In Pat Roark, I knew that I had one good man on my side. And one good man was all I needed.
We rode into Main Street in no particular formation, Pat and myself still in the van, and the others strung out in the rear. The town was ready for us. Everything that a bullet could hurt had been taken off the plank walk and dragged inside. The street was almost deserted, with only two or three horses standing at the block-long hitching rack. The last buckboard was just pulling out of the far end of the street as we came into town.
“We hit it right,” Pat Roark said out of the side of his mouth. “The cavalry's not in town.” He was moving his head slowly from side to side, not missing a thing. The thumb of his right hand, I noticed, was hooked in his cartridge belt, close to the butt of that new .44. When his head turned in my direction again he said, “You want to try the City Bar first?”
I nodded. The bar was a two-story frame building standing on the corner, at the end of the block. When we reached it, I motioned for Pat to pull in, and I waited for the others to come up.
“Look,” I said, as they grouped up around me, “I know this is none of your fight. I'm not asking you to come in with me, but I'll appreciate it if you keep watch outside here and see that nobody has a chance to get me and Pat in the back.”
The men looked as if they wanted to object and join in on the fight, but nobody did. Jed Horner was the only one to say anything.
“Tall, we don't want you to get the idea that we're not with you. It's just like I said...”
I left him talking and looped the bay's reins over the hitching rack. Pat was waiting for me on the plank walk, his back against the building.
“I guess we might as well go in,” I said.
“I guess so.”
We kicked both batwings open at the same time and stepped inside. I was ready to draw from the first. I half expected a rifle, or maybe a shotgun, to be looking at us from over the bar. But there was nothing out of the way. Business was going on as usual. A couple of Davis policemen were having beer at the bar, a handful of turncoats and scalawags were in the back of the place where the gambling tables were. A roulette ball rattled like dry bones as the wheel spun, then the rattling stopped abruptly as the ball went into a slot. “Black, twenty-three,” I heard somebody say.
“He isn't here,” Pat said under his breath.
The bartender and two policemen were watching us carefully, but nobody made a move. There was something about the whole setup that I didn't like. I knew the bartender recognized me, and probably the two policemen as well. Then why didn't they do something? I was the one they wanted.
I went over every inch of the place with my eyes. There were nine men in the place, counting the bartender, a croupier, and a blackjack dealer. In the back of the place there were some stairs leading up to a small gallery jutting out over the gambling area, but there was nobody up there that I could see.
Without turning his head, Pat said, “You want to try the marshal's office?”
That would be the logical thing to do, but there was still something about this place that I didn't like. I walked over to the bar, and Pat stayed where he was, by the door. The roulette ball didn't rattle any more. The blackjack dealer paid off, raked his cards in, and waited. Everybody seemed to be waiting for something.
The bartender moved away from his two police customers and came down to the end of the bar where I was.
“What'll you have, Tall?” he asked easily. Maybe a little too easily.
“Information,” I said. “I'm looking for a man. A man by the name of Thornton.”
He thought it over carefully. “You ought to try the marshal's office,” he said finally. “That's his headquarters, not here.”
He started to reach under the bar for something. A bar rag maybe, or some fresh glasses. But it could have been a shotgun.
I said, “Just keep your hands where I can see them.” The two policemen were watching us, but so far they hadn't made any move toward their guns. One was short and big around the belly and hips. The other was big all over, maybe six feet tall and weighing around two hundred pounds. I called down the bar.
“You down there, where's your captain?”
The big one set his glass down. He looked at the short, fat one, and they both grinned quietly, as if they were enjoying a secret little joke just between the two of them.
“Down at the marshal's office, I reckon,” the big one said.
He was lying. I was sure of that without knowing how I was sure. I could have killed him right there, both of them, with no regrets, no feeling at all. It could just as easily have been one of them, I thought. I'd never be able to look at a policeman again without thinking that, without feeling that sick anger blaze up and burn again.
And the two of them stood there grinning. The bartender and the others didn't do anything.
I heard myself saying, “Do you know who I am?”
The big man shrugged. The short one had another go at his drink.
“The name is Cameron,” I said. “Tall Cameron. I hear you Davis police are looking for me.”
They didn't even blink. I was hoping that they would make a move for their guns, but they didn't move at all.
The big man spoke mildly. “You must of heard wrong, kid. We don't want you.”
“You're a goddamned liar,” I said.
That jarred them for a minute. I watched the grins flicker and fade. They looked like they might go for their guns after all, and I was hoping they would. I was praying that they would give me an excuse to put a bullet... But that was as far as the thought went. Pat Roark stopped all thinking, all action that might have taken place, with:
“Tall, look out!”
I wheeled instinctively. I vaguely noticed that the bartender's hands had darted under the bar again and I caught the glint of a brutish sawed-off shotgun. And I was aware of the two police clawing for their own side guns —but all that was in the back of my mind. It was the gallery that held my attention.
The man up there had a rifle pointed at my chest. I didn't know how he got up there. Probably he had been up there all the time, waiting for me to turn my back. I knew, with the same instinct that told me the big policeman was lying, that the rifleman was Thornton. Before I had half whirled about I heard Pat Roark's .44 crash and saw the bartender sliding down behind the bar, the shotgun dropping from his limp fingers. Somehow my own gun was in my hand.
At a time like that you don't stop to think. Your mind seizes all the facts in a bunch and there is no time to separate them and decide where to act first. The two policemen were still clawing for their pistols, awkwardly. But the man on the gallery didn't have to draw. The rifle was ready, aimed, and I imagined that I could see the hammer falling. I forgot about the two policemen. The .44 bucked twice in my hand and the room jarred with the roaring. Two shots, I knew, would have to do it. I couldn't wait to see if the man would fall. The two policemen were awkward with pistols, but they weren't that awkward.
By the time I swung on them again, the big man's gun was just clearing his holster. I shot him in the belly and he slammed back against the bar, clawing at the neat black hole just above his belt buckle. The fat one didn't have a chance. He shouldn't have been allowed to carry a gun. He didn't know what to do with one. He was still fumbling with the hammer as my bullet buried itself in the flabby folds of fat under his chin. He reeled back and blood began to come out of his mouth.