The Desperate Deputy of Cougar Hill Page 3
Arker had finished his turn and now it was Cameron’s right to move. He started slowly forward, his eyes fixed on Arker. The big man was motionless, his massive torso bent slightly forward in a gunfighter’s crouch, his fingers just clear of his gun butt.
Cameron kept his eyes on Rafe Arker’s face, not on his hand. He had learned long ago that a man’s eyes and expression revealed more of his intent than a hand motion. And always the quick blink or the sudden fixed stare, the tautness around the mouth or the uncontrollable twitch of a muscle — one of these preceded the draw by a fraction of time.
Cameron walked with his arm crooked slightly at the elbow, his fingertips brushing his gun butt. His stride was slow-paced, steady. With each forward step he made, the silence in the saloon thickened until it was like a solid wall wrapping itself around himself and around Rafe Arker, a cocoon that cut them off from awareness of their surroundings.
Arker and Cameron had been a good twenty feet apart before. Now the distance between them was six feet. Cameron lifted his foot for another step. He saw the telltale movement from Rafe Arker — the involuntary flick of the man’s tongue across dry lips. At almost the same instant, Arker dove for leather. He stopped his draw abruptly, his .44 barely more than half clear of its holster. Surprise flooded his expression as he stared at Cameron’s gun, drawn and aimed steadily for his belly.
“Hardware on the bar, butt first,” Cameron said. His words dropped softly into the thick pool of quiet. “You first, Arker.”
With aching slowness, Raft Arker pulled his gun free. He turned and with the same slowness, laid the gun on the bar top. A sigh rustled through the watching men as he lifted his hand, empty, and stepped back.
“Your turn, Farley,” Cameron commanded.
Joe Farley followed Arker’s lead, his small body stiff with frustration. As he moved away from the bar, his lips moved jerkily, throwing words at Arker that were too soft for anyone else to hear.
Arker grunted and stared fixedly at Cameron.
From the rear of the room, Jupe Dondee called again, “I told you to watch yourself, mister.”
The mocking twist was back on Rafe Arker’s mouth. “So the law is faster with a gun. That don’t prove nothing.”
Cameron could feel the challenge in the words bring all eyes toward him. He had resigned himself to the fight with Arker and for the moment was not concerned about it. But he was puzzled at the way this affair was going. Even though Arker had obviously been surprised at the speed of Cameron’s draw, he had not acted as if he expected to win a gun duel. Rather, Cameron thought, he had acted as if he expected to lose it.
Cameron could not rid himself of the feeling that each move Rafe Arker had made — from the butchering of the steer to the laying of his gun on the bar — had been carefully planned in advance. Planned to force Cameron into moves he had no desire to make. He had the sensation of playing a game of chess against an expert. And yet it was impossible to believe that Rafe Arker was capable of planning one move ahead, let alone a half dozen.
Cameron took a backward step. “Take those guns,” he ordered the barkeep. They disappeared from the bartop and Cameron holstered his own weapon. He unbuckled his belt and let it drop to the floor. Pushing it aside with a foot, he took off his hat and sailed it on top of the gun and belt. Each move was made slowly and deliberately.
“It’s time you learned what the law is,” Cameron said softly.
And now it was Arker’s turn to hesitate. Clearly he had not expected Cameron to accept his challenge, to meet him in hand-to-hand combat. Surprise flickered into his eyes and then drained away, letting the contempt appear again.
“That’s an old trick,” he rumbled. “After I whip you, the marshal hauls me to jail for resisting a law officer.”
Cameron’s answer was to unpin the star from his vest and to drop it into the crown of his hat. Again Arker showed momentary surprise. Then he laughed.
Cameron stood quietly. Again he was waiting for the signal that would tell him Arker was going to make his move. This time Cameron expected a bull rush, an attempt to catch him in those thick arms — a catch-as-catch-can, no-holds-barred kind of wrestling that would let Arker take full advantage of his size and weight.
The street door opened. Momentarily all eyes turned in that direction. Cameron followed suit, wanting to make sure that this was not a threat aimed at his unprotected back.
The sight of the man quietly closing the door behind himself was a shock that froze Cameron, briefly blotting out everything else around him. The slim, sharply chiseled features with the long upper lip, the widow’s peak of black hair coming off a high forehead, the sardonic glint in the black eyes — these Cameron could never have forgotten.
Sax Larabee! And Cameron knew that the ghost of the long dead past had come to life. The memories he had sought so long to bury were no longer memories. They were reality.
The sound of a foot scuffing on bare boards jerked Cameron around. Arker was coming toward him. He moved his huge bulk with surprising speed, and not as Cameron expected in a bull rush, but lightly, on his toes like a boxer. Before Cameron could shift his full attention from Sax Larabee to Arker, the big man was on him.
Cameron stepped back, but not quickly enough. Arker drove out his left fist, slamming rock-hard knuckles against Cameron’s temple. He felt the skin peel back and the force of the blow sent him off balance. He staggered against a table and crashed with it to the floor. He rolled and came to his knees.
Close by, Jupe Dondee laughed with deep pleasure. Cameron staggered to his feet, shaking his head. Rafe Arker was a blur filling the cleared space between the bar and the tables. Cameron stayed where he was, sucking in air, fighting to clear the mist from in front of his eyes. Another minute, he thought, and he would be able to see again; he would be free of the paralysis gripping his muscles.
Then Jupe Dondee laughed a second time. Cameron felt hands against his back, felt himself pushed roughly forward to where Rafe Arker waited. He saw Arker’s grin swim at him through a reddish haze. He saw the big fist driving for his face. He caught the blow on the forearm, reacting by instinct. At the same time he pivoted to avoid the body blow that should follow that first fist. He felt the jar of bone against his arm and felt the wind of Arker’s other fist as it slid past his belt buckle. Then his senses cleared.
Arker had thrown both punches hard, driving them with his legs as well as his shoulders as he sought for the quick kill, and so he was leaning slightly forward, a hairline off balance. And now it was Cameron’s turn. He stepped in and hit Arker twice, under the eye and across the bridge of the nose. He took a punishing fist on the shoulder and then stepped back out of range.
The blow to the nose had hurt, Cameron saw. Arker’s eyes were watering. Again Cameron moved in. He feinted for Arker’s eyes with his left, and when Arker’s guard came up he drove under it to smash viciously at the nose again. He twisted as he struck, tearing skin and crunching cartilage. Arker’s mouth came open and he flailed out wildly. Cameron back-pedaled, drawing Arker after him. The big man kept up his wild swinging, obviously hoping to send Cameron down again.
Cameron had fought men bigger than himself before. He knew from experience that once inside Arker’s crushing arms, he would be helpless. He also knew that the big man was liable to depend too much on his strength, to forget in the driving tempo of a fight whatever rudiments of boxing he might know. And as Cameron hoped, it was this way with Rafe Arker.
Cameron sidestepped Arker’s rushes. Each time Arker charged by, he reached out and flicked a fist at the man’s unprotected face. Ripping knuckles caught Arker full on the mouth, splitting his lips. Twisting fists slashed at the exposed eyes, tore unmercifully at the already battered nose.
Arker caught him a second time on the temple. But his blows lacked force now, and Cameron was able to come back in quickly, under Arker’s guard, to rip again and again at the bleeding, torn features. And now Cameron stepped in tight and began to whip his blows
into Arker’s body. His fists sank into muscle made flabby by a prison diet. Arker’s mouth came open in pain as Cameron scored twice under the heart.
And now Arker gave ground. Slowly, steadily, his big body kept backing away, yielding each inch reluctantly. Cameron shifted his aim, moving from Arker’s torso to his face and back again. His knuckles began slipping on Arker’s blood, and now it was only a matter of time.
Rafe Arker growled from deep in his throat. He continued to lash out with his huge fists. Half blinded, he swung his great trunk like a wild animal. For all the pain that rode him, for all that his eyes were swollen half shut, his nose and mouth a mass of flowing blood, he still moved with surprising grace and speed. And suddenly his massive fist caught Cameron on the forehead. He tried to lean away from the next blow. It took him under the ear and spun him, dazed, to the floor.
He was up quickly to one knee, blinking his eyes to clear them. He saw Arker lean forward to focus his gaze and then come charging down, his legs driving. The way he ran told Cameron he intended using his boots. Cameron drove himself upward with a powerful thrust of his legs. He caught Arker at the beltline with his shoulder. The force of his charge sent Arker backward, arms flailing. His back hit the bar, sending glasses dancing. Cameron straightened up and stepped back far enough to give himself room to swing. He lifted his arm and let it drop down again.
Rafe Arker was sagging at the knees. His expression was empty. Cameron stepped back again. There was nothing here for him to fight. He simply stood and waited while Arker slid slowly down to his knees and then fell forward to bury his face against the rough boards of the floor.
Cameron walked to his small pile of gear and put it on. Sax Larabee spoke up and he turned, meeting the man’s gaze full face. “That was a fine fight. Ill stand you a drink.” There was no hint of recognition is his eyes; none in his voice.
“No,” Cameron said. He turned away and strode to the table where Jupe and Hale Dondee sat.
They were twins, look-alikes except that Jupe wore a shaggy black beard and Hale just seemed to have forgotten to shave. They were short, solid men; and for all that they professed to be experienced miners, they dressed and walked like men more accustomed to a saddle than a pick and shovel.
“Next time I want help in a fight, I’ll ask for it,” Cameron said softly.
Jupe Dondee’s truculent glare shifted away. Cameron said, “And another warning. Keep away from my cows.”
“Now look here,” Jupe protested. “You never proved nothing on me and Hale. We don’t …”
“One of these days I will prove something,” Cameron interrupted. “And just remember — out in the valley I’m no more bound by the law than you are.” He swung away from the mixture of fear and anger that leaped into both men’s eyes. Not bothering to look at Rafe Arker still lying motionless on the floor, he walked outside.
The night had begun to cool, and there was a hint of fall in the air that rolled down from the mountains. Cameron hunched his shoulders and winced as the movement pulled bruised flesh. He walked slowly up the empty board sidewalk.
Light still showed from Jenny’s Café, and Cameron knew that she was waiting for him. He would go there and have his piece of pie, he decided.
Then he would go back to the jail office and wait for Sax Larabee and the past to come to him.
IV
JENNY HAD kept both the stew and a piece of apple pie hot for Cameron. The café was officially closed for the night and so they had it to themselves. Cameron ate slowly, savoring the food and the obvious concern for him Jenny showed.
“Somebody will spread the word about what happened tonight, and you’ll be a hero for a day or two,” she said.
“It’s foolishness,” Cameron answered, “but of a kind that never hurts the law’s reputation.” He was shaping a cigarette to go with his coffee and he glanced up at her. “You sound almost bitter.”
“I was just thinking that the bigger a fighting man’s reputation, the more people want to best him.”
“In the Cougar country, I don’t have to worry about anyone but Rafe Arker,” Cameron smiled. “And he won’t be bothering anybody for a few days.”
Jenny shook her head. “I don’t know why but I’m afraid for you — more than I was before you fought Rafe.”
With an effort, she laughed away her frown and leaned over the counter to kiss Cameron. “I sound like a biddy hen, don’t I? But you won’t have to listen to me much longer. I promised Matilda Crotty I’d go to her singfest.”
The Widow Crotty’s was quiet as Cameron escorted Jenny to the front door. Through the diamond glass panes, he could see the singing group seated in the parlor, eating applesauce cake with gobbets of fresh whipped cream on top. For a moment Cameron envied these people the quietness of their lives. But as he turned to walk back to the jail office, the feeling vanished. When he first decided to become a lawman, he knew what the future would hold for him. And only seldom had he ever regretted his decision, and then not for long.
But tonight the feeling came back, and he knew that it was because of Sax Larabee. He and Sax, wild kids drifting about the ranges of the west, working hard and playing hard, burning up their energies with the enthusiasm and thoughtlessness of healthy young animals.
And then Cameron became aware of the change in Sax. Older and with a little more education than Cameron possessed — and a good deal more than most of the others they rode with had — he began to fret at his lack of success. A bitterness seemed to grow in him as he came to realize that the mere fact he was Sax Larabee was not enough to bring him more than other people.
Cameron still remembered with sharp clarity the night Sax’s feelings came to a head. With two friends and two strangers, they were drifting south after working a roundup in the San Juan country of Colorado. They were camped on the upper Rio Grande and had just finished supper when Sax stood up, a cheroot clamped between his teeth and his hat thumbed back to show the widow’s peak in his black hair.
Cameron would never forget the hell-for-leather grin on Sax’s lips nor the wild glint in his dark eyes. “That roundup left a lot of money in the Alamoso bank,” he said suddenly. “You all know money’s the root of evil. Now I’m a man who’s always been hellbent against evil, and I aim to change the situation back there in town.”
Skeet Ryan laughed and got to his feet. “I’m with you, preacher.”
Toby Callow and the other two, whose names Cameron could never remember, joined Sax Larabee as well. Cameron stood up too, finally, but with the intent of riding the other way. It was a simple parting, with no arguing on Sax’s part. He said, “I’ll be seeing you, Roy,” and turned away. It had been an empty ride south for Cameron, knowing as he did that even if they met again things could never be quite the same between them.
He put up for the night with a sheepherder camped on the river just north of the border with New Mexico Territory. From there he drifted, not coming back to Colorado for nearly two months. And when he did, he was arrested.
He learned that Sax and Toby and one of the drifters had been arrested on their way out of the bank. Skeet and the other drifter had fought their way free and ridden off. Since Cameron was known to have ridden with Sax and Skeet, the law decided he was the second man and wanted posters were put out.
The sheriff was fair enough with Cameron. He sent a deputy to find the sheepherder Cameron claimed to have spent the night with. But the man had gone into the hills, and Cameron was tried and sentenced and locked in the penitentiary for three months before the evidence to clear him came.
The law made its manners and apologized. But that nor anything else could wipe out the grim memories of prison. Nor of Sax Larabee.
It was Sax’s claim that Cameron had doubled back that night and warned the authorities, and that they had given him his term in prison to keep the gang from knowing this and so planning a future revenge. Cameron’s quick release confirmed his opinion, despite anything Cameron or the sheriff could say.
Cameron put the memories deep in his mind and rode west. He worked a ranch here and there and tried his hand at mining, and finally he accepted a job as deputy. It took only a little while for him to realize that this was the kind of work he wanted, and to protect himself he told the old lawman he worked for the story of his past.
The sheriff cursed him for a fool. “People talk a lot about honesty, but they won’t love you for showing it, son. You’re shaping into a good law officer. But you’ll never keep a job as one in any decent town as long as you tell folks you was in prison. By the time they get around to believing you were there by accident, they’ll already have you down as a scoundrel who made fools of them. So forget what you was — just think about what you are.”
It was advice Cameron took. As he drifted north and west, he built a solid reputation around himself. Even so, Balder asked a lot of questions when he talked to Cameron about being his deputy with an eye to the main job in a short while. Cameron answered the questions readily enough, but he blotted out the years that Sax Larabee had touched.
But, he thought now, that was like writing on paper with your pen dipped in milk. The words were still there even if they were invisible. And when someone touched heat to the paper, those words came out bold and clear. It was that way here — Sax Larabee’s coming was the heat that was going to make Cameron’s past stand out for everyone to read.
Cameron walked into the jail office and settled behind the desk. The pile of paper work was still there and he thought of Marshal Balder. What would he think when Sax Larabee exposed Cameron’s past? In fourteen months Cameron had come to know the old man well. He would be fair — he would ask Cameron for the truth. But once he heard it, that would be the end of Cameron’s future. Balder, Stedman, Colby, McTigue — they would all react the same way. Jenny? He suspected that she would stand by him; she would believe he had been jailed unfairly before he could even tell her as much. But what would such a revelation do to Tod, and to other boys like him? Growing out of boyhood but not quite yet men, they were balanced on the tightrope between what Cameron represented as a lawman and the lure of the wild life. Cameron was aware of the admiration many local boys had for him, Tod in particular. More than anything, he was afraid of the effect Sax’s story might have on them.