The Devil's Boneyard

by William W. Johnstone; J. A. Johnstone

  “Thank you kindly,” Jake replied. “Hope you come back to see us again.”

  “I’m sure I will, whenever I’m in town. How far did your brother have to go this mornin’ to help Billy Wells butcher hogs?”

  “Oh, it weren’t that far,” Jake said, “just on the other side of the river. Billy’s got a little farm less than half a mile past the bridge.”

  “Is that right?” Ben asked. “I swear, I’ve traveled that road several times before and I don’t remember seein’ a hog farm that close to the bridge.”

  “Well, you wouldn’t hardly notice it, I reckon, less you were lookin’ for it. You can’t see much of the farm from the road and there’s just a little sign beside the path to the house. It ain’t even got Billy’s name on it. It just says, ‘Pigs.’”

  “You know,” Ben said then, “that coffee tastes mighty good. I believe I’ll have another cup. I’m not in any hurry.”

  “How ’bout a slice of pie with it?” Jake suggested. “Betty made an apple pie this mornin’.”

  “Well, now, that really sounds good to me,” Ben replied. He decided to kill a little time, enough for Walt to go to the stable to saddle his horse. He had a strong feeling that Walt was in a hurry to go somewhere. And if his hunch was right, he wouldn’t worry about trying to trail him, because he already had directions to Walt’s possible destination.

  CHAPTER 18

  Billy Wells stopped as he was walking from the barn on his way to the house, a movement in the edge of the trees where the path cut through from the road having caught his eye. He paused there to watch a rider on a buckskin horse emerge from the pines that stood between his house and the road. “Walt Murphy,” he muttered unconsciously. After hearing Frances Wright’s account of the night when she had fled the church, he felt an immediate moment of panic. A visit from the sheriff was something he had dreaded and hoped would not occur. His initial instinct was to run to the house for his shotgun, but he feared it was too late for that. He was caught in the open, and if the sheriff saw him run, he might simply shoot him down. He had no choice other than to play innocent for the sake of his wife and kids. Knowing now the evil the sheriff was capable of, playing dumb might be his and his family’s only chance for survival. He turned to face him as he rode into the yard. “Well, afternoon, Sheriff Murphy,” he greeted him. “What brings you out this way?”

  “How do, Billy?” Walt responded. “I understand Frances Wright is stayin’ with you and your wife. I thought I should come out and tell her about a fire at that old church she was doin’ some cookin’ for, in case she was thinkin’ about goin’ back there.”

  “Oh?” Billy replied, trying to think of the best thing to say. “She’s in the house, Sheriff. I reckon I can tell her you’ve come to see her. I know she’ll be sorry to hear about the fire.”

  When Billy remained standing there, Walt said, “Why don’t you just do that?”

  “Right,” Billy replied. “I’ll just do that.” He turned and started for the house, only to stop again. “Can I get you a drink of water or somethin’? Make you some coffee?” As soon as he said it, he realized how awkward it was.

  “No thanks, I just et,” Walt answered. “I’ll just have a word with Frances.”

  With no other choice, Billy continued on toward the house, with Walt on the big buckskin plodding close behind him. Inside the house, Betty and her aunt were already aware of the sheriff’s arrival. Frightened, Frances backed into a corner of the kitchen, sank down on the floor and sat there hugging her knees. Seeing her aunt so terrified, Betty took another look out the window and said, “I’ll be damned . . .” and took Billy’s shotgun down from its pegs over the fireplace. “You just stay here till we see what he wants.” Then she took a post beside the kitchen door with the shotgun beside her, just inside the door, where it couldn’t be seen.

  Billy stopped at the foot of the kitchen steps and when Betty opened the door, he said, “Hon, Sheriff Murphy is here and he wants to talk to your aunt about that place she was cookin’ for. He said they had a fire in that old church and he thought he oughta let her know. I reckon she’ll be surprised to hear that.” He hoped his wife was catching the vague phrases he was using to tip her off.

  She understood what he was trying to tell her, so she responded. “Well, that was mighty nice of Sheriff Murphy to go to that trouble. Afternoon, Sheriff,” she called out to Walt then. “Aunt Frances has been down with the miseries for a couple of days, so she’s lyin’ in the bed. I’ll see if I can get her up. I know she’ll wanna hear about that fire.”

  “I don’t wanna cause her no trouble, if she’s ailin’,” Walt said. “I’ll just be a minute. I can come in, or she can just come to the door.”

  “I’ll get her to the door,” Betty said. “I think she can stand up that long.” She went at once to her aunt and quickly told her what to do. “You don’t have to worry. You just remember, you weren’t there that night. You just act surprised and don’t be afraid. I’ll have that shotgun right beside me, and the first sign I see of mischief, I’ll blast him outta the saddle. All right?” Frances nodded rapidly and let Betty help her to her feet. Then with Betty’s arm for support, she walked to the kitchen door to face the man who had murdered Dora and Paulene.

  “Afternoon, Frances,” Walt said, still sitting in the saddle. “I’m sorry you’re ailin’, but I figured I oughta let you know the church burnt down night before last.”

  He watched her carefully for her reaction, but she gave him the best performance she could manage. “Burnt down!” she exclaimed dramatically. “How did that happen? Did everybody get out all right?”

  He wasn’t sure, so he hesitated, still watching her closely. “No, I’m afraid I’ve got some bad news about that. Both Dora and Paulene didn’t get out in time, and we had to bury ’em right behind the barn.”

  “My Lord in Heaven,” Frances gasped. “What are Reuben and Riley gonna do now?”

  “I ain’t seen either one of ’em,” Walt replied. “They weren’t there. I reckon they decided to move on somewhere else.”

  “Maybe they figured it was gonna happen any day, so they left before it did,” Frances said. “Thank you for comin’ to tell me.”

  “I thought you deserved to know,” Walt said, suspicious again, thinking her statement about them thinking it was going to happen might imply that she knew the fire was deliberately set. He knew that he hadn’t said how the fire was started. He decided there was too great a possibility that she was lying and knew he had raided the church. He couldn’t take a chance on her spilling her guts about the raid and the murders, whether she was lyin’ or not. She knew too much. He could feel an itch in his trigger finger to pull his. 44 and silence her now, but there were too many witnesses, including two small children. He would have to kill every one of them and that might be too much to handle. It would be best to do it at long range, he figured. There was too much daylight left, so he decided he would leave now, then come back later and set up in the trees with his rifle after it began to get dark. She was bound to seek the outhouse before going to bed, and that was when he would silence her. It would be much easier to ride back up the road unseen after dark. “Well, that’s all I came to do,” he said. “I’ll get on back to town. I hope you get to feelin’ better.” He wheeled the buckskin. “Billy,” he acknowledged and rode back up the path toward the road.

  Kneeling on the ground with the barrel of his Winchester 73 protruding through the branches of a laurel bush, Ben relaxed his grip and let the front sight drop from its position on the middle of Walt’s back. He had held it there for the entire time the sheriff sat talking to Frances Wright, ready to squeeze the trigger at the first show of aggressive movement on the sheriff’s part. It appeared that Walt had bought Frances’s story, and from where Ben knelt, the poor woman appeared barely able to stand. He pulled his rifle back out of the bush and walked to the edge of the trees to watch Walt leave.

  Following the path back up to the road, Walt didn
’t hesitate. He turned toward Waco and headed straight back toward the bridge into Waco. He had been too far away to hear the conversation at the back door of the house. But whatever he told them didn’t appear to upset any of them. Ben didn’t know what had actually happened at the church that night. Most of what he had learned had come from Wayne Price. But he knew it was Walt’s idea, and Walt had led the attack. It was his theory that Walt wanted all parties connected to the stolen bank money eliminated, so he could keep it all. He felt strongly that Pete Russell was more than likely dead and probably by Walt’s hand. He needed to be able to prove it, and the only source that might give him a clue was the frail-looking little woman he had just witnessed Walt talking to. There was no doubt Walt had been concerned about the woman, enough so that he had taken a ride out there to find her.

  Ben climbed on his horse and made his way to the edge of the trees where he could see Walt riding down the road toward town. He waited until the sheriff was out of sight, then turned Cousin back on the path that led to the house. Billy was still standing at the foot of the steps at the kitchen door, talking to his wife and her aunt, when Betty alerted him of the arrival of another visitor. Billy turned to look toward the path, and when he saw it was a stranger, he muttered, “I hope to hell he’s lookin’ to buy a pig.”

  Looking over her husband’s head from the top step, Betty looked at the big man and commented, “He don’t look like he’s lookin’ for a pig.” She looked at Billy and asked, “Now what?” Frances stepped back inside the door.

  “Howdy,” Billy greeted Ben, somewhat guardedly.

  “Howdy,” Ben returned, looked at Betty and said, “Ma’am,” with a nod of his head. “I’d like to get a little information if I could. My name’s Ben Savage . . .”

  “Ben Savage!” Frances gasped from inside the kitchen door before he could finish. “Oh, my Lord, my Lord!” Her reaction immediately alarmed Billy and Betty.

  “Yes, ma’am, Ben Savage,” he replied. “I’m a Texas Ranger, and I just wanna talk to the lady inside the door. I’m tryin’ to get to the bottom of what happened to those two women at the church night before last. It’s my guess that she was in that church when they set it on fire. Am I right, ma’am?”

  Frances didn’t answer the question. She was interested more in one of her own. “Reuben Drum and Riley Best went to Buzzard’s Bluff to kill you! Did you kill them?”

  “No, ma’am, I haven’t seen any sign of Reuben Drum or Riley Best, and I wouldn’t recognize them if I had. Why were they gonna kill me?”

  “Because you killed Lester, Reuben’s son,” Frances said, no longer hiding behind the edge of the door.

  Ben looked at Billy and asked, “Mind if I step down?” When Billy invited him to, he stepped down out of the saddle. “I’ll admit I killed Lester Drum,” Ben replied. “I didn’t know his name at the time, but it wouldn’t have made any difference if I had. He gave me no choice. I don’t take kindly to any man who draws a weapon on me. The reason I’m here right now is to make sure you’re all right. I know that Walt Murphy led the raid on the church to kill Reuben Drum and everyone else there.” At this point, he was bluffing because he had no proof backing that statement up. “I know that the sheriff killed the other two women that night. What I don’t know is why he didn’t shoot you. You were in that building when he set it on fire. Why did he let you go?” He was gambling on her reaction to his remarks, and she responded pretty much as he had hoped she would.

  “He didn’t let me go!” Frances cried at once. “I had to hide behind the kitchen pantry while those men rode around and around the church like wild Indians. When the sheriff told Dora and Paulene to come on out the back door, I started to go, too. But before I got out into the kitchen, he shot Paulene down on the back steps. And when Dora saw that, she turned around and ran back into the church, but he shot her down, too. I ran back to my bed to hide again.”

  There it was, a complete witness report of the murders. The only thing better would be if she had written it all down and signed it, he thought. “Wayne Price told me you weren’t in the church when they checked the ruins the next mornin’. How’d you get out?” Not withholding anything once she had begun, she told him about taking an opportunity to escape and hide in the overturned outhouse. “One last question,” he said. “Did anyone else see Walt shoot the two women?”

  “No,” she answered, eager to tell him. “They were all on the other side of the church when he stopped his horse by the back door. They were all shootin’ their pistols up in the air, so I reckon they didn’t notice his two shots.”

  That was good news to Ben to know that the citizens of Waco who had volunteered to ride as vigilantes were not a party to the murders. He was also glad to hear that Wayne Price was not a party to the executions, because he was of the opinion that Wayne was basically a good man. He had thought from the beginning that Wayne had no idea his boss was as crooked as any outlaw in Texas. “Well, I wanna thank you, ma’am, for answerin’ my questions, and I’m glad that you were able to get outta that fire alive. I expect you told the sheriff just now that you weren’t there at all that night. Right?”

  “I did,” Frances answered. “I guess he believed me. He didn’t shoot me.” She hesitated for a moment before saying, “You’d best watch out for yourself, ’cause Reuben went to Buzzard’s Bluff to kill you. Riley Best tried to talk him out of goin’ after you, but Reuben’s determined to take his vengeance on you. Riley ended up goin’ with him.”

  “Thanks for the warnin’,” Ben told her. “I’ll try to keep an eye out for him.” He stepped back up into the saddle then. “I intend to charge Walt Murphy with these crimes. If it comes to trial, I’ll call on you folks to testify.” Judging from the expressions on Billy and Betty’s faces, they weren’t too enthusiastic about that. But Frances was nodding her head vigorously, and she was really the only witness he needed. I hope to hell I can keep her alive to testify, he thought as he turned Cousin back up the path.

  Following the path through the screen of pines that hid the house from the road, he cleared the edge of the trees and came face-to-face with Walt Murphy. Startled, both men reined back hard to confront each other. Walt, maybe the more surprised of the two, spoke first. “Ben Savage, what are you doin’ here?” He had at first planned to come back after dark to finish the job and shoot Frances when she went to the outhouse. But before he got to the bridge over the Brazos, it occurred to him that, if the woman was ill, she probably wouldn’t come outside in the dark. She would use a chamber pot. Feeling stupid for not considering that to begin with, he turned around, thinking he would just have to wait for a shot at her while it was still daylight.

  “Maybe I should ask you the same thing,” Ben replied in answer to his question.

  “I’m on some official business of the sheriff’s office,” Walt said, “to make sure Frances Wright wasn’t in that fire at the church. I’m wonderin’ what business a saloon owner from Buzzard’s Bluff has up here.”

  “None that I can think of, but I ain’t here as a saloon owner,” Ben retorted. “I’m here in my official capacity as a Texas Ranger, and it looks like I’m gonna have to place you under arrest for the murders of two women. And before you start thinkin’ it’s just my word against yours, Frances Wright was in that building when you set it on fire and shot Dora and Paulene.” Walt realized then that he wasn’t bluffing. And before he thought to react, Ben was holding his six-gun on him. “Don’t try it, Walt. It would be a mistake,” Ben warned when the sheriff started to reach for his .44. “It’s best for you to make it easy on yourself, so I don’t have to put a hole in your chest. And that’s just what I’ll do, if you make one move I don’t like.” He motioned with the Colt and said, “Now, reach across with your left hand and pull that pistol outta the holster with nothin’ but your thumb and forefinger and drop it on the ground.

  Walt did not move to do as Ben instructed. Instead, he sat there, a sneer of defiance on his broad face. “You’re a little ou
tta your territory, ain’t you, Ben? I’m the law in these parts.”

  “Do like I told you,” Ben replied, “or I’ll take a corpse back to town.”

  Walt still remained motionless. “If I don’t, are you just gonna shoot me as I’m settin’ here?”

  “That’s exactly what I’m gonna do. When I bring a body in, they don’t ask me if you put up a fight or not, so you’ll just make my job easier, if you insist on suicide.”

  “Tell you what, Ben, ever since you rode into town that first day, I’ve been wonderin’ what kinda man you really are. There ain’t nobody out here in the woods but you and me. Why don’t you put that gun away and we’ll settle this thing like real men? Just you and me, man-to-man, and we’ll decide who deserves to die and who deserves to live. Whaddaya say, Ranger, have you got the guts to face me?”

  “All that would prove would be which one of us is the dumbest,” Ben answered. “Now, stop wastin’ time and get rid of that gun, like I told you.” He aimed his six-gun at Walt’s chest.

  “All right,” Walt said, “you’ve got the upper hand. Don’t get itchy fingered on me. You know, if you shoot me, or if you take me to jail, then over twenty thousand dollars of cash money ain’t never gonna be found. Right now, I’m the only one who knows where it is. Half of that money could buy you a lot of whiskey for that saloon of yours.”

  “I’m done talkin’,” Ben said, impatiently. “If you don’t throw that gun down, I’m gonna start shootin’ pieces offa you.”

  “All right, all right,” Walt blurted, “but you’re passin’ up a damn big payday. And all you have to do for it is go on back to Buzzard’s Bluff and leave us be.” Ben answered with the cocking of his weapon. “I’m doin’ it,” Walt exclaimed and reached across his body with his left hand as Ben had ordered. “Two fingers, see,” he said, holding the hand up high for Ben to see. Then, thinking to distract Ben with the left hand, he suddenly reached for his pistol with his right hand. Expecting it, Ben put a round in his right shoulder, causing him to drop the pistol on the ground. “Damn you!” Walt exclaimed painfully and clutched his shoulder while Ben slid off Cousin and hurried to take control of Walt’s reins.