by Mark Warren
“How much?” Wyatt asked.
The man squinted off to the horizon again and inhaled deeply through his nose. “I think I can up your monthly pay by ten dollars.” Then he thrust out the second envelope as if he had forgotten he was holding it. “Either way, this here is yours. You earned it.”
Wyatt took the envelope and weighed it in his hand. “Can I think on it?”
The foreman nodded once and offered his hand. Wyatt took it and felt the man’s gratitude telegraphed through the strength of his grip.
“Till I pull out for Rawlings,” the foreman said. “Either way . . . good luck to you. You’ve been a good hand.”
Wyatt nodded and held up the bonus envelope as a gesture of thanks. “I’ll let you know.”
After work he sat on a pile of surplus ties, pushed back his hat brim, and studied the envelope from Virgil. Peoria, Illinois, it read. He opened it and flattened the letter on his thigh.
Wyatt,
This is a long shot to reach you. A fellow who quit freighting for the railroad came thrugh here and told me you been working for the Union Pacific. If you’re waring down from hard labor and the wether like I did, there are some opportunaties here in Peoria and Beardstown that might intrest you. These bisnesses need protection from trouble makers. Thare is good money and mostly it means looking like a hard case. I figure that might be something you’d be good at.
If you come out by rail to St. Louis, stop off in Beardstown and look up John Walton at the Walden Hotel. I met him just after the war. I told him about you. He has several profitable enterprises going. If John has got nothing for you there, come on upriver to Peoria and join me. We might just sew up this town between the two of us.
Ma and Pa have settled down in Lamar, Missouri. Pa is up to his usual—running for office, running bootleg whisky, starting up some kind of bisness to put a good face on it.
If you get this, let me hear from you.
Your brother,
Virgil
Before leaving, Wyatt gave notice to the foreman and sold the gear he had accumulated for his job. With the extra pay, he bought a packhorse to accompany the roan mare he had acquired through a winning hand of poker. He bought provisions from the sutler who stocked the nearby forts, and then said his goodbyes to John Shanssey over a pot of Irish coffee the pugilist had brewed in his tent.
When they shook hands, Shanssey asked, “So, are you pulling out right away?”
“Just about,” Wyatt said. “I’ve got one piece of business to tend to.”
Shanssey squinted at the expression on Wyatt’s face, but Wyatt said no more. He only nodded once, turned, and walked out the tent.
Wyatt found Stefgard in one of the tent saloons connected to a row of whoring cribs. The burly blond was arm wrestling, taking all comers on one-dollar bets. The onlookers laughed and taunted the man currently losing to the Swede. Wyatt circled the crowd and made his way to a bench where the doves sat disgruntled over the men’s choice of entertainment.
“Well, hello, Wyatt,” purred a slender woman with teasing, green eyes. She sat up straighter and pushed a curl of hair from her forehead. “Are you looking for something more pleasin’ than squeezin’ another man’s hand on the table?”
Wyatt set his hat on the nearest table and remained standing. “Just going to set a spell, if you don’t mind.” The whore squirmed along the bench and patted the rough plank next to her hip.
When Stefgard slammed the challenger’s arm to the tabletop, a roar of approval filled the tent. Money changed hands, and Stefgard drained half a pint of beer.
“Who iss next?” he dared. “Who vill face Steffo? Steffo hass steel cannonballs right here, by God.” He grabbed his crotch and contrived a manic smile. “Vat you boys got down dar? I tink maybe you got little hum-mink-birdt eggs!” Stefgard’s booming laughter filled the tent.
“I’ll have a go,” Wyatt said, rising from the bench.
The whores turned to see Wyatt’s face but said nothing. The bartender stopped wiping the long plank bar. Everyone in the camp knew of the beating Wyatt had taken from the Swede, and now this new contest put an expression of uncertainty on most of the faces.
“Ah, iss da little piss-ant come back for anudder lesson from Steffo.” He sized up Wyatt with a sneer. “You tink you got da muscle for diss, little piss-ant?” He propped his elbow on the tabletop, opened his hand, and smiled enough to show his teeth.
Wyatt’s face showed nothing. “We’ll do this standing up,” he said.
Stefgard coughed up a laugh and let his hand fall flat to the table. He cocked his head.
“You vant fight Stefgard again? You make badt schoolboy. You not learn lesson goodt?”
Wyatt picked up his hat and walked to the table, the soft padding of his boots on the dirt floor the only sound in the tent. He stopped across from the Swede.
“You gonna talk or fight?” Wyatt said evenly.
The Swede crossed his arms over his thick chest. “You vant put money on fight?” Wyatt opened the front of his coat, and every eye before him locked on the Remington pistol stuffed into the waistband of his trousers. A few men stepped back, and the space inside the tent went still and quiet again, the only movement amongst the crowd being the slow drift of tobacco smoke in the dark quarters.
“I’ll take just what’s owed me,” Wyatt said. “What you do with the rest is your business.”
Moving in an unhurried fashion, he picked up a stack of coins from the table and dropped it into his hat. The Swede made a grab for it, but Wyatt’s move was too fast. Stefgard missed and half slipped off his stool, hitting the table with his chest and upsetting his beer. By reflex two of the men sitting at the table backed away to avoid the spill, looking sheepishly at Wyatt as if belatedly asking for his permission to move.
Stefgard pushed up from his knee, staring at Wyatt’s gun all the while. “So da little piss-ant brings gun to do what he can’t do widt hiss fists. Iss the way of da cowardt, yah?” He searched the room for agreement, but no one paid him any mind. Every eye was on Wyatt.
“I’ll be outside,” Wyatt said. “If you come out there with a gun, you better aim on using it. Otherwise”—he tapped the walnut grips of the pistol—“I’ll set this aside, and we’ll take up where we left off.”
Stefgard’s chest pumped up, and the guarded slant of his eyes relaxed. “Yah? I tink I put you down for goodt dis time.”
Wyatt counted out a number of coins, inverted his hat, and dumped the remainder onto the table. The coins spilled across the tabletop, rolling in random arcs, the sound humming on the wood surface until the last coin toppled into silence. Stefgard made no move to recover them. Wyatt pocketed his share of the money and walked out.
All bets were placed for Stefgard to win, the winnings based upon how long Earp would last. When a self-appointed handler took charge of the money and led the procession outside, Stefgard rode out with the flow of bodies like a hero caught up in his own parade. More spectators poured into the muddy thoroughfare, asking questions, and flashing money to be included in the betting. Wyatt took off his coat and shirt and draped them over the side panel of an idle buckboard parked between tents. He handed his revolver to the old hostler who lived in one of the passenger cars on the tracks. When Stefgard removed his blouse, a few spectators involuntarily sucked in a whisper of air. The Swede had forty pounds on the young Earp.
When John Shanssey arrived on the scene, he quickly took charge, steering the event toward the formality of their Sunday bouts by adopting Queensberry rules and a referee. The bloodlust of the crowd was high, but Shanssey prevailed, and gloves were doled out to each fighter. They decided upon six rounds and a fifteen count when a man went down. A reluctant rail crew foreman was pushed into refereeing, and the bartender agreed to serve as timer.
When the proper space was paced off and cleared, the foreman nodded, and the bartender clanked an iron ladle against an empty whiskey bottle, and the fight commenced. The crowd of onlookers raised a rowdy r
oar as both men circled, fists aloft, eyeing one another for an opening. For three revolutions neither man broke the monotony of the circling, and the general cheering turned to taunting. Wyatt’s concentration was complete, his focus locked on his opponent, as Stefgard laughed and jested with the crowd.
“Someone go make coffin for piss-ant! Steffo put him into ground!”
“Git to it, Stefgard!” someone yelled. “I got a week’s pay ridin’ on round one, goddamnit.”
After two more revolutions by the fighters, a man yelled an insult to Sweden. Stefgard’s forehead tightened to rounded mounds of flesh; his eyes squeezed down to angry slits. Lunging, he threw a left jab just as Wyatt reversed direction, slipped the punch, and drove in hard with a right before the Swede could cover up. In the shuffle Stefgard lost his footing in the mud and went down. The crowd groaned. Two men stepped forward to help the Swede up, but the foreman ordered them back.
Slowly Stefgard rose, glaring at Wyatt. “You von’t touch me again, little piss-ant!” His pale face went hard and glowed with rekindled heat. Hunching forward and weaving his big fists in the air before him, he moved steadily toward Wyatt with a new momentum. Feinting twice, he sidestepped and struck Wyatt a jarring blow to the ear, following that with a series of jabs that backed Wyatt to the edge of the available space. The men standing there pushed him back toward Stefgard. The Swede dodged in close and connected with a powerful right.
Wyatt went down hard, slapping the mud with his back. The crowd roared its approval. Stefgard backed away, trying to bob on his feet in the mire. As the foreman began a count, Wyatt stood and faced the men who had thrust him back into the ring space.
“You’ll keep your hands off me, or I’ll bring some o’ this fight your way!”
“Fight is dis way, piss-ant,” Stefgard taunted. Wyatt turned to the Swede and assumed the boxer’s stance. Smiling, the Swede straightened and propped his fists on his hips. “Vat you tink, boys? Do I beat him into pile uff broken bones or take pity on young hot-head piss-ant?” He looked to his left as if to take an assessment of the crowd’s pleasure . . . but it was a ploy. Even as someone began shouting an answer to his question, the Swede charged, his forearms crossed before him to ward off blows. He used his weight to barrel into Wyatt, and the two fighters went down together, taking onlookers with them.
The bartender set up a racket clacking the ladle against the bottle as the referee followed the fighters into the notch that they had cut into the crowd. Both officials yelled for the men to disengage, but Stefgard continued to pummel Wyatt with repetitive blows to the head.
By the time the foreman wrestled Stefgard away, Wyatt’s face was cut and bloodied and one eye half closed. His other eye gazed into the sky in an unfocused glaze. Two men pulled him up and tried to thrust him into the arena. Wyatt rolled off their hands, spun, and struck one man squarely on the nose, producing a fountain of blood that spilled down the front of the man’s shirt.
When the ref came back for him, Wyatt was standing on his own. The Swede pranced heavily around the confines of the fighting space, pumping his fists above his head as though already claiming a victory. The foreman leaned to Wyatt’s ear in quiet conference.
“You’re cut up pretty bad . . . you want me to call it?”
Wyatt hinged his jaw from side to side. “I’m all right,” he said, his eyes fixed on the Swede. The ladle clanked against the bottle, and Wyatt staggered forward on wobbling legs.
Once again Stefgard came at him swiftly, but this time Wyatt ducked the first fist. The second caught him full-force on the chin, and he stumbled back into the crowd. Greedy hands clutched at his upper arms and back, and again he was hurled forward. After two steps, Wyatt reversed direction and came at the men who had pushed him. His first punch put a man on the ground, and the second sent another man sprawling into the ones standing behind him.
The referee grabbed Wyatt from behind and struggled to guide him back toward the arena. There he released the young fighter, quickly stepping back to avoid Wyatt’s wrath.
“Keep the goddamn crowd off me,” Wyatt said hoarsely. But before he could turn back to the fight, Stefgard charged again, driving him deeper into the spectators, who parted more nimbly than before. The two fighters crashed into the gate of the wagon where Wyatt had hung his clothes, and they went down, the Swede on top. On his knees, Stefgard straddled Wyatt and began pounding his face in a relentless rhythm.
The foreman grabbed a handful of the Swede’s pale-blond hair and pulled him back into the makeshift ring. “No hittin’ when a man’s down!” the referee warned. He returned to Wyatt, checked briefly for signs of consciousness, and then proceeded to yell over the celebratory shouts of the onlookers. “One! . . . Two! . . . Three! . . .”
At the sixth count Wyatt stood and leaned on the wagon gate. In the bed of the wagon lay a cast-off sledge hammer, the heavy head plugged by a three-inch stob of broken shaft, the rest of the wood handle stretching more than half the width of the wagon.
A foul-smelling bearded man put his face into Wyatt’s and yelled, “Either quit or git back out there and take your due.” He took Wyatt’s arm and tried to turn him. Another man grabbed the other arm and together they tried to disengage him from the wagon.
Wyatt stretched forward, fitted his gloved hand around one end of the long hammer shaft, and turned, swinging in a vicious arc that connected with the bearded man’s skull. The solid rap of wood on bone was audible above the din of the crowd, and the men around him drew back.
When Wyatt stepped back into the arena carrying the sledge handle, the glee in Stefgard’s face dropped away. The referee raised both palms to Wyatt and cocked his head deferentially.
“Wyatt!” came an iron voice from his right. He turreted his head to see John Shanssey’s face gone stern. “Queensberry rules, Wyatt. Hold to the book and wear him down.”
Wyatt looked back at Stefgard, opened his gloved hand, and let the club drop to the mud.
The din of the crowd surged, as if to push both men forward by the strength of its collective sadistic pleasure. When Stefgard charged again, Wyatt sidestepped and struck a downward blow behind the Swede’s ear that put him down. The crowd responded with anger, the sound sweet to Wyatt’s ears. It empowered him, and he moved in to finish the job.
“Let him git up, Wyatt!” the referee ordered, stepping into his path.
When the big Swede rose, half his face was covered with mud. He staggered for a moment and then tried ineffectually to scrape the muck from one eye with a glove, which only made matters worse. Cursing, he grabbed one glove lacing with his teeth and managed to pull out the knot. Then the other. To the uproarious approval of the crowd, he pulled the gloves from his thick hands and cast them aside. Wyatt worked at loosening his own gloves as he watched Stefgard begin to breathe in deeply, filling his chest like a bellows. Before Wyatt could get a glove free, the Swede, abandoning all caution, charged at him with an animal growl hissing through his bared teeth.
As Wyatt was hurled backward he felt Stefgard’s fingers grinding mud into his good eye. When they hit the ground, Wyatt tried to cover himself. The blows he took to his head brought bright flashes of light, and the shouts of the crowd began to retreat into a room filled with water. Then a large bell pealed inside his skull, and all his senses faded to black.
How much time had passed, Wyatt did not know. Shanssey was kneeling beside him, gently dabbing a wet cloth to his eye. The crowd milled about in a chaotic mix of buoyant conversations. Wyatt pushed away the Irishman’s hand and levered up on an elbow. Squinting through the grit in his eye, he could make out Stefgard stuffing his trouser pockets with coins. Wyatt tore off his gloves to check his pockets and, finding them empty, stood.
“Wyatt,” Shanssey called to his back, “they’ve already given him the win.”
Most of the laborers were crowded around the bet handlers as names were read from a list and bets paid off. Stefgard stood talking to the foreman and two other men. Wyatt leaned down
, picked up the sledge handle, and made his way to the Swede.
At his name, Stefgard turned. His smile snapped off as he eyed the wooden haft hanging by Wyatt’s leg. The foreman stood for a moment as though he might speak, but thought better of it and took two steps backward.
“Some o’ that’s my money you’re holding,” Wyatt said in a low monotone.
“You haff lost fight, piss-ant. Now be like man and take vat comes.” He patted the pocket at the front of his hip. “Vinner take all.”
“You’ve got my poker winnings. And I figure you throwed out Queensberry rules, so I reckon we’ll split whatever’s left.”
Stefgard turned to the man next to him and chuckled, but the bystander remained mute, his attention fixed on Wyatt. The wood club flashed and made a dull thud on Stefgard’s head. The big Swede sank heavily to his knees and flopped face-down into the mud. Wyatt knelt and dug a handful of money from the Swede’s pocket. After counting it out, he stuffed a portion into his own trousers and threw the rest into the mud. Before standing, he lifted the Swede’s head by his hair, turned his face away from the mud, and let his cheek slap back into the slop.
The knowledge of the Swede’s demise spread through the crowd, and men jockeyed for position to have a look at the pugilist’s inert body. Then all eyes settled on Wyatt, who stood defiant against what any man might say.
“You ain’t got no call to be usin’ a club in a fistfight,” barked a big man in a plaid shirt. “Queensberry rules was agreed on.” The man took a step toward Wyatt and stopped. Two others joined him to make a flank, each man’s face taut with challenge.
“Reckon those rules weren’t workin’ out so well for anybody today,” Wyatt replied. When the smooth grips of his revolver slipped into his left hand, he turned to see the hostler standing beside him. The feel of the gun was money in the bank. The men in the crowd looked down at the stillness of the weapon, and Wyatt felt the momentum of the confrontation stall. With an easy swing, he tossed the broken hammer shaft into the bed of the spring wagon, where it clattered against the side panel. He transferred the gun to his right hand, and the crowd quieted.
