Wild Bill got off the train at Topeka, and returned to Abilene the next day. A week later he went up to Ellsworth, to which place he was a frequent visitor, being attracted to that town by a woman whose name we omit to mention, by her request. This woman was the keeper of a house of ill-repute, but her beauty made her a most attractive person, and her real admirers were numbered by hundreds. She is now pursuing the same calling in Kansas City, but though still a fine looking woman, very few traces of her former beauty remain. She is wealthy, however, and what she now lacks in natural appearance, she compensates for by artificial means, and is still a leader of her kind. Bill’s love for her was undoubtedly genuine, although he never asked her hand in marriage. Bill Thompson, a big bully, and handy with his pistol, was also a worshiper at the same shrine, and hated Wild Bill more inveterately than any other man on earth. This hatred was, perhaps, not so much inspired by the rivalry between them for the woman’s smiles, as it was caused by the fact that on one occasion Wild Bill had arrested and severely handled Thompson, while the latter was carousing in Abilene. Thompson had repeatedly made threats which reached Bill’s ears, and caused him to be watchful. A collision occurred between the two in a restaurant in Ellsworth, under the following circumstances: Bill had entered the place and called for an oyster stew. He took a seat in a small alcove, in which was a table, with his back to the saloon, a position he was never known to assume before or since. The moment the waiter was entering with the stew, Bill turned in his seat at the very instant to see Thompson enter a side door with pistol in hand. Bill slipped out of his chair and dropped onto his knees, with the view of using the chair as a sort of breastwork. The instant he moved, a ball from Thompson’s pistol whistled passed his ear, and struck the plate on the table in front of him. Before another shot could be fired from the same course, Bill jerked one of the two derringers he nearly always carried, from his pants pocket, and, whirling on one knee, sent a bullet squarely into Thompson’s forehead. The man fell forward on his face without uttering a sound, stone-dead; the dish of soup in the waiter’s hand tumbled onto the floor and broke into fragments. Resuming his seat again at the table, merely rising from his kneeling position, Bill told the affrighted waiter to bring him that oyster stew he had ordered, but the restaurant speedily filled with morbid people, and there was too much excitement to admit of serving stews thereafter. Bill was the least excited of any, and after waiting a few moments, and seeing that he could not get what he called for, he went out of the place and took his oyster stew at another restaurant. Of course he was arrested, but as it was a clear case of self-defense, he was at once discharged.
MAKES TWENTY MEN ASK AN APOLOGY.
In a few weeks after the killing of Thompson, Bill again visited Ellsworth, and during this visit he met with an episode in which his influence among the desperado element was clearly evidenced. Reaching the town late in the evening, he had gone direct to the house kept by the woman just referred to, and after taking supper and playing a few games of cards with her, he retired to bed. About eleven o’clock at night, loud and boisterous noises, coupled with threats to tear the house down if admittance were refused, awakened everyone in the house. One of the girls raised a front window and asked the crowd what they wanted. The reply came that they intended to clean out the house, and to open the door quick, or they would break it down. The crowd numbered twenty of the worst men Ellsworth could produce, and as they were two-thirds drunk, everyone in the building except Bill became very much alarmed, and fearful that some fatal consequences would be the result. Bill arose from bed, and telling everyone in the house to leave the settlement of the trouble to him, descended the stairs in his night clothes, with his two derringers in his hands. A light was burning in the hall, and while the men were pounding on the door, and swearing that they would burn the house and everyone in it, Bill unlocked the door and threw it open. As he did so, he placed himself upon the threshold, and told the crowd that he would give them just ten seconds to leave the place, adding: “Or I’ll turn this place into a great big slaughter-house.” The surprise depicted on the faces of those twenty men was a fit subject for a painter. They all tried to apologize at once. Said the leader: “I’ll take my oath, Bill, if I’d a-knowed you was here I never would a-come; we never meant any harm, and as you are a gentleman, and we’re drunk, we owe you an apology. We’ll leave this minute.” They all added in chorus: “That’s so, Bill, and we beg your pardon a thousand times.”
“Then get out of here!” responded Bill.
And they went at once.
BILL’S FIGHT WITH PHIL COLE’S COUSIN.
About one year after the killing of Phil Cole at Abilene, Wild Bill had occasion to visit Wichita, Kansas, on some private business. He made the trip on horseback, there being no other mode of travel between the two places. Bill was acquainted with no one in Wichita, and habit caused him to make his first stop in the place before a saloon, where he hitched his horse and went in. There was no one in the saloon at the time of his entrance; so Bill took a seat expecting the proprietor had just stepped out and would be back in a short time. While he was sitting beside a table reading a newspaper, a stranger stepped in and enquired:
“Is your name Wild Bill?”