Doc: A Novel

ALSO BY MARY DORIA RUSSELL

Dreamers of the Day

A Thread of Grace

Children of God

The Sparrow

Doc
is a work of fiction. Though some incidents, dialogue, and characters are based on the historical record, the work as a whole is the product of the author’s imagination.

Copyright © 2011 by Mary Doria Russell

All rights reserved.

Published in the United States by Random House, an imprint of The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.

R
ANDOM
H
OUSE
and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA

Russell, Mary Doria
Doc: a novel / Mary Doria Russell.
p. cm.
eISBN: 978-0-679-60439-6
1. Holliday, John Henry, 1851–1887—Fiction. 2. Earp, Wyatt, 1848–1929—Fiction. 3. Dodge City (Kan.)—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3568.U76678E54 2011     813′.54—dc22    2010015062

www.atrandom.com

Jacket design: Marietta Anastassatos

Photo illustration: Steven Youll, based on images

© Iain McKell/Reportage/Getty Images (chair) and

© Matthias Clamer/Stone Collection/Getty Images

(room and piano)

v3.1

For Art Nolan, who told me what Wyatt knew; for Eddie Nolan, who showed us what John Henry had to learn; for Alice McKey Holliday, who raised a fine young man; with thanks to Bob Price and Gretchen Batton.

This book is fiction, but there is always a chance that such a work of fiction may throw some light on what has been written as fact.

—E. H
EMINGWAY
,
A M
OVEABLE
F
EAST

The Game

Cover

Other Books by This Author

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Epigraph

THE PLAYERS

Georgia

Texas

Kansas

THE ANTE

Playing for Time

FIRST HAND

The Deal

Down Cards

Show Cards

SECOND HAND

Bad Beat

Roughing the Edges

Three Grand Gone

Stacking the Deck

THIRD HAND

The River

Ladies High

Wild Card

Three of a Kind

FOURTH HAND

Side Bets

Ringer

Chinaman’s Chance

FIFTH HAND

Joker

Call

Under the Table

SIXTH HAND

No Help

Raising Blind

Turning the Play

CASHING OUT

Playing for Keeps

THE RAKE

The Bitch in the Deck

Author’s Note

About the Author

The Players

Fictional characters are listed in italics
.

GEORGIA

The Hollidays

John Henry Holliday, D.D.S., later known as Doc Holliday
Alice McKey Holliday: his mother
Henry Holliday: his father
Wilson and Chainey: brothers, born into his family’s possession

John Stiles Holliday, M.D.: JHH’s uncle
Permelia: his wife
Robert: his younger son, later a dentist
George: his older son; sent to care for JHH in Texas in 1877
Sophie Walton: his foster child; taught JHH to play cards

Martha Anne Holliday: JHH’s childhood sweetheart

TEXAS

Henry Kahn: a bad-tempered gambler; shot JHH in 1877
Mary Katharine “Kate” Harony: a prostitute; JHH’s companion
David W. “Dirty Dave” Rudabaugh: a train robber
George Hoyt: an inexpert assassin
Tobias Driskill: a Texan with a grudge
Billy Driskill: his son, arrested for assault in Dodge

KANSAS

The Earps

Morgan Earp: a policeman; JHH’s closest friend
Louisa “Lou” Houston: his girlfriend

James Earp: Morgan’s brother, a brothel manager
Bessie Bartlett Earp: his wife, the madam

Wyatt Earp: brother of Morgan and James; a policeman
Urilla Sutherland Earp: Wyatt’s wife, deceased
Mattie Blaylock: a Dodge City streetwalker

Lawmen

Lawrence “Fat Larry” Deger: the Dodge City marshal (chief of police)

Ed Masterson: chief deputy to Marshal Deger; deceased

Marshal Deger’s deputies:

Morgan Earp

Wyatt Earp

Jack Brown

Chuck Trask

John Stauber

William Barkley “Bat” Masterson: sheriff of Ford County; half owner, Lone Star Saloon and Dance Hall

Dodge City Chamber of Commerce

Robert C. “Bob” Wright: proprietor, Wright’s General Outfitting Store; member, Kansas House of Representatives

Isabelle “Belle” Wright: his daughter

Alice Wright: his wife

Hamilton “Ham” Bell: proprietor, Hamilton Bell’s Famous Elephant Barn

Chalkley “Chalkie” Beeson: proprietor, the Long Branch Saloon

George “Deacon” Cox: proprietor, the Dodge House Hotel

James H. “Dog” Kelley: mayor of Dodge; proprietor, the Alhambra Saloon

George “Big George” Hoover: proprietor, Hoover’s Cigar Shop and Wholesale Liquors; leader, Dodge City anti-saloon reform movement

Margaret: his wife; formerly the prostitute Maggie Carnahan

Other Kansas Figures (Dodge and Elsewhere)

Edwin “Eddie Foy” Fitzgerald: vaudeville comedian
Verelda: his girlfriend, a prostitute

Jau “China Joe” Dong-Sing: proprietor, China Joe’s Laundry and Baths John Horse Sanders: a young faro dealer

Charles Sanders:
Johnnie’s father, deceased;
a black man killed in Wichita after defending his wife from two Texans

Father Alexander von Angensperg, S.J.: an Austrian Jesuit; Johnnie Sanders’ favorite teacher at
the St. Francis Mission School for Indians, near Wichita

Father John Schoenmakers, S.J.: a Dutch Jesuit; superior of St. Francis

Brother Sheehan, S.J.: an Irish lay brother; taught farming at St. Francis

Father Paul Maria Ponziglione, S.J.: an Italian Jesuit, missionary to the Plains Indians

Captain Elijah Garrett Grier, U.S. Army: stationed at
Fort Dodge, Kansas;
owner of Roxana

John Riney: tollgate operator
, Dodge City toll bridge

Mabel: his wife

John Jr., called “Junior”: his eldest son

Wilfred Eberhardt: a German orphan

Thomas McCarty, M.D.: a Dodge City physician and pharmacist

Nick Klaine: editor,
Dodge City Times

D. M. Frost: editor,
Ford County Globe

The Animals

Dick Naylor: Wyatt Earp’s horse
Roxana: an Arabian mare owned by Elijah Garrett Grier
Michigan Jim: a quarterhorse owned by Mayor Dog Kelley
Alphonsus: the Jesuits’ mule