by J. Lee Butts
Dianna’s voice went colder than a Montana well rope in January. “What’s your name?”
Her question caught him by surprise. Our talkative captive appeared to feel he’d dodged a death-dealing bullet. Think for a spell he actually believed he’d spotted a softening, or weakness, in his female tormentor.
Right proud, he smiled, and through bloody teeth bragged, “Name’s Burl Tiner, but everyone calls me Smoky, ma’am. You can call me Smoky, if ’n you’d like.”
“Well, Smoky,” she growled, “I want you to watch what I’m about to do—very carefully.”
Gal legged it over to Jethro Parker’s still-convulsing body, levered a shell into her rifle, and shot him right between the eyes. Busted that ole boy’s skull all to pieces. Bone, blood, pieces of scalp, and hair sprayed in every direction.
Don’t know who was most surprised, me or Smoky Tiner. Been my experience that it’s always one thing to say you’ll do a thing, another to actually do it. She’d said she would kill them all. Way she dispatched Jethro Parker made a born-again believer out of me. Scared the literal hell out of Smoky. Man covered his face and cried like a baby.
“Oh, Jesus. Save me, Jesus. Come help me, Jesus,” Tiner squealed. “Good God Almighty. I ain’t done nothin’, lady. Swear to you on my dear sainted mother’s grave. Them boys done all the shootin’. I jist held their horses.”
Slowed him down some when he felt the muzzle of her rifle against his ear. “Oh, God. Oh, God. Oh, God. Please don’t shoot me, missez. Ask me anything. I’ll tell you whatever you want to know. Do anything. Anything at all. Just please don’t shoot.”
Sounded like an agitated mother wolf when she snarled, “Who sent you to my home with murder in your black heart?”
“Nate Coffin, ma’am. He done it. Paid us money, he did. Hundred dollars each. Said he’d give us another five hundred when we got back and he knew for sure you wuz dead as a lightnin’-struck tree.”
“You’re certain of that?” I asked. Tiner turned from Dianna and looked at me like I’d lost my mind. “Coffin sent you boys himself?” I went on.
“Hell, yes. Think I’m stupid or somethin’? Known the man for five years. It were Coffin sure as big black bears piss in the woods. Pardon me, ma’am. Let my mouth get ahead of my thinker box. Meant no offense.”
Dianna jabbed the nervous killer with her rifle again. “How do you know Nate Coffin?”
Tiner flinched like she was killing him. “We ’uz workin’ for the man over in Uvalde. Stole livestock for ’im. Ole Nate has cattle-stealin’ camps like our’n all over south Texas. He come up over a week ago from his big ranch house, down near Carrizo Springs, to check on our operation. He’d got news that day as how you’d done went and kilt his little brother Reuben. Man went crazy wild. Said he’d pay a handsome price to any of us willing to rid the world of your shadow.”
“Have any idea where Coffin is now?” I asked.
“Far as I’d know, he’s probably back at the ranch. Don’t get far away from that ’ere place, ’less he has to.”
“Don’t lie this late in the game,” Dianna snapped. “You don’t want to stand before your Maker with a falsehood on your lips.”
“Swear ’fore Jesus, lady. I ain’t a-lyin’.”
Dianna raised her Winchester and aimed at Tiner’s head. Forced me to step in and touch her on the shoulder. “Why don’t you see to Mrs. Wainwright. Let me talk with Smoky some more. You’ve got plenty of time to kill him, and he might be able to provide us with more in the way of needed information.”
As if recovering from a trance, she shook her head, then lowered the weapon. Turned toward the vacant-eyed woman perched on the rock. Cold as ice, Dianna said, “All right, Ranger Dodge. You talk with this skunk all you want. But if I have anything to do with his highly questionable future, the belly-slinking slug won’t see tomorrow’s sun come up.”
She turned, headed over to MaryLou Wainwright, and placed a sympathetic hand on the mute woman’s shoulder. Could barely hear Dianna as she tried to offer words of comfort to someone who looked as if she might well be beyond such efforts.
Tiner got my attention when he pulled at my sleeve like a chastised child and whined, “You ain’t a-gonna let her kill me, are you, Ranger?”
Never got a chance to answer his question. Dianna huffed back over and snapped, “We’ve got to get her to a doctor soon as possible. What these bastards must have done to this unfortunate woman goes beyond anything I could have conjured up in a nightmare.”
“Willow Junction is about fifteen miles away. Them folks have a fine sawbones in residence. Leastways had one last time I passed through. Also have a city marshal and jail. We can get Mrs. Wainwright cared for, deposit Tiner in the calaboose, and put up for the night in the Cattleman’s Hotel. Sleep in a real bed. How’s that sound?”
She side-glanced at Tiner, and for a second or so, appeared torn between my suggestion and making good on her threat to finish him off. After about ten seconds of puzzlement, she said, “Fine with me. Let’s get moving. Not sure how long this lady can last if we don’t see to her needs. Appears her mind might have snapped.”
“We gonna bury these dead fellers?” Felt I already knew the answer, but thought the question needed to be asked.
She threw a calloused and fleeting glimpse at the corpses. Said, “They can rot where they fell. I’m far more troubled about Mrs. Wainwright’s condition right now.” She pointed at Tiner with her rifle again. “Put that yellowbelly on a horse before I change my mind and kill him right here.”
Smoky almost fell all over himself in an effort to thank me for saving his sorry neck. “Sweet Jesus, Ranger, thought I wuz a goner for sure and certain. Cain’t thank you enough.”
“Don’t be thanking me before the fact.”
“What you mean by that?” he said as he climbed on his horse.
“Well, it’s just that she’s not finished with you yet, ole son. Real good chance you might not make Willow Junction if’n that angry, heartbroken female takes a notion to snuff your lamp ’fore we get there.”
He shot a sneaky peek at Dianna as she helped Mrs. Wainwright get mounted. “You’re kiddin’, aren’t you?”
Climbed on Grizz. “Nope. Not kiddin’ in the least. Best keep your mouth shut and your head down. Otherwise, you could end up coyote and bug bait on the side of the trail just like your dead friends.”
Scared son of a bitch never uttered another word till after we reached civilization again.
8
“BOTH OF YOU’LL BE BARKIN’ IN HELL . . .”
WE RODE INTO Willow Junction about the time the sun gave up its flaming spot in heaven. Well-established Texas community bustled with visitors from the surrounding hill country. Wagons, buckboards, and horses crowded narrow dirt streets. Women and cherry-cheeked kids in abundance frequented the boardwalks and doorways of every mercantile and shop I could see. Just nothing like the entertainment available for farmers and ranchers during a Saturday night visit to a small town.
Got our animals stabled, and soon found the local lawman’s office. Unremarkable building was located about midway of the busy settlement’s dusty main street. Unfortunately discovered, right quicklike, that the good folk of that pleasant village had saddled themselves with a badge carrier whose breath carried the powerful odor of hen feathers. Boldly displayed brass plaque on the door declared him as Marshal Ridley Matthews.
Stood at the beer-gutted and red-faced man’s litter-covered desk and watched as he disintegrated right before my eyes. With his bootless and poorly socked feet propped in a battered chair, he pawed at an enormous, greasy gut and whined, “What the hell’d you bring ’im here for? If’n he’s Nate Coffin’s man, I don’t want ’im in my jail. Everybody in this whole godforsaken country knows the bunch that follows ’at ’ere wicked son of a bitch will come to my town in force, break him out, and kill us all sure as fat women sweat.”
Wasn’t in any mood for a debate on the subject, so I snapped back, �
��You don’t have one helluva lot of choice in this matter, Marshal Matthews. Gonna have to put him in one of your empty cells until I can make arrangements for his return to Salt Valley for proper trial and suitable hanging.”
Matthews turned, squirted a gob of stringy tobacco juice toward a brimming spittoon from the chewed cigar stub clenched between his yellow-stained teeth, then looked at me like I had three heads and an ear between each pair of eyes.
“Damned if I will,” he said. “Maybe I didn’t make myself completely understood. Ain’t a livin’ soul in these parts that don’t know what a murderous monster Nate Coffin is. You force me to put this scum in one of my cells, and Coffin finds out about it, my life won’t be worth any more’n a two-ounce lead fishin’ sinker.”
Dianna had strolled inside with me to inquire as to the whereabouts of a sawbones for MaryLou Wainwright. Face red as scarlet, she pushed around me, placed her hands on the fat slug’s desk, and leaned his direction.
Ice in her voice when she snapped, “Ranger Dodge is just trying to be diplomatic. Let me get right to the crux of this matter, Marshal. Hike your lazy rump out of that chair, you big tub of guts, get the keys off the peg behind you, and lock this man up. Or if you’d prefer, I’ll put a bullet in him right here and now. Then, when the story gets out that he died in your office, Nate Coffin will pay you a deadly visit for sure.”
Matthews came near to choking on the chewed-up cigar stump. His stubby, bootless feet hit the floor as he flopped forward in his chair. Stuttered, “Wha-wha-what the hell d-d-did you just say, woman?”
“Don’t tell me you’re deaf as well as fat, ugly, and stupid,” Dianna shot back. “I said, either lock this murderer up, or you can go buy a shovel and bury him. Your choice. Along with the possibility your wife, if you have one, could well be attending a funeral in the very near future herself.”
Nervy gob of spit jumped to his feet, slapped the top of his desk with a sweaty hand, and yelped, “B-b-by God, woman. I’ll not listen to such—”
’Fore he knew what happened, the end of his nose was surrounded by the muzzle of her pistol. Gingerly as I could, barely touched her with my finger, and ever so gently pressed the hot-eyed girl’s arm back toward her holster. Hell, couldn’t allow her to splatter his nose, and most of his brains, all over the jail wall.
Said, “Locals might not take well to us killin’ the courageous and renowned Marshal Ridley Matthews, Dianna.” Gradually the fire in her eyes came down a scorching notch, and she took a fuming step backward.
Whispered, “Calm down,” as she moved away. Turned back to the flabbergasted lawman. “Gonna have to do as the lady says, Marshal. Otherwise, I just might be forced to adopt her hotheaded methods and, trust me, you wouldn’t want that.”
Matthews looked like a man who’d been slapped in the face with a filthy, puke-dripping, Saturday night bar rag from the busiest saloon in town. His jowly, stubble-covered face twitched around tobacco-stained teeth and lips. “Well, shit, bring ’im on back, by God. But I swear ’fore crucified Jesus, if anything wayward occurs because of this brazen inconvenience, I’m layin’ the blame right at your feet. You Rangers need to take up a bit more in the way of polite methods for handlin’ your affairs. Cain’t just run over folks like this.”
Ignored the angry marshal’s less than charitable remarks and pushed Tiner to his cage. Smoky wasn’t stupid by any means. As Matthews and I headed back into the office, he grabbed the bars, squeezed his face between them, and yelped, “Jist you boys wait till Nate finds out where I am. You law-bringin’ sons of bitches won’t live any longer’n spit on a stoked-up depot stove in January. Both of you’ll be barkin’ in Hell soon enough, and I’ll be drinkin’ tequila at the Los Lobos Cantina over in Uvalde.”
His speech bothered me not one whit, but I could tell Tiner’s load of horse fritters rattled Matthews, right down to the holes in the toes of his moth-eaten socks. Marshal clumsily wobbled back to his still-warm seat, and slumped into it like a man who’d just been beaten bloody with a fence post sporting a horseshoe nail. Took some doing to get his attention back, but I eventually dragged directions to the office of Willow Junction’s local pill roller out of him.
Escorted Dianna and a blank-faced Mrs. Wainwright another few blocks down Front Street toward the easily missed storefront operation of Dr. Hardin Q. Puckett. We shuffled along the boardwalk and, for the first time since we’d found MaryLou Wainwright, I had a chance to notice the amazing contrasts between the two women. Dianna’s dark-haired, ruby-lipped, fiery-eyed beauty served as an exact opposite for the shattered Mrs. Wainwright’s sandy-haired, pale, vacant-faced appearance.
No way not to feel sorry for the broken lady if you had any knowledge of her blood-saturated recent past. Poor woman’s predicament, and the foul murder of Dianna’s young son, William, made me all the more determined to see Nate Coffin, and any of his henchmen responsible for such vicious, soulless destruction, swinging from the nearest tree, or spitting blood if they resisted.
Given the disappointment of Willow Junction’s less-than-cooperative marshal, the local medicine man turned out much better than I had any right to expect. Far too many of the bone poppers who made their stumbling way to obscure parts of the West drank to excess as a result of being plagued by an unknowable past on the killing fields of Mr. Lincoln’s tragic war on the South. Not this one. Gangly, thin as a rail, and nervous in the extreme, Puckett appeared precisely what any person in need would hope for in a pill-wrangling cut-’em-up.
We explained the dreadful circumstances of our appearance. The doc nodded as though he recognized the problem immediately. Placed a skinny arm around the devastated woman’s shoulders and guided her to a leather-covered couch in one corner of his office. Long, spiderlike fingers caressed her trembling shoulder as he gently assisted the lady into a reclining position.
“Appears she has involuntarily descended into a profound state of shock,” he said. “Her troubled mind, overwhelmed by the brutal circumstances you’ve recently described, has simply taken a much-needed rest. And will most likely lie dormant until coaxed into properly functioning again.”
“I have no idea what that all means, Dr. Puckett. What we have to know is, can you help her?” Dianna’s question contained more than a bit of concerned desperation.
“Oh, yes.” He turned and gently patted Dianna’s shoulder. “You must not feel compelled to worry yourself overly much, my dear. I’ll keep her warm. Prop her feet up. See she gets plenty of liquids and attentive care. With any luck at all, your friend should start coming around in a matter of hours, days perhaps, weeks at the outside.”
“That’s most encouraging, Doctor,” I offered.
He scratched his head for a second, then added, “Yes, but you should also be painfully aware that in some instances these things do take time.”
“How much time?” Dianna asked.
“Well, I’ve seen many past examples of trauma to the wounded mind that refused treatment. ’Course that was during the War of Yankee Oppression—a time of unparalleled human destruction and murderous slaughter. Still, even doctors with considerable training can’t accurately foretell the exact outcome for certain. I’d venture an educated guess, though, and say the lady should recover, and be made whole again, in pretty short order.”
After seeing to our animals, Dianna and I hit the street in search of a hotel room. We strolled along the boardwalk and she said, “The more I think on it, a night in a real bed would be most agreeable—a skin-singeing bath even more so.”
I flicked a furtive glance in the dazzling girl’s direction. The overpowering thought of her completely naked body engulfed my every conscious thought.
Of course, we took separate rooms at the Lone Star Hotel and Boarding House located a block away from the jail and across Front Street. Had hoped Dianna’s room would be nearer mine, but the desk clerk claimed only limited vacancies at the time. She set up residence near the stairway landing on the second floor, while I had to thro
w my bedroll in a room several doors farther down the hall. After some consideration, I came to feel that the separation amounted to nothing more than a minor irritation. Wished later I’d thought a bit more on the subject.
Two days after our arrival, Mrs. Wainwright’s situation had improved enough that we decided to continue on to Uvalde and points south come the following morning. Had lunch in the hotel with Dianna that afternoon. Lady implored me to bathe myself and shave for a special evening she had planned. Flattered by the mysterious request, I agreed to her terms.
’Course all kinds of wicked thoughts flew through my heaving mind. While our relationship had started out well when we first met, her son’s brutal death, and the events surrounding the chase, had thrown water on those initial embers of passion. Couldn’t imagine what she intended.
Once Dianna had tended to her twa-let that evening, and freshened herself to the utmost in man-slaying appearance, she tapped on my door. When I opened it, she took my arm and said, “Come along, Ranger Dodge. I’ve discovered the location of a well-recommended restaurant and would like to buy you dinner.”
My God, but she was a glorious thing to look upon. Her dusky beauty entranced me in a way that made it hard to breathe, much less concentrate. From somewhere amidst the load she’d placed on our mule, a flattering, bone-colored dress, accented by a navy-blue shawl trimmed in red, had magically appeared. As my dear ole daddy liked to say, “Lucius, ’at ’ere gal is purdyer’n a fresh-painted wagon.”
Did my level best to act surprised and noble. Wasn’t difficult. “You needn’t do that, Mrs. Savage. I’d be most happy to stand for the two of us to have a good meal.”
She looped her arm through mine and pulled me into the hall. “You will do no such thing. Come along now. A grand evening awaits Willow Junction’s hungry sojourners at Jewel’s Café.”