Support Your Local Deputy: A Cotton Pickens Western

by W. , Johnstone, William

  Miss Quick, she did just fine, knocking clay birds out of the sky. She went on first, while the light was good. By the end of the show, light was fading, and they did their grand march just in time, finishing up at dusk. People had a fine old time, and then they drifted into Doubtful, full of inspiration. That final drum and bugle parade was just right.

  I watched Bones’s crew dismantle things, and they did it so fast I could hardly believe that for a few days, they had conducted a big Wild West show there. In the morning, they’d hitch up their teams and ride away.

  It sure gave me a good feeling. I drifted over to Sammy Upward’s saloon, and it was already filling up. There were a mess of cowboys from the Admiral Ranch, and I spotted Big Nose George and Spitting Sam, belly to the bar, sipping the first red-eye of the evening. There were boys from all the ranches in there, sucking beer, laying out coin for a shot of rye, or a glass of sarsaparilla if they weren’t the drinking sort. Plug Parsons and Carter Bell were in from the T Bar, along with Rudy Beaver. That outfit was far out, and they’d come a piece to see the show and rub shoulders with the crowd. Those cowboys were slicked up, in high-heeled boots and bandannas, and some had even washed up for the occasion. But there wasn’t a sidearm among them, and I liked that, because sometimes one of them got a little frisky and began perforating the ceiling. But this here was a social occasion, wall-to-wall smiles, and that would make for a fine evening.

  The Wild West boys began drifting in, looked around, and settled on a corner table. They were mostly drinking rye whiskey. Maybe that was the preferred booze for the outfit. They were a muscular bunch. Cowboys were mostly thin and wiry and short; these show people were muscled up. Cowboys mostly sat on a horse; these show people were wrestling teams and tents and furniture and livestock all the time, and were all bruisers. The cowboys were more colorful, all spangled up in bright colors and gold and silver, while the roustabouts were wearing brown britches, old boots, and tight, knit shirts. I saw Rinkydink among them, and wondered what Miss Quick saw in him. Maybe it was none of my business, I thought. He was no bigger than the other roustabouts, but his shoulders were axe-handle wide, and he had hands the size of hams.

  Everyone was sure having a fine time, and Sammy Upward was dishing out the booze faster than I’d ever seen him, coining money as he went along. It got crowded in there, and Sammy lit a couple more kerosene lamps in the wagon wheel chandelier, so there was good light even in the far corners. The T Bar boys and Admiral Ranch boys were old enemies, so they stayed at opposite sides of the place, and mostly sat there in the heat, looking dreamy. It sure was a fine August evening, even if the place needed a little more air.

  Amanda Quick and Billy Bones showed up, still in their show outfits, she in her fringed buckskins, he in a giant sombrero topping a black suit of clothes. They sure looked fine. I waved, and they both saluted me from across the room, and next I knew, someone had lifted her to the bar, and she stood up on it, and was lifting a glass with something green in it.

  “Here’s to Doubtful, Wyoming,” she said, and all the good folks in there cheered.

  “And here’s to Sheriff Cotton Pickens,” she said.

  That evoked a hoot and a holler, and Smiley Thistlethwaite emptied a beer mug over me, and then Rinkydink beaned Smiley with a whiskey bottle, and then Plug Parsons kicked Big Nose George in the crotch, and then Sammy Upward yanked out his shotgun and fired at the ceiling, which was an awful racket, and then no one paid the slightest attention to Sammy. A mighty howl rose up and swamped the Last Chance Saloon, and drinking was forgotten for the moment because everyone had some new entertainments to keep him busy.

  I felt a crack on my shoulder, and I saw Carter Bell’s fist whiz by my nose. I thought that this could be an enjoyable evening, but I had a duty to maintain the peace, and also preserve the Last Chance Saloon before it was torn to pieces. So I leapt over the bar, looking for Sammy’s billy club, grabbed it, and climbed up on the bar, planning to rap hard for attention.

  Well, my ma used to say that good intentions aren’t enough. Miss Amanda Quick kneed me where it hurt, and as I folded over, Spitting Sam shoved me off the bar and into Sammy Upward’s prone carcass. Big Nose George had knocked him cockeyed, and he was nursing himself under the beer spouts.

  I heard wild laughter, whoops, howls, and a rumble of anger in there, too, as all them rowdies began to get serious about the whole business. A bottle of booze landed on my head, but my hat softened the blow.

  “You all right?” I asked Sammy.

  “You’re an idiot,” he replied.

  “You got any bright ideas?” I asked.

  “Arrest them all,” he said.

  “I’ll give her a try.” I clambered up, dodged a tumbler that shattered on the back bar, and yelled, “Stop! You’re all under arrest!”

  A beer bottle conked me on the forehead. A fist caromed off my shoulder. That hurt.

  “I’m ruined,” Sammy said.

  “This place is about to burn. One spilled lamp, and it’s all over,” I said.

  Some roustabout leaned over the bar and puked on my boot.

  By then things were beyond human restraint. I heard the roar and squeal, the shatter of glass, the cackles, the thump of fist on flesh, the snap of glass underfoot, the whoosh of air exploding from a gut, and shadows danced on the walls as the chandeliers careened this way and that. There was less laughter now and more rage. I heard glass shatter. Something busted the mirror of the back bar, and shards of glass landed on Sammy and me.

  “You want the revolver?” Sammy asked. “Shoot out the lights?”

  “And burn down the town,” I said. “I’m gonna haul the bodies out.”

  I edged around the bar, worked my way outside, saw that Amanda Quick and Billy Bones had escaped, and saw a crowd collecting there.

  “We’ll haul out the bodies,” I said.

  A reveler came flying through the door, dripping red. He had been rolling around in shattered glass. He sat on some horse manure, laughing.

  I edged in and dodged a flying chair, spotted a bloody cowboy who was being stepped on, got him by the ankles, and dragged him out. He howled as he scraped over glass, but in a moment he was lying on the street, leaking blood.

  “Fix him,” I yelled, and plunged back in. A beer mug hit me on the head, and I started after the roustabout, but thought better of it. I found another cowboy slumped against a wall, out cold, his mouth pulverized and leaking blood. I lifted him up, dragged him by his belt, and dropped him next to the rest in the manure outside.

  “Hey, sheriff, why don’t you just let them kill each other?” George Waller asked.

  “Help me. We got people getting killed in there,” I said.

  Waller laughed.

  I ducked a flying fist—this time it was Rinkydink’s ham hand—and got ahold of Spitting Sam, who had been no match for the roustabouts, and lolled stupidly against the bar.

  “Come on, Sam,” I said.

  I got an arm around him, and was about to get him out, when someone shoved me from behind, and I tumbled into the glass, taking Sam with me. All that glass cut me up, but I got up and hauled Sam outside. A bandaging crew was at work out there.

  The brawl was winding down, and it quit as suddenly as it started. Some were laughing, and some were sobbing. Sammy Upward was surveying his saloon, or what was left of it, moaning and groaning.

  The townspeople outside suddenly got brave, and helped me drag the casualties out to the clay road, stanch the blood, and line them all up like corpses.

  One roustabout sat there laughing. He was unharmed. The cowboys got the worst of it. Show people did hard work every day; cowboys only occasionally, and now it showed. There were twice as many cowboys on the injured list.

  “All right, I’m taking you all in,” I said.

  “But we’re leaving at dawn,” Billy Bones said.

  “After Hanging Judge Earwig has his say,” I replied.

  “What are you charging them with?”

>   “Well, let’s see. Disturbing the peace, assault and battery, destroying the saloon—I’ll need to look that up—you name it, I’ll include it.”

  “Hey, suppose I just donate a hundred dollars and you let them go.”

  “I don’t take gifts,” I said.

  Waller stepped in. “Just get them outta town, Pickens. Tell them to vamoose.”

  “Nope, I’ve got twelve roustabouts and twenty cowboys moaning and groaning around here, and they’re going to stand before the judge.”

  “I don’t know how you ever got appointed,” Waller said.

  “You shouldn’t have appointed me,” I replied. “Now help me move these galoots.”

  But the jail was a long way off, and we’d have to drag about twenty of these wrecks.

  “I’ll help you,” Sammy said. “I want my saloon paid for.”

  But it was Bones himself who came to the rescue with a two-horse freight wagon. We piled in the bodies, moaning and groaning, and I took the first load over, and locked them in Cell One. Then we loaded up the wagon again, and herded those who could walk, and we filled up Cell Two. By the middle of the night, I had over thirty revelers crammed into two cells, thanked Billy for the wagon, and told him I’d get the judge up early so the show could be on the road.

  “They ain’t fit to travel, sheriff. So there’s no rush,” Bones said. “You can treat me to breakfast.”

  Miss Quick eyed the sorry humanity in the cells. “I’m glad I’m not a man,” she said.

  Chapter Thirty-four

  That was Hanging Judge Earwig’s finest hour, and he knew it. He convened court at six in the morning, making sure that everyone was grouchy and no one had dosed himself with coffee yet. I marched the criminals into court, thirty-three in all, and they were a surly lot, stained brown from all that dried blood. They shed a lot of it, wrestling on the floor with all those broken bottles.

  Billy Bones came along with a bag of money; he was reconciled to what was coming, and wanted to bail out of Doubtful as well as he could manage, which would mean forking over.

  Earwig leered at the assembled miscreants, cowboys off the ranches, roustabouts, and show cowboys from the Wild West.

  “What a beautiful morning, gentlemen,” he said. “At least I think you’re all gentlemen, aren’t you? What a lovely, sweet dawn welcoming a glorious day in Puma County. Do you wish to plead guilty to whatever charges we can think up? It will save time. If not, why, I will set the trial for two weeks hence, and you may post bail for a thousand dollars apiece, or enjoy the hospitality of Sheriff Pickens. I understand the piss pots are overflowing, and there’s a lack of bunks, but you’ll have no trouble accommodating yourselves to minor discomforts.”

  All those miscreants stared up at Earwig, not yet fathoming his opening sally, since half of them were still drunk, and the rest were hurting, or leaking liquids from every pore and orifice. Still, they listened.

  Earwig was enjoying himself. “There is the small matter of Mr. Upward’s saloon, which is now suffering from the recent and memorable joust in which you participated. He has yet to give me an estimate, but he lost every bottle of spirits in his possession, most of his glassware, most of his furniture, and sundry other items. Even the Montgomery Ward catalog in his outhouse, he tells me.”

  He peered owlishly at the silent and surly crowd of miscreants. “There is the matter of disturbing the peace. The matter of assault to do great bodily harm, if not exterminate anyone in your way. There is public drunkenness. I believe there were threats and foul language. There was the matter of defying the sheriff, who ordered you to cease and desist. And I suppose I can think up a few more, and court testimony will enlarge and embellish the list of infractions against the good order and peacefulness of Doubtful, Wyoming Territory. How do you plead?”

  No one said a thing. So Earwig pointed at each man and asked him to plead, guilty or innocent. But they were all clamming up.

  “Very well, I will remand the prisoners to the sheriff, and direct them to appear at their combined trial in a fortnight,” he said.

  “Ah, Your Honor,” Billy Bones said. “May I be heard?”

  “Step forward, sir.”

  “I am the employer of twelve of these gents, and I will enter a guilty plea for those in my company.”

  “A guilty plea, is it?”

  “If it can result in a fair settlement, Your Honor, guilty it will be.”

  “And what would a fair settlement be?”

  “Ah, let us say, no more than forty percent of the cost of rehabilitating Mr. Upward’s business establishment, if you determine that my group was at fault. However, since they didn’t initiate this difficulty, but sat peacefully until set upon by drovers, the true amount should be less, no more than ten percent, because they were merely defending themselves.”

  Earwig leaned over, and jabbed a finger at Rinkydink. “You there, how did you defend yourself ?” he asked.

  “We were sitting peacefully at our table, Your Honor, when we were set upon by local rowdies. We remained seated until it was plain that we needed to protect our persons, and guard our private parts against the unruly mob.”

  “Good, good, sir. Now how did you protect yourself against the drovers from the ranches, may I ask?”

  “Well, sir, we invited them to join us for a drink, and we expressed our friendship and best wishes, for we had just competed in certain rodeo events in our show, and we offered to buy them a round of drinks, but they chose to hit us.”

  “Hit you?”

  Rinkydink sighed. “We did our best to keep the peace, sir, but it came time to defend ourselves, and so we did, it being a principle of justice that we have the right to defend our persons against harm.”

  “Ah!” said Earwig, his eyes aglow.

  “Your Honor,” said another roustabout, “it was a matter of honor and decency. The star, the glory, of our show is our shooter, Miss Quick. She came to have a friendly drink with all parties, being of a generous nature, but the locals began to abuse her, threaten her, mock her honor and skills, and needless to say, we were ready and willing to defend her against these calumnies, canards, and gross perversions of the truth.”

  That fellow sounded real practiced at this, I thought. Maybe he had some experience. I thought I’d ask Bones if this sort of departure was ordinary.

  Earwig leaned forward. “And so you defended her honor against the local drovers? Who were demeaning her? Is that it?”

  “Yessir.”

  “What are calumnies? Tell me about canards.”

  “Those are real evils, sir, right out of Webster’s.”

  “And what truth was perverted by these drovers?”

  “They said she couldn’t shoot worth a damn. If she didn’t load her rifle with sand, she couldn’t hit the broad side of a barn.”

  “Ah! Now we are getting somewhere,” Earwig said. “And does she use sand?”

  “Never, sir, she shoots nothing but lead. And anyone who says otherwise is a rotter, a cad, and a bounder.”

  “Those are from Webster’s, too?”

  “That’s what Billy Bones taught me to say.”

  “Your boss is a fine, upstanding gent,” Earwig said. “A lady’s virtue is at stake.”

  He turned to the rest of the miscreants, familiar faces from the assorted ranches around Doubtful. “Ah, it’s always a joy to spot old friends and acquaintances,” he said. “Now, then, my curiosity has got the best of me. I shall point, and you shall tell me how many times you have been before this court. If you wish to repeat your name, that is fine; if not, it won’t matter.”

  He pointed a crooked index finger at Big Nose George. “Tell me truly, sir, how many times you have stood before me in this court of law.”

  Big Nose scratched his nose, dipping into assorted memories. “I believe it was four, sir.”

  “Ah! And you, fella?” he asked, pointing at a T-Bar cowboy.

  “Five, sir.”

  He pointed at Alvin Ream, from th
e Admiral Ranch. “And you?”

  Ream puffed up some. “I don’t rightly remember, sir. So many times I can’t quite say, but it’s in the double digits.”

  “Ah, more than the fingers on my hands,” Earwig said, spreading out all his fingers.

  “Yep.”

  Several cowboys whistled. A little brag was good.

  “How about you, sir?” Earwig asked, pointing at a cowboy unfamiliar to me.

  “Well, sir, five or six times, before you, and eight or ten before the previous judge, best as I can recollect.”

  Earwig nodded. “A true reprobate, and proud of it.”

  He aimed his finger at Smiley Thistlethwaite.

  “Beyond counting, Your Honor. Simply taxes my mind to remember them all,” Smiley said.

  “Good, good. And you, Spitting Sam?”

  “I’ve never had the honor, sir, but only because I’ve dodged the law. But I’ve been before a dozen judges throughout the territory, and have survived twenty or thirty good fights.”

  “Good, good, good,” the judge said.

  The motley crowd looked plumb worn out after a night of uproar and blood, and then a few hours packed into cells intended to hold one or two. The culprits weren’t bleeding now, but they looked pale and drawn, as if they were on their last legs. All of which delighted Judge Earwig.

  One by one, he had the locals fess up. And most of them put the best face possible on it, and confessed to far more infractions than they had to their credit. I thought most of them had been before the judge once or twice, at most, but this lot was confessing to five or seven or a dozen arrests for brawling. There was something really satisfying about it, and it did my heart good to see so much manhood confessing to so much public disturbance in Doubtful. There was not a town in the territory that could match or beat Doubtful when it came to public disturbance. And I must say, those roustabouts with the show were really impressed. They hadn’t the faintest idea, until last evening, what they were facing in Doubtful, Wyoming.