Robert Parker - Gunman's Rhapsody

“Are my legs out straight?” Morgan said softly.

“Yes.”

No one said anything else. Allie and Bessie cried softly.

And Morgan died.

CHRONICLE

FOR VIOLATING THE NEUTRALITY LAWS

Philadelphia, October 26-

Captain A. C. Rand and Mate, Thomas Pender, of the steamer Tropic, who were convicted in the United States

District Court of violating the neutrality laws by furnishing arms and ammunition to insurgents in Haiti, were today sentenced by Judge Butler to one year’s imprisonment each and to pay a fine of $500 and the cost of the prosecution.

HALLER ONE OF QUANTRELL’S BORDER HEROES

Denver , Oct. 26-

The killing of his wife, Alice Haller, by Johnston Haller, and the wounding of the man Morris, who had won the affections of Alice, has brought to light a story which began in a border romance and has ended in disgrace to two and sorrow to a third. Haller was a member of the Quantrell crowd, and a knight of the road when Jesse and Frank James were looked upon with a sort of mock heroism. He was a fearless devil, and in the saddle he was handsome as Murat. He was in some of the bloodiest engagements that blighted the West. He went with Quantrell, when that daring horseman swooped down upon Lawrence, Kan. and left the bloodstains of its best people on the blackened ruins of their homes. He was also a trusted courier of the James boys…

A LEGACY FOR A COLORED WOMAN

New York , October 26-

The following letter was received at police headquarters today, dated Powhatan, VA, October 23, 1883: “A colored woman named Flora Baker left Richmond some years ago to seek employment as a domestic servant. She had a couple of children whom she took with her. She is probably in New York City, or in Brooklyn. A legacy has been left by her old master, W. W. Wooldridge, and if you can find her, I will compensate you handsomely.” It is signed W. Pope Dubary.

CARRIED AWAY BY ANGELS

Baltimore , October 26-

Mrs. David Moses, the fat bride weighing 517 pounds, on exhibition here, and recently married in New York, was found dead in bed this morning. She had been in it for two weeks, and not been on exhibition since last Tuesday. She was born in Detroit in 1866 and had been before the public for about a year. She had gained sixty-seven pounds in the past seven months. She was to have appeared in Philadelphia next Monday at a museum whose curiosity hall is in the fourth story of the building. As she could not walk up three flights, the manager was putting up a derrick for purposes of hoisting her.

BASE BALL GROUNDS,

Friday Oct. 27th

Bostons vs. Dr. Pope’s Picked Nine.

GLOBE THEATER-EXTRA

Mr. Jon Stetson has the honor to announce the engagement of Mr. Edwin Booth under the management of Messrs. Brooks & Dickson, commencing Monday, Nov. 5 in the following repertoire.

Monday and Tuesday, Nov. 5 and 6- RICHELIEU . Wednesday, Nov. 7 -MACBETH. Thursday and Friday, Nov. 8 and 9- KING LEAR. Saturday Matinee, Nov. 10- RICHELIEU.

The young man void of understanding may be depended upon to fall into the ditch of debauchery without much pushing, and the gilded youth will seek out white sepulchers without other urging than their own fondness for folly, but the stranger must be enticed into the snares of the strange woman by cunning wiles. Not long ago Lillie DeLacy found it advisable to move out of a street at the South End, where the neighbors objected to her nocturnal festivities, and open a new establishment on Eliot St. In order to get the place upon a paying basis she sent cards through the mails to such persons who seemed most likely to accept invitations to call upon a strange woman, but these cards did not all fall into the hands of strangers from the country. The police got hold of some of them and detectives called at the house to investigate. The result was Lillie’s arraignment in court for keeping a house of ill-fame, but as the only evidence was her own admission to the detectives, which was not legally sufficient, she was discharged. It is very wrong in Lillie to carry on such a business, without doubt, but there are grounds for suspecting that several other persons in this city are engaged in similar pursuits and are never interfered with by virtuous administrators of the law.

A half hour after Morgan Earp died, Doc Holliday, in a black hat and no slicker, with half a quart of whiskey in him, and the bottle in his left hand, started to look for Johnny Behan.

“It was him killed Morgan, him and Will McLaury,” Doc said. “I don’t know they pulled the trigger, but they done it, either way.”

With the rain coming hard and the wind pushing at him, he walked up Allen Street armed with a Colt.45 on his hip and a Smith & Wesson hammerless.32 in a shoulder rig. Every door he came to he opened. If a door was locked he would kick it in, and curse the people whom he often rousted out of bed. In the saloons even the nastiest or drunkest of the patrons had nothing to say to him. His eyes were bottomless, his face was ashen. His clothing was soaked and his face was wet. Occasionally he stopped to pull at the whiskey bottle. When it was empty he threw it against the side of a saloon and watched it shatter. Then he went into the gaslight and reeking stove heat and took a nearly full bottle off the bar and drank some and scanned the room.

“Johnny Behan,” he shouted. “Behan, you back-shooting son of a bitch.”

Behan was not in the room. No one said anything. Doc rushed out, his Colt hanging loosely in his right hand, his left with a new bottle of whiskey. He didn’t pay for the whiskey. No one asked him to. He continued up Allen past Sixth Street and started kicking in doors in the cribs where the whores were. Behan wasn’t there. Neither was Will McLaury. Doc turned toward Toughnut Street where the miners lived. Again he banged on doors and pushed in past whoever answered. All night he rambled through Tombstone in the harsh rain with his gun in his hand, drinking, looking for Behan. Near dawn he stood in the middle of Fremont Street in front of the San Jose Rooming House and turned his face up to the downpour and screamed, “Behan,” at the black sky. Then he stumbled back down Fremont to Fourth Street and up Fourth into the face of the storm toward the Cosmopolitan Hotel. In the lobby he tossed the partly drunk whiskey bottle onto the lobby floor. The remaining whiskey spilled silently onto the carpet as Doc climbed the stairs to his room and went in and fell facedown on his bed, where he lay motionless, the Colt in his hand, his clothes soaked with rainwater, and cried.

It was morning. The early sun shone straight down Allen Street. In Hafford’s, Virgil and Wyatt were drinking coffee. Wyatt had some paper and a short pencil.

“It’s Stilwell,” Virgil said. “Everybody in town knows it was him. It was pretty surely him I saw heading toward the waterworks the night they shot me.”

Wyatt wrote down Stilwell’s name.

“Which means it was Behan,” Wyatt said.

“Stilwell’s his deputy.”