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HORSE THIEF CANYON

By Rhonda R. Eichman

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~ One ~
Home After the War

Fort Dodge, Kansas 1865
Ellie Wilks stepped from the stagecoach and all eyes turned to watch. She brushed her silk skirt aside to miss the dust-covered coach frame and stepped to the dirt street below. She raised a parasol to protect her freckled skin from the midday sun. The August heat proved unbearable, and her blonde bangs pressed damp against her forehead.
I should have waited until early fall to make this trip home.
Ellie surveyed the settlement from the rough boardwalk. She saw a saloon, general store, and buildings under construction. Ellie entered the stage office and left a generous tip for the youth to make two trips.
As Ellie made her way to the boarding house, she glanced at the dress shop and thought an order for her garment factory might be possible. She strolled with a graceful gait making her way to the boarding house.
“Good day, my lady. Welcome to the Dodge House.”
“I’d like a room on the east side of the building,” Ellie said.
“Yes, ma’am. The east side of the building will be cooler. We have a two-room suite with a sitting area. How long will you be staying?”
“A few weeks. I have business at the end of the week. I will ride out for several days and leave my bags while I’m gone. Can you offer security for my room?”
“Yes, ma’am. I will lock your room while you’re away. Meals will be served in the main area to the left.” She pointed to the dining area. “I also offer a fine sitting parlor on the other side of the entrance hall. Please, feel free to use the parlor at any time.”
“Thank you, Misses—?” Ellie asked.
“Misses Camden, if you please?”
“Of course. I am Ellie Wilks. Please call me Ellie.”
“I should be delighted to have you stay, Ellie.”
“There should be a couple of gentlemen coming to meet me in a few days. When they arrive, please let me know at once. I will meet with them in the parlor.”
“Are they gentlemen or cowboys? What are their names?”
“They’re gentlemen, I assure you. They are detectives with the Pinkerton Agency. Phil Watson and Thomas Morrison are my escorts,” Ellie said.
The young man arrived with bags in tow. Mrs. Camden directed him to the back of the building. She opened the double French doors into Ellie’s suite to reveal elegant furnishings.
Ellie felt relieved to have extra days before the Pinkerton detectives arrived. She was tired and a bit nervous about the next part of the trip. Travelers needed fighting men for protection. The calvary accompanied any sizeable contingent of travelers, a choice not available for single parties.

~ * ~

A thin man watched Ellie walk to the boarding house. The scar on his face distorted his mouth and his breath smelled of whiskey. He confronted the young man who delivered Ellie’s bags. “Tell me about the blonde woman.”
“What do you want to know?” the young man asked, backing away. The man needed a bath and white whiskers jutted from his face. A stiff white ponytail fell long against his neck from under a dirty black hat.
“How long does she intend to stay? Did she say why she came or where she is going?”
“The lady said she will stay for a few weeks.” The boy did not lie. He simply chose not to tell the stranger anything else. The stranger spit into the dirt and walked to the saloon.
The young man ran back to the stables to tell his employer about the encounter with the woman who gave him a generous tip.
“You did well, boy. You can go home. I’ll see you tomorrow,” Waldo said, returning to his horseshoeing task. Waldo laid his hammer aside and walked to the saloon. The blacksmith knew Marshal Crown might like the information.
Marshal Crown sat in his usual corner and the stranger stood at the bar drinking whiskey. Waldo walked to the bar to order a draw of beer and wiped sweat from his brow with a massive hand.
“Howdy stranger,” Waldo said.
The stranger grunted, looked at Waldo, and downed his whiskey with one gulp. Waldo took his beer and walked to the marshal’s table. “It’s getting too hot to work this afternoon,” Waldo said.
“Have a seat, Waldo, and cool off. You’re right, it’s too hot to work a forge today.” Marshal Crown exchanged conversation with the laborer waiting for whatever Waldo felt he needed to know. Marshal Crown knew the six-foot, eight-inch giant seldom took a break, even in the heat.
“The stranger stopped my stable hand. He asked about the blonde woman. He asked too much,” Waldo said.
Marshal Crown nodded, “Yes, I saw her get off the stage, a real beauty. I’ll watch the stranger to make sure he stays away from the boarding house. Thank you, Waldo. You may have saved the young woman from harm.”
“I’ll watch, too. She shouldn’t be bothered by the likes of him,” Waldo said.
“You don’t do anything, Waldo. You come tell me. I will take care of the stranger. I don’t want you hurt, either. You don’t carry a gun. The stranger carries two, one in a holster and one in the back of his waistband.” Waldo nodded in agreement.
Marshal Paul Crown knew the stranger could be trouble. Any man with a hidden gun doubts his own actions. I’m sure he stores another smaller gun in his boot for backup. He watched the stranger order a plate of food and drink whiskey until dark. The marshal remained seated for a few minutes after the stranger left. He paid his bill with a tip and walked out the back door.
Marshal leaned against the back corner of an unfinished building. He watched the stranger ride out of town. The road he chose led to the Fort Dodge encampment of soldiers. Marshal Crown watched for another hour to make sure the stranger didn’t double back to the boarding house.


Mrs. Camden knocked on the French doors to Ellie’s room. “Phil Watson and Thomas Morrison have arrived. I’ve seated them in the parlor.”
“Thank you, Misses Camden. I’ll be a few minutes.” Ellie dressed in soft calico fabric with her ponytail high on the back of her head to make the heat more bearable.
Phil Watson frowned at his partner, Thomas Morrison, who brushed the dark hair away from his face to fix green eyes on the new client. Phil watched Thomas smile at Ellie when she entered the room. Pinkerton Agency instructions were to not be personally involved with clients. Phil didn’t want the paying relationship with this client compromised. His frown deepened when he watched the two interact.
“You do know this trip is into the heart of Indian country,” Phil said, stroking his beard.
“Yes, I know. Indians are the reason I hired both of you. I spent my childhood on a homestead in the territory. I need to travel there again. The trip should take only a week or ten days to find out what I need to know. Did you bring me the rifle I requested?” Ellie asked.
“Yes ma’am. We have the items your letter detailed. We will travel on horseback with light loads, only jerky, coffee, and weapons.” Thomas repeated the instructions Ellie detailed in her letter to the Pinkerton Agency in Kansas City. The group shook hands, agreeing to meet at the stables before sunup.
Ellie used the rest of the day to select her clothing with care for harsh, hot weather and rough travel with only one change of her blouse and camisole for the trip. She washed her hair and soaked in a hot bath knowing it would be the last for a while.


The marshal watched Waldo take one last look at the drunk sleeping in the alley. The stranger returned sometime after midnight. The stranger made no trouble, only drank whiskey. Marshal Crown knew the man brought something more with him when he watched the stranger stalk Ellie’s movements.
The Pinkerton men and Ellie crossed the street, walking their horses out of town. They crossed back behind the livery stable to use a back road away from the buildings on the main street. Not even a dog barked. They were good, good as Waldo. The marshal smiled to himself, looking out the front windows of his office.
Waldo stopped by Marshal Crown’s office with a bag of fresh baked biscuits. Waldo always made certain marshal received home-cooked food.
“Nothing is to be said to anyone about the departure of the lady and the Pinkerton men,” Marshal Crown ordered. “I think most of the day will pass before the stranger realizes they are gone.”
Waldo nodded, finished his biscuit, and left the marshal’s office to put in a full day at his forge.

~ * ~

The stranger began walking to the boarding house mid-afternoon. “Where are you going old man?” the marshal asked taking a confrontational stance facing the stranger.
“The boarding house,” the stranger answered.
“To rent a room?”
“No, only looking.”
“I suggest you leave Misses Camden’s guest alone. If you’re not renting, you have no business there. I suggest you stay away from the boarding house or I’ll arrest you.”
The disgruntled stranger walked back to the saloon. The stranger only knew the Pinkerton men were no longer in town, he didn’t know if Ellie left with them.
Marshal Crown stopped by the stables to see Waldo. “Waldo, I need you to watch the front of the saloon today to see if the stranger leaves. I’ll be around the back side to watch the rear exit.”
Waldo kept hammering, watching the front of the saloon. “Yes, I can see the main doors. I’ll work from here. Do you want me to follow or come tell you first?”
“Don’t follow, he will know. Only watch where he goes before you come and tell me,” Marshal Crown said.


Ellie’s wide brimmed cowboy hat and buckskin gloves protected her from the sun. She wore her favorite deerskin riding pants. She remembered the fit and form of Annette’s exquisitely crafted garments. She ordered several pairs of the riding pants sewn for her by the seamstresses she employed.
Ellie’s factory employed fifty girls with the latest in sewing machines lining the factory floor. She took great interest in her employees, remembering her laboring days. Ellie ordered double ventilation doors installed on both floors to dispel the Atlanta heat.
Her cotton blouse clung to her back. The three riders marched on. The two Pinkerton men traded taking point and following Ellie at rear guard. They proved to be excellent horsemen.
Ellie rode two or three times a week at an equestrian center in Atlanta. She often took treks into the Georgia countryside with friends on weekends. She remembered her childhood riding bareback on the prairie with Cole. She felt a sudden urgency to talk to Cole and Annette.
Ellie pulled on a buckskin jacket to ward off the night dampness when they camped at night. Tonight, she looked forward to sleeping in the barn at her old homestead. Ellie remembered how much she loved to camp out in the loft. She felt growing anticipation the closer they came to her old homestead.
“We’re about a mile from the barn,” Ellie said. “We can sleep in the barn and travel to Annette’s cabin at first light.”
Soon Thomas, riding point, saw the structure. “Why did your family build such a huge barn?”
“My dad planned to store bales of cotton in the barn.” She hesitated. “He spent a lot of time in the barn drinking. He never did get to the cotton farming. The banker in Abilene told me, family left the barn unlocked for travelers to use. The big house near the back of the property is not to be entered.”
As they pulled their horses to a stop in front of the barn, Ellie noted the shack she lived in her entire childhood no longer stood on the prairie. A house sat at the back of the property, dark, with the windows boarded shut.
“Anybody live on this homestead anymore?” Phil asked.
“No, the bank listed the property for sale again. I sold this homestead to a doctor after I left for Atlanta.” She led her horse to the barn. Thomas hurried to get ahead of her.
“Let me check the structure first, in case we’re not the only ones thinking of sleeping in here.”
Thomas built a campfire in front of the barn to make a pot of coffee. He took the first watch, circling the barn at thirty-minute intervals before waking Phil. They saw no signs of Indians on the journey.
Ellie sipped her coffee with beef jerky. “Good night,” she said, tossing her blanket over her shoulder. She took her saddle bag to use for a pillow and climbed the stairs to the barn loft. She decided to sleep in the haystack on the north side. Ellie began watching a squirrel digging out of his cache of nuts in the eaves, thinking back to the night she lost her baby.
The pains began while she sat in the loft looking out the double doors. She remembered the cool breeze felt good on her feverish face. Her neck swelled, and she thought she might be getting sick with something.
When the pains began in her abdomen, she descended the stairs with slow progress to make her way back to the shack. She miscarried the baby later in the night. The next morning, she buried the tiny body in a wooden sewing box in the garden, marking the grave. She decided she would check the grave site at first light.
Those days were such hard times, and she didn’t want to repeat them again. She spent most of the days on the homestead by herself, after her mother’s death. Her father always left with other tasks to do. She preferred the loft of the barn to the shack they called home.
Ellie grew slim in Atlanta, losing the padded fat on her tall body during the first few months in Georgia. She loved to eat during her time at the farm. She never found enough food to satisfy her hunger.
In Atlanta, Ellie found a new resolve and ate only what food she needed to keep her body strong for work. She found coffee, nuts, apples, and jerky worked perfectly for her. She rented a room with a one-burner stove for her coffee pot on top.
Ellie kept her bills to a minimum, saving her paychecks for four years. She inquired about an older abandoned building near the shop where she worked. She made a down-payment with the rest of the money due in one year. Ellie moved into the loft, creating a living area for her apartment upstairs and the factory took shape downstairs.
Soon after, a letter arrived from the banker in Abilene with a bank draft for the sale of the homestead. He asked her to see him in Abilene concerning pieces of ore and gold nuggets in a safe deposit box belonging to her father.
She decided to pay the rest of the building payment and buy the newest models of treadle sewing machines. The banker in Atlanta acted surprised when she brought in the draft. He extended her whatever credit she might need to get her business venture off the ground.
I refuse to repeat those days here again. Ellie swore to herself, making a fist with her right hand. I refuse to let others use me again. I refuse to be poor again. She wrapped her blanket tight around herself and slept, leaving her right fist tightly curled around the blanket corner.
Ellie awoke to a strange scratching sound and watched a squirrel scrapping a rock against the wood floor. She wondered if he confused the rock for one of the nuts.
The moonlight shown through a window, finding its way across the floor. The quartz rock glinted against the moonbeam with yellow brightness. She crossed the barn floor barefoot with light, sure steps. She didn’t want the Pinkerton men to hear her and investigate.
Ellie reached into the eave where the squirrel entered to find a torn leather pouch and a bound book. She recognized her father’s leather notebook. He began the book when he planned the barn and cotton farming. She searched the eave two more times to insure she found every piece of quartz.
She angled the journal into the moonlight and read. The morning light came into the barn window as she finished reading the entries. She placed the worn volume in her saddle bag with the pieces of ore.
She understood what her father, John, did and why. Ellie could no longer hate him.
She silently exited the back of the barn to search for the garden plot she tended when she lived here. She found the slight indentation in the ground where she buried her baby next to the end of a row of currant bushes. She couldn’t find the original wooden cross. She found some stones and marked the indentation in the earth with a cross of flat, yellow limestone rocks.
Ellie stood by her baby’s grave sobbing. The Kansas wind swirled dried bits of grass around her boots. She felt firmly planted in this place, filled with pain. She did not want to be here on the prairie anymore. The mix of emotions only added to her tears, but she lacked the strength to move away.
Thomas stood back, watching her weep. He longed to comfort her when he realized she stood by a small grave. When he heard Phil moving, rekindling the fire, he left his post to go to her.
“We can mark the spot with a headstone if you want. There’s soft limestone at the back of the draw. I can cut a piece for you.”
“A proper marker will be nice,” Ellie wiped her face, “but another time. We need to leave for Cole and Annette’s place.”
Thomas looked startled. “Cole? I knew a Cole in the war with a wife named Annette. Are we talking about Cole Waldren?” he asked.
“Yes. You know him?” Ellie asked.
“I fought with him at the Second Battle of Bull Run in Virginia. He suffered a gunshot wound. The medics carried him back to their tents. I didn’t see him again.
Cole took out a sniper nest so the rest of us could run for cover in the woods. He saved a dozen or so us. You’re looking for Cole Waldren?”
“Yes, Cole and I grew up together. He married Annette when her man died near his homestead on the Santa Fe Trail.”
Thomas knew Cole suffered a gunshot wound in the lower left side. He knew being gut shot usually meant death. “Let’s go back to the front of the barn before Phil eats all the jerky.” Thomas smiled at her. She smiled back.

~ * ~

The group arrived at Cole and Annette’s homestead. The limestone house at the back of the property, with a classic portico, stood out against the stark, brown prairie. Arches shown at the top of the boarded windows.
A smaller cabin sat at the front of the property. The heavy wooden door of the cabin opened when Ellie pushed on the latch. The men entered first with Phil at the front door and Thomas at the back door. With the area clear, they went inside. Thomas lit a lamp at the kitchen table. Ellie opened a letter on the table in Annette’s handwriting and began reading.
Annette wrote, ‘I’m having this letter delivered by courier. Cole did not return after the war and I’m taking our boy, Joseph, to Abilene to check out the war lists of injured and dead. I will telegraph the war department concerning his whereabouts. If you’re reading this and know anything about Cole Waldren, please contact the banker in Abilene with your information.’
“Thomas, please read this. Tell me what you think.” Ellie handed the letter to him.
“Call me Tom, please,” he said.
Ellie made a mental note to continue to call him Thomas to keep a small degree of distance between them.
When he finished reading, he told Ellie what he knew. “Cole’s wounds were pretty bad. Most people don’t survive being gut shot, but I don’t know for certain. Annette should be in Abilene and have her information by now.” He paused when he saw the pain his words caused.
“We can telegraph the banker in Abilene when we get back to Fort Dodge to see if she’s there?”
Ellie replaced the letter in the envelope and slid the envelope under the cup and saucer. Her shoulders slumped from the disappointment of Annette’s loss. She followed the men out of the cabin. They mounted their horses to begin the ride back to Fort Dodge.

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