An Heritage of Crime [pp. 266-275]

2An Heritage of Crime.
a large one, and where he had been something more than a year; was said to have
been in the service of the Confederacy, and
to have come through from Texas with one
of the numerous bands who made their appearance in that region during the latter
days of the rebellion. Altogether, he was
an enigma, and an object of very considerable interest and speculation with the officers;
though he but seldom came into contact with
them, not only for the reason that they naturally avoided one of his mode of life, but
also because he seemed equally anxious to
shun them. His partner was always in sight,
and, by his manner, implied that, while he
knew he was obnoxious, it was a public road,
and the military could not help themselves.
After we passed Oatman Flat, these two
men disappeared, and it was supposed we had
seen the last of them. But a day or two before we reached Fort Yuma, or Arizona City,
which was the same thing the two places
being only separated by the Colorado River
three citizens rode into our camp at midnight, who were just out from Arizona City.
They were in great haste, and dismounted
only long enough to inform the officer of the
day-who met them-that a wagon master
had been murdered the night before in the
quartermaster's corral in the most coldblooded manner, and that the gambler, Ewing, of whom they were then in pursuit, was
the murderer; though his partner was also
believed to be implicated in the matter, and
had already been arrested, and was then in
the guardhouse at Fort Yuma. (There was no
jail there'at that time, nor any civil magistrate
nor authority of any description, excepting
that of the military.) Of course, the officer
of the day could only inform him that Ewing had not been seen since he left the command at Oatman Flat, some days previously,
and they passed on up the road. Although
this conversation was during the night, some
of the members of the guard had also heard
it, and by reveille in the morning there was
not a soldier who was not aware of it, for
Ewing was well known to all of them. The
subject was soon exhausted, however, as a
topic of conversation among them, for the
killing of a man in that country was too trivial a circumstance to occupy their attention
very long.
Much to the surprise of everybody, on
the morning of the day on which we were to
reach the Colorado, Ewing suddenly made
his appearance in camp, without his horse,
his clothes torn, and in a condition of general dilapidation, bearing conspicuous signs
of having had a hard tramp. He had first
approached a soldier by the name of Chambers, who had strayed a short distance from
camp among the mesquite trees, and had
told him that his horse had gotten away from
him, and he had been two days in the hills
at the south of the road, trying in vain to find
the horse. He inquired incidentally whether there was "anything new," or had "anybody passed out from town recently." Chambers manifested no surprise at meeting him
there, and answered that various parties had
passed out from town, but had "nothing in
the way of news.'.' This was, of course, the
reassurance he had hoped for, and the two
came in to camp together. Singular as it may
appear, not one of the soldiers betrayed any
unusual interest in his appearance, either, and
he accepted their invitation to eat breakfast
with them. After this, he said he might as well
return to town, too, as it was useless to look
further for his horse, and started with the
troops without a suspicion that he was a prisoner, and could not possibly have taken any
other course, if he had wished to. The buckboard, with the mail from Tucson, had passed
while Ewing was eating breakfast, and by this
means word was sent in advance that he was
with the command. In a few hours, some
men on horseback met us, immediately arrested the murderer, and after placing him
on a horse which they had brought for the
purpose, galloped away, and we saw no more
of him until the following day.
The quartermaster's establishment at Arizona City was known as the Yuma Depot,
and was a refitting point for troops marching
in either direction, where all transportation
was overhauled, repaired, or changed, previ' ous to going "inside" (as it was called when
going towards California), or passing into the
268
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