Mojave (29 page)

Didn't answer her. Just leaned over and kissed her softly on the forehead, then I escorted her through the heat and smoke to the part of Calico that wasn't yet burned to the ground, but soon would be.

Well, that's pretty much all there is to my story, which is much truer, for the most part, than that pack of lies Colonel Drury proclaimed was his wildest but most truthful story ever penned.

After Calico got wiped out again—even them rammed-earth adobe buildings didn't stand up too good to that fire—the citizens got busy rebuilding. They do that in silver towns, especially when silver's selling for 96.59 cents per ounce fine.

Seems that Lucky Ben Wong's contracts with brides and grooms had likely been destroyed in the strange fire that consumed his home and his life, but most of the girls wound up wedding the men who'd they corresponded with. None of them become prostitutes, which must have made Betty, if not Calico's miners, thankful.

Far as I know, the mail-order brides and their grooms all is busy living happily ever after.

Even Jingfei. Now, her betrothed was one dead criminal, but a nice Chinese family taken her in, and me and Mr. Clark would pay them a visit, sip tea, chat about the weather and laundry and things of that nature. We never brung up Whip Watson or the fifteen bullet holes that ended his wicked life.

After word got out about all that had happened, a bunch of deputy U.S. marshals arrived with those prison wagons and plenty of iron manacles and John Doe arrest warrants, but Calico was cleaned out by the time they set up headquarters at the Hyena House. Only was a few wounded boys left to be arrested.

Dr. Franklin Kent, who had teamed up with Calico's doctors to help those injured in the fire, was questioned by one of them law dogs. “Aren't you Franklin Kent?” the lawman asked. “The mad killer from Bodie?”

The doc said, “No, old chap, my name is John Milton.”

And the deputy let him go. I seen the old doc ride out later that day, and the peckerwood was on my old horse, Lucky. Another deputy wound up with Yago, saying I didn't have no bill of sale or nothing. And the law calls me a criminal!

Ever the gentleman, I taken credit for sending Whip Watson to his eternal rest. Didn't want Jingfei to have to go through that ordeal, and I also figured that there might be a reward posted on Whip Watson. That's what I was doing that abysmal afternoon, sipping a hot beer in the sun—the saloons hadn't got rebuilt yet—with Mr. Clark and telling the editor of the
Calico Print
how I had gotten the best of Whip Watson in that legendary gunfight that Colonel Drury got all wrong.

“He was shot fifteen times,” the editor said.

“It was a fair fight,” I said.

“At least five of those rounds came at point-blank range.”

“He was a tough man to kill.”

“But you killed him?”

“Damned right.”

Which is how I wound up here in Folsom.

“Well, that's right interesting,” this fellow nursing a hot beer behind me says, and I turned. First I seen the barrel of a .45 Schofield in his hand that wasn't clutching the pewter stein. Then I seen the badge. Finally, I looked at the face.

“What son of a bitch would give you a badge?” I asked, but I already knowed the answer. It was pinned on his lapel. The United States marshal for whatever district we was in had sworn in Corbin, the double-crossing snake who had damned near gotten me hung in Las Vegas, New Mexico Territory.

Still, all things considered, my luck changed a bit.

Corbin, for instance, didn't mention to his bosses or the judge, jury, or prosecutor about the fact that I was an escaped convicted murderer from New Mexico Territory. And the state of California agreed to reduce the charge from murder to manslaughter upon learning what a nefarious soul Whip Watson was. The prosecutor even said I probably would have gotten off scot free if not for the fact that Whip Watson had been shot fifteen times, most of them bullets coming at right close range and several after he had already terminally expired. Those arson charges also got dropped.

Most importantly, Mr. Clark and me never let Jingfei hear about anything that was going on. I figured it made me a hero.

Or a damned idiot.

Here at Folsom, the guards rarely put me on the rock pile, and a few will even sit in on a few hands of stud poker when the warden's at church. The lady from that hifalutin society does a fine job, and despite what folks say about food, the chow here ain't all that bad.

Ain't heard nothing from Doctor John Milton, but last week, I got a wedding announcement from Mr. Clark and Jingfei. He's taking her to Seattle, Washington, and I wish her a long and happy life, preferably as a widow.

(Clark . . . Corbin . . . I need to avoid future partnerships with gunmen whose last names begin with C.)

Thusly, I close this factual narrative of my adventures in the Mojave Desert and the town of Calico, California. Bug Beard just dropped by my cell to say that the lady from the hifalutin society will be in the library to read to us this afternoon. Bug Beard says it's a thick book, might even be bigger than
Moby-Dick.

I told him, “As long as it ain't
Massacre in the Mojave; Or, Whip Watson's Duel With Death
by Colonel Wilson J. M. Drury.”

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Copyright © 2014 Johnny D. Boggs

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ISBN: 978-0-7860-3337-9

 

 

First electronic edition: August 2014

 

ISBN-13: 978-0-7860-3338-6
ISBN-10: 0-7860-3338-X