Reuben Cole Westerns Collection

Chapter 7

Easing open the door to the coffee shop, Roose nodded towards Dray Brewer behind his counter, and saw Mrs. Samuels all huddled up, crying into a sodden handkerchief, two elderly and thin ladies dressed in black each with an arm around her, cooing soothing words. ‘It’ll be all right now, Jane, you just take your time. None of this is your fault, you’ve done what you can. Best leave it to the authorities now, they’ll know what to do … Oh, Sheriff Roose! A most timely intervention!’

Doffing his hat, Roose pulled up a chair and shuffled it towards the ladies. The two elderly ones made way for him, leaving the third, Jane Samuels, to regard him through eyes puffy and red with too much crying. ‘Oh Sheriff, it was terrible. Poor man.’

‘Is he dead?’

‘No, no I am sure he isn’t. I did what I could, made him comfortable, and then rushed over here as fast as I could, telling that young Thurst boy to fetch you.’

‘You did the right thing, Jane,’ said one of the Spyrow sisters soothingly.

‘I hope so, but … Oh, Sheriff, he has a bump the size of an egg on the back of his head.’

‘Did you see who might have done it?’

‘No. There were long gone, I shouldn’t wonder. Whoever did it gave him a terrible beating. And the house …’ Seized by a renewed wave of anguish, she bawled into her handkerchief, ‘All those lovely things that his daddy collected. So awful it is, awful.’

awful.‘There, there Jane, try not to upset yourself so,’ said the sister closest to Roose. ‘Can’t you do something, Sheriff?’

‘Miss Spyrow, I will do all I can to find the perpetrators, have no fear. But Mrs. Samuels, I have to ask you again. You are absolutely certain … is he dead?’

is he deadHer face came up and she seemed to gather herself, taking a few shuddering breaths. Roose prepared himself for the worst. He knew Cole well. They’d ridden the range together back in the days when the Indians roamed free and tenderfoots were struggling to start a new life. He couldn’t count the times Cole had saved his life, and now he too was—

‘No, he’s not dead, Sheriff. I told you. I tended to him, got him into bed. It was a struggle I don’t mind telling you. He’s a big man.’

big ‘He ain’t that big, but even so …’

‘Well … I had to strip him n***d, Sheriff. Bathe his bruises, so I know what I saw.’

The two sisters squealed, clamping tiny hands against their startled mouths.

Unable to hold her gaze, Roose turned away, face burning. He called across to Brewer in a shaky voice. ‘Any chance of a coffee?’

The coffeehouse owner nodded, but before preparing Roose’s order, he said, ‘After what Mrs. Samuels said, I called across to the stable boy, Percival, to go and fetch Doctor Evans so Mr Cole could be better cared for.’

‘That was good of you, Dray. Thank you.’

‘I think one or two of his ribs were broken,’ said Mrs. Samuels.

‘I ain’t never known Cole to be bettered,’ Roose mused in a low voice. He swiveled in his chair and looked at the still sobbing woman. ‘There must have been more than one of ‘em, taken him by surprise perhaps.’

‘Yes, I shouldn’t wonder. There was one of those baseball bats lying beside him, with blood and bits of hair stuck to it.’

Another shriek, one of horror this time, from the accompanying sisters.

Roose contemplated this news for a moment. Most of his dealings recently had been with settlers over in the west of the county, people who were moving from the already growing cities further to the north. Some were questionable types, mainly living on the wrong side of the law, coming down from Missouri with prices on their heads. Already ideas were ruminating in his brain, suspicions mounting. If desperate men, on the brink of starvation, were beginning to reconnoitre and burglarise outlying properties, he was going to have a huge job on his hands to protect the disparate population.

‘I think I might need your husband, Nelson, Mrs. Samuels. I’m going to need a good group of men to deputize. He’ll be at the head of my list.’

‘Nelson is too old to be going riding around searching for lowlifes, Sheriff. His army days are done.’

‘Nevertheless, he was one of the ablest scouts the army ever used, and I could sure as h—’ He cut off his choice of word sharply as the withering glares of the Spyrow sisters turned upon him. Squirming in his chair, he cleared his throat before he continued uneasily. ‘What I mean is, he was a good scout back then, Mrs. Samuels, and the skills he had are not ones you ever forget. And he ain’t old – he’s two years younger than me.’

‘Well, there you are, Sheriff. Too old by far.’

Too Roose returned to the sheriff’s office, chewing on a cheroot, feeling he’d been dragged backwards through the sagebrush. Sweeping the floor, Thurst, bareheaded and bare-chested, glistened with sweat. He stopped sweeping as Roose came through the door and leaned on the broom, placing his chin on the end of the pole. ‘Sheriff. He’s dead.’

Roose felt a tightening around his gut, heartbeat accelerating, the heat of the day not helping him at all. ‘That’s unfortunate.’

‘I’d say the way you went about him with that shovel meant there weren’t ever gonna be any other result.’

‘Thurst, you get on with your sweeping, then go and get yourself kitted out for an overland manhunt.’

‘I’m considering not doing any of those things, Sheriff.’

‘Say what?’

‘The way I see it, I reckon you murdered that gentleman and I am—’

‘He wasn’t no gentleman, Thurst, let"s get that straight right from the off. He was here to do me harm.’

‘All righty, but even if he wasn’t so great a guy, he’s still dead and you still killed him. I think that’s murder, right there and that’s the truth of it, Sheriff.’

‘He had a g*n on me, you pond-weed.’

‘An unloaded gun.’

‘Like I said before, I wasn’t to know that. The guy was here to kill me, that was for sure, and I wasn’t about to stand around and let him do it. If you hadn’t burst in on us it would be me setting out my patch in the cemetery, not him.’

Mathias Thurst stood staring, not at Roose, but into the jail beyond and the bundled up heap that once was a man. Roose followed his deputy’s eyes and considered his options. What would he have done if Thurst hadn’t arrived at that most convenient of times, he wondered. What did the man have to say about Maddie or anything else for that matter? Surely sure the man was Maddie’s husband. Roose had been more than friendly with the man’s wife for some time. Of course, Roose knew Maddie was married, but he believed it was all over between them, so what had galvanized her husband into a confrontation he could not say. Clearly, he needed a little face-to-face with his lover of over six months, to bring some light to the situation. Right now, however, he had other, more pressing worries, Thurst being the main one.

Roose blew out his cheeks and measured his deputy with a cold look, hands on hips, well away from the New Model Police sitting in its holster, set ready for a cross-belly draw. ‘Mathias, we can work all this out, we truly can, but at the moment we have got a manhunt to get started. I aim to find those responsible for breaking into Cole’s home and beating him close to death. I will need you.’

‘I ain’t going,’ said Thurst without pausing for a moment to consider Roose’s words. ‘I’m done with this and done with you, Sheriff.’

‘Now hold on just a minute there, Thurst, this isn’t all about you and me! We can deal with this when we get back.’

‘How will we do that?’

‘Well, I’ll make a sworn statement … Present it to the circuit judge. You can witness it or even give your own account of what happened.’

‘After we get back from the manhunt?’

‘Yes! That’s exactly right. This unfortunate incident will keep – it’s not as if he"s going anywhere is it?’

‘And what if I don"t come back?’

‘What if you don’t … What are you talking about? Of course, you’ll come back!’

‘What I mean is, what if I was to be the victim of an accident, a stray bullet, a rattler sliding underneath my blankets? What then, Sheriff? It would just be your word and …’ He chuckled, a strangely humourless and eerie sound in that small, dusty room. ‘Nobody would ever question any of it, would they, you being such an upright citizen and all.’

‘What do you take me for, Thurst? I’m as law-abiding as anyone.’

‘Why you set to him the way you did?’

‘Listen, it’s complicated all right. He’s Maddie’s husband – was Maddie’s husband.’

was ‘So that’s why you killed him?’

‘Thurst, you’ve got this all wrong! I was acting in self-defence.’

Thurst turned away, setting the broom against the side of the pot-belly stove. ‘Well, I’ve made my mind up. I ain’t going. I’ll stay here until you get back, hold the fort so to speak. And I’ll do something with the body – it is liable to get somewhat ripe in this heat.’

‘Thurst, there is no need to—’

‘There is every need Sheriff. I ain’t dumb and I ain’t gonna risk my life because you killed a man.’

And that was that. Roose could see it in his deputy’s eyes. He was not going to be persuaded, one way or the other. Roose let his shoulders relax and strode forward, pushing past Thurst. He pulled down three Winchesters from the open cabinet and stuffed his pockets with cartridges. ‘I’m taking Samuels with me and probably Ryan Stone too. Both of ‘em served in the army and they know what it is like to be out on the open-range.’ He stacked the Winchesters into the crook of his arm and glared at his deputy. ‘You’ve let me down, Mathias. When we get back, we’ll sort this out. And it won’t be to your advantage.’

‘At least I’ll still be alive.’

Roose went to say something, thought better of it and stomped outside into the glaring heat of yet another airless day.