Clifford Simak - Dusty Zebra - And Other Stories

Leather rasped as Carson holstered his gun.

“O.K., Humphrey,” he said. “You win. Law and order, it is. He’ll get a trial.”

“Hell of a lot of good it’ll do him,” the sheriff growled.

A boot prodded him viciously.

“Come on, get up,” someone rasped. “You’re lucky. We’re heaving you in jail.”

Steve hunkered in a corner of the single room that served as the Skull Crossing jail. He glared sourly at the two barred windows which let in some moonlight.

From the opposite corner came the sound of breathing, deep and regular—not of one alone, but of several people. Burns listened carefully, but the breathing rose and fell with monotonous regularity of sleep.

Funny, how sound those hombres can sleep, Burns told himself. Never figured anyone could sleep that good when he was going to be hung. His elbow was sore where the bullet had nicked it back there in the gully and his stomach still was squeamish—but he’d done the thing he’d set out to do. They’d never find Ann now.

Funny how that newspaper hombre had up and saved the beans. If it hadn’t been for that, Burns knew, Carson would have shot him in cold blood out there in the gully.

Burns shook his head. Queer setup. Carson and the sheriff were in cahoots, that much as least was certain. But they had the town buffaloed into thinking they were bringing law and order to Skull Crossing.

Rounding up those cow thieves over there in the corner had been a master stroke that convinced the town on this law and order business and assured the sheriff’s re-election. Fixing up that gallows was another thing. Lots more impressive than a cottonwood. Sort of civilized and fancy. Make the people think justice had finally come to stay.

One of the men stirred in the corner and Burns suddenly realized that the regular breathing had stopped.

“Hey, amigo,” a voice whispered. “What they throw you in for?”

“I shot somebody,” Burns told him.

“Ah, that’s bad,” the voice said. “We only steal the cows and look at us. They hang us for only steal some cows.”

He shuffled out of the darkness and came into the moonlight. Other men followed him, three of them, and squatted down behind him when he stopped in front of Burns.

“Who you shoot?” he asked.

Burns shook his head. “I wouldn’t know. I’m not acquainted here.”

“I hope it was the sheriff.”

“Not the sheriff,” said Burns. “I only hit the sheriff. In the face with a gun.”

“Hear that?” said the man to the other three. “He hit the sheriff, right in his big, fat face.”

“You tell him, Raymond,” said one of the others.

“Shut up!” snapped Raymond.

Raymond hunkered down to face Burns. The moonlight fell across his face and Burns saw that it was dirty and wolfish, a man who would cut your throat when you weren’t looking.

“You want to stay in here?” he asked.

Burns shook his head. “I don’t intend to stay.”

Raymond traced a pattern on the dirt floor with a grimy finger.

“You figure out a way to leave?” he asked.

“Not yet,” said Burns. “I will.”

“How much you give to go?”

Steve’s mouth snapped tight. “I haven’t any money.”

Raymond’s finger retraced the pattern carefully.

“You see some people in town?” he asked.

Burns nodded.

“Man with scar across his face,” said Raymond. “Call himself Gunderson, maybe. Maybe something else.”

“What about him?” asked Burns.

“He get us into this,” snarled Raymond. “He come to us, he say easy pickings here. So we come and we have easy pickings and then one day he leave us and the sheriff come.”

Raymond made a motion with his forefinger across his throat, made a noise like a spurting jugular.

“We think he sell us out,” he said.

“You think he’d still stick around here if he’d sold you out?”

Raymond’s face wrinkled like a worried hound dog’s. “Something funny,” he said. “Something smell. Judge, he won’t let us tell about this man in court. Judge, he won’t let us say a thing. Like maybe judge he know about this man and don’t want us to spill the beans.”

“Red headed man?” asked Burns. “Scar across his face. Finger missing on his left hand.”

“That’s him. That’s him. You know him.”

“He jumped me this afternoon,” said Burns.

“And you? Of course, you kill him?”

“Of course,” said Burns.

Raymond let the breath out of his lungs slowly.

“You hear that?” he asked the other three.

He swung back on Burns.

“Name of Gunderson? You sure?”

“Name of Kagel,” said Burns. “But that doesn’t make any difference. I knew him once before and his name was Taylor.”

“Man of many names,” said Raymond quickly.

“He sure took you for a ride,” Burns told them. “Helped Carson hang it on you. Carson had to find some scapegoat to explain the range terror that he used to drive the ranchers out and so he got Kagel or Gunderson or whatever you want to call him to fix you fellows up as the fall guys.”

Raymond’s eyes narrowed. “Tricked?”

“That’s it,” said Burns. “Carson’s outfit stole and burned and killed and you were blamed for it—they’re hanging you for it.”

Raymond rocked quietly on his toes and laughed softly to himself.

“No, we not hang. We got it all fixed up.”

He rose to his feet. “Come,” he said.

He shuffled toward the other end of the room and Burns followed, trailed by the other three. A packing box stood near one corner and Raymond indicated it.

“Table,” he said. “Play the monte on him.”

He laid hands on the box, grunted, shoved it to one side.

“Look,” he said, pointing.

Burns knelt on the dirt floor, staring. A dark hole gaped up at him. Behind him he heard Raymond chuckling.

“We dig,” said Raymond. “We dig like hell. Use old pie plate. Hide dirt under blankets. Tonight we finish him. Now we go.”

He clapped a friendly hand on Burns’ shoulder.

“You kill the gringo dog. You go, too.”

“A while ago,” said Burns, “you talked of money.”

Raymond spread his hands, embarrassed. “But that was before we know about this gringo. You save us the trouble of finding him and doing what was needed. You leave with us. You ride with us.”

“I leave with you,” said Burns, “but I won’t ride with you. I got other things to do.”

“As you wish,” said Raymond. “I go first. You follow me.”

The tunnel was small—just big enough for a man to squeeze his way, dark and earthy. Slowly Burns worked his way along with clawing hands and kicking boots, thrusting himself along the downward dip, along the level run that passed beneath the walls of the jail, then up, with the stars shining through the opening above him.

Raymond reached down a hand and Burns caught it and was hauled up. The hole emerged a matter of six feet or so beyond the rear of the building, just within the limit of the shadow cast by the moon that now was sliding down the western sky.

Burns squatted on his heels, ears alert, eyes busy with the shadows, while Raymond hovered over the hole, lending help to his three companions.

Getting to their feet the five of them moved into the deeper darkness next to the building.

“We go now,” Raymond said softly. “We get some horses. You sure,” urged Raymond, “that you stay here?”

“I have to stay,” Burns told him. “I got some folks to see.”

Raymond held out his hand. “Adios,” he said.

“Adios,” said Burns, “and look. Lay off the gray horse. He’s mine.”