Not one of the men who attended the funeral that morning took at all to being berated by the town’s teacher, never mind what post he now claimed to hold. His parting shot, asking if there were any men present, had been particularly poorly received. Although they didn’t give voice to their feelings in the proximity of the church and so soon after a burial service at that, by the time they were back in their homes, not a few of the men gave their views and opinions of Mark Brown pretty freely to their families. Expressions such as ‘cow’s son’ and ‘bastard’ were thrown around.
There was still no sign of Parker’s men in the town, and so by evening, most of those who lived in Barker’s Crossing were congratulating themselves on playing their hand right in keeping out of the lynchings affair. With a little luck, once Randolph Parker had asserted himself out in the wilds and reclaimed the open range for his herds, the town itself would return to normal and there would be no reason in the world for Parker to have a down on them. Quite a few of the men who had attended the funeral thought that some sort of celebration might be in order that evening, to mark the fact that the lightning had fallen elsewhere and that they themselves could now resume their ordinary lives. The Luck of the Draw was accordingly doing a brisk trade at about seven that evening when Mark Brown walked through the bat-wing doors and stood there, surveying the scene.
The rain hadn’t let up all day and it was still lashing against the windows of the saloon. Brown himself was soaked to the skin and just stood there, dripping water on to the floor. At first, nobody noticed the slight figure by the door and the patrons of the Luck of the Draw just carried on drinking, talking and laughing. But little by little, men spotted the town’s erstwhile teacher and nudged their companions; indicating with a nod of the head and roll of their eyes, the blackclad man standing and watching them. As others became aware of the sober man with his eyes upon them, so conversation dried up and laughter ceased, until there was dead silence. And still, Mark Brown just stood there, without saying a word. Then he spoke, his sharp, clear voice carrying across the whole of the bar-room.
‘You’re a set of cowards! Every man-Jack o’ you drinking here right now. There’s only two in this town as I would call real men who aren’t afraid to set-to for what’s right. One of them is a boy and the other an old man. As for the rest of you. . . .’ He shook his head in disgust. ‘You think you’ve bought your safety by turning a blind eye to the murder of a woman. You’re wrong. All you done is abandon your honour.’ Having delivered himself of this statement, Brown turned on his heels and left the saloon.
The rain was still falling and the sun just dipping below the horizon. With all the dark clouds above the town, twilight was falling early. In the distance, Mark Brown could see purple tongues of lightning licking at the hilltops which ringed Barker’s Crossing. He stood there in the rain for a moment and then something caught his attention. It was the rumble of hoofs. A body of riders was approaching the town from the west. He might be wrong, but his cat’s sense told him that these were Parker’s men, coming to pay a visit.
There was no percentage in going up against an unknown number of skilled gunmen single-handed, not unless he was left with no other choice. Brown sprinted down Main Street towards the livery stable. Now it was time to see how much the promises of Jack Brady and Miss Clayton’s nephew, Andy, were worth when it came down to it.
Old Mr Brady was sitting in his office with his feet up. In the dim yellow glow of the oil lamp, the teacher could see that Brady was reading a cheap Tauchnitz edition of some novel. ‘Well,’ he said, when Brown approached, ‘Time for me to make good on my offer, is that the way of it?’
‘Pretty much, Mr Brady. You still game for this?’
‘You betcher,’ said the old man. ‘You want that I should bring my scattergun with me now?’
‘If you got it here, then yes. That’d be a right good scheme.’
While Brady was reaching for his gun out of a closet and loading it, the teacher said, ‘You know where Andy lives? Meaning Miss Clayton’s nephew.’
‘Andy Porter? Sure, he lives down the way a space. You want that we should go fetch him now?’
‘Might be best.’
‘You goin’ to tell me what’s afoot?’
‘You weren’t at the funeral this morning?’
‘Some of us got work to do.’
Mark Brown sketched briefly the events of the day, bringing his narrative up to date by telling of the party of riders he had heard coming into Barker’s Crossing. The old man took a small green bottle from a drawer of the desk, uncorked it and took a swig.
‘Surely you ain’t getting liquored up?’ asked the teacher, slightly appalled.
‘Liquor, nothing! This is medicine.’
‘You’re sick? What ails you?’
‘That don’t signify. You want we should stay here jawing or you want the use o’ my gun?’
Brady closed up his office and, with his shotgun tucked under his arm, led the teacher down an alleyway to a little row of houses behind the stores on Main Street. The rain was easing off a little, although there was still enough to make them both dripping wet by the time they knocked on the door of a neat little cottage, which was surrounded by a clipped hedge. A middle-aged woman opened the door and stared in alarm at the gun that Jack Brady was carrying. ‘Heavens above, Mr Brady, what are you about? Can I help you?’ She noticed Brown and greeted him as well, with a little more reserve.
‘Good evening, Mrs Porter,’ said the teacher, ‘Is your son in?’
‘Andy? What do you want with him?’
At that moment, the youth himself appeared in the doorway behind his mother. ‘Hey, Mr Brown. Mr Brady.’ ‘Andy, if you really want to help me, then right now is your chance,’ Brown told him. ‘You want to be sworn in as a deputy, then fetch your rifle and come with us.’
Mrs Porter looked as if she was fit to die when she heard mention of her son’s rifle. She exclaimed, ‘Lord a mercy, what’s going on?’
‘Your son’s asked if he can help me, me being sheriff and all, which you might not have known.’
‘I never heard such foolishness,’ declared Andy Porter’s mother. ‘You just get back into the parlour, Andy, you’re going nowhere at all.’ She addressed Brown angrily. ‘You should be ashamed of yourself, a man your age trying to lure a boy into danger. You ought to know better as well, Mr Brady. Old gentleman like you.’
Andy had not argued with his mother, but retreated back inside the house. Mark Brown had more or less written him off, when the youth appeared again behind his mother. This time, he was wearing an overcoat and hat and carrying a rifle. He said to his mother, ‘I’m a-goin’ out, Ma. Don’t be afeared, I’ll take care of myself. I told you before, I can’t be sweeping floors all my life long. Lawkeeping’s something I got a hankering after, you know that.’
When Randolph Parker had sent word to contacts of his in Texas, that he was looking for some lively boys who would undertake a little rough work, money no object, he didn’t really know what he was letting himself in for. Some of the men already working for his outfit were pretty dangerous types; men who might knife a stranger over some fancied slight. The twentyfive men who came north into the Wyoming Territory that spring were something else again.
After the surrender at Appomattox Court House in 1865, there were quite a number of diehards in the South who did not feel inclined to end their war just then. Some of them proceeded to knock over banks, hold up trains and ambush Yankee army patrols for several months after the War Between the States had officially ended. When things grew too hot for them in Texas and New Mexico and the full rigours of reconstruction began to bite, some of these men crossed the border into Mexico and offered their services to Benito Juarez, who was at that time struggling to wrest control of his nation from the Emperor, whom the French had installed. By the time the war in Mexico had ended, there were a few hard-bitten souls who had been fighting in one war or another for the better part of ten years. Killing and looting was the only life some of them knew or could imagine.
A band of men from Texas and Georgia, who had been on Juarez’s side, crossed back over the Rio Grande in 1873 and then made a perfect nuisance of themselves by teaming up with Comancheros and getting involved in all sorts of activities, from running guns to the Kiowa and Comanche to undertaking runof-the-mill road agent work. Things were getting a little hot for this group of freebooters, when they received news that some rancher up in the north, well away from their usual area of action, wanted a bunch of men to go and throw some dirt farmers off his land.
What Parker didn’t altogether understand was that these men were not really under his control at all, when once they had descended upon his ranch. Sure, they would kill a few men or women and help drive the settlers back to where they had come from; that was what they were being paid for. But having found that the nearest town to the ranch had no lawman and was full of men who seemingly had no appetite to stand up to them, the hired guns quite naturally turned their attention to Barker’s Crossing. There were sure to be pickings of some sort to be had in such a town, even if it was only free drinks, the chance of a woman and whatever the stores there had, which could be made off with. They had stripped other little towns bare like a horde of locusts and there did not appear to be any good reason why they should not perform the same trick up here in the north.
The three men walked up Main Street towards the Luck of the Draw. When they were still a way from it, they saw, coming towards them, one of those whom Mark Brown recognized at once as being one of the southerners hired by Parker. ‘Hold up now,’ he said softly to his companions, ‘I want to speak to this fellow.’
When the man was level with them and about to walk past, Brown said in a friendly enough way, ‘Hey there, friend. Might I be having a word or two with you?’
‘Yeah,’ said the other, suspiciously. ‘What’s the problem?’
The teacher walked up to the man, smiling pleasantly, and said, ‘There’s no problem. It’s only this. I’m sheriff in these parts and I am making sure that only residents of this town bear arms. I’ll thank you to hand over that pistol I see at your hip.’
‘My pistol? What in the hell are you talkin’ about?’
‘There’s no call for strong language or blaspheming,’ said Brown, no longer smiling, ‘I’m telling you straight, hand me that gun.’
It was slowly dawning on the fellow that this was no game. The two men on either side of the sheriff had, without making any great show of it, moved away a few paces and were now holding their weapons as though ready and willing to bring them up to bear upon him. The men in this town might in general be walkovers, but even so, here were three men who were not to be blustered or bluffed into backing off. The man glanced up the street towards the saloon, hoping that some of his friends would appear, but there was nobody else about. Mark Brown said, ‘Time’s up, fella. Reach out that pistol, slow as you like.’
Stuart Singer had been in tighter spots than this present one. His hand snaked down towards the pistol, but he was not quite quick enough. The man standing before him, drew his own piece and then pistol whipped Singer round the side of the head. He put his full strength into the initial blow and then followed it up with a couple more cracks across Singer’s face and then down on to the top of his head. As he fell stunned to the ground, the sheriff reached down and plucked the pistol from his grasp. Then, when Singer was kneeling there, holding his head and becoming aware of the blood trickling between his fingers, he received a sharp kick in the ribs which sent him sprawling. Brown finished off by stamping down hard on the outstretched arm of the man he had knocked down. There was a clear audible crack, like the snapping of a dry stick, as some bone in his arm fractured.
Jack Brady and Andy Porter watched this savage beating in shocked silence. It was the suddenness of the attack which had left them speechless with amazement. Most fights build up with a trading of insults and then proceed to tentative blows before heating up and getting serious. This was in a different league entirely. One second, the two men had been standing there, talking quietly and the next, one of them was laying in the dirt, nursing a broken arm and probably a case of concussion.
The teacher turned to his two deputies and said, ‘That’s one of those villains who’ll not be wielding a gun today. I didn’t smash up his wrist from cruelty. I don’t want him firing on us at all. The odds are stacked high enough against us as it is.’
The change in Mark Brown was astonishing. Both Brady and Porter had been used over the last month to seeing this shy and reserved-looking man ignoring any number of sly jokes and contemptuous remarks directed against him. You would have thought that he was the meekest man alive. The sight of him exploding into violence in this way was a disturbing one. Brown must have picked up something of this from their demeanour, for he said, ‘You needn’t look at me like that. These are the men who killed a defenceless woman. They need to be taught a lesson and I’m the man to do it.’ Then he paused for a second and a grim smile appeared briefly on his lips. ‘After all, I’m the teacher, ain’t I?’
Leaning down to where his victim was still stretched out, groaning in the dust of the road, Brown said to him, ‘Why don’t you tell your friends I’m out here and would be glad if they’d favour me with a few words? Tell ’em I’ll be over yonder at the end of the street.’
‘You bastard. You broke my arm.’
‘You remember what I said to you about cursing and such? If’n you don’t want the other arm broke, then get yourself down to the saloon and do as I bid you.’
The injured man got slowly and painfully to his feet and walked towards the Luck of the Draw. Mark Brown turned to his two companions and said, ‘Well, you boys with me or not? If you’ve no stomach for shooting and killing, now’s the time to say.’
‘I killed men before,’ said old Jack Brady quietly, ‘I reckon this lot deserve it.’
Andy Porter, being the youngest of them all, was still of an age to find fighting an exciting diversion. The beating of Parker’s hired gun had thrilled him and he looked like he was ready for anything. He said, ‘Hell, yeah. I’m with you, sir.’
‘Not so much of the cursing,’ said Brown reprovingly. ‘Come on then, let’s get ourselves into position.’
Singer’s entrance to the saloon, minus his gun and with a busted arm, caused some little stir. He staggered through the doors and shouted out for his friends. There was the usual lively hubbub in the place, the saloon being crowded that night. There was a space around the bar though, where four of the men Randolph Parker had hired were drinking. They were armed to the teeth and had given the impression to the regular patrons of the saloon that they were in town for some specific purpose. This was quite true. Earlier that day, they had finally stumbled across the body of Quentin Haines, one of their number who had been missing for a few days. They had become increasingly uneasy at his absence, he not being the sort of man to run off and vanish without a word. He and his horse had apparently just disappeared into thin air.
It had been Stuart Singer and another man who had gone off to look for any sign of Haines. They knew that he had gone off to put a scare on the town’s teacher, a black-clad milksop who looked liked a priest and had been asking a sight too many questions for anybody’s liking. That had been the last anybody saw of their partner. Singer had suggested that it might be worth looking about in the pine woods lining the road from Parker’s ranch to Barker’s Crossing. It had been a cloud of buzzing flies which had first caught Singer’s eye as they combed the area, and these turned out to be feasting upon the decomposed corpse of a man who had fought side by side with Singer through two wars.
By the time that five of Haines’s old compatriots rode into town that evening, they had a pretty good idea that the one-time teacher, now evidently the sheriff in these parts, had been responsible for the death of their friend. There was a score to settle there. They had gone first to the saloon, to see if anybody knew where this precious teacher was to be found, but nobody seemed to know. Well, they could spare the time for a glass or two of whiskey, before they killed him.
Two of his friends assisted Stuart Singer to the bar, where he was given a stiff shot of rye. ‘What happened, man?’ asked somebody.
‘It was that bastard teacher,’ said Singer. ‘He buffaloed me, took me by surprise. I didn’t even have a chance to draw. Then when he’d knocked me down, he used his boots and broke my damned arm.’
There was dead silence now in the saloon. Both the townsfolk and those working for Randolph Parker were listening intently to Singer’s words. He said, ‘The whore’s son told me he’d be waiting for you boys down the road a-ways.’
‘Left or right after we leave here?’ ‘Right.’
‘You stay here, Stu. We’ll settle him now and be back before you’ve finished that drink.’
With a jingling of spurs and the click of heavy boots, the four men moved off from the bar and headed for the door. No sooner were they through the bat-wing doors, than there was a stampede, as all the other customers in the Luck of the Draw rushed out into the street to see what would follow.
Mark Brown had taken his stand right outside the corn chandler’s, outside which was parked a buckboard. He was standing alongside this, in plain view when the four men from the south came looking for him. He felt relaxed and easy, maybe for the first time since he had fetched up in Barker’s Crossing. Ever since he had quit being a marshal, Brown had been keeping himself under a tight rein. Now he was loose again and free to act as he pleased. It wouldn’t do in the long run, not if he really was going to train for the ministry, but by Godfrey, there was something exhilarating about being able to deal with matters just as he pleased!
The four men from the saloon fanned out and stopped no more than thirty feet away. They had that swaggering air about them of men who do not have the slightest doubt that they are holding the winning cards. The teacher had guessed correctly that these fellows had taken counsel together and decided to kill him this night. Still and all, he had to give them the chance to back off, if they would listen to reason.
‘Well, boys,’ said Brown, ‘What will you have? I aim to disarm the four of you. We can do it easy or we can do it hard. Which do you prefer?’
All four of the men standing there in front of him burst out laughing. They weren’t putting on a show; this really was the funniest thing that they’d heard in a good, long spell. When they had recovered themselves, one of the men said, in an accent which was pure Georgian, ‘Well now, I reckon we’ll take it the hard way.’
Although he didn’t know it, a man was already drawing down on the Georgian and preparing to fire. Deep in the shadows along the boardwalk, where the light of the moon was prevented from shining by the awnings above the storefronts, Jack Brady was crouching behind a barrel, his scattergun trained on the man who was bandying words with Mark Brown. Brady had taken first pull on the trigger and, in accordance with the teacher’s instructions, he was waiting only for the Southerners to fire the first shot, before he himself joined in the fighting.
Laying on the roof of the smithy, on the other side of the street, Andy Porter was also getting ready to open fire. His heart was pounding and his mouth full of a strange coppery taste, like he might have been sucking pennies. It was the taste of fear, although mingled with the greatest excitement the boy had ever known. He had only ever shot squirrels, deer and birds, but that didn’t mean he had never wondered what it would feel like to kill a man with his rifle. He squinted down the barrel, cocked his piece and waited for the shooting to start in the street below. Mr Brown had been most forceful in impressing upon Andy that he wasn’t to shoot until if and when he saw the men who would be coming to find the teacher open fire. Once that happened, he could shoot away at them like they were jack-rabbits.
‘You want it the hard way?’ asked Brown sadly. ‘Then I guess you boys had best pull your pistols, but recollect that I gave you the chance to settle this peacefully.’
All four of the men chuckled at these words, which sounded to them like the bravado of a man whistling in the dark. Then they went for their guns. As soon as he saw that first twitch of movement, Mark Brown dived for cover, throwing himself behind the nearby buckboard. The first bullets went wild as a consequence of this unexpected action on his part. The crack of pistol fire was answered almost immediately by the boom of a shotgun and then the sharper sound of rifle fire. He drew his own pistol, cocking it with his thumb as he did so and risked a quick glance round the side of the cart. Two of the men were down and the two others were turned away from him, trying to identify the source of the withering crossfire in which they were caught. Brown shot one of the men down and then the other fell; whether dropped by Andy’s rifle or the old man’s scattergun, he could not tell. He stood up and walked cautiously over to the four prone figures, shouting as he did so, ‘You men hold your fire now!’
Good storyline so far.
Good stuff Simon. Worth the extra days wait.