The Chisholm Trail

by Ralph Compton

  Ten seemed repentant for his angry outburst, but not to the extent that Jesse Chisholm had expected.

  “Sorry, Jess. I reckon there’s times when I’m not near as much a man as I’d like to be. It’s just…well, I want to make something of myself, and this trail drive means a lot. When you—I felt…like I’d been stomped by the bronc before I ever got in the saddle.”

  “Like I told you,” said Chisholm, “I have nothing but admiration for you, in the way you’ve ridden to the forts and set this up. But I fail to see the necessity of rushing into it ill-prepared. I’ve been a trader most of my life, and I’m not penniless. I never suggested that you give up the cow hunt and trail drive, only that you wait until after the first of the year. Now just tell me why you can’t—or won’t—and we’ll go from there.”

  It was precisely the opening Ten needed, but dreaded. He took a deep breath and plunged in.

  “I want to be more than just a half-Injun, leaning on you. I want to be a man who can stand on his own feet, make his own way. I reckon that sounds vain, but it’s not for me. It’s for the girl I aim to marry. I won’t have her livin’ in a mud hut, cooking rabbit stew over an open fire.”

  After a lifetime on the frontier, Jesse Chisholm was rarely caught off his guard, but this was an exception. Ten, apprehensive as he was, laughed at the incredulous expression on Chisholm’s face. It was a while before the old plainsman trusted himself to speak.

  “You spent an almighty lot of time in New Orleans. I reckon you’d best start at the front, and don’t leave anything out.”

  Ten began with his exposure of LeBeau’s cheating aboard The New Orleans and dwelt extensively on his meeting with John Mathewson. While he revealed none of the intimate details of the hours he’d spent with Priscilla LeBeau, he did explain her wretched predicament and the arranged marriage LeBeau sought. He was careful not to mention the possibility that Jason Brawn was the head of a smuggling and black-market ring. He concluded with his proposal to Priscilla, her acceptance, and his determination to return to New Orleans.

  “I see,” said Chisholm. “You’re going to save the young lady from an arranged marriage to a man she despises. Her daddy is in the clutches of this Jason Brawn, probably as a result of his gambling debts. To save his own hide, he’s about to sacrifice her to a man who may well be responsible for smuggling and black-marketing. The girl’s being used, and she knows it. How sure are you of her?”

  “You make it sound like she’s just…using me to save herself, like old LeBeau’s trying to use her!”

  “Now that you mention it,” said Chisholm mildly, “how do you know she’s not?”

  It was a possibility Ten had already privately considered, so it didn’t shock or further anger him. Instead, it had the opposite effect, and he grew calm. He had already reached a decision in his own mind, and he just gave Jesse Chisholm the result of his own conclusion.

  “I won’t fault her if she is using me. I want her, Jess, and if that’s the price I have to pay, then I’ll pay it.”

  “From the scars,” said Chisholm, “I’d say you’ve already paid some of it. Am I out of line if I ask how you aim to see her again without getting yourself killed?”

  “I’m not sure,” said Ten, “until I hear from her. There’ll be a letter by the time I get to Fort Smith. Whatever the risk, she’s worth it. I’ll take my chances.”

  “If you plan to go to Texas by way of New Orleans,” said Chisholm, “you’d best plan on taking the next boat out of Fort Smith. If you’re to meet the beef deadline you’ve set, you’ll have to be roping cows by the first of November.”

  Ten looked at Chisholm as though he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. He swallowed hard, and it was a moment before he trusted himself to speak.

  “You mean you’d…still be willin’ to stake me, after…this?”

  “I’ve never broken my word to any man,” said Chisholm, “whether I agreed with him or not. When you’re ready, I’ll advance you a thousand dollars. I expect you to build yourself a decent outfit. You’ve made a start, but you need more men the caliber of this Marty Brand. But you want to straddle your own broncs, and I respect that. Better to be pitched off and stomped than to not have the sand to mount up.”

  Ten and Marty reached Fort Smith on Sunday. Monday, October 2, they would depart for New Orleans. Ten had a rough map Chisholm had drawn for him. It included the major rivers in Texas, landmarks, and towns with which Jesse Chisholm was familiar. Marty breathed a sigh of relief when Ten found that all-important letter from Priscilla waiting for him. There was another letter without a return address. Ten read Priscilla’s letter first, and his delight quickly became disappointment. Marty saw it in his eyes.

  “She ain’t goin’ to be there, is she?”

  “No,” said Ten. “Something’s wrong at home. Her mother’s told her to stay in Louisville. Here, read it.”

  There was but a single page, and he read it quickly. The girl’s distress came through in every line. The last sentence was a frantic appeal, every word underlined:

  Please, please don’t go back to New Orleans now!

  Marty returned the letter, and Ten handed him the second one. It was brief, signed by John Mathewson. It said:

  Come to my office as soon as you can. Of vital importance. It concerns Priscilla.

  Marty returned the letter and waited for Ten to speak. He knew what was coming.

  “I’ll have to go,” said Ten. “I asked him to send me word if anything happened involving Priscilla. But I won’t force this boat ride on you. Go on back to the trading post and wait for me there. Texas will have to wait.”

  “No,” said Marty, “I’ll stay. I don’t hanker to explain to Jesse Chisholm how come I let you go by your lonesome to get shot dead or stomped into doll rags. You’ll need somebody with a gun, to watch your back.”

  So they boarded The Talequah and began the monotonous journey down the Arkansas. Ten read and reread the two letters, trying to get something more from them than the few words revealed.

  9

  Following his disastrous meeting with Jason Brawn, LeBeau stopped at a saloon to salve his mangled pride. When he left, he took a quart of bourbon with him. Emily wasn’t at the house, but he didn’t care. He kicked off his shoes, stretched out on his bed, and did the one thing at which he had always been successful. He got stinking drunk, and it was sometime the following morning before he awoke. He was sick, sick! Somewhere, somebody was striking an anvil, and every blow kept time to the throbbing of his head. Then came the dull realization that the anvil was his head. He groaned and sat up. In his fogged mind, he picked up the remnants of the previous day, going over his ultimatum from Jason Brawn. He had to find Sneed.

  It was noon before he was presentable enough to leave the house. He still hadn’t seen Emily. He wondered if she had returned home and had left again, or had simply been gone all night. He decided he didn’t care, after she’d hustled Priscilla off to Louisville without a word to him. That again brought to mind Priscilla’s angry repudiation of Jason Brawn, and the haunting stack of IOUs that Brawn held. Somehow he had to force the girl back into the cruel shackles he had forged for her. He went to the rooming house where Sneed lived, pounding on the door until he awoke the grouchy little man. LeBeau entered the dingy room, closing the door behind him.

  “Until I tell you different,” said LeBeau, “I want you there when the boats come in from Fort Smith. When this Tenatse Chisholm shows up, follow him. Find out what hotel he goes to.”

  “That all? You don’t want me tailin’ him ever’where, like before? What if he don’t go to a hotel?”

  “Don’t be stupid,” said LeBeau. “He can’t leave until the next boat.”

  Twice a week, for a month, Sneed met the boats from Fort Smith. Just as he had decided it was a useless vigil, and was about to give it up, he sighted Tenatse Chisholm on the deck of The Talequah.

  As the boat neared New Orleans, Ten and Marty had a final talk.

>   “We can’t afford to be seen together,” said Ten. “Do you know where the St. Charles Hotel is?”

  “Yeah,” said Marty. “Is that where we’re goin’?”

  “That’s where you’re going. When we dock, you leave ahead of me and go rent us a room in your name. Wait in the lobby, and when I come in, signal me the floor. I’ll go up, and once you’re sure nobody’s trailing me, you can follow.”

  “Good plan,” said Marty. “When will you go to the customs office?”

  “Early in the morning. There’s no way to avoid havin’ them trail me once I leave the hotel, but that’s where you come in. I want you at a great enough distance behind me that you’re behind anybody that’s trailin’ me.”

  “You’re countin’ mighty strong on bein’ followed from the hotel,” said Marty. “If they know you’re here, all they got to do is stake out Mathewson’s office until you show up there.”

  “All the more reason for you not to be close enough to get sucked in. If nothing else, I can always hole up in Mathewson’s office. I don’t think they’ll gun me down right at the customs office. You’ll have the Henry; watch for snipers at the windows, and on the roofs of other buildings.”

  “This office you’re goin’ to, what kind of place is it?”

  “Mathewson’s office takes up half the bottom floor of the building,” said Ten. “The stairs to the second floor are outside, leading to a railed balcony that runs across the front of the second story. I reckon the place used to be a Spanish mission. It’s got an open bell tower that reaches from the first floor to above the roof.”

  “Sounds like a perfect trap. A box canyon.”

  The steamboat whistled for the landing. Ten got up off his bunk, and Marty took the Henry rifle. The Talequah nosed in to the dock, and they waited until they heard the creaking of the gangplank being lowered.

  “Time for you to go,” said Ten. “I’ll be in the lobby of the St. Charles in half an hour.”

  Ten waited, going on deck only after he was certain that Marty would be ashore and out of sight. He paused on deck, but saw nobody on or near the dock that he recognized or that might recognize him. He took his time, so that Marty could arrive at the St. Charles well ahead of him. When he did enter the lobby, Marty was seated near the desk, apparently absorbed in a newspaper. Using the paper as a shield, he quickly held up three fingers. Without pausing, Ten walked through the lobby and up the stairs to the third floor. Marty followed a few minutes later, hurriedly unlocking the door to Room 31. They entered, and he locked the door behind them.

  “I’d forgot about this place havin’ first-floor entrances on all four sides,” said Marty. “I’d say that’s goin’ to make it almighty hard for them to stake out this place without attractin’ attention. I reckon you’d best look close for trouble once you reach Mathewson’s office.”

  “I aim to,” said Ten, “but I still want you stayin’ as far behind me as you can. However and whenever they come at me, stay far enough behind me that we don’t both walk into the same trap.”

  “If I’m too far behind, I won’t be much help, if they hit you close up.”

  “But if we’re both pinned down behind the same rock,” said Ten, “you’ll be no help at all.”

  The St. Charles had its own dining room. For locals and travelers alike, it was one of the most fashionable places in New Orleans to eat. Marty went to the dining room first, and Ten remained in their room until he had returned. Despite what the morning might bring, they slept. They arose well before daylight and began preparing for whatever might lie ahead.

  “Go on down and have your breakfast,” said Ten. “When you’re done, wait in the lobby. I’ll give you half an hour before I go to the dining room. When I’m finished there, I’ll leave the hotel and go to Mathewson’s office.”

  “We goin’ to keep this room?”

  “No,” said Ten. “If we walk into a trap of Jason Brawn’s making, we won’t be safe anywhere in this town. He’ll have us hunted from here to yonder. Remember—trail me at a distance, don’t risk gettin’ trapped with me.”

  “If you need help,” said Marty, “I’ll be within rifle range.”

  He stepped into the hall, closed and locked the door, and Ten began counting the minutes.

  Ten finished his breakfast, walked through the hotel lobby and out the front door. He walked around the block and then crossed the street, pausing at various shop windows. He used his peripheral vision, looking right and left. He saw nobody; not even Marty. The big clock in the hotel lobby had struck eight as he was leaving. He had no idea what time Mathewson arrived at his office, but the town seemed to have already begun the day. He paused at the corner, a block away from his destination. His eyes searched the rooftops and windows of other buildings. The morning sun winking off a windowpane or rifle barrel might appear much the same. The lead would make the difference.

  Although Ten saw nothing alarming, an eerie sense of unease hung over him like a pall. Were they going to allow him to enter the building, and trap him there? John Mathewson was a Federal agent, and he found it hard to believe that LeBeau—and especially Jason Brawn—would have him gunned down on Mathewson’s doorstep. It was the one advantage he’d believed he’d have. Now he wasn’t sure. Reaching the door to the customs office, he looked up and down an apparently deserted street. He lifted his eyes to the balcony, and even to the bell tower. Seeing nothing, he took a deep breath and tried the heavy oak door. He thought at first it was locked, but it grudgingly gave as he put his weight to it. The outer office was empty, so he shoved the door, closing it as noisily as he could. Mathewson’s office door opened, and Ten found himself looking into the inquiring eyes of Mathewson’s secretary.

  “Ma’am,” said Ten, “I need to see Mr. Mathewson.”

  She removed her spectacles, wiping her eyes before she spoke.

  “I’m afraid that won’t be possible, young man.”

  “He asked me to come. I have his letter.”

  “Let me see that,” she said.

  Biting her lip, she returned the letter to him. Then she pointed to several sheets of official stationery and envelopes on her desk. They were engraved with the name of the agency, its address, and the great seal of the United States.

  “That’s what Mr. Mathewson used. Never just plain paper. Besides, that isn’t his handwriting. When did you receive this letter?”

  “The first of October,” said Ten.

  “I’m sorry to say that John Mathewson was ambushed near the docks on the second of September, and his body was lost in the river. I’m keeping the office open until Washington sends an agent to replace Mr. Mathewson.”

  Ten stared dumbly at her. Recalling that last sentence in Priscilla’s letter, he could almost hear her pleading voice.

  Please, please don’t go back to New Orleans now!

  Then, sounding faint and far away, there was the distinctive bark of a Henry rifle.

  The big door had barely closed behind Ten when Marty saw the start of it. He stood in a doorway near the north end of the block and watched a man step out of a door across the street from the customs office. The morning sun flashed off a pistol, and Marty cut him down with a slug from the Henry. The shot might be Ten’s only warning.

  Ten didn’t know if he’d have to face one man or a dozen, but he knew full well he had walked into a trap. They were coming for him, and they hadn’t gone to all this trouble for it to end with a beating. He ran past the startled secretary, to the window in Mathewson’s office. The drapes were drawn. He thrust them aside, and a slug shattered the upper pane just above his head.

  Marty leaned out of the doorway and drew immediate fire. Two rifles cut loose, lead slapping into the door frame, showering him with splinters. From the sound of the earlier shot, he knew there was at least one man behind the customs-office building, and maybe more. In a matter of minutes one of them could sprint down an alley to the north of him and catch him in a deadly cross fire from the other end of the street
. It was exactly what Ten had feared. Gripping the Henry, he lit out in a zigzag run, as lead from the hidden rifles pursued him. He had to get Ten out of there, but where could they go? They were afoot in a hostile town. Then he heard the clopping of hoofs and the rattle of a wagon somewhere ahead. His hat in one hand, and the Henry in the other, he turned west on the next street, running toward the sound.

  In frightened silence, the woman stared at the glass littering the carpet in John Mathewson’s office.

  “Ma’am,” said Ten, “how can I get to the upper floor from here?”

  “You…can’t,” she stammered. “Outside. The stairs are outside…”

  Desperately, he tried to recall what the exterior of the building was like. A wrought-iron railing encircled a second-floor balcony, with stairs leading to the balcony at each end of the building. Every office door opened directly to the outside, and from the shooting, he knew at least two riflemen covered the front of the building. For that reason, the last place they’d expect to see him was on the second-floor balcony, or the roof. From there, with Marty’s help, he might shoot his way out. But how was he to get there? He had but one chance: the old bell tower! On the inner wall separating the secretary’s office from the floor-to-roof bell tower, there was a door. But it had no knob, no lock. It had simply been nailed shut. He threw all his weight against it, but it held. Three more times he put his shoulder to it. He stood there panting, sweat dripping off his chin. There was a veritable fusillade of gunfire from outside, and he redoubled his efforts. The door finally splintered down one side, and he kicked enough of it away to crawl into the very center of the building. The bell tower above him was open to the roof. The old brass bell had blackened with age and was big as a wash pot. From it dangled a rope!