Chapter 11
Zack Benton also returned to Coates, and made the mistake of calling on Sheriff Wilkes for the balance of his blood money later the same day. He had felled a man, and believed it to have been Uriah, and he had not stayed around to make certain. But he was due payment, and he wanted his gold.
However he came back a marked man, for Catherine Benton observed him closely from the moment he returned home, and saw him hide his Sharpes rifle in a corner of their cabin when he thought she was busy at her stove, and she knew in his hiding both that her husband had done some mischief, and that the mischief would lead him to Sheriff Wilkes.
So she waited for him to leave their cabin, and then trailed him as he rode off along Portland Road towards the sheriff�s office.
Wilkes was in good spirits. He had never much liked Preacher Conover, considering him an interfering and overbearing man. He treated himself to another generous glass of� �shine, and thought in his mind on what a fine, heroic kind of a man he himself was, imagining himself standing and making important speeches down in Nashville, and generally he felt pretty sharp.
However Benton�s arrival at his office brought him straight back to earth with a bump. He reached down to the gun belt hanging over the back of his chair the moment the deputy pushed open his door, to make sure that his Colt was free.
Benton looked nervous, and held out his hand.
Wilkes shook his head, tightening his grip on the gun, and drawing it out of its holster a little way. Benton now had the blood of two men on his hands. and he feared that he might seek to do something foolish.
�Yo� done kilt the wrong man, Zack.�
Benton�s expression changed from one of greed to disbelief edged with alarm. He shook his head. �But I put him down. I saw it with my own two eyes.�
�Yo� kilt the preacher.� Wilkes pulled the gun out of its holster, but his hand was still behind him. �They was side by side, and the Hitt boy pushed him back. Yo� sighted right, but yo� kilt wrong.�
Benton did not reply. After a second he turned, and walked out, his mind racing. He must get out of Coates, as fast as he could. It was time to head West. He would ride down to Gallatin, and catch a train bound for California, and get Tennessee and his long-nosed, interfering wife, out of his mind as fast as could be.
But Catherine was waiting for him as he came out of the sheriff�s office, and also had her hand outstretched, in the same way that Zack had thrust out his own hand at Wilkes.
Benton attempted to push past her, but she would have none of it. �I wan� some of thet thar� gold.� Her voice was a hoarse whisper.
Benton scowled, raising his hand. �Get outta ma way, woman.�
�I want it.� Her voice was insistent, and starting to rise.
Benton hit her hard across the face with the flat of his hand.
He expected her to draw back. But Catherine was a determined woman, and she knew that this was her one chance.
�I want some of thet thar� gold, an I wan� it now.� He voice rose into a shrill scream. She knew her husband wanted to get away, and counted on him buying her silence.
Benton stared at her, fear starting to mix with his anger. But he was a mean man, and his hundred dollars represented his only hope of escape. He pushed at her hard, pulling his gun from its holster, and taking a grip on its barrel. His blow caught her on the side of her head, and she staggered, catching onto one of his legs and circling it with both her arms.
She began to scream. People had now begun to gather along the boardwalk, watching them where they stood across the Portland Road, and she screamed even louder as Benton dragged her towards his waiting mount.
�Watch this man, he has evil in his heart.� She broke her words with sobs, but her voice was loud and clear. �He�s taken gold from the sheriff, and it is tainted.�
The people watching her did not move. Marital battles are always good entertainment, for those not involved in them. A couple of men standing outside the Commercial Hotel made a wager on whether Benton would shoot her. Revolvers are very final arbiters.
Turner Evered came out of the depot building. The noise was disturbing him at his work. He stopped short as Benton hit his wife a second time, and turned back to his office, to come out again wearing the gun belt he had carried that morning. Two railroad men followed him, and both carried rifles. The railroad agent strode towards Benton, looking around him. By rights Wilkes should have come out of his office, for this was sheriff business.
Benton had reached his horse. He dealt his wife another stunning blow across her shoulders, kicking her away from him, and prepared to mount. Catherine turned, holding out her hands towards Evered. �Stop ma husband, sir.� Her voice was shrill. �He�s done a bad thang, thet�s fer sure, and Joe�s given him gold on�t.�
Suddenly Evered was holding his gun, the same gun that he had raised against Wilkes and Conover at the Hitt cabin, and now it was directed straight at Benton. He crossed the dirt road, the gun steady in his hand.
Benton stared at him, and the deputy�s face was white with fear. �I ain�t done nothin�, Mr. Evered, I swear thet to th�Almighty.�
�He hid a big long gun in the cabin, thet�s what he did.� Catherine�s voice was quieter now, but steeped in venom.
�I think you should explain yourself, sir.� Evered�s voice was steely. His two men moved to position themselves a little way to either side of the deputy.
Benton slid down slowly from his saddle, letting go of his revolver. Evered looked around again for the sheriff, but Wilkes was nowhere to be seen. He had already left the town, riding hard, in the knowledge that he was riding for his life.
It was now coming on evening, and Evered took counsel with himself on what to do next. David Kingman was still in Nashville, and would not be returning for at least another day. He thought of having the dispatcher telegraph him, but needed first to discover exactly what had been going on. Catherine Benton�s words seemed to tie Benton to Conover�s death, and by extension to the killing of Jedediah Hitt, but suspicions establish no evidence.
He told his two men to lock Benton in the cell at the back of Joe Wilkes� office, a small concrete outhouse with a single barred window high on one wall, a low wooden bed, and a bucket,� and walked Catherine Benton back to her cabin to look at the gun Benton had hidden. Benton�s wife described Wilkes� visit, and his plotting with her husband and Saunders, in detail on the way. She was certain gold had changed hands, and believed she would merit some of it for providing information.
�They were very close, sir.� She lowered her voice dramatically. �Sheriff Wilkes give Zack somepin�, and they struck a deal on it.�
Evered was listening carefully. �What did he give him?�
�T�was gold, sir, an� I�m sure on it.�
�But you didn�t see it?�
�I see�d the gun, sir, when he come back. He tried to hide thet from me, but I see�d it clear.�
Catherine Benton led the way into the Bentons� home. It was now dark, and she lit a paraffin storm lamp, leading the way to a corner and picking up a bundle of cloths.
Evered took the gun Benton had used for his two killings. He knew it immediately for a sharpshooter�s rifle as he unwrapped it, and had no doubt that the rifling inside the barrel would tally with the bullets that had killed Jedediah Hitt and Conover. Catherine Benton also handed him a small pouch with ten shells in it, and he noted the crosses Benton had cut in the lead tips.
Now he knew what he must do. He wrapped the gun again carefully, pocketing the shells. �I will take this, and question your husband on it.�
Catherine Benton�s eyes gleamed. �Will I get some of his gold for turnin� him in?�
�I doubt it.� Evered was already heading for the cabin door. �I think he will stand trial for murder, and anything the sheriff gave him will be forfeit.�
He walked quickly back to Wilkes� office, told his two men to guard Benton through the night, and set off for home. He was now very late on his dinner, and he was hungry. He would rouse up again before dawn, and have a couple of men fetch in Saunders. Then he would invite Mayor Brent, Editor Harriman and Pastor Macdonald to join him in an informal panel as three leading citizens of Coates, and question both deputies. He wanted to get to the bottom of what had been going on, but in a formal and proper way. He would establish the facts, and then send Benton, and possibly Saunders as well, away to the county lock-up in Gallatin to face trial before Judge Pelligrin.
Evered�s panel duly convened in Sheriff Wilkes� office at eight the following morning. The railroad agent sat at Wilkes� desk, with a gun belt hanging over the back of the sheriff�s chair to set a suitably stern atmosphere, and Mayor Brent sat at his side, looking very grave. Editor Harriman and Pastor Macdonald sat to either side of them.
Evered ordered Saunders and Benton brought in together, suspecting that Saunders deputy might well opt to betray his companion in a bid to save his own neck. He was right.
�Joe wanted both the Hitts daid �n in the ground efter they made a fool of him in Park Street.�
Saunders spoke grimly. Benton was standing facing Evered, with Saunders at his side. Both men had the same drawn and hunted look, the look of men speaking with nooses hanging over their heads, for a small crowd had begun to gather outside the office, and the word �lynching� hung in the air. Saunders wanted to distance himself as much as possible from the whole messy business.
�He agreed to kill them?� Evered did not look at Benton.
Saunders nodded. �We went to his house, and Joe sed he would pay a hundred dollars for the old man, and another sixty fer the son.�
Benton seemed to hunch in on himself.
�And you, sir?�
�I din� want no blood on ma hends.�
�But you rode out with him?�
Saunders squirmed uneasily, and then nodded without speaking.
Evered was silent for a moment. Mayor Brent now sat with his eyes closed, as though seeking to disassociate himself from the proceedings. He had been close to Joe Wilkes, and he feared to be tarnished by association. Editor Harriman made notes from time to time on a large pad of lined paper. He had made a considerable name for himself with his vivid description of Joe�s shambush, and now wanted a good follow-up. He also had heard the word �lynching� coming from the crowd, and was already composing a dramatic description of Benton kicking his feet in the air.
Pastor Macdonald sat with his fingers pressed together in a little tent against his mouth. Benton might yet repent his crime, and he sat ready to affirm divine forgiveness and send him to a better destination.
Evered took a deep breath, and stared at Benton. �Was that how it was?�
Benton inclined his head in confirmation. He knew that he was convicting himself, but now it was a matter of little consequence. Saunders had done for him, to save his own neck, and he knew that he himself would have done the same, had their roles been reversed. Now he just wanted to get everything over and done with. He had already handed over Wilkes� blood money, to keep it out of his wife�s hands. Perhaps that would count in his favor. Murderers sometimes bought their way free from a noose by frankly admitting their guilt and making an attempt at restitution, and better for the Hitt witch to have the money than go down with the thought of Catherine counting his gold.
The four men stared at him, and he looked down at the floor. He just wanted out.
Evered was silent for a long moment. Then he looked up. �I shall make arrangements for you to be taken from here to the county lock-up in Gallatin.�
Benton stared at him.
�I am not a judge, and I have no authority to try you.� Evered spoke slowly, to make his words tell. �You will be arraigned before Judge Pelligrin, on your own admission of culpability, and I shall appear to testify against you, if I am called.� He glanced at his three companions, and Brent, Harriman and Macdonald all nodded, though the nods from Harriman and Macdonald might have seemed tinged with a little disappointment.
Benton seemed to deflate visibly, as though he had wound himself up internally to face an immediate fate. But Evered was now looking at Saunders. �You, sir, have admitted to being some kind of accomplice in� this man�s doings.�
Saunders was silent. He might have hoped at one moment to be allowed his freedom. Now he knew that he would not escape so lightly.
�You will travel to Gallatin with your companion, and Judge Pelligrin will decide whether you were party to his crimes.�
Evered�s three companions nodded again. They were rubberstamping a formality, and someone else could now rule on the two men�s fate.
The railroad agent got to his feet, taking the gun belt he had worn to the Hitt farm from the back of his chair and buckling it around his waist. Now Benton�s fate lay in official hands, and the day was moving on. He needed to replace the gun in its locked cabinet and get on with railroad business, pending David Kingman�s return from Nashville, and he was also hungry, with his stomach telling him that his dinner was calling.
However he stopped short as he opened the door to step onto the porch outside Wilkes� office. A crowd of several hundred had massed in front of the office, and it was plainly in an expectant mood.
A tall man with a deep scar down one side of his face, dressed in a shabby broad-brimmed felt hat and a jacket that might once have been a sailor�s pea-jacket stood in the front row, glowering belligerently. �Bring him out and we�ll do the rest.�
Evered stared down at him. He knew Jem Huston by report as a local trouble-maker and sometime drinking companion to Jedediah Hitt. Huston had apparently spent time working as a deckhand on a clipper carrying tea back from China, and� gained his scar in unsavory circumstances.
��Benton will go to the judge at Gallatin.�
The crowd began to mutter angrily. Blood lust is an ugly and infectious thing, that feeds on itself, and grows as it feeds. The crowd was assembled to drink Benton�s blood, and it would not be gainsaid.
A voice called from the back of the crowd. �Zack deserves to swing.�
The crowd muttered its approval, and began to press towards Evered. He held up one hand, resting the other on the butt of his revolver, and the two armed men at his back leveled their rifles.
�I am sending Benton to Gallatin to be tried properly before a court of law.�
The crowd was silent for a moment, then Huston held up a length of rope. �We gotta noose fer him.�
Now several voices called from the crowd, echoing Huston�s words. A voice cried �string �im up�, to a general murmur of approval, and the crowd took the call up generally � a mass of faces suffused with lust and raw, naked hatred.
Huston stepped forward, until his face was less than a foot from Evered�s. �We mean you no harm, sir. But we want that man outta there.�
Evered drew his gun free, and smiled thinly. �You mean to trade your life for his?�
Huston hesitated, and Evered cocked the gun.
The two men stared at each other grimly. Then Huston looked down, and Evered knew that he had gained a moment of breathing space. But the crowd still waited, and was still expectant. He raised the gun slowly, pointing it up into the air, and fired a single shot.
The crowd stopped muttering at the sound.
�We will have no rough justice here, my good people.� Evered�s voice was stern. �Stand back, and let the prisoner pass. I have a train leaving soon for Gallatin, and he will be on it.�
The crowd hesitated, and then began to draw back. Evered realized that Huston had vanished, melted away into the ruck of people at the back of him. He judged that the scarred man had gone to plot mischief, possibly to lay some kind of trap between Wilkes� office and the railroad depot. It was not a long step, but far enough to provide a place for trouble, and several trees with sturdy branches stood not far distant.
He took a deep breath. Time was moving on, and Benton would be more secure locked in a railroad boxcar with a couple of guards safe on top.
The crowd had now broken up into small silent groups that stood watching Evered covertly. He turned to the two armed men behind him. �Let�s take him to the train.�
One of the men pushed at the door to Wilkes� office, and Mayor Brent came out first, followed by Harriman and then Pastor Macdonald. The clustered groups of men spread out in front of the office building hummed like gatherings of angry wasps, but made no attempt to besiege the building again. Evered judged that they had lost direction with Huston�s departure, and prayed to himself that he could transfer Benton to the depot quickly.
Then Benton came out onto the porch, followed by Saunders. Several voices cried out raggedly from the scattered groups, but they possessed none of the ferocious anger shown earlier. Evered gritted his teeth and stepped down from the porch, glanced quickly over his shoulder to make sure that his men were shepherding Benton and Saunders after him, and that the three members of his ad-hoc committee were also party to the procession, and advanced slowly towards what looked like a gap in the crowd, his hand on his revolver butt. The crowd began to part, and he breathed more easily. He had matched resolve against hatred, and resolve seemed to be in the ascendant.
Meanwhile Huston stood by the railroad depot building, with Uriah Hitt at his side. He had been attempting to persuade Uriah to lead a lynching party, but Uriah had steadfastly refused.
�I ain�t gonna go �gainst Mister Evered, that�s fer sure.� His voice was hard, but determined. �Benton�s gotta swing, an� he will. But I ain�t goin� �gainst Mister Evered, not no way. He�s bin good to me, an� I�ll stand by whatever he decides.�
�Mebbe he won�t swing.�
Uriah began to breathe heavily, his mouth clamped in a thin tight line.
�Mebbe Judge Pelligrin�ll jes� send him away for twenty years, breakin� rocks.� Huston spoke in a low, insistent voice. �Kin yo� stan� fer thet � a man killin� yer father, and puttin� paid to yer first-born, an� jes� collectin� twenty years?� He paused. �I don� hold no �count of a man who c�ld stan� by in those circ�mstances. No, sirree. I c�ld not stand by fer thet.�
Uriah hunched his head into his shoulders like an angry bull. Huston turned to look up the slope towards the sheriff�s office. A second man now stood at his side, listening silently. Uriah glanced at him quickly, and saw that it was Lewis Jenkins, the Macon County moonshiner. Jenkins was holding a long-barreled hunting rifle. The rifle was not as accurate over distances as a Sharpes, but very serviceable for closer encounters.
�Here they come.�
The three men watched Evered lead his little procession towards them. The crowd that had formed outside the sheriff�s office now trailed along on both side of the procession like the cloud of dust that follows a group of horsemen moving fast along a dirt road.
Suddenly several men burst out from the crowd towards Benton and Saunders, pushing at them and driving them wide of Evered�s armed guards. The guards hesitated, not willing to open fire without a direct command. Evered turned at the noise, sighting uncertainly first at the men, then at his two prisoners. Benton had stumbled well out of line, to find himself in an open space. He stared this way and that, like a trapped animal freed in front of a group of hounds, and began to run hesitantly away from his pursuers, hampered by his hands still being secured behind his back.
Uriah found himself with Lewis Jenkins� hunting rifle pressed into his hands. Evered was shouting. �Stop that man!�
Huston�s voice was implacable. �Now�s yer chance.�
Uriah raised the rifle to his shoulder and fired as though without thinking, and Benton fell to the ground.
Men clustered around Benton�s body, but he was dead. Evered looked down at the deputy�s corpse for a moment, and then walked over to Uriah, and took the hunting rifle from his hands. He had no doubt that Huston had engineered events to settle a personal score, and he himself had given an order to stop Benton. He touched Uriah�s shoulder. �You better go back to work.�
There was no reproach in his voice. Heaven had dealt out justice in its own way, and Saunders could now stand trial on his own � condemned out of his own mouth.
A group of men clustered around Uriah as Evered walked away, all wanting to share in a moment they knew would go down in Coates history. But Uriah was not with them. He had lost his father, and his child-to-be, in the space of a single day, and been inveigled into killing a man, and death had taken his wellbeing. For a man is defined by that which gives him to the world, and that which he gives to the world, and a void opens when he takes from the world in place of giving. He felt as an empty husk might feel, when it has shed its fruit. But a husk is an inanimate thing, and can feel nothing, while a man knows in a moment when he is defeated.
He hesitated, and then walked slowly back towards a heap of coal he had been shovelling. There is something in hard physical labour that anaesthetises feeling, and he needed to escape from a myriad conflicting emotions. He had coal to shovel, and he would shovel coal until he dropped in the act of shoveling.