by Jory Sherman
“We’ll split up,” Brad said. “Any idea who these small footprints might belong to?”
“Norm Worth has a couple of kids. A boy and a girl. Gal’s name is Hollie. Boy is named Cal.”
Brad turned to Gid. “See if you can find a shovel in the barn, Gid. Paco, find a shady spot where the ground is soft. I want these people buried proper.”
Paco dismounted before Gid. He led his horse to a tree on the edge of the garden and tied it up, then started looking around for a burial place. Gid rode to the barn, tied his horse to a hitch ring on a post, and went inside. He returned with two shovels.
“Randy and Lou, why don’t we ride through the woods yonder and see if we can find any of the Worths. Ask them if they know what happened here.”
“I don’t like what I’m feelin’,” Randy said.
“Neither do I,” Brad replied.
Lou caught up his horse and rode toward the path that led through the woods, where he waited for Brad and Randy. Paco and Gid were already digging a double grave under the shade of a live oak.
“Gid, when you’re finished, you and Paco ride through the woods to the Worth place. Keep your eyes open.”
“We will,” Gid said. “You want ’em deep or shallow?”
“Deep enough to keep the critters from digging them up,” Brad said. “And,” he added, “see you treat ’em decent.”
“Will do, Major,” Gid said, touching two fingers to his hat brim.
“Lead out, Randy,” Brad said, after Randy had caught up his horse and mounted. They joined Lou and headed into the forest.
Brad studied the tracks on the path through the woods. He saw where the girl had led the mule from the Cooper farm, then back again. So, he thought, she must have either seen them get killed, or come upon them just after they were shot.
“Smoke ahead,” Randy called.
Brad looked up and saw the columns of smoke. His stomach seemed to fall inside him as if he had stepped into a hole and dropped a foot or two.
“Not much smoke,” he said.
“Smells of wood,” Lou said.
“Yeah, wood smoke,” Randy said, as he wound through the trees: hickory and oak, a few willows, some mesquite, sumac.
Finally, Randy rode into a clearing, and beyond, the three men saw a house and barn, with three thin columns of smoke rising from a field they could not see over the slight rise the land made beyond their line of vision.
“That’s Worth’s place,” Randy said. “Looks peaceful enough.”
“He must be burnin’ stumps,” Lou said.
Brad said nothing, but looked all around as far as he could see. Randy set a course for the house, with Lou behind him and Brad in the rear.
“That don’t smell like just wood smoke no more,” Lou said, crinkling his nose.
Brad nodded. “It smells like . . .” And then his stomach turned and bile rose up in his throat, gagging him.
The three riders topped the rise and the field where the stumps were burning came into view. That was when they heard the distinct sound of someone sobbing.
Randy turned away from the house and started toward the open field. Lou and Brad caught up with him and they rode side by side in silence.
“That looks like Hollie Worth yonder,” Randy said, pointing to a figure bending over something in the field. The stench of burning flesh was strong in their nostrils now, mingled with the wood smoke, and Lou held his nose, grimaced, as they rode ever closer.
“Oh, Cal, oh my God.” The woman’s voice carried on the still air and sent shivers up Brad’s spine.
“Hollie,” Randy called out. “Hollie, it’s me, Randy Dunn, from over to Cottonwood Creek.”
The woman, no more than a girl to Brad’s eyes, looked up, shielding her eyes from the sun with her right hand. She seemed dazed, Brad thought, or addled. There was a bewildered expression on her face.
“Randy? Is that you?”
“Yeah, Hollie. With some friends. What happened here?”
“Oh, God, Randy, they killed everybody—Pa, Cal, the Coopers . . . ”
“Did you see ’em?” Randy asked, swinging off his horse.
“No, I just heard shots. I just heard shots and now they’re dead, oh God.”
Brad slipped out of the saddle. Lou stayed mounted when Brad put up a hand. He nodded as Brad handed him the reins to his horse and followed Randy into the field.
“Brad, this is Hollie Worth,” Randy said. “Hollie, this is my old cavalry boss, Major Brad Chambers.”
“It’s just Brad.”
“Look what they’ve done, Randy. Poor Pa. Poor Cal.”
Cal’s clothing was scorched and still smoldering. Brad saw where Hollie had dragged his body away from one of the burning stumps.
“I’m real sorry, ma’am,” Brad said, taking off his hat out of respect. “We know who did this and we mean to bring them to justice.”
“That’s why we’re here,” Randy said.
“You mean you know these men?” Hollie asked.
“No’m,” Brad said, “we don’t know them. But we’ve been charged with catching them and taking them before a court of law.”
“You ought to shoot them dead,” Hollie said. Her clothes were smeared with dirt and there was soot and ashes on her face. But Brad saw that she was a comely woman, probably in her early twenties, with wet blue eyes and auburn hair, and a figure that could not be hidden under the loose clothing she wore: a pair of dyed cotton trousers and a faded chambray shirt, with flat-soled boots that laced up to the high tops, much like the brogans on her brother’s feet.
“Can you tell us what happened?” Brad asked.
“They shot Cal over by the house, and dragged him over here and threw him on a burning stump. They shot my pa in the barn and dragged him here, too. Both of them were on top of stumps. Why?”
“I reckon they’re just mean men, Hollie,” Randy said.
“They killed the Coopers, too,” she said. “Shot them both down in cold blood.”
“We know,” Brad said. “Two of my men are burying them now.”
“Oh, my God,” she said. “I never thought about that. And I’ve got to bury my pa and my brother.”
“We’ll do it for you,” Brad said.
Hollie brushed her brother’s face tenderly, then leaned down and kissed him on the forehead. She stood up, tears brimming in her eyes. “I—I don’t think I could bear putting them in the ground myself. I’d like to wash them up, though. Put some clean clothes on Daddy and Cal.”
“We’ll help you, Hollie,” Randy said. “Do you want us to carry them out back to the pump?”
“Yes, I—I guess that would be best.” She glanced down at her own clothes. “Well, look at me, will you? I look like I’ve been wallowing with the hogs.” She brushed back a vagrant strand of burnished hair that had fallen over her dirty face. “I look a mess.”
“You look just fine, Hollie,” Randy said. “Considerin’.”
“I—I’ll just go on to the house. Will you . . . will you bring Pa and Cal around back?”
“We’ll do it, ma’am,” Brad said. “Will you be all right?”
“Do you mean am I going to cry again? Probably. I just don’t want anybody to see me when I do.”
She broke into a sob then and started running toward the house, her man’s shirt flopping its tail, her boots making soft sounds on the earth.
“Poor gal,” Randy said. “She put a lot of store in her pa. Her brother wasn’t quite right in the head, but she was like a mother to him.”
“What about her mother?” Brad asked.
“She died some time back. Hollie’s had a lot on her shoulders. And now this.”
Brad sighed. He looked at the two dead men and shook his head. Suddenly, none of that day seemed real. There were too many dead and Thorne was making tracks to parts unknown, putting more distance between himself and his pursuers. But he couldn’t just ride off and leave these messes for one lone girl to clean up.
This was looki
ng more and more like the war he had thought was over. Dead people everywhere and so senseless. But this was a different war. The dead had had no chance to defend themselves, and they had not been at war. They were innocent victims of a madman—and the more Brad thought about it, the more convinced he became that Thorne was mad, an insane killer with no conscience.
Lou dismounted, led the horses to a bush, and tied the reins loosely to the branches. He and Randy picked up Norm Worth, Randy by the shoulders, Lou by the dead man’s feet. Brad shouldered Cal’s body, surprised at its lightness. The corpse was starting to stiffen, but was not fully into rigor mortis. He followed Randy and Lou to the pump behind the house, where the two men laid out Norm. Brad gently placed Cal’s body beside his father’s. Hollie must have closed their eyes because they were tightly shut, which made it slightly easier to look at them. Brad shook his head again.
“So damned senseless,” he said.
“Who in hell is Abel Thorne?” Randy asked. “Is he plumb crazy? I think Grimley’s got a lot to answer for, too. No government gave him the right to kill anybody for not paying taxes.”
“You think that’s why these two men were killed?” Lou asked.
Randy fished out his makings and began building a smoke. He offered the sack to Lou, who took it and fished in his pocket for papers. When he had built his, he handed the tobacco sack to Brad, who built a quirly and held it to the match Randy lit.
“Grimley might be just somebody Thorne’s using for his own purposes,” Brad said, blowing a spume of blue smoke out of his mouth. “The papers he served you two looked legitimate.”
“Yeah, they did,” Randy said. “I just can’t figure out why Thorne’s doing all this. Does he want land? He’s doing it the hard way, seems to me.”
“Thorne is a man just plumb full of hate,” Brad said. “Blind hate. I’ve seen it before in such men. Men like Thorne are cowards at heart. They pick on weaker people, unsuspecting people. Their hate is so strong, they’ll use any excuse to kill. Thorne is like a man who kicks his dog. At first he may kick it for a reason. But after that, he just enjoys kicking the dog. It makes him feel like a big man, a strong man to kick that dog.”
“Yeah, I’ve known men like Thorne,” Randy said. “I thought Colonel Ford was that way until I got to know him.”
“No, Rip was not that way,” Brad said. “He’s a decent man. Thorne is like a pox on the land. He infects everything he touches.”
“I’d like to infect him,” Lou said. “With lead poisoning.”
“I say rope and drag the son-of-a-bitch,” Randy said.
“Go see if you can find some shovels, Randy,” Brad said. “Lou, you go and help him. Try the barn.”
The two men walked off toward the barn, both still talking about what they’d like to do to Abel Thorne.
Hollie emerged from the house. She was dressed in clean clothes: a pair of sturdy duck pants, a clean man’s shirt, and the same boots. Her face was freshly scrubbed and her hair was tied high in the back with a green ribbon, giving her a saucy look. But there was no mistaking the sadness in her eyes.
“The boys have gone to fetch shovels, ma’am,” Brad said.
“My name is Hollie. ‘Ma’am’ is for old schoolteachers.”
“Yes’m.”
“I’m going with you, you know,” she said.
“What?”
“When you go after those men. I’m going with you.”
“No, you sure aren’t.”
“You can’t stop me. I can ride and shoot as well as any man and I want to see those men who killed my pa, my brother, and the Coopers.”
“You can see ’em in jail.”
“I’ll see them hanged, or shot,” she said, her eyes flashing with determination.
“This is a military expedition, Miss Hollie. No place for a woman. It’s very dangerous.”
“Living here was dangerous for my pa and my brother. Not to mention those poor Coopers.”
“It’s not the same. You can’t come with us.”
“Well, I am, sir, no matter what you say. Where you go, I will go. Until those men are caught or killed.”
Brad glared at her, but she stood straight, returning his stare, her chin slightly uptilted, her eyes narrowed to burning slits that seemed to bore right through him.
That’s when he twisted his head suddenly, thinking he saw the men out of the corner of his eye. But it was only that shadow that seemed to be following him, vanished now, and the men were still in the barn looking for shovels.
He rubbed his eyes, as if to clear them. When he looked back at Hollie, she was staring at him with an odd expression on her face.
“Did you think you saw someone?” she asked.
Brad shook his head, but he looked over his shoulder again one more time. Just to make sure.
18
* * *
GRIMLEY WAS SWEATING hard, and not just from the heat of the sun. For two days they had been traveling southwest, with no sign of the man pulling the pack horse since they left the crossroads near the Worth place. He kept expecting to rendezvous with the old man and the pack horse at any moment, but they had traveled miles at a good clip without seeing a soul. They hadn’t stopped at any of the farms on his list, either.
Grimley realized that without Abel Thorne, he was completely blind. He had relied on the man to take him to those farms where taxes were owed, and he had served notice on a few. The ones where he had been sent away only to hear gunshots were the ones that weighed heavily on his conscience. He was pretty sure that the Coopers had been shot, and they didn’t owe any taxes. He didn’t know about the Worths, for sure, but he had heard shots and when he’d asked Thorne about them, he had just taken the papers and said he’d deliver them later. Which was not entirely legal. But he was genuinely afraid of Thorne now, although he had seemed nice enough when they had first met and Thorne had volunteered to show him where all those farms in arrears were located. Then the old man and Thorne’s two hench-men had joined them and everything had changed from then on.
“Where are we going, Abel?” Grimley finally asked, as he wiped his face with a large blue kerchief that was already stiff with perspiration.
“West,” Thorne said.
“I can see that. Any particular place? I still have notices to serve in this general area.”
“Hogg’s Wells,” Thorne said. “We’ll get to your notices once we resupply.”
“I’m not entirely happy with the way things have been going. I am not used to the hostility from the landowners. And I should have served Norman Worth.”
“You don’t have to worry none about Worth.”
“What do you mean, sir?”
“I mean he won’t give you no more trouble, Grimley. Ever.”
Grimley felt a shiver course up his spine, as if a spider had crawled up his bare back.
“I cannot and will not be a party to murder, Mr. Thorne.”
“Murder? Why do you say that?”
“Because I suspect that you and your companions might be murdering landowners.”
“Where did you get that idea?”
“I’ve heard you shooting. And I’ve not been called in to serve papers at those places where you fired your guns.”
“Grimley, do you know what your problem is?”
“I’m not aware of any problem beyond my suspicions.”
“You think too damned much. Just mind your own business and we’ll get along.”
“I am trying to mind my own business, sir. But you are making it very difficult for me to conduct it properly.”
“Have you collected any taxes yet, Grimley?”
“You know I have not.”
“And, you ain’t goin’ to, neither. These people are dirt poor. They don’t have any cash. The damned Yankees came down here and tore up the state and stole our cotton, our tobacco, our food crops, and I don’t know what all. The federal government is just a land-grabbin’ thief sendin’ you down here to collect taxes.”
“I thought you were on our side, Mr. Thorne.”
“I ain’t on nobody’s side, Grimley. I just don’t believe in free niggers, that’s all. Niggers was born to be slaves and anybody who sets ’em free is a damned traitor to Texas.”
“I have nothing to do with slavery, sir. It’s not my job to enforce the Emancipation Proclamation.”
“That’s good, Grimley, because if that was your job, I’d shoot you dead right here and now.”
Thorne rode away from Grimley, leaving him to tag along in the rear of the three men he had come to distrust. He coughed at the dust Thorne’s horse kicked up and wiped his face again with the sweat-stiff kerchief. His clothes were soggy from the boiling sun and he felt as if he must weigh five hundred pounds with all the sweat on him.
It was a two-day ride to Hogg’s Wells and Grimley felt isolated from the others at each stop. He kept wondering when they would meet up with the man leading the pack horse, but they never did. Rations were short, and Grimley’s belly was growling in protest by the time they reached the wells. It was no more than a way station, and once Thorne and his men watered their horses, they rode on, south of the settlement. Grimley had no choice but to water his horse, fill his canteen, and follow them.
Thorne and his men rode down a slope and entered a heavy thicket of trees at the bottom of the draw. A thin veil of blue smoke hung over the trees and Grimley smelled food cooking. Beef. His stomach roiled with hunger and his mouth began to fill with saliva.
Grimley rode down into the bottom and entered the thicket at the place where he had last seen Thorne and his partners. The smell of food grew stronger and the air was laced with wisps of smoke. He heard the rumble of voices and guffaws of laughter. He rode on toward the aromas and the noises and saw the creek through a gap in the trees, and several men standing up and looking at the three who had just ridden in. Something like fear formed a ball in Grimley’s stomach and he felt a sinking feeling in his heart.
He rode into the camp and his gaze swept over the swarm of men, many of them bearded and disheveled, some wearing Confederate trousers or shirts. All were armed, heavily armed, and they turned, as one, and looked at him with dark hooded eyes. Grimley felt as if he had wandered into a nest of snakes.
