Bowdrie's Law (Ss) (1983)

by L'amour, Louis

  "Uh-huh. You see, I sent him to prison once. And his description was in the Rangers'

  Bible. Lots of descriptions there, Hadley."

  Their eyes clung. "You mean.., you got Jim Cane's description, too?"

  "Sure. I spotted him right off. Jim used to run stock across the Rio Grande. That was four, five years ago."

  "You knowed he was a horse thief and you haven't arrested him?"

  "That's right, Hadley. You see, we live on the edge of lawless times. Lots of men got their first stake branding unbranded cattle. It surely wasn't theirs, but nobody else could prove a claim to it either. Afterward some other boys came along later, so to even things up, they switched brands.

  "Now, maybe that's stealin', Hadley. By the book I guess it is. Nowadays it would surely be stealin', for there's no unclaimed stock runnin' around. It all belongs to somebody. It hasn't always been easy to decide who was a crook and who wasn't.

  "So you know what I do? I judge a man by his record. Suppose a man who's rustled a few head in the old days goes straight after that? The country is settlin' down now, so if a man settles down an' behaves himself, we sort of leave him alone. If we went by the letter of the law, I could jail half the old-time cattlemen in Texas, but the letter of the law isn't always justice. It was open range then, and two-thirds of the beef stock a man could find was maverick. If a man goes straight, we leave him alone."

  "What do you mean?" Hadley kept his voice low. "You call robbin' banks an' killin' goin' straight?"

  "Not a bit of it. If Cane had robbed a bank or killed anyone, I'd have arrested him.

  He had nothing to do with it."

  Their eyes met across the table and Bowdrie said, "That Rangers' Bible of ours, it carries a lot of descriptions, like I said. It has descriptions of all the crowd who used to run with Pierce.

  "There was one thing always puzzled Pierce, and that was how the Rangers always managed to outguess him. What he never knew was that we were always tipped off by one of his own outfit."

  Hadley pushed his chair back, both hands on the table's edge. "You've got this man spotted, Bowdrie?"

  "Sure. He had a record, just like Cane, but at first I held off. Maybe I was prejudiced because of his record. It might have been Cane or Kent Friede, so I waited."

  Chick Bowdrie lifted his coffee cup and looked over it at Sheriff Hadley. "You shouldn't have done it, Hadley. You had a nice job. People respected you."

  "With eight thousand dollars just waitin' to be picked up? And Jim Cane to lay it on?" His tone deepened and became ugly. "An' I'd have made it but for you."

  "You tipped the Rangers to that Pierce holdup, didn't you? We always wondered where the money got to. Now I know. The Rangers got him and you got the money, and now you've tried it again. You're under arrest, Hadley."

  .'i Hadley got to his feet, his hands hovering over his guns. "'You iiaake a move, Ranger, an' you die! You hear that?"

  "Sure." Bowdrie still held his cup. "I hear."

  Eli Hadley backed through the door and ran across the street as Bowdrie got up and tossed a silver dollar on the table. "For the kid's grub, too," he said. ,,H,e glanced at the boy. "It was Hadley you saw, wasn't it?" '" Uh-huh. You lettin' him get away?"

  "No, Tommy. I just didn't want any shooting in here. He won't get far, Tommy. You see, I planned it this way. There isn't a horse on the street, nor in the livery stable.

  Hadley won't go far this time."

  Outside, the street was empty, yet people knew what was happening and they woull be at the windows. Hadley was at his hiding place now, getting out the eight thousand dollars. Soon he would discover there was no horse in his stable, so he would rush to the street to get one.

  "Only he knew where the money was, Tommy. The bank has to have it back. He'll get it for us."

  Bowdrie walked outside and away from the front of the cafe. Iill Hadley emerged from an alley, a heavy sack in his hand, a pistol in the other. When he saw no horses tied at the hitching rails, he looked wildly about.

  "Hadley, you needn't look. There ain't a horse within a quarter of a mile."

  "You! You set me up!"

  "Of course I did. Just as you set up your partners, time after time.

  "I didn't have enough proof, Hadley. Only that there were no cigarette butts, just ashes and sometimes burned matches. You smoke a pipe, Hadley.

  "Also, Pierce's old partner was a knife-thrower, and the knife that killed Friede had to be thrown. At first I thought he'd been killed elsewhere, because nobody could have walked up behind Friede over that gravel.

  "We just had a few facts, Hadley, never a full description of you, so you could have gone straight and nobody the wiser. You tied it all up nicely, Hadley, you yourself."

  Hadley's gun came up and Bowdrie drew and fired before the gun came level. Flame stabbed from Bowdrie's pistol and the sheriff dropped the loot and tried to bring his gun into line. Something seemed to be fogging his vision, for when he fired again, he was several feet off the target.

  Blood covered his shir. He went to his knees. "A damn Ranger!" he said. Then he cursed obscenely. '.'It had to be a Ranger." "Our job, Hadley, but you got yours in front, not in the back." Hadley stared up at him; then his eyes glazed and the fingers on the pistol relaxed. Bowdrie bent down and took the gun from his fingers.

  People came out on the street. Some lingered, shading their eyes to see. Others came closer. Bowdrie indicated the sack. "There's your money, Cane."

  "Thanks. I moved the horses like you said." Then he asked, "How did you know?"

  Bowdrie thumbed shells into his gun. He told Cane what he had told Hadley, then added, "It was all of it together, along with those mule-ear straps on Hadley's boots. I saw the marks on the sand made by them when he sat talking in the outlaw camp. Some of those old-timey boots like Hadley wore had loose straps to pull on the boots.

  Nowadays they make them stiffer and they don't dangle.

  "I had an idea what might have made those marks, but when I saw Hadley, I knew. I had to be around town a mite to see if anybody else around was outfitted like him.

  Nobody was.

  "All along, he had you pegged for the goat. He even rode one of your horses out there to talk to the outlaws. Hadley said he didn't know I was in the country, but I happen to know headquar- ters told him I was ridin' this way. He was the only one who could have thrown that note tipping me to the raid."

  "You'd have thought he would have been sensible enough to go straight, with a good job, and all."

  "Yeah," Bowdrie said, smiling at Cane, "the smart ones do go straight."

  "You got time for something to eat? Mary Jane's frying up some eggs and she makes the best griddle cakes in Texas!"

  "Home cookin'! I always did have a weakness for home cookin'. Although," Bowdrie added, "I never see much of it."

  : In the days of westward travel the Pecos River was about one hundred feet wide and four feet deep at the Crossing's deepest. Such figures varied somewhat according to rainfall, of course, but rain was a rarity. There was nothing to indicate the presence of a river until one was close upon it. The riverbed lay eight to ten feet below the level of. the surrounding prairie, and no trees marked its course.' .

  The Crossing was namel for the skulls of horses that lay about, said to be the remains of horses stolen by the Comanches, who ran them hard in escaping from Mexico. The horses, arriving at the first water in miles, drank too much. Rip Ford, Texas Ranger, is the authority for this story.

  This was the crossing used by the Butterfield Stage. It was also used by a number of cattle drives, including that of Charlie Goodnight when he blazed the Goodnight-Loving Trail. Marcy was here in 1849, when exploring the westward route for the Army, and Bartlett, when he was surveying the U. S.-Mexican border.

  Off to the west is El Capitan, over eight thousand feet high, a peak of the Guadalupes that was a noted landmark for travelers.

  There were thirteen graves at Horsehead Crossing, most of them the result
of gun battles between cowboys over difficulties involved in making the crossing. Here, too, Boy, with his wife, several cowhands, and a large herd, was attacked by Comanches.

  Several men were wounded, and the cattle stolen. The group took refuge in the ruins of the abandoned stage station, where they held off the Indians for days until rescued by a gold-hunting party led by Colonel Dalrymple.

  It was hot country; it was dry country; it was a country that was hell on horses and men. Patience was limited, and tempers short. It was a wonder there were not more graves at the Horsehead Crossing.

  *

  SOUTH OF DEADWOOD

  The Cheyenne to Deadwood Stage was two hours late into Pole Creek Station, and George Gates, the driver, had tried to make up for lost time. Inside the coach the five passengers had been jounced up and down and side to side as the Concord thundered over the rough trail.

  The girl with the golden hair and gray eyes who was sitting beside the somber young man in the black flat-crowned hat and black frock coat had bee observing him surreptitiously all the way from Cheyenne.

  He had a dark, Indian-like face with a deep, dimplelike scar under his cheekbone, and despite his inscrutable manner he was singularly attractive. Yet he had not spoken a word since leaving Cheyenne.

  It was otherwise with the burly red-cheeked man with the walrus mustache. He had talked incessantly. His name, the girl had learned with no trouble at all, was Walter Luck.

  "Luck's my name," he stated, "and luck's what I got!"

  The other blond was Kitty Austin, who ran a place of entertainment in Deadwood. Kitty was an artificial blond, overdressed and good-natured but thoroughly realistic in her approach to life and men. The fifth passenger had also been reticent, but it finally developed that his name was James J. Bridges.

  "I want no trouble with you!" Luck bellowed. "I don't aim to cross no bridges!" And the coach rocked with his laughter.

  The golden-haired girl's name, it developed, was Clare Marsden, but she said nothing of her purpose in going to Deadwood until Luck asked.

  "You visitin' relatives, ma'am? Deadwood ain't no place for a girl alone."

  "No." Her chin lifted a little, as if in defiance. "I am going to see a man. His name is Curly Starr."

  If she had struck them one simultaneous slap across their mouths they could have been no more startled. They gaped, their astonishment too real to be concealed. Luck was the first to snap out of it.

  "Why, ma'am!" Luck protested. "Curly Starr's an outlaw! He's in jail now, just waitin' for the law from Texas to take him back! He's a killer, a horse thief, and a holdup man!"

  "I know it," Clare said stubbornly. "But I've got to see him! He's the only one who can help me!"

  She was suddenly aware that the dark young man beside her was looking at her for what she believed was the first time. He seemed about to speak when the stage rolled into the yard at Pole Creek Station and raced to a stop.

  Peering out, they saw Fred Schwartz's sign---CHOICEST WINE, LIQUOr. aND CICARs--as the man himself came out to greet the new arrivals.

  The young man in the black hat was beside her. He removed his hat gracefully and asked, "If I may make so bold? Would you sit with me at supper?"

  It was the first time he had spoken and his voice was low, agreeable, and went with his smile, which had genuine charm, but came suddenly and was gone.

  "Why, yes. I would like that."

  Over their coffee, with not much time left, he said, "You spoke of seem' Curly Starr, ma'am? Do you know him?"

  "No, I don't. Only . . ." She hesitated, and then as he waited, she added, "He knows my brother, and he could help if he would. My brother is in trouble and I don't believe he's guilty. I think Curly Starr does know who is."

  "I see. You think he might dear your brother?"

  There was little about Curly Starr he did not know. Starr, along with Doc Bentley, Ernie Joslin, Tobe Storey, and a kid called Bill Cross had held up the Cattleman's Bank in Mustang, killing two men in the process. Billy Marsden, son of the owner of the Bar M Ranch, had been arrested and charged with the killing. It was claimed he was Bill Cross.

  "I hope he will. I've come all the way from Texas just to talk to him."

  "They'll be takin' him back to Texas," the young man suggested. "Couldn't you have waited.

  "'I had to see him first! I've been told that awful gunfighting Ranger, Chick Bowdrie, is coming after him. He might kill Starr before he gets back to Texas."

  "Now I doubt that. I hear the Rangers never kill a man unless he's shootin' at them. Have you ever met this Bowdrie fellow?" "No, but I've heard about him, and that's enough."

  Gates thrust his head in the door. "Time to mount up, folks! Got to roll if we aim to make Deadwood on time."

  Clare Marsden hurried outside and Walter Luck stepped up beside her.

  "Seen you talkin' with that young feller in the black hat. Did he tell you his name?"

  "Why, no," she realized. "He did not mention it."

  "Seems odd," Luck said as he seated himself. "We all told our names but him."

  Kitty Austin drew a cigar from her bag and put it in her mouth. "Not strange a-tall!

  Lots of folks don't care to tell their names. It's their own business!" '

  E S, he glanced at Clare Msden. "Hope you don't mind the smoke, ma am. I sure miss a cigar if I don't have one after dinner. Some folks like to chaw, but I'm no hand for it, myself. That Calamity Jane, she chaws, but she's a rough woman. Drives an ox team an' cusses like she means it."

  Luck had a cigarette but he tossed it out of the window as the stage started.

  The young man in the black hat reached into his pocket and withdrew a long envelope, taking from it a letter, which he glanced at briefly as they passed the last lighted window. He had turned the envelope to extract the letter, but not so swiftly that it missed the trained eye of Gentleman Jim Bridges. It was addressed, Chick Bowdrie, Texas Rangers, El Paso, Texas.

  Bridges was a man who could draw three aces in succession and never turn a hair.

  He did not turn one now, although there was quick interest in his eyes. There was a glint in them as he glanced from Bowdrie to the girl and at last to Walter Luck.

  "If you plan to see Starr, you'd better get at it," Luck suggested. "Texas wants him back and I hear they're sendin' a man after him. They're sendin' that border gunfighter, Chick Bowdrie." "Never heard of him,"

  Bridges lied.

  "He's good, they say. With a gun, I mean. Of course, he ain't in a class with Doc Bentley or Ernie Joslin. That says nothin' of Allison or Hickok."

  "That's what you say." Kitty Austin took the cigar from her teeth. "Billy Brooks told me Bowdrie was pure-Dee poison. Luke Short said the same."

  "I ain't interested in such," Luck replied. "Minin' is my game. Or mine stock. I buy stock on occasion when the prospects are good. I don't know nothin' about Texas.

  Never been south of Wichita."

  Bowdrie leaned back and relaxed his muscles to the movement of the stage. Clare Marsden aroused his sympathy as well as his curiosity, yet he knew that Billy Marsden was as good as convicted, and conviction meant hanging. Yet if his sister was right and Starr knew something that might clear him, he would at least have a fighting chance.

  How much of a chance would depend on what Starr had to say, if anything. The court would not lightly accept the word of an outlaw trying to clear one of his own outfit.

  If he had even a spark of the courage it took to send his sister rolling over a thousand miles of rough roads, he might yet make something of himself.

  Chick had himself made a start down the wrong road before McNelly recruited him for the Rangers. It had been to avenge a friend that he had joined the Rangers. It led to the extinction of the Ballard gang and the beginning of his own reputation along the border. Yet since he had ridden into that lonely ranch in Texas, badly wounded and almost helpless, he had never drawn a gun except on the side of the law.

  It was easy enough for ev
en the best of young men to take the wrong turning when every man carried a gun and when an excess of high spirits could lead to trouble.

  Chick Bowdrie made a sudden resolution. If there was the faintest chance for Billy Marsden, he would lend a hand.

  E Dealing with Curly Starr would not be simple. Curly was a hard case. He had killed nine or ten men, had rustled a lot of stock, stood up a few stages, and robbed banks.

  Yet so far as Bowdrie was aware, there were no killings on Starr's record where the other man did not have an even break. According to the customs of the country that spoke well for the man. When the stage rolled to a stop before the IXL Hotel & Dining Room in Deadwood, a plan was shaping in Bowdrie's mind. He was the last one to descend from the stage and his eyes took in an unshaven man in miner's clothing who lounged against the wall of the IXL, a man who muttered something under his breath as Luck passed him. Stooping, Bowdrie picked up Clare's valise with his left hand and carried it into the hotel. She turned, smiling brightly. "'Thank you so much! You didn't tell me your name?" "Bowdrie, ma'am. I'm Chick Bowdrie." Her eyes were startled, and she went white to the lips. He stepped back, embarrassed. "If there's any way I can help, you've only to ask. I'll be stayin' in the hotel." He turned quickly away, leaving her staring after him. Bowdrie did not wait to see what she would do or say, nor did he check in at the hotel. He had sent word to Seth Bullock, and knew the sheriff would have made arrangements. He headed for the jail. Curly Starr was lounging on his cot when Bowdrie walked up to -the bars. Howdy, Starr. Comfortable?

  R Starr glanced up, then slowly swung his feet to the floor. "Bowdrie, is it? Looks lil they sent the king bee." Bowdrie shook his head. "No, that would be Gillette or Armstrong. One of the others. "Anyway, I've a lot of work to do when I get you back, Curly. There's Bentley, Joslin, Tobe Storey to round up." And then he added, "We've got the kid." Starr came to the bars. "Got any smokin'?" Bowdrie tossed him a tobacco sack and some papers. "Keep 'em," he said. "Curly," he said as Starr rolled his smoke, "the kid's going to get hung unless something turns up to help him." "Tough."