I didn’t answer.
“He’s betting right into me.”
“He knows the game,” I said.
McGarron leaned forward. Archer had been sitting on my left. McGarron looked hard at me. “What has he got, Ralph?”
I stared at McGarron. “Are you kidding?”
The man was drunk. Pig-drunk, but under enough control to know what he was doing. He smiled, and it was a peculiarly womanish smile. “Ralphie, how do you know who it is that I’m wondering about? You want the job?”
“I don’t want it that bad, McGarron. I don’t want any job that bad.”
He could see I meant it, and I could almost hear his mind ticking over. He leaned back and grinned expansively. “And we wouldn’t want any man working for us who’d do a thing like that, Ralph. Jus’ a test. Jus’ a li’l test.”
Archer came back in, his eyes watery. He sat down and shuddered.
McGarron said. “Well, it won’t do any good to raise you again. Only thing I can do is call, I suppose.”
“Or fold,” Archer said evenly.
“With this hand? Son, you seldom see a hand like this.” McGarron pushed the money out. “I’m calling,” he said.
Allan Archer flipped his cards over casually. Four lovely bullets. “Got one on the draw,” he said.
McGarron’s little blue eyes squeezed almost shut. He ripped his five cards in half and threw them at the fireplace and stumped out. I went over and looked at the pieces. He’d had kings full. A tough one to lose.
Archer said, “It’s me, you know. He doesn’t want me hired.”
“Hell, you can’t be sure.”
“I am sure, though.”
“Does it mean a lot to you?”
He stood up slowly. “It means... more than I can tell you, Ralph.”
“Maybe it would have helped if you folded that hand.”
“I thought of it.”
“I’m glad you didn’t.”...
McGarron was up at seven, bellowing around, sending out repulsive waves of morning good cheer. Jake was grim, Tom was sleepy, and I had a head like a hippo’s gall bladder. Breakfast helped a little. Afterward, McGarron issued the firearms and ammunition and acted like a top kick. We walked for two miles and then McGarron posted Jake and Tom and myself in the flats where two creeks came down a long slope.
McGarron said, “Archer and I will go around the hill and come down those creek beds. Chances are we’ll either get a shot up in there, or drive a couple out. You guys take it easy this time. You ready, son? You’re going to have to make tracks to keep up with me.”
Archer nodded and away they went. McGarron setting a fast pace.
I moved over toward Tom. Jake joined us. We had a cigarette and I told them about McGarron and the cards. Jake made a few juicy comments about McGarron’s parentage.
“I think we’re safe,” Tom said. “It’s the kid he’s down on. And the kid doesn’t know how to play up to him. McGarron thinks he’s the world’s complete man, and the kid acts like he doesn’t go along with the estimate.”
“I hate to get a job from a bastard like McGarron,” Jake said. “And for my money, the kid is all right.”
“McGarron likes his war of nerves,” I said. “I wish we could make him feel as insecure as he’s making us feel.”
Tom ground out his cigarette. “You might have an idea there, Ralph.”
“How do you mean?” Jake demanded.
“There might be some risk in it. I mean there’s an outside chance it might make him so upset he’d turn the whole lot of us down,” Tom said.
“I don’t give a damn,” Jake said. “Do you, Ralph?”
“Let’s hear the idea first.”
Tom hitched himself forward and instinctively lowered his voice. “I’ve been working for Dillon for a long time. The big boys in manufacturing hate McGarron’s guts, but they respect him because the changes he demands usually go over big in the field. But he rides rough-shod over so many people in the company there’s always been a bunch trying to get rid of him. McGarron knows it, and he knows he’s safe because P. J. Dillon thinks McGarron is the best in the business.
“Dillon is the guy who saves McGarron’s bacon every time. He’s a tough old cookie and he’ll probably live to be a hundred and six. If he ever retired, McGarron would last about ten minutes, and McGarron knows it. Hell, if P. J. retired, every regional sales office would declare a public holiday and burn effigies of McGarron. Now, I think if we very carefully manufacture a rumor about P. J. Dillon, it will spoil the hell out of McGarron’s weekend.”
“Lovely!” Jake said reverently.
“I know the company well enough to make it sound good,” Tom said. “Now let’s set it up.”...
The deer were conspicuous for their absence, and we plunged around in the brush until we were as hungry as wolves. It was easy to see that McGarron was trying to wear us out. Jake and I kept up as well as he did. But Tom and Archer began to show serious signs of wear. The more their butts dragged, the happier McGarron acted.
We ate a heavy meal and then went out onto the porch. There was a wind blowing out toward the lake. McGarron collected the empty bottles, put some water in them so they’d float low, and heaved them out.
While he was getting the guns Jake groaned and whispered, “Now he’s got to show us he’s the world’s best shot.”
McGarron made us wait until the bottles were well out. The neck of a bottle at 150 yards isn’t much of a target. There was no danger of stray shots because the mountain on the opposite shoreline was too steep for anybody to stand on it, much less build camps.
McGarron said, “Six shots apiece, fellows. You take all your shots in a row. Get a bottle and everybody else owes you five bucks. Okay?”
“This is turning into an expensive weekend,” Jake said unhappily.
We matched odd man and had to flip about eight times before Jake was elected to try first. He shot quite a group around the nearest bottle. You could have covered his group with a freight car. I was next, and I did better, but not well enough to get myself a bottle. McGarron won the next flip and got a bottle on his third shot. He gave a yelp of triumph and switched his aim to the next one. He was very, very close with every shot, but he missed. Tom did about as well as me.
Archer shot last.
He missed with his first, got a bottle with his second.
“Nice going,” McGarron said, meaning it not at all.
Archer got the third and last bottle with his fourth shot. McGarron got some more bottles. The rest of us begged off. He shot it out with Archer, and Archer was clearly the better shot. That was another mistake.
McGarron wasn’t even subtle about it. He was so sore he didn’t let a decent interval elapse before he said, “I might as well tell you, Archer. I’m not going to recommend you for the job.”
Allan looked at him steadily, lips compressed. “Why?”
“Son, it’s nothing personal. You just haven’t got a sales personality.”
“You mean I don’t bellow at people and keep shoving them while I talk to them like you do, Mr. McGarron?”
“Don’t get snotty with me, son,” he said in a dangerous voice.
I glanced at Tom. Tom gave an imperceptible nod and said, “McGarron, before you get too hasty, I think I better talk over something with you.”
McGarron wheeled on him. “You trying to tell me my job?”
“No. We all like you, McGarron. We’d hate to see you get clobbered up. Doesn’t the Archer Company buy from Dillon?”
“Sure, but that doesn’t make any difference. You trying to tell me, Durboldt, that I got to hire this kid so they’ll keep buying equipment?”
“Not at all. I just thought maybe Allan here could help put the Archer Company behind you this month, and that might help.”