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Marshal Frank Ragan had not requested an automatic deputy.
This point became increasingly important.
Wallace stood proudly beside a seven-foot mechanical lawman.
“Never sleeps! Never eats! Never asks for wages!”
Deputy J.D. Smith stared at it.
“I already don’t like him.”
Vance Porter walked around the machine.
“Does it shoot?”
Wallace looked horrified.
“Certainly not.”
Gromit quietly removed a spring-loaded pistol from the machine’s ankle compartment.
Wallace blinked.
“Oh. Prototype component.”
Ragan closed his eyes.
The machine was called Deputy-O-Matic.
It had a tin star, a rotating head, telescoping arms, and a vocabulary of twelve legal phrases.
“Halt!”
“State your business!”
“Move along!”
“No loitering!”
“Tea?”
Ragan looked at Wallace.
“Tea?”
“Hospitality setting.”
Gromit unplugged that wire.
The Dakotas were escorting a prisoner named Wade Kells to Fort Randall when Kells’s gang attacked the town.
The gang wanted Kells.
They also wanted the strongbox in Ragan’s office.
The deputies prepared for a siege.
Wallace prepared the Deputy-O-Matic.
Ragan pointed at him.
“No.”
“But—”
“No.”
“It could help.”
“No.”
Gromit raised one paw.
Ragan looked at him.
“You control it?”
Gromit nodded.
Ragan sighed.
“Fine.”
The attack began after dark.
Kells’s men entered from three streets.
The Deputy-O-Matic rolled into the square.
“Halt!”
A gunman fired.
The bullet ricocheted off its chest.
“RUDE BEHAVIOR DETECTED.”
J.D. stared.
“It says that?”
Wallace smiled.
“New phrase.”
The machine extended both arms.
One grabbed a gunman’s belt.
The other grabbed a hitching rail.
It pulled.
The gunman lost his trousers.
There was silence.
Vance laughed first.
Then everyone did.
The outlaw fled.
“MOVE ALONG!”
More men came from the alley.
Gromit worked the controls.
The Deputy-O-Matic spun, blocked the alley, confiscated two revolvers, arrested a barrel, released the barrel, arrested J.D., apologized, and finally captured three actual criminals.
Ragan fired from the courthouse steps.
The gang leader reached the jail.
Wallace saw him.
“Gromit!”
Gromit turned the machine.
“STATE YOUR BUSINESS!”
The gang leader shot the control box.
Sparks flew.
Gromit’s ears dropped.
Wallace whispered, “Oh dear.”
The Deputy-O-Matic began rotating.
“HALT! TEA! NO LOITERING! TEA! STATE YOUR TEA! MOVE ALONG!”
Everyone scattered.
It charged through the jail doors.
Kells screamed.
The machine emerged carrying the prisoner under one arm and the gang leader under the other.
“ARREST COMPLETE.”
Then it walked into the horse trough.
Silence.
Steam rose.
Ragan looked at Wallace.
“Is it finished?”
The Deputy-O-Matic raised one hand.
“TEA?”
Ragan drew his gun.
Gromit quickly unplugged the machine.
The gang was captured.
Kells remained in custody.
The strongbox was safe.
Ragan made Wallace promise never to build another law-enforcement machine.
Wallace agreed.
“Absolutely.”
Gromit narrowed his eyes.
Wallace coughed.
“Not without permission.”
Ragan shook Gromit’s paw.
“You ever want a badge, come find me.”
J.D. protested.
“Why does everybody offer the dog my job?”
Ragan looked at him.
Gromit looked at him.
Vance looked at him.
J.D. sighed.
“Yeah, all right.”
Wallace and Gromit boarded the stagecoach the next morning.
As it rolled away, something metallic clanked inside Wallace’s suitcase.
Gromit stared.
Wallace smiled nervously.
“Automatic magistrate?”
Gromit reached for the suitcase.
“A very small one?”
Gromit threw it off the coach.
“Fair enough.”