“Oh, my head hurts,” Carter said.
“It’s a side effect of the ether. We had to keep gassing you to keep you from waking up.”
“My leg?”
Jack said, “Can you feel your foot?”
Carter thought about that. He wiggled his toes. “Yeah. I guess I can.”
“Things went quite well, considering. The shin bone’s broken, and it’s going to be splinted up and you won’t be doing a lot of work around the house. I suppose I could help out, as long as you don’t aggravate me too much.”
“No promises there.”
“The tear in the artery wasn’t very big. I got it sewn back together with two stitches. We found both fragments of the bullet. All in all, I’d say you were quite lucky.”
“What about infection?” Carter shifted a bit on the sofa and winced with the effort.
“Hey, don’t move around. You have to lie still for a while. Once we’re sure the stitches are going to hold, then Granny Tate is going to splint your leg up good and solid. But until then, you have to lie still. And I don’t think you have to worry about infection. We washed that wound out really thoroughly with whiskey. The best infection prevention I’ve ever seen.”
He nodded. “I remember on the trail.”
“I wanted to wait until you woke up to do it, but Granny thought it best not to wait.”
“I bet you did.”
Jack shook his head, and took a sip of whiskey, and found himself grinning.
“What?” Carter said.
“I was just realizing something. Aunt Ginny said no education is wasted. I think I see her point, now. If I hadn’t spent those years back east in school, you wouldn’t have your leg now.”
“Women have this way of being right all the time.”
“They do seem to, don’t they?”
“Confounding habit.”
Jack chuckled and took another sip of whiskey.
Carter said, “What about my wife? And Nina? Where are they?”
“They’re outside. Darby gave ‘em the news, and there was lots of hugging. They’ve already been in here to see you, but you were too busy being unconscious to notice.”
“I can be that way sometimes.”
“Emily is going to stay the night. Bree’s headed back to your farm with Nina. Bree’s going to stay with her.”
“That’s quite a sister you have.”
“Yeah. But don’t tell her that. She’d be insufferable.”
Carter chuckled. “Did Nina talk to you?”
“Just enough to say thank you. That’s about all.”
He shook his head. “She’ll come around. I just hope it’s before you’re all gray haired.”
49
September rolled into October and autumn settled into the mountains. Each morning now greeted Jack with a layer of silvery frost. The oaks and maples that stood in places along the valley floor, such as around the small lake, had burst into reds and yellows, and then dropped their leaves and now stood skeletal and gray.
Jack pulled on his jacket and stepped from his office to head over to Hunter’s.
The morning sky was gray and overcast, with a wind coming down from the mountains. Felt like snow, Jack thought.
He glanced to a small hill that rose behind the hotel. On that hill now stood a cabin, and smoke was rising from a stone chimney. Jessica and Darby were awake, he figured.
They had been married three weeks earlier. They had told Jack she was with child, but he doubted anyone other than he and Granny Tate knew. As far as the rest of the community would be aware, they had conceived almost directly after their marriage and the child was Darby’s.
“Besides,” Darby said. “In a very real way, I am the father. It’s not who begats you, it’s who raises you. And I’m gonna raise this child like it was mine.”
Jack couldn’t have put it better himself.
He figured within a short while Darby would make his way down the hill to join him at Hunter’s for breakfast. Darby still wore a tin star on his shirt and was taking his duties seriously as a deputy marshal. This little community had seemed to awaken something inside him, and he had a peace within that Jack had never seen in him before. He was sure Jessica had something to do with it, too.
Darby had taken a stage down to Bozeman and the bank there, and returned with a pocket full of cash. He not only furnished his and Jessica’s cabin comfortably, but he bought a second desk for the jail and a good rifle rack, and three more rifles from Franklin’s to fill the rack with. He also paid for a new iron stove, and the old one was hauled out to stand beside the office. That way, Darby said, if we want coffee during the summer, we light up the stove outside so we don’t have to heat up the office.
The jail cell in back of their little marshal’s office was now empty. A couple of weeks ago, Dan Bodine had ridden in with a couple of deputies to pick up the prisoners.
Walker said to Jack, “You ain’t heard the last of me. That I promise.”
Dan Bodine said, “I wouldn’t worry about Two-Finger Walker. He’s wanted in three states and two territories. If one doesn’t hang him, the other will.”
As Jack walked toward Hunter’s, he took a glance about the town. Smoke was drifting from the stove pipe in the side of Franklin’s store, and likewise at the hotel.
This little town was where Jack belonged, he knew. He was home. For the first time in many years, he felt like he truly had a place in the world.
Two horses were tethered in front of Hunter’s and both bore the Circle M brand. Josh and Dusty, he figured. They rode into town a couple of times a week now for coffee with him and Hunter and Darby. And at least once a week Jack would ride out to the ranch for coffee with them.
As he stepped up on the boardwalk, he heard the sound of a wagon approaching, from the direction of town that meant it was coming from down in the valley.
It was Carter and Nina. His leg was wrapped in a heavy looking wooden splint, but he had kept the leg. He was in a coat and his floppy hat was pulled down tight, and Nina was in a coat and scarf. On the seat between Carter and Nina was a pair of wooden crutches, the ones she had used the summer before when she had sprained her ankle.
Carter turned the team toward Jack and reined it in beside him.
“Howdy, Marshal,” he said. “Turnin’ off kind of cold this mornin’.”
Jack nodded. “Tends to do that this time of year.” Jack touched the brim of his hat and said, “Nina.”
“Jack,” she said.
To Carter, Jack said, “How’s the leg?”
“Still there. In no small part due to you.”
Jack shrugged. “Well, it’s not like I had anything else to do that day.”
“Yeah, and I was just layin’ around on your sofa, in everyone’s way.”
Nina gave a sharp huff, and held out both hands in a stopping motion. “Will you two just stop it? How can you joke about a thing like that?”
Carter said, “We are what we are, Sweetie.”
She shook her head but said nothing.
He said, “I’m here to see Granny Tate. She wants to check the circulation in my foot. And I’m here to pick up some supplies at Franklin’s. I talked Nina into coming with me.”
Jack said, “It’s mighty good to see you again, Nina.”
Carter said, a little impatiently, “Will you get down from this wagon and go talk to the boy?”
“Father, we have to get you to Granny Tate’s.”
“I can get there myself. I’m a big boy. Been gettin’ myself around for a long time.”
“Will you at least listen to reason?”
“Never have. Don’t see the point in doin’ so now. Get down from the wagon.”
She shook her head with resignation and climbed down. Jack offered his hand which she took.
Carter turned the team and headed off toward the Freemans’ cabin.
Jack said, “Was it entirely his idea to come along?”
“Mostly.” She said. �
�Well, not really. I came along partly to keep him out of trouble.”
“A hard thing to do.”
“Tell me about it. But I have to confess, I was hoping I might see you.”
He said, “Would you like to take a walk with me?”
She looked at him and smiled. “I think I’d like that very much.”
A Note from the Author
In my writing, I don’t usually try to depict historical events. Instead I write fiction, but I set that fiction against a historical backdrop. Hence, the town of McCabe Gap is not a real town. The valley the McCabes live in is not really there, though there are valleys like theirs sprinkled throughout the Rockies from Colorado to the Canadian border. And the towns of Bozeman and Helena and Virginia City were, and still are, very real. The Bozeman trail, which in 1879 was the primary route from Wyoming to Bozeman, plays a prominent role in this story. War between the Army and the Sioux made travel along the trail kind of precarious in the mid-1870’s - this was the war that gave us Custer’s Last Stand. The war ended in 1877, and after that travel along the trail was a lot more frequent until the early 1880’s, when the railroad built a line from Cheyenne north into Montana, and then travel along the trail began to dwindle again.
Likewise, I don’t usually have real people in my novels. Jack McCabe, Darby Yates, Nina Harding, Harlan Carter and the others, regrettably, never existed. I did make one exception, though, with a cowboy working for the Zack Johnson spread. He was born Francisco Gomez, of Portuguese descent, the son of a wheat farmer and former merchant sea captain, and who became a cowboy by choice. He was called Coyote by his contemporaries. He was the real deal. He was one of the best there was with a rope and was known for his bronc busting and his tracking. He brought more than one herd from the southwest to the railheads of Kansas and Wyoming, and worked spreads from Oklahoma to Montana.
In the real world, Coyote Gomez was only 15 in the summer of 1879 and was just beginning his cowboy career. It would be a few more years before his travels would take him to Montana, but I played fast and loose with history in this case so I could include him in this story. You see, he was the father of the great New York Yankees pitcher Lefty Gomez, a player I greatly admire. My passion for the Old West and baseball intersect with the life of Coyote Gomez. Though he makes only a cameo appearance in this story, his presence is my way of tipping my cap to a great ballplayer.
I would like to offer a word of thanks to Amazon for making this great opportunity for independent writers such as myself to find an audience. I also owe a lot to my father for encouraging me to write when it would have been too easy to allow discouragement to prevail.
I owe a great debt of thanks to Kay Jordan, copy editor extraordinaire.
I would also like to thank you, the reader, for buying this novel. It was a lot of fun to research and to write, and I hope you enjoy it. Please feel free to drop me an email at [email protected].
Brad Dennison
Buford, Georgia
July, 2013
A Few Comments on Life in the 1800’s:
This story takes place in 1879, and people spoke much differently then than they do today. They tended to say the same kinds of things, because human nature doesn’t really change, but people of the 19th century spoke in a lofty, verbose way that would outdo even today’s politicians. The more words you used, and the bigger they were, the more educated you were perceived to be. People also tended to try to speak with a lot of stiff sounding formality, rather than in the more casual sort of way of people today. I tried to capture the feel of all of this in the dialogue of this story, but shied away from full 19th century talk as it might have made it kind of hard to follow what the characters were saying. And it would have been a pain to write.
The game of baseball is mentioned in this story. Professional baseball was played as early as 1869. But the game Jack McCabe and his friend Darby would have seen in Boston was much different than the one played today. Gloves were for the most part not yet used in 1879. Pitching was done as an underhand toss. To eliminate a base runner, the ball would actually be thrown right at him. Ballplayers didn’t wear shoes with spikes on the soles, and a typical game would see players slip-sliding around the bases, ducking a ball as it’s thrown at them, with the crowd roaring with laugher. Baseball back then was a hoot, more like a keystone cops event than today’s elite, athletic game. And a ballgame was a drunken, rowdy affair. Beer flowed in the stands and gambling was rampant, and fans threw objects on the field if they disliked a player or a game situation. If they disagreed with an umpire’s call, they might pelt him with empty beer bottles. Players smoked cigars on the field and openly engaged umpires in fist fights. It was the perfect atmosphere for a couple of college kids like Jack and Darby who liked their whiskey and could get a little rowdy themselves.
The team they watched, the Boston Red Stockings, played in a wooden ball park that seated 6,800. A far cry from today’s super stadiums made of concrete and steel, and with jumbo screens set up behind the outfield and rock music filling the air between innings. The Boston park was grand for its time, though, with two steeple-type structures standing tall behind the stands. In photos, it has an almost elegant look.
The Red Stockings underwent a series of name changes and eventually changed cities a couple of times and became today’s Atlanta Braves. Today’s Boston Red Sox is a different franchise that first took the field in 1901.
The fast draw, in which a man whips a gun from his holster almost faster than the eye can follow and fans a couple of quick shots with pinpoint accuracy, is one of the most iconic aspects of the legend of the American West. Unfortunately, it is just that. Legend. None of my research indicates there was a fast draw executed until Hollywood got hold of the West. When gunmen of the real West talked about a fast draw, what they were actually referring to was a smooth, fluid draw. A draw in which the pistol was cocked in mid-motion and then the arm was brought out to full extension and the trigger pulled. One smooth, continuous motion. This is the type of fast draw I show in this and other stories.
Accuracy with a pistol was a precarious thing, because those old pistols actually used black powder, and the bores weren’t made with the precision of today. Shooting at a target a couple hundred yards away was the equivalent of a football Hail Mary. Hitting a target at that distance would be more luck than anything, and the bullet would be so spent it wouldn’t do much damage. If a gunman of 1879 was anticipating having to shoot at something more than even a hundred feet away, he often opted for a rifle.
In this novel and in others, I try to capture the views society had toward women and minorities. Views on both were different in the 1870’s than they are today, but they were also much different on the frontier than in the more civilized regions. On the frontier, as politically incorrect as it might seem today, equality was seen as something earned. Simply being a white man gave no special favors, and being a minority was not seen as a detriment. Men of the frontier learned quickly that race was not really all that relevant. Regardless of race, men were often respected based on qualities like courage, honesty and work ethic. Some sources indicate one in four cowboys was African American, and they worked alongside their white counterparts with little or no grief. They all drank at the same saloons and slept in the same bunkhouses and frolicked in the same brothels.
Racial slurs were, unfortunately, an accepted part of society until recent decades. As such, I have a couple of characters use them in this story simply for the sake of historical accuracy. Please don’t assume they in any way reflect my views.
Women were highly valued, almost revered. Violence against women was extremely rare because women themselves were rare. Especially women of marrying age. In some of the more remote frontier areas, men outnumbered women by as much as 10 to 1. Even an accusation of violence against a woman could get a man lynched, and did so on more than one occasion. Women were also seen as valuable contributors to the community, every bit as valuable as men and maybe even
moreso. Women were allowed to vote on local issues in some frontier communities as far back as the 1870’s, although the federal government didn’t get its act together and pass the Nineteenth Amendment until 1920.
Fashion was very different on the frontier from the view Hollywood has. The stetson with its brim curled at the sides is something perceived as common in the 1800’s, but I have looked at many photographs of cowboys and gunmen from the time period and have never seen one hat like that. In the Southwest, brims tended to be straight and crowns rounded, and they were usually called sombreros, even though the hat was much different than the one we usually associate today with the word sombrero.
People kept away from the sun as much as possible. Men didn’t roll up their sleeves to work, or take off their shirt entirely as is done sometimes today. Shirts stayed on and sleeves were worn to their full extension and buttoned at the wrists. If dirt got on the sleeves, well, that’s what laundry was for. Women likewise wore dresses or blouses buttoned to the neck and had sleeves down to the wrists. Low-cut necklines and sleevelessness were things well-to-do women might go with at a ball, but you never saw that sort of thing among women on the frontier.
A woman’s hair in the 1800’s was worn extremely long, but on the frontier it seldom if ever fell loosely. It was tied up in a bun during the day and often worn under a bonnet, the reason being to keep dust and lice out of it. By night the hair was brushed out and tied into long braids.
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