Epitaph (29 page)

She told herself, There are worse things than living in a big house with an important politician who might be governor someday.

She told herself, He'll make it up to me. He always does.

She told herself, Nobody's perfect. Most of the time he's very nice.

She told herself, It was my own fault. He has a temper, and I know that. I shouldn't have made him mad.

Albert would be home from school any minute now. She had to pull herself together.

For a moment, she considered telling Wyatt. No, she thought. He'd kill Johnny. It was strange, how sure she was about that.

“ALL MEN ARE CAPABLE OF SAVAGERY.”
That's what Bob Paul told Wyatt Earp over coffee, back when they first met. “I learned that lesson in 1855, Wyatt. I was undersheriff during the Ranchería riots. You probably don't even remember them.”

“I was seven,” Wyatt said.

Bob snorted and shook his head. “Damn, I'm getting old. Anyway, a gang of liquored-up Mexicans started it. Went from one Chinese camp to another. Robbing stores. Stealing horses. Killed a white woman and her kids. An Indian. A couple of Chinks. Word got around fast. Really brought the community together,” Bob said cynically. “White miners and Chinese shopkeepers and the Indian's relatives rounded up all the beaners they could lay hands on. Lynched eight of them.”

Before nightfall, entire families had been convicted of being Mexican and driven from their homes. More than fifty houses were burned to the ground, along with a Catholic church.

“Course, some of those ‘Mexicans' turned out to be from Chile,” Bob said, “but they spoke Spanish and that was by-God close enough. Meanwhile, the real killers were twenty-two miles south. My posse ran them down. I shot two myself. We hauled the others back to jail and locked 'em up, so I thought it was safe to go home and get some rest. While I was asleep, another mob broke into the jail and dragged out the man they thought killed that woman back in Ranchería. Ran him up three times.”

“Ran him up?” Wyatt asked.

“Half-hanged him. Brought him down, revived him—twice! Wanted to make sure he suffered before they finally killed him,” Bob explained. “
That
is what happens when people take the law into their
own hands: Crime is compounded by vengeance and brutality. The law and its strict enforcement are all that separate civilization from barbarism. That's why I'm running for sheriff, Wyatt, and I'd like to have your support.”

There were very few men Wyatt Earp looked up to, morally or physically. Robert Havlin Paul was among them. Standing six feet, six inches tall in his stocking feet, a massive 260 pounds in meaty maturity, Bob had placed his own huge body on the line between civilization and barbarity for two and a half decades. That such a man had been defrauded of the sheriff's office was, simply, not to be borne. And Wyatt Earp meant to do something about it.

He got Morgan to compose a letter of resignation, copied it out in his own hand, and signed it. Ignoring Morgan's questions and Mattie's, he packed a valise and left Tombstone on the evening stage. Changed to the train in Benson, arrived in Tucson the next morning, and went straight to the sheriff's office. Told Charlie Shibell he was resigning and why. Told him he was going to Bob Paul next with his suspicions about Precinct 27.

Charlie rubbed his face with both hands. “Bob will appeal, I expect.”

“Yes, sir,” Wyatt said. “I expect so, too.”

Charlie stared at him. “You don't think I had anything to do with this, do you? That I rigged the election?”

“No, sir, I don't.” But he wasn't willing to work for a man who'd accept such a tawdry victory.

“Well, I'm still sheriff until it's decided,” Charlie said. “No hard feelings, Wyatt, but under the circumstances, I've hired Johnny Behan to replace you as my deputy.”

“Yes, sir. I figured that would happen.”

And if that's the price of honesty, he told himself, I'll pay it.

He went to Bob Paul next and laid out what he knew about the fraud in Precinct 27. Bob listened without comment and when Wyatt was done, he said, “You're a good man, Wyatt. I owe you.”

They didn't make any deals about who'd be Bob Paul's undersheriff,
but if appeal of the Precinct 27 results went in Bob's favor, Wyatt was pretty sure Bob would remember his help.

He caught the next train back to Benson and got some sleep on the way. He was waiting for the stage to Tombstone when it came to him that his own affairs might work out better with Johnny taking over as Charlie's deputy. Johnny liked to be in the thick of things. He might move to Tucson where the Sheriff's office was. After the county got split up, Johnny might stay up north because Pima County would be controlled by Democrats and he'd have more of a chance at higher office if he had a base there.

Which would make it likely that Governor Frémont would appoint Wyatt himself sheriff of the new county in southeastern Arizona. Which meant collecting taxes in the Tombstone Mining District. Ten percent of which would set him and his brothers up for life. In the meantime, Wyatt would be free to look after his business interests.

NIGHTS, HE HAD FARO TABLES IN SEVERAL SALOONS
—four that he banked now, plus the one at the Oriental that he ran himself. Mornings, he took one of the horses out for exercise and did a little prospecting while he was at it, for it had not escaped his notice that a man could stake a claim, dig a hole, announce a strike, and sell the pit for $50,000 to some fool with more money than sense. Doc Holliday had him thinking about water rights, too. People kept talking about piping water down from the Huachucas, but so far only one small line was operational. “Everything in Tombstone depends on water, one way or another,” Doc had said. “If this town is goin' to grow, that is where the money will be.” So Wyatt was thinking maybe him and his brothers ought to ride out to the canyons west of the San Pedro River and stake some water claims. Doc, too. It would do the dentist good. Get out in the sunshine. Build himself up some. And if he had an income from water rights, he could go back to that sanatorium sooner and stay a while.

When a handsome, broad-backed sorrel came up for sale over at Dunbar's in early December, Wyatt looked her over. Duchess, she was called, and she was cheap because the idiot who broke her had scared the animal senseless from the start, probably slamming a big, heavy Mexican saddle onto her and sawing at her mouth. She'd flinch at a blanket and frog around for a time after she was saddled, but once she was moving, she had an easy gait that wouldn't wear the dentist out before they got halfway to the mountains. Wyatt had gentled horses like that before—look how well Dick Naylor had turned out! It was time to start training Reuben, too. The colt hadn't inherited as much leg from Roxana as Wyatt had hoped, but Reuben would do well in the mile.

That's what he was thinking about after he closed out his faro table at dawn one day in mid-December. About how good things were going. About how satisfying it would be to work with Duchess and Reuben—salvaging one, bringing the other along the right way.

The sun had just started to climb as he walked home, and the town was quiet. Shops still closed. Dogs gnawing on fleabites or asleep in the dirt. Mountains, blue in the distance. A cold wind was carrying the noise of the mine engines away, which made everything seem peaceful.

“Mr. Earp?” a soft voice called.

Two of them. No weapons visible. Ike Clanton and a young stranger who asked, “You're Wyatt, right? Not one of the others?”

“Who wants to know?”

The boy looked around, then backed away, beckoning Wyatt into the vacant lot between Fly's photography studio and the O.K. Corral. They'd be out of sight there, which is exactly why Wyatt didn't follow him.

A movement caught his eye, above and to his left. Corner room, second story of Mrs. Fly's boardinghouse. Doc Holliday was standing at the window, coat off. His hands were on his shirt buttons—he was getting ready for bed—but he lifted those arched brows high as if to ask, Everything all right?

Wyatt met Doc's eyes, then returned his attention to Ike and the fidgety kid with him.

“My name's Jim Johnson, sir,” the boy told him. “But I—I said I was Henry Johnson, when— Look, I'm the one who certified the votes in Precinct Twenty-seven, but it was Ringo's idea!”

“It was Ringo's idea,” Ike confirmed.

Wyatt waited while the kid gathered his nerve. That cost the boy some work, but once he started, the words came out in a rush.

“Ringo, he told me to say there was a hundred and four votes for Charlie Shibell, but there warn't, sir. They was mostly for Charlie, that's true, but there warn't more'n a coupla dozen real votes. Ringo told me what numbers to put down and said I should sign the paper. He's acting like he's boss now. Curly Bill never bossed us, but ever since Ringo took over— You never know what's gonna set him off, and he'll kill you if you cross him.”

“He's a mean sonofabitch,” Ike said, “and I know mean when I see it.”

Wyatt and young Johnson turned to stare. There was real conviction in that statement, and they both knew why.

“My daddy's in Mexico,” Ike said. “Ringo thinks he's in charge when the old man's gone.”

“We want Curly Bill back,” the boy said.

“What do you expect me to do about it?” Wyatt asked. Bill Brocius was still in jail up in Tucson for shooting Fred White, even though Fred had said the shooting was accidental. “It's in the courts now.”

“So's the election, sir,” Johnson said. “It's in the courts, right? Because Bob Paul's trying to get the results declared a fraud. Well, you was there when Fred got shot. If you testify for Curly Bill and he gets off, I'll by-God say in court what I know about the vote in Precinct Twenty-seven.”

“What makes you think Ringo won't kill you for that?” Wyatt asked.

Johnson lifted his chin, like a little kid sticking up for himself.
“Well, he might. So I want fifty dollars and a train ticket, too. I'll testify, then it's me for Memphis. I got kin there.”

“Why not just go home to Memphis and be done with it?” Wyatt wanted to know. “Why do you care if Curly Bill gets out?”

“Because Bill was always kind to me, sir, and Ringo—”

“Ringo is a mean sonofabitch,” Ike said.

“He can't just hit people for no reason!” the kid cried, sounding aggrieved. “If Ringo don't want Bob Paul to be sheriff, then by God, that's why I do! Because that'll show him!”

“Lemme think about it,” Wyatt told them. “Come by the Oriental on Friday. I'll give you an answer.”

Satisfied, they bobbed their heads and hurried off.

Wyatt glanced up. Doc was still standing at the window, ready to help if he was needed. Wyatt nodded his thanks. Then he finished the short walk that took him back to a house that passed for a home and a woman who passed for a wife.