Still, Beulah said nothing. A glassiness appeared in her pale eyes. She sat staring... staring... Elec had the chilly feeling that she was looking right through him at something on the other side of the world. Anger and impatience swelled within him.
“Look,” he said shortly. “Every minute counts, ma'am. Surely you can understand that. Now please, as quick as you can, tell me exactly what happened.”
Wirt Sewell burst through the front door at that moment, pale and frightened. “Beulah, you're all right!”
“My head hurts,” his wife said peevishly.
Elec Blasingame, outwardly, remained calm. “Wirt, Doc Shipley'll be here directly to look her over. Now it's important that she tell us what she saw.”
“Even if she's hurt?” Wirt demanded.
“Even if she's hurt!” Elec said.
After a tense moment, Beulah said, “All right, I guess I'd have to tell sooner or later, anyway.”
“You don't have to talk if you don't feel like it,” her husband told her.
“Damn it, Wirt!” the marshal exploded. “You stay out of this!”
By this time a good-sized crowd had gathered in the bank building, tensely waiting for what Beulah Sewell had to say. “My head hurts,” she said weakly. “It must have been a gun he hit me with.”
“Who hit you?” Elec put in quickly.
“I'll have to tell it my own way, Marshal. You see, Jed was locking up when I got to the bank. He let me in and was about to make me a receipt when the door opened again and in came this—”
“What did he look like?”
“He told me not to turn around,” Beulah went on, as though she hadn't heard the question. “But I did. He didn't want me to look at his face; that's why he hit me. It didn't do him any good,” she added grimly. “I got a good look at him. I stared right to the bottom of his mean eyes before he hit me. I guess he thought he'd killed me. He wouldn't have run off the way he did if he'd known I was alive to tell about him.”
The marshal sensed that she had reached the end. “Mrs. Sewell,” he said gently, “who was it?”
“May the good Lord help him,” Beulah said grimly. “It was my own brother-in-law, Nathan Blaine.”
A SOUND OF AMAZEMENT rose inside the building. Elec Blasingame had been prepared for almost anything—but not this. When he spoke, his voice held the rasp of urgency. “Mrs. Sewell, are you absolutely certain?”
“Of course I'm certain. I looked right at him.”
“You also told me that it must have been a gun that he hit you with,” Blasingame shot at her. “Seems to me that you'd have known it was a gun if you were looking at him.”
Beulah's small eyes bored into the marshal's face. “You're not calling me a liar, are you, Elec Blasingame?”
“You know better than that, ma'am. I just wonder if you actually turned and looked at this man, or if you merely thought you did. Put a person's mind under a strain and it sometimes plays funny tricks.”
The look she gave him chilled the marshal like a cutting rain. “My mind wasn't playing tricks!” she bit out. “I turned and looked at Nathan Blaine, and that's why he tried to kill me.” She raked the crowd with her anger. “You think I wouldn't recognize my own brother-in-law? You think I like dragging my family's name in the mud? And the boy Wirt and I raised like our own—do you think I'd hurt him like this if I didn't have to?”
“All right, ma'am,” Elec said heavily. “I just wanted to make sure.” He turned to Bert Surratt, who was standing at his elbow. “Nate Blaine couldn't have been in your place while the bank was being robbed, could he?”
Bert shook his head. “Funny thing. Blaine started drinkin' the minute he come in from your office. He left the saloon before the shootin'. Said he needed some air.”
Elec watched Beulah's face carefully, but it was set like iron and told him nothing. He turned shortly and headed for the door. “It looks like Nate Blaine's our man.”
As soon as school let out Jeff headed for the bank corner where Nathan usually waited for him. His pa wasn't there today. Instead, there was a scattering crowd of angry-eyed men, most of them carrying shotguns or rifles. There was a hoarse yell from the far end of the street, near the public corral, and old Seth Lewellen came hobbling out of the bank building and said, “By golly, it sounds like they found him!”
Not since the cattle trade had quit Plainsville had Jeff seen so much excitement in the town. He pushed up to the door of the bank, trying to see what was going on. He almost ran into his Uncle Wirt and Aunt Beulah, who were just coming out.
“Jeff,” Wirt said roughly, “what are you doing here?”
“The academy just let out,” Jeff said, puzzled. “I always come this way. What's all the excitement about?”
“Never mind that,” Wirt said. “Help me get your Aunt Beulah home; she's had an accident.”
“What kind of an accident?”
Wirt looked at him, and Jeff had never seen such fire in those usually mild eyes. “Stop asking questions,” he said shortly, “and take your aunt's arm.”
Aunt Beulah looked kind of funny too, Jeff was thinking. She was leaning on her husband, her eyes almost closed, her face as pale and bloodless as bone china. She hardly even looked at Jeff as he got on her left side and took her arm.
