Support Your Local Deputy: A Cotton Pickens Western (5 page)

There sure was a ruckus east of Doubtful that evening. The medicine show was going full bore, with one act after another, but now there was the orphan wagons parked nearby, in some cottonwoods. It looked like the whole town of Doubtful was on hand, and so were a mess of cowboys off the ranches.

All them orphans, they were cut loose to go wherever they wanted. The girls, they clumped together and seemed timid, but the boys, they roared around looking for ways to get into trouble. Mr. and Mrs. McCoy, they just roamed placidly, keeping an eye on the orphans.

The accordionist, he finished up a jig on that little wagon stage, even as the two teamsters lit some oil lamps as dusk settled. The stage, backed by one wagon, was all lit up, drawing attention to the show. I wandered around behind the stage, looking for trouble, but most of them medicine show people, they just sat on folding chairs and smoked cigars, including the women.

The professor appeared, all fixed up in his tux and tails and stovepipe hat, and now he climbed a few steps and got out in front of that mob. This would be his last pitch; whatever he didn’t sell tonight, he’d have to sell in the next town.

“Ah, my friends, my new lifelong friends in this noble town of Doubtful, Wyoming, we come to the moment of parting. Tomorrow, Doctor Zimmer’s medicinal exhibit will pack up, not only all of our things, but all of our sweet memories, and hasten away.

“Now I’ve told you all about what my famous elixir does for the mortal body, but I have yet to speak of what it does for animals. The tonic is known to put new life in old horses and mules, to put joy into a venerable dog, and it has a special effect on draft horses, making them eager to pull and tug, and turning them young again. A spoonful for your horse, and the plowing goes better.

“My friends, animals have their own sorrows of body and soul. They age and grow weary. They faithfully carry the cowboy on his daily rounds. They draw heavy wagons, and pull plows, and drag buggies. And they hurt, just like we mortals hurt after a hard day. Any cowboy who knows his horse knows how much the horse has given to him that day, all-out help, every hour.

“Now, long ago some cowboys discovered that a little dose of Doctor Zimmer’s Tonic comforts their faithful and noble horses. It needn’t be much; maybe two teaspoons of it, mixed with the grain, and lo, behold, their animals are young and frisky again, and ready for the next hard day. It’s an act of charity, an act of kindness, to treat your faithful horse or mule or dog to this tonic that restores youth and vitality in them.

“Now, to prove my point, I invite someone to bring his horse up to the stage, and I will supply an absolutely free dose of my tonic, and you will soon see that old horse sigh, smile, and dance. Are there any takers?”

Sure enough, several cowboys were running to fetch their horses, and in a moment, one showed up. Zimmer expertly opened the horse’s jaw and pumped a spoonful of his tonic into the beast, which licked and slurped, and then farted.

“Now, friends, it takes a little time for you to see the results, so while we wait, I’ll be pleased to sell you two bottles for one, as my going-away offer, two dollars for two bottles of Doctor Zimmer’s Medicine Tonic.”

Sure enough, a mess of cowboys lined up in front of the teamster who was doling out the bottles and collecting the cash. He must have sold twenty bottles or so when the horse began weaving, rocking, swaying, and finally settled to earth, sighed, rolled over on its back, and pawed the air.

“There, you see? One happy horse,” said Zimmer, who sounded a little worried. “Listen to him pass gas; the mark of true happiness in any livestock. Show me a farting horse, and I’ll show you a happy horse.”

But he stared anxiously at the downed animal, until at last the beast got up on its forelegs, and then staggered up on his rear legs, and shook the dirt off.

“One happy horse,” Zimmer bellowed.

The cowboys flocked around the beast, patting it, tweaking it, studying it, and mostly agreeing. The tonic had wrought joy in the old plug.

“There, you see? The salvation of man and beast!” Zimmer announced. “Buy now, because it may be a long while before I return with my fine company of performers. Buy now, because the sand is flowing through the hourglass, and in the morning, we’ll be on our way, heading to the next town, to give them all an opportunity to enjoy Doctor Zimmer’s famous tonic. Buy it now, to relieve the sorrows of dogs, babies, horses, mules, goats, women, schoolteachers, merchants, law officers, and hoboes. And to improve all nighttime activities.”

Well, I had to credit Zimmer. Those cowboys ponied up in a long line and began to shell out their hard-won cash for the tonic, instead of blowing it all in the saloons. But then an old gray cowboy reached into his britches to buy some of that joy juice, and came up empty.

“I been robbed,” he bawled. “Some light-fingered whelp’s made off with my purse.”

That sure caused a commotion, and pretty quick, most of them cowboys were digging into their pants, making sure they still had their cash and private parts, and a mess more came up missing their pay.

“Some little whelp’s gone and dug into my pants,” yelled another son of the prairies.

I didn’t doubt what started the crime wave, and headed straight for them little orphan buggers, who were racing around there. I’d had my eye on one, a carrot-topped little punk that looked mean as a lobo wolf, and pretty fast. I snatched him by the collar and flattened him on the dirt, and dug into his pockets, and sure enough, there were three purses he’d purloined while working that crowd, and by then Rusty had snagged another punk, this one with blond hair and a big jaw, and he proved to be another light-finger genius, with four more cowboy purses stuffed into his pants.

Them cowboys saw all this, and snared the rest of the orphan boys, and dug into their pockets, while the McCoys sounded like a pair of squawking pigeons. But the cowboys came up empty. Rusty and me, we’d got the two pickpocket punks. It took a while to get the purses back to the right owners, and have them count up the cash, but in time we got it all squared away, and they got back into line and bought Zimmer’s Miracle Elixir for their horses and their own carcasses. There wasn’t a man or woman or merchant around there that wasn’t checking purses and wallets and pockets. And the orphans, male and female, vamoosed over to their own camp and hid out. I sure wondered how the adoptions would go the next morning on the courthouse steps.

Zimmer, he got his performers to strike up a tune, and pretty soon the next acts, the fat woman in the grass skirt and the fiddler, were hard at it in the yellow light of the lamps.

Rusty and me, we dragged those two little hooligans off to the jail and set them down for some serious palavering.

“You first,” I said to the red-haired one. “What’s your name?”

“My name’s whatever you choose. I don’t got none, but Mickey’ll do. And if you want me to fess up, you got it. I’ve been snatching purses since I was six, and I almost got enough to retire tonight.”

“You with that orphan train?”

“Them turds. I almost got away tonight.”

I turned to the blond kid. “And you?”

“Call me the Big Finn, copper. I got more loot than Mickey, and I’ll whip his ass any time.”

“Where’d you grow up?”

“Nowhere. Hell’s Kitchen, but you’re too dumb to figure that out.”

“Where’s that?”

“I don’t know. That’s where this orphan outfit caught me. Regular snare net come down over me and they hauled me off to here.”

“You want to spend the rest of your days behind them bars there?”

“Beats getting adopted and having to work my ass off for a living. That’s what it is, pal, slave labor. That’s a slave labor outfit, selling us out.”

“You been doing this all your life?”

“Since I was old enough to spit, copper.”

“You want to go to the pen, the big brick pile, and hammer rocks the rest of your life?”

“Hey, they feed me, right?”

“Yeah,” said Mickey, “toss us in there. We get three squares a day, and don’t have to lift a finger.”

“You got any remorse?” Rusty asked.

“What’s that? If it’s worth something, I’ll cop some for you.”

“I stole a bottle of Zimmer’s dope,” the Finn said. “It’s in the wagon. I’m gonna go on a wild ride.”

“Where’d you get that?”

“Right off the table when that big galoot was making change.”

“What do you want to be when you’re grown?” I asked.

“A paid clock-stopper. Them gents get a hunnert dollars for each hit. I’d kill me half a dozen and live like a king. I’d slit their throats; beats having a gun.”

By this time, I sure was wondering what to do, and the most likely thing to do was get these two out of town as fast as the orphan train would take them. I couldn’t think of anything that would slow this pair down.

That’s when King Glad walked in. King, and his sister, Queen, ran the Admiral Ranch outside of Doubtful. They were both tough customers, as hard as any people got, but straight shooters. Their pa had started the outfit, and employed the roughest hands in Puma County, including Big Nose George, Spitting Sam, Smiley Thistlethwaite, and Alvin Ream. They sure weren’t men to mess with, and most of them were recruited from jails back East. The Glads ran their outfit with an iron hand, and smart people left them alone.

“I heard about the ruckus,” King said. “These the little punks?”

“Yep, this here’s Mickey, from off the streets somewhere, and this one’s the Big Finn, from Hell’s Kitchen, wherever that is.”

“Perfect,” said King. “They’re just what I’m looking for.”

“Naw, they’re not. This one here, he wants to stay in jail because he gets meals and no work; this other, he wants to be a contract killer and live easy.”

Glad turned to the punks. “My kind of fellers,” he said. “I’ll indenture you tomorrow, when they have that hoedown on the courthouse steps.”

“You know what you’re doing, King?”

He grinned at me. “Sheriff, I run the best reform school in Wyoming. A few days with Spitting Sam and Big Nose, and they’ll be the best little workers around.”

“I’m locking them up tonight, King.”

“I’ll buy them tomorrow,” he said.

Not a bad deal, I thought. Except maybe the brats would steal the ranch.

I went to see the medicine show off at dawn. I sort of hated it; I hadn’t figured out who nipped the boodle in Zimmer’s cash box, and I hadn’t come up with any suspects at all. I wished I could set it right with him.

I wrestled myself out of my cot at Belle’s Boarding House and got out there just as the outfit was fixing to roll.

“You, is it?” Zimmer asked. “You found some hard-won and easily nipped greenbacks that belong to me?”

“No, sir, I reckon I ain’t. Not even a likely prospect. But I want an address so if I get aholt of it, I can return it.”

Zimmer sighed. “I have none, sir. I hope to retire in Ames, Iowa, when I’ve advanced a few more years, but my home, sir, is only a soft and seductive dream.”

The feller sounded sort of lonely. It would be a strange sort to run around the country peddling tonic all his life, with nary a hope of home and family. But the world’s full of odd sorts like him.

“You do well here?”

“I would have, but for the theft, sheriff.”

“You sure it ain’t someone in your company? Someone who wouldn’t be noticed sawing away on the padlock in your wagon?”

“It pains me to see you drive a wedge between my loyal people and me, sir. No, they are stalwarts. The visit to Doubtful was a wash, thanks to some culprit in your town. And now, sir, we make haste for Douglas, up north a way.”

Those people were standing around, waiting for me to let them loose, it seemed, so I waved them off. For once the professor wasn’t in his tux and tails. He wore soft britches and shirt, and was going to drive one wagon.

The whole business seemed unfinished to me, but that’s how it is with law enforcement. Stuff goes unresolved. For all I knew, this outfit pilfered all the stuff from George Waller’s mercantile, and maybe more.

“One last word, sheriff. People in towns like yours are suspicious of road shows like mine. There’s a sentiment that we’re knaves and thieves, and that we’re not to be trusted. I’ve run into it time after time. So, if there’s doubt in your bosom, feel free to examine any of my wagons and their entire contents. Maybe that’ll put to rest whatever’s bothering you; whatever brought you here at dawn to look us over.”

“Well, Rusty, he had a look already, so you just get on the road now. I got a mess of new troubles, including an orphan sale this morning.”

Zimmer smiled. “I’ll sell you a bottle of tonic for fifty cents, sheriff.”

“Naw, my ma always said, don’t use crutches if you can walk upright.”

Zimmer nodded, clambered up to the high seat, cracked the lines over the croups of the draft horses, and the wagons slowly rumbled away. I watched them go, itchy and unhappy, wanting to finish business that lay hanging over me. It put me in a bad mood, and when I thought of those little hooligans I had to go back to the jail and feed, I got myself into an even badder mood. Them two, unless King Glad could square them up, was headed for a hanging, and likely their own.

The brats were awake and rattling the cage. When they saw me, one reached for the slop bucket, and I knew what he had in mind.

“Toss that at me, boy, and I’ll put a bullet between your eyes.”

That was a slight exaggeration, but it stopped him. Some people, force is the only language they understand. He edged away from the bucket, which stank from the night’s accumulation.

“You want some chow, do you?”

“Nah, we don’t need nothing,” Big Finn said.

“When do we get outta here?”

“When I feel like it,” I said. “You have to get on the good side of me to get what you want.”

“There ain’t a good side to you,” Mickey said.

“You got that right, boy.”

Rusty, he came in with two bowls of oatmeal from Barney’s Beanery, eyed the prisoners, smiled, and looked over the logbook.

“Hey, we want the feed,” Mickey said.

“You gotta work for it,” I said.

“Doing what?”

“Talk,” I said. “Tell me all about yourselves and you’ll get your chow.”

“Talk?”

“You bet. Start yakking away. Talking’s hard work. Who are you? Where’d you grow up? Who are your folks? Who are your grandparents? What do you want from life? You got any dreams? You talk, work hard at it, you eat. You slack off, you don’t eat.”

Mickey and Big Finn stared at each other.

“I got nothing to say,” Big Finn said.

“Tell me everything that’s happened to you.”

That met with silence. Rusty, he was enjoying this.

Neither boy talked. The clock ticked. The boys eyed the cold gruel malevolently. I finally relented, handed them their gruel and spoons, and they wolfed it down.

“You want to talk now?” I asked.

“We ain’t worth it,” Mickey said.

“You’re worth it. I want to know all about you.”

“Yeah, so you can throw the book at us.”

“Think whatever you want. Mostly I want to know who you are. I like me, but you don’t like you, is that it?”

I wasn’t making any headway with the boneheads, but pretty quick I was rescued by King Glad. He had indenture papers in hand, had made the legal arrangements with the McCoys and the Children’s Aid Society, and had come to collect.

“They’re in there. You got some help? You’ll need it,” I said.

“Big Nose George and Spitting Sam are right outside.”

“Yours, then,” I said. I unlocked the cell, while the brats watched, ready to bolt, but King Glad and I, we collared the pair and marched them to the door. Out there, Big Nose and Spitting Sam were waiting with two empty saddle horses.

“Who’s this? What’s he want?” Big Finn asked me.

“This is King Glad. He’s got a big ranch near here. He’s indentured you both.”

“Indentured? What’s that?”

King Glad replied, “I get to stuff food into you until age sixteen, and you get to work for me and learn a trade until age sixteen.”

“Work? I ain’t gonna let you sucker me into that.”

“That’s fine. I won’t let you sucker me into feeding you.”

“We’ll bust loose, sucker.”

“I’m sure you’ll try. Want to try right now?”

The hooligans, they eyed me, and eyed Glad, and eyed the door, and allowed themselves to be taken outside, where the horses were waiting, along with Glad’s men.

“You’re gonna hafta drag us,” Mickey said, and immediately quit walking. So we dragged him down to the street, and then dragged Big Finn, too.

“This here’s Big Nose George, he’s my ramrod, and this here’s Spitting Sam, he’s my second ramrod. You boys climb up on those nags and we’ll head out,” King said.

Instead, Mickey and Big Finn sat down in the street. “Make us,” snapped Finn.

Them hooligans never knew what landed on ’em. Next they knew, they was stretched out in the horse dung, on their bellies, and the ramrods were sitting atop them. Spitting Sam, he dug into his pockets for some chaw, put a pinch into his mouth, and handed the tin to Big Nose, who took some and slid it under his tongue.

“You had breakfast yet, Sam?” Big Nose George asked. “A rank horse sure makes me hungry.”

“We’ll send someone to the Beanery,” Spitting Sam said. “I got a bucking bronc here.”

“Hey, let us up,” Big Finn snapped.

“You hear something, Sam?” asked Big Nose.

“Just the crickets,” Big Nose said.

By then they were attracting spectators, who eyed the odd scene with displeasure.

“Don’t mistreat the orphans,” said one lady. “This is inhumane.”

“I only weigh a hundred forty, ma’am,” Spitting Sam said. “You mind telling me how I’m mistreating these fine young fellers? We’re just having a chew and some breakfast.”

She glared at him and stalked off. The rest of them folks, they just snickered.

This whole deal lasted about ten minutes, and then Big Finn said, “Yeah, let me up and I’ll get on that plug.”

“Glad you see it our way, boy,” Spitting Sam said, and stood up. Big Finn rose slowly, and climbed on the horse, looking whipped. Mickey followed. In moments, King Glad and his foremen were riding out of Doubtful with their two indentured boys riding slow plugs just in case they got notions. Neither of them had ever been on a nag before, so the ride out to the ranch was going to be an education that would improve their butts. I didn’t think it was going to go well for anyone, but I’m not very good at predicting the future. The thing that clawed at me was a hope that the little hooligans were treated fair, and not hurt. They didn’t know any better, and I hope King Glad understood that.

It was time for the adoptions, and there were a mess of people, mostly curiosity-seekers, milling around the courthouse steps. I was glad most of them didn’t see what was going on in front of my office. I saw the McCoys over there, with their orphan wagons, and all them young folks looking for a new ma and pa, or maybe not wanting one. But they didn’t have any say in it, being minors, so most of them were just standing there, half afraid, awaiting their fate. The girls were quieter and sadder; the boys were scared, anyone could see that. The girls didn’t look at the people, but stared at the clay, while the boys, some looked bitter, and others were real hopeful, and wondering if they were entering heaven, or hell, or no place at all.

The McCoys, they got their show on the road right at ten.

“All right, friends, these are orphaned youngsters, or children without shelter, and they’re looking for good homes and parents who’ll protect them, love them, raise them up straight and true, and welcome them into their families. You’ve had a chance to look them over. They’re all sound of limb and teeth, and speak English. They’ll all be good little workers and affectionate and obedient young people. So, let’s begin. Are there takers?”