GUNSMOKE – Welcome To Dodge – Chapter 1

“Wanted for murder…”

“Clay Richards…”

“Clay Richards.”

“Aged thirty-one…”

“Mmmm.”

“Height, six feet…” 

“Six feet…”

“Eyes Brown, hair red.”

“Brown, Red…” Hightower looked up from his pencil. “Hey, how’d you like me to print his picture on these notices! I got a woodcut – let me show you. Ernie!”

From the back of the shop Ernie poked his head out. “Yep?”

“Fetch the Marshal a copy of that front page.” Hightower twisted his fancy swivel chair back to face me. “Interviewin’ Clay’s wife yesterday, I noticed a tin-type settin’ up on the mantle – their wedding photograph. So, first thing you know, I snipped it.”

“Very thoughtful,” I said.

“Yeah,” agreed Hightower with a bald grin. “Oh, I’ll take that, Ern. And then I propped it up in front of me and carved up this woodcut. Ain’t she prime? Ain’t she just elegant?”

“Real elegant,” I said.

“Good likeness, don’t you think? Of course, he was seven or eight years younger then. Had his hair cut shorter…” 

The short newspaperman prattled on as I studied the photograph. Yeah, it was a good likeness. It didn’t show what makes a law-abiding man suddenly rob a bank. And he didn’t look like a man who killed an old cashier and a Chinese cook who just happened to be there. But it was a good likeness. 

Hightower lifted his latest edition. “A picture like this sure dresses up the front page, don’t you think?”

“Yeah,” I said. “It’s a little masterpiece, Mr. Hightower. A notable contribution to the culture of our city.”

“Well, thank you, Marshal. Does fetch the eye, don’t it? I’m printing an extra five hundred copies of the weekly, and I bet I’ll sell ‘em all. Too bad the cashier’s shot went wide. If he’d managed to kill Clay, or even wing him, why I bet I could sell a thousand extra copies!”

“We must be thankful for the blessings we do receive, Mr. Hightower,” I said.

“Oh, I am, Marshal, I am! Why, just before it happened yesterday afternoon, I didn’t know what I was going to fill my columns with, and then, like manna from heaven, two murders and a bank-robbery.”

“Attempted bank-robbery, Mr. Hightower,” I said, correcting him. “He turned and ran before he got his hands on so much as a dollar. Still, as you say, like manna.”

My new deputy walked in then. Short and lean, you could almost look the Texan over without seeing a thing. He wore his fine black hair long – though not in any kind of fashionable way, just to keep the sun off his neck – and his eyes were always half-lidded, unless he was squinting at you. No, Chester Proudfoot wasn’t much to look at. But I liked the way he walked. And I’d seen him shoot.

“Mr. Dillon, I –”

“I’m talking business,” I said, with a little snap to it. I hadn’t meant to, but ten minutes with Hightower in a good mood will do that. A little softer, I said, “What is it, Chester?”

Chester looked put out. “It can wait, I guess, Mr. Dillon.”

Deciding Chester would be all right for the moment, I turned back to the town’s publisher. “Yeah, print Clay’s picture on those notices, Mr. Hightower. Where was I?”

“Eyes brown, hair red,” said Hightower helpfully.

“Oh yeah. Also known as Red, Brick-Top, and Sorrel. He didn’t answer to any other nick-names, did he?”

“No,” said Hightower, “that’s what they called him.”

“All right, then in big letters, four hundred dollars reward – dead or alive. And at the bottom, apply Matt Dillon, Marshal, Dodge City. Print, ah – two hundred copies. How soon can I send Chester over for them?”

“This afternoon,” said Hightower, touching the nub of his pencil to his tongue.

I tugged the brim of my hat down, said, “Good morning, Mr. Hightower. Chester,” and my deputy and I left the news-office.

Outside the heat was coming up off the street, making waves over the wooden sidewalks. The water troughs looked like they were boiling. The county was suffering the worst drought anybody could remember. Under my vest my shirt was soaked with sweat. It’s not a bad feeling, and if you’re on horseback it even feels pretty good. But walking down a dusty street with a few hours to go before the first beer, it felt pretty lousy. I was wearing my dark vest and a dark shirt – the better for the night’s ride. I don’t often wear a coat, although Doc thought it was pretty funny when he gave me one just like his at Christmas. Long and black, it came down to my knees. I’d just killed my first man since taking up my office in Dodge. I guess Doc thought it was a good joke.

I walked slowly towards my office, looking up and down the street. People were looking at me, wondering what I was going to do about Clay. It was kind of a test. And any day now the cowboys would be coming in to Dodge. My first round-up, and they’d be watching me to see how I handled things. That’s the thing about a badge – there’s always another test.

Chester was ranged alongside me with a couple feet between us. We’d already talked about walking too close. He said, “Think those posters’ll do any good? Richards is probably over the line to Oklahoma or Colorado by now. That strawberry roan of his is the fastest in the county.”

“He
’s got no money,” I said. “He panicked and ran out of the bank before he got a penny. I think he’ll try to get help from his wife or brother or some friend the first chance he has, maybe tonight. I say he’s around here somewhere.”

It was bothering me, why Clay had turned thief and murderer. But I couldn’t do anything about that, at the moment. It would have to wait until I caught up to him.

There was something else bothering me. “I, ah – I’m sorry I turned on you like that, Chester,” I said.

Chester ducked his head, shrugged. “Why, that’s all right, Mr. Dillon. Out all night with a posse, no sleep, a man’s bound to get touchy.”

“No, it’s not that. It’s the way – it’s the way men use a thing like this. The men out riding last night enjoyed it, as if they were hunting fox or possum. Hightower back there, he acts like it’s a birthday treat specially gotten up for him. Everybody finds a way to use it.” I shook my head, blinked away the sweat gathering on my eyebrows. “What was it you wanted to tell me?”

“Hm? Oh! I got a kid, a little boy, locked up in a cell. Looks like he run away from home. Ed Slade turned him over to me when he come through on the stagecoach just now. Kid about twelve years old.”

“Whose is he?”

“Ed doesn’t know. Not from around here. He flagged Ed down for a ride on the road halfway between there and here. Soon as Ed seen him standing there with a bundle on his shoulder he knew what he was up to, so he told the kid he’d help him, and then turned him over to us when he got here.”

We reached my office, a little two-room affair bought with government money. The door wasn’t locked, though the gun-cabinet behind the desk was. That was a lesson a fellow I knew had learned the hard way. “All right,” I said, “we’ll start sending out telegrams to see if anyone around here is claiming him. Well, come on in, Chester, and shut the door.”

Chester had stopped by in the doorway and was looking up the street, back the way we had come. “Mr. Dillon?

I stepped over to a trunk and pulled out a clean shirt. A white shirt. “You’re letting in every horsefly in Kansas,” I said.

“Mr. Dillon?” said Chester again. “I think you better cancel the order for them notices.”

“What?” I just had my old shirt off and as I buttoned up the new one I walked to the door. Chester made way, and I saw Pete Ziegler, known around town as the Dutchman, coming up the street on his sad little mare. He was fair and tall, but not imposing in any way, with his slack shoulders and awkward, shambling walk. Pretty harmless to look at.

Tied to his saddlehorn was the lead for the horse that trailed along behind him. A strawberry roan. There was a body draped across the roan’s back. I could tell from where I stood it was Clay Richards. Like a sack of wheat across his saddle. Last time I saw him, two days ago, he was standing at the bar in the Texas Trail, laughing his head off. And now he was a sack of wheat across his saddle.

The Dutchman kept right on towards us, keeping a painfully slow pace. His poor old horse was feeling the heat and was too tired to even swat the flies at her hindquarters. They were followed by half the saloon-bums and loafers in town.

“All right, Chester,” I said, “make ‘em keep back.”

Chester walked forward with that light step I’d hired him for. “All right now, you fellers, stand back now! Stand back!” His hand was nowhere near his gun. 

“Ziegler!” I called when the Dutchman was close enough. “How’d it happen, Ziegler?”

Ziegler dismounted and took off his hat – a ten-gallon looks silly on most men, and he was no exception. He pulled out an old handkerchief and mopped his face from brow to chin. “My goat, my old billy-goat, he pushes open the pens last night and runs away.”

“Forget your goat, now,” I said. I was still feeling a little mulish. And I hated those bums watching. “What about Clay?”

“I – I tell you,” said Ziegler, a little less certain now. “This morning I go look for the goat. I walk here, and there. Near the river I see Clay. He sits there. I say, Hello Clay, vie geits?”

From out of the crowd someone shouted, “You dirty dutchman! You no good dog!”

Then someone else was picking up the mood. “Clay was your best friend! He helped you buy your farm, so you kill him for it!” The crowd was growing, and they were all shouting. Chester was looking at me.

“All right,” I said, “all of you, keep back, everybody.”

The Dutchman was looking out at the crowd in confusion. “Clay? No no. My brother he was like!” There were some derisive sounds from the bums. “We was in the war together. Listen…”

He didn’t know it, but he was making things worse. “You killed him for the reward!”

“Not so!” shouted Ziegler, mopping his face. “I kill nobody – not since Gettesburg. Clay is dead when I find him.” He turned to me. “I don’t even own a pistol.”

The crowd was getting bigger, louder, and uglier. “Ziegler – get inside, quick,” I said, stepping out of the doorway and into the street.

“Ja.” The Dutchman ducked inside quickly.

I must’ve looked a poor peace officer, no coat, no vest, and my shirt-tails hanging out. The crowd wasn’t just bums and drifters anymore. Real citizens were coming to see what was up. And what I was going to do about it. “Chester, give me a hand with Clay.” I walked around the strawberry roan and didn’t look at Clay’s face – there’d be time enough for that inside. But before I got a handle on him I decided to do something about the crowd.

“All right, all of you. Listen.”

They didn’t.

“Shut up!”

They did.

“I will not tolerate a disturbance,” I told them. “You know me.”

No, they didn’t. Eight months, and easy ones at that. They didn’t know me from Adam. And they trusted me even less.

“All right, Chester, take his legs.”

We carried the body inside.