by Lou Bradshaw
Bob was in the second stall on my left. After looking my way, he blew through his nose and resumed looking at the first stall on my right. As quietly as I could manage, I moved toward that stall. As I worked my way along the right side of the isle, I peeked into each stall just to make sure Bob wasn’t mistaken.
Squatting down, almost touching the boards to the stall, I eased myself up to where I could look over the top. I didn’t know which was working harder, my legs or my beating heart. I could hear my heart beating because it was in my throat, but my thighs were screaming at the super slow rise. Peeking over the top, at first I couldn’t see anyone, until I looked directly below me.
There he sat with his back against the wall at my right. His legs were drawn up and his hands were draped over his knees. The rifle was leaned against the back wall near his right shoulder. He might have been dozing or just doing some mental wandering, but he sure wasn’t paying attention to his business.
When I reached my full height, I eased my gun over the edge without making any noise or touching anything, and pointed it right at the top of his head. The click of that hammer being pulled back was almost deafening in the quiet of the barn. He flinched but he didn’t move.
“Friend,” I said, “if you ever want to have another meal, drink another beer, kiss another gal, then you’d better not have any thoughts about doing anything stupid…. I’ve dealt with stupid before, and stupid always loses.”
“I ain’t always smart,” he replied, “but I ain’t always stupid nuther.”
“You just kinda hunch yourself forward and get on your hands and knees, but you be real slow and easy like.” When he was getting on his hands and knees, I shifted my gun to my left hand and reached over and snatched up his rifle. “Now crawl out through that stall door.” If you get a fella on his hands and knees, you’ve kinda got him over a barrel. Any move he might make is easy to predict and easy to deal with.
When he was out of the stall, I had him stand and turn around slowly. I’d seen his face, but that didn’t mean I knew who he was. “What’s your name, mister? And who sent you?”
“The name’s Martin… Thad Martin and nobody sent me. I just came in here to get out of the wind.” I had to give him credit, he was a cool customer, but he lied about not being stupid because that was the lamest thing I’d ever heard.
“Well, Mr. Thad Martin, I’m losing patience with folks coming around here trying to take my scalp. You were up in the hills scouting me for at least an hour before you came into this barn. I sat up in the brush and watched you come down… You need to shade your field glasses when you’ve got the sun in your face.”
“Now you just turn around and march up to the house.” Before he had taken a single step toward the door, I laid that pistol barrel across the side of his head and he dropped like a sack of spuds. When he started shaking the cobwebs out of his head, I had him hog tied and was hoisting him by his hands from the pulley over the loft door. I left his toes touching the ground to keep from cuttin his wrists up too much. Then I went to fetch Dusty and go pick up his horse. I had a pretty good idea where it was. My oh my how that boy could cuss.
When I had come back with the horses and let him down, he was still cussin. I said, “Thad Martin, shut up! The only reason I didn’t shoot you is because then I’d have to bury you, and if you fellas keep coming up after me, I’ll be gettin blisters from the shovel… I already buried one.”
“Let’s go.” I said and climbed into the saddle. He started to step into leather, and I told him, “Martin, don’t even consider climbing on that critter. You ain’t ridin into town, you’re walkin into town, or maybe you’re gettin dragged into town if you can’t keep up.”
I put a lead rope on his horse and then put a lead rope on him, which I tied to his horse’s saddle horn. We made quite an unusual caravan. He walked the whole six or so miles to town, and he cussed every single step of the way.
Chapter 39
I got Mr. Thad Martin safely tucked into jail at about three thirty that afternoon. He had traveled a bit farther on the seat of his pants than he did on his feet. Some fellas just can’t seem to keep up. His jeans were a bit of a sight.
I told the sheriff the story and that Mr. Martin claimed that he was just getting in out of the chilly wind, but he had left his horse back in the brush and walked up to the barn. That sort of behavior sounded peculiar to me, and the sheriff had to agree.
“Now, Mr. Martin tells me that no one sent him to ambush me, Sheriff, but I think he’s not being completely honest. In fact I think that Mr. Martin may not even be a man named Martin at all. I think his name may be Smith or Williams or even Jesse James. You know, Sheriff, if we look through that stack of wanted posters, I’ll just bet we can find one that looks a lot like him. It could look enough like him to get a rope around his neck someplace. And we could split the reward.”
Thad Martin grabbed the bars with both hands and yelled, “Hey, wait a minute!”
“What’s that, Mr. Martin? You having a recovery of memory? Is there something you’d like to tell us?”
“Just hold on a stinkin’ minute… lemme have a little thinking time.” He blurted out. “I’m not sayin my skirts are completely clean, but there ain’t no hangin offenses on me.”
“What about you trying to waylay me from my own barn? Cold blooded murder can get a man hung in most towns.”
“Murder? Hell that ain’t murder.” He argued. “That’s just business.”
“Well, Thad Martin, if the sheriff here can’t find a crime to hold you on, I’ll just make another citizen’s arrest and walk your scuffed up little butt all the way to the US Marshal in Santa Fe. I’m sure they can take in everything west of the Mississippi until they find wanted bills with your exact name and picture on em. And I’ll bet there’s at least one hanging crime listed.”
Sheriff Nelson had to leave or else bust out laughin. I guess I was slathering it on pretty thick, but I had the ball rollin’ and I didn’t think Martin could hold out. He was getting a little worried.
“Look here cowboy,” he started up with a new burst of bravado. “You can start outa here takin me for Santa Fe, but you ain’t never gonna git there.”
“Martin, you ever run across a gent named Jake Mason?”
He was holding on to the bars of the cell door and looking at the floor. When I mentioned Mason’s name, his head came up with a snap. “Yeah, I know him. We’re saddle partners of a sort. I come up here lookin for him.”
“You can quit lookin, he ain’t ridin with you anymore. I buried him back there about two hundred yards from where your horse was tied.” I thought he was coming through those bars.
While I had him riled up, I thought I’d go for the throat. “Mister, do you know Abe Winslow, John Mullin, Dan Coleman, and Bill Frazier?”
He stopped rantin and glared at me at me through the bars with a sort of corner of the eye suspicious look, and finally said, “Yeah… I knowed em in the border wars. They’re all dead now.”
“I know they’re dead. My partner and me fetched ‘em all. Well, except for Frazier. We had him hung in Dodge. So if you think I’d not be able to walk a little piss ant like you 80 miles to Santa Fe, then you better do some more thinking. You think today’s hike was hard, wait till the second or third day. I doubt that you’ll even be alive by the forth day.”
He stepped back from the bars and paced around for about a half minute. Then he said, “You’re lyin… I know you’re lyin. Coleman was shot in a Texas whorehouse, by Hickory Jack Moore. Not you.”
“My partner.” Was all I said.
I poked my head out the door and called, “Sheriff! I guess I may as well take Mr. Martin on down to Santa Fe, if you don’t have anything to hold him on.”
Nelson came in holding as straight a face as he could; Andy was right behind him. They had been listening through the window so they knew what had been said. Martin was pacing around in his cell flapping his arms like a big bird and having an argument wi
th himself.
Andy walked over to the cell and studied the prisoner. “Sheriff, maybe I ought to ride down to Santa Fe, just for Martin’s protection.”
Martin stopped flapping and pacing and turned to Andy, “You Hickory Jack?” he asked.
“You don’t know me well enough to call me that. You can call me Deputy Moore, the man who’s going to keep my little brother from ripping you to pieces out on the trail… He was always the mean one in the family.”
The sheriff picked up his cue and said, “Can’t spare you, Moore. Go ahead and turn him loose. He’ll just have to take his chances.”
At that point, getting out of jail was the last thing Martin wanted. He confessed to several crimes, but the sheriff wasn’t listening, until Martin gave in and decided to give us some names.
We gathered around the cell door, Martin or whoever he was backed away. He didn’t want any part of me or Andy. “Okay, fella. Who hired you to bushwhack me?”
He stalled around for the better part of a minute, and then he looked up and said, “As close as I can figger, it was the night clerk at the hotel.”
“Open this door, Andy. I’m goin to whale the tar out of him.”
He jumped back against the wall and screamed, “No! Honest! It was him who brung me the envelope and a hunnerd dollars in greenbacks with a note. The note said to kill you and told me where you lived, and that there’d be a nuther hunnerd dollars when it was done.”
“The price is going up.” I said. “If I stick around long enough, my scalp will be worth some real money…. Okay Martin, who was the note from?”
He said he didn’t know because it wasn’t signed. So I asked him, “If there wasn’t a name on it, how were you supposed to know who to collect the rest of the money from?”
“Wal,” he drawled, “I don’t reckon I even thought about that. Don’t matter though ‘cause a hunnerd dollars is plenty enough for me. If I’d known, you killed my pard, Mason, I’d a’ve done you for free.”
I asked to hold him until I got back and said, “You know, sheriff, I think this fella might be lookin’ good for Avery’s shooting.” Nelson’s eyes lit up, and he started grinning. I told him and Andy that I had to get me a room at the hotel so I could stay over in town, and I wanted to talk to that night clerk.
Walking the two blocks to the hotel, I was trying to come up with a plan to get the information I wanted from the clerk… if he was even there yet. I should have found out what Martin’s room number was, but I didn’t think that far ahead, so I’d just have to play it by ear and see what happened.
At the front desk, I told the clerk that I needed a room for the night. He gave me a key and turned the register around for me to sign in which I did. Then I asked, “You got a fella staying here named Martin?” A shake of his head told me that he didn’t. “How about a seedy lookin’ gent about thirty five or forty… he’s maybe five nine and a hundred and fifty pounds… a real hillbilly a little smarter than a turnip.”
“Oh, that’s Mr. Tanger, Thad Tanger. Not exactly the sort we go out of our way to attract here, but he paid for his room for the week. He’s in room seven, but he went out yesterday and hasn’t been back since.” I thanked him and went on up to my room.
I looked it over and left. Two doors down, at room seven, I forced the door and went in. It was close to sundown and the gloom had set in, so I struck a match and lit the lamp. Finding his duffle, I went through it until I found an envelope addressed to Thad Tanger. I opened it and found the note he had talked about. Basically it was as he described except it was signed by C Gentry.
I had already suspected that much, but it still didn’t get me any closer to finding out what name Clyde Gentry was using, nor the name Amos Poke was using. I put the note back into the envelope and went back down stairs.
The clerk was busy shuffling some papers and looking important. The place was empty, so I don’t know who he was trying to impress. He looked up as I came down the last few steps. “Is your room satisfactory, Mr. Blue?”
“Oh, it’s just fine. No complaints that I can think of.”
“But say,” I asked in a hushed voice, “this fella, Tanger wants to buy a horse from me, but he said he’s waiting for some money to be delivered here for him. Do you know if anything has been delivered for him in the last several days?”
“No, but earlier this week, there was an envelope left here for him. I gave it to him as he came down the next morning. Do you suppose that could be the money he’s expecting?”
“I’ll just bet it is. Did you catch the name of the gent who brought it in?”
“Oh sure. That was Petey. He works at the Double Eagle saloon and anywhere else he can pick a few coins to keep him going. He’s not altogether in the head. If you know what I mean?” I admitted that I did.
Back to the Sheriff’s Office, I reported what I had learned, which wasn’t much. It seems that Nelson recalled a flyer on someone named Tanger, and that would be enough to hold the prisoner for a few more days at least. It was a rather uncommon name, so there was a good chance that Mr. Tanger wouldn’t be seeing the light through unbarred windows for quite a spell.
I blasted Tanger with all the indignant rage I could muster for not telling us his real name, and for not mentioning that the note was from Clyde Gentry. He backed up against the far wall and said he forgot. He said he didn’t know what name Gentry was going by, and couldn’t remember what he looked like. My patience was growing thin with Tanger, but we had gotten about we could from him.
“Do either of you know a local character named Petey?” I asked the sheriff and Andy. They both acknowledged knowing Petey. So I explained that he was the one who delivered the envelope to the hotel. Apparently, Petey made his living running errands and such. They both agreed that it would be a miracle if Petey even knew what I would be asking him. I thought I’d give it a try anyway.
Asking the bartender at the Double Eagle about Petey, I was directed to the walk way between the saloon and the gun shop next door. I found him sitting in a beat up split bottom chair tilted back against the saloon wall. “Petey,” I said, “I’m Ben Blue, and I’d like to ask you a few questions.” I put a two bit piece in his hand.
“Ben Blue… Ben Blue… Ben Blue,” he said, “now I’ll remember you.”
“Petey, about four or five days ago, you took a letter to the hotel for Mr. Tanger. Do you remember that?”
He started shaking his head yes. “That was the night that the ghost came to me and gives me the letter. He said I had to take it and give it to the hotel man, and if I didn’t, then I would be real sorry. He came walking up out of the dark back there and he didn’t make no noise. I was so scared, I peed on myself.”
“What made you think he was a ghost?
“Because he didn’t have any face… just eyes. And he didn’t give me any money… ghosts don’t have money you know.”
“Did you recognize his voice?”
“Sorta.” He said. “But I don’t know many dead people’s voices.”
“Well maybe dead people make their voices sound like people who are still alive. Did he sound like any of the alive people you know?”
“He did sort of sound like Frank Miller.” I didn’t know who Frank Miller was, and when I asked him, he just said, “Don’t know.” I went back to the Sheriff’s Office.
There I learned that Frank Miller was Barkley’s foreman. I thought maybe I needed to have a look at this Miller gent.
The following morning, I rode out of Taos shortly after breakfast. On the way I decided to stop by the MB pick up Bob on the way, and while I was there, I’d make sure I reloaded the smokehouse fire pit with some slow burning green stuff. I wanted to take Bob or that Jake horse up to the bar M bar, just to see if I could get a reaction from the foreman. If Bob used to be his horse Bob might show some signs of recognition. I didn’t know how good a horse’s memory was.
I had a good idea where Barkley’s ranch was, but it would be worth stopping at Juan Doming
o’s just to make sure. When I rode into the courtyard, I found a rather large number of horses and men, all in typical New Mexican garb, gathered around in small groups. I was the immediate center of attention. Fortunately, Enrique was a face I recognized.
“Ahh, Benito,” he said as he walked toward me. “Come down, you are among friends here.”
Some of the faces were starting to look familiar to me. I couldn’t put names to them, but I knew who they rode for, and that meant they were some of the best most skillful horsemen north of the boarder. They all worked for Don Carlos. “Buenos Diaz, Enrique, have I come at a bad time?”
“On the contrary, Benito, you have been a friend to the rancho. I’m sure you will always be an honored guest to the Domingo’s… It so happens that Don Carlos Vasquez has also honored us with a visit.”
At which time, Juan Domingo and the Don came from the hacienda. Both men made me feel welcome. I told them that I had just stopped by to get directions to the bar M bar. Juan gave me a curious look. I told him that I would explain, but I couldn’t here in this crowded courtyard. “Don Carlos is already aware of part of it.” With that he escorted Don Carlos and me inside and asked for coffee to be brought.
I briefly went through the story for Juan, and then told them both that I wanted to get a look at Frank Miller because he might be one of the men I’ve been looking for. Then I explained that there had been two attempts to ambush me in the last couple of weeks, and both were ordered by Clyde Gentry, who could be this Frank Miller. “I need to have a look at him.”
Don Carlos drummed his fingers on the chair arm for a minute before saying, “Juan, is not this Frank Miller the Segundo for the one with the miraculous cows? Would it be a problem if I rode along with Benito, I would like to send a subtle but not too subtle message about animal husbandry.”