Yankton

Chapter 55

Chapter 55 Getting Hitched

We found the clerk in a clapboard office set off from the main street. Deadwood history told me a much better county building would be coming soon…Just not right now. The man informed me that all parties were required to be present before he could issue the license.

"I must ascertain that all parties are of legal age, of sound mind and are not related, as well as not currently married. When I issue the license, it will be good for a period of thirty days.

So it looked like we would have to make another trip back down here to Deadwood, and rather soon before the reverend showed up. I remembered that I needed ammo for the Spencer, so I stopped by a gun shop I didn't go too much but it was on this end of town.

Every time I went into a gun shop…Any gun shop, I checked the owner's used guns inventory. This time was no exception, I didn't really see anything that caught my eye, but Colin brought my attention to a muzzle loading rifle that was in rather good shape. I learned early on not to overlook muzzle loaders, or even on occasion flintlocks.

The rifle was an English Whitworth military target rifle, (I would have to ask Oliver about this) I was looking at a military-style target model and a 33 inch barrel. The front and rear sights were definitely target sights, and it looked well taken care of.

"Fellow brought that in two weeks ago," explained the shop owner. "Traded it for a Winchester then walked out. Folks around here don't have much use for them ole muskets."

Well I knew it wasn't a musket, but the name "Whitworth" kept nagging my brain, aside from the fact that one of our regulars was an English "remittance" man named Oliver Whitworth. I had read something about these rifles before, I knew the south bought them from England during the civil war, but that was all.

"How much?" I asked.

"Well since it's been around here to long, and I honestly can't figure out what it shoots, I'll let ya have it for ten." I bought it along with the last three boxes of .52 caliber the guy had. Colin asked me,

"What did you buy a gun ya can't shoot for Mr. Yankton?" I grinned at him and replied.

"This gun might just be worth a lot of money Colin."

Back in Purgatory, I called a general meeting of the four principle partners, although Melinda was there as well.

"Well "little d**k" or what ever his damn name was, is now in Bullock's custody," I announced, "How's Narcissa doing?" I asked.

"A black eye and a few bruises," stated Melonie, "She's still upset about the whole thing, apparently she had a small pistol with her, but it wouldn't fire or something, she would have shot that man herself."

"Well I spoke to a reverend Gale who has agreed to perform the ceremony, I also spoke to him about the possibility of performing regular services here on every other Sunday or so, and he seemed interested so there's that. I also spoke to the county clerk about marriage licenses, but it looks like we all have to go see him to apply. He has to make sure we're all of legal age, nobody's trying to marry their sister or brother, and we're not a bunch of half-wits, at least I don't think we are…Are we?" Everyone just glared at me for my lame humor, as we discussed Purgatory's ongoing money situation.

After the meeting I spoke with Jake who felt sure he could either repair the broken furniture or make new, but getting my sister away from him long enough to do any work would be tough. Right now she was "hanging" with Kitty, Maggie, and Annie, as they sat at the employee's table chattering away like a bunch of hens. I then went to see Narcissa who was still over in the clinic. She was talking with Mel and Klara about nothing in particular.

"That guy who slapped you around is safely in jail Narcissa, Bullock says we might have to deal with his brothers but that may, or may not happen. I understand your pistol didn't fire, mind if I take a look?"

"I don't know what went wrong," stated Narcissa, I always have my little pistol with me but it just wouldn't fire." She then produced a tiny pistol from a pocket in her skirt. Handing it to me, I could see what the problem was already.

It was a Colt New Line pocket pistol chambered in .22 caliber. Nickel plated with pearl grips the kind of personal protection I expected a woman like Narcissa to carry. I had difficulty ejecting the cartridges, discovering in the process that they were very corroded. Since they were rimfire cartridges I didn't want to use my knife to pry them out of the cylinder.

"Here's your problem Narcissa," I said, showing her the corrosion between the cartridges and the chamber.

"The bullets are very corroded, I'm pretty sure moisture has gotten inside and ruined them. Your second problem is that you're using a twenty-two caliber "toy" I've got something you might find more useful, but tomorrow I'm taking the boys out to the target range, I think you had better come as well, I think you could use a few tips on handling guns, and I won't take "No" for an answer!"

I took Narcissa's pistol back to my tent cabin and knocked the cartridges out of it, cleaning it thoroughly. Plenty of Hoppes, lead remover, bore scrubber, and a good bore and chamber brush got the little pistol back in condition. I had a brick of modern .22's but they were smokeless powder, this pistol was built for black powder. I had a Remington Number two pocket pistol that I was saving for the auction. It was chambered in .38 caliber, and in excellent shape, the heavier caliber had better stopping power that the .22 but it was a little larger so maybe it wouldn't ride in Narcissa's pocket very well.

The following day after chores I rounded up Caleb and Steinar, but even more surprising Inge wanted to come as well.

"This isn't for girls!" grumped Caleb.

"Now hold on Caleb," I shot back, "This IS for girls, Mrs. Yancy will be joining us, I need to familiarize her with a new pistol, Inge, and you're more than welcome to join us." Annie also jumped in at the last minute, along with Mark and Mel,

"Mel needs another lesson in gun handling as well," explained Mark, "I'd like her to practice a little with that Winchester you got from Walt Spears." No doubt about it, another Winchester arcade rifle was definitely needed.

I started out teaching everyone proper sight picture, using drawings I had made, then proper shooting stance beginning with the prone position, even Inge laid down, and practiced her shooting. I had everyone wear modern hearing protectors over their ears something that puzzled the participants. When I wasn't working with the children, I had Narcissa and Annie practicing with an army colt since I didn't have a lot of ammo for the Remington. We went all afternoon just "banging" away. Mark asked me,

"Do you think all this shooting will get people coming around, I read in the paper that there's been some unrest south of here, people might think there's an Indian attack."

We kept an eye out for riders, but no one came by so we carried on. The Spencer really got a workout, requiring periodic cleaning due to fouling. Both Caleb and Steinar performed rather decently with it, being a carbine, it was just the right size for the boys, although Inge even fired off a few rounds with it. Just before I called it a day, we held a contest to see what had been learned. Weapon handling got a C+, safety got a B only because Mark and I were so strict, but accuracy received a B+ which surprised the hell out of me. The children did well with the Winchester, Inge turned out to be the best shot followed by Caleb with Steinar making a good showing as well. All in all, it was a good day, the kids were taught the basics, the ladies became a little more confident in their ability to defend themselves. As a small treat I let Melonie and Annie shoot an AR. Mel was a little apprehensive at shooting such a modern weapon, but after Mark properly explained things she was game. Annie on the other hand jumped right in, exclaiming,

"I've been watching you shoot that thing, betcha I can do just as well." Even with the Eotech red dot sight, Annie grasped the concept as well as how to load it and charge it, leaving Mark and I quite impressed.

"I think I like this she remarked, it don't kick, and it shoots more than one of them ole' Winchesters. Amazingly, she did rather well with the targets, earning her the name "Annie Oakley!"

"The real Annie Oakley is seventeen years old, married, and living in Cincinnati right now Annie," I explained, her fame is still a few years off yet." Caleb showed a little more responsibility so I let him keep the Spencer, Steinar was a little younger so I didn't expect him to pick it all up right at the start, but he was learning. Saving the best for last, the surprise of the day had to be Inge. She had trouble at first racking the Winchester, but her shooting ability really surprised us all.

"See Caleb," I chided,

"That's why this shooting business is open to girls as well." After that, he also seemed quite impressed. As a result, I awarded the Winchester to her, something that caused a little concern for Klara, but I dismissed her worries with,

"Don't worry Klara, girls get dirty too!" From then on our little shooting club had two regular female members, Inge and Annie.

Work on the boarding house was going along well, after the carpenters left for the day, Craig and I sprayed foam insulation over the outer walls then nailed up lath over the inner because we really didn't want to answer a lot of questions. Craig was another one that surprised me. Back in Afghanistan, he was a good man to have around, always doing everything I asked of him. Coming here, he seemed to have developed a lazy streak, I was always having to remind him of things, then he started spending a lot of time with Kitty and Maggie, to the point that even Montana got involved.

"It would seem that all this friend of yours wants to do is screw my girls, I don't see him doing a whole lot of work around here." Then we started to notice a subtle change in Craig. He started fussing about the boarding house becoming more involved in overseeing its construction, and putting in longer hours. I hesitated to say anything for fear of impeding the

Progress. Right now Craig seems to be on top of his game, even his drinking and fooling with the ladies has tapered off. Lately, he and Jake have begun to work together, Jake picking up general carpentry skills, and Craig learning basic woodworking.

Before long, Craig and Jake completed the repairs to the tables and chairs helping to get things ready for our wedding.

As requested by the county clerk, the four of us traveled down to Deadwood to appear in front of the clerk so he could issue the marriage licenses. The whole thing took around twenty minutes, but then we had to stop at a couple dress shops so the ladies could buy something more "appropriate" for the occasion. Because we had a lot of enemies in Deadwood, Mark and I kept our eyes and ears open watching for some i***t trying to score points with Swearingen or Tom Miller, owner of the Bella Union. While we were in town, I spoke with sheriff Bullock letting him know that he and his wife were invited to the wedding, along with other city notables.

"Please let Calamity and Charlie know they are invited as well, oh, and let Doc Cochran know he's invited as well." While Mark and I were there, I checked on "Little Bob," who, the sheriff informed me was scheduled for trial next week, and that we also had to be there as well.

"We'll be there sheriff," I assured him,

"Well just be careful Mr. Yankton," replied Bullock, "His brothers are looking for you."

"Yeah" I replied, "Well, you'd better tell them that if they try anything the Wilber family will cease to exist, and you know it will happen, they won't even see it coming." The sheriff frowned,

"I'll tell them, but when that bunch gets a notion in their heads, well…"

The double wedding was starting to shape up as a major social event, Montana had sent word to Dora DuFran, who had already responded promising to come bringing her girls as well. Mark and I had to make a quick return "home" to pick up two very important items, namely the rings. It was something we should have done when the last time we were here, but it was just one of those things that just didn't get done. We needed to pick up certain decorations, as well as a cake. Both Mark and I had a good idea of what we wanted in the way of rings, nothing too fancy, that wasn't Montana or Melonie but rings that were on the modern side and would stand out a little. When we arrived back in 2014 there were E-Mail's I had to reply to, as well as phone calls to return, however as is always the case, there was always the damn "monkey wrench" screwing things up. In this case it was Mark's sister again. Out of habit, he called his parents to tell them he was getting married. The call then became rather contentious, as both parents wanted to be there, but job responsibilities took first priority. Then when Mark gasped,

"Well she sure picked a good time to come!" I could see him scowling into the phone.

"Yeah I…Yeah we'll wait, what else can we do…Look dad, I promise Mel and I will have another ceremony just for you and mom…It will have to be out here Mel won't fly, she doesn't like coming to the future in the first place so it will have to be out here."

And so it went, judging from his voice, and facial expressions Mark managed to calm his parents down before hanging up. I knew that whatever he had to tell me wouldn't be good, and it wasn't. Looking quite grim, Mark announced,

"Wendy will be here the day after tomorrow, she's flying in from Italy, don't ask me how she knows I'm back but somehow she does. Damn! I certainly wasn't looking forward to babysitting her."

""Chill out Mark," I replied, "We'll just have to deal with it, look at it this way, you'll have another family member present, and anyway Mel likes her, Hell! She can act as her maid of honor!" Mark muttered something, before throwing his hands up in disgust.

Since Mark's sister was due in shortly, we had to work quickly, however I had to contact a couple auction sites as well as Alex in Lead over some of the stuff he had sold for me, not to mention all the E-mails. After screwing around will all this crap, I began to respect my sister even more for what she was doing for us. Since we would have to pick Mark's sister up at the airport, and the jewelry stores were all in Rapid City, we picked up the ham along with the pre-made cake, as well as booze, and all the other groceries we'd need. Both Mark and I had the misconception that buying a ring would be easy since we had a general idea of what we wanted, but after three jewelry stores, we had to call off the search to pick Wendy up at the airport. By this time neither of us was in a good mood, and the prospect of Wendy tagging along only made things worse.

Dressed in her blue navy dress uniform, Mark's sister looked all "spit and polish," when we picked her up at the airport. Mark on the other hand was always getting in trouble for his less than sharp appearance.

"Wendy and the navy were made for each other," grumped Mark, "she really gets off on all that discipline and shine shit." Mark didn't greet her with any sort of "brotherly love," instead it was,

"How did you know we were home, we only came back to the present to pick up the rings and a cake, we're leaving again as soon as we find the rings we're looking for!"

"Well excuse the hell out of me!" Snapped his sister, I was on my way to Japan had a months leave so I thought I'd take you up on your previous offer, but what's all this about you getting married? Mom and dad told me they weren't invited, what gives with that?"

Mark and I then explained the whole situation making sure she understood that in order for Montana and Melonie to get married here in the future, we were going to have to work on their ID's a bit, and all that would happen in due time, but for right now, it was going to be just a private double wedding. Wendy grudgingly accepted the explanation, and then asked about our problem finding the proper rings. When that was explained to her, she just smirked.

"Find us a jewelry store," she ordered, "A big one." I drove to one we hadn't checked out yet and by god if that woman didn't locate just what we were looking for.

"It's uncanny," observed Mark, "We could have gone to that very store without her and never have spotted those rings."

"You're not women," snickered Wendy, "Men know nothing of these things, besides; I was out with a friend doing the very same thing last week in Naples of all places."

"Ahh," replied Mark, "getting serious about someone?"

"Umm, perhaps," she replied, but we were just…Looking."

We stopped at an Olive Garden for supper, with Wendy dryly observing,

"Olive Garden is OK, but you haven't eaten Italian until you've been to Italy, there's this incredible little café right in the middle of town…"

"Well now that you're here are you ready to return with us to those thrilling days of yesteryear?" said Mark.

"Are you still running that saloon?" She asked me.

"Sure am," I replied, "Actually Montana runs it, we've even hired a couple new girls."

I added that for the rise I knew it get out of Wendy,

"Prostitutes?" She asked,

"One is, one isn't," I replied with a grin.