Ace High (Ben Blue Book 3)

by Lou Bradshaw

  He was a nice looking man with graying hair and side whiskers, but you could tell that his age and profession were beginning to show. He looked to be underfed and under rested, which gave him a sallow and slightly stooped appearance.

  “That’s a pretty fair guess, Doctor.” Ben told him. “I’d like to swear out an arrest warrant.”

  “Well, the sheriff usually does that, but I guess a private citizen can do it also…. If he can convince me that he has a good enough case to warrant it. You have to consider, young man, that I’m a doctor, and not a lawyer. The only reason I do it at all is because I’m smarter than anyone else in the county… If you measure that strictly on education alone, that is.” Then he chuckled at his own joke.

  The doctor then sat down at a large and somewhat cluttered roll top desk and rifled through a drawer until he pulled out the form he wanted and laid it in front of him.

  “Now sir, what’s the name that goes on this warrant?”

  Ben said, “Sheriff Bagley… first and middle names unknown to me.”

  The doctor jolted like he’d been lightening struck. He spun around in his swivel chair glaring at Ben. “Now see here, whoever you are, If this is some kind of sick joke, well I’m damned sure not laughin’.”

  “This is no joke, Doctor. My name is Blue…. Ben Blue, Special Deputy US Marshal and cattle rancher from Taos, New Mexico.” With that, Ben laid his badge on the desk in front of the doctor. “The charges are conspiracy to rustle cattle and receiving stolen cattle.”

  The doctor sat looking at the badge and the blank arrest warrant. “Damn!” was all he said.

  “I’ve got a letter here from US Marshal, Jasper Stewart of the Santa Fe office, if you need any more proof of my authority.”

  “No, I believe you, marshal, but I better take a look at it, just so I got myself covered when all those horse turds start flyin’ around from every direction… Good Lord, young fella, do you have any idea what kind of rock you turned over?”

  “Sorry, Doc, that wasn’t my intention. My intention was to come in here and shoot the bastard on sight, but I couldn’t do that with this badge in my pocket. But you’ve got to understand that I’ve got five dead drovers out there, twenty five hundred cattle scattered from here to the back side of hell, and about a thousand head on Bagley’s ranch which were having their brands changed an hour ago. Bagley’s men gave him up, and said this had been going on for some time.”

  “What do you plan to do with him when you arrest him?”

  “If you will vouch for his deputy as a replacement, then I’ll lock him up and leave an affidavit for his trial. If you can’t vouch, then I’ll take him to Pueblo and try him there in a federal court… I’ll be coming back through here in about three weeks. I’ll check on the outcome then.”

  The doctor turned back to his desk and began writing on the form. He studied over it for a few minutes, and then he signed it and handed the pen to Ben. When both men had signed, the doctor magistrate blotted it and handed it to Ben. He then pinned the badge to his vest and put the folded warrant in his shirt pocket. He thanked the doctor on our way out the door.

  I was standing on the boardwalk, waiting to hear his plan, as he closed the door. He moved the few feet to my side and said, “Max, here’s what I think we ought to….” That was all I heard when the rifle bullet slammed into the door frame inches from Ben’s head.

  Chapter 13

  Ben went right diving behind a water trough, and I went left into the space between the Doctor’s office and a saddle shop. I found enough debris there for some semblance of cover. Whoever it was doing the shooting didn’t seem to be too interested in me because they were pouring lead into that water trough at an alarming rate. I could see flashes and smoke from four different positions, and they were some pretty good positions.

  Easing my way up to where I could see Ben, I saw him looking in my direction. He was pinned down proper. I held up four fingers, and then I showed one finger pointing to an upstairs window over a saloon. Next I pointed three fingers directly across the street to let him know that they were on ground level. Giving him, as best I could, I signaled that I was going to try and get around behind them.

  As I took off going back towards the alley behind the two buildings, I heard Ben calling out to the crowd across the street. “Hey out there, this is US Marshal Ben Blue, working out of the Santa Fe office… I’m here to arrest Sheriff Bagley for rustling…. If you’re not part of the rustling operation, you can just walk away before it’s too late.”

  “That true, Sheriff? He really a US Marshal? You said he was an escaped prisoner.” Came the call from the upstairs window.

  “Shut up Perkins! I told you he was an escaped prisoner, and that’s what he is. There’s a thousand dollar reward on him. Now keep shootin!”

  With that the fusillade continued in earnest. I wasn’t too worried about Ben’s position. That trough was made of heavy oak planks that would stop a lot of lead, and with all that water in there, he was pretty cozy, but he couldn’t return fire.

  Four buildings down I came to the cross street. They were concentrated on the water trough, so I took off running the fifty or sixty feet of open space to the general store on the corner. As I ran across, I noted that all the fire was coming from ground level. The upstairs window was empty. That didn’t make sense; the window was the best position. That kept Ben tucked in close to the trough. I couldn’t think about it at the time because I had some running to do if we were gonna get out of Trinidad with our whole skins.

  Once I got around to the back side of the general store, I had to slow my pace. I sure as hell didn’t want to run into something unexpected, which is exactly what I did. As I was crossing behind the saloon, I heard boots coming down the side stairs… in a hurry.

  I stepped around the corner of the building with my Colt in hand and ready for what came. What came was a young man wearing a badge hot footing it down those stairs. “Hold it right there” I ordered and backed it up with my Peacemaker. The young man came to an abrupt halt.

  “You Perkins?” He seemed surprised that I knew his name, but he nodded that he was indeed Perkins. You quitin this fight, Perkins?”

  “Uh huh… I ain’t bushwhackin’ no US Marshal on Bagley’s say so. I’ll clean stables first.

  What about those others out there with Bagley, they deputies too?”

  “No, they’re a couple of hired guns that Bagley calls his foreman and ranch manager. I don’t know what that old bastard’s got himself into, but I ain’t gonna be part of it.”

  “Alright, Perkins, as of right now, you’re a temporary US Deputy Marshal. You and me are gonna go up between these buildings and get the drop on the foreman and the ranch manager. That’ll take a lot of heat off of Marshal Blue over there.”

  It was a simple plan and sometimes they’re the best. When you got a lot of moving parts, there’s more chance that something will get broken. And right now broken parts was something we surely didn’t need.

  According to Perkins, the two gunmen were in front of the feed store and shooting from behind bags of grain and bales of hay. So he went to the right of the feed store and I went to the left. Just as I was getting ready to poke my head around the corner, I heard Perkins shout, “Drop your gun, Blain.”

  Blain spun and fired drawing blood, but Perkins got two of his own into Blain. The other gunman was turning to take a shot at Perkins when he saw me coming around the corner and sent a wild desperate shot my way. I pulled the trigger as fast as I could three times, and that put two in the chest and the other was a miss. He just slumped and sagged against a grain sack, with his hat falling over his face and rifle clattering onto the boardwalk.

  “Ben,” I shouted, “Ben Blue. Two down and one changed sides…. Don’t come out yet cause Bagley’s still holed up here somewhere. We’ll snake him out for you, and then we can hang him with the rest.” I was hoping to get some reaction from Bagley. The reaction I got was the sound of a horse being ridden
hard and fast. That told me all I needed to know.

  I went to where Perkins was sitting on a feed sack, shaking and bleeding low on his left side. He was a young man, and this was probably his first shootout, but I had to give him credit… he stood his ground… the boy had sand.

  His wound was superficial, but it would need cleaning and patching. Blain had a bullet hole in his chest and one in his gut. He was gonna die.

  Within a few seconds, Ben and the Doc were there. The Doc took a look at Blain and said the only thing he could do for him was give him laudanum to ease the pain and wait. Then he checked the other gunman, whose name turned out to be Gorman, and pronounced him dead. He took Perkins over to the office where he could fix him up under conditions that were a little closer to ideal. Two townsmen carried Blain to the Doctor’s office.

  We followed the Doctor and his patients back across the street. After giving Blain a dose of laudanum, the part time magistrate and full time Doctor went to work on Perkins’ wound. While the doc was cleaning the wound and stitching, Ben, was for all intense and purposes interviewing the young deputy. “Can you tell me where Bagley is most likely to go?” Ben asked

  “If he doesn’t go to his ranch, then I don’t know where he might be headed. He’s got a bunch of kin scattered all around here. He could go to any one of them, but he’s most likely gone to the foot hills. His kinfolk will tend to him.”

  “Does he have a wife or a special woman that you know about. Women are funny when it comes to their men. They wouldn’t think of breaking the smallest little rule, but they’ll break every statute bound law to cover their man when he’s in trouble… Just like they’d do for their kids.”

  “No…” drawled Perkins, “Oh he visits several of the regulars at the saloon, but so did half the men in town.”

  After about eight or ten such questions, Ben finally figured he had all the information he could get from Perkins and said, “Doc, talkin to this young man, makes me feel comfortable with him taking over as acting sheriff until an election can be held. The first order of business is to keep an eye out for Bagley. That warrant is still good and you can add attempted murder to it.”

  The Doctor nodded his head and said, “My thoughts exactly, Marshal. In fact, if he’ll run in that election, I’ll vote for him.”

  “Well then, Sheriff,” Ben addressed the newly appointed peace officer, “We’ll be movin’ our cattle back to the main herd, if there’s anything left of it…. One more thing, Perkins, we’ve got about a half dozen of Bagley’s boys under guard out on the range. Those boys in any kind trouble, or can I just take em to help move my cows?”

  “Naa, they’re not a bad lot. Git a little drunk on payday, but that’s the only problem from any of em.”

  “Well sir, I’ll stop by on my way back to Taos, just to say howdy, and see how things are going…. You might want to keep an eye out for Bagley. I got a feelin’ he has some cash stashed somewhere, and he’ll be coming around to get it…. He left in a pretty big hurry.”

  We bid farewell to Perkins and the good doctor, but since dead men don’t say much, we didn’t include Blain in the goodbyes. When we reached the place where Cain and Tater were holding Bagley’s hands, we told them what had happened and that they were now unemployed.

  “Cain, why don’t you and Tater escort these gents back to the bunk house to get their gear and any personal belongings they may have because I’ve just hired them on to move those cows up to the main herd…. Of course, they won’t be paid for it, since they were caught altering brands on stolen cattle. It’s either that or we can hang em here and now. Like we did with the others.”

  “Max and I will start this bunch moving toward Rall’s camp. You may want to round up some grub while you’re there. We’re gonna need some extra. Just so there’s no misunderstanding, we’ll take their weapons with us…. They can have them back when they finish the job.”

  Moving a thousand head of cattle is a formidable task for four men and a bit harder for two men, but I had a hunch that Ben wanted to get back to camp as soon as he could to cut those men down. As tough as he was, he was still a good man at heart.

  About an hour later, Tate, Cain, Curley, and the Bagley crew caught up with us. They spread out and took their positions and the herd moved right along. Ben left me in charge while he took off at a gallop toward the camp.

  Hanging rustlers isn’t necessarily a crime in these parts, even though there is something in the law books that’s called “Due Process of Law”, and if you don’t hold a proper trial, then due process isn’t followed. So a lot of it depends on circumstance. I believe Ben could have been thinking that he might have stretched the circumstances a little thin.

  Chapter 14

  By the time we arrived with the herd, and made sure they were happy enough with our choice of graze and water, Ben had everyone on solid ground and all were breathing and all were showing signs of relief on their faces. He told me later that several had extended their arms up and entangled their fingers in the rope to take the strain off their legs. None had fallen to sleep, but they all looked like they were about to. I dare say, this was probably the worst day of their lives.

  One of Bagley’s boys, Earl, said to one of the rustlers, “Hey! That red haird boss said that he’d hunged you fellers… Why that lyin’ no good…”

  “If you’d a been here a half a hour sooner, you’d a seen a different story. He had us hung alright, but we was barely able to touch ground. I don’t even want to think about it.” One of the rustlers replied. “After about four or five hours of that you almost just give it up and let yourself get choked to death.”

  “Tater, you wanna ram-rod the cookin’ duties?” Ben asked. “Get a couple of those Bagley boys to help you. You tell ‘em what to put in the pot and how hot to make the fire, but keep your gun handy. I don’t trust ‘em not to try and poison us or spit in our food.”

  Tate went to work bossing people around. He had them fetching water and gathering wood. Soon every pot pan and skillet had something in it. Mostly it was the same stuff except for the coffee pots, which were dedicated to coffee.

  After supper, night guards were set with two riders per shift, one was one of us, and the other was an unarmed Bagley rider. The prisoners were tied and uncomfortable. The Bagley riders weren’t much of a threat, so they were left untied but unarmed. They had nothing waiting for them back at the ranch but riding the grub line, which is pretty much what they were doing now. They weren’t getting paid, but they were getting fed, and when the job was finished they could ride on.

  The rustlers had a different future waiting for them. If they weren’t too much trouble the only punishment would be a long ride to Pueblo, with their hands tied. But if they were a problem, their future could hold some prison time or worse. In the case of Ralls’, it would certainly be worse. He was up to his dirty neck in trouble and he knew it.

  The next morning we moved the herd north. The Bagley crew knew what to do with cattle. There wasn’t a top hand in the bunch, but they could ride, use a rope, and they knew which direction north was.

  The prisoners didn’t have to herd cattle, but I’m betting they would have traded places with any one of the drovers. They all rode with their hands tied and under the sawed off shotgun of Ben Blue. Ralls wasn’t riding with the others; in fact he wasn’t riding at all. His hands were tied and the other end of that rope was wrapped around Ben’s saddle horn. At least he wasn’t tied to the tail of some old mossy horned steer, but it was a long way to Pueblo, and it could still happen. Ben let the prisoners know that any problems would put them on the ground along side of Ralls. None of them wanted that.

  The way I figured it there are maybe three or four reasons why a man to turn to outlawry. One was just plain cussidness; some men just want to show the world what rotten bastards they were by stealing, killing, or destroying, and if they could make a few dollars along the way… then so much the better. Another reason for a man to go to the shadier side of huma
nity would be arrogance. They were the ones who thought they were smarter than everyone else and they would never get caught. That has proven to be wrongful thinking more often than not. The other reasons would boil down to stupidity and laziness. My uneducated opinion ranked most of the outlaws into the latter grouping, but I’ve known those who would fit in both of the former categories.

  That first day, we moved the herd nearly fifteen miles, which is a good day’s travel for a herd of cattle. Ralls had to do some hot stepping to keep up. Several times he stumbled and almost went down, but to his credit he stayed on his feet.

  At the end of the second day, we started seeing signs of the main herd, and we caught up to them the next morning. Jesus had put them on a plain with plenty of grass and water running through to keep the cattle from getting restless. We just moved the newcomers in with them for a family reunion. Bagley’s bunch fell in with the rest of our crew, but when we tossed the prisoners in with the four that the cook was watching over, there was immediate trouble.

  When one of the cook’s prisoners saw Ralls, he jumped to his feet and rushed across the intervening twenty or so feet and slammed the man to the ground. Ralls was getting hammered by the other outlaw, and with his hands still tied he was defenseless. Ben let the man get in a number of good licks before he pulled him off.

  “Let me go… I’ll kill that bastard.” The man shouted. “He and Slack set us up to be killed so’s they could make off with the rest of the cattle” You know how many of our men were killed because of him… Do you?” The outlaw was trembling with rage and running his words together.

  “Actually, I do know, mister… you lost nine men… and we lost five good men because of the same man’s greed. Now, you don’t want to beat him to death anymore than any of my men do, but, we’ll get to see him walk up those stairs and drop as far as his rope will let him drop.”