“This ain’t your fight, Henderson.” Emory was clearly intoxicated. He stumbled back a step and pushed back his coat to reveal his gun. “Stay out of it.”
By now a crowd was gathering onto the boardwalk. Hank seemed to enjoy the attention. He tucked his coat behind his gun, a sure sign he was ready for action. “I’m not takin’ blather off any of you.”
Edward carefully stepped up on the boardwalk. “You don’t need to make things worse, Hank.”
Emory took that opportunity to reach down and yank the man he’d been fighting to his feet. He punched him square in the jaw. The man let go a yell and headbutted Emory, sending him back to the ground. This was apparently enough to cause all three parties to put aside common sense.
As he regained his footing and breath, Emory grabbed theman and hurled him farther across the street. Despite being drunk, Emory moved after him with the liquidity of a cat and was on top of the man before anyone could even move.
The men around them were yelling support for both sides, but Fred was having none of it. He put himself in between the two, but it was Emory he grabbed hold of. “I told you to stop it or I’d haul you in. Guess you’re goin’ to jail.”
Shots rang out, one right after the other. Edward pulled his gun and ducked around the side of the building. Everyone ran for cover as the firing went on with someone emptying out one revolver and then another. Edward pressed forward to get a look around the edge of the building. It was Hank. He was shooting everywhere. When the shots finally stopped, Edward peeked around the corner of the building, his gun drawn.
“Hey, you could have hit me,” Emory protested as he got up from the street.
“Wasn’t aiming at you,” Hank replied, reloading his revolver.
“Drop it, Hank,” Edward said. He rushed the man and knocked the gun from his hand. “Enough!”
Edward noted there were two men still lying on the street. One was the stranger Emory had been beating. The other was Fred.
“Take hold of them both,” a man’s voice called out.
Edward recognized several members of the vigilante group. They took charge and grabbed Emory and Hank. Stepping forward, Edward saw that even more vigilantes had arrived.
“I saw the whole thing,” one of the men declared. “It was murder, pure and simple.”
“Killed both in cold blood,” someone else yelled out to a rousing chorus of agreement.
Both?Edward looked again at the men on the street. Fred still hadn’t gotten up. In fact, he wasn’t moving at all.
Edward hurried to his side and dropped to his knees to roll Fred over. Someone rushed forward with a lantern. Edward could see a single bullet hole in Fred’s forehead. His eyes were closed and his body still.
Fred Henderson was right. He wouldn’t live to see Cheyenne become a decent place to live.
24
Edward knelt by Fred for a long time. All around him chaos was breaking out, but he didn’t care. The vigilantes could tend to it. He stared at his friend and former commander. This couldn’t be happening. Fred couldn’t be dead. What was Edward supposed to do now? What was he supposed to say to Fred’s wife and boys?
“You okay, Deputy?”
He looked up, hardly seeing the man standing beside him. He blinked a couple of times, but his mind wouldn’t let him respond. Fred was dead.
The man reached down and pulled Edward to his feet. “Are you hit?”
“No.” Edward shook his head, then looked back down at his friend. “He was just trying to stop the fight.”
“I know. We saw the whole thing. It was murder. Hank was shooting wild and killed Fred while Emory put a bullet into the other man. They will both hang tonight.” The man glanced down. “Do you know this fella?”
“No.”
“Well, someone will. Don’t worry about it.”
Another man knelt beside Fred and felt for a pulse. Edward didn’t recognize the man but watched him in wordless silence. It was as if his entire world had gone quiet. He could see down the street that a large group of men were dragging Hank and Emory off to their fate. And still Edward couldn’t move.
The other man rose. “They’re both dead.”
“Thanks, Doc. I’ll have them taken to the undertaker,” the man who’d been talking to Edward said. He looked at Edward. “You know the deputy—his family?”
