News bears wings in a hamlet. It seems indeed if it be ill news to have a telepathic quality of transmission. Robin made his request matter-of-factly. Buying a Colt revolver was probably as common a transaction as buying a hat. But the clerk shook his head.
“Sorry,” he said, “but we can’t do it.”
Robin pointed to a row of weapons protruding from a shelf.
“You got ’em for sale,” said he. “My money’s as good as anybody’s. You take it for tobacco and clothes. Why not for a .45 and some ammunition?”
“Sorry,” the man repeated. “I can’t. I got orders.”
Robin cast his eyes about the store. In the rear by the bookkeeper’s high desk Adam Sutherland sat smoking a cigar. Beyond him there was a figure Robin knew. He turned on his heel and walked out.
“The deck’s stacked against me,” he said a little bitterly to Matthews. “If I could get my hands on a gun I’d settle it quick, win, lose, or draw. He’s forced it on me even if it looks like I’m makin’ the play. I got to go through with it, and why not now?”
“Come over here and sit down a spell,” Tex replied. “I got somethin’ to say, myself.”
He led the way to a pile of ties beside the spur track that served Sutherland’s store. They sat down. Before them Big Sandy spread its limited area, two or three dozen buildings on a bald flat, dwellings surrounded by yards guiltless of tree or shrub, the unpainted walls bleached to the drab gray of the sagebrush that flowed in an unrippled wave to the edge of the town. The only spot of color was the bit of green lawn about Adam Sutherland’s white cottage. The cow horses dozed on three legs in a row on the dusty street. Here and there a man moved about his business. Beyond the town the Bear Paws loomed against the sky line, a purple mass with white tufts of cloud hovering about the high conical peaks.
“Advice in a case like this is about as welcome as ice cream in January,” Matthews broke silence. “Just the same I got to pass some along. Maybe I won’t tell you nothin’ you don’t know. First off, you got no license to tangle with Mark Steele. You know what I mean.”