“It don’t make Blaisedell one.”

“Maybe it don’t.”

“A man has got a right to a friend,” Bacon said.

“Why, what if it does make Blaisedell one?” Mosbie said, in his heavy, rasping voice. “What he is here for is against sons of bitches, and maybe a man has got to be one himself to make it. A real son of a bitch that shot Ben Nicholson loose from his boots and chased those wild Texas men out of Fort James till they are running yet, I hear — that’s the kind we need here bad.”

The judge folded his hands over his belly and turned his muddy-looking eyes to watch Schroeder plucking at the star on his vest. Milky dust drifted into the jail as riders passed in the street.

“Five hundred dollars a month, I hear the Citizens’ Committee is paying him,” Parsons said. “Five hundred, and what’s Carl here—”

“Four hundred, God damn it!” Skinner broke in. “By God, how the talk in this town makes everything something it isn’t. Old man, you’d set yourself where he sets for four hundred a month?”

Tim French, who worked at the Feed and Grain Barn, squeezed inside past Skinner. He had a round, cheerful, bright-eyed face, like a boy’s. “Heard the news, Carl?”

Schroeder nodded tightly, and, with the same slow, careful movement, tipped his chair back again. “Heard it. Some fellow named McQuown’s coming in.”

There was a silence. Then French said, “Saw Bud Gannon down the street. I thought he was over at Rincon.”

“Come back,” Schroeder said. “Just came in an hour ago.”

“Expect McQuown figures he needs all the help he can get,” Mosbie said. “Pleasant to see Abe with the nerves.”

“If Bud Gannon’s any shakes of a gunhand I never heard anything about it,” Skinner said scornfully.

“Johnny’s all right,” Schroeder said. “I don’t care he’s Billy’s brother or whose. He quit them down there.”

“Come back, though,” Parsons said, grinning sourly.

“He got laid off over at Rincon,” Bacon said.

“I wait and see,” Parsons said. “Looks like he come back at the right time for McQuown.” He grunted and said, “I wait and see on Blaisedell, too. Maybe he’s no son of a bitch, but all I’ve seen so far is him hanging over a faro layout or whisky-drinking with Morgan. Or buggy-riding Miss Jessie Marlow. He—”

He broke off, for the judge was speaking. “Any man,” the judge said, and paused for their attention. “Any man,” he went on, “who has got himself set over others and don’t have any responsibility to something bigger than him, is a son of a bitch.” He stared from face to face, his cheek twisting around the great wart, his mouth drawn out flat and contemptuous. “Bigger than all men,” he said, “which is the law.”

Then he looked at Schroeder again. “And those the same that take the law for a fraud. For the law is for all, not just against some you hate their livers.”

Schroeder had flushed, but he said without heat, “Can’t see everybody’s livers from where I sit, Judge.”

“See just toward San Pablo from where you sit,” the Judge said. “So where is the law?”

“In a book, Judge,” Tim French said gravely.

“Never been a man yet to know what it was he swore when he put on that badge,” the judge said. “Maybe you thought you swore blood on Abe McQuown and his people, Deputy. But that wasn’t what you swore.”

The front legs of Schroeder’s chair tapped to the floor; his hand, where it still clutched a bar of the cell door beside him, was white with strain. In the easy voice he said, “Judge, I went up to Sheriff Keller and told him I’d come in here because Bill Canning got run and not a man to stand up for him. I come in here against Abe McQuown and people getting run or else burnt down by sons of bitches like him and Cade and Benner and Billy Gannon and Curley Burne. That’s what I swore to, and your law for Warlock’s in a book still, the way Tim said, if you don’t like it.” Then he laughed a little and said, “Though I have kind of got this ice water in my bowels right now.”

The others silently avoided his eyes, except for Peter Bacon, who was watching his friend steadily. Bacon said, “I guess you could leave things up to Blaisedell, Horse.”

“None of your put-in, Carl,” Tim French said.

“Never said it was,” Schroeder said. “Only—” He was silent for a time, and the others stirred nervously. He drew a long breath and said, “Only if they run him. If they run him and think they are going to whoop this town like they did before.” He paused again and his face stiffened. “I guess that’d be my put-in. I guess you’d say I was looking the right way if I took that for my put-in, wouldn’t you, Judge?”

The judge moved his head in what might have been a nod, but he didn’t speak. Skinner said, in an embarrassed, too-loud voice, “Well, now, I expect you can count on Clay Blaisedell not running, Carl.”

“There was Texas men tried to run him out of Fort James,” French said. “I expect maybe Abe is going to bust a few teeth on Blaisedell, and choke on them too.”

“I just wait and see,” Parsons said.

“Every man is waiting to see, Owen,” Bacon said.

“Well, Blaisedell looks a decent one to me,” Mosbie said. “Don’t look to be holding himself above a man, being what he is and all. I expect he will make out tonight. I expect he will make a fine marshal here, and Carl an easy job out of it.”

Schroeder’s lips twitched beneath his colorless mustache as he glanced up at the names of predecessors scratched in the whitewash. The judge was shaking his head.

“No,” the judge said. “Not an easy job for Carl if he does his job. No, and not enough for Blaisedell to look decent either. For he has set himself to kill men and judge men to kill. And the Citizens’ Committee has.” He glared up at Skinner as Skinner started to interrupt. “No, not enough!” he said.

“Blow!” Skinner said. “By God, you are on the Citizens’ Committee the same as me. It seems like you could go along with what the rest of us decided had to be done or shut up about it. Blaisedell isn’t costing you nothing.”

“He costs me,” the judge said hoarsely.

“You damned drunken old fraud!” Skinner cried. “Nobody ever got any money out of you for anything yet but whisky. I am sick of your damned blowing! You are no more judge than I am, anyhow!”

“On acceptance,” the judge said. He looked flustered. Clumsily he opened the table drawer against his belly, took out a bottle of whisky and started to pry the cork out with his thumbnail. Then, as he saw the others all watching him, he changed his mind and only set the bottle down before him. “On acceptance only, in this law-forsaken place,” he said.

Tim French said suddenly, “Well, I will sure say this, Carl. How you ought to let Blaisedell take on what he is paid good money for. It is his showdown tonight and none of yours.”

“Surely,” Schroeder said.

Mosbie, his dark face flushing more darkly, said, “There is others but you have come hard against McQuown now, Carl.”

“Not a man here that isn’t with you,” Pike Skinner said heavily. “Me included. And not a man here that won’t back off when it comes time to scratch, I guess. That has been proved on us hard.”

No one spoke. The judge sat staring at the whisky bottle before him.

“But with you all the same,” Skinner said. He slapped his hat against his leg and turned to leave, but stopped.

“Got a help-wanted sign outside there,” Schroeder said, with an edge to his voice. “Keller says I can have another deputy in here, can I hire one.”

Skinner grunted explosively and flung on outside. His heels hammered away on the boardwalk. Owen Parsons rose and stretched, and Peter Bacon bent forward to sweep up his shavings. His face hidden, he said, “People have been shamed, Horse. I expect next time a man needs help, there’ll be help.”

“Uh-huh,” Schroeder said. His mustache twitched again, but his voice still held the bitter edge. “There’ll maybe be help, but I haven’t heard much about anybody offering it to Blaisedell tonight. That might need it bad.” He rubbed his hand over his mouth. “Me included,” he said.