Epitaph

by Mary Doria Russell

  “It’s called the Bird Cage, and it’s going to be a variety house!” Josie told him. “Billy Hutchinson is an impresario. He and his wife, Lottie, are going to bring all the best touring performers to Tombstone. The main floor’s not done yet, but there’ll be a stage on one end and a three-piece orchestra.”

  “Impressive,” Doc said, trying not to remember Fred’s screams. He concentrated on breathing for a few moments before he admitted, “I am not sure . . . I understand why you wanted . . . me to see it.”

  “It’s a surprise!” She giggled and danced a bit, wrapping small hands around his bony arm. “Now that I’m sure you can get here, I’ll tell Lottie to let us in on Sunday morning. Do you need to rest a while, or shall we go straight home?”

  He could still see Fred. Bleeding in the street.

  “Let’s go on back,” he said.

  AH, IF YOU AND I COULD ESCAPE THIS FRAY!

  THERE WAS NOTHING INAPPROPRIATE ABOUT TOM McLaury’s note. Mrs. Earp, he’d written, you might think after all that rain, there should be Flowers again in your garden. Do not worry the plants are not Dead. They need some cold before they come back next Spring. Respectfully, T.M.

  Lou had nothing to hide, and yet . . . she never mentioned the note to Morgan. She folded it and kept it tucked into an apron pocket.

  Sometimes she took it out to read again when she was alone. That might have seemed suspicious but in all honesty, she wasn’t tempted by Tom McLaury. Not really. His boyish face and those beautiful, earnest, yearning blue eyes—they put her in mind of her brothers when they were little. That’s all. A few minutes of conversation with Tom were all she’d needed to size him up. She knew instinctively that he was not the kind of man who could protect her and maybe that was what she found so hard to shake off: the idea of a life in which she wouldn’t need to be protected.

  So, yes, she saved that note, though she kept it to herself.

  Because she loved Morgan Earp. She did. He was as decent a man as Lou had ever known. He had a talent for happiness and a sunny, even temperament that made each day with him a pleasure. She loved his curiosity and how tickled he was when he learned something new. She loved his tenderness at night. The joy was still there. The affection. The daily satisfactions. To her surprise, things had actually gotten better between them after she yelled and cried. Maybe Bessie was right. “Honey, the Earp boys mean well,” she’d told Lou, “but sometimes you have to hit them with a shovel to get their attention.”

  Morg worked in town now. He came home every evening and when she saw him round the corner with that big grin on his face, her heart still rose. “Wait’ll you hear what happened today!” he’d call. The stories he told were always funny, never mean-spirited. While Lou would not have chosen to live in Tombstone, she had a three-room house of her own here and a discreet gold ring on one finger. She understood the seasons better and despite the harshness of the landscape, she knew that Arizona would provide bright blue days and pleasant weather in the spring and fall. She hardly heard the noise from the steam engines down at the mines anymore. She had learned to pay attention to the flute and twitter of nearer birdsong.

  Even so, sometimes—sitting out on the front porch, listening to the buzz and squabble of a tiny darting mob of hummingbirds and watching Higgs chase lizards with clumsy puppy zeal—she would take that note out of her pocket and allow herself to wonder what her days and her nights might be like with the shy, thoughtful, sweet-faced farmer who had brought her a wagonload of spring beauty and a puppy’s exuberance to ease her loneliness and to make her smile.

  Different, she decided. Not necessarily better. Just different.

  “Bitch! Slut!” Mattie shouted, announcing Doc and Josie’s return.

  Lou slipped Tom’s note back into her apron pocket and gave Doc a steadying arm as he climbed the veranda stairs.

  “It’s official, Lou,” Josie announced. “Sunday morning, nine o’clock, at the Bird Cage. You and Morgan are invited, of course. Tell Morgan to get Wyatt to come. If Virgil and Allie would like to attend, that would be very nice, too.”

  Winded but pleased with himself and his progress, Doc asked, “Miss Louisa, do you know . . . what this . . . is about?”

  “No, she doesn’t,” Josie said, “so don’t waste your breath asking her.”

  “She’s been working on something,” Lou told him, “but she won’t say more than that. Are you going to dance for us, Josie?”

  “It’s a surprise!” Josie cried, exasperated. “‘Surprise’ means you don’t know what it is until it happens. I’ll see you at nine on Sunday.”

  “Jew slut!” Mattie yelled, standing in her doorway across the street. “I know what you’re doing. You have to have them all, don’t you! Wyatt, Morgan, and now Doc.”

  “Good mornin’, Miss Mattie,” Doc called as loudly as he could. “I hope . . . you feel better . . . soon.”

  “Go to hell!” Mattie yelled. “And take those bitches with you!”

  IT WAS A DAY FOR SURPRISES. That’s what Wyatt would remember about September 18, 1881.

  First off, Virgil and Allie showed up at the Bird Cage that morning. Wyatt hadn’t expected them to come, for Allie had been slow to warm to Josie.

  Then Albert Behan joined them, noticeably taller than the last time Wyatt had seen him. No surprise there—kids grew like weeds in the summer. The round freckled face was still that of a little boy, but Al shook hands like a grown man with the Earps and their ladies. When he was introduced to Doc Holliday, he said, “Josie and my father have both told me a lot about you. I’m inclined to believe Josie.” Which made everybody laugh. “I’m supposed to be at church,” Al said, “but Josie and me have breakfast every Sunday instead. It’s not lying. It’s just not telling. Anyways, my dad sleeps in, so he doesn’t know the difference.”

  “Nice to know the sheriff is up on events in town,” Virgil murmured.

  “No wonder he can’t seem to arrest anybody,” Morgan said, spitting into the street. “Doesn’t even know what’s going on in his own house.”

  “Doc, you all right?” Wyatt asked, for the dentist looked kind of peaked.

  “Certainly,” Doc said. “Certainly . . . Just . . . a little . . . out of breath.”

  “I’ll be right down!” Josie called from her hotel window across the street. When she emerged at street level a minute later, she had sheet music in her hands. Doc went still, and her face lit up. “Don’t expect much,” she warned him, “but I’ll do my best!”

  Lottie and Billy Hutchinson arrived to let them in. “The Bird Cage will be the finest building in Tombstone when we’re done,” Billy bragged. “Two stories aboveground and a cellar below. This open area in the center here will be general audience, but we’re running galleries along both sides with box seats.”

  “I’ve got velvet curtains on order,” Lottie told them, “and there’ll be upholstered chairs in the boxes.”

  “Theater on the main floor, gambling in the cellar,” Billy said, but his eyes were on Doc Holliday, for—like a man in a trance—Doc had worked his way around piles of construction materials and now stood still, staring at what they believed was the surprise Josie had promised him.

  “It’s a J. P. Hale square grand,” Billy said with quiet pride. “Came in that last shipment of goods before the roads closed. Not as splendid as a Chickering—what a pity to lose that beauty in the fire! Still, plenty good enough for the acts we’ll have.”

  “Wyatt,” Josie said, “bring that chair over for Doc, would you, please? And put it right there?”

  Next to the piano, she meant, not in front of it.

  That was the next surprise, for it was Josie herself who sat on the piano stool. Hands hovering over the keys, she murmured, “No need to rush.”

  In the silence of the half-finished theater, she began to play. Slowly, tenderly. As though a child were sleeping in the next room. Letting each note linger in the heart and in the ear. It was just one piece, perhaps three minutes long, but she
played it well. When she finished, no one clapped or even breathed, for they were still inside that sacred place that music can sometimes create.

  Finally, Josie herself broke the spell, going to Doc’s side, kneeling before him, reaching up to wipe the tears from his face with her own hands.

  “Well, now,” he said, voice fraying. “Ain’t you something.”

  “Oh, Doc, you wouldn’t credit how I practiced! I left out the hardest parts, and it still took weeks and weeks to learn it. ‘Traumerei’ is the only thing in the world that I can play.”

  “And you are my only pupil,” Doc said when he could speak again, “but I cannot imagine . . . one who might have . . . pleased me more.”

  THEY ALL WENT OVER to the Can Can Café for dim sum after that, even Albert, who sat next to Josie with a proprietary air.

  They tried a couple of dozen little dishes of strange Chinese foods. The girls made a fuss about how good it was. Morgan and Virgil joshed Quong Kee about bird’s nest soup and asked if he’d make cow pie dumplings next, but there wasn’t a scrap left on the table by ten o’clock, when church let out.

  Al told them he had to get home. That was the signal for the rest of them to leave as well. Morgan tried to pick up the check, but Wyatt told them, “I took care of it already.”

  Everyone stared at him, boggled, for Wyatt was the tightest man with a dollar any of them knew.

  “What’s next?” Virgil asked. “Talking horses? Honest politicians?”

  “Nah,” Morgan said. “He’s not paying! He just won a bet with Mr. Kee!”

  “Hush up, Morgan,” Doc said. “Thank you, Wyatt. You are very kind.”

  Virgil needed to get back to the city marshal’s office. Morgan was late for work at the Alhambra. Doc said he’d escort Allie and Lou home, if they didn’t mind walking at a snail’s pace. That left Josie with Wyatt, who walked her back to her hotel over on Sixth but couldn’t think of anything to say along the way.

  When they got to the door, he just stood there like an idiot on the boardwalk, turning the brim of his hat around and around in his hand.

  “Well,” Josie said, “it’s been a lovely morning, but . . .”

  “That was real nice,” Wyatt said. “What you did for Doc.”

  Relieved that he had finally spoken, she smiled happily. “He’s been so sick . . . I just wanted to do something special for him. He has such a terrible reputation, but it’s like you said—people get the wrong impression. I think he’s sweet.”

  Wyatt looked away, then made himself say it. “He is lucky to have you. I know he’ll treat you good.”

  She blinked. “I’m sorry?” Frowning, she squeezed her eyes shut for a moment, then looked at him again. “Wait! You mean—you thought Doc and I . . . ? ” There was a startled laugh. “No! No, no, no! I mean, there’s nothing wrong with him, but— No! Wyatt, Doc’s still in love with Kate.”

  It was Wyatt’s turn to be startled. “Kate? Oh, hell! Don’t tell me he’s gonna take her back!”

  “Now, see, that’s exactly why he didn’t say anything to you! He knew you wouldn’t approve.”

  “Darn right, I don’t approve! She drinks and she’s bad-tempered, and— Hell, she almost got him hanged! Why in the world would he take her back? That’s just plain foolishness.” He stopped. “But then . . . you and him . . . you ain’t . . . ? ”

  Eyes bright as sunlight on water, she waited, letting him work it out.

  “So then, you and me . . . I mean, if you wanted . . . we could—”

  She squealed then, like an excited little kid. And leapt into his arms. And planted a kiss on his lips. Right there, in broad daylight. On a public street.

  “Oh, Wyatt!” she cried, half-exasperated, half-thrilled. “My God! I thought you’d never ask!”

  HE HAD KNOWN ONE GOOD WOMAN, and a fair number of bad ones, but he had never known anyone like Josie. She was not shameless, or indifferent to what he did, or merely tolerant. She was joyful. She was glad of him.

  When he finished, he thought their first time was real fine. He would never know that she was thinking, Well, that was dreary.

  She was, by then, an accomplished actress who liked men in general and found them endearingly fragile. So she waited, letting him drowse a while before she rose on one elbow and gazed down at him with a face full of challenge and fun.

  “I suppose you think you’re done?” she asked, brows high.

  She brought his hands to places he had never touched. She made him slow down and then commanded, “Now!” and rose to meet him. When she cried out, he froze, thinking he had hurt her. Sweating, breathless, she lay back a few moments later and laughed: a throaty, deep, satisfied laugh.

  Seeing his confusion, she smiled. “You didn’t know a woman could feel that, too?”

  Dumbfounded, he shook his head.

  Eyes warm, she kissed him again. “Don’t worry, Wyatt. I know enough for both of us.”

  THE CHURCH BELLS WOKE THEM early the next morning. That was a surprise, too, for it was Monday.

  The tolling was slow, not the rapid clanging of a fire alarm or the stately announcement of worship services.

  Wyatt got up and went to the window to see what was going on. Behind him, still in bed, Josie said, “Don’t move! My God, I could look at you for hours.”

  Startled by the remark, he turned, covering himself with his hands.

  She giggled. “I had no idea men could blush all the way down!”

  Then it struck them both: The slow tolling of bells was funereal.

  “Hell,” Wyatt said. “Garfield musta died.”

  The gunfire began a moment later. He reached for his clothes, and Josie groaned, “No! Don’t go!”

  “Virg might need me,” he said, bracing for the kind of argument he used to have with Mattie. Your brothers always come first. I’m always last. But that was another surprise, for Josie sat up, small breasts bare to the morning light, her eyes serious.

  “You’re right,” she said. “Go. Go! I’ll be here when you get back.”

  DOWN ON THE STREETS, there were crowds of people. “The president’s dead,” he heard someone say, and that’s what he’d expected, but it was still a shock to hear the words and his heart sank.

  Joining the throng that was headed to the Western Union office, he witnessed for himself the way the town—and the nation—was divided. Republicans were struck dumb by the news: half in grief for Garfield, half in dread of what a Chester Alan Arthur presidency would mean to the nation. Democrats adjourned to the saloons to celebrate the death of an abolitionist who’d meant to oppose the reestablishment of white rights across the old Confederacy.

  Wyatt found Doc Holliday in the crowd near the Western Union office.

  “I would not have voted for the man,” Doc admitted, “but this—” He lifted a fine-boned hand toward the street, where small groups of Cow Boys were now tearing down Allen on horseback, shooting at the sky and racing beyond the city limits before the police could do anything about the ruckus. “This is indecent.”

  DENSE THE BATTLE-HAZE THAT ENGULFS THE BRAVE

  STRIFE STRIDES ACROSS THE EARTH

  THE SEPTEMBER 21 MEETING IN MEXICO CITY BEGAN with condolences, of course. His Excellency Ignacio Mariscál, head of the Secretariat of Foreign Affairs, conveyed his government’s heartfelt sympathies to the bereaved citizens of the United States, which were gracefully accepted by His Excellency Philip Morgan, minister plenipotentiary of the United States legation to the Republic of Mexico. These pro forma courtesies were followed by murmurs of genuine personal regret upon the passing of James Garfield. Mental notes were made to wait a few days before any private assessment of the new president’s character—or lack of it—were exchanged.

  Then they came to grips.

  “Despite these grievous circumstances,” Sr. Mariscál said briskly, “our ships of state cannot be allowed to drift. As you well know, the conditions on the Arizona border are now and have been—for many months—outrageous. Cattle
raids. Drunken predation on peones. Rape, sir, of our women. Our gray-haired elders beaten. And now the Cow Boys have murdered sixteen Mexican nationals on U.S. soil. Civilians, sir. Honest merchants, robbed of over three thousand dollars and killed by criminals who are known to your officials but who are permitted to roam free.”

  “Your Excellency, I agree fully that the border situation is regrettable, but since President Garfield was shot in June—”

  “I understand that there has been a constitutional crisis since the attack on your president, but please! Do not dare to offer excuses. Conditions on the border are more than regrettable, sir. They are dangerous—very dangerous!—but when my government protests, nothing is done. Worse than nothing, for insult is added to our injuries when members of these very outlaw gangs are deputized by the sheriff of Cochise County.”

  Philip Morgan, who had not been invited to sit down, shifted uneasily on his feet, one of which still ached from a wound he had sustained thirty-some years ago, not far from this office. “Sheriff Behan’s decisions in this matter are lamentable, but he is within his legal rights to deputize anyone he deems suitable. My understanding is that none of the men he employs has been convicted of any crime—”

  “Only because their fellow outlaws provide alibis for them in court!”

  “Nevertheless, according to the rule of law—”

  “The rule of law in Arizona is utterly corrupt. Do you dispute this?”

  The American remained silent.

  “No. I thought not. And so: I am instructed by my government to demand again that the United States deploy troops on our mutual border to control these murdering thieves—”

  “And I, Excellency, must explain again that the Posse Comitatus legislation bars the U.S. military from any association with civilian law enforcement.”

  “Then declare martial law!’

  “If we were to do that, there would be an insurrection in Arizona and, quite likely, in Texas and New Mexico as well.”