“Yes, he was in here a little after noon.”
“What did he say?”
“Well. He said you’d killed Ace. He said he knew who you were, because Lew Morgan told him last night at the ranch Frank Travis’s brother was in town.”
“What else?”
“Well, he said you weren’t goin’ to slip up from behind and get him like you got Ace.”
Parker looked over at the poker players. There were six of them and they solemnly returned his look. “If any of you believe that’s how McElhaney died, go look at him. Go see whether that bullet hit from behind or from in front.”
None of the card players spoke. They sat on, though, appraising Parker. Johnny Fleharty looked at his fingertips. At this moment he despised himself, could not bring himself to look out at the man who had made that kind of a coward of him.
Parker wheeled about, left the saloon, and turned southward toward the hotel. He almost at once collided with Sheriff Wheaton. Hub stopped dead still. He was sweat-dust stained and red-necked.
Parker beat him to it. He said: “Have a nice ride to Lincoln Ranch, Sheriff?”
Hub shook his head, looking more mournful than ever. “No,” he replied quietly, “it’s hotter’n the hinges of hell on the plains today.”
“Yeah,” grunted Parker. “In more ways than one. What’s on your mind?”
“I was looking for you.”
“I can see that. What for…to arrest me?”
Hub Wheaton was not like Johnny Fleharty; he did not scare easily. “No. Not yet anyway. To tell you there’s a man in the hall outside your hotel room waiting to talk to you.”
Parker’s mind selected a name and dropped it down. “Morgan?” he asked.
“Yes, Lew Morgan. He rode back with me. Are you going to see us?”
“I’ve already seen you, Sheriff. I’ll see Morgan alone.”
Parker started past. Hub Wheaton turned slowly to watch him progress southward. Once, he parted his lips to speak, then he closed them again and stood undecided while Travis swung in and passed beyond his sight at the hotel doorway.
Several men came out of the Great Northern Saloon. They saw Hub standing there and came to a rough stop. Johnny Fleharty also pushed through and saw Hub, but Johnny didn’t hesitate at all; he rushed at the sheriff.
“Hub, that feller Travis was just in my place makin’ me tell him about you warnin’ Ace about him bein’ in town an’ that he was that other Travis’s brother.”
Wheaton swung back. Over Fleharty’s shoulder he spied those rough range men standing together by the saloon’s doorway. He read their faces and their stances correctly.
“What’re you tryin’ to do,” he asked Johnny, “start a fight?”
Fleharty looked bewildered “What are you talkin’ about? I was in my own saloon mindin’ my own business…”
“I’m talking about those riders back there…those six men who just came out of your place. Who got them on the prod?”
“I didn’t. It was Travis. They heard him pumpin’ me about Charley Swindin an’ you talkin’ to Ace last night. You an’ Lew Morgan. They…”
“Lew Morgan wasn’t in your place last night, Johnny.”
Fleharty blinked. His agitation was considerable. “Wasn’t he with you when you talked to Ace?”
“No, he wasn’t.”
“I thought…I guess there were too many fellers in there for me to be sure last night.” Johnny’s eyes widened. “I thought he was with you ’n’ Ace. That’s what I told Travis.”
“No,” growled Hub Wheaton. “You’re not tryin’ to stir anything up. Hell, no, you’re just tryin’ to get Lew killed along with Swindin.”
Fleharty said protestingly: “But, Hub…”
Wheaton, however, was passing northward toward those six grim-faced cowboys up the sidewalk. He left Fleharty standing helplessly, with new sweat bursting out upon his face, feeling more degraded than ever.
When he was close to the motionless range riders, Wheaton said: “Forget it. There’s enough trouble here without you fellers butting in.”
One of those cowboys, a gaunt, battered man, hooked both thumbs in his shell belt, looked coolly at the sheriff, and growled: “You folks here in town afraid of that Travis feller?”
Hub’s long face settled into tough lines. He said sarcastically: “Yeah, we’re scairt to death of him. We’re also scairt to death of men like you. We’re so scairt I’m going to lock the lot of you up in my jailhouse unless you climb on your horses right damned now and hightail it out of town and back wherever you belong.”
Another rider, broad, swarthy, raffish-appearing, looked around. He made an elaborate shrug with his shoulders and said gruffly to his friends: “To hell with it. Come on, let’s get goin’. These here folks don’t want no help.” This man turned his back upon Hub Wheaton, stepped down into roadway dust, and trudged over where six saddled horses were drowsing. His friends went along after him, one at a time, until only the gaunt, battered man remained behind.
Hub took a little forward step, put his palm against this cowboy’s chest, and gave a little push. The gaunt man’s eyes flashed; he dropped both hands from his belt and teetered there, on the brink of action.
From his saddle, out in the yellow brilliance, that raffish-looking man called: “Forget it, Buck! Come on. Let the townsfolk handle it their own clumsy way.”
“That,” said Wheaton quietly to the angry-eyed man in front of him, “is damned good advice.”
Afterward, when the six of them were riding off, Johnny Fleharty came up tentatively, not certain whether to speak or step on past and run into his saloon. He was still undecided when Wheaton spoke without taking his eyes off those moving riders.
“Johnny, I know something about you.” Hub turned and looked down. “I know you were egging McElhaney to find that missing three thousand dollars. Now I’m going to tell you something, an’ you’d better believe me. There never was three thousand dollars. There was only nine thousand dollars. That’s all there ever was.”
“But the express company said they’d been robbed…”
“I don’t care what they said. That nine thousand dollars wasn’t their money. I’m almost positive of that. Likely, at this late date, we’ll never recover their twelve thousand anyway. Whoever got that is hundreds of miles away by now.”
“You mean…Frank Travis really wasn’t the robber?”
Hub Wheaton turned at a slight sound. Amy Morgan was there behind him in a white blouse and a buckskin- colored riding skirt. He forgot Fleharty altogether to stare.
“Where is Lew?” Amy asked.
“At the hotel.”
“Hubbell, why didn’t you tell me, too, what happened this morning?”
“You mean about McElhaney and this Travis feller?” asked Hub. “Well, Amy, Lew asked me not to frighten you with it.”
Amy looked exasperated. “Hubbell,” she said crisply, “I am the one who was responsible for Parker Travis being out on the stage road this morning. It was I who put him where McElhaney found him. Do you know what he’ll think about me for what happened to him out there?”
Hubbell didn’t answer this. He frowned a little and said: “Who told you about McElhaney?”
“Charley did. Right after you and Lew left the ranch this afternoon, Charley came to me with a little note my uncle had left with the cook for him. In the note it said Lew was coming to town with you to see Parker Travis…”
“Yes? What else did it say, Amy?”
“It said for Charley to saddle up and get out of the country at once, for him to write Lew when he settled somewhere, and Lew would send him money.”
Behind Sheriff Wheaton, Johnny Fleharty made a little sigh of sound. Hubbell swung angrily on him. “Go on, crawl back in your rat hole, an’, if you don’t keep that double-hinged tongue of yours quiet, I’ll personally carve it out of you an’ make a necktie out of it. Beat it!”
