The Lonesome Dove Chronicles (1-4)

by Larry McMurtry

  Clara stopped far shorter with Bob Allen, the large, silent horse trader; despite two years of courtship, Mr. Allen had not yet touched her hand. Augustus, who considered Mr. Allen an ignorant fool, would never have put up with such restraints. Gus had to touch her and kiss her, to dance with her and swim with her, and was sulky and sometimes rude when she refused him more. “It’s your fault I’m a drunkard and a whorer,” Gus told her, more than once. “If you’d just marry me I’d be sober forever, and I’d stay home besides.”

  Clara didn’t believe the part about staying home; Gus McCrae was by nature much too restless for her taste. The rangering was just an excuse, she felt. If there were no Indians to chase, and no bandits, Gus would still find reasons to roam. He was not a settled man, nor did she feel she could settle him. He would always be off with Woodrow Call, beyond the settlements somewhere, adventuring.

  Still, she felt a little guilty, where Gus was concerned—she knew there was some justice in his complaint. Though she suffered when he was in the whore tents, somehow she could not resign herself, or commit herself, to begin the great business of married life with him. Though Gus moved her in ways no other man ever had or, she feared, ever would, something in her still refused.

  Clara tried to look at life honestly, though, and when she thought closely about herself and Gus, and Maggie and Call, she could not feel that her refusals gained her any honor or moral credit. Was she any better than Maggie Tilton, who at least gave an honest service for money paid, and met an honest need?

  Clara didn’t think she was better, and she knew she was as hard on Gus McCrae—whom she dearly loved—as Woodrow Call was on Maggie Tilton.

  Clara didn’t like—indeed, couldn’t abide—Woodrow Call. His appearance, even on the mildest errand, brought out a streak of malice in her which she could not restrain. She seldom let him leave her company without cutting him with some small criticisms. Yet Woodrow Call was a much respected ranger, courageous and even in judgment, the last being a quality that Augustus McCrae could not yet lay claim to, though he was as courageous as any man. Perhaps Call even loved Maggie, in his way; he sometimes bought her small trinkets, once even a bonnet, and had twice come to fetch medicines for her, when she was poorly. There must be good in the man, else why would Maggie pine so, when he was away? She surely didn’t pine for every man who paid her money and used her body.

  Still, the one thing Maggie needed most was marriage; it might be the one thing Gus McCrae needed most, as well. But Call couldn’t or wouldn’t give it to Maggie, and she couldn’t give it to Gus. It was a linkage that irked her, but that she could neither ignore nor deny.

  When Maggie stepped in the door, after giving herself a thorough inspection, Clara smiled at her, and Maggie, surprised as she always was by Clara’s friendliness, shyly smiled back.

  “Why, it’s you. How I wish we were sisters,” Clara said, surprising herself and startling Maggie so deeply that she blushed. But the store was empty; what harm could the remark do? Besides, it was what she felt—it had always chaffed Clara that she was expected to live by rules she hadn’t made; all the rules were made by men, and what dull rules they were! How much pleasanter life would be if she could treat Maggie as she would treat a sister, or, at least, as she would treat a friend.

  “Oh, Miss Forsythe, thank you,” Maggie said. She knew she had received a great compliment, one so unexpected that it left her abashed and silenced; for years she was to remember Clara’s impulsive statement and felt happiness at the memory. She also felt a little puzzlement. Clara Forsythe was the most respected and sought-after young woman in Austin. Many of her own customers, the young ones particularly, worshiped Clara; several had even proposed to her. Maggie could not imagine why a woman in Clara’s position would even want her friendship, much less want her for a sister.

  Clara realized she had embarrassed her customer and tried to put her at ease by directing her attention to the stoneware.

  “We just got these cups and plates from Pennsylvania,” she said. “My pa thinks they’re too fancy, but I think they’re the very thing.”

  Maggie agreed, but she only let her eyes linger on the nice brown crockery for a moment. She had to be cautious when shopping, so as not to start yearning for fine things she could never afford. She did like pretty things too much; once her fancy seized on a particular ring or dress or trinket, she could scarcely think of anything else, for days. She especially wanted to impress on Woodrow that she was a good manager. She didn’t owe a cent to anyone, and had never asked Woodrow—or any man—for a cent more than she was due. She had long since stopped wanting Woodrow Call to pay her, when he came to her—but he insisted, leaving the money under a plate or a pillow if she refused to take it.

  Maggie, just for a moment, wished she could be Clara Forsythe’s friend. If they could talk freely she felt sure Clara would understand why she no longer wanted Woodrow’s money. Clara’s smile was frank and friendly, but before Maggie could even enjoy her little fancy an old man with a stringy beard came in and stomped right between them.

  “Horseshoe nails?” he asked Clara.

  “Yes sir, in the back—it’s the bin on the right,” Clara said.

  With a customer in the store Maggie didn’t feel she ought to be talking to Miss Forsythe about crockery—much less about anything else. Besides, the man was a customer of hers as well. His name was Cully Barnstone—he had visited her frequently in the last year. His presence, as he sacked up horseshoe nails, drove home a point that Maggie knew she should not, even momentarily, have forgotten. She and Clara Forsythe weren’t sisters, and couldn’t be friends. Clara had never been offered money for the service of love, and never would be. She might have her own difficulties with Augustus McCrae, but she would never experience the shame of being given money by the one man in the world she wanted to give herself to.

  Clara was annoyed with old Cully Barnstone, for coming in just when she might have had a word of conversation with Maggie; but there was nothing she could do about it. The store was open; anyone who wanted to buy something was free to come in. When Mr. Barnstone came to the counter to pay for his nails, Maggie turned away. She wandered listlessly around for a bit, keeping well to herself; she picked up a bonnet and a little hat but put both back without trying them on. In the end she merely bought a packet of darning needles and some red thread.

  “Thank you,” she said, when Clara gave her her change.

  “There’s no news from those wild ranger boys,” Clara said. “I suppose they’re still up on the plains, freezing their ears.”

  “Yes, it’s been sharp weather—I expect they’re cold,” Maggie said, as she went out the door.

  11.

  WHEN PEA EYE set out north with the rangers on his first expedition, he was as proud as he had ever been in his life. Mr. Call, who found him in a cornfield, fed him, and persuaded Captain Scull to give him a tryout as a ranger, had emphasized to him that it was just a tryout.

  “We need men and I think you’ll do,” Call told him, rather sternly. “But you watch close and follow orders. I told the Captain I’d vouch for you—don’t you disgrace me now and make me regret speaking up for you.”

  “I won’t, sir, I’ll watch close,” Pea Eye said, not entirely sure what he would have to be watching.

  “If you get scalped, don’t sit around yowling, either,” Gus McCrae said. “People survive scalpings fine if they don’t yowl.”

  He said it to josh the boy a little, but Pea Eye’s big solemn eyes opened a little wider.

  “What’s the procedure, then?” he asked. Long Bill Coleman, an experienced man, had told him there were procedures for every eventuality, in rangering.

  Pea Eye meant to do all he could to avoid a scalping, but in the event that one occurred he wanted to know what steps he should take—or not take.

  “Just sit there calmly and bite a stick,” Gus told him, doing his best to keep a straight face. “Somebody will come and sew up your head as soon as ther
e’s a lull in the killing.”

  “Why’d you tell him that?” Call asked later, when he and Augustus were cleaning their weapons. “Of course he’ll yowl if he gets scalped.”

  “No he won’t, because I instructed him not to,” Augustus said. “But if I get scalped you’ll hear some fine yowling, I bet.”

  On the trek north Pea Eye’s job was to inspect the horses’ feet every night, to see that no horses had picked up thorns or small rocks that might cause lameness. In the event of a chase a lame horse would put its rider in serious jeopardy; Pea Eye inspected every hoof at night and made sure that the horses were well secured.

  Then the sleet came and he had a hard time looking close. In the worst of the storm he could barely see his horse; at night he had to deal with the horses’ feet mostly by feel. His hands got so cold when he worked that he was afraid he might have missed something in one hoof or another; but none of the horses went lame.

  Deets, the black man, seeing Pea Eye try to inspect the hooves in the dark, brought him a light and stayed with him while he went down the line of horses, picking up their hooves one by one. It was a kind thing, which Pea Eye never forgot. Most of the men stayed as close to the fire as they could get, but Deets left the warmth and came to help him make sure that the horses’ feet were sound.

  On the fourth day of cold, Pea Eye began to wish Mr. Call had just left him in the cornfield. Proud as he was to be a ranger, he didn’t know if he could survive the cold. He got so cold at night and in the bitter mornings that he even forgot to be afraid of scalping Indians, or even death. All he could think of was how nice it would be to be in a cabin with a big fireplace and a roaring fire. It was so cold his teeth ached—he began to try to sneak food into his mouth in small quick bites, so the cold wouldn’t get in and freeze his teeth worse than they already were.

  Augustus McCrae, who seemed able to ignore the cold, noticed Pea sneaking in the tiny bites and decided a little more joshing wouldn’t hurt.

  “You ought to duck your chin down into your shirt, if you’re going to try and eat in this breeze,” he said. “If you ain’t careful your tongue will freeze and snap off like you’d snap a stick.”

  “Snap off?” Pea Eye asked, horrified. “How could it snap off?”

  “Why, from talking,” Gus said, with a grin. “All you have to do is ask for a cup of coffee and your tongue’s liable to fall right into the cup.”

  Later Pea Eye told Deets what Mr. McCrae had said and they debated the matter quietly. Pea was so cautious about opening his mouth that he could barely make himself heard.

  “Your tongue’s inside your head,” Deets pointed out. “It’s got protection. Ain’t like your finger. Now a finger might snap off, I expect, or a toe.”

  Pea Eye’s fingers were so cold he almost wished they would snap off, to relieve the pain, but they didn’t snap off. He had been blowing on his fingers, blowing and blowing, hoping to get a little warmth into them, when the Indians attacked and killed Ranger Watson. Pea Eye had been about to step right past the man, in order to take cover behind some saddles, when he heard Jimmy Watson give a small grunt—just a small quick grunt, and in that instant his life departed. If Pea Eye had not moved just when he did, making for the saddles, the bullet might have hit him—it passed just behind his leg and went only another yard or more before striking Jim Watson dead.

  No one in the troop was as glad to see the sun shine, the morning they finally headed south, as Pea Eye Parker.

  “The dern old sun, it’s finally come out again,” he said, to Long Bill Coleman.

  To Pea Eye’s surprise, he almost cried, so happy was he to see the familiar sun. He had always despised cloudy weather, but he had never despised it as much as he had during the recent days of cold.

  Fortunately Long Bill Coleman took no interest in Pea Eye’s remark and didn’t see him dash away a tear. Long Bill was attempting to shave, using a bowl of water so cold that it had a fine skim of ice on it; he considered the whole trip an intolerable waste of time—in that it was no different from most expeditions against the Comanches, only, in this instance, colder.

  “Me, I’ll take Mexico over these dern windy plains,” he told Augustus McCrae, when the troop was on the move south.

  “Me too, Billy—there’s plenty of whores in Mexico, and pretty ones, too,” Gus remarked.

  “Now, Gus, I’m married, don’t be reminding me of the temptations of the flesh,” Long Bill admonished. “I got enough flesh right there at home—there’s no shortage of flesh on Pearl.”

  Augustus thought the comment dull, if not foolish.

  “I know you’ve got a fat wife, Billy,” he said. “What’s your point about Mexico? I thought that was what we were talking about.”

  “Why, the point is, it’s convenient,” Long Bill said. “In Mexico there’s Mexicans.”

  The remark seemed even duller to Augustus than the one before it. Since marriage to Pearl, Long Bill had lost much of his liveliness, in Gus’s opinion. He had grown dull, cautious, and even pious. His wife, Pearl, was a large woman of little attraction, a bully and a nag. Had he himself been married to Pearl he would have endeavored to spend as much time as possible in the nearest bordello.

  “In Mexico there’s usually someone to ask where the bandits are,” Long Bill went on. “And there’s trees to hang them from, once we corner them. Out here on the plains there’s no one to ask directions from, and if we do see an Indian he’s apt to be way down in the canyon, where you’d have to scramble to get at him.”

  Augustus didn’t answer. The fact was, he missed Clara. No amount of easily located bandits, or hanging trees, made up for that one fact. A good two-week jaunt on the prairies always lifted his spirits, but then, inevitably, there’d come a night by the campfire or a groggy morning when he’d remember his old, sweet love and wonder if he’d been foolish to let his long courtship lapse, just for the sake of adventure. Despite her standoffish ways, Augustus felt, most of the time, that there was little likelihood that Clara would actually marry anyone but himself; at other times, though, the demon of doubt seized him and he was not so sure.

  Pea Eye found Mr. McCrae puzzling—Mr. Call he was more comfortable with, because Mr. Call only spoke to him of practical matters. Mr. McCrae sounded convincing, when he talked, but a good deal of what he said was meant in jest, like the business about his tongue snapping off.

  The hardest part of Pea Eye’s job, as the company farrier, was to see that the Captain’s big horse, Hector, did not get anything wrong with his feet. Pea Eye had never seen an elephant, but he doubted that even an elephant had feet as heavy and hard to work with as Hector. The Captain had to have special horseshoes forged, to fit the big horse’s feet. When Pea Eye did manage to lift one of Hector’s hooves the big horse would immediately let his weight sag onto Pea Eye—he could just support the weight, but it left him no strength with which to clean out the hoof. Several times Deets, seeing his plight, had come over and helped him support the big horse long enough that his feet could be properly cleaned.

  “Much obliged,” Pea Eye always said, when Deets helped him.

  “Welcome, sir,” Deets would reply.

  It unnerved Pea Eye to be addressed as “sir,” though he knew that was how black people normally addressed white people. He didn’t know if it would be correct just to ask Deets to call him by his name; he intended to discuss the point with Mr. Call when the time was right.

  Then, to his dismay, though they traveled south through a day of sunlight, the cold struck again. On the third day of their ride south the sky turned slate black and an icy wind was soon slicing at their backs and making their hands sting.

  That night Hector leaned particularly heavily on Pea Eye, and Deets was too busy preparing a meal to help him. Pressing up against the big horse caused Pea Eye to break a sweat; when he finished, the sweat froze on his shirt before he could even walk back to the fire. The sun had just gone down; Pea Eye did not know how he was going to make it through
the long winter night. He had only a thin coat and one blanket; few of the men had more. Deets didn’t have a coat at all, just an old quilt he kept wrapped around himself as he worked.

  It was Deets who showed Pea a way to survive, as the cold deepened. Deets took a little spade and dug out one side of a small hummock of dirt; he dug it so that it formed a sort of bank. Then he made a small fire up against the bank of dirt. He brought a few coals over in a small pan, and, from the coals, made a fire near enough to the bank that the bank caught the heat and reflected it back.

  “Here, sit close,” Deets said, to Pea Eye. “It ain’t much, but it will warm us.”

  He was right. Pea Eye could never get close enough to the big campfire to derive more than a few moments of warmth from it. But the little fire reflected off the bank of dirt, warmed his hands and his feet. His back still froze and his ears pained him badly, but he knew he would survive. Even with the good fire it was difficult to sleep, though; he would nod for a few minutes and then an icy curl of wind would slip under his collar and chill his very backbone.

  Once, in a few minutes of sleep, Pea Eye had a terrible dream. He saw himself freeze as he was walking; he stopped and became immobile on the white plain, like a tree of ice. Pea Eye tried to call out to the rangers, but his voice could not penetrate the sheath of ice. The rangers rode on and he was alone.

  When he woke from the dream there was a red line on the eastern horizon; the sun glowed for a moment and then passed above the slatelike clouds, which reddened for a little while but did not allow the sunlight through.

  “Much obliged for keeping this fire going,” Pea Eye said—all night Deets had fed the fire little sticks.

  “You welcome, sir,” Deets said.

  Pea Eye, cold but glad to be alive, could not contain himself about the “sir” any longer.