Stone Cold Joe

By Stephen Porter

They called him Stone Cold Joe because he'd lost his emotions as a child and his face was set as cold as stone. Marshal Joe Stone grew up lonely, and now he would die lonely. The Cloud Hills outlaw gang was coming to Snake Pit, Texas, where he was the law. They were intent on killing him to avenge the death of Buddy, the brother of Turk, leader of the gang and the meanest and most dangerous outlaw this side of the Mississippi River. But Joe, a fighter, was determined not to go into the afterlife without taking some of Turk's gang with him.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Word Alive Press
• Release date: Jan 4, 2015
• ISBN: 9781770695801

Stephen Porter

Steve has been a newspaper reporter, technology magazine editor, PR guy, web and social media expert, and now a book author--which is really what he wanted to be all along. And thanks to the program he lays out in this book, he's also 40 pounds lighter than he was before.

Book preview

STONE COLD JOE

Copyright © 2011 by Stephen C. Porter

All rights reserved. Neither this publication nor any part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the author.

EPUB Version ISBN: 978-1-77069-580-1

Word Alive Press

131 Cordite Road, Winnipeg, MB R3W 1S1

www.wordalivepress.ca

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

Porter, Stephen C., 1951-

Stone Cold Joe / Stephen Porter.

ISBN 978-1-77069-383-8

I. Title.

PS8631.O738S86 2011 C813’.6 C2011-908218-7

This book is dedicated to New Brunswick Country Music Hall of Fame member Dwane Drost. A good friend, a better brother.

Contents

About My Friend, Dwane

Author’s Appreciations

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

About the Author

About my friend, Dwane

Dwane lives with his wife, Gail, just outside of Fredericton, N.B. in Durham Bridge. They are long time Christians with a son, two daughters, a granddaughter and one grandson.

His mother’s family were all very musical and instilled this love of music in him. He has been singing and playing publicly for the past twenty years and has produced six full length albums of his own songs.

He has songs released to Nashville and his ‘Thank a Vet’ song received letters and acknowledgement from former United States President George H. Bush, Her Royal Majesty Queen Elizabeth II and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

He is a shipper/receiver for a local plumbing manufacturer but still finds the time to sing and perform at many local venues, churches, senior homes, Veteran hospitals, weddings, funerals, etc.

His goal is to touch and bless people with his songs and loves sharing Jesus with them.

For more of Dwane’s music and songs, he can be reached at;

Dwane Drost

331 Lower Durham Rd.

Durham Bridge , N.B.

Canada. E6C 1G8

Author’s Appreciations

I would like to voice my appreciation to Dwane Drost for the CD he has created for this book and the song he wrote, titled ‘Stone Cold Joe’ specifically for my book.

I would also like to thank him for posing for the cover picture of the book and presenting himself a model for Marshal Joe Stone.

It is also with great appreciation that I can give credit to Brook and Lisa Estey for the scene setting, western props and horse and gear.

Lisa also assisted by taking the author picture on the back cover of the book.

Appreciation is also extended to all those faithful friends and fans that helped me pick the final cover from the three that was presented in a Facebook contest.

Last but by far not the least; I would like to voice my appreciation to all those readers of my books that keep encouraging me to write more. I hope that I can keep living up to your expectations and write interesting and enjoyable books for your pleasure.

Yours Respectfully;

Stephen C. Porter

Chapter One

He knew that they would kill him. He had to kill Turk’s baby brother, and Turk would be bringing his Cloudy Hills gang of gunslingers, murderers, and cutthroats here to avenge that death. Joe couldn’t run away and had no friends to help him but, tough as they were, Joe would see that some of Turk’s gang preceded him into the afterlife.

He had been a law officer all his life, it seemed, ever since Charlie had seen how fast he was with his hands and how accurately he could shoot a gun. Now he sat, a lonely old lean-boned, hard-eyed marshal in Snake Pit, Texas, just a hop, spit, and holler from the Mexican border.

Charlie had been the sheriff back in Stampede, Texas, where Joe’s parents had tried to settle in 1831 when Joe was only ten.

Joe looked at the dust-covered calendar attached to the wall by a Bowie knife. It was turned to May 1876. It was June and as he reached over and ripped May off the calendar, he thought, I’m getting better. June 13. He had only forgotten for two weeks this time.

Three flies were leaving drag marks in the thick dust on his desk. He studied them as they circled endlessly, not going anywhere.

Like my life, he thought. Not really going anywhere.

There was a time when he would have flashed his hand across the desk and caught all three flies, but he didn’t even try now. He knew that he was getting slower, but he was too old to care very much.

His mind drifted into his past, back to his dad and mom. He hadn’t seen them for forty-five years, a fact which he was trying to forget.

They had been very poor, homesteading a farm in cattle country. Their vegetables died in a drought, winter killed their milk cow, and coyotes ate their chickens. They survived on what they could find around them—a buffalo once in a while, wild roots and vegetables, cactus pulp… anything edible appeared on their table at one time or another. Hunger was his constant companion, but his dad had taught him that it was better to starve than steal, better to go hungry than beg, and one never ever lied. He’d said that if a man’s word was no good, his life was no good.

His dad, Jim, had been hard on him, but he had been harder on himself. Joe respected his dad and knew deep in his heart that, no matter how hard his dad had been, he had loved him and what he’d taught him would make his life valuable.

He had his dad’s rugged, square features, angular chin, and straight nose. At one hundred ninety pounds, he stood six feet tall in his sock feet. He had kept himself in shape chasing outlaws. He had his mother’s blue eyes and sandy brown hair mixed with a hint of grey. His hands were calloused and his skin looked like an old piece of leather, but there had been more than one girl with a wistful look in her eye as she watched him pass by.

His mother, Ann, had never complained in those hard times. Joe had watched her fail away to skin and bones, but she always had a kind word and gentle touch. She would kiss him goodnight every evening and read him a story from her family bible. The stories she told of God and His kingdom would fill his dreams at night, but he woke to the same hardship every morning.

For a long time, he had doubted those stories and held a grudge against God. But that had changed, too.

One morning while he was out fishing for some breakfast, the Apaches ended his parents’ suffering. Joe had heard the noise and saw the smoke, but when he got back they were lying in the yard. His dad had fought hard, hand to hand; his axe was bloody and there were three pools of blood around him where he had hurt or killed an Indian. Out of respect for his courage, they had not scalped him or Mom. She had been running to help her husband, a butcher knife in hand. She had one arrow shot straight through her heart.

Their cabin and barn were on fire, but because Joe was alone they burned to the ground.

He had sat in the yard all that day holding his father’s hand and cradling his mother’s head in his lap, crying until there were no more tears and hurting until his soul went numb to all pain.

That was the last time he cried.

He buried them in the yard, took whatever he could find, and walked off into the plains. Strangely enough, his mother’s bible had survived and he read it as often as he had time. He read about the love that God had for people and wished that he had some of that love, but the pain of remembering made him draw into himself. He had closed the door on all emotions.

He had been twelve, and in the following years he lived as best he could with whatever he could find, kill, and eat.

He had found the Indian village but, instead of hating them, he found a hiding place almost in their midst and lived undetected for three years, watching and learning from them. He never stole from them. He would eat their leftovers and quietly, while they were sleeping, trade an animal skin for a piece of meat. He learned to walk through their village so quietly that no one knew he was there. He learned to hide in plain sight.

He learned to track like no other person, just to survive and cover his tracks. He watched their fighting methods and weapons practice and learned to do it better.

He grew up tough and hard in muscles and mind. It wasn’t that he hated them; he didn’t, but he didn’t love, either. His face became an unreadable stone mask. He learned to rely only on himself and do whatever had to be done—alone.

Coming back to his present situation, he knew that he would have to do this alone, too. He wouldn’t survive when Turk and the gang got here, he knew that, but he wouldn’t beg or run; he would fight and try to take as many with him as he could.

He looked at his hand and it shook ever so slightly. Age was taking the hard muscle from his frame, thinning his hands and face, making his angular jaw and high cheekbones stand out. His eyes were sinking into their sockets and darkening. His thinning lips gave him a death’s head look when he grinned, especially because he smiled without emotion.

Looking around his living quarters, he saw a ten-foot-by-ten-foot office space with an extension on the back holding two cells. One he used for his bedroom; the other was for visitors. As with most buildings in southern Texas, it was made of adobe and the walls were about two feet thick. Two small shuttered windows in the front faced the dust trail they called a street, one on each side of the only door into the jail. The floor was dirt-packed hard from much use and large logs held up the ceiling of planks with adobe a foot thick.

His office furniture consisted of a two-drawer desk, a potbelly cook stove, and a washstand with a water pail on it. On the wall over the washstand was the only unbroken mirror Joe had ever seen. Held on the opposite wall by two wooden pegs was a well-stocked gun rack with two drawers full of ammunition.

Looking up, Joe could just make out the trapdoor that opened onto the flat, sunken roof. It was almost hidden between two roof logs. With the walls extending three feet above the roof, it was like a small fort up there. Snow collected on the roof in the winter to help heat the otherwise cold room.

The totality of his life’s possessions were here and in the little stable out back—a saddle, bags, and one of the fastest, toughest horses alive.

Partner was his gelding horse, all black except for a white blaze down the front of its face. Partner was a one-person horse, totally faithful to him alone, and would come busting through any wall or forest at the sound of him hissing through his teeth, and woe to the person who tried to stop or touch him. Partner would fight like a wild animal, using his feet and teeth in deadly earnest.

Joe remembered training Partner to saddle and bridle back when his son was just a baby. Partner had loved Clint and guarded him like a faithful

dog while he played around Partner’s feet. The only ones who Partner would let touch Clint was Joe himself and Molly, the boy’s mother.

Partner and Clint were the same age, which meant they both would have been twenty-five today. Joe wondered where Clint was now; it was so long ago when his son had angrily stormed out of his life. He hadn’t seen him since. That had been right after Molly’s funeral, nine years ago.

His mind fogged as he drifted into a nap, still sitting at his desk. He slept the sleep of the weary, silent and unmoving until it was over. Even though it was short, the nap left him refreshed and alert.

It was still morning and nothing around him had changed. He had no friends in the town of Snake Pit, even though he had been their marshal for five years. Some people, like Dan Mossman, the doctor, and Ken and June Thomas, the restaurant owners, were friendly enough, but Joe wouldn’t let them into his life as friends.

People had nicknamed him Stone Cold Joe, because he showed no emotion and his last name was Stone. He had forgotten how to laugh, cry, or feel any emotion when his parents died; it was as if his heart had gone numb that day and never revived. He spoke quietly and killed, when he had to, without emotion. It was something he had to do and he did it very well.

Molly had been the only one to see how lonely he was, and she had often told him how big his heart could be. She had known that there was a man on the inside who couldn’t get his feelings to show on his face. She said that his hands could be as gentle as a child’s and saw past his face into his eyes, eyes that were always sad with loneliness and pain.

She had forced herself on him because she could see who he could be, and for seventeen years he had known what it was like to be happy.

They had moved from town to town, marshalling job to marshalling job, dealing death to those who needed killing and law and order to everyone else. As his reputation grew, he was tested more and more by would-be gunslingers and bad men. They all lost, but each time it made his job harder and more distasteful.

He hadn’t let his emotion show to Clint, their son. He hadn’t wanted him to have loved and lost, to have been hurt like he had. He realized, too late, that that had been a mistake. Clint came to think he was a cold, hard, uncaring man.

Emotion welled up in Joe’s chest, but he forced it down. The pain of his childhood loss was almost more than he could bear and he couldn’t allow himself to be emotional again. He didn’t think he could survive that pain twice.

To avoid