by Bill Brooks
“Like I said,” he continued. “All I want is for you to see to him, change his bandages, take care of him, until he gets better.”
“What if he die, then what?”
“Then...get somebody to help you bury him. Pay them if you have to, I’ll leave you enough money.”
“I don’t know.”
For the first time, she took the time to study this man who sat across from her and demanded so much. He was not a bayou man, that was easy enough to see from his color. Bayou men were dark, like the swamps—lean, and hard like cypress roots. This man was big and pink-skinned and had hair the color of old straw. This man did not speak like a Cajun, but his tongue was thick with accent.
Mostly what she noticed about the man who sat sipping the chicory coffee was that there was no smile to him, no fire down in his belly.
Her reluctance was beginning to fray his nerves. He was not accustomed to bargaining with women. Still, she held all the cards, he knew that much. If she refused to care for Lowell, he had little choice but to put him on a horse and find some sort of sanctuary—but where?
“I could shoot you for refusing to help,” he said, but without conviction.
“You can kill Marie, that’s for sure. But, I’m not afraid of you.”
She saw the helplessness in his expression, the dogged creases around the eyes, the unsteady mouth.
“Well, sister, if you won’t take my money and you won’t take my threats, then I guess I just gather up my little brother and we’ll be on our way.” He pulled a wad of paper money from his pocket, peeled off some of it and placed it on the table near her coffee cup.
“That’s for what you’ve done so far, for the night’s stay, and the bandages and the coffee.” He said, standing to his full height.
“I will take care of him,” she said. “That fellow, he cannot go out. Such a thing would kill him.”
Carter blew a sigh of relief. And for once in his life, he felt grateful for another’s help.
“Thanks sis.”
“You sit and have some cooking before you so first, eh?”
He was anxious to get started, but a warm meal seemed too much to refuse.
He finished the last of it, noting the bite of its flavor.
Swiping at his plate with a piece of hard brown bread, he cleaned the last of the meal.
“You are lucky you did not come to old man Thibideux’s place up the road there,” she said, pointing with her nose. “He would have shot you, Bang, Bang, Bang, and then asked you what you want.” Her laughter filled the room.
“I guess we could not have afforded anymore bad luck than what we’ve had lately,” he said. She was surprised to see him smile, even though it was a faint one.
“Mr. Thibideux sounds like the kind of fellers we got back home in Autuaga County.”
“Where is that place you say, eh?”
“Oh, it’s a ways from here. A place called Alabama.” He found himself enjoying her company, her conversation, her questions. “It’s where me and Lowell lives.”
“What you do in that place?”
“You mean what kind of work do we do?” She nodded. “Well, we have us a hog farm, more than two hundred head on about one-hundred and sixty acres. It ain’t bottom land though, but it’s good enough for raising hogs on.”
Half of what he said was foreign to her, but she enjoyed the way he spoke of this Alabama.
“How you have so much land, eh?”
He scratched the stubble of beard growth on his cheek and realized that it had been some time since he had attended to his daily toilet. The sourness of his clothes was also apparent.
“Who this fella you after, eh?”
He pushed his plate away. His pile of crawdad shells was twice that on the woman’s plate and he realized how hungry he had been.
“The feller’s name is Johnny Montana. He murdered our pap. Killed him over a handful of cards.”
“So, you chase after this fella what killed your pa-pa,” she said, her eyes wet with curiosity. “And when you catch him, then you take your revenge, eh?”
“That’s about the size of it, sister.”
“You call me, Marie, eh?”
“Sure, sure.”
“What if this man he kill you first?”
“Well, it ain’t going to happen that way, Marie. I’m going to catch him and kill him, and that’s going to be the end of it.”
Her question had added to his own doubt about the mission he had set for both him and his brother.
Ever since the gunfight of the night before, he had turned the whole thing over in his head. A part of him was willing to give it up, to turn back. As much as it seemed unlikely, he found himself missing home and even the dern hogs.
The guilt of such thoughts nagged at him like a bad tooth.
For several long minutes he sat there in silence. Finally, the woman spoke.
“Well, you had better not be wasting so much more time in this place if you are going to catch that fella and kill him, eh?”
“I reckon so.” He stood and walked to the bed where Lowell lay curled up in a peaceful sleep.
Turning to the woman, he said, “I’ll leave his horse. You know anything about caring for horses, Marie?”
“Of course,” she said. “Marie know about all creatures, not just people, eh.”
“That ol’ mare’s pretty content just to graze, but a bag of oats now and again might not hurt her.”
The woman nodded.
“Well, that’ll ’bout do it then. I get back this way soon’s I can. You tell Lowell what I’ve done, once he comes around.”
She watched him from the porch until he was gone.
Chapter Twelve
They had continued to ride in a Northeasterly trek and were now nearing the southern most portion of the Llano Estacado—the Staked Plains.
Treeless and void of all life it seemed, except for the vast fields of yuccas, their tall bone-white stalks shifting in the wind, the Staked Plains seemed a desperate stretch of land.
Pete Winter had crossed this land once before, and remembered it as merciless. There was some water, but it was hard to find. There were a few spreads, but few and far between.
It was known mostly for two things: badmen and renegade bands of Comanches. Because of its hostile nature, only the evil intentioned found it to be a place worth habituating.
The Comanches had once roamed this land with impunity. Great horsemen, and proud, they were a force to be reckoned with by any invader. But a fierce and pitched battle at Adobe Walls, in which they suffered immeasurable losses, announced their end as commanders of the Plains.
Afoot, they were awkward and slow. Astride their ponies, however, there was not a more graceful or deadly an enemy.
Pete Winter had never encountered these people, but he took it on good account as to their prowess. And it was of no little concern to him that there were still a few marauding bands of these warriors around.
Now, the trio paused and rested for a matter of minutes. He had them air their horses by loosening the saddles. While Johnny Montana and Katie Swensen took their ease, Pete Winter checked the supply of ammunition that he maintained in his saddlebags.
His weaponry consisted of a .44 caliber rimfire Winchester that held sixteen rounds, and .45 Colt single-action revolver. He had also packed a .45 Smith and Wesson Schofield break-top model. He hoped it was enough to get the job done.
The land ahead seemed without life. No movement, not even the scuttle of a lizard. Something in it made him feel uneasy.
He removed one of the canteens and held it out to the woman. As he did so, he gave a shifting glance toward the outlaw who made no attempt to reach for it first.
He watched her drink, and then hand it to Johnny Montana. “Go easy, mister,” he cautioned the outlaw. “We've got a dry stretch ahead of us according to this map and my memory. This land won't forgive us if we run dry.”
The outlaw cast a furtive glance at the lawman, but
limited his take of the warm water. Pete Winter drank last, taking in the least amount he thought necessary. They still had two full canteens, but there was no telling when the next water might appear. Many of the marked sources on the map the Ranger carried had proved to be either dried up, or not where they were marked.
When he finished drinking, he hooked the canteen over the horn of his saddle, and grabbed the pair of handcuffs and tossed them to the outlaw.
“This land looks like hell and brimstone, Ranger. A man could easily lose himself and die out here. We ain't lost are we?”
“Mount your horse, mister,” was the only response Pete Winter cared to give.
He did not feel lost, but finding good water was beginning to concern him. For the last several hours, he had scanned the ground looking for animal tracks that might lead to water. He had seen none.
He moved to help the woman mount up. In order to do so, he had to form a stirrup with his hands while she gripped the horn and cantel and pulled herself up. She weighed practically nothing at all, it seemed to him.
For Katie Swensen, the trip had confirmed one glaring fact for her: Each mile crossed caused her to become more bitter and sorry for her decision to have run away with Johnny Montana.
Each time she glanced at him, she no longer saw the gallant, handsome man who had entered her father’s store that fateful day. Rather, she saw an embittered, complaining, weak soul whose only concern seemed to be his own discomfort. She had asked herself a hundred times or more since their capture why she had ever been so foolish.
She felt the heavy weight of guilt riding with her. Yes, she told herself, she was just as guilty as he for the crimes that were committed. He had done those things, but she had stayed with him. It seemed of little consolation to her that she could tell herself she had acted out of love for the man.
Now, as she stole glances at him, all she saw was a man whose wrists were shackled, a man who exuded sweat and meanness and arrogance. She saw now, not a handsome sweetheart, but a dejected, captured outlaw.
Her heart was full of gloom.
The small renegade band of Comanches came across the fresh tracks of horses.
One of the warriors dropped from his pony and read the sign, the tips of his brown fingers tracing the hoofed depressions.
Three sets of tracks indicated they were shod horses; the fourth set appeared to be that of the Long-Ear animal the white man used to pack supplies. The warrior made sign by holding up three fingers and then using his fingers to make ears atop his head to indicate the riders were packing supplies on a mule.
He pointed off toward the direction that the tracks were leading. The Comanches knew the land well. They knew it to be a dry, harsh environment that could parch a man’s throat and swell his tongue black in the summer, freeze him to death in the winter.
The band had been returning from a raiding party in the New Mexican Territory. The raid had netted them little save one milch cow, which they had ended up slaughtering for food. Now, they had a quarry at hand...only three riders.
Their leader, an extremely muscular man, looked off toward the direction the tracker had pointed. Waves of heat rose off the floor of the land and blurred his vision beyond a point.
They too were in search of water. There was good water less than an hour’s ride, but in the opposite direction that the tracks of the shod horses were headed. Their skin water bag was nearly empty.
The leader of the group considered the options: The chase would lead them away from water. He knew of no good water in the direction the tracks were leading. If the riders who had left the tracks were well-armed, it could come down to a fight where braves would be lost. He knew some of the whites to be good shooters and repeating rifles could make few seem like many.
The tracker made a short grunt followed by a hand signal that expressed his impatience at not pursuing the horse tracks.
The leader made a gesture to cut off the tracker’s impudence. He weighed, for a moment more, the decision. The lack of water for themselves and their ponies could prove a difficult problem if they did not catch up to the quarry quickly. On the other hand, the prospect of catching more horses and possibly prisoners was an attractive motivation.
The dark eyes within the coppery face searched the direction the riders had ridden off. His pony, too, seemed to be impatient as it stamped and pawed at the ground.
Finally, with a broad grin splitting his round face, he signalled them forward in the direction of the tracks. They yipped their approval.
To count coup, to take scalps, to steal the enemy’s horses, that was the way of the true Comanche.
The shadows of the three riders and their animals grew long over the plains. The fiery sun had made its trek from east to west across a cloudless sky.
For the better part of the last hour, Pete Winter and his prisoners had been following a dry wash that snaked across the flat ground. Even though dry, the fact that it existed at all gave the Ranger some hope that it might eventually lead to water.
Earlier, they had spotted a jackrabbit hunched beneath a greasewood bush. It had broken cover as they neared and quickly disappeared among the many yucca. It was a missed opportunity for some meat, but, the Ranger concluded, it might mean that water was near.
They rode on.
The small band of Comanche warriors were closing fast on their quarry; the tracks were growing fresher. They rode proud, haughtily upon their ponies. Some possessed Henry model 1866 repeating rifles, their stocks studded with brass tacks. The others carried old breech-loading, single-shot Springfield carbines. They wore no paint, except the paint of dust that clung to their coppery skins.
When they would find water, they would cover themselves with mud to stave off the heat and sting of insects.
They carried war shields of painted hide. And one or two carried the old weapons of bows and rabbit fur quivers full of arrows.
“I’ve got to stop for a time, Ranger!” announced Johnny Montana. “It’s that time of day for me. You got any more of those catalogue pages left from that book?”
Pete halted the group and allowed the outlaw to dismount and walk off toward a distant yucca plant. The Ranger dismounted and helped Katie Swensen to do the same. She had a pale, haggard appearance.
He sat her down on the ground and handed her a canteen. Taking the bandanna from around his neck, he handed that to her as well.
“Wet it down and tie it around your neck,” he offered. “It’ll help cool you down.”
She smiled wanly, her eyes pretty but sad.
“Thank you, mister,” she said, spilling enough water on the bandanna to wet it down and then pressing it to her face.
“No need for thanks,” he said. “And you can call me, Pete. Mister sounds sort of old.”
She lifted her gaze once more, a slight movement of her mouth, a near smile, showed him that she was grateful for his kindness. She glanced once in the direction that Johnny Montana had gone.
“I don’t know if that would seem right,” she said, “me calling you by your first name.”
“Well, I’d prefer it,” he said, easing down beside her, holding the reins of all three mounts in his hand. The pack mule was contained by a lead rope tied to his saddle horn.
She thought him handsome, but not in the rakish way she had once thought Johnny Montana was handsome. The Ranger had a soft, boyish face and crisp eyes that seemed forever shadowed under the brim of his dusty black Stetson. He had the raw-boned leanness of the land itself. She found both his speech and his manners to be pleasant.
“It’s terribly warm, Texas,” she said, patting the damp kerchief to her face.
“Well, maybe back where you come from,” he said, with an easy smile. “But out here, I’d say this is just about normal. Now, when it gets so hot you have to put newspaper in the bottoms of your shoes to keep the soles of your feet from blistering, that’s when it’s considered warm.”
She laughed slightly.
“Is it normal fo
r Texans to tell such tall tales?”
“Oh yes ma’am. If us Texans couldn’t swap stories, we might just as well all move to Kansas. Surely you have heard by now that everything in Texas is bigger and better and much improved over what the rest of the country has to offer.”
He pushed back the brim of his hat far enough to reveal a sandy shock of hair and the crystal clear gray eyes, exposing a tender shyness that greatly appealed to her.
She thought that if this were another time, another place, they could easily have been two young lovers out for a day’s ride.
He had been entertaining thoughts of her as well. She was pretty and good-natured, and did not complain. It was hard for him to understand how she could have ended up in such a mess.
A rustle in the distance drew their attention.
Johnny Montana, his gaze immediately fixed upon them, hurried his step to where the couple were sitting.
“Seems a man can’t hardly do his duty in the bushes without someone trying to steal his gal. I turn my back and the first thing I know, you two are getting cozy with one another!”
Pete Winter flushed with anger over the accusation, but more so over the outlaw’s foul manner. He leaped to his feet to confront the man.
“I’ve warned you mister about prodding me. Now you just back off!”
“Go ahead, Tex! Show me how tough you are! Prove it to the lady! Go on, whip me while I’m handcuffed!” It wasn’t jealousy that motivated Johnny Montana—jealousy had nothing to do with it. All he hoped for was that the Ranger would make a mistake, lose control, anything that might give him a chance.
Katie quickly pushed herself between the two men.
“Please!” she said, her eyes pleading with the angry stare of the lawman. Her fear was not for the outlaw. She knew that Johnny could be deceptive and vicious and that if the two engaged one another in combat, Johnny might gain the upper hand.
“Please, no more violence!” She had placed her hand on the lawman’s chest, a slight pressure of resistance, a pleading for him to refrain.
