Shot in the Back

by William W. Johnstone

“Billy? Boy, you’ve been gone for a whole year without one word, and you show up here in the middle of the night?”

  “I’m in trouble, Pa.”

  “What kind of trouble?”

  “I, uh, I held up a grocery store. And now the law is after me.”

  “A grocery store? You held up a grocery store?”

  “Damn, I should ’a known better than to come here. You always have been a . . . a goody two-shoes.” Billy turned toward the door.

  “How much did you get?” Jesse asked.

  Billy stopped.

  “You heard me. How much did you get?”

  “Thirty-six dollars.”

  “Thirty-six dollars,” Jesse scoffed. “Tell me, Billy, just how much did you expect to get? If you’re going to rob some place, seems to me like the least you could do would be to rob some place that has money. Why on earth would you hold up a grocery store?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t have any idea how much I would get. All I knew is that I needed money.”

  “Did you kill anybody, Billy? Did you kill somebody for thirty-six dollars?”

  “No, Pa, I swear. I didn’t kill nobody. I didn’t even hurt anybody.”

  “Why did you come here, tonight?”

  “I thought maybe, that is, I was hoping that maybe you could give me a little money, enough to get out of Oklahoma anyway.”

  Jesse walked over to the chest, pulled open the top drawer, and pulled out some money.

  “Here’s two hundred dollars,” he said.

  “Pa, you don’t need to give me that much, all I need is—”

  Jesse raised his hand to cut him off.

  “Go to Dallas, Texas,” he said. “Check in to the Cattleman’s Hotel and wait for me.”

  “Wait for you? What for? Pa, you don’t need to waste your time on me. Just give me the two hundred dollars, and I’ll be out of your hair.”

  Billy reached for the money, but Jesse pulled it just out of his reach.

  “Do you want the money, Billy?”

  “Well, yeah. I mean, yes, sir.”

  “Then do what I said. Go to Dallas, check in to the Cattleman’s Hotel, and wait for me.”

  “Wait for how long?”

  “It’ll take me a couple of weeks to get things turned over to Frank. Surely two hundred dollars is enough for you to get by for that long. You just wait on me.”

  “All right, Pa. I’ll wait.”

  “Do you still have Dancer?”

  “No, I, uh, well, I had to sell him.”

  “I figured as much. How did you get here?”

  “I paid a freight wagon driver ten dollars to bring me to Chandler, and I walked out here from town.”

  “Take a train to Dallas. Now, get on with you.”

  “I was thinking maybe I could stay here for the night, and—”

  “No,” Jesse said. “I don’t know yet how seriously anyone is looking for you. But I don’t want Frank and Ethel Marie to be involved.”

  “All right, Pa.”

  “You’ve got enough money to get a Pullman berth. You can rest on the train.”

  “I’m kind of hungry.”

  “We had ham and biscuits for supper. Leftovers are under a cloth on the kitchen table. Come with me; I’ll stand by while you make yourself a sandwich.”

  CHAPTER TEN

  “Frank, I’m going to be leaving here in a couple of days,” Jesse said over breakfast the next morning.

  “Leaving? Where are you goin’, Pa?”

  “I’m not sure. I just want to do some traveling around. The thing is, I’m signing the farm over to you, lock, stock, and barrel.”

  “You don’t have to do that, Pa. Heck, I’ll keep things going here. And I’ll bank your share when I get the crop in.”

  “You don’t understand, son. I’m not going to be here to get the crop out, and I’m not going to be here for the harvest, so I won’t have a share. It’s all yours,” Jesse said. He looked over and smiled at Ethel Marie, who was feeding the baby. “Besides, you’ll be needing more money, what with the baby and all. You can handle the farm by yourself, can’t you?”

  “Well, yes, sir, I’m sure I can.”

  “I’m sure you can as well.”

  “You’ll keep in touch with me, won’t you, Pa?”

  “I’m not very good at writing letters, Frank, I never have been. But, from time to time, I’ll write.”

  “That’s more than we can say for Billy. We haven’t heard a thing from him from the moment he left.”

  “Maybe I’ll try and find him,” Jesse said.

  “If you do, you’ll let me know if he’s all right, won’t you, Pa?”

  “I’ll let you know,” Jesse said.

  Eight days later, Jesse checked into the Cattleman’s Hotel in Dallas.

  “Frank Alexander,” the clerk said as he read the registration book. “That’s funny.”

  “Funny because you have another Alexander registered here?” Jesse asked.

  “Yes. How did you know?”

  “Because Billy Alexander is my son. What room is he in?”

  “He’s in room three twelve. If you would like, I can put you in three fourteen, which is next door to him.”

  “Yes, thank you.”

  Jesse did not go to room three twelve right away. Instead he went to his own room and changed clothes. No longer wearing the three-piece suit he had worn on the train, he was now wearing blue jeans, a denim shirt, and a belt with two holsters and two pistols. Stepping next door, he knocked lightly on the door.

  “Who is it?” a muffled voice called from the other side of the door.

  “It’s your pa, Billy. Open the door.”

  The door opened. “I waited here for you just like you—” Billy started, then seeing the way his father was dressed, he stopped in midsentence. “Pa, why are you dressed like that?”

  “I’ve come to take you to school,” Jesse said.

  “School? Pa, what are you talkin’ about? I don’t have enough education to go to college. I never got beyond the eighth grade, and at my age, I sure don’t plan on ever goin’ back. I’m damn near twenty-two years old.”

  “That’s not the kind of school I’m talking about. Get your gun and come with me.”

  “My gun?”

  “You haven’t hocked it, have you?”

  “No, I’ve still got it.”

  “Then strap it on and come with me.”

  “Come with you where?”

  “Out to McKamy Creek. I’m going to teach you to shoot.”

  Billy laughed. “Pa, come on, really? You are going to teach me to shoot?”

  “I was in the war, remember.”

  “Yeah, I know you’ve said that. But I wasn’t always too sure you were telling the truth. I mean, sure, you were probably in the war, but I always figured that maybe you took care of the horses, or something.”

  “Or something,” Jesse said. “Speaking of horses, I know you said you sold Dancer. Have you got another one?”

  “He’s in the hotel stable. Same as yours, I reckon.”

  “I don’t have a horse; I left everything with Frank. Let me take a look at your mount.”

  Billy led Jesse to the stable, where he examined the horse’s feet and legs. He also looked into the animal’s mouth.

  “No,” he said. “He won’t do.”

  “What’s wrong with Patch? He’s a good horse.”

  “You think he could do fifty miles in a single day?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I do know. He can’t.”

  “Well, why would he have to?”

  “You never can tell. The time might come when we’ll have to cover fifty, maybe even sixty, miles in one day. You need another horse.”

  “Pa, even with the money you gave me, I don’t have enough to buy another horse.”

  “I do,” Jesse said.

  An hour later the two men, having ridden out on the just purchased horses, were standing alongside McKamy Cree
k, a quickly flowing stream just north of Dallas. It was an ideal place to practice shooting, as it was over five miles from downtown.

  “Let me see you shoot,” Jesse said. “I want to know what I’ll be working with.”

  “What do you want me to shoot at?”

  “I’ll let you pick your own target,” Jesse said.

  “All right. Look over there. Do you see that can?” Billy asked, pointing to a rusty can on the other side of the stream. “I’ll shoot it.”

  Billy pulled his pistol, raised it to eye level, aimed, and shot. He hit the can and turned toward Jesse with a broad smile on his face. “What do you think about that?”

  “You took too long,” Jesse said.

  “What do you mean, I took too long? I aimed at it; I hit it. What more do you want?”

  “You don’t always have time to aim,” Jesse said. “Most of the time you just have to pull your gun and fire.”

  “What good does it do to pull your gun and fire if you can’t hit anything?”

  “Oh, I’ll hit something,” Jesse said.

  “All right, pick the target. Let me see you pull your gun, fire without aiming, and hit something,” Billy said with a challenging smile.

  There were a couple of dragonflies hovering about four feet over the edge of the opposite side of the creek.

  “See those snake doctors?” Jesse asked, pointing.

  Billy laughed. “Don’t tell me you are going to try and shoot one of those.”

  “I’m not going to shoot one of them,” Jesse said.

  “I wouldn’t think so. You couldn’t, even if you did aim.”

  “I’m going to shoot both of them,” Jesse said.

  “Wha—” Before Billy could get the word out, Jesse drew both pistols and fired. The two dragonflies disintegrated right before Billy’s eyes.

  “Damn!” Billy said. “How the hell did you do that?”

  “Point your finger at me,” Jesse said.

  “Why?” Billy replied, pointing his finger even as he asked the question.

  “How did you do that?” Jesse asked. “You didn’t raise your hand and aim your finger at me.”

  “No, I didn’t have to. I just knew where you were and where my finger was pointing.”

  “That’s how I shot the dragonflies.”

  Billy shook his head.

  “I’ll never be able to do that.”

  “Sure you will,” Jesse said.

  “Shoot snake doctors out of the air?”

  “Maybe not that. But before we go back to the hotel today, I’d be willing to bet that you can put more holes in that can, without aiming.”

  “I never thought I’d be able to do that,” Billy said that evening over supper in the hotel dining room.

  Once again, Jesse was wearing a suit.

  “You’re not very good at it yet,” Jesse said. “But I have no doubt that as I work with you, you will get better.”

  “You know what really surprises me is that you can do that. I mean, I’ve never known you as anything but a . . . pardon me for sayin’ it, Pa, but sort of a milksop kind of a guy. I mean, well, you remember the time on the train when that man tripped over you. It was his fault, but you apologized to him.”

  “It doesn’t hurt to be nice to someone,” Jesse said. “And it isn’t always good to let people know who you are.”

  “Ha! You say that, but as soon as Jim Corbett said who he was, that man sure turned and ran away, didn’t he?”

  “I reckon he did.”

  “Didn’t you feel embarrassed by that, Pa?”

  “No.”

  “Not even a little bit?”

  “No, not even a little bit. Did you feel embarrassed?”

  “Yeah, I did.”

  “Why?”

  “Why? Because you are my pa, and that man was having his way with you.”

  “He just thought he was. Being embarrassed about something is just a waste of time.”

  “I don’t know. I guess I just thought you should have done something.”

  “Billy, if I had gotten into a fistfight with that man, I would have been beaten up.”

  “There, you see what I mean? And you don’t think that would have been embarrassing?”

  “No, because I would not have gotten into a fistfight with him.”

  “What if Jim Corbett hadn’t been there? And what if I hadn’t been there? What if it had been just the two of you, and being nice to him wouldn’t stop him? What would you have done then?”

  “I would have killed him,” Jesse said calmly.

  “What?” Billy’s eyes narrowed as he stared across the table at his father, as if seeing him for the first time. “Pa, are you serious? You really would have killed him?” he asked in a quiet voice.

  “Yes.”

  “Have . . . have you ever killed anyone before?”

  Jesse picked up the menu. “Look, they’ve got black- and blueberry cobbler. I know it isn’t as good as the cobbler your ma used to make. But I bet it’ll be good enough. What do you say we have that for dessert?”

  Billy nodded, knowing that Jesse wasn’t going to answer his question.

  “You’re right, it won’t be as good as Ma’s. But let’s try it anyway.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Every day for two weeks, Jesse and Billy went out to McKamy Creek to practice shooting. Before long, Billy could shoot at a can, or a rock, or a tree, and hit it, even without taking specific aim at it.

  “What do you think, Pa?” Billy asked after they concluded one of their shooting exercises. “I’m getting pretty good, huh?”

  “Passable,” Jesse answered. “Let’s get back to town.”

  The two men mounted and started out, with Jesse in the lead. A short distance after they got under way, Jesse left the trail.

  “Pa, where you goin’? Town’s that way,” Billy called to him.

  “Just follow me, and do what I do,” Jesse said.

  Shortly after turning off the trail, Jesse broke into a gallop, and Billy had no choice but to match his pace. After about two minutes at a dead gallop, Jesse stopped, dismounted, and led the horse into some grass. There, after leading the horse for a few minutes, he remounted and made a big circle, not getting out of the grass for about a mile. Then, he turned back, crossed the trail and the tracks they had left earlier, and continued to ride for at least a mile before turning back to retrace the path they had taken at a gallop. Then, turning off the trail again, he started back toward Dallas, rejoining McKamy Road about three miles from the creek itself.

  “What was all that about?” Billy asked as he moved up to ride alongside Jesse. It was possible to ride alongside him on the road, though it hadn’t been possible to do so on the narrow trail.

  “Someone was following us,” Jesse said.

  Billy turned in his saddle. “I didn’t see anyone. Who was following us?”

  “It doesn’t matter whether you saw anyone or not,” Jesse said. “As far as you are concerned, from now until I tell you otherwise, someone is always following us.”

  “Oh,” Billy said. “Oh, yes, I see what you mean.”

  “Do you? Because it might save your life someday.”

  “Yeah, Pa. I see,” Billy said.

  “You need to know how to build a fire,” Jesse said a few days later.

  “Pa, I can build a fire.”

  “All right, make a fire, right now.”

  “I don’t have any matches.”

  “Have you ever eaten a rabbit raw?”

  “What? No! Why would I want to eat a raw rabbit?”

  “Well, if you don’t know how to build a fire without matches, the day may come when you have to eat a rabbit, or a squirrel, or a bird, raw. And I can tell you for a fact, raw game isn’t very tasty.”

  “You mean you’ve eaten raw rabbit?”

  “Yeah.”

  Billy laughed. “So you can’t build a fire, either, without matches, can you?”

  “Didn’t say that. I just
said that I ate raw rabbit. It wasn’t that I couldn’t build a fire, it was because at the time, it just wasn’t convenient to build a fire.”

  “Do you have matches now?” Billy asked.

  “No.”

  “Can you build a fire?”

  “Yeah, I can build a fire. What you need is a spark, something to catch the spark, wood, and air. Gather some dry grass and little pieces of dry sticks. Then a few larger pieces of wood so that once the fire starts, there will be something to burn.”

  It took but a minute to get everything gathered.

  “A match is the easiest way to start a fire, and when we start out on our adventure, we’ll always have matches with us. You can also use flint and steel. That works, but it isn’t really all that easy.”

  “You’ve built a fire with flint and steel?”

  “I’ve built a fire by rubbing a stick in a hole, dug out of a piece of wood,” Jesse said. “And that’s even harder to do.”

  “You said you don’t have any matches, so how are you going to build a fire?”

  “Next to having a match, this is the easiest way,” Jesse said. “And you’ll more than likely always have this way with you.”

  “What way is that?”

  “Just hold your horses and I’ll show you,” Jesse said.

  Jesse took a round from a cylinder chamber of one of his revolvers. Removing the bullet, he poured half of the gunpowder onto the little pile of tinder, then he tore a little piece of cloth from his handkerchief and stuffed it back into the cartridge. Replacing the cartridge in the chamber, he held the gun over the powder and tinder, and fired. The little piece of cloth came out burning. Jesse bent over quickly, shielded it from the wind, then started dropping sticks onto it until it was a pretty good blaze. He put on larger, and gradually larger sticks, until finally he added a substantial piece of firewood.

  “There,” he said with a smile. “We won’t have to eat our rabbit raw.”

  “What rabbit?”

  Jesse lay back and, lacing his hands behind his head, smiled up at Billy.

  “Why, the one you’re going to bring to cook,” he said with a broad smile.

  An hour later, having finished their meal, Jesse put out the fire.

  “Are we goin’ back to the hotel?” Billy asked.