The Killings of Stanley Ketchel

by James Carlos Blake

  Dalton did not offer to say. He smiled and took a sip of his drink. Then said: “What I’d like to know, Mr. Ketchel, is what sorta pistola you got tucked in your belt there?”

  Ketchel looked down to see if the weapon was showing, but it was not. “What makes you think I’m carrying a gun?”

  Dalton smiled.

  Ketchel looked around and then opened his coat so Dalton could see the revolver.

  Dalton nodded, and drew his coat aside to give Ketchel a glimpse of the same model Colt in the holster under his jacket. “Frontier’s a honey, ain’t it?”

  Ketchel grinned.

  “I wonder something else,” Dalton said.

  Ketchel raised his brow.

  “Will you be fighting Johnson again?”

  Ketchel took a swallow of bourbon. Then said: “Got to. If it’s the last damn thing I do.”

  “Yeah,” Emmett Dalton said. “That’s exactly how Bob felt about going for two banks at once.”

  FOR THE LAST half hour of the trip he could not take his gaze from the coach window. “Sweet Christ, I’ve been around and seen a lot of pretty country, but this is…special.”

  “Must be something in our blood the Ozarks calls to,” the colonel said. “I felt the same as you the first time I saw it. So did my daddy before me.”

  “Captain Jerry.” Ketchel liked to say the name. “Grandpa.”

  “He woulda loved hearing you call him that.”

  They got off the train in Conway, some thirty-five miles from Springfield. The colonel’s ranch lay about seven miles distant. He had sent word ahead to the Conway livery where he kept a team and carriage, and the vehicle was ready to go when they got there.

  They drove out of town and followed a narrow road that went winding through groves of oak and hickory, stands of pine, over plank bridges crossing streams and gullies. Except for their own voices, the only sounds were of the horses’ hooves and the carriage rattles, the thin cries of high-wheeling hawks.

  “Most folks around here will tell you that the prettiest parts of the Ozarks are farther south,” the colonel said, “and I’d have to agree. You got the mountains down there, though people like yourself who seen the Rockies might laugh at what Missouri considers mountains. Hunched up, choppy hills more like it, all cut up with ravines and gullies, all full of caves. Hollows so deep and thick with trees the ground never sees a spot of sunshine. Fogged up as often as not. It’s pretty, all right, but you play hell trying to grow much of anything in all that rock. Around here, I can raise me a little wheat, a little corn.”

  The only thing Ketchel had known about the Ozarks was that during the Civil War it had been part of the region ruled by fearsome Confederate guerrillas the like of William Clarke Quantrill and Bloody Bill Anderson, both of whose daring exploits he had read about many a time. He could see why the guerrillas had fared so well. This was country made for ambush.

  He’d heard that former members of Quantrill’s Raiders or allied bunches had been having an annual reunion somewhere in Missouri ever since the end of the war. There wasn’t a man among them under the age of sixty anymore, and some were into their seventies, but there were at least two dozen or so of the rascals yet walking the earth and they got together every year. The colonel said he’d heard about the bushwhacker reunions, too, but didn’t know where they were held. They’d have to find out and attend one. Could be fun listening to those old killers telling their war tales.

  Dickerson wasn’t surprised there were so many bushwhackers left. “Missourians are a rough folk in general,” he said, “but these Ozarkers are the roughest of the lot. Take my word for it, son, they’re not a people to chivvy with.”

  THE ESTATE WAS as beautiful as the colonel had claimed. It was bordered by a river from which a dozen streams branched and went meandering over the property. There were stands of hardwoods, grassy meadows, a field of wheat and a larger one of corn. Late afternoon sunlight lay in a golden mist on the grass, glowed softly green through the trees.

  “Most of the creeks on the place are spring-fed,” the colonel said. “Clear as glass and cold as ice all year round. Some good-size trout in them.”

  As they drew near to the ranch house they passed by one of the several tenant houses scattered over the property. A man and his wife and child were out in the yard and waved as they went by.

  The colonel yelled, “Howdy, Luther! Howdy Miz Brazeale, Sally Jean. This here’s Stevie!” Ketchel and the family waved to each other.

  The ranch house stood at the edge of a dense hollow. It was a large two-story structure with gabled dormers and fronted by a screened porch. A stout man in work clothes and a woman who might have passed for his twin in female dress came out to greet them and help unload the baggage. Behind them stood a young girl in an apron. The colonel introduced them as the ranch foreman, Mr. Bailey, and his missus. The girl was Hilda, Mrs. Bailey’s helper.

  The colonel told Ketchel that Bailey had recently tendered his resignation, effective the middle of next month. He and his wife were moving back to Kentucky to help Bailey’s sickly bachelor brother manage his farm.

  “You’re leaving me high and dry and you know it, you damned hillbilly,” the colonel said to Bailey. “Where am I going to get somebody able as you and your missus to run this place?”

  “Oh really, Mr. Dickerson,” Mrs. Bailey said, “you’ve been saying the same thing for weeks now.”

  “Well hell, it’s been true for weeks. You’re running out on me.”

  “Gee whiz, Colonel, you’re gonna have us all blubbering in a minute,” Bailey said.

  “Whoever I get to take your place might not be as good,” the colonel said, “but for damn sure he’ll have a more respectful tongue in his head.” He leaned toward Ketchel and said in lower voice, “Hell, he’s not going anywhere. He’s just holding out for more jack. Soon as I make the right offer he’ll stay.”

  “I heard that,” Bailey said. “And you’re wrong. I keep telling you.”

  “Oh sure I am,” the colonel said, and winked at Ketchel.

  The colonel’s quarters were on the second floor. The main floor comprised three rooms: a bedroom on one side of the house, a dining room with fireplace on the other side, and a parlor between them. The dining room also served as the Baileys’ quarters. There was a kitchen off the rear of the house, and the Hilda girl slept there on a cot in a corner. The colonel told Ketchel the downstairs bedroom was his for as long as he wanted it. “It’s your house, son.”

  As they were settling in, the sky abruptly clouded and a wind kicked up and minutes behind it came whipping sheets of thun-derless rain, a hard storm that rattled the windows for a quarter hour and then was gone. After a supper of chicken stew and biscuits they retired for the night. Ketchel positioned his bed directly under an open window, and after extinguishing his lamp he lay awake and let his senses acquaint themselves with the Ozark evening. The sky had cleared but the moon was not yet risen, and the night’s only light was in massive clusters of stars. A soft chill breeze came through the window. A tree branch gently scraped the side of the house. He heard an owl hoot. Was surprised by the wail of a coyote. He breathed deeply of the crisp air and its moist aromas of sweetly rich earth and unfamiliar vegetation. He thought he might have found a home.

  DURING THEIR FIRST few days on the ranch the colonel took him on hikes over various sections of the property, through shadowy hollows, along the banks of rippling creeks, across meadows of yellow grass to their thighs. The more of the place Ketchel saw, the more he was taken with its beauty. One afternoon they reeled in a half-dozen trout from one of the streams and that evening fried the fillets in butter and seasoned them with coarse black pepper and a touch of lemon. Another day they brought down several fat quail with the colonel’s shotguns, and Mrs. Bailey roasted them to perfection.

  Within view of the house was a newly constructed barn with one wall yet unpainted, and a few feet from it stood a high mound of excavated dirt and scrub brush that Ketchel use
d as a backstop for target practice with his guns. It pleased the colonel to hear him at his daily shooting, to peer out the window and see him making short work of bottles and tin cans. Sometimes he went out and joined in with a gun of his own.

  Ketchel had been there a week when he told the colonel he believed the Ozarks was the place to settle down. He would let his brother have the Pine Lake home for whatever price he could afford to pay. The colonel was delighted by his decision. It happened that a large parcel of property adjoining his own was for sale, a nice place to build a house and fertile enough to be farmed if he took a notion. Ketchel liked it, and when he asked if Dickerson could suggest something to invest in, the colonel drove him out to view a dense section of timberland on which he had an option but was willing to let Ketchel buy in his stead. Ketchel bought both properties and for the first time he felt as if he were truly putting down roots.

  And yet…. He could not stop thinking of Johnson. Or, for that matter, of Wilson Mizner. The more he thought of his telephone talk with Mizner, the more he had come to see that Pete the Goat was right, Mizner was no true friend of his, only a business partner whose sole concern was the size of his own cut. But so what? That was the man’s job, after all, it was how he made his living. No, what truly grated him about Mizner was the man’s apparent certainty that he could not beat Johnson. You don’t know me, pal, Ketchel thought. You don’t know me worth a damn. Still, Bill Mizner was a hard man not to like, and he’d had a hell of a lot of fun in his company. He saw no reason to end things on a sour note.

  He wrote Mizner a letter saying he was resettling in the Ozarks, that he had bought timberland and farm acreage and was going into business in both. He was quitting the fight game. He wished him well and said maybe they could have a drink together if he was ever again in New York. As he sealed the letter in an envelope, he thought, You’ll find out how wrong you were when you read it in the papers, old pard.

  He then wrote to Pete the Goat in California to tell him he was settling in Missouri but would be seeing Jack Johnson in New York next month to try to get a rematch. He told Pete about his letter to Mizner and said he would be acting as his own manager in dealing with Johnson. He wanted Pete to be ready to come out to the Ozarks and set up a training camp as soon as the rematch was all set.

  OVER THE NEXT weeks they made frequent trips to Springfield, where the colonel took him around to meet every man of importance in town, from the mayor to the chief of police to the editors of the local newspapers. He took him to a meeting of the Elks Club and introduced him personally to every member. A few nights afterward, Ketchel was initiated into the lodge by special decree. The formal rite was accompanied by a rendition of Chopin’s “Funeral March,” which the colonel knew to be Ketchel’s favorite musical composition. After the ceremony the “carefree, boisterous crowd,” as the local newspaper characterized the company, celebrated late into the night.

  Some days later Dickerson booked a showing of the Jeffries-Johnson fight film at the Landers Theater, and Ketchel was the evening’s special guest. When he entered the theater and went down the aisle to his reserved seat, the applause shuddered the walls. Ketchel waved in recognition of the tribute.

  “You haven’t been here a month and already you’re a hometown hero,” the colonel said. “You picked the right place to make a home, son.”

  “Feels like home,” Ketchel said.

  THEY WERE A week into October now and despite his persistent blandishments and tenders of an increase in salary Dickerson could not persuade Bailey to stay on.

  “Goddamn it, man, I already offered you more than I ever intended,” the colonel said. “It’s one thing to hold out for a raise, but I won’t be robbed.”

  “I’ve told you and told you, Colonel, I’m going. It’s nary to do with money.”

  “What the hell is it? What you got against me, anyway? I thought we liked each other.”

  Bailey sighed and turned to his wife and shrugged.

  “Well, by God, I won’t stand for this insolence,” the colonel said. “You’re fired. This fella here”—he pointed at Ketchel—“can run this place good enough.”

  “You can’t fire me, I already resigned,” Bailey said. “But I said I’d stick till next Saturday and I will, unless you say leave right now.”

  The colonel ran a hand through his sparse hair. He was his father’s son and not used to being put over a barrel.

  “I don’t doubt Mr. Ketchel can manage the place,” Bailey said, “but he can’t run it by himself and you know it. You best get him another working man and a housekeeper unless you’re fixing to do the plowing and cooking.”

  “Goddamn it,” the colonel said.

  “I’ll stay till next Saturday like I promised, but it’s only another week. You best get to hiring somebody.”

  “I know, I know,” the colonel said.

  That afternoon he and Ketchel went to Springfield to spend a few days. The colonel had some business to attend to and also wanted to help Ketchel arrange for timber contracts on his new property. But the first thing he did was go to an employment office managed by a friend of his named Spears. He told Spears he needed a field hand and a housekeeper who could cook, preferably a married couple. He needed them right away but he didn’t want any slackers or drinkers or complainers. If any likely applicants should come around, Spears was to send them to him lickety-split.

  The following Monday afternoon a young couple presented themselves at the colonel’s office and said they had been referred by Mr. Spears.

  After a brief interview, Dickerson hired them.

  Goldie and Walt

  Goldie Smith had for a few years used her stepfather’s last name of Bright. She had at different times of her life also been Goldie Woods, Goldie Knight, and Goldie Osborne. She was a pretty woman, blonde and gray-eyed and well proportioned, and on the day Dickerson hired her she was twenty-two years old.

  An Ozarks native, she had been a sexually precocious girl who enthusiastically parted with her virginity at the age of thirteen. She knew several lovers in the following year and was not yet fifteen when she eloped with a dapper and darkly handsome man named Woods. He was a gambler by trade and a procurer by inclination, and Goldie earned a fair share of their keep as they traveled about Missouri. They avoided K. C. and St. Louis, where Woods said the competition was too stiff and the cops too rough with those who didn’t pay off. She did not object to the life. Indeed, she considered herself lucky in comparison to women such as her mother, farm wives who worked like plow animals and were old and swaybacked before they reached forty. She did, however, object to her husband’s infidelities, and she registered her objections in the tantrum fashion of the child she in some ways yet was. But Woods had low tolerance for shrill antic and each time responded by slapping her silly. It would not occur to her until much later that she was not his first whore-wife.

  They had been married a year and were living in Jefferson City when Woods informed her they were now divorced. He gave her a copy of the decree and a five-dollar bill and said so long. She watched from the window as he got behind the steering wheel of a little runabout in which a woman in a feathered hat had been waiting and then drove out of her life forever.

  All she could think to do was return to the Ozarks, where her mother and stepfather were living on the outskirts of Chadwick, about thirty-five miles from Springfield. It was not a warm reunion, as both her mother and Mr. Bright had long before given her up for bad. But she promised to make herself helpful and mind her behavior, and so they took her in.

  Inside of six months she was again desperate to be free of the farm. Deliverance presented itself in the form of R. W. Knight, a station agent for the Frisco line who was posted at the Chadwick depot. She had just turned sixteen when they wed. Nine months later she bore a baby girl. Knight was delighted. Goldie loved the infant, too, and yet shortly after her initiation to motherhood she began waking in the night in a gasping terror that she would soon be an old woman and soon
thereafter die. To counter these fears, she reverted to sexual adventure, to sporting with passing drummers, tinkers, the occasional hobo just off a freight and in search of a handout. Time passed and suspicions slowly sprouted among the neighbors. Rumors made the rounds and eventually reached her husband’s ear. He confronted her and she made heated denials. But the rumors did not abate, and he began to uncover evidence of their truth: a crushed cigar butt at the bottom of the kitchen steps, a faint trace of whiskey in a sink-side cup, a sooty hand towel balled behind the wash basin. One morning he reached under the bed for his shoes and found a man’s shirt collar, and the game was up. She could not muster the words to explain the fears that drove her to it. And so a little more than two years after they married they were divorced. Knight readily agreed to pay support for the child, then transferred to a station in Arkansas.

  For a time she made ends meet by dint of Knight’s support money and by taking in seamstress work. But she was lonelier than ever and continued to engage in liaisons. She read of Evelyn Nesbit and her adventurous life in New York, of the red velvet swing and the rich men who vied for her, killed for her. She wept with the want of such glamorous excitement in her own life.

  Word of her indiscretions again made its way to her former husband Knight, albeit it had farther to go this time and took longer to reach him. Two years after leaving her, Knight returned to Missouri long enough to gain legal custody of their daughter, a simple matter in light of the copious neighborhood testimony regarding Goldie’s iniquitous conduct. On conclusion of the legalities, he told Goldie to stay out of their lives forever and took the little girl off to Arkansas.

  She told herself then and would tell others later that the loss of her child unmoored her from all sense of purpose and worth and was likely the reason that some months later she married a man she hardly knew and moved with him to Kansas. In truth, she could not then or later have named a clear motive for this marriage. The man’s name was Osborne. He was a traveling salesman, a drummer, and for reasons as murky as everything else about their time together, they divorced in Cherryvale after being married only four months. She stayed in that town and worked as a waitress for a time, and now and then turned a trick. From what she heard about Coffeyville, which lay a little farther to the south, she thought the pickings might be better, so she moved there. And despite her young years was soon managing what she called a boardinghouse for women but which the local sheriff correctly suspected was a different sort of house. He raided the place, confiscated all of her money, dispersed the other girls, and gave her one day to get clear of the county or, as he put it, he would have her ass on the women’s work farm.