Wild Side of the River

by Michael Zimmer

  Leaving the horses in the barn, Ethan took his rifle and shell belt and went around the front of the house to the small porch. The wicker chair where he’d slept last night sat to the left of the door, catching the full rays of the afternoon sun, but a couple of comfortable-looking rockers set back in the shade of trellises woven through with green ivy caught his eye, and he settled gratefully into one of these. He dropped the heavy cartridge belt in a heap on the floor beside him, then laid the Winchester across his lap. Leaning back, he propped his heels on the porch railing and tried to relax.

  From the Carvers’ front porch, Sundance looked almost serene. Bees buzzed in the flower bed alongside the house, and hummingbirds darted back and forth like tiny gossips, blurred wings humming. Ethan could have slept if he’d allowed himself to, but he was afraid to let go. From here, he could see the jail, a couple of blocks down and across the street. The Bullshead was hidden from view, but in his mind’s eye he could still see the line of horses strung out along the hitch rails, the hard faces of the men who’d ridden them into town.

  Forcing his gaze away, toward the broad expanse of empty plains rolling in gentle swells to the south, Ethan spied a thin plume of dust rising into the sky. His eyes narrowed and his fingers slid unconsciously back over the Winchester’s side plate to the rifle’s steel lever. He slid three of them inside, ready to cock the piece for firing, forefinger curved toward the trigger.

  Time crept past at an arthritic gait. The dust rose higher, but didn’t thicken as it might have under a group of fast-approaching horsemen. Ethan took that as a good sign. After a bit, he stood and walked to the edge of the porch. It was a wagon rolling toward Sundance, its features vaguely familiar. As it drew nearer, he suddenly placed it, and said, under his breath: “You damn’ old fool.”

  It took another thirty minutes for the outfit to reach town. As it drew even with the Carver house, Ethan almost stepped into the street to intercept it. Yet something stopped him, kept him rooted where he was as Gerard Turcotte guided his ancient rig down the middle of Hide Street.

  Corn Grower sat on Gerard’s right, Rachel on his left. All three glanced at him as they rattled past, but none offered even a gesture of recognition. When the wagon had rolled past, Ethan glanced south again. Trailing Turcotte’s rig by half a mile was a second wagon. From its faded red canvas cover, Ethan recognized Badger Dick Barlow’s trade wagon. The burly, apple-shaped figure of the gray-bearded old peddler and his Piegan wife sat side-by-side atop the tall seat, their full-grown sons riding alongside on scrawny Indian ponies, long-barreled rifles slanted across their saddlebows. They also passed without greeting, although Ethan knew they saw him. They followed after Turcotte, and, when they were hidden by Claudia Carver’s rose bushes, Ethan looked south once more. Off in the distance, three more narrow columns of dust were spiraling into the sky, rolling in from the Marias’ breaks like a storm front.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Supper at the Carvers’ that night was roast beef, potatoes, carrots, and apple sauce. There was sweetened lemonade that Ethan ignored, coffee he drank black, and rice pudding for dessert. Under different circumstances, he would have considered it one of the best meals he’d ever eaten. As it was, he barely noticed the food passing his lips in the awkward silence that dominated the table.

  By the time he was called in to eat, Ethan had watched no less than six hunter’s wagons roll into town. They came in separately, as if by chance, but not one of them had acknowledged Ethan as they passed. Not even a nod. Something was up and Ethan was eager to know what it was, but instinct told him to proceed cautiously, that whatever was going on would reveal itself in time.

  They were still seated at the table when they heard a staccato of pistol shots from the street. Ethan was out of his chair in a flash, grabbing his Winchester and shell belt on his way to the front door.

  Following close behind, Doc lay a warning hand on the younger man’s shoulder. “Don’t go out there, son.”

  Ethan had no intention of rushing blindly outside. Leaning against the wall, he fingered a sheer out of his way to peer through the glass.

  “What’s happening?” Claudia asked fretfully from the dining room.

  “Looks like some of Kestler’s boys are blowing off steam,” Ethan replied.

  “Drunk, too, I’ll wager,” Doc said disapprovingly.

  “Looks like it.” Ethan watched a group of horsemen race their mounts down the street, whooping and hollering, firing their revolvers into the sky.

  Doc’s face grew taut with agitation. “This is Charlie Kestler’s doing. He’s deliberately trying to intimidate the town.”

  One glance at the doctor and his wife, and Ethan figured it wouldn’t take much to do just that. “Kestler wouldn’t risk the safety of innocent people,” he argued. “He’ll keep a rein on his boys.”

  “I’m afraid you don’t know our Mister Kestler,” Claudia replied.

  “Now, we don’t know if those rumors are true,” Doc said, although without much conviction. He glanced at Ethan. “There have been stories that Kestler rode with Quantrill during the late war. To my knowledge, Kestler has never confirmed his role in the war . . .”

  “Or denied it,” Claudia interjected.

  “Nor,” Doc continued sternly, “have I ever heard anyone accuse him of any participation in the border wars.”

  “Those stories came from somewhere,” Claudia replied stubbornly.

  Ethan had been little more than a toddler when William Clarke Quantrill led his raiders into Lawrence, Kansas in one of the bloodiest attacks on civilians during the Civil War. Quantrill and his men had gone to Kansas seeking retribution for wrongs done to them and their families in Missouri, and they’d been in a vengeful mood the morning they overran Lawrence’s skimpy guard. When they left town that afternoon, more than two hundred men and boys had been slaughtered, entire blocks ravaged by fire, women raped, homes and businesses plundered, wrecked. If Kestler did come from such a murderous background, Ethan figured that would change the rules significantly in regard to Joel and Ben. He spun away from the door, headed for Doc’s office.

  “Where are you going?” Doc asked.

  “I want a closer look,” Ethan flung back.

  “Be careful!” Claudia called.

  Ethan left the house and made his way past the barn, taking the back way to the Bullshead and staying out of sight as much as possible. The rear door to Ira Webb’s living quarters was unlocked, and Ethan slipped inside, unnoticed. Nothing had changed since he’d awakened here the morning after his fight with Nolan Andrews—the single bunk was still unmade, same dirty laundry on the floor, dishes unwashed in the dry sink.

  A closed door across the room led to a cluttered storage area, dimly lit by a single lantern. Beyond that was the main room and bar. Ethan eased past empty beer kegs and cases of sour mash to an inconspicuous door in the corner and cautiously eased it open a quarter of an inch. What he saw didn’t look promising. There were at least twenty men—cowboys and merchants alike—lined up at the bar. Others stood around the big room drinking and talking, voices burred with anger. The men who had been there earlier—Nolan Andrews’s men—were gone; Ethan would have given a $5 gold piece to know where they’d disappeared to.

  Ira was handling the bar with hurried efficiency, keeping up with the demands for fresh drinks, but just barely. Right now the crowd seemed loud but contained, yet Ethan figured it wouldn’t be long before things began to deteriorate.

  It would start small, he reasoned, and probably be isolated within the saloon itself at first. A fist fight or smashed furniture, blood spilled, threats made. As the evening progressed, it would gradually spread outside. Cowboys would no longer be content to ride their horses in the street, and targets unnoticed before would suddenly present themselves—store windows, street lamps, maybe a passing citizen scrambling out of the way of bullets thrown at his heels. Eventually it would be as Davidson had predicted, the whole town engulfed in violence.

&n
bsp; Unless someone stopped it.

  That would be Kestler’s job, but only if he wanted it. If he didn’t, if he turned his back to it, dawn could well illuminate a town in ruin, Joel and Ben hanging from nooses as its centerpiece.

  Ethan eased the door shut. He needed to get Ira back here, convince him to shut down the Bullshead. But how? Kestler’s men were keeping him bumping, and Ethan knew he couldn’t show his own face to those inside, already working themselves up for a lynching.

  Glancing around the room, a case of empty whiskey bottles caught his eye. Leaning his rifle against the wall, Ethan picked it up and heaved it against the wall. The shattering glass made a lot more noise than he’d anticipated, and he quickly ducked behind the door in case someone other than Ira came to investigate.

  In the front room, the rumble of conversation momentarily lessened, and Ethan slid his fingers around the Remington’s worn grips. Then the racket picked up again, and the storage room door swung open. Ira stepped inside.

  “What’s goin’ on in here?” the bartender shouted, a tautness to his voice Ethan had never heard before. When Ira stepped deeper into the room, Ethan kicked the door shut. Ira whirled, a leather blackjack raised. “Ethan!” he exclaimed. “Dammit, man, you scared the hell outta me.”

  “What are you doing out there?” Ethan demanded. “You know what’s going to happen when those boys get drunk.”

  Ira lowered the lead-packed club. “Charlie Kestler’s payin’ me good money to keep the booze flowing. What can I do?”

  “You can tell him you’re going to close up, that no amount of money is worth what’s going to happen when his men get so lacquered they can’t be reasoned with.”

  “They’re damn’ near there now.”

  “Then put a stop to it!”

  “I can’t. Charlie gave me a hundred dollars to keep the Bullshead open, keep serving drinks till no one asks for more. He said, if the money ran out, I should start a tab and he’d pay me the rest later. Hell, Ethan, I can’t turn my back on a hundred bucks.”

  “If you don’t, you’ll be turning your back on the whole town.”

  “Half the town’s already in there. Sam Davidson, Tim Palmer, Lou Merrick. Even Ralph Finch is swillin’ down drinks like he’s never seen a whiskey glass before.”

  “Where are Andrews’s men?”

  “I couldn’t say. They hightailed it soon as Kestler and his boys showed up.”

  Ethan shook his head and looked away. He felt helpless in the face of so many things spinning out of control, so many things that had never been in his control. “Ira, I’m asking you as a friend, shut this place down.”

  “I’d do it if I could, but that ain’t no option no more. If I tried it now, them boys’d just take the place over.” After a pause, he added: “I hate to say this, but you ought to go try to talk Jeff Burke into slippin’ your brothers out the back way and hiding ’em somewheres, because, sooner or later, Kestler is gonna try to take ’em outta there by force.”

  Ethan doubted if Jeff would even listen to such an argument, let alone voluntarily release his two prisoners.

  “I’m sorry, Ethan,” Ira said softly, reaching for the door. “I truly am, but I gotta get back before some drunk cowboy takes a notion to climb over the bar and help hisself.”

  Ethan stared silently, at a loss for words, and Ira pulled the door open and slipped back into the main room. The raucous laughter momentarily grew louder, then faded again as the door swung shut. Ethan stood where he was for a moment, feeling the pulse of the crowd through the woodwork, then grabbed his rifle and wound back through the storeroom and outside.

  The sun had set and the air was turning brisk. Ethan continued north through back alleys and empty lots, stopping at the edge of town. There was a dip in the land just outside of town, a low spot where the prairie grass was always a little lusher, a small spring at its head that ran the year around. It was where the hunters always made camp when they came to Sundance for supplies, and it was there that Ethan headed now, wanting to know what had brought so many old-timers into town at the same time.

  Coming to the edge of the low bank, Ethan paused in surprise to see the hunters’ wagons pulled up in a protective circle. It was something a man was more apt to see along the Overland Trail, or with a freight outfit going into camp for the night and needing a place to corral their mules or oxen. These men and women were a solitary breed, used to going their own way. As a rule, they avoided one another on the high plains, not out of animosity, but out of respect from another man’s privacy. That they were huddled together now told Ethan a lot.

  Gerard Turcotte’s wagon was parked on the west side of the depression, and Ethan smiled when he saw Rachel bent over a small fire, stirring the contents of a cast-iron pot. He veered automatically in that direction, but hadn’t gone more than a few paces when Badger Dick’s two sons came out from behind their father’s red-canvassed wagon and waved him over.

  “Ethan!” the younger one called.

  “Gabe,” Ethan returned, then glanced at the older brother. “Howdy, Seth.”

  “Ethan,” Seth returned, “Papa says you should come with us.”

  “Is there trouble?”

  “Is there not always trouble of one kind or another?” Seth replied, smiling. “Come, Gerard also wishes to speak with you.”

  Ethan took a last, wistful look at the Turcotte camp, then turned away to follow Gabe and Seth to their father’s Studebaker. He nodded a welcome to the men gathered there—Gerard and Badger Dick, Scotty Dunham, Hank McKay, François LaBarge. They returned his greeting warmly, these old friends of Jacob Wilder, most of whom could remember Ethan as a boy, just learning to ride and shoot.

  “There is coffee,” Badger Dick offered. “You would like a cup?”

  “Coffee sounds good,” Ethan concurred, shoulders hunching to the growing chill.

  Kneeling next to the fire several yards away, Badger Dick’s woman, Mary Many Robes, immediately dug a tin cup out of the parfleche container at her side. She filled it from a pot hanging over the low flames, and brought it to Ethan. He accepted gratefully, thanking her in his own awkward Piegan as she returned to her chores.

  “You wonder why we come to Sundance, Ethan?” Gerard asked.

  Ethan nodded. “I do, yes.”

  “We are here to seek justice from the white man’s law.”

  Ethan eyed the old trader speculatively. “Since when has a hunter sought the laws of a foreign country for justice?”

  The men grinned, murmured assent. They felt as Jacob had, that the citizens of Sundance were the interlopers, immigrants to a land they held no legal claim to. It obviously pleased them that Ethan shared their view.

  Even solemn old Gerard smiled, but it was a short-lived display. Nodding toward Badger Dick’s oldest son, he said: “Seth brought word three days ago that Tom Handleman was killed.”

  “Tom?” Ethan echoed, nearly choking on his coffee.

  “I found his body in the Marias,” Seth explained. “It had been there for several days.”

  “He was shot,” Badger Dick added. “In the back.”

  “What about his wife and kids?”

  “Swan’s Wing and her children were not harmed, but Swan’s Wing has already left to return to her people. Janey and the boys go with her.”

  Ethan’s fingers tightened on his cup, the burn of the hot tin cool compared to the growing anger in his breast. “Who did it?” he asked.

  “We don’t know,” Seth replied. “Swan’s Wing says Tom was looking for buffalo in the breaks. She did not know he was dead until I brought her his body.” After a pause, he added: “I buried him there, then helped Swan’s Wing and Janey pack their belongings in a Red River cart and hitch up her horse. She left that night.”

  “And old Emile?” Ethan asked of Gerard.

  “I have yet to find him, but I still believe I will.” His voice became hard. “When this is settled.”

  “I’ve already talked to Jeff Burke about i
t,” Ethan said. “He won’t do anything until this business with Kestler is settled.”

  Squatting before a bare patch of earth, Gerard began sketching lines in the dirt with the tip of his butcher knife. It took just a few strokes for Ethan to recognize the winding course of the Marias, the breaks and coulées that marked the river south of Sundance.

  “Here,” Gerard said, making a series of Xs, “is Sundance, no? Here is Kestler’s Lazy-K, and here the Bar-Five. And here”—he stabbed at the dirt—“are the homes of Handleman and Emile and Ian McMillan. Four men killed, counting Jacob, and now these places where they lived are empty . . . except for the Bar-Five. Even so, Victor has been shot, Ben and Joel are in jail, and you”—he looked at Ethan—“you slip around town like a coyote, afraid to be seen.”

  “Afraid he’ll be shot,” Seth corrected.

  “All these men, all these homes that are now empty.” A smile tugged at the corners of his lips when he saw the sudden look of understanding come over Ethan’s face. “You see it, yes?”

  “Yeah, I see it.”

  He’d seen it earlier too, on the map in Jeff Burke’s office, but he hadn’t put it together because a vital piece of the puzzle was still missing. Now, with Handleman’s murder, that piece had been dropped neatly into place—an arch that ran north through the breaks of the Marias, the town of Sundance at its apex. But he saw something else, too, something Gerard hadn’t included.

  Dropping to one knee, Ethan lifted the knife gently from Gerard’s hands and drew a straight line across the base of the sketch, south of the Marias.

  “Sacre bleu!” Francois exploded.

  Taking a clay pipe from his mouth, Scotty Dunham said: “Aye, we should ’a’ seen it, lads. The damn’ railroad.”

  Gerard’s eyes seemed to glitter as he ran a hand, magician-like, above the map. “These lands . . . for the railroad they would be easy to grade, no? See, here above old Emile’s cabin, then down along the river to Jacob’s and across the Marias there. Then the same going west, where the bluffs are lower, the land not so broken. Here, between where Ian and Tom had their cabins.” He stood, returned the knife to its sheath. “But who would do such a thing, and why? Except for Jacob, no one had claim to the land. No one owned it. The railroad could have paid each of these men a few dollars and they would have moved on just to get away from the noise.”