by J. T. Edson
The door opened and Mosehan came in with the old woman. Mrs. Thornton looked at Kagg and Bunt for a time, the grins dying from their faces and worry replacing them as the old woman looked them over.
‘It’s them all right, Captain,’ she finally said.
‘She’s lying!’ Kagg screamed and came to his feet.
Waco put a hand over the man’s face and shoved him back down into his seat, then turned to the old woman who stood by Mosehan’s side. ‘You sure of that, ma’am?’
‘Sure enough. I told you what the two looked like, except for the clothes these two are the same size.’
Before either Kagg or Bunt could make a sound of protest, Mrs. Thornton was let out of the room and Mosehan looked the two men over. He did not speak for a moment, then said, ‘That closes it for us.’ ,
‘I tell you we never done the killing,’ Kagg howled. ‘She’s made a mistake. We weren’t in Arizona when the killing was done.’
‘How do you know?’ Doc’s words cut across like a whip.
‘We know the men who killed the old-timer. We met them down there and they told us when they done it,’ Kagg looked at the unsmiling faces, reading their disbelief. He stared wildly at Bunt, trying to remember exactly where they’d been when the killing took place, and failing.
‘Who hired you?’ Waco snapped.
Once more Kagg and Bunt looked at each other, remembering what Carelli had told them when he hired them. He’d warned them that any attempt at bringing him into it would end in failure. He’d promised that he would get them a good lawyer if they did get into trouble, but only if they kept him out of it.
~*~
‘We was only having a joke with the Ranger,’ Bunt answered.
‘All right, then we’ll take you to Ysaleta for trial,’ Mosehan answered.
‘Surely hope it gets to a trial. Folks liked ole Dad down there. They likely will want the men who did it hanging from a tree without bothering with a trial.’
‘I tell you we didn’t kill the old-timer,’ Kagg roared. ‘I want a lawyer.’
‘You can have one at Ysaleta, not before,” Mosehan answered. ‘You’ve been identified as the killer and that’s good enough for me. I’ll have you sent there in the morning.’
Waco moved nearer the table. ‘You know, Cap’n, there might be something in what they say. Why’d whoever hired them take them on. They looked like the two men who did the killing. Their boss knows that, sends them here to Tucson because he knows we’ll be watching and pick them up. He figgers that we’ll take them to Ysaleta for trial and knows the mob will get them. Knows us and the local law won’t face down and kill honest men to save the two who murdered Dad Thornton. So this pair get lynched and he can fetch his other boys back.’
Kagg and Bunt’s eyes met; they could see now it was pointed out to them that the young Ranger might be right. Both knew that Carelli took them on without knowing a thing about them and in something of a hurry. Now they could see there might be another motive than just needing two musclemen to carry on for Tull and Haufman who were lying low in Mexico.
‘The lousy skunk,’ Bunt snarled. ‘The dirty, scent-smelling greaser.’
‘Yeah!’ Kagg looked at the Rangers. ‘I’m not getting hung for him. The man you want is Carelli. You know, he runs that new freight outfit that’s coming up so fast. Maiden, his agent here, was the man we were told to report to. He took us and pointed you out to us. He must have known who you was and set us up.’
‘Could have at that,’ Waco agreed, then looked at Mosehan. ‘Do we take the said Mr. Maiden?’
‘Go get him, Doc. Take Billy Speed and leave him to watch that no one sends a message off to Carelli. You two want to make a statement, talk ahead and Jed here can take it down.’
By the time Maiden was collected and brought to Ranger headquarters, Kagg and Bunt had told all they knew, putting it down in the statement and signing it. They looked up with glowering eyes at the thin man as he was escorted into the room by Doc Leroy. Maiden’s face was a dead giveaway as he stared at the two men, then he managed to get hold of himself and asked:
‘What did you want to see me about, Captain Mosehan?’
‘These men say you can clear them on a murder charge.’
‘I never saw them before in my life. I don’t know them and I don’t know a thing about Dad Thornton’s killing.’
‘Who said anything about Dad Thornton?’ Waco snapped.
‘I-I-I-’ Maiden stared at the men, realizing he’d made a bad slip. ‘I never saw these two men before in my life.’
‘They said you could clear them of a murder charge, friend,’ Waco put in. ‘How about it, why’d they mention you?’
‘I don’t know why,’ Maiden stared round at the men again; he was getting panicky, for he’d never expected to be caught in this business. ‘I want to see my lawyer. This is an outrage.’
‘Why’d you want a lawyer?’ Mosehan asked. ‘We haven’t charged you with anything yet.’
Waco turned to Kagg and Bunt. ‘Sorry, gents. Looks like we’ll have to take you to Ysaleta after all, this gent hasn’t cleared you.’
Kagg lunged forward, his foot driving up at Maiden. At the same moment Bunt charged forward, his shoulder smashing into the thin man and knocking him backwards. Waco grabbed Kagg by the shirt collar and heaved him backwards, while Mosehan pushed Bunt to one side.
With a snarl that was half fear, half terror, Maiden sent his arm under his coat and brought out a short-barreled Colt Storekeeper revolver. Doc Leroy’s ivory-butted Colt came out and smashed down on to the man’s gun arm hard. With a moan of agony Maiden let the gun fall and clutched at his injured arm, going to his knees.
‘All right,’ Mosehan snapped. ‘We’re holding you on a charge of attempted murder, Maiden. Put the prisoners in the cells out back.’
‘Only got one spare cell, Cap’n,’ Waco remarked cheerfully. ‘I’ll take the handcuffs off these two and put them in; Doc bring the other one.’
Maiden realized what was being said; he also realized how he would be situated, locked in a cell with those two men whose life he held in his hands. They would get the truth out of him one way or another. He suspected that the Rangers were going to let Kagg and Bunt do just that and knew that his only chance was to talk and talk fast.
‘All right, all right,’ he gasped. ‘I’ll talk, I’ll make a statement and sign it. Just don’t lock me with these two. They didn’t kill Dad Thornton.’
Half an hour later the telegraph wires began to sing and in a dozen towns the local law moved fast. The orders came, not from the Arizona Rangers, but from the Governor of the Territory himself. The agent of Carelli’s Freight Services in each town was arrested and held incommunicado; the men who worked for the company kept away from telegraph offices. Other law enforcement officers went round the various ruined freight owners and with guarantees of protection obtained full particulars of the men who’d scared or put them out of business.
In Tucson, Mosehan, Federal Judge Carmody and the Governor’s legal staff were kept very busy sifting the information which came in to them. It was noon the following day before Mosehan called in Waco, Doc Leroy, Pete Glendon and Billy Speed.
‘Go to Calverton, that’s the head office of the Carelli Freight Services.’
‘Sure, Cap’n,’ Waco answered. ‘Then what?’
‘Arrest Carelli, Dodd and Spencer, they run the company and they’re the ones we want. The Governor’ll indemnify you against any measures you take in the arrest He wants them and he wants them bad.’
~*~
Luigi Carelli was at peace with the world as he ushered his guests from the room and watched the cream of Calverton society walking along the hotel passage. Then he shut the door and went back to the table. Carelli was a short, fat Italian, dressed to the height of good taste and latest fashion of the East. Dodd, his second in command, was a big, burly man, always talking loud and making jokes. He was the mixer, the man who raised goodwill amongst the m
enfolk by heartiness and a hand which willingly shot out to pick up the check when in company. Spencer, the third partner, was smaller, a sober-looking man who attended church regularly, three times every Sunday, and was always on hand when the reverend held out his palm for donations. It was Spencer who kept the ladies of the town in hand, they pointed him out and held him up as a shining example of the ideal man.
Each of the trio had his part to play. Carelli was the shrewd business head of the organization. Circumstances, including the New York police, sent him west to what proved to be a land of milk and honey. He’d brought his two partners with him and they picked on the freight business as being the one which would afford them the best chance. The first step was to establish themselves in Calverton, to make friends with the people who counted, the banker, the county sheriff, the richer merchants. By careful working the three were now regarded as being the most desirable of citizens and a stranger who might have passed a disparaging remark about them would be likely to wind up in jail.
The door closed and from the bedroom where he’d been waiting came a dark, swarthy man, dressed in clothes more suited to New York’s tough East Side than here in Arizona Territory. Under his arm he carried a saddle pouch; this he put on the table and opened it.
‘How’s it going, Toni?’ Carelli asked.
‘Not bad, boss. We got another tough one on our hands, over Bisbee way. He ain’t got no family and he’s real tough.’
‘Fix him.’
‘No killing, Fascati!’ Dodd warned. ‘We don’t want any more killing if we can help it. Get those two new men on it, work him over or burn his place.’
Spencer, the legal mind of the trio, looked at the pouch and said the same thing he’d said many times before.
‘I don’t like the idea of Fascati bringing that pouch here. There’s enough in it to get us all in jail for the rest of our lives.’
‘Don’t worry, Albert,’ Carelli answered. ‘Nobody knows we’re connected with Toni here. In this town they’d never believe anything bad about us. Why if we were arrested I bet those bunch who just left would write to the Governor and demand we were let loose.’
‘I know, but it seems foolish to take such a chance Spencer protested feebly, watching Fascati spread out on the table enough evidence to send them all to Yuma, a far less pleasant place than any prison they’d been in back East.
The door burst open and two men came in, guns in hand.
‘Rangers here, throw them high!’
Carelli, Dodd and Spencer were seated, Fascati standing with his back to the door. Not one of them had the time or the opportunity to do anything and only Fascati was armed. He twisted round, hand going up under his arm in the misguided belief that his speed on the draw could beat the guns in the hands of those two tall, young Texas men. Like most of his kind, he regarded the Western lawmen as untrained, unintelligent country hicks, easily fooled and an easy mark. His gun skill was famous in New York against his opponents, the New York police, who in those days relied far more on the nightstick than the gun and were far from being efficient and well-trained performers. Fascati was fast by New York standards; but Calverton, Arizona, was not New York and went by a different standard.
Even with his guns in leather Waco could have beaten Fascati to the shot, with them out he could find time to pick his mark and sent a .45 bullet through the dude’s shoulder. The force of the bullet, powered by thirty grains of prime Dupont powder, sent shock waves ripping through him and dropped him to the ground, his gun sliding from his hand.
‘Freeze all of you!’ Waco snapped. ‘We’re Arizona Rangers.’
‘What do you want?’ Carelli had a very low opinion of the abilities and morals of Western lawmen and these two looked even younger than most.
‘We’ve a warrant for your arrest on charges of extortion, accessory before and after murder,’ Doc replied. He could hear doors opening and people running towards the room.
Spencer stared at the buff-colored paper Doc Leroy held out, knowing all too well what it was. He looked down at the papers on the desk and his face paled, knowing that they were caught well and truly.
Dodd suddenly roared. ‘Hold up in here!’ and dived for the gun on the floor.
Waco’s left-hand Colt crashed out, the bullet hitting the revolver and knocking it from under Dodd’s hand. The man crashed to the floor and lay there, hand outstretched, waiting for a bullet to strike him.
The footsteps halted in the hall, none of the people who’d come out of the rooms making any attempt to come in. They were halted by two hard-faced, unsmiling men who informed them, from behind lined guns, that this was not a hold-up but that the Arizona Rangers were making an arrest.
For a moment Carelli was silent; the sudden arrival of the two Rangers and the casual, easy way they’d handled Fascati, whom Carelli regarded as being very good with a gun, unnerved him. He was, for once, taken by surprise and off balance. Dodd’s failure to get assistance did not help Carelli to assess his position any better. He knew that these men were not local law and knew they wielded considerably more power than either the county sheriff or the town marshal.
‘How much money do you boys make a month?’ he asked.
‘Enough,’ Waco replied. ‘Doc, get Pete in here and collect all those papers on the table.’
Carelli and his two partners were forced back against the wall; Pete Glendon and Billy Speed came in, handcuffs were clipped on and the incriminating papers collected. They were doing this when someone knocked hard on the door and a voice roared:
‘Open up. Sheriff here.’
Waco opened the door and the sheriff came in, face flushed with the exertion of running back to the hotel after the meal Carelli had laid out before him and his fellow citizens. He came in, two deputies at his back, followed by the town marshal who was also red-faced and puffing hard.
‘What’s all this?’ he asked.
Waco holstered his guns and held out the warrant without a word. The sheriff read the warrant through, then handed it to the town marshal.
‘There’s been a mistake somewhere,’ he snapped. ‘Release Mr. Carelli.’
‘Sure, as soon as he’s safe in a cell,’ Waco replied.
‘Not in my jail,’ the marshal snapped. ‘I ain’t having you Rangers coming into my town and—’
‘Take a look at this, friend,’ Waco answered, holding out a letter.
The marshal took the letter, glanced at the printed heading, then gulped and read the writing underneath.
‘This is from the Governor,’ he finally said.
‘Sure, asking for full co-operation from the County Sheriff and Town Marshal,’ Waco answered. ‘What was you saying?’
The town marshal scowled, being awkward with the Arizona Rangers was not a safe game to play at any time. When they bore a letter from the Governor asking that every assistance and facility be given to the said Rangers it was like patting a teased-up and riled rattler.
‘This’s a misunderstanding, Mr. Carelli,’ the sheriff remarked. ‘I’m afraid that our hands are tied and that you must come down to the jail for the night. I think that tomorrow Judge Foulsham will sort it out for you.’
Waco smiled as he watched Doc Leroy attending to Fascati’s shoulder. If the sheriff and Carelli expected any help from the local judge they were going to get a real big, bad shock in the morning.
~*~
‘This is an outrage, a deliberate outrage and I will not let the matter rest here. I’m not without friends in the Territorial Capitol I might add.’
Mosehan looked at the fat, pompous and well-dressed banker, then at the group of influential citizens grouped round the table of the jail. It was the morning after the arrest, and the town of Calverton was in a state of righteous indignation. The Arizona Rangers were in town, had arrested three of the most respected and prominent citizens and were holding them at the jail. This deputation, led by the banker, was making its second appearance at the jail. The first was not very fruitful for t
hey’d been met at the door by a brusque, drawling young Texas man who refused to release his prisoners or allow anyone to talk with them until his boss, Captain Bertram H. Mosehan, arrived.
The deputation next went to see sheriff, town marshal and judge, but this trio, having conferred the previous night, was not available. The Judge was out making his circuit, the sheriff left to assess taxes at the far end of the county and the town marshal took to his bed with a severe attack of the gripe.
‘We came along earlier this morning to order the release of Mr. Carelli and your man was insulting to us,’ the owner of the largest store in town went on.
Mosehan hid a grin. He could imagine Waco would be insulting to anyone who tried to take a prisoner from him. The quartet of Rangers here were the tophands of his force and would not allow or submit to anyone taking prisoners from them.
‘I heard from my men that you threatened to have them taken from the Rangers,’ he snapped. ‘I hire and fire the Rangers and I don’t fire them for obeying my orders. I told them to come here, arrest Carelli, Dodd and Spencer. If you’ve any objections make them to me.’
Smethurst, the banker’s face turned redder than ever. He was used to respect in large portions from the members of the local law. He started to splutter then cooled down and snapped: ‘I demand that Mr. Carelli is tried as soon as possible, that way he can clear his name. Will you send one of your men after the judge?’
A tall, slim man stepped from the side door, a man wearing an expensive black suit and with a low-tied gun at his side.
‘That won’t be necessary, I will be judging the case.’ Smethurst looked at the man, thinking he looked like a very successful professional gambler, or an undertaker from a trail-end town. ‘May I ask who you are?’ the banker inquired, very much on his dignity.
‘The name is Carmody. I’m the Federal Judge for Arizona Territory. Extortion is a Federal offence. I’ll hold the trial tomorrow at noon.’
Carelli was standing at the front of his cell, listening to all this. He knew what his chances were if this ever came to a trial and did not like the odds. There was only one slight chance for him.