Clem couldn’t wait to get out of Missouri. He intended to go West and strike gold. He knew there was gold out here, he had read about it. All you had to do was find a stream then start sifting through that stream with a pie pan, and you could find as much gold as you wanted.
Or so he had thought.
The reality was much different. The reality was that he didn’t find any gold, and in order to eat, he had turned to stealing. After that it was an easy step to fall in with murderers and thieves, and now he was about to pay the price.
When Moreton Frewen told Matt that he was a judge, he wasn’t exactly lying, but he was stretching the truth. He was a member of the Magistrate’s Court in the Judiciary of England and Wales. In this appointed but unpaid position, his authority was limited, even in England. He had no authority whatever in America, except for an honorary recognition of his status, but he believed in the principle of
Because The Lion and The Crown Saloon was the largest building in Sussex, arrangements were made to hold the trial there. Nearly everyone who had attended Burt Rawlings’s funeral that morning were now present at the saloon turned courtroom. The tables had all been moved to one side, except for three: one to be used by Frewen as the judge’s bench, the second to be used by the defense counsel and the defendant, and the third to be used by the prosecutor. The chairs were then put out in rows, theater-style, but there were far too many people for the chairs, so the rest of the attendees were lined up along the bar and the walls. Two of the bargirls who worked The Lion and The Crown, Lucy and Rose, were sitting up on top of the upright piano. Their crossed bare legs were the object of attention of many of the cowboys who had come into town for the trial.
There were only two lawyers in town, so Frewen appointed one to act as the prosecutor, and the other to act as defense counsel. Orin Dempster, the court-appointed lawyer for the defense, registered a protest before the trial even got underway.
“Mr. Frewen, I submit, sir, that you do not have the authority to preside over this trial,” Orin Dempster said. “This is clearly a case of
“I am a duly appointed Magistrate,” Frewen said.
“In England, sir, not in America, and certainly not in Wyoming. We could quite easily send to Buffalo for a judge,” Dempster insisted.
“No need to waste the judge’s time,” Frewen said. “I am quite capable of presiding over the trial.”
Clem was sitting at the table with Dempster and with Marshal Drew.
“You got no right to try me,” Clem called out.
Frewen looked over at Clem. “You are not to speak until you are asked to speak.”
“But this here feller is right,” Clem said. “You can’t try me.”
“If you speak again, I will have you gagged,” Frewen said.
Clem opened his mouth as if to speak again, but closed it before he uttered a sound.
“Your Honor, I want my protest to go on record,” Dempster said.
“Duly noted,” Frewen said. “Marshal Drew, would you bring the prisoner before me, please?”
Marshal Drew prodded Clem before the table that Frewen was using as his bench.
“Would the prisoner state his name, please?” Frewen said.
“Clem.”
“And what is your surname?”
“My what?”
“Your last name. I shall require your last name.”
Clem smiled. “You do, huh? Well, you ain’t goin’ to get it. I reckon that means you can’t try me, don’t it?”
“It will not prevent the trial from taking place,” Frewen said.
Clem turned toward Dempster. “Can he do that? Can he still have the trial even if he don’t know my last name?”
“Your Honor, I am filing a second protest,” Dempster said.
“Your protest is noted,” Frewen said.
“What’s that mean?” Clem asked Dempster. “These protests you are filing.”
“That means that whatever the verdict is as a result of this trial, there is a possibility that it might be overturned,” Dempster said.
Clem grinned broadly. “Is that a fact?”
“It could take as long as a month,” Dempster said.
“That’s all right, I’ve got a month.”
“Wrong, sir. You have all eternity,” Frewen said.
“What? What do you mean? What do you mean I have all eternity?”
