Lawman
Chapter 6
Matt had hoped to arrive at the jail before Gina got there. He pulled the buggy over to the hitching rail, then untied the saddle horse from back of it and tied the animal directly to a post. Inside one of the two guards hired by Etheridge was again slumped back in his chair with feet on the desk.
The temporary deputy had grown used to the Marshal's comings and goings over the last few days and didn't even bother to put his feet to the floor as Dillon picked up the keys and made his way back to the cells.
Matt wanted to ask his friend for more details of the bounty hunter and the events that led up to the accusations of murder. For his part Hamilton related the story much as he had before, how he rode out to meet the bounty hunter, handed over the money and stayed by the river fishing for a few hours. As far as he knew no one saw him. It was two days later that some cowboy brought the body in. He was not sure if a full autopsy had been done and he didn't know why the town suddenly decided he had committed the murder.
"Where you short of money?"Matt asked casually.
Doug stopped and looked at him.
"You surely don't think I would murder a man to rob him, do you?"
"It doesn't matter what I think Doug. If this comes to trial we have to have some facts."
"Well I didn't. I gave him the money and he rode off."
"What about the man who brought the body in, do you know him?"
"I think he works at the Double D ranch about 10 miles east of town, I've seen him around but don't know much about him."
Matt was about to venture into more delicate questioning. He hated doing it, but tried to remember that his friend's life could depend on the answers.
"Tell me about Gina. Is she happy with the life you have together?"
Instantly, he replied "Of course she is, I love that woman."
"She's a lot younger than you Doug, sometimes younger women look for.." but he didn't finish. Doug sprung up from the cot where he had been sitting.
"Don't you ever say that Matt. I thought you were my friend." He was shouting the words, almost hostile.
"Whoa, calm down, I am just trying to get answers to questions you will be asked in court."
"You can't take me to trial, I'll never win and they'll hang me for sure. I didn't do it Matt, don't you believe me?"
Matt hated what he was doing but knew it was the only way to get to the truth.
"Why did you take this job?"
"I'm beginning to ask myself that. Gina didn't like that I was gone so much when we lived in Pueblo."
"Was anything ..going on?" It was a difficult question to ask, but he had to do it.
Hamilton stopped and looked at his friend. At first Dillon thought the man was going to come at him with fists flying, but he seemed to control his anger and taking a deep breath or two finally answered the question.
"I don't know Matt, at first, when I wasn't home, she began spending time with some of the other young women in town, but I must admit there were times when I wondered. Sometimes even when I was home she would tell me she had to go to a friends house to help finish a quilt or arrange a bake sale for the church. I did think it strange at times, but well..I guess I didn't want to know. She always came home even if it was late."
"Did you ask her about it."
"I did, but she swore it was just the women folk she was visiting, and that would stop if I was home more."
"So that's why you took this job."
"Partly. But I think I was a little tired of chasing outlaws and getting shot at. I wanted a family and to spend nights at home with my wife, not sleep alone out on the prairie."
Matt could understand that, sometimes he felt the same way - but in his case ..well that didn't matter now.
"How was it when you got here?"
"The work was pretty easy once I had made a few crooked gamblers leave town. Then after I got the saloons to close at two in the morning and send all the drunks home it got quite peaceful."
"Did you have any trouble with that?"
"A few of the owners wanted longer hours and all night Poker games in back rooms, but you know as well as I do that only leads to fights and killings."
"What about the Sheriff who was here before, how did he run things?" Matts eyes were on the door now, he knew Gina would be here any minute.
"I think he was paid to look the other way. He was a good man, but his idea of law and order was different to mine."
Matt understood. He got up from the stool where he had been sitting.
"I have a buggy outside, there's three places I want to see. Where you went fishing, where you handed over the money and where the body was found. I want you to give me your word not to try to escape, I don't want to have to put you in handcuffs, or spend the next week tracking you down because I didn't."
"You're really going to make me go through with this aren't you Matt?"
"If I have to."
"I thought you were my friend."
"If I wasn't I wouldn't be here."
"All right you have my word - for this afternoon."
Of course there were objections from the young deputy when Matt took Hamilton from the jail, but at this point the Marshal had more important matters to consider.
Hamilton drove the buggy and Gina sat beside him, to all intents and purposes the attentive wife. She even held on to her husbands arm and thanked Dillon for arranging this little trip for them both. Matt was unsure of what was happening, one minute he thought she was somehow involved in this and the next minute he couldn't believe she was anything but the loving wife she portrayed.
Their first stop was the place where the body had been found. Doug said he had not seen the place before but it was where the cowboy who brought the body in, had described to him. It seemed a little strange, from where Matt was standing it was a little to far off the road for a body to have been spotted by someone casually riding by. He told Hamilton and his wife to stay in the buggy while he looked around, he knew the chances of finding any tracks were slim, too much time had passed, but just in case he didn't want anyone else walking around and adding to the confusion. He walked carefully around the area but didn't see any broken limbs on the scrub bushes that grew here. At first he didn't see anything, he walked up and down for about twenty paces in each direction. He picked up a small quantity of the sandy soil run through his fingers. It didn't look like it had rained here in a while, if there had been any prints there should still be some evidence of them. Then something caught his eye, almost hidden in the shadow of overhanging branches. He walked over to it and squatted to get a closer look. The print was quite clear, made by a boot with a distinctive mark in the heel, like a small nick or splinter had been cut out of the leather. He was studying the detail when he became aware of someone coming up behind him. It was Gina.
"I thought I told you to stay in the buggy." He looked up at her as he spoke but there was no smile on his face.
"I just wanted to know if you had found anything."
He looked back at Hamilton who was still sitting there where he'd been told to wait. The woman had her hands in the pockets of her skirt, Matt thought it unusual for young woman to walk around like that but said nothing. She walked behind him, scuffing up the sand and he looked back to watch her hoping she was not destroying evidence. Then he saw it, a small white object just there where she had been standing. He picked it up and turned it over in his fingers - a small white shirt button. It maybe looked a little clean to have been lying there for a week or more, but all the same he would keep it. He said nothing and slipped it into his pocket. There was absolutely nothing else here, no spent rifle shell, no prints from horses hooves or broken twigs where a man might have fallen off a horse and no marks to show where the body had been hoisted on to another horse and taken away. Just a solitary boot print and a button.
They turned and headed back towards town, stopping less than a mile up the road, at the place where Hamilton said he handed over the money. It was indeed a lonely place by a bend in the river. There were plenty of prints here, from many different boots and horse shoes, but no print from the boot with the small piece missing from the heel at least that is what he thought at first, then he found one. It was blurred from weather but it was there and he could see the small wedge shaped cut in the outline of the heel.
"Matt" Hamilton was calling from the buggy, "Over there under that tree is where i stood fishing." He was pointing almost exactly at the place where the boot print was.
The Marshal continued looking around but could find nothing else. He did notice that now Gina stayed in the buggy beside her husband.
The return trip to town was uneventful, Doug let his wife off at their house, she told him she would bring him supper and clean clothes later.
With the man safely locked up again and the young deputy back on guard, Matt went back to his room at the hotel, he had a lot of thinking to do.
He removed his boots and laid back on the, hands behind his head, trying to relax and let his mind sort through everything.
He hadn't been there long when a knock on the door disturbed him. At first he tried to ignore it but it was repeated a time or two before finally being accompanied by the agitated sound of Etheridge's voice.
"Marshal, open this door we need to talk."
Matt reluctantly eased himself up from the bed and let Etheridge into the room.
"What is it you want?" Matt was tired and exasperated and his voice reflected that.
"I heard you took the prisoner out for a ride this afternoon."
"You heard right,"
"Where did you go."
"That is my business not yours."
"I think it is the town's business Marshal, and I have the right to know."
Matt stuck his thumbs in his belt and looked down on the self important town leader.
"It is my business, Mr Etheridge," he leaned across his visitor and opened the door, " now please leave before I lose my temper."
The man looked like he was going to object, he even began to open his mouth, but the heavy stare from the Marshal made him change his mind.
TBC