“Of course not, darling. I love all of my children equally.”
“But Stone’s not your children,” Bella said.
“He is. He’s your brother.”
“That’s not what Grand-mere says.”
“Well then, I’m going to have to have a talk with Grand-mere. But right now, I want all of my children to go to sleep.” Magnolia bent over to give the girls a kiss. She was moving toward Stone’s trundle when she was interrupted by her mother-in-law’s call from the next room.
“Magnolia! Get in here. We have problems!” Mary’s voice was tinged with fear.
Magnolia pulled closed the blanket that hung in the doorway, in an attempt to shield the children from whatever had upset Mary. When she looked around she saw the reflection of wavering yellow light splashing against the walls.
“Grand-mère? What’s going on?”
“There are a lot of men outside!” Mary said, her voice rising.
Magnolia looked through the front window and saw at least a dozen men standing there. Several of them were carrying lit torches, and their faces were bathed a demonic orange in the glow. She started toward the door.
“Don’t do that! Don’t go outside!” Mary grabbed Magnolia’s arm.
“It will be all right,” Magnolia said in a very calm voice, as she patted Mary’s hand. “I’ll see what they want.” Opening the door, she stepped out onto the front porch.
“Good evening, gentlemen,” she called out to them. “What do you want?”
“You know damn well what we want. We want that Injun brat!”
Magnolia recognized Kirk Jordan as the spokesman for the group.
“Mr. Jordan, I don’t think you’re going to get him.” Magnolia turned toward the door.
“Wait a minute, Missy,” Kirk Jordan said. “We’re goin’ to give you five minutes to bring that little blanket-ass nit out here ‘n turn ‘im over to us. ‘N if you don’t do that, we’re goin’ to burn this house down over your head. Now what do you have to say about that?”
Magnolia hurried back inside and slammed the door, leaning against it as she tried to compose herself.
“We need Jeter,” Mary said. “Hurry out the back door.”
“Yes, I’d better . . .” Magnolia stopped in mid-sentence. “No, I can’t leave the children.”
“Then I’ll go get him,” Mary said. “There’s no way I’m going to see that child turned over to that gang of henchmen out there.”
Ed Masterson had just finished telling a funny story, and everyone in the Red House Salon was laughing when Mary came in. Jeter, who was also laughing looked up and saw her. He was very surprised because his mother never came to the salon, and the expression on her face made it obvious that something was wrong.
Jeter rushed to her. “Mom! What is it? What’s wrong?”
“Oh, Jeter, you have to come home. That Jordan man who’s after Stone is down at the house with a whole bunch of men. He says they’re going to burn the house down if we don’t send Stone out to them.”
“What?” Ed Masterson said when he heard Mary’s comment. Ed turned to Herman Fringer. “Go find Charley Bassett, and you, Alonzo, run down to the Dodge House and get Evans and Cox. Tell them what’s going on and round up as many men as you can. And, Pete, you step over to George Hoover’s Saloon and do the same thing. Have ‘em meet up here.”
Masterson turned to the others in the Red House. “Those of you who have the guts to come with us, we need as many as possible. Soon as the others come, we’ll go set this straight.”
“I’m going now,” Jeter said.
“Don’t be foolish,” Ed said. “There’s nothing you can do by yourself. Wait for Sheriff Bassett to get here.”
“I’m not going to challenge them directly, but I’m not going to leave my wife and kids alone in that house.”
“I’m going back with you,” Mary said.
“Mom, you’d be better off to stay here with Frankie and Cetti.”
“I got here, and I can get back to that house. No matter what happens, Magnolia will need help with those four children. Can you imagine how scared she must be?”
“All right, let’s go, but you’re gonna have to hurry.”
As Jeter and Mary approached the house, Jeter could hear some of the taunts of the men out front.
“They ain’t no sense in all of you burnin’ up, Miz Willis. All we want is the Injun brat!”
“Send ‘im out here. Hell, he won’t feel nothin’. It ain’t as if ya can hurt Injuns.”
“We don’t wanna hurt ya, but we’ll do it iffn we have to. You got about a minute left, then we’re goin’ to commence a burnin’ your house down!”
Stepping up onto the back porch, Jeter jerked the door open, and when he did he saw Magnolia standing there, holding a shotgun pointed toward him.
“Magnolia, it’s me!” Jeter yelled. “Don’t shoot.”
“Oh, Jeter!” Magnolia said, putting the shotgun down and running to him. Jeter took her in his arms and as he held her he saw Bella, Chantal, and Stone peeking out from behind the drawn quilt, their big eyes, filled with fright.
“Daddy, are those men going to burn the house down?” Bella asked as she ran toward him.
“No, Darlin’, I’m not gonna let them do that,” Jeter said as he caught his daughter in his arms.
“But Jeter, how can you stop them? You haven’t looked out but there are so many,” Magnolia said, as a sob caught in her throat. “How can they be so mean?”
Jeter smiled. “In about two minutes, we’ll outnumber them, but in the meantime, you and Mom and the kids huddle by the back door just in case. Run to the Red House if anything happens.”
“Jeter, no! I can’t lose you!”
He kissed Magnolia on the nose. “Not to worry. We’ve been through rougher times than this.”
“Your time’s up, Missy!” a voice shouted from outside. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you!”
Jeter grabbed the shotgun and hurried to the front window. He saw Kirk Jordan coming toward the house. Jordan drew his hand back to throw the torch and as he did so, Jeter raised the shotgun to his shoulder and fired, shattering the glass in the window. In the light of the torch, Jeter could see a fountain of blood erupt from the large wound in the man’s chest.
Jordan dropped the torch, then fell on it. Quickly his clothes began to blaze, but because the shot had been fatal, he didn’t make a move.
“Come on, boys!” another man shouted. “He ain’t got no shells left in that shotgun!”
“No, but our guns are loaded,” Ed Masterson said, as he led a group of more than two dozen men up the street. “Drop those torches.”
Startled by the sudden and unexpected appearance of so many of the townspeople, the ruffians dropped their torches.
Jeter stepped out onto the front porch.
“Looks like we got here just in the nick of time,” Ed Masterson said, nodding toward Jordan’s body.
“I had to shoot him,” Jeter said.
“Look here, Masterson, Jordan warn’t wearin’ no gun, ‘n he got shot anyway. That’s murder, ain’t it?”
“I would call it self-defense,” Sheriff Bassett said, as he arrived at the scene.
“But he didn’t have no gun!”
“This man had a torch and he was about to burn down this house,” Ed Masterson said. “We all saw what happened. I’d say that makes it self-defense. What about, you Sheriff?”
Charley Bassett nodded his head. “The only thing left to do here, is put the fire out on Jordan’s body. We don’t want him burnin’ up ‘fore he gets to hell.”
Several men began kicking dirt over Jordan’s body.
“One more thing,” Charley Bassett added. “If anything happens to the Willis house, or to the Red House, or to any one of them, and that includes the boy, I’ll put every one of you in jail. And if I have to, I’ll hang every one of you.”
“You can’t hang ever’ one of us.”
“Oh, yes, I
can,” Bassett said easily. “And you’ll be the first once I hang, Lewis Benton. Now you all disperse, a’ fore I arrest you now,”
Ed Masterson pointed to Jordan’s body. “Before you go, drag him down to Eb Collar’s place. There are children in this house, and they don’t need to see a dead body lying out front.”
Magnolia joined Jeter as they came down from the porch to stand by the gathered group of townspeople
“I can’t tell you how much we appreciate what all you did for us,” Jeter said.
“Yes, to be honest, it looked pretty much like you had it under control.”
“Pete, it seems to me like all these men deserve a drink at the Red House,” Jeter said. “Can you take care of that?”
“Come on, men.” Pete Cahill said. “Drinks are on the boss.”
Everyone followed Cahill except Ed Masterson and the sheriff.
“What will we do if they come back?” Magnolia asked.
“I don’t think you’ll have to worry about that,” Masterson said.
“I wish they didn’t hate that poor innocent child, the way they do.”
Masterson shook his head. “Now, Magnolia, I’m afraid there’s nothing I, or the sheriff, or anyone else can do about that. Prejudice is a pretty deep-rooted thing in some people. And once they get this prejudice in them, well, there’s not much of anything you can do to talk ‘em out of it.”
“I know this is your business,” Charley Bassett said, “but if there’s any place you can take that kid, you ought to find it.”
“He’s a little boy,” Magnolia said. “He can’t go back to his people. They gave him to Cade and if Cade takes him back, they’ll more than likely kill both Cade and Stone.”
“Ma’am, you just made my argument. Them people are savages, and this here boy you’re protecting—why who’s to say he won’t turn on you, or worse one of your sweet little girls? Think about that tonight,” the sheriff said. “Now, come on Masterson, let’s go get us one of them drinks Cahill’s passin’ out and leave these people alone.”
Jeter and Magnolia were standing in front of their house. Jeter had his arm wrapped around his wife’s waist, and he pulled her closer to him.
“What are we going to do about Stone? What if the sheriff is right?” Magnolia asked.
“I don’t think anybody’s going to try something like this again,” Jeter said. “Jordan was the one who was always the worst, and with him gone, I don’t think anyone will actually try to hurt Stone. But, it’s like Ed said, people have prejudices, and there’s nothing we can do about that.”
“You’re telling me that—an octoroon who grew up in New Orleans? My mother didn’t even know her ancestor who was colored, and yet when the census taker came, we were always colored.”
“And that makes me love you all the more,” Jeter said as he pulled her to him and kissed her.
“We better go in,” Magnolia said as she pulled back from Jeter. “What are we going to do? I’m so scared.”
“Don’t be. We’ll wait and talk to Cade,” Jeter said. “The three of us will come up with the right answer. We won’t let anything happen to Stone.”
19
White Deer Creek:
Cade, Armitage, and Frenchy were eating buffalo steaks that Frenchy had cooked on a grate, over on open fire.
“Frenchy, you cook buffalo better than anyone I know,” Cade said.
Frenchy laughed. “In the Café Procope, on rue de l'Ancienne Comédie, I cooked many wonderful things. But never, did I cook steak of the buffalo.”
“That sounds like a pretty fancy restaurant,” Cade said.
“Oui, it was.”
“Why did you leave France?”
“Monsieur Bellefleur, who was the manager de restaurant, did not like it that his beautiful wife so often shared her charms.” Frenchy smiled. “And what he most did not like, was that she shared her charms with me.”
“Well, I’m glad she did,” Cade said. “Otherwise, the Englishman and I wouldn’t be enjoying this fine piece of meat out here in the middle of nowhere.”
“The Frenchman has done an excellent job in the preparation of the steak, that is true,” Armitage said. “But a bundle of fresh spring asparagus topped with drawn butter lying alongside the steak. Now that would be a meal.”
“Non, non, champignons,” Frenchy insisted.
“You’re both crazy as loons,” Cade said. “What this steak needs is a big, baked potato, slathered with lots of butter. Or, maybe we should have grits,” he added with a smile.
“Grits? My word,” Armitage said.
“Mon Dieu,” Frenchy exclaimed.
The culinary conversation was interrupted when in the distance, they saw a wagon coming toward them.
“That looks like a Murphy wagon,” Armitage said. “Surely, there is no hunter who has a sufficient number of hides to necessitate the need for such a wagon.”
“That’s not just any wagon; that’s a Harrison and McCall wagon,” Cade said as he folded his knife and put it in his pocket.
“So it is,” Armitage said. “And I do believe that is Billy sitting beside your partner.”
“This will be interesting,” Cade said as he headed out to meet the wagon.
Billy proceeded to explain how he had lost the wagon, the hides, and the guns, and how the mule had died immediately after getting out of the river.
Cade burst out laughing.
“I didn’t expect this to be your reaction,” Billy said. “I thought you’d be mad.”
“And what are you going to do about it? Can you get the wagon out of the river? No. Can you find the hides? No. Can you fish out the guns . . .?”
“All right, I get your point,” Billy said.
“You went to bring back a skinner. Is this the best you could find?” Cade said, nodding his head in Jacob’s direction.
“Look, I’m the driver,” Jacob said. “In all my jobs, I’ve never skinned a buffalo.”
“We will teach you,” Armitage said. “It is a rather simple task, although it does require much strength.”
“Then that let’s Jacob out,” Cade said. “He’s as weak as a cat.”
“You two stop your caterwauling,” Billy said. “It may be that Armitage and Frenchy won’t need any help. I didn’t tell you, Cade, but there wasn’t a big .50 to be had at the Walls.”
“What? How are we going to kill buffalo without a gun?” Cade asked.
“Rath let me have a gun that he promised to George Causey, but it’s a round barreled .44. And for you I got a Spencer carbine.”
“You’re right. We don’t need another skinner. I can skin,” Cade said.
“Boys, I hate to rain on your parade,” Jacob said, “but the Harrison part of Harrison and McCall has to get back to Dodge and take care of business. And it wouldn’t be a bad idea if the McCall part decided he should come back, too.”
Cade let out a sigh. “I know, Jacob. You’ve been doing all the work, but how about this? We lost close to 400 hides in the river. Can you stay until Billy shoots that many? And then I’ll go back to Dodge with you.”
“All right,” Jacob said. “But no more than four days.”
The three skinners worked from sunup to sundown skinning the buffalo that Billy was killing. The skins were piling up and on the second day the number was up to 286. The carcasses as well were piling up, and Jacob brought out one of the mules to move them into a big pile. The vultures blackened the sky as they swooped down on the fresh meat, picking the meat until the bones bleached in the sun.
“Indians!” a rider yelled as he rode toward the men, causing the vultures to take flight. “Indians! Indians are comin’.”
All five men raced toward the wagon that was standing nearby. When they got there, the rider stopped to tell them the news.
“Where and how many did you see?” Cade asked.
“I didn’t see any of the bastards, but I seen what they done. Cheyenne Jack and Blue Billy—over by the Salt Fork—they cut off al
l their parts and then they scalped ‘em.”
“Are you headed to Adobe Walls?” Billy asked.
“I’ll go tell ‘em what I know, but you can’t pay me enough to stay in this country. I got me a wife and kids back in Caldwell, and I’m gonna high tail it right back home.” The man slapped his horse. “I’ve done my duty. If you men are fools enough to stay here, I can’t help it,” he yelled as the horse was galloping away.
“Do you know who that was?” Cade asked.
“I’ve never seen him before,” Billy said, “and I thought I knew most of the hunters out here.”
“Well, I hope he gets back to his wife and kids,” Cade said.
“I don’t have a wife,” Jacob said, “but I’d sort of like to live long enough to get one someday. With Dudley and Wallace, these two make four men killed within the last week or so. I know I said I’d give you four days, but would you consider loading up and going back to the Walls?”
“It’s up to you, Billy. It’s your outfit,” Cade said.
Billy nodded his head. “I think it wouldn’t be a bad idea to go in. First of all, I miss my big .50, and second, I sort of smell Indian in the air. Maybe we’ll stay at the Walls a couple days, then move the camp someplace else. The herd’s movin’. Maybe I’ll go north a little ways.”
Encampment of Cheyenne, Head of Washita River
Following the Sun Dance, Quanah Parker and White Eagle were disappointed that only about half the tribe agreed to go to war. Most of the Penatekas returned to the reservation; Chief Horse Back led many of the Nokonis away, and Chief Quitsquip took the Yamparika back to their agrarian ways. It was hard for Quanah to understand how raising plants for food could replace the excitement and freedom that killing the buffalo provided for the People.
Quanah was convinced that White Eagle could persuade the other southern plains tribes to join them, but just as the elderly of the Comanche had accepted the handouts from the government, the Arapahos, led by Chief Powder Face, chose to reject the call to war and they, too, returned to the agency. Likewise, Striking Eagle, chief of the Kiowas, took many of his people and returned as well.
The Western Adventures of Cade McCall Box Set Page 74
