Sundance, Butch and Me

by Judy Alter

  "Yes," Butch told him, "I am."

  In between races, young Button told us everything we could ever have wanted to know about Winnemucca, the bank, even escape routes.

  "There's a shortcut," he said, "over Soldiers' Pass to Clover Valley. Not many folks know about it, but it's good travelin'. Pa says you can really make time goin' that way."

  "That so?" Sundance said casually.

  Button nodded affirmatively.

  We ended up robbing the bank at noon, in spite of all my protestations about breaking patterns. "There just aren't as many people in a bank at noon, Etta," Sundance had said, and the bits of information we pried from Vic Button proved him right. So noon it was.

  Dressed like a man, my hair tucked under a hat and the brim pulled low over my face, I sat outside the bank just before the clock struck twelve. Coming toward me across a vacant lot were two hoboes with ragged blanket rolls. They were, of course, Butch and Sundance, and inside those blanket rolls were their rifles. The plan was that they would look sort of aimless—certainly harmless. But Sundance carried it one step too far. As he later explained, it was such a beautiful day that when that cat ran in front of him, he couldn't resist chasing it. The cat proved to be a skunk, which turned on him, dousing him with spray from head to foot.

  By the time they entered the bank, even Butch was about to gag. There was no need for a dramatic show of force: All those in the bank fled, holding their noses and gasping for air. One clerk remained, only because he was so violently ill from the smell that he could not move.

  Fortunately my job was to get the horses we tied behind the bank, so I was not exposed to the skunk smell until we were mounted and fleeing. Meantime, Butch and Sundance had scooped all the money they could from the tellers' cages, picked up sacks of gold coins out of the safe, and run out the front door to where I waited with the horses. In minutes we were pounding down the road, following the railroad tracks away from Winnemucca.

  Word spread quickly, given that it was noontime. Behind us as we rode, occasional bursts of gunfire sounded, but the bullets hit harmlessly at some distance from us. Once when I looked back I saw someone on a bicycle pedaling furiously after us, but he soon fell too far behind. Besides, the man couldn't shoot and stay on the bike at the same time.

  "I hear a train," Sundance called suddenly.

  "Could you... ah... ride downwind of us?" Butch called back.

  "No time for joking, Butch. I hear a train," he repeated.

  I turned to look and saw an amazing sight: A train was indeed steaming toward us, men hanging off the sides with pistols and rifles aimed directly at us. But even as I watched, two of those hangers-on fell off the sides of the cars to which they clung. The train stopped, backed up to get them, and slowly built up speed again. After it had done this twice, we were out of sight.

  Still it was not an easy getaway. Sundance dropped—actually dropped!—a sack of gold coins. Throwing his reins to Butch, he leaped off his horse, scooped up the sack, and was mounted and on his way again in seconds.

  "Why'd you stop?" I asked, raising my voice to be heard over the wind and the horses' hooves.

  "That's probably $6,000," he shouted back. "You'd have stopped too."

  "I can't believe you did that," Butch yelled, shaking his head. But he was grinning. They were both grinning and happy, and it struck me with force that it took a robbery to make them happy. If we "retired" to South America, what would they do for fun?

  * * *

  At Soldiers' Pass we switched to the fresh horses we'd left there, and Butch took precious time to write a note, which said, "Give this white horse to Vic Button." He signed it "Butch Cassidy."

  That night, as we camped well away from Winnemucca and the railroad posse, Butch said, "You know, it's a crime how easy it is to take money from people. If bankers were honest men, I'd feel guilty about it."

  "Yeah," Sundance yawned, "me too... but not very guilty."

  "Sundance," I said, "you sleep on the other side of the fire... and throw those clothes away."

  Posses were formed all over northern Nevada to catch us, but we never saw any of them. When we stopped at Hammett's for our belongings, that genial rancher scoffed, "They'll be fightin' amongst themselves about who's responsible, who's got to pay. You all might just as well ride slow and easy."

  And from the reports we heard, that was just what happened. The Winnemucca folks charged those from Tuscarora with letting us go, and the Elko County sheriff said the posse from Battle Mountain could have caught us if they'd been alert. All of them were looking for three men: As we rode north toward Idaho, I let my long hair blow in the breeze and felt very feminine.

  Somewhere in Idaho, we counted our take: $31,000 plus change.

  "Not bad," I said, "for a final fling."

  Chapter 24

  We split up. Butch wanted to go back to Wyoming, wouldn't be talked out of it.

  "Every lawman in that state is looking for us and knows us by sight," Sundance argued. "You couldn't pay me to go near the place."

  "I'm going," Butch said stubbornly.

  "It's Mary Boyd, isn't it?" Sundance said, although he knew full well he was treading on forbidden waters.

  "None of your business," Butch muttered. He wouldn't get angry at Sundance as he would have at Curry, but he wouldn't be pushed.

  "All right," Sundance said, throwing a stick of wood at the campfire so hard that sparks rose and I had to beat out two that landed on my blankets. "You go on and go to Wyoming, and if you don't get caught, we'll meet you in—say, Fort Worth—in three months."

  "Fort Worth?" I said. "Why not at Fannie's?"

  "Oh, maybe we'll go to Fannie's," Sundance said. "I just feel like a change."

  "Where you going?" Butch asked.

  Sundance shrugged. "Maybe California, see my brother. Maybe San Antonio so Etta can see Fannie."

  As it turned out, we did both.

  * * *

  "We'll just tell him we're married," Sundance said nervously.

  We were on a train—the Union Pacific—but now we were respectable passengers, with the mail and baggage cars far from our minds. I distinctly did not want to go to California to see Sundance's brother, but I didn't have many choices. Clearly Butch did not want me going with him—and I couldn't have done that to Sundance. Fannie's was... well, still not an appealing idea. Caught by my pride and by the foolishness—I now saw it as that—that had led me to follow Sundance to Wyoming in the first place, I found myself headed for California.

  My mood lightened when I thought of the train officials and how hard they were searching for us when we were right there, riding their train. I grinned a little. Even the rather pompous conductor inspired a smile in me. I doubted he'd be as brave as the conductor at Tipton.

  "Stop laughing," Sundance said irritably. "My brother, well, he just wouldn't understand."

  "Does he understand about your robbing banks and trains?" I asked pointedly.

  "No." Sundance looked at the floor. "They don't know. I haven't seen any of them in, oh, twenty years. I just thought... I mean, if we're going to South America, I may never see them again." He looked out the window of the train, staring into the dark night that rushed by us.

  I felt almost sorry for him. That touch of softness that came out occasionally in both Butch and Sundance completely disarmed me. "It's all right. I'll tell him we're married. But what about Anna Maria?" I hadn't thought of Sundance's actual wife in a long time.

  "I'll tell them she died," he said, without one trace of remorse.

  I burst out laughing, loud enough to turn heads. "Such a sentimental soul, you are," I said. "Not only a bigamist, but now a wife murderer."

  "I didn't murder her," he said, his teeth clenched, "and could you please lower your voice? I don't even wish her harm. I just wish her out of my life."

  "She is," I pointed out, "and she probably feels the same about you."

  We rode in icy silence for a long time, until sleepiness overc
ame me and I put my head on his shoulder. At first he was stiff, but then his arm crept around me and his body relaxed. We were soon both at ease with each other and asleep.

  Elwood Longabaugh was a banker! I couldn't believe it! As soon as Sundance—I had to remember to call him Harry—and I were alone, I exploded into laughter. "Aren't you tempted to rob his bank?" I asked between chortles.

  "It's not funny," Sundance said stiffly. "Besides, he's only a teller. It's not like he's a banker who robs from the poor and pays the rich."

  "You sound just like Butch," I said, and felt a pang of missing Butch.

  "And where are you from, Etta?" Elwood asked me politely as we sat at dinner in a small cafe where the food was not much better than what we'd have gotten in a railroad station in Wyoming. Elwood was a bachelor—a frugal bachelor—in addition to being a banker. I'd heard of San Francisco's legendary dining—seafood, Chinese restaurants—but we were to get none of it apparently.

  "Texas," I said, and offered no more.

  "Is that where you met?" he asked, and I knew he was inquiring less from curiosity than politeness.

  "Etta was teaching in San Antonio when I was there... on business," Sundance said crisply.

  "Ah, yes," Elwood said, "railroads. You certainly have a fine line of work, little brother."

  Sundance toyed with his roast beef. "Yeah."

  We stayed five days in San Francisco, and that was plenty. Oh, when Elwood was clerking at the bank, we explored the city, wandered on Fisherman's Wharf and ate things I'd never tasted—lobster and crab—and breathed the salty air and watched the ocean. But I had been landlocked too long: Water had little appeal for me, and I found the texture of most seafood suspicious. "Give me good, chewy beef," I told Sundance.

  We rode cable cars up and down the steeply pitched streets and marveled at the houses so close together. "Texans couldn't survive here," I said. "No space around you."

  "Folks from Wyoming, too," Sundance said, and we both knew that we were fish out of water, which struck me as a trite and inappropriate analogy considering where we were.

  "Well, Elwood..." Sundance didn't seem to know what to say in parting. "I guess... well, I don't know when I'll see you again."

  "It's been twenty years," Elwood said precisely.

  "Yeah. It might be another twenty. I think... well, there's a business deal in South America. That's probably where we'll go next."

  "You'll take Etta there?" he asked, aghast.

  "Oh," I replied, "it's very civilized. I'm looking forward to it."

  Elwood pursed his lips and frowned in disapproval but said nothing more.

  With relief, we boarded the train for Texas.

  "You know," I said, because it had just occurred to me, "we may never see Wyoming again."

  He shrugged, that gesture so characteristic of him. "That's not all bad. We remember it as a great place, but I have a feeling if we went back, something bad would happen—and then it would be forever tainted. I can carry Wyoming with me anywhere I go."

  I wondered if I would be able to do that too.

  * * *

  We went to San Antonio. But that was no more satisfactory than San Francisco. Oh, I was glad to see Fannie, and Julie and Hodge, though I thought Hodge now looked almost too old to get around. His walk had become stiff, and it took him too long to move from kitchen to parlor or kitchen to Fannie's "boudoir."

  "How long can Hodge keep working?" I asked Fannie one night.

  "Until he drops in his tracks," she replied without sentimentality. "What other choice does he have?"

  "Would you... I mean, what if he simply can't do what he does?"

  "You asking if I'll throw him out on the street? Of course I won't. I'll keep manufacturing things he can do as long as possible. I'm not heartless, you know." She peered at me over a pair of spectacles pulled down on her nose. Then she pulled the glasses off and waved them in the air. "Trouble is less what he can and can't do than his pride. He's got to think he can still do everything he's always done. Julie and I worry about that a lot."

  "You talk to Julie about it?"

  She smiled patiently. "Of course. Between us, we scheme to take care of Hodge. Don't you worry about him."

  Sundance threw himself into the life of the house with his usual abandon. He stood around the piano with the girls, singing heartily. He danced with this one and that, and he reported to me with great enthusiasm that "Marcy wants to be a schoolteacher" or "Sheila really wants to go to Wyoming. She says I make it sound like heaven."

  Sheila and Sundance disappeared one afternoon for hours, and I paced the floor in front of an amused Fannie.

  "Might as well sit," she said philosophically. "They aren't upstairs, if that's any consolation to you. But wherever they are, you've got no control over what they're doing."

  "He wouldn't!" I snapped, pacing the length of her boudoir. In truth, I didn't know why I was so upset. I'd have never told Fannie, but if the right man had come along, I'd probably have cheated on Sundance in a flash. Only, the right man's heart was still in Wyoming—where I presumed he also was.

  "I don't know where you ever got the idea that Harry Longabaugh is more of a saint than other men. Me, I always thought he was a little wilder than some. Mostly I've been surprised at how tame he's been with you." Fannie was still amused, while I, distinctly, was not.

  I glared at her, not wanting to hear what she said. It was that same old thing again that I'd gone through with Elise just months earlier, and I still couldn't figure out my angry reaction.

  Sheila came back, alone, about four in the afternoon. "Did some shopping," she said over her shoulder as she hurried up the stairs.

  Sundance came limping in about an hour later. "Tried to ride Butch's damn bike," he said, rubbing one leg below the knee. "Think I wrecked the thing, and it serves him right. Maybe Hodge can fix it." He avoided looking at me.

  "Where have you been all afternoon?" I asked.

  "Oh, you know, just around. I figured you and Fannie were talking and I'd just go out." He stood up, that charming smile gracing his face. "You miss me?"

  "Yes," I snapped, "I did. And I was downright curious about where you were."

  He turned his back on me. "And you thought I was with one of the girls." It was a statement.

  "Sheila," I said tersely.

  He turned to look at me. "And what did you think we were doing?" Then, with a mischievous smile, he added, "And where?"

  "The Menger Hotel, for all I know," I spat out.

  "Nice place," he said. "It would show good taste." And he turned and walked out of the room.

  Late that night, long after I had crawled into bed to lie sleepless and awake, Sundance came quietly into the room, hung his pants on the bedpost, and lay down beside me. I lay stiff and still, hardly breathing, so that he would think I was asleep.

  He lay on his back, arms crossed behind his head. After a long while, he said, "Etta?"

  "Yes?" I barely murmured, and started to turn away from him.

  One arm reached out and grabbed my shoulder. "Don't," he said. "I've got to tell you something." He took a deep breath, and I fully expected a long confession about his dalliance with Sheila. Instead, he said, "I want you to know that I have no interest in Sheila, that I have never touched her, don't intend to."

  I stared at him, unnerved that he knew I didn't totally trust him.

  "You don't have to apologize," he said. "I just want you to know. If I have an interest in another woman, you'll be the first to know. Now tell me what else is bothering you." He said it with an air of authority that left no room for doubt. He lay now on his back, his eyes fixed on the ceiling. "Is it Butch?"

  "Butch?" I echoed.

  "Butch," he repeated firmly. "Lately I feel as though if Butch isn't around, if we aren't a threesome, you aren't really happy. I want you to love Butch, but I don't want you to love him like you do me."

  "Oh, I don't," I cried, my voice rising too fast in denial.

&nbs
p; He reached over and put a finger to my lips with a quiet "Shhh."

  I invented a reason for my preoccupation. "I... I guess I feel that we're on the brink of a great adventure—going to South America—and it makes me edgy to wile away time in San Francisco and San Antonio." It wasn't altogether a lie.

  "I thought you wanted to see Fannie."

  "I did, but we can do all our visiting in two days—and then there's, well, there's nothing to do here. I don't know how she stands it."

  At that, he laughed aloud. "It's her business and her life, that's how she stands it. But I feel the same way." Then he sat up and said decisively, "We're going to Fort Worth tomorrow."

  "It's more than a month until Butch will be there," I said. "What will we do?"

  "Maybe rob banks, maybe live like rich men. We've got the money."

  Fannie was dismayed that we left so quickly, and as I hugged her she raised an eyebrow at me in question. I shook my head quickly to tell her I didn't know the answer to her question. It struck me that I never would know where Sundance had been that afternoon, or if he'd been with Sheila. He'd turned the whole problem back on me and effectively eased himself out of it. Grudgingly I admired his effrontery. And, probably, he hadn't been with Sheila. After all, the bike really was wrecked.

  Saying goodbye to Julie and Hodge, particularly Hodge, was harder, for I knew I'd never see them again.

  "You come back more often now, Miss Etta," Hodge said, and I assured him I would. Surely the Lord wouldn't mind that white lie.

  * * *

  We spent a month in Fort Worth. Sundance presented himself as Harry A. Place, cattleman who had recently sold a big herd, and I was, of course, his wife. We stayed at Maddox Flats again, though Sundance apologetically said several times we could stay at a better place—and maybe should to preserve the cattleman image. But we were known there and comfortable.

  Because Sundance had money to spread around, we were courted by the city. We met and dined with B. B. Paddock, the colorful newspaper editor who'd brought reform to Fort Worth, at least in some areas, and K. M. Van Zandt, the Civil War veteran who was now a banker and civic leader, and Jeff McLean, a crusading reformer who was county attorney. It tickled me to see McLean trying to enlist Sundance's help—Mr. Place, he called him respectfully—in his efforts to clean up Hell's Half Acre, the city's red-light and saloon district. Sundance listened and nodded when McLean talked endlessly, and, with a straight face, Sundance expressed appropriate outrage over the flourishing houses of ill repute. I was nearly overcome with a coughing fit and had to leave the table momentarily.