Clifton Adams - Gambling Man

Jeff felt an icy finger move up his spine. “How do I know this ain't another lie?”

“You don't,” Somerson said bluntly. “You could find out if you wanted to write the authorities on the Border. But you won't. Because you can see I'm tellin' the truth, can't you?”

Jeff tried to tell himself differently, but he instinctively knew that this was the truth, just as the other had been a lie. His legs felt suddenly weak. “Let's hear the rest of it,” he said quietly.

“It's the simplest thing in the world. Your Pa needs money. It wouldn't help him much in Texas, but in Mexico he can buy himself onto the right side of the law.” Now he grinned again, but this time the expression did not reach as far as his eyes. “With plenty of luck, I'd say your pa has about a month to go before they catch him. Do you know how they execute rebels in Mexico, kid? First, they make you dig your own grave, then they tie your hands and feet and bring in the firing squad. Mexicans are lousy shots, especially the ones they put in firing squads. They shoot you in the gut, if they can, and while you're still yellin' they start shovelin' dirt in—”

“That's enough!” Jeff snarled.

“Makes you squeamish, doesn't it? But that's the way they do it. That's the way it'll happen to Nate, if he doesn't get help. Five thousand dollars, kid. Is it worth that much to save your pa from a Mexican firing squad?”

Jeff felt his insides shrinking. He didn't even have enough to pay for his sleeping room.

Somerson saw that he was winning, and pushed hard. “Plainsville's a lively town these days,” he said. “Farmers bringin' their crops in, a lot of cattle money changin' hands. There's plenty of cash in that bank for a man smart enough to get it—enough to save your pa, kid, and then some.”

Jeff could not think. His brain felt as cold and immovable as stone. “What could I do?” he asked numbly. “Why did you pick me?”

“That's easy, kid.” Somerson picked up the coffee can, poured in a little cool water from his canteen to settle the grounds, then drank from the tin lip. “First, you're Nate Blaine's boy, so I figure you've got the guts for this kind of thing. Next, I'm not afraid you'll do any dangerous talkin'. Finally, and most important, you know the town and everybody there knows you. That's goin' to be important, as you'll see later.”

“What about your friend Fay. Why don't you get him to help you?”

“He will. Here, you'd better have some of this coffee, kid. You look like your nerves could use it.”

It was almost noon when Jeff headed back toward Plainsville. Somerson walked across the weed-grown yard with him to get the claybank. “It has to be on the first of the month,” the outlaw was saying. “Everybody does his bankin' around then, so there should be plenty of cash in the vault. How do you feel?”

“How am I supposed to feel?” Jeff asked bitterly.

Somerson's voice was suddenly a snarl. “You listen to me, kid, and listen good! If you want your pa dead, you just go back to town and forget all about this. But if you want to save Nate's neck, you do as I say!”

When Jeff said nothing, the outlaw grabbed his arm. “You write the Border rangers, if you don't believe what I'm tellin' you about Nate!”

“Get your hand off me.”

Somerson blinked in surprise, then dropped his hand. He could almost believe that Nate himself had spoken. “Sure, kid, I didn't mean to grab. Well, you go back to town and think over what I told you. I'll have Milan Fay contact you when the time is right.”

Jeff swung stiffly to the saddle and said nothing.

Chapter Sixteen

JEFF LEFT THE CLAYBANK in the alley behind Ludlow's store. It had been twenty-four hours since he had slept, his nerves were jumpy, and there was sickness in the pit of his stomach. Through the long ride back he had pondered Somerson's proposition and still had no answer.

Now it was night again, Sunday night and gravely quiet. No pianos, no fiddles, no dancing. Main Street was almost deserted; the cowhands had slept off their drunks, and the dancers had gone home. He could hear the whispered rattle of the wheel of fortune in Bert Surratt's place, and that seemed to be the only sound in the whole town.

Wearily, Jeff loosened the cinch on the claybank, unbitted the animal and tied it to graze behind the store. Where Milan Fay was, he did not know.

He tramped heavily toward the outside stairs that led to the rooms above Ludlow's store. He climbed the stairway and stood for a moment on the landing, looking down at the sleeping town. This, he thought, is where my pa was raised, and where I was born. It's the only place I know.

The thought hung, suspended in his mind. How would it feel to cut yourself away from the only world you knew? Nathan had done it. Somerson was going to do it, and Milan Fay. How did they get along, those men?

Then he thought angrily that all he needed was some sleep. He'd be damned if he'd get sentimental about a town that had done its best to break him.

His spurs rang softly as he walked down the hot hallway; the boards squeaked under the thud of his boot heels. His door was partly open. He shoved it open the rest of the way and saw the tall, lean-faced man lying across his bunk.

“What are you doing here?” he said to Milan Fay.

Obviously Fay had been asleep, but he came awake instantly, flipping over the edge of the bed with the quickness of a cat. In the white starlight, Jeff could see the revolver pointed at his middle. Fay had been sleeping with it in his hand. He recognized Jeff and said, “That's a dangerous thing to do, comin' on a man sudden that way!”

“What are you doing in my room?”

“Can you think of a better place to wait?” Fay said calmly, dropping his Colt's into its holster. “I don't think people know me in this town, but there's no sense takin' chances.” He kept his voice quiet, for the sound of snoring drifted through the thin walls like the drone of bees.

“How long have you been a friend of Somerson's?” Jeff asked curiously.

The man laughed softly. “Didn't he tell you?” Then he sat on the edge of the bed, flipped makings from his shirt pocket and skillfully built a brown-paper cigarette, Mexican style. He looked at Jeff and shrugged, as though he had been by himself for a long time and wanted to talk to someone.

“I've known Somerson off and on for a good spell,” he said easily. “He's a lousy gambler and too fast to get his bile up, but he's as good as the next to team with. I warned him he'd get in trouble usin' a holdout in a town like this.”

“You were here when he shot Costain?” Jeff asked, surprised.

Fay laughed silently. “Sure, but not in Surratt's place. That holdout contraption he had up his sleeve; I told him he'd never get away with it.”

It was a brilliant night, white with the light from moon and stars. Jeff could see the touch of dry amusement on the man's face. Somerson's getting caught at cheating and Costain's getting shot was all a kind of bitter joke to him. Fay held a match to his cigarette and said, “What did you and Somerson decide on, kid?”

“Why did you and Somerson come to Plainsville?” Jeff asked, as though he hadn't heard the question.

“What did Somerson tell you?”

“That my pa was in trouble and had to have money to square himself with the Mexican authorities.”

Fay looked faintly surprised. “It's the truth,” he nodded. “You can check it with the Border rangers, if you want to. I'm kind of surprised that Somerson told you, though. He's against the truth, as a matter of principle.”

“How much do you know about Somerson's plans?”

“First,” Fay said softly, “you tell me what kind of a deal you two struck up. Are you throwin' with us?”