It seemed to Mark Brown that he had no sooner rested his head on the pillow that night, than that there was a knocking at his door, with somebody urging him to rise. He looked round and saw that it was pitch dark. Was the house on fire or something? Why would anybody want him to get out of bed in the middle of the night? As he came to, he recognized Miss Clayton’s voice. She sounded scared.
‘Mr Brown, do get up. There’s need of your services.’
‘Give me a chance to get dressed, ma’am,’ he called out groggily. ‘I’ll be there directly.’
‘Do hurry.’
As he pulled on his trousers and fastened his shirt, Brown tried to figure out what kind of crisis might be demanding his urgent attention at this ungodly hour. It could hardly be school business, which, by a natural process of elimination, left his role of sheriff as the reason that he was being roused at. He struck a Lucifer and consulted the pocket watch at his bedside; ten past two in the morning.
When he felt that he looked reasonably decent and presentable, Brown emerged from his room, to find the old woman standing on the landing, with a lamp in her hand. ‘What’s the commotion all about?’ he asked. ‘I hope it’s important.’
‘It’s important,’ she answered grimly, ‘There’s a visitor downstairs for you.’
‘For me? At this time of night? Who is it?’
‘You’d best come down and see.’
Waiting in the parlour were two people. One was a woman that Brown had seen about town now and then, but whose name he did not know. The other was Patrick McDermott. He was wearing only a nightshirt and his bare feet were streaked with blood. ‘Patrick,’ he said, ‘What ails you, son? What’s amiss?’
‘It’s my ma, sir.’
‘Your mother, you say? What of her?’
‘She’s . . . she’s . . . she’s . . . dead!’ And at that fatal word, ‘dead’, the boy commenced weeping and sobbing like a little child. Instinctively, Brown went over to him and put his arms around the distressed boy. Patrick buried his face in the man’s shoulder and cried his heart out. While this was going on, the teacher looked up at the two women and asked in a low voice:
‘Anybody know what this is about?’ Miss Clayton and the other woman shook their heads. He said, ‘How does the boy come to be here?’
‘I was lying in bed and heard a wailing and weeping. When I looked from my window, this young fellow was wandering about in the road outside. He was plumb distracted and so my husband said as I should get dressed and fetch him here to you.’
‘I’m sorry,’ said Brown, ‘But I don’t recollect your name?’
‘I’m Mary Proctor.’
‘Well, it’s right good of you to bring Patrick here, Mrs Proctor. Was he wearing shoes when you found him?’
‘No, sir. Looks to me like he walked barefoot all the way here. No wonder his feet is cut to ribbons.’ It was true; the boy had left bloody footprints across the carpet.
Brown said, ‘Mrs Proctor, you have done your piece and we’re grateful for it. Why don’t you cut along back home now?’
‘If you’re sure there’s nothing more I can do?’
‘No, me and Miss Clayton will manage well enough. Thank you again.’
After Mary Proctor had left, the teacher tried to dismiss Miss Clayton to bed in the same way, but the old woman wouldn’t hear of such a proposal. ‘I think I know my duty better than that, Mr Brown,’ she said stoutly. ‘We’ll want to bathe that poor child’s feet before we go any further. I’ll boil up some water.’
She was as good as her word, and it didn’t take long for the two of them to clean and dress the cuts and lacerations which covered the soles of Patrick McDermott’s feet. After that had been done, with the boy himself accepting their ministrations stoically, without speaking a word, Brown said, ‘You won’t be able to sleep this night until you’ve told your tale, son. You can sleep in my bed, with Miss Clayton’s leave, and I’ll do well enough on the settee here. That all right, ma’am?’
Old Miss Clayton waved the question away as though it were of no import. She said, ‘Happen this boy will speak more easily if it’s just you and him together. I’ll bid you both goodnight.’
After the old woman had gone back upstairs, Brown said, ‘Come on then, Patrick. You best get this off your chest and tell me what befell you this night.’
The calm and authoritative way that his teacher spoke acted on the boy as a sedative and with no sobbing or tears, he set out precisely what had chanced a few hours earlier. ‘It was dark. Ma was readin’ to me and talkin’ ’bout what I’d been doing at school. Been dark for an hour or more, I guess. Then we hear horses, riders. Sounded like a fair bunch o’ men and Ma went out to see what they wanted. There was maybe ten of ’em. Couple had rifles aimed at her, soon as she walk out the house. Some of the others was holding pine brands aloft, so that everything was lit up in the flames.’
‘You recognize any of the men?’ asked Brown. ‘Ever see any of ’em before?’
‘Yes, sir, one of them had come by the house with Mr Parker a few days back. I knew him all right.’
‘What did they say, son?’
‘They said as Ma had been stealin’ cattle from the range. They said that she’d taken mavericks and given them her own brand. Ma laughed at them. She said, “What in the hell do I want with his cattle? I got enough o’ my own to tend to.” ‘The man I seed before, he says, “My boss has had enough o’ you people cuttin’ him off from his water rights and now rustlin’ into the bargain.”
‘What did your ma say to that?’
‘ ’Fore he talk of rustling, Ma was kind of laughin’ at them, like she didn’t think it was any real trouble. When he say rustling though, I could tell that she was getting scared. She bent down to me and said, “Patrick, don’t you make a fuss about it, but you kind o’ shuffle away off into the shadows, you hear what I say?” I said to her, “Ma, I don’t want to leave you.” but she said, “Son, you got to get ready to run all the way to town if needs be. Do as I bid you.”
The boy was trembling and cold, so the teacher reached out and drew Patrick to him, putting his arm round his shoulders and saying, ‘It’s best you tell me the whole thing, son. Else you won’t sleep this night. Go on.’
‘I did like Ma had told me and kind of moved out of the way. They didn’t set any notice to me, they only wanted Ma. Couple o’ the men, they get down off they horses and go to the pen to look at our calves. They say, “This’uns one o’ ours for a bet. She done stole it!” Then another man gets down and he says to Ma, “Aggie, we’re agoin’ to take you to see Mr Parker, see what he makes o’ this here.” She said, “What are you talkin’ of?” I could tell she was real scared now. Then two of them, they tied her hands behind her back.’
‘What next?’ said Brown, his own face ashen, guessing as he could the outcome of all this.
‘Just then, more riders fetch up and they got Mr Avery with ’em. I guess they took him prisoner too, because he has his hands tied together in front, so’s he could ride his horse, but not fight or nothing. He says to my ma, “Hallo Aggie, these scallywags been troubling you as well?” He kind of laughed when he said it, like he didn’t think much of those men. He turns to them and says, “You’re a brave set, I don’t think. Untie my hands and I tell you now, not one of you cowards durst face me in a fair fight.” ‘They got Ma on to a horse as well and then the leader says, “We change our minds. We ain’t agoin’ to take you to Mr Parker at all. We’ll show you how we deal with rustlers where we come from.” You know that old tree outside our house?’
Brown nodded, sick at heart.
‘They threw ropes over a branch and tied them to another branch. They must have planned it all before, sir, ’cause there were nooses already on the end o’ them ropes. Mr Avery, he said, “Are you mad? You men’ll answer for this.” They didn’t take not a morsel of notice. Just brought my ma and Mr Avery right to the tree and said, “You got any last words?” Mr Avery, he say, “Let the woman go. Hang me if you must, but let her be.” The leader of those men, he just told his men to get on with it. They put those ropes round their necks and then somebody fired a gun a couple o’ times and the horses bolt.’
‘All right, son,’ said the teacher, ‘That’s enough now. You came here barefoot, through the night? You’re a brave one. Your mother would have been proud of you.’
‘Ma set a store by you, sir,’ said the boy ‘Any time I had a question, she’d say, “You ask that Mr Brown. He’ll know.” ’
‘Did she, though? I thought a lot of her too. And now, before I get you tucked up in bed for the night, I’m going to tell you something which might make you feel a tiny bit better.’
‘What’s that, sir?’ asked Patrick listlessly, as though he couldn’t conceive of anything that would improve his situation.
‘I promise you now, boy, that those men who did that to your ma will answer for it. I’ll hunt every last one of ’em down and make them pay. It’s not much comfort, but it’s all I can offer you right now.’ He stood up. ‘Let’s get you to bed now. You’ve had the roughest night I ever heard tell of.’
Mark Brown didn’t sleep too well after he had seen Patrick safely to his bed. For one thing, the settee was lumpy and uncomfortable, for another, his mind was racing and sleep was long in coming. He kept thinking about the cold-blooded murder of a woman. It was the foulest crime he had ever heard of and he had come across a few bad cases in his work for the marshal’s office.
It was not the first murder of a woman he had encountered, but the others had been carried out in hot blood; husbands bludgeoning their wives to death when they were in their cups or lovers’ quarrels which had got out of hand. This present case had clearly been planned well in advance. It was monstrous.
Mark Brown had never been a hasty man, which perhaps accounted for his success as a peace officer. He was not a one to rush in, not without weighing up all the pros and cons carefully first. This business would need a good deal of thought. There would be little point in him charging up to Parker’s ranch and being shot down for his troubles. He would have to take it step by step.
Mrs Clayton was up early. She was a tough and indomitable woman, but it was plain that the events of the previous night had left her shaken. Brown filled her in on the rough outline of what had become of Cattle Aggie. She started in shock when he told her that Linton Avery had also been the victim of this brutal crime and tears came to her eyes. He said, ‘There’s no occasion for you to be involved further in this affair, ma’am. I’ll take young Patrick over to the schoolroom and I can put him up there.’
‘I won’t hear of such a thing,’ she said, with a flash of asperity. ‘The child stays right here, leastways ’til we know what’s to be done with him.’
‘That’s real good of you,’ said the teacher gently, ‘But it might prove dangerous. That boy is the only witness who can bring the crime home to those who committed it. It might be that an effort will be made to silence him. I mean somebody might want to kill him.’
‘Somebody would kill a child?’
‘I don’t want you to be put at hazard, ma’am.’
‘Pah, I ain’t afeared of those rascals. You go and do what’s needful and leave the boy in my care. There’s no point debating the matter further, Mr Brown. My mind is quite set on that subject. If nothing else, I reckon I owe it to my late brother-in-law.’
Before leaving the house, Brown tiptoed into the room to see how Patrick McDermott was doing. By a great mercy, the boy was sound asleep. Taking care not to disturb him, the teacher took his gun belt from where it hung at the foot of the bed. Then he carefully closed the door behind him, bid Miss Clayton farewell and headed into the centre of town.