Saddle and Ride. Ernest Haycox

Hillhouse. "Wait and see."

      "I'm waitin'—and I'm seein'," murmured Hack, quite seriously. He put his elbows on the table, a handsome young man, a man impatient and unconforming and disbelieving. "And this is what I'm seein', Charley. Ben Herendeen and Gurd Grant and Lige White will get tough. They'll figure to clear up the hills, their own way. You know how that ends, Charley? The sheep and the goats. Everybody on their side is sheep. Everybody else is goats. No questions and no answers. Just bang!" He stretched his long finger outward and cocked his thumb, making an imaginary shot. "They'll figure to scare hell out of every stray rider. But they won't, my boy. They'll just make fellows like me damned good and mad—and then the trouble starts."

      "If it was your beef you'd see it our way," repeated Charley Hillhouse.

      Hack Breathitt had his moments of wisdom; he had his far thoughts. "There's two kinds of people in this world, Charley. Those that have got beef—and those that have got none. People that stick and people that drift. The Lord made you and me different. It ain't my fault and it ain't your fault. But I like my way—and no man can make me change."

      "Ben's got nothing against you," said Charley Hillhouse.

      Hack Breathitt showed Hillhouse a smart, dark expression. "When folks get heated up, Charley, there ain't no halfway. It's one thing or the other. The sheep or the goats." He poured himself a second drink. "You know what I'm thinkin', boys? I'm thinkin' that this is probably the last time us three will sit at the same table."

      "Don't talk like that," said Charley Hillhouse.

      But both of them were watching Clay Morgan, who sat silent all this while, buried in his own thinking. He had always been the silent one, the last one to speak. He said, very quiet with his words, "I want you to know this, Hack. If you ever get in trouble, come to me. I'll stand behind you."

      Charley Hillhouse shook his head, bothered by Morgan's words. "I knew you'd say that, Clay, but I wish you hadn't. Makes it tough on me. Long as I work for Three Pines, I'll let nothing get between me and the ranch. Nothing at all." He met Hack Breathitt's glance and quietly added: "Don't come to me, Hack."

      "See?" murmured Hack, and then was smiling at them with a little regret and a little of his old malice showing. "Well, we've had fun."

      That was all. These three rose and crossed the room, pushing through the doors. Ben Herendeen remained under the locust trees, with Lige White and Gurd Grant and a group of Three Pines riders. Sheriff Nickum was also there, coat hung loosely to his gaunt frame. Jesse Rusey, farther down the street, watched this crowd; and on him Clay Morgan put his glance for a moment. Charley Hillhouse went across the dust to join Herendeen. Janet turned out of McGarrah's store, advancing toward Morgan. Her little shoulders showed straight in the sunless light, her small feet made a quick tapping on the sidewalk boards. She said:—

      "We are having supper with Ann McGarrah, Daddy." Her soft smile held its secret again, her eyes showed it. "Didn't I tell you?"

      Hack Breathitt removed his hat. "How, honey."

      "How, Hack."

      Hack said: "Come along with a gentleman."

      Janet put her hand in Hack Breathitt's fist and walked away with him. Hack Breathitt pushed his hat far back on his head and began speaking confidentially of a sidehill gouger he had recently seen.

      "Did he have a kink in his tail?" asked Janet, who liked to be fooled.

      Morgan laid his shoulders against the wall of the saloon and freshened his cigar with a match. The group remained beneath the locust trees, Herendeen and Lige White now talking together while the rest remained silent. A good many people had come to the street, scattered under the board awnings. All of them, he noticed, were watching the courthouse. Tension crawled up the street, strong enough to touch Morgan's nerves. Jesse Rusey never moved from his position as he, too, watched the courthouse door. A stage stood by the Mountain House hotel, ready to go. At the stable, Parr Gentry sat on a capsized barrel, lumped over and apparently disinterested, but Morgan saw the way the man's eyes traveled around. Hack Breathitt and Janet were crossing the dust to Tanner's drugstore, and at this moment Ollie Jacks, freed by the jury's verdict, stepped from the courthouse, looked to either end of the street, and halted.

      There had been some talk along the street. It died out as quickly as if a gust of wind, rushing between these buildings, drew all sound away. A pair of men walked from the saloon and stood near Morgan, one of them whispering, "Watch this, Bill." Herendeen swung his big body from the locust tree. The crowd around him shifted, each man wheeling on his heels, until everybody faced Ollie Jacks. Suddenly, for some reason of his own. Jesse Rusey left his position at the mouth of Stage Street, passed Herendeen's group and stopped at the edge of the post office, not far from Ollie Jacks.

      This shifting and turning was what Clay Morgan saw, this and the taut shape of Ollie Jacks before the courthouse. He was a wiry man with the drawn, blank face of a gambler; he was a man who had been caught stealing beef and now, by the act of the jury, was free to ride out. His horse was in Gentry's stable, fifty feet from where he stood, yet this was as far as he got, this rooted position before the courthouse with Jesse Rusey on one side of him and Herendeen's group watching him from the other, and with all the town looking on. At that moment he knew what Clay Morgan and every soul in town knew: he knew he was a dead man.

      THE THIN CHANCE

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      This was the way Ollie Jacks faced the town, narrow-shaped and thoroughly still, his glance taking in all that was to be seen. He showed no expression during that small interval, nothing marred the smooth blankness of his wiry cheeks. Yet Clay Morgan knew what lay behind that mask—the shocking fear, the wild clawing of desperation, the scheming and the hoping, the fatal insight; and though Morgan had never liked the man he had his stir of admiration and pity. This was showdown for a fellow who had gambled his life; now in the showdown, with all his luck running out, he wasn't breaking.

      During this time two other bits of side-play caught Clay Morgan's attention—Rusey's change of position and the sudden appearance of Pete Borders at the corner of the Mountain House hotel. By all the rules of the book Borders had less security in this town than Ollie Jacks, for Borders was known as a rustler far more ambitious than Jacks had ever been. Jacks was a weak man caught by a daring he wasn't big enough to carry off, whereas Borders was the kind to make his audacity stick and now to appear here, contemptuous of them all.

      The long silence held on, as though everybody waited for something to come. Ollie Jacks reached at his shirt pocket and produced his tobacco. He put his head down while he rolled the cigarette, the brim of his hat shading his eyes, and he was thinking, Clay Morgan knew, of each last thin chance he had. Morgan watched the man's fingers roll the cigarette back and forth until the paper began to crush and the tobacco to spill. There was a growing sharpness to Jacks's shoulder-points until at last, when Jacks could no longer endure it, he dropped the cigarette and pulled up his head and showed this town the gray bitter color of his face. His glance struck into the street, point by point; he looked at Herendeen, at Rusey, at Gentry's stable, and at last he looked straight to Clay Morgan. His shoulders dropped and he seemed to let a great breath out of him; and, still staring at Morgan, he came across the dust.

      "Clay," he said, "I never did you no wrong, did I?"

      "Not that I know of."

      Sweat ran its oil-shine across Ollie Jacks's face; his lips were small and sharp and his eyes—not eyes that any man could trust—clung to Morgan. "No," he said, "I never did you any wrong. I never set foot on an inch of your range in my life. That's something, ain't it? I'm not lyin'. The jury gave me a break, but I know what all this means. All I want is a chance to ride out of this town."

      Morgan slowly turned the cigar in his mouth. The weight of the town was on him; all the eyes of Herendeen's crowd had swung to him. He saw the way Charley Hillhouse slowly shook his head, signaling him to keep out of it. He watched Jesse Rusey make a half-turn to more accurately face him. Hack