by Matt Braun
“Are you not known as a shootist, Mr. Holliday? A professional gunman?”
“I am a professional gambler, Mr. Sanchez. Nothing more nor less.”
Sanchez sniffed. “I have no further questions of this … witness.”
“Very well,” the judge said. “Anyone you want to call, Mr. Holliday?”
“Yes, there is, Your Honor. Thank you most kindly.”
Holliday briefly questioned two witnesses. Jim O’Farrel recounted that the deceased had manhandled one of his employees yesterday afternoon, and how he’d thrown him out. The bartender, Johnny McNamara, testified that he had witnessed the shooting through the shattered window. He substantiated Holliday’s version of the incident. Mike Gordon had fired first.
Lila Foster was then called to the stand. After she was seated, Holliday positioned himself so that she was facing the judge. “You were formerly the companion of the deceased. For how long, Miss Foster?”
“Almost three years.”
“What was his vocation?”
She looked confused. “Vocation?”
“His occupation.”
“Oh.” She sat erect. “Mike was a thimblerigger. Anything with a con to it, that was his game.”
Holliday nodded. “A swindler often finds himself in a tight fix. Was Gordon ever caught out?”
“Yes.”
“How did he respond?”
Her eyes dropped. “Mike was only caught twice. Once in Leadville and again in Denver. He murdered both men.”
“Were you a witness to these murders, Miss Foster?”
“Oh, no, I never got involved in Mike’s schemes. But he liked to brag when he got drunk, and both men turned up dead. They were shot in the back.”
“I see,” Holliday said solemnly. “So it would be fair to characterize Mike Gordon as a man with a violent temper?”
“That’s the reason I left him. I got tired of him beating on me.”
“Were you ever in fear of your life?”
“All the time,” she said, tears puddling her eyes. “He was a cold-blooded killer. He enjoyed it.”
Holliday gave her his handkerchief. “You are a brave young lady, Lila. No more questions.”
Judge Hough rendered his decision without deliberation. He declared the death of Mike Gordon, at the hands of John H. Holliday, a justifiable homicide. No charges were to be pressed, and he ordered the books closed on the case. He dismissed the court with a bang of his gavel.
Outside the courtroom, O’Farrel fell in beside Holliday. “Congratulations, Doc. You ought to have been a lawyer.”
“Practice makes perfect.” Holliday took a slug from his flask. “I regret to say that wasn’t my first time before the bar of justice.”
“Well, your luck’s running strong. Won the Occidental and cleared yourself of a hanging offense. You’re on a roll.”
“Not one of my choosing. How would you like to have the Occidental back?”
“Like it fine,” O’Farrel said. “But I’m just as broke today as I was yesterday.”
“I have a solution,” Holliday told him. “I’ll take forty thousand of what I won, and you keep the rest to run the club. I retain a quarter interest until you’ve paid me another fifty thousand. Sound fair?”
“Hell, it’s more than fair, Doc. But I’m confounded why you’d do it. The Occidental’s a gold mine.”
“I prefer a simpler life, no entanglements. Do we have a deal?”
“Damn right!” O’Farrel said boisterously. “I’ll pay you off in no time.”
“I’m sure you will, Jim.”
Holliday felt he’d won and lost and won again. The burden of last night, operating a gaming parlor, was the euphoria of today. All at a tidy profit.
By its vagaries, he told himself, life was the clown prince of jesters. And all the rest a joke.
CHAPTER 34
The stagecoach rolled to a dust-smothered halt at the Wells Fargo station. The driver set the foot brake with a hard kick and looped the reins around the lever. He leaned over the side with a raspy shout.
“All out for Prescott!”
Holliday was the first passenger to alight from the coach. After stretching his legs, he dusted himself off and walked to the luggage boot. He fished out a match, waiting for his steamer trunk to be unloaded, and lit a cigarillo. Puffing smoke, he hooked his thumbs in his vest and scanned the street. All around him was a tableau of bedlam.
Prescott was located in central Arizona. The town twisted through a pine-forested valley along Granite Creek, at an elevation of a mile high. Looming northward were the Santa Maria Mountains, and to the south were the peaks of the Weaver Mountains. Wagons drawn by oxen clogged the street, and the shouted curses of bullwhackers intermingled with the pop of their whips. The boardwalks were thronged with men, and the uproarious commotion of a mining camp pervaded the town. There was a sense of maddened revelry about the milling crowds.
A week ago, having tired of following the end-of-track railheads, Holliday had decided to try another mining camp. He recalled that Wyatt Earp’s brother, Virgil, was the marshal in Prescott, and he’d booked passage for Arizona Territory. Once the decision was made, he was eager to be on his way, and he had settled his interest in the Las Vegas gaming dive for fifty cents on the dollar. The next day he had boarded a stage that took him from New Mexico on a winding route through the westward mountains. Folded in his money belt were cash and bank drafts for more than ninety thousand dollars, and he felt an itch to gamble. He thought Prescott had the look of a camp that would attract high rollers.
The weather was blustery, with low clouds framed against the distant mountains. Holliday marked the date at October 16 as a handyman from the stagecoach line loaded his trunk onto a cart. The finest hotel in town was the Mount Tritle, and he engaged a suite with a handsomely appointed sitting room. He arranged for a suit to be pressed while a galvanized tub and buckets of hot water were brought to his suite. The trip westward had been tiring, and he lazed around in the tub for the better part of an hour. A shave with a splash of bay rum made him feel like a new man.
Shortly before dusk Holliday emerged from the hotel. With directions from the desk clerk, he walked upstreet toward the town marshal’s office. He was curious to meet Virgil, the eldest of the Earp brothers, and reportedly a lawman of Wyatt’s stature. As he moved along the boardwalk, he noted several banks, and a newspaper, and the territorial capitol building at the far end of the street. The business district was closing for the night, but a steady stream of men on foot and on horseback were headed for the lower part of town. He suspected the sporting district was in that direction.
The marshal’s office was in a wide frame building, with jail cells beyond a partition at the rear. As Holliday came through the door, a man looked up from behind a desk, his features bathed in the glow of a lamp. The family resemblance was striking, and there was no question that he was a member of the Earp clan. He was stoutly built, a solid six-footer, with hard eyes and a sweeping handlebar mustache. His expression was one of quiet resolve, and he looked to be in his middle thirties. A Colt six-gun was holstered high on his hip.
“Help you with something?”
“Yes, I believe so,” Holliday said with an amiable smile. “Unless I’m mistaken, you must be Virgil Earp.”
“You have me at a disadvantage, Mr.—?”
“Holliday. John Holliday. Wyatt has told me a great deal about you.”
Virgil’s eyes narrowed. “Doc Holliday?”
“I answer to that name as well.”
“Wyatt’s told me about you, too. Leastways, what could be put in a letter.”
“Nothing too unfavorable, I trust.” Holliday extended his hand. “A pleasure to meet you at last.”
Virgil rose from his chair. His handshake was firm, and dry. “What brings you to Prescott?”
“A gambler travels wherever there’s action. I hear good things about your town.”
“We have our share of high rollers.�
�
Holliday sensed something less than a welcome in the other man’s manner. He was accustomed to a cool, and sometimes hostile, reception from peace officers. But he had expected more from the brother of Wyatt Earp.
“Let me put your mind at rest,” he said. “I am not here to presume on my friendship with your brother. I merely thought to introduce myself.”
Virgil hesitated, then gestured aimlessly. “Wyatt wrote me how you’d saved his life with them Texans. So I’ll give you more leeway than I would most gambling men.” He paused, his jawline tight. “But you kill anybody, I won’t bend the law to save your neck.”
“Nor would I expect special treatment of any sort. I will endeavor not to be a bother.”
“Just wanted to clear the air.” Virgil motioned him to a chair. “Guess you haven’t heard the latest about Wyatt. He’s on his way here.”
“Prescott?” Holliday was astounded. “Wyatt’s coming to Prescott?”
“Yeah, I just got the wire day before yesterday. He ought to be here in a couple of weeks.”
“Why would he leave Dodge City? He’s very highly thought of there.”
“Not for me to say.” Virgil’s look became closed. “Wyatt’ ll have to tell you that himself. You never met my other brothers, have you?”
“Morgan and Warren?” Holliday said. “No, I haven’t, even though Wyatt told me a good deal about them. Why do you ask?”
“Well, they’re headed this way, too. Everybody’s supposed to get here toward the end of the month.”
“I recall Wyatt saying they are lawmen, as well.”
“Sort of runs in the family,” Virgil remarked. “Morgan’s the marshal up in Butte, Montana. Warren’s assistant town marshal in Cheyenne.”
Holliday considered why four brothers, all of them lawmen, would gather in one spot. He thought there was more to it than a simple family reunion. But Virgil was clearly reluctant to offer an explanation. He would have to wait for Wyatt’s arrival.
“Quite an occasion,” he said. “All of you together, again.”
“Near as I recollect, it’s been three years, maybe longer. Work kept us pretty much scattered.”
“Has Wyatt resigned his position in Dodge?”
“Like I said, you’ll have to ask him.”
A searing spasm ripped through Holliday’s lungs. He bent forward in a strangled cough, and hawked a clot of bloody waste into his handkerchief. After returning the handkerchief to his pocket, he unstoppered his flask and took a long slug. His features pallid, he managed an offhand smile.
“I do not recommend stage travel in Arizona Territory. God never meant man to breathe dust.”
Virgil looked unconvinced. “Wyatt told me about your condition. You need to see a sawbones?”
“Thank you, no,” Holliday said, returning the flask to his pocket. “I am an enigma to the whole of the medical profession.” His eyes became inquisitive. “Wyatt seems to have given you my life history. I confess I’m surprised.”
“Well—” Virgil faltered, choosing his words. “Wyatt was gonna stop off and see you in Las Vegas. Anyway, that’s what he said in his last letter.”
“How did he know I was in New Mexico?”
“Your name’s a regular thing in the newspapers. Guess folks like to read about a shootist.”
Holliday let the comment pass. “Why was Wyatt planning to stop in Las Vegas?”
“Wanted to talk with you,” Virgil said. “Got a proposition, but that’s all I’ll say. Let him tell you about it.”
“You make it sound … mysterious.”
“I’ve said too much already. It’ll keep-till he gets here.”
“Providence has a strange way of dealing the cards.”
“I don’t follow you.”
“Wyatt would have missed me in Las Vegas. But here I am in Prescott. Perhaps it was fated.”
Virgil shrugged. “I reckon anything’s possible.”
Holliday’s gaze went to the wall behind the desk. A wanted poster on William Bonney, otherwise known as Billy the Kid, caught his eye. Beside it, he saw one on Dave Rudabaugh, and the reward was dead or alive. He knew now where Rudabaugh had gone after their chance meeting in Las Vegas. He wondered if Josh Webb had also joined the Kid’s gang.
“Interesting,” he said, nodding at the poster. “I see Dave Rudabaugh has joined forces with Billy the Kid. A poor choice of company.”
“Damn fool,” Virgil said stolidly. “He should’ve stuck to robbing trains. You know Rudabaugh?”
“Our paths have crossed here and there. I take it you believe cattle rustling to be more dangerous than train robbery?”
“Especially when you ride with the Kid. What he done in the Lincoln County War signed his death warrant. Anybody caught with him will likely get hung.”
“Too bad,” Holliday commented. “Rudabaugh isn’t a killer at heart. He just prefers the outlaw life.”
Virgil searched his face. “Rudabaugh a friend of yours?”
“No, merely an acquaintance. A sporting man meets all kinds. Outlaws included.”
Holliday detected skepticism. He suspected Virgil placed him in the same class as Rudabaugh, or the Kid. For a moment, he toyed with the idea of relating how he’d once put Wyatt on Rudabaugh’s trail. But then, on second thought, he rejected the notion. He saw no reason to justify himself to anyone, or curry favor. He wasn’t yet sure that he even liked Virgil.
“The Kid’s as good as dead,” Virgil said absently. “Lawmen from Arizona to Texas are lookin’ to collect that reward. He’ll more’n likely get shot before anybody has a chance to hang him.”
“Do you know Joshua Webb? He once served as a deputy with Bat Masterson.”
“I don’t place the name. What makes you ask?”
“A matter of curiosity,” Holliday replied. “The last time I saw Rudabaugh, they were partners. I wondered if Webb also enlisted in the Kid’s gang.”
“Well, if he did, that’d be a helluva note. A lawman turned outlaw deserves to have his neck stretched.”
“There is a caprice to some men’s lives. Circumstance often dictates their course.”
“Not to my way of thinkin’,” Virgil said shortly. “A man comes to a fork in the road and he’s got a choice to make. No excuses for them that takes the wrong turn.”
Holliday thought the statement revealing. Virgil had all the earmarks of a puritan, straightlaced and rigid in his views. Unlike Wyatt, he probably never saw both sides of the coin. He sounded intolerant and implacable. A stickler for the rules.
“Well, on to other things,” Holliday said. “Perhaps you could recommend a gaming establishment in Prescott. I prefer high-stakes poker.”
“The Gem’s the best,” Virgil told him. “Any high rollers in town, you’ll find ’em there. Poker, faro, no nevermind.”
“Sounds made to order.”
“Why don’t I walk you over? I’ll introduce you to Harvey Fuller. He owns the place.”
“That’s most kind of you.”
“Least I could do for a friend of Wyatt’s.”
Virgil led him downtown. A civic booster of sorts, he provided a monologue on points of interest along the way. Prescott was settled in the early 1860s, by prospectors who found gold along Granite Creek. In 1863, concerned that the Confederacy would attempt an occupation, President Lincoln granted Arizona territorial status. The town boomed in 1870 when modern technology reduced the cost of extracting ore from gold and silver. The population was now pushing the twenty thousand mark.
“Good town,” Virgil went on. “’Course, we have our troublemakers, like anybody else. But they get the message pretty quick.”
“From the way you say that,” Holliday observed, “I take it troublemakers are treated to a rough time. Do you follow Wyatt’s practice—buffalo them with a pistol barrel?”
“Miners are a lot like cowhands. A few busted heads and everybody starts to toe the line. Got to keep ’em in their place.”
“What wor
ks in Dodge City works in Prescott. Is that it?”
“Or vice versa. I showed Wyatt that buffalo trick a long time ago.”
Holliday accepted the statement at face value. Virgil impressed him as an older, and somewhat tougher, version of Wyatt. He had no doubt that Prescott was run with a no-nonsense attitude, and an iron fist. A troublemaker was almost certainly assured of a busted head.
The sporting district was locally dubbed Whiskey Row. At the lower end of town, along a four-block section, saloons and gambling dens operated beside hurdy-gurdy dance halls and a surprisingly large selection of bordellos. The Gem Saloon & Gaming Parlor was much like a hundred such dives Holliday had seen across the West. The mirror behind the bar was flanked by the ubiquitous nude paintings, with gaming layouts arrayed along the opposite wall. The poker tables were grouped at the rear of the room.
Harvey Fuller, the owner, beamed when Virgil made the introduction. “An honor, Mr. Holliday,” he said grandly. “Your reputation precedes you as a high-stakes player. I’m proud to have you in my establishment.”
“Thank you,” Holliday said. “Marshal Earp tells me there are high rollers aplenty in Prescott.”
“And they all come to the Gem,” Fuller bragged. “Mine owners, ranchers, and of course, our resident politicos. We have a regular clientele from the territorial legislature.”
“I have no objection to playing with politicians. As the saying goes, their money spends.”
“Careful now,” Virgil said, with his first glint of humor. “I got lots of friends up at the capitol. Don’t trim them too hard.”
“Virgil’s quite popular in Prescott,” Fuller said approvingly. “He made our town safe from cutthroats and ruffians. The powers-that-be think very highly of him.”
Holliday smiled. “No public servant will leave my table a sore loser. I have the gift of flattery.”
Virgil and Fuller stared at him a moment. Neither of them were certain whether he was serious, or merely indulging in a jest. Finally, after begging off on a drink, Virgil went on about the business of policing the town. Fuller got Holliday ensconced at a table reserved for high rollers, and quickly spread the word that he was looking for action. His notoriety drew a crowd within the hour.