The Last Days of Wolf Garnett

had been Wolf Garnett. But now, facing the sheriff's bland smugness, he wasn't sure any more.

Olsen looked at him for several seconds. At last he said, 'I'll let you talk to Doc Doolie. He's the one that laid Garnett out and got him ready for buryin'.'

'I didn't come here to talk, I came to see the body.'

'Mister,' the sheriff said wearily, 'the thing's done. He's buried, fair and legal. The coroner attended to him and made his report. The sister of the dead man identified him. A hundred folks from hereabouts, and newspapermen from as far away as the Nations, was here to see the plantin'. I can't go diggin' him up again just because you was late.'

'My horse went lame up north of the Red, that's the only reason I'm late. I headed south the minute I heard that you'd found somebody you thought was Wolf Garnett.'

'South from where?' Olsen asked sleepily.

Frank Gault forced himself to answer without shouting. 'South from the Big Pasture where I lease some grass from the Comanches—or used to.'

'Used to?'

'I sold my stock after…' His eyes became remote and cold. 'I sold out about a year ago and went lookin' for Garnett.'

The sheriff sighed, pushed his chair back from the table and got up. He lumbered over to the wall and pounded on it with a hairy fist. 'Doc, get yourself in here a minute!' He returned to the table and sat down again.

'I told you,' Gault said angrily, 'I didn't come here to talk, I came to see.'

'There ain't nothin' to see,' the sheriff told him placidly. 'Nothin' that wouldn't wrench your guts, anyhow. When we found the body it was lodged in some roots of a salt cedar, over on the Little Wichita. It had been in warm water maybe two weeks, Doc says, when we found it. Like I say, it wasn't nothin' pretty to look at by that time.'

'Who found it?'

'I did.'

'How'd you come to find the body?'

'Lookin' for horse thieves. Comanches, most likely. They like to raid across the Red every chance they get. That's what comes of havin' Quakers as Indian agents.' He smiled lazily. 'Poor Lo ain't as dumb as some might figger. He knows them Quakers ain't goin' to do anything to him just for stealin' a few white men's horses. But I guess you know about that, runnin' cattle in the Big Pasture.'

A figure appeared in the sheriff's open doorway, and Olsen said, 'Doc, this here's Frank Gault. Mr. Gault runs cattle on Comanche grass. Or used to. He claims he seen Wolf Garnett up in the Choctaw Nation about a week ago, alive and kickin', fit as you please.'

'Creek Nation,' Gault said. 'Four days ago.'

Doc Doolie was a wizened little brown nut of a man. He came into the room, peering up into Gault's face. 'Seen Garnett's ghost, maybe. But not Garnett. Not four days ago. He's buried. I seen to it myself.'

'How can you be so sure it was Garnett?'

The little doc glanced at Olsen and shrugged. 'I admit he wasn't much to look at by the time I got him. But his sister identified him.'

'How?'

'By his clothes. By his size and general appearance. The sheriff must of told you that. Besides all that, there was a scar on the back of his neck in the shape of a cross. Wolfs sister said her brother had a scar just like that.'

'Lanced boil,' Gault said, unimpressed. 'Half the men in Texas carry cross-shape scars caused from lanced boils.'

Doolie looked at him and said dryly, 'So you're a doc as well as a lease cowman.'

'I know what a lance scar looks like.'

Sheriff Olsen held up a hand and said patiently, 'All right, it's not much. But a lot of little things, and they all add up to Wolf Garnett.' He spread his big hands on the oilcloth. 'Sorry, Gault. I know how you feel—guess I'd feel the same way, in your place. But it's a fact you'll just have to get used to. Garnett's dead. There's nothin' you or anybody else can do about it now.'

Gault made no effort to hide his anger and disgust. 'Where is this sister of Garnett's that was so handy when it came to identifying the body?'

'She's back at the family place on the Little Wichita.' Olsen's eyes narrowed and his voice became cooler. 'And don't you go botherin' her, Gault. She's had a hard time these last few days. I don't want her bothered any more.'

'Then let me look at the body.'

The big lawman shook his head. 'I can't do it. We got decent folks here in New Boston. We don't go diggin' up the dead.'

Frank Gault's angular jaw set like concrete. 'Then you won't help me?'

'I'll do better'n that, I'll give you some good advice. Let it alone. What's done's done, and there's no way you can change it.'

'I see.' Slowly and deliberately, Gault slipped his Winchester under his arm and picked up his saddle and warbag. He got as far as the door when he turned and glanced back at the sheriff. 'I wonder,' he said, 'if there happened to be a price on Wolf's head?'

Something happened behind those pale eyes, but Gault couldn't be sure just what it was. 'Yes,' the sheriff admitted, with no change in tone, 'there was a reward. The express company that Wolf had robbed put up a five- hundred-dollar bounty. And there was a cattlemen's association up in Kansas that claimed Wolf had killed one of their detectives—they put up another five hundred.'

One thousand dollars. Gault had known men who would do anything, including murder, for much less. 'Who's doing the collecting?' he asked.

Sheriff Grady Olsen managed a small smile. 'I am. Now, if you don't mind, Gault, I've got a letter to write.'

Gault answered him with a smile of his own, as taut as a fiddle string and etched with acid. 'Two five hundred dollar 'dead or alive' bounties, and you collect them. Now it's not hard to understand why you're not in too big a hurry to open up that grave.'

Gault was not surprised to find there were no vacancies in New Boston's only hotel, due to the holiday atmosphere brought on by the funeral and burying of a famous outlaw. 'Mister,' the desk clerk beamed at Gault, 'we ain't had a room for rent since before suppertime yesterday. Seems like the whole county's gathered here. Just to be able to say they was on hand when the famous Wolf Garnett was planted, I guess. You might try the wagon yard at the end of the street. If they ain't got a camp shack for rent, they might allow you to sleep in the loft.'

As Gault was turning to leave, the clerk said, 'Mister, maybe I ought to tell you somethin', for your own good. About that .45.' He looked at Gault's wood-handled weapon. 'We got an ordinance in New Boston against carryin' firearms. The sheriff don't like it.'

Gault smiled his heatless smile. 'What does the town marshal say about it?'

'Ain't got a town marshal, just the sheriff. And Dub Finley, that's Olsen's deputy.'

Handy, Gault thought silently. A million-acre county, with only two lawmen to look over it. That kind of job called for strong men.

There was no problem finding the wagon yard. A group of men were gathered by the livery corral beside the barn. Town loafers, and a few visiting cowhands and farmers. Gault lowered his saddle to his hip as he moved in to see what it was that interested them. 'What's the excitement about?' Gault asked a cowhand who was just leaving.

'Wolf Garnett's outfit,' the cowhand told him. 'His gun and the rig he was wearin' when the sheriff found him.' He grinned and strolled away toward the nearest saloon.

Gault stood like stone for several moments. Then, without a word, he bulled his way through the crowd, oblivious of the hostile looks and the grumbling. He stood gazing down at the items of curiosity that so fascinated the citizens of Standard County.