Sullivan spun sideways in the saddle and fell cartwheeling to the prairie grass. As Dace ran toward the body, he could hear the woman coming up behind him. A quick glance showed she was unarmed.
“Stay back, ma’am.”
“No!” He’s my brother!” she screamed at him. “You shot Norb like he was a dawg!”
Sullivan lay face up, his vacant eyes staring at nothing. The .44 slug had ripped an exit wound in his chest large enough to stick two fists in.
“I’m sorry,” Dace said. “I called to him to stop.”
Sullivan’s sister looked straight into Dace’s face with such an intensity of hatred that it made him flinch. Her voice quavered in grief and anger. “Norb said he’d rode for you on your ranch. How could you just haul off and shoot him?”
“I didn’t want to, ma’am. I truly didn’t,” Dace said.
“But you did! You did!”
“Ma’am, I knowed him,” Dace said. “If there’d been any way at all to take him alive, I’d’ve done it. Believe me.”
Her face was contorted with rage. “Why’nt you just let him go? He’s only a poor cowboy who’s been treated bad.”
The woman turned her attention to the dead man and knelt down beside him, taking the body in her arms. Her weeping was a gentle moaning as she held her brother’s head in her lap. “Oh, Norb—baby brother—oh—”
Dace noticed the little boy standing fearfully by the house as he walked back to check on Martinson. He didn’t have to roll the lawman over to see if he was alive. Martinson’s backbone, shattered by the mushrooming slug, jutted out through his wool jacket.
~*~
It was well after midnight when Dace Halston finally reined up in front of the U.S. marshal’s office in Guthrie. He led both Leroy Martinson’s horse and Norb Sullivan’s. Each animal bore its owner’s corpse, slung and tied across the saddle.
Chris Madsen was on duty and he had stepped out the door at the sound of Dace’s approach. “That the Kansas sheriff?” he asked in his Danish accent.
“Yeah,” Dace said. “The other is a feller named Norb Sullivan. He was wanted for murder and horse stealing up in Fort Scott.”
“Well, we’ll send the sheriff’s body home in a box,” Madsen said. “Then we make a proper identity on the fugitive and stick him in the ground, ja?”
“I reckon that’s the way it’s done,” Dace said swinging stiffly from the saddle. He groaned. “I got to get some rest.”
“Sure,” Madsen said. “Might as well use the bunk in the back room.”
“I got a place over to the hotel,” Dace said.
“Not much sense in going over there,” the Scandinavian lawman said. “You’ll be going out again in a couple of hours.”
“Goddamn it!” Dace swore. “What is it this time?”
“There’s a prisoner over at Fort Sill with a Federal warrant out for him,” Madsen answered. “You’ll have to go pick him up and bring him back here to Guthrie.”
Dace shook his head. “The amount o’ leisure you get to enjoy in this job is mind boggling, you know that?”
Madsen grinned. “Don’t forget to fill out your report before you turn in.”
“By the time I get these bodies to the undertakers and the horses stabled, I don’t think I’ll have time for any rest.”
“You don’t make much money, but you sure have lots of fun, right, Dace?” Madsen asked with a laugh as he went back into the office.
Dace sighed and stood quietly for several minutes before taking the horses’ reins to lead them down the street to the undertaker’s parlor.
Chapter Four
Dusk settled rapidly over the town of Wharton as George McClary loafed nonchalantly by a hitching rail in front of a dry goods store. He looked down the street and could see Leon Spalding slowly approaching him. When Leon reached George, he nodded a greeting. Then the two strolled from the center of the business district toward the Santa Fe depot located on the outskirts of the village.
“How do things look?” George asked in a low voice.
“I just checked in with ever’body, George,” Spalding said. “The boys is primed and ready for action. Though some still think we shoulda tried this during daylight hours.”
George nodded in understanding. “Maybe the day trains do carry more money, but they’re guarded with small armies. The takings may be small tonight, but there’ll be enough to go around.”
“I think it’s a good idee,” Leon said. “You know I’ll back you up a hunnerd percent, George.”
“I appreciate that, Leon,” George said. He checked his watch. “We got two hours. Want to get a drink?”
“Sure,” Spalding said. The two turned and walked back to the busier part of town. There were few people on the street because the evening had turned decidedly cold. But the early spring coolness didn’t bother George McClary or Leon Spalding. Both men, used to being outdoors most of their lives, bore the uncomfortable weather with the same mute acceptance as the cattle they once herded during the days they earned honest livings.
The interior of the saloon they chose was crowded but relatively quiet. A quick glance showed several locals and unattached drifters either sipping their drinks in silence or carrying on conversations in low tones.
“Bourbon,” George ordered. “Double shot.”
“I’ll have a beer,” Spalding said.
“Coming up, gents,” the bartender replied. Within a few moments, he had served them and taken their money then drifted back to the far side of the bar to resume his conversation with a local acquaintance.
Spalding took a sip of his warm beer. “I notice you get along real good with the young Lilly in Ingraham.”
“Yeah,” George replied. “A man’s got to have a woman, don’t he?”
“Yeah,” Spalding agreed. “I sure wish I could get one o’ them gals to look my way.”
“They will. If you got the price,” George said laughing.
Spalding grinned sheepishly. “You know what I mean. You fellers that get a whore—” He hesitated. “I’m sorry, George. I didn’t mean nothing personal.”
George shrugged. “Lilly is a whore. Why pretend she ain’t?”
“I sure don’t want you to think I’m trying to rile you George,” Spalding said sincerely.
“I know you ain’t,” George assured him. “And I ain’t taking no offense.”
“I really mean to compliment you,” Spalding said. “It takes a hell of a man to win a soiled dove’s heart.”
George smirked, “Hell, Leon, if you’d stop beating the hell out of ’em, you could do better.”
“I cain’t help myself,” Spalding said sadly. “It just riles me to be with a gal knowing that she wouldn’t have nothing to do with me unless I give her money. Then if I’m drunk on top of it, I lose control. The next thing I know, I’m belting ’em around.”
“I’ll tell you what,” George said finishing off his drink. “When we get back to Ingraham, I’ll see if Lilly might help you meet one of her friends. But you got to stop hitting them gals, Leon. You really do. I don’t care how mad you get.”
Spalding smiled happily. “By God, I will, George. I promise. You just tell Lilly to help me out with one of them whores over to Maude Pierson’s hotel, and I won’t never beat up a gal again.”
“I’ll do what I can,” George said. “In the meantime, you want another drink?”
“Hell, yes! And I’m buying, George,” Spalding said. He let out a whistle. “Hey, barkeep! Another round down here.”
~*~
Harriet McClary returned to the kitchen and sat down at the table to resume drinking the cup of coffee interrupted by her children’s squabble in the back bedroom.
Herb Eldridge, her father, sat across from the young woman. He broke up stale bread, soaking it in his own coffee before consuming the soggy mess. He was a deeply wrinkled man, aged before his time by hard work in a harsh environment. His unkempt white thatch of hair stuck up like a badly tied shock of wh
eat. “Who started it this time?” he asked his daughter. “Georgie or Joey?”
“Georgie,” Harriet answered wearily.
“Just like his pa,” Eldridge said. He rubbed his shoulder. “No damned good.”
“He’s your son-in-law and Georgie’s your grandson,” Harriet said in way of defense.
“George McClary ain’t worth nothing,” Eldridge said. He changed the subject. “Damn late cold weather makes my shoulder ache. Got the rheumatiz in it, I reckon.”
“Want some hot cloths?” Harriet asked.
“Don’t want nothing,” the old man responded testily. “He was here the other night, wasn’t he?”
“Who?”
“Who? You know who!” Eldridge said.
Harriet sighed and nodded. “He was here.”
“You shoulda married his friend Dace Halston,” Eldridge said, turning his attention from his shoulder back to his office.
“Dace didn’t come courting.”
“He would’ve.”
“He didn’t.”
“You didn’t give him a chance,” Eldridge complained. “First chance you got you up and said ‘yes’ to that damn George McClary.”
“He asked me to marry him,” Harriet said. “Dace Halston never came calling once.”
“He was here lots o’ times,” Eldridge said.
“He talked more to you than me,” Harriet remarked.
“He really come to see you,” Eldridge insisted. “Any fool could’ve seen that. How come you didn’t at least let him in on the running? Why’d you want to marry that damn George McClary in the first place?”
“I fell in love with him,” Harriet said. “How come you married Mama? Didn’t you love her?”
“Hell, no, I didn’t love her!” Eldridge said. “And she didn’t love me neither. I needed a woman and she needed a man. It was that simple.”
“Oh, Pa! That’s a terrible thing to say!”
“What’s so terrible about it?” Eldridge asked. “They was hard times in them days. Nobody in their right mind cared a hoot about sentiments. The only thing we was inter’sted in, was just being able to get by.”
“But, surely, people loved each other,” Harriet insisted.
“You’re living in a dream world,” Eldridge said. “That’s the way you was as a girl, and I’d say you hadn’t changed much now that you’re a growed woman.”
Harriet decided to make no more comments. Her silence only goaded the old man to continue.
“George is on the owlhoot trail down there in Oklahoma, ain’t he? He’s gonna end up in the territorial prison, mark my words.”
“George is mad about them opening up things down there,” Harriet said. “You ought to realize how he feels after losing his ranch and all that.”
“Goddamn ranch never was his in the first place,” Eldridge said. “Them dumb Injuns down there leased that land to them cattlemen for practically nothing. If that’s the best thing they can figger to do with fertile land, the government did right by taking it back and letting honest farmers have a go on it.”
“George’ll settle down directly,” Harriet said calmly.
“He’s going to jail,” Eldridge said. “Or get shot by some starpacker. If he ain’t strung up by a lynch mob first.”
“Sure you don’t want some hot cloths for that shoulder, Pa?” Harriet asked. “You keep rubbing it.”
“No! I don’t want—oh, hell—all right,” he said, pretending he was doing her a favor. “If you just gotta play around with my aching shoulder, you might as well get it over with as soon as possible and leave me in peace.”
Harriet got up and went to the stove. “It won’t take me long.”
Eldridge rubbed the painful area again. “George McClary is gonna bring as much grief to this family as he will to hisself. You can count on that, missy!”
~*~
The wind had picked up with the growing darkness as George McClary and Leon Spalding once again approached the train depot. They eased alongside the building and settled down to wait in the darkness.
“How much time?” Spalding asked.
“Last time I looked at my watch, it was a half-hour to go,” George answered.
“Damn train is gonna be late,” Spalding said.
“The later, the better,” George said. “We ain’t going nowhere on it, remember? We’re gonna rob the damn thing.”
“Yeah, I reckon you’re right,” Spalding said with a sheepish grin. “Well, ever’body’s wide awake and ready.”
“They damn well better be,” George said.
The two outlaws lapsed into silence, each lost in his own thoughts until, finally, thirty-five minutes later a train whistle sounded faintly in the distance.
“Let’s go,” George said. He led the way as they walked around the building and up the short steps that led to the depot platform. George assumed a casual pose as Spalding approached the station manager’s window.
“Howdy,” Spalding said touching the brim of his hat. “That the night train I just heard?”
“Sure is,” the railroad man answered. “Need a ticket or are you meeting somebody?”
“I’m meeting somebody,” Spalding said drawing his .45 and pointing it at the startled man. “In fact, I’m meeting everybody. You just raise your hands and sit there nice and quiet, hear?”
“Yes, sir!”
Spalding whistled softly. “Ready here.”
George waved back and looked down the tracks where he could see the faint lights of the Santa Fe night southbound growing larger and stronger as the train approached. The whistle, clearer now, sounded again and within a few minutes the outlaw could distinguish the sound of the locomotive’s steam engine slowing down as it drew close to the Wharton depot.
Finally, amid hissing and clouds of steam, the engine rolled into the station to a grinding, screeching halt as the baggage car door slid open and the man inside leaped out—in time to find himself facing George McClary’s Colt pistols aimed at his middle.
At the same time, Shorty Eastman and his best friend Earl Tolliver slipped into the engine cab and threw down on the engineer and fireman who slowly raised their hands, looking at the bandits in frightened confusion.
The two passenger cars were quickly covered by four more men who herded the sleepy and frightened travelers out to join the baggage men and depot agent under George and Spalding’s guns.
Within fifteen minutes, both the train and its riders had been looted and left poorer by close to five thousand dollars as George McClary and his gang galloped boldly away in the darkness.
“Them sumbitches was fast!” one passenger marveled as he patted his empty pockets.
Another man, a leathery ex-rancher, was more specific. “One o’ them owlhoots was George McClary,” he said with an air of certainty. “And I’m gonna tell the U.S. marshal about him too.”
The passenger was dumbfounded. “You knew one of ’em?”
“Damned right. From back in my ranching days. He was a hellraiser even then. If he hadn’t been partners with a better man, he’d never have made it.”
“Sounds like he’s turned to his true self,” the other passenger said.
“I don’t care nothing about the life he chose to lead. But I’ll have my money back or see that galoot’s ass rotting in the territorial prison, by God!”
Chapter Five
Dace Halston walked across the porch of Fort Sill’s post headquarters. He stepped through the door that opened onto a small foyer, and stopped at a table manned by a young soldier.
“I’m from the U.S. marshal’s office in Guthrie,” Dace explained. “I gotta see—” He paused and withdrew a piece of paper from his pocket. He unfolded it and read the instructions written on it. “It says I report to the—praw-vust marshal.”
“The provost marshal’s office is the last one down that hall,” the soldier directed him.
“Is that the way you pronounce that word?” Dace marveled. “Pro-voh, huh?
&nb
sp; “I reckon,” the soldier said with a shrug. “I just do ever’thing the army’s way. It keeps me outta trouble around here.”
“I suppose it does,” Dace said with a smile. “Well, much obliged.” He walked down the short hallway and knocked on the indicated door. “Come in.”
Dace stepped through the portal. He saw a dapper officer with a clipped moustache talking with a burly, red-haired sergeant. The officer’s accent was definitely eastern. “May I help you?”
“I got papers to pick up a prisoner here by the name o’ Blevins—Emmet Blevins.”
“Thank God,” the officer said. He turned to the husky NCO. “Take care of that will you, Sergeant?”
“Yes, sor,” the sergeant answered in a thick Irish brogue. He held out a beefy paw to Dace. “Sargint O’Flynn at yer sarvice.”
“Howdy,” Dace said. “Dace Halston, deputy U.S. marshal.”
“Well, Marshal Halston, let’s go over to the darlin’ guardhouse and we’ll turn the bloody rascal over to yer tender, lovin’ care.”
Dace grinned as he followed the larger man out of the building. “Sounds to me like you ain’t overly fond o’ the prisoner.”
“It’s nothin’ personal I got against him,” the sergeant replied as they walked across the parade ground to the place where the garrison’s prisoners were confined. “But, sure an’ I don’t like civilian bandits in wit’ honest soljers.”
O’Flynn led Dace into the post’s lockup. “Most o’ the pris’ners here is honest drinkers and brawlers. Decent lads that need their arses kicked now and again to keep ’em on the up and up. Puttin’ a bloody train robber in among ’em is a insult to army blue.”
A sentry at the door of the military jail nodded a respectful greeting to the sergeant, then took a key off his belt and unlocked a heavy padlock. “I hope we’re getting rid of that Blevins,” he said swinging the heavy, barred portal open.
“That we are,” O’Flynn said.
They went into the interior of the dank building and stopped at a cell where an incredibly dirty and unshaven man sat on the floor. Dace could tell from the look in the prisoner’s eyes that he had caught plenty of unpleasant attention from the big sergeant. The lawman nodded to the man. “Are you Emmet Blevins?”
Oklahoma Showdown (An Indian Territory Western Book 1) Page 4
