“Did it!” he said. “They are going to make it, by God! Came right through them, and the best thing she could’ve done, too.”
The buggy began moving more swiftly now, out of the press; it disappeared into the darkness up Main Street.
“Taking him to the General Peach,” someone commented calmly. “Well, they’ll never bust over her.”
“Where’s Blaisedell?”
“He just went inside the jail. He’s all right, looked like.”
“He held them long enough for her to get Morgan out. Slick!”
“I’d a lot rather seen him cut a few of them down.”
Miners stood in uncertain groups in the street. The deputies were shooing them off the boardwalk. Two of them carried off the miner who had been shot. Schroeder had a long, bloody cut over one eye. Gannon retrieved Blaisedell’s black hat from a miner who had picked it up.
Mosbie climbed down from the tie rail. “What the hell did Blaisedell let those sons of bitches run over him for?” he said to Wheeler. “That’s what I don’t see. God damn it to hell.”
Nick Grain appeared beside Wheeler. “Did you see him get run over, Fred?” he cried, in an excited voice. “They sure called his bluff.”
“Shut up!” Mosbie said. He caught Grain by his shirt collar. “Shut up! You push-face cow-turd of a butcher! Shut up!” He flung Grain away from him, and Grain disappeared hurriedly into the crowd.
“I hate that stupid asinine flap-mouth son of a bitch,” Mosbie said. He and Wheeler started back along the boardwalk with the others. The men around them were talking in low tones; one of them laughed and Mosbie glared at him.
Groups of men stood in the street, looking toward the jail, or up toward the General Peach where the buggy had gone. The miners were heading into the saloons, or congregating along the boardwalks.
Wheeler and Mosbie walked on east in the deep shadow under the arcade, crossed Broadway, and continued up to Grant Street, where they joined a group standing by the side of the Feed and Grain Barn. All the windows were lighted in the General Peach. The buggy stood in front, the fat bay scratching her neck against the hitching post. Eight or ten miners stood near the buggy, and the crippled miner, Tittle, was watching them from the porch with a rifle in his hands.
“The Doc’s buggy,” someone commented.
“Not a one to try and stop her!” Paul Skinner said. “Not a one!”
“There’s a woman with more guts than any man I know.”
“Shame to see them bust over Blaisedell,” said another.
“Should’ve shot one for himself like Carl did.”
“I heard Carl didn’t go to. The stupid muck got hold of his shotgun and yanked on it, and Carl’s finger on the trigger.”
“Looks like maybe Blaisedell’s a human being like the rest of us though,” another man said. Mosbie started toward him, but Wheeler grasped his arm.
“There comes Curley Burne,” someone whispered.
Curley Burne came across Grant Street toward them with the light from the General Peach gleaming on his black curls.
“Curley,” someone said, and several others also greeted him.
“Big night, boys,” Curley said. “You boys fun it like this every night in Warlock?”
There was some laughter. “Where’s those Regulators of MacDonald’s, Curley?” a man drawled from the shadow of the adobe wall. “Just when we needed those Regulators bad they didn’t show for beans.”
“Warlock’s too calky for them,” Curley said. “Curl a man’s hair just to walk down the street here.” He indicated his own head with a sweep of his hand, and there was more laughter.
“There’s Blaisedell.”
They all fell silent. Blaisedell rounded the corner; he limped a little as he walked down toward the General Peach. As he mounted the porch past Tittle he held to the hand rail, and, in the light there, he did not look so tall. The front door closed behind him with a hollow whack.
“The marshal got himself some chewed up tonight,” Curley Burne said.
Wheeler gripped Mosbie’s arm, but Mosbie pulled away with a curse. “Go tell it to Abe McQuown, Curley!” he said thickly. “Maybe it will bring him out of his hole.”
“Who said that?” Curley said.
Mosbie crouched a little. “I said it!”
“Hold off now!” Paul Skinner said. “Hold off! Curley, you leave be! Moss!” Wheeler stepped between Curley and Mosbie.
“You shouldn’t have said it, Moss,” Curley said, and his voice was as thick as Mosbie’s.
“I’ll say it again!”
“Take it and forget it, Curley,” a voice said from the darkness. “He has got friends here and you haven’t.”
“We are pretty sick of cowboys up here,” another man said.
Curley glanced toward the two who had spoken, looked past Wheeler at Mosbie, shrugged, and turned away. His hat swung across his back as he disappeared into the darkness.
“Soooooo-boy!” Wheeler said. “He is no man to mess with, Moss!”
“I am no man to mess with tonight either,” Mosbie said.
Behind him someone laughed a little, relievedly.
“God damn it to hell!” Mosbie said, and kicked in fury and frustration at the dust.
34. GANNON PUTS DOWN HIS NAME
I
GANNON leaned limply against the cell door, pressing a hand to his ribs. Pike Skinner and Peter Bacon were hunkered down with their backs to the wall opposite him, Pike with a bloody ear over which he kept cupping the palm of his hand, Peter supporting himself on the shotgun. Tim French had helped Hasty, who had been badly shaken up, home to bed.
“Nothing to do now,” Carl said. He sat at the table brushing his hand back over his graying, thinning, sweat-tangled hair. “It is off our back anyhow. Blaisedell is probably right, there is less chance of trouble if we stay away from the General Peach.” He sat looking down at the crooked trigger finger of his right hand.
Gannon slowly seated himself in the chair beside the cell door, holding his breath at the sudden ache in his ribs.
“Damn them,” Carl said, without heat. “Looked like they might’ve saved that one I shot. But they had to let him bleed it out and then tramp what was left of him. Course, any man that’s fool enough to give a jerk on a gun barrel when it’s pointed right at him and cocked, and your finger—”
“Sure, Horse,” Peter said. “None of your doing.”
“Well, he held them off long enough for Miss Jessie to get Morgan out the back,” Carl said. “What we was after, after all — save a lynching.”
“Yes,” Gannon said, and Peter Bacon glanced up at him and nodded.
“I guess he did pure right not shooting,” Peter said. “But that didn’t make it a better thing to see.”
“I admire to see a woman cool as Miss Jessie was,” Carl said. He straightened and stretched. “You boys go home and get some sleep. This deputy’s office is just about to close up for the night.”
Pike said, “I’m going out and drink some of the meanness out of me.”
“You stay out of scrapes with jacks, now!” Carl said. “I don’t want anything more to mess with tonight. If I don’t get some rest for my old bones I am going to have to lay right down and die.”
“’Night,” Peter said, rising; he nodded to Carl and Gannon, and he and Pike went outside into the darkness.
Carl went over and kicked at the broken glass on the floor, and inspected the broken latch of the door. “You suppose the Citizens’ Committee’ll pay for fixing these? Place could fall down for all of Keller. All I asked him for here was a new sign, but I guess I am not going to get it unless I pay for it myself.” Blood had scabbed over the long scratch above his right eye, and run and crusted on his cheek. “Bad night,” he said, in a sad voice. “Let’s close up, Johnny.”