by Jory Sherman
Lew handed her the reins after she was in the saddle. She nodded to him.
Just as they were turning their horses, an angry woman appeared in the doorway, her stocky body silhouetted in the light.
“You—you murderers,” she shouted. “Come back here. You come back here now.”
“Who’s that?” Seneca asked.
“Sarah Canby. Let’s go. She’s got Luke’s shotgun in her hands.”
They rode off fast, expecting to hear a shotgun blast, but there was only the sound of the relentless rain.
Lew headed for the road to Osage, Seneca following behind him.
He was sorry things had turned out the way they had. He knew he had turned still another corner in his life. He was sorry that Seneca didn’t understand that he had been forced to kill those men. Perhaps she would understand someday, but for now, there was a gulf between them. She was probably still in shock, still confused by all that had happened. Still, he would have expected her to show greater courage, perhaps some compassion for him. Maybe, he thought, she doesn’t know that I have to leave the county, leave everything I love behind. Including her. He would be a wanted man now, and he had already found that he could not expect any justice in the county, maybe not even in Arkansas.
Lew left Seneca at the bridge.
“You’d better go over to see Sheriff Swanson,” he said.
“You’re not going to ride home with me?”
“No. I’m a wanted man now, Seneca.”
“But . . . I mean, you acted in self-defense.”
“Do you really think Carroll County’s going to look at it that way? I killed the Alpena sheriff, you know.”
“I could be a witness.”
“Not now, Seneca. I’ve made up my mind. Ed’s probably still at Swanson’s office. If not, Don can ride you home.”
“You’re just going to leave me like this?”
“Yes.”
“You’ve changed, Lew,” she said, her bitterness evident in her voice. “You’ve become . . .”
“What, Seneca? What do you think I’ve become?”
He could barely see her face, but he could feel her eyes boring into him. They were two shadows in the rain, faceless people, staring across a great distance at one another, neither seeing the other, but knowing that the distance was growing.
“I—I don’t know,” she said. “Maybe . . . maybe killing those . . . those men did something to you.”
“Maybe my killing them did something to you, Seneca.”
“Oh, so now you’re putting it on me,” she snapped.
“Putting what on you?”
“What happened up there in Alpena. You think it’s my fault you had to shoot those men.”
“No, I don’t blame you at all. That would be stupid.”
“But I was the reason you came after them.”
“Maybe I was looking for a reason,” he said. He knew he was being cruel, but he couldn’t help himself. Seneca was plagued with doubts about him anyway. If it was going to end, whatever there was between them, then perhaps it was best to break it off now, before he left. He couldn’t expect her to wait for him. He knew he would never be back.
“Well, maybe you were,” she said.
“Good-bye, Seneca,” he said. He touched two fingers to the brim of his hat and turned his horse.
She did not say good-bye, but as he rode away, he knew she was still there, watching him. He heard the sound of her horse’s hooves on the bridge, riding away from him, riding toward Osage in the darkness and the rain. He choked back tears of self-pity and drew himself up straight in the saddle. He breathed in air to fill his lungs. But he could not fill the emptiness inside him, nor quell the swirling sickness in his stomach.
Damn it, he told himself, why hadn’t he told Seneca that he loved her? He did love her. But they had both crossed a bridge and were heading in different directions. There was no use in flogging a dead horse. It was over. All of it. Only memories and sadness remained.
Lew did not spend much time at his house. He wrote a short note to his lawyer in Berryville, a man named Eugene Anderecky, wrapped the note, some bills as payment, and all the papers the Butterfields had signed, put them in an envelope, which he wrapped in oilcloth. He took some food he could eat along the way, got cartridges for his rifle and pistol, extra dry clothing and the money he got for the sale of his property.
He packed his saddlebags full, filled two canteens, and then rode off. He would take the back road to Berryville, drop the packet of documents off at Anderecky’s house, then head north into Missouri. Once he was across the state line, he would head west. In a few days, he would be in Oklahoma and then decide where he was going.
For a time, he knew, men would be hunting him. They would probably make up dodgers and mail them to places he might go. If he was lucky, all that would take time, and he would escape capture.
He wondered what Seneca would tell her father. What she would tell Don Swanson. Don would have no choice but to ride up to Alpena to confirm the deaths and await orders from officials in Green Forest and Berryville. Then Swanson would be one of the hunters trying to figure out where he had gone.
Lew rode almost to Carrolton, then took the Green Forest road. He passed through Green Forest and went to Berryville, where he dropped off the papers at Anderecky’s office, near the courthouse on the town square. He slipped the packet through a slot in Eugene’s door. The rain continued and he saw no one. Nor did he see any lights, either in town or on the farms he passed.
It was still dark when he crossed the border into Missouri, and he crossed a river, going by dead reckoning. He did not know the country and there were no visible stars to guide him. He was, for all practical purposes, lost. He tried to think of Missouri towns he might know, but the only one he could summon to memory was Joplin, which he knew was fairly close to the Oklahoma border. If he could find a sign that said Joplin, he would follow such a road.
For now, though, he wandered in the dark, and he had no compass.
The rain stopped shortly before dawn, but the sky stayed dark and he heard the rumble of thunder far to the south of him. He came to what looked to him like a well-traveled road, and turned Ruben to the left, figuring it led westward if he had kept his bearings straight. He was sure that he had.
He passed a number of farms, where the smell of wet grain was strong in his nostrils. The road was muddy and the going was slow. There were places where water had washed across the road, cleaning off all the pebbles. He saw no tracks at that hour.
The sky lightened and he came to a fork where there stood a sign in the form of two white arrows painted with black lettering. He stopped to read it. One arrow pointed in the direction he had come from and said: SPRINGFIELD, 25 MILES. The other said: JOPLIN, 50 MILES.
Lew let out a sigh of relief.
At least he was on the right road and heading in the right direction.
A light wind came up and he took off his slicker. His clothes began to dry, and as the sun rose behind him, he felt the first chill as the ground gave up its cold. The wind began to warm. He stopped to give Ruben a hatful of grain at a creek and let him drink.
He looked beyond the bridge he would cross and saw the road stretch to the horizon. He heard cows lowing in a nearby pasture, and a pair of mourning doves whistled overhead, their bellies colored peach by the sun. He was not used to such flatness as he saw around him. Suddenly, he was homesick for the green hills he had left behind.
He knew he could never live in such a place, where the land was unbroken, the trees scarce, the creeks puny.
He knew at that moment where he was going to go, even though he had no specific destination in mind. He would ride west to the Rocky Mountains, leave behind the monotony of the plains.
He knew that it was a long way and that it would take him a long time to get there. He knew it was just the kind of place he wanted to be. It would be a place that reminded him of the Ozarks, with hills and hollows and long valleys, an
d streams leaping with fish, game aplenty in the woods.
He knew there must be such a place out West. There had to be. His heart demanded it.
8
THE CASE WAS A WEEK OLD BY THE TIME HORATIO BLACKHAWK got to Alpena and interviewed Sarah Canby.
“You’re a U.S. marshal?” she asked, staring at Blackhawk’s badge.
“Yes’m. I rode down from Missouri, had orders from Kansas City. Judge Wyman over in Berryville sent a telegraph to my supervisor and he sent me down to investigate the murder of a law officer named Billy Jim Colfax. I understand you were an eyewitness.”
“Wasn’t only Billy Jim got murdered,” she said. Sarah was still fixing up the hardware store, finding small pieces of glass in the flooring. The windows had been put back in, and the door fixed, but she had been unable to scrub away all the blood. And she was still finding shards of glass along the baseboards beneath the front window. She and Blackhawk stood there by the front window, with sunlight streaming in, highlighting motes of dust dancing like silver fireflies in the air the broom had stirred up moments before.
“I understand, ma’am. Your husband, ah, Mr. Lucas Canby, was also killed.”
“Murdered.”
“Yes’m.”
“Look over in the corner there,” she said.
Blackhawk looked at the dark stain. He could still smell the lingering odor of bleach.
“Looks like you tried to get rid of some blood there.”
“That’s where that Zane boy shot Sheriff Colfax. There’s bullet holes all over the place, I declare.”
“Yes’m. Now, you saw this Zane fellow shoot Sheriff Colfax?”
“He shot him all right. I got here just after Sheriff Colfax died. His body was still warm. I saw that Zane boy and his galfriend making their getaway out back. It was him all right. Lordie, three men dead as God is my witness, and that no-good boy done it.”
“Did you hear the shots?”
“It was raining cats and dogs, Mr. Blackhawk. You couldn’t rightly hear yourself think. But I come down to the store to bring Luke and Virgil their supper. All these winders was shot out and blood running ever’where in the front of my store. I didn’t see Luke right off, but I went back and saw Virg a-lyin’ there gape-mouthed, dead as a doornail, and heard them two out back and saw ’em ride off with me yellin’ at ’em to come back, and then I seen Luke and I just broke into pieces.”
“Yes’m,” Blackhawk said. “I’m real sorry.”
“You say you come down from Kansas City?”
“Well, I got my orders out of Kansas City. Telegraph caught up with me in Springfield.”
“Up in Missouri?”
“Yes’m.”
“How come not from Little Rock?”
“I was the closest. I’m federal, ma’am. Office wanted me to look into it since a law officer was killed.”
“What about my Luke? And Virgil Pope?”
“I’m looking into those deaths, too, Mrs. Canby.”
“Well, that gal knows something.”
“What girl is that, Mrs. Canby?”
Blackhawk was not taking any notes, which made Sarah Canby eye him with suspicion.
“Why, that gal what was with Zane.”
“What was the girl doing here?”
“You’ll have to ask her.”
“A lawyer over in Berryville said the girl’s name was Seneca Jones and that she was kidnapped by your husband and Virgil Pope. He said that Mr. Lew Wetzel Zane had come up to Alpena here to rescue Miss Jones.”
“Why, that lyin’ booger. What lawyer was that?”
“Mr. Eugene Anderecky. Said that Zane dropped some papers off at his house and showed me the note Mr. Zane left among some other papers.”
“He’s a-lyin’. My husband didn’t kidnap nobody.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Canby. I’ll ask Miss Jones about it.”
“She’ll lie, too.”
“Yes’m.”
Blackhawk left the store after bidding the angry Sarah Canby good-bye, and rode toward Osage, some thirteen miles south of Alpena. He was glad he had been sent here. His father had fought for the Union during the war, had been stationed in Springfield, was at the Battle of Pea Ridge, where he had lost his life. Blackhawk knew the bloody history of the border, but he liked the country, with its green hills, its lakes and streams. A peaceful place now, but during the war, the hills ran with blood, both Union and Confederate. He had been too young to fight in it, but he was a keen student of history and had studied law in Columbia, Missouri.
He joined the U.S. Marshals Service to support his aging mother, widowed so young and crippled now with arthritis, and had learned to track and hunt men from a man who had worked out of Judge Parker’s court in Ft. Smith, Arkansas, an Indian fighter he admired and respected, one Jesse Bodine, who had scouted for the Union Army.
A little over an hour later, Blackhawk was sitting in Sheriff Don Swanson’s office, smoking a cheroot, his feet up on a chair. Don was smoking one, too, given him by Blackhawk.
“Haven’t smoked one of these since I was a kid,” Swanson said. “My pa used to have a hankering for them, until they got too dear.”
“Nothing like a good smoke,” Blackhawk said.
“How can I help you, Marshal?”
“You can call me Horatio. Can I call you Don?”
“Sure.”
“What can you tell me about this Lew Wetzel Zane?”
“A lot, I reckon. I’ve knowed him since he was a boy. Knowed his folks, too. You hear what happened to them?”
“I got some of it from Judge Wyman over in Berryville. He said Zane was a hellion, that he murdered two boys, the sons of, ah, Pope and Canby.”
“Painted you a pretty black picture, did he?”
“Pretty black, Don, yes.”
“Well, I can give you one with a little more color in it, maybe. And not because I knowed the boy, but because I know what really happened down here with those two boys Wiley Pope and Fritz Canby. Yes, sir, it’s a lot different story than the one you’ll get out of Berryville.”
“I’m all ears, Don.”
Swanson told Blackhawk the whole story, about the two boys killing Zane’s parents, robbing them, and being seen by an eyewitness. He told the marshal how Colfax had refused to arrest the boys, and how the judge in Carroll County thwarted the entire process. He told of the murder of the eyewitness and how Zane had pleaded with the authorities in Alpena, Green Forest, and Berryville to serve justice on the two murderers.
“Finally, Zane was forced to kill both boys in self-defense. Of course Virgil Pope and Luke Canby were furious. They vowed revenge. Then I heard from Ed Jones, the father of Seneca, how she had been kidnapped by Virgil and Luke. Zane, who was sweet on Miss Seneca, went up to the house that night just after Seneca was abducted, and I guess he rode up to Alpena to rescue her. Which, according to Ed Jones, was just what Pope and Canby wanted him to do. They planned to kill him.”
“Are you sure about that, Don?”
Swanson shrugged. “That’s the way I heard it from Ed Jones. I have no reason to doubt his word. He’s always been an honest man.”
“So Zane took the law into his own hands,” Blackhawk said.
“Well, you gotta admit the law sorta let Lew down, Marshal.”
Blackhawk didn’t reply.
“I reckon I’d better talk to Miss Jones,” he finally said. “If you’d be so kind as to give me directions to her house. She live in town here?”
“No, she and her pappy live out on what they call Possum Trot. I’ll draw you a map.”
“Much obliged,” Blackhawk said.
Swanson got a piece of foolscap from his drawer, dipped a pen in an inkwell, and drew a crude map. He blew on the paper when he finished, then handed it to Blackhawk.
“You just take that first fork to the left after you leave here. Follow it out and look for them landmarks. You won’t have no trouble. Want me to go along? Won’t even need a map that way.”
>
“No, I’d better do this on my own. Thanks, Don. Any idea where this Zane feller might have gone?”
“No idea, Marshal. He talked about leaving, but he never said where.”
Swanson stood on the porch and watched Blackhawk ride off. He admired the tall horse the marshal rode. It reminded him of his own mount, a Missouri trotter, sixteen hands high, good bottom, long lean legs. Blackhawk’s horse was a dark brown with three white stockings, a small blaze on its face, flax mane and tail. Pretty as one of those Currier & Ives pictures like they put on calendars.
Blackhawk found the road to the Jones place easily enough. He had passed no one on the road, and spent his time admiring the country, going over the information he had gotten up to that point. He had not yet begun to form a picture of Lew Wetzel Zane, but the man was certainly fighting for recognition. Perhaps the girlfriend could tell him enough to fill in the remaining gaps.
He rode the slope up to the house, thinking how smart the man was who had built such a place. From the front porch, whoever stood there had a commanding view of the hills all around, as well as a long time to see whoever was riding up the road. He was not surprised to see someone standing on the porch, a rifle resting in the crook of one arm, his finger inside the trigger guard.
“Afternoon,” Blackhawk said. “I’m Horatio Blackhawk, United States Marshal.”
“Ed Jones. I see your badge, Marshal. Light down and come on inside. Use the hitch rail if you like.”
“Thank you, Mr. Jones.”
“Seneca,” Jones called as he turned toward the front door. “We got company. You decent?”
Blackhawk smiled. Polite folks in these hills, he thought. Right proper.
He wrapped his reins around the hitch rail and climbed the front steps. Ed leaned the rifle against one of the posts bordering the steps and held out his hand.
“Pleased to meet you, Marshal Blackhawk. You come about the kidnapping of my daughter, I reckon.”
“I’d like to hear about it, sir.”