Free Andromeda Gun by John Boyd Page B

breakfast and walked over to the sheriff’s office. Following the sound of snores, he found Sheriff Faust asleep in a jail cell at the rear of the building.
    Ian reached down and shook the man awake. Faust opened his eyes, raised himself on one elbow, and asked, “Huh?”
    “Winchester sent me over to get deputized. You’re looking at your new deputy.”
    Faust listened, lay back, and spoke with his eyes closed, “Go take an inventory of the armory, then look over the wanted posters on my desk. File them according to real name, not alias, and try to memorize the descriptions. Soon as I wake up, I’ll swear you in.”
    Faust resumed snoring.
    Ian walked forward between twin rows of cells, four cells on each side with one bunk to the cell, and his mind continued to attack the problem he was not yet committed to solving. If he were to build the road for Shoshone Flats, a jail housing eight men would not be big enough for the twelve or fourteen men he would need on the work gang, unless some of the prisoners slept on the floor.
    Ian looked into the armory, an upright cupboard without a lock. On a side shelf was a box of shells for a sawed-off shotgun, the only modern piece in the gun rack. There was a muzzle loading flintlock without rifling in the barrel such as he had first been issued when he joined the C. S. Army and a chain with sixteen leg irons which had probably been used for transporting slave coffles before the war. He took the padlock from the coffle chain, tested the hasp, and locked the armory, dropping the key in his pocket. He decided to keep the cupboard locked. The shotgun would be immobilized for Tuesday’s operation, and the rest of the equipment might be of value to a museum.
    Piled high on a corner of the sheriff’s desk, the wanted posters were covered with dust, the bottom ones yellowed with age. Sheriff Faust had not looked at the circulars for years, but Ian was interested in the law’s comments on his friends. He riffled through the top layer and tossed three of the first ten posters into the wastebasket. They were badly in need of updating.
    Billy the Kid had been killed by Pat Garrett down in Mexico, Joe Burke lay in the Tombstone, Arizona, boothill. Ian himself had killed Frank Casper in Mexico, when Frank paid Ian’s favorite girl an extra peso for her services. Casper’s death was not officially known since the rurales were lax about records; but it would become officially known as soon as Ian was deputized, so he tossed Casper into the wastebasket.
    In the second segment he lifted from the pile, he found one he tore up in a sudden spasm of anger.
WANTED—$50 REWARD
    Ian McCleod, alias Johnny Loco. Gray eyes, sandy hair, medium weight, medium height, medium build. This man’s nondescript appearance makes him hard to identify. The alias, Loco, was given to him because in playing poker he always draws to an inside straight. Wanted for questioning in several petty thefts and for the murder of his accomplice, Jesus Garcia, a Mexican vagrant.
    The poster went as far wrong as it could go. His last name was not spelled right, and he was called Loco because he killed any man who fooled around with his women. Colonel Blicket, with the sergeant, had killed Hey You Garcia—his first name was not spelled right either—and their holdup of a cavalry train guarding the Army payroll had not been petty theft. After the heist and before they split—Ian to decoy the horse soldiers up a draw—Hey You reckoned the pouch he carried contained over $6,000 in greenbacks.
    The colonel had taken Ian’s cash and the law his credit.
    Ian was still riled when he came across a poster which charged him with greater anger.
$5,000 REWARD—DEAD OR ALIVE
    Jasper Blicket, alias the Colonel, alias Rawhead. Wanted for murder, robbery, horse theft, arson, rape and pillage. Approximately 6′6″ tall. Weighs about 170. Very skinny. Completely bald. Black eyes sunk deep in sockets. Teeth shows when he grins. Former