Elmore Leonard's Western Roundup #1

by Elmore Leonard

  “Was Moon there?” a reporter asked.

  “I told you,” Franklin Hovey said, “it was the two colored men and two Apache Indians which, I forgot to mention, had streaks of yellowish-brown paint on their faces.

  “The other colored man also began to prime sticks with blasting caps; so that between the two of them they soon had eight sticks of dynamite ready to fire, though not yet with the fuses attached. The one named Catlett approached me and poked a stick down into the front of my pants. Again, as you can imagine, I began to reason with him. He shook his head, pulled the stick out and walked around the line of us tied shoulder to shoulder and now placed the dynamite stick in my backpocket, saying, ‘Yeah, tha's the place.’”

  Many of the reporters were grinning and had to quickly put on a serious, interested expression as Franklin Hovey looked around the table.

  “Well, they were behind us for several minutes, so we couldn't see what they were doing. Then they placed a stick of Number One, which will shatter solid rock into small fragments—they placed a stick in every man's back pocket or down into his pants if he didn't have a pocket. Then came around in front of us again and began drawing the fuses out between our legs, laying each one on the ground in about a ten-foot length.

  “I forgot to mention they had found a box of cigars in somebody's gear and all four of them were puffing away on big stogies, blowing out the smoke as they stood about with their weapons, watching us. But not laughing or carrying on, as you might expect. No, they appeared serious and very calm in their manner.

  “The tall colored man, Catlett, said something and the four of them began lighting the ends of the fuses with their cigars.

  “Well, we began to pull and push against each other. We tried to reason—or maybe I should say plead with them by this time—seeing those fuses burning at eighteen seconds a foot, which seems slow, huh? Well, I'll tell you, those sputtering, smoking fuse ends were racing, not crawling, right there coming toward our legs. ‘Stomp 'em out!’ somebody yelled and all of us began dancing and stomping the ground before the burning ends were even close. The two colored men and the Apaches had moved back a ways. Now they raised their rifles, pointed 'em right at us and Catlett said, ‘Stand still. You move, we'll shoot you dead.’”

  Franklin Hovey waited, letting his listeners think about it.

  “Which would you prefer, to be shot or blown up?” he said. “If you chose the former, I'd probably agree. But you would not choose it, I guarantee, looking into the muzzles of their guns. I promise you you'd let that fuse burn through between your feet at its pace and by then try not to move a muscle while being overcome by pure fear and terrible anguish. There was a feeling of us pressing against each other, rooted there, but not one of us stomped on a fuse. It burned between our feet and was out of sight behind us, though we could hear it and smell the powder and yarn burning. With maybe a half minute left to live, I closed my eyes. I waited. I waited some more. There was an awful silence.”

  And silence at the table in the Gold Dollar.

  “I could not hear the fuse burning. Nothing. I opened my eyes. The four with the guns stood watching us, motionless. It was like the moment had passed and we knew it, but still not one of us moved.”

  Franklin Hovey let the reporters and listeners around the table wait while he finished the whiskey in his glass and passed the back of his hand over his mouth.

  “The fuses,” he said then, “had not been connected to the dynamite sticks, but burned to the ends a few feet behind us. It was a warning, to give us a glimpse of eternity: The tall one, Catlett, approached and said if they ever saw us again, well, we'd just better not come back. They hitched a team to the dynamite wagon and drove off with close to a thousand pounds of high explosives.”

  “That's it, huh?” a reporter said. “What was it the nigger said to you?”

  “I told you, he gave us a warning.”

  “Just said, don't come back?”

  Franklin Hovey seemed about to explain, elaborate, then noticed that two of the girls who worked in the Gold Dollar were in the crowd of listeners.

  “He said something, well, that wasn't very nice.”

  “We see you again, we crimp the fuse on, stick the dynamite stick up your ass and shoot you to the moon…boy,” were Bo Catlett's exact words.

  3

  A man by the name of Gean was brought down in a two-wheel Mexican cart lying cramped in the box with his new straw hat on his chest, both legs shattered below the knees by a single .50-caliber bullet. He said he felt it, like a scythe had swiped off his legs, before he even heard the report; that's how far away the shooter was. He said he should never have left the railroad. If he ever went back he would be some yard bull, hobbling after tramps on his crutches, if the company doctor was able to save his legs.

  The one who had guided the cart down out of the mountains was Maurice Dumas. The Chicago Kid was tired, dirty and irritable and did not say much that first day. He took Gean to the infirmary where there were all manner of crushed bones from mine and mill accidents, some healing, some turning black, lying there in a row of cots. It smelled terrible in the infirmary and the reporters who came to interview Gean handed him a bottle and asked only a few questions.

  Had Sundeen found Moon?

  Shit, no. It was the other way around.

  Moon was carrying the fight now?

  Teasing, pecking at Sundeen's flanks.

  Was it Moon who shot him?

  Get busted from five hundred yards, who's to say? But it's what he would tell his grandchildren. Yes, I was shot by Dana Moon himself back in the summer of '93 and lived to tell about it. Maybe.

  How many men did Moon have?

  A ghost band. Try and count them.

  What about the Mexicans?

  They'd come across women and children, ask them, Where they at? No savvy, mister. We'd burn the crops and move on.

  And the colored?

  The niggers? Same thing. Few Indin women and little wooly-headed breeds. Where's your old man at? Him gone. Him gone where? Me no know, be home by-'m-by. Shit, let's go. But it was at a nigger place the sniping had begun…riding off from the house after loading up with chuck and leading a steer…ba-wang, this rifle shot rang out, coming from, I believe, California, and we broke for cover. When we looked back, there was one of ours laying in the weeds. After it happened two times Sundeen had a fit, men getting picked off and all you could see up in the rocks was puffs of smoke. But he took care of that situation.

  How did he do that?

  Well, he took hostages so they wouldn't fire at us. I was walking up a grade toward a line shack, smoke wisping out the chimney, I got cut down and lay there looking at sky till one of your people found me and saved my life. Though I won't pay him a dime for that bed-wagon ride back here; I been sick ever since.

  What else—how about Indians?

  Shit, the only Indians he'd ever seen in his life was fort Indins and diggers. The ones rode for Moon were slick articles or wore invisible warpaint, for they had not laid eyes on a one.

  The company doctor took off Gean's right leg. Gean said he could have done it back home under an El Paso & Southwestern freight car and saved the fare from New Mexico.

  4

  My, that Gean has the stuff, doesn't he? Tough old bird.

  Maurice Dumas said to Bill Wells of the St. Louis Globe-Democrat, “Everybody was so taken with his spunk, or anxious to get out of there, they didn't ask the right question.”

  “About what?”

  “The hostages. He said they took hostages, then started talking about how I found him and put him in the cart.”

  “What about the hostages?”

  “They shot them,” Maurice said.

  He wasn't sure he was going to tell this until he did, sitting with Bill Wells in the New Alliance. Like one reporter confiding in another. What should I do? Should I reveal what happened or not?

  Why not?, was the question, Bill Wells said. “Are you afraid of
Sundeen?”

  “Of course I am,” Maurice said.

  “We have power, all of us together, that even the company wouldn't dare to buck,” Bill Wells said. It was a fact, though at the moment Bill Wells was glad they had come to this miners' saloon rather than mix with the crowd at the Gold Dollar. “Tell me what happened.”

  Maybe Sundeen thought it would be an easy trip: march up there with his hooligans and run the people off their land, burn their homes and crops, scatter the herds—like Sherman marching to the sea. Sundeen did have an air about him at first, as though he knew what he was doing.

  But there were not that many mountain people to run off. And how did you burn adobe except to blacken it up some? Tear down a house, the people would straggle back and build another. The thing Sundeen had to do was track down the leaders and deal with them face to face.

  But how did you find people who did not leave a trail? Even the cold camps they did find were there to misdirect and throw them off the track. Sundeen's men began to spit and growl and Sundeen himself became more abusive in his speech, less confident in his air.

  They had burned a field of new corn when one of Sundeen's tail-end riders was shot out of his saddle. The next day it happened again. One rifle shot, one dead.

  Sundeen came to a Mexican goat farm early in the morning, tore through the house and barn, flushed assorted women and kids, ah!, and three grown men that brought a squinty light to Sundeen's eyes. He tried to question them in his Sonora-whorehouse Spanish—no doubt missing his old segundo—and even hit them some with leather gloves on, drawing blood. Where's Moon? No answer. Smack, he'd throw a fist into that impassive dark face and the man would be knocked to the ground. The women and children cried and carried on, but the three men never said a word. Sundeen tied their hands behind them and loaded them into that two-wheel cart with a mule to pull it and had them lead his column when he moved on.

  But then, you see, he didn't draw any sniper fire and that seemed to aggravate him more than having his men picked off.

  Soon after taking the hostages they woke up in the morning to find half their horses gone, disappeared from the picket rope. Sundeen sent riders to Sweetmary for a new string. They came back to report the story of the survey crew being hit.

  It was in a high meadow facing a timbered slope and a little shack perched up in the rocks above that Sundeen, all of a sudden, reached the end of his skimpy patience. It was no doubt seeing the smoke coming out of the stovepipe. Somebody was up there, a quarter of a mile away. And he was sure they were in the timber also, in the deep pine shadows. There was not a sound when he began to yell.

  “Moon! Come on out!…You and your boogers, Moon!…Let's get it done!”

  His words echoed out there and faded to nothing.

  Sundeen pulled the three Mexicans from the cart and told them to move out in the meadow, keep going, then yelled for them to stop when they were about forty yards off. They stood in the sun bareheaded, looking up at the timber and turning to look back at Sundeen who brought all his riders up along the edge of the meadow, spread out in a line.

  He yelled now, “You see it, Moon?…Show yourself or we'll blow out their lights!”

  Nothing moved in the pines. The only sound, a low moan of wind coming off the escarpment above.

  The three men, bareheaded and in white, hands tied behind them, didn't know which way to face, to look at the silent trees or at the rifles pointed at them now.

  “I've given him enough warning,” Sundeen said. “He's heard it, isn't that right? If he's got ears he heard it.” If he's up there, somebody said. “He's up there, I know he is,” Sundeen said. “Man's been watching us ten days, scared to come out. All right, I give him a chance, haven't I?” He looked up and yelled out once more, “Moon?” Waited a moment and said, “Shit…go ahead, fire.”

  “And they killed them?”

  Maurice nodded.

  “But if he knew you were a witness—”

  “He'd forgotten I was along by then, other things on his mind.”

  Bill Wells was thoughtful, then asked, “Was Moon up there, in the trees?”

  “Somebody was. Shots were fired and Sundeen divided his men to come at the timber from two sides. That was when Gean was shot.”

  “And you were considering you might keep it a secret?”

  “I wasn't sure how I felt. I mean I've never handled anything like this before,” Maurice said. “Though I know we're sworn to print the truth, letting the chips fall where they may.”

  “Or stack the chips against the company's hand,” Bill Wells said, the idea bringing a smile. “Yes, I can see Vandozen squirming and sweating now.”

  13

  1

  There was a framed slate in the Gold Dollar, back of the bar, that gave the betting odds on a Sundeen-Moon showdown:

  2-1 one week

  5-1 four days

  10-1 two days

  It meant you could bet one dollar to win two if you thought Sundeen would track down Moon and bring him in dead or alive within one week. The house was betting against it ever happening. When a week passed and Sundeen hadn't returned, you lost your dollar. For shorter periods you could bet the higher odds that were posted.

  When Sundeen returned a few days ago with four men face-down over their saddles and the rest of his troop worn raw and ugly, they erased the old odds and wrote on the slate:

  4-1 one week

  10-1 four days

  20-1 two days

  100-1 one day

  A miner at the bar, who had not seen the new odds before, said, “I'd hide that thing I was you. Case he comes in here.”

  “Who, Mr. Sundeen?” said Ed O'Day, who ran the Gold Dollar and sometimes served behind the bar. “He wants to bet on himself we'd be glad to cover it. Or, he wants to bet against himself I'm sure there some takers. Making a wager isn't anything personal. The man is not gonna bet against himself and take a dive, is he? No, not in this kinda contest. So, he thinks he's gonna come out the victor, let him put up his money.”

  Ed O'Day was a known high-roller; he ran faro, monte and poker tables in the back of his place and would bet either side of an issue depending on the odds.

  Bren Early stepped toward them, moving his elbow along the polished edge of the bar. He said, “You're betting against him finding Moon is all you're doing.”

  “Mr.Early, how are you? Sorry I didn't see you there. The usual?”

  Bren nodded. The slight—not being noticed immediately—was as much an insult to him as the odds board: putting Sundeen against Moon and ignoring him completely. Bren had a hard knot inside his stomach. He wanted to cut this barkeeper down, level him with a quiet remark that had an eternal ring. (Something to do with, serving these miners and tourists, “What would you know about putting your life on the line?” Or, “…What would you know about facing death?”) But he couldn't think of the words when he was on edge like this. God-damn it.

  Pouring him a whiskey, Ed O'Day said, “Finding Moon is ninety percent of it, yes. If that ever happens it would be a different story.”

  “How would you set the odds then?” Bren asked, satisfied that his tone did not show the edge.

  “Well, I'm inclined to believe they would favor Mr. Sundeen. I don't mean as a shooting contest. I mean if he runs him down the game's over.”

  “How do you come to that?” Bren asked the know-it-all, feeling the knot tighten.

  Ed O'Day looked both ways along the bar and leaned closer as he said, “You take a person raised on sour milk and make him look dumb in front of his fellow man—You see what I mean? He ever sets eyes on Moon he's gonna kill him.”

  “You know that as fact,” Bren said.

  “No, but I'd bet on it.”

  “You heard right now that Sundeen had located him—you'd put your money on Sundeen?”

  “I'd say it would be the safer bet.”

  “Turn the same odds around?”

  Ed O'Day hesitated. “You said if he locates him
—”

  “Gets Moon to stand still and fight.”

  “Just Sundeen, or his men too?”

  “His men, anybody he wants to bring along.”

  The miner standing next to Bren said, “Anybody or everybody? The way he's signing up people, he's gonna be taking a army next time—saying up at the works the next time's the last time. Though I don't want to mess up your bet none.”

  “That's talk,” Ed O'Day said, but looked at Bren Early to get his reaction.

  “No, it's fact,” the miner said. “Sundeen sent to Benson, St. David, Fairbank—twenty a week, grub and quarters. Most the miners want to quit and join up; but Selkirk told him no, he couldn't hire no miners. See, he's gonna take all the men he can find and not come back till it's done.”

  The miner's heavy mustache, showing fine traces of gray, reminded Bren of Moon. He wondered what Moon was doing this minute. Squinting at heat waves for signs of dust. Or tending his guns, wiping down Old Certain Death with an oil rag. Damn.

  “I don't care how many people he raises,” Bren said, “I want to know what odds you're giving if both sides stand to shoot and you want Sundeen…ten to one?”

  “Ten to one?”. Ed O'Day said. “Talking about if the two sides ever meet.”

  “No bet less they do.”

  “Doesn't matter how many men Sundeen has?”

  “He can hire the U.S. Army,” Bren said.

  “Ten to one,” Ed O'Day said and thought about it some more. “Well, it's interesting if we're talking about real money.”

  “Give me a Maricopa bank Check,” Bren said.

  Ed O'Day went over to the cash register and came back with the check, and ink pot and a pen.

  Bren leaned over the bar and scratched away for a minute, picked up the check, to blow on it, wave it in the air, and laid it on the polished surface again.

  “Seven thousand Sundeen goes out and never comes back.”