Episode 26

Kings of the Jungle

Joe Wiley stood on the rough boards at the station house, his eyes closed, his face raised to the afternoon sun. He pushed back the brim of his hat to feel the warmth on his cheeks. The clink of spurs and creak of leather approached from behind him. The thumb of his left hand remained tucked behind his gun belt.

A voice spoke from the boards at his back. “You recall meeting me at this very spot a few days back?”

Joe turned to find Homer Gibbs standing in the sun before a shorter man with a sour expression screwed on his face. The other man wore a short-barreled Smith in a pocket holster slung before his crotch. Another cowboy in fringed chaps of frayed leather. A stubby man with a barrel chest and a face that looked like it had seen a lot of hard miles. Two more drovers leaned against the station house wall in the shade of an awning, hands resting on gun belts. One of them was from the welcoming party Gibbs hosted here a few days before. His Sharps leaned against the wall beside him.

“Gibbs. Ramrod and foreman of the Three Rivers, right?” Joe said easy.

“That’s right. This here is Big Cal Randall, boss of the Twisted Tree,” Homer said, his face impassive, eyes hard.

Joe clamped his lips together to prevent a laugh from escaping. This squirt was the “Big” Cal the mayor was going on about? He swallowed the smile but couldn’t prevent the corners of his mouth turning up. The lemon-sucker sensed it. His nose wrinkled. His eyes turned to twin gun sights.

“You had no call gunnin’ down Rufus and Charlie,” Cal Randall said, voice as bitter as his face.

“Where’d this happen again?” Joe said.

“Down the Paradise. You did them in cold blood.”

“You weren’t there, mister. You don’t know what call I may or may not have had to act as I did.” Joe turned from the man at the far-off squeal of a steam whistle. A white column of smoke was rising from the north stretch of track. The train he’d been waiting on since morning was coming along.

“The fellas ’spect to come into town and burr the edge off some. They work and pay their money to have fun is all,” the little man said through his teeth.

“Pulling a gun on me ain’t my idea of fun. Mister,” Joe said, his tone darkening.

The little man stepped closer, his mouth working to speak again.

“I ain’t engaging in an argument with you,” Joe said. “The law is the law, and the law is what I say. Your drovers are free to come to this town and poke all the cunny they can afford to poke. But I don’t hold with terrorizing whores. Bad enough those girls got to lay with those busters. They don’t need to tolerate some bastard cutting at them. That’s where I intercede.”

Big Cal blinked, trying to decide what “intercede” might mean.

“Well,” Big Cal said after a long pause, “you watch your back else someone inner-seeds you one dark night.”

Joe stepped to within inches of the smaller man, his fingertips drummed a tattoo on the leather near his slant-mounted .36. Big Cal had to crane his neck back to meet the marshal’s gaze. He looked like a lizard on a rock.

“I’ll take that as a caution, cowboy,” Joe said low for only the other man to hear. “Because if I ever suspected, even for one blessed second, that those words were any kind of threat I’d make you pull that piece you wear where your cock should be.”

The smaller man paled, swallowed hard, and backed well away before turning for the steps down from the platform.

“Do we have business, friend?” Joe said, turning to Homer Gibbs who was watching the lawman with a cool appraisal.

“Mr. Nostrand was wondering when you might be releasing those two Three Rivers men you’re holding.”

“In the morning. Does that suit Mr. Nostrand?” Joe said, the fury fading from his voice. The locomotive had reached the edge of the platform and was hissing and banging to a stop along the boards.

“The boss paid you a fat bonus for turning up here in Mercury Wells. He’s as interested as you in seeing this town calmed down to a roar. He ain’t at all pleased you killed one man of his and jailed two more,” Gibbs said.

“That sack of eagles supposed to buy your boys some slack with me?” Joe said.

“Maybe a bit of consideration,” Gibbs said.

“Then maybe you need to take it back to your boss,” Joe said. “Maybe he could use it to buy himself another marshal.”

“You need to recall that you’re only one man, Wiley. You have a reputation, that’s sure. But that only carries you till you have to prove it,” Gibbs said, an edge to his words. His two amigos pushed off the wall of the station house and stepped into the sunlight, hands loose at their sides.

“And will I have to prove it?” Joe said, corner of his mouth curling. His fingers drummed again on his leather.

“We ain’t drunk, marshal,” Gibbs said, the edge turning razor sharp. His hand dropped to brush the Colt nestled snug in its Mexican rig.

Joe’s smile froze on his face. His back to the slowing train. A cloud of expelled steam cut around him in a swirling tide. He looked like nothing less than a vengeful angel surrounded by the billowing clouds of the hereafter. His eyes weighed the three men as they locked on him, hands drifting with minds of their own for the draw.

“Damn me all to hell and back again!” boomed a voice behind Joe.

Two men emerged from the falling mist of engine steam followed by a porter lumbering with a trunk in his arms. Both men wore woolen suits over boiled shirts and paper collars. Their heads were topped with bowlers and they moved with the assured authority of men who feared nothing, cocks of the walk and kings of the jungle. That impression was enforced by the revolvers that hung from their hips and the ten-gauge coach guns cradled in the crooks of their right arms.

“Boys, I’d like you to meet Homer Gibbs, ramrod and foreman of the Three Rivers ranch,” Joe said, beaming at the newcomers. “I failed to catch the name of his two companions.”

The two arrivals blinked at Joe. The porter grunted under the weight of the trunk. Joe turned to complete the introductions but Gibbs and his drovers, their backs to him, were moving away off the platform for town.

“Sorry, boys. I suppose they had a previous engagement,” Joe said and stuck out a hand to the two men.

“You’re already stirring the shit,” Len Dugan said, smiling as he took Joe’s hand in a crushing grip.

“And expectin’ us to join hands and jump in it with him,” Seth Dugan said, less pleased than his brother with his first impression of Mercury Wells.