All Honest Men

by Claude Stanush

“You boys know where we are?” the driver said. “Pistol Hill. They say there’s a good view from up here, day ’r night.”

  He told me to get out. Then him and the other hard-eyed man pulled Frank out and dragged him a short ways, to a tree. They leaned him up agin the trunk, and one of ’em pulled out a rope and tied Frank’s feet. His partner went back to the car. He come back carrying a shovel, a pick-ax, and a little kerosene lantern. He lit the lantern. It throwed out a yellow glow.

  None of ’em was paying me any mind. They was acting like I was part of their team. I was standing next to another tree. I finally set down.

  I shoulda done or said something.

  I didn’t. But I knowed what they was up to.

  In the light of that little lamp, you could see the dust and dirt and rocks a-flying. You could hear the two men grunting and huffing. Little by little, they was getting lower and lower, ’til you couldn’t see their knees no more.

  The whole time, Frank’s eyes was popping outa his head. He was trying to say things from behind that gag, but you couldn’t make out none of the words. It just come out something like: “Aaaayyyyeeeeerrrr.”

  Finally, one of the diggers hollered: “It’s big enough. This ground’s too damn hard. I ain’t doing no more.”

  The man in the hood picked up the lantern, went over to the hole, and leaned over the edge. When the light hit it, I seen it was only about three feet long. He shrugged, come back to Frank, and crouched in front of him. Frank was making more of them sounds: “Aaaayyyyeeeeerrrr.”

  The man pulled his .45 outa his belt and touched the barrel to the top of Frank’s right ear. He put it right up agin the top ridge of the ear. He tapped it—tap, tap, tap. Then he moved the barrel two inches down to the bottom part of Frank’s ear, the fleshy part. He tapped the barrel there—tap, tap, tap. Then he moved the barrel two inches up and over to the hard bony part of the skull, right behind the back of Frank’s ear. Tap, tap, tap. Then he moved it two inches over and to the right to the hard bony part of the skull right in front of Frank’s ear. Tap, tap, tap.

  Frank’s whole body was shaking.

  I kept waiting for the gunman to push the barrel into Frank’s ear and blow Frank’s brains out, but he didn’t. Finally, he give a hand signal to his buddies and both fellas come over. One of ’em picked Frank up by the feet, the other by the shoulders. They lugged him over to the hole.

  Frank’s diamond cufflinks was glittering in the lamplight.

  One of the men pushed Frank’s legs up to his chin, and they jammed him in, ass first.

  The hole was near deep enough, but not quite. The top of Frank’s head, all that coal-black hair, was sticking out.

  The man in the hood went over and this time he didn’t waste no time tapping.

  He pointed the gun down and fired two times.

  PART TWO: THE FAMILY BUSINESS

  NINETEEN

  That was it.

  I didn’t want no more partners. Not if they was like Slim or the Dago or Frank. Or even Glasscock.

  Frank got dug up by a rabbit hunter.

  I seen it in the newspaper. A old, one-eyed colored man was up on Pistol Hill hunting rabbits when his dog got to sniffing around in some leaves and digging in some fresh dirt. The hunter got all frothed up. Thought he’d found hisself a whole case of booze buried by rum runners. He got him a shovel and he dug in. And it wasn’t long before, sure enough, he’d hit something. Something hard.

  It was Frank’s kneecap.

  I didn’t like Frank. I ain’t gonna make out like I did. Only I didn’t wanta see him dead, either. And when I laid down to go to sleep at night, the pictures’d come up in my head and claw around in there. I’d see Frank’s eyes popping outa their sockets while he watched them two men dig his grave, and I’d see the blood come a-spurting outa them two holes in his head.

  I couldn’t shake them pictures loose.

  I’d seen people die before. But I never did see nobody die in a way that was as close to me as how Frank got it. And ever’ night Frank’s dead body kept a-telling me that the same thing could happen to me if I kept on working with ex-cons like I was.

  Maybe it was best to move on. Somewhere further west, like New Mexico, or Arizona, or even California.

  Only problem, what’d I do out there? Besides that, I didn’t wanta go so far away from Louise and Lewis. And besides that, I gotta be honest here: bank robbing was hard work, but I liked it. It come natural to me, and I made damn good money at it. ’Course, money all by itself don’t get your blood to pumping. You can be the richest man in the world and feel dead as a corpse if your blood ain’t pumping. But bank jobs did get my blood to pumping. I had a good mind, and I knowed how to use it. I knowed how to keep it on one thing, and not let it go helty-skelty. And I had what they call “the nerve.” I didn’t booger easy.

  But how was I gonna keep alive if all I had to work with was cowards or cut-throats?

  The answer come one day, about a week after Frank got rubbed out, when I was setting on my bed at the Loyal, rubbing black polish on my wingtips. Booty Blue woulda give me the what-for if he seen me shining my own shoes, but my hands was needing something to do, to keep my fingers from stiffing up, and my mind was going in circles, too, when it come to me.

  All of a sudden, boom!

  Really, it was two booms. Two answers. And I didn’t waste no time shooting a letter down to Texas with two $20 bills in it. Only one of my answers wrote me back, but that’s because the other one couldn’t spell too good.

  The letter said they’d be up in a week on the four o’clock Missouri-Pacific Sunshine Special.

  When the day come, I took Louise and Lewis with me to the train station. They was back from Wisconsin by then.

  “Who’s coming?” Lewis kept asking me. “How come it’s a secret?”

  “A man that shows his cards all the time is a man that don’t win too many games,” I said.

  I poked him in the ribs and kissed his Momma on the cheek.

  They was both looking good, dressed up like it was a Sunday. Louise had on a fancy little hat, and a blue dress. Near six inches of her calves was showing, but that’s how women dressed in the cities. And she was wearing a diamond broach that I’d give her. The boy was dressed in a little bow tie and knickers, like a city kid, only he had a little Stetson on his head I’d give him.

  At 3:56, that little Stetson started a-hopping. “Here it comes!”

  And there it was, the Sunshine Special, its big old iron engine blasting into the station, bells a-clanging, wheels a-squealing, steam a-hissing, thick black smoke a-shooting way up high into the sky.

  That hissing steam and that burning coal, they give your nose a tickle. And they was smells I really liked. Even living in a city, there still wasn’t nothing much more exciting than watching a train come in. And, to tell the truth, this was the first time in my life I’d ever met anybody that was paying to ride one.

  The engine stopped, there was more squealing wheels and steam puffing out in big clouds, and people begun pouring outa cars. Before you knowed it, there was a big crowd a-milling out on the platform. Ever’body was shaking hands and hugging and kissing and hey-heying ever’body else.

  Ever’body but who I was looking for.

  Damn! Did they change their minds?

  “Who’s coming?” The boy was jerking on my sleeve.

  “It’s two of ’em … and they’re gonna look lost.”

  Then I felt Louise tapping me on the shoulder. She was pointing at two fellas who’d just got off the end car, way on down the platform. One of ’em was tall and lanky, all legs and arms and neck; the other one was shorter and squatter, with a barrel chest. Both of ’em had on high-crown Stetsons and high-heel cowboy boots. Both of ’em was lugging low-horn saddles and lumpy gunny sacks. And their heads was a-spinning around like they didn’t know where in the hell they was.

  “Y’all wait here,” I said.

  Well, I lit on over and when the stocky one caught
sight of me, he throwed his head back and out come the loudest, wildest Texas yell you ever heard.

  “Eeeeeeeee-hah!!!!!”

  It was worse’n a Injin war whoop. One lady that was walking past us grabbed her little boy by the hand like, sure enough, wild Comanches was gonna swoop down and lift off both their scalps. Only the fella that was hollering was wilder’n any Injin.

  He was a South Texas bronc buster.

  Yeah, it was my older brother Jess, and, standing next to him, my little brother Joe.

  “Godamighty, Jess!” I said, slapping him on the back. “You wanta get us throwed off to the hoosegow?”

  “Just getting a south wind going, Willis.” That moon face give me a slow grin. “Air up here in the Middle West ain’t in much of a hurry, is it?”

  Fact is, by then people was hurrying past us in a big circle, like they was afraid them two cowboys was gonna pull out six-shooters any second and start banging away. There was nothing like ’em on that platform. Their skin was brown as hickory nuts from that hot Texas sun and besides their hats and boots they was wearing rough, brown brush jackets and thick, dirty bullhide leggings. Both of ’em smelled like leather and sweat.

  I pointed down at their saddles and gunny sacks.

  “What’s that?”

  “What’s what?” Joe asked.

  “Them saddles. Whatever’s in them sacks.”

  “What d’ya think it is? Bridles, spurs, ever’thing we’ll need for that job. We brung our own gear.”

  “Hell, throw that damn gear away. It ain’t that kinda job.”

  “What kinda job is it?” Joe looked mixed up.

  “We’ll go over that later. Right now, you see that lady over yonder? Blue dress? Next to the little boy in the hat?”

  Both their necks went spinning again.

  “Oow,” said Jess. “A looker.”

  “That’s my gal. And her boy. Only they don’t know some things, so for right now you two are gonna be my cousins.” I pointed at Jess. “We’re gonna make you ‘Jess Carpenter.’” I pointed at Joe. “And you’re gonna be ‘Joe Carpenter.’”

  That throwed ’em for a few somersaults.

  I went on: “Just go with the game for now, boys. Oh, and something else. This lady calls me ‘Will Reed.’ That’s my name, see, far as what she knows. So that’s what you gotta call me. ‘Will Reed.’ You got it?”

  For the first time since my brothers got offa that train, they give me a good look, all over, side to side, top to bottom. The last time they’d seen me, I had on a work shirt and bib overalls and a straw farm hat. This time I had on a felt dude hat and a $85 mohair suit and a two-carat diamond stickpin.

  “What’s it this time, old boy?” Jess said. “Outside of Ma’s jaw, ain’t a inch of you looks like a Newton.”

  “Something smells funny.” That was Joe.

  “Just do me this one, boys. I guarantee you it’s something good.”

  Well, Lewis was beside hisself at meeting Texas cowboys with saddles and boots and high-crown hats, and Jess and Joe, even if I’d shook ’em up, didn’t flinch a muscle when I said they was my cousins. And I could tell they was pretty impressed when they seen Louise close up. They inched their shoulders back and shuffled their legs.

  But they kept their manners on, called Louise “Ma’am,” and turned their heads when they spit.

  After a little bit, I didn’t wanta take no more chances that my brothers’d let something slip about who they was, or who I was, and so I put Louise and Lewis in a taxicab and sent ’em home. And me and the boys hit on over to the Loyal. I was driving a new Studebaker Series 20 Special-Six, and the boys’ eyes popped out when they seen it. Slim’d taught me how to use all them sticks and levers. That car had all-rubber tires, and I knowed how to make ’em squeal.

  “Eeeeeeeee-hah!” Jess hollered again.

  When we got to the hotel, my brothers was like two hounddogs checking out a new cow barn. In the lobby, they sniffed at a statue of a little nekked angel, and they sniffed at some tall palm trees in shiny pots, and they sniffed at the little bellboys that was sinking lower and lower under their saddles and gunny sacks and a fat cardboard suitcase.

  “What’s going on here, Willis?” Joe’s eyes kept switching between round as circles, and narrow as slits. He wasn’t sure what to think.

  “You’ll see.”

  When we got upstairs, Joe bounced up and down on the mattress and Jess picked up the room-service menu and whistled. I knowed he could hardly read a word on that menu, but he whistled anyhow.

  “Now, you boys just settle in,” I said.

  That was all the sign Jess needed. He yanked open his cardboard suitcase and pulled out a tall bottle of Mex’kin tequila. He said the occasion called for a drink. With Jess, ever’ occasion called for a drink. ’Course, he didn’t know what this occasion was.

  I told ’em.

  Months after that, Joe told me what went on between him and Jess later that night in their room. Joe walked back and fro, side to side, for hours.

  “You think he was kidding?” he kept asking Jess.

  “Hell, no.”

  “Why should I wanta rob banks? I ain’t never broke the law in my life.”

  “Well, I’ll tell you what I’m gonna do,” Jess said, drinking that hooch straight outa the bottle. “Come morning, I’m hitting on back to Texas. I get all the kick I need from snapping a horse.”

  “He’ll say we’re yeller.”

  “Let him. We go with that crazy old son-of-a-bitch, we’re gonna end up hanging from a tree. Let’s just get up early and cut out. He don’t need to know.”

  “We’re gonna have’ta tell him.”

  “How come?” Jess snorted.

  “We need money for the train ticket home.”

  TWENTY

  “You ain’t yeller, are you, boys?”

  Joe was right. That’s exactly what I told ’em when they come knocking at my hotel door. It was just peeping daylight, and my brothers, both of ’em, was standing there with their hats on and their hands out.

  Well, there’s all kinds of ways to shame a man. But, back home, ain’t nothing worse’n calling him just plain “yeller.”

  Joe hung his head. Jess just laughed.

  “Aw, don’t give us that bullshit, Willis,” Jess said. “If we’re gonna get our necks snapped, we wanta get ’em snapped the right way—by flying off a horse. Anyhow, who the hell’s yeller here? You ever busted a bronc?”

  “Don’t be fools, boys,” I come right back. “Get in here and take off them hats. You want train fare? You gotta listen first.”

  I was ready for ’em.

  Yeah, I knowed, soon as the boys thought over ever’thing I’d told ’em the day before, they was gonna grouse and kick and raise all kinds of racket. And I knowed, if I wanted to turn ’em, I was just gonna have to ride it out.

  I was ready to take it—and I was ready to give it.

  The boys come in and set down on the edge of my bed, but they didn’t take off their hats. ’Course, that didn’t mean nothing. Back home, cowboys wore their hats from the minute they got up in the morning ’til the minute they bedded down at night, while they was eating and ever’thing else. Their hats was as much a part of their bodies as their arms or their legs was.

  I was only in trouble if them two big old hats went back outa that door.

  “It ain’t you, is it, little brother?” I walked over to Joe and leaned down and I looked at him square. “You the yeller one?”

  Joe looked away and started fingering a button on his brush jacket. “That ain’t it, Willis. It’s just that I ain’t never broke the law in my life and I don’t know how come I should start doing it now.”

  “For the money. You never seen money like I make in my business.”

  “Me and Jess don’t care ’bout money like you do.”

  “It’s human nature to want money.”

  “Maybe it’s just your nature, Willis.” That was Jess this time. But he wasn’
t talking to no button. He was looking at me straight, only half-grinning. “You was born money-hungry, and you know it. Even when you was rolling in it with that old gambler, you still wanted more. You can’t fool us. We all know you went and stole that cotton with Dock.”

  “The hell I did!” I give Jess a straight look back.

  “Well, Pa said you got just what you deserved when you got sent up and—”

  “I was framed, and that’s that! Look-it, this ain’t gonna be forever. But me and you got a bum start, Jess, without no good schooling. And Joe didn’t get it much better. And the only way folks like us can get into a good business that’s legal, like the oil business, or the horse-ranching business, is to get a lotta money to start with. That’s all we’re doing here.”

  “Whoa there, old boy!” That was Jess again. “Me and Joe do plenty fine breaking horses, and a horse don’t care if you graduated high school or didn’t make it past the first grade. And you! You coulda gone to school if you really wanted, and you know it. How about that time you run off and ended up with that old man next county down and he was gonna send you to school if you worked his farm? Only he wanted you to wear kneepants and you wanted to wear long pants. You just never wanted nobody to tell you what to do, Willis.”

  I put up my hand.

  Far as I was concerned, they’d got enough outa their craws.

  “You’re talking old history, Jess,” I said. “It’s time to go forward here. And I got a proposition for you, boys. No way you can lose on this one. I want y’all to try out my business for one month. Just one month. And if you don’t like it after that month, fine. You got no obligation to me. I’ll give you money for a first-class Pullman home, plus a thousand dollars, pilon. That’s a thousand dollars. Apiece.”

  They give each other a look.

  ’Course, both of ’em kicked like fuzztail broncs when I told ’em they’d have to trade in their cowboy outfits for city clothes. But, that afternoon, they let me take ’em to some men’s stores and buy ’em what they needed—three-piece suits, low-slung city shoes, roll-brim fedoras.