Quiet Town by J. T. Edson Page B

They figgered the Chinese would strip and rob you. That way you’re not able to prove anything. They get much?”
    “Couple of hundred dollars. I’ll go down there—.”
    “You’ll do nothing. I’ll handle it.” With that Dusty left the room, he sent Mark and Rusty to collect the woman and man from the hotel. They were told to search the room and see if they could find the bottle of butyl chloride. Then he called Doc and gave him orders.
    Mark and Rusty returned with a voluble, protesting man and a soberly dressed, pretty woman. By the time they returned Dusty had arranged for clothes for the miner and brought him in.
    “This them, Mike?”
    “Sure!” The miner growled and lunged forward.
    Mark Counter’s arm shot out, thrusting the man back. Dusty snapped, “That’s enough, Mike. Go get something to eat.”
    Slowly the anger left the miner’s face, he knew that Dusty Fog was going to handle this matter. He also knew if he tried to object he was going to wish he never even thought of it. Without a word he left the room, shutting the door behind him.
    “Found this roll of money, two hundred dollars,” Mark said. “We near took the room apart but we didn’t find the butyl.”
    “Then one of them’s got it. Butyl’s hard to come by so they wouldn’t throw it away. We’ll have to search them.”
    The man met Dusty’s eyes, there was triumph in his gaze. The girl, however, moved back, her eyes snapping fire. “You try and search me and I’ll scream this place down.”
    “Reckoned you might at that, ma’am,” Dusty agreed. He saw Doc returning and also saw he’d accomplished his mission. The office door opened and Maggie Bollinger entered, followed by Doc. “Howdy, Mrs. Bollinger. I need a special deputy. Pay’s ten dollars a week. You take on?”
    “Sure,” Maggie looked at the girl and knew what her duties were going to be. “When do I start?”
    “Right now. Take this lady in our room at the back and search her.”
    The young woman started to object but Maggie Bollinger gripped her arm and led her out of the rear door. Dusty took the man and pushed him into the cell lately occupied by the drunks. He searched the man although he knew there was nothing on him. Then from the other room he heard a slap followed by a harder blow and a thud. Leaving the man in the cell Dusty watched the drunks finishing scrubbing the passage floor. Maggie Bollinger came from the room holding a small green bottle, the girl was seated on a bed holding her jaw and crying.
    Dusty went to the rear door and looked out at a small outhouse, a building meant as a grainstore. “Hold the gal here, Maggie. I’m going to get a jail rigged for her.”
    Dusty went back into the office and sent for a carpenter and Cy Bollinger to put bars at the window of the cabin. He then gave the now-sober drunks a warning which they took to heart. On returning to the living quarters, he found Maggie was thinking for herself. Her first prisoner was not in the room, she was scrubbing out her jail.
    Doc Leroy and Rusty Willis managed to hide the admiration they felt at the way Dusty Fog handled every problem which came his way. He appeared to have foreseen and have a solution to whatever came up. They had both expected trouble handling women and neither could have thought out a way to search the girl without laying themselves open to accusations by her. Dusty foresaw this same trouble and met it by bringing in a special deputy who could not only search another woman with impunity but could handle any violent objections to her searching.
    In the days which followed they were to see and marvel still more at the way Dusty Fog handled the town. For a man who claimed that he knew little about being a lawman he made a fair hand at ad libbing his duties. Fights were broken up, the tough men handled by tougher methods. Doc himself inspected a gambling house and his findings closed the place permanently, sending its owner out of town fast. It also served