by Ralph Hayes
Sumner and Corey just sat there silent for a moment.
‘Maybe if I talked to them,’ Corey said.
Sumner put a hand on his arm. ‘No, Corey. I understand perfectly, Mr Prescott. I think you were very fair. A lot more fair than the system has been to me.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Prescott told him. ‘Maybe another ranch around here. Or try at Seger’s place when Madison goes there.’
Sumner rose. ‘I’ll figure it out. No hard feelings, Mr Prescott.’
Corey rose too. Glumly, Prescott had risen with Sumner.
‘I’ll get your note ready and meet you out on the stoop,’ Prescott said.
A few minutes later, Sumner and Corey were saddled up with Corey’s note to Seger stuffed safely into a saddle bag. As they rode out, the foreman who had taken them into the house was standing outside the nearby bunkhouse, and gave Sumner a hard grin as they passed him.
After a two hour ride, with both of them quiet all the way, Sumner stopped them for a late afternoon break beside a shallow stream where a stand of aspens afforded a coot shade. They didn’t build a fire, they were just giving the horses a rest. They sat on the ground on the bank of the creek and listened to the soothing gurgle of rippling water at their feet.
‘I got you all the way over here, and I’m the only one that got anything from it,’ Corey muttered. Poking a stick into the ground.
‘I didn’t really expect to be hired,’ Sumner told him. ‘I just came to see you get a new start. Be happy with that, Corey. It’s a lucky day for you.’
‘I’m not trying to throw mud on nobody, but I think it was that foreman that killed it for you. That don’t set well in my craw.’
‘I’m telling you, forget it,’ Sumner insisted. ‘I have.’
‘I’ll talk to Seger about you,’ Corey said. ‘Hey, you can stay at our place while we look. Anyway, I think Janie is sweet on you.’ He turned and gave Sumner a sly grin.
Sumner met his look. ‘I don’t think that would work, Corey. I’m going to take Prescott’s advice and check out some ranches here in the Territory. Where we camp tonight is where we’ll be parting company.’
‘Hell,’ Corey grumbled. ‘How will I know where you end up?’
That question touched Sumner. He clapped Corey on the shoulder. ‘I’ll write to you. And I might appear on your doorstep one day when you least expect it.’
Corey gave him a half grin. Sumner stood up, and Corey followed suit. ‘We better move on,’ Sumner said. ‘The mounts have had a good drink.’
They got the two roans ready to ride, and were about to saddle up when Sumner heard the approach of riders. He stopped cinching his saddle and stood gazing out across the scrub landscape.
‘Two riders,’ Corey commented. Unconcerned.
But Sumner was wary. Neither of them was armed. Corey wasn’t familiar with guns, and Sumner had stopped carrying one after his triple killing.
The riders were just thirty yards away, and coming up to them.
They reined in just a few yards away.
They both wore badges.
For a moment they just stared at Sumner and Corey. Then the slightly taller one spoke. ‘Who the hell are you two?’
Sumner and Corey exchanged a sober look.
‘We’re just traveling back to Texas,’ Sumner replied carefully. ‘You boys Territory Marshals?’
They both ignored the question. They dismounted and walked over to the twosome. The one who had spoken to them was Duke Pritchard. He stood at just over six feet, about Sumner’s height, and had a scar running across his right eye. He had a broken nose and had the look of a retired boxer. He had a reputation among his kind of having beaten a man to death in Wichita with his bare hands before he had joined the marshal service here in the Territory. He and his partner both wore Colt Army .45 revolvers low on their hips.
‘Texas?’ the other deputy barked out. ‘The great land of cow pucky and buffalo dung?’ A harsh grin. His name was Maynard Guthrie and he had come to the Territory a few years back, running from the law in Missouri. Many of his appointed brethren had a similar background. He was slim but wiry with cold blue eyes. He was a sociopath who loved to use the gun he carried on his belly, and had killed his own sister three years ago, in a cabin on the Upper Platte.
Corey was getting impatient. ‘What can we do for you, gentlemen? We’re trying to get clear of this country as quick as we can.’
The one called Pritchard came up very close to Corey. A new frown on his heavy face. ‘So you’re in a big hurry to clear out?’ he said slowly in a deep growl.
‘He didn’t mean it that way,’ Sumner put in, trying to keep calm in his voice. ‘He’s got a job waiting for him over in Blaneyville.’
He studied Pritchard’s hard face and wished he and Corey were armed. He had become physically tough in prison, but that meant nothing against guns. Guthrie moved over to him. Sumner looked into those vacuous eyes and realized he was dealing with something emotionally less than entirely human.
‘What’s your name, boy?’ In a soft, sibilant voice.
‘Sumner. Wesley Sumner. I’m just riding with Corey here.’
‘Sumner. Sounds familiar. You’re going to Texas, too?’
Sumner shook his head. ‘No, I’m not sure where I’m headed.’
The two tough-looking lawmen exchanged a look.
‘Looks like you boys is just making it up as you go,’ Pritchard suggested. ‘Where you been the last twenty-four hours?’
‘We just come from the Prescott ranch,’ Corey piped up nervously.
‘Looking for work there, too?’ Guthrie said tartly.
‘No, it was just to talk with Mr Prescott,’ Corey answered, beginning to act guilty for something he couldn’t figure out.
‘Is there a Prescott ranch around here?’ Pritchard asked Guthrie.
‘Never heard of one in these parts,’ Guthrie said.
‘It’s half a day’s ride from here,’ Corey gushed. ‘You can check.’
Pritchard came even closer to Corey, and even walked all the way around him. Then he turned to Guthrie. ‘What do you think?’
Guthrie nodded. ‘He fits the description.’
Sumner frowned at them. ‘What the hell is this?’
Pritchard came over nose to nose with him. His scar glistened in the hard sun. ‘Ever hear of the Spencer family?’
‘Hell, no,’ Sumner replied impatiently.
‘What about you?’ Guthrie asked Corey, moving closer to him. Corey looked into those opaque eyes and swallowed hard.
‘I never heard that name,’ he said unconvincingly.
‘Well, let me tell you about them,’ Pritchard said slowly. He casually drew the Colt at his hip, and held it up level with Corey’s face. Guthrie pulled the one off his belly and held it on Sumner.
‘Last night,’ Pritchard continued, ‘while Mr Spencer was gone and their boy was out in the barn, someone come to the house, murdered Rebecca Spencer, and made off with some petty cash in the amount of $140.’
Corey swallowed again. ‘I’m real sorry to hear that.’
‘Fortunately, the Spencer boy saw the murderer as he run off,’ Guthrie continued for his partner. ‘And you fit the description of the man he saw.’
‘What?’ Corey breathed.
‘This boy was with me last night!’ Sumner said loudly. ‘Before we arrived at the Prescott ranch. And he doesn’t have any stolen money.’
‘Well. Maybe he spent it. And if you’re vouching for him, maybe you was there, too. Looks like you’re both going down to Fort Sill.’
Now Corey panicked. ‘I’m telling you! I never heard of no Spencers! I never been to no Spencer place! We just rode to the Prescott ranch, and was there a while, then we rode on back here. On our way home.’
He was breathless looking into the muzzle of Pritchard’s gun.
‘Oh, you ain’t going to Texas now, boy.’ Pritchard grinned. ‘You’re goddamn murdering scum, and you’re going to pay a visit to
Judge Hezekiah Gabriel. They call him the Hanging Judge.’ A low chuckle.
‘Just ride to Prescott with me!’ Corey fairly yelled at them.
‘What for?’ Pritchard said. ‘He wasn’t with you last night, was he?’
‘No, but he can vouch for this boy’s character,’ Sumner intervened. ‘He’s never shot anybody in his life.’
‘What about your friend?’ Guthrie purred.
‘That was justified!’ Corey blurted out. ‘He told me all about it when we was locked up together!’
As soon as he said it, he realized his mistake. He glanced at Sumner, who was regarding him seriously. Guthrie looked meaningfully at Pritchard, and they were both grinning.
‘Well, well. Where was that?’ Pritchard asked Corey nicely.
Corey sighed. ‘Over at Texas State Prison. We just got out.’
Guthrie shook his head. ‘By Jesus. Gabriel might double our salary after this one, partner. We got a sure thing this time.’
Sumner saw it was getting out of hand fast. ‘Look. Take us to the Spencer house. The boy will tell you it wasn’t Corey. Then this can be over.’
Guthrie shook his ugly head. ‘What if the Spencer boy says he can’t identify him? He might be scared to do it. And then we’d lose that nice little raise we been hoping for. Right, Duke?’
Pritchard grinned. ‘That would be like throwing money down a black hole,’ he said in a guttural tone. ‘OK, partner. Let’s cuff them.’
Guthrie took handcuffs out and cuffed Sumner, still holding the Colt on him with his other hand. Pritchard took a bit longer to get his cuffs, and then he grabbed Corey and turned him around. ‘Right, boy killer. You’re going to answer now for what you done.’
But Corey was wild with panic. Before Pritchard could secure the handcuffs, he swung back around and threw a fist at Pritchard’s square face.
The blow connected but not solidly. ‘Corey!’ Sumner yelled at him.
But it was too late. Pritchard’s face was a mask of rage. In a quick moment he slammed his Colt into Corey’s head, hitting him on the left temple. Corey gasped and slumped to the ground, dazed. Pritchard had a frenzied look in his eyes, and blood ran from his mouth. As Sumner and Guthrie watched, Pritchard went over to Corey and kicked him savagely in the side.
‘Hey!’ Sumner called out angrily.
Guthrie was grinning.
Now Pritchard was picking up a four-foot length of a dead branch that had fallen to the ground. It was thick with no real offshoots except a few stubs remaining. He hefted it out once and then slammed it down onto Corey’s back. The club cracked against Corey’s ribs, and the sharp stubs dug into his flesh through his shirt. Corey screamed out in harsh pain that seemed to rocket through his whole body.
‘You little weasel,’ Pritchard was muttering. Breathlessly. Then he swung the wicked club again onto Corey’s back and head. A lesser cry came from Corey.
Sumner was on his way over there halfway through Pritchard’s second swing of the club. ‘You goddamn animal!’ In a low growl. Pritchard was caught off-guard by the launched attack and Sumner hit him bodily, hands cuffed behind him.
They went down together, but Sumner’s hands were useless. He had wanted to make Pritchard stop. As soon as he hit the ground with Pritchard, though, he felt the barrel of Guthrie’s Colt slam against the back of his head, and bright lights flashed on inside his skull and he fell off Pritchard. He was semi-conscious, with a deep moan coming from his throat.
Pritchard got awkwardly to his feet, crimson-faced. He drew his own Colt and aimed it at Sumner’s head.
‘No, wait,’ Guthrie said quickly.
‘What the hell for?’ Pritchard grated out.
‘We shoot them now, it’s over,’ Guthrie reasoned smoothly with his cohort. ‘You don’t want that.’
Pritchard re-aimed the revolver. ‘Also,’ Guthrie added carefully, ‘this will all make a bigger impression on Judge Gabriel if we bring them to trial. We’ll get a lot more attention. And credit.’ He said the last slowly.
Sumner could hear them talking but couldn’t make much sense of it. Pritchard stood there breathing hard for a moment then viciously jammed the Colt back into its holster. Then he picked up the club again and rained two more savage blows onto barely-conscious Corey, fracturing two posterior ribs and a low vertebra in Corey’s back. There had been one more muffled outcry from Corey, then he was unconscious.
Pritchard threw the club down, and kicked Corey’s left thigh. His face still twisted up with emotion.
‘That’s enough,’ Guthrie said casually. He had enjoyed watching it. ‘You’ll kill ’em, and spoil it for us down in Fort Sill.’
Pritchard hesitated, then nodded. ‘I got most of it out of me. There won’t never be two pieces of pond scum I’ll enjoy watching hang than these two.’
Sumner was coming around. He glanced at Corey’s still form and felt a heavy weight in his chest. He sat up groggily, his hands still cuffed.
‘Oh. You ain’t dead, neither.’ Guthrie grinned. ‘Good.’
‘You bastards,’ Sumner snapped. ‘If he isn’t dead, he might be soon. He’s an innocent boy.’
They both ignored him. ‘I’ll throw this one across his saddle,’ Pritchard said to Guthrie. ‘And get his butt on board.’
He walked over to Sumner who had just struggled to his feet. He looked directly into Sumner’s eyes, then threw a big fist into his face. There was the sound of bone breaking in Sumner’s nose, and then he was on the ground again. He lay there gasping, hatred in his blue eyes, blood inching from his nose.
‘Now all out of me,’ Pritchard growled. ‘Get him saddled up and we’ll get riding. We got a long trail ahead of us.’
It was an overnight ride to Fort Sill. The rest of that day seemed like a week to Sumner, as he rode along behind the two lawmen, hands cuffed in front of him now and tied to the saddle horn of his mount. Beside him on the other roan was Corey, his body hanging over the mount’s flanks on either side. Occasionally a low moan would come from Corey’s throat, so Sumner knew he was alive. But Sumner worried that the long ride would make his injuries worse, or even kill him.
When they camped that night, Corey was taken off the horse and slung to the ground without a groundsheet under him, and Sumner was seated against a young mesquite sapling all night with first Guthrie watching over him, and then Pritchard.
There was no possibility of escape for Sumner. Anyway, he would not have left his new friend. He had visions of pleading their case before a judge, and having someone finally listen to them.
The next morning, Corey opened his eyes and moved, then cried out in pain. Guthrie gave him a cup of water and most of it fell onto Corey’s bloodied shirt. Sumner was watching from a few feet away. Guthrie helped Corey to sit up and Corey spotted Sumner.
‘Sumner!’ He choked a little. ‘What happened?’
‘Don’t talk, kid. It will be all right.’
‘The hell it will.’ Pritchard grinned from a small distance. He was saddling up, not far from Sumner.
‘You boys will pay for this,’ Sumner muttered quietly.
‘No. We’ll get paid for it.’ Guthrie chuckled.
Soon they were on their way again, and now Corey was set onto his saddle, and that relieved Sumner’s tension some. But it was obvious Corey was in constant pain, and by mid-morning he was just slumped over his saddle horn, barely able to stay aboard the horse. Through a long day of agony for Corey, the foursome arrived in Fort Sill around mid-afternoon.
It was a fairly good sized town, with a wide central square, like a Mexican plaza with government buildings and shops all around its perimeter. The first thing that caught Sumner’s eye was the hanging scaffold that stood right in front of the court house and jail. The heaviness came back into his chest. He looked over at Corey, but Corey’s head was hanging and he was taking notice of nothing.
‘Take a good look, Sumner.’ Guthrie grinned at him. ‘It’s just setting there waiting for you two.’
<
br /> At the building, a cup of water was thrown onto Corey’s face, and it brought him around. ‘What’s going on, Sumner?’ he mumbled.
‘We’re here,’ Sumner told him. ‘We’ll get to see a judge now and we’ll be all right.’
Pritchard and Guthrie exchanged a knowing look. And then they got Corey and Sumner off their mounts. Corey could barely stand.
‘All right, you two slabs of horse pucky,’ Pritchard barked at them. ‘You got a date with the judge later. But for now we got a real nice little cell all ready for you. I reckon you know all about cells, huh?’
Within a few minutes, they were locked into a cell very much like the one they had shared in Texas except this one smelled of ammonia and there were no rat droppings on the floor. They asked for water and got it, and an hour later they were served trays of edible food. Sumner wolfed his down, his head still aching from the pistol whipping administered by Guthrie. The meal was beans and bread, and Sumner forced Corey to eat some of it. Corey tried for a few minutes, and then quit.
‘My back,’ he said to Sumner. ‘I need something for the pain, Sumner. And I think there’s something broke inside me. I feel kind of sick.’
Sumner swallowed hard. ‘I’ll get you some help, Corey.’
In late afternoon they did tape Corey’s ribs, and someone brought him some laudanum. About a half hour later, a guard came and took them up a flight of stairs and down a corridor to the court room.
Judge Gabriel was seated on the bench. There was no black robe. He looked more like a rancher sitting in for a judge. He slumped on a high-backed chair, and a flask of whiskey stood before him on the bench. Pritchard and Guthrie sat in front row seats, and there was a court reporter and bailiff present.
The federal judges in the Territory, when one existed there, were notorious for their abbreviated trials, and lack of formal procedure, and Gabriel was the most egregious of them since the other infamous Hanging Judge Parker. Justice was swift in the Territory, and its sometimes questionable deputies operated more like the federales across the Mexican border than lawmen on the US side.