Sary ran ahead, walking backward. “I need you, though!” She watched them plow on past. “You get used to the air. Please, I need you!”
Luigi stopped and said simply, “So do Tommy, Sary.”
She flashed a guilty look. “I hope not.” Damn! She watched them back as police entered the alley, focusing on her, it seemed. The red dress flamed like firecrackers on Independence Day, but the fight was illicit. The mob melted. So did she, the red gown, so piercingly bright in the alley, extinguished around a corner.
****
Ratchet hung, limp and dripping, over the fisherman’s boat as the fisherman dug through Ratchet’s pockets. Ratchet blinked, spewing water, coughing, and turning a bloody eye to the man with his hand in his pocket.
Chapter 36
Shaking, Julian plunged the needle into the withered crook of his elbow, turned away from Jude, a strapping toddler who played with his Noah’s Ark on the floor.
Handi entered, casting a weary eye at the kit. Julian scowled over his shoulder. “You’re in bed.”
Handi motioned to the fitted velvet kit, faded tubing, and hypodermics. “Not fitting, Julian.”
“Your keen perception startles me, Hannah. You are correct. Something ain’t right.” Julian stared outside. “I feel it. Here.” He rubbed his knotted wrists and fingers.
Jude climbed into his lap, digging for candy.
Julian ruffled his curls. “Kept all this intact, Jude. Shuffled cards, till my hands—Look! Knots on cedar! All for you, Jude, my treasure.” He cough-laughed, holding out lumpy hands, clenching his fist. “And it’ll stay that way.”
Handi hobbled out, shaking her stringy silver curls. Baby Jude was supposed to lighten their latter days, but the saloon suffered despite Julian’s words. The doves were impudent. They had run out of a popular whiskey last month, sending old customers to the saloon down the way, a place little more than a plank on two barrels.
Jude held up a wooden camel to Julian. “Cam-o!” he chortled. Then he offered him a wooden zebra and a lion. “Zeb-o! Wi-on!” Jude lisped and tossed them in the air, commanding them to, “Fwyyyy, Zebo. Fwyyyy, Wion!”
Julian knelt, stiff, stuffing animals back in the ark. “And the camels make four?”
Jude held up four fingers, crying, “Four!”
“And the monkeys? How many, Jude, my boy? My clever boy?”
Jude held up six fingers. Julian hugged him, absently wandering to the window as if besieged. Behind him, Jude chugged a monkey in a wooden train up the ark’s ramp.
Chapter 37
It was a fine hot day in the Redlands foothills of the Big Bear Mountains.
In the shade of the Redlands Saloon’s porch, O’Malley slugged whiskey from a bottle. Orvis swung out with a sullen bar girl and claimed the bottle for himself, looking mid-gulp at the locomotive squealing up amid hissing bellows of steam. “Here she comes.”
Cooley, tagging after Orvis, eyeballed the train too, sneering as only a horseman could as men offloaded the 1901 Mercedes. He scratched his acne and eyed the large cylinder tank riding high on the rear of the automobile before his gaze swung to the fancy woman just descending the steps.
Even to his untrained eye, the hat was, well, gaudy. But that red velvety dress, rouged makeup, and big curls bouncing like scarlet sausages? Hunh! Don’t need to knock on Cooley’s door more’n oncet.
He saw all this as Sary stepped from the Pullman car, checked her surroundings from under the sweeping hat, and froze at the sight of the three, biting her lip, recalling them from Delacorte’s. Well, that’s why the big hat and butter crock of makeup. She felt foolish in this getup, but her instincts were correct. What damning luck, though. A bad omen. Shush, Sary. No bad thoughts. You are a machine, like this automobile. Plastering a bright smile, Sary spun, overtly gay, to the waiting mechanic, resplendent in city spats and a boater hat, tapping him on the shoulder with her glove.
Cooley watched Sary openly flirting, chattering, trilling, flashing her fan at every man in pants. “Hie, there, Orvis, looka over there.”
Orvis still messed with the saloon girl and stubbornly wouldn’t look. Cooley snorted as men hoisted heavy cases and baggage to the car’s open tonneau. One dropped a wooden crate, revealing a gleam of metal. Sary froze her smile like a statue and quickly stepped in front of it as they loaded the two long boxes into the rear of the vehicle.
“Why, I cannot thank you enough,” the three heard the redhead say to the man, her crimson lips wide, showing her teeth. Emerging from a blast of steam, the hovering man tipped his boater and led her to the machine all gleaming red and warm chrome, blinding in the sun.
“Hunhh!” Cooley sniggered, watching the slicked-up dandy demonstrate the mercilessly bright auto to the fancy woman. Like teachin’ bears how to play poker.
Cooley wanted attention. “Now that’s some fancy candy box!”
Orvis squinted, taking in the sleek flashy auto and the female. “What, the fancy woman, or the automobile? Think she’ll pass it around, though? Someone like you, looks like a dead porky-pine with all the quills pulled out?”
Cooley, touched his acne, pained, stiffly ignored him, but that didn’t last. The dandy cranked some kinda handle, while the fancy lady looked on oohing and aahing. “Get a horse!” Cooley snorted. “Hie, Orvis, looka there. Horses don’t need no crankin’!”
“That’s right,” Orvis grunted. “And ain’t you forgetting Delacorte’s horses? Let’s git.”
“I ain’t the one hangin’ around.” Cooley looked to Orvis’s girl, but Orvis and O’Malley were already headed to the boxcars, where two fine horses and a pony were being off-loaded. He tarried. The flashy lady bent, showing a fine rear, and gave the crank-thing a go, and they all watched. Cooley giggled, but after a couple of false starts, the handle-thing jerked from her hands and the whole abomination hopped like a dog with fleas. The female—Funny, she turned her head just so, and danged if he didn’t think he knowed her—thanked the man, all smiley-like, hitched her dress—nice ankles—and climbed behind the automobile’s big wooden wheel.
Sary smiled grimly. That’s right, men. I scarcely look like the muddy, half-demented female you starved out of Big Bear, do I?
The Mercedes lurched forward. As the contraption jolted away, she raised eyebrows at wood blocks, ropes, and a lantern in the rear. “But what are these?”
The mechanic hustled after, enveloped in dust, yelling, “Emergencies! I meant to tell…”
But Sary had already lurched and juddered away and was waving back. “I think I have the feel of it, Mr.—? Dare not stop now. Thank you for everything,” she called from within a cloud of dust.
Orvis scowled. “Damn fool female—where in thunder does she think she’s goin’?”
Sary hung on as the mechanic ran along beside. She had gotten the general gist of it, ascertained she had enough fuel, and shut her ears to any admonitions, impatient to be on her way—to death and doom or retribution and triumph. The outcome rested partly on this bit of frippery. But she was a machine, recall? She ran on grit and intuition—no more thinking.
That dandied-up mechanic caused attention.
Oh, and you don’t?
But it is all, as Tommy has lectured, distraction, Sary…Distraction.
O’Malley nodded. “Old Julian may a got hisself some competition there in the whore-mongerin’ business, Orvis. Wouldn’t mind a taste myself.”
Orvis spat. “Ain’t our concern. Or wallet.” He eyeballed the car lurching past and away in a trail of dust devils. Across from them stood an establishment that was part undertaker, part lumber and junk yard, with a decrepit Gatling gun stenciled US ARMY listing on a cart in front of it.
He wiped his mouth. “Mind the store.” He handed the horses’ reins to O’Malley. “Gonna re-wet my whistle.”
Cooley licked his lips, contemplating the back of red-haired Sary, waiting till Orvis entered the saloon. To O’Malley he announced, “Them beans. Goin’ to the privy.”
O’Malley said, “Hurry back. I had them beans, too.”
****
Cooley had the bar girl slammed against the privy—and he giggled as, looking over her shoulder, he glimpsed a sailing red cartwheel, Sary’s red hat soaring above the trees.
****
Sary had flicked a puzzled glance at the Gatling gun with its iron-rimmed wheels—one rim gone—long multiple barrels, and cartridge loops as she jittered by, threading the Mercedes inexpertly through Redlands’ rough-laid streets, practicing the unfamiliar controls.
As establishments and houses dwindled, Sary checked behind her—no one, hah!—and cranked the enormous wheel hard, a sharp left, skirting the foothills, wandering vaguely up, until well past the settlement of Redlands, and then forcing the auto into another sharp right between clumps of bushes loaded with yellow blossoms to bump over tracks at the little-used train halt. The power was exhilarating as the Mercedes jolted onto a disused ox trail the old miners used for hauling ore and supplies, corkscrewing abruptly up. It was a useless smidgeon of information Seb had liked to show off with, and Lord knew where he’d picked it up. Still, if she hadn’t known where to look, she might have missed the rocky turnoff, even if there was a glimpse of a washed-out trail beyond. The important part was that it led to Big Bear by the back way. Her mind winged back to the last time she’d traveled this trail, unknowingly leaving Big Bear in a haze of jolting pain as her valiant horse lurched downward.
The wheel took on a life of its own as the powerful auto bumped and swerved abruptly over rocks. The exotic machine passed its first test, powerfully grinding up the climb.
Sary scrutinized the four gears and, wincing, selected one, thrust the right one forward, and successfully powered up a sheer incline, more rocks than road, feeling exhilarated and proud.
She warily eyed the first hard bend. Her conveyance was already slanted down forty-five degrees. The track, rough but passable, barely, was a steep straight grade her car had skittered up with ease so far. Yet rock slides, downed trees, washouts—all were possible around that unseen bend.
Sary’s heart dropped as she overshot the first hairpin, wildly overcompensating with the huge steering wheel. The auto tilted on two wheels, rocketing to the edge of the dropoff. Sary swung hard right to the mountain face, her foot and hand working with brakes and clutches, the effect of panic, and managed to jolt back on course without going over. Dismayed, Sary scanned the gouged-out, washed-out downward-canted defile ahead.
Mountains on her right, a sheer drop to her left, she judged the gap of good road left between the washed-out drop and the mountain. Was it wide enough for her car?
“In for a penny…”
Trodding on the fuel pedal, Sary jounced over ruts and spurted around the first small avalanche. So much for being followed. Rotten luck, the three henchmen should be there. A person would need be demented…
****
Over the bar girl’s shoulder, after spying the scarlet hat sailing like an errant flame, Cooley glimpsed Sary and the red horseless carriage for a flash, between a maze of buildings.
“What’s humorin’ you?” the bar girl snapped. “Sure ain’t me!”
“City folk!” Cooley snickered. “Old ox trail’s washed to shit—plum petered out. Ain’t been used since Moses was a baby. She shoulda took the—”
The bar girl shoved down her dress. “So be you! Petered out!” Cooley buttoned up, moseying to gawk up the cut after the automobile’s dust cloud. Scratching his head, he strove to puzzle it out.
****
Cooley took time in the Redlands Saloon, dragging out the rich tale of the female taking the hard way, as he told it to Orvis, who did his best to ignore him.
“If mam raised idjit boys, I’d swear it were that Sary-woman,” Cooley ended with a flourish. “What was dead?”
Orvis stared, frozen, into his glass, apparently looking for the secret of life.
O’Malley contributed, “Said she died, though. Got shot up.”
“Tall tales…” Orvis said. He thumped Cooley, dousing his sore face with the dregs of his whiskey.
“Owww! Dang, Orvis!”
“Why didn’t ya tell us before? This could mean money. Old Delacorte’s got his long johns twisted around his balls a-lookin’ for this Sary woman…wants her dead and gone.”
****
At the foot of the old miner’s trail, Orvis poked thin tire tracks. He looked from the town to the station and back up the ox trail, scowling at Cooley. “Dang! She’s dead. And if that ain’t her…”
****
The Mercedes corkscrewed past another washout. Sary’s hand flashed for the brakes, and the car jittered, near stalling. She scanned the way ahead. The track, indistinguishable because of another washout, sloped at the same slant as the mountain. She let out the clutch. Oh, Lord, is it to be this way the entire trip up? The car jounced over the hump almost sideways… “Easy, Mercedes.” Sary bit her lip, not breathing, leaning as far to her right and the mountain face as she could. As the axle bumped and scraped over humped rocks, the car pivoted at forty-five degrees to the dropoff, wheels scratching for purchase.
Her conveyance slithered further slanchways, with a small spill of gravel, as Sary frantically yanked the handbrake, tromped on the extra footbrake, and peeked down the sheer drop. She was so close to the edge she could not spy any ground beneath the auto at all, only the sheer drop and a spindly pine to stay her fall into the nameless gorge dizzyingly far below.
Gently, she tapped the gas—the car had a habit of leaping ahead like a jackrabbit—and held her breath as she let out the clutch. The car ground past one more crumpling edge.
****
O’Malley continued haranguing Cooley. “…and we saddle up the wrong horse, Julian ain’t gonna like it, and we’re the south end of a north-goin’ jackass.”
Orvis glared at O’Malley. “No shit.” He mounted up. “Box her in,” he grunted. “Use the new horses. Delacorte ain’t gonna like it, but use ’em anyways.” He spun on Cooley. “And if we’re milking a billy goat, you’ll be drinkin’ a bucketful of pain, Porky-pine!”
“Why don’t we just take her!” Cooley whined.
“Already answered that. She’s a fancy whore! Got herself a real pricey gewgaw there. Looks like Julian-business. I don’t mess with it! He wouldn’t take kindly. And, before you wrangle any more, that candy box probably got herself lost.” He sneered. “Females ain’t got the brain power God give a goose.”
Cooley and O’Malley unhappily eyeballed Orvis spurring off on the new, relatively short and easy way back up to Big Bear. O’Malley looked up the cut, swearing at Cooley.
****
Sary jounced steeper and higher, making good time, considering the first pitch was more rock than trail, scarcely feeling the jolts up her spine or thumps to her backside. She’d be in Big Bear City long before sunset. Suddenly her eyes widened.
She flipped the wheel, making frantic manipulations—brakes—wheel—right—left. Stomp the clutch. Pull the hand brake. Stomp the foot brake—amazed she recalled it all. Still the Mercedes stalled, skidding to a stop an eyelash short of a boulder squatting solid as a five-ton elephant, blocking her path.
She gripped the wheel and stood on the brake, pulling the handbrake, willing the car to not judder backward. The whole machine perversely veered as tires whirred, gritted, and ground for purchase, sliding back over the dropoff, and sputtered there with the back left wheel off the side.
Rope and chocks. Sary didn’t think. She groped. Funny how terror could so readily tell one what to do. Rope-tie the wheel straight. Reach down, gingerly chock the pedal, leave the car running. Next, climb over the windscreen. Carefully. Sary stood on the seat and straddled the slippery glass, slipping down over what the mechanic had named the bonnet.
The auto canted further, with a horrible grinding. Sary slithered sideways, hanging onto the windscreen by her fingertips, with her feet dangling over the drop. The auto whined and—dear Lord!—slipped anothe
r foot before it shivered and settled, silent.
Sary gripped the fanciful hood ornament, feet still dangling in space, fighting gravity, then swung her body straight across over the hood, the bonnet.
Stretching, she toed the earth beyond the front bumper, dropped off, jammed a rock behind the right front wheel, and cranked the starter back to life.
As the motor juddered, Sary crawled up the hood and back over the windscreen. She slithered out the driver’s side and, teetering with her feet wedged sideways over the fall, she reached in, un-chocking the pedal.
Press hard on the fuel. Move the clutch. The auto lurched and rolled back. Then three tires gripped and ground, spitting rock, dragging her up-slope while afraid it would take off and smash somewhere ahead…or below. Go, go, Sary pleaded. Almost there… The undercarriage caught on something, and the Mercedes rocked to a halt but, thank the Lord, still jittered away.
Sary gritted her teeth. She hung outside, shoved the doorframe with all she had, and rammed the fuel pedal with her hands. “Move, damn you!” Her arms quivered and her feet scrabbled for purchase off the edge as she sweated and strained. Why had she supposed this blamed automobile was a good idea? She hated herself at that moment.
The auto strained, too, making a horrendous roar, lurching with a pop of gravel back onto the trail—only just—and yanking Sary with it. Pulling herself through the frame, she regained the seat and jammed the gears, sort of, into place, backed way back, jerked the wheel straight, closed her eyes as the car rushed at the immovable mountain of a boulder, twice her height, and course-adjusted at the last second. The car bounced between the boulder and the mountain. With her rear fender scraping rock, she jounced through to the far side and an open track with a bend just ahead. Lord knew what was beyond that one.
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