Snake River Slaughter

by William W. Johnstone

  “Damn, Floyd, that feller plays the piano better dead than you do alive,” someone said, and a few of the others laughed, nervously, not from the humor of the comment, but from the fact that it tended to relieve the tension.

  Only the women of the bar did not gather around the two bodies. Instead, the one who had smiled at Matt when he first came into the saloon, and the other two who had been working the bar with her, now stood in a frightened cluster back in the far corner of the barroom, near the large, upright clock.

  “Did you all you see what I just seen?” someone asked. “That feller at the bar took ’em both out.”

  “Damndest thing I ever saw.”

  “I seen Hickock in action oncet. He war’nt nowhere near as fast as this here fella was.”

  “I’ve hear’d tell of a feller named Matt Jensen, but this here is the first time I ever actual saw him.”

  For a long moment nobody approached Matt, and he was glad. He had come in here for a beer, and that was all. He had no idea he would get involved in a gun fight, and he still had no idea why he was challenged. It couldn’t have been, as Madison said, to make a name for himself. For if that had been the case, there would not have been a second shooter on the balcony. And if there was a second shooter that meant this was planned. But how could they have planned it? Nobody knew Matt was coming to American Falls.

  Nobody except the person who had offered him the job. Was Madison the one who wrote the letter? Had he written it just to get Matt to come American Falls? That would explain how they were able to set up an ambush for him, but it did not explain why.

  The life Matt Jensen lived was full of desperate and deadly encounters, and those encounters invariably left enemies. But as far as he knew, he had never encountered Madison before. On the other hand, he also realized that there was no way he could ever know just who every enemy might be.

  Matt looked over in the corner toward the smallish man who had given him the warning of the second shooter. Seeing a nearly empty beer mug sitting on the table in front of him, Matt turned to the bartender.

  “Give me another beer,” he said, again putting a nickel down.

  The bartender drew a third beer, and Matt took the full mug over to the little man at the table.

  “I’d like to buy you a beer,” Matt said.

  “Thank you.”

  “Why did you do it?” Matt asked.

  “Why did I do what?”

  “You know what. You gave me a signal about the second shooter.”

  “I suppose I did.”

  “Why?”

  “Because, Mr. Jensen, if you had been killed, I would not have been able to fulfill my obligation to my client.”

  Before the little man could explain his comment, a deputy sheriff came into the saloon. He stopped just inside and looked around at the saloon patrons who were now gathered in a knot around the two bodies.

  “What the hell happened here? Did these two fellers shoot each other?” the deputy sheriff asked.

  “Not hardly,” the bartender answered.

  “Well then, what did happen?”

  Everyone wanted to tell him, and they all started talking at once, each one shouting over the other in order to be heard.

  “Hold it! Hold it!” the deputy called, loudly. He put his hands over his ears. “I can’t hear you if you are all goin’ to shout at the same time. You, Ben,” he said to the bartender. “Did you see it?”

  “Yeah, I seen it.” Ben offered nothing else.

  “Well?” the deputy asked.

  “Well what?”

  “Tell me what happened.”

  “That feller sittin’ at the table over there,” Ben said, pointing to Matt. “The big one, not the little one. Anyhow, he just come into the saloon a couple minutes ago and ordered hisself a beer. I drawed him one—from that barrel there, the other’n bein’ just about empty and it gets some bitter when you get to the bottom. And you know me, Pete, I figure the first beer anyone orders should be the best ’cause otherwise, how are you goin’ to keep ’em as a customer?”

  “For God’s sake, Ben, will you get on with it?” the deputy said. “I don’t give a damn which barrel you served him from.”

  “Yes, sir, but you asked what happened, and I’m just tellin’ you in my own way. Now if you want to hear what happened, just hear me out an’ let me speak my piece. Now, like I was sayin’, I drawed him a beer, and that feller was just drinkin’ it, all peaceful like, when that feller down there”—he pointed to Madison’s body—“he says, ‘Would you be Matt Jensen?’ And the big feller, he says, ‘Yes I am.’ And then that feller lyin’ on the floor, he says ‘I’m goin’ to kill you.’ And the next thing you know, the shootin’ commenced.”

  “What about the other one over there?” the deputy asked, pointing to Jernigan’s body. The deputy looked up at the balcony and saw the busted rail. “Did he just get so excited watchin’ that he fell through the railing?”

  “No, sir. To tell you the truth, Pete, now that’s the mystifyin’ thing of it. That feller was up on the balcony, and he shot at Mr. Jensen too,” Ben said.

  “Did he also challenge Jensen to a gunfight?”

  “No, sir. What he done is, he just commenced a’ shootin’ without no word of warnin’ at all.”

  “Ben’s tellin’ it right, Deputy,” a patron said. “It all happened just like he’s a’ tellin’ you it happened.”

  “So what you are sayin’ is, there was two men shootin’ at him, one from up on the balcony, but the big man sittin’ back there took ’em both on and kilt ’em both?

  “Yeah,” another said. “I ain’t never seen nothin’ like it. This here Jensen fella is as fast as greased lightnin’. I mean, when you think about it, it was all over in not much more than the blink of an eye.”

  “Jensen?”

  “Matt Jensen is who it is. I reckon you’ve heard of Matt Jensen.”

  “Yeah,” the deputy said. “I’ve heard of him.”

  During the entire conversation between the deputy, the bartender, and the other patrons of the bar, Matt had remained seated at the table with the small man who had warned him about the second shooter.

  “You want to come over here, Mister Jensen?” the deputy called to Matt.

  “Excuse me,” Matt said to the little man at the table. He pushed his chair back, then walked over to join the deputy.

  “Is that pretty much the way you’d tell the story?” the deputy asked Matt.

  “Yes.”

  “Folks are sayin’ you are Matt Jensen. Is that right? Are you really Matt Jensen?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’ve heard of you, Mr. Jensen. Fac’ is, I seem to recall seein’ a book that was writ about you. Would you be that Matt Jensen?”

  “I wouldn’t put much store in any of those dime novels,” Matt replied.

  “But you are the one them books is about, ain’t you?”

  “I suppose.”

  “Didn’t I just also read somethin’ about you bein’ involved in a shootout over in Green River City, Wyoming last month?”

  “You may have.”

  “You bein’ the real Matt Jensen and all, it makes me wonder what you are doin’ in American Falls,” the deputy said. “Is there a reason for you bein’ here?”

  “There’s no reason for me not to be here,” Matt answered in a matter of fact tone.

  “I reckon not,” the deputy agreed. “But the thing is, Mr. Jensen, we don’t get that many famous folks in our little town. And we most especial don’t get folks that’s famous ’cause they are so all fired good with a gun. Accordin’ to them dime novels, you are always on the right side of the law. Is that true?”

  “I try to be a law abiding citizen,” Matt replied.

  “Yes. Only, you come here to American Falls and the first thing you do after you get here is, you get yourself involved in a gunfight. Ain’t that about the size of it?”

  “I didn’t start the gunfight.”

  The dep
uty waved his hand in dismissal. “I know, I know, ever’ one says you didn’t start it. But that still don’t tell me what you’re a’ doin’ here.”

  “Deputy, since I am not breaking any law, nor am I wanted by the law, the truth is, I can be just about anywhere I want to be,” Matt replied.

  “I’m just curious, that’s all,” the deputy said. “I reckon you are right, I reckon you do have the right to be anywhere you want. And, from what all the folks are saying, I don’t see any need for an inquiry. It was self-defense, pure and simple.”

  “You’re doin’ the right thing, Pete,” the bartender said.

  “Anybody know these two men?” the deputy asked, looking toward the bodies.

  “This one here said his name was Madison. Al Madison,” the bartender said. “I seen him and the other fella together earlier. And if I recall, there was a third one with them too.”

  “Is that a fact? Is he still here?”

  The bartender looked around the saloon, then he shook his head. “I don’t see him.”

  “I seen him a while ago,” one of the other saloon patrons said.

  “Where did you see him?”

  “He was standin’ just outside the door there,” the man said. “He was watchin’ what was goin’ on. And like Ben said, he come in with them two fellers. For a moment, I was afraid he might start in a’ shootin’ seein’ as how he was with them before. But all he done was watch. He come in for a few seconds, just long enough to look at his two dead pards, then he left.”

  “You ever heard of a fella named Al Madison, Deputy?” the bartender asked.

  “Yeah, to tell the truth, I think I have heard of him,” the deputy replied. “I think I might have seen some paper on him once. Only I believe he’s from over in Owyhee county. What do you reckon he’s doin’ here?”

  “Well sir, from the way he was talkin’, I’d say he come here especially to kill Mr. Jensen,” the bartender answered.

  “Did you know him?” the deputy asked Matt.

  Matt shook his head. “No.”

  “I ain’t never heard that you ran bad, Mr. Jensen, but I have heard that you’ve come out on the standin’ up side of an awful lot of gunfights, just like you done with this one. Could this maybe be some feud you brought in from somewhere else?”

  “Like I said, I’ve never laid eyes on either one of them before today.”

  “Uh huh,” the deputy said. He stroked his chin as he studied Matt. “Well, I reckon when you come right down to it, somethin’ like this is bound to happen, pretty much anywhere you go, ain’t it? I mean people like you just seem to breed trouble.”

  “What do you mean ‘people like me’?”

  “You know what I mean. I mean people who have a reputation like you have. There’s always someone all full of himself, someone who thinks that killin’ you will make him famous.”

  Matt had encountered many such people before, so he couldn’t argue with the deputy’s logic.

  “You’ve got me there, Deputy,” he said. “It’s not something I want—it’s just something that happens.”

  “Ahh,” the deputy said with a dismissive shake of his head. “It ain’t your fault. It’s just that—well, for small towns like American Falls, we simply ain’t prepared to deal with it. Adam,” the deputy called to one of the others, “go get Mr. Prufrock. Tell him he’s got some undertakin’ business to do. We got us two bodies to take care of.”

  “Yes, sir, Deputy.”

  The young man charged off on his errand. The deputy hung around for a moment or two longer, then he started for the door, but before he reached the door, he turned back.

  “I’d appreciate it, if those of you who can write, would stop by the office tomorrow and write out a statement about what you seen here tonight. There ain’t goin’ to be no inquiry, but the sheriff and the judge are goin’ to need to know the facts.”

  “We’ll do it, Deputy,” someone called back.

  Chapter Eight

  Matt waited until the deputy left, then he returned to the table where the little man sat, quietly waiting. Matt had some questions for him, and began, by asking him his name.

  “My name is George Gilmore.”

  “Just before the deputy came in, you said something about fulfilling an obligation to your client. What were you talking about?”

  “I am a lawyer, Mr. Jensen. The client I was talking about is Mrs. Kitty Wellington of Coventry on the Snake.”

  “You are the one who sent me the letter,” Matt said. It was a statement, not a question.

  “I am.”

  “What is Coventry on the Snake?”

  “It’s a ranch over in Owyhee County.”

  “Owyhee County is in West Idaho,” Matt said. “If your client wanted me to come over there, why did you ask me to meet you here, in American Falls?”

  “We didn’t want anyone to know we were hiring you,” Gilmore said. “That’s why Mrs. Wellington suggested that we meet here, in American Falls. Evidently our ruse didn’t work, because as you can see, Madison, Jernigan, and Logan found out, not only that we were attempting to hire you, but also where we would be meeting.”

  “You knew these men?”

  “Not personally, but I know who they were. The moment I saw them here, I knew there was likely to be trouble.”

  “How did you know they would mean trouble?”

  “Mrs. Wellington has recently had some trouble with rustlers. One of her hands said that Poke Terrell was behind the rustling, and these three men are associates of Poke Terrell.”

  “Is Terrell in jail?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “It was one ranch hand’s word against Terrell’s. And Terrell had witnesses who provided them with an alibi.”

  “But you believe the ranch hand?”

  “I do. And what happened here, tonight, proves it, as far as I’m concerned. I believe they were trying to keep you from going to help Mrs. Wellington.”

  “How did they know?”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “I know how you knew I would be here, since you are the one who sent me the letter. But how did these two men know that I would be here?”

  “That is a good question, Mr. Jensen” Gilmore admitted. “I don’t have any idea how they knew I was going to meet you here.”

  “I have another question for you. Why did Mrs. Wellington pick me?”

  “At one time Mrs. Wellington knew you, and she remembers you fondly.”

  Matt shook his head. “I don’t recall ever meeting anyone named Kitty Wellington.”

  “That is her married name,” Gilmore said.

  “If she is married, why is she trying to hire me? Shouldn’t her husband be the one doing the hiring?”

  “Her husband is deceased,” Gilmore said. He chuckled. “But the truth is, Mrs. Wellington is such a remarkable woman, that even if her husband was still alive, she might very well be the one involved in these negotiations.”

  “She sounds like an interesting woman.”

  “Oh, indeed she is, sir. Have you had your dinner yet, Mr. Jensen?”

  “No, Matt replied.

  “Let me buy you dinner. And over dinner I shall show you a newspaper article about her. Then, I will show you the letter that Mrs. Wellington wrote to you. I think that will explain everything.”

  Matt smiled. “I’ve never turned down a free meal,” he said.

  The undertaker arrived just as Matt and Gilmore were leaving the saloon. He had two workers with him, and he began directing them through the grim business of recovering the bodies.

  As they left the saloon they saw the undertaker’s wagon parked out front, not the elegant and polished glass sided hearse, but the more pedestrian wagon he used to pick up bodies for preparation.

  The two men walked up the street, past the leather goods store, the apothecary, a dry goods store, and a hardware store until they reached a restaurant called Morning Star Café. They were greeted by an attracti
ve brunette, who showed them to a table in the back of the room.

  “Now then,” Gilmore said, after they ordered, “we’ll start with the newspaper article. This particular article happens to be from The Boise Statesman. When you read it, perhaps you will have an idea as to who Mrs. Kitty Wellington is.”

  Gilmore took an envelope from his pocket, then removed the newspaper article. Gingerly unfolding the article, he handed it across the table to Matt. “Read this.”

  Matt unfolded the article, spread it out on the table in front of him, and began to read.

  Coventry on Snake Will Be Ready

  TO SHIP HORSES SOON.

  Mrs. Kitty Wellington of Coventry on the Snake now has upward of one thousand horses on the Range. These are the finest animals one can imagine.

  Mrs. Wellington is a strikingly handsome woman, tall and graceful. Her face shows great strength of character and a wealth of blond hair makes a striking frame for it.

  Few persons are more entertaining conversationalists. In speaking about her ranch interests, Miss Wellington stated that the ranch was the vision of her late husband, Sir Thomas Wellington, who was the Seventh Earl of Buckinghamshire. However, he died before his ambition could be realized. While some may think that starting a horse ranch may be unseemly for a woman, Mrs. Wellington says that she considered it her obligation to bring his dream to fruition.

  Readers may know of Coventry Manor, Wellington’s palatial estate located on the Snake River at the conflux of the Bruneau. The ranch itself, Coventry on the Snake, comprises some 20,000 acres of the best grazing range in Idaho. Among the horses are several fine Arabian saddle horses, as well as imported stallions, including Normans and French coach horses.

  Her prize horse is a Hanoverian, which she brought out to the ranch from the East last year. Prince William, a champion jumper, stands sixteen hands high, weighs 1,200 pounds, and has a bright brown coat. Mrs. Wellington is breeding draft, coach, and saddle animals that are as magnificent as any that appear upon the parade grounds of the U.S. Cavalry, or the boulevards of the great cities of the world. Though she has spent the last three years developing her stock, this will be the first year she will actually ship her animals to market.