Retribution Rails

by Erin Bowman

  He runs off to send a telegraph, and though I hope his next course of action will be to search the town for the rest of the gang, I do not have time to linger. I race for the stage stop. When I round the corner at Etter’s, my heart drops.

  The coach is gone, and the passengers I’d been riding with are nowhere to be seen.

  “Where’s the coach bound for Prescott?” I ask a wiry man working the ticket counter.

  “Why, that left a solid ten minutes ago, miss.”

  “It left? But I’m supposed to be on it!”

  “Well, I regret to inform you that yer still here.” He smiles as though he’s made a fantastic joke.

  “When’s the next coach?”

  “Tomorrow, at noon.”

  “Tomorrow?” The rail is supposed to be finished by the end of the year and it’s already the thirtieth. If I miss the ceremonies, I can’t document the speeches or take notes for a story. And without a fabulous story, securing a job with Mr. Marion’s press will be impossible.

  The man chortles. “You in the habit of repeating everything you hear, or am I speaking a whole lot softer than I realize?”

  “Your sense of humor is sorely lacking,” I snap, and immediately regret it. His expression has darkened, and he no longer seems interested in helping me.

  I force a smile. It does not help to lift my spirits at all, but the man’s grin returns. “You’ll be all right, doll,” he says assuredly, and pats my hand. “Keep yer chin up. It’s a good look on you.”

  So much for things always looking better with a smile. Perhaps what Mother meant is, men like women best when they smile.

  I walk away grumbling under my breath and eventually sit on the edge of Etter’s porch, my disheveled skirt fanned around my ankles. Having spent most of my money at the Maricopa boarding house last night, my purse is all but empty. I don’t have enough for another coach fare. I likely do not even have enough for accommodations this evening. I might very well be stuck here.

  I could write to Mother in Prescott, but she has enough on her plate. Besides, she’d only come collect me like a stray dog and tow me home with my tail between my legs. She’ll claim I have been brash and reckless, but staying put in Yuma as she’d ordered would have helped no one, not if Uncle Gerald responds as I predict.

  I blow a sweaty tendril of hair from my eyes. What would Nellie Bly do?

  For one, she wouldn’t sit around pouting. If she didn’t have the coin to buy her way, she’d barter herself into a favorable position. I touch my pearl earrings longingly.

  Someone marches by my line of vision. I look up, my hand falling away from my jewelry, and spot Deputy Montgomery striding back toward the Jail Tree. There is a briskness to his gait that is concerning.

  I leap from the bench, worries of lodging and coach fare falling aside as I hurry after him.

  Chapter Seven

  * * *

  Reece

  I’m gonna hang. Just a day past eighteen, and I’m gonna be strung up and sent swinging, all ’cus of that doe-eyed train girl.

  They know we’re the Rose Riders by now. Boss and me are the most wanted outta the bunch, and we match descriptions given in telegraphs and papers and on wanted posters. Diaz and Hobbs are matches for other boys known to ride with the gang. Between the four of us, we got a list of crimes longer than the Southern Pacific’s rails, and a fine bounty, too. Ain’t no way we’ll be shown mercy.

  I reckon alls I can do is pray my neck breaks during the drop, that it’s quick and clean. I got no desire to be one of those bastards who kick and flail, trying to swim themselves free of the noose while they slowly suffocate.

  “Quit it, Murphy,” Diaz grunts.

  I try to calm my flighty fingers, but I’m too riled. After stripping us of our pistol belts and weapons, they marched us to this godforsaken mesquite one of the locals called the Jail Tree. That Wickenburg don’t have a proper jailhouse gave me hope—​at first. There’s a knife in my boot they never found, but then they cuffed the four of us, securing us to iron chains hammered deep into the tree’s trunk, and my hope all but shriveled. I sure as hell can’t reach my boots. The chains are so short, all I can do is stand, shackled hands held up near my chin.

  “They’ll come for us,” Diaz adds. “Crawford and the others.”

  Boss don’t say a word. He must got a plan if’n he willingly let us be taken. We wouldn’t’ve all got outta that saloon alive trying to fight ’em, but it’s best to go down swinging. Least that’s the sermon he usually preaches. But right now he’s got his head reclined ’gainst the trunk of the Jail Tree, looking calm as a daisy as he peers through the thin foliage and into the darkening sky above. He might as well be whistling a tune, running a poker chip over his knuckles, flipping the coin he took from me.

  That damn coin. I wish it never fell into my hands. Maybe more than that, I just wish we’d cross paths with that cowboy already so I can point a finger and move on with my life.

  I pity the poor soul who killed Boss’s brother. Boss don’t got kind plans for him.

  “Murphy, I ain’t kidding!” Diaz growls.

  I make a fist and smother it into my palm, clasp my fingers tight to quit the shaking. The chains still rattle, just not as much.

  Diaz is prolly right. My worrying’s a waste. The others’ll come, but only ’cus of Boss. If he hadn’t been with us when we got brought in, we’d be goners. They were dumb enough to get themselves caught, so they don’t deserve to ride with me, Boss’d say if the tables were turned. Jones has told me stories ’bout men getting pinched and Boss just riding on out. Sacrifice one to save many.

  I look at my chains. Four of us shackled here. Men standing in the street, all too eager to see our demise. They been standing there the last half hour or so, waiting on a telegraph from the capital and betting on our sentences. Odds seem to be on hanging, based on what I can overhear. Firing squad is a close second.

  “Deputy Montgomery?”

  My head snaps up. The train girl is chasing the lawman as he strides toward the gathered men, coattails flapping.

  “Deputy!” she tries again.

  I still ain’t sure what she’s doing up here, so far north of the line where we encountered her, but I’m again struck by how serious she looks, how far from meek and crying. Her brows are drawn ’bout as viciously as a poker player done calling a bluff, and though her cheeks are pinched with cold from the run, she ain’t breathing heavy. I’m starting to suspect that she had every intention of shooting me from the moment I shook that burlap sack in her face. She were just waiting for the right moment.

  The deputy ignores the girl and instead addresses the men. “I just heard back from Prescott. They’re calling for a trial.”

  “A trial?” she gasps out, nearly barreling into the deputy when he comes to a quick halt. “They’ll be found guilty. Why delay?”

  “It ain’t my decision, Charlotte. Now I know you’re upset from what you witnessed on that train, and you want justice here and now, but word is we’re to make an example of these boys. A formal trial, a public hanging. Enough to scare the rest of the band into dismantling, and hopefully sending a clear message to any other gangs looking to target the rail. This criminal life won’t be tolerated.”

  “I don’t imagine the trial will happen here, in Wickenburg?”

  “We’ll move them to the capital tomorrow morning at first light. In a locked coach. Escorted by a half dozen men, myself included.” He looks over his posse. “I’ll need volunteers.”

  A couple hands go up.

  “Escorted!” the girl named Charlotte erupts. “Are you an idiot, Deputy?”

  “Pardon?”

  Diaz laughs beside me, and even I can’t help but smile. I’m surprised the lawman’s let her go on this long. He looks far from pleased.

  “Where’s the rest of the gang, sir?” the girl continues. “You think your men are going to be able to best a handful of Rose Riders once you leave the safety of these streets? A locked
coach and a few escorts will not protect you on those plains. The men you don’t have in custody will free the men you do, and then we’re right back where this all began.”

  “The decision ain’t mine. I got folk above me saying to bring them to Prescott. I promise you we’re taking every precaution.”

  She grunts in a very unladylike fashion and says, “Mark my words, Deputy, this plan will not unfold as you figure. And the blood will be on your hands.” Then she picks up her skirt and shoves past the men.

  “Charlotte!” the deputy calls after her. She keeps marching. “Miss Vaughn, my hands are tied.”

  “Ah, let her go,” one of the men says. “Girl don’t know her place.”

  “She don’t,” Boss agrees. “But she’s right.”

  The deputy and his posse are too far away to hear Boss’s comment, and they hurry off to discuss our transport and hanging, unaware of the wolflike smile he flashes at the mesquite’s branches.

  “The boys’ll come, won’t they, Boss?” Hobbs asks.

  “I reckon so. Tonight, since the townfolk are expecting it during the move.”

  And if they don’t come? I wanna ask. If’n they turn their backs on us and leave us to hang?

  “I thought I saw a red coat riding for the river when they chained us here,” Diaz adds.

  Boss nods in agreement.

  It makes the ghost of a noose I already been feeling ’round my neck loosen slightly. If Crawford’s left town with the others, it means the deputy ain’t aware how near the rest of our men truly are. They’ll be able to regroup, make a plan. We just might make it out alive.

  “For yer lip,” Boss says, passing me his kerchief.

  I grab it with my bound hands, touch the pale cotton to my mouth. It comes away bloody. Skin musta split when we were taken into custody. The posse sure weren’t careful with their elbows.

  “Rest while you can, Murphy,” Boss adds. “There won’t be time for it later.”

  Chapter Eight

  * * *

  Charlotte

  I march off, silently cursing the deputy’s senseless plan, when the solution hits me. I know what to barter. I turn on my heel and race after Deputy Montgomery.

  “Sir, I beg you to reconsider,” I call out to him. He has just set foot on the front porch of what I assume to be his residence. The step creaks beneath him as he pauses. When he turns to face me, expression weary, I do not miss how his eyes skirt over my shoulder, finding the Rose Riders across the way, still secured to the Jail Tree. There is worry in the deputy’s eyes. He knows there was truth in my earlier argument.

  “I implore you,” I continue. “If you had the whole gang in custody, transporting them would be one thing. But this is a fool’s errand. You must consider alternate means.”

  “Alternate means?” He leaves the steps for the street, staring down at me with his brows raised precariously high. What I wouldn’t give to be a foot taller, to look men in the eye. “I have five men in agreement to ride with me tomorrow, and a judge expecting the gang delivered by coach. You’re what, a girl of fifteen? Pardon me for not taking the advice of a child with such little worldly experience.”

  “I’m sixteen,” I retort, “and I’m a journalist.”

  “That so?”

  I nod surely. “I was traveling to Prescott to report on the nearly completed Prescott and Arizona Central line, and I’ll be sure to cover this debacle, too, once it goes south. Then again, if you do anything unexpected—​like moving the criminals tonight, or before dawn—​maybe things won’t go south. Maybe there will be only successes to report.”

  Deputy Montgomery’s expression shifts from contempt to tolerance.

  “That’s an idea,” he says, mulling it over. “It’ll be too dark in the dead of night for a move. Not much moon this time of the month, plus our lanterns would give us away for miles. But near dawn . . . Perhaps we’ll leave early, an hour before first light. The rest of their gang will likely be still sleeping, expecting the move later.” He rubs his chin. “We could be well out of Wickenburg by the time they look to strike, on high ground and climbing the mountains, able to shoot down on them as their horses battle the slope.”

  “That sounds like a solid strategy, Deputy.” I give him the most charming grin I can muster. Let him believe it’s his plan. Let him think he’s the hero saving the day. I’m plenty used to men taking credit for my ideas—​and my bylines—​and I merely need him in a fine mood for what I’m about to suggest. I put on my most confident face and say, “I will ride in the driver’s box.”

  Deputy Montgomery nearly trips over his own feet. “Pardon?”

  “Alongside the driver. Or up top.”

  He stares in dismay.

  “Think of it this way, sir: I’ll be quiet, sit out of the way, and once you pull that coach up to the depot in Prescott, I’ll have a documented account of your heroic efforts. There’ll be a printed story featuring the good men of Wickenburg and how their deputy sheriff Montgomery captured four Rose Riders, including Luther Rose and the Rose Kid. How he exhibited great bravery and commitment to the feat of delivering them to trial, how he is the embodiment of the badge he wears.”

  Deputy Montgomery inflates a little, his brows rising with agreement. He unconsciously shines the badge on his vest with his thumb.

  He must know the power of such a story, for I surely do. With a firsthand account of the transportation of the notorious Rose Riders from Wickenburg to Prescott, no one will be able to ignore my journalistic pursuits. Not Mr. Marion, or Uncle Gerald, or even Ruth Dodson of the Yuma Inquirer. She’d turned me away earlier this summer, when she opened shop and I came inquiring about a job. Run exclusively by females, the press sounded like heaven on earth, but her budget was tight, her staff full. I understood being turned away. But I’ll have my pick of publications now. In Yuma, Prescott, anywhere in the Territory.

  “I won’t be telling my men about it,” Deputy Montgomery says after some consideration. “They won’t take kindly to a lady being involved in such a situation. I ain’t fond of it myself. But if you appear at the stage depot an hour before dawn, ready to make the trip, I won’t turn you away.”

  And just like that, I’ve hitched myself a ride to Prescott and snagged the story of a lifetime.

  It takes all my conviction not to grin like a fool.

  Draining my purse entirely, I secure a room for the night at a place called Ma’s Boarding House. Who Ma is, I’m not one to know, as it’s a young man who takes my money. He introduces himself as Jake. I’d wager I’m a year or two his senior. He’s lanky and lean, but already taller than I am. His wool cap looks new, but a pale starched shirt held in place by faded suspenders and tucked into too-big trousers have seen better days. Though I have two hands of my own and am perfectly capable of carrying my suitcase, he insists.

  The boarding house is neither big nor fancy. The first floor isn’t much more than a long hallway lined with rooms. The rug is worn from foot traffic, and candle sconces mounted between most of the doors attempt to liven up the dimly lit space.

  “Second floor’s for Ma and me,” Jake explains, which I take to mean his ma is the Ma. He gestures beyond the stairs, down the narrow hallway. “Washroom is first door on the right, kitchen the first on the left. You got the far room, at the end of the hall. Dinner’s in half an hour.”

  He leads and I follow. Most of the doors are ajar—​no occupants for the evening—​and the kitchen, which already smells of fresh bread and stew, isn’t abuzz with chatter. The floorboards audibly protest our weight as we make our way down the hall.

  “Is it always this quiet?”

  “Used to house a lot more miners, but Vulture Mine’s got plenty of quarters of their own these days, plus a Chow House and Rita’s brothel.” He says the last bit with an air of excitement. “I only stay here ’cus Ma needs the extra hands on the days I ain’t working.”

  We stop outside what’ll be my room, and he sets my suitcase down.

&nb
sp; “You need anything, you just holler.” Jake leans in close and drops his voice to a whisper. “I don’t say that for most folk, but most folk ain’t so pretty.”

  He then blushes so quickly, I reckon he means it.

  “Thank you—” I call after him as he darts down the hall. “For carrying my bag and all.” But he’s already gone.

  My room’s plain, but clean. A single four-post bed, a reading chair, a short wardrobe with a folded towel set on top. Against the far wall is a single window. I pull open the shutters and am rewarded with a sad view of a small alley littered with crates and barrels. In the distance, I can make out the peak of the roofline of the stage stop.

  I set my suitcase on the wardrobe. I have a second set of mourning clothes packed, but don’t intend to change until Prescott. The coach ride north will only dirty my skirts with dust anyhow. The blood-spattered state of my current attire, however, will not do. I snatch up the towel and head for the washroom.

  There’s a mirror above the basin, and I startle at my reflection. Stray tendrils of hair fall wild around my face, and I work the pins as best I can, re-taming the mess. Then I wash my face and hands in the basin. Dirt from the coach lifts free, followed by blood once I go about scrubbing at the stains in my skirt. It could very well be my blood that is spilled tomorrow. The deputy’s and his posse’s too.

  Whatever is wrong with midwifing? I hear Mother chide in my ear. It’s a respected line of work. I can teach you all I know.

  She has been offering this ever since Cousin Eliza sent me a copy of Nellie Bly’s first piece and I set my heart on journalism. There is nothing wrong with Mother’s profession. She is appreciated within the community. She seems to love her work greatly. It is because of this love that I am baffled at how she is unable to see that I love something else. She claims I will be met with nothing but disappointment and resistance as a journalist. So far, she’s been proven right. But I’ve assisted her in several births, and it is not for me. It is thrilling, yes, but the whole time I am wishing for it to be over, whereas with writing, as soon as I stop, I want to start again.