The Adventures of Bass Reeves Deputy US Marshal

by Charles Ray

  “This is some might fine grub, missus,” he said around a mouthful of beans.

  “Now, that’s what I like to see,” she said. “A man what appreciates his food. Them boys of mine jest pick at their food, and they never say thank you.”

  “They don’t know what a good thing they got. Iffen I had me somebody who cooked like this, I might not’ve ended up on the road facing the wrong end of a rope jest for defendin’ myself.”

  Bass didn’t like lying but found it necessary in order to maintain his disguise as an itinerant on the run. The way the old woman’s eyes lit up, he saw that it was working, too.

  “So, now you done kilt a man—it was your first one, I take it?” He nodded. “You a fugitive now. Ain’t no way you gonna be able to go back with regular folks.”

  He looked at her and tried to look crestfallen.

  “I don’ know nothin’ ‘bout bein’ no outlaw. How I gon’ survive?”

  She waited until he’d sopped up the last of the juice from the beans with the last piece of biscuit before answering him.

  “You right about it bein’ hard to be an outlaw on your own,” she said. “What you need to do is throw in with somebody, become part of a gang.”

  “But, I don’ know nobody here, and I dang sure can’t go back to Arkansas to find anybody.”

  “Well now, I jest might have the answer to your problem.” She smiled. “My boys, Chet and Clint, fancy themselves outlaws. They’s tough enough, but ain’t all that much to talk about in the brains department.” She tapped the side of her head. “You strike me as pretty smart for a colored man, and you done already kilt somebody. If you throwed in with them, they could watch your back, and you could help them out. Way I see it, everybody wins.”

  “I don’ know, missus. What if they don’ wanta me ridin’ with ‘em?”

  She snorted. “Don’t you worry your head ‘bout that. Them boys do what I tell ‘em.”

  “Where is they?”

  “When they left, they said they was ridin’ east and south. They was supposed to be back a week ago, but I ain’t heard nothin’ from ‘em. Reckon they’ll be along pretty soon, though. You kin sleep on a pallet in the corner there by the bed ‘n wait for ‘em, that is, if you’re interested.”

  “Yessum, I sure ‘nuff is interested. They be comin’ home soon, you say?”

  Just then, there was a sharp whistle from somewhere outside the cabin.

  CHAPTER 16

  When Bass looked startled Mabel Barker assured him that was just her sons’ signal to let her know they were back, and if they just sat quietly, they would know it was okay to come out of the trees and enter the cabin.

  When the two men entered the cabin and saw Bass, they immediately dropped the heavy saddle bags they were carrying and went for their weapons, but Mabel stopped them.

  “This here’s, say, what’d you say your name was?”

  “Bennie,” Bass said. “Uh, Bennie Fagan.” His oldest son’s name was the first one that came to mind, and he doubted they knew that much about Marshal Fagan, or if they did, might assume he’d once been a slave to a family named Fagan, which wasn’t an uncommon name in Arkansas and Louisiana.

  “Right. Boys, this here’s Bennie Fagan. He kilt a man down to Anadarko, ‘n he’s on the run from a necktie party.”

  “Where’s his horse?” Chet asked.

  “It done got shot from under me,” Bass said.

  “So, you take off and come here, mebbe leadin’ a posse to our house?”

  “Naw, I’se headin’ east when they shot my horse. I run into the woods ‘n cut back. Jest run ‘cross this road by accident ‘n found your house.”

  “Did you really kill a man jest by hittin’ him up side the head?” Clint asked. Unlike Chet, who viewed the newcomer with suspicion, Clint was fascinated to meet someone who’d actually killed another person.

  “Yeah, ‘fraid I did,” Bass said. “I didn’t mean to do it, but I was mad that he’d bottom dealt on me, and then had the nerve to go for his weapon. If I hadna hit him, he’d of kilt me.”

  “I’ve been thinking,” Mabel said. “You two boys would do a lot better if you had some help. Mebbe Bennie here could join up with you.”

  “I don’t know, ma,” Chet said. “We didn’t do too bad this time.” He picked up one of the saddle bags and opened it. “We got us two bags fulla silver dollars, some cash, ‘n a buncha horses that oughta fetch a good price.”

  At the sight of the glittering coins, the old woman’s eyes lit up. She put her hands on her hips.

  “Bet you had some trouble gittin’ it all here, didn’t you?”

  “Yeah, a bit,” Clint said.

  “Set yer trap, Clint.” Chet glared at his brother and then looked at Bass.

  “Tell me, Bennie, if that’s even yer real name, you think you kin do better ‘n this?”

  “I s’pose it depends,” Bass said. “How long’d it take you to pile all this up?”

  “Yeah, Chet,” his mother said. “Tell ‘im how long you two was gone.”

  Chet’s cheeks reddened and he looked down at the floor.

  “Well, I reckon it did take a spell. But, we had a few problems early on. Got ‘em sorted out in the end, though.”

  Bass looked at the coins and remembered the empty strongbox in the road near the stagecoach.

  “You fellas robbed a stagecoach or a mail wagon?” he asked.

  “Both,” Clint said. “But, the mail wagon didn’t have nothin’ but mail. That there stagecoach, though—”

  Chet punched his shoulder. “How many times I gotta tell you to keep your trap shut?”

  “It don’ take genius to figger out what you done,” Bass said. “That many silver coins, it had to be one or t’other.”

  “You see what I mean,” Mabel said. “If you two had been usin’ your heads, you’d of gone after a stagecoach or a mail wagon first off, or even a bank. Bet you robbed a general store.”

  “Naw, ma,” Clint said. “It was a livery stable.”

  Chet rolled his eyes. “At least we got some good horses out of that.”

  Mabel shook her head.

  “No doubt about it. You two need help. I think Bennie here’s just the ticket.”

  “Tell you what,” Chet said. “We’ll sleep on it ‘n tell you in the mornin’, how’s that?”

  Mabel opened her mouth to say something, but Bass cut her off.

  “That’s a good idea,” he said. “Ain’t a good idea to make important decisions without thinkin’ on ‘em a spell.”

  Hands on her hips, Mabel snorted. “Well, I reckon it don’t hurt to think on it. Bennie, you kin sleep in the corner yonder like I said.”

  “Say, ma,” Clint said. “We ain’t had grub since this mornin’. You got any beef and beans left?”

  “I could use a cup of your coffee myself,” Chet said. “Ain’t had a decent cup since we left home.”

  CHAPTER 17

  During the meal, Mabel Barker continued to harangue her sons. Under his mother’s relentless barrage, Chet finally gave in and said he’d do it. Clint had already decided that he liked the idea, probably, Bass thought, because of his story about killing a man. He kept a close eye on the younger brother, who he suspected was a few cards shy of a full deck.

  After supper, they sat around the sitting room drinking coffee—Bass passed on the coffee, claiming that it kept him awake, and drank water instead—and talking about what they’d do later, with Clint doing most of the talking, while Bass and Chet, who, for some strange reason had bonded over supper, looking at each other and rolling their eyes when he came up with a particularly outrageous idea. Mabel Barker sat across from them in a rocking chair, smiling and nodding occasionally.

  Finally, when the two brothers began yawning, and Mabel looked like she might fall asleep and fall of her chair, they decided to turn in. Mabel went off to her room, the brothers pulled off their boots and fell into their beds, and Bass wrapped himself in a tattered blanket and lay do
wn in the corner near the beds.

  But, he didn’t go to sleep. He lay there on his side, his eyes half closed, watching the two men lying across their beds on their backs, still wearing the dusty clothing they’d arrived in.

  He lay there quietly until the sound of two saws cutting through hard wood rent the stillness of the room. Just to be sure, he waited a few minutes, but from the way the two sounded, they were as sound asleep as they could be.

  Bass threw off the blanket and rose quietly. From his coat, that he’d kept on the whole evening, he took two pairs of handcuffs. He moved to the first bed. In the little moonlight that filtered through the curtains he could see Chet Barker, still on his back, his mouth open, snoring away. He touched the man’s wrist, but the outlaw didn’t move, so he slipped one end of the cuffs over the wrist, the other to the bedpost. Moving around the bed, he repeated the operation on Clint, who also wasn’t aroused when he put the cuffs on.

  Satisfied that they wouldn’t be able to get out of the cuffs, or out of the cabin, without waking him, Bass went back to the blanket, wrapped himself, and fell asleep.

  He woke up, as he usually did, just before sunup. The Barker boys were still asleep, still sprawled on their backs, and still snoring.

  He rose, removed his badge from behind his lapel and pinned it to the front of his coat, and opened the coat to get at his Peacemakers. He then walked to a spot between the beds and nudged, first, Chet, and then, Clint.

  “Okay, fellas, time to git up,” he said. “We got us a way to travel, and we gon’ be walkin’.”

  CHAPTER 18

  “Wha-,” Chet Barker tried sitting up, but couldn’t make it all the way because his wrist was hooked to the bedpost at his head. “Why’m I chained to my bed. What the hell’s goin’ on?”

  The noise woke Clint, who, when he couldn’t sit up, craned his neck and rolled his eyes toward the bedpost to which his wrist was hooked.

  “Wha’s goin’ on, Chet?” he asked.

  “We chained to our bed, you ninny. Can’t you see that?”

  “I see it, but how’d we git tied up like this?”

  “That was my doin’, boys,” Bass said, pointing one of his Peacemakers at Chet Barker’s face.

  “Why’n the heck you do that, Bennie,” Chet said. “I thought we was gonna throw in together.”

  Bass jabbed his left thumb toward the badge on his coat.

  “That won’t be possible, friend, and my name ain’t Bennie, by the way. I’m Bass Reeves, deputy marshal out of Fort Smith, Arkansas, and I got me a warrant for your arrest for stealin’. Now, I’m gon’ let you loose one at a time so I can cuff both your hands. Don’ make no funny moves, ‘cause this close I couldn’t miss you if I had my eyes closed.”

  Chet’s eyes never left the black circle of Bass’s revolver barrel aimed right between them as Bass, with his left hand, unlocked the bracelet from the bedpost and affixed it to his free hand, cuffing him with his hands in front.

  “Now, git yer boots on ‘n don’ try nothin’ funny while I gits your brother,” he said.

  Clint, still in a daze, offered no resistance as Bass repeated the process. When his hands were cuffed like his brother, he leaned over to get his boots before Bass had to tell him to.

  “Why you doin’ this, Ben-, er, deputy? Ma invited you into our house ‘n fed you. This ain’t no way to respond.”

  “I’m mighty appreciative of your ma’s hospitality, but I got my duty. You two done broke the law ‘n you got to pay for your crimes. Now, git up and head for the door. I want to get out of here ‘fore your ma wakes up.”

  “He got a point there, Chet,” Clint said. “Ma’s gonna be mad as a wet hen we let ‘im git the drop on us like this. After she skins him, she’s likely to do the same to us.”

  The frightened look in the older man’s eyes told Bass that he was more afraid of his mother than he was of Bass’s weapon. All the more reason, he thought, to get a move on.

  The three moved as quietly as it’s possible to move across an uneven wood floor wearing boots. The door creaked when they eased it open, and all three froze for a few seconds, but when no sound came from the back room, Bass prodded them to move out.

  They had walked just over a hundred yards down the road from the cabin when they heard the door bang open, followed by, “Where in Sam hell you think you three’s goin’?” Mabel Barker shouted in a voice that would have won first place in a hog calling contest.

  The two brothers turned, and their faces went pale when they saw their mother standing in the door with a shotgun in her hands.

  “We’d better walkin’ a bit faster, deputy,” Chet said. “She’s likely to start blastin’ with that scatter gun, ‘n it’s loaded with double-ought buck.”

  “She wouldn’t take a chance of shootin’ you two,” Bass said.

  Clint rolled his eyes. “You don’t know our ma, deputy. Right now, she sounds so mad, she’s jest likely to shoot us first .”

  “Well then, we’d best be walkin’ a bit faster, boys.”

  They picked up the pace. Bass kept looking back over his shoulder. The old woman couldn’t match their pace, but she was huffing along behind them, waving the shotgun and cursing up a blue streak. Some of the names she called him he’d never heard before.

  “How far we gotta walk, deputy?” Chet asked.

  “I reckon ‘bout 28 miles, ‘n with your ma chasin’ us, we ain’t gon’ git no chance to stop ‘n rest,” Bass said.

  They kept it up for another two hours, and the gap between them and Mabel Barker kept getting wider. Finally, she stopped in the middle of the road and sat down, holding the shotgun on her lap. Even from over a hundred yards, though, and after following them for nearly three miles, her voice was still strong.

  “You black scalawag,” she said. “Iffen you ever come back this way, I’m gonna skin you and hang your hide on my wall, you hear me. ‘N, as for you two good-for-nothin’ spawn of a drunken fool, you ain’t my sons no more. You’re useless, you hear me, useless. Leavin’ a poor old women up here in the woods all by herself. What’m I gonna do?”

  “I feel kinda sorry for her,” Bass said.

  “Don’t you fret none ‘bout ma,” Chet said. “She’s tougher’n all three of us put together. She’ll get along jest fine.”

  CHAPTER 19

  By the time they reached the camp site, the three of them were coated with yellow sand. The Barkers were walking like old men, shoulders hunched and their tongues hanging out. Bass was only a little winded, though, and was feeling pretty good about how his plan had worked out.

  Henry, West, and Leach were standing near the cook fire when the three dust-covered figures walked into the camp.

  “Holy Mother of God,” West said. “Bass, you three look like ghosts.”

  Bass laughed. “They ma followed us for three miles wavin’ a shotgun. Iffen she hadna give up, we might’ve been ghosts. That woman was mad, lemme tell you.”

  “The important thing’s you got ‘em ‘n we kin now head back home.”

  “Yeah, we can. I’m kinda missin’ home right now myself,” Bass said. “Git these two chained up to the wagon ‘n let’s git some grub. I’m hungry enough to eat a whole cow right now. We’ll git started back to Fort Smith first thing tomorrow.”

  “If you have no more need of me,” Henry said. “I’ll take my pay now and start for home tonight.”

  Bass would miss his friend, but he and West could handle guarding the prisoners for the trip to Arkansas. If they had any problems he could always press the cook, Leach, into service as a guard—for a bit extra added to his daily fee, of course.

  “Okay,” he said. “Lemme see, we been out for twenty-eight days, ‘n at three dollars a day, that means I owe you seventy-four dollars.” Bass couldn’t read or write, but he could count money.

  “That is right,” Henry said.

  Bass went to his saddle bag and withdrew a leather pouch in which he kept his expense money. He counted out seventy-four do
llars and handed it to his friend.

  “You ride safe, friend,” he said.

  “You as well, my friend,” Henry said.

  He walked to his horse, mounted, took one look around the camp, nodded his head at West and Leach, turned and began riding northeast toward Cherokee territory and his home.

  “Guess he don’t like your cookin’,” West said to the cook.

  Leach glared at him.

  “Ain’t a thing wrong with my cookin’,” he said. “I think he got hisself a sweetheart back home, ‘n he’s missin’ her. I know how he feel, too. I miss my wife somethin’ terrible. How ‘bout you, Bass, you miss your family?”

  Bass stared into the fire.

  “Yeah, I miss ‘em ever day. I will be glad to git back home.”

  “How long you gonna stay this time?” West asked.

  “Prob’ly not long. Trouble is, we come out here and round up these outlaws, ‘n pretty soon there’s more of ‘em takin’ they place. ‘Course, I do have some fence needin’ mendin’, so I might stay home a few weeks this time.”

  “Just long enough to make another baby, right?” West said

  Bass shook his head.

  “Naw. Shoot, I got ten already. Even with eight rooms in my house, we’s crowded. Ain’t got no room for no more chilluns.”

  West had a dreamy look in his eyes.

  “They’s allus room for children, Bass, always. Me ‘n my old woman ain’t got none yet, but we keep tryin’. I want me a brood as big as yours.”

  Bass started to warn him that having a house full of children is not as much fun as it might seem; sometimes he had problems remembering which of his children was which; but, then he thought of those times when they all gathered around him as he sat in the rocking chair on the front porch and told them stories of his travels into Indian Territory in pursuit of outlaws. The adoring looks on their faces, and the warm glow he felt in his chest, and he kept his mouth shut.