The Witness by Alex Slusar

Minnesela, South Dakota Spring, 1890

Molly Harper sat at the broken piano in the White Dog. The door opened. A man walked in—about thirty, wearing a bowler hat, black coat, and vest. He was pale and gaunt in the afternoon light. Shaggy brown hair draped a bearded face. He wore a pistol cross-draw in a cracked leather holster, and his boots and pants were clotted with grime. She’d served worse, Molly thought, just as she saw a dark shine to his sunken eyes, just like…like….

It couldn’t be, she thought.

“Afternoon, friend,” George Brown said from behind the bar with a crooked yellow grin.

“Whiskey,” the man said.

Brown poured. The man slung it back and gasped. Molly heard Jenny’s voice—whiskey set Frank off.

“What brings you?” Brown said.

“Passin’ through.”

“For Deadwood?”

“S’pose.”

“Lookin’ for work?”

The man shrugged. Brown tut-tutted. “Ought to look here. See the new builds going up?”

“Some.”

“That’s progress, friend. Railroad’s coming, all manner of commerce. The Deadwood rush is over.”

The man shrugged.

Brown poured another whiskey.

“I’d like a letter writ,” the man said.

“The girl writes,” Brown said, nodding at Molly. “Fifty cents. Ain’t all she does, mind.”

“She play that piano too?”

“Yeah. But a drunk cowpuncher fell into the keys t’other night,” Brown chuckled. “Ain’t her only talents, understand.”

“I heard you.”

Molly looked at the floor.

“She talk?”

“Don’t shut up most days,” Brown said. “Don’t know what’s wrong with her now. She need to talk for you?”

“I just want a letter.”

“Girl,” Brown said.

A chill ran up Molly’s spine. Slowly, tentatively, she rose from the piano bench. She told herself the fear was for nothing, there was no way it was him. She approached the bar and caught his scent—tobacco, horse musk, something metallic. Had Frank smelled like that back then? She couldn’t remember. He’d been heftier, better-groomed. No, it couldn’t be him. But those eyes….

Fifty cents lay on the bar. He smiled with a mouth like a wild dog’s.

“This is Molly,” Brown said. “Hardly eighteen.”

“Molly,” he said. “Ain’t you white as bloomers.”

“He wants a letter,” Brown said.

“I-I know,” Molly said quietly.

Brown fetched parchment paper, writing imple- ments, and sealing wax. Molly dipped a pen in an ink bottle, nearly stabbing it into viscuous black.

“Somethin’ the matter?” the stranger said.

“Nothing,” Molly said. “What would you like wrote?”

“Say, ‘Dear brother.’”

She felt a twinge at the back of her neck. She scrawled it.

“Say, ‘I’m back from the north, headed home.’”

Molly ran beaded ink on the paper as he spoke. Her lettering turned his coarse mutters into wide loops and curves like wave crests. She filled the paper with words of lumber camps along the Ottawa River, of travel by hoof and train.

The stranger finished. Molly said, “Your… your name?”

“What for?”

“To sign the letter.”

“Ain’t got but one brother. He’ll know who sent it.”

“A mark then.” She set the pen down. “It needs something to end properly.”

The stranger held the pen dagger-like and lay a smear under the words.

Molly folded the letter. “If you want it sent, I’ll need your brother’s name, so’s it—”

“Post office does that.” The stranger plucked the letter from her fingers and slipped the letter inside his vest. Molly flinched.

“We can post it,” Brown said. “Just twenty-five cents more.”

“For a man that’ll be rich when the rail comes, you’re keen for coin,” the stranger sneered. “And you, girl… I don’t like how you regard me.”

Molly braced against the bar.

The stranger’s eyes narrowed. “I know you from somewhere, piano girl.”

“Fort Smith,” Molly said. “You’re Frank Yates.”

He drew his pistol. Molly slung the ink bottle. It threw black liquid across his face as he howled and fired. The air exploded and a hot wind snapped along the right side of Molly’s head. She spun and fell. The floor tasted of blood and cedar.

Yates bellowed. Brown shouted. Thunder pealed twice. Glasses shattered.

Molly tried to move, to scuttle away for somewhere safe and wouldn’t. Couldn’t. It seemed to be happening to someone else, like she was in the next room listening while the shadow of Frank Yates loomed over the painted piano girl on the saloon floor, ready to send her into oblivion on a blast of smoke and lightning.

Like he did with Jenny, she thought. There were curses, heavy footsteps. A door swung open. A horse whinnied.

The rigor broke. Molly gasped and clawed at the floor, scrambled on elbows and knees behind the bar. Something there glistened red and wet among broken bottles. She heaved, sobbed, and went with the sudden dark.

There were voices and large, gentle hands. Something cool touched Molly’s brow and the hot pulse alongside her head. A sharp mineral scent took away the pain, and she floated in thick, inky darkness. She heard piano music—but muddled, like it was played underwater. An elegant, lyrical piece, maybe Clara Schumann, but that wasn’t right, Molly thought. A dark and flooded place should have a nocturne, which sounded beautiful, which was a beautiful exotic word to write but to say it was like ‘knock-turn’ and that was funny. Jenny thought so too—and she heard Jenny laugh.

Molly woke. The music stopped. She was bedded in a room scented with pine, disinfectant, and tinctures. A candle flickered against a window holding the night within. Beside it, a short, bird-like man washed metal implements in a bucket—Doc McTeer, she realized. Another man sat on a chair beside her, hat in hand, gnawing at his thumbnail. She recognized the moony face, skin like cocoa powder, thin bristly black mustache, almond-coloured eyes, denim work clothes rimed with salt—Nate Stall.

A third man stood half-shrouded in shadow at the foot of her bed. A gray man, Molly thought—tall and ashen, his Stetson hat, coat, and houndstooth gray slacks, his hair and thick pushbroom moustache over a serious mouth flecked with steel. He stared with piercing, unblinking eyes.

“She’s awake, Doc,” Nate Stall said. “Miss Molly, you hear me? It’s Nate.”

“Nate,” she whispered. “I hear you.”

Doc McTeer brought a wet cloth and dabbed her forehead. “Easy, miss,” he said. “You’ve been out near ten hours.”

“Nate… why are you here?” Molly asked.

“I heard shootin’,” Stall said. “Saw a man run out o’ the White Dog and ride south. I came in, saw what happened. I found you, got you help.”

“How do you feel?” McTeer asked.

Molly grimaced. “My head hurts.”

“It could have been much worse. The bullet creased your scalp, but it’ll heal. Bandaged you and gave you a laudanum compound for the pain.”

Molly reached up. Gingerly, she touched gauze where it was wrapped around her head.

“You were very lucky, girl,” McTeer said. “You’ll be all right.”

“You… you certain?”

“Yes. Why?”

Molly eyed the gray man. “There’s a ghost there,” she said. “Think maybe he wants to take me away.”

Stall and McTeer followed her sight. The gray man blinked.

“My name’s Seth Bullock, Miss Harper,” he said.

“Mister Bullock owns the SB Ranch where I work along the Belle Fourche River,” Stall said. “And he’s a marshal.”

“Oh,” Molly said.

Bullock came to her bedside, pulled up a stool, and sat.

“What happened in the saloon?” he asked.

Molly told him. The flash of recognition. What was said. What Yates asked for. What she’d done. How she’d confirmed her suspicion before the saloon exploded in smoke and gunfire.

When she finished, Bullock said, “You didn’t see him kill Brown.”

“No. I heard shots.” She exhaled. “George is dead, then?”

Bullock nodded. “Seems he went for a shotgun under the bar. Wasn’t fast enough. It was in his hand, un-cocked.”

Molly bit her lip. She wasn’t sure what to say. George Brown had taken her in when she’d come up alone from Arkansas, taken his hand to her, had even taken her on occasion without recompense. Fed and clothed her, yes, but kept her. Used her. She felt a void now, but with it, something like relief.

“Where’d you know this Yates?” Bullock asked.

“Fort Smith, three years ago.” Molly blinked tears. “He… killed my friend.”

Bullock frowned. “Who?”

“Jenny… Jenny Doherty. I played piano in this place, the Blue Rose—only played, I didn’t yet… but Jenny was a little older and worked. Frank worked the mill. He liked her, and she liked him, even with his drinking. Jenny said she could tame him.” Molly swallowed. “One night, Frank heard she was hosting another mill worker he didn’t like. He went up to her room. He shot ’em both, there in her bed.”

Molly trembled. Hot tears spilled, rolled silently over her cheeks. “Frank ran. The law searched, didn’t find him. Thought maybe he’d run to his brother in Oklahoma, but we never knew. Then today, he just… walked right in.” She shuddered and wiped her cheeks.

“You’re certain it’s the same man.”

“He drew when I said his name.”

Bullock rose. “All right, then.”

“What do you aim to do?” Stall asked.

“Ride him down, come morning,” Bullock said. “You saw him head south, Stall. ’Less he camps in the hills, he’ll make for Deadwood. Problem is, I don’t know him on sight.” He eyed Molly. “But she does.”

Molly’s throat tightened.

“Could she ride, Doc?” Bullock said.

“She could, yes,” McTeer said. “But she’s had an ordeal. Needs time to recover.”

“Time is a luxury. We find Yates, she can rest.”

“Not to hamper justice, Marshal, but her well-being is paramount. And I might point out, any commotion for justice for a scoundrel and pimp like George Brown will be subdued.”

“He was no saint,” Bullock said. “But I won’t abide a killer on the loose. If the same man committed this crime in Fort Smith years back, who knows what he’s managed in the interim. What more he might do given the latitude?”

McTeer shrugged. “If you keep the dressing clean and don’t go hard, she could ride. Any complications, see Freeman in Deadwood. He’s reliable.”

“I’ll cover any medicine you have to ease her travel.”

“Mister Bullock,” Stall said. “I best come with you, sir.”

“Why?”

“This Yates is dangerous. You look for him, and I’ll watch your back. And look after her.”

Bullock frowned. “All right. But I won’t pay your wage if you ain’t workin’ the SB.”

“Yes, sir.”

“I’ll swear you in. Deputy scale pays a little more’n wrangling.”

Stall smiled. “Yes, sir.”

“Mister Bullock,” Molly said. “You ain’t asked me if I want to ride with you.”

“Yates killed your friend,” Bullock said. “I figured it weren’t a question.”

“You do intend to find him.”

“I do.”

Molly heard Jenny laugh. “Then I’ll ride,” Molly said.

The morning sky was sunless and blue over the prairie. Bullock and Stall rode abreast, Molly behind Stall on his buckskin mare, holding tightly around his trunk. A purple shawl draped over her head covered the bandage. Doc McTeer provided a laudanum bottle with something added to cut down on the bitterness— Molly tasted no difference, but it eased the pain. The gentle surging rhythm of the animal underneath was pleasant, and the Black Hills with their dark ample foliage were a welcome change of sight from Minnesela. Stall rode well and was cheerful. Bullock said little and remained serious.

“He was Deadwood’s sheriff once,” Stall said while they rested in the hills, and the horses drank from a creek. “Law in Montana ’fore that. Well-known ’round here. Sure you never heard of him?”

“Maybe I did. I don’t know. Maybe the bullet scrambled my head.”

Stall lit a cigarette. “Good fortune. Bullet didn’t kill you, Mister Bullock up from Deadwood on business, and a sworn deputy watchin’ you now.”

Molly sipped laudanum, settled it on her tongue. “Why you helpin’ me, Nate? I mean, what is it that you want?”

“Want?”

“Men only ever want somethin’ from me. Growin’ up, Fort Smith. George. Even you, when you come to town.” She nodded to Bullock, where he stood by the creek, gazing at the hills across the water. “Don’t know what he wants yet, but reckon I will.”

“Ain’t always about wantin’,” Stall said, exhaling smoke. “I don’t like people who think they can hurt other people, ’specially good people. Mister Bullock, he likes things in order. That’s it.”

“I ain’t good.”

“Good enough,” Stall said. “Careful with that bottle.”

The bitter taste faded. Molly corked the laudanum. They reached Deadwood that afternoon. The high sun lent the gulch and town a straw-yellow sheen. There were buildings of red and amber brick with gleaming windows, weathered barns, and homes with slatted windows and scrollwork. Some structures were roughly made of spruce logs from the hills and had been there for years. Water pooled in hollows and wagon furrows in the tamped earth streets. Denizens milled about the thoroughfare—women with young children, workmen in grimy clothes carrying pickaxes and mattocks, weary from the day’s labor. A gaggle of bearded men in cosmopolitan black coats smoked and conversed outside a dry goods store—some gawked seeing Molly riding with Stall, then quickly shied from Bullock’s glare.

They rode past saloons and a livery. Molly searched for Yates but didn’t see him. A prominent building caught her eye, where “Gem Variety Theater” was emblazoned on a drape hanging outside. On its balcony, three whores posed and postured for passersby. A peal of raucous laughter sounded within.

“Bigger than this,” Molly said.

“What’s that?” Stall said.

“George said the rail comin’ to Minnesela will make it bigger than Deadwood.”

“What rail?” Bullock asked.

“The one from the north.”

“The Fremont, Elkhorn, and Missouri Valley Railroad. I know them,” Bullock said. “Comin’ to Minnesela, he said?”

“The town’s getting ready for it. George said money will pour like water.” She swallowed. “Suppose when it does, I’ll be somewhere like that.”

“Don’t count on it,” Bullock said.

They reached the post office, where the clerk’s records featured nothing being sent to anyone named Yates within the last day, and no sender matching his description. Nearby, a small building off the main drag had a sign bearing a five-pointed star and Arthur G. Baxter, Sheriff. Bullock brought Molly in while Stall watched the horses.

The sheriff’s office was occupied mostly by cells which were empty save for one, where a slender youth sat on a cot holding his head low. A portly man with a thick white moustache sat behind a desk smoking a thick cigar.

“Sheriff,” Bullock said. “Little traffic here.”

“A quiet week, fortunately, Mister Bullock,” Baxter said. “Who’s this?”

“Molly Harper from Minnesela,” Bullock said. “We’re lookin’ for someone, who killed her employer and tried to kill her. Name’s Frank Yates, but he might go by another. Around thirty years of age, long brown hair and beard, black coat, bowler hat. May have black ink on his face or clothing.”

“And likes drinking,” Molly said.

Baxter eyed her. “My sympathies, Miss.” He looked over at Bullock . “Ain’t much to go on... Could be anyone.”

“Well, we’re lookin’. So should you.”

Baxter twiddled his thumbs. “I will. Have my deputies do the same.”

“Appreciate it,” Bullock said. He turned and made for the door. Molly followed.

“Hey,” the boy in the cell said. “I saw that man.”

“Shut up, Halliday,” Baxter said. “You want another beatin’?”

“You couldn’t beat a rug.”

“Clever mouth for a no-good whoreson.”

The boy spat.

Molly and Bullock approached the cell. The boy was maybe seventeen, clad in a dirt-caked union suit and slacks. His vulpine face under a shock of black hair was purple and swollen on the left cheek, and the bridge of his nose was bruised.

“You knock him around?” Bullock asked.

“Naw,” Baxter said. “Broke up a fight at the Gem last night.”

“Broke up, shit,” the boy said. “Easy arrestin’ someone cold on the floor. I weren’t involved. Caught a stray blow.” He pointed to his welted cheek.

“Until the Homestake Company pays your fine, boy, you started it.”

“Homestake? You work the mine?”

“He’s a powder monkey,” Baxter said. “When he don’t cause trouble.”

The boy glowered.

“What’s your name?” Molly asked.

A faint smile showed under the bruise. “Tom Halliday, Miss,” he said. “You get hit, too?”

“Something like,” she said. “You said you saw who we’re looking for?

Halliday nodded. “Finished at the mine and went to the Gem. This feller asked Mose Hornby about work, said his name was Young, Fred Young. Had some dark ’round his eyes, face was sorta pink, like he’d scrubbed. Splash of black on his collar too. Said he hadn’t worked mines, just lumber camps north, so Mose said to go ask the camps outside town. Then he left. Angus Patchett came in and hit Wade Ford for somethin’ Wade said. That kicked it off. They oughta be in here, not me.”

“Did you see where he went?”

Halliday shook his head. “Didn’t see. He weren’t part of the fight. Seemed kinda simple. Sick, maybe.”

“It does sound like him,” Molly said. “You’re a help, Tom Halliday.”

“He really try to kill you?”

Molly nodded.

“Hope you find ’im.”

Bullock approached Baxter’s desk. “How much is his fine?”

“Twenty dollars,” Baxter said. “Kid’s no good, Bullock, nor his word.”

Bullock took out a pocketbook. He grabbed a pen from Baxter’s desk, scribbled in the book, then tore it out and passed it over.

“Remit that. Open his cage.”

“Bullock—”

“Do it.”

Baxter got up. He unlocked and opened the cell. Halliday came out slowly.

“I’d suggest you roust and fine all concerned parties before blaming the first you see,” Bullock said.

Baxter flushed. “The badge is mine to apply as I see fit, Mister Bullock.”

“How much longer, I wonder. I’ll be waiting for word you hear of Yates or Young or whatever the hell he goes by.”

Bullock led Molly and Halliday outside where Stall stood with the horses. Halliday said “Thank you, sir. I s’pose—”

Bullock whirled. “You got no business in the Gem, ever,” he said. “I know your name, now. I see or hear you’re back there, I’ll put you in a cell myself. Understand?”

Halliday’s eyes widened. “Y-yes, sir.”

“And quit the Homestake. Find somethin’ you won’t blow yourself up doing.”

“Yessir.”

“Run along.”

Halliday swallowed. He touched his brow to Molly in salute then scampered away down the street.

“Who was that?” Stall asked.

“Some kid,” Bullock said. “Well, mount up. We’re losin’ light.”

They tried the lumber camps. Half a mile due east of Deadwood a foreman held a scrap of paper confirming that Fred Young enlisted earlier that day to start work the next morning. It was signed with a black ink slash.

“He’ll have to bed somewhere and keep his horse,” Bullock said as they eased along the road back. “We’ll try the hotels, liveries. Then saloons.”

“If he works the camp tomorrow, why not wait, catch him there?” Molly asked.

“Rather keep up the hunt than allow him time to learn he’s sought for,” Bullock said. He eyed Molly. “My apologies, Miss Harper. I expect you’re tiring.”

“Sleep when Frank’s caught,” Molly said slowly.

Stall looked over his shoulder. “Been a long day,” he said. “She needs rest, sir.”

“My home ain’t far,” Bullock said. “My wife’ll see you comfortable, Miss. Stall and I will keep searching.”

“And if you find him?” Molly said.

“Bring him to you trussed to identify.”

“All right, then.”

They came around a hill. The distant Black Hills glowed orange under creeping purple night, and in the gulch below, the lanterns of Deadwood winked alive like fireflies. Against the hillside stood the iron gates of Mount Moriah Cemetery, with scattered headstones of etched marble which trees sprang up around like gnarled fingers.

Molly heard Jenny say, “Look.”

She eyed the headstones and trees in the fading light. A solitary pinprick of amber lay among them. A distant shape shifted with it.

“Nate….” she said, pointing.

Stall looked. “Gravedigger,” he said.

Bullock halted. “I don’t hear shovels,” he said. “Worth a look.”

They tied the horses at the gates. Stall helped Molly down. She leaned on him as they went up the winding cemetery path. Further up the path, another horse was tied to a tree.

“That’s the one I saw,” Stall whispered.

They drew closer. A lantern glowed set low against a tombstone. A man’s voice hummed, low and off-kilter. Molly saw him stooped low, his back turned, rummaging through something on the ground while singing to himself. When he rose, she saw the bowler hat outlined against the night.

“Frank,” Molly said. The shape turned.

“Hold it,” Bullock said.

Yates stood uneven against the tombstone. A bottle of whiskey sloshed in his hand.

“Hey,” Yates said. “Go ’bout your business.”

“You’ve none here,” Bullock said. “This him, Miss Harper?”

Molly exhaled. “That’s him, Mister Bullock.”

Yates’ dark eyes were glassy in the dim light. He looked at Molly quizzically and said “The hell….”

“Frank Yates,” Bullock said. “You’ll account for yesterday’s crimes and others.”

Yates glared. He faintly twitched. “Don’t know what you’re talkin’ about.”

“Yes, you do.”

“You remember Fort Smith, Frank,” Molly said. “You remember Jenny. Been trying to escape her all this time, haven’t you? While your evil’s been eating you up inside.” She stepped forward.

Yates flinched.

“Miss….” Stall said.

“Said in your letter you were for home,” Molly said. “There’s no home for you, Frank. No escapin’. There’s just for you to answer.” She smiled in the dark.

Yates reached for his cross-draw holster. Bullock’s hand went to his side. Molly saw a flash, heard sudden thunder close, smelled smoke as it wafted up from the pistol in Nate Stall’s hand.

Yates jolted into the darkness. Both pistol and whiskey bottle fell from his hands. He tumbled backward and rolled several feet down the hillside. He came to rest against two small gravestones where he shuddered once, coughed, and went still.

Molly listened for Jenny. She heard nothing.

Molly was at the piano in the White Dog. The door swung open, and Seth Bullock walked in.

“Miss Harper,” he said.

The saloon was empty. The chairs, tables, and portraits behind the bar were gone. Only the piano and a faint stain on the floor remained. Molly touched a cracked key. It sounded like a dull thud.

“You well?” Bullock asked.

Molly brushed her hair at the thin dark line on her scalp. “I’m recovered, thank you, Mister Bullock.”

“Heard the judge compensated you from Brown’s estate,” he said. “Trust it helps.”

“Some.” She gestured to the piano. “Thought it might be enough to buy and fix this, but… I’ll go find another.”

“I’m sure.”

“Saloon won’t sell, though. Most people are leaving.”

“So I’ve heard.”

“All this time preparing for the railway, and now it won’t come to Minnesela. They’re building on land along the Belle Fourche instead.” Molly crossed her arms. “Your land.”

“That’s so.”

“Bringing fortune right into your pockets.”

“Bringin’ people, Miss Harper. Civilization. You saw how it gets in Deadwood, how it could’ve been here. Perhaps something new and better can be developed.”

“Perhaps.”

Bullock approached the piano. “It’ll need direction, contribution. Mister Stall is interested in upholdin’ the law there. Reckon it’ll need other things. Maybe music.”

Molly frowned. “You want me to play?”

“I don’t want anything. But to ask your intent.”

“Why?”

Bullock shrugged. “When I was around your age, I left a life that didn’t agree with me to make my own instead.”

“I see.” Molly frowned. “Well, when and where I go is my decision, Mister Bullock. I won’t chase after any old scheme that might be building up. I intend to find a way to live as I like.”

Bullock smiled slightly. “Good,” he said. “Be well, Miss Harper.” He turned and left the saloon.

Molly looked at the broken piano. For a moment she thought she heard music.

Alex Slusar is a writer of crime and Western fiction. His short fiction has previously appeared in Saddlebag Dispatches, Grain, and Starlite Pulp Review, and his novella “The Hot Streak” was recently published in the anthology American Muse. He is a member of the Saskatchewan Writers Guild, and in 2022 was selected for the SWG Mentorship Program. Originally from the Canadian prairies, Alex lives in Eastern Canada, though he can sometimes be found exploring the northern wilderness or hiking in the Sonoran Desert.