by Dani Larsen
"I think I like the way you think, boy. Where will I find you when I get out? I will be on foot."
"I will try to get a job, until you get out, and buy you a horse for when you get released. You can pay me back when you get some money. Probably stay at the Salem Hotel, unless I find work that includes board and room. I will come and see you a couple of weeks before you get out. Don't want to raise any questions by coming here too often."
"Sounds good, Jude. I'm looking forward to working with you. I'll see you soon then. I'll be thinking about some ways to get that saddle back in the meantime."
He stood up and shook Jude's hand, before he turned around and went through the door in the back of the room where the guard was waiting.
Jude rode into Salem and started asking around about work, while he ate lunch at a corner restaurant. He got a low paying job at the hotel, where he was planning on staying, and he was happy to get his room free as part of his pay. He spent his free time at the saloon, thinking about a plan to find that saddle at the Troy Ranch, and dreaming about that gold.
Chapter Twenty-Three
"Siringo Delays the Search for Jude"
Charlie Siringo felt compelled to go to the Montana Territory and the Canadian border to look for Jude, but it was late summer, and the weather in Montana would turn cold by the end of September. So he decided it was too late in the year to start a trip that far north, and he delayed his trip until spring. Besides, he missed his wife, and he knew he was needed on his ranch in New Mexico to help take care of things through the winter months. Spending winters with his wife at their spacious place outside of Santa Fe was something he always enjoyed. He thought about making a stop in La Grande, to tell Anton about what he had just learned about Jude in Pendleton, but since he had telegraphed the sheriff and asked him to tell everyone who needed to know, he was sure the man would relay the information. And there was only a half an hour stop in that city, which hardly gave him enough time to get to the saloon and back.
All Pinkerton men had free passes to ride the rail systems anywhere in the United States, due to a deal made with the railroads a long time ago. The detectives had worked for the railroads and saved them thousands of dollars, by stopping lots of train robberies in the last half of the nineteenth century. The Pinkerton men caught and arrested many train robbers and broke up several gangs; including the Hole in the Wall Gang, run by Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Part of the reward for their service was a free ride for detectives and their horses. All a Pinkerton man had to do was show his badge.
Siringo's train left Pendleton at eight in the morning. The weather was still warm, but the leaves were bursting with fall colors that made the countryside look like canvases filled with reds, oranges, and golds sprinkled across the landscape. Fluffy white clouds floated aimlessly in the blue skies for several miles and eventually began turning to gray as the train traveled on its rails, and Charlie realized that a late summer storm would be upon them within the next few hours. After showing his badge, he loaded his horse into one of the two Arm's Palace Horse Cars that were built just for the animals. These cars were similar to Pullman passenger cars, including the clerestory roofs and small windows that surrounded the ceiling. The cars had two compartments with eight stalls on both sides, instead of the one compartment in the Pullman cars. They had a wall in the middle of each car which separated the car into two sides. The wall had four stalls on each side of it and four stalls facing the end walls. Two sliding doors were on each side of the car where ramps were pulled down for loading and unloading the horses. There were water and feed troughs in each stall and places for the owners to store their saddles and bags, bridles, blankets, and bed rolls. The car had just been cleaned, and smelled like fresh hay, soap and water, and the familiar smell of horses and the leather of their saddles. Charlie had given his horse water and a bale of hay, and then he found a seat in the passenger car, where he was now enjoying the scenery that was flying by.
Fifty-two miles later, the train arrived in La Grande at ten in the morning. Siringo was happy when a couple in the front of the car got off the train. The woman's heavy perfume filled the car with an overpowering smell of a flower that he couldn't identify, because whatever it was he was never going to plant it at his home. He was having trouble breathing and was coughing with every breath, as her perfume was so strong he assumed she had bathed in it. He realized why when he went to the front of the car to retrieve a newspaper. As he walked by the couple, he realized the man's odor was worse than his wife's. Men in the West didn't bathe as often as they should, but this man smelled worse than a pig sty. Siringo held his breath as he went back to the farthest seat he could find from these two. He thought the woman was trying to cover up her husband's body odor as even after they left the train, their scent still hung in the air. Charlie opened his window and the window in front of him to air out the car, while they were stopped at the station. It was too cold to leave it open all the way while they were traveling, so after he aired out the back of the car he left it open a crack. The train took off again, after dropping off and picking up mail and passengers, and then headed toward Baker City. An hour and a half later and forty-four miles up the line the train arrived. There was a two hour stopover for lunch, so Charlie ate at the restaurant by the tracks, and then watered and fed his horse. Jody had been with him for many years, and she was like a member of his family. The train took on more mail, passengers, coal, and water in Baker City, and finally left at two in the afternoon. Charlie would have been surprised to learn that the man he was looking for was less than a mile away, working at a hotel in downtown Baker City. As the train passed by the Troy Ranch shortly before passing through Durkee, Siringo wished he had time to stop and visit with the Troys again. He considered them two of the finest people he had ever met. He would love to have told them about the strange case he was investigating, to see if they could offer any insights about Jude Burden and his mother. He found that sometimes his clues needed a fresh perspective, and the Troys were intelligent people with good sense. He hoped all was well with them, and that someday he would get to see them again.
The train stopped in Huntington for fifteen minutes, then it crossed the Snake River into Idaho, where it turned south heading for the town of Payette. It arrived in Payette at five p.m. After sleeping for the last two hours, Charlie stretched and got off to check on Jody again before he went to find dinner, as this was another two hour stop. He was so bored by the time the train arrived at Nyssa that he got off to purchase some magazines to read. Siringo knew this was going to be a long trip, as the train made this many stops every day. The stops were necessary, as the train delivered mail from place to place, and it had to stop for water and coal. He also wanted to make sure that Jody was taken care of, as he didn't trust anyone else to care for his beloved mare.
They left Nyssa at quarter to nine in the evening. It was a long night with many stops, so he hardly got any sleep. Just as he would start to nod off, the train would stop again waking him up. They stopped in Caldwell and Meridian, Idaho, and finally arrived at Gooding, Idaho at four in the morning. They had covered about one hundred twenty-seven miles from Caldwell to Gooding. It was another one hundred forty miles to Pocatello, Idaho, where they finally arrived at eight thirty the next morning.
When Siringo got back on the train after taking care of his horse in Pocatello, he was happy to find an old friend of his sitting in the passenger car. Sonny Bronson had been a Pinkerton Agent for a short time and was now a U.S. Marshall heading to Cheyenne, Wyoming. Finally, he had someone he could discuss the case he was working on with, someone who would understand his thoughts on the crimes he was investigating. During the two and a half hours it took to go the eighty miles to Montpelier, Charlie began to tell Sonny what he was working on.
"Sonny, I'm working on a case that I can't seem to let go of. I should be totally retired by now, but I just feel like I have to solve this case before I quit. It all started with the murder of the governor of
Idaho back in 1905."
"Steunenberg? I thought they put that Orchard guy away for that."
"They did, but I don't think he was the only guilty party. The problem is that Orchard is such a liar that you can't tell what is true and what isn't. The man has gone by three different names over his lifetime. Then he confessed to killing sixteen other men besides the governor, but it has been proven he couldn't have killed several of them. He first reported that three of the officers in that miners' union paid him to kill the governor, but those three were all acquitted after lengthy trials. I was up there at that time and am still not sure that they weren't guilty, but they had a good lawyer who was able to convince the jury that they might not be guilty."
"Why did they get off then, if there was evidence against them?"
Sonny took off his hat and boots while he was talking. He was a tall man with long legs and big feet. His socks were sweaty and looked wet without his boots. Charlie had an acute sense of smell, so he was happy when he realized that Sonny's feet didn't smell as bad as he expected them to. He was used to the smells of men that rode on the range, and Sonny didn't smell any worse. He had a small mustache and a little goatee, and his hairline was beginning to recede in the front, but he was still a nice looking man in his mid-forties.
"The only real evidence against them was Harry Orchard's word, which the lawyers proved was unreliable. The jury thought he was lying about them too. Clarence Darrow is a damn good lawyer, but he made so many union men angry by defending them and calling Harry a liar that they were ready to lynch him. If I hadn't stepped in front of him and talked them down, I think he would have been hanging from a tree that night."
"Well, who are you looking for then? Who else is there?"
"The guy who walked up there with Orchard that night, when he went to plant that bomb, is the man I have been trying to track down. He was supposedly the clerk at the hotel at that time, but the minute that bomb went off, the man jumped on his horse, headed west, and hasn't been seen since."
"That makes him look pretty guilty, taking off like that."
"I agree. Orchard wouldn't say much about him, just snickered when I asked him about the man. But I questioned several men and came up with his name. Bud or Buddy Dampierre was a mine worker to begin with, but then he was let go after that last strike at the mine. He was young, about sixteen or seventeen, when this whole thing happened. One man told me that Dampierre had once said that he found out that his mother worked in some brothel in La Grande, Oregon, so I went on a search. I spent the last few years trying to find him in Eastern Oregon, and I think I finally found the right guy, but he is pretty slippery. If he is the man I think he is, he is not only guilty of helping Orchard kill the governor, I think he is also guilty of a few other crimes."
"Really? What else did you find out about him?"
Sonny pulled out a bag of tobacco and papers and began rolling a cigarette. He offered the bag to Charlie when he was finished, but he declined. Sonny put the bag away and pulled out a small box of matches and lit the cigarette.
"I went through all the books of wanted posters and found a Buddy Dampierre; who was wanted for questioning in Wyoming for a suspicious fire that killed his foster parents at a hotel there, but there was no picture. You might look that up, when you get settled in Cheyenne, and find out if they have any more evidence against him. He was only fourteen years old at the time."
Sonny blew out two smoke rings before he spoke.
"Are they sure he wasn't killed in the fire?"
"It's doubtful, as they only found two bodies, his foster mother and father, and it looked like someone had set the drapes in the room on fire."
"Why was he with foster parents?"
"I found his real mother in La Grande, and she said she let him go with them because she thought he would have a better life with them. She acted shocked when I told her that they were killed in a fire. And she swears she hasn't seen her son since, but my intuition tells me not to believe her."
"Why? What makes you think he is still around?"
"I went back every two or three weeks and watched her, and saw her at the Rodeo at the Union County Fair in La Grande, enthusiastically cheering for a cowhand in 1910. When she realized I was there and that I had seen her, she immediately stopped cheering and began acting guilty."
"So, did you question her and him about it?"
Sonny tapped his cigarette in the ashtray on the back of the seat in front of him
"Yes, I've questioned her several times and him once. I think she is scared of him, and he has threatened her not to tell. She was beat up real bad late last year, and I think he did it, but Dolly Dampierre isn't talking."
Charlie pulled out his flask from inside his jacket pocket and offered it to Sonny, who took a big swig and handed it back. Charlie took a quick nip, screwed on the lid, and put it back in his pocket.
"Who is this guy?"
"That's the thing. He was a foreman on a ranch there, and as far as I can tell, he doesn't have a record, at least not under the name he is using. He is going by Jude Burden. But he is such an ordinary looking guy that it is hard to get anyone to identify him. Just in the last year, things have happened that make me surer that I have the right man, and that he has committed a few more crimes in trying to cover up his earlier misdeeds. Now, I'm pretty sure that he is the one I'm looking for, and I'm ready to bring him in."
"Why not just go and arrest him?"
"Because he took off about the time I heard about these new incidents. The problem is I can't prove yet that these are accidents or criminal acts. I had asked the sheriff to keep an eye out for any information about him, and I got a letter from the sheriff in La Grande telling me that his mother had been beaten up. By the time I got there, the madam at the bordello had died suspiciously, and the ranch owner he worked for had been in a mysterious accident that left him mentally incapacitated. This guy is a real sly character."
"Wow, he would have quite a record if you could pin these things on him."
"Yeah, I am beginning to think he is one bad ass criminal, and definitely someone we don't want running loose. If you find out anything, Sonny, I would sure appreciate you letting me know. Here is my card. I'm heading home to my ranch in New Mexico, for the winter, but I will be going back up north in early spring, to see if I can track him down, and I'll stop by and see if you have found out anything."
"I will check out both names, when I get to Wyoming, and make some notes that we can go over when I see you next."
His cigarette was getting low so he took one last drag and put it out in the ashtray. He blew out the smoke before speaking again.
"I will also look further into the record of that fire. Was that in Cheyenne?"
"Yes, it was, probably around 1896."
The train was just pulling into the station at Montpellier, Idaho, so they decided to get off and have lunch. It was one o'clock in the afternoon, and they only had an hour before the train departed again. Sonny went in the restaurant to get them a table, and Charlie went to check on his horse. Sonny had paid extra to have a train worker take care of his mount. After a quick lunch, the two men got back on the train.
They crossed the Idaho Wyoming border about half an hour after they left, and were due to arrive in Cheyenne at six the next morning, so the men spent their last day together reminiscing about the old days and all the people they had come across in their travels. Sonny was about ten years younger than Charlie, so he wasn't ready to retire yet, and knew more about some of the current events than Charlie did. Having been semi-retired for the last few years, he had been working on tying up this one last loose end and wanted to know what was going on elsewhere. After Sonny filled him in on the latest news, Charlie decided to tell him about the Pinkerton Agency and his small war with them.
"You heard about the problems I've been having with the agency, didn't you?"
"No, what has been going on?"
"They don't like me telling the truth about the
m in my books. They made me change the name on my first book. I ended up taking the Pinkerton name out and making it into two books. That made me real mad, so I wrote 'Two Evil Isms: Pinkertonism and Anarchism', which told the truth on how they do business. I told how they instructed me to vote eight times during the re-election of Colorado Governor Peabody, which was voter fraud. I also related how I infiltrated the miners' unions during the 1892 strike in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho. They sued me for libel, and tried to get me extradited from my ranch up to Chicago. Luckily, the governor denied their request. Then they sent all their guys out to buy up all the copies, and got a court order to confiscate the book's plate, so they won on that one. I guess I'm lucky that I am still on their rolls at all. I think they believe they can control me if I still work for them. They don't pay me, but I still have my badge and get my train rides free. They are probably afraid of what I will do next."
Charlie laughed when he finished his story.
"Well, I don't like the way they do things either, which is why I took the job as U.S. Marshall in Cheyenne."
"While you're there, see what you can find out about that whole fiasco with Lefors. He is one guy I have absolutely no respect for."
"I don't like that guy either, Charlie. Tom Horn wasn't the nicest guy. That's for sure, but I think Lefors got him hanged for the one thing he probably wasn't guilty of."
"Yeah, that's exactly what I think too."
