The Big Showdown

Chapter Eleven

Mid-morning, with the sky clear and sunny, Caleb York was tugging his hat into place as he exited the sheriff’s office when Whit Murphy, foreman out at the Bar-O, came spur-jangling up the steps onto the jailhouse porch. Lanky, bowlegged, of medium build, Murphy was a good cattleman, but he and York had butted heads from time to time.

“Good,” Murphy said, his smile tight under the droopy, dark mustache. “Glad I caught you.”

“I was just heading down to the telegraph office,” York said with a gesture in that direction. “Why don’t you walk along, and tell me what’s on your mind?”

“If it’s all right with you, Sheriff,” Murphy said, “I’d druther talk right here, with no chance of nobody over-hearin’.”

“Okay,” York said. He pointed to two chairs on the porch and Murphy took one, and York took the other. The chairs were side by side, and Murphy sat on the edge of his, turning toward the sheriff.

“You and me,” Murphy said, “any past hostilities is in the past, right?”

“That’s where past hostilities go.” He gave the edgy man an easy grin. “When push come to shove, Whit, you backed me up. I don’t forget that kind of thing.”

“Good. Because I could use a friend right about now. Particularly a friend with a badge.”

“Why so?”

Murphy took off his Texas-style Stetson and wiped his brow with the back of a wrist. While it was warmer today than yesterday, York figured the sweat wasn’t much related to the temperature.

“Come to think of it,” Murphy said, shaking his head, “it really ain’t me that needs a friend. It’s Miss Cullen.”

Now York turned sideways in his chair. This wasn’t just a bug up Murphy’s backside — it was something real. Something serious.

“What’s happened?” York asked.

“Nothin’ yet — not quite. But we’re right on the edge of the cliff lookin’ down, and the horse don’t like it one bit.”

“Less poetry, Whit. More fact.”

The foreman sighed, the big hat still in his hands, his dark hair as stringy and wet as if he’d been caught in a cloudburst.

“Sheriff,” he said, “first thing this morning, that Zachary Gauge character shows up at the ranch house. Well, shows up ain’t right. He was expected. That’s damn near the worst part. It was a meetin’ that Mr. Cullen agreed to, or maybe even set up hisself.”

“What kind of meeting?”

“A real damn official one. Zachary wasn’t alone. He had that lawyer, Arlen Curtis, with him. They had a passel of papers with them, and Mr. Cullen had rounded up a bunch of such items hisself. Deeds and titles and agreements. Miss Cullen was there — wearin’ a dress! — and everybody was all smiles. Like it was a... a occasion.”

“You saw them heading inside for this sit-down?”

York assumed this was something Murphy witnessed, while at the house on ranch business, on his way out to the herd and his cowboys.

But Murphy said, “No, sir, Mr. Cullen asked me to be there.”

York frowned, not quite following. “Were you participating in some way, Whit?”

“Yes. Oh, nobody wanted my opinion. That would be the last thing they’d want. They just wanted me there as a witness. The lawyer needed somebody that wasn’t either Mr. Cullen or Miss Cullen to sign them papers, too. Somebody who can read and write, and I fit the bill. So I sat there with them at that big table in the dining room.”

“And did you sign your name as a witness?”

His sigh had some relief in it. “No, sir. Miss Cullen said she was surprised by the... ‘extend of the documents.’”

“Extent of the documents?”

“Yeah. Could be that’s what she said. I guess she meant she didn’t expect them to be a stack of papers thicker than Ben-Hur. She wanted to read them over on her own.”

York shifted on the hard chair. “Do you think she had misgivings? This is all a little fast, isn’t it?”

Murphy shook his head, sweat flying. “Well, it’s goddamn fast, since you ask, but the Cullens sure didn’t. All they wanted out of me was my John Henry here and there, only turned out I didn’t have to give it yet. Lord knows I don’t want to.”

York tried again. “But was Willa... wary about this partnership, or whatever it is, that Zachary Gauge wants her and her father to sign up for?”

He shrugged helplessly. “I don’t rightly know. She’s a smart gal and she don’t want to sign nothin’ that she ain’t read over good. That don’t make her suspicious.”

“Are you, Whit? Suspicious?”

“Where that Zachary Gauge is concerned? Damn right. That guy is a snake-oil salesman if ever I saw one. Ten to one he’s throwin’ dust. But I’ll give him this — he’s good at it. Slicker than a greased pig.”

“So when will they sign those papers?”

“Don’t know. Probably tomorrow.” Murphy sat forward so far, he practically fell onto the porch. “You got pull with Miss Cullen, York. You need to talk to her. She may listen to you. I tried. Didn’t get nowhere.”

York was shaking his head. “Whit, I’m afraid I don’t have much pull left with the young lady. But I’ll try. I will try.”

He extended his hand and Murphy shook it. “Thanks for the tip, Whit.”

“Don’t mention it, Sheriff. We both care about the girl. But I think she’s...” He swallowed thickly. “...think she’s under that city bastard’s spell.”

The foreman got to his feet, slung on his hat, and jangled off.

York walked down to the telegraph office, mulling what Murphy had said. What the foreman shared had only added to his own suspicions.

Inside the small office, which wasn’t much more than a counter, York filled out a form for a wire he’d intended to send even before Whit Murphy’s cautionary visit:

York handed the form to Ralph Parsons, the skinny, bespectacled operator behind the counter.

Skittish but friendly, Parsons said, “Thanks, Sheriff. You saved me a trip, stopping by — this just came in for you.”

The telegraph operator handed York a wire, which he read right there.

That meant the five outlaw brothers could be in Trinidad by this evening or early tomorrow.

York tucked the folded telegram in his breast pocket and gave the operator a two-bit tip. This pleasantly surprised Parsons, who rarely got a gratuity even when he delivered a wire, much less handed one across the counter.

But to Caleb York, the information in that particular wire was well worth paying for.

When he got back to the office, York found Tulley up and around, and making coffee. The sheriff had dispatched the erstwhile desert rat to patrol duty again last night, after which Tulley had settled in for forty winks or thereabouts on a cot in one of the cells. Sleeping in his clothes, recently store-bought though they were, gave the bearded, mussed-haired deputy a familiar disheveled look.

York got seated behind his desk and tossed the telegram casually on the desktop as Tulley delivered him a tin cup of coffee. The bandy-legged creature had learned one thing, at least, sleeping under a desert sky all those years — he made a damn decent cup of jamoka.

With company coming — even with York not knowing exactly when — cleaning and oiling his .44 seemed on the prudent side. He was seated doing that when Tulley stood across from him and demanded to know what was in the telegram. The reformed sot could not read, but he knew damn well that wires didn’t get sent “just for the merry hell of it.”

So York read it to him.

Going over the wire’s simple if disturbing contents in his mind, Tulley stumbled over to the scarred-up excuse for a table that was as close to a desk as he was likely ever to get, and plopped down. He sat brooding and sipping coffee.

Finally the deputy remarked, “Doesn’t say they’s headed here.”

“No it doesn’t.”

“But they’s the brothers of that bastard Vint Rhomer, y’know.”

“Right.”

“Vint Rhomer what you shot and kilt with that very .44.”

“Right again.”

“So it might be they’s comin’ to wreak revenge on ye.”

“Might be.”

“Doesn’t say as much in that there wire, do it?”

“Nope. But last night somebody tipped me off that the Rhomers are headed here to settle up for what I did to their brother. And rumor is they’re being paid to do that, to boot. Lucky break for them.”

“‘Lucky break...’” Tulley’s chair screeched on the plank flooring as he pushed it back and almost leapt the distance between table and desk, where York was using a bore brush on the .44 barrel.

The deputy rested his weathered, stubby hands on the desk and leaned in. “Them five red-haired sons of a bitches is comin’ to kill you, and you just sits there?”

“I’m not just sitting here,” York said with a shrug. “I’m cleaning my gun.”

Tulley went back and got his chair and dragged it over to sit across from the sheriff. “You need to tell somebody about this.”

“I just did.”

“Who?”

“You. You’re my deputy. Remember?”

Tulley’s face squeezed itself like a fist does a piece of paper about to be discarded. “No, no, I mean go to that citizens bunch what hired you, that mayor and them mucky-mucks. Tell them you need to put together a welcomin’ committee of townfolk. Armed to the teeth!”

York shook his head. He was rubbing oil on the weapon with a soft cloth. “It’s not their problem. It’s mine.”

Tulley’s eyes were wild and his flaring nostrils were more suited to a rearing horse. “You ain’t thinkin’ this through, Sheriff. I know you are good with that dang thing, but five guns to one? Them is terrible odds! And if they does manage to cut down the great Caleb York, what do you suppose they’ll do to this town after? It’ll be a hellfire hoorah worse than any payday cowboys ever visited on poor ole Trinidad.”

“If I’m not here,” York said, with a small shrug, “then you’re right — they’ll have to step up and defend the town themselves. Long as I’m taking in breath, it’s my job.”

Tulley was on his feet now. “And there’s where you’re dead wrong... or, anyway, wrong. Best leave ‘dead’ out of it. It’s our job, Sheriff. Said it yourself — I’m your deputy. You didn’t give me that scattergun just to keep vermin out of the cell block. Referrin’ of course to the crawlin’ kind with tails and not the human kind, though plenty of them crawls, too.”

York’s eyes went from the gun he was cleaning to the deputy. “You want to back me up when the Rhomers come to town.”

“I do. I aim to.”

“And you know what breed of men these are. How lightly they take killing.”

Tulley grunted deep. “I heard about ’em. And I seen Luke Rhomer kill two men over to Ellis, one of ’em the sheriff. The only reason they ain’t hung the lot of them Rhomers is they leave precious few witnesses, and them that survives is scared to testify.”

York was smiling faintly. “And you’re still with me in this?”

“It’s what ye pay me for.”

“It’s what the city’s paying you for, Tulley.”

Tulley threw his hands up. “City, then. Say I’m doin’ it for the city and it has nothin’ to do with helpin’ out your sorry backside.”

“Yes.”

“Yes?” Tulley frowned. Blinked some. “Yes, like in... yes?”

“Yes, Deputy. But you won’t be standing at my side like Doc Holliday if I wind up facing them down. It’s back to the livery stable for you, Tulley.”

The old boy’s face bunched again. “My old job?”

York shook his head, snapping the .44 cylinder back in place. “No. This job. When that rabble rides into town, they’ll come right past you there. I’ll tell you what to do when the time comes. But you’ll be in a position to see when they get here, and then come up behind them.”

“You want me to backshoot ’em?”

“I don’t care where you shoot ’em. If they’re in this town to kill the sheriff, they don’t get to cry foul.”

Tulley almost glowed. Then he said, “When you’re through with that oil and cloth and brush, could I borry ’em? I probably oughter give that scattergun some lovin’ care.”

“Sure, Tulley,” York said with a grin, knowing the man hadn’t even fired it yet.

Around three that afternoon, York entered the Victory, where a few cowboys leaned at the bar, each with a foot on the brass rail; one table of poker was going.

Rita, in dark blue satin finery similar to what he’d helped her out of last night, was standing toward the back by a table where three of her girls were sitting, waiting to be wanted. The boss lady was chatting with them and didn’t see the sheriff at first; then one of the girls noticed him approaching and nudged her to look.

She came over quickly. “If you’re here to talk to Pearl—”

“I am. She’s had time enough to cry her eyes out and dope herself. Take me up there.”

She huffed a sigh. “I wish you’d come up the back stairs.”

“Why? Don’t you want your patrons to know the sheriff is a regular? Might make them feel protected.”

Her dark eyes were hard. “I just want to protect Pearl.”

“Then I’ll post a deputy or stick her in a jail cell.”

Her frown was edged with anger. “No. Don’t be a fool, Sheriff.”

“I try not to be.”

She was keeping her voice down. “I just mean... if you make a fuss over her, somebody may think she knows something.”

“I think she knows something. Take me up there.”

Reluctantly, Rita led him up the stairs at the rear of the saloon and onto the landing where half-a-dozen doors waited. Pearl was in the room at the far end over at left.

Rita knocked lightly and said, “I’m coming in, Pearl. Caleb York’s with me.”

The dance-hall queen waited for several seconds, to give the soiled dove the chance to make herself presentable, and then went in, York right after, shutting the door behind him. He’d been in this room once before, with Rita’s sister Lola, a fact he saw no profit in sharing with the woman.

But it might have been any of the other rooms up here, except for the two-room suite where Rita herself camped out. The garish red-and-black San Francisco-style wallpaper made the small space seem even smaller; there was just room enough for a brass bed with a bedside table that was home to a hurricane lamp, which was casting a jaundiced glow, and a small dresser with a porcelain basin and pitcher. Also a chair for a cowboy to take his boots off and put them back on.

Under the sheet on the brass bed, like bundles of sticks, the skinny brunette in the white undergarment was a damn mess — her hair a tangle, her still-vaguely-pretty face, minus the paint, revealed as pockmarked and sunken-cheeked, with the big blue eyes the only real survivor among the nice features she’d started out with. A laudanum bottle was on the bedside table near the lamp.

He pulled the chair over and sat at her bedside, as if visiting a patient in a hospital, and this wasn’t that different, was it? Rita, unhappy, stood at the door, her back to it, her arms folded.

“They killed my man, Sheriff,” she said. The voice was as thin as she was. “Somebody should do somethin’ about that.”

“I’m going to,” York assured her. “But I need your help.”

“I’m too sick for that. Maybe tomorrow. He was so sweet to me. I knew he was special right off. I only let him pay me the first few times. We was gonna get married. Put all of this behind me.”

He wondered if what she planned to leave behind included her laudanum habit.

“Pearl,” he said, “I need to know if Herbert mentioned anything to you about his boss. Thomas Carter, the bank president.”

“I know who his boss is. I can’t tell you anything.”

“You can’t tell me anything because you don’t know anything? Or because you’re afraid to?”

“I can’t tell you anything.”

“If you’re afraid, I can protect you.”

Her smile was a crooked line drawn on her face by a child artist. “Herbert was a very sweet man. We was gonna move away from here. Now he’s gone. Now I’m just a girl at the Victory again.”

York sat forward. “Pearl, I think Mr. Carter may be responsible for Herbert’s death. But right now, it looks like Carter may get away with it.”

“He’s an important man in this town.”

“That’s right. But it doesn’t give him license to take a man’s life. To take your man’s life.”

“Iffen I told you something, my man would still be gone. I would still be a girl at the Victory.”

“If you know something, Pearl, you have to tell me. It’s the only way for you to...” What would work with her? “...get even.”

This smile showed teeth, yellowed but nicely formed. “Getting even don’t bring Herbert back. That’s gone from my life. Sheriff, I know you want to do right. But doin’ right don’t do no good. I’m sleepy now. Maybe we can talk later.”

“Pearl...”

Rita’s hand was on his shoulder. “That’s enough,” she said softly.

She was right.

York rose wearily, but when he got to the door, Pearl called to him.

“Sheriff — why are people afraid to die?”

He returned to her bedside, but didn’t sit. “Because we don’t know what’s on the other side of that door, Pearl. Not for sure we don’t.”

“Is it heaven?”

“Might be.” Of course Herbert Upton, if he were anywhere, would be in a warmer place. “You afraid to die, Pearl?”

“I am. I don’t know why, because bein’ a girl at the Victory, that’s no kind of life. But the way Herbert got shot, that hurt him, didn’t it? Bad. Did he take a very long time to die?”

“I’m afraid so, Pearl.”

“So I should help you make the person who did that die, too. Maybe die just as bad.”

“He’d hang. That’s plenty bad.”

The big blue eyes stared up at him; they were truly beautiful. “Maybe being dead ain’t what scares me. Maybe it’s the time it takes doing it. The dying?”

“Let me protect you, Pearl. Tell me what you know, agree to testify, and I’ll—”

But now the eyes had closed. She was not dead, just sleeping. Just riding the laudanum cloud like an angel.