A Good Day To Kill (3 page)

Authors: Dusty Richards

BOOK: A Good Day To Kill

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“No.”

“Good, 'cause I was about to tell you to stick this job in your ass. I haven't challenged him, because he was in Mexico. But I have some good information that the Skeleton Canyon murders and robbery were carried off by his men. If I had a worthy witness, I'd press it.”

“I have to warn you, there will be some public complaints coming forth over these arrests.”

“Let them come. Those men we arrested were stage robbers and had raided several small ranchers to rape and rob folks.”

“Easy, easy, Chet. I came to tell you what I expected.”

“Words won't kill me.”

“Good. I'm proud of your success. I'm certain it will blow over.”

“Tell me, who is this that thinks our efforts weren't right?”

“Oh, I'd call them the idle rich in Tucson.”

“Idle rich? Feed me a few names. I'll invite them along when we make some of our arrests.”

“Oh, Iris Thompson is the lead one.”

“What do they do?”

“Rich-blooded folks.”

“I ought to bring one of these border killers to her house for supper.”

“I wanted to warn you. You have the backing of all the men that met with you in Tucson. But there are some people suggesting we're using dictator-like tactics.”

“It won't change my operation.”

“You don't have to. You just need to keep rounding up these bandits down here. I don't believe what you and your men have done here could have been done better by anyone.”

“Well, you wanted this region cleared of border bandits.”

“Yes, and you're doing a great job, but we'll get some buckshot out of a few.”

“My men won't stop pressing to get these outlaws.”

He was still upset when Blevins left to go check on the prisoners. He'd told Chet he planned to remove all of them to Tucson. His faith in Behan and him keeping the cells locked was about the same as Chet's.

When the Tucson newspaper's latest edition reached him that afternoon, he saw what Blevins had warned him about:

Citizens are concerned that the federal law enforcement agency in southern Arizona is taking a dictator role in enforcing their own laws. A recent arrest of some area ranchers ended with four unprosecuted individuals being shot down ruthlessly by the Task Force. One was Israel Clanton, the son of a prominent Arizona ranch family. According to his parents, their son was a hard-working ranch manager. His body was delivered belly-down over a saddle, like a common outlaw, to the Cochise County Courthouse.

According to the representative of Wells Fargo Bank, these men had held up stagecoaches, and some turned state evidence to testify against the others. However, there is not a list of the names of the men who served in the posse. Are they real lawmen? How would anyone know? Their names are hidden. There is a petition being served to have a grand jury formed to learn all about them and discover any illegal methods they implemented in arresting all these untried individuals like they were common criminals.

He put the paper down with a snap.

“What's upset you so?” his wife asked, stepping out on the porch to join him.

“People who are questioning our efforts.”

“How?” She frowned and picked up the paper to read.

Jenn joined them. “What's going on out here?”

“Read this.” Marge shoved the newspaper at her.

“Well, ain't that sweet? A handful of men are out there doing what a half-dozen sheriffs can't start to do, and they complain.”

“Let's go home tomorrow, and I can sulk up there,” Chet said.

Jenn bent over his chair and squeezed his head with her arm. “I want to stop in Tucson and tell that editor what I think of him for printing such trash.”

He shook his head, amused.

“Is Jesus coming back?” Marge asked.

“Yes.”

“The stage to Tucson leaves at ten,” she said, and looked at him and Jenn.

He rose out of the chair. “Let's plan to be on it.”

The two women nodded in unison.

It was set. They were going back home.

C
HAPTER
3

One more long rocking stage ride ahead of him and his still sore shoulder.

In Tucson, Chet faced the gold lettering on the coach door,
ARIZONA TERRITORY STAGE LINE
. The lanky driver opened the door and helped his ladies into the coach. His drawling voice flirted with them and they came right back.

“Well, do you think we can get those ladies to Hayden's Mill?” he asked Chet when it was his turn to climb in the coach.

“We better.”

He lowered his voice. “You ain't turned LDS on me, have yuh?”

“No. One of the ladies is a friend of ours.”

The driver swiped his forehead like he was mopping sweat away. “You sure had me worried.”

Chet climbed in, laughing about the driver's referral to Latter Day Saints.

“What's so funny?” Marge asked.

“He thought I'd changed religion on him and both of you were my wives.”

Then they did laugh as the coach rocked out of Tucson. The trip was uneventful, and later they shifted to the Black Canyon Stage lines and headed across the Salt River at Hayden's Ferry. Marge had wired Monica when they'd arrive home and sent a request for Jimenez and another buckboard to take Jenn home.

It was dark and cool. His wife snuggled under his arm and he hugged her close as the rocking coach rolled northward. “You making it okay?”

“Oh, yes.” She stretched her arms up. “I'm glad I went. I know you're worried about me and the baby, but I'd have been crazy at home.”

“I worried you'd get too tired.”

“I'm not some baby, am I, Jenn?”

“No, he knows that now, too.” Jenn laughed. “I wonder how bad my business has fallen off with those two in charge?”

“Oh, I bet it went well. When is Dodge coming to Preskitt?” he asked.

“In a few weeks. I doubt anything happens between us. But I like him.”

“I'm not so sure about that,” Marge said. “I mean about nothing happening between you two.”

“We'll see.”

He agreed. His plans included sleeping for twenty-four hours in his own bed. His men in southern Arizona would have to tough it out a few weeks without him. He'd seen his land lawyer, Russell Craft, when they stopped off in Tucson. Russell was convinced Buster Weeks's so-called deed to the Diablo Ranch headquarters was an absolute fake document. He was to be in touch with him.

Late in the night, the turpentine aroma of pines finally reached his nose. It sure smelled damn good to be back home.

By that evening, his Camp Verde Ranch foreman, Tom and his wife, Millie; his sister Susie and Sarge; and Hampt and May and the kids were at the ranch house. A fine reunion that Monica had planned well for and no doubt spent all day fixing food to serve them.

Things at the get-together went smooth. Everyone was satisfied he was going to be fine and talked about their own ranch operations to him. Sarge felt the Navajo Agency people appreciated all their efforts to make the beef deliveries on time at the various locations.

“Getting six hundred head split up to five locations is not easy,” Sarge said to him, “but I have some great hands. We can split up and do it. We even did it twice last winter, in the snow.”

“Indeed, they did. Marge said that the government keeps redeeming that script they pay us for them, so we're on the move.”

“Good,” Sarge said. “That crew is busy building our house up on the Windmill. They have it framed and they work hard.”

“I can't wait,” Susie said, hanging on his arm. Those two were expecting, also.

The purchase of the ranch about a third of the way to the Navajo destination had been a big help in assembling those cattle and then driving them on from there. The income from the beef contract made his whole operation work, and would let them expand when he found the right places to do that.

Tom ran the big ranch down on the Verde River that Chet bought to replace their family's Texas operations. All he lacked there that evening was his nephew Reg and Reg's wife, Lucie. It was a long ways from their new ranch up on the Mogollon Rim, plus she was expecting, too. The long ride would have been too much for her.

Hampt and Tom continued to talk to him about their operations. Hampt had planted forty new acres of alfalfa with barley for a nurse crop.

The big guy talked about the seeding process like it was his baby. For a tough cowboy, he talked about the field like it was the child in his wife, May's, belly. “I've been watching it emerge, like hatching chickens coming out of the shell.”

“Well, we're with you,” Chet said, to be as serious as his man. “A good stand would sure be great.”

Hampt agreed. “Tom plants things and they all come up. But me and the boys sure want this to work, too. The hay ground fencing is about done. Tom can start fencing down there. John and them boys at our blacksmith shop have become experts at making our own barbwire.”

“They sure have,” Tom said. “Hampt said he hasn't had a head of stock get in his hay field.”

“It sure must work,” Chet agreed.

His foreman, Tom, had bought twenty Hereford bulls at Hayden Ferry and they were going to be delivered in thirty days. They decided to ship them by freight wagons to Preskitt. He didn't want them gimpy on their feet when they got up there.

“Reg will sure need some bulls up on the Rim,” he reminded the two of them.

Tom nodded. “They're tough to find and expensive. We'd sure need to freight them up there, too. But I have feelers out all over.”

“I don't want Reg to think he's our stepchild.” He looked at them with concern.

Both men nodded.

“I guess finding enough draft horses and bulls is my toughest job,” Tom said with a small smile.

“We have the horses, right?”

“Not too many, but we're almost there. I wouldn't pass up buying a few more teams, if they were good.”

“Is Rose bringing more from California?”

“He says when he gets enough together he'll be back.” Rose was the dealer who brought them horses from California to Arizona. A dependable source, but even he had problems gathering enough to make a drive that long worthwhile.

Chet understood. In the years ahead, upgrading his cowherds would be an uphill fight. He might need to save some selected half-breed bulls to supplement his program until they could get more Herefords. His plan was to talk it over with all three of his ranch managers before he tried that.

They finally excused him and Marge to go to bed. He thanked them all and climbed the steps. It had been a long trip, and they fell asleep in each other arms. In the middle of the night, the cry of a baby woke him. He bolted upright in bed and tried to clear his mind.

“What's wrong?” Marge asked, waking up herself.

“Oh, I must have been dreaming. I kept hearing a baby crying.”

“Not here yet.” She laughed, amused. “Ours is still under cover.”

He shook his head. “Good.”

They went back to sleep.

A boy delivered a telegram the next day.

JESUS IS RETURNING TO PRESKITT TO BE WITH YOU. WE ALL VOTED FOR THIS TO BE SURE YOU HAD AT LEAST ONE OF US WITH YOU. ROAMER.

“What is it?” his wife asked.

“My men voted to send Jesus up here to be with me.”

“We talked about that before we left. You told us and them that you'd be house bound for a while.” She snickered. “Those men of yours didn't believe that, did they?”

“I guess not.”

“Your men care about you. Having Jesus here will be a good thing.”

“I suppose.” He peered out a nearby window. “Looks like rain. That should make Momma Hampt happy.”

“He's mothering that new alfalfa, isn't he?”

“He's set on it making a stand.”

“I can't imagine, in the length of time we've been home, how no one has come by needing your help.”

“I guess they don't know I'm home.”

“Probablyâthat's saved you.” She kissed the side of his face. “I wasn't egging them on, either.”

Later on, his Preskitt Valley Ranch foreman, Raphael, stopped by for a visit. The Preskitt Valley Ranch was his wife's home place that her father recently signed over to them. Raphael was an older Mexican and his hands were all
vaqueros
and top men. Some were married, but he'd seen them in action when a hired gun tried to assassinate him at the house. They spread out from the ranch and treed the gang within twelve hours.

When he told Raphael that Tom had found five purebred Hereford bulls to replace some of the older ones, he was very pleased. The man was also proud to be the foreman on the home ranch and took his job seriously.

“I wish I'd been there when he shot you,” Raphael said.

“It all happened so fast. I was shot and he was, too. He never got away.”

“I just hated it when I heard.”

“Just a small incident in my life. If I buy a ranch in southern Arizona, I may need you to move some women and children off of it. They were abandoned down there by their men. If we didn't feed them, they'd starve. Jesus thinks they're backwards Indians.”

“That sounds bad.”

“Sorry, but I don't have control of it yet,” said Chet.

“You ever need me, you send word and I will be glad to come help you.”

“I'll do that. I'll send you word how to find me.”

“I am so glad you are getting over that wound. We all prayed for you. We are all one family here.”

“Amen. Tell everyone I will be up and running in a short while.”

“Don't rush it.” Raphael rose and shook his hand. He replaced his wide-brimmed
sombrero
and adjusted the chin string. “
Vaya con Dios, mi amigo
.”

When Chet walked him out on the porch, he studied the blue sky and moving clouds, grateful he'd come back to the mountains and the cooler environment. His brain had cleared more and more. There were things that happened from the shooting incident that he'd never recover from, but he didn't need them, either.

A boy brought him a telegram later on. It was from his lawyer in Tucson.

THERE WILL BE A GRAND JURY CALLED TO LOOK AT THE LAND CLAIMED BY BUSTER AND WHO IT MIGHT HAVE BEEN THAT FILED THE FICTITIOUS LAND PAPERS IN THE PIMA COUNTY BOOKS. WE CAN'T PROVE HE WAS THE PARTY INVOLVED UNLESS THE GRAND JURY FINDS SOMETHING. BUT I AM SURE THE JUDGE WILL ORDER HIM AND HIS OPERATION OFF YOUR RANCH. THIS WOULD EXPOSE HIM TO CIVIL ACTION THAT CAN BE TAKEN BY YOU. I WILL KEEP YOU INFORMED. RUSSELL CRAFT, ATTORNEY AT LAW

“What did you get?” Marge asked.

“My lawyer says they're forming a grand jury to find out who filed that original deed. It was a false one.”

“He suspected they would do that, didn't he, when we were there?” she asked.

“Yes. Now authorities are trying to trace it.”

“Did this Buster figure, since the landowner was in California, that he could get by with doing that?”

“I think so. But proving who did it will be much harder.”

He kissed her and then looked down at her belly. “We any closer?”

“Hey, this in
numero
one for me. I'm ready for it to get here.”

He hugged her, large belly and all.

“I have no idea how this will work. Aside from May, none of us has any experience at this. She's been delightful to explain things to me. I think I'll be the first to give birth and she has a midwife who can deliver it. Besides that, she will also be here to get me through the whole thing. Doc Norman said it looked positioned well to him. He said if there was any problems, he'd come out.”

“I need to go see Tanner tomorrow. I'll have Raphael send two
vaqueros
along. Or should I wait till Jesus arrives?”

“Either way will work. You decide.”

“I'll do that. Have you needed to dip into any of that government cattle money we've been getting to use for payroll?”

“Not yet. I told Susie and Tom that one day we'd need to transfer some of it to the real ranch account. So far, we haven't used any from the Navajo operation.”

“What were they making money on? What's paying us?”

“The mill lumber haul has really been busy this year. Tom sold some cull cows down at Fort McDonald and they cashed that contract in thirty days. We did combine that with the ranch funds.”

“Fine. Maybe I need him to collect up at Gallup.”

She shook her head. “They were on a different pay cycle. I'll tell Raphael to have two men ride with you in the morning.”

“Fine.”

In a short while, they went to bed. He fell into an easy sleep, then woke up sharply. What was wrong? He slid his Colt out of the holster and it filled his fist. Then, barefooted, with the silver starlight shining through the window, he carefully walked across the smooth polished hardwood floors to check on what had awoken him. Sounded to him like someone running across the porch.

Then he heard more fast boot heels running across the porch for the east side.

“Alto, hombre
.” The command came from one of his
vaqueros
outside.

Then gunshots, more gunshots, and a few horses ran off in the night.

“Saddle and ride. I want those
bastardos
,” A guard's voice rang out.

“You alright, Chet?” Marge, wrapped in a housecoat, asked from the top of the stairs.

“Go back to bed. I'm fine. You, too, Monica. Our night guards stopped them.”