God's Thunderbolt: The Vigilantes of Montana

by Carol Buchanan

  Joe glowered at Dan from under his eyebrows and gnawed on a dirty fingernail.

  Dan threw wide his hands, turned away as if he might be finished, swung back, shook the pointed stick at Joe. “What were you doing on the fifth of December?”

  Joe glared.

  “What about the seventh?” The knife scored the wood.

  Honest Whiskey Joe’s mouth opened, but no sound came out.

  Slicing at the stick, Dan recited all of the dates in early December, from the first to the sixteenth, when Palmer found Nick, each date a cut into the stick, and the knife cut faster, and chips rained down, and Joe took hold of the top sideboard with both hands to steady himself. Dan closed the knife, took the stick, now the size of a sharp pencil, into his right hand, thrust it rapier-like at Honest Whiskey Joe who staggered back. “You don’t know what you were doing on the sixth of December at all. You don’t know what you doing any day this month!”

  The witness’s chin sank to his chest.

  Dan shouted, “Isn’t that true?”

  Joe’s chin rose from his chest, and his mouth opened, but Dan pressed on, “So how did you come to recall that you were playing cards with George Ives and Alex Carter on the sixth?”

  “It must have been the sixth.”

  “Why?”

  Joe licked his lips, glanced toward the defense attorneys, but Dan blocked him.

  “’Cause that’s the day the Dutch kid was killed.”

  “How do you know that?”

  Joe shrugged.

  “How do you know Nicholas Tbalt was murdered on the sixth?” Dan bellowed, “Tell us!”

  “Uh, I guess somebody must a tol’ me. Yeah, that’s it. Somebody tol’ me, and then I recollected I was playing cards that day with Ives and Carter and the boys. Yeah, that’s it.” Looking pleased with himself, Joe shifted, to catch Smith’s eye, but Dan threw the next question at him.

  “Who told you Nicholas Tbalt was murdered on the sixth of December?”

  “I disremember. One of the boys.”

  “Which one? Who was it?”

  “I don’t rightly recollect!” Joe yelled back.

  Dan hammered on, “Who told you when Nicholas Tbalt was murdered?” No answer. “You don’t remember who told you Nick was murdered on the sixth, you don’t know what games you played all that day, what you bet, if you won or lost!” He gasped for breath. “You don’t know what you were doing on any day this month! Who put you up to this?”

  Joe raised his arm to point, and Dan stepped aside just as Thurmond and Smith sprang up. Joe hollered, “It was him! He said Ives told him the Dutch kid was killed on the sixth.”

  Thurmond gaped. Smith shouted, “Objection! It’s all hearsay! He’s testifying to what he says someone told him!”

  “Who, Joe? Which one?”

  “The tall one behind Smith.” He meant Thurmond.

  The tyger came to life and roared, but mixed with the booing of the roughs sounded a strong note from men who yelled at them to shut their faces, shut the hell up, and the cowbell rang and rang until slowly, slowly the tyger’s roar quieted to a growl and Dan could be heard.

  “Let the record show that the witness has pointed to Mr. Thurmond.”

  “He’s lying!” screamed Thurmond. “Lying, I tell you!”

  Sanders yelled, “Your honors! He’s impeaching his own witness.” Blank uncomprehending stares came from the judges. “He’s accusing his own witness of lying!” Wheeling, Sanders confronted Thurmond, “What else did your witness lie about?”

  Caught, Thurmond closed his mouth, at a loss for words and stood mute. The tyger was quiet.

  Dan flung the stick away. “I am through with this witness!”

  Sanders and Bagg shook his hand, because he had discredited Joe’s testimony and established a clear chain of reasoning: Ives had told Thurmond Nick died on the sixth, and Thurmond had told Joe, who then gave Ives an alibi for that date. Thurmond had not talked to Long John or Hilderman alone since they brought Ives in, and if someone else killed Nick, the defense had not mentioned him. The conclusion was inescapable.

  Ives killed Nick.

  But did the people understand it?

  Logic be damned, Dan said to himself, without hard evidence Ives might still be freed. The God damn mob jury.

  George Brown carried himself with his torso tilted slightly back, aping a man of affairs, though his appearance was insignificant and he had something dishonest in his air, perhaps a willingness to laugh, to overlook the character of the jokes, so long as he was included. Dan’s dislike of the man was sealed.

  As he passed the log, he said something, and the Ives faction whooped and slapped his back. Looking pleased to have scored a success with tough men, Brown climbed into the wagon. Gallagher sneered in Dan’s direction, said something to McDowell, who looked at Dan and stroked the barrel of his shotgun.

  The Spencer once more slung over his shoulder, standing with Bagg and Sanders, Dan was choking on his anger. The stupid bastards, all of them, who believed that they would never have to face consequences for their crimes.

  Ives never paid for anything.

  No more. This time Ives would pay.

  Fitch brought him a pint of beer. “Thank you.” Dan gulped down half of it, then sipped it while Sanders and Bagg brought Fitch up to date. His thumb beat hard, and he cursed his stupidity, although it given him license to rest his arm against Martha McDowell’s breast. And then he remembered Harriet. Good God, he had made promises to Harriet Dean. Blonde, beautiful, plump Harriet Dean, a treat to escort in her décolletage to a ball, to hold in his arms during a waltz, to imagine in his bed.

  She would never have brought him information about these thugs, or acquired it by braving the typhus for a whore’s child. Obedient, she would not defy her father even to the extent of promising to wait for him. But he had promised to return to her. Memory conjured her image, waltzing in another man’s arms. She was not the kind to wait. Perhaps she did not believe he would deliver the family from disgrace. He must get enough gold to return, and soon.

  But Martha McDowell, she of the luminous eyes, had put herself in harm’s way to help him. How could he leave her? Yet he had promised Miss Dean, and Mrs. McDowell was – God help him – Mrs. McDowell.

  He wished he could get blind drunk. Forget them both.

  “Good God.” Sanders’s heartfelt curse brought Dan out of his black thoughts in time to understand that Brown named Long John Frank as Nick’s murderer.

  Long John, at once the bearing beam and the frail reed in the prosecution’s case. He’d lied about the gold, he had not tried to stop Ives, he was complicit in the crime. But how far? Dan didn’t know. Would anyone ever know?

  Bagg rubbed his hands together and chortled with glee. “They’ve thrown Long John to the wolves. Let me at Brown. Just let me at him.”

  “Go to it.” Dan spoke at the same time Sanders said, “Be our guest.”

  The group around Ives, especially Gibbons, looked worried. Perhaps because, though the sun hovered just above the western horizon, Plummer had not arrived. McDowell drank out of a tall brown bottle as he listened to Gallagher. Ives tried to strike up a conversation with Alex Davis, who laid a finger to his lips.

  “Blue, listen.” Fitch, standing behind the crossed tongues, twisted the hairs of his mustache as if to make thread from wool. “Brown’s lying.”

  “We know that,” said Bagg and Sanders together.

  “Oh, yeah? Do you know where he was? I spoke with a fella who says Brown was at Dempsey’s that day, on the job just like he’s supposed to be.”

  “Will your pal testify?”

  “Hell, no. He’s got a family. It’d be his life if them boys knew he’d talked. You ought to be able to shake him loose.”

  The three prosecutors regarded each other in a silent consultation. “Yes,” Bagg said. “I sure as hell can do that.”

  “Easily,” Dan said. “Threaten him with twenty or thirty witnesses who went through
on the stage.”

  Bagg danced a clumsy step or two. “We got him. You bet we do.”

  “Thank you, Fitch,” Sanders said.

  Bagg attacked before both feet touched the wagon’s floor, a good commander on the offensive. “I put it to you that you are lying through your teeth, that you were not present at any card game on December sixth, you were nowhere near Wisconsin Creek. You were, in fact, on the job at Dempsey’s ranch, serving up beer and lies, just like now.”

  “I ain’t lying,” shouted Brown. “I was playing cards all day at Wisconsin Creek.”

  “With George Ives and Honest Whiskey Joe.”

  “And Aleck Carter. That’s right, by God.”

  “You leave the Almighty out of this. We know what He thinks of liars.”

  A voice called from the crowd: “What was the game?” Other voices chimed in, “Yeah! Ask him! What was the game?”

  Bagg cocked his head to one side. “You heard them. Answer the question.”

  “Poker. That’s what. Poker.”

  Another voice came out of the crowd: “What kind of poker?”

  “Draw,” yelled Brown. “It was draw poker!”

  Silence. Silence spread like water over the crowd, and over the group around Ives. Smith put his head in his hands, Thurmond pounded his fist on the log, and Davis half rose with a protest that died stillborn. Someone tried a half-hearted boo that no one else took up.

  “Honest Whiskey Joe said it was stud poker,” Bagg said. “What do you think of that?”

  Brown inspected something on the floor of the wagon.

  “Answer the question!” Byam snapped.

  “Five-card. Five-card stud.”

  Bagg said, “Joe said seven-card stud. What about that?” When Brown said nothing, he went on, “We know someone’s lying. My money’s on you, Brown. This here claim you’re panning, why, you won’t see any color.” Brown did not speak. “We can bring in twenty, thirty witnesses from the stage coaches that stopped at Dempsey’s that day.”

  “No, you can’t!” Triumph shone on his face and in his clear, loud voice. “We didn’t get that many passengers. It was a light –”

  Shadows from mountains on the southern side of Alder Creek eased toward the court, and the sun, sinking below the jagged horizon, set free the chill of winter’s long twilight. The tyger breathed in and out, in and out, or perhaps it was his own breath Dan heard rasping in his throat. Beside him Fitch swore under his breath, one obscenity after another, his vocabulary rich and imaginative as he left neither Brown’s privates nor his parentage unscathed.

  “It was a light day, was it?” Bagg was no longer Brown’s adversary, but his agreeable friend. “I guess not too many of the boys want to travel these days, seeing how unsafe the roads are, what with all the road agents around.”

  Brown’s chin jutted out at Bagg. “That’s what I was told. I wasn’t there. I was playing cards with Ives and Carter at Long John’s place.”

  What was Bagg doing? Dan held his left hand at a level with his heart and longed to attack a stick with his knife. He took the knife out of his pocket and tossed it idly in his right hand. In Bagg’s shoes, he’d have stopped when Brown said it was a light day.

  “So Bob Dempsey let you off that day?”

  “That’s right.”

  “He’s a good man to work for, isn’t he?”

  “He sure is. The best.”

  “I bet you’re a good employee, too. Not the sort to run out on your boss.”

  “You bet.”

  “Because you’re loyal, aren’t you? You’re loyal to your boss?”

  “Yes, I am.” Brown held up his head.

  Dan understood. He whispered, “Beautiful. Just beautiful,” and Fitch leaned to him, muttered a tobacco-smelling question that Dan ignored. Fitch would see for himself.

  Bagg said, “You want to help Ives, don’t you? Speak up, now. Answer yes, good and loud, so men can hear how loyal you are.”

  “Yes!”

  “You’re loyal to your pals, too, aren’t you?” Again yes, Brown’s pride clear in his shoulders held back, his head up. And Bagg said, “That’s good. You and Ives are pals, aren’t you?”

  “Yes!”

  The next question rode on the heels of Brown’s answer – “You’d go out of your way to help a pal, wouldn’t you?” – and hard after Brown’s reply – “Yes!” – Bagg fired the next question, “Even lie for him, wouldn’t you?” and Brown called out, his voice clear and proud, “Yes!” and Bagg shouted, “You lied about Long John, didn’t you?” and Brown shouted back, “Yes!” and then, too late, “No!”

  Thurmond, Davis, and Smith all jumped up, shouted objections that Bagg ignored as he rushed in with the final question before Brown recovered.

  “You were at Dempsey’s that day, weren’t you?”

  “Yes! I mean – No!”

  “Which is it, yes or no? Speak up! Yes or no? Yes is right, isn’t it? Isn’t it? You said it was a light day, and you knew that because you were there, weren’t you, it don’t do you no good to lie now, we know the truth, we got witnesses, and you might as well tell the truth, you were at Dempsey’s on the sixth because you’re a good, loyal employee. Ain’t that right?”

  “Yes!” Brown yelled. “I mean no, I am, I was, no, I was at Dempsey’s!”

  Bagg stepped back. “I’m through with this witness.”

  Because it took a hard man to hold onto a lie, Dan told himself, knowing he was grinning like a fool, but he’d seen a master cross-examine and break a witness, and he doubted he could have done it himself, though Brown was no hard man, but an easy-going man eager to please, and Bagg had read him and used that eagerness against him.

  Brown walked toward the group with Ives, but no one would look at him, let alone speak to him. After a few seconds, he walked away.

  Dan found he could not see his notebook until Fitch lighted a candle and held it for him. Jacob stood close, with the other two prosecutors, and the five men made a tight, closed group. The judges dismissed everyone until the next day, and under the noise of a thousand men going their separate ways, Dan said, “We must talk about this. There’s more to these robberies and murders than we have thought of. It looks very much like a criminal conspiracy, and if we’re to survive, we must root it out.”

  5: Alder Gulch: Nevada City

  Dan had hardly slept when he forced himself to rise and light a lamp while Jacob went on snoring with his face to the wall. Shivering, Dan pulled on his trousers over the long underwear he had slept in. He broke the ice skimming the water bucket, poured water into a basin, and scraped his razor over the night’s stubble of beard. He rinsed his face in the cold water, and emerged, gasping, at last awake. Damn! He wished he had built up the fire and heated the water. He dried his face, and found Jacob sitting up, elbows on his knees, rubbing the sleep from his eyes.

  Jacob yawned. “Today, what is happening?”

  “The defense will bring in character witnesses and try to show that Ives is a man of good character.” Dan slipped his left arm into his jacket and drew the garment up to his shoulder. Jacob did not ask what would happen if the defense succeeded in showing Ives to be a man of good character. He knew. They both knew. Last night, they’d been escorted to Virginia amid threats from the dark: “You bastards are dead men!” “Breathe deep, you son of a bitch, it could be your last!” Today’s witnesses could raise a doubt in the juries’ minds as to Ives’s guilt, and despite the stories he’d heard, those in his pocketbook, he had no rebuttal witnesses. The only hope the prosecutors had was to break today’s witnesses as they had broken Joe Basak and George Brown.

  Dan’s stomach lurched, and he swallowed bile.

  When they stepped outside, the Melodeon Hall was quiet and dark. Somewhere, a drunk sang “Home Sweet Home” off key, with now and then a sob. Dan hoped he had someplace to get out of the cold. A dog barked from farther up Idaho Street, and Dan froze, his hand on Jacob’s forearm, before he realized it was probably
Canary, barking at the singer. A good music critic, that dog.

  A soft Southern whisper from the shadows by the Eatery made Dan shy away: “Mista’ Stark?”

  “What? Who’s that?” His right hand had brought the uncocked rifle to bear.

  “Don’t shoot, sir, it’s me. Albert Rose.”

  “Albert, what are you doing out this early?”

  “Looking for you, sir. Miz Hudson, she said I could.”