fallen man’s belt, which
to his great content he found to be his own, the marshal gave the signal.
Silently they stole to the Red Ace corral, secured their horses, and started
for the Box B. When they were safely on their way Pete emitted a chuckle.

 
          
“I’m
bettin’ that Raven person will be a good one to steer clear of to-day,” he
opined.

 
          
In
the pale light of the dawn Green looked at the little man and laughed. “Sorry
you feel like that, Tubby,” he said. “We’re goin’ to see him.” Then, noting the
other’s bewilderment, he added, “Did yu allow I’d run away?”

 
          
“Huh!”
Pete snorted. “I claim to be as plucky as the next fella, but I’d run from a
rope every time. Dancin’ on nothin’ never did strike me as humorsome.”

 
          
“Mebbe
Raven’ll reconsider them projects if we go back with the Box B an’ Double S
outfits behind us,” Green suggested.

 
          
“Make
a difference, o’ course,” Pete admitted. “But there’s a jag o’ men in that
town.”

 
          
“Some of ‘em friends of ourn,” the marshal reminded.

 
          
The
deputy subsided, but he was not satisfied; it seemed to him nothing short of
madness to go back to Lawless, and when they reached the Box B he again
protested, only to find Andy on the marshal’s side.

 
          
“Shore
we’ll go with yu,” the rancher cried. “That bird is flyin’ too high an’ it’s
time his pin-feathers
was
trimmed. Hey, Rusty, round
up some o’ the boys, an’ tell ‘em to come loaded for trouble.”

 
          
During
breakfast Andy got the whole story of the previous day’s happenings, and his
face grew stormy when he heard of the hold Raven claimed to have on the Double
S.

 
          
“Throw
Tonia out, will he, the dirty hound? Not while I can pull a trigger,” he
growled.

 
          
“I’m
obliged to yu again, marshal, but I wish yu’d broken his damned neck.”

 
          
Accompanied
by Rusty and half a dozen well-armed riders, they made for the Double S, and
since they wasted no time on the trip, they arrived before the men had
dispersed to their different duties. Tonia met them at the door with a look of
relief which her first words explained.

 
          
“When
I saw you in the distance I thought it was that man coming to turn us out,” she
said.

 
          
“We’re
goin’ to turn him out, or, anyways, show him where he gets off,” Andy told her
grimly, and related what had happened to the marshal. “We thought Renton an’
some o’ yore boys might like to come along.”

 
          
“Yu
bet they will, an’ I’ll make another,” bellowed Reuben Sarel from the veranda,
adding, to a passing cowboy, “Yu, Lafe, push
them
broncs in the buckboard an’ send Renton here.”

 
          
The
foreman made no comment when he heard the story, but his lips clamped in a hard
line as he turned away, and when he
reappeared
six
riders followed him.

 
          
“Gotta
leave the rest to look after things an’ Miss Tonia,” he explained.

 
          
“You
needn’t worry about Miss Tonia—she’s going too,” his mistress announced calmly,
and shook a pretty but obstinate head to all their protests. “It is partly on
my account that you are going,” she pointed out. “Some of you may get hurt and
then I’ll be of use.”

 
          
She
was looking at Andy as she spoke, and that settled the matter so far as he was
concerned. The marshal clinched it by deciding that she would be as safe with
them as anywhere else.

 
          
They
set out at once, the buckboard leading, with Green beside it, followed by Andy
and Tonia, with the rest of the party strung out behind. The cowboys had not
the whole of the story, but they knew that Raven was trying to get their
respective ranches, and that was enough; whether he had any claim to them was
beside the question; they were loyal to their owners, and they did not like the
saloonkeeper. Therefore they rode gaily on an errand which might mean death for
any one of them, but beneath their banter was a note of stern purpose.

 
          
“Reckon
we’ll put a light to the Red Ace an’ chase that bastard redskin back to his
wigwam,” Rusty remarked.

 
          
“Shucks!
Ain’t there no trees in Lawless?” drawled a Double S man, whose deliberation in
speech and movement had long ago earned him a nickname.

 
          
“
Good
for yu, Lightnin’,” approved another. “I dunno what the
marshal aims to do, but I’m with him, all the way.”

 
          
Truth
to tell, the marshal did not know himself, and confessed as much when Sarel put
the question.

 
          
“I’m
guessin’ that arrestin’ Pete an’ me last night was just a bluff, an’ I’m goin’
to call it,” he said. “It’ll be a showdown, an’ I ain’t ready, but he’s forced
my hand.”

 
          
“Seth’s
crookeder than a cow’s hindleg,” Sarel observed. “He’s had me by the short hair
a long time past, but now I ain’t carin’ providin’ Tonia don’t suffer.”

 
          
The
marshal nodded. He had a fairly accurate idea of what the other was referring
to, and he looked at him with a newborn respect. There was something of his
more virile brother in the fat man after all.

 
          
They
arrived at Lawless to find the street empty save for a few loafers outside the
Red Ace. One of these dived headlong into the saloon at the sight of them.

 
          
Andy,
the girl, and Green rode on to Durley’s and met the proprietor of the Rest
House at the door. His eyebrows rose at the sight of them.

 
          
“The
old girl’ll be pleased to death to see yu, miss,” he said to Tonia, and when
she had gone into the house, “Ain’t tired o’ life, are you, marshal?”

 
          
“Not
that yu’d notice,” the officer replied carelessly. “Why?”

 
          
Durley spat in disgust.
“Yu must be—to come back,” he
retorted. “Raven’s as mad as a teased tarantula, an’ he’s turned most o’ the
town agin yu.
Claims to have got the goods on yu for fair,
though I dunno how.
There’s a meetin’ at the Red Ace right now to elect
that runt Pardoe as marshal, and show yu up.”

 
          
“We
ain’t been invited, but I think we oughta attend, Andy,” the marshal said
gravely, but the little crinkles at the corners of his eyes were well in
evidence. “Our friends will shore expect it.”

 
          
“Yu
won’t meet many there. Raven’s got the riff-raff o’ the place; the decent men
are stayin’ away,” Durley told him.

 
          
“I’m
takin’ friends with me,” the marshal said, nodding to the waiting group of
riders.

 
          
“Round
up some o’ them decent men an’ fetch ‘em along, ol’-timer.”

 
          
Durley
hurried off as Tonia reappeared for a last word with her lover.

 
          
“You’ll
be careful, Andy, won’t you?” she whispered. “Remember that you belong to me
now.”

 
          
“That’s
somethin’ I
ain’t never
goin’ to forget, honey,” the
young man said. “Don’t yu
worry.
”

 
          
At
which masculine comfort she smiled bravely and went in to do just what he had
told her not to do, as a woman will.

 
          
The
loungers outside the Red Ace watched curiously as the marshal and his followers
tied their mounts and entered. The bar was deserted save for its custodian;
with a sour sneer he watched them file through the opening into the other room.

 
          
Between
forty and fifty men were congregated in the dance-hall, lounging on the benches
which lined the
walls,
and the marshal saw at a glance
that the better element in the town was not represented. Freighters,
prospectors, gamblers, owners or workers in smaller saloons, with a sprinkling
of Mexicans, most of them had little to lose and would be ready for anything
which promised excitement and possible gain. There were several he failed to
recognize, tough-looking fellows whose presence he did not understand until he
saw the leering countenance of Leeson; no doubt the rustler had recruited and
brought them in, probably from Tepee Mountain. On the little platform facing
the door, with its worn-out piano and chairs for any other musicians who might
be available, Raven was sitting. By his side was Pardoe, his head bandaged, and
grouped near were half a dozen of the 88 riders. To the left of the door was an
unoccupied space which the newcomers promptly took possession of. The marshal
nodded nonchalantly to the gathering.

 
          
“Sorry
I’m late, gents,” he said. “On’y just heard o’ the meetin’. Hope I ain’t missed
much?”

 
          
“Not
a thing, ‘cept the election of an honest man to take yore place,” Raven told
him.

 
          
Green
looked round the room. “An honest man,” he said wonderingly. “Leeson, I’m
congratulatin’ vu on—yore reformation.”

 
          
This
produced a laugh from some and a scowl from the saloonkeeper. “I’m meanin’
Mister Pardoe,” he said.

 
          
“What,
the Parson?” Green smiled. “Converted hisself, has he? Yu’ll shorely have to
watch out, Raven, or he’ll have yu at the mourners’ bench afore you know it.”

 
          
Durley
and several of the tradesmen came in at that moment and joined heartily in the
mirth the remark evoked. Raven’s contribution was a savage snarl: “He’ll have
yu at the Seat o’