West of the Big River: Boxed Set of Eight Western Novels

by James Reasoner

  "Eddy! Save Lance!" screamed Katy, who had picked up her son and was carrying him across the camp and away from the fight.

  Fast Eddy turned, stooped down, and grabbed a rifle from the man Clare had shot. Rifle raised and aimed, Eddy was afraid to fire. Blacky and Lance were twisting and turning in a lunging knife fight. Lance had retrieved his blade by scooping up his belt and pulling his knife from its sheath.

  "I'm going to gut you like a pig!" shouted Blacky.

  "You can try," replied Lance, reaching and swiping with the tip of his knife.

  It made contact and cut a swath across Blacky’s coat and shirt, and blood dribbled. He jerked back and looked down. "You're going to pay for that,” he roared, “that was my favorite coat."

  The outlaw lunged with his long knife. The sharp tip sliced across Lance's muscular chest. A long line of red appeared and Katy screamed.

  "The pretty lady seems to care," laughed Blacky. "Wait till she sees that face of yours all cut-up."

  "You talk big for a sneaking coward," said Lance.

  Blacky growled and lunged forward with his knife. It made contact, and again blood dripped from a gouge in Lance's ribs, and once more Katy screamed.

  "Stop him!" shouted Katy. "Shoot that man!"

  "I can't," replied Fast Eddy. "I might hit Lance."

  Little Johnny, fully awake, eyes wide, was held tightly against his mother's body. Fast Eddy held the rifle up, aimed and ready to shoot. Clare had found shot, powder, and caps, and was busy reloading his spent rifle. Then into camp came running a buckskinned old man, rifle in hand.

  "Don't shoot!" shouted Horntoad Harry.

  "How'd you get here?" asked Eddy, his face an expression of surprise.

  "Been searching for you everywhere, what took you folks so long? I been jerkin' meat to sell to the miners."

  "Can't you see Lance is in danger?" cried Katy. "Do something!"

  Horntoad made a cackling laugh. "I knew that sidewinder Blacky would show up. Wouldn't miss this fight for a barrel of gold."

  "Please," begged Katy. "Help Lance."

  "Don't worry, that big feller can take care of himself. Hey, Lance! Red and the boys built two Long Toms and on the third day started taking gold out of a stream. I hung around long enough to collect some small nuggets to show you folks, and to gather my pay. I went to Stockton, had a fancy dinner, and slept in a bed. It's nearer the gold camps and ships can come up the San Joaquin River and right into the city. Easier than going all the way back to San Francisco for supplies."

  The two big men were circling, each holding crimsoned knives. Both fighters had long slices across chest and arms and both were dripping blood.

  "You don't know what willpower it took for me not to slit your throat why you was sleepin'!" growled Blacky.

  "You should have taken the chance!" replied Lance.

  "I know it!" shouted Blacky. "No matter, if it's the last thing I do, I'm gonna slice you open and cut out your heart!"

  Blacky lunged and Lance parried, solid steel striking hard in a metallic clang. Light flashed on the two blades, and everyone watching gasped.

  "Cut out his gizzard, boy!" shouted Horntoad and then the old man laughed.

  "Oh, how could you?" exclaimed Katy.

  Again the old man cackled.

  "Boy!" shouted Horntoad. "You cut that mean black-hearted feller up good, 'cause you, me, and the rest of your friends, are going into the meat and supply business. There's thousands and thousands of prospectors grubbin' in the dirt for gold and every one of 'em is starvin' for food and supplies. We're gonna be paid in nuggets and dust and later we can all set up to be the richest ranchers this side of San Francisco !"

  "We were heading for Stockton to buy supplies," said Clare. "We got a contract with Moke City."

  "Well, when that contract's done, we'll go into freightin' for ourselves. We'll be real en-tre-pre-neurs! Did you hear that, Lance?"

  "I'm a bit busy at the moment, Horntoad," replied Lance.

  "Shut up, you fool!" exclaimed Blacky. "I'm gonna end your life, you big straw-haired giant!"

  Blacky charged forward with his longer knife and the tip cut into Lance's belly. Lance grunted, sidestepped, and stabbed with his shorter knife. The tip went deep into the bicep of the dark-bearded man. Blacky winced and his knife hand dropped. Lance stepped forward and plunged his blade into Blacky's chest. The outlaw jerked back and the knife remained buried, deep in the bad man's heart. Somehow Blacky remained on his feet. With effort he raised his head and eyes to Lance's.

  "I thought you was trouble for me, first time I laid eyes on you."

  Then Blacky's knees bent and he fell heavily onto his back. Blood poured from his chest and in the silence everyone in the camp heard the long slow sigh of escaping air.

  "I knew it!" shouted Horntoad Harry. "Folks . . . happy days are ahead for us!"

  About the Author

  Charlie Steel, Tale-Weaver Extraordinaire, is a novelist and internationally published author of short stories. Steel credits the catalyst for his numerous books and hundreds of short stories to be the result of being a voracious reader, along with having worked at many varied and assorted occupations. Some of his experiences include service in the Army, labor in the oil fields, in construction, in a foundry, and as a salvage diver. Early in his life he was recruited by the US Government and spent five years behind the Iron Curtain. Steel’s work has been recognized and reviewed by various publications and organizations including Publisher’s Weekly, Western Fictioneers, and Western Writers of America. Steel holds five degrees including a PhD. He continues to read, research, and collect western literature. He is the author of Desert Heat, Desert Cold, and Other Tales of the West. Charlie Steel lives on an isolated ranch at the base of Greenhorn Mountain, in Southern Colorado. www.charliesteel.net

  West of the Big River

  The Bandit

  A Novel Based on the Life of Sam Bass

  Jerry Guin

  Chapter 1

  Dust stirred by passing horses' hooves lingered in the air and mixed with the scent of a bright spring morning as the buzz of the crowd gathering on Hickory Street grew louder. Men shook hands, slapped shoulders, and gave an occasional laugh. A woman’s voice rose to a high pitch as she yelled admonishment to some screeching children while a teenager hawked five cent apple turnovers from Maggie's Café. The crowd was there to witness the hanging of convicted murderer Claude Radkin.

  Inside the confines of the drab Denton, Texas jail, twenty-two-year-old Sam Bass had just walked into the cell block to pick up the prisoner’s breakfast dishes. The dark-haired youth, of average height and lean of frame, always had a smile on his face and was friendly and likeable.

  Claude Radkin, the only inmate in the jail, sat on a bunk in his cell. A small ten inch by ten inch barred window above the bunk, at head height, served as an air vent while allowing the outside noise within.

  The man sat with head bent down, lost in thought while he stared at the floor and waited for the deputies to come for him. He was morose and resigned to his fate. His time was almost up. Claude had killed a man in a six-gun shooting over a card game, in the resulting trial he had been found guilty and sentenced to hang. When he was arrested, Claude had said it was self-defense, that Jack Sterns, a card dealer at Denton’s Red Horse Saloon, had gone for a gun when Claude shot him. However, no weapon was found on or near the body.

  The prosecutor, a local lawyer named Mortimer Ames, was a short, cocky man, suited, vested and confidently intent on making a speedy trial as he commanded the attention of the courtroom audience. After thirty minutes of testimony from witnesses, Ames wasted no time and called Radkin to the stand to give his version of the incident. When the moment was right, the lawyer demanded, "Do you have any remorse for shooting and killing Jack Sterns?"

  Claude fidgeted on the hardwood chair. He looked from side to side as if searching for an expected savior to come to his aid. The room remained in hushed silence, a silence unbroken by the
swishing of half a dozen hand-held fans that the glum-faced audience busied. Radkin sucked in a deep breath, expelled it and sat still, seemingly lost in thought. Suddenly he straightened his shoulders and turned to face the lawyer and blurted, "I ain’t sorry that I shot the son-of-a-bitch. He was cheating!"

  The jury comprised of townsmen and local farmers took only minutes to register a guilty verdict.

  Claude was sentenced to hang, the date of execution being today July 10, 1873 at 11:00 a.m., exactly one week after the trial.

  Now, Sam Bass stood just outside the cell bars and asked, "Can you slide me that tray under the bars, Claude?"

  Claude Radkin jerked his head up at the intrusion. Turning to face the young man, he said, "Yeah, sure." He stood, picked up the tray from a nearby table then took a step, bent at the waist and slid the tray to Sam’s reach.

  Sam stood back while Claude went back to his cot. "Is there anything I can do for you, Claude?" he asked.

  Claude was fifteen years older than Sam and had been on the wrong side of the law since he was a youngster of nineteen. He had grown accustomed to Sam’s daily visits even if it was only to bring him meals or empty the slop bucket and leave after a few minutes. They were on a first name basis. Claude had even begun to feel a kinship to the young man because no one else came around.

  Claude didn’t move or acknowledge the question for a long moment, and then he looked over at Sam and gave a faint smile. "The only thing anyone can do for me right now is to convince the hangman to give me a proper high drop! I hope the sheriff knows what he’s doing, if he’s the one to spring the trap."

  Sam looked at Claude questioningly.

  Claude snorted. "Ain’t you ever seen a man hanged?"

  Sam shook his head from side to side. Claude attempted a thin smile that turned into a grimace. "Lots of things to consider when a man is strung up. If he’s just hauled up and the end of the rope is tied off, he’ll just strangle. I saw it done to a fella caught rustling, one time down in El Paso. It wasn’t pretty! They put him on a horse, pulled the rope tight and tied the end off to a tree trunk, then slapped the horse away. That poor bastard gave a gurgled cry as soon as the horse bolted from under him, then the noose got tight and he got quiet, couldn’t breathe, I expect. He kicked some and squirmed around. His face got all screwed up and turned purple. His tongue stuck out and his eyes bulged, then one of his legs gave a last kick and he pissed his pants. The whole thing only took three or four minutes. It seemed longer to me, though, before he quit moving and just hung there swinging back and forth."

  "You shouldn’t be thinking about those things right now, Claude," Sam said in an attempt to console the condemned man.

  "Why shouldn’t I think about it?" Claude flared. "Listen to ‘em out there. You’d think it was the social event of the year! Hanging is a sorry way to go, whether it’s a lynching or done from a gallows and supposedly cleaned up for the benefit of the ladies in the crowd. A hangman that’s any good at it will place the noose around the neck and draw it snug, positioning the knot right behind the left ear." Claude touched a finger to his left ear to illustrate. "When they spring the trap and the poor bastard reaches the end of his rope the sudden jolt will snap the neck kinda sideways and break it instantly. That’s if there’s plenty of rope and they give you a good high drop. It’s over in a matter of seconds." His voice faltered and trailed off, then he added, "So they say." Claude shook his head. "I think that I’d rather be shot! Fact is, I expected to be shot many a time when I was robbing. Guess I was luckier in them days than I am now." His voice trailed off again.

  "Sounds like you were happy about robbing," Sam said.

  Claude straightened up and nodded his head. "A man’s got choices in how he lives. When I was your age I thought I was tough and smart, too smart to work on a hardscrabble farm night and day for damned little pay. So I beat the hell out of a stingy neighbor that had offered me a single dollar after I spent three long days of labor filling his corn crib. I took what money he had in his pockets and a couple of his best horses then rode like hell. It gave me a start. It seemed to me, at the time, that I’d never do another day’s labor for wages and I never did. You are what you think you are. I chose robbing to make my way. There’s nothing I can do to change that and I’m not sure I would even want to. I liked what I did and I never intentionally shot anyone while I was holding them up. I did shoot Jack Sterns on purpose, though, and now I’ve got to pay for it. The only thing that galls me is to have to die for killing a skunk that needed shooting!"

  "Are you afraid to die, Claude?"

  "No, I ain’t afraid to die!" Claude was quick to answer. "I used to think I was, then one day a man in a Taos saloon, a big nasty-looking guy, decided he would change my looks. Didn’t like 'em, he said. Before I could even think about anything, he had me wedged up against the bar. He pulled a long-bladed knife out and smiled while he showed it to me. I thought I was a goner. I was pretty scared and didn’t know what to do, but you know what? I took the knife away from that big bastard and stuck it in his belly. He died on the saloon floor, quivering like the hog he was. After that I never worried about a damned thing. I quit worrying about being killed by anyone and things got easier. I ain’t seen a man yet that I was afraid to go up against, gun or knife. Everybody’s going sometime. The date of your death doesn’t matter. When your time’s up, it’s up, that’s all there is to it! It’s the matter of how that’s worrisome!"

  Sam stood to one side when two deputies accompanied by a skinny, balding man holding an open Bible came into the cell block. Claude did not utter a word. He rose from the bunk and stood while the deputies manacled him then led him out the cell door and through a door into the sheriff’s office.

  Sam picked up the tray and necessary bucket then stepped from the cell block into the office. The deputies eyed him warily as he walked quickly past them while carrying the used goods outside. Sam could hear some muffled talk begin from behind the closed door but it faded to nothing as he stepped away.

  Once inside the sheriff’s office, Claude spoke. "What’s that kid do besides bring meals and swamp the jail?"

  Sheriff W.F. Egan looked at Claude questioningly. "You mean Sam? He works for me. Does some odd jobs that keep the deputies free to do more important work."

  "He seems too mild-mannered to be working in a jail," Claude said.

  Egan nodded. "I didn’t hire him on merit. I just saw a young man down on his luck and needing a hand to get up before he went off in the wrong direction. I remember when he first came to town. One day I was summoned over to the mercantile because they say he stole a pickle out of a barrel. Virgie Olsen, the owner’s wife, wanted me to throw him in jail."

  Claude smirked. "You’d throw him in jail because he was hungry?"

  "No, I would have lodged him there, if I figured that he took the pickle and ate it but didn’t pay for it. Sam said he didn’t take it and there wasn’t any evidence to show otherwise despite Mrs. Olsen’s rant that she saw him eat it. I paid for the pickle and hired him instead. If I hadn’t given him a way to earn his keep, then it would be of no great surprise that he might end up like you have, Claude!"

  "That was mighty decent of you, Sheriff," Claude said. "Does that mean that he doesn’t have any money?"

  "Yeah, I suppose it does," Egan said, "though he’s been here for a while, he might have squirreled away a little by now.

  "He ain’t a regular deputy then?" Claude asked.

  "No, he’s not a deputy and I don’t expect he ever will be. I don’t think he has the temperament for it. Like you said, he’s pretty mild-mannered. Sam just does some work for me and helps around the jail when I need him to," Egan said.

  "What are you going to do with all my stuff afterwards?" Claude asked.

  Egan flashed a stern glare. "What you owned will be sold and the proceeds will go toward your funeral."

  "Burying don’t cost that much," Claude protested. "When you checked me in here I had $132.00 and some chang
e, a horse, saddle and bags, a converted .44 new army model Colt and a Henry rifle. I want to give it all to Sam, the kid."

  "What?"

  "I want the kid to have my things," Claude repeated. "List it on a paper and I’ll sign it. The preacher here can be a witness. All I need is a ten dollar pine box. You ought to give the gravedigger a few dollars and five dollars to the reverend here so’s he can say a few words over me when it’s all done. Everything else goes to the kid. Maybe it’ll give him a start and he won’t have to empty your shit buckets."

  * * *

  When the hour for the hanging grew near, Claude was marched glumly through the street with the deputies stepping alongside, one on either side of the condemned man. They led him up the thirteen steps and now Claude alone stood on the trapdoor of the gallows. Sam watched from a distance. A hush came over the crowd when the trapdoor dropped under Claude’s feet. Sam had not thought to look to see if the knot of the rope had been placed on the side of Claude’s head like he had said would be best. It must have worked, though, for there didn’t seem to be any movement by Claude afterwards except for his body swaying back and forth. They left him hanging for about ten minutes, all movement or swaying had stilled before two men lowered Claude’s body down and into a waiting coffin, then slid the box inside a wagon bed.

  Sam was surprised and elated when Sheriff Egan called him into the office and presented him with one hundred fifteen dollars and thirty-two cents in cash, a .44 caliber Henry rifle, a .44 six-gun that took the same shells as the rifle, and a cartridge belt and holster for the six-gun. Egan directed Sam to claim Claude’s horse, saddle, and saddlebags at the livery . . . the entirety of Claude Radkin’s estate.

  Sam was grateful for what Claude had done. He hurriedly took the items back to his bunk in the tack room and admired the guns. He was giddy with excitement as he examined his new-found fortune and didn’t bother to attend Claude’s funeral, not that he would have anyway, nobody else did. It was not a funeral with mourners, just a quick burial. The gravediggers had hauled the coffin out to the graveyard right after the hanging and filled in the grave before ol' Claude was even cold. Sam thought about it later and shrugged.