Sunset Trail (13 page)

XVI

Corrigan met Matt and Nora Dugan half a block from their house. He touched the brim of his hat as he nodded at Nora, and said:
“Good morning.”

They stopped, Nora saying: “Good morning, Jerry.” Matt remained silent, but he gave Corrigan a questioning look as if he wanted
to say something but couldn’t decide whether he should or not.

but couldn’t decide whether he should or not. “Sorry about getting you out of bed last night, ”Corrigan said. “I’d heard about
an outlaw named Ross Hart. It’s not a real common name and I started thinking maybe this was the same man, so then I got to
worrying about him being in your house.”

“He’s not the one,” Matt said. “I asked Smith about it and he said the outlaw Ross Hart had been killed in a gunfight in Nogales
a few days ago.”

“I hadn’t heard about that,” Corrigan said, wondering whether it was true and how Smith happened to know. He thought about
saying that Smith struck him as being something he wasn’t, then decided not to. If the man really was a cousin, Nora might
be insulted and the last thing he wanted to do was to insult his future mother-in-law. “I guess I’ll go in and see if Jean
can find me a cup of coffee. That is, if she’s up.”

“Oh, she’s up, all right,” Nora said. “Well, I’ve got to run along, Jerry, or Hannah Talbot will be looking for me.”

Nora walked past him, moving toward the Methodist church in her usual graceful manner. Corrigan, his gaze following her, thought
she could have been a queen. She was a mature woman, yet somehow she managed to give an appearance of youth. Then it struck
him that she had been unusually pale.

“Is Nora sick?” Corrigan asked. “She looked a little puny.”

Matt hesitated, then he said: “She’s just upset. You’d look puny, too, if you had to work with Hannah Talbot all morning.”

Corrigan laughed. “I reckon I would at that. Well, I’ll go see about that cup of coffee.”

“Jerry.” Matt threw out a hand to stop him, then hesitated again as if not sure whether he should say what he wanted to say.
Finally he blurted: “Damn it, I don’t want you to think I’m trying to tell you how to do your job, but I wish you wouldn’t
stay with Jean very long. I guess I’m a little boogery with this crowd in town and the money for the dam in the bank and all.”

Corrigan nodded. “I know what you mean. Uncle Pete Fisher was on my back just a minute ago. He wants to keep the governor
out of town, but, hell, I can’t do that. I turned the Owl Creek bunch loose and told ’em to get out of town and stay out.
They were making some wild threats last night against the governor. Now I dunno. Maybe I should have kept ’em in the jug.”

“It’s just that I’ll feel better knowing you’re where the crowd is,” Matt said.

“I’ll be there,” Corrigan promised, and went on past Matt toward the Dugan place.

Corrigan knew that he was jumpy, too, and he wasn’t sure why. He thought about it as he walked through the gate and along
the path to the front door. It wasn’t Uncle Pete Fisher’s warning or the threats the Owl Creek men had made. Maybe, like Matt,
it was just having so many people in town for the celebration and having the money in the bank, and knowing, too, that so
much depended on the day’s going right.

No, he decided, it was more than that. Perhaps it was this business of having a man named Ross Hart in the house, a man he
hadn’t seen, and then Smith’s story that the outlaw had been killed in Nogales. And he couldn’t get the haunting notion out
of his mind that Smith himself was a phony and Jean was shut up in the house with Ross Hart and a fellow named Sammy Bean
who looked like an idiot.

He opened the front door and called: “Jean!” He’d get her out of here, he told himself. He didn’t know how, but he’d do it.

“Here, Jerry,” Jean answered. “Back in the kitchen.”

He went through the house to the kitchen. Bud wasn’t in sight, but John Smith was sitting at the table smoking a cigar, and
Sammy Bean was across from him wolfing down his breakfast.

“Good morning, Sheriff,” Smith said. “Did you get done prowling last night and go to bed?”

“Yeah, I went back to bed,” Corrigan answered. “How are you, Bean?”

Sammy Bean looked up from his plate and mumbled something that might have been: “Good morning.” His mouth was too full of
eggs and bacon to say anything distinctly. He wasn’t an idiot. Not at all. His eyes were too sharp and cold and cruel. An
animal, perhaps a weasel, but not an idiot.

Bean lowered his gaze again and jammed another bite into his mouth, then rose and hurriedly left the kitchen. He was the kind
who instinctively hated law and lawmen. Corrigan wondered if the mere presence of a sheriff in the same room with Bean had
been enough to make him uneasy.

Corrigan glanced at Smith who was puffing away on his cigar as if he were perfectly satisfied with life and didn’t have a
worry in the world. Obviously he wasn’t concerned about being in the same room with a sheriff.

Jean set a cup of hot coffee in front of Corrigan. “What’s this about being on the prowl?”

“Oh, it wasn’t anything,” Smith said. “I couldn’t sleep last night and I was sitting on the front porch when our young friend
showed up and made me get your dad out of bed to answer some silly question about Ross Hart.”

Corrigan’s temper flared and he opened his mouth, but he closed it before the hot words poured out. To Smith the question
might have seemed silly. Besides, maybe Smith really was a cousin, and, if that was true, Corrigan didn’t want to quarrel
with him for Jean’s sake. But Smith did have a way with him, a way of making Corrigan look foolish without saying so.

“If Jerry asked a question in the middle of the night, it wasn’t silly,” Jean said sharply. “Will you have another cup of
coffee?”

“No, thank you, Jean,” Smith said. “At the moment my cigar is all the nourishment I need. How are things downtown, Sheriff?
Got a big crowd this early in the morning?”

“Not yet,” Corrigan said, “but there will be.”

“I should think you’d need to circulate around,” Smith said in an offhand manner. “You know, just let folks know the law was
on the job.”

“I’ll be there,” Corrigan said shortly, wondering what business it was of Smith’s whether he was there or here. “Where’s Bud,
Jean? Looks like he’d be up early on a day like this.”

For a moment he sensed that Jean was terrified, For a moment he sensed that Jean was terrified, her gaze whipping to Smith
and back to him as if this question was one she couldn’t handle. Smith said: “He’s under the weather, Corrigan. Nora said
for him to stay in bed until he felt better. You know how it is with kids on the Fourth of July and Christmas and big days
like that. They get worked up.”

“I’ve got a headache myself, Jerry,” Jean said. “I’m going to stay home.”

This was too much. Corrigan said irritably: “You never had a headache in your life.”

“I didn’t until this morning,” Jean said. “Maybe Bud and I are coming down with something. I just don’t feel like doing anything.”

“She couldn’t eat any breakfast,” Smith said. “If she hadn’t felt she had to wait on us, she probably would have stayed in
bed like Bud did.”

“I suppose you’ll be out buying cattle this morning,” Corrigan said.

Smith rose and, going to the stove, tossed his cigar stub into it. “To tell the truth, Sheriff, I’m a little undecided. Like
I told you last night, I had hoped to get a loan from Matt’s bank, but he’s not at all favorable. I couldn’t bring myself
to come right out and ask him, but I hinted and he sure hinted right back. Maybe we’ll have to ride home to Grand Junction
without any cattle.”

“Why don’t you run along, Jerry?” Jean asked. “My head is splitting and I know I’m not good company.”

Corrigan rose. Matt and then Smith and now Jean had all suggested that he get back to his business downtown. Bud might be
sick in bed, but Corrigan didn’t believe for a minute that Jean had a headache.

“All right,” Corrigan said, “I’ll take a sashay around town. I’ll drop in later, Jean. I want to keep tabs on your headache.”

“I’ll be in bed,” she warned.

He nodded at Smith who was fishing in his coat pocket for another cigar. Smith nodded back absently as if his mind was on
the loan he wasn’t getting from the bank. Corrigan walked into the front room thinking that this might be on the level, that
maybe Smith had come here to take advantage of his relationship with Nora to borrow money from the bank. Now it was embarrassing
all around.

Sammy Bean was sitting on the couch, a cigarette dangling from the corner of his mouth. He didn’t say anything as Corrigan
crossed the room to the hall door, but his eyes were pinned on Corrigan all the way to the door.

Suddenly Corrigan had a feeling that sent a chill raveling down his spine. All it would take to start the guns roaring would
be a fast, threatening motion on his part. He didn’t know why this hunch had come to him unless it was the cold, animal-like
stare that Sammy Bean had given him, but the hunch was there and he had learned a long time ago to pay attention when a hunch
like this came. If it reached the shooting stage, Jean might be killed. For the moment at least, he had to act as if he didn’t
suspect anything was wrong.

He left the house, knowing this wasn’t on the level at all, but how did you find out what was going on when all you had was
a hunch? Sure, it added up with Bud staying in bed on a morning when too much was going on for a boy to miss and Jean having
a headache when she had never had a headache in her life as far as he knew and Nora who was usually the picture of health
looking as pale as if she were deathly sick.

He paused when he reached the boardwalk. Maybe Nora could and would tell him what was going on. At least, he could talk to
her without John Smith’s hearing every word and Sam Bean’s watching him with those cold, weasel eyes of his.

Corrigan turned toward the Methodist church and began to run, sure now that it wasn’t just the prospect of working with Hannah
Talbot all morning that had made Nora look the way she had.

XVII

Governor Wyatt and Tom Henry ate breakfast by lamplight with Dick Miles in the hotel dining room at Burlington. None felt
like talking at this hour. The waitress yawned and rubbed her eyes as she went back to the kitchen with their order.

Wyatt smiled, knowing exactly how the girl felt. He hadn’t had a night’s sleep for weeks and more weeks would pass before he
did. He wondered as he had so many times why he or any man sought a political office only to be criticized and threatened
and poorly paid.

Of course, he had better reasons than most politicians had. As a matter of fact he wasn’t a politician at all. He was a Populist
and that made him a crusader of sorts with new ideas and a new program. This made him suspect to most people who were opposed
to new ideas because they were afraid of what the future would bring, so afraid that some of them actually were plotting to
murder him.

He sighed as the waitress set his plate of bacon and eggs in front of him. He wasn’t hungry, but he ate because he had to
keep his strength up for the grueling weeks of the campaign that lay ahead.

He thought about those men in Denver who wanted to see him dead and he was a little surprised at himself for not hating them.
Actually he felt sorry for them because they placed such a great value on their wealth, wealth that they were convinced they
would lose if he had another term as governor.

Miles bolted his breakfast and rose. “I’ll fetch the team and rig to the front door, Governor,” he said.

“It won’t be more than ten minutes.”

“We’ll be there,” Wyatt promised.

Miles swung around and strode out of the dining room. Henry stared at his back, frowning. “I don’t trust that man. I still
think we should send word to Amity that you can’t make it and catch the next train out of here.”

Wyatt sighed and, picking up his cup, drank the rest of his coffee. He said: “You’re still thinking about that death threat,
Tom. I won’t disappoint the people in Amity because we get a letter from another crackpot.”

“I don’t think it was a crackpot this time,” Henry said. “We’ve known for a month or more that there was a conspiracy in Denver.
. . .”

“I know, I know,” Wyatt said testily as he rose. “Let me remind you that there is a good deal of difference between a conspiracy
and an actual effort to kill me. Now let’s go get our luggage and be ready when Miles gets here with his rig.”

Henry’s jaw jutted forward stubbornly. “It’s a Henry’s jaw jutted forward stubbornly. “It’s a waste of time and effort. You
won’t get a vote from that bunch down there. You ought to save your strength. . . .”

“Tom, sometimes you try me severely,” Wyatt said. “There are a few worthwhile things in this campaign besides getting votes.
Now, come on.”

From long experience, Tom Henry knew how far he could go with Wyatt and he had reached that point. He followed Wyatt out of
the dining room and up the stairs to their room. A few minutes later Wyatt closed and locked his suitcase and set it in the
hall outside his door. Henry picked it up and carried it and his own bag downstairs and put them down on the boardwalk in
front of the hotel.

A moment later Wyatt joined him just as Miles drew up in a hack. Henry piled the suitcases in the back and stepped up and
sat down beside Wyatt in the rear seat.

Miles handed two rifles to Wyatt and Henry, ask-ing: “How are you gents on the shoot?”

“I’m pretty good,” Wyatt said as he took the Winchester. “Are we stopping to hunt jack rabbits?”

Miles scowled. “You know damned well why I’m handing out these Thirty-Thirties. We may go clean through to Amity without any
trouble, but again maybe we won’t. I figure three rifles is a hell of a lot better than one. If we get stopped, show that
we’re armed and do it fast.”

Henry had taken his rifle and carefully placed it between him and Wyatt as Miles turned and spoke to the team. Wyatt couldn’t
keep from grinning as he winked at Henry. He said: “Well, Tom, are you ready to defend yourself?”

“I told you we shouldn’t make this trip,” Henry said. “It ain’t worth it to risk our necks just to give a talk about a dam.”

Wyatt guessed that Henry had never fired a rifle in his life, but he didn’t lack courage. That fact had been demonstrated
more than once in the time they had been associated. He said gently: “That’s a matter of opinion. You may be proved right,
but in my opinion it is worth risking our necks for and my opinion is the one we have to go by.”

Henry’s face turned red. “Yes, sir,” he said.“I know that. It’s just that I hate to take the risk of having you assassinated.”

“We take that risk every time I make a speech,” Wyatt said.

They were silent then, the town dropping behind.

They were silent then, the town dropping behind. The road led straight south through a rolling land covered by grass and sagebrush
and Spanish bayonet. The dust rose behind them in a gray cloud and hung there in the still morning air while the sun moved
up into a blue sky.

It was warm now, but Wyatt knew that by noon, when they were due to reach Amity, the temperature would be in the nineties.
He would have to stand on a platform under that hot sun to make a speech, and then he would get back into a rig and ride north
to Burlington to catch a westbound train.

It was too much, he told himself. Just too damned much, but he had made a commitment and he would keep it if it killed him.
It might do exactly that, too. He had felt the heat more this summer than ever before. A day like this could give him a heart
attack or heat prostration or something of the sort. Tom Henry had apparently not thought of it, but Wyatt considered it a
greater danger than an assassin’s bullet.

The country was monotonously the same, with here and there the buildings of a cattle ranch set back from the road. Wyatt didn’t
like eastern Colorado. He had spent much of his life before becoming governor in the mining camps high in the Rockies. He
loved the scenery which was never quite the same, the invigorating air of the high country, the variety of colors, the pale
green of the quaking aspens or their gold in the fall, the dark green of the pines, the sharp green of the grass in the mountain
meadows.

If he lost the election, he would go back to the high country. There were times, and this was one, when he actually hoped
he did lose. Then quite suddenly he dropped off to sleep, his chin dipping to his chest, his head bobbing back and forth.
An hour later he woke suddenly as Miles yanked the team to a stop, cursing furiously.

“Here they come, Governor,” Miles said. “Let ’em see your Winchesters. Both of ’em.”

It took Wyatt a moment before he could fully comprehend what was happening. Tom Henry had lined his rifle on three cowboys
who were riding toward them. Miles wrapped the lines around the brake handle, then picked up his Winchester. Wyatt rubbed
his eyes and moistened his dry lips with the tip of his tongue, then lifted his rifle across his lap so it could be seen.

“Who are they?” he asked.

“In town we call ’em the Owl Creek boys,” Miles answered. “They’ve got shirt-tail spreads up Owl Creek and they make a hell
of a poor living on ’em. They’re like a lot of cowmen around Amity. They blame you and the Populist party ’cause they’re almost
broke.”

“How do you know they’re after me?”

“I’ve heard ’em talk.” Miles motioned at the three riders and called: “That’s close enough! I’m taking the governor to town
to speak at noon. We haven’t got time to stop and palaver, so if you’ve got anything to say, spit it out and get to hell off
the road.”

The three men pulled up and sat their saddles, their eyes on Miles as if surprised to run into him. One of them started to
curse as he reached for his gun, then froze as Miles cocked his rifle.

“Don’t do it, Yarnell,” Miles said. “I figured some of you tough hands might try something like this, so we fetched along
three Winchesters. Just start the ball, boys, and we’ll finish it.”

“What is it?” Wyatt asked. “Are you men here to see me?”

“We’re here to kill you,” the one Miles had called Yarnell said, “but we didn’t figger to run into three rifles. Maybe you
and your friend can’t hit anything, but that damned Miles can shoot a fly off a man’s nose at fifty yards. What’s the matter
with you, Dick?”

“That’s what I’d like to know,” another one said truculently. “You’re a cowboy and you know what that old goat has done to
us. We just sold all the steers we could round up and we got about enough
dinero
for ’em to pay taxes. What the hell are we supposed to live on?”

“Get off the road or you won’t need to worry about having anything to live on,” Miles said. “You don’t have to like the governor,
but you’re going to treat him real polite. You hear me, Lupton?”

Wyatt laughed. “I’ve been called worse names than an old goat,” he said. “Gentlemen, I’m sorry about the low price of beef,
but I don’t know why you blame me. If you’ve got to blame somebody, blame the bankers. As governor, my program has been stopped
in the legislature by the bankers and other wealthy men in the state.”

“Oh, hell,” Yarnell said. “Don’t cuss the bankers. If there’s one decent man in Amity, the banker’s him, but you probably never
heard of Matt Dugan.”

“On the contrary,” Wyatt said, “he’s the one who asked me to come to Amity to speak today. He’ll be disappointed if you kill
me.”

“You’re drunk,” Miles said. “No sense trying to talk to you. Get out of our way.”

“Sure we’re drunk,” Yarnell said. “Everybody will be drunk before Dam Day’s over.” He scratched a stubble-covered cheek as
he stared at Wyatt. “We didn’t know you were here to speak because Matt invited you.”

“Yeah, we sure didn’t,” Lupton agreed. “Maybe we won’t kill you, after all.”

Miles laughed at them. “Of course you won’t. You’re a pack of fools. If you start anything . . . anything at all, I’ll see
all three of you hang just as sure as you’re the ugliest man on Owl Creek.”

Miles put his rifle down and, taking the lines, spoke to the team and drove straight at Yarnell and Lupton. Grudgingly they
reined to one side of the road and the rig wheeled past them.

“Watch behind you,” Miles said. “I bluffed ’em that time and I don’t look for trouble now, but they’ve been drinking, and
sometimes whiskey gives men like that enough guts to do what they wouldn’t do any other time.”

Wyatt and Henry turned to watch the three cowboys who were holding their horses in the road as if not sure what they should
do now. Wyatt said: “They’re not chasing us.”

“This is about what I expected,” Miles said. “We’ll still keep our eyes peeled. I figure them three are mostly blow, but there’s
men in Amity who ain’t.”

Wyatt glanced at Henry. He said: “No, we’re not going back to Burlington even after that.”

He didn’t sleep any more. For the first time he came to grips with the hard fact that Tom Henry had been right about the danger
they would be facing in Amity. He had been underestimating it in his own thinking. The men he had just seen had suffered enough
and had been drunk enough to have killed him if Dick Miles had not handled them exactly the way he had.

There would be other men in Amity waiting to see him, men who had suffered as much and would be as drunk as these three. He
was heading into a hornets’ nest. It was his business if he chose to face danger, but he had no right to take Tom Henry with
him.

He turned to look at Henry’s set face, wanting to ask him to get out of the rig before they reached Amity. He turned his head
again to stare at the long, gray ribbon of road ahead of them. He couldn’t do it. Henry would be insulted if he did.