Savage Territory

Chapter Thirteen

St. Louis

Matt didn’t really want to go to Phoenix, but he had made a promise to Lee to find his brother and give him the money, so, checking out of the hotel, he returned to the depot and bought a ticket.

“You will be aboard the Western Flyer, sir,” the ticket clerk said as he began stamping on the long folded train ticket. “The train will depart from track five at two o’clock this afternoon.”

“There isn’t one earlier?”

“I’m afraid not, sir.”

“All right, thanks,” Matt said, taking the ticket and putting it in his pocket. Looking up at the big clock on the wall, he saw that it was just after eleven, which meant that he had three hours to kill. He walked down to the newsstand and bought a copy of the St. Louis Democrat, then found a bench in a remote and quiet part of the waiting room. With another glance at the clock, he sat down to read. He found an article that made him chuckle.

Hokum Balloon Ascension

A balloon ascension that took part on the riverfront yesterday was deemed an absolute failure. The proprietor of the magnificent airship, Professor de la Smith of Paris, promised to take up not only a bridal party, but every reporter in the city. He ascended alone two hours before the time allotted, and the few people who saw him declared that he was so frightened that his teeth chattered. After ascending no more than one hundred feet at the end of a tether, he began calling for help. The balloon had to be pulled down by the rope, as he was incapable of even so small a thing as pulling the valve. Afterward, he admitted that he had never been up before, and that he had stolen the balloon from a proprietor in Ohio, doing so with the idea of making money by giving rides to those who were willing to pay for ascensions.

Glancing up once more at the clock, Matt saw that it was slightly after twelve, so he went into the dining room to have lunch. He had just ordered when he heard a loud and angry voice.

“You ignorant swine! This soup is cold!”

The complaint came from an irritated diner who was sitting with two others, a woman and another man, at the next table.

“Very good, sir, I shall take it back to the kitchen and have it warmed,” the waiter said.

“I don’t want it warmed, you ignorant dolt. I will require another bowl! I swear, the farther west one goes in this country, the more savage the people and the more incompetent the help.”

The man complaining was short, pudgy, and bald. He was sitting with a quiet, studious-looking man and a very pretty woman.

“Jay, please, can’t you just eat your soup without making such a fuss? There are a lot of people in here and you can see how busy the waiter is,” the young woman said. “I have tasted the soup. I find it quite warm enough.”

“Yes, I am quite sure it is warm enough for you, Cynthia, but you must understand that is only because you are willing to accept inferior as adequate and mediocrity as standard,” Jay replied. “I am not. I demand satisfactory service in all things and I say that being busy is no excuse for ineptitude. And just because you are content with less than acceptable conditions, that is no reason for me to be. You and Hendel are such mice that you would just let people run all over you.”

Cynthia did not reply, and she and Hendel ate their soup without complaint. Jay squirmed in his seat, waiting for the server to return with his soup.

Finally, the main course was brought, but there was still no soup.

“Oh, this is just unconscionable,” Jay said in anger. “Now the main course is here and I still have not had my soup.”

“I’m sorry, sir, I forgot,” the waiter said. “I will bring your soup now.”

“Well, no, you bungling oaf, there is absolutely no need to bring it now, for heaven’s sake. You have already served the main course, so what good would it do me now? However, I do want it clearly understood that I will expect an adjustment to my bill”—he held up a finger pointedly—“and you, my incompetent friend, may disabuse yourself of any expectation of a gratuity.”

Ignorning the obnoxious diner’s complaints as much as he could, though it was difficult as the man was at the very next table and found much to complain about, Matt ate his own meal. Afterward, Matt left the restaurant and walked around the depot, killing time until his train departed.

Matt saw a line of railroad cars sitting on a track at the far end of the car shed, and because he was just killing time until his train left, he walked over to look at them. The cars had been there for some time, as evidenced by the fact that there were cobwebs formed on the wheel trucks.

“No! Help! Help me, someone! Please help!”

The call for help came from the other side of the line of cars, and quickly, Matt stepped between the cars, then looked up and down the brick pathway. That was when he saw someone being set upon by two assailants.

“Give us all your money!” one of the two men said angrily.

“You two!” Matt called, starting toward them. “Get away from that man!”

Hearing Matt’s challenge, one of the two assailants turned away from the victim and started after Matt, holding a club over his head.

“Mister, you’re goin’ to learn better’n to butt into somethin’ that ain’t none of your business,” the club-wielding thug said. “Fact is, we’ll just take your money, too.”

The would-be assailant made a vicious swing with the club, but Matt ducked easily under the attack, then rising up again, caught the man with a hard blow to the chin. The attacker went down.

“What the hell!” the other thug yelled and, abandoning his attack on the victim, he came toward Matt holding a knife in his hand, low and turned sideways in the manner of someone who knew how to use a blade.

“Friend, this here is an Arkansas toothpick and I aim use it to gut you like a fish.”

Matt crouched down and managed to avoid the attacker’s first swipe at him. When the assailant made a second attempt, Matt stepped to one side, then kicked his adversary in the kneecap.

The assailant let out a loud yelp of pain, but he kept his feet and came after Matt with still another vicious swing. This time Matt stepped gracefully to one side, grabbing the knife-wielder’s arm as he did so. He twisted the arm violently, and heard the snap of a breaking bone, even over the sharp yell of pain.

By now, the first man had regained his feet, but seeing that they were now both disarmed, and that his partner had been injured, he gave up any idea of continuing the encounter. Turning away from Matt, he started running toward the front end of the long line of cars—away from the depot itself and out into the marshaling yard.

The second assailant, now holding his injured arm, glared at Matt for a moment longer. Then, realizing that he had been abandoned by the other assailant, he ran after his partner, limping badly on his injured knee.

Matt turned to the would-be victim.

“Are you injured?” he asked.

“No, I don’t think so,” the man replied. “No thanks to those ruffians.” He began brushing his clothes. “The name is Bixby, sir. Jay Peerless Bixby.”

It wasn’t until that moment that Matt realized this was the same obnoxious diner who had been sitting next to him in the railroad restaurant.

“I’m Matt Jensen.”

“Well, Mr. Jensen, you have my gratitude for coming to my rescue.”

“It was just lucky that I happened to be here at the right time,” Matt said. “I’m curious. What would bring you to this remote part of the car shed?”

“You called it, sir, I was curious,” Bixby said. “I grew weary of waiting for my train to depart, so I set upon an exploration of the depot. I wonder, though, if I could prevail upon you to accompany me back to my wife and employee. I do not want to take a chance on encountering anyone else such as these two hooligans. I would be more than happy to compensate you for your trouble.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t feel right in accepting money merely for doing what is the right thing to do,” Matt said. “I will be glad to walk back to the depot with you.”

“I shall be eternally grateful, sir,” Bixby said.

Returning to the waiting room, Bixby pointed out his wife.

“This is my wife, Cynthia,” he said. “Have you ever seen anyone any more beautiful?”

“Jay, please, you are embarrassing me,” the young woman said. “I do not consider myself beautiful, and I find it uncomfortable for you to carry on so.”

“Nonsense, my dear,” Bixby replied. “Of course you are beautiful. Why else would I have married someone like you, if not for your beauty? It certainly isn’t for your intelligence,” he added with a raucous laugh.

Matt saw a flicker of humiliation pass across Cynthia’s face as she glanced down in mortification.

“And this is my employee, Ken Hendel,” Bixby added. “I keep him on because of his business acumen and—also—because he is, at heart, too frightened to ever challenge me.”

As Cynthia had before him, Matt saw Hendel react to Bixby’s harsh words. The reaction, however, suggested that Hendel might not be quite as subservient as Bixby believed, and when Matt smiled knowingly at him, he was pleased to see Hendel return the smile. It was as if Hendel had just verified Matt’s observation.

“Tell me, Mr. Jensen, where are you bound?” Bixby asked.

“Phoenix.”

“Phoenix? Well, what a wonderful piece of luck. We, too, are bound for Phoenix,” Bixby said. “That means we shall be able to keep each other company during the journey.”

Phoenix, Arizona Territory

“I’ll give you one hundred dollars for all of it,” the jeweler said.

“One hundred dollars?” Meechum complained. “These here necklaces is worth a lot more than one hundred dollars. Why, there’s twenty of ’em here and I’ve seen just one of ’em bring twenty dollars in Denver.”

“You aren’t in Denver,” the jeweler said. “Of course, if you don’t like my offer, you can always take ’em to Denver to sell.”

“Take the money, Billy,” Philbin said. “It’s better’n nothin’, and right now nothin’ is what we have.”

“All right, all right,” Meechum said disgustedly. “We’ll take the one hundred dollars, but that ain’t right and you know it. It ain’t no way right.”

“If it isn’t right from you, consider the Indian you bought these from,” the jeweler said. “I don’t know what you paid for them, but I’d be willin’ to bet you didn’t pay no one hundred dollars.”

“Hah! You got that right!” Cantrell said.

Meechum glared at Cantrell for a moment, then said, “Give us our money so we can get on about our business.”

The jeweler counted out five twenty-dollar gold pieces. Meechum kept two for himself, than gave one each to the other three men.

“How come you get to keep two?” Oliver asked.

Meechum held the piece up. “This here is for all of us,” he said. “We’ll go over to the saloon, get us somethin’ to eat and somethin’ to drink, have some left over for some whores—and we’ll still have twenty dollars apiece in our pockets.”

“Yeah,” Philbin said with a big smile. “Yeah, that sounds good to me.”

The three men tied off their horses, then went into the Last Chance Saloon. The barkeep was at the other end of the bar talking to a couple of his patrons. He laughed loudly at something one of them said, then with the smile still on his face, moved down the bar toward Meechum, Philbin, Oliver, and Cantrell.

“What can I get you gents?”

“Whiskey,” Meechum said. “Leave the bottle.”

“What kind?”

“I don’t care what kind. We want to get drunk, not give a party.”

The bartender took a bottle from beneath the counter. There was no label on the bottle and the color was dingy and cloudy. He put four glasses alongside the bottle, then pulled the cork for them.

“That’ll be a buck-fifty,” he said.

Meechum slid the double-eagle gold piece toward him, then waited for the change.

Philbin poured four glasses, then passed them around. He took a swallow, then almost gagged. He spat it out and frowned at his glass.

“What the hell is this?” he asked. “This tastes like horse piss.”

Cantrell took a smaller swallow. He grimaced, but he got it down. Meechum and Oliver had no problem at all with the whiskey.

“It’s all in the way you drink it,” Meechum explained. “This here is sippin’ whiskey and it can’t be drunk down real fast. What you got to do is, you got to sort of sip it.” He demonstrated.

Philbin took another swallow, following Meechum’s advice to sip it, and this time he, too, managed to keep it down.

“Yeah,” he said, coughing to clear his throat. “Yeah, I guess it ain’t all that bad.”

They were on their second glass each, and the bottle was more than half empty, when another patron stepped into the saloon. He stood just inside the swinging batwing doors for a moment, taking everything in with one comprehensive sweep of his eyes.

“Whoa, get a load of that little dandy over there who just come in to the saloon,” Oliver said, chuckling. “Ain’t he somethin’ now? I bet that little feller wouldn’t dress out more’n seventy-five to eighty pounds. Ninety pounds at the most.”

“I’d be careful makin’ them comments about that little feller iffen I was you,” Meechum said.

“Why, what’s he going to do? Come over here and beat me up?” Oliver asked, laughing again.

“No,” Meechum said. “But he might put a hole between your eyes.”

“What do you mean, he might put a hole between my eyes? What are you talkin’ about?”

“We’re over here,” Meechum called out, and the little man at the door started toward them.

“What the hell you invitin’ him over here for?” Oliver asked, obviously irritated by the invitation.

“Men, I want you to meet Pogue Willis,” Meechum said when Willis joined them.

Oliver had just taken another swallow of his whiskey, and he spat it out in surprise.

“Willis?” he said. “This is Pogue Willis?”

The others laughed at Oliver.

“Damn, Abe, iffen you ain’t man enough to drink that whiskey, maybe you ought not to even try,” Cantrell said, and they all laughed again.

“What do you say we find us a table at the back so we can talk?” Willis said. “Get another glass and bring the bottle.”

Meechum grabbed the bottle and another glass, and they all went to a table at the back of the room.

“I told the boys you had a job for us,” Meechum said.

“Only he didn’t tell us what it was,” Oliver added.

“Does it matter?” Willis asked as he poured himself a glass of whiskey.

“It don’t matter as long as it pays off,” Oliver said. “I just don’t want no more bank jobs like the last one.”

“I told you I sent word callin’ that job off,” Meechum said. “It ain’t my fault if you got greedy and went before you was supposed to.”

“Yeah, well, that one is behind us,” Cantell said, “and there’s no use in palaverin’ over it now. What is this new job, and what do you want us to do?”

“The bank of—” Willis started, but Philbin interrupted him before he could continue.

“Whatever bank this is, I hope you checked out the safe so’s there’s nothin’ like happened before,” Philbin said.

Willis glared at Philbin with such intensity that Philbin had to look away.

“You boys goin’ to let me tell you what this job is about? Or are you goin’ to sit there and prattle on like a bunch of women?” Willis asked, his voice showing his irritation.

“I’m sorry,” Philbin said. “I was just makin’ a comment, is all, given what happened to us the last time we tried to hold up a bank.”

“I am not in the mood to listen to any comments any of you might be wanting to make,” Willis said.

The others were quiet.

“Like I was about to say, the Bank of Phoenix gets a transfer of funds from a bank in Colorado every Friday,” Willis said.

“What is a transfer of funds?” Oliver asked.

“It means the bank in Colorado is sendin’ a lot of money down to the bank here in Phoenix,” Meechum said. “By train,” he added.

“Son of a bitch, you’re talkin’ about robbin’ the train, aren’t you?” Oliver asked.

“No,” Willis said. “We’re goin’ to rob a stagecoach. That’s a lot easier than holdin’ up a train.”

“But I thought you said the money was comin’ by train from Colorado.”

“Yeah, I did. The only thing is, the train don’t run all the way to Phoenix. Closest it comes is Maricopa. Then they put it on a stagecoach.”

“How much money are we talkin’ about?” Cantrell asked.

“From what I hear, they don’t never transfer less that ten thousand dollars. Is that enough money to get you interested?” Willis asked.

Cantrell smiled broadly, then nodded. “Yeah,” he said. “Yeah, I think ten thousand dollars is enough money to get me interested.”

“How are we goin’ to pull this off?” Oliver asked.

“Don’t be worryin’ none about that,” Willis replied. “I’ve got it all figured out.”