The Redemption of Zach Fain

Chapter 1

October 1879

It happened so fast that people could not even get it to register. One moment, Sheriff Madden and his two deputies, Henry and Cal, were talking in front of the jail. They stepped down into the street together, starting across, and out of nowhere the screams and the thundering of hooves and wagon wheels made them stop dead, in exactly the wrong place. It was just a runaway buckboard, but it was enough. In less than five seconds, all of the law enforcement for Stockton was ploughed into and lying moaning in the street.

Jarrod Barkley saw it from his office window and immediately came running down. Dr. Merar saw it from his window and arrived at the same time Jarrod did. Other people were coming, the mercantile owner bringing an entire bolt of linen to make bandages with. The hardware owner was bringing ax handles to use as splints if needed. Harry from the saloon was bringing liquor, as antiseptic and pain relief.

The driver of the runaway wagon finally got it stopped but was two blocks further down the street before he did. He even came running, shouting, "A dog! A damned dog spooked my horses! Bit one of them! A damned dog!"

Dr. Merar performed a quick triage. The deputies were both stunned but moving. Henry had an obviously broken leg and Cal was doubling over from having been hit in the gut. Jarrod was beside Sheriff Madden. The sheriff had a head injury and a bleeding upper right arm, and he was flat out unconscious.

"Get me some stretchers!" Dr. Merar yelled. "I need all of these men at my office – Jason! Ambrose! Give me two ax handles and the cloth – I need to immobilize Henry's leg, fast!"

Two stretchers appeared.

"Fred and Cal first!" Dr. Merar said, working on Henry's leg. "Get them to my office and then get back over here for Henry."

As men began to get the sheriff and Cal onto stretchers, Jarrod said, "Doc, as soon as you get that leg stable, I'll stay with Henry until they come get him. You need to get to your office."

"Thanks, Jarrod, keep this leg still while I get some of this cloth around it to hold it," Dr. Merar said. "Somebody! Get over to the insane asylum and get Dr. Seymour over here to help me!"

Soon, things began to get orderly. By the time Dr. Merar had Henry's leg immobilized, the deputy was beginning to understand what was going on – and to hurt. He suddenly almost screamed with pain. Dr. Merar calmed him and told him his leg was stable now, and before long someone returned with a stretcher. Dr. Merar ran ahead, over to his office. Jarrod stayed beside Henry as two men carried him over there.

Things began to get back to normal in the street within half an hour, but the work at Dr. Merar's office was taking a lot longer. The sheriff still hadn't regained consciousness after an hour and half, and the doctor realized he was going to have to operate on Cal to repair internal damage. Henry was conscious, but Dr. Merar was about to give him laudanum for the pain, so Henry grabbed the nearest arm – Jarrod's.

"Mr. Barkley, we got no law enforcement right now." Henry handed Jarrod his badge. "Get some help. This is just when the troublesome types are gonna come out and steal from the shops that aren't attended."

Jarrod took the badge as Dr. Merar gave the laudanum to Henry. "I'll take care of it, Henry. Doc, you don't need me here, do you?"

Dr. Merar shook his head. "Iva will stay with Fred. Seymour and I have to get to work on Cal."

Jarrod left, clipping the badge to his jacket. Several men saw him wearing the badge, and Jarrod immediately recruited them to check on the shops and saloons and to make sure everything was quieting down in town. Inside the sheriff's office, Jarrod found no prisoners right now, but one judge. Judge Farnham was there, leaving a note.

"Jarrod!" the judge said. "I was just looking for you. You're in charge?"

"For now," Jarrod said. "But Judge, we're gonna need some long term help."

"How bad off are the sheriff and his deputies?"

"Henry has a broken leg but I think he'll recover. I don't know about Cal and Fred. They're both still in trouble."

"The driver of that wagon didn't know what to do. He turned up at my office, fit to be tied, afraid he was going to be locked up."

"Who was it?"

"Older man, works at the Wheeler ranch. I sent him on home. We'll have to investigate this, but that's not top priority right now and we sure can't do it without a sheriff or any deputies."

"I can send for my brothers to help out for the time being, but Fred and his men are going to be laid up for a long time at best. We need an actual sheriff in here, maybe for weeks."

"Between the two of us, we know a lot of lawmen. What do you think? Will a first class deputy from somewhere else do?"

Jarrod shook his head. "I don't know." Then he took a deep breath. "But I do know of a man who's available, a former sheriff in Nevada, if he'd be willing to do the job."

"Who?"

Jarrod took a deep breath and tried to figure out how to explain.

XXXXXX

The day that Jarrod Barkley rode into Rimfire, shot in the head and slumped over his horse, was the day Sheriff Zach Fain's own world began to fall apart, and within days he was writing his resignation. He had let Cass Hyatt out of jail, to be hunted in the street by an out-of-control Jarrod Barkley out to kill the man who murdered his wife. Fain had a wad of Jarrod's money under his belt when he did it, money he gave back but the deed was done. After the disaster was over, after Jarrod and his brothers had left town and Cass Hyatt was taken by marshals back to California, Fain was left to live with himself, and he couldn't do it. Not and remain a sheriff.

Zach Fain was a married man. Margaret was his second wife, his first wife having been murdered young, as Jarrod's was, and her killer escaping justice, as Cass Hyatt had. Fain understood Jarrod's anger too well and that was behind his willingness to let Hyatt out of jail so Jarrod could have at him, but at the time he did that, he just wasn't thinking about the ramifications. He wasn't thinking about much of anything except his own dead first wife. He wasn't thinking about Margaret.

There were people in Rimfire who took pleasure on heaping a man's shame on his family. Fain found out very soon after he resigned that Margaret was going to pay a price for his actions. For her part, Margaret was stunned by what happened, hurt by the reaction of some of the people she thought were friends, but all she said about it to her husband was, "You should have thought this through better, all of it." Beyond that, she supported him and defended him, but it just wasn't enough.

Fain had no job, no income, and he was now a pariah in the town he had served for several years. And worse yet, his wife was scorned by too many people. They couldn't stay there.

It was six months after the debacle in Rimfire that Jarrod stumbled across Zach Fain again, totally unexpectedly. The man was tending bar at a saloon in Lodi – a saloon in Lodi! Jarrod just happened in there while he was in Lodi on business, and he was so stunned he nearly stumbled coming in the door. Behind the bar, he caught the corner of Fain's eye, and they stood staring at each other, both of them washed over with shame at the sight of one another.

Jarrod found the courage somewhere to go over to the bar. Fortunately, it was only mid-afternoon and the place wasn't crowded. When he got to the bar, all he could say was, "Sheriff Fain."

Fain said, "Not anymore, Mr. Barkley. I resigned."

Stumbling for what to say, Jarrod could only come up with, "I'm sorry. I – I can't – "

Fain shook his head quickly. "What'll it be?"

"Whiskey," Jarrod said, the word barely coming out.

Fain poured. With a faint smile, he said, "You cleaned yourself up pretty well, Mr. Barkley."

That took Jarrod by surprise. He looked at himself, at his business suit, and remembered what shambles he was in the last time Fain saw him. Dirty, unshaven, bloody bandage around his head wound. He unconsciously rubbed his cleanly shaved face and smiled. "It's a wonder you recognized me, I suppose."

"What brings you to Lodi?" Fain asked as he finished pouring and pushed the shot glass Jarrod's way.

"A land deal for my family," Jarrod said.

"How are those brothers of yours?"

"They're fine, just fine." Then he was at a loss for words.

Fain smiled even a little more. "You want to know how I ended up tending bar in Lodi and not sheriffing in Rimfire."

Jarrod did not smile. "I think I already know it's my fault."

"I don't know if I'd call it your fault, but yeah, it's because of your visit to Rimfire. I couldn't keep on as sheriff. I just couldn't do it."

"I'm sorry. I was so far out of line that day, you should have shot me."

"I almost did."

They looked at each other closely then, and Jarrod looked down at his drink. "I never even made an effort to make it up to you."

"You wouldn't have been able to find me. Margaret and I left Rimfire within a week of what happened."

Jarrod looked at Fain again. The guilt in Jarrod's eyes was clear.

"Not because I was fired or anything like that," Fain said. "Margaret and I took some heat, and we decided we didn't want to be there anymore, that's all."

"You did one helluva job with a murderous madman," Jarrod said, his eyes changing from guilt to admiration. "You saved my life."

Fain smiled a little. "Sometimes my wife tells me I shouldn't have left that sheriff job, but then she notices that I actually make more money tending this bar here than I made sheriffing in Rimfire. It's working out, Mr. Barkley. Sometimes life actually works out despite all we do to ruin it."

Something happened between the two of them that afternoon. The awkwardness gave way to talking. "Sheriff Fain" and "Mr. Barkley" gave way to "Zach" and "Jarrod." Slowly, they talked more about what had happened in Rimfire, what led to the destruction of the men they had been, how they were putting life back together. They started talking out the guilt they carried – Jarrod's deep oppressive guilt for having ruined Fain's career and life, Fain's for having taken Jarrod's bribe without thinking of what it was going to do to his job and to his wife. They talked until the crowd began to make its way in at the end of the day.

"I have a business meeting at dinner this evening," Jarrod said, getting ready to go.

"I'm glad you've put your life back together, Jarrod," Fain said.

Jarrod shook his head. "It's only by you not charging me that I'm not in prison. If I put my life back together, it's been at the sacrifice of yours."

Fain smiled at that. "Not a big sacrifice. Like I said, I actually make more money in here, and it's a lot safer."

Jarrod didn't smile. "But I cost you your life's work."

"You were a man who was hurt and lost, and I helped you the wrong way, that's all," Fain said. "And my life here is good. I got no complaints. I'll tell you what. Why don't you and I put the past away? You'll be coming up here now and then, I'll bet. I'll be glad to see you. I can serve you a drink and we can NOT talk about old times."

Jarrod nodded. "Sounds like a good idea to me."

XXXXX

Jarrod actually did go to Lodi now and then after running into Fain there. He did take a beer or a whiskey at the saloon Fain tended bar in, and they did talk and strike up an unusual friendship. Now, a year after talking to Fain in that Lodi saloon for the first time, talking to Judge Farnham about what Stockton was going to do for a sheriff, Jarrod thought of Zach Fain.

But there were questions. Would Fain even want to be a sheriff again? Stockton would pay much better than Rimfire had but maybe not as well as bartending did. Would taking the sheriff's job in Stockton cost him that good bartending job? What would Fain's wife think of him becoming a sheriff again, even if only temporarily? If they were happy in Lodi – and Fain did seem to be happy there – would they want to risk losing that?

And there were questions in Stockton, too. What would Farnham think of hiring a man who had accepted a bribe? It wasn't Farnham's call, but the men who would be making the decision would be looking for his advice. All the questions rolled through Jarrod's mind before he decided what to say.

"I know of someone," Jarrod said. "Very qualified, but I have to tell you a long story about how I came to know him, and Tom, it's that very ugly story about that very ugly part of my life about a year and a half ago. It's uglier than you know – but I think Zach Fain would be right for the job, if we can get him."

Judge Farnham sat down behind the sheriff's desk. "All right. Tell me everything about how you know Zach Fain."