The Butcher of Baxter Pass

by William W. Johnstone

  “I ... am ... coming ... out!” the man inside the office yelled. There was another squeak—this one from a loose board on the walk, as Jess could make out the outline of the man as he stepped from the office—and a gunshot followed.

  “Damn it!” Jess rolled to his left, seeing a second muzzle flash and hearing the report from Lee Bodeen’s position. The shotgun roared once, and then the man was running from the office. Jess fired, saw orange flame spit again from the shotgun’s second barrel as the man ran. Bodeen cursed, fired. Jess felt like sending a shot toward Bodeen, who had botched this whole evening now. Instead, he fired in the general direction of the man, but that was a warning shot.

  “He’s used both barrels, Bodeen!” Jess yelled when the gunman with the Ranger star shot again.

  Something popped. Jess saw the flash near the loading pens and felt a bullet whistle past him.

  “He’s got a pistol now, Casey!” Bodeen snapped back.

  Jess heard wood smash against wood, and then a soft grunt. The wood slammed again, and he knew that the man who had shot at General Dalton—and now Lee Bodeen and Jess Casey—had made his way into the stockyards.

  He came up to his knees, lowering the hammer on the Colt and started toward the water trough. “I’m heading your way, Bodeen!” he yelled, and took off running, sliding the last several yards, and coming up into a half-seated position, his back resting against the wooden trough. He tried to catch his breath while he shucked out the empty casings and reloaded the revolver. From the noise he heard on the other side of the trough, Lee Bodeen was doing the same.

  “He was coming out, Bodeen,” Jess told him over the trough. “Giving himself up.”

  “How do you know?” Bodeen’s voice was tight.

  “Didn’t you hear me?”

  “Couldn’t make out any words,” Bodeen said. “Wind and all.”

  Jess filled the last empty chamber with a cartridge and snapped the loading gate shut with another curse. Most times, he kept the chamber under his hammer empty, but his gut told him not to worry about safety right now. As far as Lee Bodeen’s excuse, he didn’t believe him but dropped the subject.

  “He’s got only that peashooter now,” Bodeen said.

  “Unless he reloaded the shotgun,” Jess told him.

  Now, it was Bodeen’s turn to curse.

  Jess brought himself up, staring at the mostly empty stockyards.

  The pens went on for acres, loading chutes off to his left. Most likely, the watchman would have to climb over the high wooden fences or open some heavy gates. Jess didn’t know how many pens there were, but there had to be plenty. Once he got through this maze, beyond the stockyards lay mostly empty prairie. Thunder rolled again, but the sound came from the distance, and Jess saw no flashes of lightning.

  “Well, Sheriff ?” Sarcasm laced Bodeen’s voice.

  The safe bet would be to wait until daylight. Send out a posse. Jess looked at the lanterns along the top walkway on the side of the pens near the loading chutes. They seemed to be spaced out about every four pens, and the light wouldn’t cover more than two pens away from the chutes. Several more pens would remain in complete darkness.

  If the watchman were smart, he would stay in the darkened pens. He knew this place. Had to. Anyway, since the Union Stockyards were practically brand-spanking new, having operated for only one season, the watchman would know the lay of this land a lot better than Lee Bodeen or even Jess Casey. On the other hand, staying in the light from the lanterns, or at least on the edge of the light, would make his traversing of these corrals a lot faster.

  Somewhere in the pens, a steer bawled.

  Jess pushed himself up, pointing with his gun barrel. “Let’s go,” he said. “When we get inside, stop.”

  In a crouch, he hurried to the gate, which the wind had slammed open. He came through, stepped to his left, and waited until he heard Bodeen go to the right. The night remained so dark, he could see nothing. They stood in the darkness closer to the chute side of the pens.

  It was a dangerous risk, but Jess found a lucifer and struck it with his thumb, cupping his hands to protect the blaze and waiting till the wind died down. As soon as it stopped, as if in answer to Jess’s silent prayer, he raised the burning match.

  “There,” he said, nodding. “You see that?”

  “The opening?” Bodeen asked.

  “Yeah.” Jess shook out the match, returning the pair of lawmen—lawmen being a loose term—into darkness.

  “You go through that. Slow. Careful.” He started to gesture toward his left, only to realize that would be a waste of effort since Bodeen couldn’t see him. “I’ll go to the walkway. You’re low. I’m high. You should be able to see me with those lanterns. So don’t shoot at me.”

  “That guy who cut loose with that double-barrel will be able to see you, too, Casey.”

  Jess nodded grimly. “Yeah. Don’t I know it.”

  “I think your way makes a beeline straight through the stockyards. Fellow we’re after might be nearer you, at the edge of the light. Might also be in those other pens, in the darkness. Watch yourself.”

  “You, too, Casey.”

  Jess grinned. “Watch your step, Bodeen,” he said. “They run cattle where you’ll be walking.”

  Bodeen snorted a laugh and was gone.

  Revolver in his hand, Jess moved along the wooden fence, past the empty pens, then came up the steps eight feet until he was under the first lantern. His eyes adjusted to the new light, and he stepped away, gun pointing at the empty pens. Two pens over he could see Bodeen, though only as a shadow, as the gunman crept along. Jess backed against the wooden rails at the edge of the walkway and moved carefully toward the next pen. In a moment he was out of the light, heading toward the next lantern, aware of the sound of his boots on the wooden planks. In darkness, a steer snorted and skedaddled from the sound of Jess.

  Jess almost shot the animal.

  He sucked in a breath, exhaled, told himself to settle down, and stepped closer to the light.

  At the third pen, he stood underneath a wooden structure and realized it led to more pens to his left. He peered through the slats, into darkness, and smelled the odor of old cow dung, mud, and his own rank stink from sweat and nerves.

  The watchman could have gone that way, Jess thought, sneaked back toward the street, waited for Jess and Bodeen to disappear inside the maze, then go for his mule and hurry out of Fort Worth.

  No. Quickly, he dismissed that idea. The watchman would have to climb up, out of the pens, and onto the walkway. He’d be in the light from the lanterns, easy to spot, easy to shoot. No, he’d stay in the dark, over toward Bodeen or beyond him.

  Jess walked, gun ready, seeing the figure that had to be Lee Bodeen again, a few yards ahead of him.

  He moved on, now with more intent, and when the next pen loaded with a few cows started bawling, Jess did not come close to shooting them, although he did look at the animals—just to make sure the watchman wasn’t doing that startling.

  Nice looking beeves, thought Jess, ever the cowboy. Probably bring thirty-five a head at market.

  He kept going, farther into the darkness again, deeper into the abyss, heading toward the next lantern and its warming, though possibly deadly, light.

  How much time had passed, he had no idea. He glanced skyward, but clouds blocked any stars. Jess kept moving, in and out of darkness, past more pens that now remained empty. The wind blew. Thunder rumbled. He saw nothing but Bodeen’s shadowy figure and the glowing light from distant lanterns.

  Something stopped him, and he crouched, bringing the hammer back on the Colt and looked back. He couldn’t place the sound. Maybe he had just imagined it, but he looked back a few pens, toward the blackness near the pathway Lee Bodeen had taken. A number of pens went beyond that path, and Jess had thought the night watchman might have gone that way, taking advantage of the dark.

  Holding his breath, he listened, not wanting to take his eyes and ears away from tha
t direction, not looking to see if Lee Bodeen had stopped, too.

  The noise sounded again, a soft thump from behind Lee Bodeen. Cattle? Possibly, but Jess didn’t think so. He couldn’t see anything but blackness in those cattle pens. Now, he heard nothing but the wind, but a few moments later, came the soft faint sound, maybe, of iron hitting wood.

  That’s when Jess knew, and he sprang up, and ran, back down the walkway above the shipping pens, toward the street, the offices, and Jess’s and Bodeen’s horses and the night watchman’s mule. It was a guess, actually, more of a hunch. The watchman was smarter than Jess had figured, had hidden in the darkness in those far pens and waited for Jess and Bodeen to pass. Now he was moving back to get his mule—or better yet one of the horses—and flee Fort Worth.

  Jess wasn’t sure if Bodeen would understand, follow, and didn’t want to shout. He heard nothing except his own footsteps and breath, but had to guess that the watchman would hear the noise, too, would understand that Jess had guessed what was afoot. Yet Jess wasn’t even sure if his hunch was right, until the gunshot sounded, the orange flash appeared over one of the pen walls, and the lantern above Jess exploded.

  His back burned, and he felt the heat, smelled the singeing of his Mackinaw, saw more flames flying past him. He ran a few more feet, and then realized that flaming coal oil had landed on his coat, ignited the wool, and he was merely feeding the flames. Instantly, he dived into the pen, just as another bullet whistled past him.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  Monday, 11:20 p.m.

  Landing on the hard, frozen ground, Jess Casey immediately fell to his back, rolled over and over and over, putting out the flames licking the woolen coat on his back. Cattle scurried about, and Jess realized that his luck had put him in one of the few pens that held beef. He came to his feet, moving toward the wall, leaping, hoping to find wood and not the sharp point of a longhorn’s horn.

  Next, he began climbing up out of this pen, over the top, and dropping down into the adjoining cattle pen. His gun remained in his hand. He smelled the stink of burning wool but not burning flesh.

  Behind him and to his left came the sound of footsteps in a hurry, but that would be Lee Bodeen. Jess moved across the pen to the next fence of wooden planks and climbed. Ahead of him came the sound of the night watchman as he raced toward the street to get out of this death trap, this dark dungeon of wood, dust, and frozen and fresh cattle droppings.

  He heard the gunshot, saw another flash of orange, and heard the bullet smack into the top plank several feet to Jess’s right. His finger squeezed the trigger, and the .44-40 bucked in his hand. Over on the street, the mule brayed. Jess came down into the next pen.

  This time, he slipped on ice but kept from falling and moved. Wood slammed, followed by footsteps, and he realized that the watchman had reached the end of this abyss and that he had to be hurrying for a horse. By then, Lee Bodeen had shot past Jess, which Jess had expected. The gunman had a straight shot down a path, not obstructed by high wooden fences that separated the holding pens.

  Jess had considered climbing over the pen wall and dropping into that walkway but didn’t want to risk it. Bodeen might mistake him for the watchman and kill him. Or the watchman might be waiting for Jess to do just that and kill him. He came up, dropped over, and realized he was in the outer yard. A gunshot roared—this time from a shotgun—and beyond the yards, Lee Bodeen answered with a shout and a shot. A horse screamed. Hoofs danced, and Jess found the opening and dived out, landing on his stomach.

  He sensed the presence of Lee Bodeen, crawling on hands and knees in the darkness toward the water trough. He heard the mule snort and bellow, and Jess came up, thumbing back the hammer on the Colt, moving. He fired, low, intentionally toward the mule and heard the bullet whine off a rock. Then the mule snapped its tether, the watchman cursed, and the mule’s hoofs clopped on the dusty street as it ran toward Main Street, away from the shooting.

  Which left the watchman afoot. One horse—Jess prayed it wasn’t his—lay on the ground, kicking, squealing, in its death throes. The other horse, Jess’s own mount, he could sense more than see, had pulled loose and hurried back toward Fort Worth proper.

  Now came other sounds. Dogs barking. People shouting. Lanterns began to be turned up, but none so close as to light up the stockyards. A shadow slipped one way and vanished.

  “In the alley!” Jess shouted toward Bodeen, and ran toward the watchman’s office. He slammed against the side of the wall, saw the door, and stepped inside. Striking a match, Jess found the lantern, lighted it, and came outside, lantern in his left hand, Colt in his right.

  He was careful not to look into the glowing light. Bodeen hurried past him and stepped toward the lean-to across from the office. The alley separated the two men.

  There was one thing Jess remembered about the layout of the Union Stockyards business buildings. The alley was a dead-end. Oh, there was a high wooden fence that butted between the office and a warehouse full of hay and feed, but that fence had to be ten or twelve feet high—too far for the watchman to climb, and the man hadn’t slipped past the lean-to. He had a picket building on his left and a brick warehouse on his right. Nowhere to go.

  “Give it up!” Jess yelled. “It’s finished! You’re trapped!”

  The pistol popped twice, one bullet whistling through the lean-to, the other slamming into the picket wall of the watchman’s office.

  Jess swung the lantern back behind him, then let it fly, seeing it arc upward—the watchman, unnerved, even took a futile potshot at it—and landing on a bale of hay where workers would sit during their dinner breaks to eat, smoke cigarettes, and wear out chewing tobacco.

  It burst into flames, lighting the alleyway, but also giving the watchman a clear shot at Jess and Bodeen when they showed their faces.

  If the watchman hadn’t reloaded, and Jess couldn’t figure how the panicked man would have had time, he had a couple of shots left in the revolver and one barrel full of buckshot in the scattergun. Jess nodded at Bodeen, and motioned with the Colt’s barrel low and then nodded again.

  Bodeen would go low. Jess would go high.

  Now!

  He moved, saw the watchman, the pistol tucked in his waistband, the shotgun held at his hips with both hands. The man had a clear shot, but the wicked flames of the burning haystack would distort his vision. He swung the barrel at Bodeen, then back at Jess, and three shots sounded almost as one.

  Jess felt the kick of the Colt in his right hand as he watched the watchman stagger backward against the high fence at the end of the alley. The shotgun had discharged, but a bullet had caught the man in his chest, and the buckshot fired toward the clouds overhead. Jess knew he had aimed low, not to kill, but more to discourage. Bodeen had no sensibilities.

  For the gunman shot again. And once more.

  “He’s finished!” Jess yelled, stopping the man-killer from putting another bullet into the watchman.

  Bodeen had cocked his revolver, but now came the metallic clicks as he lowered the hammer.

  Jess Casey did the same. Both men stood in the alley now, watching the night watchman slide down the fence, then topple over onto his side. He did not move. The flames licked savagely at the dry hay.

  * * *

  While Lee Bodeen put out the fire, walking back and forth to the water trough with a bucket, Jess walked down the alley toward the dead man, his greatcoat spread out like a blanket beneath him, head resting on the ground, mouth wide open, eyes locked in eternal surprise. He wore no hat. Likely, he had lost it somewhere in the stockyards.

  The empty shotgun, still smoking, was indeed a Parker Brothers ten-gauge, its thirty-two-inch Damascus barrels with two-and-seven-eighths-inch chambers. Jess picked up the gun, which had to weigh nigh ten pounds. The handgun in the waistband was a little .22-caliber Smith & Wesson, silver-plated with rosewood grips, probably one of those No. 1 second issues with a seven-shot cylinder.

  What caught most of Jess’s attention were t
he three bullet holes in the center of the dead man’s boiled shirt. There was little blood seeping through any of the holes. All three rounds must have struck the gent’s heart. Jess figured a Morgan dollar would have covered two of the holes. Two dollars would have covered them all.

  The light died, as water made the hay bale hiss, and Jess sighed and searched his pockets for a match, but he had used all of what he had. Boot steps sounded behind him, and then Lee Bodeen brought a match to life, lowering to his knees while holding out his left hand toward the dead man.

  The watchman did not see the flame that reflected in his dead eyes.

  “Little off in my shootin’,” Bodeen said. “Need to get in some more practice.” He laughed at his own sick joke.

  The match died as the killer shook it out, and Jess rose.

  “Horses are gone,” Bodeen said. “One I rented is dead. That’ll probably irritate that old sop who rented that nag to me.”

  Nag? That was as fine a horse as you’d find in any Fort Worth livery, Jess thought, but he kept those thoughts to himself.

  “Guess the major and Miss Caroline will have to pay that damned Mick off.” He began reloading his revolvers. “Mule taken off after your mount, I figure. I guess we got us a long walk back to town.”

  “We’ll get a horse,” Jess said as he walked back toward the smoldering hay bale and toward the street.

  Dogs barked and lanterns and torches began to shine in the darkness, coming eerily toward the Union Stockyards. Jess could make out Irish brogues and Mexican whispers as the workers cautiously approached the street and the shipping pens.

  “I’m the sheriff,” Jess called out to the lights. “Jess Casey. Everything’s all right here.” He repeated that in Spanish, and let out a heavy sigh.

  Everything’s all right here? That was a bald-faced lie.

  Thunder rolled, but only slightly closer now, and the wind picked up, chilling Jess and his burned Mackinaw to the bone.

  * * *

  The dead man’s name was Banan Bainbridge.