Smoke stood up from the rickety chair. “You have got to be kidding!”
“Wish I was. They been hiding out over in the Idaho wilderness. Just surfaced a couple of weeks ago on the Montana border.”
“I haven’t heard anything about Dad in several years. Not since the Regulators ran them out of Colorado.”
Cord shook his head. “I been hearin’ for some time they been murderin’ and robbin’ miners to stay alive. Makin’ little forays out of the wildnerness and then duckin’ back in.”
“How many men are we talking about, Cord?”
Cord shrugged his shoulders. “Don’t know. Twenty to thirty, I’d guess.”
“Then all we’re doing is taking two steps forward and three steps back.”
“Looks like.”
“Did you get a report on damage last night?”
“One bunkhouse completely ruined, the other one badly damaged. The big house is pretty well shot, back and front. Smoke, Dooley has given the word: shoot us on sight. He says Gibson is his and for us to stay out of it.”
“The hell I will!”
“That’s the same thing everybody else around here told me ... more or less.”
“Well, it was funny while it lasted.” Smoke’s words were glum.
Cord poured a cup of coffee. “Personally, I’d like to have seen it. Beans and Lujan has been entertaining the crews for an hour. Did Lanny Ball really have his guns strapped on over his short drawers? ”
Smoke laughed. “Yeah. That was right before the door hit him.”
Both men shared a laugh. Cord said, “Would it do any good to wire for some federal marshals?”
“I can’t see that it would. It would be our word against theirs. And they’d just back off until the marshals left, then we’d still have the same problem facing us. If I had the time, I could probably get my old federal commission back ... but what good would it do? Dooley’s crazy; the gunslicks he’s buyin are playing a double-cross and Dooley’s so nuts you’d never convince him of it. I think we’d just better resign ourselves that we’re in a war and take it from there.”
“The wife says we need supplies in the worst way. We’ve got to go into town.”
“Then we’ll go in a bunch. This afternoon. We’ve got to show Dooley he doesn’t run the town.”
“Sorry, Mister McCorkle,” Walt Hillery said primly. “I’m completely out of everything you want.”
“You’re a damn liar!” Cord flushed. “Hell, man, I can
“All that has been bought by the D-H spread. They’re coming in to pick it up this afternoon.”
“Jake!” Cord yelled at his hand driving the wagon. “Pull it around back and get ready to load up.”
“Now, see here!” Leah’s voice was sharp. “You don’t give us orders, Mister Big Shot!”
“Dooley’s bought them,” Smoke said quietly. He stood by a table loaded with men’s jeans. He lifted his eyes to Walt. “You should have stayed out of this, Hillery.” He walked to the counter and dug in his jeans pocket, tossing half a dozen double eagles onto the counter. “That’ll pay for what I pick out, and Cord’s money is layin’ right beside mine. If Dooley sets up a squall, you tell him to come see me. Load it up, Jake.”
The sour-faced and surly Walt and Leah stood tight-lipped, but silent as Jake began loading up supplies.
“Grind the damn coffee, Walt,” Cord ordered. “As a matter of fact, double my order. That way I won’t have to look at your prissy face for a long time.”
“I hope Mister Hanks kills you, McCorkle!” Leah hissed the verbal venom at him. “And I hope you die hard!”
Cord took the hard words without changing expression. “You never have liked me, Leah, and I never could understand why.” didn’t back down. “You don’t have the mental
She didn’t back down. “You don’t have the mental capability to appreciate quality people, McCorkle ... like Dooley Hanks.”
“Quality people? What in the name of Peter and Paul are you talking about, Leah?”
But she would only shake her head.
“Money talks, Cord,” Smoke told him. “Especially with little-minded people like these two fine citizens. They’re just like Dooley: prideful, envious, spiteful, hateful ... any and all of the seven deadly sins.” He walked around the counter and stripped the shelf of all the boxes of .44 and .45 rounds. “Tally it up, storekeeper.”
Cord walked around the general store, filling a large box with all the bandages and various balms and patent medicines he could find. “Might as well do it right,” he muttered.
If dark looks of hate could kill, both Cord and Smoke would have died on the spot. Not another word was exchanged the rest of the time spent in the store except for Walt telling the men the amount of their purchases. All the supplies loaded onto the wagon, both Cord and Smoke experienced a sense of relief when they exited the building to stand on the boardwalk.
“Quality people?” Cord said, shaking his head, still not able to get over that statement.
“Forget them,” Smoke said. “They’re not worth worrying about. When this war is over, and we’ve won—and we will win, count on it—those two will be sucking up to you as if nothing had happened.”
“What they’ll do is do without my business,” Cord said shortly.
The men walked over to Hans for a cup of coffee and a piece of pie. Beans and Lujan, with Charlie Starr and his
