Joseph West - The Man From Nowhere - A Ralph Compton Novel

Baxter was speaking again. “In reply to the gentleman’s question, the low persons who have been brought before us here will not be hung.” He paused for effect, then said, “Let all present bear witness to the decisions of the Honorable Company of Concerned Citizens of Alma. For the more respectable element here gathered who may not know these people, each of the accused will be brought before you as his or her name is read.”

Baxter consulted his paper.

“Edward Oates, laborer—”

“Drunk, you mean!” a man yelled.

The banker waited until the laughter had stilled, then continued. “Edward Oates, laborer, vagrant and dance hall lounger. Sentence: banishment.”

Oates was pushed back to the gallows platform. Then Sam and the women were dragged out one by one.

“Samuel Tatum, orphan and simple boy—banishment.

“Stella Spinner, known as High Timber, fancy woman—banishment.

“Lorraine Sullivan, fancy woman—banishment.

“Nellie Carney, known as Cottontail, fancy woman—banishment.”

Baxter stepped to the edge of the gallows platform. Behind him the bodies of the three Hart brothers stirred in a rising wind. To the northeast, above the cone-shaped peak of Round Mountain, dark clouds were gathering, threatening rain.

“Sentence to be carried out immediately,” he said.

Chapter 3

“Mr. Baxter, if you will, just a moment.”

The banker hesitated on the steps, then recognized the man who had just spoken. “Oh, it’s you, Reverend Claghorn,” he said with a noticeable lack of enthusiasm.

“If I could just say a word?”

Baxter hesitated, then nodded. “All right, say what you have to say.”

Claghorn was a thin, bent man with a gray beard that fell in sparse strands to the waistband of his pants. He mounted the steps and spread his arms to the crowd.

“My dear friends, the poor souls you see before you, a drunk, three scarlet women and a simple boy, will soon be gone from our midst. They have neither reaped nor sown, and thus we who have done so can no longer give them bread.”

“You tell ’em, preacher,” a man yelled. He turned to the others around him. “We’re gonna miss them scarlet women though—eh, boys?”

“Then why don’t you take them home an’ feed ’em, Lou?” a miner asked loudly.

“Because my old lady won’t let me,” Lou answered, a response that brought ribald laughter from men and disapproving looks from the women present.

“Please, please, good people,” Claghorn called out, “before we cast them out, even as Adam and Eve were cast from the Garden of Eden, let us bow our heads in prayer and ask that these unfortunates may travel their lonely road in peace.”

Perhaps fearing that his invitation might be turned down, Claghorn immediately clutched his Bible to his chest and stared up at the threatening sky.

“Oh Lord, protect your five wayward children from the perils of the trail, outlaws, savage Apaches and wild animals. And may they not starve but find grub in the wilderness, even as you fed manna to the Israelites as they wandered in the desert.

“And Lord, most of all, we ask that the nigger cavalry from Fort Bayard will arrive soon and free our fair city from the Apache yoke.”

There was a scattering of “Amens” and, emboldened, Claghorn began to sing in a weak, quavering tenor.

There is a land that is fairer than day,

And by faith we can see it afar;

For the Father waits over the way

To prepare us a dwelling place there.

In the sweet by and by,

We shall meet on that beautiful shore;

In the sweet by and by,

We shall meet on that beautiful shore .

Baxter cut the hymn short. “Yes, thank you, Reverend,” he said, clapping his hands. “Now, you Company members, get them damned parasites out of our town.”

Eddie Oates had watched all this with eyes of glass, a disinterested man attending a boring play. He made no protest when he was pushed away from the gallows with the others, as limp and unresisting as a rag doll.

The three women had stuffed what few possessions they could find into carpetbags and had obviously dressed hurriedly before they were bundled out of their tiny cribs in the Silver Nugget.

Lorraine Sullivan, a dark-haired woman, the wear and tear of eleven years of frontier prostitution showing on her, wore only her shift and a ragged plaid mackinaw.

Like Oates, Sam Tatum carried nothing.

As they were prodded at rifle point in the direction of the town limits, Stella Spinner lashed out with her bag at the bearded man who was pushing her roughly between the shoulder blades. Her face, free of paint, was pale and tired, but her mouth twisted in fury as she rounded on the people crowded close to her.

“You sons of bitches,” she screamed, “you’re killing us. You know we’ll die out there.”

“Shut up, Stella,” the bearded man said. “Take your medicine quiet, like the rest.”

“We have as much right to live as any of you, and maybe more,” Stella yelled. “We won’t last a day with the Apaches surrounding the town.”

A respectable young matron dressed in rustling, rust-colored silk pushed forward. “We won’t waste food on whores,” she snapped, her mouth as hard and mean as the clasp of a steel purse. “Now . . . just . . . leave.”

Stella’s eyes flared. “Bitch!” She jumped on the woman and they tumbled to the ground in a flurry of white petticoats and popping buttons.

“Get her off me!” the woman cried as she tried to fight off Stella’s raking nails.

A couple of grinning men dragged Stella to her feet and one, a miner, pushed her bag into her hands. “You go quiet now, girl,” he said. “There ain’t nothing left for you in Alma.”

“John Turley,” Lorraine yelled, “how do you expect us to go quiet? We could all be dead within hours.”

“Yeah, you could,” the miner named Turley said, grinning. “Maybe you should have thought about that afore you took up the whorin’ business, Lorraine.”

“Turley,” Lorraine said, “the other girls always told me you were a dickless son of a bitch. Now I know it for sure.”

As scornful laughter rained down on him, Turley’s face turned ugly. “Lorraine, I hope fifty Apache bucks take turns on you afore they gut you like a sow.” He motioned with the muzzle of his rifle. “Now git goin’.”

The young matron had been helped to her feet, and the women around her, angry now, yelled, “Whores!” and threw rocks and clumps of horse dung. Lorraine and Stella were hit several times. A cut opened up on Lorraine’s forehead, trickling blood, and dung matted on the hair of all three women.

After a while Cornelius Baxter put a stop to it.

“That’s enough!” he yelled, pushing through the eager crowd. “Damn it to hell, how many of you does it take to get three whores out of town?”

“Hey, Baxter!”

The banker turned toward the soft but commanding sound of the voice, as did most of the others.

Dark, handsome, Warren Rivette, the Mississippi steamboat gambler, lounged on the porch of the Silver Nugget, a Henry rifle in the crook of his left arm. The word in town was that the Cajun was trying to outrun a losing streak, but he had prospered in Alma, thanks to silver miners and the free-spending cowboys from the surrounding ranches.

Since Rivette was rumored to be good with a gun, no one had ever questioned the honesty of his poker. Nobody had tested his speed with the Colt either.

“What can I do for you, Rivette?” Baxter asked, walking toward the saloon. He was wary of the Henry. The gambler was not a man to be trifled with.

Rivette smiled. “I want to talk to Eddie Oates, if that meets your convenience.”