Excerpt from "Horizon Dawn" book

He’d take his leisure to plan, plot---then…strike! With a declared and unmerciful vengeance.

Within several months, Ezra Van Gangen celebrated the birth of his heir-apparent son with a huge celebratory announcement bash at the ranch to which the entire town and surrounding small farm and ranch operations, all, of course, beholden to the “king” as they rented their land from him, had been invited. They all “voluntarily” attended the soiree, a chance to socialize, be seen, wear their very best finery, rub elbows with the high and mighty “elite”, as it were, all while getting to visit the grand ranch house built a few years earlier; also, any fiat issued by “Royalty” only masqueraded as an “invite”; of course, it was a “command attendance” with scripted accolades for the elite performers. And, none ever dared disappoint “His Majesty”. C’est la vie!

Over the next few years, Adelaide settled into the routine of the estate hosting summer parties at the ranch and throwing a holiday celebration each Christmas at the mansion she insisted Ezra build for her next to his bank in town. He despised spending money for any reason, good or bad. If dollars fled his pockets, no matter the cause, that expenditure was decidedly “Bad!” But, he indulged his young wife’s frivolities, she was quite the show piece; a respectable man of his social position had to have his trophies; Adelaide was most beautiful. Also, she did not seem to mind the little “burg”. And, at twenty-plus years her senior, he often smelled bad in a disgusting blend of stale beer, sour whiskey-breath  and cheap perfume from his fraternization with the saloon girls in town, Ezra pretty much left her alone. She maintained her separate sleeping room.

Adrian was growing up, becoming a man. Adelaide’s first five years on the estate found her attitude toward the half-Indian boy to be aloof, uninterested, dismissive. He seemed more an intrusion, like a chair out of place in an elegant parlor, something to be walked around, ignored.

As the boy approached his twelfth year, suddenly, Adrian became aware of the beauty Adelaide had suddenly become, seemingly, overnight. That she had always entertained male visitors whenever her husband had been away from the home ranch, at fall and spring round-up times, his many necessary trips to the east for weeks at a time, even, on accession, Ezra’s jaunts to the Albino Prairie Dog Saloon in the town of his namesake, Adrian had been aware, but his “little-boy” mind did not grasp the nuances of such adult-fancy activities. As he matured physically into near-manhood, his perspective naturally “broad”-ened in the course of events.

The young man became painfully aware of his mistress’s attractive looks; and, she sure did smell nice with liberally applying some fancy perfume which she ordered from the General Store where she managed to keep the clerks busy with requests for all manner of merchandise from the east; Adrian had seen the fancy bottles of intoxicating perfume on his mistress’s dressing table when he snuck into her bedroom at every opportunity  and verified her claim that they were, indeed, French, as he could not decipher the strange writing on the labels. No matter, they spoke the language of love by virtue of their intoxicating scent and the boy purely enjoyed the pleasurable experience, immensely at each opportunity. And, more so, with each passing day.

One afternoon, after two long years of his frequent forays into her private lodging place, he heard her coming down the hall and, in his haste, accidentally spilled some of the alluring liquid onto his shirt front. He hid as best he could, crouching beside her large chifforobe, reeking of the pungent potion; the boy hoped Adelaide could not smell the elixir; he closed his eyes, tightly.

When she sounded no alarm, suggesting that she had not detected his clandestine presence within her boudoir, he dared open one curious eye in a surreptitious “peek” when the woman approached the armoire; he held his breath.

Through the crack between the door edge and the style-frame of the wardrobe, Adrian stared as Adelaide pulled a silky dress from the closet; she seemed to look directly at the boy but said not a word, turning instead toward her giant white-silk covered fluffy bed where she began to very slowly and, seductively, undress, seemingly oblivious to his presence.

He couldn’t believe his luck. Of late, he had been hanging around Adelaide whenever the opportunity presented itself, enamored by her beauty and pleasant smell; often, at dinner, he would purposely arrive late so that he could unobtrusively walk close behind her chair, stealing a curious glance over her snow-white shoulder to ogle her ample alabaster softness enticingly peeking out of her gown’s lacy top. If Ezra happened to be seated at the table Adrian made his surveillance and improper appreciation of the mistress very quick, walking rapidly behind her; when the old man was absent, which was frequent, the boy took his leisure, fully enjoying the show and breathing deeply of her enticing love-potion.

Often, she would chortle lightly, but say nothing; Adrian began to suspect that, somehow, she knew what he was doing, enjoying the game, too. Considering that aspect’s possibilities and what it might mean, he shook his confused head, deciding: He’d never understand women!

Completely disrobed, Adelaide returned to stand before the armoire where she opened a drawer rummaging around its contents as though searching for some garment; Adrian could not take his greedy eyes from her exposed beauty; he felt that he might actually faint if she did not immediately vacate her activity so near to him that he could quite easily reach out and touch her magnificence. Taking a deep breath, he swallowed hard as he suddenly began to feel very warm.

Suddenly, she stopped, took a deep breath of her own, then fully exhaled it as though she had reached some decision about something weighing on her. Then, she looked directly at him, cowering behind the opened door of the tall wardrobe. His luck had run out; she reached to pull the obstruction aside; Adrian closed his greedy eyes. All manner of possible corporal punishment mayhem which might be inflicted upon him for his mis-behavior flashed through his mind.

Finally, he heard the beauty laugh; this caused him to squeeze his eyes shut even tighter, trying to avoid the inevitable; then, he felt her cool touch upon his forehead. He trembled.

“Adrian!?” She cooed as though surprised to find the boy in her room, apparently hiding.

He dared a peek at the mistress of the manor expecting wrath and anger. He was surprised.

Taking the youth by the hand with long, delicate, cool, soft fingers, not at all threatening as he had feared, Adelaide gently coaxed and cajoled Adrian to gain his unsteady feet; she pulled him close against her, fondling his unkempt hair, forcing his flushed face against her soft bosom. He moaned, unable to control his emotions which elicited a throaty laugh from his temptress who did not relent in her tight grasp of the boy. They stood that way for several long moments.

“Adrian?” She finally breathed, “What are you doing in my room? Spying on defenseless little ole me?” She held him at arm’s length, smiling demurely. He openly stared at her womanhood, his consternation slowly subsiding evidenced by an ever widening bedeviled grin.

“Adrian?” she repeated. “I asked you a simple question; offer an answer, please.”

Swallowing hard, Adrian tried to speak; the lie caught in his throat as a high pitched voice whistled, embarrassing the youth even further.

“No, ma’am,” he managed. Then, quickly, “I mean, yes ma’am.” Then, “I mean, I’m sorry.”

Adelaide turned her hand so that the back of it touched his flushed cheek as it gently caressed the tender softness; she smiled; he enjoyed the soft coolness of her alabaster skin.

“It’s alright, boy,” she comforted, “I understand your curiosity; about women, I mean. It’s only natural for a young man your age. Really. I’m not going to tell anyone; especially not Ezra.

“You just behave yourself, Adrian, and we’ll keep this our little secret. I can teach you a lot.”

And, in the next two years, as the boy grew in strength becoming a full grown man, Adelaide did exactly as she had promised. Many hot summer afternoons, whenever Ezra was out on the range or busy with ranch work, or on his several-times-a-year business trips, the young wife took Adrian under her wing, so to speak, and schooled the youth in the ways of love. Adelaide possessed great skills as a devoted teacher and Adrian proved to be a willing and expert student.

On one of those passionate summer afternoons, when Adrian had reached the age of seventeen, half-brother, Hyatt, then ten, burst into his mother’s room, unannounced, catching the amorous couple entertaining one another in a most compromising position.

No child, male or female, grows up on a working ranch or farm and long remains naïve to the natural ways of male and female for very long; Hyatt knew full-well the myriad implications of his untoward discovery; such highly flammable information could prove very useful. Indeed!

Adelaide chased her young lover from the bed, then, bargained a truce with her young son.

Hyatt hated Adrian for the affair with his mother, but, he let his acumen for cunning business dictate his smooth handling of the matter. His half-brother must vacate the ranch, never to return, thus precluding any inheritance the old man might somehow feel stupidly obligated to leave the half-breed ne’er-do-well. Where he went did not matter, so long as Adrian agreed to never come home looking for a handout. Adrian thought the deal most favorable; he was ready to spread his wings, anyhow. And, too, he suddenly realized, Adelaide was getting old, leaving the youth dissatisfied with their amorous adventures, of late. He jumped at the chance to take his leave.

As for Adelaide? Well, Hyatt forced his mother into little more than a miserable life as an indentured servant to his will and every whim; he was not unkind, but, did demand loyalty to which condition Adelaide willingly acquiesced. Her role as apparent mistress of the mansion remained; being careful not to alert Ezra to anything, the pair continued as son and mother.

Adrian drifted generally east, determined to get a taste of the wild St. Louis lifestyle. But, fate has a nasty way of derailing most plans and quickly interceded to lead the boy further astray.

Working his way down through Iowa and into Missouri doing odd jobs wherever he could find work in the scattered, sparsely populated towns across the new frontier, the young man took to drinking too much and working too little. Mostly sleeping in livery lofts, often without procuring permission of the proprietor before making himself at home. He drifted even further south through the “Show-me” state, reluctant to cross the ole Mississippi River into Illinois as the Union army was always on the prowl for young cannon fodder in its battle with the Confederacy; Adrian wanted no part of that debacle. He correctly figured that no matter who won the altercation, ultimately, in reality, there would be no true winners, save the politicos.

In that “mature” assessment, the naïve teenager was absolutely correct. Indeed! And, always!

In a saloon one hot August night, about the time the conflict between the states had been raging for more than three years, or so, Adrian sipped warm beer from a dirty glass as he leaned the back of a rickety chair against the wall and watched a five-handed poker game. Such easy entertainment passed the time; anyway, the two saloon girls were ugly, smelled bad with even worse manners, save for customers with jingle in their pockets and pointedly avoided the likes of the plow-boy too poor to pay attention. Sulking in his depression and nursing his flat beverage, the boy hardly noticed when the game broke up and three of the gamblers retreated to the bar seeking the attentions of the “ugly” painted-ladies who, somehow, looked better as the night wore on causing the warm beer washing down amber whiskey-swill to “pretty” them up, some!?

The remaining two men, rough cut and dressed in non-descript attire, sat close together whispering back and forth, ignoring the youth half-asleep in his chair leaning against the wall.

Adrian’s vacant daydreaming about nothing in particular was jolted to attention when he overheard one of the cowboys say, “Coon Dog believes we can tree that there town,” he boasted, getting a little too loud, causing his mate to elbow him hard in the side to shush him.

“Damn! Roscoe!” Sore ribs complained. “That hurt!” He rubbed the tender side injury.

“Quiet! You Idiot!” Rebuffed Roscoe, calling his friend by his acquired nickname. “You want to tell the whole damned world about it?” He shook his head, eyeing the boy in the chair who was now watching them, intently.

“Oh!” Idiot whined. “Hell! He ain’t nothing but a damn boy.” Then, checking himself, he said to Adrian, “Hey, kid. You didn’t hear nothing we was talking about now, did ya?”

Roscoe rolled his eyes as the boy remained, wisely, silent.

Roscoe rose, grabbing his hat from the table top and said, gruffly, “Let’s go, Idiot.”

Idiot took the command and got to his feet, following his leader out the batwing doors to the board walk out front of the saloon but taking full advantage to get one final eyeful of the fine looks of the bar maids, suddenly wishing Roscoe had more patience; that Lucy Ellen sure was pretty, and, smelled “not too bad”, too.

“Well! Hell! Maybe next time?” Came Idiot’s final hopeful lament.

As soon as the pair reached the walkway, Adrian quietly slid along the wall and exited the barroom through an open window into an alley which led to the street out front. At the corner of the building, he chanced a peek around the edge of the building; Roscoe and Idiot were headed his way. The boy secreted himself in a handy wooden open-ended crate, biding his time.

The boots of the pair approached his position as he mentally mapped their progress by the hollow thudding of hob-nail boot heels scraping across the rough-sawn boards of the wooden walkway. When the men reached the alley and stepped off into the dirt of the alley, Adrian heard the altercation of a scuffle and, among several mean grunts and thumping punches, some of the vilest curse words the boy had yet witnessed.

Suddenly, one of the men slammed against the wall directly in front of Adrian’s hurriedly-decided, and, poorly-chosen, hiding place.

Blood trickled from Idiot’s mouth and his nose was smashed; his dark eyes fell on the frightened face of the boy from the saloon who had overheard his comments. His own eyes widened and he held his hand forward to forestall Roscoe’s threatened continuing rage.

“Hold it! Roscoe!” Idiot nearly yelled. “Just look-y what I found me.” He pointed.

Roscoe peered in, then roughly grabbed Adrian by the shirtfront with a ham-sized fist and literally plucked the boy bodily from his faux security, such as it was; evil death threatened in the bully’s dark, pernicious stare.

“Boy!” Roscoe began, “I’m only asking you once; you lie? You die! Right here! Right now!”

Adrian felt a pointed-pain in his neck; his darting eyes caught the glint of an Arkansas “toothpick”. He felt warm blood trickle down his skin; if Roscoe pushed just a tiny bit harder---Adios! Adrian swallowed, hard! Hoping it would not be his last time to be able to do so.

“You spying on us in there, boy?” Roscoe spat the words, warning, “Don’t lie to me!”

Adrian tried to swallow, again, this time his mouth so dry from fear that he had no saliva left; Roscoe pressed the honed blade a bit harder with the dagger tip now severely paining the youth.

“N-No! Sir!” Adrian finally managed. He swallowed, a little, quickly adding, “I just wondered if I might join up with you men. I’m on my own; ain’t had a decent meal in two days.”

“Aw! Roscoe!” Butted-in Idiot, “Let the kid go; he don’t know nothing.”

Roscoe glared at his partner. “Maybe?” He said, unconvinced, and---worse…undecided.

Some men came out of the saloon, talking, then, heading their way; Roscoe pulled Adrian deeper into the darker shadows of the vacant alley, keeping the knife to his throat; Idiot dutifully, followed being careful to avoid making noise at all costs. Damn! That Roscoe was mean!

When the trio passed, Adrian, in indirect light from a side window of the saloon could see that Roscoe was considering the situation. At least, he had some hope; the dagger point relented.

“Boy,” the thug began, “I might take a chance on you; of course, the boss has to okay it. If he says ‘No!’ well, then…” He made a cutting motion in the air with the knife and smiled, mirthlessly. Then, “You got any experience with horses and cattle, boy?”

That query brought a smile to Adrian’s face. “Yes! Sir! I sure do!”

They rode three hours into the night; arriving at a well-supplied camp overrun with rough- looking men drinking and carousing among several campfires while whooping it up with several haggard women, Roscoe and Idiot took the boy to a large tent; Roscoe rapped on the center pole.

That had been Adrian’s formal introduction to Quantrill. The “Colonel” took a liking to the boy as Adrian related his flight from his home resultant of an affair with his father’s young and beautiful wife, as their son, Hyatt, caught the pair together and used the discovery to send his half-brother away, leaving any, and, all, future inheritance to Hyatt, the “legitimate” heir.

Originally taken on as a wrangler for the outlaw band, Adrian worked his way into the confidence of their leader and took active roles in the atrocities creating their infamous celebrity.

Adrian had drifted southward, later, where he had met, and married, Rosita.

That episode, of course, on the stormy morning of the stranger’s arrival to Sheriff Adrian’s Van Gangenburg, Nebraska town in the springtime early dawn, was all long-past history. Adrian had been welcomed home by Ezra as the old pioneer was getting up in years and needed a ranch foreman who could handle the expanding enterprise. Hyatt had a brilliant mind for business; he also had an eye for the ladies, loved to travel, often taking long “business” trips by his lonesome. That boy was good at making money, seemingly, his only true talent.

Ezra welcomed Adrian, promising, “No questions asked”; the man quickly grabbed the offer.

Hyatt, surprisingly, greeted Adrian’s return with surprising pleasantness sanctioning the “prodigal son’s” return with a handshake giving pretty Rosita a more than brotherly embrace.

The newly-arrived couple moved into a cabin on the ranch; Rosita, a great cook, took on duties lending a hand in the kitchen while Adrian happily undertook his foreman tasks. Hyatt lived in town in his grand mansion, seldom visiting the main ranch. Adrian settled in, contented.

He avoided the huge ranch house where Adelaide resided, seldom seeing her; she had grown haggard---and…Old! She never spoke to Adrian, but, lonely, became good friends with Rosita.

Later, when a cantankerous bronc which refused to be broken, no matter the method employed, bucked Adrian off, slamming him on his back atop a stout board fence rail, Ezra proclaimed the injured man his permanent appointment as high  Sheriff of his town, Van Gangenburg. He and Rosita moved the five miles into town into a cabin along the river bank where she nursed him back to health; two months later, Adrian assumed his duties as sheriff.

Hyatt went along; why not? No harm! He had already assumed ‘General”-status of the rapidly expanding land and cattle empire controlling everything within a two day ride radius of the town.

Adrian had been “appointed” as ranch foreman by Ezra when the man had returned from Mexico with Rosita; the ramrod of the ranch, a tall, lean Texan by name of Jeb Frazier, had been next in line for that prestigious position, after all, he had been adequately handling the foreman responsibilities as well as admirably performing his ramrod duties for several years and enjoyed a good relationship with the hands who looked up to the man and sincerely respected him.