by Bill Brooks
The rode west out of town, rode until the air rising up from the nearby bayous turned dank and mysterious. Great white herons flew up out of swamps that were bordered by stands of moss laden cypress. There were snakes and alligators and death lying within those swamps. Carter found everything about this country to be strange and offensive.
They rode for a time in silence, the blaze of sun warm upon their faces.
“Well, little brother, how much did that little romp back there cost you?”
Lowell had been lost in thought, the image of the white-skinned woman floating in his mind. The question broke him from his reverie.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, how much did you have to pay her?”
Lowell’s features went from dreamy to confused. He let the question rest in his mind for a long full moment. Then, it dawned on him, and with a great deal of glee, he answered: “She didn’t charge me anything, big brother. Didn’t ask for one red cent. I guess maybe she just favored the way I looked.”
Carter suddenly pulled back on the reins of his mount.
“Lowell, you are as green as spring tomatoes. Women like that don’t just give themselves away. Now how much of our money was it that you spent?”
“Honest, Carter. She never even mentioned money ...”
“Check your pockets you dern fool!”
Something heavy passed through Lowell’s mood as he felt through his empty pockets.
“Damn!” he muttered. “My roll’s gone!”
“How’d you let her get at it in the first place?”
“Don’t know ... except ... it seems I might have dozed off for a spell.”
“That’s all it took. She rolled you blind. Come on!” shouted Carter, wheeling his dun back around toward the town.
“Ah, Carter ...” But before the younger brother could protest, the older one had already begun to spur his mount into a trot.
By the time the pair reached the edge of the city, the sky had turned a dusty rose in the descending darkness. Gas lights flickered along the street casting tongues of light unto the wet cobblestones. Twenty minutes earlier, there had been a brief thunderstorm that had left them soaked, the brims of their hats down over their faces. Now, the heavy air had the added smell of spices emanating from the many open windows where Cajun food was being prepared.
“Cursed place,” complained Carter. “Nothing but wet and smelly and full of evilness.”
Shadowy figures moved along the boardwalks. The cry of prostitutes still rang down from the balconies, from the darkened doorways, their numbers increased with the coming of nightfall.
They reined up in front of the tall house with the wrought iron gate leading to the courtyard. Lowell looked up at the now empty balcony. A stain of yellow light fell on the frame of windows.
“She may not be there, Carter. What’ll we do if she ain’t?”
“We’ll worry about that when the time comes. Let’s go.” Lowell saw his brother shift the revolver on his hip and then dismount.
“What do you plan to do, Carter?”
“I’m planning on getting a damn fool’s money back,” he said as he pushed open the iron gate and stepped into the courtyard. “You comin’?”
Lowell slid out of his saddle and hurried to catch up.
The heels of their boots, in spite of their effort to move quietly, knocked on the cobblestone.
“Be careful of them steps, Carter, some of them’s rotted.”
The first step wasn’t rotted, but it groaned under Carter’s bulk. He pulled his pistol and continued to climb.
It seemed like an eternity to Lowell before they reached the top of the stairs. Pausing, Carter leaned his ear to the door.
He could hear laughter inside—a man’s and a woman’s laughter. He turned and whispered in a hoarse breath: “They’re here, Lowell. You had better pull your piece.”
“Carter ...” Lowell’s voice broke with apprehension. “Carter, it ain’t hardly worth it, shooting someone over money. It wasn’t all that much ... not more than seventy dollars.”
“Shut your yap!” demanded the older brother through clenched teeth. The laughter in the room suddenly stopped. For a long moment, silence shrouded the house—inside and out. A mist of fog was beginning to claim the land and its buildings.
“Who’s out there?” demanded a man’s voice from within the room.
“I come to see the lady!” shouted Carter.
“The lady is bizee. Come back tomorrow, eh?” came the thickly accented voice from within.
Carter stepped back just far enough to raise a heavy boot and brought it hard against the door, rattling it nearly off its hinges; a second kick knocked it open.
Lowell and Carter Biggs found themselves facing a naked couple entwined on the bed.
“I guess she’s home,” said Carter, sarcastically to his brother.
The man on the bed cried out, as though he had been wounded. He scrambled to retrieve some respectability among the bedding. A second movement coming through the door behind them drew everyone’s attention.
Framed there in the busted doorway stood a lithe, little man with dark slick hair, hawkish nose, and dressed like a dandy clear down to the powder gray spats he wore.
“You have interrupted my bezniss, mon ami,” he said, pointing a nickel-plated derringer at them.
The man of the bed leapt to his feet with a scream.
“What is the meaning of this—am I being robbed?”
Carter shifted his gaze from the dandy to the naked man.
“You are,” he said to the frightened toad. “But not by us—by him! You ain’t the first chicken to get plucked by these two today!”
The man dropped to knees upon the bed. Bringing his hands together in prayerful gesture, he pleaded: “Please ... I only come for a leetle plaisir ... I beg you not to shoot me, monsieur!”
The man’s demonstrative plea was just enough to divert the attention of the gunman.
Carter snapped his arm straight upwards and in the same instant pulled the trigger on the revolver he had been holding in his hand. The explosion rocked the room. The bullet struck the dandy high in the chest, slightly right of center, and knocked him backwards against the door jamb. The derringer clattered to the floor.
The naked man flounced on the bed, his every sound a wail, a plea for mercy. “Oh please ... please, mon ami...do not kill me also!”
The woman had sprung from the bed like a panther. Her own screams joining those of the hysterical paramour. Too late Carter saw the dirk clutched in her hand. Lowell, who stood still staring at the dying man, felt something like the blow of a fist strike him between the shoulder blades.
The knife plunged in to the hilt, the blade breaking off into bone.
Carter swung the barrel of the pistol around. For one brief second, the woman stared into the large black hole of the barrel.
The second explosion sounded louder than the first. The bullet tore a neat hole through the woman’s forehead and flung her backwards onto the bed. Her blood covered the naked man, causing him to topple over into a faint.
A movement by the door caused Carter’s attention to be drawn there again. The dandy was still alive, still trying to crawl further into the room.
Carter felt the sliding tug of his brother as Lowell dropped to his knees, his breath labored.
“Carter, what’s happened to me?” His eyes were searching those of his sibling for an answer.
“Come on, little brother. We’ve got to get the hell out of here!” Carter, using his full strength, lifted Lowell to his feet. When he did so, he felt the warm stickiness of Lowell’s life blood spill over his hands.
Carter stared into the ashen face of his only kin and wondered if he would even make it out of the room alive. With the mighty bulk of one arm, he practically carried the wounded man toward the doorway.
The dandy had gotten as far as balancing himself on his hands and knees. Carter paused long enough to pat the pockets
of the man’s jacket and vest. Feeling a lump, he reached into a vest pocked and retrieved a handful of paper money.
The dandy’s eyes cowered within his pained face.
As a final angry gesture, Carter pushed the man over with his boot. “I guess your robbing days are over,” he said, continuing to carry Lowell toward the doorway.
It was a chore trying to get the wounded brother down the rickety steps. Lowell’s legs had lost their steadiness.
By the time they had made the courtyard and come through the iron gate, a crowd had gathered in front of the building, their interest drawn by the sound of gunfire.
Carter, half-carrying his wounded brother like a scarecrow, pushed his way through the on-lookers. Someone said: “Look, that fellow’s bleeding like a stuck hog!”
And it was true. Lowell’s blood was splattering on the wet cobblestones in jagged, crimson patterns.
They reached the horses, and, with one great effort, Carter flung the wounded brother into the saddle.
“Hold on tight, Lowell.”
“It feels like my back is set afire,” groaned Lowell as he slumped forward in the saddle, feeling the horn press into his gut.
Carter made his own saddle and, gripping the reins of Lowell’s horse in one hand, he drove his heels into the flanks of the dun, spiriting the powerful animal into a dead run.
Lowell’s hat went flying; he could feel the warm fluid of blood draining down his spine, soaking his trousers. A numbness was setting in. He felt the wind against his fevered face. The yellow flames of the gas lights suddenly disappeared behind them and into the darkness they rode.
Chapter Seven
Tascosa, Texas
Royal Curtiss was busy staining the front of his shirt with the grease drippings from a fried chicken; a pile of gristly bones lay piled on a plate in front of him. Next to that, a stein of beer. The leg of the chicken was the last of it, a big fryer that Maybelle had delivered him for his lunch.
He was working down into the double bone of the chicken leg with his teeth when the door to his office rattled open.
“You City Marshal Curtiss?” asked the big man standing in the frame of the door. Wind blew in behind him and upset a stack of papers on the chicken eater’s desk.
“You mind closing that?” said the man over a mouthful of bone, his lips and chin greasy.
Henry Dollar closed the door behind him and stepped farther into the room. What he saw was the slovenly man sitting behind his desk, a plate of chicken bones, and a pair of protruding, suspicious eyes.
“Yeah, I’m the city marshal,” said the chicken eater. “Who’s asking?”
“Name’s Henry Dollar, Texas Ranger.”
“Didn’t know there was any rangers in the area,” said the man behind the desk, teasing the last sprig of meat from the chicken leg and then dropping it on top of the others.
Henry watched as the man wiped his greasy fingers on the cracked leather vest he wore. A brass badge was pinned to the vest.
“I got word that there was some trouble up around here,” said Henry, not liking the man all that much. “Was over in Mobeetie on some business when I was told about a rustling problem. Decided to have a look into it.”
The rotund lawman placed both hands on the edge of his desk and pushed himself back in his chair. His mouth gnarled up into a stupid grin.
“Well hell, that must have been some story to get ’em to send a ranger over here.” The man’s grin turned sour.
“Where the hell are you rangers when I got drunks to corral at night, or wild cowboys who like to shoot their pistols off at anything that moves?”
“I rode over here to help put an end to your situation, mister,” warned Henry, “not to be abused by you.”
“Wal, maybe you ought to just get back on your horse and ride out again—we don’t need no strangers coming in and dictating how things is going to be.”
Henry stepped close to the man’s desk, and bent slightly at the waist before speaking.
“You’re walking awful close to a line you don’t want to cross with me, marshal. I didn’t ride here for nothing, and I’m not riding out for nothing. I came here to do a job, and I plan to see it through. You don’t want to cooperate, you stay the hell clear. You get in my way, try to interfere, you’ll pay a hard price.”
City Marshal Royal Curtiss stared into the eyes of the big man, saw no promise of anything good, saw no cause to challenge this man.
The color drained from the chicken-eater’s face.
“Okay ... go ahead and do your investigatin’ ... nose around ... who cares.”
“Fine. Now take a pencil and write down the names of the nearest ranchers around here and directions on how to reach their spreads.”
Henry waited until the city marshal had completed the list and then took his leave of the squat useless man.
The first name on the list was a man named Clave Miller. His was the nearest place on the list as well: three miles west of town, first road to the left.
* * *
Out upon the open grassy plain, he saw a herd of cattle grazing, their white faces and reddish brown hides moving slowly. Their long horns rose and dipped as they lifted their heads to watch the rider pass by and then resumed their graze.
A mile or so down the wagon trace he had taken off the main road, he saw in the distance a windmill, its blades spinning in the wind, saw too the metal roofs of several small buildings.
He spurred the buckskin to a dog trot until he came within shouting distance of the main house, a house that needed a painting.
“Hallo inside,” he called out. It didn’t pay to just walk up to a man’s door and knock, not in this country it didn’t.
There was a long slow moment of silence before the door opened and a woman stepped into its framework. The wind billowed the bottom of her dress. She put one hand to her brow to shade her eyes.
“What do you want here, mister?” The question rang strong and clear.
“My name’s Dollar. I’m with the Texas Rangers. Came to see your man, Clave Miller, if he is your man?”
“What’d he do?”
“Nothing I know about.”
“Then why you here to see him?”
“Looking into cattle rustling hereabouts. Wanted to see if he had been a victim of said crimes.”
“Rustling ain’t nothing new in these parts, mister. Rustling’s been going on for years. How come you to just now be showing up?”
“Just now heard, sister.”
She dropped the hand down away from her face. She had a stark face, hair pulled back tight, plain and unattractive—much like the land itself.
“Might as well step down, Mr. Dollar. Come on up to the house. Water your horse over there at the tank if you want. It’s a hot day all around.”
He loosened the cinch on Ike’s saddle and lifted it up from his back for a few seconds allowing air to pass between horse and blanket, after which he led him to the water tank and let him drink. He scouted the layout of the place as he did so. A few buildings, a couple of corrals with good-looking horses in them, a chicken coop. Not a bad spread.
He removed his Stetson and dipped a hand down in the water, bringing up enough to splash on his face and neck and head.
Turning back to the house where the woman still stood in the doorway, he gave idle thought to what it would be like to have his own spread, a few hundred cattle; quiet, steady work laid before him that did not call for dealing with bandits, horse thieves, rustlers or killers. It was difficult to imagine.
There was still no sign of a man around the place.
He stopped within easy distance of the woman. She had the stark suspicious gaze of a woman alone on the plains.
“Your husband, is he about, ma’am?”
“He’s off checking the herds, him and the other hands.”
“You reckon when he might be back?”
“Hard saying. Depends on where the cattle are at.”
The lawman stood sta
ring out at the vast flat sweep of land, at the long straight horizon where the faded blue sky and the brown earth were seamed together. He stood there listening to the wind, and listening to the silence that was left whenever the wind stopped.
“You hungry mister?”
He was. Hungry and near wore out after a ride that had begun before sunup.
“Yes, ma’am. I surely am.”
“Then come on in the house, wipe your feet if you don’t mind.”
He scraped the soles of his boots on the bottom of the door frame and stepped inside.
The warm scent of fresh baked bread caused his hunger to instantly increase. She pointed to one of the four chairs around a square, scarred oak table that would have taken two men to lift.
He hung his Stetson on the back of the chair and sat down.
She glanced disapprovingly at his spurs. He started to remove them.
“No, that’s okay,” she said. “Do you drink tea, Mr. Dollar?” He didn’t, normally.
“Yes ma’am, tea is fine.”
“Good. It’s hard to find a man that drinks tea. Hard to find anybody that drinks tea out here.” She sat a copper tea kettle on a big iron stove that had ornate nickel plating along its edges and porcelain handles. Several fresh-baked loaves of bread sat in pans along the window sill.
He studied her as she prepared the tea, taking it from a tin can and placing the leaves into a small metal basket: A large woman. Rawboned hands, reddened knuckles. The hair, brown and faded, streaks of silver. The eyes, tired.
It seemed a great effort to do so, but when she turned to bring him the tea in a china cup, she smiled. The lines around her mouth creased deeply—Texas sun was no good for a woman’s skin.
She took one of the loaves of bread out of a pan and cut it in two. She reached on a shelf and took down a jar of apricot preserves. She laid both in front of him. A pot of stew was simmering on the stove. She ladled him a tin plate full and put that in front of him as well. He thought for a moment that he might faint from hunger.
“You go ahead and eat, I already have earlier,” she said.
She sat across from him and drank her tea while he did his best to restrain himself from simply shoveling the food in as fast as he could.
