Blood Valley

by William W. Johnstone

  Finally, I give it up and looked at Rolf. “Y’all just gonna have to excuse my ignorance, folks. I just don’t know which thing to use with what.”

  “Don’t let it worry you, Sheriff,” Jeff said. “Personally, I never saw that it made much difference.” He smiled at his mother. “But mother was and is a stickler for table manners. She grew up in New Hampshire.”

  I suppose that New Hampshire bit was supposed to be impressive to me. It wasn’t.

  “It’s easy, Cotton,” Pepper said. “You just start from the outside and work in with each course of food that’s served.”

  “Oh! Well, I’ll just be da . . . durned. So that’s how it’s done, huh.”

  Made me feel kinda dumb ’cause I hadn’t figured it out myself.

  “What’s this we’re eatin’?” I asked Rolf.

  Rolf looked at me and smiled. “Lamb. Rather tasty, isn’t it?”

  It sure was. I’d never et no sheep before. I complimented Pepper on a good supper. Dinner. To Rolf, “I bet you’d get some dark looks from A.J. and Matt if they knowed you served up sheep for a meal, hey?”

  “I’m going to start raising sheep, Cotton. It’s really a very profitable venture.” When I didn’t say nothin’, I guess he figured I was agin’ that. He was wrong. “Does that offend you?”

  “No, sir. I get along right well with sheep and them that raise them . . . providin’ it’s done right.”

  “Oh, I plan to do it correctly. That’s the only way sheep and cattle can get along together. I have about thirty thousand acres that will be just perfect for sheep.”

  I wondered if he knowed just how much trouble he was gonna stir up by sheep-raisin’. He was settin’ himself solid agin’ the big cattle spreads.

  As if readin’ my thoughts, the elder Baker said, “Yes, Cotton, I know.”

  I nodded my head, then decided to change the subject. “Any of y’all plannin’ on comin’ into town tomorrow?”

  “Why . . . no,” Rolf replied. “Why do you ask, Cotton?”

  “Don’t,” my voice was flat. “I’m gonna brace that back-shooter, Haufman tomorrow. If he’s in town, that is, and I figure he will be. I’m either gonna run him out of the county or kill him.”

  Everybody stopped chowin’ down with that statement. “We’re going to have to discuss your future, Cotton.” Martha said, in her soft way.

  “When all this is over, ma’am, I’m gonna start ranchin’. But for now, it’s pretty well lined out for me. I aim to either stop this buildin’-up war in the valley, or stand right in the middle of it shootin’. I took an oath to do that. And I ain’t never broke my word in my life. I don’t intend to do that now.”

  She inspected me with her eyes. “No, I don’t imagine you have, Cotton. But you now have Pepper to think of.”

  “I do that mite near all the time anyways, ma’am.” I could see that pleased them all, ’specially Pepper. I could practical see the steam comin’ out of her ears. Kinda made me woozy in the pit of my stomach. And produced some other sensations in other areas of me, too. I was right glad nobody asked me to stand up just about then.

  “Cotton,” Rolf said, “I would like you to give me your thoughts on the upcoming war. No, wait! Cotton, what is your last name? Don’t you think we have a right to know, especially now that you’re about to become a member of the family?”

  I give out a long sigh. I knowed I had it to do. “Well, I reckon so. But please don’t laugh. I’m sorta sensitive about it.”

  So I told them.

  Jeff, he had to leave the table, and I silently thanked him for showin’ me that much respect before he busted right out laughin’. I would have hated to have punched out my future brother-in-law.

  Rolf, he blinked a couple of times, then covered his mouth with a big table napkin. He took a sip of wine, then shook his head and damned if he didn’t swaller the whole glassful.

  “I think it’s a lovely name,” Martha said, with only a little smile. But her eyes sure was twinklin’.

  “I think it’s grand!” Pepper said. “Just think, I’ll be Mrs. Pepper . . .”

  “Don’t say it aloud!” I blurted. “I’m thinkin’ of changin’ it, anyways.”

  “You’ll do no such thing!” Rolf told me, considerable heat in his voice. “A man’s last name is very important. To retain it means to perpetuate the lineage forever.”

  Now it was my turn to blink. I sure didn’t have no idea what it was that Rolf Baker had just told me.

  Jeff, he come back in and took his seat at the table. His face was all flushed and he looked like he’d just swallered a ladybug.

  Martha cleared her throat. “Do you have any brothers or sisters, Cotton?”

  “Yes’um. A whole passel of ’em. But I haven’t seen none of ’em in years. Not since we was separated after our folks passed. Don’t reckon I ever will see none of them. I don’t have no idea what happened to any of them.”

  “How sad,” Martha sniffed a couple of times. Looked like she was gonna bust out cryin’.

  There’d been enough blubberin’ for one day. “It ain’t nothin’ to get all worked up about. The little ones got cared for proper and us older ones made it all right, I reckon. The only one I ever really think about, is my brother, Jack.”

  Pepper glanced at me. “Something special about him, Cotton?”

  “Oh, yeah, I looked up to Jack. Even though he had him a mean streak a yard wide. But he was always good to me. He pulled out ’fore the folks passed. But even as a boy, he was uncommon fast with a short gun. Why, once I recall seein’ him . . .”

  Then it hit me. Was it possible? Jack. Jack Crow! Could it be? God, I hoped not. But there was always that chance.

  “You have a very pensive look, Cotton,” Martha said.

  I thought I knew what that meant, but I wasn’t really sure. So I just nodded my head. “Yes, ma’am. I guess so.”

  Jack Crow! Was it possible?

  The more I thought on it, the more I thought it just might be true. Although part of me desperately wanted it not to be. Then I remembered that pet crow Jack had one time. Somebody had told him that you could make a crow talk; but try as he did, he never could get no more than a squawk out of that bird. But Jack, he give it his best try.

  A neighbor boy come over one afternoon, and for no good reason that anybody could figure out, he killed Jack’s pet crow. Man, I never seen nobody go into such a rage as Jack done that day. A cold, killin’ mad. And the boy who killed the bird? Well, that boy was found shot to death about two weeks later, killed with a single bullet wound to the chest.

  The law? Hell, what law? There wasn’t no law in that part of the country where we was raised up. I was . . . oh, about ten years old when that happened, and that was a long time ’fore any kind of real law and order come to that part of the wilderness.

  “You’re very deep in thought, Cotton.” Pepper was starin’ at me acrost the table. “What in the world are you thinking about?”

  I was so deep in thought, her words just barely reached me.

  I shook my head and laid knife and fork down on my plate, all my appetite suddenly gone. “I was thinkin’ of a gunfighter name of Jack Crow . . . but I don’t think that’s his real name. He never liked his last name neither.”

  “I’ve heard of him,” Jeff said. “He is reputed to be the fastest gun in the west. Other than Smoke Jensen, that is. But Smoke has hung up his guns, married, and settled down. Over in Idaho, I believe it is.”

  “He’s married and settled down, but he ain’t near’bouts hung up his guns yet.”

  “Why is this gunfighter, this Jack Crow, weighing so heavily on your mind, Cotton?” Martha asked.

  I give out a long sigh. Everything was beginning to fit like a completed puzzle. Jack always did favor black clothing. Told me back when I was just a little shaver that someday he’d have a name for hisself and then he’d have all the black outfits he wanted.

  I was conscious that everyone had stopped eatin’ and was ju
st sittin’, lookin’ straight at me, waiting for some sort of answer.

  “Why?” I met their eyes. “’Cause I think he’s my brother.”

  I didn’t sleep too good that night. Done a lot of tossin’ and turnin’, with my head filled with boyhood memories about me and Jack and our ma and pa and all the other younguns. I wondered what had become of them. Were they doin’ all right? Had they married and settled down? Did they have families and all that went with that?

  I’d sleep a while and then wake up and start to thinkin’ again. And all my thoughts had Pepper all mixed up in them.

  I pulled out before dawn, after Pepper fixed me breakfast—she really could cook—and then give me a promise-of-things-to-come kiss right on the mouth. I rode Pronto into the darkness, headin’ for town.

  The night past, we’d all gathered up in the fancy sittin’ room and I’d told them all about my childhood, and all that I could remember about brother Jack.

  “Forgive me for saying this, Cotton,” Rolf said. “But this Jack appears to be the carrier of the bad seed in your family.”

  He was sure right. I couldn’t deny that.

  “Ain’t nothin’ to forgive when a person is right, Mister Baker. And you’re sure right. Now that I’m a man grown, and lookin’ back, I an see where a lot of the things Jack done was just lowdown dirty mean.”

  All that was on my mind as I rode into the spreading silver dawnin’ of the day. But I wasn’t dwellin’ just on that. A good part of me was on the high alert for any trouble that might be hidin’ in the shadows.

  But all my attention to danger was for naught, and when I rode into town, the streets and boardwalks of Doubtful was quiet and empty of anything except for a few dogs and cats. I rode slowly to the stable and put up Pronto. I told him to stay calm and don’t kick no slats out of his stall.

  Pronto, he shoved me back up against the stall and tried to bite me.

  The gimp-legged man had just opened his cafe as I walked up the boardwalk. Noddin’ my good mornin’s, I took me a table by a window and ordered coffee and breakfast.

  Pretty soon, Rusty come walkin’ up the way, his spurs jinglin’. He spotted me and joined me at the table.

  Rusty, he ordered breakfast and coffee, and over coffee, I asked, “Anything interestin’ happen while I was gone, Rusty?”

  “You might say that.” He sugared and creamed his coffee and stirred. “Buck Hargon, Doc Martin, and that Canadian gunfighter, Sangamon, rode in. They’re over to the hotel.”

  “Least it’s slowed down to a trickle. Hell, Rusty, there can’t be that many more gunslingers that’s out there out of work.”

  “Yeah.” His reply was glum. “And for a fact, Jack Crow is comin’ in. He was spotted a few days ago near the Salt River Range.”

  “Then he’ll be in any day now.”

  “Yeah. Sheriff, do you realize they’s more than fifty known gunhands now in the valley?”

  “I know.”

  The cafe man brung us our food and for a time, we concentrated on eatin’. Then, pushin’ our plates away, we poured more coffee and I brung Rusty up to date . . . but I didn’t say nothin’ about my gettin’ engaged. That was up to Pepper and her ma to make that announcement.

  “Your horse gonna be all right?”

  “Oh, yeah.”

  “You sure it was Haufman?”

  “It was his horse for a fact.” I dug in my vest pocket and laid the .44-.40 brass on the table. “And I found this.”

  I’d found something odd about that brass, but I didn’t say nothin’ about it. I’d confront Haufman with it . . . after I beat hell out of them. Or killed him.

  “Haufman come in early this mornin’, Sheriff. I got up ’bout four and seen him ride in.”

  “I didn’t see his horse when I stabled mine.”

  “Rode in on a shaggy mountain pony. Never seen the brand before.”

  “I seen that one in the corral. You got any idea where he is now?”

  “Havin’ breakfast at the hotel. Was when I walked past. And he don’t look like he’s packin’ no iron.”

  “Yeah, that figures. That’s one of his trademarks. Usually after a kill, he’ll show up in town, unarmed.”

  I didn’t want to kill Haufman. I just wanted to beat hell out of him.

  I said as much to Rusty.

  “He’s a bull, Sheriff. I hear he used to wrestle ’fore he come out west.”

  “He did. And box, too. I seen him fight a couple of times. He’s good.” I met Rusty’s eyes and smiled. “But I think I’m some better.”

  “I always knowed you didn’t have no sense,” Rusty said sorrowfully.

  Back at the office, I dug in my war bag and come up with a pair of tight-fittin’ leather gloves. That China-feller who taught me some tricky ways of fightin’, he had them gloves made for me as a gift. He said, and he was right, that a man can hit harder wearin’ gloves. And you don’t do near’bouts the damage to your hands, neither.

  I tucked the gloves in my hip pocket and looked over the mail; the stage had run while I was gone. There was a passel of wanted dodgers and not much else. I left the mail on my desk and took off my spurs, not wantin’ to get all tangled up in them when I tangled up with Haufman. Then I stepped out on the boardwalk.

  Takin’ my time, I prowled the streets, not locatin’ the German. Spottin’ a little boy, I asked, “You seen a big, stocky-lookin’ feller out this mornin’, son?”

  “Looks like a nester?”

  “That’s him.”

  “He’s over yonder at the Wolf’s Den.” The boy pointed.

  I thanked him and crossed the street. Steppin’ up on the boardwalk, I pushed open the batwings and stepped inside.

  Miss Mary was behind the bar with the bartender countin’ out money. The swamper was cleanin’ up the place, and Haufman was sittin’ at a table, his back to a wall, playin’ solitaire with a geasy deck of pasteboards.

  Haufman would have heard the news that I was still alive, probably from a hardcase once Big Mike got back to the spread, so he didn’t show no surprise on his face when I walked in. But his face was right and his eyes bright with tension, wary as a wolf.

  Walkin’ to the bar, I deliberately turned my back to him. “You missed, Haufman.”

  “I don’t know vhat you’re talking about, Sheriff Cotton.”

  “You’re a goddamn liar!”

  He began huffin’ and puffin’ like a steam engine.

  “You missed me and shot my good horse, you son of a bitch. Now you get your shaggy horse and get your butt out of this county. Don’t you never come back here.”

  I slipped on the leather gloves. They felt good on my hands. I turned to face him. His face was red with anger.

  “I demand that you take back that slur against my mother, Sheriff!”

  “You go to hell, Haufman! And ride your ugly horse there. I’m warnin’ you, Haufman. You get out of town right now—ride!”

  “You talk tough to an armed man, Sheriff.”

  “Well, now, I’m glad to hear that, Haufman. ’Cause in that case, I’m gonna kick your fat butt a time or two before I run you out of this town.”

  He laughed hoarsely. “You’re a fool, cowboy. I have never lost a fight. I was a professional back east.”

  I unbuckled and untied, layin’ my gunbelt on the bar.

  I laughed at him. I wanted to make him so mad he’d lose all control. “A professional? A professional what, whoremaster? A pimp, maybe. What’d you do, Haufman, pimp for your sister?”

  That done it. With a roar of rage, he overturned the table, sending the cards flyin’. He charged me like an angry bull, knockin’ tables and chairs ever’ which-a-way as he come screamin’ acrost the room.

  I knowed one thing for certain: I couldn’t never let him get his big hands on me, for the German was strong as a go-riller. And he hadn’t been jokin’ none when he said he’d never lost a fight. And he might have been a world-class champion if he hadn’t killed a little fellow outside
the ring.

  I sidestepped and he crashed into the bar like a rampagin’ elephant. I clubbed him on the side of the head, right on his ear. It stung him, I could see that, but it didn’t even slow him down none at all.

  He cussed me in German, and I didn’t have to speak the language to know that he’d called me some terrible names.

  I laughed at him. “Come on, you fat pig. So far, you ain’t showed me nothin’ but mouth.”

  Then the sucker hit me in the mouth with one of the fastest left hands I’d ever seen. It hurt me. But it was not a solid blow and I could dance back.

  Howlin’ his rage, he lumbered towards me. I snapped out a quick left and caught him on the mouth. The blood popped out from his thick wet lips and his head snapped back. I done a little dancin’ like that China-feller taught me and a different light came into Haufman’s eyes. He knowed then that he wasn’t fightin’ no cherry when it come to boxin’.

  “I will destroy you at your own game, you stupid fool!” he hissed at me. Then he drew hisself up straight and raised his hands in the classic boxer’s stance.

  My reply was to kick him in the kneecap.

  He give out a yell of pain, his guard droppin’ for just a second. That was all I needed to give him a combination left and right to the mouth and to the jaw. Then I stopped in close and busted him right on his nose.

  He staggered backwards and once more give me a good cussin’.

  I didn’t waste my breath returnin’ the cussin’. I turned and he threw a right that missed. Steppin’ under the blow, I once more popped him on the nose. The nose busted this time, and the blood went flyin’. Haufman, he shook his head to clear it, faked me, and then knocked the pure-dee piss out of me. He hit me so hard I thought the fight was gonna be over ’fore it even got goin’ good.

  I backed up, keepin’ my guard up, and ducked around several tables until the fog lifted outta my head and the little birdies stopped chirpin’ and I got back whatever sense I had. Haufman, he grinned through his bloody face and stalked me around the room, his big fists held up high. He swung a loopin’ right hand, but I just ducked and didn’t try no counterpunch; I knowed what he was tryin’ to do: sucker punch me.