Spacepaw by Gordon R. Dickson Page B

the trip back again in time for the fight the next day. No ordinary person, as I say. But in those days I was in pretty good shape, what with one thing and another. And I didn’t hesitate for a minute. I just took off.”
    “But your grandmother—” Flat Fingers was attempting again, when More Jam smoothly interrupted him once more.
    “—Wasn’t dead at all as it turned out, of course,” said More Jam, his eyes still fixed on Bill’s. “As folks around here know, she lived to be a hundred and ten. It was just some kind of a rumor that this stranger had picked up and passed on. And of course, it was so dark out when he told me that I didn’t know what he looked like. So I was never able to find him again.”
    “Good thing for him I bet!” muttered Flat Fingers. “So you went all the way home and didn’t get back in time for the fight? Was that it, More Jam?”
    “Not exactly,” said More Jam. “As I say, I was in pretty good shape in those days. I turned right around when I found out the truth, and headed back toward the foothills. And I made it back, too. I got back to Shale River Ford just as dawn was breaking. But you know, when I hit the door of the Inn, I sort of collapsed. I just fell down and passed out. It was plain for one and all to see that after a round trip like that, I was in no condition to fight.”
    “True enough,” said the Hill Bluffer, with an expert traveler’s judiciousness.
    “So that’s why you didn’t fight One Man?” interposed Flat Fingers.
    “Well … yes, and no,” said More Jam mildly. “You see a funny thing had happened to him, too—I found out after I woke up. Just as One Man was heading back to the Inn, himself, the night before, after talking to me—I told you how dark it was out—”
    “You told us,” put in Flat Fingers.
    “Well, dark out as it was,” said More Jam, “One Man didn’t see this hole in the ground. And he stepped right into it and twisted his ankle. Broke it, I think, although it was kind of hard to tell; his legs were so muscley. Of course,” added More Jam, deprecatingly, with a glance at Flat Fingers and the Bluffer, “nobody was about to call One Man a liar if he said he thought his ankle was broken.”
    “Ha!” snorted the Bluffer. “That’s right enough!”
    “And, of course,” added More Jam mildly, “nobody would think of doubting my word that I’d actually had somebody come up to me in the dark who I couldn’t see, and tell me a false rumor about my grandmother being dead.”
    “I’d like to see them try it!” growled Flat Fingers. “That’d be something to see!”
    “So, one way and another,” wound up More Jam, his gaze returning to Bill, “neither One Man nor I was fit to have that fight after all. And the way it worked out, we never did meet again. Though I hear he’s still alive, up there in the mountains.”
    “He sure is,” said the Hill Bluffer. “Says he’s all worn out now and decrepit! Him—decrepit!” The Bluffer snorted again, disbelievingly.
    “You shouldn’t jump to conclusions though, Postman,” put in More Jam, almost primly. “You young men in the prime of life, you don’t know what it’s like when your bones start creaking and groaning. Why, some people might even look at me and think I might have as much of a shadow of my own old strength left. But I tell you, if it wasn’t for my daughter’s cooking—and my stomach’s so delicate nowdays I can’t handle anything else—I’d have been dead long ago. You may not believe One Man’s being cut down by age, but an old hulk like me knows better.”
    The Bluffer muttered something, but not loudly enough, or in a tone disbelieving enough, to emerge as obvious challenge to the innkeeper’s statement.
    “But there you have it, Pick-and-Shovel,” said More Jam sadly, turning back to Bill. “That story of mine, of how I had my chance at One Man and then missed out on it—through no fault of my own—has been preying on my mind for