Fatal Justice

by Ralph Compton

  God, how he loved it! Anymore, Ash couldn’t get through a day without it. He told himself that he could if he really wanted to; he just didn’t want to. Why should he when without it he would spend each day suffering the torment of the damned?

  The rapturous feeling grew. Ash closed his eyes and let it claim him completely. Time became meaningless. Only vaguely was he conscious of the wall he was leaning against and the room around him. Were Sharkey to walk in, he’d be at the mercy of a man who had none.

  Sharkey. Ash should go back out and watch in the saloon until Sharkey showed up. Sharkey’s men were there so maybe he would come join them.

  But Ash didn’t move. He was immersed in morphine heaven.

  The doctors had warned him that morphine was a demon in disguise, but they were wrong. Morphine was a chemical angel. Morphine brought joy and peace. Everyone should use it. Then they’d know. Then the whole world would know.

  Suddenly the door opened and in came a man wearing an apron, who stopped short in surprise.

  “What the hell. Who are you?”

  “Nobody,” Ash said.

  “What are you doing back here?”

  “I’m holding the wall up,” Ash said, and chuckled. The man stared. “You don’t look so well. You’re not sick, are you?”

  “If that was all I was, I’d be the happiest gent alive.”

  “You don’t make much sense.”

  “Life doesn’t make much sense.”

  “Enough riddles. Off you go. No one is allowed in the saloon after we’ve closed. The boss is strict about that.”

  “Sure. I’ll go.” Ash reached for his jacket. “Hold on. Did you say the saloon is closed?”

  “We stay open until dawn. Then we close until noon so we can clean up and get ready for the new night.”

  “I couldn’t have!” Ash said. He ran out and down the hall.

  No one was there. The saloon was empty. The front window wasn’t dark with night but was growing bright with the light of dawn. He went out and looked up and down the street. The man he had followed was long gone. He had blown his chance to put an end to Sharkey.

  “Damn me anyhow.”

  Ash bent his steps to his boardinghouse. It served him right for losing all track of time.

  Once in his room, Ash lay on the bed and curled into a ball. It was just like life to offer him hope and then dash that hope to bits. He should get back up and scour Denver from end to end. Maybe tomorrow, he told himself. Right now all he cared about was the morphine, and the feeling it gave him.

  Sharkey and the rest of the world could go to hell.

  Chapter 23

  The days blurred into weeks and the weeks blurred into a couple of months and Ash spent nearly every minute in his room with his morphine. He injected constantly. He couldn’t stand not to. The pressure, the pain, were always there, always reminding him that he hovered on the precipice of oblivion.

  Ash seldom bothered to wash up. He never shaved. Every other day or so he shrugged into clothes and went to the nearest restaurant to eat. The food was poorly cooked and the portions were pitifully small but it was cheap, and truth to tell, Ash didn’t care much about eating anymore. Or drinking. He stopped downing whiskey. The morphine was all he needed. On the tenth of each month he always went to the doctor for more. Without fail.

  Once a week his landlady came to his room for her money. Usually he opened the door a few inches and shoved it out to her and went back to bed.

  Came one day, though, when Ash opened the door and she crinkled her nose and sniffed.

  “What is that awful odor? That’s not you, is it?”

  “Might be,” Ash allowed.

  “You need to bathe. I won’t have you stinking up my house. Honestly. You impressed me as so clean-cut. What in the world has happened to you?”

  “Life,” Ash said.

  “Life is for living. You need to get out more.”

  “This room is as much of life as I care to see. Now scat.”

  Another month went by.

  A knock on his door brought Ash out of bed. He had taken to sleeping in his clothes and shuffled over to open it. He knew who it was. “Just a minute and I’ll have your money.”

  “There’s no hurry,” the landlady considerately replied.

  Ash opened his saddlebag and took out his poke. He loosened the string and upended it over the bed. The coins and bills that spilled out made a pitifully small pile. He counted out his rent and opened the door. “Here you go.”

  “Good heavens. Have you looked in the mirror recently, Mr. Smithers?”

  “Who?” Ash said, then remembered he had taken the room under an assumed name.

  “Very funny. But have you? You look abominable. I dare say you would frighten some of my female boarders to death. Please. Clean up and shave or I’ll be forced to end your stay here.”

  Ash sat on the bed and counted the money he had left. It wasn’t enough for the next rent. Worse, he was low on morphine and needed what was left for his next visit to the doctor. He could go without food and drink but he couldn’t go without morphine.

  “How did it all go so fast?” Ash asked the walls. Rising, he went to the basin and looked in the mirror. “My God.” He hadn’t seen his reflection in weeks. The person staring back at him wasn’t him. An unkempt tangle of hair and a shaggy beard made him look as wild as the Frazier brothers. He was so thin his own mother wouldn’t recognize him. His cheeks had sunk and his eyes were dark pits. His clothes were a rumpled mess. He raised his arm and nearly gagged. “The old biddy was right.”

  Ash stared at the bed. He wanted to lie back down and drift on clouds of delight. Instead he poured water from the pitcher into the bowl. A lot of scraping with his razor and a lot of rubbing with lye soap and presently the image in the mirror reminded him more of him—but God, he was thin. Skin and bones and little else.

  Ash donned the only clean shirt he had left and a pair of pants. He slipped into his jacket, opened the window to admit fresh air, and went out. The landlady was on the porch, as usual, knitting.

  “That’s much better, Mr. Smithers. Although I must say, you could stand to eat more.” She smiled in her kindly fashion. “I don’t mean that as a criticism, mind you. I know you’re sickly. You haven’t said what ails you and I have no right to pry, but you really should take better care of yourself.”

  “Do you happen to know the address of the Rocky Mountain News?”

  “Why, that I do. They used to be over to Cherry Creek but their first building was washed out in the big flood of ’sixty-four. Mr. Byers, the owner, went and bought out a rival paper, the Commonwealth, and the News had been there ever since.”

  A pert young woman at the front counter told Ash that, yes, the News did keep copies of previous editions.

  “Our archives are up the stairs and to the left. Miss Eddings will gladly assist you.”

  Ash was about to step on the bottom stair when the last person in the world he wanted to run into came up and cheerfully clapped him on the back.

  “Marshal Thrall!” Horace Smithers exclaimed. “What on earth are you doing here? Looking for me, perchance?”

  “No,” Ash said, and shook hands.

  “How have you been keeping yourself?” Horace asked, his eyes betraying his shock.

  “As well as can be expected.”

  “I wondered where you got to. It isn’t every day someone becomes famous and disappears. The people of this territory will never forget the service you rendered in wiping out the Frazier clan.”

  “I’d rather not talk about it,” Ash said. He turned to go up but stopped. It might take hours to find what he wanted in the archives and here was a living source of the information he needed. “Say. Maybe you can do me a favor.”

  “Anything, Marshal. Anything at all.”

  “Are there any others like the Fraziers? Outlaws with bounties on their heads?”

  “The list is as long as your arm. I can write one up for you if you
want. Or you can go to the sheriff and talk to him.”

  Ash would rather not do that. “Give me a name. Who has the highest bounty? Or one of the highest?”

  Horace lit with excitement. “Oh, my. You’re planning to do it again, aren’t you? In that case, the one you want to go after is Marion Judson. He is worth almost three thousand dollars.”

  Ash’s interest was piqued. “What has he done?”

  “What hasn’t he?” Horace rejoined. “Judson came west during the beaver years. He trapped until the trade dried up and then he prospected for a while, but that didn’t suit him so he took to shooting people and helping himself to whatever they had of any value.”

  As Ash recollected, the beaver trade faded more than forty years ago. “He must be in his fifties or sixties. How many has he murdered?”

  “No one knows for sure. The last estimate I heard was more than thirty people. There was a family of settlers. Another time it was a banker’s son up in the mountains, fishing. Then there were some Mexicans down Durango way. I wouldn’t know them all, but I can look them up for you if it’s important.”

  “Sounds as if he’s been killing all over the territory,” Ash observed. “How do they know it’s him?”

  “He puts a rock on the head of each of his victims.”

  “He does what?”

  “You heard right. Judson places a rock on the head of everyone he bushwhacks and robs. No one knows why. The law would like nothing better than to string him up, only he’s impossible to catch. He’ll be a lot harder to find than the Fraziers.”

  The money, though, would last Ash months. “Where would I start? Any notions?”

  Horace looked around as if to be sure no one was listening. Taking Ash by the arm, he led him away from the stairs. “I might. But if I do you this favor I expect one in return. I want your word that if you catch him you’ll come to me with the story. To me and only me.”

  “That’s all?”

  “You don’t understand what it will mean to me. Men in my profession get ahead by getting news no one else has. By being the first with important stories. That series I did on you exterminating the Fraziers? I don’t mind telling you it earned me a fifty-dollar-a-month raise.”

  “Congratulations.”

  “Thank you. My point is that I owe you. So I’ll share a tidbit I came across a while back when I was writing about one of Marion Judson’s murders.” Horace looked around again and lowered his voice to a whisper. “Judson has a sister. Her name is Rohesia Kanderwold. She lives up in Estes Park with her husband, an invalid. You might start with her.”

  Ash pumped Horace’s hand. “Thanks. I’ll be in touch.” It occurred to him as he left the News that bumping into the journalist in Ute City has been a godsend. Smithers undoubtedly knew a lot more than most about the various and sundry lawbreakers roaming the territory, especially those with large amounts of money on their heads. The man could keep him in morphine indefinitely.

  The thought brought Ash to a stop. A pall of despair fell over him.

  He had less than a year to live; that was about as definite as it got.

  Still, Ash was elated at the idea of getting his hands on three thousand dollars. It might last until the grave claimed him.

  The sun was just peeking above the rim of the earth the next dawn when Ash stepped into the stirrups and rode out of Denver on the road that would take him to Estes Park. It was a long climb. Denver was a mile above sea level; Estes Park two thousand feet higher and seventy-five miles into the mountains. Ash had never been there but from what he’d heard the scenery was spectacular. Estes was a resort where the young went to frolic and the old to rest weary bones.

  Ash had bought more morphine the night before. He had enough to last a month if he used it sparingly. He must find Marion Judson quickly so he could get more and use it as freely as he liked.

  The mountains were in full splendor. Lower down, deciduous trees fringed the banks of creeks and farm fields. Cottonwoods were particularly plentiful along the waterways. Wooded slopes were broken by boulder-strewn bluffs and tablelands of red rock. Higher up, thick forests of pine were mixed with tracts of firs and occasional aspen groves.

  Bald eagles soared among the clouds. Hawks circled in search of prey and buzzards circled in search of carrion. Songbirds warbled and jays squawked.

  White-tailed deer roamed the lowlands; black-tailed deer preferred the high country. Twice Ash spotted elk. He’d heard that once buffalo roamed the foothills as well as the plains but they had long since filled supper pots. Most of the grizzlies had been killed off too. It was rare for anyone to sight one these days. Black bears were still around but in far fewer numbers.

  As eager as Ash was to reach Estes, he took his time. It would be pointless to ride the roan or the packhorse into the ground.

  About the middle of the afternoon Ash had to stop for a spell. His chest was bothering him. The pain would spike and then fade. He had injected that morning and didn’t want to use more morphine if he could help it.

  Toward sunset Ash camped on a shelf with a magnificent view of the country below. The emerald foothills rolled in waves to the sea of grass that stretched for unending leagues far to the east and the broad Mississippi.

  Ash put coffee on. For his supper he heated a can of Van Camp’s beans in tomato sauce. He cut several thick slices off a loaf of bread and smeared them in butter from a small tin. With the fire crackling and stars starting to blossom, he dipped the buttered bread in the piping-hot beans and ate with relish.

  It was ironic, Ash reflected, how much more he appreciated being alive now that he was dying. He looked around him at the mountains and the foothills and felt the wind on his face and the warmth of the food in his belly, and he almost broke into tears.

  Ash didn’t want to die. He would give anything to relive that fateful day when Sharkey shot him. He should not have gone to Abigail Mason’s. He should have stayed in his office.

  Abigail. Ash suddenly remembered Sharkey saying that he’d paid her to send for him. Did she know why? Had Sharkey told her what he was up to and Abby sent the boy anyway? Ash would like to ask her and, if she had, beat her to death with a club.

  A coyote was yipping when Ash pulled his blanket to his chin and lay in a cocoon of warmth and contentment. For that moment in time everything was perfect. He wished it could last forever.

  Ash touched his chest. Tear welled, and this time he didn’t fight it. He quietly wept until he was drained dry. Wiping his nose on the blanket, he stared at the dark sky and asked out loud, “Why me? What did I do to deserve this?”

  Ash shuddered. Everything he ever believed had turned out to be wrong. All those years he wore tin, all those years he did his best to live right and do good—and for what? For lingering agony and a slow death?

  “I don’t know a lot,” Ash said haltingly. “I don’t know why we’re here and what purpose all this serves. But I do know it’s not right that people suffer. It’s not right that people have to go through what I’m going through. How the hell can you let it? How can they say you care when you put us through hell and we end our days as maggot food?”

  The sky didn’t answer.

  Ash was angry and growing angrier. “It’s bunk and bunkum, that’s what it is. Only a lunatic would call this life sane. Only a fool could see all the hurting and claim there’s some purpose to it.” Ash shook a fist at the stars. “Do you hear me up there? Or am I talking to empty air? Prove to me I’m wrong. Give me a sign. Show me there’s more to this. Please.”

  To the north a shooting star cleaved the heavens, burning bright, only to fade into the night.

  “That’s it? That’s your sign?” Ash laughed and couldn’t stop. He laughed until his sides hurt. He recollected hearing somewhere that life was a stage and everyone was a player. “If that’s so,” he told the speckles above, “then the play is a comedy and we are all of us jackasses.”

  On that bitter note, Ash let himself drift off. His last thought
before sleep claimed him was that those who thought life made sense had no sense at all. He was living proof.

  Or rather dying proof.

  Chapter 24

  The toll road up to Estes had only recently been completed. It was considered crucial to opening up the area to settlement.

  Not everyone was happy about the idea.

  Estes Park was split into factions. There was the Earl of Dunraven, one of the very first to set eyes on the park’s natural charms. The earl started a ranch and tried to take control of every square inch of land; he had to settle for controlling six thousand acres. Those acres were soon surrounded by more and more homesteads. The earl wasn’t worried. He was confident the harsh winters and short growing seasons would drive the homesteaders off. As added incentive he had their fences torn down and drove his cattle over their lands and through their gardens. His hard tactics and the hard winters might have driven them off if not for the natural wonders the earl so admired.

  The homesteaders admired them too. Everyone who saw Estes Park fell in love with the Eden of the Rockies. People from all over the territory came to fish and hunt or enjoy the splendor. They packed into tents because there were no accommodations.

  That gave one of the homesteaders a brainstorm. He reasoned that people who came so far just to bide for a short while might be willing to pay good money to have a place to stay. Soon practically every homesteader offered lodging and meals and earned enough to stock up for those hard winters and to put up new fences to keep the earl’s cattle out.

  The earl was a practical man. He decided that if he couldn’t beat them, he would go them one better. He planned to build a lavish lodge to cater to the needs of the visitors and add to his already considerable fortune.

  All of this Ash gleaned his first night there. He stayed with a family by the name of James. Their homestead bordered the earl’s ranch and James spent most of the evening meal complaining about how the English in general and the earl in particular thought they had the right to take over the world.