Free Return of the Outlaw by C. M. Curtis

assassin could achieve. His voice, as always, was low, but the words came out hard and slapped the air. “Havens is gone.”
    “You mean someone unburied him?” asked Stewart, incredulous.
    “He never was buried. The old man tricked us. He just made a pile of rocks.”
    “ Then Havens wasn’t dead,” said Stewart suppressing a rising anxiety. “Where did the tracks lead?”
    “I gotta hand it to the old greaser,” said Fogarty. “He knows how to hide a trail. He led us through the marsh and down the river, then up into the hills across some rocky ground that wouldn’t hold a print, and we lost him.”
    Stewart turned and walked to where Jennings stood, the heat of anger rising to his face; “Sheriff I want Jeff Havens found. He rode in here last night, and for no good reason whatsoever, killed one of my men.” Stewart then related to Jennings a distorted version of what Fogarty had told him.
    “I ’ll need to see the body,” said Jennings, “and talk to the witnesses. Then I’ll ride down to Mexican Town and nose around a little; see what I can find out about this old greaser.”
    After an impassive Jennings had listened to Fogarty ’s own twisted version of what had occurred the previous night, he put on his hat, nodded curtly and stepped out the door. Stewart followed him outside and said, “Sheriff Jennings, your attitude seems a little too casual. This was a cold-blooded killing. A man who’ll do this once will do it again. I’d like to see you put together a posse and go after him in earnest.”
    Jennings rubbed his chin. “Mr. Stewart, a posse is made up of volunteers; usually it takes folks who are mad and want to see somebody hung bad enough to leave their work and do some hard riding to catch him. A lot of people around here seem to think what you’ve got working for you is a bunch of gun slicks. Your men aren’t very popular in town. They ride in, get drunk, pick fights, sometimes insult women. To be honest Mr. Stewart, I doubt if anyone will be too upset to hear one of them got shot. On the other hand, Jeff Havens has lived around here most of his life, though he’s been gone for a few years. He and his grandfather were well liked. It’s true a lot of folks lost respect for him when he jilted Anne Hammond without even so much as a letter good-bye, and people don’t think too highly of the fact that he sold the ranch out from under Amado Lopez before old man Havens’ body was even cold, but I reckon that’s his business and I don’t think it’s enough to make people want to join a posse and hunt him down.”
    Stewart had listened impassively, standing with his arms folded on his chest. But now he sp oke: “War can do bad things to men. I’ve seen it before: they learn how to kill and pretty soon they start enjoying it. Your Jeff Havens is a killer and now he’s shot a man in cold blood. I’m trusting you to do your job, Lloyd.” It was the first time Stewart had used the sheriff’s first name and it was done intentionally.
    Jennings ’ reply was cool; “I always do my job, Mr. Stewart.” 
    Later, after Jennings had left, Fogarty said, “I thought you said he was going to be with us.”
    Stewart smiled. “Rand, you need to go fishing more often. Some fish just have to be played longer than others.”
     
     
    It was not a long ride from town to Two Mile Meadow, but it was long enough for Jennings to think several times of turning around, going back to town, and letting Tom Stewart do his own dirty work. Stewart was an Easterner, and maybe he didn’t know that in the West people were expected to take care of their own problems and the law was expected to look the other way. Even though Jennings was a lawman he saw no dissonance in this philosophy. He would have never even started on this errand had it involved any piece of land other than Two Mile Meadow, but Two Mile Meadow had a special meaning to him. It was the most coveted piece of land on the range, and in his mind it