Death Rites

by John J. McLaglen

  “I have no need to sit here and listen to you insult me, Herne.”

  Jed stood up off the bed, buckling on his gun belt. Towering the best part of a foot over Jollye, who recoiled a couple of paces in shock, nearly knocking over the wash-jug and bowl from the table near the door to the bedroom.

  “I don’t give a damn for you, Jollye. Nor all the sniveling crew of you! I’m goin’ after those bastards for my own reasons.”

  “You know where they are?” butted in the agent, face lighting up with a faint gleam of hope that something might yet be saved from the disaster.

  “You interrupt me again and you’re goin’ to be pickin’ teeth out the back of your stiff collar, Jollye. Yeah, I guess I do know where they are, but, like I say, I go for my own reasons, to do my own job.”

  “The plates.”

  “You try makin’ me an offer then I’ll have me a think about it and decide whether it’s one that I feel I can refuse or not. Now, if you’ll excuse me, Mr. Jollye, I have to go see if my Sharps rifle is safe off the train, and I have to go see a preacher about a buryin’. Good day to you.”

  Herne retrieved the long buffalo gun from the depot and took it straight back to his room. After he’d dropped it off, he decided that it was time to go and get something to eat. At the top of the stairs of the rooming-house he caught a glimpse of the agent, bustling across the lobby. Jed pulled back quickly into the shadows, letting Jollye trot past him, before he continued down and out into the bright chill of the Tucson morning.

  Crossing the trampled dirt of the street in search of somewhere to eat.

  He was attracted by a sign that stated simply: Good, cheap food. Home cooked.

  The windows were sparkling clean and looked as if they’d been polished only that morning, and he could see inside that the tables were covered in stiff white cloths set with gleaming knives and forks. It looked the sort of establishment where he could eat well and in quiet comfortable surroundings. There was only one other person in there so late in the morning; an old man, with silvery hair, crouched over a steaming cup of black coffee.

  Nothing escaped Herne’s notice, and he was surprised to see such an old man carrying a handgun, tied low on the thigh in the classic position of the gunfighter. There was something about the set of the old man’s shoulders that seemed familiar to Herne. Something from the past.

  A silvery bell tinkled as he pushed the door open, to be greeted by the fresh tang of baking bread, mingled with the odor of dark brown coffee boiling on a stove. He inhaled noisily, heeling the door shut.

  A red-cheeked girl in her late teens came through a curtain out back, rubbing flour from her hands on a spotted towel, greeting him with a pleasant smile.

  “Morning. Nice day.”

  “Looks that way.”

  “What can I get you, Mister?”

  “Some ham; grits; cornbread; four eggs an’ coffee. That’ll be fine for a start.”

  “How d’you like the eggs?”

  “Over easy.”

  “Fine. Sit down and make yourself comfortable. It’ll take about ten minutes.”

  Herne hooked a seat out with his foot, just to the right and a table behind the old man. Who had taken no notice at all of his entry, sitting slumped over his drink, chin resting on his left hand.

  There was a sign over the counter that said: “If you don’t ask you don’t get.” And another that said: “If you don’t like it then tell us.”

  There hadn’t been time to check that the action of the Colt hadn’t been damaged by being dropped on the floor of the train, so Herne flipped the protective loop off the hammer and drew it.

  Cocked the hammer gently back, with the soft triple click of the action.

  “Dry-gulcher!”

  The old man had caught the faint noise, and had reacted with amazing speed, diving sideways off the chair, sending the cup spilling. Reaching for the handgun on his hip with his right hand.

  It would have been a brilliant piece of gunplay, and Herne might easily have found himself with a bullet in the gut from the old man.

  Sadly, the fingers didn’t obey the message from the brain and the Colt dropped from the hand, spinning out of reach.

  Herne’s own reaction was equally fast. He realized what was happening, and was on the edge of blasting the oldster across the room, when he saw the gun drop. He relaxed, easing back the hammer on his own Colt, meeting a red and angry pair of eyes, framed with silver hair, like a disarrayed halo.

  “Bastard. Get it over with. Who sent you? Clanton? Who was it?”

  “Take it easy, old-timer. Misunderstanding.”

  “What?”

  Herne raised his voice, finding it hard to believe that the old man had heard the gentle sound of the Colt and couldn’t hear what he was saying.

  “I said that you could get up and pick up the gun, Mister. My fault for taking out my own pistol.”

  The raised voice brought the girl from the kitchen. She stood there, arms folded, looking at the strange tableau. The silver-haired man still sprawled on the floor, his gun a few feet from his outstretched hand. And Herne sitting at his table, about to holster his own Colt.

  “Gramps! You just get up and stop actin’ the fool like that or I’ll send you up to your room.”

  “Shucks, Ellie-May. I didn’t mean nothing but this son of a bitch here …”

  “Gramps!”

  “Sorry, honey. But he drew on me from behind. Tryin’ to back shoot me. Killer from Lincoln County is my guess.”

  Herne stood up. “I guess he’s kind of right, Ma’am.”

  “What?”

  Still keeping a careful eye on the old fellow, Herne explained what had happened. The girl listened to him, and then repeated all of it to her grandfather, who nodded, and grinned, revealing a mouth that was high on gaps and low on teeth.

  “Guess I owe you something, Mister,” he said, holding out his hand to be helped up.

  Herne took it, yanking him to his feet, glancing at the girl in puzzlement.

  She smiled, looking back to the kitchen. “Must get back to those over easy eggs. Guess you’re wonderin’ how it is he don’t hear what you say so well, and he hears me good and clear?”

  “Yeah. And how he heard the Colt so fast?”

  “Gramps used to be a gunman.”

  “I figured that out. Seems like maybe I ought to know his face.”

  “I think he … land’s sakes! Those eggs.” Shaking a finger at the old man who was stooping wheezily to pick up his fallen gun. “Now you behave, Gramps. Or it’s off to your room with you.”

  She swept out, leaving the two men facing each other in a strained silence. Finally Herne gestured to the overturned table.

  “Maybe we ought to pick that up.”

  The words got through, and together they lifted the table up, setting the cloth square on it. Then stood there looking at each other, neither knowing what to do or say. Finally it was Herne who pointed to one of the chairs, pulling out the other and sitting down in it.

  “Join me?”

  “Sure. I guess I was a mite fast on slappin’ leather, Mister.”

  “Name’s Jed Herne. Good to meet you.”

  The brows wrinkled and there was obviously considerable effort going on inside the skull of the old man.

  “Herne. Don’t I know that name?”

  “Maybe. I hear you were ...” he changed his mind. “Hear you use a gun. So do I.”

  “That’s right. You’ll have to speak up Mr. Herne. I don’t hear so good since Wes fired off a derringer in my ear for a joke back in ... way back ... Herne? Ain’t you the one they used to call the Hunter?”

  “That’s right.”

  “I heard you was dead. Some trouble with the Cheyenne near Fort Phil Kearny up on the Powder.”

  “That was the Fetterman affair. Back in sixty-six. Hell, I may be old but I was only in my teens then. Spunky kid full of fire and killin’”

  “Good to meet someone from the old times, M
r. Herne. Real good.”

  “Call me Jed. I don’t know your name.”

  The old man smiled. That’s right.”

  “I said I didn’t know your name.” shouted Herne, trying to remember if he’d seen the face before. It was just an old man’s face to him. Lined and seamed, a great jagged scar high up on the temple. Heavy scarring, with layers of skin folding in on each other. The oldster kept playing with it, letting his fingers touch it, then leap away as if they’d been burned.

  “My name?”

  Jed nodded, looking through the back and seeing that the girl was nearly ready with the meal.

  “I’m Scotty. Scotty Mitchell. Rode with ... what the Hell was his name? Damned how things slip away from you, Mr. Herne.”

  Again the finger rubbed at the old scar.

  “Jed.”

  “Sure. Jed.”

  “You lived in Tucson long, Scotty?”

  “Gramps has been with us nearly seven years now, Mr. Herne.”

  The tray the girl carried was well loaded.

  The plate that she put in front of Jed almost creaked with the weight of the food. Fried eggs, jostling great slices of fresh ham. A white mountain of grits threatened to overwhelm everything beneath it, and the cornbread was piled so high a couple of pieces actually fell off the plate on to the cloth.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “That’s fine. Miss ... Mitchell, is it?”

  “Surely is. I hear you saved the folks on the train, Mr. Herne.”

  “I did some.”

  Scotty leaned forward. “Herne the Hunter. That’s where I heard of you. My name’s Mitchell. Gunned down four men one noon in Lincoln, Nebraska. Or it might have been Juarez. Can’t rightly recall. Must go out back. Pour me some coffee, Ellie-May. Seems I mislaid the last cup.”

  He shuffled out, hand rising once again to that livid scar, vanishing towards the kitchen.

  “If Gramps troubles you, Mr. Herne, then I can easily get him ...”

  “No. Wouldn’t dream of it, Miss Mitchell. That wound on his head?”

  She sighed, pouring out two cups of brimming black coffee, strong enough to float a horseshoe on.

  “That’s much of it, Mr. Herne. I know he’s an old man, but he doesn’t harm anyone. He really was a great shootist years back. All the tales we’ve ever been able to check on have been true. Even if they happened in a different town or in a different year.”

  “I guess you could say that I’ve been in the same line of business as he has, for a good number of years, Miss Mitchell.”

  “Mr. Herne?” She was breathing a little fast, leaning towards him across the table. He noticed that a couple of buttons on her blouse had come open, and he could see the shadowed beginnings of her right breast peeping coyly out at him.

  “Yes?”

  “I guess you’ve been one of my heroes, ever since ... well, since I can remember. It’s so romantic, you being such a famous gunman. What a wonderful life you must have led. I surely wish you could tell me all about it.”

  The invitation was there. No doubt at all about it. Herne had been propositioned times enough to be damned sure when a lady was laying herself right on the line for him. But she was very young, and he was going to be busy in the next few days.

  “Romantic, Miss Mitchell?”

  “You can call me Ellie-May if you like.”

  “Why thank you. But let me tell you a little about the romance. The romance of running and hiding for months on end, jumping every time an alley cat knocks over an empty bottle. The romance of killing men. Seeing them die right in front of you, spewing up blood in your face. Gut-shot men taking three days to die screaming. Men the Indians have caught. That’s damned romantic, Miss Mitchell. Seeing a horse with its belly ripped open by a Sioux lance, dragging its guts with it through mesquite and sagebrush until it falls over and can’t rise. Why don’t you ask your grandfather about the romance? Maybe he’ll tell you what it’s like to have to spend more time in cemeteries than in church. Buryin’ friends and family. Havin’ friends die in your arms, with no life left to come. And not damned much life behind them. Sure, it’s real romantic”

  It was one of the longest speeches that Jed Herne had ever made in his life, and he had reached out and held the girl’s arm to stop her moving away.

  “You’re hurting me, Mr. Herne,” she said, face contorted with pain.

  He let her go, gnawing his lip as he saw the great white marks where his fingers had bitten into her soft skin.

  “I’m sorry. But I’ve lived it all my life, and the one thing that it is not, is romantic”

  “I understand that now, Mr. Herne. I guess you must think me pretty silly, what with having Gramps the way he is and all.”

  “Maybe. But you don’t ever learn anything if you don’t get taught, Ellie-May. That scar on his head?”

  “That’s why I guess you never heard much of him. He got a bullet graze there, way back. Before the War, we figure. That kind of made him a mite peculiar at times.”

  “So long back?”

  “We think so. Only he does get a mite confused about it. Said it was Mormons back in Iowa. After that he drifted around the country, living under a whole lot of different names. Most of them we don’t know. But he lived by the gun.”

  “You say he lived here for ... how long?”

  “Seven years about. Autumn of seventy-six it must have been. Course we saw him before then. Every year or so he’d pass by Tucson. I was born here. He seemed fine. A little odd now and then, but gettin’ better. Talked about comin’ home here to settle down.”

  “So what happened? My, but this ham is the best I’ve tasted since I was last in Virginia, Ellie-May. Sure melts in the mouth.”

  The marks on her arm were fading, and she smiled at him. “Thank you, Mr. Herne. Home killed, that hog was. Gramps and that scar, I was tellin’ you about. We didn’t hear nothing about him for couple of years, then he arrived looking like he’d been through the valley of death and come out the other side. Weighed about as much as me, and he looked like he’d aged ten years in two. Hair gone silver and that scar on his temple. Same place as the old bullet burn. Only much worse. Like someone had tried to split his head open for kindling.”

  The coffee scalded his mouth, but Herne gulped it down, intent on the girl’s story.

  “Never found out for sure. What we think we keep kind of quiet about.”

  “Why? A killing?”

  “Kind of.” She hesitated. “I’m sure I can trust you, Mr. Herne.” There was the invitation again, and again Herne chose to ignore it.

  “Go on.”

  “He wouldn’t talk much. His mind was much worse. Like you see him now. Confused and ramblin’. Like in a fever. Just said he’d been with some soldiers. For a ride. On the Yellowstone River. They’d been attacked, or they’d been attackin’. He never seemed sure. Then there’d been a whole load of Indians. More than the stars in the sky or the wheat on the prairies was what he said once. He was with a few of the soldiers, all the rest was dead. Climbin’ up a hill to try and make a stand.”

  They heard a door shut out back, and she spoke more quickly.

  “Then more Indians came over the top of the hill and rode over them. One hit him with an axe and he doesn’t recall another thing until he was in Butte with that scar and a headache he still has.”

  “Seven years ago. On the Yellowstone. Soldiers being wiped out by an army of Indians.” Herne couldn’t believe what the girl was suggesting.

  “That coffee smells good,” said the old man as he rejoined them, smiling vaguely.

  The girl shook her head in a warning at Herne not to mention what they’d been talking about and vanished out the back again.

  The two men sat and sipped their coffee together in silence, while Herne looked at him. Looked at Mitchell’s head wound. And wondered.

  It had always been thought that there hadn’t been a single survivor seven years ago. When the Indians wiped out the soldiers up on the Yel
lowstone. Everyone knew that they’d been killed to a man.

  With their impetuous leader.

  Had Scotty Mitchell really ridden with Custer?

  Conversation was hard. Half the time old Mitchell didn’t seem to hear what Herne was saying, and the rest of the time he was rambling on about half-remembered events in half-forgotten places.

  Every now and again a name would come up that Herne knew. Once it was even Billy the Kid. A story about Billy and Pat Garrett that Herne had heard Billy Bonny tell about himself, so he knew it was true. Scott Mitchell had surely been about.

  Gradually, the story about the train came out. The name of Luke Barrell seemed to ring some kind of bell for the old man, but he couldn’t hold it together and it evaporated into the mists of the black powder smoke of his past.

  “Maybe I could help you, Jed?” he said, as Herne finished the meal and settled up the check with the girl.

  “Gramps!” said Ellie-May warningly.

  “Yeah, old timer. Maybe you could.”

  “I’m still fast.”

  “I saw it.”

  “I recall the day that ... that ... what in Hell was I talkin’ about mister?”

  “The train and the robbers.”

  “Yeah. Course, I recall it, Jed. Lot of sons of bitches in that gang, didn’t you say?”

  T did.”

  “Well, if you want help, then let me know.”

  The girl took the old man by the arm, trying to lead him towards the stairs.

  “Time for your rest, Gramps.”

  “I guess so. Remember what I said about some help, Mr. Herne the Hunter.” The fingers rubbing at the knotted scar as if they could wipe it away.

  “I’ll remember that, Scotty. If I need you I’ll just call you.”

  “And I’ll come a’running. Just like when old Two Moons chased me and gave me this wound.”

  He vanished up the stairs, leaving Herne staring thoughtfully after him. Two Moons had been one of the leaders under Crazy Horse when Custer and his command was massacred. At the Little Big Horn.

  Around seven years ago.

  Chapter Seven

  Jollye was waiting for him back at the rooming-house.

  “Where on earth have you been, Herne?”