The Pistoleer: A Novel of John Wesley Hardin

Mack said Old John’s eyes flamed up and for a moment it looked like he might pull—but he didn’t. “If Old John was ever going to pull on Wes Hardin in a stand-up gunfight, that was the time he’d of done it,” Mack said. “The man had just called him a murderer, for Christ’s sake. But Old John didn’t get old by. taking chances in a stand-up fight, if you know what I mean—and if you ever tell him I said that, I’ll call you a bald-ass liar.”

Anyhow, that’s what I saw of John Wesley Hardin with my own eyes in El Paso and what I heard about him with my own ears. Jeff Milton took him before Judge Howe and the judge made him repay the money to Buck, then fined him twenty-five dollars.

They say Hardin and Jeff got to be friends after that and often took a drink or two in the saloons together— and George Scarborough with them. Some say the three of them got to be thick as thieves and even conspired in the killing of Martin McRose. I wouldn’t know. By then I was on my way to California. But I do know that Hardin and Old John weren’t friends for even a minute. Between them, it was bad blood from the start.

There’s nothing worse can happen to a man than to fall in love with a hot-ass bitch. That’s what happened to Marty. Hell, she used to give me some looks, and I ain’t nothing to look at. If it had a dick, she was interested.

Me and Vic and Tom were at the cantina table in Juarez with them when Scarborough told Marty that Hardin was keeping company with his wife. He said it real casual, while he was rolling himself a smoke. He said everybody in El Paso knew it too and was having a good laugh about it. Marty’s grin looked like wood. He said what the hell did he care, she wasn’t his wife no more. He said he’d divorced the no-good tramp in Ojinaga a coupla months ago, so she could fuck all El Paso for all he cared. Bullshit. He was lying to try and save face. Whenever Marty was really steamed, a big vein on his forehead would swell up, and just then it looked about to pop.

“Well,” Scarborough says, “you mighta divorced her and all, like you say, but I bet those fellas laughing at you in the saloons across the river don’t know it. I bet Hardin don’t know it.”

He was smart, Scarborough, egging Marty like that. A couple of days earlier, when he figured Marty was holding out on him, he said he’d arrest him next time he crossed the river. Old Selman had throwed a fit about being cheated and said he’d shoot Marty if he set foot back in Texas. But now Scarborough wanted to deal. “Cut me half the take from the cows,” he said, “and I’ll set Hardin up for you.” He’d trick him into showing up at the railroad bridge in the middle of the night and Marty could be laying for him and let him have it.

“What about your bigmouthed pal Selman?” Marty says. “He want the other half of the take?” Scarborough says, “Fuck Selman. Old bastard don’t know how to get along. This is between you and me.” Marty wanted to know how he would get Hardin to go to the bridge in the middle of the goddamn night, and Scarborough says, “Hell, me and him are big buddies now, ain’t you heard? I’ll tell him a dealer I know is selling some guns to some Mexes at the bridge tonight and wants to hire protection for himself in case the greasers try a cross. Hardin’ll go for it. He’s trying to prove he’s still the man he was before he went to the pen. Been pushing his luck lately.”

“I’ll push his fucking luck,” Marty says. All right, he says, it’s a deal—only he ain’t giving Scarborough a nickel until after Hardin’s taken care of. “Sure,” Scarborough says with a big phony smile, “I trust you. Just don’t forget to bring the money.” Marty gives him a go-to-hell smile back and says, “Don’t worry about that, George. I always keep my money on me—all of it. It’s the safest place.” Scarborough says, “All right, then—the rail bridge at midnight,” and heads back to El Paso to set the thing up.

That night, Marty posted me at our end of the bridge with my Remington repeater to cover their retreat if they had to make a run for it back to our side. Then him and Vic and Tom went out to the middle of the bridge to meet Scarborough. There was a mist on the river, but the other side was lit up by a streetlight good enough for me to see everything. At the far end of the bridge, a pair of ice wagons stood on one side of the tracks. George Scarborough came out from behind one of them.

They met out on the bridge and talked for a minute. Scarborough pointed to the wagons like he was saying that was where Marty could lay for Hardin. Marty nodded and they all headed that way.

As soon as they got to the end of the bridge, Scarborough pulled his gun and shot Marty twice in the head and jumped off to the side just as rifles opened fire from one of the ice wagons and a shotgun blasted from the other. Vic and Tom went down before they could clear their holsters. I ducked behind one of the bridge posts and watched from the shadow. Hell no, I didn’t shoot. It wouldn’t of helped Marty and Vic and Tom one bit, but it likely woulda brought the shooters running over to kill me too.

All that shooting didn’t take five seconds. Then Scarborough scoots out and takes out Marty’s gun, fires it in the air and drops it on the ground, then quick cleans out Marty’s pockets. The police captain, Milton, and a man the next day’s newspapers said was a Texas Ranger came out from behind one of the wagons, both of them with carbines—and from behind the other wagon comes Wes Hardin with a shotgun. I’d always figured Milton was in on the deal for those cows we rustled in Little Texas. The Ranger too, I guess. Lawmen—Christ! A dog’s hind leg ain’t as crooked as a lawman.

Hardin gave the scattergun to Milton and hurried off down the street, but Scarborough, Milton, and the Ranger stayed and smoked cigars while a crowd of excited sports came out of the nearby saloons and gathered to gawk at the bodies.

The newspapers said they were shot for resisting arrest on warrants of cattle rustling, but the talk in the saloons was that Hardin had paid Scarborough and Milton to kill Marty so he could have Beulah McRose for himself. Well, he wanted the bitch, all right, and he got her—but he did his own shooting, like I said. The others were just paying Marty back for crossing them. While they were at it, they crossed Old Man Selman too, for some damn reason. Hardin musta been behind it, though—because just look how Selman got even with him.

Early that summer, my husband made a deal with some people in El Paso to move a herd of cattle down from New Mexico. Two of those people, he said, were George Scarborough and John Selman. He didn’t mention Jeff Milton—maybe because Jeff wasn’t in it, maybe because Martin didn’t know he was. Anyhow, they told Martin they had a buyer out at Van Horn all ready to take the cows off their hands at a real nice profit. They were stealing the herd, of course—that’s why they contracted Martin to move it for them. He had a reputation for expertise in that regard. I once heard him describe his profession as the low-overhead approach to the beef business.

I married Martin because I was young and bored and didn’t know much except that I wanted some excitement in my life. My brothers taught me to ride and shoot when I was still in pigtails, and I always envied them their freedom to roam and take their pleasure where they found it. I won’t be stupidly coy and deny that I’d known men before Martin, but they were mostly dullards of the sort to be found by the bushels in small towns—clerks and druggists and drummers. Men with stiff collars and soft hands and eyes as oily as their hair. Now and then I’d fool with a farmboy. Their muscles were hard, but I wanted no part of their sweat-and-dirt futures. I’d never known a truly exciting man until I met Martin. He took me away to the bright lights and loud music and fast smoky pleasures of Galveston and San Antone. He taught me the mean comforts of whiskey, and many of men’s secret sexual delights. Before long, however, I found out he was not the man I thought he was. I began to suspect that he was afraid of losing me, and one dark night, when he whispered that I was the only one he’d ever trusted, I knew I was right. I realized how much stronger than him I was, and I couldn’t help but hate him a little for disappointing me so bad.

Scarborough gave Martin half his fee before he left for New Mexico and promised to pay the rest on delivery of the herd to a small ranch just east of El Paso. Martin took Vic Queen, Hector O’Keefe, and Tom Finnessy with him and went up to Little Texas to get the cows. Two weeks later he got back to our rented house in town and woke me in the middle of the night, still smelling of dust and horse sweat. He said they’d run into some hard luck on the way back with the herd. They were attacked by rustlers just a few miles north of the Texas border and had the cows stolen from them. “We were lucky to get out of it alive,” he said, and I heard the lie in his voice. That’s the trouble with a liar: he even lies to the people he doesn’t have to. He undressed in the dark, saying he was worried because he didn’t think Scarborough and the others would believe the herd had been rustled. “Guys like them,” he