Dakota Ambush

Chapter Twenty-two

Matt met the other residents of Ma Perkins’ Boarding House at breakfast the next morning. Mr. Proffer was the only other male resident. Miss Grimes was a schoolteacher, Mrs. Mouser and Mrs. Gibson were, like Lucy Perkins, widows, though they were much older.

Kenny had already heard the news of Matt shooting Butrum, and he kept looking at Matt across the breakfast table.

“Is it true?” Kenny asked. “Did you really do it?”

“Is what true?” Lucy asked. “Kenny, don’t be rude to our guests.”

“I’m not bein’ rude, Ma,” Kenny said. “I think it’s great, if it’s true.”

“If what is true?”

“When I went down to help Jimmy put out the feed in the livery stable this morning, he said that Mr. Jensen shot Butrum last night.”

“Kenny, what a thing to say!” Lucy said.

“It’s true, Ma. Jimmy seen it.”

“Jimmy saw it,” Miss Grimes corrected.

“He told you too?”

“I was correcting your grammar,” the schoolteacher said.

“To hear Jimmy tell it, it must have been somethin’ to see,” Kenny said. “According to Jimmy, Butrum come into, uh, I mean came into the saloon with his gun in his hand, blazing away. His first shot missed Mr. Jensen, but Mr. Jensen drew his gun and shot back and didn’t miss. Jimmy said he had never seen anyone draw his gun as fast as Mr. Jensen drew his.”

Throughout Kenny’s dissertation, Matt said not a word. Instead, he just picked up his cup of coffee and took a swallow.

“Very good coffee, Mrs. Perkins,” Matt said, aware that she and everyone else at the table were now staring at him. He put the coffee cup down.

“Is the boy telling the truth?” Proffer asked. “Did you kill Butrum last night?”

“Yes,” Matt said. “Mrs. Perkins, I’m sorry if this distresses you. I’ll move out as quickly as I can.”

“If you make him move out, I will move out as well,” Proffer said quickly.

“Nonsense,” Lucy said. “Neither of you need move out. If Mr. Butrum was shooting at you, of course you had no choice but to defend yourself. And though I never met Mr. Butrum, I did read about him in the newspaper. I know that he has killed at least three men within the last month. I am not normally given to such sentiments, but in his case, I would say good riddance.”

“Will there be a hearing?” Proffer asked.

“Yes, I am to present myself to the marshal’s office at ten this morning.”

“You may not know this, Mr. Jensen, but I am a retired lawyer,” Proffer said. “I would be glad to accompany you to the hearing, just to make certain that you are treated fairly. And I will do sopro bono.”

“Pro bono?” Kenny asked.

“It means he would do it for free,” Matt explained. He looked over at Proffer. “I would love to have you accompany me,” he said. “But I intend to pay for your services.”

There was no courtroom as such, so the hearing was held in the marshal’s office, presided over by James Cornett, the city magistrate. Because of the lack of room, the only ones allowed in were those whose testimony would have direct bearing on the outcome of the case. That included those saloon patrons who were eyewitnesses. Matt asked for, and received permission for, Julius Proffer, duly licensed and a member of the bar, to be present as his counselor. Cornett agreed.

The hearing took less than half an hour, and the magistrate ruled that the shooting was justifiable.

“I got no reason to hold you, Jensen,” Marshal Tipton said, “so I ain’t goin’ to.” He raised his finger to make a point. “But I am goin’ to be keepin’ an eye on you. You say you’re workin’ for the newspaper, but I’ve got the idea in my mind that you ain’t just a handyman. I figure if you’re workin’ for John Bryce, he has somethin’ else in mind. So I’m tellin’ you right now, don’t you be makin’ no trouble for Nigel Denbigh. I don’t need it, and this town can’t afford it.”.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Matt said.

When Matt returned to the newspaper office, John showed him a broadsheet.

“I’ve put out another extra,” John said. “What do think?”

“We have been doing a newspaper in this town for over two years,” Millie said. “In all that time, not one extra, but this is the second extra this month.”

“Do you think this story doesn’t deserve an extra?” John asked.

Millie smiled, then walked over to her husband and leaned up to kiss him on the cheek.

“I think it absolutely deserves an extra,” she said. “I was just making an observation.”

Matt took the broadsheet from John.

EXTRA EXTRA EXTRA EXTRA Deadly Encounter

SHOOTOUT AT NEW YORK SALOON

Butrum Killed

Olliver Butrum, a killer employed by Nigel Denbigh and, in the opinion of this editor, Satan’s surrogate, was himself killed yesterday when he attempted, yet again, to ply his deadly avocation. Witnesses stated that Butrum rushed into the New York Saloon with wild and flashing eyes, his mouth contorted with anger, and with a blazing pistol in his hand.

His target was Matt Jensen, a man who was standing at the bar enjoying a beer. What happened next sent Butrum to his Maker with what had to be the biggest surprise of his life. Confident in his own ability to dispense death by the adroit use of his pistol, Butrum encountered a man who was more than his equal. Matt Jensen, witnesses report, stood calmly as the bullets flew, drawing his own revolver in the blink of an eye and discharging it with deadly effect. Butrum went down with a .44-caliber ball lodged in his heart.

As Nigel Denbigh’s employee, Butrum’s only job was to intimidate and, if necessary, kill in the enforcement of Denbigh’s illegal collection of tolls on the Ellendale Road. Butrum was quite good at his job and, within the month instant, sent three innocent men to their graves.

Although the death of anyone should not be applauded, there are times when it is difficult not to be grateful for the demise of evil, even if that evil is incarnate in the form of a human being. Ollie Butrum was just such an incarnation and this is such a time.

Matt read the story, then handed the paper back to John. “Denbigh is not going to like the story much,” he said. He chuckled. “Which is why I like it.”

“Yes, well, it never hurts to tweak the beard of the giant when you can,” John replied.

“Denbigh ain’t got no beard.”

Both Matt and John turned toward the front door of the newspaper office, where they saw Jimmy Smith, the young man who worked both in the saloon and at the corral.

“I know he has no beard. It’s a metaphor,” John said.

“I know what a metaphor is. Miss Grimes taught us. It’s like calling someone a snake, when he ain’t really a snake,” Jimmy said.

“Very good, Jimmy, very good,” John said. “Now, what can I do for you?”

“I need to talk to Mr. Jensen,” Jimmy said. “Only, it has to be a secret.”

“Does it have to do with the arrangement we have?” Matt asked.

“Yes, sir.”

“It’s all right. You can talk in front of Mr. Bryce.”

“The fella you was askin’ about? The one sittin’ at the table last night?”

“Yes, what about him?”

“His name is Lucas Meacham,” Jimmy said.

“So that’s Lucas Meacham,” Matt said.

“You mean you know him?”

“I’ve heard of him,” Matt said. “I’ve heard nothing good about him, but I have heard of him. He is what they call a regulator, someone who hunts wanted men for the reward. He seems to have followed me here,” Matt said. “Though I have no idea why. There is no paper out on me.”

“Is this Meacham fellow going to be trouble?” John asked.

“Let’s just say that he might be the joker in the deck.”

Matt pulled a quarter from his pocket and handed it to Jimmy. “Thank you, Jimmy, that was good work.”

“Thank you, sir,” Jimmy replied, smiling happily as he pocketed the coin. “Oh, I know something else too,” he said.

“About Meacham?”

“No, sir, this ain’t nothin’ to do with what we was talkin’ about. This is about somethin’ else, some-thin’ Kenny Perkins told me.”

“What would that be?” Matt asked.

“Kenny’s ma is hopin’ you’ll go to the firemen’s ball come this Saturday.”

John laughed out loud.

“Are you?” Jimmy asked.

“We’ll just have to see, won’t we?” Matt replied.

“You didn’t tell Jimmy that, did you?” Lucy Perkins asked her son, her voice rising in exasperation.

Kenny had just returned home after delivering the extra edition of the Defender, and casually mentioned to his mother that he had told Jimmy Smith about her expressed interest in Matt Jensen attending the firemen’s ball, which would be held the coming Saturday night.

“Please don’t tell me that you told him that,” Lucy said.

“But Ma, you said that yourself. I heard you tellin’ Mrs. Bryce that you hoped Mr. Jensen would go to the firemen’s ball.”

“That was strictly between Millie and me,” Lucy said. “It was nobody else’s business, not your business, and certainly not Jimmy Smith’s business.”

“But Jimmy is my best friend,” Kenny said. “I tell him everything.”

“He may be your best friend, but he isn’t mine. You can tell him anything you want about yourself, but I don’t want you blabbing to him, or to anyone else, things about me.”

“I’m sorry, Ma,” Kenny said contritely.

Lucy sighed, then walked over, put her arms around her son, and pulled her to him.

“You are a good boy, Kenny,” she said. “I know it has been hard on you without your father. It’s been hard on me as well, but you have been such a big help to me. I don’t know if I could make it without you.”

“Are you going?” John asked. Jimmy had already left, and John and Matt were cleaning the press after the extra run.

Matt laughed. “You are as nosy as Jimmy.”

“Of course I’m nosy, I’m a newspaperman,” John said. “It is my profession to be nosy. What do you think of her?”

“You mean what do I think of Ma Perkins?” Matt accented the word “Ma,” and John laughed out loud.

“Yeah, Millie and I had a good laugh thinking about that. No doubt when you heard her name was Ma Perkins, you were expecting some fat old lady.”

“I will admit I was surprised when she answered the door,” Matt said. “You are right, she is not someone I would think of as ‘Ma.’ She is an uncommonly handsome woman.”

“She is a very good woman too,” John said. “A lot of women would not have had the gumption to stay if they lost their husband the way she lost Emil.”

“What happened?”

“Emil worked with dynamite. Evidently, there was a bad fuse or something, because the instant he held a match to it, the stick blew. That set off all the other sticks, and Emil was killed.”

“That’s a shame.”

“Yeah. But like I said, she has really been strong. Her strength is to be expected, though, since she comes from a good family. Her father owns a plantation in Mississippi, and was a brigadier general in the Confederate Army. Her husband, Emil, was a good man who met her when he came down to Mississippi after the war. He was a Yankee civil engineer, so her father didn’t approve, but she defied her father, married Emil for love, and came out here with him when he took a job with Peabody Mining Company.”

“Is she doing all right with the boardinghouse?”

“It’s not just the boardinghouse, you know,” John said. “She also owns the Coffee Cup Restaurant, and the Fullerton Ladies Emporium. That’s how she wound up as president of the Fullerton Business Association. And Kenny, the boy that works for me? He’s a regular entrepreneur. In addition to delivering papers for me, he mows lawns in the summer, shovels snow in the winter, cuts and delivers firewood, and helps Jimmy out at the livery stable. Yes, sir, that boy is going to be a wealthy man someday.”

In the New York Saloon, Lucas Meacham sat at his usual table in the back of the room, listening to the patrons who had witnessed the shooting yesterday regale those who hadn’t seen it, with the story, told and retold, until eventually it became so embellished as to bear little resemblance with the facts.

“‘No man relieves me of my pistol and lives! Die, you impudent dog!’ Butrum shouted as he pushed through the doors, a blazing gun in each hand, and a knife clinched in his teeth.”

Unexplained was how Butrum could have shouted such a challenge while clutching a knife in his teeth.

“‘You have met your match, Ollie Butrum. You will take your supper in hell!’ Matt Jensen replied as he drew both guns and returned fire, his bullets finding their mark.”

Meacham shook his head in disgust as he saw Matt Jensen being promoted to the status of hero right in front of him. At least the story, as reported in the Extra edition the Perkins kid had brought to the saloon earlier, more closely adhered to what actually happened.

Looking up from the story, he saw Logan, Caleb, and Ben coming into the saloon. The only reason he knew their names was because he heard them spoken last night. He’d also learned last night that these three men worked for Denbigh.

Seeing them gave him an idea, and getting up from his table, he walked up to the bar.

“Gentlemen, if you would join me at my table, I’ll pay for your drinks,” Meacham said.

“You’ll buy the drinks?” Logan said. “Hell, yeah, we’ll join you.”

Paul poured whiskey for the three men and Meacham paid for them. The four men returned to Meacham’s table.

“I don’t like to look a gift horse in the mouth, mister, but why did you buy us drinks?”

“You three men ride for Denbigh, don’t you?”

“Yeah,” Caleb said. “Only, he don’t like to be called that. He likes to be called Lord Denbigh.”

“Why do you ask?” Ben wanted to know.

“Have you been back out to the ranch since last night? What I’m asking is, have you told him about Butrum?”

The three looked at each other. Then Logan spoke for them. “No, we ain’t told him yet,” Logan said. “It ain’t nothin’ we’re lookin’ forward to doin’, so we was kind of hopin’ he’d find out about it on his own.”

“Suppose I tell him for you,” Meacham suggested.

“What? Why would you want to do that?”

“I have my reasons,” Meacham answered.

Logan smiled broadly and looked at the other two riders. Then he reached his hand across the table to shake with Meacham.

“Mister,” he said. “We’d be pleased to let you tell Lord Denbigh about Butrum gettin’ hisself killed last night.”

Meacham had not been specific with the three riders as to why he wanted to be the one to tell about Butrum. But he believed it was possible that Butrum getting killed may have just elevated his own position with Denbigh. It was time that he rode out to have another visit with the man.