Yankton

Chapter 17

Chapter 17 Here's to the Ladies

We found Melonie helping Kitty to move around, finally on her feet, and working towards a speedy recovery. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Mark give Melonie a quick hug but just smiled to myself. Mark checked Kitty's wound, and pronounced it healing just fine. Melonie, said, "Dora and a couple of her girls were up here today visiting Kitty. Dora asked me to tell you they are completely out of Tylenol, and uh, condoms." Mark laughed, "Looks like I'm going to have to find a bulk supplier for condoms, I'm going to get an awful lot of looks going into Wal-Mart and cleaning out their supply of condoms." Picturing the scene in my mind, I began to laugh as well. Kitty then spoke up, "What's so funny? Those things really work, and are a big improvement over what we've had to use before, by the way, where are you getting them?" Mark grinned and patted Kitty on the shoulder, "Keep your eyes and ears open Kitty, maybe you'll figure it out." Mark then pulled me aside and whispered, We've got a lot of crap going on here, but tomorrow might be a good time to go "home" there's a ton of things we need to get,." I agreed, and replied, "You're right, I want to get all those guns up on auction, and certainly more supplies, it wouldn't be a problem if we stayed a couple weeks and set the "wayback" for say, the day after tomorrow."

As we were sitting down to eat, an ominous knock came at the door, Cautiously opening the door, I saw the sheriff and the doctor standing outside. "Well, Come on in sheriff, doctor Cochran."

"Pardon us," I added, we were just sitting down to eat, can I get you gentlemen anything?" "No that's fine," replied Bullock, The doctor here wanted to have a look at the young lady here, and I came to offer you a warning." Our ears perked up at this, "A warning," inquired Mark, "About what?" The sheriff sat at the table looking grim, then looking at me, he continued. "Swearingen is down there right now stirring up a mob to come up here and take revenge for what you did to his men." I sat there for a moment thinking, as I finished chewing then put my napkin on the table and got up. "Sheriff, I'm going to show you something, maybe it will give you an idea of just how bad it would be for anyone coming up here attempting to kill us." With that, I went and retrieved my Colt LE-901, Marks M1-A as well as his AK. Laying then out on the table, I pointed to them, then removed the magazine, and handed the sheriff my Colt. "Pick up that rifle sheriff, and look down the sight, look into that scope, yeah, just like that. See that little green horseshoe,? Anything that sight rests on is dead, that rifle is battle sighted for 200 meters." The sheriff looked at the rifle like it might bite him, then laying quickly back down on the table. Handing him Mark's M1-A I had him do the same, "That red dot is set to do the same anywhere that dot rests on is where that round will go, a man's head, his gut, his crotch, doesn't matter, he's going down."

I then picked up the AK. "This sheriff is a Russian design it's known as an AK47, it's full automatic meaning that once I pull the bolt back, and squeeze the trigger, it will dump twenty or thirty rounds out in as little as three seconds. Can you imagine what all this would be like? Ever see pictures of the sunken road at Antietam, or the aftermath of Pickett's charge, or Marie's heights? I guarendamntee the base of this hill would be a landscape turned red, it would look like Custer's last stand down there. Then, we would pay Mr. Swearingen a little visit, a visit he would come out badly on, then I'd burn that whole f*****g Gem Theatre to the ground. No sheriff I don't want that, you certainly don't want that, and last but not least, history doesn't want that, But I will defend myself."

The sheriff studied us for a silent moment, then said, "I don't know where you come from, and I don't want to know, Mr. Yankton, but you've made your point, I'll see what I can do, Swearingen's a hothead, he may not listen to reason, so I suppose you should be prepared,." "Listen sheriff," I replied, "I told you why we're here, we just want to do what we came here for, that's all, but we couldn't stand by and let him force those women into prostitution like that, you of all people should be taking care of the problem. Frankly, I don't understand why he isn't in jail right now." Bullock shrugged "Call it politics, call it expediency hell, call it failure to perform my duty if you like, but I simply can't arrest him for probably the same reasons you can't kill him, it is what it is, but I will not have a bloodbath if I can help it." I looked at him and grimaced, "I don't know what to tell you sheriff, maybe when Earp shows up you should hire him, he doesn't take crap off anybody, he's certainly keeping Dodge City squared away." The sheriff gave me a puzzled look, "Why are you so sure this Wyatt Earp fellow will show up here?" I grinned at him, "I thought you didn't want to go down that road. Believe me sheriff, when he does, and he will, you'll realize everything I've told you and many things I haven't are true, just roll with it." I patted him on his shoulder, and with a laugh, said, "Relax sheriff, regardless of what you think, we're on your side, we won't come into town or try and stir things up worse than they are."

While our little discussion was going on, the doctor had taken Kitty in to the bedroom to examine her. Shortly they returned, with Cochran saying in amazement, "I can't believe what a recovery she is making." Turning to Mark, he asked, "Are you truly a doctor?" Mark grinned and shook his head, "Just a navy corpsman, but someone who washes his hands before I go probing around someone's wound cavity."

"Stop up here again doc when you've got more time, I'm teaching Melonie over there real medicine, sit in on one of my lectures, you might learn something." The doctor gave him a disgusted look, as both he and the sheriff made for the door. "You're a good man sheriff," I said, "Just convince Swearingen that unleashing his mob on us would be the absolute worst thing he could ever do, and any attempt to harm us will be met with extreme force." Bullock stared at me, then left out the door.

Maybe we'd better put off or supply run for a day or two," remarked Mark. :I suppose," I replied, "However, I have a hunch that Bullock will be able to keep Swearingen on "ice," The sheriff understands the horror we could unleash, I saw it in his eyes," I replied. "Would you really do something like that?" Said Melonie, a look of alarm in her face. "Only as a last resort," I said quietly. "Whatever you may think Melonie, we are not blood thirsty killers; however, I really hope I gave Bullock the impression we are. He's the only one who can deal with Swearingen, I'm running this bluff with our lives, and tomorrow is a showdown, if nothing happens by that time, it never will, although I want us all to be on our guard at all times, I'm going to have to get some more food to those girls sometime tomorrow regardless, but we'll play that strictly by ear. To pass the time. I dragged out a deck of cards, and the four of us played cards for a couple hours. As we played, and talked among ourselves, Kitty remarked, "You two certainly talk differently, I've never heard slang like that, or the way you use certain words, I find it rather…Interesting." Suddenly an idea popped into my mind, "Kitty, what's the word down at Dora's, I'm talking about your customers, anybody talking fresh gold strikes?" "Not really," she said, "Mostly they're worried that the army isn't dealing with the Indians properly, they found two men scalped out to the west of here." Mark looked at me, "That sure sounds familiar," he said with a chuckle, then looked at Kitty, "We call them "insurgents, obviously the army's pacification efforts aren't going so well." Both Melonie and Kitty gave us strange looks, unsure of what we were talking about.

Mark and Melonie spent pretty much the next day in study and lectures, on one occasion using me as a "dummy" to demonstrate proper bandaging methods. The rest of the time, I situated myself in concealment near the cabin, with a clear shot down the hill, but thankfully, the day passed without incident. That night both Mark and I stood guard, constantly scanning the base of the hill with our night vision devices. Around mid morning, Bullock showed up to tell us that he had a chat with Swearingen explaining to him the disastrous mistake he would be making by sending a mob to rout us out. He also told us, "It may well be that news of a fresh gold discovery to the south of here has caused most of the potential troublemakers off to seek fresh claims. Regardless, I think the crisis has passed, although I would suggest you gentlemen stay out of town for awhile."

Later that afternoon I rode out to the shack taking food to the four women. They were all quite bored, and wanting to know when they would be able to leave. "Just as soon as we can sell the horses ladies, we had a little situation the other day, but I think well try and sell them tomorrow." While I was there, I enlisted the women in helping me in some re-modeling work around the shack and the barn using wood from the tumbled down shack up the road.

While we worked, I asked, and learned about the life of Chicago "city girls," women who maintained a staunch Victorian attitude, but as Professor Harold Hill proclaimed in the "Music Man," were the "sadder, but wiser girl." Both Mark and I really had to watch our language around these women, language that wouldn't phase a modern girl brought gasps of horror as well as stern admonishment from them.

The next day Mark and I returned, and took the horses up to Central City and sold them for more than we figured, the fresh gold strike sheriff Bullock told us about had fueled a high demand for horses, we netted close to two hundred and twenty dollars each for the horses and saddles. I gave each woman one hundred and ten dollars, and the following day Mark and I took Jenny and Rebecca over to Cheyenne crossing, and made sure they got on the stage all right. We asked them to write once they got to where they were going. As I was giving them our address, I inadvertently gave them the zip code for Deadwood. "Uh sorry girls, a little too early for that yet."