The Dark Sunrise

by Terrence McCauley

  The miners looked at each other.

  Mackey saw Deputy Bray’s bladder go.

  Sweazy looked at Mackey. “You wouldn’t.”

  “Probably not,” Mackey said, “but Billy sure would. He’s right about the kind of day we’ve had, and he’s in a pretty bad mood.”

  “Damn you,” one of the miner’s yelled. “Colburn’s the only thing keeping us alive.”

  “I’ve got paper on him,” Mackey yelled back, “and we’re taking him in. Straight up or over the saddle, makes no difference to me.”

  “Won’t be nothing to put over your saddle if he’s buried under tons of rock,” Sweazy said.

  “I’ll take what I can get.” He pointed at the lead miner. “You. Bring Colburn out here. Alone. Now.”

  “And only Colburn.” Billy set the cigarette in his mouth and thumbed a match, lighting it. “And be quick about it. Before I finish my smoke. If I see anyone else come out of there, or if you’re not back by the time I’m done, I set this butt to a stick and start chucking.”

  The lead miner ran back into the mine. The others stood around the ore car, arms folded across their chests.

  Sweazy turned to face Mackey. “You, sir, are a son of a bitch.”

  Mackey ignored him and watched the mine entrance.

  * * *

  Billy had long since finished his cigarette but was keeping a match ready when the lead miner appeared at the entrance. He was followed by a burly man whose face was as black as his beard.

  He pushed his way past the group of miners and stood alone before Mackey. “I’m Colburn.”

  Mackey looked at the man as he asked Sweazy, “That him?”

  “Yeah,” the sheriff looked at the ground. “That’s him.”

  “Brett Colburn,” Mackey announced, “I hereby place you under arrest for the murders of three people in Virginia City, Montana. Deputy Sunday and I will be bringing you back to Helena to stand trial. If you behave yourself, you’ll be treated well. If you try to escape, we’ll cut your tendon and bind you in shackles the whole way back.”

  “Mackey,” Colburn squinted. “Yeah, I suppose you would. I’ve heard of you.”

  “Then you know I mean what I say.” Mackey stepped to the side and beckoned him to come his way. “Prison’s hard enough on a man with two good legs. It’s worse when he’s a cripple. Get moving. We’ve got a long ride back to Helena.”

  Colburn lumbered toward him. “It’s a hangman’s noose for me either way. I won’t get no fair trial.”

  “It’ll be fair.” Mackey could sense the man was storing up energy as he moved and got ready to duck. “Judge Forester’s a good man.”

  “Maybe,” Colburn said, “but I’m not.”

  When he got close enough, the miner tried to rush Mackey. The marshal stepped aside and tripped the big man, sending him face-first into the dirt.

  Mackey closed in quick and kicked him in the head, then drew his pistol to keep the miners or Sweazy or Bray from getting any ideas about helping their boss.

  But Billy already had them covered.

  Mackey spoke to Sweazy. “Colburn got a lawyer who handles his business?”

  “I believe he does. Why?”

  “I want you to talk to him and see to it the mine stays open while Colburn’s on trial. Tell him to make sure these men get paid. Just because Colburn’s in jail doesn’t mean the mine closes. He’ll have plenty of time to settle his affairs before he hangs.”

  Sweazy glared at him. “I thought you said he’ll get a fair trial.”

  “He will,” Billy said. “Then he’ll hang.”

  Mackey pointed at the sheriff and his deputy. “You two pick him up and drag him back to your jail. Billy will sit with him while I get his horse. I take it he’s got one in that livery we passed on the way in.”

  “He does,” Sweazy said as he beckoned his deputy to help him lug Colburn back up the hill. “A chestnut Morgan.”

  Mackey was glad it wasn’t something smaller that might falter on the trail. “Good horse for a long ride. Now move.”

  Sweazy and Bray grunted as they dragged the unconscious Colburn back up the foothill to their jail. Mackey held his pistol at his side as he followed them.

  Billy walked backward, eyeing the miners as they went.

  None of them made a move.

  CHAPTER 19

  Dover Station

  James Grant sat on the edge of the bed, still too drunk to rise to his feet to greet such an important day.

  He had spent the past week of his return to Dover Station awash in future glory to come. He had made a great show of spending money among some of the more important people in town who had prospered in the months since his incarceration. Businessmen, shop owners, saloon keepers, and bankers who had prospered independent of the Dover Station Company’s blessing. People who had despised him when he tried to run them out of business, but now that he had won his freedom, looked upon him as the best hope to break the stranglehold the company had on the town.

  None of them were much on their own, but together, they represented a base of the population that could propel him back into power when the time came. He had spent the past week or so wining and dining them, showing them a good time and allowing them to partake in the female companionship The Ruby offered in their cribs out back.

  He did not expect their undying loyalty to him. He only needed it for as long as it took him to regain power over the town. To do that, he would need to be as lucky as he was prepared. And, with Rigg’s help, he happened to be both.

  Through his hangover, he could hear a great many people outside who had gathered along the alleyways and byways off Front Street all the way to Lee Street. He checked the pocket watch he had cast on the nightstand before falling into bed alone in the early hours of the morning. There were no shortage of Hancock whores who wished to bed him, but save for the times he was securing new allies in his bid for the town, he lived a solitary existence. He feared he might say too much when he had drank too much, and the wrong people might hear his plans.

  The success of his plan hinged on one absolute certainty.

  Secrecy.

  He knew the weight of his plan would collapse in on itself if anyone was to learn of it too early. Fortunately, today was the day it was scheduled to begin.

  He opened his pocket watch and saw it was almost noon. He had not slept past the dawning of his new destiny after all.

  He would have to be content to sit by the window and watch the aftermath from above. To do anything more would be dangerous. To do any less would rob him of his first taste of revenge against the town that had given him so much and had been only too happy to take it all away.

  He closed the pocket watch and held it tight in his fist. “By this time tomorrow,” he said to the empty room, “the town will be mine again.”

  James Grant fought off the wave of nausea that washed over him as he got to his feet and stumbled to the door. He pulled it open and yelled to the bar three levels down. “Coffee! Bring the whole pot! Now, damn you!”

  He slammed the door shut and began to get dressed. He pulled a new black suit out of the wardrobe he had made in Helena for this day. It would show solemnity for the coming tragedy, but also convey the power he had acquired once again.

  One of the soiled doves who worked the place knocked before opening the door and placing a pot of coffee and cup on the dresser. She looked him up and down in his new suit and said, “Lookin’ mighty spiffy, Mr. Grant.”

  But Grant was too busy knotting his tie just right to take compliments from a whore. “Get out.”

  When she did, he took a step back and looked at himself in the mirror. Yes, I suppose I do look spiffy at that.

  He raised his chin, disappointed by how the collar seemed too big for him. The months he had spent recovering from the bullet that had almost taken his shoulder followed by the time in Mackey’s jailhouse had caused him to look gaunt and thin.

  He would avenge every second of the pain
he had felt. He would avenge every moment he had spent in prison. He took a final look at his pocket watch and saw it was five to noon. His vengeance would begin soon.

  He slid the pocket watch into his vest pocket and walked over to the chair he had placed by the window. He pulled the drapes apart and took a seat, prepared to watch his destiny unfold before him.

  “My time,” he said to the empty room. “My time.”

  * * *

  This is almost too easy.

  From his perch in the turret of the Municipal Building, Colonel Nathan Rigg sighted his Sharps on the platform that had been built across the middle of Front Street. He had spent the past week or so watching the fools from the Dover Station Company build it from wood cut from the company’s new sawmill.

  Paul Bishop, the new manager of the company, had made sure every piece of lumber was stamped with the ornate DSC symbol, designed for all the town to see. Red, white, and blue bunting had been hung from the platform. Across the length of Front Street, a canvas sign billowed in the wind that read, “God Bless Mayor Mackey, God Bless Our Town and God Bless the U.S. of A.”

  Front Street was packed with townspeople and other spectators who had come from miles around to witness history in the making. He doubted a field mouse would be able to find enough of a path on the thoroughfare to scurry across.

  Dover Station was set to throw itself the biggest party it had ever seen. Bigger, as he had been told by several drunks in The Ruby, than even James Grant’s swearing-in ceremony the previous year.

  That day, the people told him, had been marred by the new mayor’s disappointment that he had not been able to get rid of Mackey and Sunday. They had gone and gotten themselves appointed U.S. Marshals.

  Everyone was confident that Brendan Mackey’s swearing in as mayor would be a much more festive celebration. An event the town would not soon forget.

  Rigg grinned at the memory, for he knew no one would be forgetting this day any time soon, but not for the reasons they thought.

  The simplicity of it would have made Rigg laugh had he not been hired to put James Grant’s “Grand Plan,” as he was fond of calling it, in place.

  Right now, part of that job was to sit and wait for the festivities to begin. A glance at the Bank of Dover Station clock tower told him he had five minutes to go.

  As he sat with his back against the turret, Nathan Rigg pondered the road that had led him here. He had spent the last week or so looking the town over and could not understand Grant’s fascination with the place.

  It was no different than any of the other dozens of towns sprouting up west of the Mississippi. Its only virtue was that it was far enough from the other big towns to seem like more than it was. The buildings Grant had built when he had been in charge were overdone and overly built. He supposed that had been by design.

  No, Dover Station was no different from the other towns Rigg had seen except in one respect. None of them had been controlled by James Grant.

  And by the same time tomorrow, the town would be his once again. Nathan Rigg would see to it personally.

  During one of Grant’s many drunken nights since returning to town, Grant had told Rigg repeatedly that he envisioned Dover Station growing into the ornate buildings he had built. He wanted it to becoming its own city-state, as it were, where no county or state or even federal government would dare question its authority. Let Helena be the capital, but Dover Station would remain the most important city in Montana. “Albany may be the capital of New York,” Grant often slurred at the top of his lungs, “but Manhattan is its power. Dover Station is destined for the same greatness.”

  Nathan Rigg had been a soldier and an officer long enough to understand that power did not come from places or things. It came from men who knew how to wield it. And no number of fancy buildings could ever change that.

  James Grant had envisioned himself to be one of those men. He claimed the only difference between him and Frazier Rice or Silas Van Dorn or Carnegie or Morgan was money and position. Judge Forester may have taken a large chunk of his fortune, but not all of it. Barely a third. And Grant remained confident that Rigg and the men he had brought with him, combined with the Hancock family, would be enough to help him regain the town that had been taken from him.

  But Rigg knew Grant had lost far more than his position. His run-in with Mackey had cost him his mind. He was already beaten but had just enough money to convince himself otherwise for now.

  J. D. Rhoades may have washed his hands of his client, citing the fact that Grant’s delusions made it difficult for him to continue to take the man’s money. If Grant was intent on wasting his money, Rigg saw no reason why he should not take as much of it as Grant was willing to part with. Nathan Rigg had always considered himself a practical man.

  Which was why Rigg had tolerated Grant’s drunken ravings, listening dutifully to his nightly assurances that a single bullet would set the wheels of progress in motion that would return his fortunes to him once again. And when the calamity settled, he would regain his rightful place as the man in charge of Dover Station.

  Rigg had nothing to lose in finding out if Grant might be right. It was far from a gamble on his part. His deal with Grant was for forty percent of every new enterprise in town. He had already been paid handsomely for his alliance with Grant, so if the Grand Plan worked, all the better. Grant may have lost his mind, but his plan was surprisingly sound.

  Rigg knew that after he took the fatal shot, Front Street would descend into chaos. No one would notice him in the panic as he slipped out the back door of the Municipal Building, out through the secret back stairs behind the bookcase Grant had built for himself in the mayor’s office.

  Rigg certainly was not concerned about Chief Edison or his men. They were already positioned too far up Front Street to reach the building in time before he escaped. And even if someone happened to see him run from the building, which was a distinct possibility, he would have a saloon full of witnesses at The Ruby who would swear Rigg had been there the entire time.

  The fact that every witness would be a Hancock man would seem convenient to some, but would stand up in any court in the land.

  Not that anyone would be making any arrests immediately after Rigg had accomplished his mission, for the assassination was only the first part of Grant’s Grand Plan. The second part would come later that night, during something that Grant called the “Purification.”

  Rigg looked out at the crowd of revelers again. Every square inch of Front Street was filled with spectators jealously guarding their tiny piece of real estate to watch that blowhard Mackey take the oath of office.

  Rigg, for his part, was glad of it. He had always been a frustrated showman. He had often wondered if he might have been successful had he followed his fellow Virginian John Wilkes Booth in a career upon the stage.

  He only hoped his assassination would be just as obvious but, unlike Booth, end in anonymity.

  The crowd below stirred and rose to a roar as Brendan Mackey, Doc Ridley, and Chief Steve Edison walked out of the Municipal Building and ascended to the stage. That Yankee popinjay Paul Bishop was with them, too. That was no surprise. Dover Station belonged to his company lock, stock, and barrel. He had no doubt Brendan Mackey would be in his pocket, too, if he was not already.

  He would not be there long.

  Rigg ducked once more behind the balustrade of the turret. He held his rifle loose and listened for the precise moment when the ceremony began.

  Then he would strike.

  And the new Dover Station would begin to be born.

  * * *

  Jerry Halstead eyed the crowd from his spot on the jailhouse porch. He had done a good job of keeping the porch clear of spectators in general but allowed some of the smaller kids to climb all over it in the hopes of getting a good look at the platform. He doubted any of them cared what was going on, much less understood what was happening. But it was something to see, and kids always liked to be part of things.

/>   With his Winchester on his shoulder, Jerry was glad to see Chief Edison had spread his men around the fringes of the group. The deputies Edison could trust were closer to the platform. He had made sure the Hancock deputies were farther back and on the edges. No sense in tempting fate. The rivalry between the Hancocks and the Mackeys was becoming the stuff of local legend. What better way to cement a legend than taking a shot at their rival’s old man as he was sworn in as mayor?

  But Jerry had seen enough Hancock men shoot to know they would probably miss even if they were standing right next to them. But they were a mean and stupid bunch, and sometimes, that was enough to put a man down. He was sure Walter Underhill would have attested to that had he still been aboveground.

  His killing of a Hancock man at the station a week ago had not won him any friends among the clan, but they had given him plenty of space in the days since. He figured one of them might make a run at him today once the whiskey started pouring and family pride took hold.

  Jerry looked to the platform when the crowd began to cheer. Pappy, Doc Ridley, Mr. Bishop, and Chief Edison were walking down the stone steps of the Municipal Building and making their way to the platform.

  Pappy looked as proud as a Mexican general. His black morning coat buffeted in the cool breeze blowing along Front Street. Only the white sash he wore with the word “Mayor” stitched into it kept it closed. He had to hold on to his black top hat to keep the wind from carrying it away.

  He was glad the town committee had decided against having the stage in front of the Municipal Building. It had to be the gaudiest building Jerry Halstead had ever seen. The round turrets on the corners and the balustrades atop it made it look more like a castle than an office building. Maybe that had been Grant’s idea when he had built it? A king surveying his kingdom from his castle.