“I see,” Frémont said. “Well, I’m glad to hear that.” He stroked his chin, then picked something up from his desk. “He wrote me a letter, you know.”
“Yes, sir, so he said.”
“It was about the trial of Matt Jensen,” the governor continued.
“Yes, sir.”
“What do you know about the trial?” Governor Frémont asked.
“Only what I learned while I was there,” Kyle replied. “And from what I have learned, the trial was a gross miscarriage of justice. In fact, the word justice can hardly be applied. Cummins was both the arresting officer and, in the case of the trial, the judge. And the shooting, trial, and conviction all happened within less than an hour. I don’t see how a trial like that could possibly be fair. The only thing that kept it from being a lynching was the fact that they were sending Jensen to Yuma to be hanged.”
“Do you think Jensen killed Deputy Gillis?”
“Oh, there is no question that he did. But I also heard from an eyewitness who testified that he saw the deputy draw first.”
“Do you believe the witness?”
“Yes, Governor, I believe him. On top of that, from everything I have been able to find out about Matt Jensen, there is nothing that would make me think he could kill a man in cold blood.”
“Do you know Matt Jensen?” Governor Frémont asked.
Kyle shook his head. “Not exactly. I met him at the train wreck, though I didn’t know at the time who he was. He was working to pull people from the wreckage, and he helped Doc Presnell attend to the injured. And also it seems anyone who ran into him has nothing but praise for the man.”
“Let me tell you what I know about Matt Jensen,” Governor Frémont said.
“You know him?” Kyle asked, surprised by the comment.
“No, but Governor John Routt of Colorado does. I checked with neighboring states and this is what I got back from Governor Routt.”
Frémont began reading from a sheet of paper:
“Last winter during an attempted train robbery, some bandits killed both the engineer and the fireman of the Midnight Flyer. Now, the dead-man’s throttle is supposed to stop the train anytime the engineer is incapacitated, but it failed, and rather than stopping the train as the bandits planned, their actions caused a runaway train. Matt Jensen was a passenger on that train. And while he knew nothing about the attempted holdup, he did realize rather quickly that the train was in great danger. He knew also that somehow he would have to get to the engine.
The only way for him to get to the engine was to crawl along the top of the swaying, ice-covered cars on a train that was speeding through the dark at sixty miles per hour. Matt finally managed to reach the engine and stop the train, just before it rounded a sharp turn. Had he not succeeded, the speed they were traveling would have sent the train, and all 131 passengers over the side of a mountain to a sure and certain death.
As governor of the State of Colorado, I issued a proclamation declaring a day to be officially entered into the State historical records, as Matthew Jensen Day.”
Frémont put the paper down. “Does that sound like someone who would kill in cold blood?”
“No, sir, it doesn’t,” Kyle said. “That’s more like the person I saw at the site of the train wreck.”
“But Marshal Cummins believes him to be a murderer,” Frémont said.
“He either believes it, or has reason to want others to believe it,” Kyle said.
“Does Marshal Cummins have everything under control?”
“Yes,” Kyle said. “If you call having the entire town under his thumb as being ‘under control.’”
“Under his thumb?”
“Governor, Marshal Cummins has six deputies to help him keep control.”
“Isn’t that a little excessive?” Governor Frémont asked.
“Excessive? Yes, and much more than a little excessive,” Kyle said. “If I had my way, that town would be cleaned up and Cummins would be gone.”
“You do have your way,” Governor Frémont replied.
“I beg your pardon?”
“I am overturning the results of the trial,” Frémont said. “I am granting Matt Jensen a full and complete pardon. It would probably be better to have a new trial so he could be completely absolved—but in the meantime, the pardon will have to do. I also have something else I want you to look into.”
“What is that?”
Governor Frémont picked up a letter from his desk.
“This is a letter from a man named Ronald Jerome,” the governor said, handing it to Kyle. “He was my adjutant during the war, and he is a longtime friend. It seems his son disappeared in Purgatory.”
“Disappeared?”
“Yes. Apparently Jerome bought some property near Purgatory and his son, Cornelius, came out here to take possession of it. And while Cornelius posted a letter to his father every day of the trip, he did not do so on the day he was to have arrived in Purgatory. Would you look into that for me?”
“Yes, sir, I will.”
Frémont stroked his chin. “Based upon what you have just told me, and based upon the letter I received from Robert Dempster, I am now convinced that this man Cummins has no right to occupy the office of city marshal. Unfortunately, I have no authority to relieve him unless we can find him guilty of a felony. I’m going to give you that responsibility.”
“That is quite a responsibility,” Kyle said.
“I know that you can handle it. But first, I want you to find this man Matt Jensen, and inform him that he is no longer wanted for the murder of this man”—the governor checked a piece of paper—“Moe Gillis. I don’t want that hanging over his head much longer. When someone is wanted for murder, they are sometimes pressed into doing things they would not otherwise do. I think it is important that we notify him as quickly as we can.”
“I agree,” Kyle said. “I’m not exactly sure how we are going to do that, but I agree with you that it does need to be done.”
When Paco Bustamante rode into Choulic, he saw a small group of people standing in front of the hardware store. At first, he didn’t know what they were looking at, but then he saw a coffin, standing upright. Riding over toward it, he was startled to see that the coffin was occupied by a body.
The body was that of Emerson Bates.
There was a sign above the coffin.
Ebeneezer Cartwright
SEE ME
for all your undertaking needs.
“I think it is disgusting to put a body on display like that just to advertise your work,” a woman in the crowd said.
“Well, from what I heard, his throat was cut and he looked pretty bad. I reckon ole Cartwright is some pleased with his work,” a man answered.
“Besides which, didn’t nobody know where Bates came from, so it ain’t like he’s goin’ to have kin to complain,” another said.
One of the other men laughed. “And the only friend he had rode out of town butt-naked.”
Paco hung back as the men in the group told and retold, with great relish, the story of Cletus Odom leaping through a window on the second floor, then, without a stitch of clothes, riding out of town.
“I never thought of Odom as bein’ someone who would run from anyone,” another said. “Who was he runnin’ from?”
“He was runnin’ from the same person who killed Bates. His name was Cavanaugh.”
“Oh, yeah, I know who you are talkin’ about. Fact of it is, Cavanaugh is still in town, stayin’ over to the Homestead Hotel. He’s been askin’ a lot of questions. He’s trying to find the ones who wrecked that train a couple of weeks ago. I think he’s a lawman or somethin’.”
“He says he ain’t no lawman. He says he just wants revenge against the ones who wrecked the train and killed all those people.”