by J. T. Edson
‘Nothing’s changed,’ the Major confirmed. ‘Rita and Ranse will get you to Polveroso City and Jubal will fetch Mark there.’
‘Jubal and Lightning, or maybe it should be the other way round,’ supplemented Sergeant Mark Scrapton, who had also selected his sobriquet as having been one favored by his equally famous maternal grandfather, 62 jerking his right thumb to where the bluetick was lying on the ground to all appearances asleep. ‘There now, “Rapido”, didn’t I tell you’s how I always get the better class of company?’
‘I’d be the last to be giving you any “ar-grew-ment” about that, young “Comanch’”,’ Sergeant Jubal Branch drawled. ‘Only, when you gets to be my age and “wisder-imum”, which ain’t “espesh-tically” like’ to “heaven-trate” less’n you right soon change your sinful ways, you’ll know a whole heap better’n say such afore you’ve had your breakfast cooked by the other company.’
‘Much as I hate to admit it, but I agree with Jubal,’ the girl put in and, knowing something of the reddish haired Texan’s culinary tastes, she continued with an almost angelic innocence, ‘Isn’t it lucky we’ve remembered to bring plenty of tomatoes to mix with everything, Ranse?’
‘It surely is, Rita,’ Sergeant Ranse Smith agreed, being equally aware of Scrapton’s antipathy where that particular vegetable was concerned. ‘But this is the first time I’ve seen them used with hominy grits.’
‘You’ll notice you didn’t get warned until after you’d been let make a fool of yourself, “Comanch’”,’ Alvin Fog remarked, just as cognizant that his companion was very partial to hominy grits. ‘Which’s just about what you’d expect from an ornery old lawman.’
Watching and listening to the conversation, Major Tragg felt relieved. Circumstances had compelled him to put the two young men through what must have been a harrowing and very traumatic experience. From all appearances, they were satisfied that what they were helping to do was necessary and unavoidable and they were not being plagued by pangs of misguided conscience. Even if there had been any lingering doubts amongst those in the know, this latest and, by far, most difficult assignment which they had brought to a successful conclusion proved they were both worthy members of the Texas Rangers’ newly formed, specialized and secret Company “Z”.
Fifteen – In Explanation
Only a few people in Texas were aware of the existence of Company “Z” Even less were informed about the special and clandestine duties it had been formed to carry out. Its men were the pick of the Texas Rangers, mostly officers with considerable experience in all branches of the duties performed by that organization and of law breakers throughout the Lone Star State. As they were all familiar figures to members of the underworld, however, a few younger men were enrolled whose connection with law enforcement in general and the Texas Rangers in particular was not known. 63
The events leading up to the unofficial, though completely justified, hanging of Philip “Handsome Phil” Foote was the kind of assignment Company “Z” was created to perform.
Having studied the evidence, on learning that the gang leader—whose life up to that point had been far from blameless, although nothing could ever be proven in a court of law—had engaged Reece Mervyn to conduct his defense, Major Benson Tragg had suspected the specialized services of Company “Z” might be required to ensure justice was done. Although it was certain Foote was guilty as charged, knowing the attorney had contrived to win cases for other clients of equal culpability, he had been determined that the gang leader would pay the appropriate penalty no matter what verdict the jury could be cajoled or compelled to bring. Furthermore, he had promised himself that—should Foote be found not guilty as a result of legal skullduggery—he would try to ensure that Mervyn would be made to suffer and, at the very least, lose some of the revenue acquired as a result of the miscarriage of justice.
The Major had been in Forth Worth on an assignment with members of Company “Z” when the arrest of Foote had taken place. Unfortunately, the case upon which they were engaged and a certain amount of rivalry on the part of the chief of the Dallas Police Department had prevented them from intervening before the essential witnesses were killed, injured, or scared off. Accepting that other means must be found to ensure justice prevailed, Tragg had taken advantage of the delay in deciding upon a suitable venue for the trial. By the time that the choice had been made, he and his men were ready to deal with the, situation which they anticipated yet hoped would not arise.
From the beginning, the Major had displayed the tactical genius and ability to make the most of whatever was offered by circumstances, which explained why he had been chosen to command Company “Z”. Without waiting for the trial to begin, even though he had hoped the need to put them into effect would not arise, he had commenced formulating plans to cope with the contingencies he was anticipating.
The production during the trial of the hitherto unmentioned Seth Chiverton and Irvin Schulman, to give their ‘evidence’ on Foote’s behalf, had been the deciding factor so far as Tragg was concerned. Although the attorney for the prosecution had been unable to disprove their testimony, due to the way in which Mervyn had had them coached and the apparent credibility of the story they were given to account for their participation, the Major decided that—outside the witness box, at any rate—they could prove to be the weak link in the defense. Believing they could be induced to supply proof beyond any shadow of a doubt of Foote’s guilt, which was vitally necessary before the intended operation could be set into motion, he had made preparations to have this obtained. Furthermore, by the kind of coincidence no writer of fiction would dare include in a novel, he had been aware of how they might be punished for their perjury if there was no way of having this done legally.
Having hunted on numerous occasions with Judge Robert J. McCrindle, the Major was conversant with the geography of Marlin and Falls County. He had put this knowledge to use when laying his plans. Aided by a certain amount of good luck and considerable foresight in anticipating how the opposition would react, the various parts of the operation had gone smoothly and produced all that was required of them.
While Sergeant Jubal Branch had been watching the room at the Brendon Hotel occupied by Simeon Oakes on the last day of the trial, he had not been the real subject of the surveillance. Being aware that his specialized military service was a matter of public knowledge, Tragg had made sure that Foote learned of the Winchester Model of 1876 rifle he had brought with him in what he believed to have been secrecy. As was anticipated, Butch Cope had noticed his absence from the courtroom and, little realizing that a trap had been laid, had gone to carry out the instructions given by the gang leader.
The elderly peace officer and Sergeant Carlos Franco were occupying a room at the Brendon Hotel, on the opposite side of the passage to that of the bereaved father. On Cope’s arrival, the knife and lock pick he was carrying had implied he was not intending to restrict himself to just verbal dissuasion. 64 However, before he could effect an entrance, Branch had approached silently and undetected from behind to render him unconscious with a blow from a sap. Chloroform applied by the Chicano peace officer, who had earlier played an essential role in another part of the operation, had ensured Cope remained in that condition until he could be used for the furtherance of the Major’s plan. The money and property taken from him to create the impression he had been the victim of a robbery, a pretense he was willing to accept rather than chance having his reasons for being at the hotel questioned, had been delivered later and anonymously to the offertory box of the local church. Leaving Franco to attend to the gangster, Branch had used the lock pick to gain admittance and, aided by his inseparable companion, Lightning, kept Oakes from committing what would have been a serious breach of the law.
Being led to believe that Foote had contrived to avoid traveling in their company, the suspicions of Chiverton and Schulman had been aroused before they were taken out of the courthouse. The shots were fired to narrowly miss and frighten them
by Sergeant David Swift-Eagle and Sergeant Alexandre ‘Frenchie’ Giradot, who had been allowed to use the judge’s house ostensibly to keep watch for and prevent any genuine attempts at assassination. The two peace officers had then collected Cope from the Brendon Hotel. Due to the majority of the population being outside the front of the courthouse, they had delivered him to the parking lot unobserved and in a manner which conveyed the impression of his complicity in the shooting. Although the intervention of Chiverton had saved, them from being open to a charge of perjury, Schulman’s almost completed comment had been sufficient to establish Foote’s guilt to the satisfaction of Major Tragg. It had also been enough for him to order the arrangements for their punishment to be implemented.
Not only had the Major served during the Great War with the father of one of the girls made pregnant by ‘the Wisenheimer and the Dummy’ in their days as burlesque entertainers, but he and the man’s employer—now a prosperous rancher—had been friends for a number of years. They had, in fact, been officers in the same regiment and fought with the American Expeditionary Force in Europe. It had been Tragg, with the support of the employer, 65 who had prevented the father from taking violent reprisals on learning what had happened to the girls. However, knowing all his men would be fully occupied elsewhere and unavailable, he had decided to let the intended punishment take place. It would be so belated that, with there being so many other irate parents who had cause to carry it out, the chances of the victims guessing who was responsible would be minimized.
Using Franco as an ‘anonymous’ intermediary, the Major had had his friend notified that the errant pair would be taken to Texarkana in a way which offered an opportunity for the reprisals. The Chicano peace officer had made the telephone call which informed the waiting party of the kind of vehicle to watch for, so there would be no mistakes in laying the ‘trap’. Tragg had no doubt that, being a man of honor and otherwise law abiding, his. friend would take precautions to ensure the escort would not be harmed. Furthermore, Sergeant Colin Breda and Sergeant Aloysius ‘Paddy’ Bratton had known what to expect. On being ‘captured’, they had contrived to let the onus for them having surrendered without fighting fall upon their prisoners. Arranging for Chiverton and Schulman to be compelled to inflict the whipping upon one another had been the sergeants’ idea, but their superior had expressed his approval when informed of what they had done.
As the employer and the father—who was segundo on his ranch—were prominent in the cattle business, they had taken the precaution of wearing hoods to conceal their identity. Being less well known, the Negro had agreed to let his face be seen as he played the part of the diner’s colored fry-cook in case the peace officers were aware such a person existed. Not that he had had anything to fear. Breda and Bratton had been deliberately vague when describing him to the sheriff of Limestone County. Nor, on being informed of the circumstances, was that official inclined to expend too much energy and effort in trying to catch those who were involved. As the father of three young daughters, he considered whoever had committed the offense was justified and he conducted only a token investigation before announcing they had eluded him and left the area of his jurisdiction.
While the efforts of Company “Z” had established that Foote was guilty and had caused the pair whose false testimony had saved him to suffer although the law could not have touched them so long as they refused to admit they had lied under oath) the affair was far from being over. Even if they had confessed to committing perjury, the rule of ‘double jeopardy’ would still have prevented the gang leader from being taken back to court to face for a second time the charges of which he had been acquitted.
There had been no chance involved in the decision that Foote was not to be taken directly to Texarkana and await the trial for the non-existent bootlegging. It was made in advance and with the aid of the wave of adverse publicity in the newspapers which Mervyn had instigated. Doing as Tragg requested without asking questions, 66 the Attorney General had brought pressure to bear on the heads of every law enforcement agency in the State. They in turn had passed it on, via their subordinates, to the discomfiture of the criminal element. 67 By exaggerating the amount of resentment and hostility this was creating, the Major had had his suggestion accepted that the State Prison Farm at Jonestown would be the safest place in which to keep Foote away from any vengeance being contemplated by disgruntled members of the underworld. 68
To give the attorney credit, he had intended to have the precautionary escort for his client on the journey to—he assumed—Texarkana carried out by his confidential clerk. However—knowing he had made a similar arrangement on other occasions—Tragg had not only been ready to counter the move, he had used it to make Foote susceptible to the explanation of its absence given by Sergeant Benjamin ‘Benny’ Goldberg and Sergeant Hans ‘Dutchy’ Soehnen.
Like his employer, Wilfred Plant was not averse to dalliance with attractive members of the opposite sex. Luring him away from his vehicle so the rotor arm could be removed by Franco had been easy. The bait was Rita Yarborough, wearing a long platinum blonde wig and suitably revealing attire. Using the name ‘Rita Ansell’, she had first become involved with Company “Z” during its members’ second official ‘unofficial’ assignment. This had been to bring a dishonest financier back to the United States, in spite of his having acquired Mexican citizenship which rendered him immunity from legal extradition. 69 He had been responsible for the murder of her parents and the courage and determination she had displayed while trying to avenge them, believing the law could not, had led to her enrolment as an active—if honorary and not officially registered—member of the Company.
Having dealt competently with the matter of delaying Plant’s departure, Rita had helped to inflict a well-deserved punishment upon his employer. Ably supported by Sergeant Ranse Smith, the most recent official recruit to Company “Z”, who was also wearing a disguise—including a coir padded ‘paunch’ which helped stave off the effects of the blow to the stomach delivered by Mervyn—and behaved in a most convincing fashion as the outraged, if dull-witted ‘husband’, she had set up the situation in the parking lot of the Palace Hotel. Such was the consummate skill with which both had played their parts, the attorney never suspected the true state of affairs. In addition, not only had she prevented the clerk from raising the alarm on his inopportune arrival, but she had helped with the exterior damage to Mervyn’s Packard which had been done in the woodland where it was abandoned. This, added to the destruction of the engine resulting from the iron filings and sugar poured respectively into the oil sump and gasoline tank by her companion prior to leaving the parking lot, had reduced the vehicle to little better than a wreck.
So thoroughly had Rita and the giant young Texan carried out their instructions that—as Branch had later surmised—the replacement of the Packard, added to the cost of his medical and dental treatment, left Mervyn with very little of the fee he had received for obtaining the acquittal of a man he had known from the beginning was guilty of rape and murder.
Satisfying and justified though the treatment accorded to the attorney and, inadvertently, Plant had been, it was Foote who ranked as the primary object of Company “Z”’s attentions. They were all in complete agreement with their commanding officer’s determination to ensure that the gang leader was made to pay the full penalty for his crimes, regardless of the verdict forced upon the jury due to the connivance of Mervyn. Knowing of the lax conditions prevailing in the State Prison Farm at Jonestown, Tragg had been confident that arranging for the execution to be carried out and, even more important, the escape of those involved could be accomplished.
Of Company “Z”, with the exception of Smith—who was required to perform other duties—only Sergeants Alvin Dustine Fog and Mark Scrapton could hope to enter the Farm without running the risk of being identified as a peace officer by either a member of the staff or an inmate. All the others had served with distinction as Texas Rangers for long enough to be well known in
their official capacity. However, neither had had any experience in carrying out an execution and the Major was aware of the problems which might arise if they attempted to do so. 70 Realizing the same objections applied as those which prevented the more senior of his officers from going to the Farm, where employing one of the professional executioners who were active in the Lone Star State was concerned, Tragg had brought in a friend who served in such a capacity in Montana.
Arriving after the trial had commenced, Jason Byron Macauley Farringdon had joined his two young assistants and they had waited at the dilapidated empty ranch house for the Major to give them the order to commence. While they were doing so, as a precaution against him being recognized by somebody at the Farm who might have made his acquaintance elsewhere, Farringdon had made changes to his appearance. On receiving the go-ahead, using a car—its license plates changed—which belonged to Company “Z” and supplied with the necessary means of establishing his ‘identity’, he had arrived at the Farm in the guise of a United States marshal transporting two desperate and dangerous prisoners.
The rest of the case has already been recorded.
Philip “Handsome Phil” Foote had contrived to escape the meshes of the legal system, using the loopholes which were created by the rules intended to protect the innocent!
Company “Z” had seen that justice was done and he paid the penalty for the crime!
About the Author
J.T. Edson was a former British Army dog-handler who wrote more than 130 Western novels, accounting for some 27 million sales in paperback. Edson’s works - produced on a word processor in an Edwardian semi at Melton Mowbray - contain clear, crisp action in the traditions of B-movies and Western television series. What they lack in psychological depth is made up for by at least twelve good fights per volume. Each portrays a vivid, idealized “West That Never Was”, at a pace that rarely slackens.