Jim Saddler 5

by Gene Curry

  The sun traveled across the sky as we moved on. In a few hours it would begin to get dark. Night had its protection and its dangers. But they hadn’t attacked yet, and every mile put us that much closer to the California line. Right on the other side of the line, right at the end of the Overland, there was an Army post. If we could manage to survive for another few days, there was a chance of running into a patrol. That was the optimistic side of me thinking; the other side knew that Kiowa Sam wouldn’t wait that long. The danger of plague had taken the fight out of his men, and Sam would have to find a way to get it back.

  Culligan gave it to him, or I should say Culligan’s wagon did. Of all the wagons to break a wheel, the last wagon had to. Maybe Culligan had been too busy fixing other wheels to look after his own. I heard the goddamn thing break from way up in front. It broke with a sound like a rifle shot, and there was a crunching, smashing noise as the wagon went over on its side. I jumped down and started to run back. Far out I saw the flash of field glasses, and then the line of raiders began to move faster. Now they were making their own dust cloud. The field glasses flashed again, and I knew they had seen me running. Claggett and Culligan were coming down from the front of the wrecked wagon. The rumble of the raiders’ horses was getting closer as they lashed and spurred their animals to run faster. They were still too far out for accurate shooting, but a bullet doesn’t have to be well-aimed if it kills you. In seconds, their bullets began to come in closer.

  Culligan could run fast enough for a man of his bulk and drinking habits. Jesus! Suddenly, I thought of all the whiskey in the Irishman’s wagon. Claggett wasn’t doing so good. Moving as fast as he could behind Culligan, he staggered and fell. The raiders were getting the range now, and bullets sang all around us. I didn’t want Sam to get the Irishman’s big store of whiskey, but there was no way I could get out of helping Claggett. I cursed him for being so old, but I had to let the whiskey go and help him to his feet. His face mottled with anger, he shoved me aside and followed Culligan, making his old legs work as best they could.

  Now I could see the raiders plain, make them out as men instead of shapes in the dust. I turned and ran after Culligan and the preacher. I heard Kiowa Sam’s wild yell and knew he was out in front of the others. I chanced a look and saw Sam riding straight for the halted wagon. The rest of the raiders had slowed down some, not wanting to get that close to it. By the time Sam reached it, they had reined in and were waiting. I heard Sam yelling at them to come on in: there was no danger. I heard him yell, “Whiskey, boys! All you can drink!” But the raiders stayed where they were, all but three of them, who took their horses out of the waiting line and rode forward.

  Culligan climbed into another wagon, but the preacher kept pumping his old legs until he had reached his own. He got alongside, and Maggie reached down to help him up. I got up too, knowing I was the only one who had given thought to all the red-eye in Culligan’s wagon.

  “They’re still holding back from a full attack,” Maggie said.

  “Maybe not for long,” I said, “They’ve got all Culligan’s whiskey. Once they get that down, they’ll be brave enough. Some of them will.”

  Claggett gave out with a biblical oath.

  “At least they’ll be good and drunk,” I said. “The ones that do attack will hardly be able to walk straight. No amount of whiskey will persuade the others.”

  Maggie grinned fiercely, actually looking forward to the fight ahead. “Then it won’t be so bad,” she said. “Every man I kill, I’ll be thinking of my drunken father and his leather belt. It won’t be so bad after all, Saddler.” I knew it would be bad enough.

  Chapter Seventeen

  It got dark. Claggett thought we should keep moving on into the night. Traveling on the flat was easy, even after it got dark. But I said no. It was best to make camp where we were. If we kept moving, they could sneak in from both sides, maybe get in front of us, too. The preacher remained silent after that, and I knew he thought God had cursed his expedition.

  This time we formed the wagons into a fighting circle, with the harness animals inside the circle, the cows turned loose. If we survived, we could round them up in the morning. The attack had to come that night, because Sam wasn’t likely to stumble over another cache of whiskey. If they didn’t attack tonight, they wouldn’t attack at all.

  We made no cook fires. What cooked food there was had to be eaten cold. Claggett sat with bowed head, chewing slowly on a biscuit and sipping peach juice from a can. Maggie went to her wagon and came back with a canteen of cold, strong coffee. That was another of her peculiarities, drinking cold coffee all through the day.

  The coffee tasted good after the slightly rancid meat I’d been chewing. Far out in the darkness I heard them yelling, tanking up on Culligan’s whiskey.

  “They’re working up their nerve,” Maggie said quietly.

  I handed the canteen of coffee back to her. “That’s what they’re doing.”

  She drank deeply from the canteen and stoppered it. “How long do you figure, Saddler?”

  “As long as the whiskey holds out,” I said. “Then they’ll come, those that are coming.”

  It was going to be a long night, or maybe not so long. At least as long as a boxful of quart bottles. I had divided our force evenly: one half would sleep or rest, the other would stand guard. Claggett and Steiner were with the women on the first watch. Culligan and I were to join the second. The watches were to be short, so there wouldn’t be too much strain on the watchers. I thanked Maggie for the coffee and crawled into Claggett’s wagon to sleep for an hour. I knew the whiskey would last longer than an hour. From where I lay on the bed of the wagon, I could see the stars through the hoop opening of the wagon cover in the front. I heard a sound, opened my eyes and saw Maggie O’Hara filling the hoop of light. There was a tenseness in her that had nothing to do with the impending attack. Her voice was quiet, “Don’t talk to me, Saddler. Just do it!”

  She lay down beside me in the half darkness, but when I tried to kiss her she pulled her head away. Then she changed her mind and let me. Her mouth was sweet, with a taste of coffee. We couldn’t take all our clothes off. We took off just enough so that it didn’t make any difference. It was strange not being able to talk, to make any noise. But that didn’t make any difference either.

  Maggie’s body grew rigid when I put my hand between her legs, so I kept it there but didn’t move it for a while. Then she took my hand and put it deeper between her legs. She was sopping wet, as if she had been wet long before she came to the wagon. Yet she resisted when I tried to straddle her. Her resistance, too, passed in a few minutes, and she opened her legs, took my cock in her hands and guided it into her.

  Her back arched as it went in, driving deep into her. The cry she gave was almost a sob. I don’t know what it was, maybe a cry of relief. I expected her to put all her expert ways to work on me, as she had promised, or threatened, but after the first hostility passed she was as tender as any woman I’d known. It could be that the thought of death had softened her, made her see that there was no need to fight me. I drove into her, but it took hard work to make her come. Coming with a man inside her was what she wanted, something I guessed she hadn’t been able to do. I helped her every way I could. I had to break down years of anger and disgust with men. I think the desperation of the moment helped to do it. Maggie seemed to know that she might never get another chance. I counted the minutes in my head without being completely aware that I was doing it. Maggie might be the last woman I might ever enjoy, and I put everything I had into making it good for both of us.

  She came quietly. I expected her to writhe under me, dig her nails into my back. But her orgasm was quiet, and she kissed me hard while she was coming. I hadn’t come yet, so I made her come again and again. Women are lucky, the way they can keep coming until they are exhausted. I think Maggie was worn out by the time I couldn’t hold back any longer. She had had many men in her during her life, and she knew I wanted my own come.r />
  “Come, Saddler,” she whispered into my ear. “Come now—I want to feel your hot juice.”

  And so I did, spurting my juice inside her. I couldn’t be sure what she thought of me, if she’d forgiven me for fucking Flaxie. For all I knew, she might still hate me. There was no way to tell. I wasn’t even sure that she might not try to kill me with that double-edged knife. It lay close at hand with her short-barreled revolver. But after I came she did nothing but relax, so maybe I wasn’t going to get knifed or castrated after all.

  I thought she might run off after her sex experiment with me. Some half-forgotten instinct had made her come to me. She wanted to prove something to herself We were all so close to death she knew she might not have another chance to prove anything. I had been wanting this fierce-tempered woman since that first night in Claggett’s wagon. But I had given up hope because of her relentless hostility. But here she was on what might be our last night on earth.

  The way she fucked, I could well believe that she had been one of the best—if not the best—whores in the New York Tenderloin. She pushed my head down between her legs, wanting me to do to her what she had so often done to Flaxie. I was gentle with her because I have to admit I was afraid not to be. She seemed to like the way I tongued her because she sighed with contentment. She reached down and held my head with both hands, running her fingers through my hair. When she came she came as quietly as she had when we fucked in the regular way. She squeezed my face between her legs.

  “Oh Jesus, Saddler, I’m all confused,” she whispered. “Things got so turned around in my life. You know I love Flaxie, but...”

  I had nothing to say to that. Circumstances had made her a woman-lover and I felt sure she wouldn’t change at this point in her life. I really don’t understand woman-lovers, but I could see that loving someone like Flaxie wouldn’t be so bad. Everybody needs sex and you do the best you can.

  “I think we better leave off,” she said finally. “The bastards will be coming soon. We don’t have much of a chance, have we?”

  I could be straight with this tough woman. “Maybe, maybe not. All we can do is make a fight of it. You have any regrets about this trip?”

  “Not a one. Anything is better than jail. How about you?”

  “Nobody lives forever. I don’t know if you still hate me, have changed your mind enough to like me, or if you plain don’t give a shit about me.”

  “Well, you’re not the ruthless bastard I thought you were. I guess I like you all right. Is that good enough for you?”

  “It’ll do,” I said.

  Out in the dark the yelling was louder. They were full of whiskey now, and some of them sounded willing to risk anything to get at the women. I told the people on the first watch to stand their ground. The attack had to come in minutes. I turned and saw Maggie take up her position beside Flaxie on the other side of the circle. She hugged Flaxie for a moment. I didn’t know how much of it was woman-love or just love. It didn’t seem to matter. We all need love, no matter how or where we get it.

  I stood up and moved around the circle of defenders, talking quietly. Jake clapped me on the shoulder and said he hoped I’d be able to make it to San Francisco. Jake seemed to have no doubt that he and Rita would survive. If they had to die, it was best to go out thinking that way. Rita kissed me, then let go. Culligan was down on one knee, his rifle ready. He was in a cold fury at having his whiskey stolen. He didn’t know that maybe his whiskey would make it possible for us to live through this. Some of us. He didn’t look at me, and I had no words for him. Claggett was the last one I spoke to. “If I get killed and you don’t, head straight for the California line. I think tonight will decide it. Whatever happens will happen now. If you get it and I don’t, I’ll do my best for your women.”

  Claggett looked surprised. “My women!”

  “That’s who they are, Reverend. They still look up to you.”

  “I don’t mind that,” Claggett said, and that’s all he said.

  Everyone knew what they had to do: fight to the end. No stylish plan was called for. Drunk as they were, the marauders would come straight at us. It was some consolation that Sam wouldn’t be able to cook up any fancy plan of his own. His men were too drunk for that. Sam was, in his way, as desperate as we were. I had no more orders, no more advice to give. Shoot and keep on shooting I’d said, until you’re down to the last bullet. Then fight with anything you can find.

  We waited, tense in the darkness. Out beyond us, they were working up to a frenzy of drunken lust and rage. I was counting in my head again. That was nerves. I made myself stop. I wouldn’t have been half as jumpy if it hadn’t been for the women. Sam’s men would have to kill some of them; the old killer must have accepted that by now. I guess he was hoping to pick up whoever was left. But he had to be crazy and desperate to settle for that.

  They were moving out around us now, but I couldn’t see a thing. Then a rifle cracked and flashed and they opened up from all sides, screaming and yelling as they fired. The night exploded with gunfire as they came in for what they hoped was the kill. Then there were dim shapes behind the flashes, and I yelled, “Open fire!”

  Flames jetted from the wagons. The yelling was drowned out by the shooting on both sides. During a break in the noise I could hear Kiowa Sam urging them on. The attack wasn’t as heavy as I expected it to be, but it was heavy enough. If they hadn’t been drunk, they would have done a lot better. Suddenly my women—Claggett’s women—began to yell themselves, as if all the months of tension were tearing loose inside them. It rose up into a scream of fear, anger, and desperation. It chilled my blood to hear women scream like that. Suddenly, I knew we were going to win. It would be bloody, but we were going to win.

  Drunk, staggering, still yelling, they came on through our fire, some dropping to the ground under the hail of bullets. A woman got hit with a bullet in the face. She jumped, fell down and died without a sound. The woman’s death seemed to drive the others crazy. They fired and reloaded as fast they could pull the trigger or work the loading lever.

  The night was filled with death and gunsmoke and hot lead. And still they came on, running, lurching to their deaths. I felt another woman dropping beside me. There was no time to see who she was. Maggie yelled her hate when a bullet brought Flaxie down with a soft, helpless cry. I jerked my head around and a bullet sang past where it had been a moment before. I knew from Maggie’s scream that Flaxie was dead.

  We were holding firm on my side; they were breaking through on the other. Rita took a bullet in the arm and shifted her handgun to the other hand and kept on firing. I heard Claggett cry out, a gasp more than a cry, and knew he had been wounded. They broke through on the other side, and we turned to face them as they came howling through between the wagons, some falling under our fire. I spotted Kiowa Sam, and he spotted me at the same time. I jerked my rifle to my shoulder, but before I could pull the trigger four or five women turned their guns on Sam and he fell, blasted by lead.

  Claggett was wounded again, and I killed the man who fired the shot. Somebody jumped me from behind. I threw him over my head and shot him in the back of the head. Maggie’s rifle was empty; she yanked at the belt gun and started blasting. A wounded raider came at me with a big Bowie knife, and Maggie shot him twice in the chest. She was yelling something at me when a bullet drilled her through the heart. She stood for a moment looking at me, holding her chest with her left hand. I don’t think she actually saw me. She fell and lay still, with Flaxie a few feet away.

  And then, as quickly as it had come, the attack was broken. We shot at the few raiders left as they ran into the dark. We killed a few before they got to their horses. I heard them—not many—riding away into the night. I knew they wouldn’t come back. Sam was dead. They’d be heading for places where the Army couldn’t find them. The sound of the fleeing horses died away, and it was quiet again except for the moaning of the wounded.

  I ordered torches lit, then the lamps in the wagons. Claggett h
ad died during the last moments of the attack. Maggie was dead, so was Flaxie. Culligan was wounded but alive. Steiner was binding up the wound in Rita’s arm. Nine other women had died; six had been wounded. One died later. We had lost close to half our people since starting out from Missouri. Now, at long last, it was over.

  We buried our dead at sun-up. Since Claggett was among them, it fell to me to read the prayers. I didn’t feel foolish doing it. Not silly at all. We had come a long way, but there was still a fair way to go. I didn’t know what the remaining women would do when they arrived in California. I had done my best for them, but from now on they would have to make their own way in the world. I guessed they’d be all right. Men were looking for wives all over California; even the plain ones would have no trouble finding a husband.

  This time we put crosses over the graves of our dead. Then it was time to move. We were running short of water, but a river was marked on the map. We pulled away in bright sunlight. Before the distance became too great to see, I turned and looked back at the crosses standing stark in the glare of the desert.

  “Goodbye, Maggie,” I said. Then I thought of all the others who had died, and I said goodbye to them too.

  As we moved on, Jake turned to me and said, “I guess you’re the leader now.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “I guess I am.”

  About the Author

  Peter J. McCurtin was born in Ireland on 15 October 1929, and immigrated to America when he was in his early twenties. By the early 1960s, he was co-owner of a bookstore in Ogunquit, Maine, and often spent his summers there.

  McCurtin’s first book, Mafioso (1970) was nominated for the prestigious Mystery Writers of America Edgar Award, and filmed in 1973 as The Boss, with Henry Silva. More books in the same vein quickly followed, including Cosa Nostra (1971), Omerta (1972), The Syndicate (1972) and Escape From Devil’s Island (1972). 1970 also saw the publication of his first “Carmody” western, Hangtown.