2-Gun Western, November 1955 — page 62: what you’re looking at

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

62 2-GUN WESTERN look and see what your cards and bul- lets have done.” Reluctantly, Lew Hatton went to the door and stood there watching as a buckboard and team tooled into the thick dust of Banville’s main street. The younger woman held the reins; her mother sat beside her, head bowed in crushing grief. Looking at the dark face of the gambler, Ed Lane thought for a moment he saw a shadow there— a hint of self-disgust, or regret for ir- revocable wrong done. “T didn’t know,” Hatton said, slow- ly. “I didn’t know about them—” The marshal only grunted, but he put a lot of meaning into it. Riding beside the buckboard was the man who had gone out to tell Kel- sey’s widow and daughter the news. He happened to glance in the direc- tion of the marshal’s office now as they rode abreast of it, and caught sight of Hatton standing in the door. At once he leaned and spoke to the women in the buckboard, and both lifted their heads and stared at the gambler. There was loathing in their eyes. And Hatton, his face like stone, met their glances squarely, bearing the brunt of their scorn. He was familiar with the painted girls of saloon and honkytonk; he was not prepared for the loveliness he saw now, as the face of Tom Kelsey’s daughter was turned to him. Somehow, it tightened his throat for an instant. And then the buckboard had passed on down the rutted street, leaving Hatton staring after it from the door- way. Behind him, the marshal asked quietly, “Sort of proud of your pro- fession right now, Hatton?” The gambler jerked around in sud- den anger, “That killing wasn’t my fault,” he retorted, hotly. “Kelsey picked the fight, didn’t he?” Lane said nothing; only looked at Hatton as-he dragged another puff of smoke out of his pipe. But the gam- bler knew suddenly, as well as though it had been put in words, what the other was thinking. IS FACE darkened with resent- ment. “All right, say it!” he grit- ted. “Cards and liquor and gunplay—I stand for those things, and it was those things that ruined Tom Kelsey and finally killed him, That’s what you mean, isn’t it?” The marshal calmly tamped out his pipe. “You said it pretty well,” he muttered. “An’ I reckon the Kelseys see it the same way.” He stuffed the briar in the pocket of his coat. “Well, remember this, Hatton! Honest cards or not—if I ever get the chance to buck Spade Pierce and close out that damn Red Rooster place of his, Ill close you out with it!” — -Hot with rage, Lew Hatton turned his back and strode out of the mar- shal’s office. Lane had struck very close, with those few terse words. The pride of a gambler, and his anger at being looked on as a pariah, were sud- denly very high and strong in him, But what the lawman had said troubled him, too, the more he let his thoughts work on it. And there was something else. Two women in a buckboard, looking crushed and alone as they drove through Banville’s dusty street. A face, young and proud and sadly beautiful.... He passed the saloon owner, Spade Pierce, almost without seeing him. But then, without knowing exactly why he did it, he turned on his heel | and came back a step along the plank sidewalk, stopping the fat man. “Just a second, Pierce,” he said. “I want to talk to you.” The narrow eyes bored into his; the cigar wheeled as the other said, “Yeah?” “About the notes Kelsey signed for you. Now that he’s dead, I suppose you're going to go easy on those, aren't you?” Pierce studied him coldly. “What’s it to you?” he demanded. Hatton was asking the same ques- tion of himself, He said, “Nothing, I reckon. But I was just thinking of his widow—” “And the gal, huh?” There was al- most an evil sort of humor lurking far back in the saloon man’s piggish eyes as he said that. He took the soggy butt of the cigar out of his mouth, spat on the sidewalk. “Well,” he said, sur- prisingly, “you can forget about the notes. I’ve torn ’em up already.” Hatton hadn’t expected that. He’d thought it might take some persuad- COMIC DOO;KS.EO©