The Vigilance Man

by Fenton Sadler

  The Vigilance Man

  For twelve-year-old Brent Cutler, seeing his father lynched was the most powerful influence on his young life, giving him an abiding and life-long hatred of injustice of any form.

  As an adult, he returns to the town where he grew up as a representative of the District Attorney’s office. He finds himself going head to head with the man responsible for the death of his father a decade earlier. There will be hard words and tough actions before Cutler can finally lay the demons of his childhood to rest.

  By the same author

  Whirlwind

  Assault on Fort Bennett

  The Vigilance Man

  Fenton Sadler

  © Fenton Sadler 2016

  First published in Great Britain 2016

  ISBN 978-0-7198-2118-9

  The Crowood Press

  The Stable Block

  Crowood Lane

  Ramsbury

  Marlborough

  Wiltshire SN8 2HR

  This e-book first published in 2016

  www.crowood.com

  Robert Hale is an imprint of

  The Crowood Press

  The right of Fenton Sadler to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

  CHAPTER 1

  Seeing your own father hanged is the hell of a thing and likely to have a deep effect upon even the most careless and unimaginative boy. When Brent Cutler’s pa was taken out the house and hanged in front of him that January day in 1867, it set a mark upon the child which no subsequent experiences in his life were ever likely to erase. This is how it happened.

  The Cutlers were living at that time in the small town of Grant’s Landing, on the Arecibo River. The family consisted of Mr and Mrs Cutler and their three children; Brent, who was twelve and his 7-year-old twin sisters. Patrick Cutler, Brent’s father, was away from home a lot on business and so from an early age, the boy knew what it was to be relied upon to do stuff around the house. That winter, Patrick Cutler had been away for weeks at a time, leaving his wife and children to get by as best they were able. The family never wanted for food and warmth, for when he returned from his business trips Mr Cutler was always flush with cash money; but the lack of a man about the place was keenly felt during his absences. When, on January 21st, Patrick Cutler walked through the door after having been away for over a fortnight, his homecoming was greeted with unfeigned delight.

  ‘Patrick,’ cried his wife, Ellie-May, ‘Thank the Lord you’re back.’

  ‘Ah, I would’ve been home sooner, but there was a little matter as detained me. How have these young rascals been behaving?’ It was plain that he meant the twins, rather than Brent. There was an unspoken understanding between Patrick Cutler and his son that they had a man-to-man relationship and both knew how much Brent did to keep the household on an even keel when his father was away.

  ‘It’s good to see you, Pa,’ said Brent. ‘How long you back for?’

  ‘A good long spell, or so I hope,’ declared his father. ‘Leastways, I got no plans for going off again in a hurry.’

  They had at that time been living in Grant’s Landing for four months or so. On average, the Cutlers moved house once a year; often travelling great distances when they did so. Almost, thought Brent once, as though they were trying to put a deal of space between themselves and their previous home.

  ‘I’m famished,’ announced Mr Cutler. ‘We got vittles in the house?’

  ‘We’ll be eating at six of the clock,’ said his wife. ‘Can you wait that long?’

  ‘Happen I’ll have to!’ exclaimed Patrick jovially. In the event, though, he was not destined to eat dinner that day; or indeed ever again in the whole course of his life.

  A half hour after Patrick Cutler had returned to the bosom of his family and while he was sprawled in an easy chair, telling the twins some nonsensical tale of his adventures, there came an impatient pounding at the door. ‘I’ll get it!’ said Brent and walked over to open the front door. Standing there was a group of six or seven grim-faced men.

  ‘We’re lookin’ for Patrick Cutler,’ announced one man. ‘He inside?’

  ‘Who shall I say wants him?’ asked Brent, trying to maintain the customary civilities.

  ‘Don’t you tell him nothin’, boy,’ was the reply. ‘He knows well enough what’s to do.’

  With no further words, the knot of men surged into the house and surrounded Brent’s pa. Some had pistols in their hands and one was carrying a carbine. Patrick Cutler raised his eyebrows quizzically as he got to his feet. ‘What’s all this?’ he asked quietly.

  ‘What it is, Cutler,’ said the man who appeared to be the leader of the group, ‘is that you’ve been dancing between the raindrops a little too long and now you got caught in a storm.’

  ‘Care to speak plainer?’ asked Patrick Cutler, ‘only we’re getting ready for our dinner here.’

  Another man chipped in at this point, saying, ‘We been tracking you all the way from the High Peaks and now we caught up with you. That plain enough for you?’

  It seemed to Brent, as he watched the scene unfolding before him, that in spite of his professed bewilderment, his father knew, or at the very least had a suspicion, what this was all about. Patrick Cutler said, ‘Let’s take this outside, gentlemen.’

  ‘Not ’til we found what we lookin’ for!’ declared one of the men. ‘You got stolen goods here or I’m a Dutchman.’

  At that moment, there came the sound of splintering wood from the back of the house, followed by cries of triumph. Two more men came bursting through the door, brandishing sheaves of papers. One of them announced, ‘We done found these in that little shed out back. Bust down the door and there they was!’

  If his father had showed little real surprise at the arrival of the men earlier, it struck Brent that he was now truly dumbfounded at the sight of the papers being flourished in his face. When he exclaimed hotly, ‘I never saw those things before in my life!’ the words had, to his son, the ring of truth.

  The man who appeared to be in charge of the others took the documents and leafed through them carefully. Then he looked up and said, ‘These here are bearer bonds, stolen from the mail coach ’tween Greenhaven and Fort James. How d’you account for ’em bein’ here?’

  ‘I don’t account for them no how, ’cause I never saw them before. Someone must’ve put them there.’

  The men stared contemptuously at Brent’s father, this explanation evidently striking them as feeble in the extreme. Their leader said, ‘That’s enough, take him outside.’

  Patrick Cutler was disposed to resist at this point, but two men grabbed his arms, while another offered him the barrel of his pistol.

  Ellie-May had stood silently up to this point, but now she cried, ‘Where are you taking my husband? What’s going on?’

  The man in charge said gruffly, but with a certain amount of courtesy, ‘Best you stay here, ma’am, with the little ’uns. I’m sorry we had to take him in front of you.’

  ‘Take him?’ said Brent’s mother, ‘I don’t rightly understand you. Where are you taking him?’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ said the man, once more. Then they all streamed out into the darkness leaving Brent and his mother staring at each other; speechless with amazement and horror. The twins were not old enough fully to appreciate what was going on and so were not as affected.

  ‘Stay here with the girls, Ma,’ said Brent impulsively, ‘I’ll see what’s what.’ Before his mother could forbid him, he darted through the door into the chilly darkness. There was a full moon and by its light he could see the little party moving down towards the Turn of the Cards saloon. Trailing behind in the shadows, the boy followed; watc
hing to see what would befall his father.

  When they reached the saloon, two of the men went in and returned with a half dozen others who lived in Grant’s Landing. The men who had come into the house had been strangers, but Brent recognized those who came out of the saloon. There was Jack Taylor, who owned the livery stable, the fellow who ran the hotel and others whom he had seen about town. What Brent Cutler did not altogether realize was that these men were all members of the town’s so-called ‘safety committee’.

  In those days, many towns did not have a sheriff and the nearest marshal might be a couple of days’ ride away. Groups of concerned citizens set up what became known as ‘vigilance’ or ‘safety’ committees, whose self-appointed task was to maintain law and order. Later, such men were called vigilantes and it is an undeniable fact that some of these individuals terrorized the districts which they claimed to be protecting. The Grant’s Landing safety committee was one of the better examples of the breed.

  ‘Well, what’s to do?’ asked Jack Taylor, ‘I know some o’ you boys. What’s the idea of takin’ of a prisoner in this town?’

  The man who had knocked on the Cutlers’ door spoke out. ‘You and me know each other, Jack Taylor. You know I’m the nearest thing to law up in Greenhaven. There was a stage robbed, matter of eight days ago. Two men killed, driver and messenger both.’

  Taylor listened carefully and then said, ‘You ain’t yet explained what’s going on here. I see a fellow from this town; looks like you got him captive. What’s the game?’

  ‘We tracked this man-killer all the way here from Fort James. Word is he was one of the road agents as took the mail coach down. He got here just ahead of us and when we searched his place, we found these.’ The man handed a bundle of papers to Taylor, who received them without a word.

  After he’d looked through the documents, Taylor said, ‘You take a lot on yourself, Seaton. Hell of a lot. Come into my town and start searching folks’ houses. You say as these were stole from that stage you tell of?’

  ‘That’s right. We come to take this ’un back with us.’

  ‘What d’you say of it, Cutler?’

  ‘I say it’s a heap of lies. I never saw those papers in my life.’

  Taylor thought this over for a space and then said, ‘I reckon you got cause to suspicion him of this. I won’t oppose you takin’ him back to answer for it.’

  As the men surrounding him closed in and began to hustle him from the scene, Patrick Cutler tried to break free and shouted, ‘Taylor! I’m an innocent man. Let me tell you about it.’ At that moment, one of the party cracked Cutler over the head with his pistol butt, sending the man sprawling to the ground. Taylor and the other men from town said nothing, went back into the Turn of the Cards.

  Brent trailed along after the men who had taken his pa prisoner; far enough behind that he could not be seen in the darkened street. They moved to the outskirts of town, where they had seemingly left their horses. It was when they reached the mounts that Patrick Cutler’s fate was sealed by a trifling oversight on the part of those who had tracked him down: nobody had thought to bring a spare horse for the prisoner. From his hiding place in the shadows, young Brent overheard snatches of angry conversation from the men who had taken his father.

  ‘You chucklehead, I figured you’d o’ thought of it.…’

  ‘Son of a bitch.…’

  ‘Can’t take him back on foot.…’

  ‘Well, I guess that clinches it.…’

  The leader of the men, who Brent had heard addressed as ‘Seaton’, said, ‘There’s little enough point in shilly-shallying round. We know what this man has done and whether he hangs here or twenty miles away makes no odds.’

  ‘You want we should hang him here?’ asked another of the men.

  ‘Less’n you want to travel back with him, and he likely to cut your throat in the night if he gets the chance?’

  There was silence for a space and then one of the men surrounding Brent’s father said, ‘Got a rope in m’saddle-bag.’

  ‘You can’t just lynch me without any kind of trial,’ said their prisoner. ‘This is just what I’ve been looking into.’

  ‘Looking into?’ asked the man called Seaton, ‘How so?’

  ‘I’m a peace officer, you fools.’

  There was a positive gale of laughter at this absurd claim. When it began to die down, Patrick Cutler said, ‘Listen to me, I can prove it.’ He got no further because one of those standing near to him reversed the rifle he was cradling in his arms and slammed the stock into Cutler’s head so hard that the man fell to his knees. Another mighty blow knocked him out cold.

  ‘Don’t have to listen to a heap o’ foolishness,’ said the one who had silenced Brent’s father so brutally and effectively. ‘Case is plain as daylight. Let’s hang him and be done with it.’

  It seemed to Brent, as he watched, that there was indecision on the face of the man who was evidently the leader of the band. But by this time, the rope had been thrown over a branch of the old, dead, lightning-struck oak standing near to hand. A noose had been swiftly fashioned and events had taken on an unstoppable momentum of their own.

  Patrick Cutler was hauled, still unconscious, onto a horse and the hang-rope fastened around his neck. Then somebody slapped the rump of the beast and it was all over, with a man suspended at the end of a rope, swaying gently in the evening breeze.

  Even at such a tender age, Brent Cutler felt instinctively that it would be hazardous to reveal himself as a witness to the proceedings and so remained cowering out of sight, the tears running down his face. There was, after all, nothing he could do to help his pa. Brent clenched his fists so hard that he later found that he had gouged four deep half-moon-shaped gashes in each palm. At least it didn’t look like his father had suffered; he hadn’t so much as twitched when the horse bolted and left him hanging there.

  After they were sure that their victim was dead, the party of men saddled up and trotted away. Brent went up to his father and broke down in a fit of weeping, clutching hopelessly at the corpse. Then he dried his tears and went home to tell his mother what had occurred.

  The following day, there being nothing in particular to detain them, the family paid a farmer a nickel to let them ride on his wagon to the next town, which had a railroad station. From there, they made their way to his mother’s family’s home, some three hundred miles away. So great was their mother’s fear of what might befall them if they lingered she didn’t even arrange a funeral for her husband.

  Many a boy, having witnessed the murder of his father in this way by a lynch-mob, would have turned bad and sworn to revenge himself on a society which could tolerate such injustices. Some, though, take the other road and find that such a terrible experience fills them with a hatred of anything approaching mob rule and feel a desire to support the official law and do everything in their power to help it along. This is what happened with Brent Cutler.

  His grandparents were wealthy enough that he did not have to work and was placed instead in a good school. He did not neglect his studies, and proved to be an apt scholar. By the age of fourteen, the boy knew what direction his life would be taking. He was determined that when he was fully grown, he would devote himself to making sure that nobody would ever again be treated as his own father had been and that every man and woman in the country should be given the chance of a fair trial when accused of even the most trifling offence.

  Mixing as he did with other young fellows whose ambitions extended no further than driving locomotives or becoming cowboys, Brent soon gained a reputation for being something of an oddity at school. In all other respects, though, he was as merry and high-spirited a lad as you could hope to find and so his playmates forgave him this minor eccentricity.

  When he was sixteen and his schooldays were drawing to a close, his grandfather asked the youngster what he would like to do next and was not at all surprised to hear that the boy wished to work in a lawyer’s office. Had there been enough mone
y, then Brent would have liked to go to law school, but his family’s finances were not quite up to such a course of action.

  ‘I’m right sorry, boy,’ his grandfather explained, ‘but I just don’t have the funds to put you through college.’

  Brent smiled cheerfully and said, ‘You’ve done enough for me already, sir. I’ve had an education, which is more than many fellows my age have had. If I can get a situation in an office dealing with the law, I reckon I’ll do well enough.’

  Old Mr Carter was a corn chandler and he wished to do all that he could for his only grandson. He asked round his business contacts until he heard tell of an attorney in a neighbouring town who was seeking a smart young man to help in his office. After some haggling, it was fixed that Brent Cutler would work for the lawyer for a small, regular sum, until he had mastered the business. Grandpa Carter had made some inquiries and established to his satisfaction that this was a good way into the law for such as could not afford to study at college. After he’d made the necessary arrangements, he sent for his grandson and told him, ‘Well, boy, I’m happy to tell you that you are provided for and will, I hope and pray, do your duty. Work hard and carry on with your studies and there’s no reason you shouldn’t go into law on your own account after a few years.’

  So it was that at the age of sixteen, Brent Cutler left his family and went to live on his own account. The man to whom he was apprenticed was a hard but fair taskmaster and it didn’t take the young man long to discover that he had a positive aptitude for the law. For four years, he learned as much of the law as was possible in a small, provincial town. Soon after his twentieth birthday, he applied for a position at the District Attorney’s office, up at the county seat. To his immense surprise, he was successful. It looked both to Brent Cutler and to those around him that his future was assured and that the young man was on his way up in the world.

  CHAPTER 2

  It had been a good hanging. In fact, sitting now at his ease in the comfortable and well-appointed parlour of his home, Mark Seaton could not recollect a better. He was certainly in the best possible position to judge such things, having officiated at well over a hundred executions over the last fifteen years or so. As head of the Greenhaven vigilance committee, this was his duty. Although he didn’t much like taking any man’s life, Seaton would allow that he felt a certain sober satisfaction in dispatching wrongdoers in this way. An eye for an eye, it said in the Good Book and as a Godfearing man, Mark Seaton conceived it to be his duty to see that malefactors received their just desserts; at least if their crimes had been committed in or around Greenhaven. In a very real sense, he was the law in those parts and had been so almost since the little town had been founded.