Stringer and the Hanging Judge

by Lou Cameron

  Most of the few recorded cases, however, seemed to deal with petty local disputes involving unpaid debts, disputed property lines, unleashed dogs worrying stock, and so forth. It was no way to keep records, but as far as Stringer could make out the few on hand, the casual old cuss had smoothed over most of the disputes with common sense and caustic humor. There wasn’t one thing naming the four Bean kids as the heirs to Bean’s mighty hazy estate, or even proving he’d ever had them.

  As the local moved on up the tracks, leaving Stringer rolling a smoke in a pensive mood, he tried to tell himself again that he was, a newspaperman and not an estate lawyer. The way the old man had been running things in Langtry hardly explained why anyone would want to run an investigative reporter out of town, anyway. Nobody out to dispute the estate of a man who was still alive had call to worry about anything he might write for a distant newspaper. Old Bean himself had more political pull than any stranger might. Something more sinister than ownership of the Jersey Lily had to be involved. So what was left?

  Stringer lit his smoke and strode across the tracks and into the trees. The sandy soil shaded by the canopy of cottonwood and willow was well-trodden and littered with the trash of hasty evacuation. But he saw no hoofprints, and the first thatched choza he came to in a clearing was undamaged, albeit deserted. He was exploring a second when he became aware he was not alone after all. He turned to see the heavyset Gordo and two other Mexicans regarding him with considerable distaste. He was glad to see none of them were armed with anything more serious than machetes.

  He nodded. “Buen dias, Gordo. I see those cowhands didn’t burn you out, here, after all.”

  Gordo scowled. “They never came, after that stupid Roy Bean scared everyone across the river por nada! We just now waded back across, for to read sign, and anyone can see it was a lie he told us. For why did he lie to us, gringo? Is it considered amusing to make women scream and children cry with stories about night riders?”

  “Roy wasn’t making it up,” Stringer said. “I was there when a bunch of Double W riders announced serious intent to bust things up here. So they were the ones who lied. I don’t know why. It might have been to get Roy to do just what he did. Later on, I saw some of them getting drunk in One Thumb Brown’s cantina. Look on the bright side. What if Roy hadn’t warned you and they’d hit this camp more serious?”

  Gordo scowled. “They had no reason for to bother us to begin with. You say you think they lied to Roy Bean for to get him to lie to us. For why do you think they would do that?”

  “For openers,” Stringer said, “they seem to have made you and all your people sore as hell at the Beans, right?”

  “Si,” Gordo said, “we have always treated El Patron with respect. Was not right to scare us shitless like that, por nada.”

  “There you go,” Stringer said. ‘They call that divide and rule. The judge has always protected you folk. In turn he’s always had a few willing hands to call on when need be. Right now he’s too old and feeble to lick a determined chicken, and has nobody to stand up for him but one grown son and, well, me.”

  Gordo raised the blade of his machete to regard it as if he’d just noticed it. “Maybe he has more friends than that, if you can tell us who his enemies are and what they want.”

  “I wish I could,” Stringer said, “for if I did, I’d tell the judge and he’d know how to deal with it. It has to be something the law’s not supposed to know about. The judge and everyone else knows you folk are in Texas sort of informal, so that can’t be it. Those riders, last night, as much as accused you wetbacks of running stock through here to say Chihuahua. Before you yell bad names at me, I can see you boys own no ponies and no cow’s been across this sand in living memory, but—”

  “That is most stupid!” Gordo cut in.

  One of his older companions announced, “They always seek to blame us for things we have not done. Everyone knows no Mejicanos could have run off any of that missing stock. For why do they accuse us?”

  “Even if we did wish to run stock down into Chihuahua,” Gordo chimed in, “would we be stupid enough to drive it through Langtry, where everyone could see us? The cow thieves are driving their stolen stock across somewhere else, not into this oxbow where they would be so easy to spot.”

  Stringer nodded. “I never said you folk were dumb enough to drive stolen stock through this neck of the woods. How come you seem to feel free to speak for other old boys from south of the border, though?”

  “That is no mystery,” Gordo replied. “In our country no gringo can ride far without someone noticing. In Texas it works the other way around. If there was a band of vaqueros raiding the herds north of the border, for why has nobody ever reported seeing any?”

  Stringer thought, and nodded soberly, “I follow your drift, and I have to allow you make more sense than those wild-eyed cowboys last night. Where would you run cows across, to say some Mex confederates, if you were a Texas hand in business for himself, Gordo?”

  The heavyset youth shrugged. “It would depend on whether I was worried about Los Rurales or working with them.”

  The older man who spoke English shook his head. “I do not see Texas thieves paying off the law in Chihuahua. Not if they hoped for any profit. Los Rurales are pigs, and seldom keep their word when bribed, anyway. Beef sells for less in Chihuahua than up here. To make it worth their while, Gringo rustlers would have to drive stolen stock hard, to some dishonest ranchero, and slip back with their ill-gotten gains before Los Rurales caught them, eh?”

  Stringer grimaced. “If they had any sense, they’d just drive the beef to some other part of Texas and save themselves a heap of bother. I know a Ranger called Slade was last seen heading north to the greener range up yonder. Old Will Slade could be a jump ahead of us on purloined beef.”

  Gordo objected, “Then for why is someone trying to make it look as if we are running the stock through here?”

  “Mayhaps to keep folk from guessing where they are running it. I’ll suggest Will Slade have a word with old One Thumb, next time I see him. I can’t get Brown to tell me much.”

  As he turned to retrace his steps, Gordo asked, “Do you think it is safe for our people to cross over again?

  They have no shelters built on the far side of the river, and Los Rurales could stumble over them at any time.”

  Stringer sighed, “I sure wish everyone around here wouldn’t appoint me their damned guardian. I can’t speak for any roughnecks on this side of the border, gents. But from what I know of Los Rurales, you’d be as well off if the Double W hands came after you with murder in mind. How many men and how many weapons do you boys have to work with?”

  “Forty or so men and a few tough women and boys,” Gordo said, “Pero mostly with sticks, a few machetes, and a couple of shotguns. Muzzle loaders.”

  Stringer grimaced. “You’re in a hell of a mess if anybody attacks you enough to matter. I still think you’d be a mite safer on this side of the river, where Los Rurales can’t get at you.”

  The Mexicans agreed. So Stringer shook with all three of them and they parted friendly enough. As Stringer burst out of the tree line again, he found himself somewhat farther down the track, nearer the water tower. As he crossed the track, he spotted a bitty mustard-yellow shack even farther, and since the door was ajar and an old gent in coveralls was lounging there behind an open newspaper. Stringer wandered over for a howdy.

  The elderly railroader howdied him back and put aside his paper. “Are you one of our dicks, son?”

  “Not hardly,” Stringer said. “I’m Stringer MacKail and I write for the San Francisco Sun. What sort of trouble might the Southern Pacific be in, calling for the services of a railroad dick?”

  “Not in this section,” the older man replied. “That’s why I was wondering. The line’s been getting littered with dead bodies of late. Hadn’t you heard?”

  “No. I haven’t read today’s papers. Did you say bodies, plural?”

  The section hand nod
ded. “Yep. One old boy scattered across the desert just west of L. A. near the tracks. Dressed too fancy for a hobo. But he still struck the track walkers as a man who’d been thro wed off a train. Then, just this morning, they found another old boy, dressed more like a cowhand, curled up dead in an empty boxcar, over to the San Antone yards. It reads that he got shot in the chest, somewheres else, and crawled into the car to hide out and bleed to death. Sure is mysterious.”

  Stringer didn’t think so. But he saw no need to mention the rascal Pat Garrett had swapped shots with in the L.A. yards. The other, of course, had to be the one who’d attacked Pam Kinnerton. He asked the railroader, “Have they any names to go with either of them?”

  “Sure,” the old-timer said. “Says so right here in the paper. The one who went diving off a speeding train had an L.A. voting card giving his name as… Let’s see, Dan Logan. The other old boy who bled his fool self to death in the boxcar had Morgan Jones printed on his hatband. So that was likely his name, unless it was his hat maker’s. Neither one’s had any kith or kin come forward for mortal remains or pocket money, though. So betwixt you and me, I’d say they was owlhoots traveling incognecated.”

  Stringer agreed, even as the one name, Morgan Jones, rang a bell in the back of his mind. He couldn’t match it up with anyone, but he felt sure he’d come across it before. Maybe the old man was right and Morgan Jones sold hats.

  Stringer pointed casually up at the telegraph line running in line with the tracks. “What I really wanted to ask you was how far down the line I’d have to go to send a wire to my home office.”

  The old railroader raised an eyebrow. “You mean for money?” When Stringer nodded, he stood up and said, “I can patch you through to Western Union. Cost you a dime a word, though. Half for Western Union and half for, well, the bother.”

  “That sounds fair,” Stringer said. “But does that mean anyone can send a wire from here in Langtry, any time he wants?”

  The older man shrugged. “Any time I ain’t got more important dispatches to send. My job is watering trains and seeing they don’t bump noses. But as you see, I got lots of time on my hands, so, sure, I make a little on the side as a sort of disofficial telegraph office.”

  Stringer said, “I was told there was no way to send wires from here and— Right, never ask a liar if you want an honest answer. I’d like to send a couple of wires, seeing I suddenly got lucky. Do we have a blank pad handy?”

  The old-timer nodded and ushered Stringer inside, where both pad and pencil reposed on a plank desk beside his telegraph set. Stringer perched on the stool and quickly blocked out several messages in a row. Then he tallied all the words and reached in his jeans. “Let’s not worry about the thirty cents change I could get Scotch about. How soon do you figure I should come back for some answers?”

  The railroader picked up the penciled messages to scan their destinations. “You sure write a lot. I can’t promise service quick as Western Union. Like I said, I got to give first call to railroad business. How does sometime around sunrise sound to you, son?”

  It sounded slow for telegraphs if faster than the U.S. mail. But since he was in no position to argue, Stringer didn’t. He said he’d drop by the next day, and headed back to the Jersey Lily to see about supper. It was sort of amusing, the way folk ducked inside again as he strode up the street.

  But as he approached the Jersey Lily from the south, he saw a cloud of dust coming his way from the north. As it turned into a passel of riders loping into town on lathered ponies, he decided he might not have scared the whole town all by himself. One of the riders was Sunny Jim.

  Stringer stopped and stood his ground in the center of the street, in front of the Jersey Lily. For an awkward moment it seemed the whole bunch meant to ride him down. Then they reined in, just as he was tensing to draw, and nobody said anything for a spell as the dust settled. All but one of the riders wore dusty jeans or chaps. The one who didn’t, wore a dusty skirt and sat her palomino sidesaddle. From the waist up she dressed more mannish, in a charro jacket and flat-crowned Spanish hat. She had a six-gun riding her left hip. She was sort of pretty, to be scowling down at him so ferocious. It was she, rather than Sunny Jim, who told him, “We’re on our way to clean out that Mex shantytown. Any objections, MacKail?”

  “Yep,” he said. “I just told ‘em it was all right for them to come back, and you have the advantage on me, ma’am.”

  “I’m Belle Rogers,” she said, “owner and operator of the B Bar Lazy Six. Most of these boys are with me. You may recall Sunny Jim and these other two off his spread. Both outfits are missing stock. A lot of stock. So stand aside and let us discuss the matter with those infernal wetbacks you seem so fond of.”

  “I can’t do that, Miss Belle. Two reasons. In the first place, I just told ‘em it was all right for ‘em to come back across the river. In the second place, they don’t have your stock. I was just talking to ‘em about such matters.”

  She looked more surprised than angry. “You must be dumb as well as loco en la cabeza, MacKail. Can’t you count?”

  He nodded. “Yep. I make it fourteen of you, not counting ladies and Sunny Jim, to one of me. I sure hope you folk can count, as well, for I sure don’t want to go down. So if you force my hand, you’ll ride on with at least a couple less, and a dozen of you might not be enough to take on the forty-odd Mexicans on the prod, down by the river.”

  One of her men shifted in his saddle, but she snapped. “No! I’ll say when, Pete.” So Pete didn’t draw, after all.

  But then a rider on the far side of Sunny Jim said, “I don’t work for you, Miss Belle.” He dismounted behind the shelter of Sunny Jim’s pony and came around afoot, grinning wolfishly at Stringer. “Sunny Jim told me how you crawfished him earlier. I’m his ramrod, Bronco North. I was just telling old Jim how anxious I was to meet such a ferocious stranger.”

  “We agreed Sunny Jim ought to run home to his mama,” Stringer replied. “Miss Belle, is this between the two of us, or could I be in real trouble?”

  She laughed despite herself. “Bronco, cut it out. Can’t you see we’re smack in town, you fool?”

  “That’s what this other fool’s been counting on,” Bronco said. “He figures being pals with that old windbag, Roy Bean, gives him the right to rawhide everybody. But I ain’t scared of Bean or anyone else. Least of all this Mex-loving newspaper boy!”

  Belle Rogers reined her pony backward as she told her own men, softly, “Stay out of it, muchachos. They’re both acting dumb as hell.”

  Stringer smiled at Bronco North. “The lady has a point, amigo. This is rapidly degenerating into a mano a mano in front of witnesses, and be it recorded I mean to let you go for your gun first, being such a law-abiding cuss.”

  Bronco laughed. “Sunny Jim,” he called out, “you count to three for us. That way nobody will ever be able to rightly say just who started what with who, see?”

  “Don’t do it, Bronco,” Sunny Jim called back. “You’ve never seen that boy slap leather.”

  Bronco scowled, not taking his eyes from Stringer’s gun hand as he marveled, “You sure have old Sunny Jim worried, little darling. I’m still waiting to see how good you are.”

  Then his jaw dropped as Stringer’s gun seemed to materialize from thin air, aimed at his startled eyes. That might have been the peaceful end of it, had not a shot rang out behind the tensed Stringer, spooking him as well as the ponies all around, so that Stringer fired without thinking, even as he crabbed to one side and spun to train his smoking .38 on the figure half hidden by gun smoke on the porch of the Jersey Lily.

  Then he saw it was Judge Roy Bean, with a frock coat on over his nightshirt and his own six-gun smoking in his fist. “The District Court of Langtry is now in session,” he roared, “and what in the hell is going on out here!”

  Stringer felt more sick than amused to hear someone behind him shouting, “MacKail just shot Bronco North, Your Honor. We tried to tell him you wouldn’t like it, but—”r />
  “I’ll ask the questions in this here court,” the old man cut in, seating himself behind one of the packing crates and banging on it with his other six-gun as Stringer turned to see Bronco sitting up with both hands clasped to his bleeding head. “Stand clear so’s I can view the victim, dammit,” old Bean said. “Bronco North, are you dead?”

  Bronco just moaned. Belle Rogers called back, “Looks like a scalp wound, Judge. The boys were fixing to shoot it out when you spooked us all like that.”

  Roy Bean shook his unkempt white head and decreed, “Gunfights in the township of Langtry is forbit by dammit law. This court fines both culprits a dollar apiece for disturbing the peace, and I got some horse liniment in stock for that split scalp, Bronco. It’ll cost you another buck.”

  Everyone there but Bronco laughed. Stringer saw the method in the old man’s madness. He was sure glad old Bean was back on his feet at last. Smiling, Jim said, “Us Double W riders had best take old Bronco home, Judge. Can he owe you the dollar until payday?”

  Bean pondered the matter before he growled, grudgingly, “All right. But see he don’t leave the county afore he squares himself with the law.”

  Then, as his pals helped the dazed and bleeding Bronco to his mount, Roy Bean scowled at the rest of them. “What in thunder got into all you children this evening? You look like an armed posse out to hang a horse thief high.”

  “That’s not far off, Judge,” Belle Rogers called back. “We was on our way to shantytown for a showdown over considerable beef when this loco MacKail tried to stop us.”

  Old Bean raised an eyebrow. “Tried to, hell, it seems to me he done it. Who told you that you had any right to pester them harmless greasers, Miss Belle?”