Killing Time Read online

  The Killing Time

  Paul Lederer writing as Logan Winters

  ONE

  You could tell he was a man by the two legs and two arms, his mouth and nose. Even his protruding red eyes were somewhat human, and someone had dressed him up in man-clothes, no matter how filthy his jeans and torn blue-checked shirt were, so the overall image of John Bass should have led you to believe he was a human being. He was, of course – but his standing there with his mouth half-open showing broken yellow teeth, hunched forward with his thick hands hovering over his holstered Colt revolvers, caused Tom Dyce to wonder what sort of animal he had come up against. Bass didn’t breathe so much as snort in and out through his wide nose; he didn’t so much speak to a man as grunt at him, and the grunts were not pleasant. He seemed to have difficulty saying more than four letters at a time. Bass was big, sweaty and had a sickly smell about him like a dying bison. His face was covered with black pores as if he had taken a blast from a shotgun loaded with pepper full in the face. The hair on his forearms was more like fur than human hair. Outside of that, Dyce supposed, he was probably a friendly, upstanding citizen.

  Tom Dyce was ready to give any man the benefit of the doubt, and would have if Bass hadn’t grunted out his strong desire to shoot Tom Dyce dead.

  Tom Dyce had come to arrest John Bass, but Bass seemed unwilling to go with him, even though he obviously belonged in jail, if not in a pen where people could come to wonder at him and children could be taught lessons in abiding by the law and the importance of hygiene.

  ‘It’s just that you’re not welcome in the town of Rincon,’ Tom Dyce said. ‘The marshal wants me to lock you up while he decides what to do with you, and I have to do what he tells me.’

  ‘Why?’ came the growl.

  ‘It’s how I make my living,’ Tom Dyce said and Bass’s body began shaking with rumbling laughter. When he had quieted, he growled again:

  ‘No. Dyce, it’s how you get dead!’

  People in the saloon began to back off in various directions. They had gathered for the amusement, but lead flying around in the small room was not entertaining. No man in the saloon doubted that Bass would draw. He had proved his willingness to shoot on multiple occasions, most recently the day before when he had gunned down two unarmed Chinese, apparently only because they were available targets.

  That was the incident that had prompted Marshal Joe Adderly to send Tom to the Silver Strike saloon to face Bass. ‘Frankly,’ Adderly had told Dyce in confidence, ‘I don’t care if you shoot John Bass in the back through an open window. Just get him.’

  Tom Dyce considered Adderly’s advice as Bass stood hunched forward, glaring at him with those red eyes. He half-wished he had ambushed the man as the marshal had all but suggested, but even shaggy wild animals deserve a chance.

  ‘Put your guns down,’ Dyce said and the men around him smiled. Even Dyce knew that was no more than a weak joke. Bass wasn’t going to surrender and walk over to the jail. It wasn’t in him to go easily. Dyce was thinking: ‘If it has to come to this, I’ve at least got a better chance in a gunfight than going knuckle and skull with John Bass,’ who could probably tear him apart like a baked chicken.

  ‘Listen, Bass.…’ Tom Dyce tried again, but it was too late for last chances. Even as he opened his mouth to speak he saw one of Bass’s bear-paw hands drop toward his holstered gun. The big man fired and Tom Dyce felt a tug at his belt as a bullet passed his body, missing by only that much.

  ‘Oh, the hell with it,’ Tom muttered. He slipped his own Colt from its holster and fired back. Gunsmoke filled the room now, floating up in black wreaths toward the low ceiling. Bass did not fire a second time. He couldn’t. John Bass was sprawled against the rough floor of the saloon. A few men stepped forward to congratulate Tom on his shooting as he stood over the fallen form of John Bass. When he had entered the saloon, the customers had jeered Dyce. After all, no one wanted to offend the killer, and Bass had been buying the drinks. But the winner is always cheered, and Tom Dyce seemed to have bested John Bass.

  Tom nudged Bass with his toe and it was as if he had prodded a dead man back to life. A hunter himself Tom Dyce should have known better than to assume the grizzly was dead and not just stunned.

  Bass came up on hands and knees and thrust his skull up into Tom’s crotch, doubling Dyce up. Tom Dyce backed away, seeing that his pistol had flown free, as had that of John Bass. And now Bass was on his feet, panting and snorting, stalking Tom across the saloon, his ham-sized fists clenched. Tom glanced around for help, but it was obvious that no one else was willing to risk John Bass’s wrath. Tom backed away, his hands held weakly up, until his back met the wall. He could see the blood on John Bass’s chest, see beyond his shoulders the unperturbed bartender in his white apron, calmly rinsing his glasses while there was a break in serving drinks.

  Bass roared and lunged at Tom Dyce.

  Bass threw a big circling right hand against Tom’s ribs and Tom felt something crack. He had his own fists clenched firmly now that the wave of nausea from being hit in the groin had passed. He tried jabbing, pawing at Bass, feeling like a child. He couldn’t get the space to find the leverage he needed, pinned against the wall as he was. Bass in the meanwhile continued to drive punishing blows with the weight of his massive shoulders behind them. He wasn’t fighting like he was the gun-shot man.

  Tom put his fists in front of his face, ducked and wove trying to avoid the big man’s fists, but if Bass was badly wounded, he didn’t show it. He was relentless, pounding Tom’s body with fists that landed like anvils. Desperately Tom tried kicking his attacker’s shins, stomping on his feet, clawing at his eyes. None of it did much perceptible damage and Bass continued to buffet Tom’s body, occasionally landing a head shot. Tom could feel blood leaking from his ear and dribbling from his nostrils now, and he knew he had no chance if he remained pinned where he was. Their faces were close together. Tom could smell the strong buffalo-scent of the big man, see those bulging eyes which seemed to have no intelligence behind them, see the gaps in Bass’s broken yellow teeth. Bass took half a step back to load up for a finishing shot from his right hand and Tom seized the moment, kicking Bass on the kneecap with all of his remaining strength. When Bass grunted and staggered away just a little, Tom ducked under Bass’s arm and slid aside.

  Bass howled like the wounded animal that he was, and charged in Tom’s new direction. Tom Dyce saw his opportunity. He felt behind him and gripped a chair, and as Bass trudged forward, Tom swept the chair up and then brought it down with all of his remaining strength.

  It was a good chair of solid oak. It did not crack or split, but John Bass did. His fending arm was broken above the wrist and his cheek split in a long, jagged gash above the cheekbone. John Bass went down again.

  ‘Should have shot him again when you had the chance,’ a man said, handing Tom back his Colt. Everyone was suddenly his friend again. Tom took the pistol, turned his head and spat blood.

  ‘Give me some rope, bartender, or a few bar towels – whatever you’ve got.’ He would not let Bass become conscious again with his hands untied. After trussing the big man’s hands, sparing no energy as he tied the knots, Tom took an extra bar towel and wiped his face. His nose continued to bleed, his ribs to ache. He looked around him and saw no one he could trust to help him escort Bass to the jail, so he holstered his revolver and crouched down to try to pick Bass up from the floor. Lifting 250 pounds of dead weight proved to be beyond him just then. As he rose, panting, two men stepped forward, willing to help him that much. They threw Bass over Tom’s shoulder, and he staggered toward the batwing doors of the saloon, the unconscious bear weighing him down. As he left, the drinking men were already at the bar, ordering fresh drinks, the moment’s excitement ended
.

  ‘That’s it, Joe,’ Tom Dyce told Marshal Adderly as he sat in a wooden chair in the lawman’s office. In the cell he could see John Bass, fitfully sleeping, his hands now secured with manacles. ‘I’m quitting the game.’

  ‘Because of one rough night?’ Adderly asked. He was a narrow man with thin reddish hair, not meek, but very careful about the way he approached trouble. That usually involved sending a deputy to do his work.

  ‘Because I can’t see any profit in it,’ Tom groaned, bending over. They had sent for a doctor to see to his ribs and to Bass’s wounds, but they knew that the doctor was a drinking man and might be hard to rouse at this time of night.

  ‘You know, Tom,’ Adderly said in a fatherly tone as he leaned back in his chair, his cupped hands folded together on his lap, ‘I took you in and gave you a chance when you were down and out. You were grateful enough to have the job then.’

  ‘Yes, I know, Joe. When you’re flat broke, fifty dollars a month sounds like fair pay.’ He shook his head and wiped back his dark hair with his fingers. ‘After you have a little silver in your pockets, you start to wonder.’ To wonder if he had become nothing more than a hired gun for a cowardly marshal, Tom thought, but did not say aloud.

  Adderly rose and walked to the cell to glare at the massive form of John Bass. ‘Why didn’t you just finish him off when you had the chance, Tom? It would have saved you a lot of grief.’

  ‘I don’t know. It just didn’t seem sporting,’ Tom said as Joe Adderly returned to perch on a corner of his desk. ‘I never killed anyone in cold blood.’

  ‘I understand, but do you think a man like John Bass is ever going to say to himself, “Gee, Tom Dyce could have killed me but he didn’t. I ought to thank him.” ’

  Tom found enough strength to grin. ‘I don’t suppose so.’

  ‘A man with a badge has to do what he thinks is right, but, Tom, he also has to survive. There’s no wisdom in being a suicidal lawman.’ Adderly stretched his long arms. ‘I suppose I should have gone after Bass myself, but I knew you could handle it. Besides, as you know, I have a wife and two sons to think about. What would they do without me?’

  ‘I don’t hold your sending me over there against you, Joe. Where’s that damned doctor!’ Tom called out as his cracked ribs sent a surge of pain through him.

  ‘He’s probably on the way. What you’re saying about quitting me, Tom … are you sure this isn’t something that might pass in the morning when you’re feeling better?’

  ‘I’ve been thinking about it for a while, Joe.’ Tom shook his head heavily. ‘No, I’ve decided – I have to get out of the business and ride somewhere where I can find work that doesn’t involve blood and killing.’

  Joe Adderly nodded meditatively. ‘I think I know what you mean, Tom. This is a hell of a way to earn a living. Puke and blood and fighting. I think if I were a younger man I might consider quitting myself and just riding off.’ His eyes grew distant, then he yawned. ‘But you know, I’ve got a good deal here, and there is always my wife and two sons to be considered.…’

  ‘I know, Joe,’ Tom said a little snappishly. His ribs were hurting, his head had begun to throb dully. He closed his eyes briefly and thought about going home and sleeping without waiting any longer for the doctor, but he kept his seat. The hotel seemed a long way off. He wasn’t sure he could even make it that far.

  ‘Tom, have you any idea how you’re going to make out after you leave Rincon?’ Marshal Adderly asked, rising to walk to his creaky filing cabinet.

  ‘No, Joe. No, I don’t.’

  ‘Well, a man has to have something in mind,’ Adderly said, slipping a sheet of paper from the cabinet. He returned. ‘This might be something you could get your teeth into.’ He handed the paper to Tom Dyce.

  Tom scanned the Wanted poster – for that was what the paper was – briefly, then shrugged and asked Joe Adderly, ‘What’s this to me?’

  ‘I thought it was something you might be interested in. Look. Tom, where are you planning on riding after you leave Rincon?’

  ‘Back to the Thibido region, I suppose.’

  ‘That’s what I figured. Thibido is near to Flagstaff isn’t it?’

  Tom Dyce rubbed his tired eyes and answered, ‘Not what you’d call near, but Flagstaff is the largest town anywhere close, yes.’

  Marshal Adderly returned to his desk and sat down as if he were finished talking, but a lot was left in the air between them. ‘You never had much luck making a living up on the Thibido, did you, Tom? Else why would you have come down here?’

  ‘I didn’t have much luck,’ Tom agreed, leaning back to hold his arms tightly across his ribs. Adderly had started those old thoughts again. Thoughts of Aurora Tyne, whom he had only just begun to forget. When he had left Tom had harbored hopes of returning to her one day with his pockets full of money. Such is the way of life – he was sitting broken and battered in a shanty town with almost enough money to buy trail provisions on his ride north. ‘What are you thinking of?’ Tom Dyce asked, not sure he wanted to know.

  ‘Vance Wynn – the man on that poster – is reported to be up in the Flagstaff area. If you didn’t read the whole poster, he robbed a bank down in Ruidoso some months back. Made off with a good bit of loot. You know that even if I wanted to, I couldn’t look for him, my responsibility being toward this town.’

  ‘I know,’ Tom answered dully, grateful that Adderly had, for once, not brought up the fact that he had a wife and two sons to worry about.

  ‘Sheriff Harley Griffin out of Ruidoso has been trailing Vance Wynn for a long while. He’s in town right now. But he also has other obligations. It seems there’s a range war looming down there. He’s going back to Ruidoso, giving up on Wynn, who’s far out of his jurisdiction anyway.’

  ‘And so you are suggesting that I go after the man?’ Tom asked in disbelief.

  ‘I’m not suggesting anything,’ Adderly replied with a weak smile. ‘It’s just that there might be a chance in it for you.’

  ‘I’m not a bounty hunter; I’m not going to continue being a lawman.’

  ‘No, Tom,’ Adderly said, holding up a hand. ‘I know that. And just now you’re tired of being beat up and shot at. But say you did happen to run across this Vance Wynn? There’s a good description of him on the poster.’ Tom found himself involuntarily scanning the Wanted notice smoothed on his lap.

  ‘Tom,’ Adderly said, comfortable in his chair again. ‘Don’t you see what else the Wanted poster says. They’re offering two thousand five hundred dollars for Vance Wynn. It’s the biggest reward I’ve ever seen put up. They want him bad in Ruidoso.’

  Tom nodded, his thoughts drifting briefly away again to Thibido, to Aurora Tyne’s smiling face, her dark hair drifting in the mountain breeze.… He shook himself, mentally. ‘I can’t be hunting a man down, Joe. It’s not my line of work. I’ve learned that,’ he said, sparing a glance at the sleeping form of John Bass.

  ‘Maybe when you’re feeling better,’ Joe Adderly said. He rose to answer a tap on the door and let Doctor Sean Leitner in. The physician looked shaky. His white hair was unbrushed. His eyes were reddish and his manner irritable.

  ‘What now, Adderly! I had just fallen asleep.’

  ‘This man is injured,’ Adderly said, nodding at Tom Dyce. ‘And I’ve another in the cell with a gunshot wound and a broken wrist.’

  ‘See to Bass first; I’ll wait,’ Tom said. Now that help was here, it didn’t seem so urgent. He knew for certain that he didn’t want John Bass to succumb to his bullet wound. Any inquiry into the cause of his demise might take days, delaying Tom’s departure, and he meant to be riding north as soon as possible.

  The doctor and the marshal were sparring verbally as Adderly took the key to the cell from the rack behind his desk.

  ‘I don’t suppose this is a cash call,’ Leitner said crossly.

  ‘Prisoners’ injuries are paid for by the town, Sean, you know that.’

  ‘It only takes them a month to p
ay up their bill. Doesn’t anyone realize that doctors, like anyone else, have bills to pay and mouths to feed?’

  ‘Take it up with the mayor,’ Adderly said, unlocking John Bass’s cell.

  ‘What about the other one?’ Leitner demanded, not through with his bickering yet. He nodded toward Tom Dyce. ‘Cash?’

  Adderly’s expression grew impatient. ‘He’s a deputy, Sean. The town pays his doctor bills as well; you know that.’ He turned the brass key in the lock and swung the cell door open. John Bass grunted and moved a little on his cot.

  The doctor hesitated when he saw who it was.

  ‘That’s a dangerous man, Joe. I’ll need you to stand by while I treat him.’

  After some prodding and poking and a lot of bandaging while the marshal stood by, gun in hand, Leitner announced that he was finished with the man. John Bass flopped back on his cot and fell into a drunken sleep again. The doctor came out to see to Tom’s wounds. When he was finished binding Tom’s ribs he gave him some advice.

  ‘You are going to have to spend some time in bed, young man. If a cracked rib breaks free, it can do a lot of damage internally. Just forget about any duties you might have for now.’

  Dismayed, Tom said, ‘I was planning on riding out tomorrow.’

  Jolting around on horseback is probably the worst risk you could take,’ Leitner said, placing a not unfriendly hand on Tom’s bare shoulder. ‘Put off your plans. Whatever they are they can wait a few days. Go home, get some rest. I’ll give you something to ease the pain and help you sleep.’

  The powder the doctor gave him did help Tom’s aching ribs and they did help him to sleep. By midnight he was dead to the world in his hotel room. Unfortunately the medication did nothing to keep him from dreaming, and when he awoke at dawn it was with a lingering dream of the Thibido and Aurora Tyne still in his feverish mind.

  TWO

  Tom Dyce woke up early. He began from force of habit to swing his feet to the floor, but his body resisted. The pain in his ribs was savage in its determination. He could not go back to sleep and so he lay on the thin mattress, watching the morning shadows move across the room as the sun rose higher. Flat on his back, he watched a spider in a corner of the ceiling spin an intricate web. Restlessly he fought sleep and finally embraced it. What else was there to do?