CHAPTER 2 - LYNCH MOB RESCUE
We rode together for several months, stealing cattle and horses from big landowners and selling them off, spending the proceeds on our gallivanting around, drinking and whoring and even kitting ourselves out in decent clothes to replace the rather raggedy outfits we inhabited.
On the occasions when the three of us spent our nights in whorehouses, I reinforced the opinion that I was not fussy. Billy of course took his pick, as did Pat, but I didn't care what was left as long as I got some. My bedroom activities seemed to be something I forcused on more than half of my waking life and Billy and Pat, who at least showed a modicum of restraint, taunted me for having the morals of a prairie dog. I took it as a compliment. I did have some standards – well, one. They had to be white. I'd always rather pick the well worn, slightly wrinkled, past her prime forty-year-old white whore than the Mexican girl barely out of her teens. Other than that, I really didn't care.
In addition, I prided myself on going through life having fun and not letting myself get tied down with feelings like some of them did. For instance, when we later rescued Doc Scurlock and Chavez from certain hanging (another story to be recounted shortly) I quickly came to realise that Doc was a man I would never understand.
He was a good looking boy, smart and educated and proper, who no doubt could have had anyone he wanted, but he had saddled himself with a China girl and her whole family. From what I gathered, she'd been house entertainment for Lawrence Murphy so Doc could have had his fun and walked away, but no, he had to go and marry the girl and take on fourteen siblings. When he spoke of her, he adopted this goofy, dreamy expression and went all poetic. Jesus. Like I said, he could have had anyone; even me, at least for an hour or two. I smirked. Sometimes I even wondered at myself. I found myself weighing up everyone I met in terms of whether I'd like a roll in the hay with them.
I could never work Chavez out either. He often kept pretty much to himself and the times we had called at whorehouses, the others would all be bragging about what they got up to, but Chavez said not a word. I sometimes wondered if he simply sat in the barn with the horses while we were all at it, or better yet, did it with his horse, but the time Deputy Carlyle and his men surrounded the house and we all had to stop in the middle of it and rush downstairs, Chavez emerged looking as rumpled as the rest of us, shirt undone and hair tangled, but that all happened later on.
Hendry too, who joined the gang when Pat left, was barely twenty-three and had already been married and widowed. What the hell was it with people wanting to get married? Variety was the spice of life, in my opinion.
Anyhow, forgetting about them others for the moment. There was just Billy, Pat and me when Billy made a deal with the governor to be arrested, testify against Murphy's men and then be acquitted. However, it didn't quite work out the way he hoped. Once he was locked up, they intended for him to stay that way. Being Billy, he didn't stay locked up for long though. Pretty soon he turned up again looking for Pat and me, announcing that two of his friends who used to ride with him as the Lincoln County Regulators, were in the pit in Lincoln and needed rescuing. They were to be hanged the next day so we had to get them out that night. I was all for an adventure and was delighted when Billy proposed we pose as a lynch mob with torches and everything, to get Doc and Chavez out. This was the first time he had mentioned the pair of them to me.
I frowned at the second name. Chavez? Surely Billy didn't have a Mexican for a friend? Ah well, at least there was an adventure to be had in executing their rescue. Maybe someone would finally write about me in the newspaper if I made enough of a show of myself. I was therefore less than pleased when Billy made me wear a flour sack over my head with eye holes cut in it. I'd rather people could see who they were dealing with.
We rode into Lincoln and Bob Ollinger, who was hanging around close to the pit with his sidekick, Bill, welcomed us.
"You're a bit late!" he cried, obviously expecting a lynch mob.
"Open the pit!" I instructed, delighted to have a leading role in the operation. We peered in at the bunch of cowering men. Bob reported that Billy had escaped.
"There's no Billy the Kid in there!" Billy confirmed, adopting an Irish accent. Bob immediately announced that Doc and Chavez who had ridden with Billy were there.
"Ah, shit. They'll have to do. Bring 'em up," Pat said in a stern voice.
The two men climbed out of the pit, both looking terrified. Doc was blond and wearing a suit. Chavez looked more like an Indian than a Mexican, with masses of long black hair, dark skin and dark eyes. I glowered through the eye holes in my flour sack mask, wondering what was wrong with Billy that he wanted someone like that in his gang. The pair of them climbed onto the two spare horses we had brought and we all set off, me and Billy riding up front with Doc and Chavez in the middle and Pat behind. Doc began to jabber that he had never seen Billy and was a school teacher from the city of New York. When I turned around, he looked like he was shitting his breeches at the thought of what this lynch mob might do to him. I snorted under my hood.
"I'm a school teacher from the city of New York!" repeated Billy in a screechy voice and then laughed hysterically. Billy's laugh was legendary and I immediately saw recognition on both Doc and Chavez's faces, before Billy pulled off his mask. I took mine off too in relief.
"Howdy, Doc, how are your drawers?" Billy asked Doc, sniggering.
"Nice to see you again, Billy," Doc said, looking startled.
Moments later, we ran into the real lynch mob and much galloping around and shooting followed. It all happened so fast I hardly had time to think, although I managed to make it sound like a good story when I told it later to anyone who would listen. At the time I just fired at everyone that seemed to be coming at me with a torch and hoped that somehow I might hit Chavez in the process; or if not, that someone else would. However, the five of us escaped unscathed some time later and rode out of Lincoln to safety. I was disappointed it was over, but looked forwarded to checking the newspaper the next week to see if I got a mention. We continued to ride until the sun came up and then stopped to water the horses and allow them to rest, giving ourselves time for something to eat. It was only then that I got a proper look at Billy's two friends.
Billy had shot through the chain linking Chavez's cuffs and halfbreed was now attending to one of his horse's legs as it had apparently sustained some kind of injury during the excitement. Billy then got ready to break Doc's chain. Doc was getting frustrated, though, crouching on the ground with his hands either side of a rock waiting for Billy to shoot the chain, while Billy chattered and didn't get on with it. He was talking about how he and Doc and Chavez had made a pact – pals forever. I wanted to throw up. I had pretty much forgotten the boys I'd ridden with in the past. I certainly wouldn't be confessing undying love if I ran into them in the future.
"Look, I don't care if you guys swap spittle and piss in each other's boots, I don't take to tenderfoots in my gang and I definitely don't take to no Mexicans," I said, scowling at Chavez. I had to think of some way to convince the others to get rid of him.
"It ain't your gang, Dave," Billy reminded me. I knew that well enough, he was always telling me. I just liked to think I was as important as him.
"Mexican-Indian, you son of a bitch," growled Chavez from a few yards away.
Ah – so he did have Indian blood too. Could a person be a worse combination? I hated both. One of my grandfathers had been killed at the Alamo which put paid to any regard I might have had for the Mexicans and as for Indians….they were scum and in my opinion should be hunted down like dogs and shot. The only good thing about the government was that it kept a lot of them in reservations like cattle.
"Oh, I'm sorry," I sneered. "Tell me something, Chavez, was it a Mexican whore putting it to the savages, or was it an Indian whore putting it to the whole godamned Mexican army?!" I laughed. I was great at insulting people. I always managed to come up with exactly the right words to make them lose it and here was the perfect candidate to be on the receiving end.
Typically, Chavez lost it and flew at me, half shoving, half punching me in the shoulder. The man had hands like steel and I was surprised when it actually hurt. A second later, Pat grabbed him and Billy shoved me away from him, reminding me his friends were the original Lincoln County Regulators like it was something to be in awe of.
"Yeah, was," I said, unimpressed.
"Were," corrected Doc; he was big on grammar, being a teacher and all. He then pleaded with Billy again to shoot the chain.
Finally loose, Doc threw a pocket watch to Billy announcing it would pay for the spare horse which he intended to take. Billy said the horse wasn't for sale, but Doc was welcome to his boots instead. To my surprise, Doc kicked out at Billy and then launched himself off the horse on top of him. The pair of them rolled and pummeled each other and I jumped around, cheering Billy on, aware that I probably sounded like a moron, but I did love to see a good fight. Watching a good fight was second only to being part of one. I was quickly disappointed, however, when Pat grabbed Billy and Chavez pulled Doc away, but at least Billy had dropped the watch and I managed to pick it up and slip it into my pocket without anyone noticing.