“Howdy, Preacher,” said the man.
“Hello, Hurley,” said Preacher gravely.
Hurley’s eyes fastened on Packard. “If you’re Packard,” he said, “I got to talk to you.”
“Talk away,” said Packard.
Swiftly the man stepped into the room, slammed the door behind him, stood with his back against it.
“You’d better hit the trail,” said Hurley. “Stover’s on the prod.”
“Who’s Stover?”
“Stover,” explained Preacher Page, “is Randall’s top-notch gun-hand. Deadly shot, I’m told.”
“So am I,” snapped Packard.
Hurley studied Packard quietly. “Just how good a shot?” he asked.
“Good enough for Stover,” Packard told him. “Good enough for any of the two-bit gunmen who hanker for my blood. Learned it in a circus. Fellow rode ahead of me and threw up glass balls, fast. I shot them in the air.”
“You should have stayed with the circus.”
“I was agreeable,” said Packard. “But they didn’t keep me.”
Hurley chewed at the corner of his mustache. “Found out who you were, huh?”
“That’s right,” said Packard. He stared at the man, a tight, grim-lipped stare. “How come you know?” he asked.
“I rode with your daddy,” said Hurley. “Was with him when he died. Would know you anywhere. At that time he looked just like you do now.”
Hurley looked at Page. “One word of this, Preacher,” he warned, “and I personally will plumb tie you into knots.”
“Gentlemen,” said Page, “I haven’t heard a thing.”
Hurley opened the door, asked: “How about it, kid?”
Packard holstered his gun. “Just point out this Stover to me.”
The board walks were frosty beneath their boots as Packard and Hurley climbed the steps that led to the porch of the Crystal Palace. Inside the lights still burned and a dawdling swamper wielded a broom. Back of the bar the bartender was yawning and cleaning up the glassware. A drunk was sleeping it off at a table in the corner.
Hurley led the way across the room toward a door that led into the back. The swamper went on sweeping and the bartender took no notice of them. The drunk snored and sputtered in his sleep, thrashing his arms on the table top.
Packard felt the hair stir at the base of his neck. There was something wrong, he knew. Nothing he could put his finger on, but something that was wrong. The way the swamper went on sweeping, the way the barkeeper yawned and went on polishing his glasses. Paying no attention to them. Almost as if they might have been expecting them.
“Hurley,” said Packard. “Hurley, there’s something …”
A faint sound warned him, the whispery creak of the swinging doors up front. Like a cat, he whirled, guns already coming out.
In the doorway stood a man, a man whose pistoning arms were a blur of motion, whose eyes were gimlets of steel shining in the light. Steel, like the gleam of light on glass balls spinning in the sunshine.
The man’s guns were clear of leather and were swinging up and, behind him, the batwing doors swung gently to and fro, almost robbed of motion, but still swinging.
Flame exploded in Packard’s hands, the blasting flame of jumping guns that bucked and hammered, filled the room to bursting with their roar.
The man in front of the batwing doors was slammed through them, hurled backward through them as if someone had grasped and hurled him with tremendous force. One of his guns was still in his hand, but the other spun from his fingers and skidded through the sawdust.
And then the doors were swinging violently, flapping to and fro and from under them protruded two boots, toes pointing toward the ceiling.
The barkeep stood with both hands spread upon the bar, amazement on his face. “I be damned,” he said. “I be double-damned.”
The swamper leaned upon his broom and stared. The drunk had come alive and was trying to burrow into the sawdust underneath his table.
The door in the back flung open and Randall stroke out. He stopped, staring at the boots, at the flapping doors.
Then, slowly, his gaze switched to Packard and Packard raised his guns.
“You next?” asked Packard.
Randall simply stared.
“By rights,” said Hurley, coldly, “he’d ought to give it to you. You went and double-crossed us. It was supposed to be a fair fight.”
Randall shrugged. “What difference does it make? Packard, here, won out.”
“Four shots,” said the bartender. “Four shots and every one dead center. Four shots before Stover hit the floor.”
“What’s going on here?” asked Packard coldly. “You gentlemen better start to talk.”
Randall laughed shortly. “Hell,” he said, “no use of getting riled. Packard, you just killed yourself a job.”
“A job?”
“Sure, Stover’s job. I’ll need a man to take his place.”
“I told you the kid had the right stuff in him. Just like his old man,” Hurley told Randall.
“I don’t want the stinking job,” said Packard.
Packard turned on his heel and walked away. Through the silence of the room he heard the rasp of the swamper’s broom, the still frightened gulping of the drunken man. At the door, he pushed the batwings wide and walked around the body of the man who’d tried to shoot him in the back.
Outside the air was crisp and new with the coming of the day. The stars were paling and Packard suddenly realized that he was sleepy and hungry.
The frost crunched crisply underfoot as he strode down the walk toward the hotel and suddenly his head felt light and giddy and the throb took up again … the throb of his scalp where the bottle had landed.
He walked slowly past the livery stable, where a smoky lantern burned redly in the office window. Out of the shadows of the alleyway between the stable and hotel a voice hissed at him.
Startled, Packard’s right hand plunged for his gun, but the voice said: “Take it easy, Packard. I’m a friend of yours.”
Hand still on the gunbutt, Packard stepped into the dim alleyway, saw the face of the man before him. A moonlike face, puffy and dissolute, with blubbery lips.
“Craig is the name,” said moonface. “Cardway said you would be coming.”
“Cardway’s dead,” snapped Packard. “I saw him, hanging in a tree. What was Cardway to you?”
Craig stepped closer. “We can get along without him, Packard. Just the two of us to split.”
Packard frowned. “What about this man that Cardway killed?”
“Name of Jett,” said Craig. “One of the express office guards. Same as I am.”
“But why did Cardway kill him?”
The flabby face twisted impatiently in the shadow. “Jett was in with the Randall crowd. He heard us talking.”
Packard’s hand shot out, grasped the man’s vest, twisted it tight and drew him close. “Talk sense,” he snarled. “What has Randall got to do with it?”
Craig wriggled. “Didn’t Cardway tell you?”
“Not a word,” said Packard. “Just wrote to me and said that I should come. Said there was a good thing here.”
“It’s the gold,” wheezed Craig. “Ready for shipment. Randall’s gang holds up the stages. Easier and safer than holding up the office.”
“This Jett was Randall’s man, you say. Tipped him off when a big shipment was on hand.”
Craig nodded vigorously. “You catch on quick. Cardway said you would. Said your dad …”