Frontier Lawyer

by Lawrence L. Blaine

  Briefly Clem summed up Eli’s testimony. Kilgore uttered five astonishingly obscene words. Then he said, “I’m cursing myself out, not you. I’ve got no right to expect you to outfox Pete Beaudoin. All right, we have a writ. And they’ve got a witness. What else?”

  Clem described the circumstances under which Laurie Morgan had told him of the diamond ring given to Honey.

  “Lord Jesus Everlasting,” Kilgore muttered. “Go on, then. What other calamities can you relate?”

  “Just one more, sir. Carlotta—Miss McCandless—went to Santa Fe with me, you know. She petitioned Governor Tellegen to supersede Beaudoin with someone less beholden to Tilley. But the governor refused. Said his hands were tied. That was this afternoon. We got right on the train and came back.”

  For a long moment, Kilgore was silent.

  Blow upon blow upon blow. A motive for the murder provided—a damning witness in the prosecution’s hands—and the door closed to any hope of fair treatment from the prosecutor.

  His head ached mercilessly. He felt the cold in the marrow of his bones.

  “I suppose Duer has placed Eli Weingarten in custody, Clem?”

  “Yes, sir. The U.S. Marshal at Santa Fe has him.”

  “That explains why I couldn’t find him to question him.” Kilgore looked up, his heavy-featured face racked with pain. “Well, I never seriously thought Beaudoin would be superseded. And I was pretty sure Laurie would produce something amounting to a motive. And I even thought that Beaudoin would make good use of Eli under cross-examination. But one thing puzzles the deuce out of me.”

  “That is, Mr. Kilgore?”

  “How did Duer and Beaudoin find out about Eli Weingarten? Eli certainly wouldn’t have gone to the authorities on his own. And I don’t think Ben Weingarten would have told Duer, either. But someone tipped Duer off. Someone gave him this vital information. Who could it have been?”

  “Maybe it was Dade Rawlins. Eli went to his place to get Honey.”

  Kilgore shook his head. “Dade told me he didn’t see who was driving the buggy, and I believe him. No, I doubt it was Dade. Or Eli, or Ben. And nobody else knows—except the servants at Wa-po-nah, who saw Eli out there that night.”

  “Would they inform against their own master?”

  Kilgore frowned quizzically. “I doubt it, but you never can tell. Some old grudge, maybe. There’s got to be a traitor at Wa-po-nah, Clem. Either that or Beaudoin can read minds. There’s no other way he could have gotten that statement out of Eli Weingarten.”

  11.

  ANOTHER TALK with Harry McCandless was called for. Kilgore bundled himself up warmly, and he and Clem went out. The lawyer was deep in thought. It was, he thought, as though a curse had descended on the House of McCandless—a curse as potent as that which had shriveled the House of Atreus. The now almost inevitable collapse of the McCandless financial empire. The transformation of the gay Isabella Lucero whom Kilgore had known decades ago into the frigid matron of today. The foppishness of Harry, culminating in this Honey Morgan incident. Even the spinsterhood of Carlotta, a definite possibility now despite all her charm and beauty. One by one, the important things in Dan McCandless’ life were being destroyed.

  Atreus, though, had brought the vengeance of the gods upon himself and his seed by committing an unspeakable crime against his brother Thyestes. What hideous deed lay in Dan McCandless’ past? What had he done that was causing this grim expiation?

  Kilgore liked the image of the family curse. He suggested it to Clem, embellishing it with details out of Aeschylus and Sophocles. A dreadful act, leading to the destruction of a powerful man. “You’re seeing a Greek tragedy unfold, boy,” Kilgore said resonantly. “Every ingredient is present. Only for Kilgore’s sake, let it not end the way most of the old stories did.”

  “But what could Dan McCandless have done?” Clem said. “What could have brought all this upon him?”

  Kilgore shrugged. “I can’t rightfully say that. But I might as well let you in on some conjectures of mine. You know, some twenty years back all this land around here was part of the Lucero Grant. Don Alfredo Lucero—Isabella’s father-owned it. Then came Dan McCandless, and his partner Joel Tilley. Dan courted Isabella and married her. The old don obviously didn’t care much for his new son-in-law, but he recognized that McCandless had strength and was a worthy heir, even if he was an Anglo. For a few years everything went well. Then—not long after Harry was born—old Don Alfredo was murdered, out in the malpais, the badlands. Remind me someday to show you the place where the body was found. It’s marked by a single white oak in a treeless plain.”

  “And they never found out who did it?”

  Kilgore shook his massive head slowly from side to side. “No. Dan McCandless inherited the Lucero Grant. And right afterward, he and Tilley had their quarrel. Nobody knows over what. But Tilley lit out for Santa Fe, where he became a big man in the Territorial government, with lots of connections in Washington.”

  Clem said, “You think McCandless might have—might have murdered the old don?”

  Kilgore shrugged. “I’d rather not say what I think. But if there’s an old-fashioned Greek curse on the House of McCandless, it’s got to have a cause. You can draw your own conclusions. And meanwhile be good enough to change the subject, because here’s McCandless himself.”

  They had walked all the way across the plaza by this time, and were outside the sheriff’s office. Dan McCandless approached on foot from the opposite side, his face bleak, his huge shoulders slumped wearily. Only the blazing intensity of his eyes hinted at the powerful man who once had been.

  He greeted Kilgore with a nod. Kilgore introduced Clem; it developed that Carlotta had already told her father something about Kilgore’s new clerk.

  McCandless said, “Carlotta’s told me everything that happened in Santa Fe.”

  “Including the fact that Eli Weingarten will testify for the prosecution?” Kilgore asked.

  “Including that. I’ve just been for a talk with Eli’s father.”

  In alarm Kilgore said, “You didn’t get violent, Dan!”

  McCandless shook his head. “I just talked to him. I asked him if he had been the instigator of Eli’s visit to the sheriff. He said he wasn’t. He swore he wasn’t. He’s pretty disgusted with Eli.” McCandless smiled faintly. “When Ben Weingarten takes an oath, he means it. So somebody else tipped Duer off about Eli. Who, Jake?”

  “I’m sure I don’t know.” Kilgore shivered. “Will you keep me out here in the cold all day, Dan? I’m on my way to talk to your son.”

  “I’ll accompany you, if you don’t mind.”

  “Suit yourself,” Kilgore said.

  As they entered the lockup, McCandless said, “I’d like to know who tipped off Duer. It might be someone at Wa-po-nah. And if it is, I’ll smash him!”

  One of Duer’s deputies led the three men to Harry McCandless’ cell. Harry was sprawled out on his cot, reading a selection from a crate of books brought down from Wa-po-nah by Julian DuVivier. His look now was one of indifference and cool reserve as the lawyer and his assistant entered, but as his father appeared, his expression changed. He closed his book and arose.

  “Hello, Father,” he said quietly.

  “Hello, Harry,” said Dan McCandless. “Are they treating you all right?” His glance took in a scrubbed cell, a warm Franklin stove blazing in the corridor, a neatly made cot covered with rough blankets, and a devotional picture drawn in charcoal on the cell wall by a previous prisoner—or so it seemed, until the father, taking a closer glance at the macabre scene of a Crucifixion, indicated it apparently was the work of the current occupant of the cell. “I wish you wouldn’t do those drawings, Harry,” McCandless murmured unhappily. In the lengthened, twisted body of the Man in torment, something Byzantine could be seen.

  “I’m sorry, Father,” said Harry. “I’m being well treated. After all, royalty is royalty—even in captivity. I’ll be well fed until the moment I’m hanged.”

/>   “Oh, Harry, Harry,” murmured Dan McCandless, twisting his face with pain. “Don’t take that line. You’ll be acquitted. You listen to Kilgore—”

  “If you say so, Father,” said Harry. “I just don’t think they mean to give me a chance. It looks hopeless. Well, gentlemen, I can’t offer chairs, but you can sit on this couch—”

  Dan McCandless looked uncertainly at the lawyer. “I’m sorry, Kilgore,” he said apologetically. “I guess you’d better take over. I don’t trust myself to talk.” He turned aside and gripped the bars and let his shoulders sag with weary frustration as the interview went on. Kilgore covered a few preliminaries before he came to the main point. Crouching in the narrow space, he put his questions in a low voice.

  “What made you deny you saw Honey during that week?” the lawyer asked.

  The youth shrugged. “I told him I didn’t murder that girl,” he said coolly. “Isn’t that what you’re working so hard to prove?”

  Kilgore searched the level, intelligent eyes of the youth, so close to his own, looking for a trace of fear—but saw— what? He could not be sure.

  “I don’t object to a denial of guilt,” he said slowly. “What bothers me, Harry, is something else. What made you deny that you saw the girl at Wa-po-nah the entire week of her death? It was bound to come out, that lie.”

  Harry looked aside. “I didn’t think—” he muttered. “Is it important?”

  “Yes, it’s important,” said Kilgore quietly. “But I’m puzzled, Harry. You’re the most intelligent man I ever met. You’ve got a penetrating understanding of these things a grown man would envy. But you must have known that Eli Weingarten was roaming around outside. What made you sure he wouldn’t fall into the hands of the other side?” Harry McCandless was silent. “A lie is one thing. A lie that can come out in court is another. Falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus! Once you’re caught in one lie, the jury can disbelieve all the rest.”

  There was silence in the cell, broken only by the heavy breathing of Dan McCandless.

  The youth finally raised a twisted face of cynicism. “They wouldn’t believe me anyhow,” he muttered. “What difference would it make? You’re the expert on courtroom lying, Kilgore. Can’t you figure out some smart tactic?”

  “Oh, Harry!” Dan McCandless burst out.

  Kilgore raised a hand for silence, touching the stabbing pain in his ear. His deep eyes searched the pale, desperate face of the youth. “I ain’t a miracle man,” he said quietly. “I got that reputation because of my unusual talents and my persuasive, golden tongue, but I can’t work against stupidity. Unless you want to hang, you’ll change that smartalecky attitude and listen to your lawyer. We got the whole Territory against us. Your only hope is with the jury.”

  Dan McCandless’ voice was choked. “How could you do this to your mother?” he burst out. “It’s my fault, Kilgore! My fault! When he gets out, he’ll live on five dollars a month. Fifty cents, maybe! If I’ve still got fifty cents to my name—”

  “McCandless—please,” Kilgore said.

  McCandless subsided. Kilgore hesitated, mastering his anger at this worthless boy, mastering the pain in his skull. He said quietly after a moment, “You’ve made a lot of trouble for me now, Harry. The prosecution can fasten on evidence of a guilty conscience. It’s a rule of evidence in criminal law that flight, and denials, and lies that point to guilty conscience, are in themselves some evidence of guilt. You should have realized that.”

  Harry remained silent.

  Kilgore said, “You’re intelligent. Too damned intelligent for your own good. And you’re calculating. How could you have possibly committed an act so out of character as that stupid denial? It was unworthy of you, Harry!”

  “Is that a compliment or an insult?” Harry asked thinly.

  “Take it as you like. But it throws an element of confusion into this case that I could have done without. It leads me to wonder what other nasty surprises lie ahead. Eli Weingarten is going to testify against you.”

  Harry’s glance was unwavering. “I rather expected that Eli would do that.”

  “And still you lied to Duer?” Kilgore said. “All right, then. I want you to tell us exactly what happened the night you and Eli had Honey Morgan up at Wa-po-nah. And no more lies, damnit! Erskine,” he added, “make notes.”

  Harry sighed. “Well,” he began, with a sidelong glance at his father, “Eli and I decided to have some fun, and Honey had been begging the longest time to come out to Wa-po-nah. It was a pathetic dream of hers to see the big house. I guess she imagined it to be something out of this world—a sort of palace, not the place it truly is in reality. Rather ordinary, rather drab, really—” Harry begged for a cigarette and went on. “I had arranged for Eli to pick her up on the quiet when he drove into town. He brought her back to the house and we had some fun, all right—”

  Kilgore interrupted. “Did you get her to bed? The two of you?”

  Harry hesitated. “What would be the better version?” he asked. “I mean, what would make a better impression on the jury?”

  “Harry!” Dan McCandless burst out.

  Kilgore put up a hand. “The only thing that can help you now is the solemn, unvarnished truth,” he said grimly. “I get the impression both of you had that little girl. Suppose Eli were to say that?”

  Harry looked about at implacable eyes. “I couldn’t deny it.”

  “You both had her in bed?”

  Harry nodded, turning his glance from his father to the overcast winter sky seen through the prison bars. “Around half past ten she started getting wild on cognac. By this time Eli was drunk and ready to fall asleep in the guestroom. I knew I had to get her out of the place before she started to smash some of Mother’s fine Wedgwood china—which she was threatening to do.”

  “Go on.”

  “Go on about what?”

  “How did she get all bruised up?”

  “Oh, that!” Harry closed his eyes. “I had her one last time— with force. Oh, it wasn’t exactly rape, Kilgore. Honey was wild and we wrestled around a bit, but she was inviting it. It was all part of the drinking. At any rate, when it was over I dressed her and I helped her out to the carriage. I told Eli I was taking her home and I left. That was about eleven o’clock at night.”

  Dan McCandless was staring with glassy eyes. “Why the hell did this have to be at Wa-po-nah?” he groaned. “Why in your mother’s house? Why not at the girl’s own place? Or in some barn? Or out in the fields? This will kill your mother.”

  “I don’t know why,” Harry muttered. “It just happened.”

  Kilgore said, “Never mind that now. The point is, that Harry is beginning to give some reasonable explanation of the facts. It’s a hell of a lot better than some fool lying that wouldn’t deceive a cow.” He turned back to the prisoner. “How drunk was she? Could she walk on her own power?”

  “Yes, she could,” Harry said emphatically. “But she was plenty drunk, and pretty sore at me. I got her into the carriage, and—”

  “A carriage, not a wagon?” Kilgore suggested.

  “Right!” Harry paused and went on. “Ask Julian, and he’ll back me up. He was watching when I left.”

  “And the girl was alive?”

  “Alive,” Harry agreed. “I got her almost to San Carlos, and I guess somebody must have seen the lights of the carriage—but when we were almost in town she grabbed the reins and started flogging the mare. It was a fine, spirited animal, and not used to that sort of treatment. We damned near had a runaway. Honey was thrashing around pretty wildly, and I was afraid we’d get wrecked if I kept her with me. Besides, I was pretty tired myself, and bored with her. So I stopped the carriage and dumped her out on the road.”

  “Where did you do this?” Kilgore asked.

  “It was practically in town. I could show you the spot.”

  “Did you dump her physically? I mean, did you hurl her to the ground?”

  Harry shook his head. “I grabbed her by the waist a
nd set her down on her feet. She was drunk, but sober enough to stand up. She cursed me out and shook her fist at me, but I turned around and drove back to Wa-po-nah.”

  “Then she was alive and well when you last saw her?” the lawyer asked.

  “Definitely,” Harry said.

  “You aren’t talking to Duer now. I want the truth, even if it’s not so nice.”

  “The truth,” Harry said, “is that I left her alive on the road. I figured she’d walk the rest of the way home. In her state, the fresh air would have done her good.”

  “What time did you get back to Wa-po-nah?”

  “Around one. Eli was asleep. I went to bed, and in the morning I told him what had happened. Next thing I knew, it was a few days later and Duer was arresting me for a murder. You know what happened, of course. Somebody else found Honey and raped and killed her on the road after I left her. It’s that simple.”

  Kilgore snorted. “Is it, now? Suppose you try to make a jury believe that, with all the other evidence that’s piled up against you!”

  “The other evidence?” Harry said.

  “Your fraternity pin was found by her body,” Kilgore said.

  “What of it?” Harry said. “I gave it to her months ago. She wanted some kind of token from me. And since I’d been expelled from college, I gave her the silly pin.”

  “Was she wearing it the night you last saw her?”

  “She wore it all the time. It must have been ripped off her in the struggle with her killer.”

  “All right,” Kilgore said. “I might be able to find someone reliable who remembers having seen her wearing the pin before her death. That would be sufficient refutation. But what about the Navajo blanket she was wrapped in? Might it not be proved that it was your blanket?”

  “I have several blankets. They all look alike, anyway.”

  “And the campesino who saw the body being lowered from a buckboard with the Wa-po-nah insignia?”