Shootout of the Mountain Man (27 page)

“Do with it? Minnie, you didn’t take it from his desk, did you?”

“No,” Minnie said. “I thought about it, but what good would that have done? That wouldn’t prove that he had ever gotten it.”

“You’re right,” Nabors said. He sighed. “This is frustrating. We now know for sure that he got the letter, but how are we going to prove it?”

“We’ve got to arrange for someone else to see the letter, someone the judge will trust. But I don’t have any idea who that might be.”

“I have an idea who it could be,” Nabors said.

“Who?”

“Marvin Cutler.”

“The newspaper editor?” Minnie replied. “Are you serious? You read his articles. He has it in for Bobby Lee.”

“No he doesn’t,” Nabors said. “Not really. Like I said before, he is just a newspaperman. Why, he would jump at the chance to do a story like this, and the very fact that his previous stories seemed to be against Bobby Lee would just make him that much more credible. Yes, sir, if we can arrange for Marvin to see that letter, there is no doubt in my mind but that the judge will listen to him, and believe him.”

“If there really is a letter, then yes, I would do the story,” the newspaperman said. “As a member of the noble profession of the press, it is my duty to see to it that truth is told and justice prevails.”

Doc Baker laughed. “You aren’t running for office, Marvin,” he said. “All we want to know is, will you do the story?”

“Yes. It would be a great story,” Cutler replied. “And it might give me the opportunity to undo what damage I may have done by being so quick to judge.”

“Good. Then all we have to do is give you the letter,” Nabors said.

Cutler shook his head. “No,” he said. “I can’t take the letter from you.”

“Why not? How else are you going to write about it, if you don’t see the letter?”

“I have to see the letter in the sheriff’s possession,” Cutler said. “Otherwise, there would be no proof that it wasn’t a plant.”

“Are you accusing us of trying to plant evidence?” Doc Baker asked sternly.

Cutler held up his hand, palm out. “Heavens, no, my dear fellow,” he said. “I am merely saying that, for the integrity of the story, I must personally see that the letter is in the sheriff’s hands.”

“How are you going to do that?” Minnie asked.

“Did you say you saw it in the middle drawer of his desk?”

“Yes.”

“Then, somehow, I am going to have to get it from his desk.”

“Do you have any idea how you are going to do that?” Nabors asked.

“Nothing comes to mind.”

“Perhaps we can arrange a diversion,” Doc Baker said. “Something that will pull the sheriff and his deputies away from the jail.”

“Yes,” Cutler said. “Yes, that would be a very good idea.”

“You go on back to your office,” Doc Baker said. “Let the three of us put our heads together. I’m sure we will come up with something.”

“Very well. Get word to me when you have an idea,” Cutler said. Standing, he started toward the door, but Minnie called out to him.

“Mr. Cutler?”

“Yes?”

“Where did you get that story about the two new riverboats in St. Louis?”

“What story is that, my dear?”

The newspaper was still lying on the table, and Minnie showed him the story.

“Oh,” Cutler said. He smiled proudly. “My dear, disabuse yourself of any idea that because we are in a remote part of the United States that we are unable to report on the latest news from anywhere in the world. I’ll have you know that this newspaper is a member in good standing of the Associated Press and because of that, we receive news articles such as the one you mentioned on a daily basis.”

“I see.”

“Why the particular interest in that article?”

“One of the boats is named after her,” Nabors said.

“Indeed?”

“Not exactly,” Minnie said. “But close enough that it got my attention.”

“Well, I’m glad you enjoyed the story. I pay a fortune for the service, and one never knows if the stories I print from the Associated Press are even noticed by readers. I am pleased to see that they are.” With a final wave, Cutler left the saloon.

“Now, all we have to do is come up with a diversion of some sort,” Nabors said after Cutler left.

Nabors and Doc Baker began discussing ideas as to how to get the sheriff and all his deputies away from the jail, but Minnie wasn’t listening. Minnie had drifted off to another time, and another place. She was remembering St. Louis two years ago.

Minnie’s mother had died when she was eighteen. Three months later, her father shocked all of St. Louis society when he married a young girl who was not only the same age as Minnie, but who had been one of Minnie’s high school classmates. She had graduated with Minnie, the graduation taking place just one month before she married Minnie’s father.

The person everyone in Cloverdale knew as Minnie Lou Smith was not, as so many of the soiled doves, a young woman driven to the profession by a state of destitution. On the contrary, the young woman everyone knew as Minnie Lou Smith had come from one of the most affluent backgrounds in America. Her real name was Minnie Kay Culpepper, and her father, Thaddeus Culpepper, was owner of the Culpepper River Boat Company. Thaddeus Culpepper was a millionaire many times over.

“Minnie, I would like for you to meet your new mother,” Thaddeus said, introducing his daughter to his new wife.

Standing beside him was Kristina Dawn Turner. Kristina Dawn and Minnie Kay had known each other for many years, and had long been adversaries, sometimes rivals for the attention of a young man, other times competitors in academic or athletic projects. Until the moment of her father’s announcement, she had no idea that there was any kind of a relationship between Kristina and her father.

Her mother had only been dead for three months. How long had this relationship been going on? How could her father marry this person?

“Kristina is not my mother.”

“I am now,” Kristina said with a triumphant smile.

Minnie was shocked that her father had so dishonored her mother, and she wondered how he could have so betrayed her.

There was no doubt in Minnie’s mind but that Kristina had married her father for his money. In fact, Kristina did not deny it when Minnie made that accusation.

“Tell your father that and see which one of us he believes,” Kristina said with a malevolent smile.

“Be gone with you, girl!” Thaddeus Culpepper had said when Minnie indeed made the accusation against Kristina. “She is my wife, and more than that, she is your stepmother. You will honor her as you honored your own mother, and I will not listen to any more such scurrilous accusations.”

“But Father, you must listen to me. This marriage isn’t right,” Minnie insisted.

“Minnie, if you cannot find it in your heart to accept this young woman who I love as a part of this family, then I will have no choice but to expel you from the family,” Thaddeus said harshly.

Minnie gasped. She had no idea her father would ever consider such a thing.

Then, the longer Minnie thought about it, the more determined she was to deny him the opportunity to ever expel her from the family. She decided to expel herself. A week after that conversation, Minnie left home, taking a night train out of St. Louis. She had no particular destination in mind, but after a series of train rides, she stopped when the last train she boarded reached the end of track in Cloverdale, Nevada.

She had met Janet Farrell on that trip down from Battle Mountain, and Janet introduced her to Nate Nabors and “the life,” as Janet called it. She lost her virginity the first night she went to work, but given everything else that had happened to her, that was almost insignificant. She had not been in touch with her father in the two years since she left St. Louis. She had no wish to be in touch with him now, because she did not want to give Kristina the satisfaction of knowing that she had become a whore.

“I’ve got it!” Nate Nabors said, pounding his fist in his hand. His loud outburst summoned Minnie back from her memories.

“You’ve got what?” she asked.

“Haven’t you been paying attention, Minnie? I’ve got the solution to our problem. I know what kind of diversion to create in order to get the sheriff and his deputies away from the jail.”

Although Minnie wouldn’t admit it, she had been so lost in her memories that she had not been paying attention. She had to regather her thoughts to know what he was even talking about.

“What is the idea?” she asked.

“There needs to be a fight,” Nabors said. “And it can’t be just any fight. It has to be a fight that will get the whole town to come watch.”

“Who are you going to get to fight that would draw the entire town to watch?” Doc said. “Hell, Nate, you know as well as I do that drunks get into fights every day without anyone paying the least bit of attention.”

“Yes, but this won’t just be a couple of drunks,” Nabors said. “And I guarantee you that folks will come to watch these two fight.”

“All right, now you have me interested. Who is going to fight?”

“Minnie and Janet,” Nabors said.

“What? Are you crazy?” Minnie asked. “Janet is my best friend. I’m not going to fight her.”

“I agree with Minnie,” Doc said. “You can’t ask her to pick a fight with Janet.”

“It wouldn’t be a real fight,” Nabors said. “All it has to do is look like a real fight. And it has to take place outside so the whole town can come see it.”

“I don’t know,” Doc said. “What do you think, Minnie? Would you go along with something like that? And do you think Janet would?”

“Janet would if I asked her to,” Minnie said. “Especially now, after Sheriff Wallace killed Andy.”

“Do you think you two could make it look real?” Doc asked. “I mean, real enough that the men who gather to watch it will be convinced that you two are actually fighting?”

Minnie smiled, and nodded her head. “Yes,” she said. “Yes, women have been putting on shows for men since the dawn of time. I don’t think we’ll have any problems in convincing them that it is real.”

“Will you arrange it with Janet?” Nabors asked.

“I’d be glad to,” Minnie agreed.

Half an hour later, Minnie and Janet walked across the street to the Cloverdale Emporium. They found a hat that was the only one of its kind in the store, and both of them reached for it.

“I saw it first,” Minnie said.

“No, I saw it first.”

“I did.”

“I did,” Janet said, and she grabbed it.

Minnie pushed Janet down and picked the hat up from the floor. Screaming angrily at her, Janet jumped up, then pushed Minnie outside, where the fight continued until they were standing in the street, shouting at each other, pushing each other, and pulling each other’s hair.

Though it looked as if they were very angry and doing their best to hurt each other, the pulling of the hair was very controlled. As Nabors predicted, though, the fight began to draw a crowd until soon, well over one hundred people, almost everyone of them men, were gathered in the middle of the street, shouting encouragement and laughing at the antics of the two women.

The young newspaper boy who worked for Cutler ran down to the sheriff’s office.

“Sheriff, you better come quick!” he said. “They’s two ladies fightin’ out in the middle of the street and it looks like they are tryin’ to kill each other!”

“A couple of women fightin'?” Deputy Beard said. “I want to see this!”

Sheriff Wallace came out of the jail and looked toward the crowd that had gathered at the far end of the street. The shouting and screaming, along with the shouts and laughter of the crowd, could be heard easily, even from this distance.

“What the hell?” Wallace asked as he started toward the disturbance.

Marvin Cutler was standing just behind the corner of the leather goods store, watching. As soon as Wallace started down the street toward the fight, he moved quickly to the front of the jail. Just before he stepped inside, he looked over at the newspaper boy.

“Tommy, you stay out here. If you see the sheriff comin’ back, you let me know,” Cutler said to his employee.

“Yes, sir,” Tommy replied.

Cutler went into the sheriff’s office, pulled open the middle drawer of the sheriff’s desk, then saw the envelope.

“I’ll be damned,” he said quietly. He picked up the envelope, then removed the letter and began to read.

* * *

That evening, Marvin Cutler worked late in his newspaper office, writing the story even as he was setting the type. So familiar was he with setting type that he was able to read and proof the story, even though every letter and every word was backward. When he finished setting the type, he perused it once more, then, with a smile of satisfaction, put the platen in place, and printed the first issue. It was the first “extra” issue he had ever put out.

EXTRA – EXTRA – EXTRA – EXTRA

A Reconsideration of the Trial
of Bobby Lee Cabot