Leaving Epitaph: The Sons of Daniel Shaye

3

On the street in front of City Hall, Dan Shaye stopped and stood on the boardwalk. People walked past him and lowered their eyes, not wanting to meet his. He had thought for years that they were his friends, his wife’s friends, but the events of the past few days had proven him wrong. They were not his friends. He was the sheriff, and they were the town, and there would always be a barrier between them.

He stepped into the street and crossed over, headed for his office. He knew his days as sheriff of Epitaph were numbered. He needed the badge only to give him some semblance of authority while he hunted the gang, even though he was sure to end up out of his jurisdiction. After that, from wherever he ended up, he’d send it back to them.

He’d spent the better part of the day trying to replace his deputies or round up a posse, and had failed at both. Now there was only one course of action left to him.

When he reached his office, he opened the door and stepped inside. He found three men waiting for him, and they were all wearing deputy’s badges.

“Hello, boys,” he said to his three sons.

Earlier in the day the three boys had talked while at the house, which was situated at the south end of town. They had spent the past twelve years there, but now it felt oddly empty.

“What are we gonna do, Thomas?” James asked his older brother. “We can’t just let Pa go after those men without us.”

“He ain’t gonna get a posse up,” Matthew said. “And his deputies have already quit.”

Matthew had gone to town earlier in the day to get some idea of what was happening, and had returned with this news.

“There’s only one thing we can do, boys,” Thomas said. “We got to be Pa’s deputies.”

“He used to call us that, when I was little,” James said. “His little deputies, remember?”

“I remember,” Matthew said. “Ma used to tell him not to even think about it.”

“Well,” Thomas said, “he’s gonna have to think about it now, ’cause we’re all he’s got. And we got a right to avenge Ma’s death, just as much as he has.”

“Even me?” James asked hopefully.

“Even you, James,” Thomas said. “You’re a man growed, just like we are.”

“So what do we do, Thomas?” Matthew asked.

“We go to town,” Thomas said, “and we don’t give Pa a choice.”

“We stand up to him?” Matthew asked.

“That’s what we do.”

“We ain’t never done that before,” James said.

“Well, we’re gonna have to do it now,” Thomas said. “We got to be together on this. Matthew?”

The middle brother took a moment to think, then nodded and said, “Yes.”

“James?”

“Oh, yes,” the younger brother said without hesitation.

“Then let’s go to town, boys.”

The three boys had just pinned on the badges they’d found on top of and inside the desk when their father walked into the office.

“What have we here?” he asked.

“Deputies, Pa,” Thomas said.

“Three of us,” Matthew said.

“We heard what was happening in town,” James said. “You need us, Pa.”

“And we deserve to go along,” Thomas said. “She was our mother. We got a right to avenge her death.”

Dan Shaye studied his three sons. They all stood as tall as he, Matthew even taller and bigger. They all wore guns. He knew that Thomas could shoot. He knew that Matthew’s size and strength made him deadly in a fight. James was nineteen, though. He could not shoot like his older brother, nor could he fight like Matthew. But he had the same rights as the other two boys.

“Pa?” Thomas said.

“My three deputies,” Shaye said. “Your mother would kill me for pinning those badges on you.”

“You didn’t pin ’em on us,” Thomas pointed out.

“We pinned ’em on ourselves,” James added.

“Yeah,” Dan Shaye said, “yeah, you did.”

In truth, Shaye had already decided that his only course of action was to take his sons along, after first deputizing them. They had never gone against another man in a fight, never killed another man, but he had no choice. If he was going to catch up to the Langer gang and make them pay for what they had done to Mary Shaye, he couldn’t go alone.

“You boys have to do what I say, when I say.”

“We will, Pa,” Thomas said.

“Every step of the way,” Shaye added, “no questions asked.”

“We will,” Matthew said.

“James?”

“Yeah, Pa?”

“You’ll have to do the cooking.”

James smiled and said, “Right, Pa.”

Shaye stepped forward and spread his arms wide. The three boys stepped forward and all four embraced briefly, but powerfully.

“Let’s go and get outfitted, then,” Shaye said. “Like somebody just told me, it’s the least this town can do.”