Dad Egan

By the time my train got to Waco the coaches were buzzing. Some said all had been killed. Some said only one. Some said two officers were killed and the whole gang escaped. It was impossible to find out the truth. But something big had happened, and I had missed it, and from Waco to Round Rock was the longest ride of my life.

The depot was full of Rangers, many just arrived. I introduced myself to one standing on the platform. Yes, Sam Bass had been in Round Rock, he said. He or someone in his gang had killed A. W. Grimes, a Williamson County deputy sheriff, and badly wounded Maurice Moore, a Travis County deputy who had come up from Austin with Major Jones. One of the bandits had been killed, but he didn’t know which. The trail of the others had been lost on Brushy Creek, but Major Jones would resume the search at daylight. “Where is Major Jones?” I asked.

“At the jail,” he said. “The Judas has been taken there.”

“The Judas?”

“Jim Murphy.”

He gave me directions to the jail, and I lifted my saddlebags to my shoulder and went into the depot. The floor was strewn with saddles and blankets, and about two dozen men, most of them Rangers, lounged on the benches and sat on the floor against the walls, cleaning rifles and pistols and talking quietly. I picked my way through the clutter and stepped into the warm night. The buildings were brightly lit, and the streets and sidewalks were crowded for such a small town so late in the night. There were few women, and nearly all the men were armed. It looked like Denton had a month or two before. Another Bass war was in the making. The crowd was thickest and noisiest around a small building down the street, and I knew it was the jail. Two Rangers stood in the door, guarding it, but they stepped aside when I gave my name. A lamp burned on the jailer’s desk, and another in one of the cells, among several men. “How do you know this is Seaborn Barnes?” someone asked.

“Take off his pantaloons if you don’t believe me,” said another. “He’s got three buckshot holes in his right leg and one in the left. He got them at Mesquite.”

The voice was Jim Murphy’s. “That won’t be necessary,” I said. “I’ll confirm the identification.”

The men in the cell looked at me. A small man wearing spectacles held the lamp. I took him to be a doctor. Jim looked pale and sick. He glanced at me, then quickly looked away. The others were Rangers, and I didn’t know them.

“I’m Sheriff Egan of Denton County,” I said. “I’m sure I’ll know the man.” But when I saw him in the shadowy light I wasn’t sure. The bullet had struck in the middle of the face, almost in the nose, and had crushed the bone. His dark hair was matted with blood. “Well, maybe you’d better take off the pantaloons,” I said.

One of the Rangers lifted the body while another worked with the belt and buttons until he bared the body’s legs. The scars were there, scarlet against the pale skin. Another Ranger laid his hand on Jim’s arm and said, “You’re under arrest.”

“Let him go. He’s working for us.” The voice came from behind me. I turned around. Major Jones was sitting alone in a dark corner of the office. “Hello, Dad,” he said. He stood up and shook my hand. The Ranger removed his hand from Jim’s arm and looked at him with more contempt than I’ve ever seen in human eyes. Jim slid out of the cell and joined Major Jones and me. “Come to the hotel with me, Dad,” the major said. “We’ve got to talk.” He moved toward the door, and Jim started to follow us, but Major Jones said, “Go hide yourself, Murphy. And pray that Frank Jackson doesn’t find you. I’ll see that you get the money.” His voice was heavy with contempt. Jim looked at me with pleading in his eyes. I pitied him, but followed the major out the door.

Men are strange creatures. With the exception of myself, Major Jones wanted more than anybody to see justice done to Sam Bass. And Jim Murphy had been responsible for the end of Seaborn Barnes’s ignominious career and might yet help bring the bandit chieftain himself to bay. He had saved the Williamson County Bank, too. Yet there was no more friendless creature in Round Rock that night than Jim Murphy. Seaborn Barnes, burning in whatever pit Satan reserves for his kind, at least had the company of kindred souls. And he had the respect of those who had killed him. But there wasn’t a man in Round Rock who would have lifted a hand to save Jim Murphy from Frank Jackson or anybody else. In the minds of some men there are causes higher than justice. I remembered the Ranger at the depot calling him “Judas,” and I regretted it, for I had always considered Jim a decent man. But the name fit. To Pontius Pilate our Lord was an outlaw, of less consequence to him than Sam Bass was to Major Jones and me. But to Judas Iscariot he was a friend sold for silver, and I knew Jim Murphy would never have another friend, nor would his soul be at peace again.

I wondered why Major Jones had warned Jim against Frank Jackson and not Sam, but I withheld my questions until we had worked our way through the crowd and the major had poured himself a glass of whiskey in his hotel room. “Bass was wounded badly,” he said. “He’ll probably be dead when we find him. I/we find him. If he died, Jackson may have hidden his body or even buried him by now. That young man was still very healthy when we last saw him.”

The major was weary and not at all elated to be so near the end of his mission. He told me of Jim’s letter, a duplicate of my own, and the mad dash to beat Sam to Round Rock. When he received the letter on Wednesday, he immediately telegraphed Lampasas, the station of the nearest Rangers to Round Rock. The major and Deputy Moore, who had been wounded in the battle, then came the twenty miles from Austin on the train. He was disappointed that only three Rangers had arrived before him. The rest of the Lampasas squad had been sent the previous day to San Saba, but were notified to ride for Round Rock at once. He had telegraphed Austin to send most of the men stationed in the capital, and had prayed the trap be sprung quickly, for his decision left the state treasury almost unguarded.

But the battle had occurred before the Austin and Lampasas men arrived, before anyone was ready. Grimes and Moore had been fools to confront the bandits alone, even if they didn’t know who they were up against. The barn door had been opened prematurely, and only one of the escaping horses had been caught. “We’ve damn sure shut the door behind them, too,” the major said. “Bass and Jackson aren’t going to ride back to Round Rock. The worst thing is, I don’t know whether there are enough decent horses in this town to mount my men. The Lampasas men practically killed theirs getting here. The bunch from San Saba rode a hundred and ten miles in twenty-three hours, and their mounts might as well be shot. We had nothing but livery stable nags this afternoon, and they gave out before we were three miles out of town.”

He had men scouting the ranches and farms for horses, he said, and hoped they found some. “Goddamn it, Dad,” he said, “I hate working with local officers. They’re politicians first and officers second, and don’t know beans from billiard balls.”

I must have flushed, for he said, “I didn’t mean you. Anyway, Grimes and Moore should’ve known better. They both used to be Rangers, and in my command, too.”

I tried to think he meant no harm. Sam Bass had haunted the minds of both of us for months, and until today we had only Arkansas Johnson to show for all our trouble and expense. And even Salt Creek had happened by accident. “I’d like to turn in,” I said. “I wonder if they have another room here.”

“I reserved you one,” he said. “I figured you’d show up.”

I went downstairs and registered at the desk and took my saddlebags to my room. For once, I wished I was a drinking man like the major. I paced the tiny room, unable to sleep, unable even to sit down, listening to the shouts and laughter of the drunks in the saloon below, all claiming credit for the bullet that smashed Seaborn Barnes’s face. Finally I pulled on my boots and walked down the stairs and headed for the livery stable at the end of the street. The door was open, and a lantern hung lit inside, but I found no one until I climbed to the loft. A boy was sleeping there. I touched him with my toe, and he sprang awake. “Are you the hostler?” I asked.

“Yessir. I’m in charge till Mr. Highsmith gets here in the morning,” he said.

I showed my badge and said, “Come down. I want to show you the horse I want in the morning.”

He did as I told him, and I walked along the stalls until I found the horse that Sam had stolen from Bill Mounts and Seaborn Barnes had failed to ride out of the alley. “That horse was stolen in my county,” I said, “and I claim him to return to his proper owner. I’ll get him at daybreak.”

“I can’t do that, sir,” the boy said. “He’s the one the dead outlaw rode. The Rangers want him.”

“If I don’t get him, I’ll have you and Mr. Highsmith in jail for possession of stolen property,” I said. “Sheriff William F. Egan will ride that horse, and he’ll be saddled and waiting at daybreak, son.”

Yes, it was a bluff. But I was determined that one officer would be well mounted the next day, and that officer would be me. Sam would be found, all right, but not by the Texas Rangers. He would be taken by a politician from Denton County who didn’t know beans from billiard balls.

I went back to the hotel and slept well.

Major Jones’s men rounded up a dozen good mounts during the night, so he wasn’t angry at finding me sitting Barnes’s horse in front of the hotel. My foresight wasn’t wasted, though, for he assigned all the good mounts to his own Rangers and left the local officers to quarrel over the livery stable nags, which they were doing when the Rangers and I rode out to Brushy Creek just after daylight. I was surprised that Jim Murphy was among us. “If Sam’s alive, he’ll kill you on sight,” I said.

Jim’s face turned even redder than usual, and he glanced away without reply.

“I asked him to come, to identify Bass,” Major Jones said. “We don’t need him,” I said. “I know Bass as well as anybody.” The major gave Jim a little nod, and he turned back toward town.

Sam’s trail had been lost at the creek, and we figured that he and Jackson had turned either upstream or downstream after they forded the water. Maybe they separated there, but I doubted that because of Sam’s condition, and I remembered Jackson’s devotion to him from the earliest days of their acquaintance. I suggested we split our party and scout the creek both ways until we found the trail. The major agreed and assigned two Rangers, a private and a corporal, to go with me. In a little-traveled lane not far upstream we discovered the tracks of two horses that obviously were traveling together. The Rangers were expert trackers, and we moved along the lane at a slow gallop, keeping the trail in sight without difficulty until we came to the edge of an unfenced pasture. There the tracks disappeared into the grass. Beyond the pasture was a low hill with a cedar brake near the top and a huge live oak rising from among the cedars. The Rangers were from Lampasas and had never trailed Sam before. They didn’t know his love of timber as I did. So I said, “Scout the trail here. I’ll rejoin you in a minute.” Before they could reply, T spurred across the pasture, but slowed and drew my pistol as I neared the cedars. I reached the edge of the brake and stopped and listened but heard nothing. I peered into the somber green boughs but saw nothing. “Sam! Sam Bass!” I called. There was no reply. I moved the horse into the cedars, scanning the shadows, half expecting to see a gun barrel pointed at me, but there was nothing. Until I reached the live oak.

Sam wasn’t there, but he had been. A bloody black coat was folded neatly, lying against the trunk. I dismounted and unfolded it and saw the bullet hole in its back. Almost on the spot where it had lain was a large dark blot. He bled a lot there. And there were several narrow pieces of cloth that looked as if they had been torn from a shirt and a brown bottle about a third full of some liquid. I pulled the cork and sniffed. Laudanum. I walked to the edge of the brake and cupped my hands to my mouth and shouted at the Rangers below. When they got to the live oak, I was holding the coat spread before me. “Damn!” the corporal said.

It didn’t take long to find the trail out of the brake. Or rather, the trails. One man walked, leading a horse. The other rode, at a run, toward the west. “Jackson left Bass here and took off in a hurry,” the corporal said. “Right after dark, probably. He’ll be hard to catch. Since Bass was walking, I reckon he was too weak to climb on his horse. I doubt he’s gone far.”

We followed Sam along a northward course, but lost the trail again among the rocks on the side of the next hill. “I’ll go see what’s on the other side,” the private said. He had barely reached the ridge when he called, “Farm house down there.”

While we were riding down the other side, a woman came out of the house and stood in the yard, watching. As we neared the fence, she called, “Who are you?”

“Texas Rangers, ma’am,” the corporal said.

“Are you looking for a wounded man?” she asked.

“Yes, ma’am.”

She squinted at us, worried. “He was here last night.” “When last night, ma’am?”

“Late. I was in bed, and he knocked on the door and begged for water. But I was alone and afraid to open.”

“How do you know he was wounded, ma’am?”

“I watched him through the window as he went away. He was staggering, and didn’t get on his horse. There was blood on my porch this morning.” The woman looked embarrassed. “I wish I’d opened the door, but I didn’t.”

“You did right, ma’am. He’s dangerous.”

“Who was he?”

“Sam Bass”

“Oh, my God!”

Sam’s trail wasn’t hard to follow. If his wounds had been bandaged, as I assumed from the strips of cloth I found, the bandages had been soaked through, and he was bleeding again. I prayed he wouldn’t bleed to death before we found him. Remembering the hundreds of hot and wet miles I had pursued him through the bottoms and prairies of North Texas, I wanted him to know who had captured him, when that hour came. Was it a vengeful thought? I don’t think so. Sam Bass was my personal bandit. By helping him keep body and soul together when he was a lonely child in a strange land, and especially by loaning him the money to buy that accursed mare, I had been the sponsor of the trouble he had inflicted. I had cast my bread upon the waters as the Scriptures direct, but it was plague that floated back to me. And since it was I who had loosed the plague upon the land, I didn’t want to leave its cure to others.

About a mile from the farm house we struck the new Georgetown spur of the International and Great Northern Railroad. The line was still under construction, and we lost Sam’s trail among the litter of the project upon earth that had been much trodden by men and mules. But a construction gang was working only a few hundred yards away, and we rode to it. The nigger hands took our approach as an excuse to stand up and lean idly on their sledges and pickaxes, and their white overseer didn’t object. “Morning,” he said. He took off his hat and wiped his brow. “Going to be another hot one, ain’t it?”

“So it seems,” I said. “We’re officers of the law, looking for a wounded man leading a sorrel mare. Have you seen him?”

“What if I have?” the man said.

“His name is Sam Bass. He’s a fugitive.”

“Sam Bass! Well, I’ll be damned!”

“You’ve seen him, then.”

“Yeah. This morning. When the boys and me was riding to the job.”

“Where was he?”

“Laying under a tree aside the roadbed. I thought he was just resting. He hollered at us, and one of my boys went over and give him some water. He said he was sick.”

“Where’s the tree?”

He pointed down the track. “Just follow it,” he said. “Big oak, maybe a mile down.”

We struck down the track at a run. The tree stood alone between the railroad and a pasture. The mare was tied to one of its branches. Her red hide glistened in the sun. The Rangers and I drew our weapons, and I called, “Sam Bass!”

There was an answer, but I couldn’t understand it. The voice was small and weak. We reined our horses to a slow walk, our pistols ready. “Sam! Are you armed?” I shouted. “If you resist, we’ll kill you!”

“Don’t worry, Dad. I can’t even lift the damn thing.”

The Rangers and I rode in, cautiously. Sam was lying on the other side of the tree from us, and when I saw him I knew we had nothing to fear. His face and shoulders and chest, all naked, were so drained of blood that they glowed in the shadow. The end of his right arm, wrapped in a blood-soaked rag, seemed little more than a stump. Heavier bandages around his waist were so soaked that not a white spot was to be seen on them. A pistol lay near his left hand, but he made no effort to pick it up. “Hello, Dad,” he said. His eyes were shiny and so vacant that I was surprised he recognized me. “What took you so long?”

I didn’t reply. I dismounted and hunkered before him. His dark eyes were looking back at me, I guess, but they didn’t seem focused.

“Is this man Sam Bass, Sheriff Egan?” the corporal asked. “Yes. Go find Major Jones. And go to Round Rock and get the doctor.”

The Rangers departed. I picked up Sam’s pistol and put it in my belt.

“Are you going to shoot me?” he asked. “Of course not.”

“What are you going to do with me?” “Take you to town.”

“Why don’t you shoot me? Better that than be lynched.”

“You won’t be lynched,” I said.

“We killed somebody, didn’t we?”

“Yes. Deputy Grimes.”

“Was he well liked?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t know him.”

“I never meant to. He shouldn’t have jumped us like that.” It amazed me that he could talk so. “Can you see me?” I asked. “Yes. I’m pretty doped up, but I can see you. What are you doing here, Dad?”

“Major Jones telegraphed me,” I lied. “He knowed, then.”

“Yes. He knew.” Then I asked, “What brought you down here, Sam?”

He made a noise that was either a cough or a laugh. “You,” he said. “You drove us down here. You and easy money. We thought we had us a soft thing, but it turned out pretty serious. Dad, you got any water?”

“I’ll get it.”

I hunkered again to lift the canteen to his lips and asked, “How many were you?”

He swallowed first. He had trouble taking the water into his mouth, and it dribbled down his chin. “Four,” he said. “Three that meant business and one drag.”

So he knew about Jim, or suspected.

“How’s my old pard Army?” he asked. “And little John?”

“They’re fine.”

“I had a chance to kill you and Army once. Seab wanted to do it, but I didn’t let him.” “I’m glad,” I said.

He smiled a little at that, then said, “Let’s don’t talk, Dad.”

He closed his eyes, and I feared he was dying. I went to the roadbed and stared down the tracks, hoping for the Rangers or the doctor. It was too soon for them to come, I knew, but I was nervous. I’ve never liked to look at death. I walked to Sam’s mare and laid my hand on her soft muzzle. She snuffled.

“She’s thirsty,” Sam said.

“I’ll give her some water,” I said. I poured the water I had left into my hat and put it under her muzzle. She drank it with loud sucking noises.

An hour passed before I saw the Rangers. Major Jones’s entire search force was riding down the roadbed, followed by a hack.

As the major dismounted he said, “Is he alive?”

“Yes, barely,” I said.

The bespectacled doctor who had been at the jail climbed from the hack and carried his little bag to Sam. Sam opened his eyes. “I’m Dr. Cochran, son,” the man said. “I’ve got to look at you.” Sam said nothing, and Dr. Cochran knelt beside him. “Who bandaged you?” he asked.

“Frank Jackson.”

“He did a good job, under the circumstances.”

“Frank always done a good job,” Sam said.

Major Jones stepped up to him then. “Where is Jackson?” he asked.

Sam’s eyes narrowed, as if trying to recognize the face before him.

“Major John Jones, Texas Rangers,” the major said. “I don’t know where Frank’s at. Long gone, I hope.” “But where? Back to Denton?”

Sam gave him the same glassy, vacant stare he had given me. “Leave Frank be,” he said. “He wanted to quit, anyways.”

“I can’t do anything for him here,” Dr. Cochran said. “Let’s put him in the hack.”

“There’s a farm house not far from here,” I said.

“No, let’s take him to town. I didn’t bring much with me.”

Four Rangers lifted Sam and carried him to the hack and laid him on some blankets there. “Is he going to die?” Major Jones asked the doctor.

“Oh, yes.”

“When?”

“Soon, I think.”

Sam whimpered as the hack rolled across the rough prairie, but quieted when we reached the road. I was surprised how quickly we reached the town. We must have found him no more than three or four miles from Round Rock, but the way had seemed much longer when we were tracking him. We entered the town near a graveyard and went into the colored section. The darkies must have heard we were coming, for woolly heads lined the road, staring in wonder at the still form in the hack. The doctor stopped in front of the first house we came to, and Major Jones went to the open door and knocked. A young negress, a girl, really, came to the door. Her hair was wrapped nigger-fashion in a red rag. Major Jones said something to her, and she looked at the hack and screamed and ducked inside. The major went inside, too, and in a few minutes returned. “It’s all right,” he said. “Unload him.” Four Rangers lifted him as they had before and carried him through the gate. The other Rangers remained mounted, but the major and the doctor and I followed.

The shanty was shady, but hot. The cookstove was near the front door, and a fire roared in it. Several irons were heating on its top, and two piles of laundry, one damp and wrinkled, the other ironed and neatly folded, sat on two chairs near an ironing board. The negress was seated at the table now, her head buried in her arms. She was rocking back and forth and moaning rhythmically, as niggers do when scared or grieving. “Lay him on the bed, boys,” Major Jones said. Then he went outside to give orders to his men, and the Rangers who had carried Sam trooped out after him. Dr. Cochran took a pair of scissors from his bag and snipped at the bandage across Sam’s belly. He looked at the wound, then stood up and muttered, “I’ll need some things,” and went outside, too. Maybe the negress thought I had left, too. She raised her head and looked toward the bed. “Samuel,” she said.

“Mary?” Sam replied. “Is that you?”

She rose and moved toward him.

“You know each other?” I asked.

The negress wheeled, fear and anger in her eyes.

“It’s all right, Mary,” Sam said. Then to me, “Yeah, I know her, Dad, but she don’t know who I am.”

The negress remained tense and poised, like a cat about to spring, until Sam repeated, “It’s all right, Mary. That’s Dad Egan. I’ve knowed him a long time.” The black muscles relaxed then. She sat down on the side of the bed and looked at the bloody hole in Sam’s belly.

“God, Samuel!” she moaned. She covered her face with her hands, as if about to cry, but she didn’t. She sat like that, still and quiet, until Major Jones and the doctor returned. It was so quiet I heard the high, clear voices of nigger children playing somewhere and the murmur of the crowd outside the yard.

Major Jones wanted to question Sam immediately, but the doctor wouldn’t let him. The major and I paced the room while Dr. Cochran and the negress cleansed the wounds and tied clean bandages on them. The doctor gave Sam a draught of something, and the negress removed his boots and fluffed his pillows and

“That’s right. I don’t remember.”

“Jackson rode with you a long time.”

“He’s a good friend of mine,” Sam said.

“But he didn’t commit any robberies?”

“It’s against my profession to blow on my pals, Major. If a man knows something, he ought to die with it in him.”

The major gave me a look of exasperation and licked his pencil. “How did you start on such a life, Sam?” he asked. “Sheriff Egan says you were a good man when you worked for him.”

“I started sporting on horses. It just went on from there. Let’s stop now, Major. I ain’t feeling too good.”

Major Jones stood up and closed the notebook. “Would you like me to get a preacher for you?”

“No. I’m going to hell. I got lots of friends there.”

Major Jones shrugged. “Come on, Dad. Let’s get some rest, too. We’ll come back in the morning.”

The crowd outside the yard had gone, but the major instructed two of the Rangers who were standing on the porch to sleep there. I turned for another look at Sam, perhaps the last I would see of him alive. I was shocked. The negress was bending over him and seemed to be kissing him.

The hotel was full of newspaper correspondents and other lovers of misery who had been arriving on every train since the fight at Koppel’s store was telegraphed through the state. They circled in the lobby, very like buzzards, but noisier, shouting questions and passing rumors. They swarmed at us when we entered, but two of Major Jones’s men pushed them aside, uttering threats. The Rangers stopped at the foot of the stairs and blocked them while the major and I climbed to his room. One of the Pinkertons from Dallas was there, sipping a glass of the major’s whiskey. I had met him before, but I didn’t remember his name. He didn’t offer it, since Major Jones apparently knew him, too. “Make yourself at home,” the major said sarcastically, pouring himself a drink. He waved the bottle toward me, not expecting me to accept, and I didn’t.

The Pinkerton gave us a supercilious smile. “What did you get?” he asked.

The major pitched him the notebook. He read through it quickly and said, “Not much.”

Major Jones breathed a weary sigh. “No, not much.”

“Maybe I’d better question him,” the Pinkerton said.

“It wouldn’t do any good,” I said. “He’ll probably be dead by morning, anyway.”

The Pinkerton reached for his hat. “Then I’ll go now.”

“No!” Major Jones’s voice filled the room. The Pinkerton gave him a look of pure hatred, but removed his hand from the hat. “Let the poor devil go in peace,” the major said.

The Pinkerton smirked again. “The man’s a criminal, Major. It’s my duty to recover at least some of that money.”

“He hasn’t got a dime,” the major said.

“What happened to it?”

Major Jones waved his arm in a half-circle. “Scattered all over Texas, sir. If he had any left, he gave it to Jackson.”

“Where’s Jackson?”

“Read the notebook, damn it.”

“Well, I’m going to ask.” His hand moved toward the hat again.

“My men won’t let you in,” the major said. “They’ll kill you if they have to.”

The Pinkerton glared at me. “Sheriff, do you support Major Jones in this?”

“Absolutely,” I said.

He grabbed his hat then, and jumped up. “Rebels!” he shouted. “Every stinking one of you!” He left and slammed the door.

Major Jones gave me a tired smile and raised his glass. “I wish you were a drinking man, Dad,” he said.

Major Jones and Dr. Cochran and I rode out to the shanty in the doctor’s hack. The morning was already blistering hot, but country folks were arriving in their wagons and buggies, wearing their Sunday best. They gathered in knots in the hotel lobby and on the sidewalks, exchanging news and gossip, pointing at Koppel’s store and up the road toward the niggertown. “I guess he hasn’t died,” the doctor said. “Nobody came for me.”

The crowd outside the fence was larger now, with more white faces. The two Rangers who had slept on the porch were lounging there, smoking, gazing without interest at the people beyond the fence. They stood up when they saw us. “I’ll relieve you in a little while,” Major Jones told them.

Sam was sitting up in bed. The negress was bending over him, feeding him broth. “What day is it, Dad?” he asked. His voice was as weak as before, but his face had a little color.

“Sunday,” I said.

“Of the month, I mean.”

“The twenty-first of July.”

“Important day, Dad. Remember?”

“No.”

“Mrs. Egan used to fix me all the pancakes I could eat.”

“Your birthday!” I said, and he smiled. “How many?”

“Twenty-seven. Twenty-seven years old today.”

I nearly wished him happy returns, but caught myself. He looked younger and smaller, so pale on that nigger bed, than he had so long ago when he rode into the Denton square, determined to be a cowboy. The doctor grasped his wrist and felt his pulse, counting it on his watch. Then he dropped the wrist and shook his head.

“How am I doing, Doc?” Sam asked.

“You’re dying, son. Why don’t you tell Major Jones all you can while you’ve got the chance?”

“I ain’t dying,” Sam said calmly. “Old Dad’ll have a chance to hang me yet, if he can hold onto me.”

The negress took the bowl away and went to work with her laundry. The irons clattered on the stove. She burned herself and muttered something and sucked her finger. Dr. Cochran checked the bandages but didn’t change them. He gave Sam some liquid in a cup, and Sam made a face as he swallowed it. Dr. Cochran closed his bag and left. Major Jones sat down in the only rocking chair and started rocking. The rockers creaked on the loose floorboards. I sat down in one of the chairs at the little table. “Sam,” the major said.

“I got nothing to say.” Sam closed his eyes and went to sleep, I thought. No children were playing outside. The crowd had gone. Over the creak of the rocker I heard the irons moving on the cloth, making a kind of whispering noise, then there would be a clatter when the negress laid down a cold iron and picked up a hot one. She came to me once and asked, “Does you want something to eat?” I shook my head, and she went back to the ironing board, her bare feet scratching softly on the bare floor. We sat there a long time, I think, for I heard the church bells once and wondered whether they signaled the beginning of the service or the end. I took out my watch and saw that it was noon and wondered why I hadn’t heard them earlier. Maybe the bells ring only at the end in Round Rock. Then Sam awoke with a kind of weeping noise. “Oh, God, I’m hurting!” he said.

Major Jones rose and went quickly to the bed. “Sam, you’ve done much wrong in this world,” he said. “You now have an opportunity to do some good before you die by giving some information which will lead to the vindication of that justice which you’ve so often defied and the law which you’ve constantly violated.”

The speech surprised me. I wondered if he had composed it as he rocked, or had he spoken it many times to dying outlaws?

“No. I won’t tell.”

“Why won’t you?”

“I done told you. It’s against my profession to blow on my pals. Get the doc. I’m hurting bad.”

The major stood up and slapped his legs in disgust. He picked up his hat and stomped out the door, and I took his place on the bed. “Are you dying, Sam?” I asked.

“Yes, Dad. Let me go.”

He closed his eyes, but I still heard his breathing. Then he opened his eyes and said, “Water.”

I waved at the negress., She was standing motionless beside the ironing board, staring at us. She stooped and dipped a cup into the water bucket, and Sam said, “The world is bobbing around.”

The negress brought the water, splashing a little on the floor in her haste. She sat down on the bed beside me and lifted his head and moved the cup to his lips. Sam drank, then closed his eyes. In a moment they opened again, wide, and he stared at the negress as if recognizing her for the first time. “There’s a horse for you in the corral,” he said.

And she said, “Thank you.”