Sheriff on the Spot (2 page)

But, how did all that affect Sam Sloan and the eight thousand dollars he and Ezra had gotten from the sale of their ranch? Pat was a simple man, with no experience at unraveling mysteries. He and Ezra and Sam had done more than their share to unmask lawlessness in the West, but always it had been a direct matter to be settled with blazing six-guns.

He didn't know anything about the ways of city slickers, he told himself morosely. He was certain that Fred Ralston had something up his sleeve, but he sure didn't know how to go about shaking it out into plain sight. It was evident, though, that the plan required the help of a sheriff, and that the conspirators had been waiting for the time when Pat would step down and turn his badge over to Jeth Purdue.

Slow anger began to burn inside Pat at the thought. Purdue had fooled him all right. Just as he had fooled all the other honest citizens of the Valley. Planning some sort of devilment his first night as sheriff, with Joe Deems, Kitty Lane and a stranger from Denver.

The hoofbeats of a galloping horse came through the open window from the road leading south from Dutch Springs. The galloping was labored, as of a horse straining to keep up the pace, spurred on by a relentless rider.

Pat frowned and listened intently, heard the horse swerve away from Main Street toward the small adobe jail and lean-to.

He stiffened and turned from the window as the animal plowed to a stop outside. He heard the thud of hard boot-heels on the planks outside, the jingle of spurs.

Jeth Purdue came panting into the office, his thin red face tight with worry. He was a tall man, with a greyhound leanness of frame. He wore a single gun-belt carrying a .45, with big-roweled Spanish spurs on his run-down boots. His face showed relief at sight of Pat Stevens.

“I was afraid you'd get tired of waitin',” he panted. “Got hung up out to the ranch. Two of my best dang cows bogged in Clay Creek. Then when I got started, damn if my hawse didn't put his foot in a prairie dawg hole an' I had to shoot him and go back to rope me out another.” He paused to catch his breath and then ducked his head to step inside the lean-to.

Pat asked, “What was all the hurry about?”

“You said as how you wanted me to take over tonight an' you'd be clearin' out. I didn't want you to get tired of waitin' for me an' leave town.” Jeth glanced around the office. His gaze stopped at the badge on the table, clung there as though its silver-brightness hypnotized him.

Pat said, “Looks like you're mighty anxious to start bein' sheriff.”

“'Taint that,” Purdue protested. “Jest didn't want to be late.” He paused, then asked with an elaborate show of unconcern, “Evenin' stage come yet?”

“Come an' gone.”

There was a little moment of silence in the small lean-to. Pat stood on flat feet with his arms folded across his chest, little wrinkles about the outer corners of his eyes as he studied the face of the man who had been selected to succeed him as sheriff.

Jeth Purdue shifted his weight from his right foot to his left. He glanced at Pat's impassive face and said uncertainly, “Well, looks like you're packed up an' all. Nothin' much left to do but this, I reckon.” He took a step forward and reached down toward the badge of office.

Pat said, “Wait a minute, Purdue.” He spoke in a slow drawl, but with enough weight to cause Purdue to jerk back his hand and look up apprehensively.

“What do you know about a feller named Fred Ralston?”

Purdue wet his lips. “I didn't catch the name.”

“From Denver,” Pat went on evenly.

Fear leaped into Purdue's eyes. He lowered them swiftly and muttered, “Dunno what you're talkin' aboot.”

“What've you got planned with Joe Deems an' Kitty Lane, an' this Ralston
hombre?”

Jeth Purdue began to shake his head from side to side. “I shore dunno what you're drivin' at.”

Pat said angrily, “Start talkin', Purdue. An' talk fast. Ralston came in on that stage tonight.”

Jeth Purdue took a backward step. A yellowish gleam flickered from beneath his lowered eyelids. His right hand started stealthily downward toward the butt of his holstered gun.

Pat Stevens warned, “Don't try it, Jeth.” His arms were still folded.

Purdue's gun-hand went downward fast.

Pat lunged forward and drove his fist against the point of the lean man's jaw. Jeth toppled backward off balance, desperately dragging his gun clear of leather.

Pat laughed savagely and pulled his own gun free, swung it downward in a sharp arc that smashed the heavy barrel against Purdue's wrist.

Jeth sobbed with pain and his .45 clattered to the floor. He shrank back in abject fear as Pat towered over him. “Talk, you skunk,” Pat ordered through tight-set teeth. “Give it to me before I start gun-whippin' you right.”

Jeth whined, “I dunno nothin'. As God's my judge, Pat, I dunno what you're jumpin' me for.”

“You lie,” snarled Pat. “It's something about Sam an' Ezra.”

Jeth Purdue moaned, “You've busted my wrist sure's hell.” He caught hold of it with his left hand and cried out sharply with the pain of it. His face took on a queer pallor and he sank down limply to the floor, lay there with closed eyes.

Pat stood over him and cursed him, but he did not move. Pat hesitated, then shrugged and reholstered his gun. He stooped and got his hands underneath Purdue's shoulders, dragged him over the threshold and around to the open door of the empty adobe jail.

He pushed him onto the floor and let him lie there in a limp heap, closed the barred door and padlocked it securely.

He strode back into the lean-to and kicked Jeth's gun into a corner, picked up the silver badge and dropped it into a shirt pocket. He turned down the lantern and gave it a quick shake to put it out, then went out and closed the door behind him. He figured it had been just about half an hour since Fred Ralston's visit as he started toward the Jewel Hotel.

2

Pat Stevens had to traverse the entire single block of Main Street from the village square to reach the Jewel Hotel at the other end. There weren't many saddled horses at the hitchracks along the way. Half a dozen of the old-timers had remained loyal to the Gold Eagle Saloon, and their horses were tied outside, but nine-tenths of the other riders in town were congregated at the Jewel.

A lop-sided yellow moon faced Pat in the east as he strode along the boardwalk past the almost deserted business houses and restaurants. There was already the sharp tang of autumn in the night air in that portion of the southern part of Colorado lying eastward from the Rockies, and Pat drew in great draughts of the clean, cool air in an effort to clear the confusion from his mind as he strode forward.

The night air didn't have the usual effect on his mind. He was a simple man, accustomed to simple situations and direct answers. His way of meeting almost any emergency was by straightforward action. He felt, now, that he should have taken Fred Ralston by the throat back there in the lean-to, and choked an explanation out of him. He didn't quite know why he had restrained himself from doing that.

Instead, he had let Ralston go away thinking he had talked to Jeth Purdue. By that action, he had invited the continuance of whatever sinister plot Ralston, Deems and Kitty Lane were involved in together.

Looking at it that way, Pat realized he'd be responsible for anything that had happened or might happen at the Jewel Hotel. He could have stopped it merely by letting Ralston know that Jeth Purdue had not yet assumed office. Instead of that, he'd had to play smart and encourage them to go on with their plan. Pat's lips twisted in a mirthless smile as he thought it out that way. He was acting, by golly, like a smart city detective instead of a simple western sheriff. Like he
wanted
something to happen so he could look smart by solving it the way detectives always did in storybooks.

His pace increased and he became more and more uneasy as he approached closer to the hotel. Twenty-five or thirty saddled horses stood outside, and bright light and music streamed out of the swinging doors and wide plate-glass windows of a large, ground-level room beyond the entrance into the hotel lobby.

Some of Pat Stevens' uneasiness evaporated as he shouldered the swinging doors aside and stepped into the saloon. The bar was crowded with laughing men, and half a dozen were grouped around the accordion and tinny piano at the end of the room singing a popular song of the day in loud disharmony.

Certainly, he thought, nothing very serious had happened here as yet. It gave him a sort of foolish feeling to walk into this scene of gaiety and good fellowship when he had been fearing something else.

He tipped his Stetson back on his head, hooked his thumbs in his gun-belts and looked around for Fred Ralston or Kitty Lane. Neither of them was in the saloon adjunct to the hotel. Neither did he see either Sam Sloan or one-eyed Ezra about. But as he stood there in the doorway, Joe Deems detached himself from the group at the bar and came toward him with a hearty greeting:

“Well, well. If it's not Patrick Stevens. Going to loosen up and celebrate now that you've got rid of that badge, Pat?”

Pat said, “I'm looking for Sam Sloan.”

“He'll probably be around.” Deems put his hand on Pat's arm and urged him toward the bar. “Have a drink on me—now that you're not a sheriff any more.”

Joe Deems was about Pat's height, with a deceptive slimness of figure that hid a lot of substantial weight. He was about thirty-five, though his thinning sandy hair made him look older. His face and voice had a surface appearance of geniality, though it couldn't wholly hide the intrinsic hardness of the man underneath. His forehead sloped back sharply from ragged eyebrows, and he had a sharp nose that had at one time been knocked awry. It had grown back almost straight, but enough one-sided to give his face a curious appearance of unevenness. He had long white hands and a way of gesturing nervously with them, and he wore a green-striped shirt with red suspenders holding up tight-legged pants of black broadcloth, and red elastic armbands on the sleeves of his shirt.

Pat let himself be led to the bar by the proprietor, but said quietly, “I'll buy my own drink, Deems. An' drink it alone.”

Deems let go of his arm with a pained look. “That's not being very friendly, Stevens.”

Pat said, “I didn't mean it to be.” He turned away from Deems and said curtly to the bartender, “Green Valley.”

Joe Deems stayed by his side. He cleared his throat as the bartender set out a shot-glass and poured bonded bourbon into it. “I thought the reason you'd stayed away from my place was because you were sheriff and felt you shouldn't do much drinking in public.”

Pat downed his drink without saying anything.

Deems laughed uncertainly. “But I thought things would be different after you turned your badge over to Jeth Purdue.”

Pat set his empty glass down and spun a silver half dollar across the counter. He said, “You do a lot of thinking, don't you, Deems?” and turned, brushing past the proprietor toward a side door leading into the small hotel lobby.

There was a leather-covered sofa and four straight chairs in the lobby. A wizened little man leaned on the counter over an open hotel register, blinking rheumy eyes at the brightly lighted saloon. He showed some yellow snags of teeth in a smile when Pat came through the doorway. “Fust time I've seed you around here, Pat.”

Pat said, “Evenin', Forrey.” He came to the counter and leaned one elbow on it, looked down at the open register while he got out the makings.

“Reckon you jest couldn't make out to stay away no longer.” The aged clerk chuckled gleefully. “That Kitty Lane brings 'em all in sooner or later. But you'll hafta cut out Sammy Sloan if you git anywheres with Kitty.” His cackle of merriment had an obscene sound.

Leaning over the counter, Pat was reading the last name written on the register. In heavy, bold letters was written, “F. A. Ralston, Denver, Colo.” The number of the room assigned to Ralston was scratched so thinly that Pat couldn't make it out. He put the blunt tip of his finger on the name and asked, “What room has he got?”

Tom Forrest peered down at Pat's fingertip. “That dude feller from Denver? Number fifteen. I recollect he ast fer it particular.”

“Is he in his room now?”

“I reckon. He went up an' I never seed him come down.”

“What room have Sam and Ezra got?”

“They got
two
rooms.” The clerk chuckled happily. “Yes sirree. One room for each of 'em. Livin' in style since they sold out their ranch an' moved into town.”

“What are their room numbers?” Pat asked sharply.

“Eighteen an' twenty. Right straight back from the head of the stairs. I dunno whether you'll find 'em there or not.”

Pat said, “I'll see.”

When he turned away he became aware that Joe Deems had come up silently behind him while he stood at the counter. The hotel proprietor had light brown eyes which looked yellowish now as they met Pat's. Deems stood between Pat and the foot of the stairway leading up to the hotel rooms. He stood there with his arms folded and asked the clerk, “What did Stevens want?”

“He ast me what room Ezra an' Sam Sloan was in.”

Joe Deems' lips came back from his teeth. “Didn't he ask you something else?”

“Well, now I do recollect—”

Pat took a step forward, his eyes blazing. “Why don't you ask me, Deems?”

“All right. I will. What are you snooping around for?”

Pat Stevens drew in a deep breath. His hands were bunched into big fists by his sides. He said, “I'm going up.”

“No, you're not.” Deems stepped backward, up to the second stair, the yellowish glint becoming more pronounced in his eyes.

Pat controlled himself and asked, “Why not?” in the tone of a reasonable man who wants an answer.