The Last River

by Leon Loy

  “Fresh legs on this four-year old,” the horse trader said, bringing up a sorrel mare. “Hasn’t been ridden for over a week.”

  After a quick inspection of its legs, Caleb ran his hand from withers to croup and down over its flank. The mare calmly watched him, twitching its tail as Caleb brought his hand over its neck and rubbed its nose. He would need a strong horse to hold up to the pace he intended to put it through. The sorrel reminded him of his own sturdy mare, safely stabled in Dodge City.

  “You tradin’ the chestnut?” the horse trader asked.

  “I’d like you to hold it for Charles Rath. It’s his horse. He’ll be coming through here on his way back to Dodge City.”

  “I know the man well. When is he comin’ through?”

  “A month, maybe more. How much for the mare?”

  “A hundred dollars, if you’re buying with cash.”

  “I’ll give you seventy-five.”

  “You know that mare’s worth at least ninety dollars.”

  Caleb pulled his money clip from the saddle bag he had draped over a nearby gate, and counted out eighty-five dollars. It left him with only ten dollars—all that remained of his savings. He stuffed five dollars in his vest pocket and turned back to the trader.

  “Here’s eighty dollars,” he said, holding out the money. “That’s a fair offer.”

  The horse trader scratched his chin. “I don’t think I can let her go for eighty dollars,” he said.

  Caleb pulled out the five in his vest. “That’s eighty-five. I’m all in.”

  The trader took the bills and thumbed through them, counting. “You need a bill of sale. It won’t take long for me to draw it up. I’ll have my boy saddle up the mare for you.”

  “I appreciate it,” Caleb said.

  At the sutler’s store, he bought enough provisions to last a week, even though the journey to Dodge City was only a four-day ride north. The trader brought him the bill of sale, which he stuffed into his pocket. The trader’s teenage son held the mare outside for him.

  Soon, he was on the military road north, the same road he had traveled nearly a month earlier with the Rath supply train en route to Sweetwater. When he reached the bank of the Cimarron River the next day, he left the road, turning the sorrel upstream, heading west.

  He had remembered something a buffalo hunter had once told him. The hunter had successful hidden from Indians in the breaks of the Cimarron, south and west of Dodge City. In a bend of the river, for nearly a mile there were rocky bluffs and heavy brush, ideal cover for hiding out. If Buck Hester had taken Sparrow there, going to Dodge City could be a waste of valuable time. It might be a long shot, but his gut was telling him to follow the river to the breaks.

  The night was lit by a half moon, reflected in silver slivers on the surface of the water, which gurgled softly over its bed of pebbles and sand. An eerie bluish glow illumined the tops of tangled brush which grew along the banks.

  Caleb did not stop to make camp but kept riding westward, letting the horse find its way in the moonlight. When the mare slowed its pace, he set spurs to its flank. He gave no thought to the hunger pangs in his stomach, the dull ache of the old wound in his shoulder, or the chill of the night air. He thought of nothing else but the fate of his wife, and what she might be enduring at the hands of Buck Hester.

  12

  The first night Sparrow spent in Buck Hester’s cabin by the spring, she did not sleep. Her wet clothes were draped across two chairs in the center of the small room, and she lay naked on top of a straw mattress beneath a dirty blanket, which stank of men’s sweat. Her wrists were tied to a lead rope connected to the bed post. The men slept outside around a campfire, the night being mild and clear. All night, she kept her eyes on the doorway which, in place of proper door, was covered by a strip of burlap nailed to the top.

  If Buck, or one of the other men came to her, she was determined to fight them with all her strength. With her hands bound, the only weapon she had available was her teeth, and she pondered where to place a bite to inflict the greatest injury. If they intended to rape her, and she believed that was almost certain, she would make them pay dearly. They may kill her for it, but she determined that death would be preferable to the humiliation of giving in to them.

  As morning light filtered into the room through a window, she heard the men stirring outside. Soon the aroma of fire smoke, coffee, and hoecakes filled the air. Her stomach groaned, reminding her how hungry she had become.

  The burlap was shoved aside, and Harold entered the cabin holding a bandana with two small hoecakes in it. He set it on a chair, and slid the chair across the dirt floor to the bed.

  “You need to eat,” he said and left, only to return a minute later with a tin cup of coffee. “Here’s something to wash it down with.”

  “Will you untie me?” she asked, “So I can put on my dress?”

  He pulled her dress and undergarments from the chairs and stood over her, holding them out. “I can dress you,” he said.

  She shrank underneath the blanket, trying to keep her body covered. The men had all gawked at her with hungry eyes, but not one of them had made any move to touch her. Not yet.

  “I would rather dress myself,” she said. “Please.”

  Harold hesitated, trying to decide what to do. Buck stuck his head through the burlap. “What are you doing?” he said.

  His brother threw her clothes on the bed. “She wants to get dressed,” he answered.

  Buck could barely make out her figure lying on the bed in the shadow. “So, let her get dressed,” he said.

  “She wants her hands untied.”

  Buck came through the doorway, and walked to the bedside. “I’m going to untie you,” he said. “You remember what I told you yesterday. I will shoot you if you try to run away.”

  She slid to the side of the bed, covering as much of her body with the blanket as possible, and held out her wrists.

  “Cut her loose, Harold,” he said, moving to the door. “Then come out, and let her get dressed.”

  Harold used his knife to cut through the rope that bound her wrists, and then turned and went to the door. He stood looking back at her for a moment, and then went out. She waited until he was outside before throwing aside the blanket and hurrying into her clothes. Then she took the bandana of hoecakes and put it in her lap.

  The cakes were coarse and bland, but still warm. She ate them quickly, and then gulped the coffee, even as she examined the interiors of the cabin. All the furniture, which consisted of the bed, and a table and four chairs, had been crudely crafted from cedar and cottonwood trees cut near the cabin. The sweet smell of green cedar filled the room. A wall of stacked stone framed a fireplace opposite the bed, and a small, glassless window opened into the back wall. Next to the fireplace were stacked various pots and pans and an iron poker leaning against the stone. A wooden box under the table held tins of food, coffee, and a sack of flour.

  She left the bed and inspected the window. It was too narrow to crawl through, even for her slender frame. The doorway offered the only exit. She could hear the men outside finishing with their breakfast. Crossing the room, she pulled the burlap on the doorway to one side, and peeked out.

  Joe was at the creek splashing water into a frying pan, and scraping it with a spoon. About fifteen yards from the cabin, Harold and Buck were reclining against their saddles and talking quietly. She could not understand what they were saying. Beyond them, the horses were corralled behind a rope wound around a circle of cottonwood trees.

  She stepped away from the door and sat down on the bed. What next? she wondered. So far, the men had restrained themselves, but she had noticed the lust in their faces when they looked at her. The sleepless night began to take its toll, and she slumped back on the bed.

  But just then, she sat up, wide awake. Her eyes were drawn to the fireplace, and the ir
on poker leaning against it.

  The morning grew warm quickly, and Buck and Harold let the fire die as they leaned back on their saddles, watching Joe at the creek, cleaning up after breakfast. Harold kept looking back at the cabin.

  “You going to leave her untied?” he asked.

  “I’m thinking on it,” Buck said. “There ain’t nowhere for her to go. Hell, she don’t even know where she is.”

  “She’s a Ind’n. Part, anyway. She might figure it out.”

  Buck thought for a minute. “Naw, she’s Tonkawa, is what I heard. Stolen from her mama and raised by Comanche down on the Red River. She don’t know this country.”

  “I didn’t think you trusted Ind’ns,” Harold said.

  “I don’t. What I’m telling you is, she ain’t stupid. There ain’t nowhere for her to go, and she knows it. We’re three days’ ride from anywhere.”

  “What I’m sayin’, Buck, if you’ll stop being so hard-headed, is she could figure out where to go. Ind’ns are like that. They ain’t ever lost.”

  “Not this’n. As long as she gets food and water, and is left alone, she won’t run away.”

  “So, you don’t aim to use her for a whore? What a waste.”

  “Not just yet. It’s best to leave her alone till we get some money for her.”

  “I don’t see what difference it makes. Now or later.”

  “Are you going to argue about this all day?”

  Harold gave up. “So, when do I leave?”

  “I’m thinking tomorrow.”

  “We just got here, Buck. The horses are tuckered. They need more than one day’s rest,” Harold said, turning to look at the cabin again.

  Buck knew what his brother was thinking. “You want a piece of that girl so bad you can taste her. Get that idea out of your head right now. If they don’t give you the money for her, you can have your fun when you get back. After me.”

  Harold glared at him, and spit into the campfire coals, making it hiss. “It ain’t going to be easy to get her to lay still,” he complained. “You saw what she can do when she’s riled.”

  “You don’t need to be thinking about laying her. Not till we get the money.”

  Joe had laid the pots on the creek bank to dry and was walking over to the horses to take them out of the gulch to graze. He left the brothers alone when they were scheming.

  “We should just keep her,” Harold said. “Even after we get the money. Not give her back to them.”

  That very thought had already occurred to Buck. Keeping her would mean they would have to find a hideout much further away than the Cimarron breaks. The whole country would turn out to look for them. Harold wasn’t the only one itching to have a go at her. Buck had every intention of getting all he wanted of her, whether he let her go or not, but he wasn’t sharing that thought with Harold.

  “I’ve given some thought to going to Mexico when we get the money,” he said.

  “Let’s bring her with us,” Harold said, his face brightening at the prospect that his brother might be warming up to his suggestion. “She might even take to us after a while.”

  Buck gave his brother a dubious look. He doubted she’d ever take to them, but he thought he could at least train her to fear him.

  “Keep it down,” he said, casting a glance at the cabin himself. “She don’t need to hear what we’re up to. Hand me that pencil.”

  Harold dug into the saddle bag lying near him, and fished out a stubby pencil. Noticing its broken lead, he took his knife and whittled it to a point, then handed it to Buck.

  “Paper,” he said.

  Harold fished around in the bag again and produced a crumpled receipt from Zimmerman’s mercantile in Dodge City, where he had bought provisions four days earlier. “This is all I got to write on,” he said, handing it over.

  Buck turned the receipt over and spread it out on his thigh. He paused to think about how he wanted to word the note. “How much should we ask for?”

  Harold rolled his head around, pondering. “Would five hundred be too much?”

  “Hell, no,” Buck said. “That’s not near enough. I was thinking of five thousand dollars.”

  “You’re loco, brother. That doctor won’t have that much money lying around. Ask for a thousand.”

  “I didn’t go to this much trouble for just a thousand dollars. I’ll ask for two thousand.”

  He began to write:

  To Doctir T. L. McKarty of Dodj City,

  If yu and thet clurk want to see the Indin gurl Sparo alive agin it will cost yu 2,000 dollirs. Give the muny to the man who givs yu this note. Win he gits back with it I will sind hur to yu. If he dus not git back with the muny in 1 week by hisself she is ded. Do not put me to the test for I will do it sur.

  Yurs truly,

  Buck Hester

  “Read that to me,” Harold said.

  Buck read it aloud, keeping his voice low, and then said, “What do you think?”

  Harold nodded. “That ought to do it.”

  Buck handed the folded paper to his brother and said, “Keep that dry.”

  Harold tucked it into his saddle bag. “Can Joe go with me?”

  “No,” Buck said. “They know Joe in Dodge City. They don’t know you. Besides, I might need an extra set of eyes and hands. In case she gives me any more grief.”

  “If you keep her tied up, she won’t be no trouble.”

  Buck ignored the comment. It did no good to argue with Harold. He never let go, once he got an idea in his head.

  “Take the extra horse and ride all day and night. The doctor’s house is that yellow one behind Front Street. Go there at night. He’s probably still nursing that goose egg I put on his head. Keep clear of them Earps and Masterson brothers. They don’t know you, but it wouldn’t do for them to start asking you questions. And stay clear of Doc Holliday, too. He ain’t law, but he’s got a bee in his bonnet for me.”

  “I ain’t stupid,” Harold said. “They won’t even know I’m in town.” He got to his feet, picked up his saddle bags and started for the cabin.

  “Keep your hands off her,” Buck warned. “I mean it.”

  “I’m just going inside to pack some coffee.”

  When Harold stepped through the burlap, Sparrow was waiting. She brought the poker down as hard as she could, aiming for his head. He saw, and dodged just quickly enough for the iron tip of the poker to miss his head and strike his shoulder.

  He cursed, backing through the doorway into the yard. His shirt was torn, and a red whelp marked the flesh near his collarbone. He felt the poker again, this time against his side. She was in the yard now, swinging the poker for another blow. Harold held out his hands to prevent it from striking him again. She swung the other way and struck his arm.

  “Buck,” he called out loud, “Stop this bitch before she kills me!”

  Buck was up and coming for her. She pointed the iron tip of the poker at his face. “Come no closer,” she said, “Or I will put out your eye.”

  He stopped, and smiled at her. “You don’t want to do that.” With lightning speed, he grasped the end of the poker and wrenched it out of her hands.

  Before he could take hold of her, she turned and ran around the cabin to the wall of the gulch. She desperately looked for a way up, but the rock outcroppings to the floor of the prairie above were too steep.

  Hearing the men behind her, she turned away from the wall and darted across the creek, her steps kicking water head high. She hoped to make it to the cottonwood grove and the horses.

  But Joe was already there, crouched, waiting to head her off.

  Upon seeing him, Sparrow ran back, crossing the creek to the other side, running toward the campfire, where she could see gun belts and rifles on the ground near the saddles. She almost reached the weapons, when Buck caught a handful of her hair fro
m behind. He pulled with such force that her feet went out in front of her and she fell hard on her backside in the dirt. The breath was knocked out of her, and she lay flat, gasping, eyes wide and fighting.

  Buck stood over her, pinning her down with his boot. Harold caught up, holding his hurt arm.

  “Now will you tie her up?” he asked.

  13

  Sallie McCarty raised a lantern and examined the lump behind her husband’s left ear. It had been five days since Buck Hester had hit him with his pistol and left him unconscious near the edge of town. When he didn’t come home that night, she got her neighbor to go with her to search for him. They brought him home, and she sent for the physician at Fort Dodge, five miles away, to come see him.

  “Tell me, Sallie. What color is the skin?” asked Dr. McCarty.

  “It looks better than it did this morning, dear. Not as blue.”

  “That’s good. I can tell by touch that it has gone down.”

  “Yes, the lump is much smaller. How is your headache?”

  “Still there, but not as bad. My eyesight has cleared.”

  Earlier in the day, he had left the house and, for the first time since the incident occurred, checked on patients at his office. The physician from Fort Dodge had seen Dr. McCarty’s patients the day before. For nearly twenty-four hours after he was found on the street and brought home, he had drifted in and out of consciousness. It wasn’t until the second day that he could recall what happened.

  Many visitors had stopped by to see him, including Mayor Kelley, Sheriff Masterson, and Marshal Deger, who were all eager to know who had pistol whipped the town physician. The marshal was livid upon learning that the doctor had been beaten while trying to prevent Buck Hester and Joe Lebeouf from abducting Caleb Thomason’s wife. The sheriff immediately put together a search party to scour the plains around Dodge City. The colonel from Fort Dodge assigned details to assist. Mayor Kelley sent a message to Caleb in Sweetwater, via the garrison at Camp Supply.

  “Don’t you even think about searching for her, Thomas,” Sallie said. “There are dozens of people out looking. You are in no condition…”