Ralph Compton Brother's Keeper

by Ralph Compton

  Almost directly overhead, a funnel was forming. It seemed to be sucking clouds into itself as it spun and spun. The bottom dangled midway to the ground, darting this way and that as if eager to touch the earth and bring destruction to everything in its path.

  Thal was terror-struck. Kansans knew all about tornados. Against its unbridled power, they’d be helpless. He could see up into the funnel, see odd blue lights and little baby twisters that broke away from the column of the large one. For a few harrowing heartbeats he feared he’d be sucked up, but the funnel passed over them, sweeping to the east.

  Soon the lower end touched down, widening as it advanced. Whole swaths of prairie were violently wrenched into its maw and obliterated.

  Thal watched until he couldn’t see the twister anymore. By then the wind no longer screeched, and the rain had dwindled to a shower. The worst was over. Slowly straightening, he saw that the others were as waterlogged and miserable as he was.

  Crawford draped his arms across his saddle. He looked at Thal and started to smile, then went rigid.

  Thal heard it too and spun. A faint swish to the north that quickly grew louder. “What in the world?” he blurted.

  “Climb!” Crawford bawled. “Climb for your lives!” He yanked on his reins and began scrambling up the side.

  “What’s goin’ on?” Ned said in confusion.

  “Flash flood!” Crawford cried.

  Thal pumped his legs for all they were worth. The ground was so soaked it gave way under him. Slipping and sliding, he managed to clutch at the rim. He found a purchase and pulled himself up and over. Balanced on his hip, he hauled on the reins. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw rivulets sweep around a bend to the north, infants to the mother, a watery wall five feet high that crashed around the bend, a liquid force so strong it would carry all before it and drown everything in its path.

  With a desperate wrench, Thal gained solid footing and hauled the chestnut to his side.

  Below them, the rushing water swept the hail, and part of the bank, away.

  Thal moved farther back. The others had made it out and were doing likewise. “We’re safe,” he said breathlessly.

  “We were lucky,” Crawford said.

  “Wasn’t that somethin’?” Ned said, and laughed. “This is more fun than we ever had on the ranch.”

  “Fun?” Crawford looked at Thal. “Has anyone ever told you that your pard is plumb loco?”

  Ned laughed louder.

  Chapter 12

  The Magic City of the Plains. That was what people called Cheyenne. A strange nickname, given that it had nothing to do with magic. It stemmed from the fact that after the Union Pacific Railroad had rolled in, the city grew by leaps, and more leaps. Now, thanks to the Black Hills Gold Rush, the population had exploded.

  Cheyenne was a riotous mix of the frontier and big business, where saloons outnumbered churches ten to one. Where rich cattlemen from the Stock Growers Association hobnobbed at the Cheyenne Club, while the cowhands who worked for them raised Cain at the saloons.

  Cheyenne’s streets bustled with activity. The ring of hammers on nails and the scrape of saws on wood testified to the ongoing construction of new businesses and homes.

  People from all walks of life mingled and mixed. Townsmen in plain store-bought clothes and dapper suits, women in homespun and colorful dresses. Railroad crews in their work clothes. Cowhands from outlying ranches, their spurs jangling. Trappers and Indians added splashes of buckskin.

  It was, as Ned commented when they drew rein at a hitch rail in front of the Tumble Weed, “A regular jollification of humanity, that’s what we’ve got here.”

  “A what?” Jesse Lee said.

  “A jollification is a celebration,” Crawford said, and bobbed his chin at the passersby. “I’d hardly call this that.”

  “Well, it sure is somethin’,” Ned said, and turned in his saddle. “What do you think of it, pard?”

  Thal was thinking of his brother, and the quickest and safest way to reach the Black Hills. “Let’s ask around inside about expeditions.”

  It was early yet and the saloon wasn’t crowded. Thal made straight for a portly fellow in an apron who was wiping a glass with a towel. The man had watery blue eyes, and the tip of his nose was red. Must like his own stock, Thal reckoned.

  “What can I do for you gents?” the bartender asked, setting down the towel and the glass.

  “Information would be good,” Thal said.

  “I might have some, but it doesn’t come free.”

  “That’s only fair. Whiskey all around, then.”

  A painting on the wall drew Thal’s gaze. A woman as plump as the bartender lay sprawled on a blue couch with only the sheerest of white lace to cover her ample bosom and hips. She was reaching out, as if to someone, and her full red lips were puckered, as if she was about to plant a kiss.

  “Will you look at that?” Ned marveled. “I wouldn’t mind hangin’ this one over my bunk to give me dreams at night.”

  “Give me the real article,” Crawford said.

  “We don’t have time for that,” Thal said, worried they might decide to visit a sporting house, as they were called.

  “I wouldn’t anyhow,” Jesse Lee said.

  “Why not?” Crawford said. “You like females as much as I do.”

  Before the Southerner could reply, the bartender set four glasses down, slid one to each of them, and produced a bottle of whiskey, which he poured with a flourish.

  “Do you dance too?” Ned asked.

  “Behave,” the man said.

  Thal paid, took a taste, and sighed with contentment. He would dearly have loved a bottle back on the prairie after that hellacious storm soaked them through and through. They hadn’t been able to get a fire going, everything was so wet, and the whole night long he’d shivered and tossed.

  “Now, what’s this information you want?” the barman said.

  “The Black Hills,” Thal said.

  “Head northeast. You’ll know when you get there because you’ll be up to your armpits in Sioux.”

  “Hardy-har,” Ned said.

  “What’s the best way to get there that doesn’t involve the Sioux?” Thal said.

  “You have your pick,” the bartender said. “There’s the Cheyenne and Black Hills Stage Company. The tickets are pricey, though, and they’d only take you and not the horses I saw you ride up on.”

  “You’re an observant cuss,” Ned said.

  “I observe you like to flap your gums,” the bartender said.

  “He has you pegged,” Crawford said.

  “Now, where was I?” the man said, and rubbed his chin. “There are several outfits that haul mining machines and wagonloads of prospectors to the hills. They’d likely let you ride along.”

  “Are they the expeditions we’ve heard about?” Thal asked.

  “Ah,” the bartender said. “What you want is this.” Turning, he opened a drawer, rummaged inside, closed it, and opened another. “Here it is.” Taking out a folded sheet of paper, he spread it flat and slid it around so that Thal could read it.

  Thal tried, but the letters were a jumble, like always. “What’s this?”

  “They call it a flyer.”

  “Let me,” Ned said, and picked the paper up. His mouth moved a few times, as if he were practicing, and then he slowly read aloud, “‘Wild Bill has announced an expedition to the Black Hills. . . .’” He stopped, and blinked. “Wait. Which Wild Bill is this talkin’ about?”

  “Hickok,” the bartender said.

  “You’re joshin’.”

  “The Prince of the Pistoleers,” the bartender said. “Him and Colorado Charley are goin’ off to strike it rich like everybody else.”

  “Wild Bill Hickok?” Jesse Lee said, in clear awe. “Why, I’d give my left arm to meet h
im.”

  “Not your right?” the barman said.

  “That’s the one I shoot with.”

  “Let me finish,” Ned said, and resumed his slow reading. “‘The expedition will leave Cheyenne on the twenty-seventh of June and proceed to Fort Laramie. From there it will travel to Custer City, rest for a week to ten days, and continue on to Deadwood. The cost is eighteen dollars from Cheyenne to Custer City, thirty-five dollars from Cheyenne to Deadwood. Sign up now while you still can.’” Ned set down the paper. “That’s all there is.”

  “I’ve lost track of my days,” Crawford said. “When is the twenty-seventh of June?”

  “Tomorrow,” the bartender said. “The wagons are gathered over to the freight yards, if you’re of a mind to join up.”

  Thal would very much like to, but they had a problem. “We’re obliged,” he said. Glass in hand, he moved to an empty table, hooked a chair with his boot, slid it out, and sat.

  “What are you lookin’ so glum about?” Ned asked, sinking into the chair next to his.

  “You heard him,” Thal said. “How much money do you have on you?”

  Ned fished in a pocket and brought out a handful of coins and crumpled bills.

  “How about you two?” Thal said to Crawford and Jesse Lee. “We need seventy-two to go as far as Custer City. One hundred and forty if we go to Deadwood, wherever that is.”

  “Which is closer to American City?” Jesse Lee asked. “Ain’t that where your brother was heard from last?”

  “How would I know? I’ve never been to the Black Hills before.”

  “We’ll have to ask around,” Ned said. “As for how much money I have, I’m almost rich. Eleven dollars and change.”

  “You call that wealthy?” Crawford said.

  “For me it is,” Ned said.

  As it turned out, Jesse Lee had twenty-two dollars, Crawford only had seven, and Thal could boast of eight dollars and twenty-five cents.

  “That’s barely fifty dollars between all of us combined.” Crawford totaled the amount before any of them could.

  “Shucks,” Jesse Lee said. “We can’t even afford to go to Custer City.”

  “Unless we go by ourselves,” Ned proposed. “Let’s forget joinin’ Wild Bill’s expedition. Who needs it?”

  “We do,” Thal said. “This is Sioux country we’re talkin’ about, not a walk in the park. We traipse off on our own, we could wind up dead.”

  “We can wait for another expedition,” Crawford said. “A cheaper one.”

  “Maybe Wild Bill’s is the cheapest around,” Thal said. “No, I’d rather not wait. There’s my brother to think of.”

  “What, then?” Ned said.

  Thal drummed the table and pondered. If that run-in with the Indians out on the prairie had taught him anything, it was that he shouldn’t take anything for granted. They needed the protection a large group offered. “Either we work for the money or we try to win it.”

  “At cards or at dice?” Ned said.

  “Cards,” Thal said. “Poker will do.” It was his favorite. Dice were too iffy a proposition.

  “You’re gettin’ ahead of yourselves, ain’t you?” Jesse Lee said. “We have to sign up, remember? Maybe the expedition is full up. Maybe they’re only takin’ so many, and we’re too late.”

  “We can learn that right quick,” Thal said, and took a long swallow. “Drink up, and we’ll go to the freight yards and ask if they can put us on their list.”

  “Without the fee?” Ned said.

  “We’ll give them half of what we have as a down payment and tell them we’ll have the rest in the mornin’,” Thal proposed.

  “And if we can’t raise it?” Crawford said.

  “We’re up the creek without a paddle.”

  “No,” Ned said. “We’re up the creek without a canoe.”

  Thal drained his glass and smacked it down. “Let’s go find the Hickok expedition.”

  It proved easy. A long banner announced to the world that a line of wagons were the Hickok-Utter Black Hills expedition. Hardly anyone was around. Thal reckoned most were making last-minute preparations. Stocking up, and the like. He walked around a loaded freight wagon and nearly collided with a man coming the other way.

  “You ought to watch where you’re stepping, mister.” The man was tall and broad-shouldered, with hair that hung past his shoulders. He wore fringed buckskins.

  “Are you Wild Bill Hickok?” Ned asked.

  The man looked at him is if Ned’s mental faculties were in question. “Am I dressed as a gambler?”

  “Well, no,” Ned said.

  “Do you see a red sash around my middle with the butts of two Colts sticking out?”

  “I do not,” Ned admitted sheepishly.

  “Do I even have a mustache?”

  Ned shook his head.

  “Then it’s more than likely I’m not Wild Bill.”

  Ned brightened and snapped his fingers. “I know. You must be that pard of his, Colorado Charley Utter.”

  “They shouldn’t let you loose unattended,” the man said.

  “Beg pardon?” Ned said.

  “Does my hair look like I comb it and brush it every day? Do you see beaded moccasins on my feet? Or gold and silver pistols at my waist? Do I smell like lavender or lilacs?”

  “Why would a man smell like that?” Ned said. “It’s a female smell.”

  “From taking a bath each and every day, come hell or high water,” the man said.

  “You’re sayin’ that Colorado Charley Utter is fond of bathin’?”

  “You catch on quick,” the man said sarcastically, and went to go around them.

  “Hold on,” Thal said. “If you’re not Wild Bill and you’re not Charley Utter, then who are you? A scout for the army?”

  “I’m Steve Utter, Charley’s brother.”

  Thal was taken aback. “Yet you talk about him the way you do?” Brothers shouldn’t ever speak ill of brothers—or to them—was his belief. He’d never once had a harsh word for Myles all the years they were growing up. Sure, they’d had a few childish spats, but nothing serious.

  Steve Utter was saying, “Mister, my brother takes more baths than anyone I know or ever heard of. He likes water so much he should have been born a fish.” He put his hands on his hips. “Now, what are you gents doin’ here anyhow?”

  Thal explained that they would like to sign on with the expedition.

  “You’re too late,” Steve Utter said. “We’re not taking anyone else on. We’ve got too many as it is.”

  “How can you have too many?” Ned said.

  “A wagon train ten miles long would be hard to protect, so we have to limit its size,” Steve Utter said. “The best I can do is take your names, and if someone drops out, you can take their place.”

  Thal was crushed but tried not to show it.

  “What will it be? Do you want to give your names or not?”

  “Christie,” Thal said. “My handle is Thal Christie, and I need to—”

  Steve Utter held up a hand to stop him. “What is this, mister? Some kind of joke?”

  “Sorry?” Thal said in confusion.

  “You name is Thal Christie? Then these others must be—what was it?—Ned Leslie, Jesse Lee Hardesty, and Crawford Soames.”

  “How in hell do you know my last name?” Jesse Lee demanded.

  “How do you know any of our names?” Thal said.

  “You can stop the act,” Steve Utter said. “I’m not amused.”

  “By what?” Ned said.

  “By pretending you want to sign up for the expedition when you already have.”

  Chapter 13

  Thal could have been floored with a feather. He looked at his friends and they looked at him.

  “You’re joshin’ us, mis
ter,” Ned said.

  “Stop playacting,” Steve Utter said. “I was standing at my brother’s side when he took the money from the little lady and she gave him all your names. I have a good memory for names, so if those are yours, you’re the ones.”

  “Little lady?” Thal said.

  Steve Utter tilted his head and scratched his chin. “What’s going on here? I’m beginning to think you’re really not pretending.”

  “I don’t know how to pretend,” Ned said.

  “Where is this little lady who signed us up?” Thal said. “We should thank her for her generosity.”

  “From what I understand, she’s taken a room over to the Metropole,” Steve Utter informed them.

  “What name is she going by?”

  Utter frowned. “I knew you were joshing me.” He wheeled on a heel.

  “Wait,” Thal said. “I just want to know who she is.”

  “As if you don’t,” Steve Utter said in annoyance, and stalked off without a backward look.

  “He was halfway riled,” Ned said.

  “That was dang peculiar,” Crawford said.

  “Do we go to the Metropole and find this woman?” Jesse Lee threw in.

  “Need you ask?” Thal stalked off and the others followed. That tiny voice at the back of his mind was acting up again. He had an awful premonition, and kept telling himself Surely not. He stopped to ask an elderly gent for directions to the Metropole, and the man volunteered the information that it was one of the better hotels in Cheyenne.

  “It’s where the well-to-do and famous folk hobnob.”

  That eased Thal’s worry, a little.

  With its fancy facade and decorations, the Metropole was Cheyenne’s nod to elegance. The lobby was positively plush, with carpet and sofas and a small chandelier.

  Thal had no sooner stepped past the double doors than he stopped in his tracks and blurted, “It can’t be.”

  Seated in a high-backed purple chair, reading a magazine and attired in a new dress and bonnet, was none other than his very own sister.

  Marching over, Thal said angrily, “Ursula Marigold Christie, what in tarnation do you think you’re doin’?”

  Ursula lowered her magazine, which had something to do with ladies’ fashions, and beamed sweetly. “Thalis! Finally!” Rising, she gave him a huge hug. “How many times have I told you to never, ever use my middle name? I hate it more than I hate just about anything. It’s the only foolish thing Ma’s ever done, naming me after her favorite flower.”