“Must have blown shut,” Carver stated. “There’s a spring lock on it. Wait a minute and I’ll pile into some clothes and let you in. What do you want, anyway, at this time of night?”
“There’s been complaints lodged against you for selling whiskey to the Cherokees,” Freel explained apologetically. “I don’t suppose there’s anything to it but I was ordered to make the arrest. You can clear yourself likely.”
Carver laughed easily.
“Why, man! This is the first time I’ve been here in two months,” he scoffed. “They won’t keep me overnight.”
“I hope not,” said Freel. “It’s the pen if they cinch you—Federal law, you know. I didn’t like the idea of coming after you but I was ordered to do it.”
“I’ll be with you in a minute,” Carver answered cheerfully. “I can explain it easy enough.”
He thumped the bed with the edge of his hand in imitation of a bare foot descending upon the floor.
“Killed while resisting arrest,” he said to himself, his mind working swiftly. “This is just a plain old-fashioned killing. Freel knows I wouldn’t be so simple as to start shooting over being picked up on a fool charge like this. I’d take it more as a joke. He’ll step in to talk it over while Noll pots me from outside. Neighbors hear shots—a regular battle in progress—and later, at the inquest, it transpires that my gun’s been shot empty. They can prove that Cherokees have been buying bottles here, whether I did it or not, and Freel, having heard about it, had come out to investigate. I put up a desperate fight but went down in the smoke—died hard as it were, but real dead. But they wouldn’t do it before I was dressed. That might appear like they’d slaughtered me in my sleep.”
Meanwhile he commented in disjointed fragments to Freel.
“I’ll go on down with you and explain it. It’s a right foolish charge.” He was now fully dressed. “They’ll let me out by to-morrow so it don’t matter any.” And to himself, “After Noll’s first shot there’s two from inside. Neighbors look out into the moonlight. Freel has ducked back outside and they see him prone on the ground shooting into the house. He rushes the open door, calling out to me to surrender in the name of the law, and the neighbors all hear him. There’s sounds of a struggle inside; chairs overturned, and there’s shooting. A regular hell-roaring combat—and me dead on the floor all the time.”