Untethered by Marcia Lynn McClure Read Free Book Online Page A

embellished his already stunning smile. This was the first night she’d wondered what he thought about it.
    Quickly she crept from her bed and to the chest at the foot of it. Raising the lid, she carefully shuffled through the many treasures she secreted there until she found the one she wanted to study again in that moment.
    Sitting down on the floor, Cricket unfolded the newspaper clipping she’d managed to squirrel away from behind the saloon when a cowboy had tossed it in the garbage barrel a year ago.
    “ Abducted Young Women Found Murdered ,” she read aloud in a whisper. Cricket had read the story many times. Yet each time she read it over again, a horrific sympathy for all that had happened to Heathro Thibodaux the summer before swelled inside her.
     
    Sunday last, Texas Rangers found the bodies of the eight young women abducted from Turner Bend one week previous. All had succumbed to death. The eight promising young women of Turner Bend, having been abducted by a heinous band of outlaws one week previously, met their death on the rocky bed of a canyon, having been pushed over the canyon ridge ledge while tied together at hands and feet. Near the bodies of the dead young women, Texas Rangers found one of their own, Ranger Heathro Thibodaux, clinging to life, but only just.
    Shortly after the Texas Ranger posse set out in search of the abductees, Ranger Thibodaux argued that the band of outlaws was traveling with the girls to New Orleans , while other members of the posse insisted the miscreants were mapping Mexico as their destination. Ranger Thibodaux broke from the posse and tracked the outlaws and their young female prisoners in a solitary manner. However, when he came upon the outlaws and their victims, he was but one man against ten and was beaten, shot, and left for dead. Barely conscious and unable to move to assist the eight abducted young women, Ranger Thibodaux watched helplessly through swollen, bloodied eyes as the outlaws discussed the matter of his arrival. It was decided among these evil abductors of innocence that if one Texas Ranger was near, then a full posse would soon follow. Thus, Ranger Thibodaux, wounded and slipping in and out of consciousness, witnessed the most gruesome of acts as the outlaws murdered the eight Turner Bend innocents.
    “They tied their hands and feet,” Ranger Thibodaux reported, “tethered them together loosely, and pushed them over the rim of the canyon.”
    Ranger Thibodaux suffered a broken arm, a broken leg, broken ribs, a broken hand, a cracked tooth, three gunshot wounds, and various bruising and lacerations. He was unable to assist the Texas Ranger posse as they identified and buried the eight young women from Tuner Bend.
    While recovering from his injuries in San Antonio, when asked if perhaps it may have been better for the Turner Bend young women had he not come upon the outlaws at all, Ranger Thibodaux answered, “I would rather see those girls dead on the floor of the canyon and know their souls are safe in the arms of the Lord than to live my life knowing those outlaws had reached New Orleans with the girls alive. They’re far safer in death.”
    Witnesses report that many who heard Ranger Thibodaux’s response spat on him, calling him a coward and a devil. Yet with rumors of white slavers operating in Texas and the New Mexico Territory , there are many who support Ranger Thibodaux’s estimation.
    Regardless of whether Ranger Thibodaux was amiss in his actions and opinions, the township of Turner Bend mourns for those eight bright and beautiful blossoms that were lost. They were and are: Minnie Edwards, aged 16 years; Hattie Campbell, aged 17 years; Dora Murphy, aged 18 years; Ruth Wallace, aged 18 years; Hazel Palmer, aged 16 years; Charlotte Berry, aged 17 years; Pauline Elliott, aged 15 years; and Dorthia Gilbert, aged 15 years.
     
    Cricket exhaled a heavy sigh discouragement and pain. She shook her head, brushing the tears from her cheeks as she