the endless sky.
Somerson had reached the horses now. Discarding the carbine, he grabbed his revolver and fired twice across the street. Nate Blaine fell back but stopped himself with an outstretched hand. Then, quickly, as Somerson was climbing hurriedly to the saddle, Nathan fired once, twice, with his own Colt's.
For an instant the impact of the bullets seemed to lift Somerson out of the saddle and hold him there. Then his great hulk fell like stone across the cantle, the frightened horse shied to one side, and Somerson slipped slowly, like poured concrete, to the ground.
Elec put Somerson from his mind. The outlaw would never bother anyone again.
Kirk Logan came running up to Nathan. He glanced quickly at that gray face, those dull eyes, and came on to Elec.
“Are you hurt, Marshal?”
“Nothing I can't get over. But see if you can find Doc Shipley; Nate's going to need some help.”
The deputy shook his head. “Nothing Doc Shipley can do, Marshal.”
After its moment of flame and violence, the town came under the weight of sudden silence. Then, almost immediately, the marshal heard the pound of boots coming toward them, and the sound of excited voices. Elec turned to Logan and said hoarsely, “Keep the crowd away. Nate has earned the right to die in peace.”
The marshal leaned heavily against the building as his deputy headed toward Main Street to hold back the morbid and the curious. He watched the boy kneeling in the dust, holding Nathan's heavy body in his arms. Where numbness had been in Elec's shoulder, now pain burned like a bright flame.
Elec's left arm hung limp and his shirt was plastered to his body with his own blood. Logan led Doc Shipley through, but the marshal pushed him away impatiently. Heavily, he walked into the open street where Nathan lay dead. The marshal was strangely fascinated by the red, wet spots on Nathan's gray face, where the boy's tears had mingled there with the red dust of Plainsville.
Jeff looked up at last and saw the marshal standing there. “Why did he do it?” he asked, his voice hard.
The marshal shifted uncomfortably. “Why did Nate stop you from killing Somerson?” He rubbed the back of his hand over his jowls and tried not to think of the pain in his shoulder. “Maybe it was because Nate knew how bad it is to kill a man, even a man like Somerson. Maybe your pa came to understand that and wanted you to understand it. Maybe it was his way of letting you know that he didn't want you to take the same trail he took so long ago.
After a moment Elec lifted his good arm and motioned for Doc Shipley to take over. He saw Amy Wintworth's white, stunned face in the crowd beside the bank building.
“Marshal, let me talk to him!”
“Not now, Amy.”
“But he needs me!”
“Maybe.” Elec nodded ponderously. “But what he needs most is to get things straight with himself. Give him time, Amy. Give him time to think.”
The next day turned out cool. Great thunderheads had rolled in off the Gulf during the night and a sprinkle of rain had settled the dust. It was a good day for a funeral, Elec Blasingame thought, if any day was a good one for such a thing.
Perhaps the good weather accounted for the big turnout, but Elec doubted it. His left arm bound tightly to his body, the marshal looked over the crowd gathered on the barren slope to the north of town and vaguely wondered what Nathan would think of this if he could see it. Nathan Blaine, a villain in life, was being buried a hero.
Elec regarded this fact wryly but without bitterness. He accepted it as a brutally truthful comment on the conscience of his neighbors. Many of them, he speculated, must have slept uneasily at times during these past five years when they were reminded of the wrong they had once done Nathan Blaine. Now they were showing a respect to Nathan in death that they could not have brought themselves to express when he was alive.
But that was only a small part of it, the marshal realized. As a matter of cold fact, Nathan had saved the town a great loss in money when he had stopped the robbery.
That was the important thing. Many of these people would have lost their life's savings if the robbery had been carried off. It was a matter of dollars and cents, more than a matter of conscience, that made them look at Nate Blaine in a newer and cleaner light.
And besides, those dark eyes that had blazed in life were now dull in death. They inspired no fear; it wasn't difficult to be charitable to a man when there was no reason to fear him.
Still, Elec was surprised that so many had come to the cemetery that day. Sam Baxter, Bert Surratt, Widow Harper, old Seth Lewellen, all had come to discharge a debt of one sort or another, but they didn't display any sense of loss.
Several cowhands from the big cattle outfits had come out of curiosity, and the new banker and his wife for obvious reasons. Todd Wintworth, now a rising young businessman, seemed uneasy and reluctant as he stood near the edge of the crowd beside his sister.
Amy, Elec noticed, held herself like a proud young queen, ignoring the glances of the curious, her anxious eyes fixed on Jeff Blaine's drawn young face.
The marshal finally focused his attention on young Jeff Blaine. There beside the grave, the boy stood rigid and cold. There was the look of brittleness about him, and suppressed violence. His eyes, brilliant and dry, gazed fiercely at some indefinite point in the distance.
