Wyatt Earp

“ He stepped down from the sidewalk’s edge into the roadway, crossed it, and came to a halt within a few feet of his enemies. Addressing Wyatt Earp by name––so goes the story––
“This sort of thing,” John Ringo said, “has been going on for a long time now. Pretty soon there’s bound to be a big killing if it keeps up. Now I’ve got a proposition. You, or Doc Holliday if you’d rather have him, step into the street here with me, and the two of us will shoot it out, and, if you’re game, why we’ll do it holding the opposite corner of a handkerchief in our teeth. ”

“ Resignation of Virgil and Wyatt Earp as Deputy Marshals Major C. P. Dake, United States Marshal, Grand Hotel, Tombstone- Dear Sir: In excerising out official functions as deputy United States marshals in this territory, we have endeavored always unflinchingly to perform the duties entrusted to us. These duties have been exacting and perilous in their character, having to be performed in a community where turbulence and violence could almost any moment be organized to thwart and risist the enforcement of the process of the court issued to bring criminals to justice. ”

“ Their trail never led south from Helm's ranch, as Ike Clanton has stated.
We used every effort we could to capture these men. I was out ten days. Virgil Earp and Morgan Earp were out sixteen days, and we done all we could to capture these men, and I safely say if it had not been for myself and Morgan Earp, they would not have got King, as he started to run when we rode up to his hiding place, and was making for a big patch of brush on the river, and would have got in it if it had not been for us. ”

“ Virgil turned around to Doc Holliday, Morgan Earp and myself and told us to come and assist him in disarming them.
Morgan Earp said to me, "they have horses; had we not better get some horses ourselves, so that if they make a running fight we can catch them?" ”

“ The difficulty between deceased and myself originated first when I followed Tom McLowry and Frank McLowry, with Virgil and Morgan Earp and Captain Hearst and four soldiers to look for six government mules which were stolen. ”

“ He was gone about ten days and returned with the word that he had got there a day too late; that Leonard and Harry Head had been killed the day before he got there by horse thieves. I learned afterward that the thieves had been killed subsequently by members of the Clanton and McLowry gang.
After that Ike Clanton and Frank McLowry said I had given them away to Marshal Williams and Doc Holliday, and when they came in town they shunned us, and Morgan and Virgil Earp and Doc Holliday and myself began to hear of their threats against us. ”

“ He said he would make a fight with Holliday any time he wanted to. I told him Holliday did not want to fight, but only to satisfy him this talk had not been made.
I then went away and went to the Oriental, and in a few minutes Ike Clanton came over with his six shooter on.
He said he was not fixed right; that in the morning he would have man for man that this fighting talk had been going on for a long time, and it was about time to fetch it to a close.
I told him that I wouldn't fight no one if I could get away from it. ”

“ So I said to Ike Clanton, who was then sitting about eight feet away from me, "you d--d dirty cur thief, you have been threatening our lives, and I know it. I think I should be justified shooting you down any place I should meet you, but if you are anxious to make a fight, I will go anywhere on earth to make a fight with you, even over to the San Simon among your own crowd." ”

“ Billy Clanton and Frank McLowry had their hands on their six shooters.
Virgil said, "Hold I don't mean that; I have come to disarm you."
They - Billy Clanton and Frank McLowry - commenced to draw their pistols, at the same time Tom McLowry threw his hand to his right hip and jumped behind a horse. ”

“ Ike Clanton said that he would be glad to have Leonard captured, that Leonard claimed a ranch that he claimed, and if he could gel him out of the way he would have no opposition about the ranch. Ike Clanton said that Leonard, Head and Crane would make a fight, that they would never be taken alive, and that I must first find out if the reward would be paid for the capture of the robbers dead or alive. ”

“ I said, "No, if they try to make a running fight we can kill their horses, and then capture them."
We four then started through Fourth to Fremont street. When we turned the corner of Fourth and Fremont streets we could see them standing near or about the vacant space between Fly's photograph gallery and the next building west.
I first saw Frank McLowry, Torn McLowry, Billy Clanton and Sheriff Behan standing there. We went down the left hand side of Fremont street. When I got within about 150 feet of them I saw Ike Clanton, Billy Claiborne and another party. ”

“ As a kind of spell, cast by the fingers of steel and the superhuman flexibility of his opponent's wrist, a palsy was creeping up his outstretched arm. And one twitch of relaxation, he knew, and he was sped! Now, whether from the depth of his own need, or whether the spirit of the master were hovering over a beloved scholar in his dire extremity—who shall say?—certain it was that the very tones of Saviolo were now recalling to Wyatt's brain a favorite axiom of the fence-school:
"Chi para, busca; chi tira, tocca!" (He who parries, only seeketh; he who thrusts finds!) ”

“ Morgan made no reply, and walked off.
Before this and after this, Marshal Williams and Farmer Daly, and Ed. Burns and three or four others, told us at different times of threats made to kill us, by Ike Clanton, Frank McLowry: Tom McLowry, Joe Hill and John Ringgold.
I knew that all these men were desperate and dangerous, cattle thieves, robbers and murderers. I knew of the Clantons and McLowrys stealing six government mules. I heard of Ringgold shooting a man down in cold blood near Camp Thomas. ”

“ Locomotive bell and coughing exhaust were music to Wyatt as the heavy train tooled into motion. At a car window he caught one glimpse of a panic-smitten face—a face with the unseeing eyes of fear, with a red mustache that blazed against a leaden pallor. Then Maximilian Veazie was flicked forever from his life.
“Well, there goes my one big scoop!” said Wyatt, a bit grimly. “There'll never be another one like that for me!”
But then he laughed—laughed in the knowledge that any loss for the sake of love is golden gain. ”

“ Wyatt watched him, thinking He will raise that gun and fire and that will be the end of it.
The man's voice reached him, thin with distance and surprise. "Hey, it's a man. It's human. It ain't no monster after all—"
From inside the open hatch of the globe Wyatt heard a radio-transmitted voice speaking.
"If you will withdraw your—er—aircraft as a sign of good faith, our representatives will come to—"
Wyatt didn't hear the rest of it too clearly. He was struggling with the reaction of relief. Not only for Earth, but for himself. ”

“ Wondering, waiting, Wyatt regarded the Universe. The stars looked icily back.
At last, almost completely broken, Wyatt went to bed.
eauclaire's first days passed very quickly. He spent them in combing the ship, seeking her out in her deepest layers, watching and touching and loving. The ship was to him like a woman; the first few days were his honeymoon. Because there is no lonelier job that a man can have, it was nearly always this way with men in the Command. ”

“ When the last inch of the smartly cocked rapier scabbard, neatly draping a fold of the cloak, had disappeared round the corner, he himself called for his bilbo and cape; and as he flung the patched folds with noble gesture about his old shoulders, he found Dick Wyatt at his elbow.
"Ah, fare ye well, young sir," said he genially. "Shall ye take advice? Then, till your locks are blanched and rare, like these, never believe you have that skill, not only in your rapier play but in any art military, which is not some day to be caught in a trap. ”

“ Next day the kind old lady sent him a pair of silk stockings, a hat, a black silk waistcoat, and a dollar in money.
Wyatt was now transferred to the castle at Laguna, above Santa Cruz, where he found five-and-twenty English prisoners, among whom was a physician, Dr. Ross. It was some time before he was healed of his wounds, but eventually did recover.
One day a man came to the castle with a drum on his back, and Wyatt at once asked him to be allowed to beat it. To this he consented, and Wyatt beat a march. ”

“ Holling had little to say, but he spoke of the rising value of land in the neighbourhood; and Wyatt was a landlord. Wyatt heard with a wretchedly simulated cheerfulness on his sad-eyed, sallow face. What would it profit him though he gained the whole world?
Wyatt had been in his day the brightest and best of companions; but when a man's material heart within him has taken on autumnal tints the man's spirits droop also. Both, the doctor knew, were symptomatic. ”

“ Wyatt was continually repeating to himself, though when he sprang through the door he could scarcely draw his breath because of some mysterious, invisible clutch at his throat.
He sought to ascribe this symptom to the density of the pervasive fog without, that impenetrably cloaked all the world; one might wonder how a man could find his way through the opaque white vapor. It was, however, an accustomed medium to the young mountaineer, and his feet, too, had something of that unclassified muscular instinct, apart from reason, which guides in an oft-trodden path. ”

“ Wyatt, as if unconscious that he had left the great body of his army behind him, and had now the enemy betwixt it and himself, rushed along past Charing Cross and through the Strand to Ludgate, in the fond hope still that the citizens would admit him and join him. In the passages of the Strand were posted bodies of soldiers under the Earl of Worcester and the contemptible Courtenay, who, on the sight of Wyatt, fled. It was supposed to be cowardice on his part, but was most probably treason, for he had engaged to unite with Wyatt, but had not the honesty to do one thing or another. ”

“ It was not long before her confidence in the commander of the royal troops was justified, and news was brought that put an end to all fear. Wyatt was taken.
308 At the head of that body of his men who had been allowed to clear the enemy’s lines, he had ridden on towards the City, had passed Temple Bar and Fleet Street, till Ludgate was reached. There he halted. He had kept his tryst, fulfilled the pledge he had given, and knocked, as he had promised, at the gate. Let them open to him; Wyatt was there—successful so long, he may have thought there was magic in the name—Wyatt was there ”

“ But at heart he had an enormous respect for authority. Before he came to Wyatt, he would not have dreamed of proceeding beyond words in his revolt. Wyatt acted on him like some drug.
Neville-Smith came upon Wyatt on his way to the nets. The notice concerning the holiday had only been given out that morning, and he was full of it. He expressed his opinion of the headmaster freely and in well-chosen words. He said it was a swindle, that it was all rot, and that it was a beastly shame. He added that something ought to be done about it.
"What are you going to do?" asked Wyatt. ”

“ He is now residing in Vancouver, Washington.
Mr. Wyatt has had a long and varied experience in the musical world. When only 18 years old, he began his career as a conductor, and for 47 years he sang and successfully filled this important position.
Mr. Wyatt left his home in Vermont in the fall of 1849, destined for the gold mines of California, traveling by way of the Isthmus of Panama. He arrived at the mines in the spring of 1850, locating on the North Uba river. On account of failing health, his physician advised a change of climate and recommended Oregon. ”

“ Wyatt collected a considerable force at Rochester and marched upon London, when taking the first to the left, then the second to the right, they found themselves masters of Southwark. He had intended to give battle in Bermondsey, and put a cannon at the corner of the street, but it did not go off so well as he expected. In the meantime the queen's forces began pouring upon him some of the juice of the grape, from the Tower, and intimating to his followers that it might affect their heads, he withdrew as far as Kingston. ”

“ After he had been twenty-eight days in the castle he was sent for to Santa Cruz to the general, who had heard that he drummed, and was eager to hear the performance. This pleased him so well that he asked Wyatt if he would teach the black boy of a friend of his how to handle the drum-sticks. Wyatt consented, and thus obtained much liberty, for the owner of the black boy, whom he called Don Mathias Caster, took him into his own house. As instructing the boy did not occupy the whole of Wyatt's time, he resolved on turning his knowledge of dyeing to advantage. The Spanish love black ”

“ Wyatt's hand quivered out in desperate appeal. “We've got to spare her, to protect her from—”
“You seem to have rather a close personal interest in Miss Forrester. You might at least introduce yourself!”
“I'm Rodman Wyatt, and if I'm not engaged to Disney, I—well, I don't know who is! So you see—”
“I see that you're as bad as a reporter, or worse; and God knows they're the most accursed breed that ever infested honest people's affairs!” The old doctor, quite out of breath with growing indignation, got up and obesely confronted Wyatt. ”