No one walking the streets of Simpson forgot that dusty July afternoon that Caulfield Blake rode into town. He was no ordinary man. His six-foot two-inch frame gave him an appearance larger than life as he sat atop his great black stallion. A week’s growth of beard made his face seem dark, menacing. Those piercing blue eyes that had alternately struck enemies with fear and comrades with devotion swept the streets, observing everything, noticing even the smallest detail. Long strands of dark brown hair sprinkled with traces of gray curled under and around a faded brown leather drover’s hat.
He wore buckskin trousers and a cotton shirt, a combination which seemed strange to the onlookers. Around his waist was a black Confederate officer’s belt, with its accompanying Colt revolver resting on his right hip.
If the town seemed preoccupied with Blake, Blake was no less taken aback by the town.
“It’s changed,” he mumbled as he nudged the horse toward a brightly painted building with a hand-lettered sign over the door, STEWART’S. Sitting on a bench beside the door was a small blond boy of ten or so. Blake climbed down from the horse, tied the reins to a post, and approached the boy.
“Dix around?” Blake asked.
“Out to the ranch today,” the boy said, shrinking back from Blake’s steellike gaze. “Got business with him?”
“Might have. Let’s see now. You’d be ten April last, as I recall. Your papa named you Charles, but it’s likely come to be Charlie by now.”
“You know Papa?”
“About since the first time he threw me off into the creek down in Siler’s Hollow.”
The conversation was interrupted by the appearance of a girl. She had her brother’s fair hair and deep brown eyes, but her face revealed suspicion and suggested caution.
“Can I help you, mister?” she asked.
“And you’d be Katherine,” Blake said, moving the boy forward with a weathered right hand as they entered the store together.
“And who might you be?” she challenged. “I got no uncles, and I don’t take to liars.”
“Or baths, either, as I remember. I’ll bet they call you Kate.”
The boy nodded, and Blake’s eyes brightened. The beginning of a smile appeared on his lips.
“Just who are you?” Kate asked, retreating to where a shotgun rested beside the cash drawer back of the counter.
“Let’s see if I can help you figure it out. There was a man here a few years ago. You used to complain about his mustache. Made it tickle when you kissed him.”
“Lots of men have whiskers.”
“Well, that’s true enough. But how many know about that little heart-shaped mark on your . .
“Stop right there!” she said, her face growing bright red. “I don’t see how you could know about that.”
“Oh, I might could if I had to give you a bath. You weren’t too agreeable to it, I admit, tossin’ soapy water in my eyes, bitin’ my fingers.”
“You’re him,” she suddenly blurted out, trembling.
The boy seemed confused, but Kate walked briskly to an old desk beside the window and took out a yellowing photograph. Five soldiers sat together under a Tennessee oak tree. Kate pointed to the tall, dark-haired young man in the center. Blake nodded.
“Uncle Caulie,” she said, wrapping both arms around his dusty waist and hugging tightly. “I remember.”
Blake pulled the boy over and squeezed his thin shoulder.
“Papa didn’t expect you to come to town,” Kate said. “You might should leave. Colonel Simpson’s at the hotel.”
“Good. It’s best he know right away.”
Kate’s forehead wrinkled, but Blake smiled away her concern.
“He’d know sooner or later,” Charlie mumbled. “He finds out everything.”
“Well, money can buy a lot of information in a town like this one,” Blake said bitterly. “Money can buy lots of things.”
Yes, he thought, remembering the angry crowd that had tom him off his horse, beaten him with sticks, robbed him of his home, his family. He recalled the faces, those people who’d begged him to take on the duties as sheriff when he had a world of work to do at the ranch. Where had they been when the crisis came? They’d kept to the shadows, then jumped like a pack of wolves at his back.
“I’ll see your horse gets some water,” Charlie said, touching Blake lightly on the arm before leaving.
“Be careful,” Kate warned as Blake turned and started for the street.
“Never been one to walk lightly,” he said, taking a deep breath. Then he started for the hotel.
People stepped back into doorways and scrambled for cover when they saw Blake. Few recognized his face, but there was no mistaking the glare in those defiant eyes, the strong, determined walk of the soldier he’d been most of his life. When he marched through the open door of the hotel, the half-dozen people in the lobby grew silent.
“Excuse me, sir,” said the desk clerk, “but the hotel’s reserved this week. Colonel Simpson’s expecting cattle buyers.”
“Why don’t you tell the colonel someone’s here to see him?”
“And who might that be?” a young man asked from the sofa.
Blake turned in that direction. The young man wore a tailored suit and one of those short-rimmed hats that had become fashionable in Austin. His legs were long and thin, and no whiskers were as of yet growing on his face. He couldn’t have celebrated his eighteenth birthday, but he was wearing a pistol under his coat. The long blond hair, the arrogant brown eyes reminded Blake of all the Simpsons.
“I might be just about anyone,” Blake said. “As it happens, my name is Blake.”
“Caulfield Blake?” young Simpson asked as a hush swept the room.
“I figured you might recognize the name.”
“Oh, dear,” a woman near the door said.
“Mr. Blake, I’d appreciate it if you’d go elsewhere,” the clerk said.
“I’ll get my grandfather,” the young man said, nervously watching Blake while backing his way up the stairs.
The hotel lobby emptied as Blake waited for Simpson. When the old man finally appeared, his wrinkled face filled with rage. Simpson needed the grandson’s help to negotiate the steps. Finally, the two old enemies stood face to face.
“Blake, I warned you never to come back,” the old man shouted. “I’ll see you dead this time.”
“You’ve done your warnin’, old man,” Blake said, never flinching. “I told you somethin’, too. I told you to leave my family be. If you need to blame somebody for your boy bein’ a murderer, then blame me. Hannah never caused you pain.”
“She’s a Blake,” Simpson said, spitting on the rich carpet of the hotel. “That’s enough. And she gave birth to two Blake pups.”
“Look, Simpson, eight years ago you came to me and asked me to be sheriff of this town. You asked me to swear to uphold the laws. You didn’t say anythin’ about lookin’ the other way when your boy shot a judge in cold blood right in the middle of Front Street.”
“That judge was a carpetbagger, a thief. He was no better’n a snake. You shoot snakes.”
“He was a man, no better or worse in the eyes of the law than Henry Simpson or Caulfield Blake. I didn’t ask for that badge. You and the others, you put it all on me. Then when the soldiers came and expected justice, you turned away. Afterward your brave bunch of men came after me.”
“You hung my son, Matt’s father.”
The young man glared at Blake. A trace of viciousness appeared in the corner of his eyes.
“I helped execute a killer. He had a fair trial before a jury of his peers. You could have appealed.”
“To Yankees? To the same men who killed two of my boys at Selma?”
“I fought in the war, too, remember? I didn’t sit behind a desk and call myself colonel when the smoke cleared.”
The comment brought a shiver of rage to the old man’s face. Blake only smiled.
“You’ve been warned, Blake,” Simpson shouted. “The next time you show your face in this town, someone’ll put a bullet through it right in between your eyes!”
“Oh?” Blake asked, chuckling. “You think maybe you can pay someone a few hundred dollars to do that? Or will you face me yourself? Why wait? Why not right now?”
Young Matt started toward Blake, but his grandfather held him back. Then the sheriff walked through the door, a Winchester rifle in his hands. Blake moved aside and let the lawman take over.
“I think it’s best you leave,” the sheriff said to Blake. “Colonel, maybe you ought to have a little rest. You seem a bit flushed.”
Simpson smiled.
“You remember what I said, Blake!” the old man shouted.
“Oh, I will,” Blake told him. “And you keep in mind that I won’t look kindly on you troublin’ Hannah and the boys.”
Before the old man could say anything more, Blake turned and slipped quietly out of the hotel. He soon spotted his horse at a watering trough in front of the Palace Saloon. He walked cautiously the hundred yards to the horse, accepted the reins from Charlie, and climbed into the saddle.
“Tell Dix to come see me,” Blake told the boy. “And tell him to keep a weather eye out for Simpson. The old man’s capable of anythin’.”
“Yes, sir,” Charlie said.
Blake then turned the horse toward the far end of town and began the five-mile ride to the Bar Double B. Home. For the first time since arriving in town he trembled.