Gun Play at Cross Creek by Bill Dugan Page B

that, just as the playwright knows where the fault lies. But he didn’t know how to do it right. He had broken a life, two lives, three, and there was no way to fix them. Two had mended on their own, like badly set bones. The leg would never again move as it was meant to, the arm never quite bend the way God had intended, but they worked. His own fracture, though, had never set at all. He could hear the scraping of unknit splinters of bone with every gesture. His was a life that had been so completely shattered that it could never be set right.
    That was the one incontrovertible fact that he had overlooked. Now, Katie’s home, the one he had hoped to build with his own hands so long ago, receding behind him as he rode over the crest of the first hill, he realized that nothing could ever undo what he had done. He didn’t want to accept it, refused to accept it, but he knew it was true.
    Still, he kept telling himself, there must be some atonement, some way to make things better than they had been. He had not allowed himself to expect anything, thinking only that he owed a debt that he was finally willing and able to pay. But it hadn’t worked out that way. Thinking merely to soothe an old wound, he had succeeded only in reopening it.
    But maybe that was a good thing, he thought. Maybe he had let out a little poison. Maybe there was still reason to hope. All he really wanted now was to go somewhere and stand up to his waist in cold, clear water and pull out a trout, a big, arching rainbow, and flip it onto the sand. With his son by his side. And Katie to sit down with the two of them to pick the flame-whitened flesh from the delicate bones. It wasn’t much to ask.
    Or was it?
    The town wasn’t much, either, but he’d be damned if he would leave. He wasn’t the kind of man to give up so easily. If Morgan Atwater had learned one thing from his father, it was that a man owed something to his son. And that, whether the son wanted it or not, he had to give it to him.
    He would find some way to make it work, just long enough for that simple meal, maybe, but he would have that. He could close his eyes then and let them cover him over. It would be alright. He would have done the one thing in his life that remained undone.
    As Cross Creek suddenly loomed up in front of him, he slowed his horse, wondering if there was some way he could justify staying on. Maybe a week or so. If it took longer than that, then he’d be willing to admit it would never happen at all. But he’d give it that much time, anyway.
    John Milton was sitting on a chair at the front of the livery stable as Atwater rode up. The old man stared at him as if he’d never seen him before. Atwater slid from the saddle and offered the reins to Milton. The old man snatched at them, but never left his chair.
    â€œMarshal was looking for you,” he said.
    â€œWhat’d he want?”
    â€œDidn’t say.”
    â€œHe want me to come by?”
    â€œDon’t know.”
    â€œYou aren’t so damn talkative, today, are you?”
    â€œNothin’ to say.”
    Atwater nodded. He turned toward the hotel. Milton called after him, “Still staying the month?”
    Atwater said nothing. He realized he didn’t know how to answer the question. At the moment, all he could think about was Brett Kinkaid. He hadn’t liked the man since he first laid eyes on him. Nothing he had seen or heard was calculated to change that initial impression.
    The walk down the center of town seemed endless. He had the feeling that dozens of pairs of eyes followed him from behind curtains and under the bottom edge of lowered shades. He knew it was foolish, but the feeling wouldn’t leave him.
    He went straight to Kinkaid’s office. The door was open, but no one was there. He sat in the lone chair across from Kinkaid’s desk. He noticed the gun rack on the wall, a half-dozen long guns, mostly carbines and a single