15 Western Short Stories — page 53: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

THE TEXAS KIND certainly would knock them cold. And when the water rushed through the gap, the three of them would drown. Neat. No bullet holes. Some tres- passers drowned when they didn’t get out of the way of a blast in time. Neat enough for a no-good sheriff and deputy. Especially when these Underwoods had no friends here- abouts. Larribee backed to the end of the wall, dropped suddenly down onto the hillside so there were no Underwoods between him and Pete. Then Larri- bee yelled: “Pete! You horse thief Try me!” Pete blinked in surprise. He’d rec- cenized Larribee earlier...but he didn’t know what all had happened to Larribee since the drifter from Wyo- ming had bought that sorrel. Pete had been uneasy about it these past few minutes—but then Larribee had ap- peared to be solidly on the Smathers team: . Now, as Pete swung his gun hand around toward Larribee, the man from Wyoming brought the .45 out of its holster faster than ever before. The 45 roared. Pete Smathers clutched at his bloody right shoulder and dropped his gun. Pete's shakily aimed bullet plowed into the foliage behind Larribee. Larribee swung his weapon smooth- ly to the left—just as the surveyor dived flat onto the ground and Hank and Jacoby brought their guns out of the holsters. Right now, Larribee de- cided, speed was the upper half of philosophy. He got Hank through the bulky forearm and Jacoby through the shoulder. Their guns went off in er- ratic reflex, but the slugs were far from the target. The surveyor made no try for Larribee at all, having no stomach for gunfighting. Y THAT time the three Under- woods had dived for their weap- ons, and come up with them. Pete was bringing his gun off the ground with his left hand. Underwood shot him through the left shoulder with the .44. Larribee yelled at the trio: “Get off that wall, quick! And don’t ask ques- tions!” He glanced down at the fuse. it had less than a minute to go. 53 Now Larribee gestured to the sur- veyor and Hank and Jacoby with his gun. “All right, you brave groundhogs —get out to the middle of that wall and see how it feels to be blowed to hell!” Hank’s eyes bulged and he gulped. Jacoby went pale and the surveyor, now standing up with his hands raised, went paler. “That's murder!” Hank blubbered. “It'd have been murder for them, too,’ Larribee said. “You have a choice—out to the center or get a slug through each of your bellies!” Neither choice offered any great advantage. But they decided on the dynamite. They edged reluctantly to- ward the center of the wall. Mean- while, Underwood was standing at the north end with one foot on Pete’s neck, and they all were staring at the scene. By now they could hear the burning fuse. Larribee talked fast: “You willing to sell your spread to Underwood lock, stock and brownness—if he writes you a good check and lets you cash it?” “Hell yes! Get us off here, Larri- bee!” Hank was blubbering and wild- eyed with fear. The other two didn't look much happier. “All right.” Larribee turned eyes right, aimed calmly and shot the fuse in two about three feet short of the sticks. The severed section burned to its end and went dead. The three men on the wall were sweating almost as heavily as they were bleeding. Larribee looked at Underwood. “That’s the only way to do it: buy their mangy spread. In wet years you'll have enough water to irrigate at least part of it. Write ‘em a check for a reasonable amount. We herd ’em to town and they cash the check so it’s all legal. Then we take ’em to the sheriff and file a charge of attempted murder. If it doesn’t stick with the sheriff, we'll call in some Rangers... and it'll sure as hell stick with them. That’s because we’re gonna have writ- ten proof about this whole swindle.” He looked at the surveyor. The man’s face went white as a trout’s belly. “What?” “That tidy little document you salt- ed with a friend—in case these twa comicbooks oO CO