Paper Sheriff (23 page)

“You ain't sure, Harv,” the gaunt man said.

“The hell I ain't. You ever seen a shirt you could play checkers on like his? Besides, it figures. He said he was going to arrest Hoad. We all heard the gunshot, didn't we?”

“What d'you aim to do?” the older, bulky rider asked.

“I sure ain't going to let him go,” the redhead said. “Stape, you cut back for Bale. Hunt up that Sheriff and tell him what we saw. The rest of us will watch the place.” He looked at the others. “Wilsey, you circle and fort up in the barn. Pace, you take the front and side. I'll get by the bunkhouse. Now hurry it up before he has time to saddle up and ride out.”

Thus the siege began with Harvey, Wilsey and Pace watching the house and Stape riding for Bale in the slow rain.

The first half hour puzzled the R-Cross riders. Nothing happened. It was the redhead, Harvey, who ran out of patience first. Hoad could not watch in four directions at once and maybe he could make the house while Hoad was looking in another direction. Casually then he started around the corner but as he was taking the second step a rifle shot racked out and he heard the slug drive into a head-high log on the corner. In one motion Harvey wheeled and lunged for the protection of the bunkhouse. He walked its length, poked his rifle around the corner and put a shot through the window. There was no answering shot, and he knew with chagrin that he was only being taught a lesson.

A movement out on the flats drew his attention and soon he made out three slickered riders approaching the place. Was this help from Bale? No, Stape hadn't had time to get there and back. He watched as the riders approached the wagon shed joined to the big barn, dismounted, put their horses under the shelter of the wagon shed and started for the house.

Should he challenge them, give a warning shot? He knew Pace and Wilsey were asking themselves the same thing and likely waiting on him for the first move but, hell, he couldn't shoot at three strangers who came to call on Hoad. Even if he did fire a warning shot, what was to stop them from circling around through the cottonwoods, and then he'd have a rifleman on either side of him. No, all he was interested in was holding Hoad here until the Sheriff took over the situation.

The three men, two young and one old, tramped through the barn lot to the back door, tried it, knocked and were admitted. Wilsey held his fire too; Pace probably couldn't see them. The slow rain was cold and maddening and Harvey had no shelter from it. It would be drier under the cottonwoods, he reasoned, so he moved back toward them, keeping the bunkhouse between himself and the house. Once he was in the cottonwoods, he took up his new station. He could not tell for sure but he thought the light was fading. What, he wondered, would they do when darkness fell.

It was twenty minutes later when he picked up two more riders crossing the flats in the misting rain. They too came up to the wagon shed, left their horses and tramped across the muddy barn lot toward the house. One was a big man, the other very small; in fact, small enough to be a boy or a woman. Still, he doubted it was a woman. The figure wore pants and cowman's boots and a man's hat. Again he held his fire and watched them enter the house.

Then he remembered. Hadn't someone ridden out before Hoad fired his first warning shot? Maybe whoever that was had summoned help, not for them, but for Hoad. Well, they had help, all right. It was six against three right now. The only thing they could do was keep those six inside the house.

Jen was with Reese when Mrs. Parkinson showed a man into the room. He was a big man, unshaven and partially bald. The slicker and the hat he held in his hand quietly dripped water on the rug as he moved across to the foot of Reese's bed.

“Name's Stapleton, Sheriff. I'm one of Reston's R-Cross hands.”

“Daley told me about you earlier. Take a chair.”

“Won't be here long, Sheriff. I think you got troubles, like me, like us.”

Stape told them how they had learned from the bartender in the Best Bet that Orville Hoad was the last man to talk with Reston and also where he lived. They were close to Hoad's gate when they heard a single shot fired coming from the house. At the gate one of them dismounted to open it while the other three watched the house. They saw someone mount a horse and ride around the house. Two men were sitting in chairs on the veranda, one of them got up and reached for a rifle inside the room. The other man still sat in his chair, head slumped forward. He wore a red and black checked shirt. The first man fired over their heads, and they yelled at him to quit it. He yelled back that this was his land and to get off it. He fired again. The man sitting in the chair never looked up, never moved. Stape said the man was wearing a shirt like Daley had on this morning. Daley had told them that he was going out to pick up the man who killed Reston.

As Stape finished Reese was sitting straight up in bed, his mouth open a little, a look of utter incredulity on his freshly shaven face. Now Reese looked at Jen, then back to Stape.

“You're sure he didn't move? You're sure it was Jim Daley?”

“I never said that it was Daley. I said it was a man with a shirt like he was wearing this morning. As for him moving, he surely didn't. That rifle went off twice not six feet from him. He never looked at us nor at Hoad.”

Reese cursed softly with bitter anger, and then he looked at Jen. “Orv's on his way out of the country by now.”

“I don't reckon,” Stape said simply. “I think my three partners have got him bottled up in his house.”

A look of animal pleasure came into Reese's face now. He swept the bed clothes from him and said, “Jen, get out of here so I can dress. Stapleton, ride down to the livery and hire a rig for me and bring it back here.”

Jen had her mouth open to speak as Reese came out of the bed and reached for the crutch leaning against the wall by the bedpost. Then she didn't speak, only rose, went over to the closet and took down Reese's washed and mended trousers and his shirt. She returned with his clothes, boots and hat. Stapleton had already left the room.

Reese said, “Ask Mrs. Parkinson to round up Doc's pistol and rifle. And shells for both, remember.”

“You're sure he's got them?”

“I'm sure. Now hurry, Jen.” As Reese struggled awkwardly to dress himself, he felt a quiet, total fury boil up within him. For some reason, and it must have been a good one, Jim Daley had disobeyed his instructions and confronted Orv, who had murdered him. There was only one shot, Stapleton said. That meant Orv had surprised Jim who was not easy to surprise, especially by any Hoad. The thought of Jim Daley dead brought a genuine anguish to Reese. Jim had been a cross-grained, solitary and womanless man, but to his selected friends he was kind and even foolishly generous. As a law man he had no peer, and only his rough tongue made his election impossible to achieve. Now he was dead, probably shot in the back, at the hands of a man who shouldn't even be called a man.

Dressed, Reese hobbled out of the room, crossed Doc's office and went into the living room. Reese saw immediately the weapons lying on the big leather sofa, and he lurched across the room toward them as Jen and Mrs. Parkinson watched him.

“Doc's not going to like this, Reese,” Mrs. Parkinson said.

“I don't like it either,” Reese said roughly. At the sofa he reached down for the loaded shell belt holding the holstered gun and strapped it on. The pistol was new with a stiff action. The carbine, however, was old and used and by it was a leather shell bag which, by its heft, told Reese was almost full. A near shapeless Stetson which was Doc's hunting hat and a black rubber raincoat made up the rest of the equipment.

With Jen's help Reese shrugged into the raincoat. Then she picked up her own raincoat from a chair. She said quietly, “You know I'm going with you, Reese.”

“You are not,” Reese said flatly.

“Then after you leave, I'll get a horse from the livery and follow you.”

Reese looked at her searchingly. “I believe you would,” he said slowly.

“I promise you I will. I've earned this, Reese.”

Reese sighed audibly. “You've earned more, but why do you want to see this?”

“To gloat,” Jen said honestly.

Reese said curtly, “All right.”

“You're being a goose, Jen,” Mrs. Parkinson said kindly.

“No, I'm just human is all.”

There was a knock on the door. Reese said, “That's likely Stapleton, Jen. Let's go.”

Outside the buggy and horse were waiting in the lowering dusk. Without assistance Reese made the buggy seat. Jen lifted his injured leg inside, climbed in the buggy herself and pulled a rain apron over them. Stapleton untied his horse from the buggy and mounted, and the three of them headed out of town in the misting rain.

It was mostly a silent drive with the rain drumming on the top. All of them were wondering what they would find at Orville Hoad's.

Breaking the long silence, Jen said, “Reese, I've got to ask you this since she won't tell me.” She paused. “Did Callie come to see you this afternoon?”

“No. She probably didn't know about the shooting, Jen.”

“She knew,” Jen said quietly. “I sent a stable boy out to tell her this morning. He saw her and delivered the message.”

“It doesn't matter.”

“Especially to her,” Jen said bitterly.

It was full dark as they approached the lightless shack of Orville Hoad's. They picked up the sound of sporadic gunfire long before they could make out the tall cottonwoods around the house.

The darkness was almost total, made so by the sifting rain, so that they rode up to the gate and still could not see the house. Stape moved away from them and called into the night, “Pace, you around?”

A gunshot from the cottonwoods broke the silence, and on the heels of it a voice called out, “Stape, over here.” Then he added anxiously, “You got help?”

“The Sheriff,” Stape said laconically. Now Reese pulled in behind Stape's horse and stopped when it did. Stape and Pace moved up to the buggy and halted.

“This here's Pace, Sheriff. Anybody make a break from the house, Pace?”

“Not this side. But Wilsey back in the barn's been shooting. So has Harvey.”

“How many are in there?” Reese asked.

“They been shooting from four sides of the house at the same time, so at least four.”

“Any talk back and forth?”

“No. Just shooting. Not so much from them lately either.”

“Shoot at anyone who tries to leave, Pace.”

“That's what I'm hoping for.”

“Stapleton, lead me to your other partners.”

Again Stape put his horse in motion, following the fence and turning when it did. They were in the cottonwoods now, and this time they were picked up by Harvey. “Stape, sing out.”

“It's me and the Sheriff,” Stape called. In a moment Harvey appeared by the fence, and Reese asked again if anyone had tried for a break.

“Two of them,” Harvey said. “One's down out there now. The other was knocked down, but he made it back. Now I got to get back, Sheriff.” They heard him move off into the night, heard the sound of his footsteps stop, then return. “They got mighty quiet in there, Sheriff. D'you think they're planning a rush for their horses?”

“Maybe they're low on ammunition.”

“Maybe. But at first they were shooting like they was making it in there.” Again they heard him move off.

Reese said, “Now take me to the last man.”

Stape now passed the fence, circled around and pulled up behind the log barn. Stape went inside, calling, “Wilsey. It's me, Stape. Wilsey, sing out.”

Then Reese and Jen heard two men talking and afterwards Stape appeared beside the buggy. “Why don't you drive it inside, Sheriff. Wilsey don't want to leave his post. I'll open the door.”

Reese waited until he heard Stape's call, and then he turned the horse toward the barn, trusting him to find the door in the blackness.

Once inside Reese wrapped the reins around the whip stock, then by feel loaded the carbine. Afterwards, in the pitch blackness, Jen helped him down. Then Stape led them toward the door in the front of the barn. Stape said over his shoulder, “Wilsey brought in all their horses through a side door after it got dark. They're off to the right so watch it.”

Afterward they reached Wilsey who was standing just back of the door, whose other half was open. “Keep behind me, Sheriff,” Wilsey warned. “I've been shooting from up by the loading door, but they may figure I've shifted.”

“One man down?” Reese asked.

“One down and one hurt.”

“How many are in there?” Reese asked.

“One loner, a big woman, made the seventh, counting Hoad.”

That would be Minnie, Reese thought. She would have rounded up the boys and probably Ty and Buddy. Reese considered now. Orv would know that he was being besieged by four men, no more. Of his own seven men, one might be dead, another wounded. That would leave his five, counting Minnie, against the four. One of the four, Wilsey, stood between him and the horses the Hoads needed. Twice the Hoads had made a try for the barn and lost. Orv, as always, wouldn't accept this defeat but what did he plan? If he waited until daylight his plight would be worse, since he would think that one of the R-Cross riders would alert the town and he would face a posse after daylight. Surely then, alone or with all the others, he would rush the wagon shed and adjoining corral for the horses necessary to his escape. He would not know that as of now there were three riflemen in the barn instead of one. Accordingly it would be foolish for Reese to reveal his own presence by trying to persuade Orv to surrender. Still, wasn't that his duty?

His thoughts were interrupted by Wilsey. “Stape, you take the door here. I'll head up the loft to the loading door.” He vanished and they heard him climb the wooden ladder to the hayloft. Jen said then, “What are you thinking, Reese?”