Hombre - Leonard Elmore John - Страница 5

“How much he give you?”

“Ask him,” Russell said.

“I just wondered, that’s all.”

“Ask him,” Russell said again.

Why bother? I thought, and went on making out the list. I put all the names down but the ex-soldier’s because I didn’t know his. I just put down Ex-Soldier and never did change it, even when he came in a couple of minutes later with this canvas bag on his shoulder. He swung it down, bouncing it off the counter, and reached into his coat pocket.

“What’s the fare?”

“I guess you saw Mendez,” I said, and told him how much.

“I don’t know the whyfor,” he said. “But I’m for it.”

He waited while I tore off one of the orange-colored tickets, then another one. “If any stops are open on the way, show this for meals. Drinks are extra. You hand it in when you reach your destination. The other one’s for him.” I nodded to Russell. “You want to hand it to him?”

The ex-soldier looked at the ticket as he walked over to the bench. He was a heavy man and his coat was tight-smooth across the back. I would judge him to have been about thirty-seven or -eight. “I see you’re going to Contention,” he said, handing the ticket to Russell. “I change there for Bisbee. Yesterday I was in the Army. Next week I’m a mining man and the week after I’ll have a wife, one already arranged for and waiting. What do you think of that?”

John Russell pulled the blanket roll toward him as the man sat down, propping his feet on his canvas bag. “You saving your lamp oil?” the ex-soldier said to me.

“I guess we can spare some.” I came around and put a match to the Rochester lamp that hung from the ceiling. Just then I heard the coach and I said, “Here it comes, boys.”

You could hear the jingling, rattling sound coming from the equipment yard next door. Then through the window you could see it-smaller than a Concord and almost completely open with its canvas side-curtains rolled up and fastened-just turning out of the yard, and the next moment the jingling, rattling sound was right out front. Four horses were pulling the mud wagon; two spares were on twenty-foot lines tied to the back end.

The ex-soldier said, “I wouldn’t complain if it was an ore wagon all loaded.”

“It’s mainly just for rainy spells,” I explained. “Sometimes a heavy Concord gets mired down; but three teams can pull a mud wagon through about anything.”

The Mexican boy and his father were both up on the boot. Then Mendez, who must have just crossed the street, was standing there. “Everybody’s going,” he said. Then looked at John Russell. “Your saddle is on the coach. Now I go up and get myself ready.”

I waited till we heard him on the stairs, then told them how I had offered to drive this run, but now that I was a passenger it would be against the rules. “There’s rules about who can ride up with the driver,” I said, looking at John Russell and wondering if he had any ideas. But that was all the farther I got.

The man who came in was wearing range clothes and carrying a saddle which he let go of just inside the door and came on, looking straight at me, but not smiling like he was ready to say something friendly.

He was tall by the time he reached the counter, with that thin, stringy look of a rider and the ching-ching sound of spurs. Even the dust and horse-smell seemed to be still with him, and he reminded you of Lamarr Dean and Early and almost every one of them you ever saw: all made of the same leather and hardly ever smiling unless they were with their own look-alike brothers. Then they were always loud, loud talking and loud laughing. This one had a .44 Colt on his hip and his hat tipped forward with the brim curled almost to a point, the hat loose on his head but seeming to be part of him.

“Frank Braden,” he said. His hands spread out along the edge of the counter.

I said, “Yessir?” as if I still worked for Hatch & Hodges.

“Write it down for that coach out front.”

“That’s a special run.”

“I heard. That’s why I’m going on it.”

I looked down at the four orange cards on the counter, lining them up evenly. “I’m afraid that one’s full-up. Four here and those two. That is all the coach holds.”

“You can get another on,” he said. Telling me, not asking.

“Well, I don’t see how.”

“On top.”

“No one’s allowed to ride with the driver. That’s a company rule. I was just telling these boys here, certain people can ride inside, certain people outside.”

“You say they’re going?” He nodded toward the bench.

“Yessir. Both of them.”

He turned without another word and walked over to John Russell with that soft ching-ing spur sound.

He said, “That boy at the counter said you got a stage ticket.”

John Russell opened his hand on his lap. “This?”

“That’s it. You give it to me and you can take the next stage.”

“I have to take this one,” Russell said.

“No, you want to is all. But it would be better if you waited. You can get drunk tonight. How does that sound?”

“I have to take this one,” John Russell said. “I have to take it and I want to take it.”

“Leave him alone,” the ex-soldier said then. “You come late, you find your own way.”

Frank Braden looked at him. “What did you say?”

“I said why don’t you leave him alone.” His tone changed. All of a sudden it sounded friendlier, more reasonable. “He wants to take this stage, let him take it,” the ex-soldier said.

You heard that ching sound again as Frank Braden shifted around to face the ex-soldier. He stared at him and said, “I guess I’ll use your ticket instead.”

The ex-soldier hadn’t moved, his big hands resting on his knees, his feet still propped on the canvas bag. “You just walk in,” he said, “and take somebody else’s seat?”

Braden’s pointed hat brim moved up and down. “That’s the way it is.”

The ex-soldier glanced at John Russell, then over at me. “Somebody’s pulling a joke on somebody,” he said.

Russell didn’t say anything. He had made a cigarette and now he lit it, looking at Braden as he blew the smoke up in the air.

“You think I come in here to kid?” Braden asked the ex-soldier.

“Look here, this boy is going to Contention,” the ex-soldier explained, “and I’m going to Bisbee to get married after twelve years of Army. We got places to go and no reason to give up our seats.”

“All this we,” Braden said. “I’m talking to you.”

The ex-soldier didn’t know what to say. And, even with his size, he didn’t know what to do with Braden standing over him and not giving an inch. He glanced at John Russell again, then over to me like he’d thought of something. “What kind of a business you run?” he said. “You let a man walk in here and say he’s taking your seat-after paying your fare and all-and the company doesn’t do a thing about it?”

“Maybe I better get Mr. Mendez,” I said. “He’s upstairs.”

“I think he ought to know about this,” the ex-soldier said and started to rise. Braden stepped in closer and the ex-soldier looked up, almost straight up, and you could see then that he was afraid but trying hard not to show it.

“This is our business,” Braden said. “You don’t want somebody else’s nose stuck in.”

The ex-soldier seemed to get his nerve back-I guess because he realized he had to do something-and he said, “We better settle this right now.”

Braden didn’t budge. He said, “Are you wearing a gun?”

“Now wait a minute.”

“If you aren’t,” Braden said, “you better get one.”

“You can’t just threaten a man like that,” the ex-soldier said. “There are witnesses here seeing you threaten me.”

Braden shook his head. “No, they heard you call me a dirty name.”

“I never called you anything.”

“Even if they didn’t hear it,” Braden said, “I did.”

“I never said a word!”

“I’m going to walk out on the street,” Braden said. “If you don’t come out inside a minute, I’ll have to come back in.”