Apache Rampage (2 page)

CHAPTER TWO

The town lay in the steep sided protection of a U-shaped draw, back from the main stage trail. Access to the town by wagon or stage-coach was only possible through the open end of the U, the sides being too steep-sloped even for a man to ride a horse down. From the main stage route the trail branched down and at the city limits became Church Street, main and only thoroughfare of the town. Along Church Street has most of the town’s business section; stores, the one saloon, the town court offices which also housed the Marshal’s office and jail, the Wells Fargo depot and the telegraph office. The Wells Fargo office was the sole reason for the town being here at all. It served as the main relay point for the stage-coaches.

There were few people on the street as the garish-looking medicine show wagon entered the town. Phyllis watched the few who were on the street, noting the disapproval on their faces. The men all seemed to be wearing sober black suits and low crowned black hats. The women were dressed in black frocks which hid any sign of womanhood. On every face was a look of miserable piety which would have warned off a more sensitive man than Thornett.

Looking around him, Thornett was supremely confident that the people would thaw out when they saw the show. It was all good, clean fun, but for all that he was pleased he’d remembered to warn Rosie to cut out her rather risque can-can for this one show. He knew his persuasive tongue well and was sure he could soothe the most disapproving crowd. For all that he was startled by the scowls which greeted his warm and friendly hat-raising.

‘Doc! Hey, Doc Thornett!’

The voice brought them to a halt outside the town court-house. At a barred window of the jail Thornett saw two familiar faces. One was a cheery, sun—or whisky—reddened face with twinkling brown eyes. The other was a thinner set of features, rather vacant and dreamy-looking. He recognised them both, and although it did not surprise him to see them framed by a set of bars, he was surprised to find them jailed in so small a town.

Always polite, Thornett raised his hat in a friendly greeting. ‘Good morning to you, Scully old friend. How are you today, and you, Willy?’

‘Howdy, Doc, Miz Phyllis,’ replied the simple-looking, tow-headed, younger face, beaming delightedly. ‘Ain’t seed you all in a coon’s age.’

Thornett was curious, though not unduly worried at seeing Scully and Willy in jail. They were a pair of confidence tricksters who made their living selling gold bricks, fortune telling and otherwise extracting money from the gullible. Scully was a brash, jovial, fast-talking man who always dressed well, and ran the team. Willy was a gangling, raw-boned young man who looked like a half-wit and talked with a slow southern drawl. His talk and appearance acted as a blind, for Willy was far from being the fool he looked. When needed he was far from slow, could swing a punch like a Missouri mule’s kick and fight like a tiger. His big, awkward-looking hands were capable of delicate manipulations with a deck of cards. Not only could he deal the second or bottom card with ease, but he was a master of the most difficult move in the cheater’s repertoire. He could remove a desired card from the centre of the deck without being detected. It was his general slow appearance which acted as a cover when his talents were being put to use.

‘How do you come to be incarcerated in this small and undeveloped town?’ Thornett asked, although he could guess.

Scully sounded more indignant than distressed at his plight. ‘Like this, Doc. I thought the rubes here would go for the Old John Conquer Root and was just starting to tell them how it cures all ills, makes child-birth easy and restored vitality to men, when the great seizer arrived. You know I abhor violence, especially when there’s a ten-gauge lined on me. So we came along quietly. We’re in jail for offending public morals and for vagrancy. What’s more, that sick marshal won’t take a bribe.’ From Scully’s tone this was the supreme indignity of all. ‘Imagine that, a hick town marshal who can’t be making more than thirty dollars a month clear, tossing me in the hoosegow and refusing to accept a bribe. Why, I’ve bribed such exponents of the badge as Wyatt Earp, Wild William Hickok and Jim Courtright in my time, always doing it in such a way as to give no offence. And this hick refuses to accept one. More, he says he’ll hold me for attempting to bribe an official if I try it again.’

‘Hard luck, Scully,’ said Phyllis, smiling now she knew the jailing was not on a serious charge.

Scully nodded his thanks to Phyllis. He’d known Thornett’s show for several years and early on made an attempt on Phyllis’s virtue. Her refusal and his failure made him respect her all the more. He gave a warning to his friends:

‘I wouldn’t show here, was I you, Doc. Not unless you and the girls want to join me here. And I warn you the food’s terrible. This town’s no good.’

‘Thanks for the warning, old friend,’ replied Thornett. ‘Do you have sufficiency of the wherewithal to purchase your release, to whit, by payment of your fine?’

‘Sure, we’ll get by, thanks,’ answered Scully. He knew Thornett would make the offer and was grateful, but he would never take money from a good friend when he did not need it. ‘You get out of here while you can.’

Thornett started the wagon forward again, seeing the ‘I told you so’ look on Phyllis’s face. He was not unduly worried by Scully’s warning, even though the conversation did not go unnoticed by the watching people. Scully was a confidence trickster. His entire way of business was different from Thornett’s. The medicine show gave folks a good entertainment for their money and made no attempt to cheat them.

There was no way the wagon could turn in the street. Even the stage-coaches were compelled to enter the plaza to make a turn. So Thornett drove on, sublimely unconscious of the angry looks and morose mutterings of the gathering people. He knew they were following the wagon and thought they were coming to see his show. Phyllis and the girls saw the crowd following and did not feel so happy about it. The girls stood at the rear of the wagon, looking through the window in the door. Molly turned and loaded both her rifles. She’d seen too many hostile crowds not to see the signs. There was no enthusiasm or interest in those miserable-looking faces, only cold dislike and disapproval.

Bringing his wagon into the plaza, Thornett beamed in delight. The place was almost made for his show. He brought the team around and halted them on the far side in front of the church. Jumping down, he expected the girls to come and help him get ready. Usually Phyllis and Molly lowered the stage while Patty fixed on the supports for it and the younger girls started to ready the equipment for the show. Not one of the women moved. Phyllis sat on the wagon box and watched the people who were now crossing the plaza, standing well clear of the wagon, to watch every move the show people made.

‘Janice, me dear,’ said Thornett, looking in some surprise at Phyllis and the girls. This was a team job, and they did not hang back from it at other times. ‘Get your guitar and entertain the good people whilst the rest of us make ready. We’ve an audience and nothing to show them.’

‘That’s no audience, Doc,’ warned Phyllis. ‘It looks more like a lynch mob to me. Let’s forget it and move on.’

‘Nonsense, me dove. True, they appear a touch soggy and dull, but I’ll toss ‘em a few fifties which will tickle’ their sense of humour better than a goose-feather. They’ll probably turn into quite a warm and appreciative audience before we get through with them.’

Phyllis doubted that. From the looks of the crowd, it would only be responsive when the marshal either took the show to jail or chased it out of town. She saw the faces of two women in particular among the others. One was thin, narrow and sharp, a mean face. The other was fat, bloatedly fat, yet it was not a happy-fat face. These two seemed even more vicious and hating than the others.

‘Look there, Mrs. Haslett,’ the fat woman said in a loud voice which carried to Phyllis. ‘That man’s got four women with him.’

‘Just goes to show what sort of folks they are, don’t it, Mrs. Millet,’ replied the thin one maliciously.

Phyllis’s face flushed red at the words. The insult did not annoy her for her own sake, but for the implied slur on the innocent Doc and her daughters. It was at that moment Phyllis decided the time had come when she must take the initiative and persuade Doc to marry her. That would put things on a basis where such remarks could not be made. Right now it was more important that they got out of town, and she opened her mouth to say so.

A man was coming along Church Street, stepping through the crowd on the plaza. The people made way for this man, allowed him through, then moved up behind him.

He was a big man, tall, wide-shouldered and hard-looking. His face showed some strength, it was a hard face and one without the saving grace of humour about it. On his head was a Union Army officer’s campaign hat. His clothes were of the same sober black. Unlike the majority of the men in the crowd, he wore a gunbelt. A fast man’s rig from the look of it. The holster was low-hanging, tied to his leg, the side cut away to allow the trigger-finger to find the guard of the revolver. It was the rig a good man with a gun would wear. The old range saying went, ‘A man who ties down his holster doesn’t talk much—not with his mouth.’

Phyllis watched the man. She did not need to see the marshal’s badge to know who he was. This was the great seizer, the man who shipped a dance-hall girl back to Tucson without letting her walk on the streets of the town. This was the man who threw Scully and Willy into jail on a charge of offending public morality. She knew who he reminded her of and did not like the comparison. There was a look about him which reminded her of Wyatt Earp. Yet this man was different from Earp in one respect. He would not take a bribe, whereas the rumour was strong that Earp not only would, but often did.

Thornett studied the crowd as they moved forward. They were far less enthusiastic than he’d expected, but he was prepared to win them over as he’d won over many another town from here to California and back the long way.

‘Greetings, good citizens of the fair town of Baptist’s Hollows,’ he began. ‘I am here today with a rare and exciting offer which may never come your way—’

‘You’ve got just fifteen minutes to get out of town.’

Thornett halted his speech as the words came from the town marshal. He frowned and threw the man a look which had quelled many a frontier bully. There was no apparent effect this time.

‘I beg your pardon, my good man. May I ask you to repeat that most extraordinary remark.’

‘I said you’d got fifteen minutes to get out of town. See you’re gone.’

‘Now see here, my man,’ boomed Doc, eyebrows fluffing angrily and face reddening in indignation. ‘I have come out of my way, at considerable expense, I would add, to include this town on my itinery. I would be obliged if you—’

‘You heard what I said,’ snapped the marshal, stopping Thornett’s tirade. ‘We don’t want your kind in this town.’

‘Kind sir, kind!’ Thornett replied, ignoring the muttered agreement with the marshal’s words. He could also see that Phyllis had been right all along but did not mean to give up without a fight. ‘You make it appear the West is full of purveyors of my Superior Elixir. I assure you that this is far from being so.’

‘Cut it out,’ the marshal’s voice dropped to an angry growl. ‘I’ve told you how long you’ve got here and—’

Doc knew his sole remaining hope was to talk the other man down and do it fast. ‘Do you suffer from aches and pains, my good public servant? Or are you a martyr to indigestion? If so, allow me to present to you, free, gratis and without any cost at all, one of my Superior Elixirs. This potion of mine, handed down from an Indian medicine man—’

‘Listen you,’ growled the marshal, in a tone which warned Thornett off. ‘One more word like that and I’ll jail you for attempting to bribe a peace officer.’

‘Run them right out of town, Major Ellwood,’ screeched the thin woman. ‘We don’t want that sort of rabble in our town.’

The marshal turned and shook his head. ‘I gave them fifteen minutes and they’ve got a little less than that now. They aren’t going to give their indecent show, but they might want to buy some supplies or something.’

The thin woman looked as if she were torn between two conflicting emotions. Her husband owned the local store, and it would most likely be he who profited from any trade the medicine show brought. She also wanted to see the show chased out of town. Putting on a simpering smile that was reserved for important people like the marshal and the minister, she said:

‘Well, I suppose we must show some charity. I just did not wish our young people to be corrupted by their kind.’

That was the sort of thing Phyllis expected from people like these. They would not allow the show to perform but were willing to take its money. Apparently, taking Thornett’s money would not endanger or corrupt anyone. She looked at Doctor Thornett who was now facing Ellwood, all puffed up like a bantycock.

‘Come on, Doc,’ she said. ‘Let’s get out of here.’

‘Major Ellwood’ll see you do,’ jeered the fat woman. Her eyes showed her hatred and envy at any other woman who was better favoured than herself. She hated Phyllis for looking younger, healthier and happier than herself.

‘Now wait a minute, Mrs. Millet,’ a thin, mournful-looking man put in. ‘Like the major says, they might want to buy supplies.’

Thornett ignored this. He fastened the knot he’d loosened ready to lower the stage. Then, with quiet dignity in every line of his frame, turned to run a final bluff on the marshal.

‘I suppose you are aware that the mayor of the town is a personal friend of mine, my good man?’ he asked. ‘And that he—’

For a bluff it missed by a good country mile. ‘I’m the mayor, and the town marshal,’ Ellwood answered. ‘You’d best get to moving, time’s running out on you.’

‘Don’t worry,’ snapped Phyllis, watching various people consulting their watches. ‘We’re going as soon as we turn the wagon.’

‘We need supplies, maw,’ Janice put in, coming forward.

‘Don’t we have enough to make Fort Owen?’ Phyllis asked, not wishing to allow the people of Baptist’s Hollow any profit from their show.