Snake River Slaughter

Chapter Twenty-six

Back in Medbury, Clay Sherman stepped into Marshal Spark’s office. Sparks had parts of a kerosene lantern spread out on his desk and was busy trimming the wick. He looked up as Sherman came in.

“What can I do for you, Colonel?” he asked.

“No doubt Mrs. Wellington is going to come see you sometime today, reporting that some of her horses have been rustled.”

“Why do you think that?”

“Because I took five hundred horses from her during the night. It was the horses she had ready to sell to the army.”

“What the hell, Sherman?” Marshal Sparks replied angrily. “You steal five hundred horses, then you have the audacity to come to my office and tell me about it? What is this, a challenge?”

“Take it easy,” Sherman replied, holding out his hand. “I didn’t steal the horses. That’s what I came here to tell you.”

“What do you mean you didn’t steal them? Didn’t you just tell me that you took five hundred horses from Kitty Wellington in the middle of the night?”

“I did.”

“What is that, other than stealing?”

“Legal confiscation,” Sherman replied.

“What?”

Sherman pulled a piece of paper from his pocket and handed it to Marshal Sparks.

“Kitty Wellington was, and is, in violation of the herd management law. If you will read this, you will see that it is a violation to raise anything but cattle in this herd management district, unless you have specific authorization from the territory and county herd management council. Kitty Wellington has no such authorization. Therefore, I confiscated the horses on behalf of the territory of Idaho.”

“I’m sure Mrs. Wellington never even heard of that law,” Marshal Sparks said. “Nor have I heard of it.”

“It is obvious you haven’t heard of it, Marshal,” Sherman said. “If you had, you would have done your duty and prevented her from raising horses in cattle country.”

“I wouldn’t have arrested her,” Sparks said. “I would just have told her about the law so she could get a permit. I can’t imagine the county or the territory, for that matter, withholding the permit.”

“It’s too late for the permit,” Sherman said. “The law has been violated, the penalty must be paid.”

“Where are the horses now?” Marshal Sparks asked.

“That’s really none of your concern, Marshal,” Sherman said. “Let’s just say that the horses are somewhere safe.”

“Sherman…”

“Colonel Sherman,” Sherman said.

Marshal Sparks glared at Sherman for a moment. “Sherman,” he repeated. “I may not have known about the herd law, but I do know that before you can confiscate anything, you have to have a court order, and you have to serve it. I’m just guessing, mind you, but I don’t believe you served Kitty Wellington a court order. Not in the middle of the night, you didn’t.”

“Yes, well, here is the thing, Marshal,” Sherman said. “My authority differs from yours. Your jurisdiction is limited to Medbury. Mine, on the other hand, extends throughout the entire territory of Idaho. I can issue my own court order and warrants.”

“As city marshal of Medbury, I am also a deputy sheriff for the county of Owyhee, which means I have jurisdiction throughout the county,” Sparks said. “And I don’t believe, for one moment, that you have the authority to serve a court order in this county, much less issue such an order.”

“It doesn’t make any difference whether you believe it or not, Marshal. I have already exercised my authority and I came here to tell you about it, only as a matter of courtesy. If Kitty Wellington, or her hired gun, Matt Jensen, comes to report that their horses are stolen, you might tell them that. Oh, and tell Matt Jensen that if he tries to recover the horses, or opposes me, or any of my men, we will be within our legal right to kill him.”

Matt had learned his tracking skills from the legendry Smoke Jensen, and had learned so well that it was said of him that he could track a fish through water. However, it required no particular skill to track the herd of horses the rustlers had taken. Even a novice could have followed the wide band they left, not only tracks, but also their droppings.

But it was the latter, the horse droppings that provided additional, vital information. This information was something that only someone with Matt’s remarkable skills and specialized education would be able to ascertain. The droppings of the range horses were filled with the Kentucky Blue Grass that Kitty had imported for her pasture land. But here and there could be found droppings that contained only Fescue hay. The hay droppings stood out from the others as if they had little signs attached to them, and those horses, Matt knew, belonged to the rustlers.

It was difficult to ascertain just how many rustlers there were, though Matt was sure there were fourteen or fifteen of them, and maybe more. Then, when they crossed Mill Creek, many of the rustlers turned away, leaving only four that he could still account for. He was glad to see that none of the range horses had turned away, because if the herd had been split, it would make the recovery a lot more difficult.

As he continued to trail the rustlers and the herd, he could tell by a close observation of the droppings that he had nearly caught up with them. The droppings he was seeing now were less than half an hour old.

When he approached a long, low lying ridge, he dismounted before he reached the top. Then, with a word for Spirit to remain in place, he crawled to the top to look over to the other side. There, in a natural bowl, he saw the horses. The herd was contained on one side by Blue Creek, and on the other three sides by the natural walls of a dead end canyon. Four mounted men were keeping watch over the horses.

Matt returned to Spirit, mounted, then pulled his pistol. Slapping his legs against the side of his horse, he rode up the ridge, then down the other side, his cocked his pistol raised.

“Hold it right there!” he shouted at the four riders.

“What the hell?” one of the men shouted. “Who is it?”

“It’s Matt Jensen! Shoot ’im down!” another called. Matt recognized the one who identified him as being one of the four he had confronted in the Sand Spur.

The four riders pulled their pistols then and opened fire. Matt returned fire and one of the men dropped from his saddle and skidded across hard ground. All hell broke loose as muzzle flashes and drifting gun smoke filled the air, while the crashes of gun fire rolled back from the canyon walls.

Matt was in command of the situation as he rode down the hill, well positioned to pick out his targets. The rustlers, having been surprised by his sudden and unexpected appearance were mounted on horses that were rearing and caracoling about nervously as flying lead whistled through the air and whined off stone.

Matt picked out another rider and shot him from the saddle.

“Shoot him! Shoot the son of a bitch!” one of the two remaining outlaws shouted in panic.

Matt fired two more times, and the last two riders fell. Then it was quiet, with the final round of shooting but faint echoes returning distant hills. A little cloud of acrid bitter gun smoke assailed his nostrils as Matt dismounted, then walked out among the fallen rustlers, moving cautiously, his pistol at the ready. He need not have been cautious in his approach. None of the rustlers were left alive.

The entire battle had taken less than a minute.

George Gilmore was bent over some papers on his desk when Marshal Sparks stepped into his office. He looked up in surprise.

“Marshal, Sparks,” he said. “Is something wrong?”

“I don’t know,” Marshal Sparks said. “Maybe nothing. But something is going on that I don’t feel right about.”

“What is it?”

“Are you aware that the Clay Sherman and his so-called Auxiliary Peace Officers’ Posse are in town?”

“Who isn’t aware?” Gilmore replied. “That’s all anyone in town has been talking about ever since they arrived, wondering why they are here.”

“I think I know why. Have you ever heard of something called the herd management law?” Marshal Sparks asked.

Gilmore shook his head. “No, I can’t say that I have.”

“This is why they are here,” Sparks said, showing Gilmore the paper Sherman had given him. “According to Sherman, they are here to enforce the herd management law.”

Gilmore perused the document for a moment, then handed it back to the sheriff. “Enforce it in what way?” he asked.

“Last night Sherman and his men visited Kitty Wellington’s ranch and took five hundred head of her horses. Confiscated the horses is how Sherman put it. He confiscated the horses on behalf of the territory of Idaho, because, he claims, by running horses, she was in violation of the herd management law. Though why he confiscated exactly five hundred, rather than serving a notice that he was confiscating the entire herd, I don’t know.”

“I know,” Gilmore said.

“Then I wish you would tell me.”

“Five hundred head is the number of horses Mrs. Wellington is contracted to furnish the army. He took those horses to prevent her from fulfilling that contract.”

“Damn! You’re right,” Sparks said. “That is exactly why they took five hundred head.”

“Did Sherman have a court order to confiscate the horses?”

“I asked him that same question,” Sheriff Sparks replied. “He says that he doesn’t need a court order. He said he has the authority to issue his own court order.”

Gilmore shook his head. “He’s lying,” he said. “Not even a federal marshal could confiscate an entire herd of horses on his own initiative.”

“What about this herd management law? Would he be able to use it to get a court order that would allow him to confiscate Kitty Wellington’s horses?”

“Let me check something,” Gilmore said. He walked over to his book shelf and took down a book called Codes for the Territory of Idaho.

After looking through it for a moment, he shook his head. “There is no judge in the territory who would grant a court order to allow that. For all intent and purposes, this is absolutely meaningless.”

“What do you mean, meaningless?”

“I mean it would no effect on Mrs. Wellington. Listen to this. This is the next paragraph, paragraph twenty five, subparagraph three, stroke three.

“Any land owner, owning more than twenty percent of the land in said proposed herd district and who has a herd that is separated by more than two miles from a herd of dissimilar stock, who is a resident in, and qualified elector of, the territory of Idaho is not subject to the herd law, unless special petition is made and filed by land owners whose aggregate holdings total more than fifty percent of the land in said district. Such petition, if granted, shall be served upon the land owner by the county sheriff or his deputy.”

“I haven’t served any such notice,” Marshal Sparks said.

“Then if notice has not been served, and Sherman really did take the horses, he stole them,” Gilmore said. “That means you can arrest him and the entire posse.”

“Yeah, I guess I could, couldn’t I?” Marshal Sparks replied without enthusiasm. “Or, maybe I can just show him the error of his ways. Mr. Gilmore, would you copy that law out on a piece of paper for me so I can show it to Sherman.”

“I’ll be glad to do it for you, Marshal, but what will that accomplish?” Gilmore asked. “If Sherman knows about the part of the law that he showed you, the part he used as justification to steal Mrs. Wellington’s horses, then you can bet that he knows about this part of the law.”

“Yes,” Sparks said. “But at least this way, he will realize that I know about this part of the law as well.”

It was mid-afternoon by the time Matt and the other riders from Coventry on the Snake managed to retrieve the horses and put them back in the field where they were being held, pending the shipment to Chicago. As soon as all the horses were recovered, Tyrone detailed some of the men to repair the fence the Auxiliary Peace Officers had destroyed when they took the horses.

“I don’t understand,” Kitty said. “I thought Poke Terrell was behind all this. But he’s dead and the rustling continues.”

“Do you remember in the café yesterday, when I pointed out the head of the Auxiliary Peace Officers to you? I told you he was going to be trouble.”

“Yes, I remember.”

“The four men I killed were wearing the uniforms and badges of the Auxiliary Peace Officers.”

Kitty gasped. “Oh, Matt. Have I gotten you in trouble with the law?” She asked. “If I have, I will never be able to forgive myself.”

“If so, it won’t be the first time I’ve come close to the line,” Matt said. “But don’t worry about it. Whether they are wearing badges or not, I don’t believe, for a minute, that they are actually law officers. They may be some sort of posse with deputies’ badges, but they are not legitimate law officers.”

“Where are they now?” Kitty asked. “The men who stole the horses, I mean.”

“Tyrone sent Prew back out with a wagon to pick up the bodies. I’ll take them into town tonight.”

“What are you going to do with them?”

“I’ll figure something out,” Matt said.