CHAPTER THREE

Jess remembered little of the next twenty four hours. Delirious with fever, he slipped in and out of consciousness. A soft, calm voice kept telling him to drink something, and a strong arm supported his head while he gulped down a savory broth. Someone wiped the sweat of his brow with a cool, damp cloth and tucked blankets around him. He tried feebly to protest, to say he had to be moving on, but when he attempted to get up he was unceremoniously pushed back down. Finally he gave up trying, and gratefully accepted the tender care that was offered. His fever finally broke, and he slipped from a feverish, half conscious state into deep sleep.

Daisy Cooper, who was mother, housekeeper, boss, and just plain “Daisy” to the Sherman household, gazed down at their unexpected guest.

“Well, now,” she said, satisfied. “I think he’s going to be all right.”

She smoothed the unruly, dark hair off her patient’s forehead, and gazed with compassion at the thin, drawn face resting on the pillows. She turned to the two people looking on anxiously from the foot of the bed. Slim Sherman, tall and broadshouldered, with blond hair and sky blue eyes, placed a hand on the shoulder of the young boy next to him.

“Hear that, Mike?” he grinned, “your newfound hero’s goin’ to be just fine. When he wakes up you can thank him proper for saving your life – and Buttons’.”

The boy’s face was furrowed with worry. “Gollee, Slim, I sure am sorry I caused him so much trouble,” he said. “Aunt Daisy, are you sure he’s not gonna die?”

“The stage knocked him for a loop when it hit him, Mike, but there’s nothing broken,” she reassured him. “All he needs is rest. Poor man’s completely worn out.”

“I suspect he hasn’t had a square meal in quite a while,” Slim ventured. “Wonder how long he’s been out of prison.”

“Prison?” Daisy said startled. “What makes you say that?”

“Shackle marks on his wrists,” Slim pointed out. “Only place you get those is behind bars, Daisy.”

“Slim, d’you think he’s an escaped desperado?” Mike’s eyes were wide with excitement.

“More’n likely just got out,” Slim replied.

He took the stranger’s gunbelt from the chair where he had placed it, and removed the weapon. It was a Single Action Colt .45 Army; perfectly balanced, he judged, sighting down the barrel. The holster was oiled; the bluesteeled weapon lovingly cared for. He frowned as he noticed the filed down trigger guard.

“Can I see it, Slim, Mike begged. “Come on, let me hold it!”

“No,” Slim said sharply. “You stay away from this one, Mike. It’s got a hairtrigger, and you’d wind up shootin’ yourself in the foot.”

“Well, whoever he is, he needs rest and care,” Daisy said firmly. “Let’s leave him to it.”

They moved into the kitchen, and Daisy bustled about fixing a fresh pot of coffee. Slim eyed her thoughtfully as he sipped his cup. She seemed preoccupied, and kept glancing towards the open door to the bedroom where the stranger slept.

“All right, Daisy,” he sighed. “Out with it.”

“Out with what?” she asked innocently. “Whatever are you talking about, Slim?”

“Somethin’s cookin’ behind those blue eyes of yours,” Slim grinned, and put down his cup. “Suppose you tell me.”

“I was just thinking,” she said slowly, “you desperately need a hand to help you run this ranch, Slim, not to mention the stageline work, and the man in there looks like he could use a job, and three square meals a day. We owe him a large debt of gratitude for what he did for Mike. Why not offer him a job?”

Slim rested his hip against the kitchen counter, frowning into his coffee cup. He looked up at Daisy, and shook his head.

“I just don’t know if it would be such a good idea, Daisy. From the looks of him he’s a drifter with a fast gun. We still don’t know why he spent time in prison, and I hardly….”

Slim froze as a barely audible voice interrupted him.

“I shot down a seventeen year old kid,” Jess said hoarsely and pushed himself up on an unsteady elbow.

His head was fuzzy with sleep and fatigue. He had been struggling to the surface when Slim’s words cut into him, and derived a perverse satisfaction from the shocked look on their faces. Daisy recovered quickly, and hurried to his side.

“Well, I’m glad to see you’re awake! We were worried about you, but the fever’s broken, thank goodness.”

Jess eased his head back on the pillow as she checked his pulse.

“You a nurse, ma’am?” he wondered.

“I was for many years,” she replied. “Back East. My name is Daisy Cooper, this is Slim Sherman, and that’s Mike Williams, and you are…?”

“Harper, Jess Harper,” he murmured wearily, and turned his head towards Mike who had scooted on to the side of the bed. “Glad to see you’re all right, Tiger. What about the pooch?”

“Buttons’s got house arrest,” Mike announced, “he knows he’s not supposed to be in the yard when the stage comes in. If’n you hadn’t got to him…” His voice trailed off and he lowered his head, fiddling with the edge of the blanket. “I’m real sorry you got hurt on my account, mister.”

“Hey, the main thing’s the two of you weren’t hurt,” Jess said. He laid a comforting hand on the youngster’s knee, and was rewarded with a shy smile.

“How are you feeling, Mr. Harper?” Daisy asked solicitously.

“Weak as a kitten,” Jess admitted.

“That’s to be expected,” she smiled, ‘you need to get some solid food into you. Do you think you could eat something?”

“I have…a feelin’ you’re not… not going to take no for an answer,” Jess managed a wry smile.

“You’re right about that,” Slim said as Daisy headed for the kitchen with Mike in tow. “Don’t cross her, she runs the place.”

He paused awkwardly.

“About what I said…”

“Forget it,” Jess said. “You had every right, I reckon. Soon’s I’m on my feet I’ll be movin’ on.”

“Now hold on there a minute,” Slim said quickly. “I do need help around here, but…”

“But not a man who’s been in trouble with the law,” Jess said, unable to keep the bitterness out of his voice.

“Dammit, stop putting words in my mouth,” Slim snapped. “Suppose you tell me the whole story. What about the kid you shot?”

“Youngest son of one of the most powerful men down in Bowdrie, Colorado.” Jess dredged up the dark, bitter memories with an effort. Slim saw his eyes turn bleak and cold, the lines of fatigue deepening around his mouth.

“He was a wild, mean-tempered kid, spoilin’ to prove himself with a gun. One night he called me out, in the saloon, after a poker game. Said I’d cheated him…”

“I can guess the rest,” Slim said slowly. “But if it was self-defense, why’d you go to prison?”

“The kid’s old man bought off, or frightened off, most of the witnesses,” Jess replied. “Not enough to git me hanged, but enough to land me behind bars for two years. I got out about two weeks ago.”

Jess gazed up at the lanky rancher, liking him, liking Mrs. Cooper and the kid for the warmth and kindness they had shown him. Sure, they were grateful to him for saving Mike’s life, but still, they had taken him in and tended to him like he was family. They had already done more for him than he had any right to expect, and he had no call to feel bitter because Sherman hesitated to hire a man with a prison record.

Slim, on the other hand, sensed the dark, ruthless side of other man’s nature, and recoiled slightly at it; unleashed it would probably wreak havoc on those around him. He knew gunfighters had a tendency to attract more of the same. Still, Daisy, who was rarely wrong in her judgment of people, felt all he needed was a chance. He chewed irritably on his lower lip.

“We owe you for Mike, Jess,” he said at last. “You get back on your feet, then we’ll talk.”

*****

Jess woke up just before sunrise the following morning, feeling rested for the first time in a long while. The fever was gone, and so as the deadening feeling of fatigue. The house was quiet, no one was up yet. He heard a rooster crow out in the yard, and tossed the blankets aside. His clothes hung freshly laundered over a chair by the door. Dressing quickly Jess pulled on his boots, and buckled on his gun. He spun the cylinder. It was fully loaded.

‘Sherman’s either a fool, or a trusting soul,’ he thought grimly, and stepped out on the porch. The storm had washed everything clean, and the morning was still and clear, the sun just beginning its climb at the edge of the horizon. He took a deep breath, savoring the air, and wandered down to the pole corral that backed up to the barn. Several horses milled around, and one ventured over to him in the hope of getting a morsel. It was a sleek, longlegged buckskin, and it nudged Jess gently, ears pricked up in expectation.

“Sorry, friend,” Jess grinned and scratched the horse behind the ears. “Don’t have anything for ya.”

He stroked the soft neck as he mulled over his situation. He needed a horse, but he had barely a dollar and change to his name. He could probably hitch a ride with the stage into Laramie, but then what? Look up Sheriff Corey, as the warden had suggested? Jess smiled sardonically. No, he’d tangled with too many lawmen in the past, some of whom had one foot on either side of the law. He was sure the Tyrell’s were dogging his trail, and there was little sense in taking a chance on stirring up trouble. A twig snapped behind him, and he whirled and drew. It was a fluid, effortless movement, and Slim stared at him in shocked disbelief. It had happened so fast he wasn’t sure he had seen the gun clear the holster.

“Kinda sudden, ain’t you?” he drawled.

“Do you make a habit of sneakin’ up on people?” Jess said exasperated, and shoved the weapon back in the holster. He swore at himself for being so skittish.

“Let’s get one thing straight right now,” Slim said. “If you’re goin’ to be workin’ here you can’t go pulling a gun on everyone who happens by.”

“You offerin’ me a job?” Jess pushed his Stetson back off his forehead, squinting in the early morning light.

“Yeah, I guess I am,” Slim said. “I need help with the ranch work, and handling the stages comin’ in. I can’t pay you much right off, fifty cents a day and three squares, but I’ll throw in a horse. Job’s yours if you want it.”

Jess lowered his gaze, thick, black lashes hiding the haunted look in his eyes.

“I’m a gunfighter, not a rancher, Sherman,” he said quietly. “You could be buyin’ into a pack of trouble.”

“Maybe,” Slim acknowledged. “But I owe you for Mike, and besides, it’s Daisy’s idea, and she won’t take no for an answer, believe me.”

Jess smiled crookedly. He held out his hand and Slim grasped it firmly.

“You’ve got yourself a hired hand,” Jess drawled.

ooo0ooo

CHAPTER FOUR

“I tracked him down, Pa,” Johnny Tyrell said triumphantly. “He’s in Laramie.”

Hurd Tyrell stood with his hands behind his back, gazing out of the large window that faced the setting sun. His domain, the Rocking T, sprawled before him, reaching as far as the eye could see, and beyond. It included thousands of heads of cattle, a freight line, a partnership in Bowdrie National Bank along with numerous other interests. Tyrell had built it all from scratch, starting with a strong back, and some scrawny brush cattle.

Blessed with a knack for staying one step ahead of his competitors, he quickly clawed his way to the top. He purchased large tracts of land and raised beef, which he sold to the army under a lucrative contract. As his success grew, he went back East for his childhood sweetheart. He was a hard, ruthless man, not easily given to smiling, and Sarah Tyrell had provided what little warmth he permitted into his austere life. He built her a large, rambling house with a porch facing west and she bore him three sons, Matt, Johnny and William. The birth of William proved too much for her, and when he was six months old she quietly passed away.

Devastated by her death, Tyrell threw himself into his work, raising the boys with only the help of an old housekeeper. William, the youngest, was his favorite, he had the same wild, reckless nature Tyrell had in his youth, but he lacked his father’s shrewdness and tempered judgment. Matt and Johnny, older than Billy by five and three years, ran the Rocking T alongside their father, and, like him, they indulged their kid brother.

Matt suspected that the youth would come to a bad end. He was too fond of guns and fast living. Billy knew his father kept a very loose rein on him, and he grew up spoiled and temperamental, with scant thought for other people’s feelings. The folks in Bowdrie knew the influential Tyrell family were responsible for putting their town on the map, and sidestepped Billy when he went on a rampage. Hurd Tyrell paid his fines, and settled whatever damages his son had caused in the local saloons, then he cuffed his young cub about the ears, and went back to running his empire. Nothing stood in his way as he consolidated his position as one of the most powerful men in the territory. But for Sarah’s passing, his life was going just the way he had planned it.

Then one night, young Billy Tyrell challenged a drifter over a card game, and was shot dead. Tyrell's perfect, untouchable world came crashing down, and as he stood by his son’s open grave he felt his heart harden and die. Vengeance, dark and choking, ate away at him until he was blinded by it.

A quick investigation by some of his men showed him that Jess Harper was not just a common drifter; he had a reputation as a maverick with a fast gun and a short fuse. Turning a deaf ear to the fact that Billy had provoked the confrontation, Hurd Tyrell tried to buy himself a hanging, but not even his power and influence could buy off all the witnesses.

The saloon had been packed that night, and a bunch of rowdy drovers from a cattle drive outside of town, were not the least bit impressed with the Tyrell name. The circuit judge was an honest, cantankerous old man, bent on a fair trial. Still, in view of the contradicting testimony, and Harper’s reputation, he was found guilty of involuntary manslaughter and sentenced to two years hard labor at the territorial prison. Tyrell derived scant satisfaction from the stricken look on the drifter’s face. Where was the justice in a no-account gunfighter being left alive while his youngest rotted in his grave?

At his son’s words, Tyrell squared his shoulders and turned his tall, powerful frame from the window. He had grown thinner since Billy’s death, his eyes deep within their sockets, hooded and cold. He drew his bushy grey eyebrows together.

“So, the killer surfaces,” he said slowly.

“Yeah, Pa.”

Matt, the most serious and introspective of his boys, looked uneasily at his father. He had dreaded this moment, knowing it had to come.

“He’s got a job at a relay station some twelve miles outside of Laramie,” Johnny volunteered.

“Tell me everything, son,” Tyrrell said, sitting down behind his massive oak desk. “How did you find him?”

“Friend of mine was on the stage headin’ for Laramie,” Johnny grinned. “They stopped at this relay station to change teams. He recognized Harper from the trial. He figured we were looking for him, so he sent word back. Matt here took it upon himself to check it out, personal like.”

“Very sensible,” Tyrell nodded. “We have to be sure it’s him. Well, Matt?”

Matt Terrell swallowed. His father’s deep, all-consuming hatred for his brother’s killer left him cold. He saw how he had changed since it happened. Unlike his father and Johnny, Matt had no illusions about Billy. He had loved his kid brother, he supposed, but he had known the day would come when Billy would pick a fight with someone who wasn’t impressed by whose son he was.

He caught Billy practicing with his sixshooter on several occasions, and was surprised and dismayed by how fast he had become. But when Billy Tyrell accused Jess Harper of cheating at poker and went for his gun, it had cost him his life. Although he grieved for his brother, Matt had listened carefully to the testimony at the trial, and realized early on that the man on trial for murder had only acted in selfdefense. He watched his father, whom he worshipped, try to subvert justice and buy off the witnesses, and it had sickened him.

His brother Johnny, ruthless and vicious, was ready to gun Harper down on the spot, and only his father’s intervention had prevented another killing. He didn’t want to risk losing another son. Now it would start all over again.

“Fellow by the name of Sherman owns the ranch where Harper works,” Matt told him. “He also has a franchise with Overland Stage Company. There’s an elderly lady, a Mrs. Cooper, who’s sort of a housekeeper, and a young boy, ‘bout eight years old, whom Sherman took in a year ago.”

“And now he takes in a drifter,” Tyrell mused, drumming his fingers on the desk. “This fellow sounds like a regular Good Samaritan. Well, we shall give him cause to regret it.”

“Pa,” Matt said hesitantly. “Harper seems to be trying to go straight… he served his time, don’t you think he should at least have a chance?”

Hurd Tyrell’s face mottled with rage as he glared at his oldest son.

“A chance?” he said harshly. “You think he deserves a chance, do you, boy? What do you say to that, Johnny?”

Johnny Tyrell threw his brother a disgusted look, and hooked his thumbs into his gunbelt.

“Way I see it, Harper’s got no business walkin’ around while Billy’s on Boot Hill,” he sneered. “Matt’s goin’ soft on us, Pa.”

“He murdered your kid brother, Matt”, Tyrell said, his voice measured and cold. “Billy was barely seventeen, a little wild and foolish, sure, but every boy’s entitled to some wild oats. Harper makes his living with a gun. What chance did he give Billy?”

Matt shook his head at the futility of the argument. They had been through it before to no avail. His father was driven by revenge, not reason, and even if Matt didn’t agree with him he would never go against him. He simply wouldn’t know how.

“What do you want us to do, Pa?” he asked resignedly.

Tyrell pursed his lips as he stared at his two sons. In their early twenties, they were both dark haired with deep brown eyes, and wide in the shoulders. Billy had been the only one to favor his mother, with his blue eyes and fair coloring. Maybe that was one reason why Tyrell had found it so easy to indulge him.

“So, our gunslinger friend is trying to turn over a new leaf,” he mused. “Well, I have lots of contacts in Laramie. I think we’ll give Harper time to settle in, to feel safe. Let him think we’re not coming after him. When he lets his guard down and thinks it’s all behind him, then we’ll move in.”

Hurd Tyrell rose. He rubbed at the tension in his neck, a thin smile on his lips.

“I’ll use his newfound friends to destroy him,” he said softly. “Sherman will have cause to regret giving refuge to a killer, and in the end, when Harper has nowhere left to turn, I’ll be there to take him down.”

ooo0ooo

*********************************

Back to Original Stories Home

Back to Requiem Index

Part Three