A Reason to Die Read online

  “Leave him alone, Blanche,” Lucy scolded, noticing a slight blush creeping up from Perley’s collar. “He’s got his reasons. You keep pickin’ at him and we’ll be back tryin’ to find Dodge City on our own again.”

  “I reckon I’d best go see to the horses if we’re gonna get started anytime soon,” Perley declared and got to his feet, ignoring the broad grin on Blanche’s face.

  Since they would make Dodge that afternoon, regardless of the time they started, he left it up to them to decide if they wanted to eat breakfast before starting or wait till they stopped to rest the horses. He was not surprised when they chose to eat first, so it was close to seven o’clock before they were all packed up and ready to roll.

  Although he deemed it necessary to make a stop short of Dodge to keep the horses pulling the wagon fresh, they rolled into the town in the middle of the afternoon, just as he had promised. They were stopped almost immediately by a man wearing a badge as they passed the railroad station. Perley wasn’t surprised. A wagon carrying four rather rough-looking women would catch the eye of a lawman.

  “Afternoon,” the lawman offered as he signaled Dolly to rein her horses to a halt. He waited then for Perley to dismount. “Where are you folks headed?”

  He directed the question at Perley, but Blanche answered his question. “Nowhere. If this is Dodge City, we ain’t goin’ nowhere. We’re here.” She looked at Dolly beside her and they exchanged grins.

  “New in town, huh?” He again addressed Perley. “There’s some rules you need to know before you think about staying in this town, and if you don’t obey ’em, I or one of my deputies will lock you up. Now, to start with, you’re already looking at a jail cell for those weapons you’re carrying.” When Perley looked genuinely surprised, the lawman continued. “Since you say you’re new in town, I’m gonna give you the benefit of the doubt. But if you’re plannin’ on staying here, you need to know there’s a deadline that runs north of the railroad yards on Front Street. You are not allowed to wear or carry firearms north of that line. That’s the commercial district, and I won’t stand for any violence in that section.” He glanced briefly at the four women staring at him. “There’s plenty of saloons and brothels in the red-light district south of the deadline. I expect that’s what you’re looking for.”

  “And just who might you be?” Blanche enquired. “You the head of the welcomin’ committee?”

  “I’m Wyatt Earp, Chief Deputy Marshal,” he said.

  “Earp, huh?” Blanche grinned at Perley. “And you thought you had a funny name.”

  Perley quickly jumped in before she made any more smart remarks. “She don’t mean no sass, Deputy, and I sure don’t wanna break any rules.”

  Earp was in no mood for lip from a whore. He pointed toward a saloon south of the deadline. “Take your ladies down that way and stay out of trouble or I’ll let you get acquainted with my jail. You obey my rules, and you’ll get along just fine.”

  “I’ll not trouble you a’tall, Deputy,” Perley said. “I’ll turn right around and head for Texas. I just led these women to Dodge. They were lost, so I brought ’em here. I’m sure they won’t break any rules. They’re just workin’ ladies, tryin’ to get ahead.” He turned toward the wagon and said, “Good luck to you ladies. I hope you find what you’re lookin’ for. And you’d best behave yourselves. I believe this man means business.”

  “I’m gonna miss you, Perley,” Lucy said. “I kinda liked havin’ you around.”

  “I’m gonna miss you, too,” Perley responded. “I’d stick around to see how you ladies end up, but I expect the folks back home in Texas need my help. So take care of yourself and don’t give the marshal here no trouble.”

  “It’ll be hard to keep Blanche in line, but I’ll try,” Lucy said, then remembered. “What about your two horses? You have to wait till we get them unhitched.”

  “I’m gonna let you keep those two horses,” Perley said. “Maybe you can sell ’em. You’re gonna need a little startin’-up money.” They had belonged to Billy Tuttle, anyway, and he was quite content to see the last of anything to remind him of Billy Tuttle.

  They all said good-bye and thank you, and while Earp watched, Perley wheeled Buck and the packhorses and headed south at a lope, anxious to leave Dodge City behind.

  “What’s his name?” Earp asked.

  “Perley Gates,” Lucy answered, “and he’s the best man I’ve ever met.”

  “Perley Gates,” Earp repeated. “Funny name.” He turned and pointed toward the red-light district.

  With no need for further directions, Dolly slapped the reins across the horses’ rumps and the wagon jolted off toward their side of town.

  * * *

  “Wyatt Earp,” Perley thought aloud. “Where have I heard that name?” He tried to recall, but gave it no more than a couple of minutes before he returned his thoughts to the trail ahead. He should have remembered the rules about a deadline in the town, but he didn’t. Maybe it was because he stayed with the cattle when they had stopped to rest the herd, but none of the men had mentioned it. Maybe this Earp fellow just got there.

  Perley’s chance meeting with the four prostitutes had delayed his journey at least two or three days. Maybe he should have sent another wire to Rubin when he was in Dodge City, but it hadn’t occurred to him at the time. “Oh, well,” he sighed to Buck. “We’ll get there when we get there, long as we don’t run into any more delays.”

  Buck whinnied, a response Perley thought appropriate. He had not let his horses rest before turning them around again, but the morning trip had not been that long. He figured he’d ride another ten miles before giving them a good rest. After that, he might try to put another twenty miles between himself and Dodge City. If his memory served him, he figured it to be around fifty or sixty miles from Dodge to the Oklahoma border. He’d know he was in Oklahoma when he struck the Cimarron River.

  It felt good to be riding free and clear. He had run into more trouble on his journey to and from the Black Hills than any one man could expect. With nothing on his mind but to ride to Texas, he was determined to avoid any more towns unless he had to buy more supplies. Hopefully, he’d already had his share of trouble.

  CHAPTER 9

  After camping for the night at the Cimarron River, Perley packed up, saddled Buck, and with the packhorses, left the river, heading due south. His plan was to stop at a trading post sitting in the fork created by the confluence of the Beaver River and Kiowa Creek. It was owned by a man named Malcolm Drew. Perley remembered the store when on the cattle drive up through Oklahoma Territory in the past. He hadn’t seen it on the drive just recently made that had ended with the search for his grandfather. They had driven the cattle over a little farther to the west than they normally did, but he assumed the trading post was still there.

  From the Cimarron, it was a ride of no more than twelve or fifteen miles, so he had not ridden long when he saw the trees that bordered the Beaver River. And off to his left, he spotted a faint trace of smoke snaking its way up through the trees where he expected to find the store.

  He guided Buck and the packhorses down through the trees that grew along the riverbank until stopping short when he neared the point where the creek joined the river. Immediately alert, he backed the bay gelding up to remain among the trees. The store was gone, replaced by a pile of burnt timbers, lying haphazardly around a stone fireplace and chimney. The smoke he had seen was still wafting up from some of the timbers, even though the fire had long since burnt out. Scanning up and down the river as far as he could see, he looked for signs of anyone, but saw no one. Still, he waited for a while, alert for any threat, until he decided no one was about. Then he nudged Buck, and the patient horse walked slowly down from the trees, and into the yard where Perley dismounted. Indians? he wondered. Or maybe a lightning strike? Who could say?

  As he walked around the remains of the log structure, he confirmed that the fire in most of the timbers had gone out some time before his arriv
al. I reckon Mr. Drew had some bad luck, he thought as he approached what he guessed were the living quarters. He started to move on, but suddenly stopped when something caught his eye. He took a step back to be sure what he was looking at. Behind the chimney, underneath a half-burned ridge pole, he discovered a grisly scene. Two bodies, burned beyond recognition, were trapped side by side in the partial remains of a bed.

  Mr. and Mrs. Malcolm Drew, I expect.

  It must have been a lightning strike that killed them instantly, he figured, since they had not even had time to get out of bed. And the fire had gone out before it totally consumed the bodies.

  “That’s some bad luck,” he murmured as he pulled aside a piece of fallen rafter, held it for a few seconds before dropping it again, startled by what he discovered. Pieces of burned rope still bound the bodies to the bed frame. “Damn!” he gasped involuntarily. Drew and his wife had been murdered, tied to the bed and burned to death. Perley automatically brought his rifle up, ready to fire as he looked all around him, but there was still no sign of anyone. Yet, once again, he had a feeling that he was being watched. Another quick look around told him it was his imagination.

  More attentive to any signs that could tell him more of the tragic story, he studied the tracks of horses and boot heels—enough to tell him there had been several horses, so that meant more than one assailant, no doubt with robbery as their incentive. A small barn had been left untouched and the gate to the corral was standing open.

  This was bad business. Why couldn’t they just have robbed the couple and left them alive?

  He looked again at the bodies and decided the killing was not done by Indians. Even though the hair was burned off, there were no signs of a scalping knife. Also, he saw enough boot prints to indicate white men were recently there.

  Perley felt sure the murderers who had done this evil thing were no longer anywhere around. He felt a Christian obligation to remove the bodies from the wreckage and give them a decent burial.

  Since that was going to take some time, he first unsaddled Buck and relieved the packhorses of their burdens. “It ain’t my idea of a pleasant place to camp,” he said to Buck as he pulled the saddle off, “but it’s the right thing to do.” He looked in the barn and was pleased to find a shovel, since the only tool he carried that he could dig with was his knife. “We’ll put ’em to rest up there on the bank,” he said to Buck, who responded with nothing more than a curious eye. “But not too near those big cottonwoods. No sense in havin’ to fight any big roots.”

  The spot he picked for the grave turned out to be a good choice because the ground was not overly hard. He decided on one big grave, thinking the man and his wife would want it that way. The digging was the easy part; moving the bodies out of the house was the unpleasant part of the job. When first he tried to pull one of the bodies from the house, it began to pull apart and he was afraid the legs were going to separate from the pelvis. He remembered seeing a piece of canvas in the barn, so he got that and rolled a body onto it, then dragged it to the grave site and rolled it into the grave. That worked pretty well, so he repeated the procedure on the second body. That worked well, too, except when he rolled it off the canvas, it landed facedown in the grave.

  “Damn,” he muttered.

  They were supposed to lie side by side, and there was no room for him to get down in the grave to turn the body right side up. It was obviously the wife’s body that had landed wrong. Since it was smaller than the other one, he was able to shift it around with the shovel until she was on her side, although with her back toward her husband.

  “That’ll have to do,” Perley decided. He suddenly had another feeling that he was being watched. He looked around him again, but there was no one there. “Nobody’ll know she’s got her back to him,” he said, thinking the corpses were far past caring. He spread the piece of canvas over them, then began shoveling the dirt back in, stopping once to pick up his rifle when Buck whinnied and snorted.

  But, as before, there was no sign of anyone, so he continued until he finished filling the grave.

  Ordinarily, he might have decided to cook himself some breakfast before he got his horses ready to travel again, but after having dealt with the two burned bodies, he was not in the mood for any bacon fried in the pan. In fact, the thought of it made him feel a little queasy. Deciding to crank up his coffeepot anyway, he built a fire with some small half-burned pieces of shingles then went down to the river to fill the pot. Again, he experienced the feeling that he was being watched. He recalled the day he’d had the same feeling and turned to find a rabbit watching him. He chuckled to remember the rabbit had ended up as supper and minutes later Lucy Butcher had showed up.

  With his coffeepot full of water, he had turned to take it back up the bank when he experienced a distinct feeling that something was watching his every move. He sensed that it came from a gully half covered by a berry bush near the top of the bank. Rabbit, maybe, or muskrat. He couldn’t be sure, but he was convinced something was in that gully, watching him.

  He pretended not to notice the gully and started up the bank, aware of a slight rustling of the bush when he became level with it. Figuring he wouldn’t get but one chance before the critter took off for the water, he slowly drew his pistol, ready to fire, and stopped beside the bush. A slight tremble occurred in the leaves of the bush, but he could not see into the gully beneath it. It dawned on him that it might be a bigger critter than a rabbit, and that maybe he might better be thinking about avoiding wrestling with a bobcat. Too curious at that point to leave the critter alone, he parted the branches of the bush with the barrel of his .44 to reveal a small boy huddled as far back in the gully as he could get.

  “My God in heaven . . .” He exhaled.

  Stunned, both man and boy continued to stare at each other, speechless for several long moments.

  Although it was obvious to him, Perley finally asked, “Was that your mama and papa I just buried?”

  There was no reply to his question. The terrified boy just continued to stare, his eyes wide with fright.

  “It’s all right, boy,” Perley said, speaking as calmly as he could. “I ain’t gonna do you no harm. You can come outta your hidin’ spot now. Whoever did this is gone.”

  Still the boy crouched hard against the side of the gully.

  After a moment, Perley tried again. “My name’s Perley Gates. What’s yours?”

  Still no response beyond the boy’s wide-eyed look of fear. Perley decided the boy was undoubtedly still in a state of shock, most likely from having seen his parents murdered. He was going to have to give him more time, but it would probably speed the process up if he could get him out of the gully.

  “I’m fixin’ to make some coffee and I always carry an extra cup just in case I have somebody to share it with. How ’bout it? You want some coffee?”

  Again there was no sound out of the boy’s mouth, but he saw a slight lowering of the child’s chin, which he decided to take as a possible nod. “Maybe I can find you something to eat, too. You look like you ain’t et in a while. Maybe I oughta fry up some bacon to go with the coffee. Whaddaya say?” With still no verbal response, Perley got to his feet. “I’ll be over by the fire. You come on out when you feel like it.”

  He turned and walked back up the bank to his fire, which was showing a healthy blaze by then. He had lost his appetite for fried bacon after seeing the charred bodies of the boy’s parents, but bacon was the quickest food he could fix for the boy. He got what was left from the side of bacon he had bought in Deadwood and sliced off some strips to fry. While it was frying, he went to his packs and got a plate and some hardtack to warm in the bacon grease then knelt beside the fire to tend the cooking. He turned partially away from the river, pretending to pay no attention, but he was able to watch the gully out of the corner of his eye.

  In a little while, the coffee was ready and Perley made a big show of pouring a cup for himself, smacking his lips after taking the first sip. It see
med to make no impression on the boy hiding in the gully. Perley began to think he was going to have to drag the boy out of his hole. Just before he started to do just that, there was a definite rustle in the leaves of the berry bush.

  Moments later, the boy crawled out of the gully, but stood by it, watching Perley, much like a stray dog or a wolf lurking around a buffalo hunter’s camp.

  Perley picked up his extra cup and held it up so the boy could see him fill it. “Get it while it’s hot,” he sang out.

  There was still a moment of hesitation on the boy’s part, but he finally came up from the riverbank and picked up the cup of coffee Perley had set on a piece of board.

  “I’ll have you some bacon in a minute.” As soon as the meat was done, he put it on the plate, then soaked up most of the grease left in the pan with the hardtack, and handed it to the boy.

  There was no hesitation then. Like he was afraid someone might take it away from him, the boy downed the bacon and hardtack almost without chewing.

  Perley watched, amazed. “How long have you been hidin’ in that gully?”

  The boy just shook his head and continued eating. Perley guessed it must have been at least two days. They continued sitting in silence until the boy finished all the bacon and hardtack Perley had cooked. The terrified look had left the boy’s eyes finally, replaced by a mournful gaze.

  “I know it’s mighty hard to wrap your head around something like you’ve just seen, but you’ve got to let that picture go. My name’s Perley Gates. What’s yours?”