Adam Steele 42 by George G. Gilman

Author:George G. Gilman
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: wild west, elmore leonard, american west, zane grey, louis lamour, the old west, james reasoner, westerns ebooks, piccadilly publishing westerns, edge the loner
Publisher: Piccadilly

Chapter Nine

HARRY KRIM SHOT a helpless glance toward Steele as the Virginian half carried Fallows across the saloon and out through the batwings. And Steele nodded his understanding of the man’s predicament. He had a business to run and protect.

Only briefly did the Virginian reflect that it had been his intention not to mix in other people’s troubles while he left his own business to take care of itself.

Just Joel Shumaker and Hannah Wynter were in sight out on the square: arms around each other’s waists as they strolled toward the rooming house. But Steele could sense eyes watching him through many of the windows that looked silently out upon the sunlit scene as the day neared noon. And it was natural, of course that the citizens of Providence should be anxiously eager to discover the outcome of the latest disturbance in the saloon. Which had ended with the emergence of the laughing gunslinger and the painted woman.

Then it was possible to detect gasps from many throats as the Virginian and the lawman were recognized: Fallows obviously injured and able to stay on his feet only with the help of Steele. Two men known to be antagonistic to each other.

But Steele gave no sign he was aware of being watched as he concentrated upon supporting Fallows, across in front of the now quiet newspaper office building to the sheriff’s office.

As he pushed open the door and half dragged the lawman inside, he heard other sounds of the town coming to life. More doors opening and closing; voices raised above the level of whispers; children, immune to the concerns of their elders, yelling, laughing and catcalling as they spilled out of the schoolhouse for the midday break. Perhaps set free of the classroom a little earlier than usual, for Lavinia Attwood would be as eager as anyone else to learn what had happened at the Golden Gate.

Strangely, the inside of the sheriff’s office did not seem to smell so strongly of the fresh paint that had been applied since the time the building was set on fire and a man died. But maybe this was because it was masked by the stink of beer and blood and the sweat of high tension that emanated from Len Fallows.

The office had also been refurnished since the fire. But nothing had been changed in the cell section which took up a third of the building’s floor area beyond a wall of bars. There were the same three cots in there, along with three buckets. Even the walls had not been repainted and still carried the blackened scars of the fire. For the law-and-order budget in Providence was not generous and few people ever got locked up in the town’s jail. And those that did, it was ordained, did not merit more than the bare necessities.

The barred door was not locked and Steele hooked it open with a foot, hauled the almost totally exhausted, heavily breathing lawman inside and spread him out on his back on the center cot.

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