Shaughnessey’s was still John Henry’s headquarters, in spite of the fact that he got uncomfortable whenever the Irishman mentioned Lottie Deno’s name. It might not be any of Shaughnessey’s business who Lottie slept with, but John Henry couldn’t forget Kate’s angry accusation. Shaughnessey was the first friend he’d made in Fort Griffin and had saved his life once, and he owed the Irishman some kind of loyalty, at least. Sleeping with Lottie had been a mistake and he didn’t mean to repeat it.
He was in Shaughnessey’s dance hall one cool November afternoon, having a drink and taking in the show before going back to his hotel to get ready for a night of cards, when the Irishman motioned to him from his office behind the long walnut bar.
“Doc, there’s somebody I’d like you to meet, an old friend of mine from my boxing days. He’s here looking for a job, and I thought maybe you could help him to find one.”
“Why me? I’m not lookin’ to hire anyone.”
“He’s after a law job,” Shaughnessey said with a wink, “and I told him you know more about the law around here than anybody else!”
“Very amusin’. And where is this friend of yours?”
“He’s right over there,” Shaughnessey said, “the big fellow at the far end of the bar,” and he nodded toward a tall man in a long white duster coat, his flat-brimmed hat pulled down low over his eyes. “His name’s Wyatt Earp. Why don’t you go on over and introduce yourself?”
But John Henry lingered a moment, thinking that he might just finish his whiskey and leave without bothering to meet the man at all. Kate was waiting for him at the hotel and he ought to get back to her. She hadn’t been feeling well lately, with a sick stomach and edgy nerves, and she didn’t like to be left alone too long. Then he sighed and threw back the rest of his drink. He owed Shaughnessey, after all.
“Mr. Earp?” he said as he took a place beside the man at the bar, but before he could introduce himself, he started into a fierce fit of coughing. Finishing a drink too fast always started him off like that; usually he just sipped at his liquor, letting it go down slow. He grabbed the handkerchief from his vest pocket and coughed hard into it, then folded it quickly to hide the red-flecked sputum that stained the cloth.
“That’s a bad cough,” Wyatt Earp observed. “You a Lunger?”
“For the time bein’,” John Henry replied, clearing his throat and pushing the handkerchief back into his pocket. “I reckon I’ll get over it, sooner or later.”
“Oh? I thought the consumption was fatal,” Earp said, and John Henry sighed—the man obviously had no appreciation for sarcasm.
What he did have was the broad-shouldered, hard-muscled look of a man who’d spent a lifetime on the frontier. His face was square-jawed and tanned, his hair and heavy mustache a russet-gold, making him seem like a big mountain lion, poised and powerful. A man’s man, John Henry thought enviously, and probably a lady’s man, too.
“You Doc Holliday?” Earp asked, as he took off his hat and pulled a cigar from his coat pocket, lighting it and taking a long, deliberate draw. “I seem to remember that surname on a poster from Pinkerton’s Detective Agency. Wasn’t the army chasing after you awhile back?”
“I had some trouble with the law at one time. Why? Are you plannin’ to arrest me?”
“Not today,” Earp replied, letting out a slow cloud of cigar smoke and a familiar aroma of some Havanna blend, “there’s no money in it. The army’s got a short memory where Buffalo Soldiers are concerned.”
The conversation was taking an uncomfortable turn, and John Henry quickly changed the subject away from himself. “That’s an interestin’ name you’ve got, Mr. Earp. Are you a Southern man?”
“Hell, no. I was born in Illinois. My brothers fought for the Union. I would have too, if I’d been old enough to fight. Why do you ask?”
“I knew of some Earps back home in Georgia. It’s not a common name. I thought maybe you were kin to them: Daniel Earp and his wife Obedience?”
“Daniel Earp?” Wyatt repeated. “There was a Daniel in the family, my father’s older brother. I haven’t heard of him since before the War.”
“Well, I reckon you wouldn’t have, bein’ a Union man,” John Henry drawled. Then he added with a smile. “Daniel Earp was the biggest slave trader in Griffin, Georgia. Which may come as hard news to your Yankee family.”
“Do you think you’re funny, Holliday?”
“Sometimes.”
“Well, I don’t,” Wyatt Earp said disdainfully. “But Shaughnessey says you’re the man to talk to about the lay of things around here. He says you play cards with everybody in town, so maybe you can give me the lead I’m looking for. I came down here trailing some rustled cattle, but it seems those beeves have already been sold to market. Now I’m looking for another job. I figured maybe your sheriff here could use a little help fighting the rustlers. I’m good at handling cowboys.”
“You’re barking up the wrong tree, Mr. Earp. It’s not Sheriff Cruger who’s taking care of the rustlers. It’s the Old Law Mob, and they won’t be asking for help from a stranger like you.”
“The Old Law Mob?”
“The local Vigilance Committee. They’ve been around since before there was any real law in this county, even before the military came in. They’re old Shackleford County boys who don’t trust anyone but themselves. You try to break into the vigilantes, and they’ll string you up right along with the rustlers.”
“And if they’re so tough, why haven’t they got this county cleaned out yet?”
“They’re chasin’ the wrong men,” John Henry said, repeating Lottie’s words. “Until they get the rustler boss, the cattle thievin’ won’t stop.”
“And who’s this rustler boss?” Earp asked, giving him a steady blue-eyed stare. “I get the feeling you know something about him.”
“I do,” John Henry replied, “but my life wouldn’t be worth very much around here if I told you who he was. You’d best just leave it alone, Mr. Earp, and look for a job somewhere else. The Vigilance Committee won’t take you, and Sheriff Cruger doesn’t have the goods to bring the rustlers in.”
“And suppose I find out for myself who’s behind the rustling and bring him to justice? I guess the county might be so grateful, they’d make me sheriff.”
“You dream big, Mr. Earp!” John Henry said with a laugh.
“I do, for a fact,” Wyatt Earp agreed without a trace of brag about it. “I’ve been a deputy in all the cowtowns: Ellsworth, Wichita, Dodge City. Summer work, mostly, during the cattle season. But that kind of lawing doesn’t pay, not like being a county sheriff pays. I figure I just need to find the right county and make myself known. So how ‘bout we make deal, Holliday?”
“Such as?”
“You put me in touch with somebody who’s willing to talk, and I’ll pay you a reward once I get made sheriff. And nobody will ever know I got the lead from you. How’s that sound?”
“Sounds suspicious,” John Henry answered. “Why would a lawman like you trust an outlaw like me, anyhow?”
“We’ve all done things we regret,” Wyatt said with a shrug. “Your past doesn’t concern me too much.”
“And why should I trust you? What if you get drunk some night and mention to the wrong people that you got your information from me? It could shorten my already short life.”
“I’m not much of a drinker,” Wyatt Earp replied, “nor much of a talker, neither.” He paused and looked into his glass. “Laconic, my folks called me—that means spare on words.”
“I know what it means,” John Henry said. “I just want to make sure you stay that way as long as you’re in Fort Griffin.”
“So, what do you say about my offer, Doc? Can we deal?”
While he waited for an answer, Earp took another draw on his cigar and blew out another cloud of smoke, and John Henry realized where he’d smelled that kind of tobacco before: it was the same Havanna his father had smoked, an aroma that brought back too many memories. He was about
to turn Wyatt Earp down when he remembered the debt he owed to Shaughnessey, and reconsidered.
“All right,” he said, “I reckon you’ve got yourself a partner, Wyatt Earp.”
“Good,” Wyatt replied with a quick flash of a smile against his frontier tan. Then, as he put out his hand to shake on the deal, he added: “Oh, and tell Katie I said hello.”
“Katie?” John Henry asked in surprise. “You know Kate?”
“I knew a little Hungarian pistol who called herself Katie Elder back in Wichita when I was lawing there. She worked in my sister-in-law Bessie’s brothel for awhile.”
He was less surprised by the news of Kate’s Wichita career than he was by Wyatt Earp’s family connection to it. “Your sister-in-law ran a bordello? Didn’t that put you in a compromisin’ position, being a lawman?”
“Not much. Bessie ran a good place and paid her fines regular. I figured the house was her business, hers and Jim’s. Besides, having a brothel in the family had its benefits. I met my wife there.”
“You married a girl on the line?” John Henry asked in surprise. Marrying a woman of negotiable virtue seemed to him like a needless thing to do. Why buy the cow, folks always said, when the milk was free—or cheap, anyhow? Not that Kate didn’t cost him some money with her expensive gowns and extravagant taste, but at least he wasn’t tied to her the way he’d be tied to a wife. They were both free to pack up and leave anytime either one of them got tired of their living arrangement.
“We’re not married exactly,” Wyatt explained. “I didn’t sign anything legal. But Celia Ann knows how things are with me. She knows I don’t plan on ever taking a marriage vow again . . .”
Wyatt stopped in mid-sentence as if he suddenly realized he’d revealed too much of himself, and for a moment his eyes were unguarded, filled with pain, and John Henry felt he’d had a glimpse of the man behind the brave facade. Wyatt had lost someone, too, he sensed, and carried the pain of that loss as John Henry carried the pain of losing Mattie. Then Wyatt’s eyes shaded again, closing over the emotion. A man’s man, all right, John Henry thought—the kind of man he wished that he could be.
“Why don’t you have Katie come by the hotel,” Wyatt went on after that momentary pause. “I’m sure Celia would enjoy a visit from her. The two of them used to be friendly back in Wichita.”
“I think Kate might like that.”
“So Doc, are you really as good as they say you are with the cards?”
“Why don’t you join me for a game tonight, and find out for yourself? I’ll be down at the Beehive Saloon where all the rustlers play.”
“The Beehive? I think I’d like to meet some of those card players.”
“Oh, speakin’ of that,” John Henry said almost casually, “there is one rustler in particular I’d like to see run out of this county, if you happen to come across him some dark night. His name is Johnny Ringo.”
“Ringo,” Wyatt repeated. “I’ll keep that in mind, Doc.”
“I met an interestin’ man today,” John Henry told Kate when he got back to their room at the Planter’s Hotel. Kate had been taking one of her afternoon naps, but she woke with a lazy yawn when she saw him.
“Who’s that?” she asked, stretching languidly.
“He’s a lawman from Kansas,” John Henry replied, as he pulled off his jacket and vest and poured wash water into a china bowl on the dressing table. “He wants me to help him with a law job here in Fort Griffin.”
“You?” Kate asked, reaching for the lady’s magazine she’d been reading before falling asleep. “Why should you help a lawman? The law’s no friend of yours, is it?”
“Not generally. But there’s something about this particular lawman— he seems like a man you could trust. And it didn’t seem to bother him that I’ve had some troubles with the law myself. He seems accepting, somehow, open-minded . . .”
He stopped a moment and looked at his reflection in the mirror over the dressing table and had the sudden notion that with his sandy blond hair and mustache and his clear blue eyes, he looked like a smaller, thinner version of Wyatt Earp himself. Then he shook his head and said with a laugh, “Imagine that; me having a lawman for a friend!”
“Friend?” Kate said in surprise. “What are you talking about? You don’t even know this man.”
“I knew some of his family back in Georgia. His uncle lived in Griffin when I was growing up there. And I hear he’s an acquaintance of yours, as well. His name is Wyatt Earp.”
And looking back into the mirror, he saw a sudden movement behind him as Kate dropped her magazine and stared at him.
“What did you say?”
“I said I met your friend Wyatt Earp today,” he repeated, wondering why Kate always seemed so jumpy these days. “He says he knew you in Wichita.”
“Wyatt Earp is no friend of mine! He’s no friend to anyone but himself! He had a hard reputation around Kansas . . .”
“Well, he’s gonna need a hard reputation around here,” John Henry said, drying his hands and pulling a fresh linen shirt from the dressing table drawer. “He’s got big plans for himself, cleanin’ up the county and gettin’ himself elected sheriff for it. But if anybody can do it, I reckon he can.”
Kate said with a sarcastic laugh, “And while he was telling you all his brave plans, did he happen to mention that he was dismissed from the Wichita police for roughing up his prisoners?”
“Is that right?” John Henry asked, giving her a questioning gaze. “And is that how you knew him, Kate? Did he arrest you for whoring?”
“No,” she said quietly, looking away. “He didn’t arrest me.”
“Then what gives you the right to judge him, anyhow? I should think you’d be pleased to have me find a friend with any redeeming qualities at all. Johnny Shaughnessey aside, most of the men I know would as soon kill me as lose a game of cards to me. And speaking of that, Earp and I will be goin’ out to play some poker together tonight, if you’d like to come along.”
It was the first time since they’d taken up together that he hadn’t just assumed Kate would be his companion for the evening, and she said bitterly:
“Why should I? You’ve got a new friend now, don’t you? What do you need me for?”
And John Henry, bewildered by Kate’s sudden belligerence and a little hurt as well, snapped back at her. “I need you for the same thing I always have, Kate. But if you’d rather not be accommodating, I reckon I can always get what I need down at Lottie Deno’s place. She seemed happy enough to have me in her bed.”
For a moment, Kate looked up at him with a hot Hungarian pride in her eyes. Then she took a long breath and said in that sultry voice of hers, “You don’t need to go back to Lottie, my love. Whatever you want, you can get right here from me,” and she lay back on the bed, waiting for him to come to her.
But John Henry wasn’t interested in making love just then, and pretended not to notice Kate’s willingness as he pulled writing paper and a pen from the dressing table.
“What are you doing?” she asked in surprise.
“I’m writin’ a letter. I think my cousin will be interested in hearing about my day, even if you’re not.”
“Your cousin?” Kate said with a haughty laugh. “Well, tell him hello from me!”
He ignored Kate’s contemptuous comment as he sat down at the small table in front of the long windows that looked out over raucous, rowdy Fort Griffin, and began writing:
My Very Dearest Mattie,
Do you remember that summer Sunday back in ‘72 when Aunt Permelia made us all a picnic at the Ponce de Leon Springs? You asked me then if I needed a hero, and I said I guessed that I did. Well today, I think I may have finally found a real one. His name is Wyatt Earp.
The night of cards with the Kansas lawman turned out to be two weeks of nightly card games, and John Henry got to know a lot about Wyatt Earp, though getting Wyatt to talk about himself wasn’t an easy thing to do. He was laconic, all right, and surprisingly shy, as well
, which seemed funny for a man as brave and daring as he was. Even his mannerisms seemed on the shy side, the way he hunched his shoulders in his big duster coat and pulled his hat so low down on his face that his eyes were always half-hidden in shadow, keeping himself to himself. But Wyatt was a man of action, not a man of words, and he’d lived the kind of adventurous life that most men only dreamed of.
He was born on an Illinois farm, the son of a Mexican War veteran and named after his father’s commanding officer, a fighting man named Wyatt Berry Stapp. It was a big name to hang on a little boy, but young Wyatt Berry Stapp Earp soon proved equal to it, growing tall and strong as his family moved on from Illinois to Iowa, Missouri, Kansas, and finally across the plains to California. And by the time Wyatt was eighteen-years-old, he was on his own and working his way back across the country again, driving freight wagons over the mountains from California and laying rails for the Union Pacific Railroad across the Wyoming wilderness. He settled for a time in Missouri, taking a job as a constable in the little town of Lamar, but settling down didn’t seem to suit him, and soon he was off again, hunting buffalo on the great plains, guarding stage coaches of gold bullion out of the mines of the Black Hills, and controlling rowdy cowboys in the cowtowns of Kansas. He’d done just about everything there was to do in those wild western territories, and done it all well enough to live to tell the story. And the more John Henry heard of Wyatt’s life, the more sure he was that he’d finally found himself a real American hero.
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