Yester's Ride

by C. K. Crigger

  Nat brushed aside the slur. “Do you want me to go get our horses? I can drag Heller’s body here on the way back.”

  Yester started to agree, but stopped himself. That wasn’t fair to Nat. “I’ll do it as soon as we tidy these three up and throw a tarp over them. Then you can spring Ketta. I don’t want her to see all these dead men. It’d scare her to death.”

  “All right.”

  A small voice spoke from behind them. “I’m not scared. I’m glad they’re dead. Except for—”

  Yester spun around. “Ketta!”

  “Thought I told you to stay put until I came for you,” Nat grumbled.

  Not that Ketta heard him. Heard either of them. Just as she’d done earlier with Nat, she flung herself at Yester, hugging him like she’d never let him go. He shook with the force of her trembling.

  “You came for me,” she cried. “You really did.”

  Yester stood there and let her hug. “Well,” he said when he got his own voice back, “yeah.”

  Heller’s pinto wandered into camp just as Yester finished helping Nat throw a filthy square of canvas over the bodies. Except for Kuo’s. Ketta insisted he be set apart.

  “Why?” Yester asked, to which she simply replied, “He was my father.”

  Nat stood there shaking his head in bewilderment. “Yes, but, Ketta, he kidnapped you. Put you through hell. Lookit what else happened. You almost got shot. You almost got burned up.”

  “I almost got sold, like a slave.” Hands on narrow hips, she set her mouth, a stubborn look that echoed her mother, truth be told. “But I didn’t. He didn’t sell me. And he protected me from them.” Her gaze settled on the lumpy tarp. “Best he was able.”

  “Didn’t do a very damn good job,” Yester muttered. “None of it needed to happen, anyway. He should’ve left you alone. He should’ve left Ma alone.”

  Ketta didn’t bother to deny it. “I know.” She drew in a deep breath. “Is Mama all right? I’ve been so worried.” Words seemed to fail her.

  Yester gritted his teeth. “Nat’s ma is with her. The day we left home, she said Ma would live, although she’s torn up some. And scared for you.”

  “And Big Joe?”

  Yester only shrugged.

  He went to catch up the pinto then, almost glad to get away from her. Long enough to gather himself. To be strong. This still wasn’t over. It wouldn’t be over until they all got home safe and in one piece, and heard what Big Joe had to say.

  If he had two cents to rub together, Yester thought, he’d leave and set out on his own. Maybe take Ketta with him. And Ma, if she made it through.

  The pinto was a good horse. Didn’t fuss at all with a new rider on his back. Even bareback, they made good time through the meadow to the canyon’s entrance. About midway he marked where Heller’s body had fallen, determined to fetch it on the way back.

  His horse and Nat’s pony were still where they’d been hitched, standing hipshot and patient. Without taking time to dismount, Yester put the horses on a lead and started back. He wanted to get this next part over with.

  Mid-meadow, he found Heller sprawled face down in the grass. Cautiously, making sure there were no surprises, Yester circled the body. Yeah, the man was dead all right. Flies had gathered and were fornicating on the outlaw’s open eyes. A neat bullet hole was centered in his back, and, for a moment, Yester regretted the way he’d died.

  He didn’t have time to think much on it. As he swung his leg over to dismount, the crack of a rifle echoed across the meadow. A fraction of a second later he felt a fiery sting in his arm, and his hand went numb. What the hell?

  The sight of blood pouring down his arm sent him diving into the grass on his belly beside Heller’s body. A shot slammed into Heller, jolting the corpse into a caricature of lifelike movement. Yester huddled behind the outlaw, making himself low and small. Or as small as a six-footer can get.

  Goddamn. Who was shooting at him?

  The bucktoothed feller, Beaver, that’s who. How had he forgotten Dunce’s brother? Careless.

  Worse, his rifle, which he’d dropped when the bullet hit, was out of reach, the pinto having shied off at the sound of gunfire. Yester’s own horse, as well as Nat’s cayuse, had followed the pinto. Afraid to raise his head above the grass to see what had become of them, he listened hard. Back at the cabin, Ketta was screaming his name.

  Hell! She probably figured he’d been killed, fast as he’d gone to ground.

  Hell! Beaver was probably sneaking up on him right now, and him without a weapon. But even as he thought it, those revolvers of Heller’s he’d coveted drifted through his mind. Taking care not to stir the grass, he fumbled at the holster on Heller’s hip. And swore. It was empty, the gun having most likely fallen out when Heller went down.

  But he’d had two.

  This time Yester had no choice but to risk a look. Maybe the other pistol had remained in the holster.

  Staying as flat as possible, Yester reached over the outlaw’s hip with his good arm and rolled the dead outlaw up onto his side. He was in luck. Yester snatched the pistol from the holster even as a second slug rocked Heller’s body.

  This time the bullet went right on through the corpse and clipped Yester’s side. The shock of it forced a hoarse cry from him.

  Hell! Now he had another hole in his shirt—but at least he was armed.

  Yester figured he’d be dead as a mackerel if he reared up and tried to find a target. Whereas Beaver probably had his gun trained right on the spot just waiting for Yester to do something dumb. So, he’d better be smart. Which meant he’d have to wait for Beaver to come to him, as he had no doubt Beaver would. To spit on his dead body, if nothing else.

  After a minute or so, the flies settled back on Heller. Some, drawn by fresh blood, landed on him. Determined not to stir, to make Beaver think he was dead, he forced himself to lie still.

  Yester hadn’t felt much pain until now. The numbness in his arm went away to be replaced with a world of hurt. His side burned like he’d been branded. The wait seemed to go on and on. He’d begun to feel a little woozy by the time a whisper of sound reached his ears.

  A horse stepped closer to where he lay against Heller. As if they were unholy lovers, he thought distastefully.

  A tongue clicked, urging the unwilling animal closer.

  Yester kept his eyes closed as he felt a shadow pass over him, hoping he suppressed a telltale flinch.

  The man on the horse stopped a few feet away, the horse being unwilling to get any closer. It pranced and snorted, spewing slime over Yester’s face. This time he knew his flinch was visible.

  And Beaver caught it. “Not dead yet? I can fix that.”

  Yester knew he didn’t have time to wait. He rolled toward the horse, only stopping when he reached its legs. The startled horse jumped sideways, fighting the rein as Beaver jerked its head up.

  Eyes wide open now, Yester jumped to his feet, his head bumping the horse’s nose on the way up. This time the horse shied backward, and Beaver, perhaps not the finest of horsemen at his best, slewed half on, half off. His rifle, held in one hand, shot into the sky.

  Yester opened fire. The revolver bucked in his hand, missing his target, he figured in disgust, by a half-dozen yards. Damn. Unable to raise his wounded arm, he had nothing to brace his hand and correct the aim.

  “Point your finger and shoot.” Big Joe’s voice echoed in his mind. “That’s all there is to it. You got to learn how to squeeze off your shot. Be gentle on the trigger.”

  Yester didn’t see any choice but to follow his pa’s advice, seeing that Beaver had regained his seat on the horse and yanked it back around.

  As if the pistol were an extension of his hand, Yester pointed his finger and squeezed.

  Double reports echoed across the meadow.

  Beaver’s mouth opened in a scream, exposing his unfortunate teeth. His rifle dropped to the ground. The horse stepped on it and ducked away, at the same time that Beaver lost his seat. The
man thudded to the ground and lay moaning.

  “Pa,” he cried. “Pa?”

  Yester plodded forward and stood beside him, his own blood dripping down on the man who’d shot him.

  “Your pa is dead,” he said. “All the rest of them are dead.”

  Beaver stared at him. “Dead?” It was as if everything that had happened in the last few hours—minutes—had flown from his memory.

  “I reckon you will be, too, soon enough,” Yester said.

  “No. I—”

  But he was.

  Abruptly, legs unable to support him, Yester sat down.

  Surrounded by dead men, he thought, just before the world turned black and he sank into oblivion.

  CHAPTER TWENTY: KETTA

  “We should go see what’s taking Yester so long.” Ketta fretted, staring off into the growing darkness. “It’s been a half hour since we heard those shots. Thirty minutes. At least thirty minutes. Maybe an hour.” She stood with her arms wrapped around herself as if she were cold. No matter that the mostly burned cabin still radiated heat, the fire used to ignite the torches still glowed, and, though dusk had finally come to the canyon, it retained the warmth of the day. A pall of smoke overlay everything else.

  “What if . . .”

  “I’ll go,” Nat said. He’d been pacing the open ground in front of the cabin, as restless and anxious as she.

  “I’ll go with you.”

  “No,” Nat began, but Ketta ignored him.

  “Maybe he’s bleeding. Maybe he needs our help. Maybe—” She stopped, swallowed, then went on, “Yes, he probably needs our help.”

  “Possible, I guess,” Nat said, which didn’t soothe Ketta in the least.

  The pinto, followed by Yester’s horse and Nat’s cayuse, had wandered up to the cabin a few minutes ago, along with another that one of the outlaws had been riding. There was blood drying on the pinto’s flank. Fresh blood, which Nat had taken care to rub away.

  “We’ve waited long enough.” Ketta started toward the horses, choosing the one from home that Yester had ridden on his quest. Queenie. Ketta had ridden the black mare before, when Big Joe wasn’t around to notice. She did a graceful little leap, her left foot landing in the stirrup, and dragged herself aboard. “Let’s go.”

  Nat, helpless to stop her, mounted his cayuse and, leading the other horses, followed.

  With night falling, it was getting hard to see. A horse, bridled but not saddled, so it must’ve been Beaver’s, loomed out of the gathering darkness as it grazed in the middle of the meadow. It threw up its head and nickered as they approached. The other horses answered as Ketta reined in the mare and listened.

  Nothing. Only the rattle of the bit and crunch of teeth as the grazing horse chewed around the metal.

  “Nat?” Ketta whispered.

  “I’m here.” He stopped beside her and surveyed the area. “There.” He pointed to a circle cleared in the tall grass.

  Three dark lumps stood out against the straw-yellow vegetation. Body-sized lumps.

  A sob broke from Ketta’s throat.

  Nat swore. “Don’t cry.”

  Ketta gulped. “I’m not crying.”

  “Yes, you are.”

  “Not.” As if to prove her toughness, she slid to the ground and led the horse over to the first body, yanking roughly at the rein when the horse threw up its head in protest.

  “It’s Beaver,” she said, sighing her relief. The farthest body she recognized as Heller, his black clothing blurring the outlines. That left the one in-between.

  “Ketta, stop,” Nat said, catching up to her. “Let me check first.”

  “No. It’s my job. He came for me.”

  Yester lay on his side, knees curled, head bent. He’d fallen with his wounded arm up, revealing a wound for Ketta’s and Nat’s inspection. The gash went all the way to the bone, which showed white through the blood.

  “Yester,” Ketta whispered but got no response. She looked at Nat. “Is he dead?”

  Nat drew a shaky breath. “No. See. He’s still bleeding. Dead men don’t bleed.”

  In proof, Yester let out a moan. His eyelids fluttered. “Damn,” he said. “. . . hurts.”

  Ketta was never so relieved in her life to hear somebody complain.

  “I’m here, Yester,” she whispered to him. “Nat and me. We’ll help you. You’re going to be all right.”

  Although she loved and admired every inch of her tall brother, before too many minutes passed, Ketta had cause to rethink her admiration. She and Nat had all they could do, straining and sweating as they loaded Yester on a horse. They chose the cayuse because he was the smallest. Inches counted when it came to manhandling a six-footer unable to help himself.

  “I’ll come back for the other two,” Nat said, sweat beads rolling down his face when they finally had Yester astride. “Only I’m not loading them. I’ll loop a rope around their feet and drag them.”

  Ketta applauded this plan. Anyway, outlaw bodies hardly counted in comparison to her brother. She led the cayuse back to the camp while Nat walked beside Yester and held him steady.

  They got him down on a blanket back at the smoldering cabin. It was fully dark by now, and Ketta rebuilt the campfire for more light. In the work of a moment, she’d stripped Yester of his ragged and bloody shirt and bent to inspect his wounds.

  “The one in his side isn’t bad,” she told Nat, even though he could see as much for himself. “It looks clean.” Nevertheless, she hunted up a pot from some camping supplies, filled it with water, and put it over the fire to boil.

  “Probably leave a nasty scar.”

  “Uh-huh.” Ketta sighed, bending again and peering closely at Yester’s side. “Needs stitches but I don’t have anything to sew him up with.” Truthfully, she wasn’t any too sure she could’ve done it even if she’d had the wherewithal. “Come help me.” Gathering her strength, she ripped her brother’s faded shirt into strips to bind the wound. After washing the worst of the grime from it, that is.

  Scars didn’t concern her, but nerving herself to attend his arm did. One look and she averted her eyes. “He needs a doctor.”

  “We’ll get him to one.” Nat glanced around the clearing. “We’ll leave tomorrow morning at daylight. It’s too dark to travel tonight.”

  “You could find a doctor and bring him here,” she said, quelling an inward shiver.

  “I’m not leaving you alone here with Yester shot up and five dead bodies in need of burying.” Adamant, Nat’s soft voice took on a hardness she’d never heard before.

  “I’ll be all right. I’m not afraid.” But she was. Haunts were sure to attach themselves to those men. All of them, even Kuo, her father.

  “And I’m not digging that many holes tonight,” Nat said, as if she hadn’t spoken. “That’s if I could find a shovel.”

  Carefully, Ketta ripped a piece off her already torn and shoddy apron, rinsed it out, and dipped it in the hot water to bathe Yester’s wounds.

  She got to thinking as she worked. “You don’t need to bury them, Nat. In fact, you’d better not.”

  “Not?”

  “Not if you want the reward.”

  “What reward?”

  When she was finished cleaning and covering Yester’s arm, she sank onto her heels and looked up at Nat.

  “The reward on Heller and Milt. They were bragging”—she emitted a little hiss between her teeth—“about who had the most reward money out for them. Heller won. He showed everyone a wanted poster that said there’s a $1500 bounty on him.”

  Nat’s dark eyes widened. “That’s a lot of money. What did he do?”

  “According to the poster he’s wanted for train robbery. And murder.”

  Nat swallowed. “And you—” He stopped. “What about Milt?”

  “He’s only worth half that. He robbed some banks. And killed a man while he was at it, of course.” She said it like it was old hat. “The other two, Beaver and Dunce, they weren’t mentioned by name, but
there’s an extra hundred for Milt’s two accomplices. I expect that means them.”

  Staring at her in wonder, Nat had one more question. “And Kuo? Is there a reward for him as well?”

  She looked away, finding it hard to meet his eyes. “Yes, him, too. But . . .” she hesitated.

  “But what?”

  “I hate turning him in. He is . . . he was my father.”

  “How much bounty on him?”

  “Five hundred. He went along with the bank robberies. But he didn’t kill anybody.” She hoped.

  Nat stared off into the dark beyond the fire. “You’d better claim it,” he said, but Ketta shuddered.

  “I don’t want it. I don’t want anybody to know he’s my father.”

  She’d thought Yester still unconscious, or asleep. Unaware, at any rate. But he wasn’t.

  “Take the money,” he said. “He owes you. Think on it as your inheritance.”

  Nat having made his point, and, with Yester concurring, they waited until morning to set out for Lewiston. They made quite a cavalcade then, on the trail at daylight. All the living were hungry, having only a sip of coffee and a stale, crumbly biscuit apiece to still their rumbling bellies.

  Yester’s arm hurt so damn bad he barely kept from crying like a little girl. Or maybe a baby. Every move sent agony jolting through his entire body, including his horse’s plodding stride. He tried to think only grateful thoughts. That he was alive, for one. And he knew he’d use his arm again, because his fingers moved. In fact, they twitched in reaction to the pain.

  He settled into his saddle and concentrated on staying on the horse.

  Nat led a string of five horses. Each held a body bundled in their respective bedrolls. Except for Kuo. Heller’d had a spare blanket, which served for Kuo, his goods having all burned up in the cabin.

  Ketta and Nat’d had quite a time loading the corpses, until Yester suggested using a pulley he’d observed anchored in a tree. Kuo had probably used it for hanging game. Whatever, it worked equally as well for one man, that being Nat, to haul a body high enough to lower onto a horse’s back. Ketta had helped, using a system where even a girl could hold the package steady and guide it into place.