Slaughter rode out of Tombstone alone one day, bound east. A few days later, he rode back. He had been over in Sulphur Springs Valley on a little business. That was all anyone ever learned from Slaughter. But Juan Soto suddenly and mysteriously disappeared. He never was heard of again in Sulphur Springs Valley nor in Arizona, nor, as far as anyone knows, anywhere else. A rumour of unidentified origin spread abroad that Juan Soto was dead.
Then there was Van Wyck Coster at Willcox. Slaughter gathered much evidence against Coster, who was a business man of comfortable means and good reputation among unsuspecting citizens. Slaughter’s evidence was enough, it was said, to send any ordinary person to the penitentiary. But Slaughter had had enough of courts and juries. His experience in the Soto case had taught him a lesson. He would take no more chances on a corrupt or misguided verdict. Then, why put the country to the unnecessary expense of a trial? Having tried and convicted Van Wyck Coster in his own mind, Slaughter rode over to Willcox to pass sentence.
“But, what the hell?” said Coster. “You can’t run me out of this country. I’ve done nothing.”
“I’ll run you out or kill you,” replied Slaughter. “I’ve got the goods on you and have had ’em for a long time.”
Coster wriggled and squirmed. When Slaughter went into precise details concerning a number of crimes, Coster ceased to argue. It was exile or death—he had his choice. He wound up his business and departed.
If an ordinary sheriff had tried to enforce such summary measures, the criminal probably would have laughed at him. But nobody laughed at Slaughter. The man he sentenced to exile or death knew Slaughter meant exactly what he said. The beauty of Slaughter’s one-man-jury verdicts was that they were always carried out one way or the other. Which way, didn’t make much difference to Slaughter. If the criminal preferred exile, all right. If he preferred to die, that was his business.
Agua Zarca was a huddle of mud huts on the Northern Mexico & Arizona Railroad. Dark and silent on the night of , lay the tiny village twelve miles south of Nogales on the border. Far off across the Sonoran plains appeared a point of light. That was the express. A long-drawn, eerie, dreary whistle, that seemed the voice of the desert’s loneliness, came faintly out of the distance. As the train roared to a stop at the Agua Zarca station, two highwaymen with drawn six-shooters climbed into the locomotive cab. The engineer kept to his seat at the throttle. The fireman seized the gun of the robber leader. This was a brave fireman. So a second bandit shot him dead. Four other robbers on the ground were firing guns. The conductor came running from a rear coach with a lantern in his hand. What was the matter? A bullet cut through his heart. He lay there in the dark for an hour or more, his lantern on the ground beside him shining on his dead face. The express messenger was closing the sliding side door of his car when he was killed. Every phase of heroism received the accolade of a bullet this wild night. Now at their leisure, the bandits rifled safe and mail sacks. Then they rode off. The hoofs of their horses in the darkness made fine, dashing music to which fifteen thousand dollars marched away.
But Jack Taylor, leader of the band, had lost his hat during the excitement. This bold fellow must have a hat. He stepped into a store in Nogales. He clapped a new hat on his head. Price? The clerk said only three dollars, and Mexican money at that. The Court fixed the cost at the rest of his life in the penitentiary. Another robber, a German, was arrested with him. His imprisonment for life also sent the price of that hat a little higher.
The other four robbers were Geronimo Miranda, Manuel Robles, Neives Deron, and one Federico, all Mexicans. They fled across the border to Tombstone. This was a dangerous refuge just then. The town’s name had taken on a sinister significance for robbers under Sheriff Slaughter’s regime. For three nights the sheriff and his men watched a Mexican woman’s house. But the bandits got wind of the trap. They were next heard of at Willcox and Clifton. Then their trail was lost.
Guadalupe Robles, a brother of Manuel Robles, lived in Contention and was a dealer in firewood. He had a wood ranch in Frenchy’s Canyon near Mescal Springs in the Whetstone Mountains. He would drive from Contention to the Whetstones one day, sleep at his camp that night, and return to town with a load of wood next day. Being a good, loyal brother, Guadalupe was kept under a surveillance which he did not suspect. One morning, when he drove off for his camp, he had a gunny sack filled with food in his wagon. Of course, Guadalupe must eat on his trips. He must have dinner, supper, and breakfast before he got back. But it struck the spies who were watching poor Guadalupe that a whole gunny sackful of food was a little too much even for the appetite of a healthy wood-hauler. So Sheriff Slaughter was informed at once of the bountiful supply of refreshments Guadalupe was taking to Frenchy’s Canyon. Whereupon Sheriff Slaughter and Deputy Sheriffs Burt Alvord and Cesario Lucero mounted in hot haste and rode for the Whetstones.
Night fell moonless and dark. The Whetstones went up blackly into dim obscurity. Slaughter knew the location of Guadalupe’s wood camp, but he and his men did not ride up Frenchy’s Canyon. They hid their horses in thick brush, and, on foot, struck along the top of a heavily timbered ridge that parallels the canyon. They blundered through thickets, stumbled over rocks,
