Killer!, page 5
So what if she was closer to forty than thirty?
What was wrong with a mature woman?
Sheriff Clegett tossed down his whiskey and stepped clear of the bar.
‘See you around, Hawk.’
Hawk nodded. ‘Sure thing, Sheriff.’
He watched the lawman pause a couple of times on his way towards the street, saw the battered Stetson disappear beyond the door frame, let his hand fall back to his glass.
He threw down what was left of his drink and swiveled away: and that was when he saw the kid.
Chapter Five
AT FIRST HE thought it was the boy from Rose City, followed him north for whatever damned reason. But no. Not him but like him. Tall, kind of sallow, eyes staring at him from halfway across the saloon.
He was wearing a coat that was too big for him across the shoulders and that drooped over him and gave him the presence of a shambling old man. About the only thing that didn’t look cast-off about him were his boots. Tall, black and still shiny—for some reason, Hawk’s immediate thought was that he’d stolen them, followed some drunk down an alley and knocked him on the head, pulled off his boots before he could come to and run for it.
He didn’t know that—no way of knowing—but that was the thought that came into his head.
Hawk took a couple of paces away from the bar and still the kid was staring at him. Fifteen, sixteen years old. Just standing there in that old coat and staring.
What the hell was he staring at him for?
Hawk felt like walking up to him and asking him outright, but he figured that would only make matters worse. Maybe he wasn’t exactly right in the head. He didn’t want to get mixed up with someone like that. All that he wanted was to get back to his lodgings and the tender mercies of good old Esther Brill!
To hell with the kid!
He half-missed a step, conscious again that he’d drunk a little too much, and done so a sight too fast. Some nights it was like that: some nights a man could drink forever and it wouldn’t affect him; other times all it took was a few shots and your brain turned to a mess of wool.
Well, this was one of those times.
All the more reason for not tangling with a fool kid.
All the more reason for getting home to bed.
He got as far as the door … almost.
‘Mister!’
The shout sang out clear enough to stop most of the talk inside the saloon and them as carried on talking didn’t do so for very long.
‘Mister! Don’t you turn your back on me!’
A cold shiver ran the length of Hawk’s spine. His guts churned over, turned by a cold hand. The short hairs at the back of his neck were on end.
‘Come round slow an’ keep them hands well away from your belt!’
Hawk cursed beneath his breath and turned the way he was told.
The kid had moved out into the middle of the floor, a space around him some dozen feet in every direction. He’d pulled back the sides of the old coat and that revealed a nice new Colt .45 tucked down into the left side of his belt, the butt angled towards his right hand. The hand itself was maybe six inches above the pistol grip, the fingers curled and waiting to make their draw. It was absolutely steady.
The kid’s eyes were fixed on Hawk’s face.
‘You ain’t gonna walk out on me!’ he snarled.
‘I don’t know you.’ Hawk’s voice was flat and firm, emotionless.
‘You’re walkin’ out!’
‘I’m through for the night.’
The kid giggled; the sound so strange it was almost shocking. ‘That’s right enough. You’re through. Through.’
Hawk shook his head. ‘You don’t know me. You got the wrong feller.’
And he went to turn away.
The kid bit down into his lower lip and his hand strained even closer to the new Colt.
Colt and boots, Hawk thought: he’s stolen the Colt and boots.
‘Don’t do it! Don’t do it!’
‘Do what?’
‘Turn away from me!’ the kid screamed.
Anxious faces looked at one another across the crowd. The nearest barman to where the boy was standing shuffled along a little as if maybe he had a sawn-off stashed out of sight. Hawk wondered what were the chances of the sheriff coming back in time, and he didn’t think they were very good.
‘I told you, kid, I ain’t got no business with you. I never clapped eyes on you before. I’m goin’ to turn in an’ there’s nothin’ you can do to stop me.’
The kid giggled, high and weird.
Hawk made another attempt to move away.
‘No!’
His fingers were touching the Colt grip now, barely touching it, grazing the almost-new surface.
‘Kid! For Christ’s sake!’ called someone from near the back of the room.
‘Let it alone, son,’ advised somebody else.
Hawk knew the boy wasn’t going to let it alone. Not now that he’d pushed as hard as he had in front of so many people. Not now that he’d worked himself up to it, got his nerves riding that well-honed edge from which there was only one way down. Hawk prayed that he was wrong: but he didn’t think his prayer stood a chance of being heard in the depths of hell.
Hawk moved his hands well away from his body, spreading them out to either side.
He said: ‘For the last time, I got no quarrel with you. I ain’t got no call to use my gun. I want everyone here to know that. See it … Now let it be.’
He stared at the kid and the kid stared back at him.
Both of them knew his words were just so much wasted noise on the evening wind.
Outside the light from the lantern flickered and swung.
Inside everyone held their breath.
If there was a sawn-off under the bar, the barkeep wasn’t about to use it.
‘Kid,’ said Hawk shaking his head almost sadly, ‘you don’t know me.’
‘I know you,’ the kid answered with a high-pitched laugh. ‘I know you. You’re the one they all step aside for. The one they touch their hats to, and lower their voices for, and make sure they don’t cross. You’re the one they all look at when you walk into a place, and think: I hope he ain’t come for me.’ He giggled and the side of his mouth twisted up, but his eyes didn’t leave Hawk’s face and his gun hand didn’t waver. ‘You’re a bounty hunter, that’s what you are. You’re a gunman. A killer!’
Hawk didn’t say anything: didn’t move a muscle.
‘Ain’t that right? A killer.’
‘If you say so. You’re the one doin’ all the talkin’.’
‘It’s true.’
‘Maybe,’ shrugged Hawk lazily.
‘Killer!’
Hawk’s tongue wet the edges of his mouth; he felt as dry as he had when he first rode into town. ‘You got some kinda grudge against me? This somethin’ personal? ’Cause if it is, you best spell it out here an’ now in front of all these folk. ‘An’ if it ain’t, then you’re just runnin’ off at the mouth.’
The kid smiled lop-sided and said nothing.
‘You got anythin’ against me?’ Hawk demanded, pointing his index finger at him.
The kid stuck his head to one side and giggled. The sound of that giggle was getting to Hawk’s nerves.
‘Then all you’re doin’ is tryin’ to earn yourself a reputation.’ Hawk’s voice took on a savage edge. ‘You’re a punk kid like any other, an’ you think if you drop me everyone’s gonna look up to you an’ think you’re one hell of a man.’ He shook his head. ‘Well, I tell you this: even if you did strike lucky, you’d still be a punk kid. Nothin’. Nothin’ but trash!’
The boy’s upper lip curled up over his teeth and a nasty hissing sound emitted from his mouth. At least he wasn’t giggling any more.
‘I’ve had enough of this,’ snarled Hawk. ‘I’m goin’ to turn my back on you and walk through that door. It’s what I should have done a long time ago.’
He stared at the boy for a few seconds more and then slowly and deliberately let his arms fall straight to his sides and turned towards the double doors that led to the street.
Nothing happened.
Nothing.
Still the hairs at the back of his neck prickled and still his stomach felt like it was tangled up in ice.
He took the first step towards the door.
The second.
‘Look out!’
The warning shout came as he sensed rather than heard the kid make his move. Most of those watching swore afterwards that Hawk had begun to spin round before the voice called out a warning.
He ducked as he swung, throwing out his left arm sideways to give him balance and letting his right hand dive for the butt of the Colt Frontier the way it instinctively did.
The kid was pulling the stolen pistol clear, and his tongue was poking out between his teeth, his mouth was open wide.
His thumb worked the hammer back and his teeth began to bite down into the flesh of his tongue.
Hawk’s hand blurred and then it was still.
The kid’s gun was still moving.
Blood bubbled from his tongue where his teeth had bitten deep.
Hawk’s finger squeezed back against the trigger.
The .45 caliber slug smashed into the boy’s chest and broke his breast bone asunder. It tore through him close to the heart and plowed out at the rear, splintering bone in its path. Blood and fiber sprayed across the floor and flecked the clothes of those who were standing over towards the bar.
Hawk brought back the hammer and waited.
The kid’s head jerked forwards and he dropped to his knees with a cracking sound that made most folk watching wince.
His teeth had bitten through the first quarter-inch of his tongue and it slithered over the boards in front of him.
Pink blood bubbled from his mouth.
The new Colt slid slowly from his hand and hit the floor.
A giggle broke from his mouth and became stifled in more blood.
Hawk leveled the pistol at the kid’s head, but it wasn’t necessary.
The boy began to pitch forwards slowly, so slowly that it seemed as though some unseen string was lowering him down inch by inch. After a few moments the string snapped. His face smacked against the boards with a sickening crack. For a second or two he stayed like that, folded over in half, then he collapsed to the side.
No one moved: no one except Hawk.
Hawk turned him over with his boot until he could see both his face and the hole in the center of his chest. The boy’s arms twitched some, and one of his boot heels made a quick drumming sound against the floor.
Hawk shook his head: new boots, new gun.
New corpse.
He released the hammer on his Colt Frontier and that was a signal for everyone to start talking at once, moving closer, those at the back craning their necks to get a better look at the body.
Hawk slid the gun down into his holster and turned away.
Byron Clegett was standing just inside the doorway and he had a shotgun resting across his folded arms. He didn’t look as if he was in a hurry to use it. The expression on his face was one of resignation — resignation and a sense of waste.
He heaved a sigh and stepped down through the crowd to where Hawk was standing.
‘Didn’t give you any choice, huh?’
Hawk looked straight at the lawman. ‘None at all.’
‘You didn’t know him?’
Hawk shook his head. ‘Never saw him before.’
Clegett went and looked down at the body. Blood was still running easily, freely from underneath it. The sheriff squatted down and lifted the boy’s head, stared at the face as if trying to put a name to it. Slowly, carefully, he let it rest back on the ground.
‘Shift him out of here,’ Clegett said, pointing at the nearest group of men. ‘Get him over to the doc’s for now. We’ll see about burying him come morning.’
Hawk waited for the sheriff to return, for the final round of questions, the witnesses, the whole business that he knew he would have to go through.
It didn’t take long.
Everyone agreed that he hadn’t had any option, that he’d done his best to talk the boy out of going for his gun, but when he had …
And no one knew the kid. Oh, a few had seen him around the past couple of days, but nothing more than that. The sheriff couldn’t even find anyone who’d admit to having spoken to him. And if he’d stolen those boots and that fateful gun here in Hollow Creek, the owner was keeping mighty silent about the fact.
Eventually there was nothing for Hawk to do but head back to his bed. All the energy had somehow gone out of him, the adrenalin had long since ceased to pump round his veins. When he got back to the Brill place, Esther was standing in the hallway with an expression in her eyes that made it clear she’d heard what had gone down.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said as he paused at the foot of the stairs. ‘I know it wasn’t your fault.’
For a moment, her hand touched the top of his shoulder, soft and consoling but nothing more.
‘Yeah,’ Hawk nodded. ‘Yeah, thanks.’
She moved her hand and he went on up to bed.
Chapter Six
ESTHER BRILL HAD breakfast sizzling on the stove before the cock had stopped flapping its wings on the yard fence; coffee was simmering in the pot. She was wearing an apricot robe with a fur trimming and her hair didn’t look as though it had been slept on. She was still a mighty attractive woman, even at that hour of the morning.
‘I figured you’d be wantin’ to ride out early.’
‘Thanks.’
Hawk sat down and waited as the oval plate was slipped in front of him, the cup of coffee set close by his right hand.
‘Seems like no one knew who he was.’
Hawk nodded. ‘Seems that way.’
He hadn’t slept well. His thoughts hadn’t let him alone, breaking in through his dreams: warning shouts that made him sweat and turn, fingers clawing for his gun; a dozen youngsters facing him in the saloon, in the street. All of them different, all of them looking like the kid who’d tried to slug him back in Rose City, the one who’d called him out down there in the smoky interior where he’d died. Kids without names who wanted to get themselves a reputation cheap: kids who thought he was too big for his boots and wanted taking down to normal size. Kids who had hate and envy in their scared eyes. Whose fingers shook but whose determination wouldn’t let them go.
Hawk had dreamed of them all night, battalions of them.
His hand, as it circled the cup of coffee, shook just a little.
If Esther Brill noticed, she gave no sign. She could tell her visitor was in no mood for idle chatter. One thing she had to say might be worth saying. She waited until Hawk was more or less through.
‘Feller was through here just before you came,’ she said. ‘He was down from north of here. Close by where the Hakensack runs into the Little North River. Said there’s a rancher up there name of Ventura. Runs the Lazy V. He’s looking for a man … man with a gun and lots of time.’
She shook her head to Hawk’s unspoken question.
‘I don’t know what for. Nor did he—or if he did, he wasn’t saying. But it seemed like he was willing to pay good money for the right man.’ She made a small concession towards a smile. ‘Thought I’d pass it on, for what it was worth.’
Hawk set down his cup and without asking she refilled it.
‘This Ventura … you know what kind of man he is?’
‘He’s fair. That’s what I’ve heard. He’s fair an’ he owns a lot of land. Good stock. That’s all I know.’
Hawk cradled his warm cup and thought about it. He was figuring on riding that way anyhow—as much as he was figuring on doing anything definite. So why not the Lazy V?
‘If you’re passing through this way again …’ Esther Brill smiled at him with her eyes in a way that said things didn’t work out this time exactly how I planned.
‘Sure,’ nodded Hawk. ‘I’ll stop by.’
‘Be sure you do.’
When Hawk got up into the saddle of the sorrel mare, Esther Brill was gone from sight. She was, Hawk thought, some woman. Maybe it wouldn’t prove too difficult to ride by some time … might even prove to be real easy. The first smile of the day was teasing the corners of his mouth as he touched the spurs to the horse and rocked a little in the saddle.
Out past the edge of town, where the ground was hard and spare a grizzled man with a shovel was preparing to dig an unmarked grave. This side of noon, they’d throw down into it the body of the boy Hawk had killed.
The Lazy V was on good land. The grass swayed around the sorrel’s legs as Hawk rode through, cutting a swathe across the pasture. The ranch house itself was set amongst a circle of cottonwood and blade oak, a single-story building with smoke drifting up from the chimney and chickens scratching the dirt all around a wide, square porch that took up the eastern side. Across to the right were a high barn and a bunkhouse, and between them was the corral. Some dozen and a half horses stood inside. Four or five more animals were saddled and tethered, ready to ride.
The man who swung down from the corral fence and walked towards Hawk was around thirty years of age. He had scuffed leather gloves on his hands, the ends turned back the way a wrangler often did. He was wearing a vest over his blue shirt, loose work pants and boots that looked old and comfortable. He wasn’t wearing a gun.
‘Stranger.’
Hawk touched his fingers to the underside of his hat brim. ‘Your place?’
The man shook his head. ‘Wish it was. Name’s Cavanagh. I’m ramrod here. Man you’re looking for’s Ventura. Lee Ventura.’
‘He around?’
Cavanagh pointed towards the house. ‘Try the door off the porch. He’ll be there somewhere. Said something ’bout papers he had to work on.’ The wrangler grinned almost sheepishly. ‘Stuff I don’t understand.’
