Mobley's Law, A Mobley Meadows Novel (29 page)

CHAPTER 44

The campfire flared furiously as Mobley tossed several dry logs on the coals. He stared at the sparks, pondered their momentary existence, and then leaned back against his saddle, long legs crossed before him. The sound of pounding hooves turned his head.

Edson raced his horse along the river, frothy sweat flying from its body
. What’s he doing? Where are the supplies?
He’d sent Edson into Austin to buy more staples. Jack was out hunting. They’d pondered the situation for two days, concluding nothing could be done. Three minds on the problem had made no difference. If Yancy released information about Jack, that would be that.

A decision had been made. They would track down Ferdie Lance, find him and see that he was hanged for his crimes. Mobley would then resign and retire to Waco. He would not join forces with Governor Davis or his followers.

It was a good lesson, he’d thought, not to allow events to precipitate regrettable action. While he would always be a man of action, making mistakes as he went, he now recognized that doing nothing was sometimes the best action to take.

Jack would either survive as his deputy, or he would not. Lydia would accept him back after this was all over, or she wouldn’t. Either way, they would all remain friends and stay together. No one, not even the governor could change that.

But something was wrong. Edson would not abuse his horse without cause. He continued his hard gallop right into camp, dismounted on the run,
Beauty
sliding to a complete halt on her own. Dust billowed up, causing Mobley to wave his hat to clear the air.

Edson seemed out of breath. “You’re not going to believe this, no way, no how.” He looked around. “Where’s Jack?”

“He’s out hunting. Should be back anytime. What’re you all excited about?”

Edson walked to the fire and sat, panting. He held a folded copy of the
Austin Telegraph
in his hand. He handed it to Mobley and shook his head. “Davis lost the election, just like you said, but he’s refusing to step down. The Texas Supreme Court declared the election illegal, the vote no good. Richard Coke refuses to accept the decision. They say Coke’s organizing his forces in Waco and plans a march on Austin. Davis is mobilizing, too, trying to get President Grant to call out the army. It’s all there, in the paper.”

“
Sweet Jesus
.” Mobley jumped up, threw his hat to the ground and stomped on it.

Edson picked it up, brushing the dirt off. “Now, why’d you do that? If you keep stompin’ on that nice hat, all the pretty bead work is going to come off. Can’t you think of some other way to blow your stack?”

“AAAAAAGGGGG!!!”

“
Damn, Damn, Damn!
President Grant was relying on me to keep him informed of this kind of thing so he wouldn’t be caught by surprise. Now, here I am out on the prairie pissin’ into the teeth of a gale. My God, what’re we going to do?”

“
You
talked personally to President Grant?”

“Of course I did. He appointed me to this judgeship. We met at his office after my confirmation. He told me to watch out for Davis and do everything I could to prevent the situation here from getting out of hand. Instead, I came out shootin’ and pushin’ people around. Now, everyone’s mad and getting’ ready to fight.”

“Hey,
stop that
. I think everything you did was great. Maybe you shouldn’t have shot Oliver’s ear off, but from what I’m told, he deserved it. Now, stop throwing yourself on the spear.”

Mobley put his hands on his hips.
“Sword
. It’s sword, not spear.”

“
What
? Well
, dang
, what difference does that make?

Sword, spear, they’re both sharp.”

Mobley turned and paced his way down to the river. He stopped, turned and walked back.

“Where’s Jack?”

Edson gestured with both hands, an exasperated look on his face. “You just got through telling me he’s out hunting.”

“I did? Well, he’s never around when I need him.”

Edson smiled as Mobley turned and walked back to the river bank.

An hour later Jack arrived with a small antelope tied across his saddle. Mobley was at the river knee deep in tall grass and thought. He looked up; tossed away the stem of grass he’d been chewing, and strode to Jack’s side. Jack had an uncanny way of discovering and focusing on important issues. He didn’t concern himself with the trivial. He found and dealt with the real problem.

“Jack. We’ve got some serious thinking to do here. Tell him, Edson.”

* * *

Mobley walked back and forth before the campfire, hand scratching his chin. “We’re still stumbling around in the dark. We need to find the Governor’s weak spot. To do that, we have to go over what we know and compare it with what we need. We’ve got to get enough evidence on the Governor to force him out of office. The key lies in what we already know. I can feel it. We just have to root it out.”

Jack stood and walked a few feet away from the fire. “Right, then. Let’s go over it. At the governor’s party we found out that Davis and Judge Hooks are thick as thieves and probably conspired to have you suspended. We know he’s also tight with that
arsebucket
from the newspaper, but that’s about all we picked up there and it gets us nowhere. We know Ferdie Lance supplied the
Comancheros
and organized the attack on the train. Mary Sue Doss told Edson all that, but it’s all hearsay and she wouldn’t make a good witness even if we could convince her to talk. We’ve done our best to find Ferdie Lance, but we’ve failed. Yancy Potts knows all about the governor, but he’s involved so deep, there’s no way we could get him to help us, at least
voluntarily
. We’ve got to find some other way.”

Mobley shook his head. No matter how they looked at it, the situation remained the same. He thought of Judge Oliver and the Waco situation. Two judges of equal power had ordered the arrest of the other. Was that the answer? Have Jack and Edson arrest Aubrey Hooks and haul him off somewhere? Mobley would then be the sole legitimate judicial power. He could issue an order the same way Hooks did, without a case before him, overruling the Texas Supreme Court in favor of Richard Coke. But such action would bring massive rebuke, maybe his own impeachment. The federal court would be held up to even greater ridicule. Not only that, Davis would probably refuse to accept the validity of the order. Mobley could not afford to do that.

“
Voluntarily?”
Mobley looked up at Jack. “Are you suggesting we should kidnap Yancy, force him to talk?”

Jack hooked his thumbs in his gun belt. His eyes seemed to flare. “
Why not
? The skunk is as guilty as the rest. If it’s too much for your sensibilities, let me have him. I’ll have him begging to kiss my bum in less than five minutes.”

Edson squirmed. He got up and kicked dirt into the fire. Mobley studied him. Something was definitely on his mind. “What do you say, Edson? Should we take Yancy out like Jack suggests, slow roast his testiculars, and put the fire stick to his tallywacker? That’s what the Cherokee would do, isn’t it?”

Edson snapped around, his jaw jutting forward. He glared back at Mobley. “
No!
But before we became
civilized,
before we learned how to scalp, rape, pillage, lie and break treaties like the white man, we’d have turned him over to the women. They’d have peeled him like an onion, one layer at a time. Cook and eat little pieces of his body, using salt and pepper of course, and making sure he stayed alive as long as possible to watch. The men would have stayed away, minding their own business.
Torture is for women, not warriors.”

Edson turned and stomped off to the river. He threw several rocks into the slow moving water, then sat down. Mobley and Jack looked at each other. Mobley shrugged.

“What’s really on his mind, Jack? He’s been acting all jumpy.”

Jack shook his head.

Edson stayed at the river for most of an hour, and then returned. He held his hat in his hands, fiddling it around and around. Mobley waited.

“If you could find a way to get to Yancy, would it have to hurt Dixie?”

Mobley looked at Edson quizzically.

“What do you mean, Edson?”

“I mean—I found out some things about Yancy at the party that he would not want known, but there’s no way I’m going to allow Yancy to be hurt by it if it’s going to hurt Dixie. I promised her.”

“But, Edson—there’s going to be a
war
. People are going to be killed by the hundreds. Maybe worse.”

Edson glared down at Mobley, his deep black eyes shining like obsidian.
“I don’t care
. White men have been killing each other for thousands of years, so what’s a few more matter? But I will not allow Dixie Lee Potts to get hurt. You must promise me. Whatever you do with the information, it will not be used unless some way is found to protect her.”

“Protect her? Aren’t you the one who said women don’t like being
protected
?”

Edson threw his hat down on the ground, thought to stomp on it, and then held back. “Dang you, Mobley, that’s not the same. You were trying to protect Lydia like a child. It was choking her. She’s the one who shot the man who shot you. Have you forgotten? She’s tough, but Dixie ain’t. If we go after Yancy, he’ll be destroyed. If he’s destroyed, Dixie will go down with him.

Edson sighed. “Look, I know she’ll run her string out someday—all by herself—because she takes too many chances, but I am not going to be the one to make it happen. She’s a special person.”

Mobley looked at Jack. Jack shifted his eyes between Mobley and Edson, then nodded. Clearly Edson would not relent. “We’ll do everything we can.”

“
That’s not enough
. I want your promise. Dixie Lee Potts will
not
be hurt.”

Mobley nodded.

Edson began to walk back and forth, jaw muscles working rapidly. He walked all around the Sycamore, picked up several large logs and dropped them on the fire. He decided not to tell about the incident at the mansion. That was private.

“Yancy Potts has the soul of a woman. That’s what we would say about him in my clan.”

Mobley looked at Jack and back to Edson. “Uh, Edson, what do you mean by that? He certainly hasn’t been acting like a woman. He’s been acting like a shark, the smoothest danged shark I ever saw.”

“That may be, but he prefers men over women. Young boys of a like mind, too. Among my people such men are accepted, but among the whites they are hated. I don’t know why, but it’s engrained in white society. Maybe you can use this to get Yancy to give us some evidence. But remember, you must not hurt Dixie.”

Mobley considered all he’d heard. He stood up, dusted himself and walked slowly down to the river. A clear path had been established in the tall grass.

Mobley knew Edson was right. Men like Yancy had been reviled and despised throughout history. During his years as a sailor Mobley had known of men attracted to each other, but dismissed it as caused by long months at sea. When it came to lonely and a hard pecker, a man’s brain often ceased to function.

At any rate, Yancy would not want to be revealed. He might even be scared into giving evidence against the governor, but he certainly would not do so if it meant his own conviction. Mobley would have to give him immunity, or protect him in some other manner. Immunity would protect the man from prosecution, but not from losing everything else. That would hurt Dixie.

Mobley thought of his grandfather, the way he had achieved his success. The best way to deal with anyone, Angus Meadows had said, was to make them want to do what you want them to do. In order to do that, you must know and understand their motivations.

Mobley considered everything he knew about Yancy, which wasn’t a whole lot. Yancy was a very intelligent, slick-thinking person. A bureaucrat, an extraordinary one, proud of his ability to manipulate people from a high position. Above all else, Mobley thought, such a man would want to stay in a position of power, but he was also an opportunist. Angus once said that men like Yancy would always be thinking of their options, not only of how to get ahead, but of how to escape if things went wrong. A glimmer of hope began to shine in Mobley’s mind.
Yancy would stay loyal to Davis only so long as it benefited him.

A job! That was the answer. As much as it might gall him that such a man might escape his just due, if Mobley could arrange for Yancy to get another position, a position of responsibility and power, they might be able get him to talk. But that carrot would not even be considered without the stick of exposure first. It would probably work, but at what cost?

Must we sink to Yancy’s level, extorting what we need? Is that what we’ve come to?

Almost as Mobley asked himself the question, the answer became clear. Yancy had tried to coerce him, thinking he would have no choice. Yancy never considered the possibility Mobley would rather resign than accept the alternative. Mobley would not place Yancy in the same position. The man would still have a job, at least some level of respect. If the concepts of justice meant something other than following a mindless set of rules, certainly Yancy would have had the best of it. In fact, the result would be a great deal more than the man deserved. If it was less than moral to use Yancy’s sexuality as a weapon against him, it was even less moral not to use it and allow a war to result. To Mobley, war was the ultimate immorality.