Evil Never Sleeps

by William W. Johnstone

  “What can I do you for?” Pete Watkins asked when Will stepped inside the door of the hastily built façade that fronted a large tent proclaiming itself to be a saloon. A tall, skinny man with dark-set eyes and a bushy mustache, Watkins openly looked the stranger over. “What’s your poison?”

  Will glanced over toward the stove beyond the end of the short bar and was pleased to see a large gray coffeepot resting on the edge of it. “It’s too early in the day for me to start on anything but coffee. Can I get a cup here?” He had not eaten breakfast before he started out that morning and he was beginning to get signals from his stomach to remind him.

  With a look of indifference on his face, Watkins shrugged. “Yeah, I’ll sell you some coffee—nickel a cup—but I’ve got some real smooth rye whiskey, just come up from Texas last week. That’ll start your day better than a whole pot of coffee.”

  “I’ll just take the coffee,” Will said.

  Watkins shrugged again. “I can’t make much of a livin’ offa folks like you.” He reached under the counter and brought out a cup. Placing it on the bar, he said, “Help yourself. Better take this rag, that pot’s pretty hot.” He continued to study Will as he went to the stove to pour his coffee. When he returned to the bar, Pete asked, “Ain’t seen you in Durant before, you just passin’ through?”

  “You might say that,” Will answered, then paused to test the coffee. It was as strong as he had expected. “I get over here from time to time. Your saloon wasn’t here the last time I came through.” He tried another sip of the coffee, making no effort to hide the grimace it inspired.

  “That’s good coffee, ain’t it?” Pete asked.

  “You could say that, dependin’ on how you like your coffee, I reckon. It’s damn sure a nickel’s worth.” Pete laughed at his remark. “Understand you had a shootin’ outside your place a few days ago,” Will said, changing the subject.

  “Yeah, you hear about that?” Watkins came back, but offered no more.

  “Word I got, there was two of ’em and they were liquored up pretty good when they left here.”

  “Yeah, there was two of ’em,” Watkins replied, starting to get suspicious then. “You ain’t by any chance a lawman, are you?” He immediately regretted having suggested the rye whiskey, not sure what the lawman’s stance might be.

  “Matter of fact,” Will answered. “I figured maybe you could tell me a little something about those two, since they spent most of the time they were in Durant in your saloon.” He saw Watkins immediately draw up like a clam. He really didn’t care if the man sold whiskey or not, as long as it wasn’t to Indians. He could have informed him that he wasn’t even supposed to operate a saloon for white men in Indian Territory, a law that was seldom enforced.

  “Well, there ain’t much I can tell you. They was just passin’ through and stopped here for a drink. I didn’t ask ’em no questions and they didn’t cause no trouble in here. The shootin’ didn’t happen till after they left here, so I don’t know nothin’ about it.” He was reluctant to give out any information he might have had. It wouldn’t be good for his business if word got out that he had helped a lawman. He was hoping for a lot of business from outlaws crossing over to Indian Territory to avoid the law as well as that from honest folks.

  Will was well aware of the man’s reluctance to give out any information to a lawman, so he tried to set him at ease. “My name’s Will Tanner. I’m a U.S. deputy marshal out of Fort Smith. You’ll be seein’ me from time to time, just like businessmen in other towns in the Nations. Those two men killed two people right outside your door. And if they’re not stopped, they’ll kill some more. Anything you tell me is just between you and me, so I’d appreciate it if you could tell me the names they go by. Whaddaya say?”

  Watkins was still obviously uncomfortable with the situation, apparent by the way he kept looking back and forth as if checking to see if any of the few patrons in the saloon were listening in. Equally afraid to get on the wrong side of the law, he finally offered up what little bit he knew. “I swear, Deputy, they didn’t give their names. I heard one of’em call the other’n Elmo, if that’ll help.”

  “That’ll help,” Will said. “What did they look like? Describe them for me.”

  Watkins paused to recall as much as he could. “Well, there wasn’t nothin’ special about either one of ’em, just average-lookin’, I reckon.” He paused again, then after a few moments, thought to say, “One of ’em wore his pistol with the handle forward.”

  “That helps, too,” Will said, thinking that described a man who wanted to get to his gun fast. “Did you get a look at their horses?” Watkins shook his head and said he had had no reason to go outside, not even after the shooting and the two had galloped away.

  Will was about to ask about Jim Little Eagle when Watkins volunteered it. “That Injun policeman was in here askin’ about it, but there wasn’t nothin’ I could tell him. Figured there wasn’t much he could do about it anyway, since they were white men.”

  Will wasn’t surprised. “You ain’t been in business here very long, so you ain’t found out that it pays to get to know that Choctaw policeman. His name’s Jim Little Eagle and I work with him all the time.” He reached in his pocket for a nickel and placed it on the bar. “What’s your name, friend?”

  “Pete Watkins,” he replied, somewhat reluctantly.

  “Good to meet you, Pete. Thanks for your help and I hope you do well in Durant.” He walked outside then. He stood there for a few minutes until noticing the blacksmith, Martin Baymer, standing by his forge, watching him. When he caught his eye, Baymer motioned to him. Will untied his horses and led them across to the blacksmith.

  “Martin,” Will acknowledged when he walked up.

  “Howdy, Will,” Baymer returned. “You in town because of the shootin’?” Will nodded. “I figured. I saw it. I had to hunker down behind my forge with the bullets flyin’ around. Two crazy son of a bitches, one of ’em shot ol’ Lame Foot, that Injun that was always hangin’ around the new saloon. It was for no reason I could tell. I saw ’ em when they came outta the saloon and I reckon it just made one of ’em mad when he saw Lame Foot standin’ near his horse.” He turned and pointed toward the tiny railroad station. “Then Joe Johnson came walkin’ outta the station and one of ’em, the one wearin’ his handgun backward, whipped it out and shot Joe down. Just for the hell of it, I reckon. Anyway, he was the same one that shot Lame Foot. I don’t think the other feller ever pulled his gun.”

  “Did you see their horses?”

  “Sure,” Baymer replied. “They was tied right across the street from me. One of ’em’s ridin’ a bay. The other’n’s riding a sorrel with white stockin’s on the front legs and they’ve got one packhorse, a sorrel.”

  “Did you happen to catch their names?”

  “The horses or the riders?” Baymer joked, chuckling. “Nope, we never got around to introducin’ ourselves with all that lead a-flyin’.”

  Will smiled in response. “Much obliged, Martin.” He told himself that he had wasted his time in the saloon. He should have talked to the blacksmith first.

  “I told all this stuff to Jim Little Eagle,” Baymer went on. “Told him they high-tailed it outta here on the road to Tishomingo. He took off that way after ’em—too long after they left, I expect.”

  “Maybe so,” Will said, “but I reckon I’ll ride out that way and see if we might get lucky.” He said so long to Baymer and rode about a mile down the road to Tishomingo to a point where it crossed a small stream. Leading his horses a little distance off the road, he dismounted and prepared to cook himself some breakfast. He wanted to rest his horses a little longer and he was still hungry. He was also thinking that he’d like to get rid of the taste of the vile liquid Pete Watkins called coffee. “Damn,” he cursed, and spat. “He musta used gunpowder instead of coffee beans.”

  When he deemed his horses ready to go, he stepped up into the saddle and started out again. His hope was to find Jim Little
Eagle because there was no possibility of tracking the two outlaws. There were too many tracks on the road, including those left by Jim, and he wouldn’t know one set of tracks from any of the others. Maybe Jim had picked up their trail soon enough to stay on their heels. Failing that, and in the event he never caught up with Jim, his only option was to ride on to Tishomingo in hopes the two outlaws passed through there.

  It was only a twenty-mile ride to Tishomingo and he planned to stop a couple of miles short of that at a small trading post on Blue River, owned by Dewey Sams. Possibly, Dewey had seen the two men he chased if they had taken that trail into town. It had been some time since he had ridden this trail into Tishomingo. Dewey and his wife, Melva, were nice folks and he was curious to see how well their store had done. Consequently, he was disappointed when he approached the store to find it seemingly abandoned. There was no sign of life anywhere around the log structure, the barn, or the corral. He sincerely hoped nothing bad had happened to Dewey and Melva. They were the kind of people that would bring civilization to this wild part of the territory.

  He crossed over the creek that ran beside the store, then pulled up short when he discovered a horse tied at the corner of the porch. It had not been visible from the other side of the creek. A second glance told him the horse was a bay like the one Jim Little Eagle rode. Cautious now, he pulled his rifle from his saddle sling and dismounted, only to hear Jim call out. “Hey, you don’t need that Winchester, Deputy, I’ll come peacefully.” He had stepped outside the front door where he had been standing when he caught sight of a rider approaching. He wore a big grin on his face.

  “Jim, what the hell are you doin’ here? I sure as hell didn’t expect to catch up with you this quick.”

  “Waiting for you. How you get here so soon?”

  “I was down at my place in Texas when I got the word from Dan Stone,” Will said. He nodded toward the empty store. “What happened to Dewey Sams?”

  “He decided to move his store into Tishomingo when some other people started moving in there. I think he was afraid he was gonna be left behind now that the town is getting bigger. Somebody will find this place before long and likely set up a homestead.”

  He was glad to hear that Dewey Sams and his wife had not fallen upon bad times. “Have any luck trackin’ those two outlaws?” Will asked. He was prone to assume he didn’t, since he was waiting in this abandoned store for him to come along.

  “Yes and no,” Jim answered. “I picked up the tracks of three horses that stayed right on the trail to Tishomingo. There wasn’t any sign of ’em in town, so I went to talk to Tom Spotted Horse. Tom said they stopped at the general store for just a little while, then rode on, since they couldn’t get any whiskey there.”

  “Did Tom know which way they rode when they left town?” Will asked. “I’m surprised he even told you they were in town.”

  Jim chuckled. He knew Will wasn’t too fond of the Chickasaw policeman. “Tom ain’t as bad as he lets on. He just doesn’t like white folks and he doesn’t try to hide it. We work together when we need to.”

  “But he didn’t make any effort to find out what those two were up to, did he?”

  “No, but to be fair, Tom didn’t get any notice about them, and they didn’t cause any trouble in Tishomingo, so he didn’t have any reason to detain them.”

  In his past dealings with Tom Spotted Horse, Will had found the man to border on belligerent when it came to cooperation with the marshal service. He still had not surrendered to the white man, Will supposed. He was good in dealing with his native brethren, but with white outlaws, he didn’t care what they did as long as it was not in his town. “I expect I’ll check in with Tom to see if there’s anything at all he might have picked up about those two. Then I’ll see if I can cut their trail outta town. I reckon you’ll be gettin’ back to your territory now.”

  “Unless you need me to go along with you,” Jim said.

  “No need,” Will said. “You’ve got your responsibilities in your section and there ain’t but two wild drifters to worry with. So I’ll take it from here. Say hello to Mary for me.”

  “I will,” Jim said. “You be careful, Will. There might just be two, but you ain’t got no jail wagon or a posse man with you.” He shrugged and added, “Not that you ever have.”

  * * *

  Will was half-decided to forget about checking with Tom Spotted Horse as he continued on to Tishomingo. But Dan Stone always encouraged his deputies to maintain a good relationship with the Indian police, so he figured it was the proper thing to do to at least let him know he was in town. It was getting along in the afternoon by the time he rode into the small gathering of buildings built beside Pennington Creek, so he went straight to the log cabin that served as the official office for the Chickasaw Nation. Tom evidently saw him approaching, because he stepped outside the cabin to wait for him on the stoop. “Tanner,” he greeted Will simply, his face the usual stern image one reserved for an unwelcome guest.

  “Howdy, Tom,” Will returned, making some effort to appear friendly. “I reckon you know why I’m out your way.”

  “I told Jim Little Eagle everything I know about those two white men,” Tom replied.

  “Did he tell you they killed two men in Durant?”

  Tom shrugged indifferently. “Nobody tell me nothin’ before they show up in my town. They don’t do nothin’ in my town. They rode on. Your problem now.” He watched Will intently, his face expressionless. “Long day, I go home now.” He started to turn around to go back inside.

  “Hold on a minute, damn it,” Will said, stopping him. “It would make my job a helluva lot easier if you could give me any information I could use to track those two murderers down.”

  “I told you, I don’t have no information,” Tom said.

  “Which way did they go when they left town,” Will pressed, “east, west, north, south?”

  Tom shrugged. “I don’t see.”

  It was obvious that the sullen Indian would not help, even if he could. Will might have been concerned that he had somehow offended Tom in the past, but he knew it was the same with the other deputies who had occasion to work with him. He thanked him for his usual fine cooperation and turned Buster’s head toward a recently built board building with a sign that read SAMS BROTHERS. He could use a few things from the general store and it would be nice to have a civil conversation after his visit with Tom Spotted Horse.

  “Evenin’,” the man behind the counter greeted him when he walked in the store. “Somethin’ I can help you with?”

  “Evenin’,” Will returned. “I’ll be needin’ some flour and some salt, and a slab of sowbelly. I reckon that’ll do it for now.” The clerk hustled immediately to weigh out his purchases. He pulled out a side of bacon from a barrel and held a knife over it until Will indicated how much of it to slice.

  “Ain’t seen you in town before. You gonna be with us a while, or just passin’ through?”

  “Passin’ through,” Will answered. “I was expectin’ to see Dewey Sams when I walked in. Is this his place?”

  “Will Tanner, right?” The boisterous voice came from the doorway to the back room before the clerk could answer and Dewey Sams walked in. Will turned to face him.

  “Howdy, Dewey,” Will responded. “I’m surprised you remember me. Last time I saw you, you were out at your other place on the river outside of town.”

  “Sure I remember you—glad to see you again.” He swept his arm around toward the front of the store. “We moved, lock, stock, and barrel into town.” He motioned toward the man wrapping Will’s bacon in a cloth. “This is my brother, Jake. I don’t believe you met him when you came by our place by the river. Jake, this is Will Tanner. He’s a U.S. deputy marshal.” Back to Will then, he asked, “What brings you back this way, Deputy?”

  “Two men who just rode through your town within the last few days,” Will replied.

  Dewey turned immediately toward his brother. “I knew it. Me and Jake both kne
w there was something about those two that made you careful not to turn your back on ’em. What did they do?”

  “They killed a couple of men in Durant,” Will said.

  “I knew it!” Dewey repeated. “Those two came in here, lookin’ to buy some whiskey. I told ’em we didn’t sell whiskey, that nobody was supposed to sell whiskey in Indian Territory. Well, the big one didn’t like it very much and I think he was fixin’ to cause some trouble till his partner calmed him down. They walked outta the store and I was afraid they’d come back in, so I grabbed up my shotgun just in case. They rode off, though, took that trail by the post office, headed west, and I was glad to see ’em go.”

  Will almost chuckled, thinking that Dewey had just blurted out more information on the two outlaws than Tom Spotted Horse had supplied upon questioning. “I’m running blind on these two jaspers,” Will said. “I don’t even know what they look like. Anything unusual about either one of ’em?”

  Dewey scratched his head while he thought about it. He looked at Jake, who shrugged in response. “Nothin’ special, just average-lookin’ fellers, I guess.”

  “One of ’ em was skinny as a broom handle and he wore garters around his sleeves and he had his pistol on backward,” a feminine voice declared. Will turned when Melva Sams came up behind him. She went on. “He was wearing a vest like some of those the Indians wear, with beads stitched around the pockets. I think he thought he was something special, with his mustache trimmed to a fine line and slicked down. The other one looked just the opposite, looked like he’d never had a bath in his life and there were grease stains all over the front of his shirt.” She paused to register an expression of disgust. “There were a few grease spots in that shaggy beard, too. His name was Elmo. At least that’s what his partner called him.”

  Will couldn’t suppress a chuckle then. “How do, Miz Sams, ’preciate the information. I was fixin’ to ask you folks some questions, but you already answered about all I can think of.”