Charley then excused himself and went back to the house to call the sheriff. On his way, he turned to the entrance road and waved a couple of times.
It wasn’t more than a few seconds before Henry Ellis was urging his horse toward the house at a full gallop.
Charley grinned. He shook his head, then muttered to himself, “I knew that boy wouldn’t be able to keep his head down.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Kinney county sheriff, Willingham Dubbs, had ridden out to the ranch shortly after he’d received the telephone call from Charley. He had been asked to please come out and pick up two intruder-trespassers Charley had caught on the property, taking potshots at the ranch house.
Sheriff Dubbs had brought two of his deputies with him to handle the lawbreakers, and he’d already sent them back to town with the two men so they could process, then put the two behind bars where they belonged.
Before he’d sent them on, he had interviewed each man separately, receiving no information at all from either one of them.
A cold wind had begun to blow, and now that the two trespassers were on their way to jail, the sheriff suggested to Charley and Roscoe that they go inside where it was warmer, because he wanted to have a few words with the two ex-Rangers.
“This dispute you claim you’re havin’ with a man named Campbell,” the sheriff began. “Have you made any attempt to settle this, uh, land claim, in a court of law?”
“Of course I have, Willingham,” said Charley. “I met with my lawye . . .” he corrected himself, “my attorney, just this morning, and there were a few things he was supposed to be taking care of.”
“Just make sure you show up in court,” said Dubbs.
“You know me better than that, Willingham,” said Charley. “We mighta had our differences in the past, but what’s going on right now I had nothing to do with. They’re trying to steal my ranch right out from under me, Willingham. Except I’ve owned this ranch for too many years, and God help those who try to take it away from me.”
“Don’t be makin’ threats, Charley. Especially in front of the law,” warned the sheriff. “Because if something happens to Dr. or Mrs. Campbell, you’ll be my first suspect.”
“You know me better than that, Willingham, to be pressuring me for something I ain’t even thought of yet. I wouldn’t hurt either one of those city slickers . . . unless, of course, one of them tried to kill me. But that don’t go for their hired guns. If one of those fellas ever steps in the way of one of my bullets, he probably needs killing.”
“I was meaning to ask you that, Charley,” said the sheriff. “You didn’t even use your gun against those two we just hauled away. That don’t seem like the Charley Sunday I know. If I’d been called out here any other day but today, at least one of those men, if not both of ’em, woulda had more blood on ’em, for sure.”
“Can I make a suggestion?” asked Roscoe.
Both Charley and the sheriff gave him their attention while Roscoe continued.
“Can you, Sheriff, and your deputies, keep an eye out for all of us out here at the ranch? . . . Go a little out of yer way, maybe, if you happen to be in the area, and check in on us? We got Charley’s grandson visiting with us for the holiday, and I wouldn’t want to see anything bad happen to him.”
“I suppose we can do that, Roscoe,” said the sheriff. “And if it looks like there might be another confrontation about to happen out here . . . use your telephone. I found out today that I can be here in under a half an hour.”
“Lotta good that’ll do,” mumbled Charley.
“What’s that you say?” asked the sheriff.
“I said,” Charley began, “a lot of good that will do . . . you taking a half hour to get here. In a half hour, they could kill every last one of us, then set the ranch ablaze. How would you feel if that happened, Wilingham?”
“All right, Charley. Have it your way. By law, a man is allowed to protect what’s his, so go ahead and protect your ranch, if you feel you have to. But mind me, Charley Sunday, if it turns out that these folks who are challenging you for rightful ownership win this case in court, I may have to look at any protecting you’ve done out here in a different way.”
“Willingham,” said Charley. “You go ahead thinking like that. But I am the rightful owner. And I really shouldn’t have to be going to no courthouse to prove that what’s mine is mine.”
“As long as you remember that this is damn near the twentieth century, and not some ol’ Wild West town you’re living in, I’ll go along with you, Charley.”
He stood to go, then he turned for one last word.
“As long as you keep doing what you’ve been doing,” said the sheriff, “you and I have no need to butt horns again.”
Charley and Roscoe both began to stand.
“No need to escort me to the door, gentlemen,” the sheriff said. “I know the way out.”
As the screen door on the porch slammed behind him, Henry Ellis came rushing into the room from the same direction.
“There’s some really big gray clouds moving in around us, Grampa. Would you like me to feed the livestock, put our horses away, then lock up the barn for you?”
Charley smiled. He reached over and ruffled the boy’s hair.
“If that’s what you’d like to do,” said Charley. “Then do it. No one’s stopping you.”
The following morning, after Roscoe and Henry Ellis had hitched the trotters to the new surrey, the two of them helped Charley wrap the vehicle in the isinglass covering. The weather had not changed that much from the day before.
Their intentions were to drive into Juanita so Charley could meet with his attorney again. He was able to do that because his lawyer, January B. Ellison, was staying at Flora Mae’s hotel as a guest and would be there for the rest of the week, the lawyer had told Charley.
As the surrey entered town, traveling down Main Street in the direction of Flora Mae’s hotel, it passed the other hotel in town, a smaller but pricier place called the Emporium.
Stepping out onto the porch as the surrey passed by was Dr. and Mrs. Campbell, on their way to a late breakfast, Henry Ellis assumed.
Charley stared straight ahead and continued driving.
“Don’t either one of you look at them,” he advised the two. “You do, and you’re dog meat in my book.”
Roscoe, in the passenger seat, kept his eyes straight ahead.
But Henry Ellis, in the back, was able to look over for a brief moment.
Dr. Campbell avoided looking at the surrey at all as the vehicle moved past them.
It was Eleanor who threw the boy a surreptitious wave when she saw his curious face staring from the backseat.
Inside the surrey, Henry Ellis turned his attention back to what was going on around him.
Charley had begun to slow the team. They were approaching Flora Mae’s hotel.
The doorman stood waiting as Charley reined in beside him. As soon as the threesome had been helped out of the surrey, the doorman whistled for a hotel teamster, and a roughly dressed man climbed into the surrey and drove it away.
“C’mon,” said Charley to the others. “Follow me.”
He led them around behind the hotel’s facade to where the pool hall and bar were located. They stepped up onto the porch, where they took turns scraping the mud off of their boots before they entered.
Flora Mae had been expecting them. She met them halfway to the door, where she offered to take their coats before they joined her, and January P. Ellison, at a roundtable that had been set up special near the back of the room.
When they had all been seated, including Henry Ellis, no one said a word. It seemed to the boy as if they were waiting for someone else to join them, and the three remaining empty chairs across the large table bore proof to that assumption.
“Oh, Mr. Sunday?” said the lawyer in a low whisper.
Charley cut him off.
“Did you get the information on those two dead gamblers back in San Mar
cos, like I asked you to do?”
Ellison nodded.
“Only, there’s only one body there in San Marcos now. The one wearing the blue suit.”
“What happened to the other one?”
“The one wearing the black cutaway coat with the red piping,” said Henry Ellis, who had been listening in on their conversation.
“The information I got,” said Ellison, “was that the man in the black coat somehow wasn’t injured that bad. They think he just woke up in the middle of the night and took off.”
Charley shook his head. He turned to Flora Mae.
“Can we get started?” he asked the woman. “I’m the one paying for Mr. Ellison’s services around here, so the quicker we can get something worked out, the better.”
At that moment, something blocked the light from outside from entering the room. Everyone looked over.
Dr. and Mrs. Campbell were entering the establishment, accompanied by another well-dressed man.
“Over here,” called out Flora Mae. “We’re all over here.”
Ben Campbell led the way, followed by his wife and the other gentleman.
Right off, Henry Ellis felt funny about the stranger who was with the Campbells. He didn’t know why the man seemed so familiar to him, but he did. And then he saw it—the man was wearing a black cutaway coat with red piping. He was the same man, the other gambler, who Henry Ellis had watched being shot dead on the Austin train.
At the roundtable, introductions were being made. And when they got around to the man in the cutaway coat with the red piping, Eleanor Campbell introduced him to the others, who were already sitting.
“This is our legal representative, Mr. Aaron Dundee, from Fort Worth,” she said.
Henry Ellis had been trying to get his grandfather’s attention, but to no avail.
Charley reached past the boy and shook the opposing attorney’s hand.
“Charley Sunday,” he said. “Pleased to meet you.”
Roscoe followed suit.
“And this is my grandson, Henry Ellis Pritchard,” said Charley, introducing the boy.
“It’s nice to meet you, son,” said Aaron Dundee, holding out his hand.
Henry Ellis refused the man’s hand. His eyes had found the repaired bullet hole below the attorney’s right shoulder, and he couldn’t take his eyes off of it.
“Henry Ellis,” said Charley.
“Uh . . . Yes, sir,” answered the boy.
“Mr. Dundee would like to shake your hand,” Charley told him.
“Grampa,” said Henry Ellis. “Can I speak with you . . . Alone?” asked the boy.
Before Charley could refuse, or ask him to wait for later, Henry Ellis got out of his chair and moved quickly to the door.
Charley excused himself from the others, and when he got to the door, he took the boy firmly by the shoulder and marched him outside.
“What’s the meaning of this, Henry Ellis?” he wanted to know.
The boy stepped back a few paces and looked Charley directly in the eye.
“Did you notice how that Dundee fellow is dressed?” the boy asked him.
“That’s a silly question, son. Now get to the point before I—”
“He’s wearing a black cutaway coat with red piping,” said Henry Ellis. “The same outfit the other gambler on the train was wearing. And . . . there’s a patched bullet hole in that coat, if you look closely. I saw it.”
Charley said nothing.
“He’s the same man who was in the gunfight on the train, Grampa,” said Henry Ellis. “I know he is.”
The boy’s got something there, Charley thought to himself. It’s no coincidence that one of those gamblers turned out to be alive. And that he up and disappeared before any investigation could begin.
“Thank you, Henry Ellis,” said Charley. “I believe you. Now, let’s get back inside before they get suspicious.”
He took his grandson by the elbow and led him back inside, where they crossed over to the table and took their seats.
Charley showed the others an embarrassed smile.
“The boy wanted to tell me something he forgot to say to me last night,” Charley said to the others. “Now that he’s got it off his mind, I reckon we can get started.”
Henry Ellis noticed that since he and Charley had been away from the table, the two attorneys had laid out several stacks of paper in front of them and were thumbing through the clutter as if the mishmash of papers actually meant something.
The boy glanced over to Dr. and Mrs. Campbell, sitting between their lawyer, Dundee, and Flora Mae. They were busy whispering under their breath to one another until they became aware that the boy was watching them. Then they hushed themselves and sat for the next few minutes in silence.
The boy took a look at his grampa. Charley sat to Henry Ellis’s right, with Roscoe on his other side.
The attorneys sat across from one another, continuing to shuffle the papers.
“Why don’t we call this meeting to order,” said Flora Mae. “Just maybe we can get somethin’ settled for once.”
“All we want is what’s rightfully ours,” said Eleanor Campbell.
“Rightfully yours,” echoed Charley. “Why, that ranch has been rightfully mine since before you were born, young lady.”
“Hush, Charley. Mrs. Campbell,” said Flora Mae. “You’re both payin’ someone else to do your talkin’ for you, so why don’t you let them talk?”
Everyone threw glances to everyone else around the table.
“So,” Flora Mae continued, “Mr. Dundee . . . why don’t you begin?”
The tension had been broken. There was a collective sigh around the table as all those present sat back in their chairs, ready for this long-awaited discussion to get under way.
“Firstly,” said Dundee, “I would like to submit the letter my client . . . Mrs. Campbell . . . received from Carter, Carter, and Rudner, Attorneys at Law, practicing in Fort Worth, Texas.”
He shuffled through the stack in front of him, eventually pulling out a very official-looking document. He handed it to January B. Ellison, who was sitting across the table.
“I’d be happy to—” Charley began to say.
“No . . . No . . . I refuse to compromise on something that is rightfully mine.”
Those were the words of Eleanor Campbell as she jumped up from the table and ran toward the exit. She burst through the swinging doors of the pool hall and bar, then onto the porch outside.
Her husband, Ben, followed her out, moving to her, putting his arms around her for comfort.
Charley was the next one through, followed by Roscoe and Henry Ellis.
“I was only saying, ma’am, that I would be willing to pay you a little something, just to make up for the expense of your having to come all the way down here to Juanita.”
The woman pulled away from her husband and faced Charley, her red eyes and tear-stained face now seething with anger.
“If you’re going to buy me out, Mr. Sunday,” she said, “at least make me a decent offer.”
“Mrs. Campbell,” said Charley. “I was only suggesting that you and your husband might be the victims of some kind of tomfoolery. That it appears that someone’s gone to a lotta trouble to convince you that what is mine is yours.”
She turned again to her husband.
“Ben,” she said, “I will not give in. Even though our letter in evidence cancels Mr. Sunday’s property deed, I will not be satisfied until I see the actual signatures of both Mr. Sunday and the person from which he purchased the property.”
She turned to her husband.
“Ben, would you take me back to our hotel? . . . Now.”
“Yes, sweetheart, in one moment.”
Ben Campbell turned to face Charley, just as Flora Mae and the two attorneys stepped out onto the porch behind them.
“You, sir, are a cad. My wife is a very delicate flower in the first place, and she is often prone to fainting spells. Now you have upset her,
and I’m afraid that any business we had planned to discuss for today will have to be put off until another time.”
“Can’t you just have someone else take her to your hotel?” said Charley. “And you come on back inside for a while? I’ll bet you pennies to a dog’s tail the two of us can have this whole matter ironed out before you know it.”
“I’m sorry, Mr. Sunday,” said Campbell. “But I never do business without my wife being present . . . and that works the other way around, too. The answer to your question, then, is no. I will definitely not be discussing anything further with you, or your adversary, concerning the ownership of the ranch in question until my wife has fully recovered.”
“I must agree with you, Dr. Campbell,” said Charley. “But while your wife is recovering, I’d like to ask you one more favor.”
“Go ahead, Mr. Sunday. Ask your question.”
“While your wife is recovering,” said Charley, “would you be kind enough to call off your hired guns? It’s getting to be old hat for us out at the ranch by now.”
“Hired guns?” said Campbell. “I’m afraid I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Sure you do, Mr. Campbell. Since you and Mrs. Campbell have been staying in Juanita, either my ranch, or my person, has been attacked daily by your bunch of hired gunmen.”
“Wait a minute, Sunday,” said Campbell. “I don’t do business that way. So help me, it’s just my wife and I who you are up against.”
“These men seem to know an awful lot about me,” said Charley.
“Well, they never got any information from me.”
“You hired them, didn’t you, Campbell?”
“I most certainly did not. And neither did Eleanor. You are mistaken.”
“Well,” said Charley, “I can see this is only going to lead to another argument. What is it you city fellas say to one another? ‘Why don’t you have your attorney get in touch with my attorney.’ That is, when you and your wife feel like talking again, let me know.”
A gut-rattling clap of thunder exploded barely seconds after a blinding flash of lightning had brightened up the surrounding area like a sunny, spring day.
The surrey was headed back to the ranch with Charley at the reins. Roscoe sat beside him while Henry Ellis napped in the rear seat.
The Comancheros Page 11
