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"After it's done," Lancaster said, "they'll have a lock on this town, that's why. After it's done everyone will be too sick, and too guilty, to stand up to them."

"You got that right, Mister," the barman said, "and that's why you got to do something."

"Why me?" Lancaster asked, picking up his mug again. "I just came here for a beer. I've got no stake in this."

"You know how to use that gun," the bartender said, "I can tell by lookin' at ya."

"Is that right?"

"There ain't nobody else," the man went on. "These people have worked hard to build this town--"

"Then they should defend it," Lancaster said. "I've never known a bartender who didn't have a shotgun behind the bar. Why didn't you use it?"

"Mister," he said, "I ain't proud of it, but I'm just as scared as the rest of 'em."

"Yeah, well..." Lancaster said. Why should he get involved? Once he'd made his way with a gun, but accidentally shooting down a little girl--a little girl with blue eyes--had changed all that. He had only recently crawled out of the bottle, and he was trying to stay out. In fact, this beer was the first liquor he'd touched in months. "It's none of my business."

"You ever been a lawman before?" the bartender asked.

"No." The man had no idea how ironic that question was.

The bartender reached beneath the bar and came up with a dented silver star, which he set down next to Lancaster's mug.

"They tore that off the sheriff's shirt," he said. "You can be a lawman now."

"I can't just put that on and be sheriff," Lancaster contested. "That's not how it's done."

"Yes it is," the bartender said. "My name's Ted Ryan, and I'm on the town council. In the absence of any other members I form a majority, and I can appoint you temporary sheriff."

"Temporary until when?"

"Just until you save the sheriff's life."

"Or I'm shot dead trying."

Lancaster stared at the badge. All he'd wanted was a goddamned beer, first one in ages. He sure picked a hell of a time....

"You know what gets me?" Ryan asked.

"What?"

"The people."

"What about them?"

"After a while they really...well, they really wanted this lynching, you know? They got a taste for it. I don't get it, I just don't get it. I mean, they know Ben Lockwood, but when they dragged him out of here there was...a hunger in their eyes."

"Jesus," Lancaster said, "hand me that shotgun..."

He picked up the badge, put it on, and left the saloon.

 Chapter Three

As he approached the crowd he noticed that the sheriff was standing on a buckboard that was being used as a makeshift gallows, with a rope hanging from a fancy new gaslight pole. The town has gaslights, for Chrissake, yet they didn't have decent deputies to back up their sheriff. The lawman's hands had been tied behind his back, and the noose was already around his neck.

Lancaster was just in time.

He fired into the air one barrel of the Greener shotgun the bartender had passed him, then ejected the spent shell and inserted a fresh one as he pushed through the crowd. They moved out of his way and when he reached the buckboard he had the shotgun in one hand and his pistol in the other.

A man was holding the head of the single horse hitched to the buckboard, or else the animal would have bolted when Lancaster fired his first shot. Great, he'd almost lynched the sheriff himself, Lancaster thought.

"People, listen to me!" he shouted. "Look at what you're doing. This man is your sheriff."

"Not anymore he isn't."

Quitman stepped forward so that he was standing alongside the buckboard, facing Lancaster. The man holding the horse was apparently one of his men. He had the same look.

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