Chapter 1

West Texas, September, 1892

There was not much to see, yet, but I expected to come to a town reasonably soon. Since I had left Hanksville, Texas, two days ago, I had seen no sign of people. I had not realized that country could be this empty. I had been told that I would find a town after about three days if I stayed on this road, but I wondered if that was really true. I could not see very far, right now, because of the hills to all sides. The road twisted back and forth, winding among the hills like a snake with too much to drink. I didn't want to push my horse too fast, because I did not dare take a chance of killing it. Killing my horse would have been a slow and particularly unpleasant suicide.

Imagine my surprise, then, when I rounded a blind curve in the road and came upon a heavily loaded wagon pulled by a team of six mules. A very grizzled driver was sitting in the front of the wagon and equally elderly woman was sitting beside him. She spotted me immediately (could she read minds?) and swung a shotgun in my general direction, but not right at me. The old man loudly said, "Now, ma, don't shoot the young fellow until we find out what he wants."

I slowly, but deliberately, raised my hands so that she could see that I was holding nothing in my hands but my reins. "Ma'am, sir, I mean no harm to anybody. I'm just riding west from Hanksville, and I have no idea how far it is to the next town, whatever it's called. Do you happen to know how far it might be?"

The old woman said. "It's called Best Chance, but I sure don't know why. It's about two miles as the buzzard flies, but about seven miles by this God forsaken road. That's where we're headed, but we're too loaded to take it fast."

"Ma'am, I feel like it's been so long since I saw a friendly face, I'd like to ride along with you for a ways, " I asked.

Then the man said, "You're welcome to ride along if you want. It' nice to hear a different voice for a change."

We continued on for about an hour, talking about this and that, when three men burst out of a side cut. The were wielding pistols and had their faces partially covered by crude masks. They had not come to a full stop when the woman fired her shotgun at the nearest rider. I immediately drew my gun and began to shoot at the other two. I hit one in the throat and the other in the gut. The one the woman had shot was about as dead as you can get with his chest showing nothing but chopped meat. The gut-shot one was as good as dead; he couldn't last more than a few minutes with that hole. His blood was flowing like a river. The throat shot had been immediately fatal.

The driver drawled, "Much obliged, Mat. It would have been a close one without you." He then showed that he was holding a Colt Navy, but he had not had a chance to use it.

"It was my pleasure to be of assistance. But what was that load in Mrs. Harrison's shotgun. I have never seen so much damage."

She said, "It's my own special load of horseshoe nails. The range is not great, but the charge is effective. I was aiming high to miss the horse. It's usually enough to slow a bandit down 'til Joel can get his pistol up."

I suggested, "Let's take them to town. There might be a reward. We can tie them on their horses and hitch the horses to the back of your wagon. Maybe we can split any reward."

They readily agreed, so that's what we did. Unfortunately, there was no formal law in Best Chance, so we got no reward. However, we did sell their horses and tack and their guns for enough to net us $40, each. The bodies were dumped in the local trash pit.

Best Chance did not appear to offer me much, so I bid my new friends goodbye and pushed on the next morning. What else was there to do, since the best accommodation I could find was a hay stack in back of the livery stable?

The next few days were pretty much a repeat of the last few, until I reached Hanging Tree. I can't say that I was any more impressed by the town than I was by its name. But it did have a large saloon with several working girls. I followed Ben Jackson's advice and hung around the bar just listening while nursing a particularly vile beer. Nothing sounded promising, so I grabbed the next available working girl, negotiated a price, and headed to her room. The room stank, she stank, and when she got her clothes off, I nearly threw up. Fortunately, I was still dressed, so I tipped my hat and got out as quickly as I could. She had her price, but I still thought I got out ahead!

Fortunately, Hanging Tree was on a busy railroad, so the next day I bought passage for my horse and me in a stock car headed for New Mexico Territory. I didn't know how far I was going, I just bought $2 worth of ticket. The agent assured me that was enough to get me into NMT. I tried to sleep as much as I could, but, as I have said before, there is only so much sleeping that you can do. I happened to be awake as we crossed the border into NMT, but I did not notice anything remarkable. Perhaps, it's just me.

At some point, the train stopped and the conductor informed me that my welcome had expired. My horse and I got off the train and we looked around. I don't know which one of us was more impressed. We were in the town of Willow; I know because I saw the sign on the station. I looked around some more and spotted a willow tree beside the town well. Ah, that mystery was resolved. At least one good thing: we could both get a drink of fresh water. After refreshing ourselves, I, for one, began to feel better.

I spotted a restaurant down the street from the station, so I went over to have breakfast. To get there, I had to pass a general store, a hotel, a bank and four saloons. A busy town! I had a surprisingly good breakfast; I was even amazed to find grits, something I had not seen since leaving East Texas. Needless to say, I loaded up on grits and fried eggs, with all of the bacon and biscuits I could hold. Almost like being home! My opinion of Willow, NMT, went way, way up. In fact, I ate so much, I had to have two extra cups of coffee to pack it all down.

When I paid my bill, I noted to my dismay that I was nearly out of small denomination coins. I needed to pay a visit to the bank. Without attracting undue attention, I slipped a $100 gold piece from my money belt and stashed it in my pocket; I would break it at the local bank. I casually stood up and strolled to the bank.

The bank appeared to be remarkably busy; I had to wait in line for a teller. While I was standing there, I heard a commotion by the door. Four men came pushing their way in. They were all wearing dusters and masks, carrying saddle bags, and brandishing guns. Since I happened to be carrying all of my worldly possessions in my money belt, I knew that I had better act if I expected to keep it. I drew my side arm and fell to the floor. I then opened fire, first on the bandit wielding the shotgun. My .44-40 blew his head into little pieces, so he was of no further concern. The massive report of my shot caused some shock to all who heard it in that crowded room. That gave me a slight additional advantage which I quickly made use of. As fast as I could operate my single-action pistol, I shot the other three bandits. Two in the head, one in the hip. They were all three incapacitated, since being hit at close range by a .44-40 tends to make you lose interest in much else. I yelled, "Somebody get the sheriff!" I then reloaded and holstered my gun. All of us were coughing from the powder smoke when the sheriff showed up.

"What happened?" he demanded.

A lot of people started talking at once and pointed at me. The gist was that I had foiled a bank robbery by shooting the bandits before they could shoot anybody. The bank president came up and pounded me on the back and somebody wanted to take my picture for the local newspaper. No photo of me; that handbill circulating with the $500 reward for my head was still too fresh in my memory. The sheriff wanted me to come by his office, so I did.

In his office, the sheriff wanted the story of my foiling of the robbery from me. I told him my version of what happened and he wrote a report, I don't know for whom. I then asked if there was any reward for killing the bandits and he promised to look into it for me. I told him my adventures in Hanksville, Texas, and asked if he knew of any action around here that I might use to my advantage. Again, he said that he did not know of anything, off hand, but he would see what he could find. I thanked him and went back to the bank to break my $100 coin.

The bank president was glad to see me and break my coin, but he was not so free with any sort of reward. My thought was that he was lucky that I had been carrying all that gold; otherwise, the bandits might have cleaned him out. Some people talk a good game, but can't come through when it means something. Anyway, I left in disgust.

By now, it was getting late, so I got a hotel room and stabled my horse. I was directed back to the same restaurant that had the grits; the supper was as good as the breakfast, so there were some decent folks in Willow, NMT.

I decided that I could take the time to visit some saloons to fish for information. I was glad I did, since several men bought me drinks in celebration of that day's events. I did hear a rumor of Four Finger Jack Sloan being in the neighborhood, but not much hard fact. The story was that Four Finger Jack was a bank robber who had lost a finger while trying to blow a bank safe. The stories of a reward ranged from $500 to $5000; with such a span, I had my doubts. Oh, well, it did make a good story.

The next day, the sheriff told me that I was out of luck with the bank robbers. It seems that they were four not-too-bright brothers who lived on a farm a few miles out of town and not worth anything to anybody. However, if I was serious about being a bounty hunter, he did have one lead. He showed me a poster for Johnathon Slinger who was a wanted bank robber. There was a $2000 reward for him, alive. He had been seen last week passing through the next town to the south, about twelve miles away, but in a different county, so the sheriff couldn't officially do any thing about it. The sheriff gave me an extra copy of the wanted poster and I hurried out of his office. I'll always have a fond memory of Willow, NMT, as the first place I got decent grits since I left home.