Dominion: Billy Two Trees. (Six)

 

They wind had picked up and soon snow mixed with a light freezing rain began to lash at their backs, Elias, and Butler rode into Malford just before dusk, it was dark, dismal, lifeless place, that spoke to them of hopelessness, desperation, and death, there wasn't much there to speak of, a handful of old small wooden buildings, one a makeshift saloon of sorts, and a dilapidated sheriff's office, a feed and tack store, and a general store, the rest of the buildings were ominously dark. They started with the single story saloon, it was small, and only had a handful of people in it when they walked through the double doors. 

Elias's eyes slowly circled the room, William Stanhope wouldn't make it obvious, he wasn't going to be an easy mark. He and Blind Dog slowly stepped up to the bar. He placed the wanted poster of William Stanhope face up on the counter. His eyes carefully studying the reaction of the barkeep, who glanced at it nervously but never bothered looking up at him, Blind Dog instinctively turned around facing the room leaning back against the bar, his eyes moving back and forth carefully studying each patron. Elias leaned in toward the barkeep again.

"Have you seen this man come in here?" He asked, his tone deep and foreboding.

His eye slowly rose to meet Elias's intense stare. He slowly nodded. He turned to look across the street.

"He's over at Chatterly's looking for a whore. She's got plenty of them." He answered.

Elias's eyes narrowed.

"How long ago?"

"Bout thirty minutes, he'll be back for whiskey right soon, I reckon." The barkeep stammered. 

"Is he alone?"

He hesitated before looking back across the street.

"No sir, he's got Frog Barret, and Joe Shine with him. They're pretty liquored up." He answered nervously.

He glanced at Blind Dog and nodded toward a corner table in the shadows, out of the way. He placed a silver dollar on the counter and requested a bottle of whiskey and two glasses. and Blind Dog followed him to the table, where they sat down as Elias poured them two drinks. Blind dog stared straight ahead, his look hardened as he raised the glass of whiskey to his lips.

"Frog Barret as I recollect, is another backshootin coward Elias, you worry about Stanhope, you leave that other feller to me." He said flatly.

Elias nodded. Minutes later they heard the faint sounds of boots on the wooden walkway slowly making their way to the saloon, William Stanhope wasn't going to come along quietly and both Elias Crowe and Blind Dog knew that there was only one way this was going to end. He stood up and unclasped the colts from their holsters, and waited for Stanhope to enter. He pushed his way into the saloon and carelessly sauntered up to the bar, laughing all the way, with Joe Shine and Frog Barret right behind him. He stopped and looked down at the wanted poster that Elias had intentionally left behind, he had a sobering thought as he slowly turned around to meet the gaze of Elias Crowe. 

"Stanhope, my name is Elias Crowe, I'm with the U.S. Marshal's office. I'm here to execute an arrest warrant, you can come along peacefully, or you can come along dead, makes no difference to me either way, it's your choice Stanhope, but either way you're coming with me."

Behind him Blind Dog slowly rose to his feet pulling back his coat over the pommel holster, his eyes never leaving Frog Barret or Joe Shine. Stanhope studied his options carefully.

"I ain't swinging from no noose, Marshal Crowe." 

He hesitated before lunging for his pistol. Elias got off four shots into his chest before his finger even touched the trigger. Behind him two more shots rang out as Joe Shine staggered and fell back outside through the saloon doors. Frog Barret as expected threw both hands in the air and dropped to his knees declaring that he wasn't armed. Blind Dog stepped up beside of Elias, his disdainful stare burning a hole in Frog Barret's face.

"Go on, get outta here Frog, you aren't even worth a bucket of warm piss, Shine is at least worth fifty." He said. 

Blind Dog went back over to the table and grabbed the whiskey bottle. corked it up and walked out to his saddlebag and stuffed it in as Elias came dragging William Stanhope's body out of the saloon, he picked him up and threw over the back of Mudbone. out of the corner of his eye Blind Dog saw the form of Frog Barret stagger from the shadows, his gun pointed at the ground, his eye's staring blankly ahead, he stumbled falling forward falling face first onto the wooden sidewalk. A bone handled knife sticking out of his back, the form of Billy Two Trees stepped into the dim light. He looked down at Frog's dead body and then up at Blind Dog.

"I always knew ol Frog was a backshooting coward." He said. "Did you get your paleface, Elias?"  He asked.

"Yep, gotta buy some more canvas in the morning, but I reckon the bodies will keep for tonight, I saw an empty small barn on the outskirts of town, don't look too bad, we can probably hole up in there til morning."  Elias answered.

They loaded up the bodies of William Stanhope and Joe Shine, and left Frog Barret to Billy Two Trees discretion. They rode to the edge of town to where what they thought was an old barn, but stood a rather large abandoned blacksmith shop and a Livery stable all together, while it was no longer in use there was a place in back for the animals and there was even a brick furnace that they could build a fire in to make their dinner. The fire could be safely contained and they and the horses could stay dry and warm throughout the night. As Elias stood building a fire to get their pot of beans and salty bacon started, Blind Dog found two lanterns and lit them just as Billy Two Trees came riding in through the front door. Blind Dog looked up at him and smiled.

"Take off your saddle, and you can put him back there with ours, Billy." He said.

He nodded and led his horse to the back with the others, The whole building looked like it hadn't been used for a long while, so at least for one night they would be safe and dry. He appeared from the back minutes later holding something at his side, Blind Dog looked down to see he was carrying two dead prairie hens. Billy gave a big sheepish grin.

 "Got em a couple of hours ago, may as well cook them, right?"    

"So how much did the man give you for the horses and scalps, Billy?"

Billy gave Blind Dog a sideways look. 

"Gave me two hundred for all four horses and  ten dollars apiece for the four scalps, cheap bastard." Billy complained.

"And Frog?" Blind Dog asked.

"Left him outside of town for the buzzards."

Butler shook his head, half smiling.

"Hey-" Billy continued. "Everybody's gotta eat."

He cleaned the prairie hens and cooked them over the furnace oven next to the pot of bacon and beans, as the snow outside slowly started to build up, and they stayed as close to the furnace as they could to keep warm, and later that night they filled their bellies with beans with bacon and roasted prairie hens and drank whiskey from tin cups, just when they thought it couldn't get any better, they found four wooden buckets of coal in the corner of the room, the coal would burn longer than wood and allow them to sleep during the night.

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