Peter Morgan and Dell Bowen rode back to the 6X6, but Spike Cahill and Bert Roddy stayed in town. Bert was a roly-poly sort of a cowboy, too fat to walk and almost too fat to ride. He had bunked with Ben Leach, and after a few drinks he became tearful.
In fact, the evening was still young when Bert became almost maudlin in his grief. He and Ben had quarreled for over a year, and at times they had almost come to blows; but just now Ben had been his best friend, a model young man, a paragon of all the virtues.
‘My, my, he wash shome feller,’ declared Bert owlishly. ‘Do I mish him? I tell yuh, Spike, it wash jist like tearin’ out my own heart to lose ol’ Bennie. There never wash and never will be another like ol’ Bennie.’
‘Lishen,’ said Spike thickly. ‘You shut up. Nex’ thing you know I’ll be cryin’ with yuh. I don’ wanna cry. Have ’nother drink. Bertie. Na-a-a-a-aw! Not another cry! You damn fool, don’tcha unnerstand English?’
‘I—I feel my losh,’ wailed Bert. ‘Don’tcha know I feel my losh?’
‘He feels his losh,’ explained Spike to the bartender.
‘He feels his liquor, yuh mean,’ said the calloused dispenser of drinks.
‘A great shorrow has come upon me,’ explained Bert. ‘You heard ’bout Bennie Leach, didn’t yuh, bartend’r? Ter’ble! The bes’ man in thish state died t’day, and I mourn him. Hish losh is more than I can bear.’
And Bert Roddy proceeded to cry openly and unafraid. Spike looked at him disgustedly, kicked him a few times, which seemed ineffectual, and then proceeded to have a little cry on his own hook.
‘Go home,’ advised the bartender.
‘Home won’t never be home without Bennie,’ wailed Bert.
‘We ought to do shomethin’,’ said Spike tearfully. ‘That sheriff won’t do nothin’.’
‘Tha’s a good idea,’ agreed Bert. ‘Le’s take the law in our own hands, Schpike. We owe it to poor ol’ Bennie.’
‘You fellers better rattle yore hocks home, before somebody finds yuh loose,’ advised the bartender.
‘That is alsho good advice,’ agreed Bert. He dug in his pocket and took out some money. ‘Gimme a quart, bartender. I’d rather drink alone out of a bottle than to make merry with a crowd at yore bar. Yore face would shour milk. Keep the change.’
‘Hey! You’re two-bits shy, feller.’
‘Hold yore b-b-breath till yuh get it, will yuh?’
They stumbled outside, Bert carrying the quart of liquor, and went to their horses.
‘The ques’n is,’ propounded Spike, ‘what’ll we do?’
‘Sh-shall we flip a coin?’ asked Bert.
‘Tha’s fine. Heads we do—tails we don’t.’
Spike produced a piece of money and threw it in the air. It being quite dark, they had no idea where it fell; so they lighted matches and crawled around in the dust on their hands and knees until Spike happened to find it.
‘It’s heads,’ declared Spike, gathering in the money.
‘We do,’ said Bert solemnly.
‘It’s all shettled,’ agreed Spike. ‘We do, and tha’s all there is to it.’
After several moments they were able to regain their feet.
‘We do,’ declared Bert thickly. ‘Now the ques’n in what do we do?’
‘Ex-actly. What do we do, Bertie?’
‘I dunno. Go home? No, that wasn’t it. Le’s have ’nother drink.’
They drank from the bottle.
‘’F poor old Bennie was only here,’ sighed Spike. ‘He loved to drink from a bottle.’
‘Tha’s it!’ exclaimed Bert. ‘Tha’s what we came for. Don’tcha ’member, Spike? We was goin’ to do shomethin’.’
‘Yessir,’ choked Spike. ‘Le’s go out and shee if we can’t find that murderin’ nester. We’ll lock’m up.’
‘Tha’s the idea. Wait’ll I button my vest around thish danged bottle. We’ll show ’m shomethin’, ol’ par’ner.’
They managed to get on their horses and headed away in the darkness. Both horses wanted to run, and both riders were willing to let them. They were too drunk to realize their danger in going to the nester’s place at night.
There were no lights in the old ranch-house. They fell off their horses at the corral fence, had another drink and tried to formulate a plan of battle. It was very dark out there. Somewhere in the hills a coyote yipped lonesomely.
‘Wha’s the idea now?’ asked Bert drunkenly.
‘Tha’s question.’
Spike Cahill was not feeling just like a fighting man now. He rather wanted to sleep.
‘Let’s turn their horshes loose firs’,’ suggested Bert. ‘Set ’m on foot, eh?’
They went staggering along the corral fence to the old stable, where they had another drink.
‘You stand guard at the door,’ instructed Spike.
‘I’ll guard it, y’betcha,’ agreed Bert. ‘I’m bes’ li’l guard yuh ever sheen.’
The big stable door was unlocked. There was quite a wind blowing, and it was not very warm. Both cowboys were carrying their guns in their hands. Spike opened the big door, swinging it back against the wall, and went inside, while Bert stood just inside the stable, with a cocked gun in his hand, trying to tune his ears to all sounds.
Even in the darkness it did not take Spike long to discover that the stable was empty. He bumped his nose against the side of a stall, and swore drunkenly. And one of his pawing hands came in contact with a set of harness, which obligingly fell off a peg and draped around him.
‘Wha’s goin’ on in there?’ demanded Bert in a sepulchral whisper. ‘Speak, or I’ll sh-shoot.’
‘Shoot if you mus’,’ wailed Spike. ‘I’m helpl’s. Got a breechin’ ’round my neck and a hame in one of my boots.’
He managed to get loose from the harness, and one of his groping hands came in contact with the short ladder which led up to the old loft. Just why he should go up there never occurred to him, but he did.
He tried to straighten up and his head came in contact with the low, sloping roof so hard that he fell on his hands and knees. Just ahead of him was the square opening in the end of the stable, used as a hay-window.
Spike was blinking at the window, when he heard a dull thud, a frightened curse, the sound of a revolver shot. There was only one explanation to Spike. The nesters had discovered Bert Roddy.
‘Well, they’ll have their hands full,’ he declared to himself, and walked out through the hay-window.
It was about twelve feet to the ground and he landed all in a heap. The liquor had made him almost shock-proof, but he realized that a man had jumped on him and was kicking and striking with sickening regularity.
Spike Cahill loved to fight. He had lost his gun, but that was merely incidental. He managed to shake off his assailant long enough to get to his feet, and then they went at it, hammer and tongs.
Down they went again, rolling over and over, kicking, striking and gouging, missing oftener than they landed, unable to see each other. A man was running from the ranch-house, carrying a lantern; but Spike paid no attention to him, until the lantern illuminated both him and his antagonist. Then he looked up at old man Lane, half-dressed, a cocked revolver in his right hand. To Spike it was very like a nightmare. He realized that his opponent had ceased fighting, and he looked down at the bruised face of Bert Roddy, whose eyes were blinking in the lantern light.
‘What seems to be goin’ on here?’ demanded the old man.
‘Thish?’ queried Spike. ‘Oh, thish? Ha, ha, ha!’
‘Yeah, this!’ snapped the old man. ‘What are you two doin’ here in my yard? Ain’t there room at the 6X6 for yuh to fight, without comin’ over here, shootin’ and fightin’, wakin’ everybody up?’
Slowly Spike got up from Bert, who managed to get to his feet. They were both badly bruised.
‘Misser Lane,’ said Spike foolishly, ‘thish is so unexpected. B’lieve me, I dunno what to shay. I’d crave to have yuh put away that gun. We ain’t doin’ nothin’, and we ain’t goin’ to do nothin’.’
‘You’re danged right yuh ain’t. Now, you fellers get on yore horses and head for home. I ought to fill yuh both with lead, I suppose. What in hell were yuh doin’ here, anyway?’
‘Tha’s a question,’ said Spike seriously. ‘B’lieve me, whatever it was—we’re all through.’
‘Ain’t it a fac’?’ agreed Bert. ‘I sholemnly swear that the test’mony I give in this case—’
‘Go home,’ said the old man. ‘You’re both too drunk to do anything. And don’t never come here again.’
‘We won’t,’ promised Spike.
He followed them to their horses and watched them ride away in the darkness, wondering why they had been fighting and especially why they were fighting in his door-yard.
‘What I’d crave t’ know is thish,’ said Bert dismally, as they rode toward Mesa City. ‘What was it all about, and where in hell did you come from? You was inside the stable, wasn’t yuh?’
‘I shore was, Bertram. What I want to know, is what happened to you down there. Didn’t yuh shoot?’
‘Oh, abstively. I—say, I’ve lost my gun!’
‘Same here,’ sadly. ‘What did yuh shoot at?’
‘I dunno. I thought somebody slammed the door shut on me. Anyway, I got knocked down and my gun went off. I got up as quick as I could and shoved the door open, when somebody comes bouncin’ almost into me; so I jist cuts loose and fights f’r m’ life.’
‘That was me,’ dismally. ‘I fell out of the hayloft.’
‘Mebby it was the wind.’
‘What was the wind?’
‘Slammed the door ag’in’ me.’
‘Mebby. Where’s the bottle?’
‘Some’ers; I ain’t got it. We can git more in Mesa.’
‘Aw, I wasn’t thirsty—I wanted to bust it over a rock.’
‘Gittin’ temperance, cowboy?’
‘Gittin’ wise. Man hadn’t ought to drink.’
‘Well, I won’t bear down so hard, Spike. I will say that a man hadn’t ort to do anythin’ else, when he’s drinkin’.’