Lone Tree

LONE TREE

by

Doug Ball

Smashwords Edition

Copyright 2015 Doug Ball

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Smashwords Edition, License Notes

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LONE TREE

By

DOUG BALL

OTHER BOOKS

BY

DOUG BALL

The Old Westerns

Blood on the Zuni

Vengeance

The Not So Old Westerns

Gentle Rebellion

4 X Armed

The State of Arizona Series

State of Defense

State of Threat

Biblical Studies

Puzzling Theology

The Fishy Prophet

This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance between persons living or dead and the characters of this novel is purely coincidental.

Locations named in this book are for reference only and may be moved at the author’s whim. Any error in historical fact is a work of fiction and the work of the author’s mind.

This book is dedicated to

all my loyal readers.

And to

Patti

LONE TREE

Sunrise comes early in Lone Tree and this one was a beaut.

Old Albert hit the gong just as that sun peaked over the edge of the desert. Albert had been doing that gong thing as long as I could remember. The whole town of Lone Tree set their workday clocks by that gong.

It was a big, shiny brass thing that Albert had hung in his barn - biggest building in town - the day he had declared that barn finished. The first stall on the right as you entered the barn was the home to that gong. It got a mite dusty hanging in there like that. Every Sunday afternoon he wiped it down and covered it with a thin coat of some kind of stinky oil - he swore that oil would heal a busted pistol - and brought that gong to its shiny self.

Everything in Lone Tree got dusty. The women folk was always complaining about the dust. It was so dusty in Lone Tree that folks figured that once all the dust was blown away and wiped up, all that would be left behind would be the gold. Folks looked for gold in Lone Tree.

Lone Tree weren’t much of a town, six or seven store fronts if you included the livery barn on the west end of Only Street. Back when the town was being laid out by the two miners who established the place - when their mine turned into a well that is - they set it up along one street. So, everybody just started calling it Only Street. They have even put a sign at each end of town proclaiming its name. Nobody thought it was strange or nothing, just seemed to make sense at the time and still does, I guess. The signs had been moved once due to an extension of the street when a new building was added. Didn’t happen very often.

Now, you could tell how old Albert was feeling by the way that gong rang. It really is hard to describe the sound of a gong, but everybody in town knew by the sound of that gong if Albert was feeling perky, sad, mad, whatever. This morning it sounded just kinda ordinary like it was just another day.

I hated that gong.

Its meaning to me was some kinda special. It meant I had to get outta bed, get the fire going in the range so’s Ma could cook breakfast. Then I’d wash up, milk the cow, feed the chickens, haul about twenty buckets of water from the mine well to the tank atop an eight foot ladder and a pipe that led to the kitchen on the back of the house, feed, and water the horses - both of them. The hardest job was to wake up Gramps in the shack out back. Gramps was one of the two miners who dug the well about forty years ago. Grandma was the other miner. It was Grandma - she died five years ago from the fever - that convinced him to stay with the well, water was worth more than gold to her, and, as it turned out, to a lot of other folks, too. She was also in a family way with my ma and just didn’t want to do no traveling any more. The shack was their first home. Ma was born there. Gramps figured he’d struck some heavy pay dirt the day she was born. Two years later my uncle was born, but we just don’t talk about him much. Don’t know for sure why, we just don’t. I met him once when I was a kid, seemed like a nice fella.

Albert drove in with his gong and a wagon full of goods right after my uncle was born and built a shack about the same distance from the well except on the opposite side. Somehow over the years that well became the center of things in these parts. It stands today in the middle of Only Street about half way down the block smack dab in the middle of all them buildings.

Me, I just wanted out of this place and a real job so I could get a ranch of my own. Storekeeping is for those who cain’t do nothing else. Except for my Pa, that is. He can do anything.

Old man Marcus died of consumption a few years back and they tore his shack down which gave the town room to grow. The lot across Only Street from his was empty so folk just naturally tore that shack down to make room for The Other Street, which had a sign, but didn’t no one use it. It gave the town some respectability having two streets that crossed in the middle of it all. The Other Street was just a gap between buildings for now with the well standing in the middle of the cross shaped intersection. Lone Tree was ready for anything, or so we thought.

Gramps and I was doing the chores that morning. Gramps, how old was you when you took out on your own.

Well, son, I guess I was a bit younger than you are now. But, my mother had died and pa didn’t much care about life along about that time, so I just up and left. Nothin’ in my pockets but an old skinnin’ knife I had found the year before. Shoes didn’t last me three weeks.

Where’d ya go?

Any danged where I wanted. I walked barefoot for five days afore I found a farm lookin’ for a worker. Stayed there til I could get me some boots and took off again ridin’ an old plug some farmer give me so’s he wouldn’t have to feed it anymore. Lived two years, that horse did. Fine horse.

I want to get outta here. Oh, I love you, and Pa, and Ma, probably Evette, too. But I gotta get and see what there is outside a this place, Gramps. Do ya understand?

Yeah? You got the same itch I had. It’ll be fun and exciting for a while. You’ll go hungry and be wetter than a Saturday night bath, cold, too. He stopped for a moment while he tossed some hay to his horse. You talked to your Pa, Nick?

A bit. He says it’s normal for me to wanna go. But, he wants me to stay, cuz Ma will be some unhappy if I’m gone.

She surely will, Nick. Your Ma will want you to stay around forever. Ever’ mother I ever knew never wanted their baby to go away, specially man babies. She’ll get over it, just like ever’ other mother that ever lived. Again he stopped, only this time he was standing there lookin’ at me. I’ll miss ya, Nick. I’ll really miss ya.

I know, Gramps. I’ll miss ever’one in Lone Tree. They’re all just like family to me

It was about the time I was washing up for breakfast that two men come riding into town by way of The Other Street over the top of where old Marcus had his shack before the town tore it down. They were sitting up in the saddles like they had a ramrod from an old musket tied to their backs. Both of them had stars on their chests, one on a vest and the other on a broadcloth coat that weren’t buttoned. Their hats had seen many days in bad weather and hard work. Horses looked solid as can be, like them big horses they grow up Montana or Wyoming way. They like’em big up there to buck through the deep snows of the winter. The only horses I ever did see bigger than them northern nags was the shaggy footed ones they use on the freight wagons that bring in the supplies four times a year.

Back to them men. Both were wearing two guns and sporting clean, well-used lever action rifles of a large caliber, I’m a guessing .45 or bigger. I saved the worst for last. The third horse, a tired out old nag with a blotchy hairdo, had an old wooden packsaddle on its back with a dead person wrapped in canvas draped over like a sack of taters and tied down like someone knew how to keep that body there.

I stuck my head in the back door and said softly, Pa.

My Pa was our local Sheriff. We don’t have a jail. Only fella we ever had need to put in jail the town just tied him to the well and everybody that drew water that weekend just drew one more bucket and poured it over him. He sobered up mighty quick. Had a heck of a case of catarrh when they turned him loose it lasted for a few weeks, but he never gave the town anymore trouble. Come to think of it, he left right after he was well enough to travel.

Pa musta knowed something was up. When he come to the door he was strapping on his sidearm, as he called it. He’d been a sergeant in the Cavalry when he met ma and got outta that outfit to marry her within six months of that first meeting. He’s always using some kinda military words to dangle ideas in front of folks, specially me.

What’s up?

Take a look. The Other Street. Which was dumb. The Other Street ran along one side of our land just like Only Street covered the front side. We had the center corner lot my Gramps always said. One end of our house was The Mercantile (gramps had bought out old Albert cuz Albert thought storekeeping was beneath him and a livery was much better for him), front end facing Only Street of course, and the other half was our home with a door facing The Other Street. Our front door on The Other Street weren’t never used by nobody. The back door, which was on the opposite side from the front side, opened onto our yard, pens, and such. Pa and I were at the back door looking at the men coming down The Other Street, which no one had ever used to enter town, that we knew of that is. That in itself should have been exciting, but to have a dead person be the third person down the street gave it even more importance I suppose.

Pa took one look and moved toward the street. One of the men noticed him and nodded. Pa nodded back before saying, Can I help you men?

Not unless you’re the law.

That’d be me. Duly elected and starless. Town can’t afford a star, and a lot of other things. What’s the need?

Got an undertaker?

Nope. We just dig a hole and bury’m. Say a few nice words over’m and fill in the hole. Mark’m if we know’m.

Got a customer for ya then.

Don’t want’m. Who might you both be? Pa was standing easy on the dirt of the street, but there was something about him that said for me to stay out of things. About that time I noticed a couple of folks across the square – that’s what we called the well area – and one of them had a rifle kinda casually hanging over the crook of his elbow. Nobody carried guns around Lone Tree anymore.

I asked myself, ‘What’s goin’ on, Nick?’ and then I realized these were the first lawmen with guns hanging on their hips I’d ever seen other than Pa. Course, I hadn’t been anywhere other than Lone Tree in my 15 years.

One of the men made the introductions, I’m U.S. Deputy Marshal Shane Burgland and this is my partner, Deputy Marshal Bud Westford. The feller hanging over that sorry excuse for a horse is an escapee from federal prison in Kansas name of Carl Meany. We been chasing him for over a month. His horse died and he tried to shoot it out about thirty miles back. A drifter helped us out with the horse he’s riding and told us there was a town down this way. I can see he was a man prone to exaggeration.

Yeah, that don’t look like any kind a horse I ever saw. Pa stopped and got real serious, Deputy, we like it here.

Well now, even Kansas has its spots of paradise like this, but we don’t call them towns. Crossroads, villages, points of interest, stage stops, whatever, but not towns. What do ya call this place, Sheriff.

We call it Lone Tree cuz of the one tree we got next to the well in the square over yonder. That tree there bit the dirt about ten years ago after a hard winter, but it’s still there. Lite and set, I’ll get the wife to add some side meat to the skillet and crack a couple more eggs. My name’s Lee Williams. My son is Nick. The wife goes by Teri.

Sounds like the best invite we’ve heard in quite some time. The both swung down, keeping their horses between them and us. I do believe I could learn to like this place, too, he added.

Pa noticed and smiled. The folks across the street went back inside and I heard Gramps lean his old Sharps against the wall inside the shack before the door creaked open.

Ma called out, I heard ya. Got it going.

Bud commented, First meal in ten days we ain’t cooked ourownselfs over a far.

Pa said, A far?

Yeah, a far. You know sticks and match, heat up your food.

You mean a fire.

That’s what I said, a far.

Shane looked around, I been trying to teach him to talk American, but he’s got a head like a rock. Trying to get anything into it is like driving drill steel into a granite wall.

Pa motioned the men inside and signaled for me to take care of the horses. Sure, Pa. I’ll get the horses, I turned to the two men before adding, if you fellas don’t mind.

Nah.

Go ahead, just watch mine. He likes to kick with that off hind leg. Just dump old Carl right there and see what you can do for that plug ugly thing we bought to bring him in on. Matter of fact, young’un, you can have it.

They handed me the reins and turned to go inside.

I’ll take them all and keep the one. Don’t worry, I know what to do with them. Save me some breakfast. I turned and headed for the barn. I now owned one horse. Thank you, I yelled at the shutting door.

The four of us men sat around the dining room table whilst Ma cooked with the help of my kid sis, Evette. Evette is eight years old and thinks she runs the show around her. First thing out of her mouth was, You men sure you washed up?

Pa slapped her bottom and told her, Be nice and help Ma.

Sure, Daddy. Pa melts every time she says that with her dumb eyes all slanty and such.

My daughter, Evette, gentlemen. She still runs with the rough string and needs a bit of training.

Shane said, She’s sure got you wrapped around her pinky and that’s the way it otter be with a baby girl.

I ain’t no baby, mister. Evette had definite opinions about herownself.

Bud laughed, Guess you been told, Shane.

Pa chimed in with, What’s with the dead guy?

2

Shane motioned to Bud. Bud kinda set his shoulders, "He’s run