Red Lands Outlaw: the Ballad of Henry Starr

by Phil Truman

  Link kicked the back of a table chair, sending it on a spinning crash to the floor. “I don’t need no damn trainin’, Starr. That ain’t what I come down here for.”

  Link walked over to the others. The men, except for Frank, formed up into a loose group behind Link, each looking darkly back at Henry. Frank walked over and righted the chair Link had kicked. He stood beside Henry, but didn’t say a word, only looked at the floor.

  Henry surveyed the gang, and looked at Frank. “That the way all of you feel?” he asked. No one spoke, but their expressions seemed to indicate that’s exactly how they felt... except for Frank. Henry sat in one of the table chairs facing the group. He removed his pistol and laid it on the tabletop in front of him, then pushed the front of his hat upward, off his forehead.

  “Aw right, then,” he said. With his right palm on the table inches from the butt of his Peacemaker, he pointed at the cabin entrance with his left index finger. “There’s the dang door. Any of you wants to leave, is welcome. No hard feelings.”

  The men all looked at one another. “Frank, we got any money left in that stash of yours?” Henry asked.

  “They’s a bit,” his partner answered. He looked back at the group, too; his hand resting on the butt of his holstered gun.

  “Enough to give all these boys fifty dollars?”

  Frank didn’t say anything for a few seconds, shifting on his feet. “Yeah, I reckon... maybe,” he said.

  “Okay, then. I’ll give any of you yayhoos fifty dollars for your trouble, and you can walk on out of here. But if you do, I don’t never want to see your hide again. We’ll be through ridin’ together.”

  More looks were exchanged among the group, waiting for someone to make the first move. Link took a step toward Henry. Watt and Happy Jack stepped in behind him.

  “Course if you decide to stay,” Henry said. “We’ll take that fifty bucks I promised you to buy supplies and ammo. We’ll do some training and practicing for a couple of weeks, then we’ll ride to a town where I know a big fat bank is ripe to be robbed. I figure each of us stands to make at least a hundred times that fifty dollars.” He looked up at the trio standing in front of him. “It’d be a bigger split, if some of you decide to leave.”

  “How do we know this ain’t another bust, Henry?” Link asked with a sneer.

  “I already checked it out, before I come and got you boys. It’s in a big town, and they got some company payrolls held there.”

  “Why don’t we just get on over there today and get it done?” Kid Wilson wanted to know. Link looked at the Kid and nodded; the others muttered agreement.

  Henry sighed and looked up at the Kid, then Link. “Cause if we went into that bank like we went into that train, most of us would get our butts shot off, or we’d likely end up in jail. That’s why we need to practice, boys. I got the layout of the town and the bank. We’ll practice every move we’re going to make, start to finish, so’s we’ll know what we’re doing and where we’re supposed to go and there won’t be no surprises.”

  Link shuffled his feet and looked at the others. Henry, seeing their wavering, added, “Ain’t no easy way to success, boys; just hard work.”

  “Well... mebbe I’ll stick, then,” Link said. Watt and Happy Jack nodded. “I ain’t never been a stranger to hard work,” Link added.

  Frank stood at the corral leaning forward at the waist, his chin on his forearms folded on the top rail, his foot propped on the bottom rail. He was watching the others at one end of the corral shoot rocks off post tops at the other end, when Henry came up beside him.

  “You didn’t have enough to cover all that leavin’ money, did you?” Henry asked Frank.

  “Nope,” Frank answered. He watched in silence as the Kid shattered three post-top rocks in quick succession. “What was you going to do if all of ’em decided to walk?”

  “That’s why I put my gun on the table,” Henry answered. “Wanted to send them all a little message. Plus, I knew you’d help me out.”

  “Did ya now? Two against five? That ain’t too powerful a message.”

  “Well, it was a calculated risk, Frank. Besides, with Boone it was more like two to four.”

  Frank snorted, then spit to the ground away from Henry. He rubbed his whiskered chin and looked at the setting sun. “I sure hope that bank’s all you say it is,” he said. “And I sure hope that little gal is worth all the welchin’ you done to these boys.”

  “I ain’t welched on nobody, Frank. I’m giving them an opportunity they wouldn’t had if they didn’t stick with me. Look at ’em: three broken down cowboys, a no-count pirate, and a farm boy on his way to getting shot through the heart by someone he shouldn’t uh picked a fight with. They’re a raggedy bunch, but they do what I say, and in a couple weeks they’ll all be walking in tall cotton.”

  “Yeah,” Frank said. “Either that or git their necks stretched.” He yawned large, and turned to head back to the house. “I best get supper started.”

  * * *

  “Fellas,” Henry addressed the group in the cool of the bright June morning. They’d gathered beneath the large white oak behind Frank’s cabin. Some stood, others sat on the ground, all in the shade of the tree. Henry stood in full sunlight facing them; he held a three-foot piece of windfall in his right hand which came to a jagged point at one end. It was their first day of training for the coming job, and he had their full attention. “...we’re going to ride about a day east and north to the town of Bentonville in Arkansas. That’s where we’ll go to work.

  “I been there and looked this place over, and I picked it for a couple reasons. First, because of the haul. Like I told you, the bank holds some payrolls, in addition to the normal stuff. I figure we can come out with a hunnert thousand, easy.”

  The group stirred and murmured.

  “Second,” Henry continued. “...it ain’t far from the Territory line. We’ll need to get in and out of there quick, and get back into the Territory before they can form up a posse. Once we’re back over here, they won’t come after us. It don’t look like they got much law in that town, so I don’t figure we’ll get much trouble. We’ll hit ’em before they know what happened.”

  Henry looked down to his right where he’d laid out a model of the operation on the ground. “This,” he pointed his stick at a six-inch-wide rock on the ground, “is the Peoples State Bank. These here,” he indicated two ruts intersecting at a right angle on one corner of the rock, “...are the streets next to the bank. As you can see, it sits on a corner.

  “We ain’t going to ride into town all at once, and we ain’t going to be armed, so’s we won’t draw no suspicion. Me and Boone will drive a wagon into town from this direction, and pull up near the rear of the bank. There’s a big elm back there we’ll stop under and wait for the rest of you.” He drew a little circle in the dirt to indicate the position of the tree. “All your rifles and pistols will be covered in the back of the wagon.

  “Each of you will ride into town alone and from different directions. Frank, you and Link come in from the south here, about a minute apart. Happy Jack will swing up north and come in that way, Kid you go around to the east side and come in, Watt you’ll follow us from the west.” Henry moved the stick about, pointing out each man’s movement. “We’ll all meet here at this elm to pick up our hardware. Jack and Watt will take a position near the front corner, where the two streets meet; Link, you’ll go to the front of the bank to keep anyone from coming in; me, Frank, and the Kid will go in through the back door. If everything goes according to plan, we should be in and out of there in less than five minutes.”

  Henry paused a few seconds to let all this information sink in. “Any questions?” he asked.

  “Wull, what is it you want me to do, Henry?” Boone Tyler asked.

  Henry tapped the stick on the top of the rock, and rubbed his chin. “You stay with the horses, Boone.”

  “You gonna drive that wagon outa there?” Frank wanted to know.

  “Go
od question,” Henry responded. “I reckon we’ll have to tow in our riding horses. We’ll leave the wagon when we’re done.”

  Henry pointed the stick toward the open field to his left. “I got things set up out here in this field sorta like the bank and town. That stack of wood will be the bank; that pile of rocks behind it yonder will be the elm tree. Let’s mount up and run through this a few times, just so we’re clear on what to do.”

  * * *

  Boone reined up the horse pulling the wagon, stopping in the full shade of the elm. Henry pulled out his pocket watch and looked at it; it was half past two in the afternoon. Thirty seconds later Frank came around the corner, bringing his horse at a slow trot toward them. At various intervals, the rest of the men arrived at the rendezvous point. All of them wordlessly pulled their pistol belts from under the tarp in the wagon bed, and strapped them on, then grabbed their rifles. Watt and Happy Jack took their positions at the side of the bank. Link stood next to them and watched as Henry, Kid Wilson, and Frank headed toward the back door of the bank. Link counted to ten and went around the corner to station himself at the front door. Boone gathered the seven horses and held them under the elm.

  Henry, his left shoulder against the back door, his hand on the knob, his shotgun cradled in his right arm, looked back at the Kid and Frank. He nodded to them; they nodded back, indicating their readiness. Henry twisted the knob and pushed hard with his left shoulder. The door didn’t open. He tried again, with more force. Still, the heavy wooden door wouldn’t budge.

  “Gimme a hand,” Henry said to Frank. His partner put his boot on the door above the knob. “On three,” Henry said. He paused and counted. Both men applied as much force as they could, but the door didn’t dislodge.

  “Damn,” Henry said, and backed away from the door. “Must be barred from the inside.” He sighed, and thought for a second. “We’ll have to go in the front.”

  When Henry and his group passed a confused Watt and Jack, he said in passing, “Door wouldn’t open,” and moved on.

  Link paced in front of the door, but stopped when he saw Henry and the others come around the corner. “We’re going to have to go in this way,” Henry said to Link, and the three pushed past him and through the bank door.

  Link took the change of plans in stride and continued his pacing. Almost immediately he noticed a small man with a satchel under one arm stopped on the street ten feet away. The man stood watching as the armed men entered the bank. His mouth hung open and his eyes were wide with surprise. Then he looked up at Link without changing his expression.

  Link lowered his rifle and pointed it at the man. “Git on outta here,” he said with menace. The man broke out of his frozen stare and bolted, diving through the door of a dry goods store catty-corner from the bank.

  Henry confronted six men inside the bank—three customers, a teller, and two bank officers. “Awright, this here’s a holdup!” Henry yelled. All in the bank turned to look curiously at the gun drawn trio. “Git yer hands where I can see ‘em!” Henry instructed.

  Frank went straight to the vault, grabbing the closest bank officer to take with him. Kid Wilson entered the teller’s cage, shoved out the teller, and began filling his bag with cash.

  “Now I want all you boys to come over here and line up against this wall,” Henry instructed. The bank customers and employees, hands high, complied. A distant shot popped outside and almost immediately there came the thud of a slug against the door. Closer, those inside the bank could hear the explosion of Link’s rifle as he fired back. More shots came with whacks and slaps as the slugs peppered the front of the bank. Window glass shattered and slugs ripped up pieces of wood from the floor and bank fixtures; one whanged off the potbellied stove in the center of the lobby. Link could be heard swearing and returning fire as rapidly as he could.

  “Hurry it up, Frank!” Henry yelled. “Let’s go!”

  Frank emerged from the vault with his hostage in front of him. “Ain’t as much in here as we thought,” he informed Henry.

  “Whadda ya mean?” Henry asked.

  “Vault’s near empty,” Frank answered.

  Henry raised his shotgun and pointed it at the bank officer’s nose. “I know you keep payrolls in here. Where’s them payrolls?”

  “You’re a day late,” the sweating banker said. “Payday was yesterday.”

  “Shit!” was all Henry could think to say. The Kid exited the cage with his bags full, and came to stand beside Henry and Frank. The gunfire increased outside, but they could still hear Link swearing loudly and firing back.

  “Awright, you men line up here in front of us. You’re gonna be our shields when we go out the door.” The hostages looked at one another, visibly frightened. “C’mon, now,” Henry said with a wave of his shotgun, and the group moved slowly toward the door. When they’d gathered there, Henry said to the Kid, “Open it.”

  When the door opened, the gunfire slackened off, except for Link’s. He continued to blast away. “Hold it, Link!” Henry shouted. From where he stood behind the hostages, he couldn’t see his henchman. “We’re coming out now with these boys in front of us,” he yelled to the unseen mob. “I reckon you’d shoot them before you’d shoot us!”

  Henry, Frank, and the Kid prodded the group forward. “Link, get over here behind us,” Henry said. One of the hostages gasped when Link shuffled toward them. His face was a splotch of blood and his left eye was gone; his left arm hung limp, blood oozing out of two holes in his shirtsleeve. Another hole in his right pant leg had a ragged halo of deep red at mid-thigh. He’d dropped his rifle, but he still held his pistol in his good right hand. “Gimme your pistol, Henry,” he said. “I can’t reload.” Henry, a little aghast himself, handed Link his six-shooter butt-first.

  The group moved into the street with the robbers huddled behind the hostages, firearms at the ready. Not three feet outside the bank door, a shot rang out from the mercantile window, the slug whizzing past Henry’s ear. Several other shots followed. “Damn!” said one of the bankers and took off running. The other hostages followed suit and scattered to the four winds, leaving the gang of outlaws fully exposed. A heavier barrage opened up from the citizens.

  Frank took one to the shoulder; the heel of Kid Wilson’s left boot flew off knocking him down, but he got right back up, firing. Watt and Happy Jack moved up from their positions to cover their colleagues in their retreat, the Kid and Henry supporting a bloody Link, his mangled face further twisted in pain. Watt and Happy Jack peppered the windows of the mercantile where most of the gunfire seemed to emanate; then they fell back as the others covered their own retreat. Boone brought the horses to them and they all mounted, galloping headlong out of the town.

  Chapter Seven

  “Eleven thousand two hunnert thirty-eight dollars and fifty cents,” Frank told the group.

  Henry looked distraught, as did his men. “Count it again,” he said.

  “Henry, I already counted it again. Another time ain’t going to make it any more,” Frank said.

  Frank’s right shoulder bulged where Billy Crow Hat had placed a slippery elm poultice and a bandage to cover it. On the way back to Frank’s cabin, Henry diverted Boone to the town of Wagoner to fetch the Cherokee medicine man. “Check the saloons first,” Henry had told Boone. “That’s where you’re likely to find him.”

  Frank had been lucky. The bullet had gone straight through the inside of his shoulder, breaking no bones nor severing a major vessel. Crow Hat had an easy cure for that; Link wasn’t so lucky.

  “Your arm’s broke,” Billy told Link during his examination. “Left eye is shot out. Got medicine for those. Legs not bleeding bad; no break, but the bullet’s still in there. Going to have to dig it out so’s there won’t be so much poison in your leg. I can probably save it, but you’ll be laid up a spell.”

  Link, who’d already consumed half the quart of moonshine whiskey he held, slurred a string of swear words at no one in particular, and passed out.

&nb
sp; * * *

  After Crow Hat did his work and packed up to leave, Henry gave him two twenty dollar gold pieces. “Billy, I reckon you won’t tell nobody where you been or what you done this evening.” The little man nodded and left. It was then Henry told Frank to tally up the haul.

  “Divide ’er up seven ways, then,” Henry said to Frank. His partner, with some difficulty and discomfort, took a pencil out of his left shirt pocket with his right hand, and started ciphering on the tabletop. The other men, except for Link, gathered around Frank to look over his back.

  After a two-minute calculation, Frank laid the pencil aside and said, “It figgers out to about sixteen hunnert and five dollars a piece.”

  Most of the men looked at the floor or the wall, none said anything. Boone decided to speak for the group. “Well, it beats a stick in the eye,” he said. He looked at the faces around the table and half grinned, but no one in the group shared his humor.

  “What the hell, Boone,” Watt said. “You reckon Link would feel that way?”

  Everyone in the room looked at the drunk and semi-conscious cowboy with the fresh bandage over his left eye. Boone Tyler looked at the floor, embarrassed.

  “Boys, I know you’re disappointed,” Henry said after a few more seconds of silence. “I am, too. Y’all done a good job. I’m proud of the way you executed the plan, and except for my fool mistake, we’d’ve made off with plenty. It’s my fault we didn’t.” He looked over at Link lying on the bed all bound up with Billy Crow Hat’s poultices and bandages. “I let you down.” He stopped talking because his voice choked with emotion on the last word. No one looked at Henry during the awkward silence that followed.

  Henry cleared his throat, and continued. “If any of you wanted to move on, I wouldn’t blame you a bit. In fact, I’m thinking seriously about getting out of outlawin’ myself.”

  “Wull, how come, Henry?” Boone continued as the spokesman for the bunch. “Whatcha gonna do?”