Ernest Haycox - The Greatest Westerns of Ernest Haycox

"Thought maybe I'd be down with my paint bucket?"

The Major raised and lowered his broad shoulders. Unconsciously he exposed the main beam of his career—a career marked by turbulence. "You will never find life up in a hotel room, my boy. It's out there," and he pointed his fist toward the street.

"Shoulder to shoulder, fist to fist," mused Tom. "Play your own hand, ask no favours, ride straight, shoot fast. Keep all obligations."

The Major nodded; a stray beam of light caught his eyes and kindled. "You have learned to express yourself well. Glad to know that. What you have said is all I ever tried to teach you. That you still abide by the code is my greatest pleasure. I had feared you would forget—that you would absorb ideas less worthy of a Southern gentleman. I will not preach—God hates a smooth tongue—but you must see the distinction between sections. The East is settled, it is orderly, it is governed by women's ideas. This is still a man's country. Make no mistake about that."

Tom bent his head. His father had struck to the core of the whole matter; had touched, unwittingly, the fear and the uncertainty within him. For he had departed from Texas with one set of ideas; in a quieter and more staid Eastern land he had discovered another. They set a value on human life there, they guarded it with jealous laws. Softness, his father called it—and softness it might be. This country to which he returned was a prodigal land, and five years had almost made an alien of him. What would he do when the time came for him to choose between codes?

His father's summary phrases recalled him. "We roll out in the morning. This will be your last night on a bed."

He shook his head. "Might as well sleep on the ground tonight." He moved to his Gladstone and took out a roll of clothes. Stripping off his suit he got into an ancient wool shirt, faded trousers, boots, vest, and a battered felt hat. It was the apparel he had worn out of Texas five years before. The Major, recognizing this, blew a great blast of air from his nose.

"Saved 'em, I see. Small for you now." Then he moved forward and unbuckled his revolver belt, holding it out to his son with an ill-concealed pride. "You'll be needing this again. It is your old gun. Brought it up for you."

Tom strapped the harness around him; his fingers touched the cold butt, and again he had the fleeting and unpleasant sensation of being alien. It seemed impossible he once had cherished the weapon with a fiery affection and shot pecan nuts off the trees in practice. He wondered suddenly whether he had lost the trick of swinging low and making a moving shield of his pony while firing under the animal's neck. Once he had been like an Indian.

He laid his new suit on the bed, smiling a little. "The next man may need it. I never will. Now, when I round up a maverick we'll be ready to travel."

The hallway resounded with some kind of a cry, the door flew open, and a burly young giant, larger than either of the Gillettes, rolled into the room shaking a shining yellow head. He was a pink and roly-poly Hercules, irrepressible and drunk. The love of life shone on his round, bold face, and exuberance babbled off his tongue. "Ha—wassis, Deerslayer? Dam' awful liquor ever I drank! What a night! Tom, my rebel, now I know what made you such a screamin' savage. Whooey! Drop that gun, Jack Cade, or I'll pierce you with a needle! What was that song you taught me?

"But the dirty little coward that shot Mister Howard

Laid poor Jesse in his grave."

"Sad—awful sad." Then, seeing Major Bob standing immovable in his path he drew up and regained a measure of gravity. "Let's see. I haven't got to the double-sight stage yet, so you must be the old man. Pater, in other words. Well, you certainly sired a tough piece of beefsteak for a son. I'm delighted. Maybe you don't know it yet, but you've hired another cow hand. Love cows. Lord, yes! Love 'em still more if I could get another drink down without fryin' the linin' of my stomach. How, Pontiac, announce me!"

Tom Gillette nodded. "It's the Blond Giant," he explained to the elder Gillette. "True name is Claude Lispenard. Blondy, this is my father, Major Robert Gillette."

"Don't hold the first name against me," adjured the Blond Giant. His big hand struck the Major across one shoulder. It was fraternally meant, but Major Bob straightened like a ramrod. It was not the custom of the country to be over friendly at first, and the Major had all the Western dislike for loose-tongued liberties. His steely silence further sobered the Blond Giant. He stood his place, hands dangling helplessly.

"A friend of yours, Tom?" inquired Major Bob.

"One of my best," replied Tom. "But in certain respects he is as weak as water. I have brought him west to buck him up." And with the bluntness of long acquaintance he added, "He's made God's own fool of himself. Three months on the trail is the cure."

The Major extended his hand. "A friend of my son is a friend of mine. You are welcome to a place with us."

The Blond Giant took the hand somewhat sheepishly. Tom broke the silence. "Get your possibles. We are going to camp."

Lispenard found his bag, the meanwhile looking to his friend. "Not taking yours?"

Tom Gillette shook his head. "I'll never need it again. We pack our stuff inside the blanket roll."

"Well," grumbled the Blond Giant, "I'll stick to my Gladstone. Be some time before I can go without soap and water or part my hair with thumb and forefinger."

The Major thrust a single glance at his son—a somewhat grim glance—and he led the way out. Passing into the street, Tom pointed toward a saloon. "We'll christen the occasion, sir." Lispenard muttered a small oath and followed the Gillettes into the place. Together they elbowed to the bar and ordered drinks.

The place roared. Smoke eddied up from the crowd and hung like a storm signal against the ceiling. The gaming tables were crowded, chips rattled; a piano strove to carry its thin melody above the racket, and lights flashed brilliantly on the tinselled costumes of the girls. One of them was singing, and toward her the crowd restlessly eddied—cowboy and buffalo hunter, railroad hand, desperado and trapper. Lispenard's animation revived at the sight of it, and he lifted his glass with the Gillettes. "I give you Westerners credit. You do it well—dam' well."

Tom spoke across the rim of his pony. "The prodigal returns, sir."

Major Bob studied the red fluid. And it could only have been his relief that caused him to speak as he did.

"My boy, I didn't know whether I would find a son this night or not. I think I have. We will drink to the Circle G."

The screaming of a woman cut through the turmoil like a knife. Men swayed and backed against the walls. Tables went down, and across the smoky lane thus formed another tragedy of Dodge marched to its swift climax. Lispenard dropped his glass and gripped the bar. "My God!"

Two men faced each other, each bent, each weaving; their features seemed out of proportion. White teeth gleamed against an olive skin, sweat beaded across a narrow forehead, glistening like crystals. Somebody's breath rose and fell asthmatically. There was a grunted word and another swift and slashing word—and in the light the opposing duellists seemed to blur and merge. Again a scream shrilled throughout the house, striking Tom Gillette's heart cold. It rose to an unearthly pitch, then was drowned by the echo of a gun thundering and crashing against the four walls. Nobody moved, nobody seemed to breathe. But presently the man of the olive skin hiccoughed and fell. The lane began to close; through it the victor fought his way, hatless, wild of eye, waving his gun. In a moment he had passed out of the place, and the drumming of his pony's hoofs beat down the street and grew faint. Bedlam rose, like air rushing into a vacuum.