The Cassidy Posse (13 page)

“That’s enough target practice there, pardner,” Butch said. “Do ya know where those slugs are going?”

The young man looked startled.

“Where’d you come from?”

“Never mind where he come from,” said Mike, who had approached unseen from the left. “He asked you if yuh knew where all those rounds you’re poppin’ off were goin’.”

The kid whirred around to see Mike with his police revolver leveled on him. He was totally confused.

“I, uh, broke all the bottles,” he explained lamely. “I was just shooting at that branch.” He pointed to it with his unloaded gun.

“Our party is trying to get down that trail over there,” said Butch. “All these stray bullets are making it a little hard to pass.”

“Sorry,” he said. “I didn’t see ya comin’.”

“Sorry wouldn’t cut it if one ov us got shot,” Mike said, allowing him no redemption.

“Well, this is my land, ya know,” he said, trying to regain his composure.

“I dun’t give a damn if duh Pope hisself owns it,” shouted Mike. “You got tuh be careful where yuh shoot off uh gun.”

“Okay,” said Butch congenially. “No harm done. Let’s just forget about it”

“Forget about it,” said Mike. “If yuh was layin’ there dyin’, yuh wouldn’t be so quick tuh fergive, Mr. Cassidy.”

“You’re named Cassidy,” said the young man, looking perplexed. “My name’s Cassidy too.”

Butch stood there self-consciously as the kid looked him over for what was a long, awkward moment.

“Well, how about that,” Butch said finally.

“I’ll be damn,” the kid declared, shoving his gun into his low-slung holster and walking over tentatively offering his hand. “I’m Jack Cassidy.”

“This is detective Lieutenant Mike McGhan from Chicago,” Butch offered.

“How do you do,” said Jack Cassidy, shaking Mike’s hand while still keeping an appraising eye on Butch.

“He goes by Butch,” Mike added for clarification.

“You’re Butch Cassidy?” asked Jack.

Butch hesitantly nodded to the affirmative.

“I’ve heard of you,” he said. “You run with the Wild Bunch.”

“Well, I’ve been known to keep some bad company, but I’m tryin’ to clean that up.”

“Are we related?” asked Jack.

“I would be doubtin’ that,” said Mike, “since Cassidy isn’t his God given name.”

“What is it?”

“Robert Leroy Parker,” Butch replied.

“Well, why the hell did you have to use my name?” asked Jack, agitated.

“It was Marshal Parker’s idea,” Butch replied with a shrug. “He didn’t care for me using his family’s name.”

“Now your usin’ up mine.”

At this moment, Elzy walked into the clearing leading his horse with a pale and shaken Patrick on board. He clung to the saddle horn to steady himself.

“Is he shot?” asked Mike with concern.

“No,” said Elzy, “but he’s a might squished. His horse got shot in the head and fell on him. I think his arm is broken. It’s swelling up something fierce.”

“Damn,” said Mike. “We got no time fer this. I knew baby-sittin’ him would slow me down.”

“It’s not his fault,” said Elzy, irritated.

“What the hell duh you know?” challenged Mike.

“Elzy’s right,” said Butch with finality. “It’s not Patrick’s fault. He wasn’t the one sprayin’ lead all over the place.”

They all turned towards young Jack Cassidy in unison. He looked at the ground and kicked a clod of dirt.

“My place is just a half mile down the trail,” he said. “I got a sister who will look after him. She’s a half sister.”

Mary Cassidy saw the riders as they broke the top of the ridge and entered her valley. She took the shotgun from the pegs that suspended it over the fireplace and broke it open to place a shell in the chamber. Satisfied that she was prepared, she went back to her seat by the window where she could observe the riders as she shucked corn for dinner.

Maureen, her younger half sister, lay napping in the hammock that stretched from the lone cottonwood tree in the yard to a support post for the porch roof of their small ranch house. She did not want to wake the girl since she had been up crying the better part of the night. A seventeen-year-old girl and love were not a stable combination. Suddenly a twinge of jealousy passed over Mary. She wished she had the fair skin and red hair of her beautiful young half-sister. She had gotten her mother’s black hair and copper colored complexion. No young boys from neighboring ranches had disturbed the sleep of a half-breed girl with offers of courtship. They came only with improper offers. That was years ago. She did not give it much thought anymore and she wanted to keep it that way.

Mary decided to take a look at the riders before she woke the young girl. When you lived by South Pass, you had to be prepared for company. Most of the visitors were friendly, but she had heard rumors of an army of gunmen invading Wyoming. Everyone was uneasy lately. As she watched them approach on this warm spring day, her mind pictured her beautiful valley as it soon would be with colorful columbine and paintbrush replacing the remaining patches of snow from another long Wyoming winter.

As they moved closer to the gate, she recognized her half-brother Jack’s black stallion. The animal was high-spirited and was always in motion, moving from side-to-side on the road as if about to break into a gallop. She thought it was too much horse for a struggling rancher, but Jack’s pride seemed to require the fastest horse in the valley. Whatever, she knew he would never listen to her. He had been offered as much as five hundred dollars for the animal but had refused to sell it. That money would have made their existence more comfortable. The barn was in a sad state of disrepair, and their four-room log ranch house was beginning to look a bit primitive as neighbors began to erect larger two-story frame houses.

Jack tried to open the gate by leaning over without dismounting but the stallion moved around too much. He finally got off and held the uneasy horse by the reins. He let four riders enter their property and closed the gate behind them. Two were riding double. As they came closer to the porch, she could see that the one in the front was hurt. He was young, about the same age as Jack, and was being held semi-upright by a handsome man who sat tall in the saddle. Riding next to them was a husky man who rode with stiff determination. A Derby hat tied down by a scarf was pulled tight upon his square face. The last rider resembled the man in the Derby hat, but he was leaner and rode easy in the saddle.

“Mary, get over here and tend to this boy,” shouted Jack. “He had a horse fall on him. He’s busted up a mite.”

Mary rushed to the horse carrying the two riders. She grasped the injured young man gently, and the tall man eased him into her care. The man in the Derby hat had dismounted quickly and was there to help.

“He’s my nephew Patrick,” he said, “I think he broke his arm.”

“I’ve got him,” she said with soft reassurance.

They eased him to the ground where she could take a better look at him.

“It’s broken all right. About to pop through his skin,” she concluded. “He’s turning very pale. I think he could be going into shock. We need to get him inside and get some blankets on him.”

The uncle and the tall man supported Patrick and brought him into the house with as little jostling as possible. Mary directed them to put him on a bed in front of the fireplace. Patrick was moaning and looking around incoherently. His face had the pallor of death and beads of sweat formed on his brow.

“Jack, you’re going to have to go fetch Doc Fellers.”

“You set arms before Mary,” Jack protested.

“Not for strangers, not this bad,” she said. “Besides, Doc Fellers is at the Jacobs’ place. She had a baby last night. You get on that fancy black horse and you can have him back here before sundown.”

Jack was going to protest again but he caught Mike glaring at him, and picking up his hat, disappeared out the door.

Mary went to the sink and soaked a rag in cool water. She motioned for Mike to come towards her.

“I think he’s a little panicked by what happened to him,” she said. “You need to talk to him and try to calm him down Mr., ah…”

“McGhan. I’m Mike McGhan. He’s me nephew, Patrick Donegel.”

“I’m Mary Cassidy,” she said without looking up from her task.

“Pleased to meet you.”

“So what happened out there Mr. McGhan?”

“Yer brother was practicing his shootin’ a little too close to the trail. We rode right into his stray bullets. Since we’re followin’ some no-goods, we didn’t know what was happening. I thought they might be ambushing us.”

“That’s my brother,” she said emphatically. “Never thinking about anyone but himself. I guess I can be thankful no one was killed.”

“Well, there’s a dead horse out there,” he said. “You might want tuh inform who’s ever in charge ov dead animal removal around here tuh pick him up.”

She looked at him perplexed for a moment and then smiled. “This must be your first time out west.”

“Yeah, and so far it ain’t been too enjoyable.”

Mary wiped the wet cloth over Pat’s head and said a few encouraging words. She motioned for Mike to come over and do the same.

“Well, kid, it coulda been a lot worse. You coulda got that bullet in duh head instead of yer horse.”

Mary looked at him sternly and shook her head.

“You’re gonna be all right,” he began anew. “It’ll take more than a horse droppin’ dead on an Irishman tuh kill’um. Now if an elee-phant dropped on yuh, I’d be standing here worried as uh crooked poletician on election day.”

This brought a smile to Pat’s frightened face and he began to stop shaking uncontrollably.

“It’s okay now,” soothed Mary. “Everything is going to be fine.”

She ran the cool, damp rag over Pat’s head, and his eyes began to loose their frenzied look. She turned to Mike and smiled. He reached out and took Pat’s good right hand in his. His young nephew squeezed the large, familiar hand gratefully.

“See, you can be gentle if you have to, Mr. McGhan.”

Mike smiled sheepishly and looked back at his fallen nephew. He tried to ignore a warm glow that Mary had created inside him. It had something to do with being in close proximity to a pretty, virtuous woman engaged in a serious act of nurturing. A man turns soft as pudding.

He had experienced this phenomenon first when he was twelve years old. Miss Abigail Spencer worked in the public library that summer during her break from college. She was studying to be a teacher. Mike would go into the library at least once a week to request a certain type of book. He had to go to the neighborhood bookworm, Kevin O’Day, to get ideas on what to request. Then he would watch Abigail as she furrowed her brow and thought about a good book in that genre. To prolong the warm, pleasant sensation, he could never be happy with the first book she found. Then he would watch her well-turned ankles as she climbed the ladder scurrying around on behalf of his education. Before he left, he would make an insightful comment about the last book she found for him, and her face would light up in a smile that an angel would envy. It turned him gooey inside. He forced poor Kevin O’Day to read so much he had to get glasses by the end of the summer.

Mike never felt bad about it because Kevin got something out of the deal. With Mike McGhan as his new friend, he didn’t get beat up anymore, so the glasses were safe. He looked more natural in them anyhow. Kevin went on to law school and had insisted Mike come to his graduation. He was now a judge in Joliet.

“Are you a lawman, Mr. McGhan?” asked Mary, dipping the rag once more into the bowl of cool water and wringing it out.

“What?”

“Are you a lawman? You said you were after some men. Are you a lawman?”

“Ah, ya…Yes, I am,” he replied, startled out of his reminiscence.

“Where are you from?”

“I’m from Chicago,” he said. “We’re after uh young fella that’s escaped jail and is running with the Red Alvins’ gang.”

“So this is your posse?” she asked, nodding towards Butch and Elzy sitting at the table drinking coffee.

“Oh, no, I dun’t want no credit fer puttin’ this outfit together. This is his posse,” he said, pointing at Butch sitting at the end of the table. “Marshal Parker got this guy outah jail tuh lead this bunch, and I’m just followin’ til I figure out what’s goin’ on. They do things a little different out here.”

“Who is he?” she asked. “He looks something like you. When you first rode up, I thought he was your brother or something.”

“Ain’t no kin ov mine,” Mike said emphatically. “He goes by Butch Cassidy.”

“Butch Cassidy!” Mary said in amazement. “Butch Cassidy is leading a posse?”

Her voice had easily carried to the table, and Butch looked their way and tipped his hat with an impish smile. Mary flushed with embarrassment.

“Why would Marshal Parker put a known outlaw at the head of a posse?” she whispered. “Has he taken leave of his senses?”

“That’s just another question I got on uh long list ov questions,” sighed Mike.

Pat groaned in pain as if to remind them that he should be their primary focus of attention. Mary quickly returned to swabbing his brow.

“Maureen,” she called to her sister on the porch. “Go out to the ice cellar and bring in a small chuck. I should have thought of that sooner. Maybe some ice would numb the pain in that arm til Doc Fellers gets here.”