by Julie Weston
Light played tricks on her—there was a mound and then there wasn’t—until she saw that snow had begun to fall, the small hard pellets closer to frozen rain than to lacy flakes. As she drew nearer to the grove, something dark moved away from the center. Quills of fear raced through her. Moonie growled deep in his throat. Then he leaped forward. When he reached the far side of the mound, he stopped and nosed at the snow. Nellie followed him, but away from the trees, the snow was thicker and she found herself wading.
“What is it?” The dark shadow had been low to the ground.
A bundle lay curled up in the snow. A deeper trench showed it had been dragged a few feet. It was Rosy. No face or skin showed, and coat and pants looked like a heap of cast-offs, but she recognized the greasy sheepskin coat, the intricate tooling of the boots. Moonshine whined and nosed at him. She shook the bundle and tried to unwrap the arms from around the legs. “Rosy, wake up.” This was not a dead body. It wasn’t stiff. The arms dropped. She took off a glove and found his face, placing her hand on his neck. It was warm and his beard scratchy. His eyes were closed, but even as she touched him, a moan broke from his lips.
He mumbled and Nellie put her ear close to his mouth. “Say it again. Wake up.”
“Llllull.” He pushed his face against her skin, like a dog nuzzling for pets.
Another low growl pulled her attention from Rosy. This time, Moonie’s hackles rose straight up and he bared his teeth, facing in the direction the dark shadow had run. Nellie peered through the snow. Two dark shapes stood not five yards away.
Coyotes. They had dragged Rosy, trying to get through the clothes to the man. She couldn’t leave to find help. What was wrong with him? She rubbed his arms and legs and hoped Moonie would stave off an attack. “Wake up. We have to get away from here.”
“Lllle . . . lone.” His voice was coming back.
Maybe light would scare them off. She dug in her bag, dragged out the flashlight, sent its beam toward the moving shapes. The two animals stopped pacing and stared back at her through the falling snow. They were scrawny with ragged coats and moth-eaten tails. Their eyes reflected orange and their teeth gleamed like fangs in a nightmare on either side of dripping tongues. One took a hesitant step forward. Moonshine growled, barked, and jumped toward them, his black coat shining in her light.
Rosy struggled, knocking the flashlight out of Nellie’s hand. It landed in a hole where it illuminated only snow. Snarling and snapping told her where the dog and the coyotes were. She tried to wrap one arm around Rosy, press him to sit up, and at the same time protect her head and his in case the wild animals attacked. She thrust her feet toward the thrashing, thinking she could fend off at least one by kicking, but knew the light would make a better weapon. Rosy struggled to escape and she grabbed him. They rolled over and buried the flashlight. The twilight seemed like midnight until her eyes adjusted.
The semi-conscious man lay heavy on top of Nellie. She squirmed out from under him, still aware of the struggle between the dog and two coyotes, filled with growls, yips, gnashing of teeth. “Rosy, wake up!” With a strong push, she managed to flop him to one side and she wriggled onto her knees to dig out the flashlight. She directed the beam to the trees. The sudden light was enough to scare one of the coyotes back a few steps and out of focus, but Moonshine still writhed and twisted in the snow with the other.
“Stop it!” Nell grabbed a walking stick and threw it toward the animals. She missed. The coyote’s teeth slashed at Moonie’s neck, his short hair no protection. Something, anything. She aimed carefully and threw the flashlight. It hit the top animal, the coyote, and dropped onto the snow. The coyote jumped sideways off the dog and then he, too, scrambled back. Nell stood and waved her arms. “Get away!” Both coyotes turned and ran. Moonie made to follow.
“Stay.” Rosy’s deep voice, although weak, was strong enough to hold the dog in place, to face him back toward his master. “Come.” With a glance after the coyotes, Moonie stepped forward, stopped, glanced back, stepped again, his breathing heavy and rasping, then walked over and sat down by Rosy. The dog licked his front paw and then tried to lick his hip. Nellie could not see whether he’d been wounded. She rubbed her hands around his neck. Extra folds of skin had protected him, although he flinched. She turned to the man.
“Oh, Rosy. You’re all right.” But he wasn’t all right. He sagged back onto the snow, breathing with difficulty, and then he vomited. “Roll over! You’ll choke to death!” She grabbed him, shouting, trying to get his mouth turned toward the snow. His body heaved again and again but after the first dribble of evil-smelling glop, nothing more came up. Exhaustion or unconsciousness claimed him and he lay still, his breathing a repeated wheeze and groan.
Nellie clambered over to where the flashlight still lit the fighting ground, picked it up, and staggered to her feet. If she left Rosy alone to retrieve the sled, the coyotes might come back. She and Moonie would have to drag him across the river and into the cabin.
Unconscious, he was easier to move. She turned him onto his back, removed first one arm and then the second from the sleeves of the coat, and buttoned the coat back over him, his arms to his sides. The sleeves would give her a handle for pulling him. Her belt was too small to wrap around Rosy to hold the coat in place. She unslung her canteen and jerked and shoved and managed to get the sling around him just above his waist and around the arms under the coat. She looped the strap on one of the bone buttons to hold it in place. Good thing he was thin.
Her makeshift travois was awkward. She stood up, face forward, and held the sleeves on either side of her and tried to walk. Her heels hit his head. “Help me, Moonie.” She tried crawling backwards, pulling at the sleeves. The dog got the idea. He grabbed a sleeve near Rosy’s head and inched backwards on his haunches. At first the body stuck, but with a jerk by Nellie, the coat began to slide across the icy surface. What they’d do at the old caved-in snow bridge, she had no idea. Get there first, she thought. The flashlight, under her arm against her side, teetered and bounced, reflecting snow falling, but also lighting their way.
At the bridge, Nellie missed her sticks. “Stay,” she ordered the dog. She returned to the mound, found only one stick, and hurried back to the river, where she tested the snow on the bridge. The cold weather for the last few days had served one good purpose—freezing over the spot where she had fallen in. By shoving and then pulling, she managed to get Rosy across and almost to the house. She trembled from the exertion, her sweat beginning to freeze. Rosy hardly seemed alive. She leaned close again to check his breathing, but she couldn’t tell if he breathed or not. “You stupid drunk!” They would not freeze ten steps from safety. She crawled up the step to the back door.
“He’s more than a drunk.” A voice growled from the doorway. “He’s a murderer. He killed my brother.”
CHAPTER 26
Nellie looked up, disbelieving, and faced Gladys Smith and the muzzle of a gun. She almost fell hurrying to Rosy, where she shielded him. Where was Moonshine? He’d been right with her. Then she saw the dog had entered the open doorway, where lamplight lit a path as gloomy dusk turned to night.
“What are you talking about? This is Rosy.” The black hole of the barrel loomed large.
“You stupid girl. You mixed in where you don’t belong. Acting like life is . . . is a . . . a song. What do you know about people like Rosy or my brother or me? You’ve been protected all your life.” Mrs. Smith’s mouth clamped shut and she stepped down from the porch carefully, still aiming her gun at Nellie and Rosy. “Now move. He must pay for what he did.”
“What did he do?” Nellie was frozen by the gun. She’d seen it in the bureau, but it hadn’t seemed real then. She backed up so her leg was resting against Rosy. He shivered either from the cold or his drug-induced sickness. “He’s sick and needs help.”
This Gladys Smith was different from the flirting woman in the boarding house and then the businesslike clerk in the mine office. Her face in the ambient light h
ad melted into that of a haggard old woman, as if she had removed a mask, if not of youth, at least of middle age.
“He needs what he gave Jack—death.” She took a step to the side, giving Nellie a breath of relief. From the expression on the woman’s face, she just might shoot through Nellie.
“Wait! How can you know it was Rosy? Maybe it was—” she hesitated, searching for any name that might distract the woman, “—Sheriff Azgo. He brought the doctor out here. Maybe he killed Ah Kee and Jack, who saw it.”
Moonshine came back out through the cabin door and stood, watching Mrs. Smith and Nellie. Mrs. Smith’s mouth opened in a dreadful grimace. “I know it was Rosy. He told me so. Get away.” Her last two words were spoken in such an intense tone that Nellie almost obeyed.
“But your brother was sick, you said. Maybe he froze here. He was frozen when I found him. There wasn’t any blood.” How could the sheriff be sure Jack hadn’t drowned?
“My brother was addicted to opium. On account of that . . .” She motioned with the gun toward Rosy. A sob broke from Mrs. Smith. “He didn’t play his trumpet. He couldn’t work. He left me alone.” So much pain and longing filled the word “alone.” Moonie heard it, too, because he took a step forward.
Mrs. Smith dodged quickly to the side and pointed the gun at Rosy. Moonie, with a sound Nellie would ever after think of as a roar, leaped from the stairs onto Mrs. Smith. In the midst of the shattering explosion, Nellie, too, jumped toward her. The smell of gunpowder choked her. Their force knocked the woman to the ground with Nellie on top, but the gun was still clutched in the woman’s hand. “Let me go!” She tried to roll away. “I’ll shoot you, too. I hate you!”
Nellie could feel Gladys’s strength under her, but held on. She shoved Moonie aside, pulled her leg up so she could press down on the woman’s middle with a knee, and then stretched her arm out to grab the gun. As she did so, it exploded once again, reverberating with sound and smell. The shock forced Nellie sideways and she lost her balance, falling backwards. The gun dropped into the snow. Moonshine grabbed at it.
“Stay, Moonshadow.”
Rosy’s voice was so startling, Mrs. Smith and Nellie stopped wrestling in the snow. He was half-sitting where Nellie had dragged him. Moonshine moved over to him and butted him with his head, trying to push his master to his feet.
A tall figure blotted out some of the light in the doorway. “Who shoot gun?” A beam from a flashlight pinned them in a bizarre scene.
“Sammy! She tried to kill Rosy. Get the gun. It’s over—” She pointed to where she thought it was, but night had covered all of them and the falling snow was like a curtain in the light. “Help me. Rosy might be wounded.”
There was no motion behind the light for a moment, and then Sammy scurried over to the two women, who floundered, Nellie trying to stand, Mrs. Smith crawling to where Nellie had pointed. He beat her to it, but the dark thing in the snow was the axe. He threw it down and Nellie grabbed it, wanting any weapon she could find. “There it is,” she said. Sammy leaped toward where she pointed, found the gun, and shoved it into his waistband. “No shoot. Want Rosy a-live.” Mrs. Smith grabbed at his legs, but he loosely kicked her away.
Moonie growled at Sammy when he squatted near Rosy, but Nellie stumbled over to the dog. She dropped the axe on the step and ran her hands up and down his neck and body. He smelled of the gun blast, but seemed unhurt. “I was so afraid she shot you!”
Together, Sammy and Nellie brought Rosy into the cabin and placed him on the one good bed. The kerosene lamp lit the room, as did a fire in the fireplace. The lamp’s light jumped and weaved without a chimney. She removed the canteen sling, unbuttoned his coat. “What are you doing here?” she asked Sammy, motioning for him to pull off the boots. Rosy’s color was so pale, he looked dead, but he wasn’t bleeding anywhere. With the bedclothes pulled up over his feet and legs and his coat wrapped around his upper body, he’d be warm. His face was slack, the scar near his bad eye white and puckered like a worm stuffed under his skin. His hair was more gray than brown and stringy with grease. He looked old as dirt.
“Give me back my gun,” Mrs. Smith demanded as she entered the cabin. “I’ll kill him.” Her threat no longer frightened Nell. Gladys sat down in a chair and lowered her head.
Sammy pulled another chair over by the bed and guarded Rosy. He fingered the gun as if it were a familiar tool. His watchfulness disturbed Nellie as much as Mrs. Smith’s keening pain. Why did Sammy want Rosy “a-live”? And for how long?
Moonie nosed under the counter for food, shoving cans and jars aside. He pushed his water dish across the floor, then lay down with his nose near it. He crawled forward on his haunches and swatted his paw under the cupboard. His actions reminded Nellie of the axe, which she retrieved from the step and placed on the wood by the stove.
Mrs. Smith’s crying shook Nellie. She crossed to the table and knelt down. “I’m sorry about your brother,” she began.
“No, you’re not,” Mrs. Smith said, lifting her face. The kewpie doll was cracked and all traces of color drained. “You took his picture when he was dead. You’re like a ghoul, watching other people suffer.” Although she had sounded as if she were crying, there were no tears on her cheeks. “You searched my room. What did you want?”
Nellie stood. Moonshine scraped something metal around on the floor and then brought his prize to her. She thought it was another broken toy, but it was not. All the information she’d learned in the past few weeks coalesced. The dog toy. The dark spot on the cigarette. The skis. The extra sock. Nellie, the answer in her hand, stared at Mrs. Smith, remembering her with her feet in a pan of water.
“I wanted to find the murderer of the man here in the cabin. You were here, weren’t you? You parked back on the road and skied to the cabin the day the sheriff brought Ah Kee to help your brother. You smoked cigarettes upstairs and waited for someone to kill Ah Kee.”
“What do you mean, you twit?” Gladys’s face contorted.
“You heard Rosy calling the sheriff to pick up Ah Kee. Then you called Gwynn Campbell to tell him Ah Kee was going to the cabin, hoping Gwynn would kill him, as he had always threatened.”
Sammy started up from his guard post.
“Stay there, Sammy. There’s more.”
“It’s none of your business that I came out here,” Mrs. Smith said. “I wanted to nurse Jack. I found opium upstairs, hidden in the lavender bags. I dumped it in the well when Rosy and Jack were out. And then I left.
“Now Rosy won’t even talk to me anymore. He follows you around like . . . like . . .” The hatred on her face was so physical, it knocked Nellie back on her heels. “I took his lavender. I came back later for the robe, but it was gone. You stole it!” She wailed a long, quivering cry.
“Jack killed your father, Sammy. The sheriff said he had faded blood all over his sleeve. I think Rosy came on the murder, after leaving Mrs. Smith here in the cabin. He banged Jack on the head, maybe, or tried to drown him. Rosy would do anything to protect Ah Kee, but he was too late. Then he brought Jack back here to Gladys so she could revive him. Rosy went back to bury Ah Kee in the most sacred place he knew—next to Lily.”
Sammy and Mrs. Smith listened, as frozen as two cats in front of a mouse hole. Nellie edged toward the stove.
“You did revive Jack. Then you, Gladys Bradley, his sister, attacked him. You’d prepared yourself—tucked a rock in one of your ski socks. Maybe he attacked you, but you were ready. A horrendous fight overturned the table, broke the lantern chimney, knocked off these glasses.” She held up the dog’s discovery: a pair of ski goggles with dark glass in the eyeholes. Like a broken windshield, one purple lens was starred. “Sunglasses for bright snow. Skiers use them.” Mrs. Smith raised her hand as if to grab, then tucked it back in her lap.
“You killed him. You swung that rock in the sock and bashed him on the head. Then you probably stuck him with one of your vicious hatpins. There were a few stains, but not many. I thought they were oil, n
ot blood. Then you left and, without socks, blistered your foot.” Nellie pulled the sock from her pocket and dangled it. Mrs. Smith looked ready to pounce. At the stove, Nellie grabbed the axe and felt safer. “Rosy came back, found a dead Jack, thought he’d been responsible, covered Jack’s face with ice, maybe to avoid seeing the eyes, drank himself silly, and left. I’d guess he put the axe in Jack’s hand. He told you he killed Jack but you knew that wasn’t true. Maybe he said that Jack killed Ah Kee. You told him to cut off the arm, take the belt, hide the body. No one need ever know.”
“You’re crazy.” Mrs. Smith glanced at Sammy and wiggled her chair back. “She’s crazy, isn’t she, Sammy? I wouldn’t kill my own brother. And I certainly didn’t want Ah Kee to die. He helped me. You know that.”
Sammy remained silent, his face impassive. Nellie began to doubt herself. Was her theory built on pieces of a puzzle that didn’t fit together? It was true she didn’t know why Mrs. Smith would kill her brother, but Gladys herself admitted she had come to Last Chance Ranch. There had been a fight. Maybe Rosy did all the damage, as Mrs. Smith claimed. And yet . . .
“You went to Ah Kee for help, Mrs. Smith. Did he help you because you were pregnant and didn’t want a baby? Maybe your brother thought you were a loose woman.”
“Shut up!” The woman leaped at Nellie, her hands clawing toward Nellie’s throat. Nellie raised her axe. Mrs. Smith shied, stumbled, and fell. This time, her sobs were real.
“It was my brother,” she said. “He made me pregnant. I thought once or twice together wouldn’t hurt anyone—we were so alone here. I loved him so much. But then he wanted it—me—again and again. Said he needed me. And I . . .” She sat up and stretched her legs out.
