Showdown at Dead End Canyon

Chapter 14

IT TOOK TWO DAYS OF RIDING FOR METZGER AND Dancer to reach the Hilliard ranch. Dancer wasn’t much of a talker, so after a few frustrated attempts to get a conversation started, Metzger gave up.

They had made a cold camp the night before, eating jerky and drinking water. Once, when Metzger suggested that they ought to build a fire and brew some coffee, Dancer glared at him, but said nothing in reply. They spread out their bedrolls just after sunset, and within minutes Dancer was asleep. Metzger did not sleep soundly.

In most of Metzger’s relationships he had been the dominant person, the one who, because of strength and size, intimidated the others. In fact, he was bigger and stronger than Dancer, and in any kind of street brawl could easily have beat him. But Metzger knew that any confrontation with the gunman would be permanent, so he held his belligerence in check. It wasn’t something he would admit to anyone, but the truth was, Dancer scared him.

During the late war, Roy Hilliard had been a prisoner of war in the Confederate prisoner of war camp at Andersonville, Georgia. He spent eighteen months in that hellhole, emerging from the ordeal at just a little over one hundred pounds. When he went back home to Pennsylvania, he found his old job gone and no prospects for anything new. So he and his wife Cindy left home and went west.

It was a gamble, and some of his family tried to talk him out of it. But, luckily, the gamble had paid off, and now Hilliard was the proud owner of a small but thriving ranch. Last year he had not only managed to support his family, but actually turned a profit, and now he was thinking about taking on a few hands to help him run the place.

Yesterday had been his son’s eighth birthday, and he and Mary had a little party for him. He was looking forward to the day Roy Jr. would be old enough to become a full partner in the operation of the ranch.

Hilliard pumped water into the basin, worked up lather from a bar of lye soap, then washed his hands and face. The cold well water was bracing, and he reached for a towel and began drying off, thinking about the pork chops Cindy had cooked for their supper. He had worked hard today, and the enticing aroma was already causing his stomach to growl.

Sometimes when he got hungry he would recall those days in the Andersonville prison, when starvation was a way of life, and the leading cause of death. He had been one of the lucky few who survived the ordeal. And he considered himself even luckier to have found a woman like Mary.

Hilliard had the towel over his face when he sensed a presence nearby. Dropping the towel, he was surprised to see two mounted men looking down at him. Where had they come from? He had neither seen nor heard them approach.

One of the men was big and unkempt, with a bushy red beard. The other man had a large, puffy, purple scar.

“Where the hell did you men come from?” he asked. They made him uneasy, and though just the appearance of the man with the scar was enough to unnerve anyone, it wasn’t what he looked like that bothered Hilliard. There was something about him and the other man appearing as suddenly as they had that left him with a troublesome and unsettled feeling in the pit of his stomach.

“Are you Roy Hilliard?” the man with the scar asked.

“Yeah, I’m Roy Hilliard.” He twisted the towel in his hand, wishing it were shotgun. “What can I do for you?”

“Hilliard, you’ve got twenty-four hours to get off this property.”

“What?” Hilliard gasped. “Now just why in the hell would I do that?”

“Your ranch has been confiscated by the United States government.”

“What are you talking about? I have clear title to this land. I don’t owe one cent.”

“Show him the paper, Metzger,” the man with the scar said.

The big, bushy-bearded man dismounted and took a paper over to show to Hilliard.

“Can you read?” the man with the scar asked.

“Yes.”

“Then read that.”

Hilliard took the document and began to read, growing angrier as he did.

United States Government

Department of the Interior

Federal Order to all concerned:

To wit:

In a vote of Congress, the Railroad Land Grant Act was passed 1862. Under this act, land will be given to qualified companies for the purposes of building a new railroad. The Sweetwater Railroad Company, having met that requirement, is therefore granted all land encompassed within the longitudinal boundaries 32 degrees 30 minutes east to 32 degrees 40 minutes west, and latitudinal boundaries 41 degrees 40 minutes south to 42 degrees 20 minutes north. Privately owned land currently situated within the aforementioned boundaries are hereby seized, set aside, and declared to be the property of the United States Government under the code of eminent domain.

All who reside within said boundaries are instructed, directed, and ordered to quit their habitation and vacate the area within 24 hours of said notification. All buildings, fences, wells, and other such stationary improvements will remain with the property. Livestock, rolling stock, and all such items as may be easily transported may be taken. Application for recompense must be submitted, in person, to the nearest U. S. land office within two weeks of vacating the property.

Signed: Addison Ford, Assistant to the Secretary of Interior, Columbus Delano

Hilliard finished reading the document and, without a word, handed it back to the man who had been called Metzger by the one with the scar.

“We will expect you to be off this property by noon tomorrow,” Dancer said.

“Mister, I’ve got five hundred head of cattle,” Hilliard said. “What am I supposed to do with them?”

“Like the order says, you can take your cattle with you.”

“Take them where? This is a small ranch. There’s only my wife, my boy, and me. And my boy’s only eight years old. How are the three of us going to move five hundred cows? And where would we take them?”

“That’s none of my concern,” Dancer said. “My only concern is to see that you are off this property by noon tomorrow.”

“And if I ain’t off tomorrow?” Hilliard challenged.

“Then you’ll have to dance with the demon,” Dancer said.

“Dance with the demon? What does that mean?” Hilliard asked. It wasn’t a term he had ever heard, but it had an ominous ring to it.

“You’ll find out what it means when the music starts,” Dancer said.

Hilliard sighed, then walked toward the house. His strides were measured and purposeful, and he didn’t turn around as he walked away.

“Hi, darlin’,” Cindy Hilliard said. “Dinner’s ready. Have a seat and I’ll bring you a plate.”

Hilliard didn’t say a word to his wife. Instead he got the double-barrel twelve-gauge shotgun down, broke it open, slid two shells into the chamber, then snapped it shut.

“Roy, what is it?” Cindy asked in a frightened tone of voice. “What are you doing? What’s wrong?”

“Stay inside,” Hilliard said as he started toward the door.

When he saw Hilliard go into the house with such purposeful strides, Dancer loosened the pistol in his holster and waited.

As Dancer knew he would, Hilliard came charging back out of the house, holding a shotgun.

“Get off my land you thieving son of a bitch!” Hilliard shouted, raising the shotgun.

The shotgun never reached his shoulder. Dancer’s pistol was out in a heartbeat, and he fired one time. The impact of his bullet knocked Hilliard back against the wall of his house. The shotgun discharged with a roar, but the gun was pointing straight up, so no one was hit, though a moment later the buckshot came rattling back down against the roof of the house.

“Roy!” a woman screamed. Running out of the house, she knelt beside her husband, who was already dead. “Roy!” she cried again. She looked up at Dancer, who was still holding the smoking gun in his hand.

“You killed him!”

Dancer stared at her but said nothing.

“Why?” she asked. “Why?”

“Your husband didn’t leave him no choice,” Metzger said. “He come charging out of the house with that scattergun.”

“What did you say to him? What set him off like that?”

“I’ll tell you what I told your man,” Dancer said. “The government’s taking over your land. Be out of here by noon tomorrow.”

“What? What are you talking about?”

“It’s all in that piece of paper, there in your man’s shirt pocket,” Dancer said.

Cindy was just reaching for the paper when Roy Jr. came running up from the barn, where he had been doing his chores.

“Papa!” the boy shouted. Seeing his father dead and his mother distraught over the body, Roy Jr. grabbed the shotgun and pointed it at Dancer.

“Roy Jr., no!” Cindy said, reaching for the gun.

Because he had not expected that reaction from a mere boy, Dancer was beaten to the draw. Roy pulled the triggers, but because his father had already discharged both barrels, nothing happened.

Cindy took the shotgun and tossed it to one side. “Go,” she said to Dancer and Metzger. “Please, just go away. Leave us alone.”

“You have twenty-four hours,” Dancer said, then looked over at Metzger and nodded. Then the two of them rode away.