The Fall of Abilene

by Johnny D. Boggs

  Hardin shrugged. “Hell, I don’t know.”

  Three-Fingered Dave scanned the horizon nervously. “You don’t reckon some other warrior come along and got it, do you, Wes? Plans to use it in revenge?”

  “And not take the body away?” Clements shook his head. “That ain’t very Injun-like.”

  Box Head pointed at the dead Indian’s waist. “He’s got a knife in the sheath there.”

  “It was still pretty dark,” Hatley said. “You sure you saw a bow and arrow?”

  “Sure as I’m living and he’s dead,” Hardin said. “I guess I tossed that bow in the river when I ran over to make sure he was dead. Yeah, that’s what happened.” He laughed. “Tell you, boys, I’m still not quite recovered from that feeling that came over me.”

  “And the quiver?” Sam asked.

  Hardin turned to my brother. Both men let the silence do all the talking for them, and I wasn’t sure if I could keep from vomiting right then, until Box Head laughed and patted Hardin’s left arm. “Hell’s fire, Wes, you probably threw the quiver in with the bow. Man, you were some spooked.”

  “I wasn’t spooked,” Hardin said. “It was just a feeling.”

  “Right, right.” Box Head squatted by the corpse. “Should you scalp him?”

  “Bury him,” Sam said.

  Another long silence filled the morning. “Yeah,” Hardin said at length. “That’s right. Sam, you and Counting Boy ride back to the chuck wagon. Have McDougal loan you a spade and an axe. Plant him deep, pack down the mound, and cover the grave with leaves. Maybe his red brothers won’t come along and find him.”

  “And if they do?” Sam asked.

  Hardin nodded north and south. “As many trail crews as there are coming and going, I don’t reckon even an Injun could figure out who put one of their own under.”

  What really happened on the banks of the South Canadian, we’ll never know. Nobody questioned Hardin’s account, of course, not on that drive.

  Hardin didn’t care who planted the corpse. Killing an Injun sure made a body hungry, he said, and by then Erastus McDougal had breakfast ready. Brit volunteered to take my place and help Sam plant the warrior. Warrior? No, that’s not the right word. He wasn’t a warrior. I don’t think he even had a weapon on him, other than the knife in its sheath.

  I didn’t eat that morning. Oh, I made myself drink a cup of coffee, but I never could get that dead boy’s face out of my mind for the rest of the drive. Now that I write this, it haunts me again. I had pushed it back to the depths of my mind. No, that’s not quite right. It’s just that other things I saw haunted me more.

  Some days after Hardin killed the boy, I found myself night-herding with Brit. When we passed on our opposite circles, we reined in, just to talk a spell to keep us awake. As we resumed our ride around the cattle, I summoned up the courage and called him back. In the moon and starlight, he watched me and waited.

  “You mind if I ask you a question?” I said.

  “You can ask.”

  I swallowed, almost lost my nerve, but drew in a deep breath, let it out, and said: “That morning. When Wes killed the Indian. Why didn’t you ride out with the rest of us to see the body?”

  He didn’t blink, or hesitate, and I guess he had been waiting for me—or somebody else—to ask that question.

  “Fought in the war, kid,” he said. “I’ve seen enough dead men to satisfy any curiosity.”

  “But you went with Sam to bury the body,” I persisted.

  He kicked his dun into a walk and, without looking back at me, said: “That’s one thing I became real good at during the war. Burying men. One more wasn’t going to bother me.”

  It seemed a contradiction. You don’t want to see a dead man, but you bury the body. That’s what I, still in my teens, thought. Some years later, Brit’s comments made sense. Riding out just to see what a dead man looks like is one thing. Burying him is altogether different.

  * * * * *

  Before we left the Nations, Hardin said he killed another Indian. This one, if we’re to believe John Wesley Hardin, was Osage, and he had demanded that we pay a ten-cent toll. According to what Hardin told us, he let the Osage know there was no way he would pay any Indian any money but that he would kill him. Which he did.

  I don’t know if any of this is true, of course, as Hardin didn’t invite anyone to see that corpse. In my mind, he would not have gotten any takers.

  He was not finished killing.

  I had a fine view of the next deaths.

  Chapter Eight

  When we came to Cowskin Creek, a man in a gray Hamburg hat, silk cravat, and linen duster rode out to our camp in a buggy driven by another fellow who wasn’t as well-dressed.

  Hamburg Hat climbed down, asked who was running this herd, and started passing out cigars. Even I got one, but Sam stole mine and shoved it in his vest pocket. The man gave Hardin the biggest cigar, and, once the stogies had been lit, he started talking about this new place called Park City that, Hamburg Hat boasted, would rival anything Abilene could offer in a year or two.

  “How about a railroad?” Clements asked.

  “In time, in time, in time,” the man assured him. “I’m not trying to steer you boys from Abilene this year. Steer? Get it? Ha! No. I’m no sharper. Not a chance. But when you’re coming up next year … well, we’d like you to consider bringing your beef to Park City.”

  “See us next year then,” Hardin said dismissively, turning to walk back to his yellow horse.

  “But if you’d like to see what Park City can offer Texans who have just made the arduous journey through the Nations …” Hamburg Hat persisted.

  Hardin turned, pulled the cigar from his mouth with his left hand, and kept his right on the butt of one of his old revolvers. “Like what?” he asked.

  The man grinned. “I own the Little Arkansas Saloon. Nickel pilsners, and twenty-cent shots of the finest bourbon, rye, and … especially for you Texans … tequila.”

  “Do I look Mex to you?” Hardin asked.

  Hamburg Hat didn’t appear to hear him. “The beer’s on the house tonight, gents. And the shots are only a dime. And all you have to do is drink your fill and just give Park City consideration for shipping your herds next year. Or just drop by on your way to the railhead. Consider Park City a … well … an oasis.”

  “Anything besides beer and liquor?” Clements asked.

  The man puffed on his cigar, making us wait. “We have one of the finest barbers west of Omaha. Two … that’s two … bathhouses. A hotel with an exceptional dining hall. You’ll find faro layouts and poker tables at the Kansas Prairie. A café if you’re not particular about what you eat. Buffalo is the specialty. And a livery to tend to your horses while you cut the dust, clean up, eat, gamble … whatever your heart desires.”

  My brother kicked a dirt clod toward the man’s fancy shoes. “That all?”

  The man tapped ash from his cigar. “Molly’s,” he said, “offers …” He cleared his throat in an exaggerated manner and winked at me. “Molly’s is a clean house with a lovely Oriental, a colored wench, and girls of all sizes and shapes … not to mention deviant … versions of … how should I put this? Horizontal refreshments?” He gave me a wink. “Or vertical. Or …” Now he laughed.

  I didn’t care for him at all. Treating me like a kid, whose sixteenth birthday had passed without even a mention during this drive.

  “You’ll find her palace on the lot behind mine. Wood frame. Imported all the way from Kansas City. Park City, gentlemen, is being built to last.”

  “Like what we’ll catch at Molly’s,” Hatley said.

  That got laughs from everyone but me, for I still fumed at Hamburg Hat with his sales pitch and foul-smelling cigars.

  “No.” Hamburg Hat started sweating some and loosened his tie. “That’s Abilene, boys. I said Molly runs a re
spectable house. Clean women. Makes the girls wash their sheets every other day.”

  * * * * *

  Half the boys rode into Park City after supper—Hardin, Clements, and even my big brother leading the charge. They promised they’d return to spell the rest of us before ten that night so that we could all give Park City a whirl.

  They rode back in, reeking of bad whiskey, smoke, and vomit, as we were filling our coffee cups after dawn.

  “I don’t reckon,” Erastus said from the chuck wagon, “that you’ll be interested in grub this morning.” Shaking heads confirmed his thinking. “Or that we’ll be staying an extra day so the rest of us can enjoy Park City’s finery.”

  Hardin managed to smile, but that effort must have sent spasms of pain throughout his head. “Erastus,” he said, “wouldn’t do you any good. There’s not a drop of whiskey to be found in Park City … now.”

  My brother started to laugh and fell off his gelding.

  * * * * *

  It could have ended like that, too, with a few laughs to be shared at later campfires. But the trail boss of the herd immediately behind ours rode in as we were lining up our herd to continue our drive to Abilene.

  “Buenos días.” He grimaced and rubbed his temples. I guess Hamburg Hat, or others of Park City’s finest, had made the rounds to other herds the previous day. He looked around. “¿Segundo? Uhhh … ¿Capitán?”

  “What do you want?” Hardin barely looked over the saddle he was cinching.

  “Mi nombre es José.”

  That was all I understood, because he went into rapid Spanish that none of our boys could decipher. Hardin sent me to fetch Carlos, who was in the remuda, rather than Brit, who was pointing our lead steers in the right direction.

  “He asks if you can move our cattle faster,” Carlos translated.

  Lead almost flew then.

  “What’s he mean by that?” Hardin stepped around his horse so that José could see the two pistols holstered in his vest.

  “He says we go too slow,” Carlos explained.

  “Tell him he can swing out and go around me,” Hardin said, and when Carlos hesitated, he put his hand on one of his revolvers. “Tell him.”

  Carlos told him. José was not wearing a gun belt. He muttered a few Spanish phrases under his breath, mounted his horse, and left.

  “What did the Mex say?” Box Head asked Carlos.

  Hardin grinned. “You don’t need an interpreter to figure that out.” He gathered the reins to his horse, stepped into the saddle, and, looking down on us, said: “Grass is greener up here. Trail’s widened some. Keep the herd moving slow. Real slow. Fatten up our beeves. That way they’ll bring a better price in Abilene.” He was watching the Mexican return to his herd all the while he gave us our day’s orders. Laughing, Hardin stepped into his saddle. “I’ll tell Brit to move our beef like they’re snails. See what that greaser thinks about that.”

  But José, it turned out, had his own brand of retaliation. Around noon, after we stopped for coffee and cold biscuits, Three-Fingered Dave galloped from the herd, screaming Hardin’s name.

  “That bean-eater!” Three-Fingered Dave reined up hard. “His beeves are heading straight for ours.”

  “The hell you say.”

  Three-Fingered Dave pointed.

  “What the hell are their point riders doing?” Hardin demanded.

  “That’s just it,” Three-Fingered Dave replied. “Ain’t nobody riding point. Or anywhere else, not that I can see, except maybe drag.”

  We ran to our horses and loped away from grub and coffee to find nigh a thousand longhorns plowing toward the dawdlers of our herd.

  “To the left,” Brit ordered. “To the left. Turn them left.”

  They weren’t coming hard or fast, more like drifting, and it was good that those steers felt as tired as ours. Easily enough, we got the Mexican beeves turned and milling, then wiped the sweat from our brows.

  If José had wanted to do serious damage, he could have stampeded his herd right into ours. Sure, that would have hurt him as much as it would’ve hurt us, but, after thinking on this on and off for decades, I’m sure that’s exactly what Hardin would have done had he thought the herd in front of us was purposely moving at a crawl.

  Of course, the way you could have looked at it, and maybe we should have, was that it was cowboy humor. A little revenge on both sides. Cowboys love to pull pranks, and, maybe, just maybe, had it been some white Texans behind us, we all would have laughed and shook hands. But these were Mexicans.

  Two hundred yards way off to our left, José and one of his drovers sat in their saddles, laughing.

  “Hey!” Hardin stood in his stirrups, cupped his hands over his mouth and screamed. “You’re nothing but a hijo de la puta. Both of you. ¿Comprende?” He sank back into the saddle and tugged out one of his revolvers. “I can speak that much greaser,” he said with a grin to no one in particular.

  But those two Mexicans had understood him, all right. The vaquero with José pulled a big Sharps rifle from the scabbard. José carried a revolver. And spurring their horses, they charged.

  Hardin filled his mouth with reins and galloped out to meet them.

  “Oh,” Clements whispered, “shit.” Then he swung onto his horse. “Mount up, boys!” he yelled. “Get back to our herd. Fast. Keep them from running. If either of the herds stampede, we’ll be looking for strays forever.”

  Clements himself didn’t ride toward our cattle, though. He galloped after Hardin but quickly reined up. Most of our riders returned to our herd, yet when Sam spurred toward Clements, I followed.

  “Get back, damn it,” Sam muttered.

  I didn’t listen, and before Sam could blow his top, a pistol popped. Who pulled the trigger first, Hardin or José, none of us could rightly say.

  We stared at this duel on horseback, two against one. The lean vaquero’s Sharps roared. How a man that thin could shoot a cannon at a full gallop, reins in his teeth, and not fall off his horse remains beyond my comprehension. He almost hit Hardin, too, because Hardin’s hat flew off immediately after the shot. The man dropped the heavy rifle onto the trail and, with his horse never breaking stride, drew a revolver from his pants.

  Hardin fired twice, but none of his bullets found a target.

  I gaped at the insanity unfurling before my eyes.

  “Get off your horse, Wes!” Clements yelled. “Damn it all to hell, get off your horse! You can’t hit a damned thing riding like that!”

  Hardin couldn’t have heard, but he leaped off the right side, using the horse he cherished as a barricade. Holding the reins in his left hand, Hardin ducked underneath Ol’ Roanie’s neck and shot again.

  “Son-of-a-bitching piece of shit.” We could make out Hardin’s curse.

  As fancy as Hardin’s rig was on his vest, his revolvers weren’t in prime condition. Cylinders on both cap-and-ball revolvers had been shot loose. He couldn’t get the Colt he held to fire, and Ol’ Roanie got up and reared as the Mexicans cut loose with aims no better than Hardin’s as they rode past.

  “Turn the horse loose!” Clements screamed. “Hold the cylinder, damn it! Use both hands or you’re dead!”

  Hardin moved to the other side of the roan, keeping the horse between himself and the two Mexicans. But by now other riders from that outfit were galloping toward the fracas.

  Seeing this, Clements turned and yelled: “Forget the damned cattle! They’re gonna kill Wes!” He spurred his claybank into a gallop.

  “Get back to the herd,” Sam told me before kicking his horse into a run. Wheeling my buckskin, I charged after him instead.

  By the time we reached the battleground, vaqueros surrounded Hardin. By a miracle, no one had been hit, and, by God’s grace, no one started shooting now. Clements kept yelling as he dismounted and ran toward the Mexicans, keeping his hands high o
ver his head.

  “Easy, boys,” he said. “Muy peace. Muy peace. They’re both drunk.” He nodded at José and Hardin. “Haven’t sobered up from last night. Easy, boys. Easy.” Nervously, Clements looked toward us as we reined up. “Fetch Brit or Carlos so we can talk peace!” he cried out, still holding his hands high.

  Neither Sam nor I made any attempt to leave either, for we heard a few of our boys loping toward us.

  “Dear God … Dear God … Dear God,” Clements started whispering, unable to finish a prayer.

  Hardin just glared. One Colt lay on the Kansas sod. The other, in his left hand, pointed at the ground. For now.

  Two Mexicans touched the butts of their holstered revolvers as Sam and I dismounted, but Sam immediately spread his hands wide, away from his revolver.

  “No mas,” my brother said, and exhausted his Spanish vocabulary. “No mas. Bienvenidos. Feliz Navidad.”

  He turned to me, whispering: “Show them you don’t have a gun.”

  I spread my arms away from my hips.

  “The hell were you thinking?” Sam kept his voice low. “Pa’s Spiller and Burr’s still in your saddlebags.”

  Box Head, Three-Fingered Dave, and Munroe reined up, and Clements spun around, but any relief he felt vanished. “Damn it. I need Brit. Or Carlos. Shit. Don’t do nothing, boys, nothing at all. But for God’s sake, one of you fetch Carlos or Brit.” He spun around, eyes wide, face ashen, and resumed his plea with the vaqueros.

  “They’re just drunk,” he began again. “Both of them are roostered. Don’t know what they’re doing. Don’t know what they’re saying.”

  The vaquero who had dropped the big Sharps muttered something in Spanish, then moved to English. “I heard what he said. To me.” He spit at Hardin’s boots.

  “You.” Clements sighed. “You speak English?”

  The vaquero grinned. “No sabe.”

  Biting off a curse, Clements pointed at Hardin and tried again. “He’s drunk. And your boss is drunk. Let’s not …” He ran out of words, so he concluded with a frustrated: “Shit.”

  My brother approached the vaquero who appeared to know English. “Listen,” Sam said, “once we’re in Abilene, we’ll have a good laugh over this. The tequila will be on us. Ain’t that right, Jim?”