The Law of the Trigger (16 page)

“The marshal's staying', Ike!”

The gang leader frowned. “Let him talk for himself.”

“I'm talkin' for him,” Dunc called harshly. “And I say he's stayin'!”

Ike's frown deepened, then suddenly it disappeared and he smiled savagely. “Gabe, could you spot Dunc's position?”

Gabe Tanis cocked his head as if he were still listening to Dunc Lester's words. “I can't be sure, but he sounded like he was right behind the top shelf.”

Ike nodded. “That's what I figured, too. He's up there by himself, Gabe. The marshal's dead, or too weak to talk-it doesn't make any difference which.”

This possibility had occurred to Tanis, but he was a careful, suspicious man. “Maybe you're right. Or maybe he's just playin' possum.”

Ike Brunner laughed. “He's not playin' possum, Gabe. He's dead!” He checked his Winchester, moved to the end of the shelf, and fired three times toward the hilltop.

The gang leader's confidence seemed to affect very man on that rocky slope. They had listened to the exchange and had drawn their own conclusions. The marshal was dead. At the signal they leaped to their feet and began clawing their way toward that jagged cap of sandstone.

Ike Brunner forgot the pain in his leg. Drunk with the anticipation of victory, he fought his way from thicket to thicket, grabbing at roots and stones, his eyes always on that cap of rock. He grinned fiercely when Dunc Lester's pistol began its meaningless pattern of firing, first from one position and then from another. This, Ike Brunner knew, was the sound of panic. This was the lone coon nipping futilely at the pack of hounds.

Ike himself was the first to reach the top. And that was as it should have been. On his hands and knees, dragging his Winchester, he saw Dunc Lester on the other side of the hill. On one knee, Dunc had his back turned to Ike, firing with his pistol at the men advancing from the west. Deliberately Ike kept his every movement slow and precise, savoring every minute detail of the moment. He lifted his rifle and, smiling, brought it to bear on the boy's straight, broad back. He had eyes only for Dunc Lester, the killer of his brother, and he did not see the marshal until Owen Toller spoke.

“Ike!”

And then it was too late.

The gang leader wheeled on his good leg, realizing that he had guessed wrong and that Gabe Tanis had guessed right. The marshal had played possum.

In that one split second Ike Brunner understood the situation as it actually was. He was alone and no one could help him. In that small fragment of time Ike saw the marshal standing there, his face pale and drawn, leaning against a massive boulder. He saw Owen Toller's shirt plastered with his own blood against his side, and he saw the deadly beauty of blue steel and polished walnut that the marshal had drawn from his holster and now held at his side. In that smallest part of a second Ike was aware of all these things and many more.

Toller said quietly, “Drop your rifle, Ike.”

The gang leader's position was awkward. He rested heavily on his good leg and his Winchester was pointed down at the ground. To kill this marshal he would have to shift his weight quickly to his bad leg, lifting the rifle's muzzle at the same time, and fire from the hip.

I can do it, he thought. I can swing the Winchester faster than he can lift the revolver. But he hesitated. He didn't like what he saw in the marshal's face.

Toller said, “Drop it, Ike. I'll not let you kill me the way you killed Mort Stringer. Or the freight agent and his wife.”

Ike darted a quick glance at the rocky ridge and saw that Gabe Tanis had reached the top behind Toller. Relief washed over him and he wanted to laugh. Gabe would kill the marshal, and Dunc Lester would be left for himself. Everything was working out perfectly!

But Gabe made no move to shoot. He merely stood there, waiting, a slow understanding appearing in his eyes. And at that moment Ike knew that he could expect no help from Tanis. He had heard what the marshal had said about Mort Stringer.

In sudden rage Ike wheeled to throw all his weight on his bad leg. In the back of his mind he could hear his men clawing their way to the hilltop, but none of them could help him now. At the start of the turn he felt his wounded leg begin to buckle. His shot went wide.

Nothing changed in Owen Toller's eyes as he lifted the heavy revolver and fired.

A sheet of numbness covered Ike as the impact of the bullet drove him to the ground. All thoughts, all hate, all anger left him. He fell into darkness.

Gabe Tanis stood like a gaunt, ragged statue and knew that the gang leader was dead before he hit the ground. All the fight seemed to go out of him. A bleakness, too profound for sorrow, took hold of him. He had lost his stomach for killing; so many of his people were already dead. What the marshal had said about Mort Stringer kept ringing in his ears. He felt as though the ground had been cut from under him and he had no place on which to stand.

“Drop your rifle, Gabe,” the marshal said, almost gently.

Gabe did not drop his rifle, but he did turn and called out in a hoarse, raw voice, “Hold it up, boys! Ike's been killed!”

Dunc Lester came running toward the marshal, but Toller motioned him back. A shocked silence fell around the hilltop. The king was dead.

Gabe Tanis rubbed his face as though he were coming out of a drugged sleep. He looked at Ike Brunner's lifeless body, then at Owen and Dunc.

Owen said, “I'll have to take you back to Reunion, Gabe.”

Tanis shook his head sullenly. “I never killed anybody.”

“Goddamn it, Gabe!” Dunc Lester shouted. “You've been tryin' plenty hard to kill me and the marshal!”

Almost carelessly, Tanis cradled his rifle in the crook of his arm. “Maybe.” He shrugged. “Ike wanted it that way, and maybe we listened too close to what he said.” He turned his head and spat with the wind. “Boys,” he said loudly, “I guess it would be best if you all went back to your homes.”

Dunc Lester's eyes flashed angrily. “Marshal, you're not goin' to let them get away, are you?”

Owen smiled. He must have known that they were helpless to stop them.

Gabe Tanis wiped his mouth thoughtfully as he turned to go. “Dunc,” he said, the words coming with great effort, “I never felt right about burnin' your folks out like we did.”

Dunc glared with bitter eyes. At last Gabe turned, called again to the men, and began the slow descent to the bottom of the hill.

So this is the way it ends, Owen thought. His head was amazingly light; his side burned as though he had been branded with a running iron.

“Marshal,” Dunc Lester said, “are you all right?”

Owen nodded. “It's just a flesh wound.” He scanned the world around him in the light of a dying sun. “Son,” he said, “I think we have witnessed the end of an era. Ike Brunner, in his way, served a purpose here. I think he taught the people something.”

Dunc scowled, neither knowing nor caring what Owen was talking about. “What if they come back?” he asked. “We're not in much condition to fight them off again.”

“They won't come back.” He glanced at the sprawled body before him. “I believe that the days of brazen lawlessness are through. I believe these hills will see no more of gangs like Ike Brunner's.” He did not know how he knew this, but he knew. Perhaps it had been something he had seen in Gabe Tanis' eyes. There had been a great weariness there, and some of the bitterness had burned itself out.

Uneasy and restless, Dunc had walked to the far side of the stone cap and stood staring down at the gathering darkness.

“Marshal, come here!”

Owen turned suddenly and almost fell. He braced himself against the boulder for a moment, giving his head time to clear. “What is it, Dunc?”

“Horses, Marshal! Two of them!”

Owen walked with elaborate steadiness to where Dunc was standing, and near the base of the hill he saw the two horses. They were hobbled and grazing quietly in a sparse stand of blackjack.

Dunc could not believe the obvious. “It's a trick, Marshal!”

Owen took a long time answering, but at last he shook his head and said, “No, I don't think so.”

“You don't know this gang like I do!” Dunc insisted. “This is just the kind of thing they would try, leavin' those two horses down there to draw us off the hill. They're down there in some gully right now, I'll bet, waitin' for us!”

This was a possibility that Owen was forced to consider but he could not believe it. He walked heavily to the boulder and picked up Arch Deland's carbine. I won't believe it! he thought. I prefer to believe that Gabe Tanis left those horses for us, and that's what I'll believe.

“Where're you headed, Marshal?” Dunc called out in alarm.

“Down to see about those horses.”

“But I tell you it's a trick!”

Owen smiled. “We'll soon know.” He eased himself over the ledge, carefully favoring his wounded side. Dunc called out again, then cursed savagely and started down the hill beside him.

“Marshal, this is the craziest thing I ever heard of!”

And perhaps it is, Owen thought. But a time comes when a man must trust the instincts of others or the world becomes unbearable. He could not explain this to Dunc. If he had been asked to put his thoughts into words, he could not have done it. He only knew that he had done the job he had come to do, the job for which he had trained all his adult life; and he knew that now was the time to learn whether all his efforts and ideals had taught him anything about the millions of humans like himself who populated the earth. He had to know if Arch Deland had died for nothing.

When at last they reached the bottom of the hill, Owen walked directly to the horses, and no sound at all was made in the surrounding woods. No rifle fire, no voices raised in hate or anger. All was quiet.

Dunc Lester said, “Well, I'll be damned!”

Dunc Lester's thoughts were more complex. He still found it difficult to believe that Gabe Tanis had not set a trap. This affected his thinking not only about Tanis, but about all the other people that he had known. Now that Ike was dead, perhaps the hills would be a different place; perhaps his folks would come back and begin again. But he did not try to convince himself that old times would return and things would be again as they had been before.

Time did not reverse itself any more than water ran upstream. Times would change. Maybe the railroad would be brought in and some of the timber cut, and maybe the gap between the hills and lowlands would not be as great as it had been before-but maybe a change would be to the good.

Maybe, he pondered, the Lesters and the Tanises and all the others had lived too long by themselves. And maybe, he thought, it wouldn't do us no harm to mix with people like the marshal once in a while.

It was curious how his brief association with the marshal had changed his mind about a lot of things. He felt that he had grown simply by being with arid watching Owen Toller. He could not explain this, even to himself, but he knew it to be true.

He thought about all these things, and more, as they rode the long grade back to Reunion, but most of the time his thoughts were filled with Leah Stringer. He had it all planned in his mind what he was going to say when he saw her. He would tell her about the cabin he meant to build on the home place, and then he would ask her to be his wife and live with him. And on a Saturday, or once a month at least, they would hitch up and go down to a settlement, like the foothill farmers did. She would have people to talk to and would not be lonesome, for his folks would be moving back, now that the Brunners were no more.

He liked to think about this, but sometimes he would get to worrying, thinking that maybe Leah wouldn't want him, or that she would want more than just a log-and-mud cabin in the woods. Once he had been pondering that problem and the marshal had looked at him steadily.

“Don't worry, son,” he said. “I figure she'll still be waitin' for you.”

Somehow that made him feel better, and he didn't worry about it much after that.

It was near noon of the second day when they sighted Reunion. Owen's impulse was to ride straight through and head for the farm and Elizabeth, but he knew that it could not be quite as simple as that.

They tied up in front of the courthouse. “I'll have to report to the sheriff,” Owen said. “You can ride on to the farm, if you want to, son.”

“I'll wait,” Dunc said.

Owen had forgotten how much hunting and being hunted could change a man. Will Cushman didn't recognize them at first. Owen smiled and rubbed his hand over his gaunt and bearded face. “We're back, Will.”

“My God! Owen!”

Will came out of his chair and around the desk, and took Owen's hand. “I was afraid you weren't coming back at all!”

“All of us didn't,” Owen said gently, and the sheriff blinked.

“Arch Deland?” he asked.

Owen nodded.

Cushman frowned, then dismissed Deland from his mind completely. “You don't know how glad I am to see you, Owen. It's been pure hell around here.” He glanced blankly at Dunc, then fixed his gaze on Owen. “Well, tell me what happened, man! What about the Brunners?”

“Dead,” Owen said quietly.

“Both of them?”

Owen nodded.

Cushman's bland face broke into a wide smile. “By God!” he said happily. “That'll fix these wolves that've been nipping at my heels!” Suddenly he laughed and slapped his deputy's back, not noticing the blood-stiffened shirt or the pain that appeared in Owen's eyes. “This will show them! Do you know there's been talk around town of removing me from the sheriff's office? Well, they won't try it now!” He laughed again. “Now tell me all about it, man! What about the rest of the gang?”

“There is no gang any more,” Owen said.

Cushman looked startled. “Good Lord! Don't tell me they're
all
dead!”

Owen glanced at Dunc and smiled faintly. “No. The gang has simply broken up. That's all I mean.”

The sheriff smiled, extremely pleased at the way things had worked out. “I'll have to tell Ben McKeever about this. Ben will want to know.” Then, at last, he noticed the bloodstained shirt. “Owen, are you hurt?”

“It isn't much. It's dried over now.”

Cushman tried to look concerned, but he couldn't keep from looking pleased. “I'll tell you what you do, Owen. You wait here and I'll fetch Doc Linnwood. I want to see McKeever anyway, and Doc's place is on the way to the bank.”

Suddenly Owen realized how tired he was and sank wearily into a straight-backed chair. He nodded to Cushman. Maybe it would be better to have Linnwood look at his side before he started home; he didn't want to worry Elizabeth any more than necessary.

After the sheriff was gone, Dunc Lester took a chair on the other side of Cushman's desk. “Marshal,” he said slowly, “would you tell me somethin'?”

“What is it?”

“Why did you do it? Go huntin' for the Brunners, I mean. It wasn't your job. Nobody could have made you do it.”

For some reason, Owen remembered what Judge Lochland had told him once about civilization and heroes, and he laughed. “Dunc,” he said, “if you have to have a reason, maybe you'd better just put it down to damn foolishness.”

“I think it was more than that,” the boy said.

And the way he said it made Owen squirm uncomfortably, and he was glad to see Doc Linnwood's thick figure appear in the doorway. “So you made it back,” the doctor said, shooting quick glances at Owen and Dunc. He stood quietly for a moment. “I'm sorry about Deland. He was a good man.”

“Yes,” Owen said. “Thanks.”

“Well!” Linnwood said after another short pause. “I guess I'd better take a look at that side.”

The doctor's big, blunt hands had the gentle touch of a woman as he helped Owen off with his shirt, then bathed and dressed the raw furrow about three inches above the left hip. “You're by way of becoming a hero, Owen.” Linnwood smiled. “Cushman's got the whole town talking.”

Owen smiled and said, “Are Elizabeth and the boys all right, Doc?”

“Fine. I was out that way yesterday.”

Owen saw the eager look in Dunc Lester's eyes, and added, “How about Leah Stringer?”

“You wouldn't know her,” Linnwood laughed. “Elizabeth decked her out in some of her own dresses, and damn if she didn't turn out to be a looker.”

Dunc sagged with relief, but said nothing. The small talk continued for several minutes, and at last they heard the solid crack of boot heels on the rock flooring and Cushman and Bern McKeever came into the office.

“Well, Owen,” the banker said heartily. “Will tells me you cleaned up the Brunners! That's just the thing I wanted to hear!”

“I had some help,” Owen said quietly. “Arch Deland and Dunc Lester, here.”

“Oh, yes.” McKeever blinked at the quiet rebuke. “Too bad about Deland, but he was an old man. The important thing is that the Brunners are dead. It'll be a simple matter to take a posse into the hills and clean out the rest of the gang.”

Owen and Dunc looked quickly at one another and then stared at the fat banker. “I'd sort of thought,” Owen said mildly, “that the matter was closed. The gang is broken up. I don't think they'll give you any more trouble.”

McKeever was clearly outraged at such an idea. “Toller, have you taken leave of your senses? They're a bunch of killers and thieves up there, every one of them. They've got to be brought to trial and punished. The sooner we clean them out of the hills, the better!”

The banker's fat jowls quivered in righteous indignation, and he shot a finger at Dunc Lester. “And that young hoodlum is to be treated the same as the others! He was one of the gang, and I'll permit no favoritism when it comes to justice!”

“Just a minute, Ben,” Owen said quietly.

“You listen to me, Toller,” the banker broke in. “What you've done was a big help, and we appreciate it, but we can't tolerate softness toward a gang of criminals.”

Owen slipped into his shirt, looking at McKeever as he buttoned it. He said, “They're not criminals, Ben. They're just farmers, like myself.”

“They're killers!” McKeever said angrily.

“The Brunners were killers,” Owen corrected. But he knew that he had no legal ground to stand on, and he was not sure that his moral ground was as completely steady as he would have liked. And yet he had met Gabe Tanis face to face, and Ben McKeever hadn't. He could not believe that men like Tanis were willful criminals.

At last he said, “Ben... maybe you're right.”

“Of course I'm right!”

Although Owen did not look in Dunc Lester's direction, he could feel the boy's instant hostility in the room. “If the gang was really disbanded,” Owen went on, “it would be an impossible job weeding out the gang members from the others.”

“They're all equally to blame, members or not,” the banker said bluntly. “The gang could not have existed without the approval of hillfolks.”

“Then all of them should be punished,” Owen said, “rounded up like cattle and brought into Reunion to stand trial.”

Ben was puzzled but pleased. “That's right, Owen! I thought you'd see it my way.”

Dunc Lester came half out of his chair, his face flushed with anger. But before he could speak, Owen went on in his mild, disinterested voice. “It looks like Ben has the law on his side, Will,” he said to the sheriff. “What you'll have to do is round up a big posse, scour those hills from top to bottom until you have every last family.”

Will appeared suddenly uncomfortable at this turn of events. “Wait a minute, Owen,” he said quickly. “I know how Ben feels about this, but it would take months, maybe years, to clean out those hills!”

“I know,” Owen agreed. “They have pride. They'll fight every inch of the way together against a posse of outsiders. But they'll have to give in eventually. It might take five, ten years, but they'll finally have to give in.”

“Five years!” Ben McKeever said. “Ten!”

“You have the hills to deal with,” Owen explained. “Why, a few of those farmers could hold up a hundred-man posse almost as long as they wanted in one of their passes. Of course you'll have to plan on a long fight.”

“But I
hadn't
planned on a long fight!” the banker sputtered. “Why, in five years the railroad would be dead and forgotten!”

“Justice doesn't always come the easy way,” Owen told him.

McKeever wiped his red face with a crisp linen handkerchief. “Now, wait a minute, Will. We've got to look at this another way. We've got to think of the good of the community as a whole. We've got to think of the prosperity that a spur line would bring to Reunion. Owen, if we... well, say we kind of let this matter sit for a while, do you think those hillpeople would co-operate with the building of a railroad?”

Owen smiled so faintly that the expression was hardly noticeable. “Maybe,” he said, “you'd better ask Mr. Lester. He knows the people better than I do.”

McKeever came angrily erect, but he was much too smart to allow his emotions to control his business sense. “Well, son,” he snapped, glaring at Dunc, “what do you say?”

Dunc had begun to see the purpose behind the queer turn of the marshal's talk. “I don't know,” he said carefully. “Maybe they'd listen to me, and maybe they wouldn't.” But his mind was thinking far ahead, and he was thinking that McKeever's railroad would mean work for the hill-people, something to fill the gap that the Brunner raids had opened. There would be sawmills and timber to cut, and roads and settlements would change the face of the hills. Dunc thought that all these things might be to the good.

He looked first at Owen, and the marshal nodded. Then to McKeever he said, “I can't promise it'll do any good, but maybe I can talk to them.”

“You do that,” the banker said quickly, wiping his face again. “I'd appreciate it, son.”

Owen sat for one long moment, quietly at peace with the world and with himself. He felt no obligation toward anyone but Elizabeth and the boys, and he was eager to see them. He was anxious to experience the pungent smell of fresh-turned earth again. Duty-if that was the name for it-no longer held him. The glories of the past did not entice him as they enticed Arch Deland. What he had done, he told himself, was not so much. A million men before him had left their plows for various reasons, for causes as subtle as the act of breathing, to fight for certain beliefs that they could not put into words. And they would do it again in the future.

Owen Toller stood up and looked at Dunc. “Are you ready, son?”

The boy rose from his chair. “I'm ready.” Owen unpinned his deputy's badge and laid it carefully on Will Cushman's desk. “Then,” he said, “I guess it's time we went home.”