Sins of the Father (16 page)

It was just about dusk when Gus Gilroy rode up to Jed’s Saloon followed by ten of the meanest looking men you could lay eyes on. Each man was a seasoned gunman and itching to make some good money to ply his skills. Gilroy strutted into the saloon and motioned to the ten men to join him. They all walked in and stood in a semi-circle around the large table where Rance Madden was seated with one of his other men, Vernon Foster.

“Boss,” said Gilroy, “these are the men I was telling you about the other day. Each and every one of these men is as tough as they come and they are looking to make some money. I’ve already explained the situation to them and they ain’t got any problems with shooting whoever you want shot, as long as they get paid well for it.”

Madden stood up and looked the ten men over. They did, indeed, look like hardened men. All of them were wearing six guns worn low and strapped down tight. “If there is any man here who hasn’t killed at least one man in his life, I don’t want to hire you, so speak up now.”

The ten men looked at one another and no one spoke up. The truth was, each of them had killed more than their share of men and a few of them had killed and raped their share of women. These were hard cases for sure. Madden motioned for them to put some tables together and sit down. The ten men introduced themselves to Madden. The men were, Lane Myers, Jon Stidham, Smitty Morrison, Vreeland Summers, Ernest Winslow, Gorden Barry, Lyle Bitters, Reginald Sharky, Hatch Simpson and Griff Clark. Vreeland Summers, who was probably the worst of the lot and probably the deadliest of them with a pistol, was the first to speak up.

“Mr. Madden, we’ve all been told that you are paying well for hired guns. I’ve talked with all the other men and they agreed to let me speak for them. We all had jobs we were being hired for and we cancelled them because we heard you would pay more. The question is, how much are you paying?”

Madden poured himself a drink. “I don’t like to admit this, but I’m desperate for men so I will pay more than you would make hiring your gun out to anyone else, I guarantee it. I have the sheriff of this town lying over at the Doctors office, and Thornton’s men broke Marshal Frank Reedy and three deputies out of the jail last night, and I’ve lost a lot of men over the last several days.”

Vreeland Summers stiffened at the mention of Frank Reedy. “Did I hear you right; did you say Marshal Frank Reedy?”

“Yes.”
“U.S. Marshal Frank Reedy?”
“Yes, do you know him?”
“I ought to. He put a bullet in me and locked me

up for six months just because I killed a man over in Leavenworth. Man attacked me with a knife so I had to shoot him. Reedy wouldn’t listen to my side of the story and when I wouldn’t go willingly, he put a bullet in my right side. I owe him one, but if you want us to take on a U.S. marshal and two of his deputies, you better be willing to pay real good. A man kills a U.S. marshal and the rest of them damn marshals take it real personal. They will keep coming for you until they get you no matter how long it takes them.”

“Not if we can ambush them first and kill them. Then we go out and bury them deep out in the forest where no one will ever find their bodies.”

“We would have to kill all the witnesses because if one person knows, he will tell someone eventually. You’re going to have to pay us enough to hide out for quite a while.”

“I will pay each of you five hundred dollars now and another five hundred when your work is finished. On top of that, I will pay one hundred per day for each man, and I will cover all your expenses along with that. You men can go to the mercantile store and take whatever you need and charge it to my account and the same goes for the saloon here as well as the hotel. How does that sound?”

Vreeland looked around at the other nine men and they all looked satisfied with the offer. He turned back to Rance Madden. “How long do you think this job will take?”

“I figure that Marshal Reedy will ride straight into town tomorrow with some of Thornton’s men and try to arrest me and my men. He figures I’m low on hired guns and he has no idea that you men showed up so fast, so I figure he won’t waste any time.”
“Well, how do you want us to go about it?” “We’ve got about twenty men now with your ten

in the fold. My man Vernon here will show you around town. I would like you to keep at least two of your men on the rooftops at all times, day and night. They can take turns. I figure that Reedy will come in at the west end of town since that’s the way to the Thornton ranch. I would like you to use the rest of your men to wait outside of town to ambush Reedy and his men when they come to town. Take three or four of my other men with you.”

“Do you want us to warn them before we start shooting?”
“Hell no. I want you and your men to open fire on them and hopefully, you’ll get four or five of them before they know what hit them. Then, finish them off, drag their sorry asses out in the woods, and bury them deep so the coyotes don’t dig them up. We don’t want any evidence.”
“What if they come in the other way?”
“Then we’ll just have to deal with it. My men can hold out until your men can get here. That’s why I need two of your men up on the roof tops and I need them to be your best shooters.”
“Hell, just pick any of them, they are all expert shooters with a rifle or pistol. I’ll leave you four men for the rooftops. They can rotate every six hours.”
“It sounds like we have a deal and a plan.”
“Yeah, but I ain’t seen any money yet.” Vreeland said, holding his hand out.
Madden smiled. “Vernon, go over to the bank and bring me back six thousand dollars. That should cover your pay, including today’s wages. You and your men get something to eat and you will all have your money in your pockets before you finish your meals.”
Vernon Foster had already headed for the bank and Madden motioned for Jed to take care of his newly acquired hired guns. Madden looked them over and smiled. He felt good that he had the upper hand again. It wouldn’t be long before he would be rid of Thornton, Reedy, Steele and everyone else who was getting in his way. He sat back and poured himself another drink.

o what is the plan Frank?” Jess asked. “Jess, the way I see it, Madden figures that I’m going to waltz right in there and arrest him and his men. Well, we ain’t going to dance to that tune this time. I think we are going to play it your way.”

“It’s about time you came to your senses, Frank. You can’t deal with a man like Madden and follow the law. Don’t you remember Dick Carter or Paul Mason? They were cut out of the same bolt of cloth that Madden was, although I actually think that Madden isn’t playing with a full deck.”

“I’m beginning to see it that way too. I know one thing for sure, he intends on killing me and my men here no matter what, I figure it’s either me or him and it ain’t going to be me.”

Jess looked at the other three men. “Are the rest of you men in on this? I don’t see any badges on any of your shirts.”

Torrey Abel, Hal Banks and Buck Hern all shook their heads in agreement.
“All right, I’ll go along with it, but I still need to work alone most of the time.”
“Jess, where were you when you shot that man down in the street back in town? Everyone was looking around to see where the shot came from, but no one figured it out.”
“You’re still not going to figure it out because I’m not telling anyone, and that includes you. What I will tell you is that I do plan on doing some shooting with my Sharps today. I figure I can pick off a few of Madden’s men before they can figure it out.”
“Jess, go ahead and get into your position and do whatever you think you need to do. Here is what I plan on doing. I’m going to take these three men and four of Thornton’s men and attack Madden tonight just after dark. Banks and I will sneak into town from the north. We will take out two or three easy targets and then run like hell for the woods. I figure that Madden’s men will follow and my other men will be positioned at the edge of the woods and they can open fire with their Winchesters at Madden’s men. We’ll get as many of them as we can and then we will all split up and head through the woods. They might find one or two of us, but they won’t get all of us. I don’t think they will follow us into the woods anyway. They’ll probably figure we have another ambush set up for them.”
Jess thought about it for a moment. “I wouldn’t have planned it any other way myself, Frank. I’ll be able to give you and your men some cover from my position. It will be dark so they might see the muzzle flash and give my position away, but if that happens, I’ll be able to get away and meet you back at the Thornton ranch.”
“Good luck to you, Jess,” Reedy said as he shook Jess’ hand.
“Luck doesn’t have much to do with it, Frank,” Jess replied as he swung up in the saddle. “I hope to see you tomorrow for breakfast.”
“You will. I don’t want to miss out on those fresh flapjacks Pattie makes.”
Jess headed out, and Reedy and the other three men went back into Thornton’s ranch to explain what they were planning to do. The rest of Thornton’s men were done eating and already out at their designated spots. Henry Thornton was sitting at the table with Stumpy Watson, Tex and Pattie Nate, drinking coffee. Thornton noticed that none of the four men were wearing a badge.
“Marshal, what happened to your badge?”
“I took it off,” Reedy said as he reached into his back pocket and pulled out his marshal’s badge and placed it in the middle of the table. Able, Banks and Buck all followed suit. “I think its best if we leave those badges here until this matter is finished for good.”
“Well, I’m glad you men finally came to your senses,” exclaimed Pattie.
Tex took off his badge and threw it into the pile. “I’m in for whatever you decide, Marshal.”
“Tex, I need you to keep wearing that badge and I want you to stay here and help protect the ranch. Any hard riding will surely open up those wounds and you will bleed to death. Besides, if things go okay, we’ll need a lawman to make legal arrests and lock up prisoners.”
Tex thought about it for a moment and then he picked his badge back up and pinned it back on. “I suppose you’re right, Marshal. I can do more good here than out there. I would probably slow you down.”
“I’m glad you agree and don’t call me marshal anymore, just call me Frank. Mr. Thornton, I need your best four men. I plan on attacking Madden in town tonight.”
Henry Thornton smiled at the thought. “You can take Stevens, Fields, Taft and one of the new men, Cotton. That only leaves me with six men and Tex here to guard the ranch. We won’t be able to fight off a large attack from Madden and his men.”
“Hopefully, you won’t have to. We should have Madden and his men too busy to attack you tonight. Pattie, I expect a big breakfast tomorrow morning, including some of those flapjacks.”
“Frank, if you come back tomorrow, I’ll cook up anything you want. Is Jess going with you?”
“No, he decided to go ahead and work alone for now. I think he’s planning on giving Madden a little grief before we get there tonight.”
“Good, that bastard deserves all the grief he gets.”
“Okay men; let’s go get the other four and all get some rest. We will ride out right after dark,” said Reedy.

ESS TOOK THE LONG WAY
towards Timber, following along the edge of the woods. That way, he could duck into cover if he saw anyone coming along the trail. He saw no one. He thought of Eddie Sloan and how he had missed him again back in Abilene, Kansas. Jess had been so distracted by the current turn of events that he had almost forgotten about his hunt for Eddie Sloan; almost. Jess figured that Sloan was finished with his high stakes poker game in St. Louis and off to somewhere else. It didn’t matter to Jess. Jess would pick up his trail again and it didn’t matter how long it took.

He worked himself behind the high ridge on the north side of Timber. He tied Sharps up about two hundred feet into the woods by the same little stream and rode Gray up the gentle slope until he reached the hole going into the cave. He walked through the cave to the other side and leaned his Sharps big fifty against the wall and placed the leather bag down, opened the large flap and placed several cartridges on the flap, all pointing in the same direction. He took his telescope and looked down at the town.

Timber was a small town with only one main street and only about a dozen buildings along each side. There were a few scattered houses around the town in no particular order. Most of them were mere one room shacks and just had a bed, a stove or a fireplace for heat and cooking and not much more than that. A few were larger and looked fairly nice with flowers planted around the house and porches. Jess had noticed that hardly any of the townsfolk came out of their homes or businesses. They were afraid to walk the streets with Madden’s men all around. Jess noticed that there were more men than before and it was obvious that Madden had hired more gunmen and by the looks of it, quite a few.

Jess could also see that Madden had a large group of men at the west end of town and a small group at the east end. Jess knew why Madden had placed the larger group at the west end of town. It was because he figured that any attack from Thornton or Reedy would most likely come from that direction and that would give Madden the perfect ambush. They were far enough out of town that Jess could hardly see them through the telescope, but he could see that they were hiding behind trees and large boulders. They were out of range for the Sharps.

The two men he had spotted on the rooftops, however, were not out of range for the Sharps. Jess looked them over very carefully. He had not seen either of them before and they looked like seasoned gunmen.
Probably new
, Jess thought to himself.
Well, time to get things moving,
Jess thought.

He chambered the first round into the Sharps and lifted the front sight up. He checked the wind and it was blowing gently to the east. He sighted in on the first target. He was sitting on a ledge, which was about two feet high and went around three sides on top of the mercantile store, smoking a cigarette. The man’s Winchester was leaning against the ledge within easy reach.

Jess propped the Sharps in the fork of the large branch he had cut and left there before. It held the Sharps nice and steady and allowed Jess to fire about five feet back from the opening of the cave. That way, the muzzle flash and smoke would not be seen in the daylight. He took careful aim and he aimed above and to the right a little to make up for the wind and the drop of the round on its way to its target. He was firing downwards at about a forty-five degree angle. He slowly put pressure on the trigger of the Sharps until it barked. Jess looked up and the man flew off the building and fell between the mercantile store and the building next to it.