Fatal Justice

by Ralph Compton

  There was a click. He tried again with the same result.

  “Damn your hide.” Judson was breathing in loud gasps and about to insert the cartridge.

  Ash made it to the bank. He tried to climb out but slipped back.

  Spreading scarlet spots stained Judson’s shirt. Blood trickled from a corner of his mouth. Yet he reloaded and rose onto an elbow, his features twisted in pain and determination. “I’ll show you.”

  Ash was out of the water. He kept slipping when he sought to stand. He spied his revolver a few yards away and threw himself toward it, only to fall.

  “Scum,” Judson was raving. “Scum, scum, scum.” He pointed the Sharps. “This is where I send you to hell.”

  Fear galvanized Ash into a desperate dive. He grabbed the revolver and cocked it as he rolled. He came up ready to shoot, but didn’t. The mountain man had gone limp.

  His cheek was on the grass, his eyes open but unseeing. Scarlet seeped from his mouth, painting his chin red. The Sharps lay beside him.

  Ash kicked the rifle away. Squatting, he felt for a pulse. There was none. “Good riddance.”

  Shivering from his wet clothes, Ash replaced the pocket pistol and the revolver. His shoulder was throbbing. He gingerly peeled off his jacket and then his shirt to look at the wound. The slug had caught him below the clavicle. The bone had been spared, thank God, but the exit wound was as big around as an apple. It wasn’t bleeding a lot, not to the extent he had to worry about bleeding to death.

  Ash moved to the pool. Lying on his belly at the water’s edge, he splashed water on both the entry and exit wounds. The cold helped, but the relief was temporary. He needed to apply a bandage to stave off infection. Rising onto his knees, he went to get dressed.

  “How could you?”

  Rohesia had the Sharps. She was pointing it at him but staring at her brother. Tears trickled down her matronly cheeks.

  “You know what he was. You know what he did.” Ash was mad at himself for not hearing her.

  “I know he was the best man who ever lived.”

  “You can’t mean that.” Ash began to rise.

  “Be still,” Rohesia warned. The click of the hammer was added persuasion. “I haven’t decided what I’m going to do with you yet.”

  Ash was used to reasoning with drunks and rowdies and hoped he could do the same with her. “You’re not your brother. You’re not a killer.”

  “I loved Marion. I loved him dearly.”

  “I’m sorry for you,” Ash said gently.

  Rohesia sniffled. “I haven’t ever killed anyone, but there’s always a first time.”

  The way she said it, so coldly and matter-of-factly, as if killing were no more difficult than sewing or cooking, worried Ash. He started to rise.

  “Don’t. Be real still and quiet while I sort this out.”

  “Act your age.” Ash clutched at a straw. “This isn’t you. It’s your grief. You’re upset but it will pass.”

  Rohesia smiled an odd sort of smile. She came toward him, the rifle steady as could be, and stopped when the muzzle was almost brushing his nose. “Thank you.”

  “For what?”

  “For telling me to act my age. It reminded me of how few years I have left. I doubt they will hang me. They don’t hang women often. I might be sentenced to life behind bars, but I doubt I’ll live five.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “That I am more than upset. I don’t know if I can describe it except to say that my blood is boiling like an unwatched pot and about to bubble over.” With that Rohesia swung the rifle.

  Ash tried to duck. He was a shade slow and paid for it with a new explosion of pain in his temple. The world swam and he felt his forehead strike the ground. He attempted to rise, but another explosion sucked him into a black well for he knew not how long.

  Sounds brought Ash around. A tinkling that reminded him for all the world of a music box. He listened, and it was a music box. Odors filled his nose, the scents of cooked food and tobacco and wood smoke. He opened his eyes. Above him was a log ceiling. To his left a window with the curtains drawn. He was in a cabin; he could guess whose. He had been stripped to the waist and his boots and socks removed. He was on his back in a bed, tied wrists and ankles to the bed-posts.

  Footsteps scraped and into the bedroom came Rohesia. She was carrying a tray. “I thought you might be awake by now.”

  “How . . . ,” Ash began, and had to stop, his throat was so dry.

  “How did I get you here? It’s simple—on a horse. Or did you want to ask how long you have been out? Nearly twelve hours.”

  Rohesia set the tray on the bed. On it was a metal fork and a curved carving knife as well as a large butcher knife and one of those thin picks for prying walnuts from their shells.

  Ash couldn’t believe this was happening.

  Rohesia sat beside him. “I’ve had a long talk with myself and come to a decision. I have never done anything like this but I can’t let that stop me. I must be strong as Marion was strong.”

  Ash swallowed and got out, “What are you talking about? What’s all that for?”

  “For you, Mr. Thrall. Oh yes, I know who you are. Marion told me. He guessed right away. He was so smart.” Rohesia held her hand over the tray. “Which should I start with? The knives will make quite a mess, I should imagine. Maybe I should start small.” She picked up the walnut pick and held it in front of his face. “This should put your eye out quite nicely.”

  Ash remembered the Fraziers about to torture him and trembled. Suddenly his chest lanced with agony. The pressure was back, worse than it had ever been. He arched off the bed and gritted his teeth but couldn’t help letting out a sharp cry.

  “My word!” Rohesia drew back in alarm, her hand to her bosom. “What on earth is the matter with you?”

  “I need morphine,” Ash gasped. “It’s in my saddlebags.” He tugged at the ropes, wishing he could double over. His chest was pounding to where he feared his heart would explode. The pressure went on and on. He was on the verge of passing out when the pressure let up and the pain faded, leaving him spent and slick with sweat.

  Rohesia regarded him intently. “It has something to do with those scars on your chest, doesn’t it?”

  Pausing often to catch his breath, Ash told her about being shot and the bullet lodged next to his heart. He told about his suffering. “And the hell of it is, I never know whether my next breath will be my last,” he concluded.

  “Well, now,” Rohesia said. Her hands were in her lap. She placed the walnut pick on the tray and picked up the butcher knife instead.

  “End it for me. I don’t care,” Ash said, and meant it.

  Rohesia raised the knife, looked him in the eyes and slashed the rope binding his right wrist to the bed-post. She rose and moved to the foot of the bed and did the same for his ankle, then moved around to the other side.

  “You changed your mind?”

  “I’m letting you go, yes.” Rohesia slashed the last rope. “I was going to do things to you, Mr. Thrall. Horrible things. I was going to make you suffer for killing Marion and then I was going to end your life. But you know what? I don’t need to. You’re already suffering. From what I’ve seen, you’re suffering terribly.”

  Rohesia put down the butcher knife. “That’s simply wonderful, Mr. Thrall.”

  “What?”

  “Yes, you go on suffering. Endure the torment of the damned. I hope God drags it out. I hope you last for months and die in the most abominable agony.” Rohesia Kanderwold smiled. “Yes, that would make me happy. Very happy indeed.”

  Chapter 26

  Life was grand again, or at least bearable.

  Ash spent each day the same. He woke up in early afternoon. The first thing he did, the very first, was to inject morphine. Then he would lie in bed and savor the pleasure. After a couple of hours he would rouse and wash and dress.

  Usually by five or six o’clock he was at a restaurant. He still had an appeti
te. The doctors said he might lose all craving for food but it hadn’t happened yet. After he ate he made the rounds of various saloons, gambling dens and brothels.

  Ash never went near Finnegan’s. The law hadn’t paid him a visit so he figured he had gotten away with killing those two men. But why push his luck and maybe end up behind bars, even if it was in self-defense?

  Ash pushed his luck in other ways. He took to gambling. Nearly every night he sat for hours playing poker or bucking the tiger or if he was feeling especially reckless he would try roulette. Some nights he won. Most nights he lost. Not a lot each time but enough that after five weeks he only had a few hundred left of the bounty he collected on Marion Judson.

  Horace Smithers did a story on Judson. The Rocky Mountain News put it on the front page with banner headlines. All about how, as Horace described him, “courageous former marshal Asher Thrall” tracked down another notorious killer and “put an end to Marion Judson’s long and blood-drenched reign of terror.”

  Horace was enormously pleased with the account and brought over three copies.

  Ash hated it. It made him sound heroic and noble. It invested him with qualities he didn’t have and painted him as someone he wasn’t. Horace didn’t mention the morphine, thank God.

  Ash learned that the journalist went up to Estes Park to pay Rohesia a visit and get her side of things. Rohesia chased him off with a rolling pin.

  “The woman nearly brained me! You wouldn’t think it to look at her, but she is quite formidable.”

  “More formidable than you think,” Ash said, and let it go at that.

  Now here Ash was, bending his footsteps toward the News. The hour was late and most of the workers had gone home. Not Smithers. He’d mentioned to Ash once that he did some of his best writing when he had peace and quiet so he often stayed late.

  “To what do I owe this honor?

  Ash sat in a chair and stretched out his long legs. “I need another one. Someone with a lot of money on their heads.”

  Horace stopped writing. “You’ve run out already?”

  “I’m getting there,” Ash confessed. And here he’d thought he had enough to last several months if not longer.

  “Living high on the hog, are you?” Horace joked, then frowned. “Sorry. That was thoughtless of me. You’re entitled to live any damn way you please. You’ve earned the right.”

  “I’ve earned nothing but an early grave.” Ash might not have much, but he still had a shred of dignity.

  “That’s not how the governor feels. There has been talk of a special ceremony.”

  “You better be joking.”

  “Not at all.” Horace sat up. “Don’t you realize the tremendous service you’ve done? You’ve rid the territory of some of its worst elements. You deserve the recognition. A banquet, say, with the governor and other leading politicians in attendance, and you receive an award. It will make the front page, I can guarantee.”

  Ash was slow sometimes but this was so obvious that it leaped out at him.

  “This is your doing, isn’t it? You contacted the governor, or someone else here did. Just so you can sell more newspapers.”

  “Selling papers keeps the clothes on our backs and food on our tables. Yes, my editor has been in touch with Governor Routt. At my instigation. I thought you would appreciate the gesture.”

  “You thought wrong.”

  “All right. All right. There’s no need to get hot under the collar.”

  “Like hell there isn’t.” Ash swore an angry streak, then said, “Look at me, damn you. Really look at me. Do you think I want to get up in front of a group of people looking as I do?”

  “What do—” Horace stopped and blinked and cleared his throat.

  “Oh. I see what you mean. I’m used to you as a scarecrow.” He apologetically added, “Honestly, Ash, I hadn’t considered that aspect. I beg your pardon. You’re right. There would be talk. All sorts of wild speculation you can do without.”

  “I’m glad you agree.” Ash was embarrassed enough looking in the mirror. The hollows under his eyes, his sunken cheeks, his pasty complexion. That old Ute had been right; he was a walking dead man and it showed.

  “I’ll talk to my editor. He won’t like it, but he’ll understand.” Horace slid the sheet of paper he was writing on aside and opened a drawer. “Now, then. You need to replenish your coffers. I have some notes here that might interest you.” He sorted through a sheaf of papers until he found several he wanted and set them on the desk. “Ever hear of a man by the name of Skelman?”

  “Can’t say as I have. Should I?”

  “Not particularly. He’s wanted down to Arizona Territory. Seems he shot a Pinkerton, a top man in the company. The Pinkertons don’t take kindly to that sort of thing so they’ve put five thousand dollars on his head, dead or alive but preferably dead.”

  Ash whistled. “That’s a lot of money but Arizona is a long way to go to claim it.”

  Horace grinned. “You don’t have to. That’s why I’ve brought him to your attention. Skelman is in Colorado. He’s been reported in the Durango area. The Pinkertons don’t know yet. If you can get to him first, all that money is yours.”

  “How is it they don’t and you do?” Ash was familiar with the detective agency’s reputation.

  “I was down there a few months ago covering a mine collapse that killed five miners. I happened to strike up a conversation with the marshal and he let it slip that Skelman was staying with some friends.”

  “Let it slip?” Ash suspiciously asked.

  “I’d asked him if anything else newsworthy had taken place and he brought Skelman up. The marshal can’t arrest him because Skelman isn’t wanted in Colorado. He doesn’t want word to get out because then he’ll have money-hungry bounty men pouring in from all over. And he won’t try to claim the money himself because he doesn’t care to go up against Skelman.”

  “The marshal is yellow?”

  “Not at all. He’s one of the bravest men I’ve ever met. His record speaks for itself. But he says that going up against Skelman is the same as suicide and it’s not worth it over a Pinkerton.”

  Ash crossed his legs and placed his hands on his knee. “There’s something you’re not telling me.”

  “Yes, there is.” Horace drummed his fingers on the desk. “How do I put this so you’ll appreciate what you’re up against this time?” He drummed a little more. “Ever hear of Wild Bill Hickok?”

  “Who hasn’t?”

  “The prince of the pistoleers. The fastest and deadliest revolver shot who ever lived. Harper’s made him famous and there have been all kinds of stories since then. Many are outright fabrications—”

  “Journalists do that?” Ash interrupted with a smirk.

  “—but the point I’m trying to make is that for all the exaggerated tales, few could match him bullet for bullet. ‘Deadly’ is the word I’m looking for, I guess. Yes, that’s it. Deadly.” Horace leaned forward. “Skelman is deadly. They say he’s about the deadliest son of a bitch who ever drew breath. He is fast and he is accurate with those two guns of his—”

  “Wait,” Ash interrupted again. “Two guns?”

  “He wears two revolvers, yes. Colts with mother-of-pearl handles. He had them custom made, I understand.”

  Ash was impressed. Two-gun men were rare. Two-gun men who could shoot equally well with both hands were even rarer. “So what you’re saying is that he is really good.”

  “No. I’m saying he is beyond good. Supposedly he has fourteen kills to his credit, but there could be more. He’s not an outlaw. He doesn’t rob banks or steal from people that I know of. He’s someone who is lightning with his hands and that lightning has gotten him into trouble.”

  “Why did he shoot the Pinkerton?” Ash thought to ask.

  “The Pinkerton’s name was Barnes. He was after a train robber from Missouri. The man fled to Arizona and was playing cards at a table with Skelman and some others when he saw the Pinkerton trying to
sneak up on him and lead started to fly. Either the Pinkerton panicked or he couldn’t shoot straight and one of his shots nicked Skelman, who promptly shot him dead.”

  “Did Skelman know Barnes was a Pinkerton?”

  “From what I can gather, no. But that hasn’t stopped them from putting a price on his head. It’s rare for them to do that but apparently they feel they need to make an example of him.”

  Ash’s sympathies were with the man the bounty was on. Still, “Five thousand dollars is a lot of money.”

  “I hesitated to mention Skelman before because, frankly, I like you, and if you go after him you are dead.”

  “Thanks for the confidence.”

  Horace sighed and spread his hands on the desk. “I knew I wasn’t making myself clear. If you try to bring him in alive, he will kill you. Your only hope is to shoot him in the back and turn the remains over to the Pinkertons.”

  Ash flared with resentment. “What in hell do you take me for?”

  “Someone who is desperate to stave off the dark,” Horace said with surprising affection. “You’re a fighter, Ash, and I admire that. I don’t know if I have the courage to do what you’re doing. I’d probably end it with a bullet to the brain by my own hand.”

  Ash said nothing.

  “That’s part of the reason I’ve helped you. It isn’t only about the front page. You can pooh-pooh me if you want but I regard you as a noble man valiantly clinging to life while death slowly eats you away.”

  “I’m an animal pissing in the wind,” Ash said bluntly.

  “Is that all you are? Is that all any of us are?”

  Ash uncrossed his legs and frowned. “I didn’t expect that from you. A parson, maybe.”

  “You’ve lost all faith, then?”

  The words were hard for Ash to say. He avoided looking out the window at the sky as he answered quietly, “Wouldn’t you?” Suddenly standing, he adjusted his hat. “Thanks for the information on Skelman. I’ll give it some thought.”

  “You do that. Think long and hard on this one. Because I was serious. I have a bad feeling about him. Go after him and he might be your last.”

  “Would that be so bad?” Ash turned and took a couple of steps, but the journalist said his name.