Dorothea and Jemmy returned to the sheriff’s office. They found nothing better to do than stare at cheerless walls—wait, wait, and wait some more. Jemmy tried to write an article about the Queen City, but every attempt faded after the lead sentence. Stewing over Hal’s disappearance banished all attempts at concentration.
The clock ticked its way to eleven o’clock as Dorothea took up work on her petit-point bell pull. Jemmy stared at her tablet. What’s the matter with me? I can’t seem to do anything at all—not search for Hal—not even write a story.
What kind of a reporter am I? A worthless kind, that’s what kind.
Lost in self-doubt, Jemmy didn’t hear the distant sound of a marching band.
Dorothea rose to her feet. “It’s about time. The parade was scheduled for nine thirty. I wonder whether the Wild West encountered obstacles in getting here. Weather could hardly be counted a difficulty. The day is most agreeable.”
“I suppose problems are apt to crop up. Moving hundreds of horses and tents can’t be easy.”
Dorothea pulled Jemmy up from the bench. “I propose we view the parade on its way to the fairgrounds. We’ll stay close by the sheriff’s office. That way we can keep watch for Mr. Koock and the deputy.”
Jemmy relished leaving the stifling office as they moved toward the courthouse steps. She stood up straight and reminded herself that covering the parade was her job. I am a reporter. Reporting the news is my job—with or without Hal. Who knows? Maybe I’ll even find my missing photographer.
The holiday excitement outside should have been enough to raise anyone’s spirits. Little boys shinnied up lampposts on the courthouse lawn. Jemmy envied them. She and Dorothea had to crane their necks even though they managed to find standing room on the highest steps of the portico along with other sensible ladies of breeding.
In size, hoopla, and noise, Colonel Cody’s parade easily eclipsed Professor Gentry’s. First came spotted ponies bearing Native Americans. Both men and horses wore fearsome slashes of red, white, and ochre paint.
Next came Cha Sha Sha Opogeo, the bushy-bearded husband of Red Cloud’s daughter. His real name was John Nelson, but his honorary Sioux title had more show-biz appeal.
A color guard of veterans from the Cuban campaign of 1898 carried a banner with the words ROUGH RIDERS. To inspire his soldiers of the First Regiment of U.S. Cavalry in the Spanish-American War, Teddy Roosevelt appropriated the term from Buffalo Bill. With a fine sense of fair play, Cody had stolen back the pilfered label.
Buck Taylor, the first “King of the Cowboys,” led a band of genuine rough riders: bronco busters. Vicente Oropeza’s vaqueros twirled ropes. Frontier girls waved, and South American gauchos tossed bolas around the horns of Texas cattle.
Even though the animals were a hundred feet away, Dorothea put her perfumed hanky over her nose to cover the reek of bovine flatulence. Jemmy stuck her nose in the air and inhaled a deep whiff on purpose. How else would she be able to describe the smell?
Conestoga wagons rolled up Ohio Street advertising the show. The first boasted oversized portraits of the stars. Framed by filigree and curlicues in gaudy paint was an oval portrait of the international celebrity, Col. W. F. Cody. Smaller ovals of Annie Oakley and Johnny Baker graced either side of the most famous showman in the world. All three names were emblazoned on gold-painted streamers under their pictures.
Wagon canvas depicted Rough Riders charging up San Juan Hill and a Puzta horseman from Hungary in a long purple coat standing atop five galloping horses.
One featured Native Americans engaged in occupations as varied as killing a bear or playing tennis. Another depicted the Sixth Cavalry riding behind a billowing U.S. flag with forty-five stars in its blue canton.
Tallyho, Cody’s own coach, was missing. Folks would have to be satisfied with his picture as a young cross-country rider. Dorothea read Pony Express owner Bill Major’s words aloud. “I gave him a man’s pay when he was fourteen because he could ride a pony as well as a man.”
Canvas roll-downs at the windows of the Deadwood stagecoach advertised RESERVED SEATS $1, REGULAR ADMISSION 50¢, and CHILDREN UNDER TEN HALF-PRICE.
The grand star Annie Oakley marched with thirty or forty orphans who were to be her guests for a meal in the Wild West cook tent. She was famous for her kindness to needy children, especially for “Annie Oakleys”—free show tickets. The crowd approved with much foot-stomping and applause.
As Annie and the orphans passed by, a shock of monstrous proportions chased any thought of the parade from Jemmy’s head. She clapped eyes once more on the skinny robber as he ambled past.
She bounded off the portico with her mind made up to atone for her failure to ask about Hal. Without a word to Dorothea, she once again bolted in most unladylike pursuit. She weaved and elbowed her way through the crowd until she could reach out to pull at his sleeve.
He stopped and turned back with a smile as if he expected to greet a friend. He beamed even wider to see a pretty girl had latched onto his arm.
His expression turned from pleasure to dismay. When his eyebrows shot up, Jemmy knew he recognized her. He jerked his arm free and ducked into the crowd at a speed she could not hope to follow in long skirts and high-heeled boots.
In seconds she could see nothing of him, but she remembered all too well how he looked. Five-feet-five inches tall; a hundred and fifteen pounds. He even wore the same blue shirt and dark blue neckerchief. He fit every note in her notebook except “Smoked sausage bits on shirt.”
She had only a brief glimpse of that particular thin fellow with light brown hair parted in the middle, but she knew beyond a doubt this was the skinny train robber. His face told the whole story. A blue-black knob of a bruise perched on his cheekbone like a lump of melting coal. A red scab line beaded across his jaw and down his chin. A yellow-purple half-moon under one swollen eye testified to the beating he had suffered on the train.
Jemmy fumed over her own stupidity. How could I be so dim-witted? Heavens in a handbag, I even told myself his bruises would help me identify him if I managed to see him before they healed.
But what did I do? I went right out and decided the skinny boy I saw at the Maple Leaf Club was the skinny robber from the train.
Did I notice anything at all about him? Did I notice he had only one single bruise on his jaw? Heavens in a handbag, how could anybody not be battered after being beaten and thrown off a train!
Did I notice he had light brown hair parted in the middle, not dark brown hair parted on the side? She stopped short and peered into the crowd for a minute or more. When, oh when, will I start to think like a newspaperwoman?
Jemmy dragged her feet back to Dorothea. Her hostess wore an expression of worry or agitated stomach. “Why are you so downcast?” She burped behind her hanky.
“I thought I saw someone I knew. I was mistaken.”
“Jemmy, my dear, I beg you to stop rushing off without a word of explanation. I can understand your need to find Mr. Dwyer, but your actions set my teeth on edge. You’ve dashed off twice already this morning.”
Dorothea gave another genteel burp behind her white gloved hand. “Each time you take flight, my innards rumble. If you flee again, I fear my stomach will cast up more than wind.”
“Forgive me, Dorothea. I am at fault for upsetting your digestion. Mother says tranquility in one’s digestive system is the key to good health, and good health is the key to a happy life. I promise not to run off again without the most compelling reason.”
Dorothea looked less than reassured by Jemmy’s answer. And neither of them could have been reassured by the downcast looks on the faces of Mr. Koock and Deputy Futcher when the men returned. The two had had no success in locating Hal at any of the less-than-respectable places they visited on the wrong side of the tracks.
They had accomplished only one thing. They stopped by the Sedalia police station—which the deputy now remembered was located on Second Street. Mr. Koock had described Hal and asked the local police to help find him.
Deputy Futcher fawned on Jemmy. “Perhaps we could discuss this over lunch if Mr. Koock’s business would permit. It’d be my pleasure to treat. I’d like to make up for my lack of manners yesterday. They got ham and beans at the Presbyterian and beef stew at the First Methodist. Church ladies do a fine meal and make a little money for missionaryin’ when the big shows come to town. Wouldn’t be enough restaurants in the whole county to feed the crowds without ’em.”
Jemmy welcomed his attentions about as much as she would a pimple the size of a grapefruit. “I’m sure we all appreciate your kind offer, Deputy, but Mrs. Koock and I must leave to interview members of the Wild West.”
Once he knew how important Jemmy was to the Koocks, Deputy Futcher’s zeal to help her assumed heroic proportions. He leaned close enough to Jemmy to bathe her in his tobacco-breath. “I’ll hunt for him on my own time soon as the afternoon deputy comes. I know a couple of places outside of town where he might have gone for a little—”
Mr. Koock interrupted. “Yes, Deputy Futcher, we’d be most grateful for any assistance.”
Obadiah ushered the ladies out the door and into the carriage. He told Jean Max to drive to the place where Buffalo Bill’s roustabouts were setting up. The campgrounds lay past the Katy shops southwest of Sedalia.
On the way, Jemmy replayed her conversation with the other skinny man—not the real skinny robber—the skinny man in the alley by the Coffee Cup Restaurant. She remembered his startled reaction when she implied she knew the Wild West would be robbed. In a flash, she realized she had stumbled on a truth. The skinny man was actually planning to rob the Wild West.
She had to tell somebody right away. She started to ask Mr. Koock to turn back to the sheriff’s office, but changed her mind. Surely the sheriff had experienced big shows coming to town. No doubt he was prepared for trouble.
Hal’s absence tortured Jemmy. What if her warning caused the deputy to stop searching for him? If anybody knew the scum of Sedalia, Futcher would be the man.
What’s more, she had a job to do, a reporter’s job. She had devoted precious little time to duty of late. She could ill afford to waste any more.
No, she had to be subtle. She would tell her host. She took a deep breath and blurted out the words as if she just had a revelation.
“Mr. Koock, in my distress over Hal, I quite forgot to mention something of grave importance. Perhaps we should go back so I may impress upon Deputy Futcher the need for extra vigilance at the show tonight.”
“What is it, Miss McBustle?”
“I have good reason to believe the thieves from the train plan to rob the show this evening.”
“Why do you think so?”
If Jemmy told him the truth, she would have to explain her lies. She would have to tell why she had run off from her companion and chased a crook into an alley.
Fortunately, she was gaining a real knack for making up little white lies. “The fellow I took the gun from on the train threatened the show. He said, ‘Just wait until the Buffalo Bill show Friday. We’ll buffalo everybody.’ Those were his exact words, near as I can remember.”
“You’ve told this to no one—not in three days?”
“At first I didn’t know whom to tell. Then it slipped my mind, and now I’m so upset over Hal’s disappearance . . .” She pulled her hanky from her sleeve and dabbed at her nose in hopes she had satisfied his doubts. Even if the words sounded odd, she really did believe the robbers would be after the ticket money. Tears would sway him—at least they would if Mr. Koock happened to be a typical male of species Homo sapiens.
“I’ll telephone Sheriff Williams and Police Chief Prentice from my office. I’m sure they have everything well in hand, but one can’t be too cautious. Forewarned is forearmed.”
“Thank you, Mr. Koock. I apologize for giving you nothing but problems. I’m beside myself trying to think where Hal might be.”
By then, the carriage had reached the Wild West campgrounds. Mr. Koock preceded Dorothea and Jemmy out of the carriage so he could steady them as they climbed out. As he handed down the ladies, he said, “Try not to fret, Miss McBustle. I daresay I shouldn’t impugn your photographer’s character; but after all, he is Irish. I feel certain your Mr. Dwyer will turn up with nothing worse than a bad hangover.”
The temperature of Jemmy’s own Irish blood rose a few degrees. She muttered under her breath the rest of the line—the words Mr. Koock would have added in male company. “Bad hangover or a dose of the clap.”
She forced a smile. “I’m sure you’re right, Mr. Koock. Thank you for all you’ve done for me. I fear I’ve repaid your kind hospitality with nothing but troubles.”
“Mrs. Koock and I are happy to do whatever we can.”
Dorothea looked hopeful as she asked him, “Will you be escorting us to the Wild West this evening?”
“I only wish I could, but I fear Lilburn will have to serve in my stead. I must stay at the shops. With out-of-town rowdies about, I always post sentries as a precaution. The Katy shops are too close to the Wild West to take chances.”
“But must you stay, too?”
“I would never ask my men to do anything I’m not willing to do myself, or to deprive them of any pleasures unless I forego those pleasures myself.”
It was Dorothea’s turn to force a smile. “Of course, Mr. Koock. I quite understand.”
With a finger pointed toward the ground and the parting words, “I’ll send Jean Max back to wait for you in this same spot,” he climbed back in the coach, knocked twice to signal the driver, and waved out the window as he rode off.
Dorothea fluttered her hanky at the departing coach. She was still smiling, a genuine smile. She motioned toward the canvas going up. “Shall we go?”
Jemmy wondered why Dorothea was smiling when Mr. Koock had refused to escort his wife to the show.
Dorothea must have felt the need to explain her apparent lack of disappointment. “For the first time in years, he looked at me when he waved goodbye.”
Wrapped in their own thoughts, the pair walked in the direction of a swarm of workmen setting tall fence posts around a rectangular field. Other workers attached canvas to the posts.
Jemmy took notebook and pencil from her satchel as she headed toward the person giving orders. The scent of fresh-cut grass lingered in the air.
“Excuse me. I work for the St. Louis Illuminator. Perhaps you’ve heard of me, Ann O’Nimity.” Her ridiculous pen name generally elicited a snort or at least a grin. Not with this foreman. He kept right on issuing orders.
“Pardon me, sir. Might I prevail upon you to answer a few questions?”
“Can’t take time off. Happy to answer if you can keep up.” He raced off at a pace that forced the ladies to trot.
When he reached a pair of diggers driving a post, he said, “Hole got to be deeper. See the red line on the post? There for a reason. Got to go down that far in the earth. Else a big wind come along and blow down the whole shebang.” The men pulled up the post, tossed it aside, and began hacking at the hard clay with spade and pickax.
The foreman walked as he cast back over his shoulder, “Hire local boys to help out. Work hard. Not bright, though.”
Jemmy wasn’t sure if he was talking to Dorothea and herself, talking to the workers, or talking to himself. He strode off toward the grandstand. From his tongue rolled a spool of statistics born of practice in giving facts to reporters and getting rid of such nosy pests without being crude.
On the way he pointed to yards of canvas being hammered into place around the vast rectangle. “Fifty-two train cars—fourteen more than Ringling. Seventy thousand yards of canvas. Eleven hundred and four stakes. Twenty miles of rope. Fence off eleven acres of ground. Grandstand tent four and a half acres of canvas for the roof. Don’t want paying customers wet.”
He pointed toward a platform near the top of the grandstand. “Electric plant cost fifteen thousand dollars.”
He changed direction so often, Jemmy could in no wise keep her good ear trained on him.
“Two gas-powered plants other side of grandstand. Three searchlights. Electric carbon-arc floodlights. Hundred and fifty thousand candle power. Hope I helped.” He tipped his hat, turned, and fairly galloped across the arena.
Jemmy raised her voice, “Please, sir, where would I find Buffalo Bill?”
“Not here.”
“Annie Oakley?”
“Cook tent or her own.”
He was almost out of earshot when she hollered after him, “What is your name?” She raised her voice louder still. “I want to spell it correctly in my article.”
He kept walking but tossed back, “Best go to Johnny Baker’s tent. You’re already late for reporter powwow.”
She turned to Dorothea. “He didn’t even let me thank him.”
“He’s a busy man.”
“I couldn’t keep up. I don’t think I wrote down half of what he said. My bad ear . . .” Jemmy pursed her lips in vexation.
“Let me help. I have two good ears and a good memory.” With Dorothea’s aid, Jemmy filled in the blanks in her notes.
Their attempts to find the press conference met with shrugged shoulders until they came across one of Annie’s orphans. A little boy in oversized pants held up by a rope belt took off at a trot. When he ran too far ahead, he loped back to encourage the ladies to move faster. Eventually, they arrived at a tent with the front flaps open and the sides rolled up a few feet to let in breezes.
Inside Jemmy could see a man holding forth to reporters, a man who was clearly not Buffalo Bill. The “Cowboy Kid” wore black from his boots to the sombrero he flourished to punctuate his quotable words. White fringe dangled from his embroidered shirt. Silver conchos down his trouser legs made him stand out from a ring of press men taking notes.
“I am proud to call myself the colonel’s son.” Johnny Baker motioned toward the note-takers with his sombrero. “You can write that down. ‘Colonel’ is what he likes to be called.”
Johnny curled the hat brim with the heel of his hand. “The colonel adopted this orphan boy when I was just seven years old. Taught me everything I know about shooting and show business. Yes, Pahaska—spelled P-A-H-A-S-K-A, that’s the colonel’s Indian name—saved my life and made me famous. I owe him everything and I’m proud to say so. In fact, I make it my life’s work to say so whenever I get the chance. I’ll take questions now.”
A deep voice demanded, “Where is Buffalo Bill?”
“He is indisposed and was unable to make the trip.”
“So he won’t be at the show tonight?”
“Unfortunately, no. But I promise you a Wild West worth five dollars of anybody’s money. And you get it all for the amazing bargain of a mere fifty cents.”
Johnny smacked his sombrero against his knee as if he suddenly remembered something. “Of course, you don’t have to pay. Every reporter comes in free on a press pass. Buffalo Bill has vowed to do all he can for the greatest democratic institution the world has ever known—the free press of the United States of America.”
A sarcastic voice came from across the tent, “Aren’t you a little old to be playing the Cowboy Kid?”
“I only bring out the Kid costume when I’m taking over for the colonel. He says a sombrero has more razzmatazz than a ranger hat.”
A baritone voice in front of Jemmy set a friendlier tone. “Do you still hit targets standing on your head?”
“Indeed I do, though folks say the years will one day keep my feet on the ground. Not soon, I hope. I like the look of the world when it’s upside down. Makes more sense that way.”
The sarcastic voice chimed in, “Most fellers prefer their headquarters over their hindquarters.”
The quip earned guffaws until Johnny rebuked the “for men’s ears only” remark. “Gentlemen, we have ladies in our midst.” He bowed to Jemmy and Dorothea. “Do either of you have a question?”
Instead of asking about Annie Oakley’s costume as the group probably expected, Jemmy surprised the crowd with “How often has the show been robbed?”
Laughter of the nervous tittering variety followed. Ladies were not supposed to concern themselves with anything so down-and-dirty as thievery.
Johnny answered by not answering. “No one would rob the Wild West, miss. Colonel Cody is too well-loved.”
A friendly voice brought Johnny back to more genial territory. “What’s the best you ever shot?”
Jemmy supposed the voice probably came from one of Cody’s own publicity men.
“I guess you mean in Hamburg, Germany. I fired one thousand and sixteen times and hit a thousand flying objects. My record still stands—less’n somebody broke it in the last week.”
The deep voice boomed, “What does it feel like to shoot a thousand rounds?”
“My shoulder felt like someone took a ball-peen hammer to it; I would have sworn devils propped my eyes open during a Kansas twister; and the colonel had to pry my fingers off the trigger. Considering everything . . .” He paused for a full twenty seconds, then hit them with a zinger. “I felt like the emperor of the rifle and the sheik of the shotgun.”
From the corner of her eye, Jemmy caught a shape slipping under the canvas on the far side of the tent. She could scarcely believe it. The skinny robber, or the one pretending to be the skinny robber, was about to elude her for the third time in the same day.
She dashed out front and raced around the tent so fast she tripped over a tent peg and fell with a most unladylike “Eeech.” Her knees, elbow, and chin met the ground all at the same time.
Before she recovered enough to push her hat back from blinding her eyes, a firm hand pulled her to her feet. As her gaze rose from boots to shirt to face, she planned what to say to the skinny robber.
But when she stared into a middle-aged man’s bearded face, she realized her powers of observation had played her for a fool yet again. His backside may have resembled the skinny robber’s. But his bushy bearded face belonged on a package of Smith Brothers cough drops.
“Are you hurt, miss?”
Jemmy rubbed her elbow and felt something damp run down her chin. “Is my lip bleeding?”
“No. A little drool is all.”
“Thank you for coming to my assistance.”
“My pleasure, miss. Can you walk? I’d be happy to escort you.” He offered his arm.
“I appreciate your courtesy, but it’s not necessary. I can walk. I do thank you for your help.”
He tipped his hat and went on his way.
Head down, Jemmy picked her way over the ropes and tent stakes, then stopped short. Wrong again. I must stop leaping to conclusions and over tent stakes. His eyes trouble me. The set of his chin seems off kilter. Maybe I’m trying to make something of it because I don’t want to admit I made a dunce of myself for the third time in one day.
Confusion banged in her head like mallets on a bass drum. How many skinny men are in Sedalia, and why can’t I tell them apart?
Where is the one I want to talk to—the one with the beat-up face—the robber from the train?
Her confusion swelled to the clatter of a thousand snare drums in her bad ear. Who is the other one? Who is the fellow with the bruised jaw? Why would he pretend to be the robber from the train?
And where on earth is Hal?