Butler's Wager

CHAPTER 51

Jim Masterson listened to Butler’s story—the same one he’d told Neal Brown, with no deviation. Masterson listened while quietly sipping his beer and when Butler was finished he said, “We sure are drinkin’ a lot of beer for breakfast since you came to town.”

“Really?” Butler asked. “I thought since you owned a saloon that would be kind of…common.”

“No,” Masterson said, “I’m more used to eggs.” He put his beer down, only half finished. “Probably time for you to leave town.”

“Why’s everybody telling me that?” Butler wondered.

“You’ve got enough problems of your own without getting’ involved in ours,” Masterson said.

“I can make my own decisions, Jim,” Butler said. “Besides, there’s still some money to be made, here.”

“The way I hear it you’re doin’ all right,” Brown said.

“I could do better.”

Masterson scratched his jaw.

“You had Thompson out there backin’ your play?” he asked.

“All he did was keep it fair.”

“But he’ll watch your back?” Brown asked.

“Surprisingly, yeah.”

“Well,” Masterson said, “you couldn’t have anyone better—according to Bat, Ben’s the best man he ever saw with a gun.”

“Bat Masterson said that?” Butler asked.

“Yes, he did,” Masterson said. “I don’t know that I agree, but he’s still a good man to have on your side.”

“We agree on that,” Butler said. “Ben says he thinks this town is about to erupt.”

“He’s a pretty damn good judge of the situation, if you ask me,” Neal Brown said. “I think Peacock and Updegraff are gonna try to kill Jim outright, any day now.”

“I don’t think they have the gumption for that,” Masterson said.

“I think you’re wrong, Jim,” Brown said, “but I guess we’ll have to wait and see who’s right.”

“I got some work to do in the back,” Masterson said. “I’ll see you gents later.”

As Masterson went into his office Brown said, “I’ll have to stick around him, I think.”

“I think you’re right,” Butler said. “Neal, what do you think about sending for Bat?”

“I’d be for it,” Brown said, right away, “but I’d never do it.”

“Why not?”

“Well, even if it kept Jim alive, our friendship would probably be over. He’d be mad as hell at anyone who did that.”

“I see.”

“Thinkin’ about it?” Brown asked.

“No,” Butler said after a second, “I can honestly say I’m not thinking about doing it, at all.”

Butler left Brown at the Lady Gay and walked over to Hank’s café. He found the man in the kitchen, cooking.

“Thought you ought to know,” he told him. “Ryerson’s dead.”

“Who killed him?”

“I did. He came after me first.”

“First?”

“Said he had a list,” Butler said. “I was first, Corbin was on it, and there was a third man.”

Hank took a deep breath.

“He didn’t say who the third man was?”

“No.”

“You think it was me?”

“No way for me to know that.”

“Who’s Corbin?”

“Just a gambler, made a mistake a while back, got a small price put on his head. Ryerson had a memory for that sort of thing.”

“If that was true, then he probably remembered me, eventually,” Hank said. “He’d have to have a helluva memory, though. It’s been awhile.”

“Doesn’t matter now,” Butler said. “He’s dead.”

“Better for everyone, I guess,” Hank said. “You hungry?”

Butler shook his head.

“I had breakfast,” he said. “Might come back for lunch, though.”

“That’d be okay,” Hank said. “Thanks for bringin’ me the word.”

“Sure.”

After Butler left Hank tossed a look over at the trunk where his gun was. The leather of the holster was getting old, even though he oiled it. The gun was in good working order, but after all these years, was he? Maybe he wouldn’t have to find out.

When Butler got back to Front Street he ran into M. J. Healy, who was hurrying along and stopped short when she saw him.

“Well, thank you very much,” she said, although her demeanor was not a very angry one.

“What’d I do?”

“It’s what you didn’t do,” she said. “I had to hear it from someone else that you were involved in a shooting this morning.”

Butler shrugged.

“I didn’t think it was big news.”

“That you shot and killed a bounty hunter on the street?”

“In a fair fight.”

“Okay,” she said, “but who was he? What was he doing in town? And how did it come to be you who shot him?”

“All very good questions.”

“And will you answer any of them?”

He thought a moment.

“I don’t want my name in the paper again,” he said finally.

“Did you read the interview?”

He hadn’t. The paper was still in his room, unopened.

“The man’s name was Kevin Ryerson,” he said. “He was a bounty hunter. I don’t know who he was here for, but he forced me into a confrontation for some reason.”

“And you’re not wanted by the law?”

“I’m not.”

“No wanted posters out on you?”

“No,” Butler said. “You can ask the marshal. I understand he was checking on that.”

“Maybe I will,” she said.

“Don’t be so mad,” he told her. “There was nothing that happened this morning that’s going to get you to San Francisco any faster.”

“So are you a gunman now?” she asked. “I thought you were just a gambler. Are you another Ben Thompson?”

“Definitely not another Thompson,” Butler said. “I’m not a gunman. The bounty hunter just wasn’t as fast with a gun as he thought he was.”

“Well,” she said, “that was good for you.”

“Yes, it was.”

“Why didn’t the marshal step in and stop it? Or the sheriff?”

“I can’t answer those questions,” he said. “I don’t even know who your new sheriff is.”

She was breathing as fast, or looking as agitated as she had been. And she’d never really been angry. Just frustrated.

“Look,” he said, “I promise you, if I kill anybody else you’ll be the first to know.”

“That’s not funny,” she said, then added, “but all right.”

They stood there facing each other for a few seconds, and then he said, “Well.”

“Yes,” she said, “I have to get back to work. You’re, uh, not leaving town because of this, are you?”

“No,” he said, “not leaving town.”

“Well, good, maybe we can…talk later.”

He smiled at the fact that she had suddenly become very shy.

“I’ll come over and see you.”

“That would be nice.”

She turned and walked away. He watched her for a block, then went his own way.