The Killing Season (10 page)

Clearly, Sheriff Wilhelm didn't like it, but there had been too many witnesses to the hired gunman's hasty confession. Nathan limped along beside Wilkes, and men moved aside for them to pass.

“You are indeed fortunate,” the doctor said, as he examined Nathan's wounds. “None of your vitals were hit and no bones broken. Just don't do anything foolish for the next three or four weeks, and there should be no complications.”

As Nathan and Wilkes left, they encountered Sheriff Wilhelm and his two prisoners in the doctor's waiting room.

“Stone,” said Wilhelm, “I'll expect to see you at the jail one hour from now.”

“I have business at the telegraph office,” Nathan replied. “When I'm finished there, I'll come to the jail to file charges.”

Nathan had been given laudanum for pain, and while he limped, he was able to walk.

“For a man that's been shot twice, you manage remarkably well,” said Wilkes. “You can always do your talking when you're feeling up to it.”

“I don't aim to do another damn thing until this is settled,” Nathan replied.

“Then you were serious about sending that telegram.”

“Yes,” said Nathan. “It's to be sent to the office of the attorney general, Jefferson City, Missouri. Ask for a report on the Limbaugh shooting in Springfield, May 18, 1872. I was forced to shoot in self-defense, and no charges were filed.”

After the telegram had been sent, Nathan and Wilkes waited for a reply, and while they waited, Nathan talked.

“The way I see it,” said Nathan, “your newspaper owes me. I came out of Indian Territory shot all to hell, and by the time I was on my feet, your writers had painted me a yard wide and nine feet tall. Every damn wet-behind-the-ears kid with a Colt and shells wanted to test my draw, but it didn't end there. Taking the word of the Limbaughs, your newspaper set me up as a killer on the run, with a price on my head.”

“Yes,” said Wilkes, “I remember. We even used the etching from your days with the Kansas-Pacific. But now it's pay-back time. Just as the
Liberty-Tribune
falsely accused you, it can now exonerate you by printing your story from start to finish. It can also turn public sentiment in your favor and against the Limbaughs.”

“I'm counting on that,” Nathan said, “but it'll be a mixed blessing. While I'll be rid of the Limbaughs, I look for a whole new crop of young fools to challenge me, trying to make themselves a name at my expense.”

It was a dismal prospect, and Wilkes could think of nothing to say. They waited in silence until a reply came to the telegram Wilkes had sent. He read it with satisfaction and then he spoke.

“It's just as you said it would be. Now, if you're up to it, I think we're ready to talk to Sheriff Wilhelm.”

Wilhelm had his prisoners in cells, and Amy Limbaugh glared at Nathan in angry silence. Wilkes handed the telegram to the sheriff and Wilhelm read it. When he spoke to Nathan, he was all business.

“It appears you're justified in filing charges. The state will prosecute, but you'll have to be present for the trial.”

“When?” Nathan asked.

“It depends on what's ahead of you on the docket,” said Wilhelm. “Probably three or four weeks.”

“You'll need a place to stay,” Wilkes said, when they had left the jail.

“I have a place,” Nathan replied. “Eppie Bolivar's. I boarded there while I was with the Kansas-Pacific. I have a saddle horse, a packhorse, and a dog waiting for me at the livery nearest the Pinkerton building.”

“You'd better stay out of the saddle for a few days,” said Wilkes. “I'll fetch a buckboard and drive you to the Bolivar place. We can tie your horses on behind.”

Nathan enjoyed the quiet days at Eppie Bolivar's boardinghouse, and he became more and more impressed with the thoroughness in which Brandon Wilkes wrote the story of Amy Limbaugh's vendetta to avenge the death of her brother. Wilkes asked for and got an in-depth report of the attempt on Nathan's life in Dodge City, as reported by Sheriff Harrington. In each edition of the
Liberty-Tribune,
Wilkes unfolded a little more of the deadly drama, portraying Nathan Stone as a man wrongly persecuted by a vengeful woman, aided by the powerful Pinkerton Detective Agency. To Nathan's surprise, men who had known him during his days with the Kansas-Pacific rallied around him. One of them was Joel Netherton.

“The railroad can still use you,” said Netherton. “Outlaws are still robbing trains, but with you riding shotgun, your reputation alone would scare them away.”

“Thanks, Joel,” Nathan said, “but it's my reputation I'm trying to live down.”

Nathan's wounds healed, and by the day of the trial, he was ready to be done with the whole affair. He listened with disgust as a court-appointed defense attorney tried to convince a jury that Amy Limbaugh was a noble, courageous woman who had sought only to avenge her dead brother. But the jury deliberated only twenty-five minutes.

“Has the jury reached a verdict?” the judge asked.

“We have, your honor,” the foreman replied. “We find the defendants guilty as charged.”

“The defendants will come forward for sentencing,” said the judge.

Amy Limbaugh and the surviving gunman, Simp Anderton, were led before the bench.

“Amy Limbaugh and Simpson Anderton, I hereby sentence each of you to five years in the state penitentiary,” the judge said. “Court is adjourned.”

Amy Limbaugh lost all her feigned innocence, flooding the courtroom with an array of swearing that would have made a bullwhacker envious.

“By God,” said Brandon Wilkes with some admiration, “the woman has talent greater than her ability to fire a pistol. Nonetheless, Mr. Stone, in the interest of your continued good health, I'd suggest you be elsewhere when the state turns her loose.”

“I aim to be,” Nathan said. “I have business in Ellsworth.”

Before returning to Eppie Bolivar's place for his horses and Cotton Blossom, Nathan returned to the telegraph office. There he sent a telegram to Captain Ferguson, at Fort Worth, inquiring about Captain Jennings. Captain Ferguson's reply was brief, and Nathan read it a second time, swallowing a lump in his throat ...

“I swear before God, Cap,” Nathan gritted through clenched teeth, “I'll gun down Clint Barkley if I have to follow him to the gates of hell and go in after him....”

Nathan took a room at a boardinghouse, and leaving Cotton Blossom at the livery with the horses, set out to make the rounds of the saloons. He could think of no more likely place to begin his search for Clint Barkley. The third saloon he entered—which was Joe Brennan's—he found Ben Thompson running a game of monte. Thompson flashed him that twisted grin he reserved for his few friends. Thompson had shed his frock coat, and as far as Nathan could see, the deadly little gambler wasn't armed. Aware of his obvious “nakedness,” he seemed embarrassed.

“This is one of the few towns where I'm on good terms with the law,” Thompson said. “Sheriff C.B. Whitney's a friend of mine. He has a gun ordinance. He'll be asking for your irons.”

“He can ask till hell freezes,” said Nathan. “My guns go where I go. I'm looking for a killer name of Clint Barkley. He may also use the name of Bill Bowen.”

“It's unlikely he'd linger here, then,” Thompson said. “He wouldn't be comfortable with the sheriff's gun ordinance. About all I've seen looked to be soldiers and railroad men.”

Ben's brother Billy entered the saloon as Nathan was leaving. The younger Thompson either didn't recognize Nathan or didn't consider him worthy of recognition, for he didn't speak. Nathan noted with approval the hotheaded little varmint was unarmed. Long before Nathan had made the rounds of the saloons, he encountered the sheriff. He was an older man, but he still spoke with authority.

“I'm C.B. Whitney, sheriff of Ellsworth. Are you aware there's a gun ordinance?”

“I am,” Nathan replied. “I'm Nathan Stone. Are you aware there may be men in this town who would like nothing better than catching me unarmed?”

“I'm considering that,” said Whitney. “I've been reading about you in the newspapers. I'm not one to meddle in a man's business, but under the circumstances, I need to know how long you aim to be here.”

“Probably not more than another day,” Nathan said. “I'm looking for a killer. His name is Clint Barkley, and he sometimes calls himself Bill Bowen. He back-shot a friend of mine in Texas. He carries a tied-down Colt, dresses like a cowboy, and might hire on with some ranch. He's an aggressive, short-tempered little varmint, remindin' you of an overgrown banty rooster.”

Whitney laughed. “I know the type, and I reckon him and me would have had words if he'd been through here. Keep your irons. I'm trusting you not to use them unless it's shoot or be shot.”

Nathan nodded. It was a fair offer, and the old sheriff was leaving himself open for criticism by making an exception to the town ordinance. After a fruitless day in the saloons, Nathan stopped by the livery for Cotton Blossom and they went to supper. There being little else to do, Nathan turned in for the night. Ellsworth was looking less and less like the kind of place Clint Barkley would hole up.

When Nathan and Cotton Blossom went to breakfast, Nathan stopped at the mercantile and bought three newspapers. One of them was a weekly, from Dodge City. Nathan went through the Kansas City and St. Louis papers first, finding little to interest him. But the Dodge City weekly had news from Texas, and although it was weeks' old, Nathan read it all with interest. The Sutton-Taylor feud was raging in Texas. William E. Sutton had shot up a party of Taylors in April, near Cuero, Texas. The Taylors had retaliated and there had been another shooting fray in June. John Wesley Hardin had been involved in shootings in July. Once in Cuero, Texas, and again in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Nathan looked in vain for some mention of the Horrells, but found nothing. He did find a death notice for Captain Sage Jennings. The old ranger had been buried at Fort Worth with military honors. There was no mention of any survivors. How many an old frontiersman had died thus, alone, not even a next-of-kin to mourn his passing? Angrily, Nathan threw the paper aside, those few words roaming the shadows of his mind like harbingers of doom. Would that not be his fate, his life's blood leaking into the sand of a lonely arroyo or into the dusty street of some lawless western town? Nathan returned to his room because the saloons wouldn't open for another two hours. Cotton Blossom sat watching him reprovingly. The dog hated the saloons, but it rankled him, being left with the horses at the livery. Making the rounds of the saloons, Nathan saved Brennan's until last. He would pause there only long enough to speak to Ben Thompson before riding out. Reaching the saloon, he found Thompson about to leave.

“I got some business with a gambler name of John Sterling,” Ben said grimly. “I lined up some side bets with him, which we was goin' to split, but the bastard won a hatful of cash and sneaked out without divvying.”

Thompson stomped out of the saloon, Nathan following. In a nearby saloon, Thompson found Sterling, drinking with Happy Jack Morco, a local policeman.

“You damn tinhorn thief,” Thompson shouted, “you owe me money.”

“I owe you nothing,” Sterling responded.

Sterling swung at Thompson and Ben returned as good as he got. But that was when Happy Jack Morco bought in, drawing his Colt and holding it on Ben.

“That's enough, Thompson,” said Morco.

“It looked like an even scrap to me,” Nathan said, his cocked Colt on Morco.

“Who the hell are you?” Morco snarled.

“A hombre that don't like seein' an unarmed man prodded with a gun,” said Nathan. “Put it away.”

“I'm the law,” Morco insisted.

“I don't care a damn who you are,” Nathan said. “You don't need the gun. Ben's leaving. Aren't you, Ben?”

“Yeah,” said Thompson, realizing he was up against the law.

“You're in violation of the town's gun ordinance,” Morco said, glaring at Nathan.

“I have an understanding with the sheriff,” said Nathan. “Put your gun away and back off. Get moving, Ben.”

Morco holstered his gun and Nathan began backing toward the door. Not until he was outside on the boardwalk did he relax.

“Damn that Morco,” Thompson said angrily, “that was between me and Sterling.”