Deadly Day in Tombstone

by William W. Johnstone

  “I’ll be sure to do that right away,” Upton said as he came to his feet. He put his hat on. “Good morning, Sheriff.”

  When Upton was gone, Burt Alvord appeared in the doorway and propped a shoulder against the jamb. “Every time I see that fella, he reminds me of a hungry coyote scroungin’ for anything he can get.”

  “Morris Upton is more dangerous than a coyote,” Slaughter said. “Did you hear what he was telling me?”

  “About that poker tournament? Sure. Sounds like it’ll really put Tombstone on the map.”

  “Tombstone is already on the map,” Slaughter pointed out. “The Earps and the Clantons took care of that.”

  “Yeah, but the place’s reputation is startin’ to fade a mite these days. This’ll make folks sit up and take note again. And if there’s any trouble . . .”

  “It’s our job to see that there’s not.”

  * * *

  Stonewall hadn’t seen Dallin Williams since the night his former friend had almost run afoul of Albie Hamilton. That was just fine. Stonewall didn’t want to get dragged into Dallin’s affairs. The womanizing cowboy could look out for himself.

  Like Sheriff Slaughter’s other deputies, Stonewall was kept busy by the sudden influx of people into Tombstone because of the upcoming high stakes poker tournament at the Top-Notch. A lot of money would be changing hands, and the free flow of money meant certain types would show up in an attempt to get their fingers on some of it.

  The games in the poker tournament weren’t the only gambling going on in Tombstone. Plenty of tinhorn card sharps were there to ply their trade on players not involved with the tournament.

  A couple wagons full of soiled doves had rolled into town ahead of the tournament, as well. The women camped in a grove of cottonwood trees on the edge of the settlement and set up tents where they could conduct their business.

  Some of the community’s respectable ladies, who barely tolerated the Top-Notch, the Birdcage, the Crystal Palace, and the other so-called “dens of iniquity,” were outraged by these new arrivals and descended on the sheriff’s office to demand that Slaughter run them out of town. He had to walk a fine line between placating the indignant ladies and enforcing the law, because like gambling, prostitution wasn’t exactly illegal in Tombstone. He couldn’t very well allow the established brothels to continue operating while driving out the newcomers.

  Stonewall had enjoyed being a deputy so far, but seeing what his brother-in-law had to deal with convinced him more than ever that he’d never want to be the sheriff himself.

  A number of hard-faced strangers also drifted into the settlement during the few days leading up to the tournament. Slaughter ordered his deputies to keep a close eye on anybody they didn’t know. Some of those drifters might be thieves and cutthroats, hoping to catch some poker player alone and drag him into an alley where he could be robbed and murdered.

  With all that going on, Stonewall sure didn’t have time for any of Dallin Williams’s foolishness. He was standing on the boardwalk in front of the Top-Notch in the middle of the afternoon with a short-barreled coach gun tucked under his left arm when a buggy rolled along the street and came to a stop in front of the saloon. He had picked up the habit of carrying a scattergun from the sheriff, who often had such a weapon with him when he walked around town.

  Potential troublemakers always thought twice when they found themselves staring down the dark tunnels of those twin barrels. The effect of a double load of buckshot on human flesh was a powerful object lesson.

  Stonewall was taking life easy at the moment. His shoulder leaned against one of the posts that held up the awning over the boardwalk. He stood up straighter when he saw that it was a woman at the reins of the buggy.

  She was the sort of woman who would make almost any man look twice. Raven hair curled around a beautiful face that held a hint of exoticism. Her eyes were a rich, dark brown. A small beauty mark lay near her wide mouth.

  She was considerably older than Stonewall, possibly near thirty years old, but when he looked at her the feelings he experienced didn’t have the least bit to do with their difference in age.

  She smiled at him, an expression that Stonewall felt all the way down to the soles of his boots. “Hello, Sheriff. Is this the Top-Notch Saloon?”

  She had to know it was; a big sign was mounted on the front of the building above the awning. She might have genuinely mistaken him for the sheriff, though.

  His badge had the word Deputy engraved on it, but maybe she couldn’t read that. Or maybe she was just playing up to him.

  Stonewall didn’t know and didn’t care. All that mattered to him at the moment was that she was talking to him.

  “Uh, yes, ma’am, it sure is.” He thought he sounded stupid and tried not to wince. “I’m not the sheriff, though. I’m just a deputy. Deputy Stonewall Jackson Howell, at your service, ma’am.”

  “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Deputy Howell.” The accent in her voice confirmed his impression about her foreign nature.

  If he wasn’t mistaken, she was British, which was pretty doggoned exotic to a fella from Arizona Territory.

  “My name is Lady Arabella Winthrop. I know I really shouldn’t be asking such a thing of such a stalwart peace officer, but if you could help me with my bags . . .”

  “Yes, ma’am!” Stonewall practically jumped off the boardwalk to lend her a hand. He stumbled a little when he landed in the street, but managed not to curse.

  Loaded down with three bags, he followed her into the Top-Notch a minute later. The place was already busy. Quite a few of the card players who planned to enter the tournament were already on hand, and so were a lot of people who would be spectators once the games got underway.

  The crowd didn’t stop Morris Upton from noticing the newcomer. He threaded his way across the room toward her with a welcoming smile on his face and held out his hands to her. “Lady Arabella Winthrop, in the very lovely flesh! It’s wonderful to see you again. I was hoping you could make it.”

  “Boston, wasn’t it?” she murmured as she clasped his hands briefly. “Or was it New York where we last saw each other?”

  “Neither. It was Philadelphia.”

  “Of course! You haven’t changed, Morris.”

  “You have,” Upton told her.

  “Oh?” The elegantly curved dark eyebrows arched upward in response.

  “Yes, you’re more beautiful than ever.”

  Lady Arabella’s faintly cool smile didn’t change at his flattery.

  Stonewall had a hunch that anybody who looked like her was probably used to it.

  “What made you decide to stage a tournament like this, Morris?” she asked.

  “Why, that’s the only way I could think of to get you here, Lady Arabella,” Upton answered without hesitation. “A frontier backwater such as Tombstone is hardly the sort of place you’d ever visit, otherwise.”

  Stonewall frowned. He didn’t much cotton to a Yankee from back east insulting Tombstone that way.

  But before he could speak up, Lady Arabella said, “You might be surprised at the sort of places I turn up. Did you know that I owned a saloon in Tascosa for a short time, several years ago?”

  “I’ve never even heard of Tascosa,” Upton said.

  “It’s over in the Texas Panhandle. And I’ve spent a considerable amount of time here in Arizona Territory, too. I’m a free spirit, Morris, you know that. I go where the wind takes me.”

  “Well, I’m glad it brought you here.” Upton moved in and linked his arm with hers. “I have a room upstairs reserved for you. The best room in the house, in fact.”

  “I suppose it’s adjoining with yours?”

  “Well . . .”

  “I’ve told you before, I don’t mix business with pleasure.”

  Upton chuckled. “You can’t blame a man for trying. Come with me—”

  Stonewall cleared his throat.

  Lady Arabella turned back to him. “Oh, yes, Deputy Howell was kind enou
gh to bring in my bags, but I can’t really expect him to carry them upstairs for me like a bellboy in a hotel. Morris, surely you have someone . . .”

  Upton snapped his fingers and gestured sharply, and one of his bouncers stepped forward to take the bags from Stonewall.

  Lady Arabella smiled at Stonewall. “Thank you so much for your assistance, Deputy. I hope to see you again while I’m here in Tombstone.”

  “I’ll be around, ma’am, so I reckon you can count on it.”

  Upton gave him a momentary glare, then was all smiles again as he led Lady Arabella upstairs.

  So she was a lady gambler, thought Stonewall as he left the saloon. He had seen a few of those, but none as lovely and impressive as Lady Arabella Winthrop.

  He might well have spent some time musing about just how good-looking the English woman was, but just as he resumed his casual pose with a shoulder propped against an awning post, the urgent pounding of fast hoofbeats drifted to his ears.

  He straightened and looked down the street to see where the hoofbeats were coming from. At that moment, a rider rounded a corner a couple blocks away and raced along Allen Street toward him.

  Stonewall had just enough time to realize that the man leaning forward in the saddle and urging his mount on at breakneck speed was Dallin Williams. Then several other riders rounded the corner behind him and the guns in their hands spouted powder smoke as they opened fire.

  Chapter 4

  Stonewall dashed into the street. Some of those bullets flying around wildly were bound to hit some innocent bystander unless he stopped them. Putting an end to the chase struck him as the quickest way of ending the shooting. “Dallin!” he yelled. “Dallin, stop!”

  For a second it looked like Dallin was going to ride Stonewall down, but then he hauled hard on the reins and tried to swerve around the deputy.

  The speeding horse couldn’t handle the turn. Its legs went out from under it and dumped man and animal into the street, where they rolled over and over in a cloud of dust. Stonewall could only hope that the horse hadn’t crushed Dallin when it fell.

  The other riders still charged along Allen Street, yelling and shooting. Stonewall leaped into their path and leveled the scattergun at them.

  Unlike their quarry, they had time to stop. One of the men yelled an order only dimly heard over the thundering hoofbeats, but it was enough to make the others pull back on their reins and saw at the bits. They held their fire as they fought their mounts to a halt only a few yards short of where Stonewall stood.

  As dust swirled through the street, Stonewall recognized all four men. The barrel-chested, brown-bearded man who had shouted the order to stop was Little Ed McCabe, whose Bar EM spread was northeast of Tombstone.

  Little Ed, despite his name, was anything but little. He was built like a bear, and was about as hairy as one, too, with a thick pelt covering the backs of his hands and sprouting from the open throat of his shirt.

  The other three men were hands who rode for McCabe. All of them looked as angry as their boss and still held the revolvers they had been firing at Dallin.

  “Pouch those irons!” Stonewall ordered with all the authority he could muster. “And you better hope all that lead flyin’ around didn’t hurt anybody.”

  “You’re gettin’ mighty big for your britches, Deputy,” McCabe rumbled. “If you know what’s good for you, you’ll stand aside and let us have that no-good skunk Williams. He’s got a date with a hangrope!”

  So it had come down to this after all, Stonewall thought bitterly. Dallin hadn’t been able to resist going after Jessie McCabe, and Jessie’s pa had caught them.

  Lynching Dallin for that offense seemed to be carrying things a mite too far, though, and endangering the citizens of Tombstone had pushed the whole situation over the brink.

  Barely able to restrain his anger, Stonewall said, “Holster your guns right now, or I’ll blow you out of your saddles!”

  An icy voice added in a tone of unmistakable command, “You’d better do what the lad tells you.”

  From the corner of Stonewall’s eye, he spotted the sheriff standing wide-legged on the boardwalk with a Winchester in his hands. Nobody with any sense wanted to put Texas John Slaughter to the test. Despite the rage that filled Little Ed McCabe, Stonewall saw a flash of reason in the rancher’s eyes.

  With obvious reluctance, McCabe ordered, “Put your guns away, boys.”

  Slaughter said, “Stonewall, check on Williams.”

  Stonewall backed away and then turned to see what had happened to his former friend.

  Dallin’s horse appeared to be all right; the animal had clambered to its feet and didn’t seem to be favoring any of its legs, so maybe the fall hadn’t broken any bones. Dallin still lay huddled in the dust of Allen Street. He didn’t move as Stonewall approached.

  Stonewall figured he was knocked out . . . or worse. But as he dropped to a knee beside Dallin and reached for his shoulder to roll him over, one of Dallin’s eyes opened a crack.

  He asked quietly, “Are they still here?”

  Stonewall leaned closer. “You mean Little Ed and his boys?”

  “Yeah. They’ve gone plumb loco, Stonewall. You can’t let ’em get me.”

  “Are you hurt?” Stonewall was a little annoyed. Dallin was in trouble again, and once more he expected the law to get him out of it.

  “Naw, just shook up a mite. I know how to fall without gettin’ busted up.”

  “I don’t doubt it, as many bedroom windows as you’ve had to jump through.”

  Dallin chuckled, then grew serious again. “What about McCabe?”

  “Sheriff Slaughter’s got a gun on him. Get up out of the dirt so we can figure out what this is all about.” There wasn’t much doubt in Stonewall’s mind what that was as he straightened and stepped back from the fallen man.

  “Is he all right?” Slaughter called.

  “Probably better off than he deserves to be,” Stonewall answered.

  “Now, there ain’t no need to be hurtful,” Dallin said as he pushed himself to hands and knees. He climbed to his feet, picked up the hat that had flown off his head, and started beating it against his clothes to remove some of the dust.

  “Shoot him, Deputy,” McCabe urged. “A shotgun shell costs less’n a good rope.”

  Slaughter said, “Settle down, McCabe. Nobody’s shooting anybody . . . unless I’m the one pulling the trigger.”

  “But he’s got it comin’!” McCabe was red-faced and looked like he was about to explode from anger and frustration.

  “I’ll listen to what you have to say in a minute.” Slaughter turned to Mose Tadrack, who had come up beside him. “Mose, is anybody else hurt?”

  Tadrack shook his head. “No, everybody scattered and ducked for cover when the shooting started. They were lucky. The bullets didn’t even hit any horses.”

  Slaughter nodded curtly and turned back to the rancher. “I’d say you and your men are the really lucky ones, McCabe. If you’d killed or wounded someone while you were blazing away at Williams, I’d be arresting you for murder right now.”

  “It ain’t murder when all you’re tryin’ to do is bring a rapist to justice,” McCabe snapped.

  The tense situation in the street instantly became more serious. Dallin Williams looked shocked and yelped, “Rapist! I never forced myself on a woman in my life! Ever’ gal I was ever with wanted to be there with me!”

  “Shut your filthy mouth!” McCabe roared. “You assaulted my daughter!”

  Slaughter began, “That’s a mighty serious charge—”

  “And it’s a lie!” Dallin broke in. “I never laid a finger on Jessie McCabe, Sheriff. I swear it.”

  “I got proof,” McCabe insisted.

  “What sort of proof ?” Slaughter asked.

  McCabe turned in the saddle and pointed up the street. “Here it comes now.”

  Stonewall looked where the rancher was pointing and saw a wagon rolling toward them. A middle-aged woman was han
dling the reins, while a younger version of herself huddled on the seat beside her.

  Stonewall recognized the two women as Hallie McCabe, Little Ed’s wife, and Jessie, their daughter. Hallie was grim-faced while Jessie’s cheeks shone with tears.

  Stonewall looked over at Dallin. “Are you sure you don’t want to change the story you’re tellin’?”

  Dallin appeared a little pale under the permanent tan of a man who spent his days working outdoors. He swallowed hard. “Whatever they claim I did, Stonewall, it ain’t true. Did you ever know me to take advantage of a gal?”

  “I’ve known you to take advantage of a dozen girls . . . but I don’t recall you ever forcing yourself on one.”

  “That’s because I wouldn’t do it.”

  Slaughter handed his rifle to Mose Tadrack. “Keep an eye on McCabe’s men.” He stepped down from the boardwalk into the street and walked to meet the wagon.

  Hallie McCabe brought the team of mules to a stop.

  Slaughter reached up and touched the brim of his hat. “Ma’am.”

  “Sheriff,” Mrs. McCabe responded coldly. “Are you going to arrest that man who hurt my little girl?” Her mouth twisted as she added, “I shouldn’t even call him a man. He’s an animal.”

  Dallin opened his mouth to say something, but Stonewall stopped him with a look and advised, “Best just keep quiet for now.”

  “I can’t arrest anybody until I know what happened.” Slaughter glanced around at the crowd gathering in the street. “I don’t think this is the place to talk about it, either. Let’s all go down to my office at the courthouse.”

  “And then you’ll lock Williams up?” McCabe grumbled.

  “I’ll listen to the story and do what needs to be done.”

  McCabe let out a disgusted snort. “That lowdown scum needs to be swinging from a gallows, that’s what needs to be done.”

  “We’ll see,” Slaughter said. “Come along, the three of you McCabes. Stonewall, bring Williams. Mose, keep an eye on McCabe’s men and the rest of the town.”

  Stonewall gestured with the shotgun for Dallin to get moving. As they started walking toward the courthouse, he said under his breath, “See what chasin’ women all the time gets you?”