by Noel Loomis
“I knew all that some time ago.”
“So did I,” said Yeakel. “I am merely recapitulating so all the cards will be on the table. I will make you a good offer, Ferguson. I will buy your land which you do not own, and I will buy the ferry and your license, and I will give you four thousand dollars in cash.”
Ferguson said, “You told Hudson you didn’t have eight hundred dollars in cash.”
Yeakel said shortly, “What else can you tell a fanatic?”
“You could tell him the truth.”
“I did. If he is patient, he will get his lots.”
“When your agent took his money, did he say anything about patience?”
“Mr. Ferguson,” said Yeakel, “lots are being sold by the thousands in Nebraska territory and in Kansas, in exactly this fashion.”
“That doesn’t make it right,” Ferguson said stubbornly. “Still there is no point in singling me out to wage a reform campaign.”
Doddridge came back. “You gentlemen look healthy enough.”
“We’re fine, except that Mr. Simmons has a broken arm.”
Doddridge looked at it. “How bad is it?”
“It hurts,” said Simmons.
“I had one like this yesterday.”
“You’ll have more if you keep Ferguson going,” said Logan.
Ferguson sat up straight. “If others come looking for trouble, instead of wanting to use the ferry peaceably—”
“Trouble or no,” said Yeakel, “you’re a bone-breaking expert.”
Ferguson sat back.
“What’s your answer, Ferguson? Four thousand dollars cash.”
Doddridge was trying to thread one of the curved needles. Ferguson said, “The answer is no.”
“On the other hand,” Yeakel said casually, “if you do not sell at a fair price, then of course I will be compelled to force you out of business.”
“You’re trying that now.”
“You underestimate me, Mr. Ferguson. When I try to run you away from the ferry, it will be over in a hurry.”
“If you are successful.”
“I will be successful, Mr. Ferguson—and it will not be too difficult. Think for a moment of Zachariah Mawson and his 12,000 sheep.”
“What about them?”
“That is a great many sheep,” said Yeakel, “and my guess is that they can be manipulated to tie up the ferry indefinitely, while people on the other side are forced to move on to find another crossing.”
“This is a new country,” said Ferguson, “and people come out here for a new start, and I think they are entitled to at least equal odds. So I am not selling the ferry to you at any price. And whether these people go somewhere else or not while I move sheep, it is not going to cost me too much. There will always be more people coming.”
“Even so, you’d better think about it,” said Yeakel. Doddridge pulled Ferguson’s head back against his stomach. The needle went in, and the door opened again while Doddridge was tying the thread.
“Mr. Newcomb, the Indian agent,” said Yeakel. “A pleasure to see you here.”
“I saw you come up here,” said Newcomb, “and I thought I could speak to you about the Otos.”
“Oh, yes, the Otos.”
“They’ve been kicked around a lot, and they’re going to be hard to hold. They know they have been awarded land on this side of the river, and they’re impatient, but I expect the removal to be orderly.”
Simmons said, “Injuns are Injuns. If they start running loose over here, there will be scalpin’ and massacrin’.”
“Not with the Otos,” said Ferguson.
“An Injun is a redskin,” said Simmons. “They are all alike, and I would not trust one of the dirty, stinkin’, filthy—”
The Indian agent said patiently, “The Otos are warriors by heritage; their chief was Black Bird, and they have a long and proud history, and should not be looked down on as shiftless Indians. If they are left alone, they will harm nobody, but if they are mistreated, they will fight back.”
“They’re still Injuns,” muttered Simmons.
“Walking Bird is a grandson of Black Bird, and he knows the handwriting on the wall. He is controlling his people, but even Walking Bird has a limit to his patience.”
“What do you want us to do?” asked Logan.
“Merely leave them alone. Walking Bird won’t let then steal or molest any white man or his property, and there will be no trouble unless some hot-head or some person starts it without thinking.”
“With Injuns,” Simmons insisted, “you don’t have to start nothin’.”
Newcomb spoke to Yeakel and Logan. “If you gentlemen have any influence over your friend here, I hope you will help him see the light. If the Indians should go on the warpath, a lot of whites will be killed. The Indians, of course, will be wiped out, but a lot of whites will be killed before it is over.”
“We’ll do what we can,” said Yeakel, who obviously was not very much concerned.
“I stopped a man named Keller. Any of you know him?”
“What did he do?” asked Logan.
“He was drinking—saw one of Walking Bird’s men and started after him with a knife.”
“How’d you stop him?” asked Yeakel.
“Tripped him,” said Newcomb, “then got the Indian out of sight.” He shook his head. “With men like that on the loose, it’s almost an impossible situation.”
But Ferguson did not feel hopeful about men like Yeakel and Logan; they were in a position to help avoid trouble, but he knew that neither of them wanted to.
CHAPTER VII
Ferguson was back at his place by supper time. He went to the well, ascertained that Noah was all right, and caught the mule to bring him up.
“It got a mite damp down there this afternoon,” said Noah. “We might have water.”
“It’s pretty early,” said Ferguson. “Most of them go to around three hundred. Anyway, we can tell in the morning. Maybe we’ll find fifty feet of water in the hole, and you’ll be through digging.”
“I’d just as soon,” said Noah.
“Anybody come by?”
Noah was brushing the dirt from his clothes. “Yes, sir, Obie pulled me up for a breath of fresh air, and a feller came by lookin’ for you.”
“Know his name?”
“Never seen him before. Had on buckskin shirt with long fringes—didn’t look like he’d ever been in an Injun fight.”
“Why?”
“None of the thrums was cut off for waddin’.”
“I think I know who you mean: A real handsome fellow, rode a dun horse?”
Noah tipped up the water jug. “That’s him.”
“What did he have to say?”
“Nothin’ much, I guess. He just come from the tavern, and he was talkin’ about Sally.”
Ferguson looked up sharply.
“He wanted to know who owned this place, and he said they were going to take 160 acres away from everybody who had 320.”
“Who is going to do that?”
Noah put the jug down and piped his mouth on the back of his arm. “He didn’t say, I guess. Something about the territorial legislature.”
“Which allows 320 acres.”
Noah looked up at him thoughtfully. “Maybe—but he said the gover’ment only allows 160.”
“Somebody has been telling him about the law.”
Noah pointed. “It looks like you’re gonna have company, Mr. Ferguson.”
A single rider on a bay horse was coming across this prairie from the general direction of Mrs. Talbot’s place. “So it seems,” said Ferguson.
“Is it true, then? Pa claims 320. Does that mean he will lose it?”
“I don’t think so.”
“But if the gover’ment—”
“The government has not done anything yet, and it has usually turned out that those who settle on a reasonable amount of land get to keep it—if they can hold it until the government gets there.”
“That’s about it. Now, you’d better head for home. Sally has buffalo roast on for supper.”
“So long, Mr. Ferguson.”
“So long.” Ferguson could not yet identify the rider approaching, but he thought it looked like a woman, for she seemed to be riding sidesaddle. He knew of no woman in the country who might be riding except Mrs. Talbot, and he wondered why she would want to see him.
Mrs. Talbot rode up on the bay, and he walked to meet her.
“I’m sorry for my rude treatment of you today,” she said, “and I came to apologize.”
He smiled. “No apology necessary.”
“I brought a peace offering.” She handed him a tin buckle covered with a clean dishtowel. It felt warm to his hands. “Smells good,” he said. “What is it?”
“Roast buffalo,” she said. “I bought some from a hunter.” She smiled. “I know how a man is, living by himself. He doesn’t like to cook and he doesn’t eat right. I made some light-bread too.”
“Smells good,” he said again.
He bit through the crunchy crust, and found it much like Sally’s; in fact, he could not have told them apart.
She said, “If you’d like some coffee, I’ll make some for you.”
She went into his house, and soon he heard her voice from the back door. “Coffee’s ready.”
He sat down and she set a place for him.
She laid out the food, and it looked good—three thick slices of light-bread and a huge chunk of roast meat. He pulled the box to the table. “I’m sorry I haven’t better chairs. Aren’t you having coffee, too?”
She got another cup.
“How did you ever get into Nebraska in the first place?” he asked.
“I didn’t intend to come here. It was one of those things that I couldn’t help. My little sister and I were orphaned when our father and mother went through the ice on the Hudson in a cutter.”
“Your parents had money, then.”
“Enough to be comfortable, but it all disappeared by the time I was of age. My aunt’s husband handled it, and I think he wanted us girls just so he could get his hands on the property.”
He chewed a juicy mouthful of buffalo meat. “What happened then?”
“Jerome—Mr. Talbot—had been courting us both. I think—” She sipped the coffee. “I think he wanted to get his own hands on the money.” She paused briefly.
“I reached my twenty-first birthday, and he proposed. I didn’t really want to get married, and I put him off, but then I found out that my parents’ money was gone, and I married him without saying anything about it.” She stared at the table. “He was furious when I told him.”
“But you liked him anyway?”
“What else could I do? I was married, I was of age, and I had no tie anywhere except to my sister.”
He tried the coffee, and found it good.
“It turned out that he couldn’t even make a living for us. We went to St. Louis, and he tried various things—but he wasn’t even a good dock-hand.”
“Then you heard about the free land in Nebraska.”
“We came out here, as you know, and took a pre-emption claim a few days after you did. Then Jerome went down to Council Bluffs City for supplies, with what little money we had left, and came back without a cent, thinking he could bluff you into letting him cross for nothing.”
Ferguson looked up. “I would have, if he had come clean with me—but he tried to argue the right and wrong of it.”
“I know. He was always that way.”
“He was a nasty fighter, too. I couldn’t get rid of him without doing—what I did.”
“It was a terrible way to die—but he had earned it.”
“Your sister,” he said. “You encouraged her to follow you?”
She looked at the candle. “She was alone, and they were not good to her after I found out about the money, so she got married to Henry Wiggins.” She looked bleakly at Ferguson. “He is not a four-flusher like Jerome, but he is a little man and very vain. It is his ambition to have people look up to him—but he is a blunderer. Nobody will ever look up to him—not even Ethel.”
“Why did he provoke a fight with me this morning?”
She shook her head. “I don’t know. I know that Yeakel and Simmons took him to the Forks to get his arm fixed. I have an idea that they talked to him on the other side of the river and offered him some money to whip you.”
He looked hard at her, then he moved around the table and took her in his arms; she was surprisingly solid and yet yielding. He held her hard against him, and presently she looked up at him in that stark, challenging way and he kissed her. He picked her up, still kissing him, and carried her to the bed. But as he started to put her down, she said, “No.”
He thought it nothing but a womanly protest, and held her for a moment, his hand on her bare thigh beneath her dress. She clung to him, but as he moved to undress her she cried frantically, “No!”
“Why not?” he wanted to know.
“It isn’t me you want. You are grateful for the food and for my company, but it isn’t me you want.”
“I want you or I would not have brought you to the bed.”
She said, “I want you. Oh, I can’t tell you how much I want you—but we will have to wait.”
“Wait for what?”
“Wait until you are sure you want me.” She looked starkly at him again. “When you are sure, you may have me.”
“Would you like me to ride home with you?”
She said in a low voice: “And go through this again? Once is enough in one night, Mr. Ferguson.”
“I am rather concerned over your going home alone. There are so many new and unknown persons in the country…”
“Please do not think of it. Really—” She put her hand on his for an instant. “I don’t need help to find my way home. And I am not scared.”
He stood there for a while and listened to the bay’s hooves fade rapidly in the soft dirt. Then he went into the cabin, blew out the candle, and lay down on the grass mattress. He did not go to sleep for a long time, and when he did, it seemed that he had hardly closed his eyes when he heard somebody pounding on the door, and Mr. Benson’s excited voice:
“Mr. Ferguson! Wake up! Something’s happened to the ferry!”
CHAPTER VIII
He got up groggily. Mr. Benson was inside by that time, and Ferguson looked for a light in the stove, found it had burned out, and got a block of sulphur matches from the box on the wall. “Now what happened to the ferry?” he asked.
“I went down at three o’clock to open it as usual, and I found the rope broke and the ferry drifted over to the other side. I couldn’t get Teddy Root up, and anyway, I guess it calls for you to make the decisions, Mr. Ferguson.” He looked at the bandage on Ferguson’s face and said, “Was it from that last fight?”
Ferguson hesitated, remembering that Mrs. Talbot had not commented on the bandage. Finally he said, “I had it sewed up. When did the ferry get loose?” He began to pull on his trousers in the dark.
“I closed down the ferry at eleven-thirty last night, and it’s three-thirty now,” said Benson.
“How did you get here?”
“On the mule—and I think I better take the other one back, and let this one rest for a few days. Seems like it takes about two teams to keep the ferry going.”
“It’s hard work—too hard, maybe. You were at it yesterday for twenty hours.” He said thoughtfully, “No Horse could run the ferry if they would let him.”
“They wouldn’t stand for it,” said Benson. “A man like Keller—”
“Too bad. But no matter—you have got to get some rest”
“I gener’ly get my nap in the afternoon when you’re there. I ain’t hurt, Mr. Ferguson. I don’t feel as old as I look, maybe.”
He was almost pathetic in his eagerness to stay on the job, and Ferguson said, “All right—but
don’t keep working until you drop. Those people can wait till tomorrow.”
His voice quavered. “You paid me for doin’ a job, Mr. Ferguson, and I aim to do it as long as I can.”
“You don’t need to kill yourself.”
Benson said earnestly, “Mr. Ferguson, I never amounted to nothin’ back home; I couldn’t even keep up my taxes. I come out here to start over, and I’m aimin’ to stay with it.”
Ferguson pulled on his boots. “All right, Mr. Benson, but don’t try to do any fighting.”
“I ain’t scared.”
“I am, Mr. Benson. I want to see you live to raise a corn crop.”
“You don’t think they’d kill anybody?”
Ferguson said, “Did you take time to put the coffeepot on the fire down at the ferry?”
“I built up the fire and put some more river water in the grounds.”
Ferguson went outside under the stars. He wondered briefly if Mrs. Talbot was awake.
“Do you want I should turn the mule loose?” asked Benson.
“Take off the bridle. I will get the sorrel out to go behind the other mule. You will have to ride double with me back to the ferry, because this mule won’t take anything on her back.”
He caught up the mule without any trouble, and led her back to the house. Benson threw a saddle on her, and bridled her.
Benson had filled the barrel-butt with water, and Ferguson listened to the worn-out mule drink noisily. “Is there plenty of rope at the ferry?” he asked.
“There’s a couple of coils and a lot of short pieces, besides the one that broke.”
They started out, the animals’ hooves clip-clopping on the hard sod. Benson motioned toward a yellow light in the distance. “Tom Turner’s girl gets up early too. They serve meals to the emigrants in the morning.”
“It’s a hard-working family,” said Ferguson thoughtfully. They saw the red-glowing fire of buffalo-chips (because all wood in the vicinity had long been used up), and presently they were close enough to see the blue flame above it. Benson dismounted and unsaddled the mule and staked her; he broke one of the chips, two feet in diameter, and put it on the fire. Ferguson unsaddled the sorrel and staked it; he went under one end of an Osnaburg canvas and got an armful of hay, and split it between the two animals. Then he went to the fire and accepted the cup that Benson offered him. He tried it, found it too hot, and stood for a moment, staring into the darkness across the river. “Fires starting up over there,” he said. “Emigrants will be coming down to the ferry.”
