For a minute I thought there had been a mistake and Basset had given me the wrong sack. But then, from the look on Bama's face, I knew that it was no mistake. This was the way the fat man paid off: He collected the silver and gave his men a pile of worthless brass buttons. Quickly I scattered the stuff some more and sorted it out, and when I had finished I had thirty-five adobe dollars and sixty-five pieces of brass.
Finally I straightened up, and what was going on inside of me must have been written on my face.
Bama seemed suddenly sober. “Take it easy, kid.”
“Is this the way Basset pays all his men?”
“I thought you knew,” Bama said.
“Look at that!” I kicked the bed and brass and silver went flying all over the room. “Is that what he calls a fair cut? I saw the money they sacked up on that raid— fifteen thousand dollars, at least. Maybe twenty thousand. And he hands me thirty-five dollars and sixty-five pieces of brass. Even if it was all silver. It would still be a long way from a fair cut.”
By the time the money hit the floor, Marta was on her knees gathering it up in her skirt. Bama sighed deeply.
“That's the way it is when you work for men like Basset. That's why I was wondering how you meant to get out of Ocotillo. Anyway, that brass is as good as the silver, if you spend it in the saloon.”
“I don't intend to spend it in the saloon,” I said. Then I wheeled and headed for the door. Marta was standing there, the silver and brass in her skirt, holding it out.
I said, “Keep it. Spend it on saloon whisky, or take it home, or throw it to the chickens. I won't need it.”
Her eyes lit up and she smiled a smile like a kid who had just found a wagonful of candy.
Bama lurched across the room and grabbed my sleeve as I was about to walk out. “Don't go down there half-cocked,” he said. “Don't you think Basset has had this kind of trouble before? He knows what he's doing and he knows how to take care of himself.”
“I don't want any trouble,” I said, “but I'm going to get what's coming to me if I have to choke the stuff out of him.”
I shook Bama off and went down the stairs three at a time and burst into the saloon. The bartender was still leaning on his broom. He didn't seem exactly surprised to see me and he didn't try to stop me when I marched straight on back to Basset's office. I kicked the door open and said, “Goddamn you, Basset, I want what's coming to me...”
But I left the words hanging. Basset had been receiving company while I'd been upstairs jawing with Bama. Kreyler, the fat man's right-hand gun, was leaning against the wall near the door. I guessed that Bama knew what he was talking about; Basset had experience in handling situations like this.
Kreyler didn't have his guns out, but he had his thumbs hooked in his gun belt, and all he had to do was cup his hand around the pistol butt if there was some shooting to be done. Basset was still sitting where I had left him, smiling that wet smile of his. He sat back wheezing and coughing.
“Why, son, what seems to be the matter? Ha-ha. You look all worked up about something. Doesn't he, Kreyler?”
Kreyler didn't say anything; he just looked at me with those flat, hate-filled eyes.
I said, “I came after my cut of that silver that we took in the smuggler raid. And don't try to talk me out of it, because I'm going to get it one way or another.”
I told Kreyler with a look that he could go to hell. If he wanted to make his draw, it was all right with me. But nothing happened for a minute. The fat man and the Marshal looked at each other and I began to get the idea that they were cooking something between them, but I didn't know what. Basset wasn't armed, as far as I could see, and even if he did have a gun on him, I figured it would take him a week to find it among all the folds of fat. If it was just Kreyler's shooting ability that I had to worry about, I was all right.
“Well, now,” Basset said, “this is very irregular. Very irregular indeed, isn't it, Kreyler? I was under the impression that you had picked up your cut this morning, Cameron.” He didn't seem worried, and that in itself was something for me to worry about. “However,” he went on, “we always try to keep the men happy here in Ocotillo. Even the ungrateful ones. Of course, it will mean going into my own pocket, but just so there won't be any hard feelings, I'm willing to add a little to your cut. Say another thirty-five dollars. In silver.”
I said, “I was thinking that five hundred dollars would be about right.”
He didn't like that. Those little eyes began to narrow and I got the feeling that this was the time to be careful.
“Well, now,” he said, “that's a lot of money. But, like I say, we try to keep the men happy.”
Grunting, he reached across his desk and pulled the cigar box over. “I think maybe it can be done,” he said vaguely. “Five hundred. Yes, I think it can be done, don't you, Kreyler?”
And while he was talking he was opening the cigar box and fumbling around in it. I had seen him do it before, just the way he was doing it now, and it hadn't meant a thing. But this time it did. Something prodded me in the back of my mind and I knew that it wasn't a cigar that he was fumbling for.
It was a little double-barreled derringer, probably, but he didn't get to use it. I guess he intended to let me have both barrels right through the lid of the box, and it wasn't such a bad idea, at that, because one of those little belly guns can do damage out of all proportion to its size. It was a nice setup, all right. In another second he would have shot my belt buckle right through my backbone. If he had lived that long.
At times like that you appreciate your training, and when it came to guns I had one of the best educations in the world. My right hand took over where my brain left off, and what came next was as natural as reciting the multiplication tables. More natural for me.
So I shot him. It was as simple as that, and I didn't wait to see where the bullet hit, because I already knew. When Pappy Garret trained a man, he didn't leave any margin for doubt about things like that. After I had pulled the trigger I moved one foot just enough to pull my body around and lay the pistol on Kreyler.
As a gunman, maybe the Marshal was all right as long as he stayed in his own class, but he hadn't had the
