Dead Man's Return Read online

  Dead Man’s Return

  How far along the trail of violence and killing can a good man walk before he becomes as bad as those that he is hunting?

  A terrible fear paralyses the town of Leyton, Texas. On the morning that Sheriff Jack Anderson is to hang a sixteen-year-old boy for a horse theft the boy never committed, Jim Jackson arrives in Leyton searching for the man who betrayed him and sent him to hell for ten years. Is Jack Anderson that man? And how can Jim Jackson exact revenge in a town full of cold-blooded and desperate killers?

  In the final part of Jim Jackson’s story the trail of intrigue and corruption – as well as the body count – rises into the upper echelons of the Texas political system, leading to a violent and dramatic finale that will have repercussions at the highest levels.

  By the same author

  Vengeance at Tyburn Ridge

  Yellow Town

  The Bone Picker

  Last Stage From Hell’s Mouth

  Dead Man’s Eyes

  Dead Man Walking

  Dead Man’s Return

  Derek Rutherford

  ROBERT HALE

  © Derek Rutherford 2018

  First published in Great Britain 2018

  ISBN 978-0-7198-2818-8

  The Crowood Press

  The Stable Block

  Crowood Lane

  Ramsbury

  Marlborough

  Wiltshire SN8 2HR

  www.bhwesterns.com

  Robert Hale is an imprint of The Crowood Press

  The right of Derek Rutherford to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him

  in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

  All rights reserved. This e-book is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorised distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights, and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.

  Chapter One

  Charles Beecher and Washington Smith built their saw mill four miles west of the Georgetown boundary line. They funded a spur from the main railroad line into the saw mill yard. The spur split into several sidings. There was a switch system that allowed locomotives that brought in virgin lumber to be moved to the far end of the train ready to haul out the flatbeds loaded with cut wood. A long platform was constructed alongside the track. Small cranes lifted the timbers from the wagons and swung them over into a holding pond, from where they were floated down to the saw mill. Three huge stationary engines were installed at the mill. The engines pulled the heavy logs from the water, dragged them up to one of six cutting rows, and also drove the huge circular saw blades. Beyond the stationary engines was a small section of railroad track on which horse-pulled wagons brought coal up to the engines. A smaller steam engine ran a water pump, sucking water in from the river over three miles away through a series of clay pipes. It felt like there was always a locomotive somewhere in the yard, belching smoke and hissing, clanking and grinding, either having just brought in coal or timber, or readying to take out the cut wood. The stationary engines ran from dawn until dusk, sometimes well into the night, pumping smoke and steam into the air. Saw blades screeched and sparked as they cut through hard wood. Horses neighed and cried, and over a hundred men yelled and laughed and argued. The sound of shovels and picks, cranes and hammers rang out on the warm still air. The cook’s ovens and fire-pits burned ceaselessly. The yard’s own blacksmith had a forge roaring day and night. There were bunk-houses, and offices, stables and workshops, latrines and wash-houses. There was an on-site tavern with its own rather large whiskey still alongside over two dozen fermenting barrels of beer out back, and a piano in front. Beecher and Smith had their own telegraph office with the cables running alongside the railway tracks.

  Four miles had felt plenty far enough all those years ago when Beecher and Smith had started the mill. It wasn’t that they cared for the sensibilities of the townsfolk. It was simply that such distance meant they were less likely to face issues and complaints. The fact that Georgetown was now expanding towards the mill wasn’t their issue. The mill had been there first, the two men would argue. You want to build a house nearby, that’s your choice. But don’t do so and then moan about the noise.

  These days they had a bigger issue.

  It was two months since Jim Jackson had sprung Leon Winters from a prison leasing camp a hundred miles north.

  Beecher was in Smith’s plush office overlooking the mill site.

  ‘What’s this fellow’s name?’ Beecher said.

  ‘Abraham,’ Smith said.

  ‘Abraham what?’

  ‘No idea. He’s simply known as Abraham. Actually he’s known as the Tall Man.’

  ‘The Tall Man?’

  ‘I guess he’s tall.’

  ‘And he’s good?’

  ‘The best. So I’m told.’

  Beecher pulled a watch from his vest pocket. It was a quarter of ten.

  ‘What time will he be here?’

  ‘Ten o’clock.’

  ‘I’m still not convinced this is advisable.’ Beecher was tall, himself. Thin, too. And his hair was greying.

  Smith sighed. ‘Look at all of this.’ He swept an arm out in front of him, taking in not just the room, but the entire mill site beyond the panelled wooden walls. ‘Think of your house in Austin. Your mansion. Mary. The kids. Everything. You want to risk it?’

  ‘But there’s no guarantee that Jackson and Winters are going after him.’

  ‘Wouldn’t you? Think about it, man.’

  Beecher didn’t need to think about it. He’d done nothing but think about it ever since he’d heard about the Leon Winters prison break. A man named Jack Anderson, who turned out to be vicious and cruel, and maybe even crazy, was up in a town called Leyton running the place like it was his own little empire. It was Jack Anderson who had framed Leon Winters and Jim Jackson and had put them behind bars for ten years. Beecher had no idea whether or not Winters and Jackson knew of Jack Anderson. Indeed how would they know? Anderson wasn’t even the man’s real name. But if they did know of him, it made sense that they would go after him. And if they did. . . and if he talked . . . then the trail might lead right back here. It was why Smith was so keen to get rid of Jack Anderson. Many times over the years Smith had proposed the idea to Beecher. Getting shot of a loose end, was how Smith always described it. Beecher had always reined him in. There’s no point, he’d argue. Let sleeping dogs lie. But now things were different.

  ‘I thought they’d have caught Winters and Jackson by now,’ Smith said. ‘But they haven’t. It’s been two months.’

  ‘I believe there are Texas Rangers in Leyton,’ Beecher said. ‘To get to Anderson Winters and Jackson have to go to Leyton, and if they go there the Rangers will catch get them.’

  ‘The Rangers have gone. If they ever were there. They supposedly waited six weeks. Nothing. So they’ve pulled out. I’m not sure we weren’t told a pack of lies about them,’

  ‘Anyway, how would Winters and Jackson even know where to find Anderson?’

  ‘I’ve no idea. But is that a risk you’re happy to take?’

  Smith again held out his hands, illustrating what they could lose.

  ‘It’s tenuous,’ Beecher said. The thing was they weren’t even sure that Anderson knew who they were. Nevertheless, he and Smith had had the debate many times over the years. He knew this time he wouldn’t win. The jailbreak had changed things. Anderson might be able to
link him and Smith to a killing that had, indirectly, helped the two of them to all of this, the mill, the mansions, the money, the lifestyle they enjoyed. If Winters and Jackson got to Anderson, and extracted the truth, then what next?

  There was a knock on the office door.

  ‘Come in,’ Smith said.

  The door opened and Evelyn, the secretary, peered round. She was a pretty red-head and Beecher wasn’t sure but had always wondered if Washington Smith wasn’t employing her for more than just her business skills.

  ‘There’s a man to see you both,’ she said, smiling. ‘Abraham. Didn’t give a second name.’

  ‘Send him in,’ Smith said.

  Abraham was quite possibly the tallest man that Beecher had ever seen. He was holding a black hat and was wearing a long dark coat. He had a beard that reached halfway down his chest and he wore two guns.

  He waited until Evelyn had closed the door then he said, ‘Gentlemen. I believe you want somebody killed.’

  Chapter Two

  Leon Winters coughed quietly into his hand so as not to wake the lovers. They were huddled together beneath a blanket on the far side of the low fire. It was bittersweet, the way they were. He was happy for them – so very happy – and he was equally happy to be free. He owed that freedom to Jim Jackson and knew it was a debt he could never repay. Yet their loving brought back hard and painful memories that he had long buried. His wife Charlotte and their son Harvey had succumbed to tuberculosis that many years ago he couldn’t count. It was one of the reasons he’d ended up robbing trains and, ultimately, doing prison time. Hell, it was the only reason. If Charlotte and Harvey had lived then everything would have been different. Looking at Jim and Rosalie, not just now, but over the last two months, seeing them grow closer, become lovers, watching them find that magic that is offered but once in a lifetime, made him sad for his own loss, whilst being as happy as a man could be for his friends.

  He coughed quietly again. His lungs hurt and he felt something splatter against his hands. He shuffled closer to the fire and held out his palms to the flickering light.

  Blood.

  It was how it had started with Charlotte, and again with Harvey. A little breathlessness, a cough, some pain, and then blood.

  So they did kill me, he thought. All those years, those desperately terrible years. They’d mistreated him, starved him, beat him, froze him, tied him up in the blazing sun, and tried to goad him into running just so they could shoot him down. All those years in which he had fought every day to survive simply to deny them the pleasure of his death. All that and when he was finally free – thanks to Jim – it turned out that he was dying anyway.

  So be it. Dying, too, was bittersweet. He would see Charlotte and Harvey on the other side. But in the meantime he and Jim and Rosalie had something they had to do. And he would be there and make sure it happened, make sure they were safe.

  They had a future.

  Below them, if he walked to the edge of the trees and looked out across the plain, the faint lights of Leyton could be seen. Oil lamps in saloon windows, a fire – maybe rubbish – burning on the edge of town. Tomorrow they would ride down there. The man they were searching for – Jack Anderson – reputedly ran the town. The question was, would Jack Anderson turn out to be John Allan, the only other member of their old gang who was still alive? The only one who didn’t appear to have done prison time.

  They’d talked through the events of that day – their last train robbery – numerous times in the last few months as they recuperated from the wounds sustained in the prison break, trying to make sense of the killing, seeing if there was anything they had missed, running it by Rosalie on the off-chance a fresh pair of eyes might spot something new.

  But it always came out the same.

  It always pointed to John Allan.

  Leon himself had been on the driver plate that day, holding a gun on the engineer and fireman. He’d seen nothing of what had happened. All he knew was hearsay, but he’d heard it so many times and from so many people that it felt like he’d been right there in the carriage where the man was shot.

  They’d all been dressed similarly and all had been wearing black masks – it was part of their leader Hans Freidlich’s plan to create a legend, the Black Mask gang, but it was also designed to create confusion and fear without actually having to hurt anyone. It was a short train, as many were in those days – just one passenger carriage and a couple of livestock and freight wagons. Jim Jackson was doing his normal thing of charming the ladies as he wandered along the carriage with a sack. He’d let them keep their wedding and engagement rings. Even though he was robbing them they seemed to love the twinkle in his eyes, and he became known as the Gentleman Train Robber.

  Jim told of how he was holding open the sack for a pretty lady to drop in her purse when the man in the seat behind her started to rise, his hand already reaching for his gun.

  The man was young, in his late twenties or early thirties, and smartly dressed. But there was steel rather than fear in his eyes. All of their shouting, and several gun shots fired through the roof of the train, had done nothing to scare him.

  Jim said he felt his racing heart quicken further. He’d never killed a man. But he was quick. He knew he was quick enough to draw and kill this man. All he had to do was make the decision to do so.

  ‘I’m a Texas Ranger,’ the man said, as he rose. ‘You need to drop that bag and raise your hands.’

  Jim was about to draw when he saw one of his black-masked colleagues coming up behind the Ranger. The man in the mask had a sack in his hand, one of the sacks they were using to collect money and jewellery and purses, and as the Texas Ranger rose this man dropped the sack over his head.

  Jim relaxed, his gun undrawn by his side.

  The man squirmed and struggled and yelled.

  Then another of the black-masked men stepped forward, his own gun in his hand, and he placed the barrel of the gun against the struggling man’s covered head, and he pulled the trigger.

  Jim had told Leon how the images and sounds and smells appeared frozen in time and yet chaotically overlapped each other. The roar of the gun, the smoke, the smell of cordite and blood, the echoes of the gunshot. People screaming. The way the front of the burlap sack exploded in a red mist that coated Jim and several passengers. The Texas Ranger bounced off the back of the seat and ended up in the lap of the woman sitting next to him. The screaming grew louder. Someone shot into the roof of the train and yelled for everyone to stay still and for the men to get the hell out of there. They rushed for the door at the end of the carriage. Jim dropped the sack of money he’d already gathered. Hands reached out for him, albeit half-heartedly. There was so much confusion that these moments were blurred even as they were happening, and afterwards, after they’d made it to their horses and had ridden breathlessly away, it was no better.

  Hans demanded to know who had shot the man.

  Jim was covered in the man’s blood, so all knew it wasn’t him. Leon had been on the driver’s plate. But it could have been any of the others. They argued. They examined each other’s guns – but bullets had been fired into the roof of the train before and after the killing. Others had shot back towards the train as they escaped to discourage chasers. Someone said that just because Hans was the one doing the questioning didn’t mean it wasn’t him. Patrick Reagan said he’d been the one that had put the sack over the Ranger’s head. John Allan said he thought the same man that had put the sack over the man had also shot him. William Moore said he’d been next to the killer and it was a different man to the sack man.

  So it had gone on.

  It had been the beginning of the end. Until then no one had ever been hurt, let alone killed, in any of the Freidlich robberies. That one killing destroyed it all.

  They came for Leon Winters within a day. The others, too. Jim Jackson told how he had been packed and ready to return to his home in the east when he had opened the door and found a Texas Ranger named Sam McRae s
tanding there pointing a gun at him.

  The beginning of the end. The start of hell.

  They had hanged Freidlich. Reagan and Moore had died in jail, and Leon and Jim had both suffered years of torment in the Texas Prisoner Leasing system.

  The only man they couldn’t account for was John Allan. ‘JA’ as Jim now called him, the initials working for John Allan or Jack Anderson. It was Sam McRae, the Texas Ranger that had arrested Jim Jackson, who had later told Jim about Jack Anderson. McRae had sought out Jim Jackson to apologise for putting him away for a murder he, by then, knew Jim hadn’t committed. McRae was now dead. A death that Jim Jackson subsequently avenged. These days Jim wore McRae’s gun.

  It was a story they had talked through numerous times.

  Now Leon looked over at his sleeping friend.

  It had been hell of a journey. Maybe tomorrow, down there in Leyton, it would finally end.

  Chapter Three

  It was morning. There was a dampness to the ground, and leaves were shining with dew. But already the early autumn sun was high enough that the first tendrils of mist were rising as the moisture evaporated. They put more wood on the fire and suspended a small pot of coffee over the flames. The smell of roasting beans soon filled the air. They toasted bread cakes for themselves and fed the horses from the oats sacks they carried – although the grass was plentiful, too.

  ‘You think he’s down there?’ Rosalie asked, looking through the trees to where the town of Leyton lay out of sight on the plain below.

  ‘He’s down there,’ Jim Jackson said.

  ‘Jack Anderson or John Allan?’ Rosalie said.

  ‘They’re one and the same,’ Leon said.

  ‘We believe,’ Rosalie said. ‘But we don’t know for sure.’