wants to speed up justice a few days. I imagine we got our hands full. You up to it?”
“I always knew I’d get myself kilt,” he said.
EIGHT
I got a little shut-eye, not half enough, and headed back to the office. They was all there when I knocked and got let in. Three ornery deputies. Rusty, who come over from the wild side a year or so earlier and joined up with me. He was the only one in the lot who was cheerful now and then. And them pals of his, DeGraff and Burtell, both a good piece older than me, tough as barbwire, and the sort never to waste a bullet because they always hit their target the first time. Them three made a bunch, all right, and the county was halfway safe because I had good men standing with me. None was married, and none wanted to be. They all had been drifting cowboys once, selling their skills to ranchers for forty and found.
I was glad to see them together, because we had a little talkin’ to do. Rusty, he poured himself some week-old java from the blue speckled pot, took a sip, and managed to get it down his gullet. The others, they were kinda waiting for me, like they had expected a little talkin’ this afternoon. They were right.
“King Bragg is enjoyin’ his visit?” I asked.
“Last I looked,” said Rusty. “He ain’t taking doom easily, and has gotten to pacing. Not any direction you can go in a ten-foot cage.”
“He should of thought about that before he kilt them T-Bar men,” I said.
I got myself some of that coffee, and it was so bad I spit it out. “Make some fresh one of these weeks,” I snapped.
But them deputies, they just lounged around, staring at me.
“All right. We gotta do some thinking. It’s hard enough for me to do any, so maybe you can do better. There may be trouble coming at us any time. Admiral Bragg’s itching to bust his boy outa here, and we can count on it if I don’t come up with something to spare the boy. He’d like to get aholt of his boy and ship him to California or some ugly place like that, outa my grasp. He’s got his own way of putting some heat on me, and it just riles me up some. Now, he ain’t the only one rubbin’ me sore. Crayfish Ruble’s rannies are getting ready to bust in here and hang King Bragg before the execution. They’ve got word that Admiral Bragg’s putting some heat on me to spring his boy, and they’ve warned me to quit looking; it’s over and the boy’s gonna get his neck in the noose. And the word is, if I don’t quit lookin’, they’re gonna bust in here and have their own necktie party.”
“Both sides?” DeGraff said.
“Both sides. Maybe twenty, thirty men on each ranch.”
“And we’re forted up.” Burtell said. He was sort of smilin’, knowing how bad it really was.
“It ain’t easy for them to bust in,” I said. “This here place is made from quarried sandstone. It’s got a slate roof. There’s big wooden shutters for the windows, and they got a few firing ports in them. We got a few scatterguns in here, just in case they bust the door in and try to rush us. I’d hate to try to break through four ten-gauge loaded with double-aught buckshot.”
“Chimney,” Rusty said.
“That’s a bad one. If we got a fire in the stove, they can plug the chimney and smoke us out. That means, no fires in our stove. We drink cold coffee from now on.”
They didn’t mind it much.
“They’re likely to try to draw us out,” I said. “Trouble out there somewhere. But trouble, lawmen needed, so we rush outa here. I ain’t got much of an answer to that. If there’s trouble, one or more of us gotta go. I’m thinkin’ maybe I’ll stay out of here, and you three guard the prisoner. I’ll do better roaming around.”
Rusty grinned. “You’re jailing us and keeping the best job for your lonesome self.”
I ignored him. “Now we got another possibility. They might try to starve you out. A siege where they got the jail surrounded and hope we run outa food and water. DeGraff, it’ll be your job to keep plenty of water in there, and keep them chamber pots and thunder mugs emptied, and keep some hardtack or crackers or jerky or something in there. Stock up and put it on the county bill.”
DeGraff, he nodded. They had twenty years on me, and I felt some ridiculous, giving ’em orders like that. Still, the sheriff job got dumped on me during a set-to a year or so earlier, and the town was happy with me—so far. No telling how they’d feel if I drove off their best customers.
“There’s more,” I said. “If Admiral Bragg and his bunch rush this place, you let him know he’s putting his boy’s life on the line. I hate that, but if it’s war, they can expect us to do what we gotta do. That won’t work with them Ruble boys, who’d just tell us to hand the boy over.”
“Cotton, that’s not good. Our job’s to protect King Bragg any way we can,” DeGraff said. “That’s the law and that’s justice.”
“You sure are right,” I said, seeing the merit in it. “I’ll back off. We’ll protect that boy as best we can, any way we can. Thanks, DeGraff.”
The man barely nodded. He was as lean as a hungry crow, and had the look of a hawk in his skinny face.
“That do it?” I asked.
“I think we got it covered,” Rusty said. “Ain’t nobody gonna bust in here without paying a price.”
“And I hope they know it,” DeGraff said. “I’ll see how we’re fixed for powder.”
“Good idea,” I said. I was pretty sure we had plenty of cartridges and shotgun shells, but it never hurt to check it all out.
We worked out a schedule that would keep two deputies in there at all times. DeGraff headed out to the pump and jacked some water into a pail, and then filled up the spare. After that he would head for George Waller’s store and get some food that would last and keep a man’s belly at bay. I didn’t want no hungry, thirsty, desperate men in here if the place was under fire.
Three or four men defending a jail against maybe twenty-five. I didn’t like them odds, even if we had got ourselves into good shape. But the thing was, it probably wouldn’t happen. Neither Crayfish Ruble or Admiral Bragg would be as dumb as that. Busting a jail and shooting at sworn peace officers would put them on the wrong side of the law for the rest of their days.
There was still a worry or two, when I got to chewing on it. In a few days a crew would start to put up the gallows in the courtyard square. What if them Bragg men tried to stop it? Tore everything out? Well, I’d deal with it. Maybe a town posse could make sure them timbers rose they way they should. I’d talk to the town merchants about it.
Still, the whole thing made me itchy. This was war, and a good way to win a war was to hit where no one expected to be hit. What had I missed? Where was my weak spot? I sure didn’t know. I wish I had a few more aces in my deck, but I don’t know how to be anyone else, and as far as I could see, I’d got us set up for trouble pretty well. There was a few odds and ends, though. I wanted to make sure that someone in town slipped away to get help from the next county if it came to that. I’d need to talk to some of them merchants, and work up a plan. Puma County was a long way from anywhere at all, at the ass-end of Wyoming, and it’d take three, four days to get a force together to break
