The Sporting House Killing: A Gilded Age Legal Thriller

by G. Reading Powell

  He’d thought about juries a great deal. “See that live oak over yonder?” He pointed. “It’s been there for hundreds of years. A jury’s like an old oak tree. It’s a beautiful thing to watch, but its true value isn’t so obvious. It has deep roots extending way under the surface that keep the soil from washing away. It may be tossed and turned by a strong wind, but it’s too strong to blow over. It always rights itself. The only thing that’ll set over an old oak is a man who cuts it down for his own reasons.” He appreciatively inhaled the fresh air. “I’d lost faith in that old tree, Jasper. I’d always stood up to folks who tried to cut it down, but I lost faith in juries for a time. Not anymore. They did the right thing by your friend Cicero.”

  “I’m sure sorry for that girl.”

  “Me too.” He tossed the newspaper on the porch and crossed his arms. “What about you? Looks like you’re headed out of town with a packed bag. President Burleson didn’t expel you, did he?”

  He couldn’t help but grin—he already knew Burleson hadn’t.

  Jasper’s eyes widened. “Oh no, sir. He give me a strong talking-to, lectured me about this lesson and that lesson, and I reckon I’ve learned most all of ’em. He told me I’d be welcome back in school come fall, and as long as I walked a straight and narrow path, I’d graduate someday.”

  “That’s mighty fine, Jasper. I know you will.” And when the boy got home soon, he’d find a letter from Baylor advising him that an anonymous gift had been made to pay his tuition. A sound investment.

  “One thing’s for sure,” Jasper said. “I ain’t inclined to go near no whorehouse. So anyways, I’m fixing to head home for the rest of the summer. There’s cotton to pick. Got a train later for Flatonia. I figure I best tell my folks about all this before they hear about it from somebody else. I’d told ’em I was staying here to finish some schoolwork, which is the way I’ve thought of it.”

  “If you need me to write them a letter for you, I’d be happy to.”

  “Thank you, sir. That’s real nice of you, but I think I best do my own talking now.”

  Catfish smiled. “Good for you, son.”

  Colonel Terry rolled onto his back, extending his paws toward the ceiling. Time for a belly rub.

  “I sure am gonna miss the colonel,” Jasper said, reaching down to fulfill the request.

  “When you come back to college next fall, he’ll still be here. Hound dogs always are. That’s what makes ’em God’s perfect creation.”

  The colonel moaned softly from the rubbing.

  “How’s that?” Jasper asked.

  “God made us men to be loyal to one another, but sometimes that causes us grief. Two-legged critters will let you down or cripple themselves trying not to. Sometimes friends betray you. Even family can disappoint you, or you them. But a good ol’ hound dog is always there for you, whether you deserve it or not. That’s the noblest impulse of the canine heart.”

  Jasper bent over and let the colonel take a last lick. “Well, sir, I reckon I better go. I just wanted to say thanks for taking my side with Baylor.”

  “You’re quite welcome. That’s why I’m here.”

  ***

  It was a fine day to sit across a corner table from Tom Blair in the Bismark Saloon. After every trial in which they battled like mortal enemies, they met there over a drink to remind themselves they weren’t. Miss Peach said it was like Shakespeare wrote: Do as adversaries do in law. Strive mightily, but eat and drink as friends. They smoked White Owls, and the loser bought the drinks.

  This night, each of them treated the other. And for the first time, Catfish brought Harley.

  “Catfish, I want you to know,” Blair began, “it wasn’t my idea to ask for death.”

  “I know, you don’t have to—”

  “Yes, I do. I want you to understand. Shaughnessy and DeGroote and others insisted on it. I thought it was just because that preacher was stirring everybody up. I didn’t know DeGroote had his own horse in the race.”

  “I know you didn’t.” Catfish tapped ashes into the brass spittoon. “I didn’t, either.”

  “I feel a little dirty now.”

  “You shouldn’t, my friend. You were just doing your job.”

  “Thanks.”

  Catfish dipped his head. “It’s me who should apologize. I let it get personal, even with you, and I’m sorry for that.”

  “I didn’t take it that way.” Blair blew smoke at the wall. “Are you going to appeal the punishment?”

  “Cicero’s happy to escape hanging. He’s young. He can make a new life somewhere else after prison.”

  “Just so you know,” Blair said, “I had two other people tell me Cicero drank too much and attacked them. He beat one pretty bad. Neither would testify, though.”

  “Where’d you find them?”

  “Schoolcraft came to see me.”

  Harley huffed. “Why does he care?”

  Catfish shook his head. His son was too defensive sometimes. “Leave it be. We’re done with Schoolcraft for good.”

  “I hope you’re right about Cicero making a new life,” Blair said, “but I’m not so sure.”

  Catfish nodded and blew smoke at the air. “I’m sorry for his folks.”

  “How are they?”

  “Henry’s bitter.” He ran his fingers through his hair, causing it to flop over his forehead. “Still says Cicero didn’t do it, and he’s not very happy with me.”

  “He should be grateful you saved the boy’s life,” Blair said.

  “He’ll figure that out some day.” He exchanged glances with Harley. “Things like that take time.”

  Blair finished his drink, and after a warm goodbye he left.

  Catfish loosened his tie.

  Harley took a sip of the new Scotch whisky the proprietor had brought. “Papa, he was right about Mr. Sweet. You saved Cicero’s life.”

  Catfish’s cigar left a haze over the table. “The jury did that.”

  “But your speech moved them to it. I watched them, especially the veterans. It was when you said ‘no more killing.’” His eyes gleamed in the lamplight.

  A fleeting whiff of kerosene from the lamp pierced the smoke.

  The war. Catfish shut out the smell of death. That war did not measure his life.

  The law. It was peaceful and civilized. In war or peace, killers sorted out their differences by violence. If lawful folks were going to be better than killers, nobody should die as the result of a trial.

  He poured himself some of the new Scotch. “Like I told the jury, it’s more about who we are.”

  “Maybe the legislature will figure that out someday.”

  He snorted. “Maybe even in your lifetime.”

  Harley tilted his head. “By the way, I happened to pick up your trial box today. It seemed lighter.”

  “Lighter?”

  “Like maybe you’d taken something out.”

  “Oh?”

  “Your new pistol.”

  Catfish scoffed. “I don’t stow that in my trial box.”

  He took off his coat, revealing the pistol snug in his shoulder holster.

  Harley’s eyes dropped. “Wasn’t it in the box during the trial?”

  “Of course not. Why on earth would you think such a thing?”

  Harley reddened. “No reason—I mean, I must’ve thought you did. Maybe something Miss Peach said. But I also noticed you holding that minié ball during the trial. Wasn’t that in your trial box?”

  “Sure, although it had no business there. Took it and my saber home to the Growlery, where they should’ve been all along.”

  They both sipped their whiskys.

  Catfish pulled off the shoulder holster and placed it under the table.

  “Speaking of Miss Peach,” he said, “did you get her off to Eulogy?”

  Harley nodded. “She was grateful for the time off you gave her.”

  “She deserves it.”

  “I told her that. We couldn’t have done it without her.�
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  Catfish settled back in his chair, then lofted smiling eyes at his son. “Awful sweet girl.”

  Harley flushed again.

  Catfish persisted. Sometimes a young man needed a nudge. “Apparently doesn’t have a beau.”

  Harley shifted in his chair. “She’s our employee.”

  “She’s more than that.”

  “Regardless, she and I,” he said, gulping the whisky, “we were talking about that bullet you took to trial. Will you tell me about it?”

  Catfish raised an eyebrow. He didn’t already know?

  He leaned out to catch the proprietor’s attention as he passed by. “Mr. Kophal, I like that new Scotch whisky.”

  He squinted to read the label.

  “Strathisla, 1888,” Kophal said. It didn’t come easily to his Germanic tongue.

  Catfish winked. “Another, please.”

  Harley leaned forward. “You were going to tell me about the bullet?”

  “We were on a raid behind enemy lines in Kentucky, and I was in a dire situation. My horse got shot out from under me. The regiment retreated, and I was all alone in the middle of a crossroads, hunkered down behind my horse. That bullet hit my carbine, not six inches from my head. I dug it out of the carbine stock later and kept it as a reminder of what Henry did next.”

  Harley’s face was tight. “What?”

  “He galloped back and rescued me. Took one in the leg himself when he did.”

  “I didn’t know.”

  Henry, too, must have thought of that day whenever he limped while others walked. Because of their friendship. “My loyalty to Henry blinded me, just like you said. Just couldn’t accept that any boy of Henry’s might be guilty.” He rocked back in his chair and smiled. “You’re a fine lawyer. I’m proud of the way you took over for me when I was out of my mind.”

  Harley smiled back. “Proud of you, too.”

  “I should have trusted your judgment more. You saw through Cicero right away and knew exactly how we should represent him, long before I did.” Had he only listened.

  Harley tilted his head. “I may have jumped to the right conclusion, but it was without any tangible basis. I didn’t even know the truth about Peter or his father at that point. I believed them. I should have had the patience to make sure of my theories before I pushed them.”

  “Calloway & Calloway,” Catfish said. “There’s a reason it’s a partnership.”

  Harley nodded. Then his expression changed. “Papa, you didn’t cause Houston’s death. You know that, don’t you?”

  Catfish looked down at his drink.

  “I’ve wanted to talk about this before,” Harley continued, “but the time never seemed right.”

  “I expect we couldn’t do it till now. I was wrong about Cicero … Maybe I was wrong about Houston, too.”

  “So you think he was guilty?”

  For so long, Catfish had fretted over what happened to Houston, bouncing from anger to guilt to hopelessness and back again. Never doubted Houston’s story, though. Maybe should have. A lawyer who wasn’t so close to him probably would have. Probably should have. He’d simply accepted Houston’s story because he loved him.

  Harley looked so much like Houston. He couldn’t protect either of them from life’s perils. All he could do was trust them.

  He wiped a tear.

  It was a fine day to lay the past to rest and get on with living. He’d borne the weight of Houston’s death long enough. Sometimes it’s easier to forgive others than yourself. Too late to change the past, but other clients still needed him, and he felt the fire in his belly for the first time in a very long time.

  He sipped the Strathisla. The water of life tasted sweet again.

  It was such a fine day.

  “Papa?”

  “You know, son, maybe Brann has the last word for Houston, too. Did you read his piece in the San Antonio paper?”

  Harley shook his head.

  Catfish shoved the folded newspaper across the table. “Last page.”

  He sat back and nursed his cigar as he watched Harley read to himself by the light of the lamp.

  Thus ended the case of THE SPORTING HOUSE KILLING. Cicero Sweet was bound for the state penitentiary in Huntsville to serve his time. Thanks to Catfish Calloway, he cheated the hangman. Audi alteram partem. One side shouted TRUTH, the other MERCY, but God demanded both. “Mercy and truth shall go before thy face.”

  But what is the truth about Cicero Sweet and Georgia Virginia Gamble?

  Truth and only truth is eternal. It was not born, and it cannot die. It may be obscured by the clouds of falsehood, or buried in the debris of brutish ignorance, but it can never be destroyed. It’s all that is, or was, or can ever be. It exists in every atom, lives in every flower, and flames in every star. When the heavens and the earth shall pass away and the universe returns to its cosmic dust, divine truth will stand unscathed amid the crash of matter and the wreck of worlds.

  Falsehood is an amorphous monster, conceived in the brain of knaves and brought forth by the breath of fools. It’s a moral pestilence, a miasmic vapor that passes like a blast from Hell over the face of the world. It may leave death in its wake and disaster dire. It may place on the brow of purity the brand of the courtesan and cover the hero with the stigma of the coward. It may degrade the patriot and exalt the demagogue, enslave a Horatio and crown a Humbug. It may cause blood to flow and hearts to break. It may pollute the altar and disgrace the home, corrupt the courts and curse the land, but the lie cannot live forever.

  But what of us who cannot wait until the lie is dead and damned, who must move forward in its backwash? For us, there is only one truth which matters. It is the truth declared by twelve citizens, good and true, for it is their truth which dictates the further progress of human affairs. We must accept that truth and go about our lives accordingly; otherwise, there is no peace.

  For the slayer and the slain, only divine truth matters. Whether it is known or unknown to the rest of mankind is of little consequence.

  —William Cowper Brann

  The San Antonio Express

  July 8, 1894

  Author’s Notes

  Some may doubt whether Catfish Calloway ever existed, since there’s no mention of him in historical records. Likewise, some may dismiss other characters as pure fiction for the same reason: Harley and Miss Peach; Cicero Sweet and his father; Jasper Cantrell and Bootblack Ben; Miss Jessie, Miss Sadie, and Big Joe; Sterling and Peter DeGroote; Cooter Shaughnessy and Thaddeus Schoolcraft.

  None may doubt, however, that Judge Levi Goodrich presided over the Nineteenth District Court in 1894, that Tom Black was the County Attorney, that Warwick Jenkins was the county judge or that he and his brother, Cicero Jenkins, were both veterans of Terry’s Texas Rangers in the Civil War.

  The historical record proves without doubt that Champe McCulloch was the mayor of Waco; that Bud Orman was convicted twice of killing Bud Houghston; and that Bob Lazenby owned the company that made Dr. Pepper famous. No student of late 19th century America would doubt that William Cowper Brann penned eloquent essays exposing human weakness and became quite well known for it across America, his circulation mounting to 100,000 before publication ceased. Indeed, his concluding commentary about truth chronicled in the last chapter may be found—mostly verbatim—among the pages of The Iconoclast.

  Likewise, none may question the existence of the places inhabited by Catfish and his contemporaries. Sanborn insurance maps, photographs, and extant newspapers remove all doubt about those places. While the wonderful, noisy old McLennan County Courthouse at Second and Franklin designed by Wesley Dodson was torn down long ago, as was the city hall, the historic suspension bridge still spans the Brazos River. Bronze longhorns now scramble toward it, reminding us of Harley’s reminiscence of Chisolm Trail herds crossing that bridge when he was a boy. Catfish’s home remains intact on Washington Avenue, though title records for some reason don’t reflect his ownership. Also standing today are Harley
’s boarding house, Wade Morrison’s home, and Mayor McCulloch’s home. A terrible tornado devastated downtown Waco in 1953 and took Sam Kee’s Chinese Restaurant and Bismarck’s Saloon, as well as many other places well-known to Catfish, though photos of them remain. Photographic evidence also confirms the existence of the Law Offices of Calloway & Calloway, though the name on the door isn’t quite visible. Photographs show the famous Old Corner Drug Store, operated by Wade Morrison, where a pharmacist named Charles Alderton invented Dr. Pepper, and soda jerks sold eager customers a “Waco.”

  The Reservation, on both sides of Barron’s Creek, operated as only one of two such legal districts in the entire country until just before America entered World War I, when the city decided it wanted the 45,000 soldiers of the proposed Camp Macarthur more than it wanted the whores. The madams of the Reservation believed both would get along nicely side-by-side, but Uncle Sam insisted otherwise. Women like Miss Josie Bennet and Miss Ada Davenport had plied their trade in the Reservation for almost twenty years. All that remains today are a few grand old oak trees which stood silent witness to what transpired in Satan’s stronghold.

  What about Miss Jessie’s sporting house? The historical record confirms that Miss Josie Bennet operated her sporting house, a three story brick structure, at the corner of Washington and Orman’s Alley until it burned in 1893, just as Harley discovered. While it was rebuilt and served as a female boarding house thereafter, Miss Jessie Rose’s name is missing from any record of its operation. Curiously, the Bawdy House Register for 1894, now in the archives of the Texas Collection at Baylor University, fails to record her thriving business. Photographs taken in the early 1900’s provide conclusive proof to doubting readers that such a place as Miss Jessie’s existed.

  The Waco Evening News of April 16, 1894 proves that Georgia evangelist Sam Jones preached a powerful sermon to the five-thousand in attendance at the Tabernacle and uttered most of the words attributed to him by Catfish and Brann, including these: “If you can block off a place, call it a Reservation, and license licentiousness, why don’t you reserve a few blocks where a man can commit murder and go unpunished?”