Doctor Who_ The Gunfighters - Donald Cotton [39]
‘Only man in the territory low enough to shoot an unarmed bar-keep, I’d say. Open and shut case,’ Ringo continued. ‘Moreover, I heard he was in here last night, lookin’ fer trouble, like always; which jest about clinches it, don’t it?’
‘Then where is he now? He must be apprehended at once!’
‘Seems like he’s done taken off on his law-dodgin’
travels once more. Anxious to avoid his just retribution,’
he clarified. ‘Come to think of it, I heard tell he was keepin’ company with a couple of high-steppin’ saloon gals. Ain’t it the truth, how such women’ll drag a man to damnation?’
‘ Two, do you say?’ enquired the Doctor, quivering with moral outrage.
‘Two,’ confirmed Ringo. ‘The man is a monster of lewdness and debauchery, an insatiable satyr, who will brook no restraint on his vile appetites!’
Some prod-nose, Cicero probably, had once applied these terms of opprobrium to Julius Caesar, he recollected; and he had always fancied they would come in useful one day.
But Steven’s mind had pounced on what it suspected was more than a coincidence.
‘Two?’ he enquired, in his turn. ‘You don’t happen to know their names, do you?’
‘Well now,’ pondered Ringo – or appeared to ponder.
‘Give me a moment, an’ maybe I’ll come up with something... Why, sure – seems like one of ’em goes under the name of Kate Elder...’
‘Holliday’s receptionist!’ the Doctor remembered.
‘Receptionist? Well, I’ve heard as she does kinda keep open house...’
‘But the other one?’ urged Steven. ‘What was her name?’
‘Hold on, there – let me see... Somethin’ with a flavour of frenchified dressin’ to it... Why, a Miss Dodo Dupont, I do believe!’
The time travellers reeled in consternation! This was all they needed: Dodo on the lam, with a wanted killer, and a bar-room floozie! The morning, which had tip-toed in with all the happy panache of a State Funeral, was bidding fair to remain roughly on course...
‘Oh God!’ exclaimed Steven. ‘There’s nothing for it –
we’ll just have to go and find them!’
‘You don’t say? Forgive me askin’, but this here Gallic flibbertigibbet’s a close friend o’ yours, maybe?’
‘Yes, dammit!’ admitted Steven. ‘Confound her innocent, artless little ways!’
Ringo felt much the same about Kate and thought he understood. So he expressed friendly and sympathetic interest.
‘So, if you find ’em, friends, what are you fixin’ to do?
Figure on gunnin’ Holliday down, is that it?’
‘Certainly not!’ said the Doctor. ‘He is my dentist. But it is essential that we get Dodo back; and so we shall... we shall just have to reason with him to that effect...’
‘Now that I’d truly like to see! Because, seein’ as we talk the same dead language, I’ll tell you folks somethin’...
Seems like you an’ me’s got common cause against Holliday... Same like we’re bound to have against all forces of ignorance an’ oppression, the world over! So now, jest supposin’, young feller, I was to let you ride with me?’
‘You mean, you know where they are?’ interrupted Steven.
‘Reckon I can maybe calculate same. The Doc generally leaves a trail like a herd of waltzing caribou when he’s pushed!’
‘Then we should be extremely grateful for your assistance,’ said the Doctor.
Ringo smiled like a scar. ‘Proud to be of service! There’s jest one thing: kindred spirits as we may be, you get yourself between me an’ him, boy, an’ I’ll blast you down, soon as spit at you! Remember that?’
Steven promised he’d bear it in mind. And it was further arranged that the Doctor would be more gainfully employed by staying where he damn’ well was for once; because it might not be a bad idea, at that, if he was to tell Wyatt Earp of the march of events.
And so this is how it came about, that shortly thereafter, a passing vulture observed Two-gun Steven Regret, Terror of the Spaceways, in company with his new partner, Johnny Ringo, Death’s understudy and master of the Latin tag, swallowing Holliday’s dust on the trail to Purgatory Bend.
The vulture followed along. After all, you never knew...
20
Thought for Feud
After their departure, the Doctor trudged glumly