Chapter 37

I arrived at Hector’s a few minutes after five. I sat down with Anna and told her what I had done. I also told her how my conscience was twinging, because I pretty much knew I’d bargained one devil away to another. Anna heard me out, squeezing my hand and nodding sympathetically. When I was finished, she slipped out of her chair and into my lap.

“That you feel bad for helping a man as evil as Judge Howard receive his just desserts, is one of the reasons I love you, mí Charro. Another reason is that you did all of that to spare people you don’t even know from suffering hardship.”

I could always count on Anna Lopez to make me feel better, not especially by what she said, but by just loving me as she did.

In the early morning hours of September nineteen, 1877, six heavily armed, masked men broke into the San Elizario jail and absconded with Charles Howard, William Braxton, and John Atkinson. According to the deputy on duty at the time, one of the attackers told him that they were taking the captives to Mexico, where a tribunal awaited to try them for the murder of Louis Cardis.

Matt Faulkner, Ranger Tays and I met and talked about the situation at lunch, the day after it happened. Sheriff Faulkner was suspicious that Georgie Boy and some of his men had broken Charles Howard, Braxton and Atkinson out of jail, pretending to be Mexicans, and that the mention of a tribunal was a cover story. Tays was thinking along the same lines, but insisted that none of his Rangers were involved.

For my part, I wired Marshall Cahill for a federal ‘John Doe’ warrant against the six men that Constable Cortez’s deputy described. My argument for the warrant was that, if the men were foreign nationals and they took Howard to Mexico, it was a federal crime. If the six were Howard’s men and they took him to New Mexico, it was also a federal offense.

Two days later, word began circulating in San Elizario that the men had been executed by a firing squad, and their bodies thrown down an abandoned well. It was a sad and sorry end for anyone, even a man of Howard’s ilk. I had a few second thoughts about the part I played in all of this, but knowing that I saved San Elizario from being looted and the Rangers from being humiliated, eased my mind quite a bit.

That same day, a troop of Buffalo Soldiers from the Ninth Cavalry rode into San Elizario. John Tays disbanded the El Paso Company of Texas Rangers as soon as the horse soldiers arrived, and washed his hands of the whole mess.

The following day, the commander of that cavalry troop, a white Lieutenant named Louis Rucker, dropped in at the hotel to visit me.

Lieutenant Rucker picked a propitious time to drop by, because I was trying to train a chorus line when Lola, the girl working the desk, led him into the ballroom. Lola curtsied when she came up to the table at which I was sitting, and announced the Lieutenant as if he were an ambassador reporting to the King of Siam.

“Mister McGuinn, this is Lieutenant Rucker, he wishes for a few minutes of your time.”

My eyebrows went up at the way she was acting, because she sure was putting on the dog. She caught my look and gave me a broad wink, letting me know that the Lieutenant might be on the pompous side.

I nodded slightly and answered her right back.

“Thank you Lola, please see to refreshments for our guest while I have a word with the ladies.”

Lola curtsied again and was asking the young and proper Lieutenant his preference for a beverage, when I eased over to the stage and caught Susan, the unofficial lead dancer’s eye. She bent down and I whispered what I wanted to happen in her ear, as I looked down into her impressive cleavage. Susan gave me a nod and a grin at where I was looking, then she huddled up with the other dancers. It was hard to keep a straight face as I walked back to where Rucker was standing, especially when I heard the dancers start tittering.

When I arrived back at the table where I had been sitting, I turned and told Susan to give the girls a break while I talked to the Lieutenant. When I said that, Susan gave the dancers the high sign and they all swarmed the table and started making a big fuss over Rucker. I don’t think all of it was an act, as Rucker was a handsome young man. Before you could say cheese, Susan was sitting in Rucker’s lap, wearing his hat and playing with the buttons on his coat, while big bosomed Charlotte had her breasts pressed into the back of his head. This was just too much fun! I gave the young officer a stern look and cleared my throat.

“I say, Lieutenant, are you here for a reason, or did you just drop by to play the libertine with my employees?” I asked in mock consternation.

Rucker was beet red by then, and trying desperately to free himself from Susan and Charlotte’s tender clutches. As he tried to formulate a reply, I winked at Susan. She immediately stood up, bent over and kissed Rucker on the lips and sailed out of the room with Charlotte and the other dancers in tow. The stammering Lieutenant finally stated his business. My little exercise had the desired effect, because it took away the mantle of authority that his uniform normally gave him.

“Mister McGuinn, at the behest of Governors Wallace and Hubbell, my superiors have directed that I put myself and my command at your disposal to resolve the matter of the kidnapped judge and his compatriots. I was so directed because the kidnappers were foreign nationals, and you have already requested a warrant for them.”

I managed to keep my poker face intact, even though I was shocked by what he said. It took me a few seconds of furious thinking to remember that the Posse Comitatus Act that prohibited the military from engaging in civilian law enforcement activities wasn’t passed until 1878. Rucker had just told me that I had about one hundred highly trained and heavily armed soldiers at my disposal, should I need a posse.

Lola returned then with a cup of coffee for both the lieutenant and me. She was a welcomed interruption, because the break gave me a chance to formulate a reply to his statement. When Lola departed, I told Rucker that I thought it best if his troops reoccupy Fort Quitman, over in San Elizario, and aggressively patrol along the border with Mexico and around San Elizario in general.

My concern now was keeping any violence from flaring up between Mexicans and Anglos, because both sides were riled up now. Even though Howard was a missing person no one really missed, the fact that Mexicans allegedly took him stuck in the craw of many Anglos.

By the time Lieutenant Rucker left the hotel, we were on very cordial terms with each other. Since it was Saturday, I invited him to return to the club that night in uniform, as my guest. He eagerly accepted my offer. When the dancers trouped back in, I told Susan that the handsome young officer would be back that evening, and asked her if she minded paying him a little attention. Susan had a predatory look in her eye when she said yes.

My chorus line needed more work, dang it, so I decided to hold off introducing it until the following week. The chorus line would be part of a members’ only burlesque show I was trying to assemble. I also wanted something to balance out the burlesque show, something fresh and new that would be acceptable to the women of El Paso as well as the men. I had an inkling of an idea that I sprang on Ray Jarvis that evening.

It was a few minutes past six when I walked up to what we now called the Gentlemen’s Club Concierge’s Desk. I shook Ray’s hand and kissed his redheaded partner on the cheek. It finally came to me that her name was Prudence.

“Raymond,” I said, “it occurs to me that I am vastly underutilizing your talents.”

Jarvis looked at me questioningly.

“What do you mean by that, Sir?” he asked.

“Well, Mister Jarveaux, I have recently learned that you are a talented thespian (Ray’s eyes widened that I knew the word ‘thespian’). I’d also wager that you have a talent for directing as well as acting, so I am appointing you Artistic Director of the El Paso Ballroom. The job will be an additional duty to the one you have now, but I’ll thoroughly compensate you for the extra work. One of the tasks I have for you is to find a ballet company that is willing to play a two or three night engagement here.”

“The Ballet!” he exclaimed, excited enough that I thought he’d pee his pants, “I adore the Ballet, and there is a troupe in Austin. I’ll contact them first thing Monday morning.”

I smiled at his enthusiasm and continued my train of thought.

“I’d also like to have a talent night where local amateurs audition for you, and if they are good enough, we’ll let them perform on stage. And finally, I want you to develop some comedic skits, lampooning people and everyday events in El Paso that people would recognize. I want you to use the women working here as your actresses, and have them fill both the male and female roles. The more over the top or naughty the characterizations are, the better they’ll go over, but you have full artistic control.”

Ray was positively aquiver by the time I finished talking. I made a quick exit, stage right, before he could hug me.

As I read back over this, it comes across as if nothing that had happened recently concerned me in the least. Well, that notion couldn’t be farther from the truth. I was acutely aware of everything that had happened. Hell, if you think about it, I had to be! I was walking on the edge of a razor, trying to keep myself alive while assisting the flow of time to correct the anomaly that was El Paso in 1877. Getting time back on track was why I hadn’t ridden to Mesilla and arrested George Howard. Deep inside me, I knew with absolute certainty that the showdown between George and me had to happen right here in El Paso. I also knew that all I had to do was be patient, because George would be back, if not to avenge his father’s death, then to at least claim his inheritance.

The Monday after Howard and Braxton disappeared, I asked Anna into my office as soon as she came to work. When she was comfortably seated on the couch, I reached into my safe and pulled out the stack of money that Louis Cardis gave me to hold. The money was in limbo, because Howard forfeited it as bond when he rode into San Elizario and tried to collect for the salt. However, the person the forfeited bond should have gone to, Louis Cardis, was dead, and the man who paid it, William Braxton, was missing and presumed dead. I explained all that to Anna and asked her if she knew of any ways we could use the money to benefit the Hispanic community. I told her a school for girls had my vote.