2 Gun Western, May 1957 — page 78: what you’re looking at

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

78 full-blown maturity in the short time he’d been gone. Across the white lin- en of the table her beauty struck him anew in the low-shouldered gown she wore, and he was again conscious of his own rough clothing, the three-day growth of black beard along his jaw. He heard Griffith’s laugh as his eyes went about the room. “Been a lot of changes, Will,” the big man said, “in the last two years. More than you see on the surface, here, too.” Will Bowman grinned wryly. “I guess you know I was counting ona few changes, Jack,” he said. And again, fleetingly, Will saw the man’s seriousness. “There may be a few things you won't like.” A frown started between Will’s eyes, but the girl’s hand came across to his own as she spoke. “Lou Durant didn’t die, Will. He’s still in town.” “Didn’t die?” Question was there in his mind then, and he was remember- ing another day like the one outside now, when he’d faced Lou Durant and two of his lean-eyed gunmen and had seen them all spread their length in the mud before he’d ridden from the town. “But that means...” “That you’re not wanted by the law, Will.” The girl’s eyes were shin- ing. “You'll have no charges to face. The other two men were wanted for murder and robbery. We thought you'd hear, thought you’d be back before this.” The two years were there, the thir- ty-a-month-and, the _ purposeless, shifting, marking-of-time. Jack Griffith coughed. “Some of the rest is not so good, Will,” he said slowly. “The ranch, for instance...” E bee RANCH. Now it was here, the look, the calculation he had seen in the man’s face there on the stair. “What about the ranch, Jack?” Will’s voice was drawn. “Well, the way things stand right now, I don’t think it’d be wise to turn it over to you again.” The man’s eyes were on the fork in his hand. “Not right away, that is.” Here it was, then. It was like this. Anger and sudden suspicion brought color up beneath Will's face. “You're 2-GUN WESTERN not forgetting who’s who around here are you, Jack?” he asked quietly. “Please, Will.” The girl’s eyes were round. “It’s Lou. He’s still got that note of your father’s.” Will noticed that she no longer referred to the dead man as.“Dad,” as she always had since old Ben had adopted her, years before. “You know he can legally at- tach anything that’s in your name as long as he has that note.” “Legally!” Will Bowman snorted. “Legally,” Jack Griffith repeated. “The word means a lot more than it used to around Junction City, Will.” His voice lowered. “Look around, for instance. Notice who’s come in since we have?” And Will was noticing then, seeing old Ezra Winthrop and his wife at a corner table, Sim Tully and his, Bert Johnson, Tack Lewis and Reed Holbrook about the dining room. These men were all farmers, nesters, from the bottoms along the San Ju- anitos. And in the cattle country that this had been, Will never remem- bered seeing one of these men in the dining room of the Union Hotel— even before this new note of pros- perity had blossomed out. The Union had always been cattlemen’s head- quarters and bare board tables had seemed good enough then. He frowned at Griffith. “Things kind of grew up while you were gone, Will.” The man expand- ed as though Junction City’s new look of prosperity and civilization had been of his doing alone. “And the people have changed according- ly. You won’t find one man out of ten carrying a gin any more.” Will was conscious of the weight of the forty-four he'd hitched back as he sat down. “Yes sir, since the rail- road’s come through and the cattle- men and nesters decided to give each other a break and let the law handle their disputes like sensible men in- stead of gun crazy fools, the San Juan Valley’s become a pretty re- spectable place to live.” Wee FELT annoyance run through him. “I kind of had the idea that’s what I was aiming for when Lou Durant forced. my hand CONNICIOOKS com