Appaloosa

41

In the morning, Cole and I walked down to the marshal’s office and found Russell Shelton sitting at a desk in front of the single jail cell, wearing a marshal’s badge.

“Russ,” Cole said.

“Virgil,” Russell said, “Everett.”

“Didn’t know you worked here,” I said.

“It’s family,” Russell said. “Ring ’n me ’n Mackie sorta take turns at it.”

“We’re here looking for our prisoner,” Cole said.

“Got no prisoners here, Virgil.”

Cole nodded.

“I’m guessing you ain’t go

“You really ain’t a marshal here,” Russell said. “You’re only a marshal in Appaloosa.”

“You know where I can find Bragg?”

“He’s with Ring,” Russell said, “and Mackie.”

“And where would they be?” Cole said.

“I got to tell you boys,” Russell said. “I got nothin’ against either one of you. And I got a good feelin’ about how you helped us out with them Kiowas.”

“Where’s Bragg?” Cole said.

“I’m go

“Yep. Where are they?”

“Ring says he don’t want this thing to drag on. Him and Mackie and Bragg’ll be at the stockyards at two forty-one today by the depot clock. I’ll be there, too.”

“See you there,” Cole said, and turned and walked out of the office.

I stayed a minute.

“You got them boots for Allie,” I said.

Russell nodded. I reached over the desk and we shook hands.

“Be better you boys went on back to Appaloosa,” Russell said.

“I know,” I said, and followed Cole out of the office.

He was leaning his backside against a hitching rail, looking at the street. The sky was dark with clouds.

“Might as well walk down there, get the lay of the land,” he said.

“Might as well.”

We walked the dirt street toward the stockyards. It was a shabby town, shacks mostly, some tents. Only real buildings were the hotel and the railroad station. Even the bank looked kind of flimsy.

“They could put some people behind some of these shacks,” I said. “Try to pick us off while we’re walking to the yards.”

Cole shook his head.

“Sheltons’ll come straight at us,” he said.

“Bragg?” I said.

“We’ll need to keep an eye out for Bragg,” Cole said.

The stock pens were mostly empty. A couple dozen white-faced steers jostled each other in the pen nearest the station. There were two stockmen leaning on a rail, chewing tobacco and watching them. A windmill turned at the far end of the yards, pumping water into the drinking troughs. Beside it was a weathered, gap-sided feed shed, raw boards nailed up and bleached by sun.

“We’ll be coming from here,” Cole said. “Sheltons’ll be there, by the shed.”

“How do you know,” I said.

“Where I’d be. If they don’t knock us down with the first volley, they can get behind it,” Cole said.

He looked at the sky.

“Sun ain’t go

“Probably go

Cole paid no attention.

“They’ll all have Colts,” he said, “and long guns. There’ll be a shotgun, probably Mackie.”

We walked past the stock pens. There was some wind to go with the dark sky. It spun the windmill hard and stirred little dust whirls in front of us as we walked. We stopped at the stock pens. The two stockmen paid us no attention. They kept on talking, staring at the cattle, spitting tobacco juice carefully downwind.

“We come at ’em this way,” Cole said, “we can keep the cattle between us and them until we’re close.”

The wind had picked up. It was whirling the dust now up past eye level, and pushing the tumbleweed along pretty briskly.

“Today be a good day to die?” I said.

“We ain’t go

“Good to know,” I said.

Cole didn’t say anything. He was looking at everything, walking through the fight as if he had already seen the rehearsal. He stopped.

“We’ll be here when it starts,” he said. “They’ll be there. They’ll be spread out. When it happens, I’ll look for Ring. You look for Mackie. I don’t know how good Russell is, but I do know how good the other two are.”

“Bragg?” I said.

“We shoot him last,” Cole said. “Bragg’s probably a good shooter. Probably killed some people. But I don’t know if he can stand his ground.”

“You ’n me are go

“If Bragg stands. Otherwise, three.”

“Well, I guess if we don’t,” I said, “we’ll never know it.”

“Probably not,” Cole said.

“So I guess it don’t matter too much,” I said.

“Probably doesn’t,” Cole said.

The wind pushed a tumbleweed past us toward the shed. It bounced a little as it moved across the wagon ruts. I could taste rain on the wind, though none had fallen.

“We’ll get to here,” Cole said, “without nobody’s fired, ’cause the cows are in the way. So from here, just past this corner post, we go right at ’em and we go fast. I’ll take Ring first, you look for Mackie. And we’ll see what develops.”

I looked at the clock on the train station steeple. It read 12:23.

“I could use some coffee,” Cole said.

And we walked back toward the hotel, with the wind whipping around us, trying to take our hats.

42

Cole and I were drinking coffee at the hotel. Allie came and sat with us. She didn’t have much to say. She seemed somehow smaller than she usually was.

“We go up against Russell,” I said to Cole, “we’re going up against the law in this town.”

“We’re the law in our town,” Cole said.

Cole held his coffee cup in both hands, his elbows on the table.

“Probably deputize Ring and Mackie.”

“Probably,” Cole said.

We were quiet. Cole sipped his coffee, still with his elbows on the table, still with the cup in both hands. He didn’t look at Allie.

“Makes the law thing a little confusin’,” I said.

Cole nodded and didn’t answer.

“Guess it’s best not to worry about that right now,” I said.

“He took my prisoner. He broke the law in my town,” Cole said.

Allie sat very still, like a child allowed to sit with the adults. Her hands were folded in her lap. She sat straight in her chair, her feet close together. The hotelkeeper’s wife came and poured us some more. Cole had laid his big pocket watch on the table. It showed one o’clock.

“Aren’t either of you afraid?” Allie said.

Cole looked startled.

“Afraid?”

“Yes.” Allie’s voice seemed as small as she did. “Aren’t you afraid that you’ll be killed?”

Cole frowned a little and stared out past Allie through the hotel door at the street for a little while.

“I don’t know, Allie,” he said after a while. “I been doing this a long time. Maybe I am. But I guess I don’t think about it much.”

He looked at me.

“You ever think about it, Everett?”

“Sure.”

“You scared?”

“Sure.”

“Probably a good thing,” Cole said. “Makes you a little quicker.”

I nodded.

“I’m scared all the time,” Allie said.

“Of what?” Cole said.

“Everything.”

“Like what?”

“Like being alone, or being with the wrong man, having no money, no place to live. If I don’t have a man, what am I supposed to do?”

“You got an answer for that, Everett?”

“You could play the piano at the Boston House,” I said.

“For the rest of my life?”

“I’ll look out for you,” Cole said.

“For how long?”

“Long as you need.”

“Virgil, you could be dead in an hour.”

Cole shook his head.

“Let’s go back to Appaloosa right now,” Allie said.

“Got to finish this thing up with Ring Shelton,” Cole said.

“There’s four of them.”