The Accidental Lawman (20 page)

“Let us bow our heads and pray.”

T
rail Dust and Guns.

Guns and Dust.

Of Men and Guns.

Titles for his novels came to mind as Hank rode alongside Oz Caldwell.

Charlie Scout had taken the lead. The Indian picked up the trail not far from Glory and now, miles later, the posse was still pounding across the open plain tracking the outlaws.

Hank’s writer’s mind had slipped outside himself as they pushed on. His thoughts echoed in his head, keeping time with the sound of hoofbeats around him.

Remember this. Remember it all. Remember the taste of dust, the anxiety, the sweat, the smell of horses and leather, the weight of the holster, the feel of the rawhide cord anchoring it to my thigh. Remember. Remember so you can write it all down.

They thundered to a halt when Charlie Scout reined in. Caldwell talked to the smaller man for a moment, then he shouted, “Looks like the gang split up. One fella
rode off in that direction. You, you and you—” he pointed again “—go that way. The rest of you, that includes you, too, Larson, follow me.”

Hank gladly let the seasoned lawman command the search. He was more than thankful when he realized none of the outlaws was headed in the direction of the Ellenberg ranch. Hank reckoned Joe and his cowhands could defend his family, but they had survived enough over the years.

As they drew near Harroway House, they heard the distinct pop of gunshots in the distance. Unintelligible shouts warned them to approach with caution. Hank grudgingly admired Caldwell’s skill with the men. His no-nonsense commands left the unseasoned posse with little time to waver. They dismounted a good distance from the house and fanned out.

“Watch and learn, Larson,” Oz told him as they headed for the house. Hank followed him, gun drawn, as they darted from tree to tree. They crouched behind a wagon, and then a water tank.

As a bullet whizzed close to Hank’s head, he silently assured himself that anything he learned today was
not
going to be repeated except, perhaps, as a scene in his novel.

One of Caldwell’s men had made his way around to the house and brought back the Harroway foreman.

“Talk,” Oswald commanded. “What’s going on?”

The shaken foreman, Wayne Morgan, had a hard time getting anything out after another shot flew over their heads and they all ducked. He rubbed his hand over his eyes, took a deep breath.

“I was here with a skeleton crew when three men rode in firing guns and shouting. We dove for cover. Before we knew what was happening, one of my men was badly
wounded and the gunmen stormed the house. They’ve got us covered from most of the second-floor windows.”

From where they crouched behind the water tower, Hank saw rifles jutting out of an upstairs window. He thought of Sophronia, wondered if her cool, unruffled exterior was helping her keep a level head. Though he’d never laid eyes on Fanny, he figured she had to be frantic and confused. Then he remembered the maid.

“I was out here last week with Amelia. There are three women in there,” Hank told Caldwell.

“Miss Hawthorne was
here
last week?
That’s
quite a coincidence.” Caldwell’s eyes narrowed.

Hank realized how suspicious Amelia’s recent visit to Harroway House must sound now that the Perkins Gang had also showed up here at the ranch. Doubt tapped at the edges of his heart until he remembered Amelia standing in the middle of Main Street with her hand on his knee. He pictured her flawless green eyes, the trust mirrored in them. He still tasted their kiss. He refused to believe she had anything to do with this. Not Amelia.

“She was here to treat Miss Harroway, a longtime patient of hers.” He tried to sound as if he hadn’t been pestered by the same suspicion he saw in Caldwell’s expression.

The foreman spoke up. “There are only two women inside. The maid ran out the back door a couple of minutes ago.”

“Where is she?” Caldwell wanted to know. “Maybe she can tell us what’s going on.”

It took a few more harrowing minutes for Hank, Oz and Morgan to make their way to the back of the barn where two more gunman inside had rifles trained on the outbuildings.

“If we could get someone onto that second-floor balcony,” Caldwell muttered, “we might be able to take out the man watching the front of the house.”

They found the maid shivering with terror in the shadows behind the barn. She was sitting on a milking stool someone had brought her, her face buried in her hands.

“Sigrid,” Hank said, taking a knee beside her. “Sigrid, we need your help.”

Her shoulders shuddered. She pulled her hands away from her face and turned teary blue eyes his way. Her face was drained of color, except for two bright red splotches on her cheeks.

“My help?”

“What happened?”

“I don’t rightly know, sir. I vas dustin’ the bookshelf in da library ven I heared poundin’ and shootin’. I ran an hid behind a fern stand. It sounded like a whole herd of men vent runnin’ up the back stairs. I heared Mrs. Harroway screamin’ “Get out! Get out!”

“Did you hear Miss Fanny?” Hank prodded.

“No, I didn’t hear her at all.”

“How’d they get in?” Oz was studying the back of the house.

“Dey valked in. De doors are unlocked durin’ the daytime,” Sigrid said.

“What about Lemuel Harroway?” Hank asked.

“He went back to Austin,” the foreman said. “One of my men is wounded. He’s in a bad way. He won’t make it without help.”

Hank noticed Caldwell didn’t seem all that concerned. “If he dies, that’ll just make it easier to tie knots in the nooses,” he said. “The Perkins brothers and their friends are going to swing for murder.” He studied the foreman
for a second, then turned to Hank. “Send somebody after Miss Hawthorne.”

“Absolutely not.” Hank refused to contemplate Amelia here. It was far too dangerous. Besides, by all accounts, her brother might very well be in the house holding two women hostage.

“Is she the only one does any doctorin’ around these parts?” Sheriff Caldwell asked Morgan, ignoring Hank.

“She is.” The man nodded. “One time one of the men was gored by a bull and Miss Amelia—”

“Send somebody to town after her,” Caldwell said, cutting him off. “Tell her to get out here on the double.”

“Leave her out of this, Caldwell.” Hank had a hard time not going for Oz Caldwell’s throat. “I don’t want her anywhere near here. She could be killed.”

“Yeah, and she might be safer than any of us. Maybe she’s in this deeper than you know. She might be able to talk that fool brother of hers out.” Oz turned to the foreman. “Go on. Get somebody moving.”

The man darted from behind the barn, zigzagging across the open yard. Shots rang out and then silence. Hank held his breath until he saw the foreman talking frantically to one of the men. A few minutes later, a lone rider cleared the barn and stable area, headed for town. Again, shots were fired, but the wrangler was soon out of range.

Hank and Caldwell peered around the corner. Each time shots were fired, he noticed the bars on one of the windows upstairs. A rifle barrel rested on the sill.

“That’s the sister’s room,” he told Caldwell, pointing out the barred windows.

“Why the jail bars?”

“She’s got nervous troubles.” It was all Hank would and could say.

“Nervous, eh? She’s plum
loco
from the looks of those bars.”

If she wasn’t before, she probably is now, Hank thought.

Just then, without warning, Caldwell stuck his head around the corner of the barn and shouted, “You! In the house! I’m Sheriff Oswald Caldwell and I’ve got a posse of men staked out around the perimeter of the outbuildings. If you don’t surrender, you’re not going to make it out alive—”

“You expect them to simply walk out?” Hank asked.

“This has gone on long enough. They’re already dead men.”

Hank knew Caldwell would show the men no mercy. If Evan Hawthorne was inside and if he was going to get any kind of a hearing, it was up to Hank to make certain.

For Amelia’s sake.

Suddenly a shout came from upstairs. “Hey, Caldwell!” It was a man’s voice, rough, loud enough to carry across the yard. “We got Harroway’s wife in here. You get word to him that if he wants to see her alive, we want twenty thousand dollars.”

Caldwell got to his feet, cupped his hands around his mouth and bellowed back, “He’s in Austin.”

“Get word to him that the Perkins brothers want the money pronto, or he’ll never see his wife and sister alive again. We’re not going anywhere.”

Caldwell mumbled, “I’ll flush ’em out or die trying. The maid and the foreman said there are two men in there. The other must have hightailed it the other way. Still, we ought to keep an eye out for them.” Oswald hunkered down against the wall of the barn. “Might as well sit it out,” Caldwell suggested. “Looks like we’re going to be here for a while.”

Afternoon intensified the summer heat until it shimmered in waves above the dry ground. Flies pestered the animals as well as the men in the barnyard. Sweltering in his wool suit, Hank stripped off his jacket and vest and was down to his shirtsleeves. His cotton shirt stuck to him like a damp washrag. Now and again he’d take off his hat and wipe his brow on his forearm. He’d rolled up his sleeves an hour ago.

He kept scanning the road hoping that Amelia refused to come back with the messenger, but he knew better. She wouldn’t turn down a call for help, nor would she miss an opportunity to try to talk sense into her brother.

Suddenly a woman’s scream rent the air. It came out of nowhere and sent a chill whipping down Hank’s spine. Caldwell, dozing against the wall of the barn, awoke with a start. Sigrid, still sniffling in the shade, let out a squeal.

“That’s Miss Fanny,” she cried. The scream went on and on until it abruptly stopped.

Hank chanced a look around the corner of the barn. Rifle barrels were still trained at the yard. There was a flurry of movement behind the curtains in one of the upstairs windows and then he saw what appeared to be a young woman with hair nearly as short as a man’s climb out of a window near the end of the second story.

On hands and knees, she awkwardly scrambled along the sloped roof that covered the veranda below. The window opened behind her and a man’s head and shoulders appeared. A volley of gunfire from the ranch hands on the ground rang out.

The man in the second-story window pitched out headfirst, tumbled down the roof past the young woman and hit the ground.

The woman on the roof began to pull her hair, screaming in fits and bursts. Below the roofline, the outlaw lay on the ground unmoving, his arms and legs twisted at impossible angles.

“I’m putting an end to this madness,” Caldwell mumbled. He began to shout orders to his men, demanded Morgan show himself. The foreman came running out of the barn.

Caldwell barked orders. “Pile a wagon with barrels, bales of hay, whatever else you can get your hands on. We’re gonna get behind it and get as close to that house as possible. Hopefully it’ll look like enough of a threat to draw some of them farther out to where we can get a clear shot at them.”

“Trojan horse,” Hank said.

Caldwell stared at him. “We’re not using a horse. They’d probably shoot its legs out from under it.”

“What about the girl on the roof?” Hank asked.

“She’s lucky she hasn’t been killed yet.”

They waited while Morgan and his men loaded the wagon.

Hank stared at the rifle barrels in the upstairs windows.

“If there are men behind two of those three guns, then nobody’s watching the front of the house anymore,” he reasoned.

The seasoned sheriff squinted up at the second floor of the mansion. “You may be right. One down, two to go.” He drew his gun, leaned out and fired at one of the windows. The rifle barrel jumped as someone returned fire.

Fanny screamed and inched perilously close to the edge of the roof.

“You’re going to make her fall,” Hank warned.

Caldwell didn’t acknowledge that he’d heard. If he did,
he didn’t care. He took aim and shot at the second gun barrel. The rifle didn’t move. Fire was returned from the first gun, but not the one Oz fired at.

“The other man must be watching the front of the house,” Hank said.

“Slip around front. Tell the men out there to fire at anything that moves, anything that doesn’t move, anything that looks like it
might
move. I don’t care if you bust up every window in the place.”

Hank took a deep breath, thought about the dead man sprawled out on the ground.

“Afraid, Larson?”

“Not really. Just biding my time.”

“We don’t have that luxury,” Caldwell reminded him. “That woman looks as if she might leap off the roof any minute. It’s about time we settled this, don’t you think?”

Hank nodded. He wondered if it was too much to hope that Evan Hawthorne was the one who rode off alone when the Perkins Gang split up a few miles back.

“I’ll watch your back,” Caldwell promised.

Hank held his breath and started running.

The McCormicks refused to let Amelia go home after Hank and the others rode out of town. With Harvey Ruggles bandaged and securely tied up again in Harrison Barker’s back room, the town settled down to wait for word. Folks went back to their daily routines as much as they could after such a dramatic turn of events, at least until a cowhand from the Harroway ranch came riding into town asking after Amelia. He was quickly ushered to Foster’s Boardinghouse where Amelia and Charity were taking tea with Laura.

Laura admitted the cowhand as far as the entry hall. The three women crowded around him.

“I’m to bring you out to Harroway House,” he told Amelia after introducing himself. She noticed the cowhand stared at Laura Foster far longer than was polite.

“Is it Fanny? Where’s Isaac?” Amelia wanted to know.

“Miss Fanny is trapped in the house. Isaac’s been shot pretty bad.”

“What happened?” Charity cried.

“Three men stormed in, shootin’ up the place. Then a posse from hereabouts rode in on their trail. The outlaws are holed up in the house.”