Stringer and the Wild Bunch

CHAPTER ONE

Stringer was thinking about robbing stagecoaches in Arizona when the Wild Bunch robbed the train he was riding in Colorado. So it took him a few seconds to figure out what was going on.

The train had just picked up some speed after a jerkwater stop on the west slope of the Divide when somebody yanked mighty hard on the emergency cord, locking every wheel of the U.P. Flyer. Stringer had been working at a writing table in the club car with a schooner of beer at his elbow and his notes spread out before him. So the sudden stop deposited a lot of beer and some of his notes in his lap. Fortunately he was wearing the faded denim jacket and jeans he favored in the field. But he was still cussing pretty good as he stood over the wet table in his wet jeans, trying to flatten beer-soaked paper on the glass top before it fell apart, when a portly old gent in a conductor’s uniform tore through the front door of the club car. He ran the length of it with surprising speed and grace, and vaulted the brass rail of the rear platform to land, still running, in the direction of that last stop.

Stringer and the other confused passengers in the club car were still staring after him when a trio of dusty desperadoes with feed sacks over their heads herded a colored porter ahead of them through the forward entrance. One of the masked men fired a round into the ceiling panels, filling the car with gun smoke and paint chips as he yelled, This is a stick-up!

Stringer and the other club car passengers had already guessed as much. Stringer’s thoughts strayed wistfully to the gun rig he’d left packed in his gladstone up forward, in deference to his more sedately dressed fellow passengers. He decided it was just as well since he only had about thirty dollars on him at the moment, and any man who’d take on three armed men for thirty dollars had to be more stupid than daring.

One of the owlhoots who hadn’t shot up the ceiling fanned at the smoke with his six-gun and announced in a more reasonable tone, I don’t know why he does that, neither. I’m sure you all know how this game is played. This here colored boy is fixing to pass his hat amongst you, and your protracted existence depends on how well you ante up.

As the porter moved down the aisle with his peaked cap inverted, the obvious leader of the trio peered toward the rear and added, That don’t include you, ma’am. We wouldn’t have to ask these gents to contribute to our support if that greedy old Mr. Harriman who owns this railroad hadn’t slickered us with a new safe in the baggage car up front. My pards may or may not manage to open her. Meanwhile, time’s a wasting and we ain’t about to ride on empty-handed.

Stringer knew better than to turn his head. He recalled the object of the bandit leader’s admiration as a plain but not too ugly woman who’d been seated alone on the rear platform when he’d first sat down at the writing table. As he stood by it now, the porter got to him with the hat. Stringer shrugged, hauled out his billfold, and emptied it into the pot. The leader nodded in satisfaction. I figured you for a top hand, he said. How come you wet your jeans like that, old son? Ain’t you never heard a gun go off afore?

Stringer smiled thinly and replied, It’s beer. I wasn’t expecting such a sudden stop just now.

The masked man chuckled inside his feed sack. Having someone slip aboard at a jerkwater to jerk the brake line is a lot more scientific than felling trees across the track. It’s a lot less work, too, come to study on it.

He started to move on. Then he spotted the wet paper spread on the glass tabletop near Stringer and reached with his free hand to pick a sheet up. Stringer snapped, Don’t! You’ll only tear it!

But the owlhoot paid him no mind until he’d picked up the corner of a soggy sheet, the corner tearing free of the page. When you’re right you’re right, cowboy, he said. What was you doing here, your homework? No offense, but you look sort of mature for a high school boy working stock on weekends.

Stringer had to be nice to the curious cuss. For despite the casual tone of the stick-up, one man was posted at the far end with a ferocious Lemat revolver and an unreadable expression on the burlap face he exposed to the world. So Stringer explained, I’m a newspaper man. Until you boys showed up, I was on my way to interview Miss Pearl Hart for the San Francisco Sun. She just got out of prison, and my feature editor seems to feel she was some kind of bandit queen in her day.

The one who shot up ceilings had moved on down the line with the porter and his hat by now. But the friendlier leader seemed to find Stringer more interesting. He said, Well, you still look sort of cow to me. But I recall the doings of Miss Pearl Hart a few years back. She sounds like my sort of woman, and they say she ain’t bad looking, neither. It was the Globe Stage she robbed that time, right?

Stringer nodded. She didn’t get far, and nobody was hurt. That’s likely why she only got seven years for her part in the robbery, if you follow my drift.

The train robber chuckled. I told you we was good at this. Then he saw what his sidekick was up to and called out, I said to leave that lady be, Arkansas! You just go on and take that brooch back, ma’am. I wasn’t funning when I said I don’t pick on women and children.

Stringer felt it was safe, now, to follow the owlhoot’s gaze. He saw that the old gal in the shapeless tan travel duster was indeed in possession of her rhinestone brooch once more. She was blushing like a schoolgirl as she nodded their way. I’d already heard of your gallantry to ladies, Mr. Cassidy, she said. I’m so glad to see the tales they tell of you are true.

The compliment didn’t seem to go down as well as it was no doubt meant. The leader yanked his feed sack off with his free hand and a roar of hurt pride to demand, I ain’t Butch Cassidy or that prissy Sundance Kid you Cruel-hearted woman!

They could all see now that whoever he was, he needed a shave, had glandular eyes, a walrus moustache, and thinning close-cropped hair. I will have you know, ma’am, he announced, that you owe your very life and virtue to the one and original Kid Curry. Cassidy ain’t leading the Wild Bunch no more. I am. And I’d better not hear any arguments about that, hear?

He glared at Stringer, who said nothing until Kid Curry demanded, Would you be kind enough to put that in your fool paper for me, newspaper boy?

If you want me to, Stringer replied. Whether I’ll be reporting it as your capture or daring escape depends a lot on how much time you boys are giving yourselves. It’s been a spell since the conductor of this train lit out for help, and I feel sure they have a telegraph at that jerkwater stop back yonder.

Kid Curry scowled thoughtfully, then nodded. I fear you have a point, pilgrim. I have been waiting on the dulcet tones of a blown safe all the while we’ve been having this interesting conversation. But my boys tell me them new Mosler safes are a caution to open with nitro because of the sneaky way they made the doors. Do you know how to blow a Mosler, seeing as you’re so interested in bandit queens and all?

Stringer smiled incredulously. I only write crime features. But if it’s any comfort, I do recall reading about the Mosler patent. They’ve got a sort of groove just inside the crack that lets the nitro all run down and out as fast as a yegg man can pack it in, right?

Kid Curry shrugged. If you say so. We’d have heard by now if my boys had figured some way to blow the fool box, so we’d best ride on. We brung plenty of spare mounts. Put on your sombrero and let’s go, newspaper boy.

Stringer blinked in dismay. What are you talking about? You got all my money, and my paper’s not about to pay any ransom for me, if that’s what you have in mind.

Kid Curry shook his bullet head. I ain’t out to kidnap nobody. That ain’t my style, neither. I’m simply the best old train robber in the world, and it’s about time the world knew it. So you’re coming along to hear my sad story and see that every word gets printed true. I’m getting sick and tired of Butch and Sundance getting all the credit for my efforts in these parts, hear? There were more like a dozen in the gang, all told, once Kid Curry had his followers and the bemused Stringer mounted up and riding north through mighty rough country. Stringer had naturally brought his old Rough Rider hat along. The others had exchanged their feed sacks for various types of battered broad brims. But Kid Curry favored a brown derby that might have seemed a mite more dapper if it hadn’t sported a bullet hole through its crown.

Stringer didn’t ask where they were headed. He’d heard many a tale of the Hole in the Wall country. He knew that in the direction they seemed to be headed, they’d wind up in rough country soon.

It was bad enough already. Stringer was gaining a grudging respect for Kid Curry’s choice of time and place as he noticed the shadows were already lengthening. They were leaving plenty of sign as they bulled through second-growth aspen and the alder hells choking the low draws they roller-coasted over at a most uncomfortable but mile-eating trot. Stringer knew that by the time the posse gathered back there along the track in enough strength to risk pursuit, it would be dark. So even if the law felt frisky enough to chase a good-sized gang into the tall timber in tricky light, they’d likely just get lost. Stringer knew his old pal Charlie Siringo, and the less likable but no less canny Joe Lefors had been spearheading the hunt for the Wild Bunch this season. Stringer wasn’t sure he wanted to be this close to any member of the Wild Bunch when, not if, the law caught up with them. An aspen trunk snagged his right stirrup, and while he had no trouble freeing it, he noted the white gash he’d left in the gray-green birchlike bark. He resisted the temptation to blaze a helpful trail. Charlie Siringo wouldn’t need his help, and the moody Deputy Marshal Lefors tended to shoot at every moving critter in sight. Stringer felt his own best bet would be not to be anywhere near these galoots any longer than he had to be. Meanwhile it was still too light to even consider making a break for it.

But Stringer was making mental notes of the few handy landmarkers amid the tangle of brush and saplings all around, when Kid Curry fell in beside him to opine, You ride pretty good for a gent with such a sissy job. Tell me some more about yourself, old son.

Stringer shrugged and reached for the makings of a Bull Durham smoke. There’s not all that much to tell. I was birthed in the Mother Lode country as Stuart MacKail. They call me Stringer now because that’s what I do for the San Francisco Sun. I’m a stringer or free-lance writer for ‘em. Since I grew up on a cow spread and worked my way through college punching cows, old Sam Barca, my features editor, likes to send me out on stories about the wild west, or what’s left of it.

Well, you’ll find her wild enough where we’re all headed, Kid Curry said. Once we get up around the headwaters of the Green, I’ll show you country so wild it ain’t on no map. It’s a pure lie that Butch Cassidy found the Hole in the Wall country. The first outlaws of any import up around Billings was the Red Sash Gang and they was even before my time.

Stringer frowned thoughtfully but continued to roll his Bull Durham. Jesus, are we on our way to Montana? Kid Curry laughed. Not hardly. That was where the Hole in the Wall story got started. After the law had it sort of located in the hills west of Billings, the old boys took to working out of a dry deserted stretch of Wyoming. Once the law had that mapped as the Hole in the Wall, we sort of moved her to the headwaters of the Green on this side of the Divide. It’s just dumb to have a hideout the law knows about, you see.

Stringer licked his cigarette paper to seal it. I’m commencing to follow your drift. A Pinkerton man I know once told me he doubted there was any particular place you boys had a hole in any wall to ride through. His name was Charlie Siringo. Have you heard of him, Kid?

Kid Curry shrugged. I got too many lawmen hunting me to keep track of all their fool names. Is this old pal of your’n likely to be trailing us right now? If he is, I sure hope you ain’t too fond of him. What kind of a name is Siringo, anyhow? He sounds like a dago.

Stringer flared a match with his thumbnail and lit his smoke before he replied, I think he’s Irish-Italian. Whatever he may be, old Charlie’s Texas-bred and hasn’t lost a gunfight yet. I sort of hope it’s him they’ll send after us. Siringo’s sort of firm but fair. If we run into Joe Lefors…

Him I know, Kid Curry cut in with a growl. You’re right about him being mean. But he’s dumb as hell as well. Me and the boys has been having lots of fun with him and that fancy railroad posse of his. Old Mr. Harriman’s given ‘em a private railroad car to ride about in after us. They even have their fool horses riding first class up and down the U.P. line. How on earth do you reckon they figure on catching anyone like that?

Stringer took a drag on his smoke and said, Oh, I reckon they mean to just keep trying. They wouldn’t have those horses riding with them if they meant to confine all their searching for you to the tracks, Kid.

Curry snorted in disgust. Well, there ain’t no railroad tracks or even trails where we’re all headed right now. Once we bust outten this timber we won’t be leaving half as much sign for the bastards, neither. I’m glad you ride so good, Stringer. We got us some slick-rock riding ahead and I’d hate to lose you off a cliff afore you could write down my sad story for the world to read. Some of the mean things they say about me just ain’t fair.

Are they true? asked Stringer, since he’d heard some` things about Kid Curry in his travels that were sort of alarming.

The owlhoot made a wry face and replied, True or false, you newspaper rascals have a way of twisting words to make a man look badder than he may be. What does High Stairable mean? That’s what someone writ I was, and he wasn’t even there when I gunned that saddle tramp for spilling hot coffee on me that time. I wasn’t High Stairable when I kilt him. I was scalded. Wouldn’t you gun a fool who poured hot coffee on you, pard?

I might see if he had anything to say about being sorry first, Stringer said.

Not if the coffee was really hot, Kid Curry insisted. When a man scalds me, I don’t care if he’s sorry or not. The point is that I wasn’t High Stairable at the time. I just riz to my feet, smiling reasonable, and announced my intent to all assembled. It was his own damn fault he was slow on the draw for a man who thought it was funny to pour hot coffee over folk. You know he was still grinning when I shot him?

He may not have understood how serious the situation was, Stringer said. I think the word you’re groping for might be hysterical.

Kid Curry said, I ain’t that, neither. You’ll find that I’m as friendly a cuss as you might ever want to meet, as long as you don’t do nothing to upset me. I want you to tell everybody they printed the name of that rascal I shot all wrong.

Stringer asked what the victim’s right name might really be.

Kid Curry shrugged. "Hell, how should I know? He was just a saddle tramp who drifted in one day, telling Butch and the others tall tales about all the wonders he’d seen and