Noble
Chapter 1
1877
Heath and Nick had come to Jarrod's office in town to sign some documents conveying some land to an adjoining owner. They had come in by wagon that was currently over at the mercantile, getting filled up with supplies they had ordered – they were never ones to waste a trip to town. "Okay, these are the last ones," Jarrod finally said and put a piece of paper down in front of them.
"Good," Nick said and signed twice. "Now you can buy us lunch."
Jarrod chuckled as Heath signed in two spots on the paper. "I just got you a good deal on this land you sold, and now you want lunch, too?"
"Yeah," Heath said, perfectly frankly, as if Jarrod were insane for asking.
Jarrod gathered up the papers, making sure they were in order before slipping them into his briefcase. "I'll file these later today and we'll be in good shape. Where do you want to have lunch?"
"Cattlemen's," Nick said quickly.
The most expensive place in town. Jarrod chuckled again. "All right, Cattlemen's it is."
Jarrod donned his gun belt and hat as Nick and Heath fetched their hats from the table by the door where they'd left them. As they did, someone outside the door knocked. Nick gave Jarrod a look, and when Jarrod nodded, he opened the door.
The man and woman on the other side looked questioningly at first, but then all three Barkley men broke into smiles to see them. "Mr. and Mrs. Noble!" Jarrod exclaimed. "Come on in here!"
"We didn't see your secretary out there, Jarrod," James Noble said as he and his wife came in.
"She's out running an errand," Jarrod said and extended his hand. "Come in, come in, sit down. You remember my brothers, Nick and Heath."
Handshakes went all around. Nick and Heath both smiled and nodded to them as the older couple sat down in the chairs in front of Jarrod's desk. Heath's smile was a little bigger. He knew the Nobles from the time he'd been robbed and wounded on the road, and they took him in for a night and fixed his wounded leg up. Nick didn't know them as well as Heath did, but he remembered Jarrod prosecuting the man who had murdered their son six years ago.
"What brings you folks to town?" Jarrod asked, sitting down behind his desk again.
"We're gonna be moving in," James Noble said. "We've bought the old Weaver house down on Oak Street, and we'd like you to handle the paperwork for us."
"It would be my pleasure," Jarrod said. "I'm glad you're coming to town. It'll be better for you, and it'll make Stockton a better place."
Alice Noble smiled. "You always were a charmer, Jarrod."
"You're buying it from their daughter, Madeline Bird, am I right?" Jarrod asked.
"Yes," James said. "She hasn't gotten her lawyer yet, but I expect she's out doing that today."
"I'll find out who it is and we'll put the papers together," Jarrod said. "Are you getting a loan from the bank?"
"Yes, short term until we sell our place, I hope," James said.
"I'll touch base over there, too. We'll get this done as soon as possible. In the meantime, I'm taking these two reprobates to lunch. Would you like to join us?"
"Oh, I'm afraid we can't," Alice said. "We have to see the estate agent about selling our place."
The Nobles got up, and Jarrod stood, too, reaching his hand out to them again. "We'll get you squared away as soon as possible."
"I expect you're gonna need help moving your things, when the time comes," Heath said.
James nodded.
"Well, we're your men," Heath said.
Nick nodded. "We can have a crew take good care of you," he said.
"That's wonderful, thank you," Alice said. "It's a little frightening, giving up the home we've lived in for so long and moving into town."
"You won't be sorry you did it," Jarrod said. "There are a lot of good people in Stockton who will be glad to see you."
The Nobles said good-bye and were soon out the door. As soon as they were, Heath said, "Those are two fine people."
"Two fine people who deserve better than life handed them," Jarrod said. "When their son was killed, a lot of us were afraid it was going to do them in, but they've rallied."
Heath wasn't around when Jarrod prosecuted their son's murderer, but Nick was. He remembered quite a few things about it, not just how hard it had been on the Nobles. The fellow named Pittsfield who had been tried for the crime had friends, and they beat up Jarrod pretty good to try to get him to throw the case. Jarrod had gotten them arrested and they were sent off to San Quentin for assaulting a prosecutor. They had misjudged the prosecutor. Jarrod got Pittsfield convicted, and the man was hanged.
The Barkley men went off to lunch, and once finished Jarrod went off to the courthouse to file the real estate papers Nick and Heath had signed. Nick and Heath picked up their wagon loaded with supplies at the mercantile and headed home.
"I'm glad to see the Nobles moving into town," Heath said as they rode along, side by side.
Nick said, "Yeah, they're getting up in years. They'll be better off having neighbors closer to help them. When their son was killed, we were all pretty worried it would be the end of them. Flynn was a good kid. He took care of them and helped out a lot of people around here, too."
"The Nobles helped me not long ago when I got robbed and wounded," Heath said, remembering that wounded leg. "I'm sorry I never got to know their son."
"He was twenty when he was killed," Nick said, remembering. "He'd been here in town helping fix the schoolhouse roof that day. The whole town was madder than hell when Flynn was killed. Came as close to a lynching as I've ever seen it come, but Jarrod was a prosecutor then and he got the case. Things seemed to settle down once he took charge and people saw this Pittsfield guy was gonna get prosecuted…"
XXXXXXXX
1871
Six Years Earlier
Alice Noble was beyond distraught when Sheriff Lyman brought the news, and he stood there in their living room feeling as helpless as he had ever felt in his life. James Noble was with his wife on the sofa, his arms around her, both of them crying but James holding himself together better. "Who did this?" James asked, growling. "Who killed our boy?"
"I've arrested a drifter named Pittsfield," Sheriff Lyman said. "He rode into town with a few of friends and it looks like Pittsfield jumped Flynn after he lost all his money in a poker game."
"Flynn didn't have any money," Alice sobbed.
"Not much," Sheriff Lyman said, "and it looks like what happened is Pittsfield got mad that he didn't and killed him. But he took Flynn's watch – we found it on him. That's why I arrested him."
"These friends of his – " James asked.
"It looks like this was all Pittsfield's doing," Sheriff Lyman said. "His buddies weren't involved."
"Where is Flynn now?"
"At the undertaker's. I'll have him brought home if that's what you want."
"Yes – " Alice moaned.
But James said, "Let's go into town and talk to the undertaker and Reverend Johnson. We can't make any decisions right now."
"I need to tell you," Sheriff Lyman said, "folks in town are pretty riled up. I took on two more deputies to keep an eye on Pittsfield because I don't know whether some people might try to take him out and lynch him. People liked Flynn a lot."
James was already shaking his head. "No, no, he can't be lynched. He has to be tried. We have to see a trial. Flynn deserves a trial."
"I just wanted you to know what's going on," the sheriff said. "The District Attorney has the case. He'll either try it himself or give it to his assistant, Jarrod Barkley. Either one of them will do a thorough job."
James kissed his wife on the side of her forehead and said to her, "We need to go to town. Are you ready for that?"
Alice began to get up, nodding, blowing her nose on her handkerchief. "I'm ready."
The sheriff helped them get their buggy hitched and rode with them into town. The place was eerie, people walking around almost all in a daze, almost all of them stopping when they saw the Nobles arriving. A group of men were in front of the jail, but if they were inclined to be threatening, they stopped when they saw the sheriff and the Nobles. The sheriff took the Nobles to the undertaker's and escorted them in.
Shaking, almost afraid to go in there, James kept hold of his wife and together they faced what they had to face. The first person they saw there, in the reception area of the funeral parlor, was Jarrod Barkley. They had known the young man in passing for years. He was nearly 28 now, with several years of legal practice under his belt, and seeing him there gave them something to hold onto, something to steady them.
His hat in his hands, Jarrod immediately reached for them. "I am so sorry," he said and meant it.
"Are you going to try this case?" James immediately asked.
Jarrod nodded. "I've been assigned."
The undertaker came out of the room in back, the room where everyone knew Flynn Noble was laid out. "Mr. and Mrs. Noble," he said. "I am so sorry."
Everyone was so sorry. "I want to see my son," Alice said.
The undertaker nodded. He had gotten Flynn cleaned up so that it would not be so horrible to look at him, but he knew from experience that Mrs. Noble might faint dead away. He knew that grief would come pouring out of the boy's parents in ways he could only react to, not predict.
Jarrod escorted the Nobles into the room, keeping his hand at Alice's back to steady her. He too knew what was going to happen in here would be terrible, gut wrenching, and he fought to keep tears away himself. They stepped inside and stopped almost immediately.
Young Flynn Noble lay on the table in this spare but sunny room, his body covered with a sheet but his face still uncovered. James thought that except for how pale he was, he looked like he was asleep, but Alice knew right away he was gone. He was like alabaster, like stone. Alice collapsed with an awful wail.
Jarrod helped James hold her up. They wanted to get her to a chair, but she pulled them to her son's side. James began to shake and weep quietly while Alice just screamed, touching Flynn's face, caressing him, kissing him, screaming. Jarrod felt the tears run down his own face now, for Flynn, for these good people who had lost their only child, for the all the despair that poured out of them.
The sheriff turned and went outside. He could still hear Alice screaming and crying, and so could the people in the street. There must have been fifty of them right in front of the funeral parlor. Women cried, men held them and cried. Sheriff Lyman looked up at the sky and cursed the sun for shining.
