More J.T.'s Ladies, page 1
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J T Edson has created more dynamic Western gals than any other writer. Into a world of rough, tough, gun-slinging heroes, his high-stepping ladies hold their own with the best of the cowboy breed, out-riding, out-shooting, out-wrestling the toughest men in the West.
The lady outlaw, Belle Starr; Woman Deputy Alice Fayde of Rockabye County; Rita Yarborough of Company Z, Texas Rangers; Annie Singing Bear, known as ‘Is-A-Man’ to the Comanche Indians; Dawn, Drummond-Clayton of Amabagasli, all demonstrate that J.T.’s ladies: beautiful and mostly virtuous, depend solely on themselves when danger threatens.
MORE J.T.’S LADIES
J. T. Edson
First published by Corgi Books in 1987
© 1987, 2022 by J. T. Edson
This electronic edition published December 2022
Names, characters and incidents in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons living or dead is purely coincidental.
You may not copy, store, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by means (electronic, digital, optical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
Editor: Mike Stotter
This is a Piccadilly Publishing Book
Text © Piccadilly Publishing
Visit www.piccadillypublishing.org to read more about our books
Published by Arrangement with the Author’s Agent.
For all the ladies who have acted as my ‘minder’ and nursemaid at various Western Writers of America Conventions and probably aroused much speculation amongst the other members present.
Publisher’s Note
As with other books in this series, the author uses characters’ native dialect to bring that person to life. Whether they speak French, Irish, American English or English itself, he uses vernacular language to impart this.
Therefore when Scottish characters use words such as “richt” instead of “right”; “laird” for “lord”; “oopstairs” for “upstairs”; “haim” for “home”; “ain” for “own”; “gude sores” for “good sirs” and “wha” for who” plus many other phrases, please bear in mind that these are not spelling/OCR mistakes.
Table of Contents
Publisher’s Note
Author’s Note
PART ONE – ANNIE ‘IS-A-MAN’ SINGING BEAR
In
TO SEPARATE INNOCENCE FROM GUILT
PART TWO – RITA YARBOROUGH, COMPANY ‘Z’
In
BEHIND A LOCKED AND BOLTED DOOR
PART THREE – DAWN DRUMMOND-CLAYTON
In
ACCIDENT—OR MURDER?
PART FOUR – WOMAN DEPUTY ALICE FAYDE
In
NO MAN ABOUT THE HOUSE
APPENDIX ONE
APPENDIX TWO
APPENDIX THREE
About the Author
Author’s Note
To save our ‘old hands’ from repetition, but for the benefit of all new readers, we have included in the form of APPENDICES details regarding the career and background of Woman Deputy Alice Fayde and Dawn Drummond-Clayton, also an explanation of various terms about which we have frequently received requests for clarification.
We realize that, in our present ‘permissive’ society, we could use the actual profanities employed by various people in the narrative. However, we do not concede a spurious desire to create ‘realism’ is any excuse whatsoever for doing so.
Lastly, we refuse to pander to the current ‘trendy’ use of the metric system. Except when referring to the caliber of those weapons traditionally measured in millimetres—i.e. Walther P-38, 9mm—we will continue to employ miles, yards, feet, inches, stones, pounds and ounces, when quoting distances and weights.
J. T. EDSON,
Active Member, Western Writers of America,
MELTON MOWBRAY,
Leicestershire,
England.
PART ONE
ANNIE ‘IS-A-MAN’ SINGING BEAR
In
TO SEPARATE INNOCENCE FROM GUILT
‘I’M SORRY, MISS Singing Bear,’ the bartender stated with genuine sounding contrition. ‘But I can’t serve you no liquor, not so much’s a beer, even though you’re only part Inj—you’re here with this reverend gent.’
Business was not particularly brisk at the Lone Star Saloon in Claxton, seat of Gareth County, Texas, that Friday evening. Half a dozen soldiers were drinking beer at a table near the main entrance, the newness of their dark blue uniforms and their sun reddened faces suggesting they were recruits only recently enlisted in the United States Cavalry. There were eight cowhands wearing what was just as clearly their ‘go to town’ clothes who were imbibing by the side door. Maybe twice as many more local citizens formed smaller groups scattered around the rest of the barroom. In addition to the girl accompanied by the somberly dressed man who had just arrived at the counter, six players in a stud poker game completed the roster of customers.
In view of the comparative lack of trade, the declaration by the bartender might have struck some people as strange for one who should have his employer’s profits at heart. However, although the female customer was only in her late ’teens and, as yet, no legal restrictions of that nature were enforced, it was not her age and, as suggested by the lack of rings on her hands, unmarried status which had provoked the comment. Those who possessed a greater knowledge of the West and the laws of the United States governing the prohibition of sales of liquor to Indians would have appreciated what was meant by the first part of the revised explanation.
Not more than five-foot-four in height, the attire and appearance of the girl gave indications that she was of mixed blood and, to those cognizant with such matters, probably of Comanche origins on one side. However her hair, instead of being black, cropped to shoulder length and parted down the middle as was usual for an Indian of her age and sex, was reddish brown and formed into two braids after the fashion of a warrior. While her pretty coppery bronze face was broad and the brown eyes were somewhat slanted, the nose was snub rather than aquiline, making the whole more Caucasian than Indian in its lines. When crossing to the bar, her movements had a light footed agility which implied she was very fit and the ‘hourglass’ contours of her curvaceously buxom figure were clearly comprised of firm flesh rather than produced by artificial aids such as corsets. Bareheaded, she wore an open necked, loose fitting, multi-colored cotton shirt hanging outside faded Levi’s and she wore moccasins on her feet. In further defiance of accepted Comanche female fashion, buckled around her trim waist over the shirt was a belt inscribed by the medicine symbols appropriate only to a fighting man of that race. It carried a walnut handled Colt 1860 Army revolver, with the barrel shortened by about half, in an open topped high cavalry-twist draw holster at the right and, at the left, a J. Russell & Company ‘Green River’ hunting knife hung in a sheath made from wapiti hide.
Despite the girl’s companion having ordered a beer, although he had been prevented from saying anything else by the warning from the bartender, there was some justification for him having been referred to as ‘the reverend gent’. Of medium height and in his late twenties, he had a black Texas-style Stetson hat tilted back on his head to show rusty-red hair. Despite a luxuriant moustache enhancing a solemn expression, his tanned face had a rugged attraction. His stocky, powerful frame was clothed in a somber black three-piece suit, white shirt and black necktie, such as a stringently practicing member of one of the more strict religious denominations might wear. While his black boots had sharp toes like those favored by cowhands, their heels were low and suitable for one who spent much of his time on foot. Riding slightly higher than was usual on a stiff wide belt, an open fronted spring retention holster of a kind more often seen on shoulder rigs held a Rogers & Spencer Army Model revolver with bell-shaped, square bottomed black walnut grips.
‘I’d serve you, was I allowed,’ the bartender supplemented. Being experienced in his work, albeit newly arrived at Claxton, he was aware there were often very stringent objections when he had to refuse to make a sale. ‘But it’s the law, you know!’
‘That it is,’ agreed the black clad man, his tone as solemn as his appearance and his deep voice that of a native Texan. ‘And, like the Good Book says, whether the law of the land be right or wrong in your opinion, verily it’s still the law of the land and has to be upheld.’
‘Being reared right ’n’ proper on momma’s milk, I’ve never took to beer nor nothing stronger,’ the girl went on, her accent also Southron in timbre. ‘A big ole glass of “sass-parilly” will do most well for me.’
‘Coming right up!’ the bartender declared, joviality replacing the concern he had experienced over having to refuse to serve the female customer with beer. He was relieved that she responded in such an amiable fashion. While he was reaching beneath the counter, having had a religious upbringing which had enabled him to supplement his wages by settling more than one bet on the subject, he tried to remember whether he had read the man’s quotation in the “Good Book”. Failing to remember it, he brought out a bottle of sarsaparilla and poured its contents into a glass. ‘I prefer this to liquor myself, Miss Singing Bear. Excuse me, it looks like them gents from the Wedge w
‘How’re you making out with that Pointin jasper, Annie?’ the somber looking man inquired, after the bartender had walked away, curling his fingers around the glass instead of holding it by its handle, and turning to lean against the counter with an air which suggested – his appearance notwithstanding – he was at ease in such an environment.
‘He’s been steering clear of me just recent’, I’m right pleased to say,’ Annie Singing Bear replied, eyeing the man in question – who was one of the poker players – with a less than flattering gaze. ‘We got on great until he started on about how Indians never slaughtered the buffalo, nor no other wild critters, promiscuous like the white folks do. Seemed he didn’t take kind’ to me telling him how I’d seen pappy and the other bucks of our village run more than one herd of buffalo over a cliff and leave ‘em to rot ’cause getting ’em out would’ve been too much of a chore. It got worse when I let on’s how it wasn’t only us Comanch’s did it, but every other tribe—’specially the Cheyenne and Sioux, and the Itehta’o was give that name by the rest of us Nemenuh because they allus put up a whole slew more pemmican than they could figure on eating in a winter and threw away so much’s’d been left over in the spring, it seemed right ‘n’ fitting they got known as the ‘Burned Meat’ band.’1
‘His sort only want to be told what they want to hear,’ the Texan declared and his scrutiny of Clivedon Pontin was no more complimentary than that of the girl.
‘Ain’t that the truth, Solly,’ Annie seconded. ‘He’s the first white man’s I’ve ever met’s’d believe them secret things, like sitting ’n’ sending messages to folks’s a long ways off somehow,2 like some of our medicine makers can do. He was just’s willing to take’s true some antics I made up which were so magical, I figured a jasper’s well-schooled as he allows to he’d know they wasn’t nothing ’cept tall tales. Would you reckon anybody’d take it as true when he was told’s, after the proper medicine was made, a brave could follow a feller on a sunny day by the marks his shadow left on hard rock? Well, he did.’
‘I’m not surprised,’ the black clad man admitted in tones redolent of disgust. ‘While his kind won’t accept nothing miraculous from the Bible, nor what it’s reckoned elsewhere’s white folks can do, they’re willing to take as gospel everything jaspers from other countries, so long’s they aren’t Europeans, are reckoned to be able to do, no matter how unlikely, nor even impossible.’
‘He’s not showing what I’d call real good sense sitting in a game with that lard gutted Martin Oates,’ Annie declared, directing an equally distasteful glance at the other player clad in eastern style clothing, albeit of a cheaper kind and older in style, if no more cleanly. ‘Which I hear him and those three college-Injuns he brought along’ve been losing regular in the evenings out to Oates’ trading post ever since they got here.’
‘The game should be straight enough tonight,’ the Texan assessed, making a gesture which indicated the two Texas cowhands and the big Cavalry sergeant seated at the table. ‘Leastwise, I don’t reckon Oates’d be loco enough to chance anything crooked with Stone Hart, Waggles Harrison and Paddy Magoon in the game.’
‘Just take a look here, Johnny,’ a voice with a Texas drawl requested, before the conversation could be continued. ‘Would it be Calamity Jane, or maybe the lady owlhoot, Belle Starr, would you reckon?’
‘It ain’t not neither of them ladies, Rusty,’ replied the second speaker, whose tone indicated similar origins. ‘This here’s Annie Singing Bear, only she’s better knowed’s “Is-A-Man”.’
Even without having heard their accents, the pair who had come to the counter while the bartender was delivering drinks to their companions would have been identified as typical Texas cowhands. In their early twenties at most and bare headed, the taller had fiery red hair and the shorter’s was of a rusty brown hue which indicated how he had acquired his sobriquet.
‘Now why’d you reckon they’d call a gal that?’ “Johnny” inquired.
They reckon’s how she’s been taught as a brave, ’stead of learning right humble ’n’ proper to be a gal,’ “Rusty” explained, as the pair came to halt in front of the girl and black clad man. ‘Now me, I don’t reckon’s how such should be.’
‘Nor me,’ Johnny asserted. ‘Anyways, I don’t reckon’s how any gal can learn how to do things like a man. ’Specially something like drawing a gun, for instance. Every gal’s I’ve met, which’s plenty, would shriek, holler and have the vapors should they even see it being done.’
‘Would you, Is-A-Man,’ Rusty queried, his manner implying he considered her sobriquet undeserved.
‘Could be I’ll shriek, holler and have the vapors was you to draw,’ Annie replied with deceptive mildness, moving a few steps away from her companion and thumb hooking her hands into her belt. Her manner was redolent of challenge as she continued, ‘Anyways, being so all fired eager to find out, why don’t one of you knobheads give it a whirl and see?’
‘Hot damn iffen I don’t!’ the taller cowhand accepted, stepping away from his companion and halting in front of the girl. ‘Ain’t nothing riles me more than an uppity woman and ain’t nobody going to say’s how Johnny Raybold of the Wedge was slow to put her in her place!’
Having delivered the final sentiment, the fiery haired Texan sent his right hand towards the butt of his low hanging Army Colt. While the move lacked the flashing speed which could be attained by one of the acknowledged masters of Western style gun fighting, it was performed with sufficient precision and rapidity to indicate he was reasonably well versed in such matters. Nevertheless, he did not meet with the success he had clearly anticipated.
Far from shrieking, hollering, or having the vapors, Annie reacted in a much more positive manner!
In one respect, Johnny might have counted himself fortunate. As was implied by Rusty, the girl had been educated to be a Comanche warrior. What was more, her sex notwithstanding, she had learned her lessons so well that she had earned the right to have the name she was given in her childhood, ‘Should Be A Boy’, changed to, ‘Is-A-Man’3 However, she refrained from employing any of the more lethal methods which she had been taught. Despite having two weapons on her person which she could handle with considerable proficiency and deadly effect when necessary, she made no attempt to touch either. Instead, displaying a speed in excess to that of the cowhand, she caught his right wrist in both hands just before he could touch the butt of his revolver. With a deft notion which prevented his fingers closing on the walnut grip, she twisted his arm behind his back. Then, putting to good use the strength of her well-muscled buxom body, she swung him around and, bringing her left knee against his rump, propelled him away from her with some force.
Although the girl had dealt with the attempt to draw a gun in a most competent fashion, her troubles were not over. Taking advantage of her having turned away from him when sending his companion staggering, Rusty lunged forward. However, he too did not offer to bring out a weapon. Encircling her arms with his own from behind, he pinned them against her sides. Hugging her to him, taking the precaution of twisting his face sideways so she could not seek to escape by slamming the back of her head against it, he made the most of his extra inches of height to hoist her feet from the floor. Suspended in such a fashion, she found her strength unequal to the task of breaking the powerful grip which threatened to incapacitate her.
‘Hold on there, Rusty boy!’ Johnny requested, having managed to bring himself to a half without falling. Striding back, he grasped the glass holding the sarsaparilla by its handle and raised it in a menacing fashion. ‘I’m going to hand her needings like she’s asked for!’
Prior to the arrival of the Wedge cowhands, it might have struck a casual acquaintance that the man who was the main subject of the discussion at the bar, was unlikely to be involved in any kind of gambling!
In his late twenties, Clivedon Pontin was tall and skinny, with greasy brown hair longer than was considered de rigueur by cowhands west of the Mississippi River. Not that anybody would have assumed he was engaged in such a strenuous form of employment. Nor was there even anything to indicate he was an author-even though his claim to the designation stemmed from having written two books published at the expense of his doting parents—and had come West to carry out research for a volume which, he had claimed in the ‘liberal’ Eastern newspapers sponsoring him, would ‘expose the truth about the abused, down-trodden and mistreated Indians’. Having a day-old stubble his features—like his hands being in need of a wash, were sallow and not rendered any more prepossessing by an expression that was intended to indicate a sense of superiority to those about him, but in fact left the impression that he was smelling something unpleasant. His face was even less likeable at the moment, as he was scowling and making no attempt to conceal his bitterness over being a continual loser. With the exception of the other player dressed in a similar fashion, all the customers had taken the trouble to wash and tidy their appearance for the visit to town; but his expensive Eastern style clothing was grubby and unkempt.
