The Lawmen by Bill Pronzini & Martin H. Greenberg (eds.)

Author:Bill Pronzini & Martin H. Greenberg (eds.) [Pronzini, Bill & Greenberg, Martin H.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Western Fiction
Publisher: Fawcett Gold Medal
Published: 1984-06-29T23:00:00+00:00

Before turning to the scripting of such TV shows as “Bonanza,” Thomas Thompson wrote some of the most highly acclaimed Western stories and novels of the 1940s and 1960s. His books include Brand of a Man, The Steel Web, and Forbidden Valley; and among his shorter works are two Western Writers of America Spur Award winners for Best Short Story of the Year, “Blood on the Sun “(1964) and this powerful tale of a marshal named Jeff Anderson, “Gun Job” (1963).

Gun Job

Thomas Thompson

He was married in June, and he gave up his job as town marshal the following September, giving himself time to get settled on the little ranch he bought before the snows set in. That first winter was mild, and now, with summer in the air, he walked down the main street of the town and thought of his own calf crop and of his own problems, a fine feeling after fifteen years of thinking of the problems of others. He wasn’t Marshal Jeff Anderson any more. He was Jeff Anderson, private citizen, beholden to no man, and that was the way he wanted it.

He gave the town his quick appraisal, a tall, well-built man who was nearing forty and beginning to think about it, and every building and every alley held a memory for him, some amusing, some tragic. The town had a Sunday morning peacefulness on it, a peacefulness Jeff Anderson had worked for. It hadn’t always been this way. He inhaled deeply, a contented man, and he caught the scent of freshly sprinkled dust that came from the dampened square of street in front of the ice cream parlor. There was a promise of heat in the air and already the thick, warm scent of the tar weed was drifting down from the yellow slopes in back of the town. He kept to the middle of the street, enjoying his freedom, not yet free of old habits, and he headed for the marshal’s office, where the door was closed, the shade drawn.

This was his Sunday morning pleasure, this brief tour of the town that had claimed him so long. It was the same tour he had made every Sunday morning for fifteen years; but now he could enjoy the luxury of knowing he was making it because he wanted to, not because it was his job. A man who had built a bridge or a building could sit back and look at his finished work, remembering the fun and the heartache that had gone into it, but he didn’t need to chip away personally at its rust or take a pot of paint to its scars.

In front of the marshal’s office Anderson paused, remembering it all, not missing it, just remembering; then he turned and pushed open the door, the familiarity of the action momentarily strong on him. The floor was worn and his own boot heels had helped wear it; the desk was scarred and some of those spur marks were as much his own as his own initials would have been.

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