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Updated: May 31, 2025
"Before I get a block away from here without my guns those coyotes will kill me." Breckenbridge had been doing some thinking on his own account during the last few moments, and he realized the justice of this argument. But the law was the law, and the sheriff was boss. It was not his business to interfere.
A moment's silence, and then a streak of light showed where the front door had been opened a crack. "Sit quiet on that there hoss," a gruff voice commanded, "and lemme see if you be Breckenbridge." "Hallo, Bill," the deputy sheriff answered. "Yes, it's me all right." And Curly Bill opened the door wider, revealing his burly form. "Put up yo'r pony in the corral," he said, "and come in."
He waved his hand toward the wide flat lands which lay shimmering like an enormous lake a thousand feet below them. Ringo raised his somber face toward the blazing heavens and launched another volley of curses upon them before he rode away. And that was the last time young Breckenbridge saw him alive.
The deputy took the bottle and made pretense of swallowing some of the lukewarm liquor. The outlaw laughed sourly, snatched it from him, and drained it. "Got another quart," he announced as he flung the empty flask against a boulder. "Better hit it mighty light," Breckenbridge advised. "The sun's bad when you get down there in the valley."
"The blamed posse made such a noise coming up to the cabin that the two of 'em thought 't was a lynching-party and opened fire on us. Yes, sir. I could have talked them into coming if I'd only been alone." And so when it did finally come to the show-down all hands learned of just what material young Breckenbridge was made. There were all kinds of bad men in the days of the old West.
The little fellow dropped him with a bullet from his forty-five before he'd come more 'n a half a dozen jumps." But Breckenbridge was a long way from being jubilant when Johnny Behan and the under-sheriff congratulated him on his behavior. "If you hadn't wished those three fellows on me I'd have brought both these boys back without firing a shot," he told the under-sheriff.
A thousand dollars was a thousand dollars and there was no telling what a man who wore a nickel-plated star might have up his sleeve. "Mr. Breckenbridge," the cattle-buyer said as the two palms met, "is here on civil business." The eyes of Curly Bill resumed their normal shape. His fingers tightened over the deputy's. "Howdy," he said. "What yo' going to have?"
As far as law and order went, the country east of the Dragoons was a foreign land; and when Breckenbridge had told the story of his journeyings with Curly Bill, explaining how the outlaw had been zealous in nosing out those citizens whose property was assessable, how he had safeguarded the county's money, then the sheriff saw how he had on his force one whom he could use to good account.
Night had fallen when he arrived and the barking of many dogs heralded his approach to all the surrounding country. Breckenbridge knew the McLowery boys well, as well as he knew the Clantons and a dozen other outlaws, which was well enough to call one another by their first names. But these were ticklish times. The big Earp-Clanton feud was nearing its climax.
So when Billy Breckenbridge came to the house he did not draw rein but kept right on as if he were riding past. Fortune had favored him by interposing in his path an enormous puddle, almost a pond, the overflow from a broken irrigation ditch. He pulled up at this obstacle and hallooed loudly. "Any way through here?" he shouted. "This is Breckenbridge."
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