He had not taken his eyes off the lawman. “When you’re set, Charlie, back over to the other side of the room right across the table from me . . . and for the time bein’ I’ll thank you to keep your hands even with your hat.”
The gunman holstered the new pistol, but kept his left arm limp at his side. “Case you don’t know it, you’re goin’ to get shot dead by your own gun—the same one that brought you here this afternoon. You got mine and I got yours, and as soon as we get a signal . . . let’s see . . . I got it!”
His eyes shifted to the woman for a split second. “Florie, you fetch that big spoon from the table, and whenever the fancy strikes you, you bang it agin’ that dish pail hangin’ behind your head. Get it. Charlie . . . when you hear the gong—go for your gun.”
Charlie Martz lowered his hands slowly until they were hanging at his sides. He swallowed hard, but there was no fear in his eyes. He had never run out on a showdown before. And he couldn’t now if he wanted to. He knew that. One step in any direction and he’d be cut down in a second.
“Guess you got me, Billy. When I woke up this morning I never thought this would be the day. How about lettin’ me say a few words to the Schmidts before the gun goes off?”
“Old-timer, you’re goin’ to have me cryin’ in a minute.” The gunman was cold now, with no trace of a smile. “You just keep your lips tight and tend to your business.” He shouted to Mrs. Schmidt, irritably, “Come on, woman, give the signal!”
Mrs. Schmidt held the long-handled spoon as if it were an object of evil. She bit her lower lip, not making a sound, but her eyes pleaded in the direction of the gunman. Bushway was about to yell at her again when she closed her eyes and, with a shudder, swung the spoon behind her with all her might.
The sharp CLANG of the dishpan vibrated no more than a second before the room was filled with the explosive bark of a Colt . . . a split second . . . then the same crashing short bark as a Colt jerked fire from its barrel.
The dishpan lying on the floor gave a sharp, hollow ring, stopped. And then quiet.
Billy Bushway held the pistol in front of him at arm’s length. He still stared across as he brought the gun onto the table . . . then he stumbled backward a few steps, jolted against the wall, and slid down slowly until he was in the sitting position. His eyes were wide open, unblinking, staring across the table, still. Then his hand dropped forward and his chin rested against his chest without moving.
“Charlie, you did it! You did it! You outgunned him!” Schmidt jumped around excitedly and then over to the fallen gunman. He touched the still outlaw lightly on the shoulder. The crouched figure slid slowly across the lower wall and sprawled on the floor.
“He’s dead as a stone, Charlie. You got him clean through the chest, twice.”
Charlie Martz had only then relaxed his position. He holstered the pistol and made his way around the table.
Siesta in Paloverde
IF YOU’D HAVE ASKED all of the boys in the Four Aces that afternoon if they had a feeling something out of the ordinary was going to happen, you’d probably have gotten some pretty sour replies with a few colorful oaths thrown in. But all the answers, regardless of the tone, would have added up to one thing: Paloverde was a hot, dusty, adobe cow-town with one saloon and a reputation for being the deadest community in southern New Mexico Territory; and that day it was even hotter, dustier, and deader than usual. And even if it was the Fourth of July, what the hell could ever happen in Paloverde!
Four cowhands from the Spanish Hat sat at a table and went through the motions of seven-card stud. Nobody had his heart in the game, because most of the time a Spanish Hat rider wouldn’t have enough money to affect his heart one way or the other anyway. But they sat around with their hats back, not saying much, nursing a bottle of yellowish-looking liquid called mescal. They only had money between them for one more bottle, so they drank slowly, making it last. It was a long day.
Count Rudolph Von Bock leaned against the bar with a thumb crooked around a suspender strap and a scuffed boot perched on the brass floor rail. He lifted his glass of beer as Mickey Tigh passed the bar rag along the shiny, wet surface in front of him. And when he raised the glass to his round, rosy, beard-stubbled face, his elbow poked out of a hole in the red-flannel underwear sleeve. Count Rudolph Von Bock wasn’t the most prosperous citizen of Paloverde, but he easily drank more beer than anyone else, and he paid cash, so Mickey Tigh, at least, was always glad to see him. The Count’s town attire was his undershirt, with usually a couple of buttons missing, a frayed Panama hat that alone would make the Count stand out in a crowd, without his other eccentricities. All the boys laughed at and with the Count, and thought maybe he was just a little loco . . . even if he was the best, and only, gunsmith in Paloverde. One thing for sure, he was the only Count in New Mexico. All you had to do was ask him. But that’s another story.
Mickey Tigh pulled his big belly from the mahogany edge and dragged the rag down the length of the bar toward the front of the saloon, and looked out the window. Mickey, fat and fifty, didn’t particularly care if there was anything to do or not. On quiet days people drank more.
It was glaring hot outside, and still. The stillness seemed to make it all the hotter. He turned back to the contrasting dimness of the barroom and almost commented on the weather. But they had been all through that before. The heat and boredom of Paloverde had been described six different ways in the past two hours. It was just one of those depressing, hollow afternoons when you’d even look forward to the bark of a stray dog, or a screen door slamming.
And then Charlie Martz walked in, and things began to happen.
Charlie had one thing on his easygoing mind and that thing was ice-cold beer. After a dusty ride like the one from the county seat at Cruces, the first stop was always Mickey Tigh’s Four Aces. This even took precedence over any law enforcing that had to be done. And as Charlie Martz, sheriff of Doña Ana County, seldom had any enforcing to do, it didn’t matter if he did like an occasional beer at Mickey Tigh’s. The only trouble was, Charlie knew he’d always be in for an argument if there were any Spanish Hat riders about, which was practically every time he came in.
The Count and Mickey Tigh were two of the few men in town who didn’t underrate Charlie Martz. And that was because they were old-timers and knew him when. They allowed that a man was entitled to take it easy after working hard as a civil servant for more than thirty years.
The Spanish Hat boys saw only a tired old man with a droopy mustache, who wore his gun far too high to be any good with it, and who had been sheriff of Doña Ana County for going on ten years without making more than a dozen arrests a year. And those were mostly picking up drunks. The Count and Mickey tried to tell them about Charlie’s younger days in Tucson and Prescott, but the Spanish Hat boys mostly believed what they saw. If he was so all-fired good, how come he never threw-down on any wanted outlaws? These same boys had never in their lives seen an outlaw in Paloverde, but that didn’t stop them from asking the same question over and over. Charlie was just right to poke fun at . . . and there he was again!
Vance Roman usually started the Charlie-baiting. Hell, he was twenty-seven! Been punching cows for a dozen years. Had to lead off because the other boys were just stretching out of their teens. Cocky, but still a little wobbly when it came to razzing an old-timer. But that Vance knew how to start things off!
“Hey, Charlie,” Vance yelled across the room. “Round up any bandidos on your ride down?” That really brought a laugh from the boys.
Charlie usually ignored the cowhands the first couple of rounds. He’d wait until he felt the relaxing effects of a few schooners of beer, then he’d let go. This day, he looked a little more tired than usual when he propped his elbows on the bar next to the Count’s.
From the Spanish Hat table a few more remarks floated over. Vance was getting wound up. But they passed right by Charlie’s head. It was still too early.
“Charlie, don’t pay no attention to thos
e kiddies,” the Count consoled.
“Hell, I don’t really mind those youngsters, but one of these days I’m going to surprise ’em and run the whole bunch in, just on general principles,” he grumbled. He had thought of it before, but with no jail in Paloverde, it would be a helluva lot of work to drag those waddies up to the calaboose in Cruces just for a general principle.
“Maybe they’ll grow up someday and I won’t have to bother,” he thought aloud. “Boy, this is good beer!” he said, smacking his lips. Charlie forgot things very quickly.
The Spanish Hat representatives went back to their seven-card game, not being able to get a rise out of Charlie.
The Count was toying with his schooner halfway up to his face, sloshing the half glass of beer around, trying to develop a head. Suddenly he banged the schooner down on the bar, some of the beer slopping over the rim of the glass.
“Hell, Charlie, I almost forgot the reason I came here! Sort of a secondary reason though, to be honest. I got your gun.” He stretched his body over the bar to look at Mickey Tigh down by the front window. “Hey, Mickey! Where’s the gun?”
The fat man waddled up slowly on the squeaky duckboards, and stooped with a grunt a few feet from the two men. “Got it right here, genius. You did a nice job on it.” He held the pistol with a light, awkward grip, eyeing it suspiciously as if it were alive.
“Give it here, Fatso, before you faint dead away,” the Count said with a very straight face. That meant he was being funny. “You see that, Charlie? Mickey still ain’t sure which end the lead comes out.”
Charlie winked at the New Mexico nobleman. “Count, you got to remember that Mickey here is a clean liver and don’t have no truck with the sources of evil . . . outside of this drinking hell he runs. Here, let me heft it,” he said, reaching for the gun.
“How she look to you, Charlie?” the Count asked with a pleased smile on his face. He hadn’t had a complaint against his gunsmithing yet and wasn’t expecting any.
Charlie balanced the heavy Colt .44 in his hand deftly. His tan, freckled fingers curled around the ebony gun-butt as he spun the cylinder.
“The old iron looks like new, Rudy. I wouldn’t have known it. You know I had in mind to chuck it, when I remembered how you make over old irons. Yes, sir, I think this is just fine.” Charlie inspected the revolver with a broad smile on his face. “Just fine and dandy.”
“Glad you like it, Charlie,” the Count said. “Only I ain’t finished yet. Just brought it in to show you the external ornamentation, you might say.”
“You might say,” Mickey Tigh put in. “But we wouldn’t.”
The Count shot Mickey a quick glance. “Just stick to your beer drawing, Fat Boy.” He returned to Charlie. “As I was saying, the finish is finished, and the bullets fit the cylinder as you probably noticed. There are five in there now and the hammer’s on the empty chamber. Only trouble is when you squeeze the trigger, the cylinder moves around too far and the hammer falls in between the chambers and jams. Doesn’t do the hammer any good either. It’s getting all bent out of shape with my testing it to fall right. Yep, it looks fine, but the way it is, it ain’t worth a tiddly-do.”
“You don’t tell me! Well, I’ll be damned!” Charlie was more disappointed than surprised.
“Oh, I’ll fix it, Charlie. Like I said, I just wanted you to see how far along with it I am.”
Charlie looked at the shiny pistol sadly, reluctant to give it back to the Count. “Rudy, what you say I just hold on to it awhile and kind of get the feel of it? Been a long time since I used this girl.” Charlie was a little boy with a new toy. He wasn’t very subtle about it either.
“Sure, Charlie. It’s your gun,” the Count answered.
The Doña Ana sheriff lifted the pistol he was carrying from the worn leather holster and handed it to Mickey Tigh. “Here, put this one behind the bar, Mick, and I’ll get it when I go.” He slipped the renovated Colt into the holster and patted it lightly. “Feels good.”
“Want another beer, Charlie?” said the bartender.
“Don’t mind if I do, Mick,” Charlie answered him, shaking his head. “That’s a killin’ ride from Cruces.”
The Count glanced over his shoulder just then and gave Charlie a poke with his elbow. “Look out, Charlie, here comes that rough rider, Vance Roman.”
A few heavy, high-heeled footsteps, accompanied by the jingle of Mexican spurs, and Vance Roman was at the bar.
“What you got there, Charlie? Looks like new iron. Let’s have a look.”
Before the sheriff could prepare for anything, Vance Roman jerked the Colt from Charlie’s holster with a howl of laughter and pointed it in his face.
“What are you doing with one of these, old-timer? They shoot real bullets, you know!” Vance threw his head back and howled again, and then waved the Colt in the direction of his compadres. “Hey, boys! Look what Charlie’s got! Think we ought to tell him what it is?”
Charlie made a wild grab for it over Vance’s head, but the cowboy jerked it out of his reach. “Give me my gun, you crazy kid!” Charlie was dead serious.
Vance wore his usual silly, superior grin. He held the pistol high over his head and held Charlie away at arm’s length. “Aw, does the sheriff want his gun? Well, let’s see him try and get it! Hey, Sid, catch!” He glanced over to the table and tossed the pistol in the general direction.
One of the cowpunchers scrambled out of his chair and caught the pistol on the fly.
“How you like it, Sid?” Vance yelled over, still laughing.
Sid examined the gun with a big grin on his hollow-cheeked face. “This here’s a big gun for such a little man. Hey, lookie here, Vance! There’s three, no four notches on the butt! How you suppose they got there?”
“Probably slipped out of his hand while he was rabbit huntin’ and got scratched on a rock,” Vance yelled back.
“All right, that’s enough,” Charlie said quietly. He pushed Vance aside and walked over toward Sid, slowly.
“You’re gettin’ kind of uppity, ain’t you, Sid, for a green kid who ain’t even shaved his whiskers yet? Give it here.”
Sid held the gun away from the sheriff, ready to throw it back to Vance.
“Come on, son. Hand it over.” Charlie spoke very softly.
“Don’t let the old coot buffalo you, Sid. Heave it back,” Vance said excitedly.
And that was the timely encouragement that Sid needed. He grinned again. “Here you go, Vance!” He feinted a toss over Charlie’s head, bent quickly and scooted the gun between the sheriff’s legs across the board floor to Vance.
Charlie Martz’s thin shoulders sagged to match the tired look on his face as he turned to face the cowboy bully. His mustache seemed to droop even lower.
“Look here, Vance. I ain’t playing with you. Hand over that iron or you’ll find out fast how I get notches on the butt. The fifth one’s liable to have your name on it.”
Vance just grinned. “You threatenin’ me, Charlie. Why I thought—”
“Shut your mouth, Vance!” Charlie’s face was full of fire. He’d never been madder in his life. “Looks like I’m going to have to paint you a little picture, Vance. Though it’s something I’ve never enjoyed talking about a whole lot.” He pointed to the gun in the cowboy’s hand.
“See that first notch? Well, that represents Wyn Scallon. He held up the Butterfield Stage Line seventeen times. Seventeen times successfully. Then I caught up with him in the Blue Bell in Prescott. I only shot once, Vance, and Wyn Scallon never robbed another stage. The second one’s Billy Bushway. He went loco from too much bad whisky in a saloon down in Wittenburg. I forget which one it was. Anyway, he shot five unsuspecting customers dead before the rest could get out into the street to safety. He turned around from shooting bottles off the bar when I walked in. He turned around, Vance, so I could plug him between the eyes. The third one belongs to Kurt Masselon. I know you heard of him. He was the fastest gun in West Texas . . . only he came too far we
st and he wasn’t the fastest no more. At least he wasn’t the day outside of Red Healy’s livery stable in Tombstone. I shot three times before old Kurt dropped. He was tough.” Charlie lowered his voice slightly. “Course, toughness don’t mean a damn thing on Boot Hill.”
“That fourth one belongs to Reb Spadea—”
A shrill peal of laughter broke from the front of the bar. Charlie wheeled around with the rest of the Four Aces’ customers to see the tall, dust-caked rider standing in the doorway. His thumbs were hooked behind two, low-slung gun belts that crossed below his waist and tapered around thin, straight hips. Two revolvers, butts forward, rested loosely in holsters attached to his thighs at the lower ends with rawhide ties. His knee-high boots were almost white from alkali dust.
He wore a sweat-stained sombrero that had a silver concha band, and his lips formed a smile that turned them down at one corner.
“Charlie, you trying to sell these boys a big bill of goods? The first part sounded all right. Could have happened. But I thought I’d better stop you before you found yourself in a fish story. I’m just gettin’ at how come you decorate your gun with a notch when that notch is standing right in front of you?” The stranger bellowed with laughter. “Don’t you know me, Charlie?”
The rider’s spurs chinged in rhythm to his heavy stride as he took a few steps to the bar and leaned his elbow on the edge. Mickey Tigh shuffled down to him to be of service, but the rider waved him away.
“This is strictly business,” he said, without taking his eyes from Charlie. “Maybe one later.” He pushed his hat back from his forehead and leered at the sheriff.
Charlie blanched and lurched a half step forward.
“I come in at the wrong time, Charlie? Did I wreck your yarn?” The corner of the gunman’s mouth drooped even farther and he shot a glance at Vance Roman holding the sheriff’s pistol.