Oakley Hall - Warlock

Inside, grunting a little now with his burden, Blaisedell moved with heavy steps toward the first faro layout. Men scrambled out of his way, and the dealer and the case keeper retreated. He laid Morgan on the layout amid the chips and counters, and the silver. He straightened Morgan’s legs and folded his hands upon his muddy chest, and he stood for a long time in the intense and crowded silence staring down at Morgan. Then he glanced slowly around at the men who watched him, his eyes slanting from face to face white-rimmed like those of a frightened stallion: toward Skinner, Hasty, French, and Bacon, who stood nearby; toward the miners at the bar; toward the sheriff and Judge Holloway, who sat at a table with a whisky bottle between them, the sheriff staring at nothing in frozen concentration, the judge leaning forward with his forehead resting in his hands. Blaisedell glanced up at the sweaty-faced lookout sitting stiffly with his hands held rigid six inches above the shotgun laid across his chair arms.

He took a handkerchief from his pocket and gently brushed the dust from Morgan’s face; then he covered the face with the handkerchief and said to the lookout in a jarring voice, “Watch him.” His bootheels scuffed loudly as he moved toward the bar. The men edged away before him so that by the time he reached it he had a twenty-foot expanse to himself. He put his hands down flat on the bar. “Whisky,” he said, staring into the looking-glass opposite him.

One of the barkeepers brought him a bottle and a glass, and retreated as though on wheels. Blaisedell poured a glassful, raised it and said, “How?” He drank and set the glass down with a sharp clatter.

The sound only intensified the silence. Faces peered in the batwing doors, and men close to the doors began silently to edge toward them, and outside. Those beyond Blaisedell remained in rigid attitudes. Skinner, French, Hasty, and Bacon quietly seated themselves at a table near the judge and the sheriff. A chair scraped and Blaisedell looked around; again his white-rimmed, swollen eyes swung from face to face. They fixed themselves finally upon Taliaferro, who stood down at the far end of the bar, and Taliaferro’s mole-spotted dark face turned yellow.

With a slow, hunched motion Blaisedell turned toward him. “Taliaferro!” he said.

Taliaferro screamed, raised his hands high above his head, turned, and fled back through his office doorway as Blaisedell’s hand slapped to his side. But he did not draw.

Peter Bacon crossed his hands on the table before him, staring down at them; Pike Skinner was gazing fixedly at Morgan lying on the faro layout with the handkerchief over his face. “Oh my sweet God damn!” the sheriff said, almost inaudibly, his lips barely moving with it. “Don’t anybody cross him, for God almighty’s sake!”

“Oh Lord, deliver us from evil,” the judge said suddenly, loudly, in a drunken voice, and the sheriff flinched.

Blaisedell glanced once at the judge, and then turned back to the bar. “How?” he said, as though to himself; he straightened, staring at his dark reflection in the glass. With a slow, deliberate motion he drew his Colt. The explosion jerked the men around him like puppets on strings; one of the miners cried out shrilly, and the bartenders ducked behind the bar. Sound rocked and echoed through the Lucky Dollar, and, in the smoke, the mirror opposite Blaisedell dissolved into a spider web of cracks. A long shard of glass tipped out and fell, and others crashed down in brittle breakage.

The lookout stood gazing straight ahead of him at nothing, with his hands held out before him like a piano player’s. The barkeepers raised their heads. The sheriff rose from his chair and, moving like a sleepwalker, slowly and carefully walked toward the batwing doors, and then, in a rush, fought his way through the men there and outside. Blaisedell stood facing the shattered mirror obscured in gun-smoke still. He thrust the gold-handled six-shooter into its scabbard, grasped the whisky bottle by the neck, and swung around.

He moved back to the layout where Morgan lay. He walked around it, putting the bottle down beside Morgan’s head, and stood staring at the men beyond with his swollen eyes in his battered, striped face. No one moved. White-faced, they avoided his gaze, and one another’s. He turned toward the judge.

“Say something.”

The judge drew his arms in closer to his body, hunching his shoulders, his wrists crossed and his hands held flat against his chest; his head sagged lower.

Blaisedell’s mustache twisted contemptuously. He turned back to the others. “Say something.”

Peter Bacon looked steadily back at him. Hasty was cleaning his fingernails with minute attention. Tim French, with his back to Blaisedell, stared at Bacon, plucking at his lower lip. Pike Skinner, his ugly, great-eared face flushed beet-red, said, “I guess he would’ve killed somebody. He broke Mosbie’s arm for him. He was after trouble. He—”

“What’s Mosbie worth?”

“He was out to kill somebody, Marshal,” Hasty said. “He—”

“Kill who? You?”

“Might’ve been me, I guess,” Hasty said, uncomfortably.

“What are you worth?”

Hasty said nothing. French turned slightly, carefully, to glance up at Blaisedell.

“Oh Lord, deliver us!” the judge said.

The whites of Blaisedell’s eyes flashed again, his teeth showed briefly beneath his mustache. He hooked his thumb in his shell belt. “Was it what you wanted?” he said to French.

French did not reply.

“What you wanted?” he said to Bacon.

“I guess I never much want to see a man killed, Marshal,” Bacon said.

“You are talking to your friends here, Marshal,” Skinner said.

“I have got no friends!” Blaisedell’s breath leaked steadily, noisily through his half-parted lips. “Don’t look at me like that!” he said suddenly.

Peter Bacon, to whom he had spoken, leaned back a little in his chair. His wrinkled face was grayish under the dark tan, his washed blue eyes remained fixed on Blaisedell. Then he rose.

“I’ll be going,” he said, in a shaky voice. “I don’t much like seeing this.” He started for the door.

“Come back here,” Blaisedell said.

“I guess I won’t,” Bacon said. His face turned toward Blaisedell as Blaisedell drew the gold-handled Colt, but he said, “I’d never be afraid to turn my back on you, Marshal.” He went on outside.

“You’ve got no cause to turn mean against us here, Marshal,” Pike Skinner said.

“I’ve got cause,” Blaisedell said. It was almost dark in the Lucky Dollar now, and his face looked phosphorescent in the dim light. “Judge me,” he said. “You judged him. Judge me now.” He swung toward Judge Holloway. “Judge me,” he said, in the jarring voice.

“What will you do?” the judge cried suddenly. “Kill us all for your pain?” He pulled himself upright, trying to fit his crutch beneath his armpit. With a swift movement Blaisedell skipped forward and kicked the crutch loose. The judge fell heavily, crying out. Blaisedell snatched up the crutch and flung it toward the batwing doors. It fell and slid with a clatter.

“I’ve had too much of you!” Blaisedell said. “Crawl for it. Crawl past him, that was a man and not all talk!”

Pike Skinner got to his feet, and Tim French half rose; Blaisedell swung toward them. The judge crawled, awkwardly, sobbing with fear; he crawled past the faro layout, reached the crutch, and pushed it toward the bar, where he pulled himself up, and, sobbing and panting, swung out through the louvre doors. It was silent again. Blaisedell went back to stand beside Morgan’s body. He took off his hat and brushed a hand uncertainly over his pale hair. He pointed a finger at one of the barkeepers.