Boswell's Luck (24 page)

The Turleys secured the rope to the white oak's trunk. Then Clem began forming a noose in the end that dangled from the tree.

“This ain't right,” Rat declared, stepping past Mitch to confront Lem Cathcart. “Ought to be a trial. It ain't all black and white. Could be a judge'd see it different. Mitch is due a chance.”

“Sure, he is,' the sheriff agreed. “The same sort o' chance he give Hoyt Palmer. You remember him, don't you, Rat? Told you to call him Pop and treated you like an extra son. Took you in, made a place for you in his own family. Forgot that, didn't you?”

“Before I even knew Pop Palmer, the Morrises opened their door and welcomed me inside,” Rat reminded Cathcart. “You recall 'cause I was at yer house then. Wasn't anybody else save Otto Plank'd take me. It was Mitch asked 'em.”

“I know you feel a debt to Mitch, and to the Morrises, too, Rat, but puttin' this off'd be poor service to any o' them. Mitch'd only see a whole town starin' up when he walked to the gallows. As for John and Mary, how do you suppose they'd feel seein' their own boy paraded down Main Street, a thief and a murderer? Think on that, Rat Hadley. Like as not it'd kill 'em both. Some thanks you'd hand 'em.”

“You mean to hang him and just forget it ever happened?” Rat asked. “Never tell anybody?”

“Cain't you see that's best?” Clem asked.

“A real kindness,” Charlie added. “Mitch, you got to see that yourself. Erases the slate, so to speak. Nobody 'cept us'll know.”

“That bein' the case,” Mitch said, swallowing his tears and rising to his feet, “why not just turn 'round and let me go? I promise I'll ride so far north you'll never hear a whisper 'bout me in the future. I'll disappear.”

“You done wrong,” Cathcart barked, glaring at the young outlaw with stone-cold eyes. “Got to pay for it.”

“Rat?”

Rat couldn't answer. He turned away, but Mitch called to him again.

“Sheriff, when'll you do it?” Mitch asked.

“I figured straight away. You need some time, do you?”

“Yessir,” Mitch said, steadying himself. “An hour?”

“Got your watch, Charlie?” Clem asked. “Time him. Maybe we can dig a grave.”

“Rat'll show you where,” Mitch said. “Just the other side o' yon oak. Near where Boswell lies.”

“Who?” Clem asked.

“An old friend,” Rat muttered. “One we never met.”

The sheriff flashed them a confused look, but Rat refused to share the tale. Instead he drew Mitch aside, and the two of them sat together and recounted old times.

“Ain't yer doin', Rat,” Mitch said, leaning against his old friend. “Just old Boswell's luck come home to roost.”

“Guess so,” Rat said, shuddering. “Always thought I was the one to catch the hard breaks.”

“Maybe that's what put the backbone in you, Rat. Lord knows I never had any.”

“Mitch, you had plenty. Ain't many boys'd stand up to Otto Plank when he had a shotgun in his hands.”

“I had room to run,” Mitch muttered. “You never did. You swear you won't let on to Ma and Pa. Tell 'em I went off to Kansas. I spoke of it.”

“I will.”

“Promise?”

“Yes, Mitch. And I'll see the others do the same.”

“That's a burden lifted, at least. You got yourself some more reward comin', I expect. Guess that'll have to do. Sheriff ain't apt to give you the three hundred.”

“No,” Rat agreed.

Mitch stared silently at the white oak then, and except for making a brief nature call, he remained still and quiet as the minutes passed relentlessly on.

“Can I get you somethin'?” Rat asked when the Turleys led a horse toward the tree. “I think Charlie's got a bottle.”

“Can't drink nothin',” Mitch said. “I seen a man hung once. Wet himself.”

“I imagine he was past carin' then, Mitch.”

“You'd remember it, though. Rat, I take it hardest you seein' me cry. And knowin' the worst.”

“It won't be what I remember,” Rat assured his old friend. “I'll only think o' the very best.”

“That's more comfort'n you can know.”

The Turleys took charge of Mitch thereafter, and Rat stepped away. He lacked the courage to watch.

“Sheriff, you sure you couldn't look the other way a minute?” Mitch asked as Clem bound his hands. “Only take me a minute.”

“Make peace with the maker, Mitch,” Cathcart urged. “Won't be another chance.”

It was then, as the Turleys placed the noose around the quivering young man's neck and hauled him atop his nervous horse, that Mitch's face paled.

“Lord, you really aim to do this, don't you?” he shouted.

“Man's got to pay for his wrongs,” the sheriff insisted.

“A man?” Mitch cried. “I ain't but twenty. Shoot, look at me! I ain't full growed!”

“Grow some backbone,” Clem urged.

“You go to blazes!” Mitch growled. “Look at me, you men. I'm about to die at your hands. Look at me, Rat!”

Rat turned and gazed upon a man gone mad. Mitch's eyes seemed to blaze with sudden hatred.

“Damn you all,” Mitch muttered. “And damn this place. If I got to die here, then I curse the life out o' this place. May nothin' grow here ever again. And …”

Mitch never finished. Clem Turley slapped the horse's rump, and the animal sped away, leaving Mitch dangling by the rope. He coughed and kicked and died.

Rat was transfixed by the glassy glimmer in Mitch's eyes. Life had slipped away. It hadn't walked softly into a fog as his mother had once described it. No, death had come like a thief to snatch Mitch's essence.

“Cut him down,” Sheriff Cathcart instructed.

Charlie reached up and slashed the rope. Clem dragged Mitch to the open grave and dumped him in like so much useless fodder.

“I'll do that,” Rat said when the Turleys started to kick dirt over Mitch. “I know how he'd want it.”

“No markers,” Cathcart insisted.

“No name,” Rat argued. “Only fittin' there's a marker.”

“All right,” the sheriff agreed. “Should we wait on you?”

“No, go ahead,” Rat urged. “I got some peace to find.”

“Here?” Clem asked, staring nervously at the dangling rope.

“It's as good a place as any,” Rat told them. “I'll see you all in Thayerville.”

“Sure, son,” Cathcart said as he turned to leave. “Be back in time for supper, though.”

“I will,” Rat pledged.

Five years had passed since Erastus Hadley had gently eased dirt over the features of the best friend he would ever have. The grave had been outlined in gray limestone rocks, and Erastus had erected a marker with the simple epitaph FRIEND carved with a knife. Wind or visitors had carried off the plank by summer, and gradually the rocks had rolled away. Nature had its way of accepting the dead, taking them to her heart.

The white oak lost its leaves that next fall, but they didn't return in April as before. Thistle and briars grew by that tree, and pencil cactus, too. The grasses and the wildflowers vanished, and the tree turned ghostly white. Perhaps it was Mitch's curse killed the giant white oak. Or maybe time caught up with the place as it did all things. Erastus Hadley didn't know. Years had passed since he'd buried his father on another hill, and he'd seldom since searched for answers or expected to find any.

He'd returned to Thayerville as promised, in time for supper. Afterward Becky had led him out to the porch, and they made their peace. They were married under an August moon, and Erastus had used his share of the reward to purchase the old Plank place. It seemed right somehow that such a dark, haunted sort of place should see new beginnings.

Erastus never had the heart to ride guard for the Western Stage again, and he instead accepted a deputy's badge. He wore it three years until the horse and cattle markets revived, and his hands turned to their first love—breeding ponies. He ran a few hundred head of cattle as well, and Becky planted the largest garden in the county. Three children were born in turn, and the youngest was called Mitchell.

“I wonder what ever became of Mitch Morris,” Becky often remarked. Thereafter she and Erastus would make up tales of the mysterious gambler to amuse the children. Erastus never shared the truth.

“I only hope he found some peace,” he would confide to Becky.

“Have you?' she'd ask.

“Long since,” he always answered. “You should know. You brought it to me.”