November 10, 2014

From “The Silt River Cover Up” by Liv Rister

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“Well, this is a fine situation you’ve gotten us both into, isn’t it?” Milton said, his doughy face brimming with contempt. Beesen was tempted to smash the butt of his rifle into the ex-major’s jaw to try and roll out some of the lumps, but necessity stayed his hand.

“You hear me up there?” the calvaryman with stripes shouted again. “This is the 5th United States Cavalry ordering you to surrender the fugitive Isaac J. Milton. We won’t ask again!”

“That you, Ed Campbell?” cried Milton. “Quit your negotiating and shoot this son-of-a-bitch already!”

“You shut the hell up, sir,” the man–Campbell, apparently–cried. “Do you think we’re here to take you back to the stockade, Milton? Go before a judge and a jury of your peers and all that bullshit?”

Milton seemed suddenly aghast. “What?” he snapped.

“I’m gonna be square with you, on account of that’s the decent thing to do when a man’s about to die,” Campbell continued. “Me and then men here, we think that what you did was just fine. Saved us the trouble of clearing the territory of savages. Lots of people in town do too. But here’s the thing, Milton: those ornery boys back east, with their newspapers and their bleeding hearts, they got wind of what you did. It’s an embarrassment to the brass now.”

“Who gives a flying shit about the brass?” Milton cried, a hint of desperation in his voice.

“We do, when we’ve been promised a month’s pay a man to make sure that ‘the Butcher of Silt River’ eats a .45-70 breakfast.”

Milton had gone quite pale. “What are your terms, then?” Beesen shouted.

“You give us Milton, we let you go,” Campbell said. “With the promise that if you breathe so much a word of what happened here you’ll get the same vittles as Milton. Unless you’d rather wait for the Dog Soldiers, of course. They’ll kill you both, and they’ll do it like a slow roast, honey glazed.”

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August 16, 2014

From “The Butcher of Silt River” by Liv Rister

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“I would like,” said Beesen, “to declare my intent to pursue the bounty on one Major Isaac J. Milton, wanted by agents of the United States Government for the crime of resisting arrest and impeding federal marshals in the performance of their duty.”

The deputy sheriff’s lips twitched under his waxed mustache. “You wouldn’t be the only one,” he said. “But what do I care? It’s a federal bounty and federal money, none of my business.”

“I’ve been advised to leave a paper trail wherever I go,” Beesen added drily, “for the purposes of my own safety.”

“Hmph,” grunted the deputy. “Well, you can leave your paper trail elsewhere. Maybe the Sears catalog in the privy would be more appropriate.” He spat a bitter mouthful of tobacco into the spittoon.

“I am detecting a note of hostility,” Beesen said.

“You’re damn right you are. People around here are apt to give that man his space and his privacy. Major Milton is a bit of a folk hero to people around here for what he did at the Battle of Silt River.”

“It wasn’t a battle,” Beesen said. “It was a massacre.”

“Whatever you want to call it, the man mucked the savages out of the territory and opened it up for settlement,” the deputy sheriff said. “That may not carry much weight back east, but out here it makes him a goddamn hero.”

“Let me tell you a little bit about that hero,” growled Beeson. “When he ordered his troops to open fire on unarmed women and children at Silt River, my friend and commanding officer Justin Davies refused. Instead, he promised to testify against Milton at the inquiry, and for that he was murdered in cold blood. I mean to see justice done upon him.”

“So it’s a personal matter, is it?” The deputy sheriff leaned forward in his seat. “That’s a bit different. Not that the distinction’ll mean much to many around here. I’ll write your name in the book and give you a piece of advice if you promise never to darken that door again, Mr. Beesen.”

“What’s that?”

“You’d best hurry. Milton may be a popular man around these parts, but that bounty has some mercenary takers. A group of calvarymen came through day before yesterday looking for him as well, and word has it that the Cheyenne have a group of Dog Soldiers after Milton as well. It’s a dirty stench of greed and revenge clinging to that man wherever he goes, and much as I think he was in the right, I won’t be sorry to see the whole thing over and done with.”

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