Day of Reckoning

by William W. Johnstone

Chugwater

  “Marshal Craig,” a young man said, stepping into the marshal’s office. “You might want to come out here.”

  The young man was breathing hard, having run a couple of blocks to deliver the information.

  “My word, Tommy, what’s got you all out of breath?”

  “It’s them two men that work for Mr. MacCallister,” Tommy said. “Mr. Gleason and the Chinaman?”

  “Yes, that would be Wang. What about them?”

  Tommy drew another couple of deep breaths before he could blurt out the rest of the information.

  “They’re comin’ into town now with a buckboard full o’ dead men!”

  * * *

  As Elmer and Wang drove into town their arrival was drawing a lot of attention, and not just from the young man who had run down to the marshal’s office but from many others. The reason so many were taking notice was the three, obviously dead, men lying in the back of the buckboard.

  Elmer stopped in front of the marshal’s office, but it wasn’t necessary to go inside. Tommy McCord’s report had already brought the marshal out to meet them.

  “What have you got there in the back of your buckboard, Elmer?” Marshal Craig asked.

  “Dead folks,” Elmer replied. Setting the brake, he and Wang climbed down to stand alongside the marshal as he examined the bodies.

  “I can see that. Did you find ’em that way?”

  “No, I made ’em that way, by damn,” Elmer said. “That is, me ’n Wang here.”

  “I expect you got a good reason for havin’ killed ’em, or else you wouldn’t have brought ’em into town,” Craig said.

  “Damn right we had a good reason. These three galoots here come out to the ranch to kill Duff,” Elmer replied.

  “I didn’t know Duff was back,” Marshal Craig said.

  “He ain’t back. But these three wouldn’t take that for an answer. One thing led to another, ’n the next thing you know, they was about to kill us.”

  “So you killed them,” Marshal Craig said. It was a declarative statement, not a question.

  “It was self-defense, Russel,” Elmer said, holding up his hand. “I swear it was.”

  “I have no doubt but that it was, Elmer. Do you have any idea who they are?”

  “I ain’t never seen none of ’em before, but I did hear two of the names spoke. One of the names was Pardeen, ’n the other was Donner. Never did hear the name of the third man.”

  “It was Bates,” Marshal Craig said.

  “What? Wait a minute, are you tellin’ me you know these men?”

  “Not by sight,” Marshal Craig said. “But I got notice that three men escaped jail in Millersburg. Their names were Pardeen, Donner, and Bates. If two of these men were Donner and Pardeen, I’d lay money that the third one is Bates. There’s a reward out for them, by the way, five hundred dollars apiece. I would say that you and Mr. Wang would be due that money.”

  “Well, I’ll be damn,” Elmer said, smiling broadly. “What do you think about that, Wang? We’re goin’ to have us some money to spend.”

  “I’m a little curious, though. I got word just this morning that these three men robbed a store along with Callahan, Manning, Cooper, and Morris. Aren’t those the men that Duff is after?”

  “Yeah,” Elmer said. “Those are the men he’s after.” Elmer glanced back toward the three bodies. “And you say that these here men was ridin’ with Callahan ’n the others?”

  “That’s what the report says.”

  “Then that, more’n likely, explains why these here galoots come a-gunnin’ for Duff. They was wantin’ to get ’im off their backs.”

  * * *

  Elmer and Wang took advantage of having come to town to buy a few things they needed for the ranch. They also stepped into Fiddler’s Green. Just as he kept a special Scotch for Duff, Biff Johnson kept a supply of Baijiu, a special Chinese drink, for Wang. He served both men.

  “Hey, what the hell is a Chinaman doin’ in here?” someone shouted. The complaining customer was not a resident of Chugwater and didn’t know that Wang was not only accepted but liked by all.

  “It looks to me like he’s havin’ a drink,” one of the other customers said.

  “Yeah? Well, he sure as hell ain’t goin’ to have a drink in here while I’m in here.”

  “What’s your name?” the regular customer asked.

  “The name is Foster.”

  “Foster is it? Well, sir, my name is Malcolm. Tell you what, Foster. Why don’t you throw him out?”

  Foster took another swallow of his beer, set it on the bar, then wiped his mouth with his sleeve. “You think I won’t?”

  Foster pulled his pistol, and when he did, at least half a dozen other customers drew their pistols as well, and they were all pointing toward Foster. Foster looked around in some surprise.

  “Here, what is this?” Foster asked.

  “If you want to throw Mr. Wang out, feel free to try,” the man who had been having a conversation with him said. “But you ain’t goin’ to do it with no gun.”

  “You ain’t all a-goin’ to shoot me,” Foster said.

  “You’re right, it won’t take all of us. Two or three of us should be enough,” his partner in conversation replied. “Now, put your gun back in its holster a’fore you go over there ’n throw the Chinaman out. That is, if you actually plan to do this. Go ahead, we’ll watch.”

  By now the entire gathering of Fiddler’s Green had stopped all other activity to watch the drama that appeared to be developing in front of them. Card games stopped in mid-deal. Everyone grew tense except for Elmer and Wang, who continued their conversation as if they were totally alone.

  “Hey you, Chinaman!” Foster called.

  Wang didn’t respond.

  “You, Chinaman, I’m talking to you.”

  Wang turned toward him. “I am called Wang. I am not called Chinaman.”

  “Is that a fact? Well, I’ll tell you what, Chinaman. I’ll call you anything I like.”

  “That’s enough, Foster,” Biff said. “I’m going to have to ask you to leave my place now.”

  “Wait a minute,” Foster said. “Are you telling me that you are going to kick me out and let the Chinaman stay?”

  “Mr. Wang is a good customer and a friend,” Biff said.

  “Ha! A friend is he? Well, all I can say is, you got a piss poor choice of friends.”

  Biff reached under the bar and came up with a sawed-off double-barrel twelve-gauge shotgun.

  “Leave,” he said.

  Foster put his hands up. “I’m goin’, I’m goin’,” he said. “There ain’t no need for you to be gettin’ all hostile about it. I can’t say as how I would want to be a-drinkin’ in a place that would be willin’ to let a Chinaman come in here ’n drink with white men anyway.”

  Foster started toward the batwing doors.

  “Good riddance to you, Foster!” someone shouted, and the other patrons of the saloon followed the belligerent customer out with loud laughter.

  Elmer chuckled. “You know what the funny thing is, Biff? I don’t believe that Foster feller has any idea what a favor you done ’im by runnin’ him out like that afore he actually tried somethin’ with Wang.”

  Biff laughed as well. “I think you’re right. He has no idea.”

  “I would have been gentle with him,” Wang said with a broad smile.

  “Yeah, about as gentle as a bucking horse,” Elmer said. “Oh, hey! I near ’bout forgot. Me ’n Wang just come into a little money. Here, Biff, how ’bout you set up ever’one in here with a drink on the two of us? As sort of a thank-you for takin’ up for us like they done.”

  “Ha!” one of the patrons said. “What the hell makes you think we was takin’ up for you, old man? Far as we’re concerned, Foster coulda throwed you out ’n we wouldn’ta done nothin’. It’s Wang we was takin’ up for,” he teased.

  The others laughed.

  “If you take up for Wang, it’s most the same as you
takin’ up for me, bein’ as me ’n him is just real tight,” Elmer said.

  “All right, we’ll go along with that,” the patron said. “Most especial since you’re buyin’ the drinks.” Every customer in Fiddler’s Green stepped up to the bar to place their order.

  Cheyenne

  “What about the wagon?” Duff asked.

  “It’s being painted,” Meagan answered.

  “And Ina Claire?”

  “She’s back in the hotel, taking care of the medicine bottles.”

  “What about the costumes?”

  “I’ve got them all picked out.”

  “For both of you?”

  Meagan smiled. “What do you mean for both of us?”

  “I mean for you and Ina Claire. Have you picked out the costumes you will be wearing?”

  “Duff, I’ve picked them out for all three of us,” Meagan replied.

  “What?” Duff held out his hand in protest. “Now, wait just a minute, let’s hold on here. There is nae need for you to be getting a costume for me.”

  “Sure there is. If we are going to make this work, we will all have to be in costume. Trust me, I’ve lived here a lot longer than you have. Besides, I think you will look very handsome in what I have picked out for you,” she added with a broad smile.

  “I’m beginning to have second thoughts about this whole idea,” Duff said.

  Meagan laughed, then put her hand on his shoulder. “Nonsense, traveling through the countryside as a medicine show is a great idea. And if you are going to do that, you have to play the part, too, not just Ina Claire and me.”

  “All right, all right, you win,” Duff said with a yielding grin. “I guess I can’t expect you and Ina Claire to dress up if I refuse to. By the way, how is Ina Claire doing?”

  “It was quite a shock for her to have to kill someone, so as I’m sure you can imagine she is still a little disturbed by it.”

  “But she isn’t questioning whether or not it was something she had to do, though, is she?”

  “No, she’s not questioning that. She understands, fully, that she didn’t have any choice.”

  Duff nodded. “Good. She’s a strong young lady, as strong as I’ve ever seen. I’ve no doubt that she’ll come through this in fine fettle.”

  Outlaw encampment, just outside Laramie City, Wyoming Territory

  Just before they bedded down last night, Manning put a pot of beans, water, and bacon in a hole over a bed of hot coals. Covering the pot with dirt, he built a fire over the top and let it burn all night long. The result was a pot of beans for the next day.

  “Damn, Manning, this is good,” Cooper said as he spooned some of the beans to his mouth. “Where’d you learn to cook like this?”

  “I was a belly cheater on a couple of trail drives,” Manning said. “Then one day I come up on the bad side of a trail boss ’n wound up killin’ ’im. On account of that, I been on the dodge ever since.”

  “Hey, Callahan, you think Pardeen ’n them boys will be back to collect their hunnert dollars?” Morris asked.

  Callahan took a spoonful of beans before he answered.

  “I think they’re more’n likely dead,” Callahan replied easily.

  “Why do you say that?”

  “If they wasn’t dead, they woulda been back by now, askin’ for their money.”

  “Son of a bitch! You mean you think this MacCallister feller kilt all three of ’em?” Morris asked.

  “He damn well could have,” Cooper said. “I told you, I’ve heard of this feller before.”

  “Yeah, ’n me ’n Callahan seen ’im in action when he kilt the LaFarge boys,” Manning said.

  “If they don’t come back, what will that mean for our next job?” Morris asked.

  Callahan took another spoonful of beans. “It don’t mean nothin’,” he said. “We’ll pull the job without ’em. Cooper, you ’n Morris need to go on into town ’n get ever’thing set up for us.”

  “All right,” Cooper replied. “But it’s liable to take us a day or two.”

  “We’ll be here,” Callahan said, returning to the pot to fill his pan again.

  “Hey, Callahan, have you ever robbed a train before?” Manning asked.

  “No, I ain’t never done it, but it can’t be all that hard to do, ’cause they’s sure been a heap o’ folks that has done it.”

  “What bothers me is how we goin’ to stop it,” Morris said. “It ain’t like the stagecoach that we stopped just by a-lyin’ down in front of it. You lie down in front of a train, he more’n likely couldn’t get it stopped in time even if he was of a mind to.”

  “I’ll figure out a way for us to stop it,” Callahan promised. “Cooper, you just get the information we need.”

  “You don’t need to worry none about that. I’ll get the information, all right,” Cooper replied.

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Laramie City

  “I don’t know ’bout you, Pogue,” Dooley Cooper said when he and Morris arrived in Laramie City. “But it’s been a month o’ Sundays since I’ve had me a woman, ’n now that we got us a little bit of money, I aim to have me one.”

  “Hell, all the girls in the bar make you buy ’em a whole bunch o’ drinks before they’ll let you take ’em upstairs,” Morris said.

  “Yeah, well, I ain’t plannin’ on goin’ to no saloon. I aim to get me a regular whorehouse woman.”

  “They cost more.”

  “Not if you count all them drinks you gotta buy the saloon whores first,” Cooper said.

  “Yeah,” Morris said, agreeing with a smile. “Yeah, that’s true, ain’t it? Where at do you think we should go?”

  “I been in this town before and I know exactly where to go. I ain’t never had enough money to go before, but I got enough now.”

  Cooper led Morris to Wilma’s House of Pleasure, where, getting a woman apiece, they took them to the rooms where the soiled doves did their business.

  Morris was finished within less than three minutes.

  “Oh, honey, that was nice,” the woman said. She had told Morris her name was Louella. Louella sat up in bed, allowing the cover to fall.

  “Where you goin’?” Morris asked.

  “Well, we’re all finished here, honey. I’m going to get dressed,” Louella said.

  “No you ain’t. How much will it cost me to stay here ’til nightfall?”

  “Oh, I could have four more visits in by that time,” Louella said. “So it will cost you at least eight more dollars.”

  “You ain’t goin’ to get that much business in the afternoon,” Morris insisted. “Maybe tonight, but I’ll be finished with you by then. I’ll give you five more dollars.”

  “All right, honey, if you’ve got it in you to do it that many more times, you can stay for five dollars.”

  “I don’t want to do it no more at all,” Morris said. “What I want to do is sleep here in your bed.”

  “Why would you want to do that?” Louella asked, surprised by the response. “You can get a room at the hotel for two dollars.”

  “’Cause, even though I don’t want to do nothin’ more, I like the idea of havin’ a nekkid woman a-lyin’ alongside me,” Morris said with a broad grin.

  “All right. If that’s what you want.”

  Otto, Wyoming Territory

  The town of Otto was named for Otto Franc, a local cattle baron who ranched in the nearby vicinity. Eight miles west of Cheyenne, it was the next stop for the westbound trains on the Union Pacific Railroad. Duff, with Meagan and Ina Claire sitting on the seat beside him, drove into town in a wagon that, by design, was painted to attract as much attention as possible.

  The wagon was different from the normal freight or working wagons. Whereas the working wagons typically had a canvas-bowed top, this wagon had sides and a wood roof. It was smaller than the freight wagons and was painted bright red with large cursive letters, in gold, on either side.

  Malcolm Campbell’s

  SCOTTISH HEATH
ER EXTRACT

  When Duff drove the medicine wagon into town, with Meagan and Ina Claire sitting on the seat beside him, they were met by a couple of young boys.

  “Mister, will you be a-givin’ us a medicine show?” one of the young boys asked.

  “Aye, that we will, lads, that we will,” Duff said.

  “Can kids come ’n watch, even iffen we don’t buy nothin’?”

  “Aye, ’tis no reason the wee bairns can’t come.”

  The boy got a confused look on his face. “You sure do talk funny.”

  “That’s ’cause he’s a furriner,” the other boy said. “That’s right, ain’t it, mister? You’re a furriner, ain’t ya?”

  “Aye, lad, ’tis Scottish born and bred I be,” Duff said.

  The two boys followed the medicine wagon down to the far end of the street. Then, as Duff disconnected the team and led them to water, Meagan and Ina Claire handed a fistful of flyers to each of the boys.

  “Would you two boys like to make a quarter apiece by going up and down the street, passing out these flyers?” she asked.

  “Yes, ma’am! We’ll be glad to,” one of the boys said. “Come on, Neil!”

  “We’d better get in costume,” Meagan said, and she and Ina Claire stepped back into the wagon to change.

  Laramie City

  When Morris woke up much later, he saw that, though it wasn’t totally dark outside, the room had grown much dimmer. He felt in the bed beside him, but the woman was gone.

  “Hey! Where the hell are you?” he asked.

  “I’m right here, honey, I haven’t gone anywhere,” Louella replied.

  Looking around, he saw her sitting in a chair. She was knitting something.

  “Hey, my mama used to do that,” he said.

  “It’s a good way to pass the time.”

  “What time is it?”

  “I think it’s a little after five,” Louella said. “It’s time for me to go back out into the parlor. My evening fellas will be coming around soon,” she added with a smile.