The Passionate and the Proud (22 page)

Emmalee and Randy turned toward Tell. Alf Kaiserhalt, his arm in a sling, sat on a chair beside the claims agent, regarding the young couple with his small, evil eyes.

“Seems we have a little problem here,” said Tell.

“What’s that?” Randy asked anxiously.

“Both of your claims are questionable, due to accusations made by Mr. Kaiserhalt here. I’m gonna have to adjudicate.”

The people in the store quieted, pressing toward Tell’s desk and the big map he had spread out before him.

“There’s nothing amiss with either of our claims,” said Emmalee, fighting to keep a quaver of uncertainty out of her voice. Kaiserhalt had returned to town first and she had no idea what tidings he had related.

“You,” said Tell, pointing to Randy, “show me on the map the sections that you and your…ah, fiancée claimed.”

Randy picked up a pencil, bent to the map, studied it for a moment, and then drew two rough squares in the uplands east of the river.

“Em and I staked these fair and square,” Randy began. “We—”

“I’ll be the judge of that, son,” retorted Tell. “Alf, you go ahead and state your case now.”

Everyone in the store was listening intently. One could have heard a blade of dry grass fall upon the plank floor. A bee buzzed near the beer barrel.

“Much obliged, Vestor,” drawled Kaiserhalt, as if he and Tell were the best of friends. “You see, the whole thing’s pretty simple, really. I was up by the three pines, driving in my first stake, when these two”—he gestured toward Randy and Emmalee—“came riding up. He was on a horse an’ she rode a mule.”

“That’s not true at all!” cried Randy. “We weren’t even together.”

“Pipe down, Clay. You’ll have your chance to talk when I say so,” Tell commanded.

Kaiserhalt grinned. “They both jumped me,” he continued. “I didn’t have a chance. Broke my arm, they did, an’ tied me to a tree. It was pitiable, I tell you. Then they put in their own stakes and rode off in separate directions to claim the land I’d figured on choosing. The gal took my horse too. Reckon she ought to learn what happens to horse thievers in this here country.”

“You’re a liar!” Emmalee spat at him.

“If that’s so,” drawled Burt Pennington, standing in the crowd that was watching these proceedings, “then how come Alf rode back into Arcady aboard a decrepit mule?”

“Don’t you call my Ned any names!” blurted Myrtle Higgins, who was perched up on the cold stove for a better view.

The tension lessened for an instant as people laughed, but the levity did not last long.

“Did you take his horse or not?” Tell demanded of Emmalee.

“Yes, but I didn’t
steal
it,” Emmalee cried. “I only took it because I wanted to”—she realized how weak her explanation sounded—“to make my claim as fast as possible. Randy wasn’t there at all. Mr. Kaiserhalt tried to kill me with a mallet. It took a while to fight him off and tie him up. I saw some people coming toward the land I wanted, so I—”

“Took the horse?” Tell grinned.

“Yes.”

“And you alone, all by yourself, broke Alf’s arm and tied him to a tree?”

“Ain’t no woman born could do that to me.” Kaiserhalt snorted. “See? I’m the one that’s telling the truth.”

Emmalee noted that Tell did not chide the scrawny rancher for interrupting.

“It is a little difficult to believe your story, Miss Alden.” Tell smiled. “You licked a
man
singlehanded?”

“Emmalee’s telling the absolute truth,” Randy put in. “She did it herself. I wasn’t even around. I’d gotten there first, you see, had driven my stake, which Kaiserhalt tore out of the ground, by the way, and—”

“Your testimony’s got to be discounted.” Tell shrugged.

“And why is that?”

“Well, you and the girl are tied up together. Naturally, you’d stick up for her.”

“But—”

“Quiet. That’s my ruling, and I have the sole right of adjudication in this territory. Do I make myself clear?”

“All too clear,” said Emmalee, glaring at him.

There was no doubt in her mind that Tell was completely on the side of the ranchers. She wondered what cash had changed hands, what promises had passed lips, and how the future of Olympia would be affected thereby. She vowed to find out before it was too late.

But right now she had other problems.

“You mentioned that some people were coming toward you at the time you absconded with Alf’s horse,” Tell was addressing her. “That means there were witnesses. Who are they?
Where
are they?”

Emmalee looked around the store. She saw all those eyes upon her, waiting to see what would happen, what she would do. Taking the horse had seemed a good idea at the time. She hadn’t given it a second thought. But taking a man’s means of transportation, she realized, carried the same punishment as murder. Yet, she saw, most of the people were not against her. Oh, Lottie Pennington was enjoying every minute of Tell’s nasty little charade, no doubt about it. But the women in particular, even the ranchers’ women, seemed disposed to listen to what she had to say. Emmalee saw the suntanned, big-handed woman who’d exchanged harsh words with Kaiserhalt in the willow grove. That woman knew what Alf was like. And Otis, Emmalee noticed, seemed in no hurry to believe his mean-spirited comrade. Burt Pennington, however, pressed the issue.

“I hate to see a pretty little gal in trouble,” he declared loudly, “but someone who’d take a man’s horse could find it in her conscience to pull up his marker stake too.”

“When we want to hear from you, we’ll ask,” shouted Horace Torquist. “Emmalee Alden is one of my people, and my people do not practice chicanery!”

“Ho!” Pennington shot back. “That’s not what I’ve observed.”

“Are you making accusations?” Torquist demanded, trying to move closer to Pennington through the crowd.

“Maybe I should. Maybe I
will,
when I get the facts,” Pennington said testily.

Emmalee realized, with a sinking sensation, that Burt Pennington either knew or suspected Torquist’s strategem involving the false claims. An angry rumbling rose from the crowd.

“I’m in charge here,” bellowed Tell. ‘We’re conducting a serious inquiry and you all better shut up or get out, understand?” The people quieted but their tension remained, hanging in the air like bitter smoke. “You were saying,” he reminded Emmalee sanctimoniously, “that there may have been witnesses?”

Emmalee thought it over. Garn and Ebenezer Creel had seen Kaiserhalt attacking her. But Garn and Ebenezer weren’t there, not to mention the fact that she didn’t want to upset Randy, which any word about Garn was sure to do. She studied the crowd some more and saw Leander Rupp drinking beer at the back of the store. Rupp and his family hadn’t seen much, but they
had
been there.

“Mr. Rupp may have seen something,” she said, catching his glance.

Rupp looked stricken, the more so when Tell called him over to the desk. Rupp was a tall, wiry fellow with big ears and a hangdog look. He avoided Emmalee’s eyes, but she saw Kaiserhalt grinning at the man.

“All right, what’d you see?” Tell demanded of the uncomfortable farmer.

“Uh…not too much.”

“He’s the one untied me from the tree,” Kaiserhalt supplied.

“Look, what is this?” Randy asked. “When Em or I try to say something, we’re told to hold our peace. When Mr. Kaiserhalt or anyone else—”

“Hold your peace or I’ll disqualify your claims on the spot,” Tell pronounced. “I’m the law here. Get it?”

“I think so,” said Randy. “A law that takes sides.” He stared unflinchingly at Tell, who glared right back. Emmalee had sensed the fact earlier, and now she saw again how Randy was being tempered and strengthened by challenge. He had the look of a young archangel about him still, but coming into his eyes, etching itself upon his features, was the steel and self-certainty of a seraphim.

Vestor Tell sensed it, too, averted his glance, and again addressed Leander Rupp. “Speak up, man. Your testimony could decide it all. What’d you see?”

Emmalee noted that Rupp’s worried eyes immediately flashed to Kaiserhalt. He seemed to find some relief there, because he took a deep breath and spoke clearly.

“I saw the girl tie Mr. Kaiserhalt to the tree. I saw her take his horse. That’s what I saw.”

“She was alone when she tied him to the tree? That is, Mr. Clay was not around?”

“No, sir.”

“He’d already done ridden off,” Kaiserhalt pointed out. “Don’t take nothin’ for a able-bodied girl to tie me if I can’t barely move on account of a ruined wing.”

“So, Mr. Rupp, you saw her tie the man and steal his horse?”

“Yes, sir.”

“I didn’t steal it,” protested Emmalee. “It’s tied to the hitching rail right outside this store. He was trying to
kill
me.”

“Heh-heh.” Kaiserhalt snickered.

“And if Randy broke Mr. Kaiserhalt’s arm,” Emmalee persisted, “then why didn’t Mr. Rupp see him?”

“I wasn’t there for that,” Rupp faltered. “I didn’t see that.”

“Of course you didn’t. That’s because Randy
wasn’t
there.”

“That’s the truth,” said Randy.

“I broke Mr. Kaiserhalt’s arm all by myself,” said Emmalee, turning so that she could address all the people in the room. “I did it because I
had
to do it. He attacked me. I saw him pulling Randy’s stake out of the ground. Now that
is
the truth.”

The tension between farmers and ranchers in the store edged to a dangerous new height. “Well, well,” said Vestor Tell. “Seems we still have a passel of contradictions here. Looks like I’m gonna have to decide.”

“No little bitty woman could break my arm,” scoffed Alf.

Emmalee lost her temper. “I’m three or four inches taller than you,” she told Kaiserhalt. “I’m not so little. Get up. Let me show everybody.”

“What?” faltered Kaiserhalt.

“Get up. As a demonstration, I’ll break your other arm.”

The words took a moment to sink in, but the response was thunderous. Instantly Emmalee regretted her splenetic outburst. She had let her temperament play right into the hands of her enemies.

“Lookit how mad she gets!”

“I bet they did it, for sure.”

“An’ stealin’ the poor guy’s horse, to boot.”

“Here’s my decision,” announced Vestor Tell. “Now, anybody with ears to hear has got to realize that we can’t get no corroboration on the actual sequence of events out by the three pines. We weren’t there. I’m inclined to believe Alf Kaiserhalt…”

Something much like a groan, followed by a suspiration of rage, rose from Torquist and his farmers.

“…because Alf is clearly the wounded party in this. Just look at the poor man’s arm. But…
but
like I say, I wasn’t there.”

“Nice of you to admit it,” muttered Myrtle Higgins.

“So,” Tell continued, “I don’t know who pulled up whose stakes, nor how Clay and Miss Alden managed to crack Alf’s bones. So what I got to do is I got to decide this matter on the basis of
in-con-tro-ver-ti-ble
evidence.”

“You don’t have any!” Torquist cried.

Tell grinned at him. “Sure do,” he snapped. “The gal took Alf’s horse. He can press charges on that matter if he wants to.”

“I only care about them acres,” Kaiserhalt replied magnanimously. “I ain’t out to see a purty gal like that strung up from a cottonwood, even if she is a thief.”

“But anybody who would steal a horse would lie. An’ any man friend lookin’ to claim land
with
her would lie
for
her. So the claims of Mr. Clay and Miss Alden are hereby disqualified, by the authority vested in me. I rule that Mr. Kaiserhalt gets both tracts of land, one to farm and the other to sell, such sale to be contracted within ninety days.”

“No!” Randy cried.

Emmalee saw Leander Rupp bend toward Kaiserhalt. “Good man, Rupp,” Alf said to the farmer. “Burt an’ us boys’ll take care of you. It don’t matter you didn’t get no land.”

“Fraud!” shouted Emmalee. “I’m going to report this to higher authorities.”

Tell just grinned at her, then he nodded toward the telegraph machine next to the wall behind his desk. “Go ahead,” he said. “You cable Washington, D.C., and tell ’em all about how a horse-thievin’ little spitfire took it into her head to steal a good man’s claim.”

He got no further. Randy reached over the desk, grabbed the claims agent by his shirt collar, and pulled him forward. The desk overturned, along with the big map that was on it. “Help!” cried Tell, as Randy drew back his fist. The imminent tension, the animosity and discoid that had been building in the store came quickly to flashpoint, something Hester Brine perceived immediately. “Don’t wreck my place!” she shouted, but it was too late. Otis leaped forward and grabbed Randy’s arm before he could punch Tell. The claims agent himself escaped Randy’s grasp and scurried for safety behind the toppled desk. Alf Kaiserhalt, fearing further injury to his arm, dashed toward the door. Burt Pennington, surrounded by several ranchers, tried to move through the crowd toward Otis, who now grappled with Randy. Their progress was hindered by Horace Torquist, who stepped in front of them, crossed his arms, and declared, “Let’s have it out now. I think you ranchers are bribing Tell.”

Burt Pennington swung from his heels, caught Torquist a fierce blow on the side of the head. The white-maned leader swayed backward into the arms of Virgil Waters and Willard Buttlesworth. But he did not go down. Pennington and his men advanced, fists ready. Women screamed and retreated behind stacks of dry goods. A shovel fell from its hook on the wall, striking Festus Bent on the head. Leander Rupp was slammed against the wall when Randy and Otis, wrestling each other, crashed into him. Rupp slid to the floor, his eyes glazed. “Stop it! Stop it!” Hester Brine shrieked. Horace Torquist threw a punch at Pennington, catching him just above the heart. “Daddy!” shrieked a terrified Lottie Pennington, as her father flew backward through the store and crashed into the beer barrel, overturning it. Torquist advanced on his downed rival, but was struck in the face by Lottie herself.

The whole store was in turmoil. Everyone in it was fighting or trying to escape or watching, most with enthusiasm and a few with dismay. The human animal has not come so far from caves and jungles that the sight of a snarling tooth-and-claw confrontation does not rouse the blood. Emmalee circled Randy and Otis, trying for a opportunity to separate them. Then Randy stuck his foot behind Otis’s leg, twisted, applied pressure. The two men went crashing to the floor, Randy on top. Otis wore a revolver in a holster at his hip, and Emmalee saw him reaching for the weapon now.