Captain Bill McDonald, Texas Ranger: A Story of Frontier Reform

by Albert Bigelow Paine

Captain McDonald looked over the ground, as quietly as they would let him, and gave it out as his conclusion that no one man could have committed all that crime in open daylight, let alone a boy of sixteen. The sentiment was almost wholly the other way by this time, and the Ranger Captain's opinion was bitterly opposed from the start. What the people wanted was a victim. If they could capture Monk Gibson they would have a victim, and they did not want any complication that would interfere with this elementary proposition and the summary idea of justice which lay behind it. The presence of military and especially of Rangers was a menace, and for Bill McDonald to try to confuse matters with his detective theories, which might result in Gibson going clear, even if captured, would not be lightly borne. He was given to understand that the people of Edna knew what they wanted, and when they wanted Rangers they would invite them.

Captain Bill, however, followed his own ideas. He felt sure that Gibson was only one of several that had perpetrated the crime, and was doubtless a tool of older men. Moreover there were bloody hand-prints, left by one or more of the Conditt murderers, and these he could not believe had been made by the hand of a boy of sixteen, small for his years as Monk Gibson was declared to be. He further believed that Gibson was somewhere in hiding near his home, for by long experience he had learned that the hunted negro will always go home, regardless of risk.

Meantime, Monk Gibson's parents were in jail, and their premises had been searched more than once. Other negroes had been arrested on suspicion, only to be discharged for lack of any tangible evidence. Captain McDonald went his own way, holding to the theory that the negro boy would be found in the neighborhood of his own home. His two blood-hounds, Trouble and Rock, he took there repeatedly to try to pick up the trail, yet always without success. He believed the boy would come home for food, and to the nearby windmill for water. The barn near his father's house was searched daily, and while for some reason Captain Bill did not attend to this detail himself he was assured each time that the search had been thorough.

Yet Monk Gibson was hiding in that barn all the time. There were some unthreshed oats in the barn, and he had found a place where he could work himself under the straw, leaving no trace on the outside. Sometimes at night he had crept out to a pig-pen for water, and had picked some ears of corn in a nearby patch. One morning when he could stand it no longer he came out and called to a negro named Warren Powell, whose brother, Felix Powell, already mentioned, was to play an important part in this tragic drama. Warren Powell immediately took charge of the boy, Monk, tied him and notified the officers. General Hulen, Captain McDonald, Sheriff Egg and others responded quickly, and putting the boy in a buggy made a wild gallop for the jail, by a circuitous route, to avoid the crowds. He was landed safely inside, tossed from man to man between a line of bayonets, and when the infuriated populace gathered they were driven back by a cordon of armed officials.

Captain McDonald now got himself disliked in more ways than one. For one thing he persisted in his theory that Monk Gibson alone could not have committed the crime; for another, he urged that Gibson be taken to a safer, quieter place for protection. Furthermore he would not permit them to obtain testimony from the prisoner by torture. Approaching the jail one night he heard screams of agony. Entering, he found an assembly of examiners in Monk Gibson's cell, with Gibson tied up by the thumbs, the boy screaming, but refusing to tell anything more than the conflicting incoherent stories told at first.

"Take that boy down," said Captain Bill. "Don't you know that anything you get out of a witness by torture is not evidence enough for a mob, let alone a court of law?"

Meantime, the Ranger Captain had been picking up threads of evidence of his own. For one thing he had observed that two negroes—Felix Powell, already mentioned, and one Henry Howard—had taken a curiously intense interest in all the investigations—seemingly fascinated by every movement of the officers, especially of the Rangers. He noticed, too, that certain other negroes of the settlement were acting in a manner which to one with a special knowledge of their characteristics, appeared suspicious. He made carefully guarded inquiries, and learned that while Powell and Howard claimed to have been working for a man named John Young all day on the day of the murder, they had in reality worked for Young only during the afternoon. When he spoke to them about it their answers were contradictory. Finally Powell acknowledged that he had not worked for Young during the forenoon, and could give no satisfactory account of his whereabouts for the morning. It was generally believed, at first, that the murder had been committed about one o'clock—the time of the alarm by Monk Gibson—but the condition of the bodies when found made it evident that the crime had occurred much earlier—Captain McDonald believed as early as nine o'clock. McDonald finally questioned Powell directly, and believed he detected guilt in his every look and word. Powell denied knowing Monk Gibson at all, though the two had been raised in the same neighborhood. Gibson on the other hand had already acknowledged that he knew Powell, and had always known him. Finally Captain Bill said:

"Well, Felix, I think I will put you in jail awhile to refresh your memory."

The suspected man nearly collapsed at this and protested his innocence. Searched, a knife was found on him, which had a rusty, inoffensive look on the outside and according to its owner was very dull and used only for cutting tobacco. But when this knife was opened it was found to be of razor-like sharpness, and when a match was passed through the jaws and blade recesses, the end of the match brought up blood! Two of the Conditt children had died of ghastly knife wounds. Captain McDonald believed that this knife had made them.