Bat Masterson - King of the Gunplayers by Alfred Henry Lewis

Bat Masterson - King of the Gunplayers

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Now Out of the Zone of Fire

Or, I might give the story of how, when Mr. Short killed Mr. Courtright in Fort Worth, Mr. Masterson took his six-shooters and begged the privilege of sitting in Mr. Short's cell all night, fearing mob violence. Friendship such as Jonathan's would have hesitated at so desperate a step! It turned out well, however, for the would-be lynchers, told by the Sheriff that Mr. Masterson and Mr. Short were together in the jail, and each with a brace of guns, virtuously resolved that the law should take its course, and went heedfully home to bed.

These and many more have been the adventures of Mr. Masterson, who, coming up through all this perilous trail of smoke and blood, is now peacefully amassing ten thousand dollars a year, as a crack writer on a New York City paper and a contributor to Human Life. I asked him if he never yearned for the West. He shook his head.

Luke Short, cowboy, gambler, lawman, gunfighter

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"I'm out of that zone of fire;" said he, "and I never want to go back. I hope never to see those dreary plains again."

But the plains come to Mr. Masterson on Broadway, or rather the men of the plains. One day he introduced me to a wiry, eagle-eyed gentleman, dressed as though just out of a bandbox.

"Mr. Tilghman," said the introductory Mr. Masterson.

Mr. Tilghman, it appeared, was East as the democratic representative of Oklahoma , to notify Mr. Parker that he had been nominated for the Presidency.

"Do you remember;' Mr. Masterson asked -- "do you remember my telling how, one Christmas eve, I ran off forty of old Bear Shield's ponies? And how I saw a party riding about among the herd that I took to be an Indian herder? It was Billy here; he got away with something like fifty good head himself that night.:

Mr. Tilghman -- now a sheriff in Oklahoma -- beamed at the rich suggestion of those afore time ponies, and then he and Mr. Masterson fell to remembering how Mr. Masterson had one day given Mr. Tilghman warning at Leota to "look out for Ed Prather;" and how the next afternoon Mr. Tilghman "looked out'" so earnestly that Mr. Prather departed headlong into the misty beyond.

"Billy kept the tail of his eye on him," explained Mr. Masterson; "and when Ed reached for his gun, he beat him to it."

One last adventure, and I am through. Mr. Masterson had not seen Dodge for a handful of years. He was in Deming when a telegram was put into his hands. It related to his younger brother, who was still in Dodge. It ran:

"Come at once. Updegraffe and Peacock are going to kill Jim."

Mr. Masterson was thirty hours reaching Dodge. Unable to sleep, his fancy roved feverishly ahead and drew dark pictures of the probable. Mr. Updegraffe was as game a man as ever buckled a belt, and Mr. Peacock would fight a little. By the time Mr. Masterson reached Albuquerque, he knew that Jim was dead; and when he had got as far as Las Vegas, [ New Mexico ] he felt sure that the funeral was over. In this frame he stepped off the cars at Dodge next day. There they were; Mr. Updegraffe and Mr. Peacock, waiting for him in the little public square.

Mr. Masterson cut short suspense.

"You murderers," he cried to the waiting Updegraffe and Peacock, "might better begin to fight right now!"

"For Shooting Inside of City Limits"

Mr. Updegraffe's bullet buried itself in the side of a Pullman. Mr. Masterson's bullet drove a 5-inch splinter of rib through Mr. Updegraffe's lungs, Mr. Peacock took refuge behind the calaboose, from which coign he fired wild and high, breaking four-story windows in a far-away block. Mr. Masterson shot twice at Mr. Peacock, and missed him by a breath. The scars of those two bullets still show on the side of Dodge's calaboose. Mr. Masterson, aiming to dislodge him, charged the entrenched Mr. Peacock. When he arrived at the corner of the calaboose, Mr. Peacock had vanished. Mr. Masterson caught a disappointing glimpse of him. as he disappeared into Mr. Gallon's hotel.

At this pinch. Mr. Webster -- Mayor, proprietor of the Alamo and no friend of Mr. Masterson -- came panting up, a 10-gauge shotgun in his shaking hands. Mr. Masterson who never forgot his strategy, went instantly and close to Mr. Webster. Mr. Webster was visibly shaken, and as white as paper. Mr. Masterson surveyed him -- eye keen as that of a lynx, six shooter in ready hand.

"What's the matter with you, Web?" asked Mr. Masterson.

"It's just this. Bat," stammered Mr. Webster. ''I'm Mayor of this outfit; and this shooting's got to stop."

"Well," returned Mr. Masterson, as steady as a tree, "I think it has stopped. unless you choose to start it again."

"I'll not start it," ejaculated the fervent Mr. Webster.

"Then let me take the 10-gauge," said Mr. Masterson, soothingly, at the same time claiming that weapon. "It doesn't look well for the Mayor of Dodge to be running about the streets with a shotgun in his hands."

Then the unexpected happened. Jim Masterson, not at all dead and buried, but clothed and in his right mind, came running up. Mr. Masterson stared as though he beheld a ghost.

"Where have you been?" he gasped.

"Over in the Wright House, asleep." returned Jim, "until your cannonading woke me up."

There had been trouble with Messrs. Updegraffe and Peacock on one end of it and Jim on the other. Some shooting had taken place, but no one scored. While the brothers stood talking, Mr. Peacock as closing the incident, sent forth an ambassador who paid Jim six hundred dollars -- the casus belli (justification.)

"Get your blankets," Mr. Masterson said to Jim. "Out of town you go by the next train! I've had to come twelve hundred miles on your account, to kill one of my friends, and now I won't even let you stay in the state. Get your blankets; you and I take the next train west!"

"But, Bat," expostulated Mr. Webster tremulously, "I've got to have you arrested."

"Be careful, Web!" warned Mr. Masterson. "I won't submit to an arrest. Your people here took to shooting at me the moment I got off the cars; I only defended myself. I give you warning that anyone who attempts to arrest me will have to arrest me in the smoke."

"Not for downing Updegraffe," protested Mr. Webster hastily; "that, as you say, was self-defense. But, Bat, we've passed some ordinances since you were here -- ordinances against shootin' inside the town." This last tentatively.

Mr. Masterson smiled: "To ease your official mind. Web," he said at last, "so it's nothing more than a money fine, and you don't over-size my pile, I'll stand it."

Thereupon. Mr. Webster, Mayor, cheered up mightily and fined Mr. Masterson five dollars for "Shooting inside the city limits;" which sum Mr. Masterson tossed to Mr. Webster, who as Mayor. gratefully collected it off the grass.

Added January, 2007

Also See:

Complete List of Old West Gunfighters

Dodge City - A Wicked Little Town

Wyatt Earp - Frontier Lawman

Luke Short - A Dandy Gunfighter

Alfred H. Lewis

*About the Author and Articles Notes:

Alfred Henry Lewis was a journalist and novelist who, by the late 1800's, had established a reputation as one of the foremost political writers of the country. In the first decade of the 20th century he started a short-lived Boston magazine called Human Life and hired Bat Masterson to write a series of articles on his gunfighter friends. However, Bat was not a autobiographer, and Lewis wrote this article on Masterson in 1907.

Though widely acclaimed during his time, we found this article somewhat difficult to read as it included a number of words not (or no longer) used in everyday language, plus assumed that the reader would know such things as "on the Medicine Lodge" refers to the Medicine Lodge River, and other such assumptions. Additionally, the article included a number of misspellings and grammatical errors. Therefore, the story on these pages is not verbatim, as it has been edited for corrections and clarification.

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