by J. Lee Butts
“Big chunk of burnin’ lead went all the way through me.” He lifted his bib-front shirt and pointed at the red weal a few inches above a pistol belt that was decorated with solid silver Mexican conchos. “Poor-shooting son of a bitch only managed to get this fleshy part of my side, thank God. Little more towards my middle and whoever got lucky enough to hit me would probably have kilt me deader’n a fifty-year-old petrified hoe handle.”
Billy chuckled and snorted, “Hell, Carl, thin-as-a-rake feller like you has gotta consider hisself mighty lucky. No more fat than there is on that stringy behind of yours, it’s a wonder that bullet didn’t blow you in half.”
Carlton feigned indignant offense. “By Godfrey, I do consider myself lucky, Mr. Billy By-God Bird—real lucky, as a matter of plain fact. All I want now is the chance to even up the score a mite. Maybe put a mark or two on whoever done this to me.”
I offered up a smoke ring the size of a number-ten washtub that floated Carl’s direction. Thumped a pile of fine-smelling gray ash on the ground and said, “Well, you’re about to get a chance to do exactly that, if you’re as game as you make out, Carl. Billy and I’ve agreed that we’re gonna go after them boys again. I intend to rid the world of Dawson and his bunch once and for all—no matter what, or how long, the bloody chore takes. Spent most of my time thinking about those murdering polecats all the way back from Boiling Springs.”
Billy puffed at his smoke and spit out a sprig of tobacco. “You and your posse had a bad day at Boiling Springs for damned sure, Hayden.”
“Yep, real bad, Billy. Bad as it gets. Maybe if you boys had been with me, the whole deal would’ve worked out a bunch different. But you just can’t ever tell. I’ve been thinking that this is still a job for the Brotherhood of Blood.”
Carl took a long drag on his stogie, then held it up as though examining the burn to make sure it was even. “Ain’t gonna try to bring any of ’em back this time, either, I take it.”
“You take it exactly right, my friend,” I said. “As both of you are already aware, I never intended to bring any of them back alive to begin with. Judge Parker sent me out to kill ’em the first time around. Our plans just didn’t work out the way I intended, or expected.”
Billy pulled one of his Schofield pistols, broke it open, and examined the loads. “Well, I can tell you for sure, there ain’t gonna be no third time with any of this bunch. I got word yesterday, from an old amigo of mine over near McAlester, that he’d spotted Mo Coyle and Buck Crowder. We get to humpin’ it right quick, should be able to catch them bad boys unawares before they can get away again. According to my friend, they’re pretty heavy into their liquor these days. Given the crimes they took part in, such behavior could well be an effort to drown a right bothersome conscience.”
“You hit that ’un on the head. Bet God’s a-troublin’ them considerable over all the terrible things they went and done, or was party to, while ridin’ with Dawson and that lunatic Charlie Storms,” Carl said.
Had to shake my head when I recalled the death and destruction we’d found in those outlaws’ wake. “Don’t get much worse than nailin’ people to trees, settin’ dead bodies on fire, or child rape and murder,” I mumbled.
Billy scratched his chin and looked lost in thought. “Just how far are you willing to go to get this bunch, Hayden?”
“We’ll do whatever’s necessary. And I do mean every word of what I just said. There won’t be any soft glove for those who might have information, either. You understand?”
Billy nodded. Carl grinned like a fox loosed in a henhouse. For about ten seconds, no one spoke. Then Carl said, “Well, let’s go kill the hell out of all them bad boys we can find, fellers. That way they won’t never do nothin’ like we seen again.”
9
“. . . CUT OLE SELBY’S HEAD OFF AND STUCK IT ON A POLE . . .”
JUST TO PROVE that nothing ever comes as easy as you hope, it took us a goodly amount of investigatory, lawdog-type snooping, in some of the rougher parts around McAlester, before we ran Mo Coyle and Buck Crowder to ground.
Prez Tate, a good friend and former drinking buddy of Coyle’s, finally turned loose of the fact that they’d put up in a shotgun cabin beside Wild Cat Creek, up on Pine Mountain. I say finally, because it took more than the usual amount of persuasion to convince the liquor-saturated slab of sorry bar-squeezin’s just how serious we were.
We caught Prez outside an illegal whiskey peddler’s place south of town, just before dark, about a week after we left Fort Smith. The drunken lout was a former buffalo hunter and, at one time, could have easily boasted of being tougher than a Comanche quirt made out of chewed rawhide. But time, risky behavior, and a raging river of highly questionable, bonded-in-the-barn jig juice had turned the man into an unshaven, stinking heap of quivering, fringe-covered filth unfit for most human companionship. Not sure he had a living friend within a thousand miles of the Nations.
Drunken scum yelped like a stomped cat when Carlton gave up on all the worthless talk and said, “This is just to let you know that we’re as serious as malaria about wantin’ to know the whereabouts of Coyle and Crowder, Prez.” Then, he grabbed the foul-smelling mound of human waste by the ear and lopped a little bitty chunk of the lobe off. Really wasn’t much more than a nick. But you’d of thought Carlton cut the stinking bastard’s entire head off.
God Almighty, the sorry besotted skunk couldn’t talk fast enough after that. Even drew us a map on the back of a John Doe warrant of how to find Wild Cat Creek and the cabin where he claimed Coyle and Crowder were holed up.
He handed the paper to Carl with a quaking hand and sniffed, “Sweet Merciful Father and heavenly choirs of angels, ye didn’t have to cut me ear off, ye badge-totin’ son of a bitch.”
“Didn’t. Only took a piece of that unimportant dangly part,” Carl said. “Now, if you’d like, I could whack off a smidgenly portion of the other’n, so’s they’d match up.”
Tate covered his good ear and yelped, “No, damn ye! Ain’t no need. Hell, ye didn’t have to do the first’n. I’d of tole ye what ye wanted to kin eventually.”
Billy pushed the butts of his Schofields forward, dropped his chin on his chest, and looked doubtful. “Well, now is that a fact? You would have talked right up for the price of a jug of giggle juice?”
Tate looked hurt, like it pained him immensely that Billy didn’t believe him. “Hell, yes. If’n ye’d of just bought me a nice jug of whusky, I’d of spake up right off. No need fer bloodshed—’specially mine. I can be right cooperative with you law-bringin’ fellers, if’n the proper enticement is to my likin’.”
Billy threw the rancid pile of human debris a bandanna for his leaking ear. “We don’t have time for deal-makin’ with the likes of you, Tate. Coyle and Crowder are sought for the worst kinds of wicked murder. This ain’t like horse stealin’, petty thievery, or introducin’. We want these two low-life sons of bitches—real bad.”
Carl wiped the blade of his razor-sharp bowie on the leg of his breeches. “And we aim to get ’em, no matter what that involves. Come down to it, I’d of relieved you of everything stickin’ out where I could lop it off, for the right information.”
“Yeah, well, that shouldn’t include whackin’ off a law-abidin’ citizen’s hearin’ equipment. Just might have to take you fellers to court for damages,” the smelly ruffian whimpered.
Carlton leaned down into the inebriated yahoo’s face, thumped him good and hard on his damaged ear, and said, “If you show your ugly mug in Fort Smith all bathed, cleaned up, smellin’ of lilac bathwaters, sportin’ a new suit, and in the company of some slick-talkin’ lawyer, someone’s gonna find your much-abused body out by the town dump the next day. I can personally promise it’ll be missing some extremely vital pieces you’re not gonna like partin’ with.” He whipped the bowie around and flicked the tip against the crotch of the whimpering sot’s pants.
Tate looked stricken. “Sweet weepin’ Jesus, calm yerself, Marshal. Ye don’t
have to get so all-fired excited. I wuz jest rattlin’ off at the mouth, as it were. Didn’t mean narry a thing by my jawin’. Ye don’t be havin’ to worry none ’bout ole Prez Tate a-showin’ up with no slick-tongued lawyer. Swear to Jesus. Never happen. Not in this life, I gar-n-tee.”
I held out a spanking-new ten-dollar gold piece so he could see it. “Are you sure Coyle and Crowder are where you said they are, Prez?”
He eyeballed the coin and went to drooling like a man about to be made wealthy beyond his wildest dreams. “Yessir. Absa-damn-lutely. They be on Pine Mountain exactly as that ’ere map I done drawed fer ye indicates.” He held up his right hand like a witness in Judge Parker’s court. “God be my guide. Ain’t tole you boys nothin’ but the hull truth, and nothin’ but.”
“Are they alone?” I rolled the coin over my fingers, so the dying sunlight made it sparkle and shine.
He looked confused, scratched a scraggly chin, and cocked his head to one side like a dog listening to its master read instructions from a book on the intricacies of algebra. “Well, now, that ’ere particular piece of information might be worth more’n ten dollars, Marshal.”
Carl whipped out his razor-sharp blade again. “Is it worth more’n a big chunk of your other ear, or maybe your nose, Prez?”
Tate slapped his hands over both sides of his head, turned away, and whined, “Wait, wait, now. No need to go and get all hot and bothered again. They might be one other feller with ’em. Could well be as how they done picked up a compadre, as it were.”
Billy peeled some of Tate’s fingers off an ear, leaned close, and said, “And who would that other feller be, Prez?”
“Well, I ain’t sayin’ for certain sure, Marshals. But it may possibly be”—he drew it out for several seconds before finally saying—“Selby Hillhouse.” He took a sneaky glance at each of our faces. Always felt the man wanted to make sure his stunning announcement had the proper impact. It did.
Carlton shot a glance at me. “Did you hear that, Hayden? Selby Hillhouse himself, no less.”
Billy shook his head and slapped a quirt against the leg of his chaps. “Sweet Merciful Father. I ain’t heard that name in at least three, or four, years. Thought somebody killed his sorry, murderin’, thievin’ self down in Texas. Heard them Texas boys cut ole Selby’s head clean off and stuck it on a pole outside San Angelo after he went and rudely murdered one of the town’s leading citizens.”
Prez smiled like a snake in a henhouse full of newly laid eggs. “Well,” he said, “guess ye’d be wrong ’bout that ’un, Marshal Bird. Done seen him with my own eyes. He’s very much alive, and he’s twice as mean and ugly as ever. Gonna take all three of you boys to throw a loop on a killer like Hillhouse. Coyle and Crowder, now they’s bad enough. But Hillhouse? Just thinkin’ on the man is enough to make my blood run colder than clear mountain streams in the Rockies after the thaw.”
Pitched Tate the coin and left the poor wretch chuckling away at the information bolt from the blue he’d dropped on us. Headed for Pine Mountain as fast as good horses could run. Got to give credit where credit’s due. Every cell of Ole Prez’s sorry body might have been saturated with cheap, brain-burning panther sweat, but he could still draw a mighty fine map. ’Bout noon the next day, we found Wild Cat Creek and the coarse cabin exactly as he’d marked it down.
Board-and-batten building was constructed of weathered, rough-cut pine planks and sat on a small rise forty or fifty feet from the freely running stream. Backside of the shack appeared to have been part of an original dugout shelter carved into a rock-covered mound. Lean-to shed, on the end away from the water, provided refuge for three horses held in a rope corral. Massive cottonwood stood between the front corner of the building and the creek. Covered belt-buckle deep in big bluestem grass, and treeless, the sloping area between us and the cabin offered little by way of discernible cover from any gunfire directed from inside the rickety structure.
We reined up behind a knobby hill, about a quarter of a mile away from our objective. Tied the animals below and crawled to the top. Laid on our stomachs and passed Billy’s long glass back and forth as we studied how to go about smoking the murdering scum out of their hidey-hole.
Carl said, “Ain’t gonna be easy, Hayden. Not much of anything to take cover behind, between here and there. Course they’ll have a tough time spottin’ any of us in grass this deep—as long as we don’t move around much.”
“Might have to burn ’em out, boys,” Billy offered. “One of us could sneak around to the backside. Gather up some grass and twigs along the way. A feller can almost walk right out onto the roof from the rocks behind the place. Get a good spark goin’, and I’d be willing to bet those dried-out pine wall planks will go up like sun-bleached tinder and firecrackers.”
About then, the cabin’s leather-hinged door popped open. Someone staggered backward onto the rickety porch. The obviously drunk bandit carried a jug under one arm and pointed into the darkness of the gaping entryway. He yelled like a man in violent conflict with a person, or persons, unseen, but we were too far away to make out exactly what he said.
Billy slapped the collapsible scope up to his eye and stretched it out to its optimum length. “That’s Mo Coyle,” he said. “Looks to me like he’s gettin’ disputatious with someone inside. Goin’ at it pretty hot, too. Man’s mighty upset about something. Whoa, momma. Clumsy jackass just stumbled backward down the steps. Aw, now that’s too bad.”
“What’s too bad?” Carl pawed at the telescope, and finally pulled it out of Billy’s hands. He squinted through the eyepiece and said, “Ha. He fell on his jug and broke it. God Almighty, he’s madder’n a nest of stirred-up hornets now. Really givin’ someone inside a serious cussin’. Uh-oh. Look in the doorway, boys. That’s none other than Selby Hillhouse, his very own self, standin’ there. He don’t look none too happy, neither.”
I said, “I’ve never seen the man before, Carl. Come on, now. Gimme a little look-see.”
Cecil reluctantly gave up the long glass. “Big ole boy, ain’t he. Must be every bit of six-and-a-half-feet tall. Has the kind of face that makes you think he could probably bite the head off a hammer and spit out a pound of tacks.”
I watched as Coyle continued to shake his finger and yammer at the huge man who loomed above him on the porch. Hillhouse didn’t say much in return. As nearly as I could tell, he appeared nigh on bored to death with the mouthy ruckus. Coyle got madder and louder, the longer he ranted. Grabbed up chunks of his earthen jug and shook it at his seeming tormentor.
Guess Hillhouse finally got all the angry, curse-laden lip he wanted to hear. Long-barreled cavalry-model Colt flashed out of a cross-draw holster and delivered a booming chunk of hot lead that, on first impression, appeared as though it hit Coyle in his right leg. Coyle hollered so loud, it sounded almost like he was standing right beside me.
Billy snickered and rolled onto his back. “You know, it could well be, if we wait long enough, these idiots will kill each other off. We won’t even have to expose ourselves to the trials and tribulations of gettin’ them fellers to give it up. Just lay up here, take a nap, while they murder one another.”
“Sounds good, Billy. And the God’s truth is there’s just nothing I’d rather witness. Always better not to confront killers and gunhands like these if we can pull it off. But I think you’re forgetting something real important,” I said.
“What?”
“We need to talk with either Coyle or Crowder. Really doesn’t matter which one, but we don’t want both of ’em dead until after a little heart-to-heart chat.”
“Why?”
“Quickest way we’re gonna find their running buddies, Maynard Dawson and Charlie Storms, is to get it out of the poor idiot rolling around in the dirt, or his friend. Now, Hillhouse is another story. Maybe we should all hit our knees, offer up some serious prayers that he ends up dead before we have to go down there. ’Cause if the stories I’ve heard are even close to being true, I’d rather not get into
a toe-to-toe gunfight with the man if it can be avoided.”
We continued to watch the show, as Coyle flopped all over the dusty ground and screeched like a turpentined cat. Hillhouse waved his pistol, and said something right pointed to the wounded gunman. After a bit, the infamous shooter of men holstered his weapon and disappeared back inside the shack. Second or so later, Buck Crowder came slinking out the door and hustled down the steps to help his wounded compadre.
Carlton said, “Ain’t no two ways about it, we’re lookin’ at one lucky man.”
“How’s that?” I asked.
“Well, from all the tales I’ve heard, if Selby Hillhouse pulls a pistol, he usually leaves a seriously dead, leakin’ body behind. Guess maybe he must like ole Mo some. Otherwise, he’d of killed the poor leg-shot chucklehead deader’n a rotten stump.”
Billy snickered. “Even so, there is a good side to what just happened, Carl. They sure don’t seem to have their minds on the possibility that the law is creepin’ up on ’em. Such ignorance should work to our advantage.”
Crowder eventually got Coyle up on wobbly legs. The wounded man leaned on his friend and hobbled back into the cabin holding the spot where he’d been shot. Carlton observed that Coyle didn’t appear to be bleeding very much, which, in his opinion, simply confirmed his theory that Hillhouse hadn’t really intended to hurt the loudmouthed drunk very badly to begin with.
Carlton struck a thoughtful pose and said, “Selby Hill-house ain’t no slouch with a pistol. If’n he wanted Mo Coyle dead, you can bet next month’s pay Coyle’d be shakin’ hands with the devil and makin’ arrangements for a room in a flaming perdition right this minute.”
Billy slapped him on the back. “Well, that’s good to know, Carl.” Then he pulled a pistol, checked his loads, and said, “But, fellers, ain’t nothin’ we’re doin’ right now that’s gonna bring this dance to a close. So, I reckon as how we’d best stroll on down there, let ’em know we’re here, and that their days amongst free men are over and done.”