* * * *
Pettigrew was saying to Winters in low tones of confidence, “What I had in mind to tell you is that a crime, I fear, has been committed in your town.”
“Nothing startling about that,” said Winters. He’d heard Bogannon’s distraught call, but gave no intimation thereof to Pettigrew. “Nor is this what I’d call a good hour for investigations.”
“True,” said Pettigrew, “but this is exceptional. I have a habit—a foolish one, I admit—of walking abroad at night. Recently, I heard groans in a deserted building and peering through a cranny I saw a man with a knife. A grotesque creature, he was. I could not see his victim, but I did see him lift his knife and plunge it down hard. Groans ceased then; undoubtedly that plunge was a death-thrust. Needless to say, I was frightened. Ah, it was that building there. Bless me, there’s a light in it now. You, as an officer, perhaps should go see what, I dare say, will curdle your blood.”
Winters stepped aside. “I never go before; it’s impolite. You go.”
“Thank you, sir,” said Pettigrew. He stepped in front of Winters and proceeded slowly, bending forward to peer cautiously at a streak of light.
Winters wished for a thousand eyes. He expected something violent to befall him at every moment—an object dropped on him from a roof; a snare pulled tight around his feet; a knife-thrust into his back; a clubbing blow on his head; some monster leaping at him from a dark recess.
Pettigrew stopped abruptly. “Look there!” he whispered. “There’s a cellar under that building. Something’s moving—”
This, Winters knew, was a critical moment. They had just passed a narrow space between buildings, shrouded in black shadow. Something undoubtedly was hiding there; this pretense of caution and discovery put on by Pettigrew had but one object—to distract Winters’ attention from a trap which had been set for him.
Winters heard a noise; vaguely he saw a misshapen creature leaping upon him. Winters whipped up his six-gun and fired. A club descended toward his head, missed, but jarred his left shoulder. He fired again—point-blank—at a small, round head that silhouetted itself against sky. Two flailing arms closed around his neck. He stepped backward to struggle free, tripped and fell. His breath went out under a dead weight that had fallen with him.
Above, towered Professor Pettigrew, gun in hand. Fire blazed downward. A slug, intended for whatever it might hit, buried itself in a body already dead. Winters’ gun had caught under his back. He tugged to get it free, at last succeeded. He aimed at Pettigrew’s chin; two guns blazed as one.
* * * *
In his saloon by a table Doc Bogannon swabbed a perspiring face. When his batwings swung in, he stared, horrified. “Winters! You’re killed.” Winters strode forward and eased himself into a chair. “A little arnica, Doc; I’ve got a bruised shoulder.”
“Winters, you’ve got blood all over your face and neck!”
“Not my blood, Doc. You might fetch a bowl of water, too, and a towel.”
Bogie, about to drop, stumbled off and poured himself a drink of whiskey. He came back with water in a wash basin and a towel over his arm.
“Winters, what happened?”
Winters stood, bent forward and washed his face. He was painstaking and slow with both water and towel. At last he sat down, looked at Bogie and drew a deep, shuddering breath. “Doc, you want to know what happened? Well, I’ll tell you. I ran into a wool-merchant. And something else, Doc. If you want to stay out of trouble, take my advice; don’t ever have no truck with a wool-merchant.”
MASTER OF INDECISION
Real Western Stories, April 1953
Deputy Marshal Lee Winters left Rocky Point at noon and traveled by way of Cow Creek and Elkhorn Pass. This was ten miles farther, but he figured on its being much safer than that ghost-infested wasteland of Alkali Flat. Even by this longer route, he counted on reaching Forlorn Gap and home comforts with Myra Winters, his good-looking wife, at least two hours before midnight.
He was three hours out of Elkhorn and riding by moonlight, when he began to wonder whether he shouldn’t have gone by Alkali Flat after all. From Elkhorn Pass to Forlorn Gap ran an ancient, lonesome road. White men did not much concern themselves about its past. It was merely a means of getting from one gold town to another, haunted because of stagecoach robberies and murders along its course, but no more forbidding to mad gold-hunters than any other cutthroat trail.
Deputy Winters, however, recalled something Doc Bogannon’s half-breed wife had said about it; an ancient warriors’ path, Athi-ami-owee, she’d called it, a trail where Shoshone braves had tramped to and fro to test their metal against enemy tribes in far-off valleys. It had been a death-trail, too, where warrior bands fell in bloody ambush. There were always haunts in a place like this.
Winters had half-expected to tie in with a ghost or two on this winding cliff-lined road, but he hadn’t expected to get his daylights scared out. He didn’t see anything; he just heard a voice that came out of a wall of solid rock. It was a spook’s voice, of course, for only a spook could live within a crackless, holeless cliff.
It was a quick, hollow voice, hard and mirthless. It said, “Going somewhere, stranger?”
Winters drew rein, hand dropping to six-gun. “What’s that?”
It came again. “No use to hurry, stranger. Time and tide have already passed you by. What difference does it make, whether you die tonight or tomorrow? Tarry a while, rest your weary bones, and renew acquaintances with departed souls. You are closer to Happy Hunting Ground than you think.”
Winters wanted no truck with disembodied spirits. He lifted bridle leather and gigged with spurs. His horse, Cannon Ball, leaped into action; his clattering hoofs filled canyon and night with wild echoes. Winters looked back at every turn, expecting to see pursuers, but except for him and his speeding horse, Athi-ami-owee was a lonely, deserted road.
* * * *
Doc Bogannon’s saloon had been a busy place all evening. His customers were local citizens, as well as travelers who were stopping over at Goodlett Hotel to await transportation either to Pangborn Gulch or to Elkhorn Pass. Then trade had tapered off, citizens and travelers had departed, some nicely braced, some stewed, and some just ordinary happy.
One visitor remained. He sat alone at a table, where he’d been all evening. Doc Bogannon regarded him as one of those queer fellows who never seemed to play out, but always straggled in on opportunity’s tail-end. Bogie had seen plenty of them, year by year; halfwits, sneaks, mad-dogs, wolves, skunks, hop-toads, blabber-mouths, prophets, apes and war whoopers. He’d even seen a scissors-grinder, a sewing-machine fixer, and a dimwit leading a goose by a string.
But here was something different; a scrawny, undersized gopher, pert and slim. He was clean shaved, well dressed, and had animated eyebrows, that were always lifting, whether he looked up or down. He hadn’t smiled all evening; in fact, he appeared to be pouting about some mild grievance.
Bogie dried a glass and set it back. He eyed his guest curiously. “Service bad, or something?” Eyebrows went up. “I didn’t say so.”
“Truth is,” said Bogie, “you didn’t say anything. I was just afraid I’d hurt your feelings. Have I?”
“I won’t say you have, and I won’t say you haven’t; in very truth, I hadn’t given it a thought.”
“That’s fine,” said Bogie. He studied his guest a moment. Doc Bogannon was big and tall; in appearance more a statesman than a barkeep. At heart he was a philosopher, curious,