Caught between the lynch mob, the marshal’s ambition, and the jail, Cobb had but an instant to make his choice. He turned on his heels and grabbed the marshal by his lapel and his belt, gave a big heave, and threw him into the mob, knocking the men in front to the ground. Without looking back he ran into the jail and barred the door.
Cobb went to the desk and grabbed the marshal’s keys, and then ran down the hallway to the cell block. His fingers fumbled as he fit different keys into the lock. The sound of yelling and banging on the barred front door reached him in the back. One key gave way and the door was open. Cobb reached in and grabbed Teddy into a fatherly embrace and led the young man into the front room. Next, he turned towards the gun cabinet on the wall.
“Teddy, I don’t want you to fight, but if a man is going to die at the hands of those who hate him at least he should go down fighting.” He grabbed a double barrel shotgun and broke it open, shoved two shells into the breech, and locked it. He handed the scatter gun to Teddy and then Cobb loaded one of the new Henry repeaters with cartridges.
Through the windows, he could see Charlie Wenger and Jean Posey talking together while a small group of men shouted and banged on the doors and windows. It wouldn’t be long before they decided to break the glass through the bars and shoot.
“Help me barricade the door,” Cobb said. They pushed chairs, benches, cabinets, anything they could find, against the door. Then they dragged the desk towards the rear hallway leading to the cells. The rear stone wall was to their backs, and the only way in was in front of them. Together they flipped the desk onto its side where it provided the cover they desperately needed.
Just then the first window broke open, and a barrel of a gun reached in and fired a tongue of flame at them. The shot went wide. Cobb kept a hand on Teddy in preparation for having to force him down below the desk. Another shot rang out and splintered into the thick wood. They ducked their heads. They had clear shots at the men firing at them but Cobb didn’t want to kill any of the townspeople unless he was forced to. He hoped they wouldn’t make him.
The marshal’s voice rang out. “Ezekiel Cobb! Surrender, you have no chance here.”
Teddy looked at Cobb with wide eyes, and Cobb said, “We’ll have to hold out till the sheriff gets here. He is a fair man. I just hope he wasn’t out and Frank missed him.”
“Cobb!” the marshal’s voice called out again. “Cobb I do not vant to do this. I know you just got back from the var to your family. But I will have every man here fire at vill if you do not surrender and come out.”
“Not a chance, Charlie! If you ain’t going to uphold the law then somebody has to! No one is killing this boy while I’m alive!”
“Don’t be a fool, Cobb! There is only one vay out of–was ist das? Vait a minute, Fraulein, you can’t go in there. Hey! Stop her!”
Cobb heard another voice then, a woman’s. His heart skipped, afraid it was Amanda. But then he started to hear the Alsatian accent, and he realized it was Emilia Sturm, the school teacher. She had pushed her way through the crowd and had her back to the door, using her body as a shield. She was shouting, but Cobb couldn’t quite make it out over the noise.
The woman stretched her arms out to either side to block as much as she could of the door. Zeke and Teddy could hear more shouting from the marshal, and the crowd finally quieted enough for Cobb to hear what the woman was saying.
“I did it!” she yelled. “I killed Katarina! It was not Teddy, it was me!”
No one knew quite what to do. Not one of them believed her and thought she was trying to be heroic for one of her students. But her insistence started to make them doubt.
Cobb and Teddy left the cover of the desk and risked a look out the window.
“I killed her at the river! Marshal, Teddy didn’t write that note, I did! I lured her out where I had seen them before, and I struck her.” She began to sob, pleading on her knees with the marshal, her hands on his jacket, her bun no longer tidy. “I never thought you would blame my sweet Teddy. I never meant for him to be in trouble. I just wanted her out of my way.” Her eyes were red and she looked frantically about her. “I just wanted Teddy to look at me like he looked at her.”
The crowd was stunned. Slowly they began to believe her, the horror dawning on them that this young woman had fallen in love with Theodore Brauer, almost a young man, and had killed her perceived rival. Cobb saw the marshal say something to her he couldn’t hear. The woman suddenly reached for his gun on his hip and seized it in both of her hands. Her wild eyes darted between the crowd, her sobs breaking into hiccupping gasps. The gunshot echoed, and for a moment, the entire mob froze, stunned into silence. She had shot the marshal.
“Stay here,” Cobb said. He pulled away the furniture with one hand and threw whatever was blocking the door. He opened it and stepped out into the front decking. He still had the Henry in his hands but kept it pointed down to the ground. Emilia Sturm was sobbing again, hair wild, tears staining her cheeks. She cried out as two men tied her hands behind her back. Cobb saw Posey’s face, pale and sad, and he looked back at Cobb. For a moment the hatred was gone between them.
Just then they heard hoofbeats and two riders were coming fast. It was Frank Mueller. He had found the sheriff.
Two days later, Ezekiel Cobb was the newly acting town marshal for Castroville, Texas. He argued with the sheriff for hours, explaining how he didn’t even solve the murder, but the lawman made a plea to Cobb’s sense of honor and duty, and eventually, Cobb agreed. He now sat at his new desk reluctantly. It was splintered and scarred and felt like a battlefield he hadn’t chosen. But someone had to stand against men like Posey. He took the kettle off of the stove so the coffee wouldn’t burn, but stay warm, grabbed his Henry, and stepped out into the early morning light.
This is part six of “Blood on the Medina.” Click here to read more stories. If you like these free stories, please subscribe. If you REALLY liked them, please consider leaving me a tip by purchasing it on Kindle for .99 (the cost for 1/3 of a cup of coffee).
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