Gun Slingers and Trigger Fingers

The narrator of this story was stopped by two men. When asked why he didn't stop the first time he was asked to, he said, "...I didn't rein up because I'm neither a darky nor a Chinaman, to be ordered about by you or anyone else..." This statement sets the timeframe for the plot. The narrator is actually a detective from Chicago, but is disguised as a doctor from Booneville. He runs into some other detectives who do not recognize him. They are all accosted by the James brothers. The narrator is left alive, and taken into the James crew, after two men are gunned down and left lying in the road.


The detective brings a packet of tokens from Jesse’s first love, Blanche. To Jesse, this was because she sent it by him on her death bed. It was, however, her father and uncle trying to help him get on Jesse’s good side and capture him alive, as well as bring back Blanche’s son-- fathered by another man before Jesse.

When he saw Jesse with his crew, it was obvious , “[he] was the natural leader of the wild crew, to whom the most implicit obedience was paid.”

When the boys captured one of the detectives and tied him to a tree, and they emptied their revolvers into him until 100 shots had been fired. They then left a note saying, “LET DETECTIVES TAKE WARNING! The James Brothers”.

They took the narrator to a cabin in the woods, and the next day it was obvious he was thought of as Jesse’s protégé. Jesse asked him if he could be trusted, and he assured him he could, because he knew if he couldn’t, he’d find a bullet in his own head. Once he felt he was ‘in’ with the crew he was, “half appalled at the risk upon which I had entered.”

The narrator is sent to a fair the next day to gather information on the James brothers, for the James brothers. He was, of course, followed by a few men to make sure he is on the up. Just after he finds out the fair has taken in $24,000, Jesse confronts the man with the money, and he takes off into the night with it.

After that, Jesse gives the narrator a lot of questions to figure out where he’s from and all things like that. He goes on to discuss his past with Blanche, how much he loved her, and he’d “rather be feared than liked.”

Jesse’s wife said about Blanche, “I hated her, and I’m glad she’s dead.”

They all go and rob a train, and manage not to kill anyone in the process.



When the narrator gets back to the house after being asked to hang back, there are men there. Jesse grabs him and throws him against the porch pillar. He is then told that James knows he is not a doctor. All of a sudden four guns are pointed at his heart…..

To be continued….