Texas Iron

by Robert J. Randisi

  Serena entered her father’s bedroom with lunch on a tray.

  “Papa?”

  Miller stirred and opened his eyes.

  “Serena…” He frowned at her and asked, “Is that breakfast?”

  “No,” she said, smiling, “lunch.”

  “Is it that late?” he demanded. “Why did you let me sleep so late, girl?”

  “Because you need your rest.” She set the tray down on the night table next to the bed. “Let me help you sit up.”

  “I can sit up!”

  She stood back and watched as he struggled to do so, without success.

  “Well, don’t just stand there, girl,” he said, impatiently, “help me sit up.”

  She assisted him into a seated position, propped a couple of pillows behind him, and set the tray of food on his lap.

  “Are they here?” Miller asked.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “I haven’t been spending half my time at the window watching for them.”

  “Have you changed your mind?”

  “No,” she said. “I’m sure they’ll come, but I’m not prepared to sit around and wait for them. They’ll come. Now eat your lunch. I made you some soup.”

  “How about something solid?”

  “For dinner,” she said. “Oh, and the doctor will be by later. I’ll check back in about twenty minutes, and all that soup better be gone.”

  “Yes ma’am,” he said, wryly.

  The McCall brothers rode to the livery and dismounted.

  “In the old days this place was run by old Charlie Runyon,” Evan said.

  “It was Charlie who caught you when you fell from the hayloft,” Sam said.

  “You fell from the hayloft?”

  “I didn’t fall,” Evan said.

  “I never pushed you,” Sam said.

  “I never said you pushed me from the loft deliberately,” Evan said, “but we were horsing around, and you did push me. If it wasn’t for old Charlie catching me, I would have broken a leg for sure.”

  “Maybe you should have landed on your head.”

  “Ha, ha.”

  “When I left, the place was owned by Swede Hanson,” Jubal said. “It’s only five years, maybe he’s still here.”

  As if on cue a tall, well-muscled blond man came out of the livery.

  “Swede?” Jubal called.

  The man stopped and narrowed his eyes, peering at the three men in front of him.

  “Is dat you, Jubal McCall?”

  “It’s me, Swede.”

  Jubal moved closer and Swede Hanson said, “You’ve grown, boy. Ja, you have grown a great deal.”

  “It’s good to see you, Swede.”

  “What brings you—ah, I see,” Swede Hanson said, suddenly. “You have my sympathy for the death of your parents.”

  “Thank you. Oh, Swede, I don’t think you ever met my brothers, Evan and Sam McCall.”

  “Evan,” Swede said as Evan stepped forward to shake hands. “And Sam McCall? I know you by reputation, of course.”

  “Of course,” Sam said, shaking the big man’s hand. Swede was about two inches taller than McCall’s six-four, and probably outweighed him by twenty pounds, most of it shoulders and upper arms.

  “You all have my sympathy.”

  “Thank you,” Sam said. “Will you put our horses up for a few hours?”

  “Ja, of course…but only for a few hours?”

  “We want to talk to the sheriff here about our parents,” Evan said, “and then we’ll probably be riding out to their—our—ranch.”

  “Well, your horses will be here,” Swede said. “That’s a coyote dun, isn’t it?”

  “It is,” Sam said.

  “And a claybank?”

  “Yes,” Evan said.

  “I’ll take good care of them, you can be sure,” Swede said, and then to Jubal he added, “Of course, that includes your sorrel.”

  “Of course.”

  “Who’s the sheriff here, Swede?” Sam asked.

  “Fella named Tom Kelly.”

  “Has he been sheriff long?”

  “No, maybe three months.”

  “What happened to Mel Champlin?” Jubal asked.

  “Mel?” Sam said, surprised. “Was he still sheriff when you left?”

  “Yes.”

  “Jesus,” Evan said, “he was the law when I left.”

  “And when I did,” Sam said.

  “That was part of the problem,” Swede said, “the Town Council felt they needed a younger man.”

  “What can you tell us about this Sheriff Kelly?” Jubal asked.

  “Not much,” Swede said, “except that he has not impressed me yet.”

  “Well,” Sam said, “I guess we’ll form our own opinions. We’ll be back in a few hours, Swede.”

  “The horses will be ready,” Swede said, “Ja, you can count on it.”

  “Thanks,” Jubal said, patting the big Swede on the shoulder.

  The McCalls removed their rifles, war bags, and sugans—and, in Evan’s case, a carpetbag—from their saddles and allowed the Swede to lead their animals inside.

  “Let’s go,” Sam said, and they started toward the sheriff’s office, assuming correctly that it would be in the same place.

  As they entered the sheriff’s office they found it empty. There was a coffeepot on a pot-bellied stove and Sam went over to feel it.

  “Still hot.” He opened it and sniffed it. “It’s fresh, and more than half full.”

  “Good,” Evan said, “we might as well help ourselves while we wait.”

  Evan McCall had more patience than his brother Sam. By nature they had different attitudes toward things like waiting.

  “Come on,” Evan said, handing Sam a cup of coffee in a tin cup, “there’s nothing else we can do until we talk to the law.”

  Evan looked around, found two more tin cups—swamped one out with his fingers—and then poured two more cups and handed one to Jubal.

  They laid their belongings down on a chair and settled in to wait. Only fifteen minutes or so had gone by’the wink of an eye for Evan, a lifetime for Sam—before the door opened and a man entered. He was tall and dark-haired, in his thirties, with a sheriff’s star on his chest. He stopped short when he saw that his office was full.

  “What do you people want?”

  “Sheriff Kelly?” Evan asked.

  “That’s right.” Kelly walked across the room to the coffee pot. “Did you leave me any?”

  “There’s plenty,” Sam said. He drained his cup and said, “Here.”

  Kelly looked at Sam, then took the cup, cleaned it out with a rag, and poured some coffee. That done, he carried it to his desk and sat down.

  “What can I do for you gents?”

  “We’re the sons of Joshua and Miriam McCall,” Evan said.

  “The McCalls,” Kelly said, “Of course. A sad thing, that.”

  The sheriff looked them over, then directed his attentionto Sam, looking him over, fastening his eyes for a moment on the .44 on Sam’s hip.

  “That would make you Sam McCall.”

  “Yes, it would.”

  They matched stares for a few moments, and then the lawman looked at the younger McCall.

  “And you?”

  “Jubal.”

  “Uh-huh. Well, I’m new here and I didn’t know your parents all that well.”

  “Tell us what happened,” Sam said.

  Kelly hesitated a moment, then said, “Well. It was a fairly simple conclusion to come to. You see…I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but apparently your father shot your mother, and then himself.”

  There was a moment of stunned silence in the room. Kelly suddenly tensed and put his coffee cup down. He lowered his right hand so that it hovered near his gun, but he knew that if Sam McCall wanted to kill him, there wouldn’t be much that he could do to stop it.

  “That’s crazy.”

  “It can’t be,” Jubal said.

  They both looked
at Sam, who hadn’t said a word yet.

  “Sam?” Evan said.

  Sam’s eye flicked to Evan’s and held them.

  “We’ll ask around,” Sam said, “talk to the doctor.” He looked at the sheriff and asked, “Who is the doctor hereabouts now?”

  “Doc Leader,” Kelly said.

  “Doc Leader?” Sam said, surprised. “He’s the sawbones who delivered us—all three of us. He must be close to eighty by now.”

  “That may be,” Kelly said, “but he’s the only doctor we’ve got.”

  “Then we’ll talk to him,” Sam said, picking up hisbelongings. “I assume he’s the one who looked at the bodies?”

  “He is.”

  “And signed the death certificates?”

  “Like I said,” Kelly said, “he’s the only doctor we’ve got.”

  “You could have brought another one in from somewhere else.”

  “We didn’t.”

  Sam looked at his brothers and said, “We’ll talk to Doc Leader.”

  “But Sam,” Jubal said, “Pa wouldn’t—”

  “Thanks for your help, Sheriff,” Sam said, cutting Jubal off. To his brothers he said, “Let’s go.”

  He went to the door, opened it and walked out. Evan and Jubal exchanged a glance, then gathered their things and went outside. Sam was standing on the boardwalk, waiting for them.

  “What was that all about?” Jubal demanded.

  “Take it easy.”

  “Take it easy? You heard the things he was saying about Pa.”

  “I heard them.”

  “So?”

  “There’s no point in arguing with the sheriff, Jubal,” Sam said. “He didn’t have anything to do with it.”

  “How do we know that?”

  “I mean, he isn’t the one who came to the conclusion.”

  “He’s a sheriff.”

  “But,” Evan said, “the doctor is the one who would come to the conclusion about the manner of death—isn’t that what you’re getting at, Sam?”

  “That’s it.”

  “Then let’s talk to Doc Leader,” Evan said.

  “And after that,” Sam added, “Dude Miller. After all, it was Dude who sent the telegram.”

  They walked to where they all remembered Doc Leader’s office as being, above the general store—and it was still there.

  They stopped at the stairway that went up the side of the building and Sam said, “Same damned stairway.”

  “How does he get up and down it every day, if he’s as old as you figured?” Evan wondered.

  “Well, maybe I overstated it,” Sam said, “but he’s gotta be at least in his sixties.”

  “Why are we standing down here guessing?” Jubal asked.

  “Good point, little brother,” Sam said.

  “Don’t call me that!” Jubal said. “I don’t like the sound of it.”

  “Sure, Jube,” Sam said, “whatever you say.”

  Sam felt his brother’s anger. Jubal was still fuming at having been cut off in the sheriff’s office.

  They ascended the steps, not enjoying the creaking sound they made.

  “When we go back down,” Evan said, “I suggest we go one at a time.”

  When they reached the door Sam knocked and waited. When the door opened there was a short man in his sixties standing there, squinting up at Sam and shading his eyes against the sun with hands stained from years of nicotine.

  “Still smoking, huh, Doc?” Sam asked. “For a sawbones, that ain’t exactly smart.”

  “Jesus,” Leader said, “I hate that word, sawbones. What the hell are you doing here, Sam McCall?”

  “We’re all here, Doc,” Sam said.

  Leader leaned out to spot Evan and Jubal and said, “So you are.”

  “Can we come in? We’ve got some things to talk about, haven’t we?”

  Leader scowled and said, “I suppose we have. Yeah, come in, all of you.”

  They entered the office and the doctor closed the door behind them. The office looked the same to Sam, with furnishings as ancient as the doctor himself.

  “I suppose you’re here about Joshua and Miriam.”

  “That’s right, Doc,” Sam said.

  The doctor turned his head and looked directly at Jubal.

  “Jubal, you’ve grown.”

  Jubal said to the room at large, “Why is everyone saying that?”

  “Well,” the doctor said, looking at them each in turn, “what do you want to know?”

  “Doc,” Sam said, “we want to know how our Ma and Pa died.”

  “I suspect you’ve already heard that from Sheriff Kelly.”

  “We want to hear it from you.”

  “All right,” Doc Leader said, “near as I can figure, Joshua shot Miriam, and then turned the gun on himself.”

  “That’s a lie!” Jubal said.

  “Easy, boy,” Sam said.

  “It can’t be true, Sam,” Evan said. “Pa wouldn’t do that.”

  “And when’s the last time you saw Pa, or talked to him?” Sam asked.

  “Well…seven years or so—”

  “And more for me,” Sam said, “and how do we know how he might have changed between now and then?”

  “You boys have a lot of gall,” Doc Leader said.

  “What do you mean, Doc?”

  “Your Ma and Pa were proud as hell of you boys, but did any of you ever come to see them? And now that they’re dead you want me to point the lot of you like loaded guns at someone and say, there, he killed your father andmother, after which you’d get your revenge. Well, there’s no revenge to be gotten, boys…not unless you want to go and piss on your father’s grave.”

  “You old—” Jubal snapped, rushing at him. Sam turned half to his left and caught Jubal with one sweep of his arm.

  “Easy, boy.”

  “Don’t call me ’boy’!” Jubal shouted. “I don’t like that any better than ‘little brother,—and let me go!”

  “Evan,” Sam said, “take Jubal outside and calm him down, will you?”

  Evan walked over to where Sam was holding Jubal and stared at Sam for a long moment.

  “Go ahead,” Sam said.

  Evan took hold of Jubal and ushered him toward the door.

  “But he can’t say that—” Jubal was protesting.

  “Shut up, Jube,” Evan said, and pulled the door shut behind them.

  “You’ve got a burr under your saddle, Doc,” Sam said when they were alone. “Do you want to tell me what it’s about?”

  Doc Leader glared at Sam for a moment or two, then turned and reached for a half full bottle of whiskey on his desk. He uncorked the bottle and tilted it to his lips.

  “You want some?”

  “No, I don’t want a drink, Doc, I want answers.”

  “I can’t give you any,” Leader said, putting the bottle down. “The burr under my saddle? I don’t know where you get off playing the outraged son, Sam McCall, that’s what’s rubbing me the wrong way.”

  “I’m not outraged,” Sam said. “That’s Jubal.”

  “Any of you!” Leader said. “You all broke your mother’s heart when you left.”

  “Children leave home, Doc.”

  “And they come back once in a while to visit.”

  “I been busy—”

  “Oh, I know how busy you been, Sam McCall,” Leader said. “Big man, big rep, we all read all about it, me, Dude Miller, your mother and father—”

  “I’m gonna talk to Dude next.”

  “If he’s in any shape to talk.”

  “What’s that mean?”

  “Dude was beat up a few nights ago.”

  “By who?”

  “I don’t know,” Leader said. “Three masked men broke into his house, dragged him outside, and gave him a sound beating.”

  “How bad?”

  “Bad enough to put him in bed.”

  “Dude’s a tough old bird.”

  “Now how would you know that? You ain’
t seen him for years.”

  Sam frowned.

  “I can see we’re not gonna get anywhere, Doc,” Sam said, moving toward the door. “Something’s eatin’ at you. I don’t know what it is, but if I find out that it’s somethin’ that I should have known, then this loaded gun just might end up pointin’ at you. Remember that.”

  Evan and Jubal were waiting at the base of the steps when Sam came down.

  “Well?” Evan asked.

  “Pa didn’t do it.”

  “Well, why didn’t you say that in the sheriff’s office?” Jubal demanded. “Or upstairs?”

  “Because I wasn’t sure then.”

  “And you are now?” Evan asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Why?”

  “Because that old man is hiding something” Sam said.

  “I can feel it, and if he’s got something to hide, then somethin’ is goin’ on here.”

  “And we’re gonna find out what it is, right?” Jubal asked.

  “That’s right, kid,” Sam said. “We’re gonna find out.”

  “Well, good!” Jubal said, and then as Sam and Evan started walking away he shouted, “And don’t call me ‘kid.—”

  Chapter Seven

  “Do you remember Dude’s daughter?” Sam asked Evan as they walked from the doctor’s office to Dude Miller’s house.

  Before Evan could reply, Jubal said, “I remember her. Yellow-haired gal, right?”

  “Yellow-haired child, by my remembrance,” Sam said. “I don’t think she was more than seven or eight when I left.”

  “She was a little older than that when I saw her last,” Evan said, “and she was pretty.”

  “When I left she was over twenty,” Jubal said, “and she was still pretty.”

  “Look at the gleam in the kid’s eye, Evan.”

  “I said, don’t call me—”

  “Well what the hell do you want us to call you?” Evan asked.

  “Jubal,” the younger brother said. “My name’s Jubal, ain’t it?”

  “It sure is, kid,” Sam said.

  “Jesus…” Jubal said.

  Walking through town they found themselves the center of attention. Men and woman stopped on the street to stare, or to point. There go the McCall boys, they were saying, or, There goes Sam McCall.