Ruthy’s New Texas Lawyer Friend
by John Blandly
Smashwords Edition
Copyright © 2012 by J. J. Brearton
All Rights Reserved.
Chapter 1
Ruthy Bartholomew looked in the mirror that hung from the wall in her room at Emma Willard’s School for Girls.
She tried on a new blue bonnet that her father had bought her for her eighteenth birthday.
The bonnet was beautiful!
She looked forward to showing it around, but now, like most girls, all she could see were the deficiencies the mirror reflected. Sure, maybe some would say she was pretty, but she felt her eyebrows were too large. While they didn’t meet in the middle, they were just too big. And the tiny bosoms-how was she going to get a man with those? She was blessed with a clear complexion, but her cheeks would unaccountably flush at the worst times. She was never able to hide her feelings.
It was difficult getting adjusted to her new school, so far from her home in Texas, but she had met some new friends, and had survived the bitter upstate New York winter in Troy.
At first she was pleased her father was sending her away to school after wolves had killed her mother. There was a real sorrow in the house. The tiny one room Texas schoolhouse she’d attended, just seemed too small. So, she understood, the selection wasn’t great. There were only a few high schools for girls in the late 1890s, and they were mostly in the East.
There was a knock on her door.
Opening it, she saw Missy Wharton holding out a little yellow envelope.
Ruthy took the envelope, and Missy, a freshman, ran away down the hall.
There was a Western Union return address. It was a telegram. Ruthy sat down on her bed. She was happy to see that it appeared that someone else had remembered her birthday.
She unsealed the envelope to read: “Sorry your father is dead. Stop. Funeral tomorrow. Stop. Sincerely. Marshall Crenshaw.”
Chapter 2
Harry Fronctil inspected the filthy, stinking cot opposite Bat Masterson and sat down.
He watched Deputy Marshall Crenshaw lock the cell door, walk to the front of the office, and place the keys on a peg. Crenshaw glanced back, opened the door to the street, and went out.
“You know why you’re here?” Harry said.
“Yeah,” Bat said. “I shot a guy.”
“So, tell me how it happened.”
“I shot him in cold blood.”
“I see.”
Harry felt a bit uncomfortable, in view of Bat’s attitude. This wasn’t going well.
He prompted the eerie French Canadian again.
“Tell me how it happened.”
“I told you. I shot him in cold blood.”
“Yes, you said that. But how did it happen?”
“He cheated-cheated at cards.”
“Excellent. Finally, we’re getting someplace. Now, the dance hall girl-how did that happen?”
“I don’t know. Maybe the bullet went through his neck right into her. I sure didn’t mean to kill her.”
“But the guy-did you mean to kill him?”
“No way. It was a scuffle. Everybody jumped up. He shot right through my coat. I think my gun went off. He shouldn’t have died, actually. Where the hell is the doctor in this town? A barber even?”
“You done yet?” Crenshaw said from the other side of the bars.
“Well, maybe in a second.”
“Forget it,” Crenshaw said. “You’re done.”
Crenshaw unlocked the cell door and motioned Fronctil out.
Chapter 3
There were still dark stains on the floor of the saloon where Frank McGill and Betty Farge, the dance hall girl, bled to death. Bat was brought back in there, since that was where court was held, to see the Judge.
Judge Quarles sat on a stool behind the bar.
“Who’s that?” Quarles said, pointing to Harry.
Crenshaw spoke up.
“We got a telegram from this guy in Dodge City, a Marshall there, Wyatt Earp. He asked that we get an attorney for this killer here.”
“Oh,” Quarles said, turning to Harry. “So, you’re Mr. Masterson’s attorney?”
“Well, I’m not actually his attorney. I’m not an attorney at all.”
“You’re what? You’re not what now?”
“I just finished my second year in law school and came out here to take the bar exam, and they said-somebody said they needed an attorney-and I guess the attorney around here died and-”
“Yes, Grover Bartholomew,” Quarles said.
“Bartholomew, yes,” Harry said. “That was the name.”
“Crenshaw, aren’t there any lawyers around here?”
“Just Bartholomew, and he’s dead.”
“Right. Okay. When do you take your bar exam?”
“I don’t know-a couple of weeks-a month-I just got into town.”
“You got a week.”
“What, to take the exam?”
“Right. To take the exam, pass, or whatever-just be back here on the 20th-next week.”
“But Judge,” Crenshaw said. “You won’t be here next week.”
“I won’t?”
“No, you’re in Abilene for the County Fair.”
“Oh, yeah. I forgot.”
“Plus,” Crenshaw continued. “The District Attorney won’t be here for a month.”
“What do we need him for? We can hang the guy right now. What do we have to wait for him for?”
“You need an executioner.”
“Really? By the way, we do still hang the guys, don’t we?”
“Absolutely. But after, we’ve been told to shoot them to make sure. We got new rules.”
“Excellent. Well, seeing as how I’m going to Abilene next week, why don’t we shoot and hang the guy right now? We can get anybody to do it. We probably got enough in petty cash to pay for it.”
“Excuse me, your honor,” Harry said.
“Don’t you say another word, son. You’re the one causing all this trouble. You want to spend a week in jail? Pretending to be an attorney.”
“But Judge, I never did anything of the kind.”
“Judge,” Crenshaw said. “This Wyatt Earp guy-said it was like a personal favor-”
“What? Who’s he?”
“He’s, like, a Marshall-from Kansas.”
“What? Is the guy wanted there too?”
“I don’t know. Maybe he’s some important guy. Maybe we should look into it. Remember what happened when we hanged that other guy?”
“How the hell was I supposed to know he appealed?”
“True. But they said all that stuff about him having an uncle who was an Indian scout, and was a decorated soldier-”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah-I can read. Okay. You got a month. Now get the hell out of here.”
Chapter 4
As he was being brought out of the saloon, Bat tugged against the chains that pulled him, and paused near Harry.
“Thanks,” he said. “You did good, but I’ll be getting a real attorney.”
He shook Harry’s hand in both of his, still handcuffed together.
“You’re welcome,” Harry said, and then turned to watch Bat being pushed through the swinging doors into the street.
Harry had nothing to do but put his papers back into the folding cardboard case he had brought.
All the arguments he had prepared, the constitution, the civil code-he never had a chance to mention them.
It was hot and stuffy inside the saloon, even with the windows open.
Harry left the papers on the table and went outside. Someone might take those papers-but what use did he have for them now?
There was a nice wooden rocking chair on the front porch of Oakley’s Hotel, where the saloon was, and just now it was unoccupied, so Harry sat down and put his feet up on the railing.
He looked down the street to his left and saw Judge Quarles drive out of an alley in a buckboard.
On the right, way out in the distance, there was billowing dust.
In a minute or two the driver of a stagecoach pulled back mightily on the reins, and the two horses pulling the contraption snorted to a halt, their hooves stomping the dirt angrily.
The driver jumped off the seat on top of the front of the wagon and went around to the side and opened the door.
A heavy-set woman pushed her way out, followed by a young boy.
The driver entered the coach, re-emerged quickly, looked around and yelled, “Is there a doctor here?”
Stepping briskly up onto the hotel porch, the driver addressed Harry. “A doctor-we need a doctor.”
Long dark hair escaped here and there from the driver’s hat-smudges of dirt above dark eyebrows-on rosy cheeks. To Harry’s amazement, the driver appeared to be a young woman.
“No doctor here,” Harry said. “What’s wrong?”
“The stage coach driver is dead-or dying.”
The driver took off her hat and shook out her hair.
She paused for a second, and calmly noted, “You’re not from around here.” Then she turned and said, “Well, I should have known. Never been a doctor here.”
Harry was standing up at this point, wondering what to do, so he walked over to the stagecoach and looked inside.