Here's a bit of a longer chapter for you. Once again, thank you so much for the reviews! :) They're always fun to read.
~CHAPTER 9~
A thin layer of frost coated the ground next morning as Joe and Hoss bundled up and left the comforts of a warm house to saddle the horses. They had all eaten breakfast early so they could get into town as soon as possible. Not that there was really any great need to rush, but all of them had been looking for a break in the whereabouts of their assailants, and now that there was one, they didn't want to lose any time in tracking it down.
Shortly the rest of the party appeared, Adam pulling the collar of his tan coat tighter and squinting at the bright sun in his eyes as Roy shrugged the rest of the way into his slicker. Although the sun was shining for the first time in days, steam could still be seen with each and every breath they took, the air bitterly cold.
The horses were led out of the barn and in short order everyone was mounted and ready to ride. The tension and excitement shared by the four men made the mounts skittish. The soon let out the reins and gave the horses their heads as they galloped down the road, the only sound coming from the hollow pound of hooves as the four horses flew across the ground, nostrils flared and tails and manes whipping with their speed. Not a single word was exchanged between the men as they sped toward Virginia City.
They had slowed their mounts to an easy trot and were still about a half hour away from town when they were brought to a sudden stop by the youngest member. "Hold it!" Joe called out as he quickly brought Cochise to a sudden stop. He had been riding on the outside when something black in the undergrowth beside the road caught his eye. Roy, Adam, and Hoss immediately pulled up as Joe dismounted and eased his way into the ditch. As he approached, he realized the black object was a man's boot. Joe knelt and parted the undergrowth with his gloved hand as an uneasy feeling settled in the pit of his stomach.
"What is it, Joe?" Hoss asked.
"A dead man," Joe responded grimly as he took in the sight of a stranger laying face down in the ditch, devoid of any life. All three of his companions immediately dismounted and came up beside him. Hoss took the man's legs and Joe his arms as the two lifted him onto the road, the body completely rigid from cold and rigor mortis.
There was no question as to the cause of death; the man's entire shirt front was stained a rusty brown and there was a black bullet hole in the man's upper left chest and a matching one in his back. As Roy glanced over the body a frown furrowed his brow, and he put his hand under his slicker to retrieve a piece of paper from his jacket pocket. After studying it for several seconds, he knelt and started searching the man's pockets.
"What is it?" Joe asked.
After his quick search was complete, Roy looked up. "Joe, I hope to goodness I'm wrong, but this body fits the description Cosmo gave me of the man that passed the payroll money."
Joe glanced quickly to his thunderstruck brothers before turning back to Roy, his face tense. "Are you sure? Look, it could be someone else."
"I'm not sayin' fer sure that he is, but the only way we're gonna find that out is tuh take him back to town and let Cosmo take a look at 'im. If this is him, it looks like he was robbed, because not a bit of the payroll's on him. In fact, there's nothin' on him."
Right after Roy's possible identification, Adam had jumped down into the ditch where the man was found and started searching around intently.
Without a word, Hoss grasped the man by the belt and with help from Joe, hauled him onto his horse before covering him with his slicker, none of them keen on seeing the body any longer.
Adam continued to gaze at the ground even as Roy slipped into the ditch beside him. "Find anything, Adam?"
Adam stood up from his crouched position and said slowly, "It's what I haven't found that interests me."
"What do you mean?" he asked, looking around himself.
Adam pursed his lips for several seconds in thought before looking up at the Sheriff. "You saw the bullet wound. Looks like he lost quite a bit of blood."
"That's right. Entered his chest, tore through and came out his back. Poor brute couldn't have lasted long," Roy replied.
"And we know the wound bled a lot from the condition of his shirt, but the ground underneath the body is dry," Adam speculated, pointing to the flattened patch of grass where the body had lain for who knew how long.
Roy knelt to get a closer look while Adam continued, speaking his thoughts aloud. "If it was robbery, why move the body, and especially to a place where people would be more likely to find it?"
Roy stood, rubbing his chin with a gloved hand as he considered Adam's logic. "Well Adam, you sure pose mighty interesting questions. It doesn't look like there's a drop of blood anywhere around here."
Hoss and Joe, talking between themselves, quieted when they overheard Adam's revealing information. "Well, if this is the guy, maybe somebody in the saloon saw him passing that bill and figured there was more to be had," Joe suggested.
Adam turned to his brother, "But why move the body, and why to the side of a main road?"
"Anything we could figure out now would just be a guessin' game," Hoss speculated.
"Hoss is right. We gotta get the body back to town to find out if it really is our man," Roy quickly brought the discussion to an end. Climbing out of the ditch, he motioned for them to mount up so they could hurry on to Virginia City.
As they started out once more, a thought kept churning in Adam's head. If this was the man that passed the money, he might have given a better clue dead than alive…
They arrived in town forty minutes later and headed straight for the Sazarac. As they rode through the streets, heads turned and hushed whispers were heard behind them as town's folk stopped in their busy meanderings to stare at the Cartwrights and Sheriff Coffee coming into town with the chilling shape of a covered body slung over one of their saddles. As they stopped outside the saloon and Roy dismounted and entered the establishment, a curious crowd assembled around the others. The other three had dismounted, and Hoss and Joe were keeping the onlookers at bay. Soon the doors swung back and Roy stepped through them with Cosmo in tow. Stepping over to Hoss's mount, he lifted the front of the slicker to reveal the dead man's face. "Well? Is it him?" he asked, looking back at the bartender.
Without a second's hesitation, Cosmo responded, "Yes, that's him, Sheriff. He's the one that passed that bill you were asking about. What happened to him?"
The three Cartwrights heaved a silent, collective sigh as the all-important question had finally been answered.
"We're not really sure, Cosmo. But all we needed from you was a positive identification. Now that we have it, we won't be takin' up any more of your time."
Not one to be affected by the sight of a corpse because he'd seen many in his line of work, Cosmo nodded and wiped his hands on his apron as he walked back into his saloon. Roy once again covered the dead man's head and turned around to be met by the curious eyes of the spectators. "Come on. Break it up, folks. There's nothin' tuh see here," he said, motioning for the lingerers to move on. "Come on over to my office, boys," he spoke to his companions in a hushed tone.
They soon made their way over to the jailhouse where Hoss transported the body inside and laid it on a bunk in one of the cells before coming back to join the others around Roy's desk. Roy was already busy looking through file after file on his desk, while Hoss sat down in the chair, and Joe perched on the edge of it. Adam removed his hat and twirled it in his hands as he leaned up against the cabinet, all the while observing their Sheriff. They knew Roy could be a little messy and at times got too busy to clean his own office, but the amount of paperwork covering his desk now was far more than usual. "Roy, do you mind tellin' us what you're lookin' fer?" Hoss asked after a minute of letting the older man comb through several stacks of papers and every time flinging them aside in disgust to create another toppling pile.
Roy looked up over his glasses at Hoss. "I'm lookin' for that man's file."
Adam's eyebrows knit in confusion, "You mean, you know who he is?"
Roy looked at the other brother. "I'm not a hundred percent sure. I went through so many of these things yesterday, I felt like my eyes would fall right outta my head, but I do recall one that might've," he paused, holding up his finger for effect, " just might've, fit our body in there." The brothers then seemed to take a keener interest in Roy's arduous activities and huddled around the desk to observe the man's work more closely.
"Roy, how'd you get all of these files?" Adam asked incredulously.
"They're the ones you asked for when you wanted to know if anybody that mighta had a score to settle with your Pa had been released or escaped from jail recently." The elderly man grinned a bit sheepishly as he continued, "Well... I mighta gone just a bit overboard, and ordered all the files from all the state prisons and penitentiaries of all the land your Pa even mighta covered from here to Boston."
Adam gazed at the countless records again, and couldn't help but be touched by the good Sheriff's willingness and devotion in helping his family. Joe, standing behind Roy's chair, placed a grateful hand on the older man's shoulder, although the benefactor didn't even seem to notice, for just then he appeared to find the sought after papers. "Aha... I think I found it," he suddenly exclaimed. Hoss by now had moved to the corner of Roy's desk and looked hopefully at the piece of paper in his hands. The suspense was heavy in the air as the three waited for possible affirmation of their stranger's identity. "Yep, this is him alright. No wonder I remembered it; even had a 'Wanted' poster of him," he said, handing it to the eager hands. "His name's Samuel Chapman. Sound familiar to any of you?" he asked, to which three heads were shaken no. "He was arrested for robbery and sentenced to a five-year sentence in an Illinois Prison, served four, released in April of this year for good behavior."
"April? That was only five months ago," Joe stated surprised.
"All the way from Illinois... this feller musta hit the road pretty soon after he got outta jail," Hoss stated the fact aloud.
Roy nodded. "It would seem like this feller somehow knew your Pa, or was acquainted with somebody that did. Why else would he take off to hit a ranch halfway across the country right after gettin' outta prison?" He shook his head in disgust, tired of seeing this time and time again in his career; countless people hitting the life of crime right after being released from jail, not even trying to make an honest life for themselves in the world but resorting to their old ways, apparently a good chunk of their lives spent in jail meaning nothing to them. He looked up after several moments of deep thought. "Adam, I know you was just a lad when your Pa was comin' through Illinois, but do you think you could remember anything or anybody from there that mighta had something against him?"
Adam sighed heavily as his brow furrowed in concentration, and he put his hands on his hips, making his jacket bunch up in the back. "Roy, I'm not sure. I was probably around five at the time. I don't think I can remember much from then," he said reluctantly, frustrated at having his memory be a loose connection in possibly finding another link in the intricate web of clues spinning out before them.
Roy nodded understandingly. "I understand that, Adam. In fact, I'da been a might surprised if you had remembered anything," he consoled, trying to relieve some of the guilt he could clearly see written on Adam's face at not being able to remember something that could help.
Everyone remained quiet for several moments, the uneasy silence finally ending with Adam's statement, "Roy, I'm almost positive that man wasn't robbed, that his body was placed there deliberately, maybe even for our benefit."
Roy eased back in his chair, taking off his glasses and chewing on one of the stems. "Because of the lack of blood near the body," he finished, to which Adam nodded.
"What do you mean 'for our benefit'?" Joe asked, having an idea of what his brother meant, but wanting it clarified.
Adam rubbed a hand over his mouth. "His body there would signify a robbery taking place, especially if the man was identified as having a significant amount of money on him. You said, maybe someone from the saloon saw him with it."
Joe nodded, urging Adam to continue.
"But the fact that there was no blood means that he was placed there, definitely not shot there."
"The only logical people to have done that would be his accomplices," Roy said.
"And we know he probably had accomplices, cause any one of those jobs woulda taken a lot more than just one man to pull off," Hoss spoke up.
"Exactly," Adam continued. "My guess is that this Sam Chapman was killed by his partners, maybe because he passed some of the payroll money."
"Now let's not start sayin' 'he was'. We barely have any information to go off on, and we can't start makin' theories be facts." Roy clarified. "We don't even know for sure if this fellar had any accomplices."
As Roy, Adam and Joe talked on about Adam's theories, Hoss stood and with hands in his pockets, silently made his way for the back cell where the dead man lay, needing to think by himself a while and leaving the fancy talk to his brothers and Roy. He stopped for several seconds in the doorway of the cell and stared, his eyes as cold as the body upon which he was gazing. Thinking that man might have been, at one point in time, one of the people responsible for causing so much damage to his home and family made the giant man's blood boil. His eyes finally diverted from the sickening sight, and he was about to leave when something caught in the cold rays of weak sunlight coming through the barred window caught his eye. As he held his head low, his blue eyes focused on the dead man's boots caught in the cold light. He noticed with curiosity a pale orange dirt jammed in to the stitching and creases of his boots. Taking out his jackknife, he scraped some of the dusty surface mud off to reveal a clay-like orange dirt, definitely not of the type to be found around there. However, for some reason that orange dirt looked unsettlingly familiar. Wracking his brain to come up with the solution, he suddenly grasped the answer that had annoyingly been eluding his grasp.
"Hey, Adam, Joe, Roy! Come in here, I think I found somethin'!" he hollered into the other room where the conversation suddenly ceased, being replaced with rushed footsteps.