Sliphammer

“What favor?”

McKesson’s smile, again, was colder than it should have been. He said, “I’d have thought you’d have figured that out by now. This is a mining state-the men who own the mines pretty much control the politics. It’s for sure they control the governor’s office. You can’t arrest Earp unless Governor Pitkin signs the extradition papers. Now do you see? Earp’s friends are trying to persuade the Governor not to sign the extradition papers.”

Tree’s pipe had gone out; he found a match and lit it. When he looked at the sheriff, the long-clawed hands were spread in a gesture that meant, So there it is. McKesson’s smile was small and almost apologetic. “Friends,” McKesson said, “and politics. Earp stays in town to intimidate the agitators, and in return, the owners protect him against extradition.”

“You think they’ll persuade the Governor not to sign?”

“Who knows? My private opinion is it’s a tossup. But whatever happens in Denver, your problem’s right here in Gu

McKesson had finished his coffee. Now he stood up. “So you see the whole city’s united against you. Regardless of what happens in Denver, you haven’t got a chance.”

Tree said, “What about you?”

“Me?”

“If the Governor signs the extradition, where does that put you?”

“In a rather uncomfortable spot, I’m afraid. I’m a county official, of course, not a state employee, so there’s some question whether I’d be bounden to obey instructions from Denver unless martial law was declared.”

Without comment, Tree stood up and knocked the bowl of his pipe into his hand. He stooped over the spittoon to dump ash into it, pocketed the pipe and rubbed his hands. He gave McKesson a dry look.

McKesson said, “Don’t make the mistake of thinking I’m a coward.”

“What word would you prefer?”

For the first time, McKesson flushed. But he regained composure quickly; he said, “Realist. I prefer realist. I happen to know which side my job’s buttered on. I’m a hired hand, you know, and if you eat a man’s bread then you’re obliged to sing his songs.”

“Thanks,” Tree said, “for telling me where you stand.” The tone, if not the words, was without sarcasm.

“Think nothing of it.”

“I will,” Tree replied, and saw it take effect; he added, “Just one other thing.”

“Name it. I’m always anxious to be of service to a friend.”

“Aeah. If I have to arrest him will you try to stop me?”

McKesson’s pitted face was too animated ever to be blank, but he held it now in stern, guarded repose. “Probably not. I’ll have to wait and see.”

Tree tugged his hat down, feeling dismal; he said, “Listen, I’ll fight you too if I have to.”

“Will you, now. You’re talking as if you had a chance of wi

“No point in acting as if I’d already lost.” Tree managed a cool smile.

“You have, you know,” McKesson breathed. “You can only get killed.”

“You can’t always go by that.” Tree went outside into the morning sun and heard the screen door slap shut behind him. He squinted. The brilliant light was not in keeping with his bleak mood. Belly churning, he went up the street.

Four

As he traveled the one-block distance between the sheriff’s office and his hotel, he was thinking darkly of the spare slipham-mer six-gun and holster packed away in his carpetbag. The way things shaped up, it looked as if he would need it: any time gunplay moved from remote possibility to likely probability, a sensible man needed two guns. Not that anybody in his right mind would use both guns at once, or be likely to need all that firepower-even case-hardened killers admitted that if you couldn’t do it with five or six bullets you probably couldn’t do it at all. But guns, even the most finely tuned and smithed guns, were never wholly reliable. You never knew when a vital spring would break, or a cartridge misfire, or a firing pin crystallize and shatter.

As he turned into the narrow lobby he became caustic with himself: Was this a legitimate errand, or was it just-a way to postpone meeting Wyatt Earp? Was he scared of Earp? Or was it that he cherished certain illusions about a legendary man and feared Wyatt Earp in the flesh wouldn’t live up to them? Or was it simply that he didn’t like this job and didn’t want to do it? If Stillwell had gone after my brother, he thought. Was it justice to arrest Earp? He couldn’t help remembering what he had said to his half brother Rafe: Fair my ass. It was a job.

He reached the back of the corridor and fumbled the room key out of his pocket, thinking maybe Earp’s influential friends would solve his problem by quashing the extradition. In the meantime, he reasoned, was there any reason why he should’hurry to meet Earp?

The key was within an inch of the lock when a corner of his vision registered warning in his mind. Alerted, he froze. The nail was gone from the doorjamb.

His left hand palmed the sliphammer gun. He moved to one side of the door and reached out to thumb the latch. The door wasn’t locked; it rode open, squeaking a little with a sappy protest of green wood. He flattened his back against the outside wall, gun up, holding his breath. Chances were there was nobody inside-somebody had searched the room, maybe, and gone…

He wheeled inside, crouching low, gun fisted tight. When the intruder fired the bullet went over his head.

Tree’s eyes registered the lancing bloom of muzzle flame and not much else: the intruder was in the dark corner. Tree shot twice, very fast; the afterglow was his aiming point.

The man came walking out of the corner as if on stilts, tripped and fell across the bed, and rolled off, leaving a red smear on the blanket. When he hit the floor his left hand opened and a tenpe

Tree was down on one knee; he got up and strode forward and kicked the gun out of the man’s fist, and then had a look at the man.

The eyes were open, losing focus. It was the same man he had seen talking to McKesson-the man who had pointed him out to McKesson. Black bile formed in his throat; he wiped his mouth with the back of his sleeve and laid his fingers along the man’s ski

Ears still ringing, Tree walked down the hall to the lobby. He still had the gun in his fist. The clerk, alarmed by the noise, stared at him and trembled.

Tree said, “Get McKesson and bring him back here.”

Swallowing, voiceless, the clerk nodded in spasms and ran flapping out the door.

Tree went back to the room, stepped across the body, and opened his carpetbag. He took out the spare gun and threaded the holster onto his gunbelt; he was buckling the rig around his hips when McKesson came in, red-faced and out of breath.

McKesson’s boot heels skidded when he came to a stop. He wore a gun, but it was holstered. His white hair was awry.

“For crying out loud,” McKesson said helplessly.

Tree bent down and picked up the intruder’s gun; glanced at it and handed it to McKesson. “One thing before you start making a speech. That’s a. 38. You can tell he fired it by the smell, and you’ll find the bullet in the wall out there in the hall. He was waiting back in that corner when I opened the door.”

McKesson took it all in his eyes, without moving from his stance in the doorway. When he spoke, he was surprisingly crisp: “Why did he miss?”

“He telegraphed. I came in low and he shot over my head.”