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Short Stories & Tall Tales
Crockett
Bill Henderson
1
The man had been dead for at least a week. With his neck at an impossible angle against a rock and signs where his horse had fallen, the cause was obvious. Papers in his pockets indicated that his name was Joe Kenwith but gave no location as to his home. A fairly new tintype of a woman and a young boy meant that he was probably also a husband and a father.
The baked patina of the desert floor took on a coppery sheen in the coolness of early morning. Somewhere to south lay the small pueblo of Tucson and far to the east, high up in the Superstition range were the mining towns of Globe and Miami.
The desert was silent. A jackrabbit paused for a moment in front of a stand of cholla, and idly studied the man. Quickly losing interest, he loped on his way, looking for breakfast.
Crockett sat back on his heels upwind of the corpse and studied the situation. He was bound for the Bradshaws and a claim that had been paying well last time he worked it, so he wasn’t happy about a possible detour. Still, someone, somewhere would be wondering what had happened to this man and like it or not, he had a duty to perform. Sighing, he got up and dug a shovel out of his pack.
The man’s back trail was plain enough but the first thing was to recover the man’s horse. It seemed to exhibit no ill effects from the fall and the numerous tracks showed that after spending some time trying to understand what had happened to its fallen rider, the horse had set off aimlessly through the cactus. But after about four or five miles, the horse’s trail took a new and fairly straight course and its pace quickened as evidenced by its longer strides and changed gait.. That could only mean one thing. Water.
Crockett found himself climbing a faint trail into a seemingly empty box canyon. He was puzzled because he thought he knew the location of every water hole in the area. Suddenly, he realized that he had lost the trail. Backtracking, he picked it up again and then lost it again. Backtracking yet again, he dismounted and carefully studied the tracks on foot. The tracks led onto an outcropping and then disappeared into what looked like solid rock. It wasn’t until he was right on top of it that he spotted a narrow opening hidden by brush and a mesquite tree. Mounting, he rode into the cleft in the canyon wall.
He wound back and forth, always climbing, for the better part of an hour, sometimes lifting his feet from the stirrups as the trail narrowed. Twice bees flew by his head, confirming the presence of water. Suddenly he broke out into a magnificent hanging valley, lush with green grass and trees. He saw several horses watching him intently and one of them was still saddled. In the distance and against the far wall of the valley, he thought he could make out a roof.
Slowly and quietly he worked his way towards the horses. With an angry snort, a big stallion slowly started moving the herd away but the saddled horse hesitated. Calling softly, Crockett nudged his mount forward. Now thoroughly alarmed, the stallion first pawed the air and then pushed the herd faster. The saddled horse turned to follow but then gave in to his longing for human companionship and stood quietly, waiting for the man.
Talking to him in a soothing voice, Crockett approached slowly and caught up the reins, still hanging on the saddle horn. Dismounting, he removed the saddle and blanket and checked for sores. Remarkably, there was only one and it was fairly minor. Retrieving some salve from his pack, he smeared a goodly amount on the gelding’s back. Finally, he removed the reins and bit and set the animal free. Mounting, he set off for the far side of the valley to investigate the roof he had spotted. Looking back, he saw the gelding following.
It was a little over three miles and twice he saw deer and once spotted a black bear print under a tree. He crossed a small stream of clear water that probably issued from a spring higher up in the mountains to the south. He lost sight of the roof but found it again easily enough. It was a small, but well made cabin of stone and wood and its builder was obviously a man of skill and a love of quality. It sat at the base of a cliff and utilized an overhang for a stable. Although it showed signs of long abandonment, it was still in remarkably good condition. The door opened easily but noisily on long un-oiled hinges but the shutters on the windows were all intact.
To his surprise, other than a thin film of dust throughout, a few spider webs, and evidence of a packrat, the cabin was neat and clean. Finding a broom in the corner, Crockett swept up and shook out the blankets on the lone bunk. Finding wood in a shed out back, he built a fire in the small stove and brought in a bucket of water for coffee. Digging in his pack, he found bacon and beans and set them to cooking in a pot he found in a cupboard. Walking outside, he sat in a still serviceable chair and rolled himself a smoke. In the west, the sun was setting into a bank of clouds that looked like a fairly good-sized storm building up. He hoped the roof was also in good shape.
Upon returning to the creek for another bucket of water, he found the cabin’s owner, or at least what was left of him. He spotted something that looked like leather jammed between two rocks and something white sticking out of it. It didn’t take long to understand what had happened. The owner had slipped on the slick rock, wedged his boot and foot between the rocks and broken his leg. A further search turned up more bones scattered by animals here and there. He also found a rusty Colt with four rounds still in it. That and a skull with hole in it confirmed that the cabin owner had taken his own life when he found he could not free himself. It also meant that he had been alone and had no hope of getting help. Crockett resolved to be very careful around those rocks.
He gathered up the skull and what bones he could find and pried the boot and broken leg bone from the rocks. For the second time in a day, he dug a grave.
Putting the horses in the stable, he went into the cabin and found a tin of oil for the lamp, trimmed the wick and lit it. Dishing up some of the bacon and beans, he was just about to sit at the table when he spotted a shelf of worn books. The former owner was also a reader. He decided that he would investigate the books when he had time but now he needed to eat, rest, and find Joe Kenwith’s family. He fed and watered the horses and then took a long, careful look around the valley. He had seen no sign at all of another human but he had long ago learned that a careless man is a dead man. In the west, the storm was building and he saw distant flashes of lightning.
Satisfied, he entered the cabin and as he finally crawled into the bunk he considered himself a lucky man. He had food, drink, and shelter. In the distance, thunder muttered and rumbled. Sometime in the night, the rain began and the roof did not leak. Crockett slept.
2
Up and around well before sunrise, Crockett rebuilt the fire and sliced bacon into a pan for breakfast. Outside, the storm was still blowing and the rain droned pleasantly on the roof. While the bacon fried, he ran outside to feed and water the horses and in spite of his slicker still managed to get fairly wet. Drying by the stove, he decided to see what information might be found about Kenwith in his saddlebags. What he found was far more than he bargained for. In addition to a letter addressed to a Mrs. Joe Kenwith, and another tintype, he found over forty thousand dollars in gold and banknotes.
“Now what kind of fool”, he wondered, “would be carrying such a fortune in the middle of the desert all alone?”
“A dead one”, he answered himself.
It was then that he remembered the bank holdup in Prescott less than a month ago and the haul had been around forty thousand dollars. That didn’t mean that this money was one and the same but it was certainly suspicious. He thought back and remembered that Joe Kenwith’s clothing and outfit were homespun, threadbare, and poor. It was unlikely that this money belonged to Joe. But there was only one way to find out. Outside, the storm was letting up.
The letter’s address was near the small mining town of Braswell on Big Bug Creek. He would start out as soon as the trail dried out. In the meantime, he might as well dig out a pan and a shovel and try his luck in the creek.
He found a spot where the creek leveled off and slowed down enough to deposit any gold it carried and found a spot underneath a large boulder that looked promising. On his first pan, he found decent color. Digging deeper under the boulder, he found a little more. All of it was rough and angular meaning that it had not traveled far from the source. He spent the morning digging and panning and found about a half ounce total. Not bad, but where was it coming from?
He walked back upstream digging and panning and had about the same success. Suddenly, he came up empty. He tried three more pans and found almost nothing. On the north, the valley was flat all the way to the mountain wall but on the south, the valley rose rapidly to a bench or two and then to the flank of the mountain on that side. Walking back to the cabin, he dug out his pick and with that and his shovel and pan, he walked to the bench. As he got close, he realized that what appeared to be an outcropping of granite was actually an ancient streambed. Thousands or perhaps millions of years ago, a long dead creek or river ran on this streambed and perhaps had deposited gold.
The gravel and mud of the old bed was cemented together with age and resisted his pick but he gradually made progress and by noon had a fair amount of gravel to sample. Taking it down to the creek, he crumbled and crushed the sample on a flat rock using a second rock as a hammer. He placed the sample in his pan and dipping it into the creek water, began to work any gold to the bottom using a back and forth rotating motion. Almost immediately, he heard something heavy scraping the bottom of the pan but he resisted temptation and continued to carefully pan off the lighter gravels and dirt. However, he couldn’t help but grin as he saw unmistakable flashes of luster in the pan. Finally he was down to just the heavy black sands and what was hidden beneath it. He back washed the sands and there, revealed to human eyes for the first ever, were three fair sized nuggets and at least a half-ounce of fine gold. If the rest of the old high bank, nearly a mile long, was this rich, he had hit the jackpot.
Tim Crockett sat down and, as was his habit, studied the situation. The former occupant was not a miner because he had no equipment and the bench had never been touched. Any miner worth his salt would have soon found the source of the gold in the creek. That meant that no one knew of this gold. But his strike would have to wait until he delivered the news of her husband’s death to the widow Kenwith and disposed of the forty thousand dollars one way or the other.
With his mind made up, Crockett returned to the hi-bank and worked it until it was too dark to continue. His first pan was his best pan until he hit bedrock in the afternoon and recovered an amazing ounce and a half in one pan with most of it in nuggets. As he covered up his diggings, he noted that he had barely scratched the surface. The find was rich beyond anything he would ever have dreamed.
He found a loose rock in the granite back of the cabin and cached his gold behind it. Then he made ready to ride to Braswell
3
Judy cleared the table and wiped the checkered oilskin cloth in preparation for the next customer. Straightening, she brushed back a stray strand of blonde hair with the back of her hand and arched her tired back. Through the window she could see the glow from the morning sun peeking over the eastern horizon. Most of the men had already eaten and she was waiting for the last of the breakfast customers to trickle in. Somewhere a rooster announced the new day and boots sounded on the wooden porch outside the cafe. At the squeaking protest of the screen door she looked up and saw a tall, handsome stranger standing in the doorway.
“Shut the door before the flies get out,” she scolded with a disarming smile. The stranger smiled back and stepped inside.
“What’s the chance of getting breakfast?”
“If you have the money, we have the eggs.”
“Eggs? Why, I haven’t seen a hen berry in months! I’ll have half a dozen, a thick beefsteak to go with them and a gallon or two of coffee to wash it all down!”
Crockett watched as the pretty young waitress poured his fourth cup of coffee. Behind him, the regulars talked of cattle prices and the new preacher. Through the widow he watched several riders following a wagon loaded with ranch supplies. He looked up at the waitress and smiled
“Excuse me miss, but I was wondering if you might know a woman by the name of Kenwith hereabouts?”
“I’m Judy Kenwith”, she replied.
Startled, Tim suddenly recognized her from the tintype and started to answer but was interrupted by the sudden crash of the door and the loud entry of several boisterous cowhands.
“Hey Judy,” yelled a beefy young puncher, “Knock off the gab and bring us some breakfast!”
“Your dad may own half the county, Pete King, but that doesn’t give you the right to order me around!”
Pete’s face grew ugly. “You heard me”, he said, “Fetch us up some food and be quick about it!”
“Leave her be”, said Tim so quietly that he was scarcely heard.
“What? What was that?”, Pete demanded.
“I said leave her be” Tim replied quietly.
“Maybe you think you can make me?”
Without rising from his chair, Tim hooked a toe behind Pete’s heel and pulled, sending him crashing to the floor. “You best stay right there and think about learning some manners.”
Red-faced and furious at the laughter of the locals, Pete scrambled to his feet and charged Tim. He ran smack into a straight right hand that first raised him on his toes and then folded him to the floor.
“Better get him outside until he comes to,” Tim suggested.
“He’ll kill you for this,” said an older hand with large yellow teeth and narrow, cruel looking eyes.
“He can try”, said Tim
Several of the hands that rode for the Rocking K thought about taking up the fight but something in Tim Crockett’s eyes made them hesitate. Something about the way his worn Russian .44 hung easy to hand. They carried Pete outside and someone began working a squalling pump for water.
Judy stared at Tim.
“I was all right,” she said, “There was no need to defend me but I thank you all the same. Pete enjoys throwing his weight around.”
“Men need to respect women”, Tim said quietly, “If we’re to be civil”.
“I’m afraid that you’ve made an enemy” she said.
“I’ve made a few but most have come to see things my way sooner or later,“ he smiled.
4
Judy looked out across the desert from the porch of her cabin as she absorbed what Tim Crockett had relayed. Joe was dead and buried and she and Jacob were on their own. But come to think of it, that wasn’t all that much of a change.
“I’m surprised that Joe died that way,” she said quietly, “Falling off a horse and all. I expected that he’d be shot or hung.”
She turned to Tim and lifted her chin defiantly, “Surprised that a new widow would say such a thing?”
“Maybe that explains some things”, Tim replied.
“Joe was a weak sort and more than a bit lazy”, said Judy. “He said he was going off to look for work but there were plenty of jobs for the asking right here. I suspected that he was looking for some easy money somewhere, maybe gambling although he wasn’t all that great shakes at cards either. He’s been gone all of six months. He just wasn’t cut out to take on a wife and son”.
“I found forty thousand dollars in his saddlebags.”
Tim watched Judy’s face and was quickly satisfied by her startled expression that she knew nothing about the money or where it came from.
“Well, what.....what in the world! Where would Joe have gotten that kind of money?”, she cried, “we never saw more than twenty dollars all the time we were married!”
“There was a bank robbery in Prescott about a month or so ago. The paper and fliers said that about forty thousand in gold and banknotes were lost.” Tim looked off to the west at the afterglow of the setting sun and waited.
After a long, thoughtful pause, Judy asked, “And you think Joe was the one?”
“Do you?”
“Yes, I suppose I do. But what now?”
“I’ll have to take it back,” said Tim.
To the East, the lights of town were coming on and flickering in the distance. “Is there any way to return it without saying who the robber was?” she asked. “It’s just that Jacob and I have to live here and if it was to be found out that it was Joe, it might make life rough for Jacob. You know how cruel folks can be sometimes.”
“Well, I suppose that they’ll just be glad to get their money back and won’t care all that much that the dead robber was never identified,” said Tim. “I see no harm in that.”
“Thank you Mr. Crockett. It means much to me and thank you too for coming all this way. Many men would not have bothered. Goodnight.”
The next morning, Crockett finished his breakfast at the restaurant and paid the waitress. He was a bit disappointed that Judy was coming in later because he would be well on his way by then. He chided himself for even thinking about the beautiful young widow but he had liked her cool manner, warm smile, and calm acceptance of the fate life had dealt her. But he had just yesterday told her that her young husband was dead so he put his foolish thoughts behind him and rose to leave. Just then, a breathless loafer that he had seen lounging outside burst in the door: “Pete King is in the street and he’s telling everyone he’s come for you!”
Crockett stepped through the door and quickly sized up the situation. Pete stood in the middle of the street with two men on his left and three to his right. No one else was in sight.
“I’ll be having my satisfaction with you,” called Pete, “you like to broke my jaw and now I mean to kill you!”
Tim studied the young man for a moment and then stepped off the boardwalk and walked rapidly to the middle of the street and right up to Pete King. Startled, Pete hesitated and then started to reach for his gun. He stopped instantly as he felt the cold, heavy muzzle of the .44 pressed hard against his forehead and heard the clicking of the hammer being drawn back.
“Now you just listen to me youngster,” said Crockett quietly, “folks tell me that you’re the only son of the biggest rancher in these parts, that you’re the one all the young girls chase after, and that you’re also the best dancer in these parts. Now is that the truth?”
Bewildered at the sudden change of events, all Pete could do was nod his head against the muzzle of the big gun.
“Then it seems to me that it would be damn foolish of you to throw all that away and to die on this dusty old street on a bright, sunny morning just because you got your due for insulting Mrs. Kenwith. Now I‘ll be glad to oblige you if you have your heart set on it, but I’d advise you to just let it go. What‘ll it be?”
Shaken, young Pete King looked down at his toes and quietly said, “I think I’ll let it go.”
“That makes you a smart kid,” smiled Crockett.
“Well, I ain’t no damn kid,” said a voice to Tim’s right. Crockett glanced in that direction and saw the yellow toothed man with the cruel pig eyes.
“My guess is that you’d be Trace Hammond,” said Tim, “the gun hand from down around El Paso”
“You’d be right,” said Trace as he fired.
Tim felt a wicked blow slam his chest as the grinning Hammond steadied his gun for a second shot. Tim felt his own gun buck in his hand once and then twice more.
Trace Hammond tried to center his sights on Crockett but he was suddenly very weary and the gunfight no longer seemed all that important. Puzzled, he tried to lift his gun again, but it was far too heavy. He sat down hard in the street and tried to remember what it was that he had been trying to do. And then he was dead.
Crockett spun around and faced the other cowhands. “Who else wants to die” he asked savagely, “Who’s next?”
Carefully, the remaining punchers lifted their hands away from their guns and slowly backed away. Somewhere down the street, a door slammed and someone ran toward him. Turning, the last thing he saw was Judy Kenwith as the ground came up to meet him.
5
Tim Crockett sat on the front porch of the cabin enjoying the cool of the morning. Judy Kenwith had insisted on nursing him after the shooting because she was the only one in town with any medical knowledge and even that was limited to a book that her father had purchased. It had been three weeks and the wound was healing nicely but Crockett’s strength was still far from normal. Tim had used the time to talk to Judy and he had made it clear that he had developed an interest in her and her son Jacob. Judy, however, had said nothing one way or the other.
Off to the east, Crockett could see the dust of riders coming from town. He expected no trouble since Pete King and his father had paid him a visit a week before to set things right. The old man had sent Pete off to check on Tim’s horse and then quietly thanked Tim for sparing the younger man’s life.
The riders came into the yard and drew up in a cloud of dust. One, an older man with a badge and obviously used to being in charge, dismounted and approached Tim.
“Your name Crockett?”
“It is”
“My name is Tyler. I’m a US marshal. You’re under arrest for robbing the bank in Prescott. No sense in denying it because the money was found in your saddlebags at the livery in town.”
“Now hold on there Tyler,” said Tim. “I buried the man that robbed that bank and I was intending to return that money”
“Why, sure you were,” grinned Tyler. “Now get on your feet!”
“Hold it right there!” Judy came around the corner of the cabin with a double-barreled scatter gun and a no-nonsense look in her eye. “Mister Crockett telling the truth.”
“How do you know?” asked Tyler.
“Because Joe Kenwith is the man that robbed your bank,” Judy replied, her chin lifting in defiance. “Mister Crockett found Joe dead after his horse fell. He died from a broken neck.”
“Well now, who’s this here ‘Joe Kenwith’ feller?” asked Tyler.
“He was my husband,” Judy said, looking the marshal in the eye. “Tim Crockett found him dead and came here to tell me about it. Joe was no good, and everyone knows it. Now you know it too, so you just ride on out of here and take that money back to Prescott. Tim Crockett is innocent.” It was the first time she had used his given name
“Tim Crockett? Harvey Crockett’s boy?” The marshal nudged his mount closer and peered at Tim. “That who you are?”
“That’s right Dave. How are you?”
“Well I’ll be.” The marshal twisted in the saddle and spoke to his posse. “This here is Harvey Crockett’s boy Tim. Harvey was my deputy for years and a finer man was never born. He was killed by a bullet meant for me. He raised his son to be as good a man as he was, and I reckon he did just that. I ain‘t seen Tim here since he was a schoolboy.“
He paused and stared thoughtfully at Tim for a moment. “Why the hell didn’t you speak up and say who you were?”
Tim Smiled. “Well sir, as I recall, you’re the one who told me not to play my hole card too soon.”
Dave Tyler grinned and reined his horse around. “Well boys , we have the bank’s money and I reckon the thief is dead. Let’s go home.”
As they watched the posse ride away, Tim put his arm around Judy and she leaned against him. “I wish there was a place far away where nobody could find us and where you and I and Jacob could live in peace,“ She said. “Somewhere where the grass is green, the deer graze, and the water flows.”
“I know just the place, sweetheart,” said Tim. “I know just the place.”
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