Luke waved off the warning, uncorking the bottle and taking a long swallow. He sat back, keeping a straight face, smiling with his lips. His guise of seeming unflappability was undone by choking on the last gulp.
His features swelled from the effort of trying to keep from coughing. He couldn’t maintain it and broke out into a wheezing, barking coughing fit that brought tears to his eyes. When the spasm passed, he set the bottle down on the desk, hands trembling slightly. “I’ve had worse,” he said, game. “Try some, Johnny.”
“I’ll pass, thanks,” Johnny said quickly. Not without some good-natured malice, he added, “Have another, Luke.”
“I’ll let that one settle,” Luke said, trying not to gasp.
“History has been made,” Johnny announced with mock solemnity, looking to heaven. “Luke Pettigrew has refused a drink.” He gathered himself up as if making ready to go. “If we’re done here . . .”
“One or two small matters before you go,” Barton said.
Johnny eased back into his seat, once more guarded and wary.
“Moran ain’t the first red-hot to come gunning for you, hoping to make himself a reputation as a fast gun,” Barton said. “He won’t be the last, either. You can’t help it. It’s not your fault. That’s just the way of things.”
“I don’t look for trouble, but I don’t run from it, either. Not ever,” Johnny said quietly, something ominous in his deadly calm.
“I know that. But it would make my job a lot easier if you and Luke would get out of town and stay out for a few days. We’ve got a lot of wagon trains passing through and camping down on the south flat this week. I don’t want to encourage any would-be red-hots to try their luck against you, Johnny.
“I know you can handle yourself, but that’s not what I’m worried about. It’s the folks, the townsfolk. I’d hate to see any innocent parties—men, maybe even women and kids—catch a bullet that some bushwhacker meant for you.”
“I’d hate that, too, but I’d hate even more for me to catch one of those bullets you’re talking about,” Johnny said.
“You’re joshing, right?” the marshal asked.
“Yes and no,” Johnny said. “You’re saying you want me—and brother Luke here—to find a hole to hide in.”
“That’s not the way I’d put it.”
“Well and good.”
“I’m not asking you to duck a challenge,” Barton said quickly, “but if you’re not around nobody can take a shot at you.”
“I’m not minded to jump in a hole and hide out,” Johnny said.
“I’m not asking you to. I’m just requesting that you stay out of town for a few days until this Moran business blows over,” Barton said, trying to sound eminently reasonable and fair-minded. “The wagon trains’ll be moving on in a day or two. There’ll be trouble enough having them in town Friday and Saturday night. They’ve been on the trail for weeks and they’ll be looking to blow off some steam. This is the last place to do it short of El Paso.
“You can do what you want, Johnny—hell, you will. I’m just saying that you’d be doing me and Hangtree a kindness by absenting yourselves for a few days.”
“What about Damon Bolt? You gonna ask him to get out of town, too?” Luke demanded.
Damon Bolt, owner of the Golden Spur, was a well-respected gambler and gunfighter.
“I can’t hardly do that, Luke, what with Damon living here in town,” Barton said, sheepish.
Thoughtful, Johnny decided to throw the marshal a bone. “We’ve got some chores at the ranch that need doing and could keep us busy for a few days.”
“That makes for a mighty dull Saturday,” Luke fretted.
“Good Lord!” Barton said feelingly. “Haven’t you had enough excitement for one day?”
“I’m talking about whiskey and women, not gunfighting,” Luke said.
“Maybe we’ll stick to the ranch this one weekend,” Johnny said. “That okay with you, Luke?”
“I reckon,” Luke said grudgingly. “If that’s what it takes to keep Hangtown from being swamped with all them poor dead bushwhacked innocent women and children. All I can say is, there’ll be a passel of heartbroken ladies in town when ol’ Luke fails to make the rounds come Saturday night.”
“Thanks, men. I appreciate it. I really do,” Barton said, pouring on the sincerity. “There’s been enough killing today to last Hangtree for a while. I’m looking forward to a nice peaceful weekend.”
“Good luck with that,” Johnny said.
“Well, you know what I mean. No killings.”
“Like I said.”
Johnny and Luke stood up, ready to go.
“By the way, I ain’t seen your Yankee pal lately,” Barton said almost as an afterthought, but too casual.
“Sam Heller?” Johnny replied, matching the marshal’s seeming nonchalance with some of his own.
“Ain’t any other Northerners in town,” Barton said, “At least none that’ll admit to it.”
“They would if they could shoot like Sam Heller.”
“Maybe so, maybe so. I ain’t denying he’s done some good for the town, in his way.”
“Why do you ask about him?”
“Seems he rode out of town three weeks ago and nobody’s seen him since. Thought you might know something about it,” Barton said offhandedly.
“Don’t ask me. I’m not his keeper,” Johnny snapped.
“That’s what Cain said, too,” Barton reminded him.
“That’s right. I guess you’d call ol’ Cain the founder of our profession, yours and mine, Marshal.”
“And what profession would that be, Johnny?”
“Killing.”
Barton let that pass without comment. “I asked you about Heller because you’re one of the few in town who has a good word to say about him.”
“He’s not such a bad sort . . . for a Yankee,” Johnny said.
“Good man to have siding you in a fight,” Luke chimed in, a rare concession for him, who had no love for the North. “Sam’s got a lot more sand than some Texans I could name.”
“Well, that’s neither here nor there,” Barton said. “You knowing Heller better than most, I thought he might have mentioned what he was up to.”
“Sam Heller doesn’t keep me posted on his comings and goings. It’s a mystery to me,” Johnny said. And it was.
“Maybe he left town because he was tired of seeing so many unfriendly faces,” Luke suggested.
“Why do you ask?” Johnny pressed. “What’s it to you, what Sam Heller is up to? He ain’t bothering nobody.”
“No reason in particular,” Barton said with the air of a man about to pull a rabbit out of his hat. “I was just wondering if he’d joined the hunt for Jimbo Turlock.”
THIRTEEN
“Jimbo Turlock! There’s a name I haven’t heard for a coon’s age,” Johnny said, genuinely taken aback. “You mean nobody’s killed him yet?”
“Apparently not,” Barton said too matter-of-factly.
“Too bad,” Johnny said. “He’s the kind that needs killing.”
“You say that like you know him.”
“I know of him, Marshal,” Johnny said, carefully correcting the other.
“You don’t tell me!”
“Hell, Johnny don’t tell nobody nothing.” Luke went to Barton’s desk and sat down on a corner of it. “Since y’all ain’t done jawing, I’ll just set myself down. I ain’t used to this new crutch yet and I don’t want to do a lot of standing.”
“I crossed trails with Turlock once or twice,” Johnny said. “Toward the last days of the war he wanted to throw in with Quantrill, but Quantrill wouldn’t have nothing to do with him. Told him to take his outfit and move on quick or he’d clean up on them himself. He would have, too, and I would have joined in. It would have been a pleasure.”
“Too bad you didn’t. You would have saved some folks a lot of grief,” Barton said. “That must have been before his Free Company days.”
; “That was when he was still making out like he was a loyal son of Dixie,” Johnny said.
“Who’s Turlock?” Luke asked.
“Ah, such innocence,” Barton said sardonically. “Never heard of Jimbo Turlock and his Free Company? Man, you must have really been out in the boondocks!”
“Boondocks like Antietam, Gettysburg, and Chickamauga!” Luke was indignant. “I reckon maybe you heard of them—”
“Don’t get yourself in an uproar, Luke,” Johnny said, playing the peacemaker. “The marshal ain’t making light of your war record.”
“Hell no!” Barton said quickly. “It’s just a manner of speaking.”
“You fought the war in the big battles east of the Mississippi, Luke, so a lot of what happened west of the river might be new to you,” Johnny explained. “Jimbo Turlock was one of those bottom-feeders turned big fish by the war in the border states. Before Sumter, he was just another ruffian tearing up Kansas and Missouri, taking advantage of the fight between pro-slavery and abolitionist forces to rob and kill folks on both sides.
“When war broke out, Turlock and his gang declared themselves guerrilla fighters for the South. He gave himself the rank of commander. He had no commission from the Confederacy, but nobody gave that no never mind. What was important was that he was fighting the Yanks.”
Quantrill pretty much started the same way, Barton thought, but kept silent.
Johnny went on, “Turlock’s bunch was made up of his old outlaw band. At first, they hid behind the flag of the Stars and Bars but soon showed their true colors. Before too long his standard attracted all kinds—deserters, renegades, cutthroats—all scum. He figured, why fight blue-belly soldiers who could shoot back when there were so many defenseless civilians?
“Turlock’s marauders raided farmers and ranchers, merchants and storekeeps. They killed the men, abused the women, stole anything they could carry away, and burned the rest. They drew no distinction between North and South. Anyone who had something they wanted and couldn’t keep them from taking it was fair game.
“Quantrill wouldn’t have anything to do with Jimbo’s marauders. Bloody Bill Anderson was none too particular about who he sided with, but even he shunned Turlock. Kirby Smith, in charge of the whole Confederate Trans-Mississippi district, put a price on Turlock’s head. General Sterling Price ordered his troops to shoot the marauders on sight.
“Long before war’s end Jimbo saw which way the wind was blowing. You can’t really say he turned his coat because he never did much for the South to start with. He burned the Confederate flag, renamed his outfit the Free Company, and opened it to anyone who wanted to join. That way, he swelled the ranks with the dregs of the Union army, too. It also picked up the rabble that followed in the wake of the armies. The camp followers who preyed on the troops—rotgut whiskey peddlers, tinhorn gamblers, pimps, and robbers.
“Turlock had always preyed on Confederate settlers just as much as Yankees but tried to do it when no one was looking, to maintain the lie that the marauders were all loyal Southerners. Once he formed up as the Free Company, all bets were off and they went after the loyalists with a vengeance.
“With the Confederacy fading fast—armies in retreat and falling apart—Turlock saw his chance to make one last big kill. His outfit was unleashed on those poor folks who didn’t have much to start with. The Free Company ran wild on them. It was pretty bad.
“Things started to get better when the blue-belly troops moved in to occupy Missouri—which should tell you something about how bad things were when the Free Company was running loose. Turlock turned tail and ran at the first whiff of Yankee grapeshot. The last I heard, the Free Company ran out to the Oklahoma Territory. But that was more than a year and a half ago.
“I couldn’t tell you what’s happened to them since then,” Johnny concluded.
“I can,” Barton said, picking up the narrative thread. “Turlock hid out in the Indian Nations in the Territory. Federal troops are prohibited from going in there by treaty, so Jimbo found himself a safe haven for a while. He and the Free Company set about doing what they do best—robbing, raping, and killing.
“They were helped by the fact that the tribes don’t get along too good there in the Indian Nations and couldn’t agree to work together to get shut of Turlock. Until finally they got themselves a bellyful and took action. Some half-breed Cherokee ex-soldier name of Sixkiller1 formed up a militia of what they call the Six Civilized Tribes. They not only ran Turlock out of the Nations, they ran him clear out of the territory.
“The Free Company turned up in Arkansas where there was a nice, hot, little war going on at the state’s southern border between the Moderators and the Regulators—whoever in the hell they are. Since the big war ended, there’s been so many small wars breaking out all over it’s hard to keep track of them.”
“I know what you mean. We’ve had a couple right here in Hangtree,” Johnny said.
“Like today.”
“Shucks, Marshal, that was no war,” Luke said. “That was just a little ol’ dustup. Cost me a good crutch, though. Ain’t sure I can trust myself to this store-bought job.”
“We’ll get Joe Delagoa to make you a new one, custom-made,” Johnny said.
Delagoa was the town’s coffin-maker, dabbling in a line of carpentry on the side.
“That’ll be fine, mighty fine,” Luke said, pleased.
“Of course he might be busy for a while fitting out those five Moran rannies in their pine box suits,” Johnny pointed out.
“What’s the hurry?” Luke demanded. “Let ’em wait. They ain’t going nowhere.”
“Never know when there’ll be another hot spell,” Barton said. “Best get them in the ground, planted fast.”
“I reckon they’re already feeling the heat where they’re going . . . and will be feeling it for some considerable time,” Johnny said.
“But what about this Turlock fellow? What happened to him? Where’s he got to?” Luke asked.
“Turlock moved out of Arkansas before federal troops moved in,” Barton continued. “The army stayed on the border to squat on the homegrown belligerents. They had their hands full trying to ride herd on them feuding Razorbacks. They couldn’t spare the men to go chasing after the Free Company. Jimbo and the marauders took off west along the Red River.”
“Where are they now?” Johnny asked, striking to the heart of the matter.
“Well now, that’s the big question, ain’t it?” Barton replied, nearing the end of his little game of cat and mouse. He’d been feeding Johnny and Luke his line, pulling them along preparatory to landing them on his hook.
Yet when dealing with such men, the matter of who was the cat and who the mouse was very much in doubt.
“Where are they now?” Barton echoed. “A lot of folks would like to know the answer to that one—the army, every law enforcement agency between St. Louis and Santa Fe . . . and me. Maybe you, too,” he added, meaning Johnny and Luke both. “That’s why I asked about the whereabouts of your pal Heller.”
“Pal is a mite strong, but I’ll let it pass,” Johnny said.
Barton took a guess. “He’s in good with Captain Harrison, the commanding officer of Fort Pardee.”
“If you say so.” Johnny was giving away nothing.
Barton laughed in disbelief. “Hell, he talked Harrison into getting you your pardon.”
Johnny shrugged. “Could be. I don’t know what he said to the Yank captain about me and I never asked. I had a deal with Heller—if I helped him bust up the Harbin gang, I’d get a clean bill of health with the law.2
“And by God, I’ve got it, too,” he added curtly, signaling that the subject was closed as far as he was concerned. If Barton didn’t like it, that was too damn bad.
“Now don’t get your feathers ruffled. What’s past is past,” Barton said. “Fact is, I’m aiming to do you boys a favor.”
“Which means you want us to do you one,” Johnny countered.
“That’s
how it works. But this time you’ll be doing yourselves a favor, too.”
“You’re too good to us, Marshal.”
“And you won’t even have to kill anybody,” Barton deadpanned, straight-faced.
“Too bad,” Johnny said.
“Don’t be too disappointed. Who knows? Maybe things will work out differently,” the marshal said. “Now let’s get down to brass tacks.”
“You’re telling it.”
“Not yet, but I will. I’m gonna let you two in on some highly confidential information that just may be of interest to you. This is just between the three of us, mind. It wouldn’t do for it to get out to the public. Might cause a panic.”
“I’m a closed book,” Johnny said.
“I ain’t heard nothing yet,” Luke said.
“Well, you will,” Barton said, all business. “Harrison took most of the fort’s company into the field two weeks ago. They went out on maneuvers to take advantage of the weather while it’s good. That’s what they said, but I know better. They went out looking for the Free Company.”
“Interesting, if true,” Johnny said.
“It’s true, all right, and more than interesting. Harrison ain’t the only one out looking. Most of the cavalry troops in this part of the state are beating the bushes searching for Turlock and the marauders.”
“They shouldn’t be too hard to find. How many men does Turlock have riding with him?” Johnny asked.
“It’s hard to say. There’s a hard core of Free Company red hots and a rabble horde of camp followers that trails along with them. Let’s say about 150 frontline marauders and twice that for the camp followers,” Barton said.
“A force that size could do some damage,” Johnny allowed.
“They have.”
“Jimbo always was a slippery cuss, back in the day in Missouri, I’ll give him that. But it shouldn’t be too hard to get a line on an outfit that size. It’s a small army.”
“That’s the trouble. It is a small army,” Barton said. “The federals have got a rough idea of their locale from what they’re not hearing. Turlock’s keeping his crew to the back trails, that’s for sure, but even there a group of that size is sure to be seen.
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