Chapter 15

This had to be an attack on Parson County Financial Company! Aaron Brown was well liked in the community, so the attack was not likely to be personal, especially since it was so well orchestrated. But, who was behind it? Joe showed up with the answer before I could stand up from tending to Aaron.

Aaron lived in the back of his shop in a 1-room apartment, so we carried him there and put him to bed. Joe told me what he had found out about the attackers while we were rounding up some wood to board up the broken window and finding someone to fix meals for Aaron and keep the place clean for the next few days. I got the local carpenter to make a couple of crutches for Aaron to use to get to the privy and such, but ordered him to stay in bed as much as he could.

Joe had questioned the gut-shot galoot before he died and gotten the name of the man who had hired him and the others. Ephrem Walker was his name, and he was known to be a shady operator. He had moved in from New York City right after the war, so I knew that I hated him on the spot as one of the damyankees who came South to cash in on our defeat. Walker lived in Pansy, but saw an opportunity for loan sharking in Jimsen, so he wanted to expand his operations. His first step was to drive Parson County Financial Company out of town.

I was committed until Saturday, so we waited until then to make our little visit to Mr. Walker. We found him relaxing in a saloon, so we got beers (Mexican, by now we were addicted) and walked to his table where he was sitting with another man, who may have been his bodyguard. The man recognized us and turned pale; we were an intimidating sight with our multiple guns and bandoleers. Without waiting for an invitation, we sat down.

I opened the conversation by asking, "Mr. Walker, do ya know who we are? Yer friend seems ta be familiar with us an' our reputation."

"No, I have no idea who either of you might be, but I want you to leave my table, immediately."

"Well, let me introduce us, then. This here is Mr. Joe Wilson an' I'm Jake Esposito. Not only are we successful bounty hunters, but we also happen to be the owners of Parson County Financial Company. Now, we don't take kindly to the way yer men treated our employee, Mr. Aaron Brown, over in Jimsen jus' last Tuesday. As ya may know, we were forced ta kill all three of 'em, an' we could shore do it again if the need arose.

"Anyway, we're here to offer ya a fair warning: either git out of our county or git yer head blown off. Ya got 'til next Saturday ta be gone. Ifen we find ya still here come Saturday, rest assured that ya won't live ta see Sunday mornin'!"

Walker reacted as I expected, "You bastard, you can't talk to me like that! Harold, shoot them both!"

I guess that Harold had seen us in action, because he raised his hands, palm outward, shook his head "no," stood up, and walked away from the table with his hands still held up. Sometimes, reputation can be a very useful thing!

We waited until Harold had left the saloon before we stood up. We both suspected that Mr. Walker was going to act somewhat less than honorably, so we kept an eye on him as we moved away from the table. Fools must be born faster than they can be killed off, because Walker reached under his business coat for a gun he had in a shoulder holster. He was furtive about it, but we were experienced enough to recognize what he was doing, so we both drew and shot him before his gun had completely cleared the holster. I shot him in the chest and Joe shot him between the eyes—we were the perfect partnership!

That was one less damyankee to pollute the fair state of Texas! We looked around and saw that there was no interest expressed by anyone in joining in, so we reloaded and holstered our guns. Joe flipped the swamper a dollar tip for his trouble in cleaning up the mess, and we left to return home. As we started out the door, Joe said, "Ya know, this might be a good time ta recruit a loan agent fer Pansy."

We went back to the bar and talked for a while to the bartender. He didn't know anybody to recommend right then, but promised to spread the word. We visited the other saloons and made the same request, with the statement that we would be back next Saturday to talk to anyone who was interested in the job.

When we left the last saloon, we decided to continue visiting other agents that we could reach before I had to be in my office on Wednesday. We did managed to see everybody in time before I had to return home, but it was a close run thing. There had to be a better way to do this!