The Blight Way Read Online Free PDF Page A

here!”
    â€œGood idea,” Pap said.
    â€œHold on there, Bo,” Batim said, pushing away from his post. “That bull’s worth twenty thousand dollars.” Then he leaned back against the post. “But shoot it if you want. It ain’t mine, it’s Littlefield’s. Critter keeps jumping the fence onto my property. Actually, you’d be doing me a favor to shoot it.”
    â€œI wasn’t planning on shooting the bull,” Tully said. “I was planning on shooting Buck. Now you tell one of your kinfolk here to get that bull out of the pasture, before I start shooting Scraggs.”
    â€œOh, all right,” Batim said. “Lem, run that bull into the corral.”
    â€œWhy me, Pa?” Lem remained sprawled in his chair.
    â€œâ€™Cause I say so, that’s why!”
    Languid as a cat, Lem got up and stripped off his dirty shirt. He climbed through a pole fence and walked out into the pasture, waving the shirt. “Here, bull! Here, bull!” he called out.
    The bull came for him, running hard and fast. At the last minute Lem darted into a corral and went up and over a high pole fence. The bull followed him into the corral. It slid to a stop and stood there glaring through the fence at its intended victim. While it bellowed, pawed dirt and shook strings of slobber from its muzzle, several Scraggs closed a pole gate behind it. Lem strolled back to the group, put his shirt back on, settled himself in his chair, stretched his legs out toward the fire and picked up his can of beer.
    â€œDurn bull,” Batim said. “Wish Littlefield would manage to keep his animals on his own property.”
    â€œYeah,” Pap said. He was still holding the rifle, but had come up alongside of Tully. “Otherwise, a person might get accused of rustling.”
    â€œThat’s right,” Batim agreed.
    Out in the grove of trees, Buck slid to the ground and walked back across the pasture. He stooped and picked up his gun, which he stuck back in his holster.
    â€œI suppose you want to see the body,” Batim said.
    â€œThat’s what we came for,” Tully said.
    â€œWell, it’s that dark shape over the fence out beyond the trees. There’s a cross fence between here and it. The bull couldn’t get to the body.”
    â€œGood,” Tully said.
    Lister was sitting up now, gingerly feeling his jaw with one hand. Tully stepped around him and headed out into the pasture. Pap followed. The Scraggs turned and looked at Batim.
    â€œY’all stay where you are,” he told them. “I reckon that’s a crime scene out there.”

Chapter 4
    By the time the deputy and Tully met, Buck was still working his way through his rather large vocabulary of profanity, some of the words running to twelve or more letters. Tully had heard most of the words before, but he thought Buck might be creating some new ones for the occasion.
    â€œBull nearly got me,” he told the sheriff. “I fired a couple of rounds at him and missed and then took off for the trees. Just barely made it up one of them. Almost froze to death up there, too.”
    Tully shook his head in disgust. “I don’t want to hear it.”
    They waited for Pap to catch up, then opened a wire gate and made their way out to the body. As Batim had indicated, the dead man was wearing a dark-blue pinstripe suit, a shiny black shoe on one foot and only a black sock on the other foot. He looked to be about forty-five or fifty, but in good shape. There were two tiny black holes in the back of his jacket.
    â€œNice suit,” Pap said.
    â€œYeah,” Tully said. “Don’t see many like it around Blight County.” He reached inside the man’s jacket, pulled out a slender billfold and opened it. “The fellow seems to be Nicholas Holt from Los Angeles, California.” He ran his hand into a pants pocket and pulled out a wad of folded hundred-dollar bills fastened