Never Too Late

NEVER TOO LATE

BY

WILL WELTON

Smashwords Edition

Copyrights 2010

Published by Smashwords.com

Copyrights on all Welton Novels wrote by

Will Welton are held by

Crystal Welton-Betts

Copyright at the Library of Congress

1983

Copyright at the office of the

Federal Republic of Germany Registration

1979

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This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, and incidents either is products of the author's imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental unless other wise noted.

Introduction

Towns and places named in Welton Novels were all there at one time. Now they might have the names changed or only be the remembrance of some of the old folks like me. A lot of the towns are underwater, some towns moved to the lakes shore, from the numerous lakes the Corps of Engineers has created in the state of Oklahoma, Texas and Kansas.

This novel and others that follow of stories told from over fifty years ago. One of the men who told some of the stories fought under the only Indian General, Stan Waite of the Cherokee in the Civil War between the States. Other members of the family have delivered food and supplies to Robbers Cave in Oklahoma, as late as 1915 until the Officers of the Law knew about the cave. In addition, they delivered to other places near the cave until the 1930s to what people of the time called the modern day outlaws.

Chapter I

There was 900 acres of the best graze land for cattle in Texas. The large ranch house was setting on the bank of Gruber creek with several large Oaks to shade the place in the hot summer months. The creek had never gone dry even in the worse drought. Two large corrals attached to the horse barn and the bunkhouse with the cook shack was setting farther up the creek. Old man Jones had died ten years ago and the old lady had wasted away.

Fred Jones had made a decision to move farther north and maybe even westward. The buyers were to be here by noon and Fred had told the men that the buyers wanted the crew to stay on. Fred Jones had his things loaded in his saddlebags and the tall gilding was standing hip shod under the tree in the front yard. Fred Jones was selling the place lock, stock and barrel. He would be ridding out on his horse with what he had packed on him.

Fred didn’t want to have anything left undone so he walked back through the house and saw the pistol his father had carried for years laying near his father’s bed. Fred went over, picked the gun up, and stuck it behind his belt. After going through the house and back out to the front porch, Fred looked off to the east and could see the dust. He knew it would be the banker and the buyer of the ranch coming.

It took them thirty minutes before they pulled into the yard. The banker was so fat he had to ride in the back seat of the buggy. The man and woman got out of the front and came over to the porch. The man asked, You sure about this Fred?

Yaha, I’m ready to move on and get away from too many memories here. Hope you two enjoy this place.

The man turned to the banker that had finally got out of the buggy and said, Pay the man Dobbs and get his signature on the deed.

The banker gave Fred Jones the money belt and said, Count that.

Naw, I trust you skin flint.

Then sign this deed there by the X.

With the deed signed and the money in the belt, Fred Jones went to his horse, stepped into the saddle, and headed north. He never turned to take a parting look for he wanted to forget.

Fred Jones looked at a lot of country on the way north. As he topped a tall hill on the Stake Planes, he saw the type of country he was looking for. The grass was stirrup high and stretched for miles. Several small rivers ran through the area and off in the distance were the mountains. As Jones neared one of the rivers, he saw there was a rather large town at the river crossing.

As Jones neared the town, he noticed someone’s halfhearted attempt at putting a sign up near the edge of town. The sign that hung on the post with barbwire was a cedar shingle and had Medicine Lodge painted in red. Fred Jones was wondering if this town was in Kansas, Texas or the Bad Lands for he really didn’t know how far north or west he had come. He would have to ask somebody in town. There was a saloon and express office over on one side of the street and on the other side of the street Fred Jones saw a large Mercantile store. Pulling into the tie rack Fred Jones dismounted and went inside the store.

The store was large for a town the size of Medicine Lodge and long, with shelves going to the ceiling on both sides. Looking up, on the upper shelves was yellow and red cans of coffee, tins of crackers, great stacks of canned beans, coal oil lamps, lanterns, and in one section, salted meats wrapped in cloth. Rifles and shoguns were in a rack behind the cash register with a long case of pistols along the counter top. Farther down, farm implements-shovels, picks, sledgehammers, hoes, rakes, and sickles were hanging from the wall. Then in the back of the store was a small dry goods section, with a limited selection of suits, shirts, hats, and one rack of dresses.

The store clerk wearing an apron came from the back and asked, What can I do for you?

Fred answered, Need a few things and some information. I’m looking for some land to buy and raise cattle on. Would you happen to know of a place that might be for sell?

You can try out at the Box L and they might be able to help you out in knowing about a place. It’s about ten miles west of town.

Taking his purchases and going back to his horse Fred put the things in his saddlebags and mounting up he headed to the west.

Fred arrived at the Box L and only stayed for a little over an hour talking to the man who was the owner. Mounting up and heading towards the north, Fred Jones noticed a saddled horse, which was dragging his reins. After looking around and not finding a rider, Fred headed on north and he would drop the horse off at the next ranch he came to.

It was coming onto dark and Fred Jones saw a line cabin back under some trees just ahead. Stopping at the cabin and finding no one had been around for some time, Fred decided to spend the night. Putting the two horses into the corral and unsaddling them Fred Jones cooked some supper and turned in for a good nights sleep.

They hanged Fred Jones in a hurry. Four minutes from the moment they hauled him out of the bunk in the disused line shack, hustled him outside, struggling and yelling desperate denial, he was dangling from the limb of a live oak, the strangling noose of a pliant rawhide rope biting deeper into his throat with every convulsive jerk of his legs.

No expression showed on his executioners sun blackened features as they stood impassively eyeing the writhing form in the moon light. Finally, its struggles ceased and it hung limp and lifeless. A stubby, fleshy man broke the brittle silence. Rolls of flesh, bulging beneath his jaw, moved rhythmically as he chomped on a chaw of tobacco. Well, he rumbled, now the coyote can do his horse stealing in hell.

No one answered as the tight-lipped members of the posse moved toward their ponies, gathered trailing, reins and swung into leather. They strung out, threading down the draw, the jingle of their bit chains loud on the brooding night. The fleshy man, town Marshal Lumus, lingered, complacently eyeing the dim form dangling beneath the shadowed oak, his broad features sweaty from exertion, eyes hard and brittle as bottle glass.

Sloppy in stained flannel shirt and dirt slick dark pants, his protruding paunch pushing against a heavy cartridge belt, yellowed teeth working on the chaw, he waited until the thud of horses hooves died with distance. Then he waddled up to the gruesome form, reached and fingered the dead man's torso, which was still warm. His mouth cracked into a wide, soundless grin as he yanked up the victim's shirt and exposed a broad money belt strapped tight above the hips. In a trice, he had it off. Waving the heavy belt in a derisive gesture of farewell, he headed for his saddle horse.

Chapter II

Men claimed that young Jim Jones would spit in the eye of the Devil himself. His flaming reputation had penetrated the length of the Red River country. However, at a casual glance a stranger would have found it hard to believe that he was anything beyond a thirty and found cowpuncher. A shabby Stetson, covering short cropped, rusty red hair, topped his spare form. A loose hanging vest dangled over his faded hickory shirt and his dusty corduroys tucked into the tops of glove fitting riding boots that had set him back the price of ten steers. Perhaps the more observant would have noted that his low flared holster to smooth the progress of a quick draw, and that a challenging wariness forever dwelt in his hard blue eyes.

It was the siesta hour in Amarillo and he was comfortably relaxed at a cigarette-scarred table in the cantina humorously named Shorthorn. The air was blue with lazy floating tobacco smoke and heavy with the stench Grande. His lips twitched with amusement as he chewed a cigarette and reviewed the events of the previous night.

Despite a full bunch of cattle, the gang had cut out a bunch of prime two-year-olds from the home pasture of The Circle D, not ten miles from Childress the county seat of Childress County, and plumb center of Sheriff Butler’s bailiwick. A real neat piece of work, considered the rider, particularly his idea of staging a fake bank heist that had tolled the sheriff and his deputies way north. It would have been worth the price of the steers to glimpse Butler’s square features when the sheriff discovered he had again been outfoxed. So Butler had sworn he'd set him behind the walls of the state penitentiary at Huntsville, if it took him a lifetime! Jim chuckled. The sheriff must have been madder than a drunken squaw must.

Jim scraped back his chair and drifted idly toward the fly curtained doorway. Outside, Amarillo slumbered. Nothing moved in the heat of midday except the ever-flicking tails of tied saddle horses and the buzzards, the pueblo's scavengers, fluttering around littered garbage.

Little escaped the saddle slimmed Texan's eyes. They flicked over a discarded newspaper, tattered and torn, tossed upon a table, and quickened with interest. He gathered up the crumpled sheets, glanced at the date line. It was a three-month-old copy of The Rocky Mountain News, and to a man, who had read nothing but labels on airtight’s for many moons, a pearl of great price. He dropped onto a nearby seat and began eagerly to assimilate the doings around Denver Colorado, a town that to him was no more than a spot on the map. This was Texas and it had been home.

Of a sudden, every muscle in his body tautened. The glowing cigarette dropped unheeded from his parted lips and lay forgotten on the packed earth floor. Disbelief clouded his eyes, succeeded by that