Chapter Thirty-Nine
"S-S-Sma-ack!" was the annoyingly loud, and only, sound which repeatedly reverberated through the Cherokee Saloon that hot afternoon. "S-S-Sma-ack!" echoed through the almost empty building as the barkeep brought the leather fly swatter he was wielding down again, lambasting his fifteenth fly in as many minutes.
"Knock it off!" one of his only five customers shouted--er, threatened. The 'buzzing' noise was apparently preferable to the disturbing sounds the swatter had been producing, "An' bring us another bottle!"
"Ahh!" another of the previously quiet quintet piped up as the barkeep set the whiskey down before him, "The only thing of any value left in this whole stinkin' place!" he glumly surmized, pouring himself a refill and passing the valuable elixar on to his sweating associates.
"True..." Elliot Polk agreed, "But jes' two miles south a' he-ere is a whole Settlement full a' sod-busters!"
"Ain' nothin' out the-ere but a bunch a' dirt poor farmers!" another of the five angrily pointed out.
"Maybe," Elliot Polk again agreed, "maybe not...What about all those wagons filled with family heirlooms? Gold watches?...Jewelry? I tell yah, I think it's at least worth checkin' out. Like takin' candy from a baby!"
"You jes' wan' us ta help you look for yore little brother!" the bottle requester realized, "Well, I ain' searchin' for nothin' o-or nobody in this heat!"
"Joe B.'s right," the liquor evaluator said, "I jes' wanna set an' sweat!"
"An' sip!" the victim evaluator added, voicing his approval of their non-removal from the saloon--and it's shade.
Elliot Polk eye-balled his closest associate the order to give the Settlement robbing plan some support.
"I dunno," Butch Delliss began, "What, with Mareck bein' broke an' all, we're gonna be needin' some travelin' money. An', after we got the gold, we could all go for a nice, refreshin' dip in the river. The Cimarron runs right by there--an' that water's bound ta be cool...a whole lot cooler than this air we're settin' here breathin'!"
"An' after our swim," Polk continued, in an attempt to turn the spark of interest--which Delliss had just generated--into a blazin' bonfire of desire, "we'll light off outta this lousy Territory, jes' like we planned! An' by the time John Law gets here, we'll all be long gone!" The outlaw smiled inwardly as his reminder of the AUTHORITY'S imminent arrival caused the desired desi-ire for immediate departure on the part of his companions. He had already talked all but one of them into hangin' around 'til after the sun set, when the air would be cooler and more conducive to travel. Now, it appeared he had convinced them to participate in a little gold prospectin' along the way. Only Joe B. was right. He weren't interested in no jewelry or watches. What Elliot Polk was after was his baby brother.
The barkeep watched as the grumpy group got up out of their wooden seats--to which parts of their sweating bodies were stuck--and then filed, unsmilingly, past him and out through the swinging doors. "Good riddance!" he said aloud, when the doors had finished 'thudding'. Then he picked his lethal leather weapon up--and went back to swatting flies... "S-S-Sma-ack!"
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After nursing Jamie, Katelyn had laid down with the baby to try to get him to take a nap. True to her word, she had fallen instantly asleep. And the two of them had remained sleeping all afternoon.
And that is what the two of them were still doing when Elliot Polk poked his head into their wagon, "Well, lookee here!" he shouted to his pillaging companions.
Katelyn snapped instantly awake, sat bolt upright on the bed and snatched her infant son up into her arms, "What do you want?!" she demanded, sounding more outraged than afraid. She didn't have to ask who the intruder was, because she recognized his ogling eyes from their encounter two days before.
"Well, well, well..." Butch Delliss began as he and the other three outlaws poked their hot heads inside to see what Polk was pointing out to them, "Where's yore husband?" he slimily inquired, noting that the woman was all alone--well, except for the baby, which didn't really count.
"He's gone in ta town," the little lady lied, "But he'll be back at any moment!"
"You're lyin'!" Polk pointed out further, "Yore husband is dead!"
Katelyn gasped in both shock and horror. But then she remembered Mrs. Fitzsimmons saying something about how everybody had heard that Jim Crown was dead--and she inhaled a silent breath of relief. "Please!?" she pleaded as the five pillagers began to approach the bed--with rapin' written all over their slimey sweat-drenched faces, "Don't hurt my baby!"
"Don' worry," Delliss said, salivating at the sight of the beauty sitting there on the bed, "We ain't interested in no babies!"
"That's right!" Joe B. adamantly agreed as the heat being generated from within his body surpassed the temperature of the air outside, "We prefer the packages they come in!"
As the heated up horde came at her, Katelyn let out an unbelievably lou-oud, blood-curdling scream.
The five rapin' pillagers were about to pounce upon their pretty prey--when a bullet went whistling down the center of the wagon, just inches over their heads! The disgusting group ended up hitting the deck, instead.
Katelyn took advantage of the distraction and sprang up and off of the bed--and out of the back of the wagon--before any of the rapists even realized what had happened.
Four of the frustrated fellows took off out the back after her, while one of them checked on who had fired the near fatal shot.
Elliot Polk cursed aloud as another bullet went whistling past his head, missing his left ear by less than an inch. He spotted the sod-buster responsible for the near miss--squeezed off a shot in the intruder's direction--and was rewarded for his effort.
The farmer's body jerked and the rifle fell from his hands.
The outlaw didn't wait around to see what happened after that.
If he had waited, he would have seen Helen Fitzsimmons race off to find the doctor.
While her son, Danny, rode off to fetch Mr. MacGregor--ON THE DOUBLE!
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"You're awake," Dulcey determined, seeing the seated figure's eyes were open--though apparently not focused on any particular thing.
Jim Crown had been sitting there for hours, holding onto Francis' hand and staring thoughtfully off into space. He glanced up, saw that the girl did, indeed, appear to be a bit perkier--and gave her a weak smile and nod.
"I wish he were," the girl glumly muttered, directing her vision towards the motionless young man on the bed, "It's a bad sign that he hasn't regained consciousness. Jarrod said the sooner he wakes up, the better his chances are..."
"Wish I'd a' known that a little sooner," the Marshal half-muttered, then he straightened up in his chair and virtually shouted, "FRANCIS! C'MON! WAKE UP! IT'S LATE! IF YOU AIN'T DRESSED AN' DOWNSTAIRS IN FIVE MINUTES I'M LEAVIN' WITHOUT YOU! NOW, C'MON! GET UP! That's it..." the lawman lowered his voice as his young friend suddenly raised his eyelids--repeatedly, "...rise an' shine," Jim Crown gently urged.
"Sorry, Jim..." Francis sleepily apologized, propping himself stiffly up on his elbows, "...guess I must a'...over-slept."
Dulcey and his boss exchanged grins.
The Deputy just lay there, looking at a total loss, "Where we goin' anyways? I can't seem ta remember..." he added--and began reaching for his aching, heavily bandaged head.
"We-e ain't goin' nowhere!" his boss assured him, and eased him gently back down on his bed. Weren't neither one a' them in any condition right then ta travel!
Francis watched in confusion as Jim Crown whispered something to Dulcey.
The girl's eyebrows arched, then she nodded and left the room, suppressing a smile all the while.
"You must a' misunderstood me," the Marshal informed him, "I said ta be sure an step OUT a' the way a' Mareck's 'train', not IN ta it!"
Francis' confused look vanished as Jim's well-chosen words succeeded in jarring his memory back to him. But not all of it, apparently, for there were still huge gaps as to what had happened to him.
"Don' look at me-e," the Marshal advised, catching that questioning look in his young friend's eyes, "I wasn' around, remember? In fact, Frank Finley informs me that I'm dead!...How did I die?" the deceased asked curiously.
"Rutgers' men ambushed you and took yore badge for the bounty," the imaginative young writer replied. "They, uh, also took Mareck's money..." he added rather proudly, "And Manny finally got a funeral."
His boss smiled approvingly and acknowledged the ingenuity of it all with a slight bow of his head.
Francis readily returned his smile, but did not dare to move his splitting split-open head.
Crown spotted a book on the top of his dresser and strolled casually over to retrieve it--and the single-paged newspaper that was lying beside it. "Is that article you did on the Kenzington twins in here?" he casually inquired as he came stepping back up to stand beside his bed, "'Course, I liked the others, too. But, that one's always been my favorite. It has jes' the right mixture of drama an' humor--"
"You've read my articles?!" the too stunned to speak up until then young reporter rather excitedly--and quite suddenly---interrupted. "But," the completely baffled lad continued as Jim Crown nodded, "in all those years, you never once picked up any a' those papers I left on yore desk!"
"I didn't need ta pick 'em up," the shrewd Marshal confessed, "I read yore articles before you sent 'em off ta be published. Didn' figure you'd mind, or you wouldn' a' left that little notebook a' yores lyin' around all the time..." he innocently explained.
And the two friends exchanged sly smiles.
The lawman's little disclosure must a' been just the right medicine for the seriously injured deptuty, 'cuz Francis' formerly gravely ill face now radiated with joy--and health, "And you really liked them?!"
"Eh-yeah," the still smiling Marshal confessed, but then candidly added,"But let's keep that jes' between me an' you. I wouldn' want folks thinkin' that I was becomin' vai-ain..."
And both the writer and the reader swapped smiles again.
Then Crown tensed somewhat as his deputy's face suddenly sobered.
"I'll never forget the first time I saw you in action," the young reporter reminisced rather reverently, "It was the day you arrived. I figured you were gonna be worth a fortune! My plan was ta make you famous an' me ri-ich! I was jes' lookin' for a legend...I never figured on findin' a friend..." Francis finished rather solemnly and flashed his friend a sort a' sad smile.
"I remember that firs' day, too-oo," the Marshal admitted, "I was in desp'rate need a both deputies a-an' friends. I needed all the deputies an' friends I could find! I liked you right off, though I must admit, I had my doubts about recruitin' you for a deputy. Bu-ut, I figured if it didn' work out--an' we somehow managed ta live through it all...We-ell, I figured we could at least still be friends. Yah see, I was lookin' for friends right along...only I never figured on findin' such good ones. A man couldn't ask for a better friend, Francis. You've uh, turned into a real decent Deputy U.S. Marshal over the years, too..." he teased, and then added with a wave of the paper in his hand, "...not ta mention, a pretty fair reporter..."
There was a solemn silence, which the reporter broke by posing the following question, "Only fai-air?"
"Well, you've only published one book an' one newspaper..." his critic defensively came back.
And so did Dulcey. "What are you two grinning about?" she wondered with a broad smile of her own. The contents of her right hand were placed upon the empty chair. The contents of her left hand were placed upon her perplexed looking patient's stomach.
"What are those for?" Francis anxiously inquired, staring over the steaming tray on his chest at the objects now occupying the chair beside his bed--er, his boss' bed. The reporter hadn't realized--'til jes' then--whose room he was actually in.
"It seems you have a real penchant for disregarding my orders," Crown obligingly explained. "So, rather than order you to remain in bed--until the Doctor says differently--I simply have ta slip these on..." he further explained. And--after passing the chain around one of the bars in the metal frame at the foot of his bed--he slipped the set of manacles that were now in his hands onto each of the invalid's two ankles. "There should be no misunderstanding about thi-is!" he triumphantly tacked on and tapped the restraints a time or two.
Dulcey's smile broadened even further--into a grin.
Francis' already fallen jaw, fell even further, and he was about to spout forth with a very verbal protest--when a cry suddenly came wafting up from somewheres downstairs.
Jim Crown stiffened. The Marshal recognized the voice that was shouting. It was his youngest deputy's voice! And that could mean only one thing--there was trouble out at the Settlement! "STAY PUT!" he ordered to both of his young friends. Then he picked Francis' boots up and hurried out of the room.
Danny Fitzsimmons was still calling for Mr. MacGregor when Crown reached his Office.
"What is it, Danny?! What's happened?!" he anxiously inquired, dropping his other deputy's boots so he could have both hands free to grip the nearly hysterical boy's shoulders.
"Five men," the breathless boy blurted, "they robbed the Settlement and shot my pa! An' no-ow, they're after Mrs. Edwards!" he concluded--by no-ow, nearly crying.
'Mrs. Crown!' the Marshal mentally corrected and gripped the kid's shoulders reassuringly, "You did real good, Danny! Now I need yore help again! My horse is tied out back a' the little shed behind Doc' Kilgren's. Yah think you kin fetch it for me?!"
"Yes, sir, Marshal!" Danny vowed. Then he pulled free and fled back out the front door--which he'd left open.
The Marshal found and loaded a spare pistol--which he shoved under his belt. Then he rammed a dozen plus bullets into the ammo chamber of his Winchester. He also took the time to cram as much additional ammunition as his pockets could carry onto his personage before finally heading for the front door.
The timing was perfect! For just as the 'dead' peace officer appeared in the street--Danny came cantering up, towing his warmed up--and really ready ta ride--thoroughbred.
"Stay inside an' out a' sight!" the Marshal ordered as he vaulted into his saddle.
Danny nodded and then watched in awe as his boss vanished in a bolt of unbelievable speed--and an incredibly thick cloud of dust.
In whatever condition Crown was, he had ta travel! An' travel fa-ast!?!