The Poacher's Daughter

by Michael Zimmer

  “You might as well forget that notion. I ain’t going nowhere without you.”

  He gave her arm a shake. “Listen, dammit, if they come, don’t you play brave. Just get, and take both horses, too. Sure as hell, I won’t need one where I’ll be going.”

  Rose pulled away, then put her hand on his shoulder. “Shorty,” she said quietly. “Would you leave me?”

  “Rose, I’m a sentimental ol’ saddle tramp, and that’s a fact, but just because I ain’t got the brains God gave a honking goose doesn’t mean you have to be stupid, too.”

  “No, it don’t have to mean that, but it does.” She went to his horse and found a checked shirt that had only been worn a few times. Returning to his side, she began pulling it apart at the seams. Shorty’s eyes were closed again, his slim chest rising and falling shallowly. Brushing impatiently at the tears gathering in the corners of her eyes, Rose set about bandaging his wound.

  Chapter

  20

  It was nearly noon on the third day after the ambush when Rose and Shorty exited a break in the hills and spotted the distant, tree-lined course of the Pipestem.

  Although it hadn’t been a particularly taxing journey—Rose had kept the pace to a walk the entire time—she was feeling as wrung out as a December weed. She figured it was Shorty’s dying that was taking such a heavy toll, for she’d discovered, as others had and still others would, that living with an impending death wore on a body more than hard labor.

  Halting Albert, she pulled Shorty’s horse up beside her. Although Shorty had either been dozing in the saddle or flirting with unconsciousness, he roused himself when Rose remarked that they’d made it. He was wearing her Stetson, with a leather thong knotted under his chin to hold it in place, it being a size too small for his head. She’d loaned him the hat the same day as the ambush, after noticing how quickly his bald pate was starting to burn.

  “Where are we?” he asked, narrowing his eyes against the glare of sunlight.

  “Somewhere above the cabin, I expect.”

  Even in the shade of her hat, Rose thought Shorty’s complexion looked jaundiced, as if maybe there’d been some liver damage, too. His cheeks were sunken, the flesh under his chin as loose as a turkey’s wattle. He looked as if he’d aged twenty years in the last three days, the changes so striking that Rose wondered if she would’ve recognized him if she hadn’t witnessed the transformation herself.

  “Not too far above it, though,” he said approvingly, judging their location by the mountains to the west. “You did good, Rose.”

  “If you can hang on a while longer, we’ll stop at the creek and rest.”

  “Naw, let’s keep going. I’m looking forward to seeing the cabin again.”

  It was a theme he’d come back to often since the ambush, as if reaching the cabin had become a goal of sorts. She didn’t ask him what it meant. She was afraid she already knew the answer.

  She led off gentle and they reached the river half an hour later. There was immediate relief from the sun when they rode in among the trees, causing her to take notice of how hot the days were becoming. Summer was upon them now, spring but a memory; soon the green grasses would turn to brown, and the creeks and water holes would begin to shrink.

  Rose led them downstream at a walk, glancing back often. She wouldn’t have been surprised at any point to see Shorty sitting there dead, but he clung as stubbornly to life as he did his saddle horn, and was still hanging on several hours later when they came to the valley above the cabin where Manuel Obreto had wintered his sheep.

  The valley was empty, as Rose had expected. The lambing and shearing had probably been completed a month ago, the sacked wool carted off to market in Miles City or Billings. By now Manuel would be making his slow journey into the high, verdant meadows of the Big Snowy Mountains, where he would graze his flock among the pines. He wouldn’t be back on the plains until October, barring early snows.

  Even forecasting a deserted field, Rose couldn’t help feeling disappointed. It would have been comforting to have a second opinion on Shorty’s condition, not to mention the solace of a friend to see them through the rough days ahead.

  It was Shorty who spotted the carcass of a sheep on the prairie side of the trail and pointed it out to Rose. She reined up, scowling. The sheep lay in a shallow gully some yards away and had been dead for at least a month. By itself, a dead sheep didn’t warrant much notice, but once her attention had been drawn to the first one, she suddenly found herself looking at thirty or more carcasses scattered over several acres a couple of hundred yards away.

  “Let’s take a look,” Shorty said. “I want to know what killed them.”

  “It don’t matter what killed them,” Rose replied. “We gotta get you to that cabin before you fall off your horse.”

  “I’ve hung on this long. I can manage another fifteen minutes.”

  She sighed. “To tell you the truth, I ain’t keen on the idea, Shorty. I’m afraid if we go pokin’ around out there, we might find Manuel, and I ain’t sure I could stand that right now.”

  “If Manny was out there, we’d see his body. If he’s dead, he’s probably ahead of us somewhere, hanging from a tree limb like those fellas back at the box cañon.”

  Although Rose hadn’t considered it quite that graphically, she knew Shorty was probably right. Still, she was confident that whatever had killed these sheep hadn’t been an element of nature—lightning or wolves or a sudden change in weather. No, this was the work of a two-legged predator, the kind that wore pants.

  They rode into the sunlight and stopped above the first carcass. A glance told her she’d been right.

  “Sons-of-bitches,” Shorty said.

  Rose kept her own opinion to herself, although it complemented Shorty’s nicely. Her gaze was locked on the bullet hole that had shattered the top of the sheep’s skull, staining the curly mop of wool with blood.

  Shorty was squinting toward the trees they’d just vacated. “Take a gander, Rose. My eyes are so blurry I can’t make out a thing.”

  Her heart gave a twitch at the helplessness in Shorty’s words, but she kept her expression neutral as she pulled Albert around. She looked hard but didn’t see anything out of the ordinary. With considerable relief, she said: “He ain’t there, Shorty.”

  “Maybe they cut him down after they hung him. Or maybe they just shot him. Let’s poke around a little.”

  “No!” Her voice was raspy with fatigue and anger. “Dammit, Shorty, we’re going on to the cabin. I can come back later and look for Manuel.”

  But Shorty was already shaking his head. “There’s no need. Hell, I’m sorry, Rose. This ain’t very fair to you, is it?”

  “Just don’t go frettin’ over fair, not with a bullet burnin’ a hole in your gut. Come on, we’re almost there.”

  They angled back to the trail, and were soon winding through a stretch of small round hills. Coming out the other side, Rose drew up with a curse. Shorty looked but was unable to make out the smoke rising from the chimney of the cabin, a mile or so away, or the cattle grazing on the land to the east, toward Crooked Creek Cañon.

  “What is it?” he asked.

  “Company, I reckon.”

  They crossed the Pipestem at the ford above the cabin, although it was hardly necessary. Even the deepest pools wouldn’t have reached their horses’ knees. It brought a smile to Rose’s face to remember the last time they’d crossed here. Lordy, but the water had been cold—high and wild and flecked with ice. Today it looked as tame as a house cat, comfortable enough to just flop down in butt-naked and close your eyes.

  She halted on the left bank, about fifty yards away to study the cabin. The place hadn’t changed much. Upon first spying the smoke, she’d feared a settler had moved in, bringing along a wagonload of kids and chickens and hogs and such. Nesters hadn’t entered Shorty’s thoughts, however. He was stil
l thinking like a wrangler. Or a horse thief. “Can you see a brand?” he asked.

  She eyed a pair of horses in the corral. “Looks like an oblong O with a wing on each side,” she said.

  “An O with wings. That doesn’t ring a bell.”

  “It don’t with me, neither.” Lifting her voice, she hailed the cabin. “Hello, anybody to home?”

  The door opened and a slim young man carrying a rifle stepped into the yard. He seemed to relax when he saw there were just the two of them, but Rose wished now that she’d taken the precaution of loosening the Smith & Wesson in its holster.

  A second man appeared on the stoop. He was hatless and toting a piece of red meat in one hand, a large butcher knife in the other. “Who is it?” he called.

  “I got an injured man here. He’s needin’ a bed.”

  “Dang it, Rose, tell ’em it’s our cabin and to get the hell out,” Shorty said.

  She looked at him tenderly, knowing she’d miss his feistiness almost as much as his humor and gentle spirit. “I don’t reckon it’s ours any more than it’s theirs,” she replied. “Besides, we ain’t in a position to be tellin’ folks to git.”

  After a moment’s palaver with the man holding the rifle, the man with the knife called: “Come on in. We’ve got a spare bunk where you can lay your man.”

  “They think you’re my woman,” Shorty said out of the side of his mouth. “That’s good. Let ’em keep thinking that.”

  “I lived out here a good many years on my own, Shorty. I don’t reckon it matters what they think.”

  He chuckled, although the effort cost him dearly for pain. “You are the contrariest woman I’ve ever met, and I lived in Texas before I came up here.”

  “Yeah, you told me. Come on now, and mind your manners. We’re goin’ visitin’.”

  They rode up to the cabin and the man with the rifle quickly set it aside and came over to help when he saw the blood on Shorty’s shirt. The one with the knife remained on the stoop, watching. Up close, Rose saw that he was bootless as well as hatless.

  “What happened?” the booted man asked.

  “He accidently shot himself whilst cleanin’ his pistol,” Rose replied innocently.

  “Looks like he accidentally shot you, too,” the man remarked, staring at her neck.

  She touched the wound under her right ear self-consciously. The bullet’s passage, back above the horseshoe bend of the Musselshell, had burned the flesh deeply enough that it would likely scar, but it hadn’t torn the flesh or drawn more than a mild seepage of blood. It was sore, though, the flesh tight and hot, and she’d learned not to twist her neck too far or too fast.

  The booted man was watching her, waiting for a reply.

  “He’ll be needin’ to get off his horse today,” Rose said in sudden annoyance. She slipped from Albert’s back and moved around to help Shorty dismount.

  The booted man took the reins of both horses, and when Shorty was clear, he said—“I’ll tie ’em to the corral yonder.”—and led them away.

  Rose looked at the man with the knife, who finally moved aside. She helped Shorty inside, to her old bunk against the south wall. The man with the knife followed, though keeping his distance. “How bad is it?” he asked.

  “Bad enough, I reckon.” She eased him down on the hard pine slats. “You wouldn’t have an extra mattress, would you?” she asked.

  “Uhn-uh, just what the ramrod brung us.”

  Although she gave him a hard look, it was clear he had no intention of giving up his own comfort for a stranger. Not even one with a bullet hole in him.

  The booted man returned, keeping his rifle in hand. “You’re that woman they call Rose of Yellowstone, ain’t you?”

  Rose looked up, frowning. “What’s that?”

  “We heard about you in Billings, before we came up here,” the man with the knife said. “They say you faced down John Stroudmire, made him crawl like a baby.”

  “They say you shot a Mexican named Garcia,” added the other, “and threatened to hang Frank Caldwell’s scalp from your saddle horn the next time you saw him.”

  “That’s foolish talk,” Shorty said from his bunk. Looking at Rose, he added: “Get me a blanket, will you?”

  “You cold, Shorty?”

  “Yeah, I’m real cold.”

  Rose looked at the two waddies, but neither man moved; they stood in the middle of the room like a pair of village idiots, while her anger swelled. Then Shorty touched her hand and nodded toward the door. “Go on,” he said, smiling. “I gotta ask these gents a couple of questions.”

  “You ought to save your strength,” she replied, although she knew he wouldn’t listen.

  She went outside and around the cabin to where Albert was tethered to one of the corral posts, his nose poking over the top rail to make acquaintance with the horses inside. Loosening the saddle strings that held her bedroll in place, she slid it over her shoulder, then paused to eye the stock of her Sharps, jutting from its scabbard. She wondered if she ought to take it with her. It wouldn’t do her much good out here if a bunch of Regulators showed up, but she was also leery of alarming the two cowpokes inside; they were already acting wall-eyed by the tales they’d heard of her in Billings. Then the sound of gunfire erupted from the cabin and she dropped the bedroll and raced around the corner with the Smith & Wesson drawn. Before she could reach the door, however, the bootless man lurched into view. Rose skidded to a halt, but the man died before she could call for him to stop, crumbling across the stoop without even seeing her.

  Light-headed with anxiety, she leaped across the dead man and ducked through the door. The first thing she saw was the booted man lying on the floor next to the table, his rifle on top of his ankles, where it had fallen. There was a small, neat hole in the middle of his forehead, but no blood. His eyes were open, the pupils rolled back until only the whites were visible.

  Shorty lay curled on his bunk with his eyes closed, his right arm draped over the edge. His Colt lay on the floor beneath his fingers, its muzzle dribbling smoke. Holstering the Smith &Wesson, Rose hurried to his side.

  “Shorty?” she whispered urgently. “Shorty, are you all right?” She stroked his forehead, then leaned forward to plant a kiss just above his brow. His eyelids fluttered but didn’t open.

  “That was nice,” he said, the words barely audible.

  She lay her head on his shoulder. “What am I gonna do with you?” she murmured into his ear. “People are gonna quit invitin’ us over if you keep behavin’ like this.”

  He chuckled, then choked and coughed up a bloody froth. Biting her lip, Rose gently wiped it away. She was glad he kept his eyes shut; she wouldn’t want him to see the anguish on her face. “You hurt yourself, didn’t you?”

  “He shot me.”

  “What?” She drew back, startled. “Who shot you?”

  “The cook. He had a little belly gun I didn’t see. Couldn’t have been bigger than a Twenty-Five, but I didn’t see it until it was too late.”

  “Where are you hit?” She kept her hand on his shoulder, afraid to move him until she knew where the wound was.

  “It’s all right. Hell, it might even … even be for the best. I was dying, anyway, and we both know it.” Then he changed the subject so abruptly it took her second to catch up. “I’m sorry, Rose. I’m sorry as hell. Manuel’s dead.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  He opened his eyes then, but they had a filmy, faraway look in the murky light. “On the wall there, beside the fireplace.”

  She glanced over her shoulder, then caught her breath. Tears came to her eyes, but she didn’t say anything.

  “They killed the dog, too,” he explained. “As soon as I saw the hide, I knew they had, but I wanted to … to find out what happened to Manuel first.”

  “Is that why you sent me outside?”r />
  “I didn’t want ’em blurting it out in front of you.”

  “Shorty, Shorty, when are you gonna learn I ain’t some fragile porcelain doll that’s always needin’ protectin’?”

  “They shot a bunch of sheep, trying to run him out. When Manny tried to stop them, he … caught a bullet. They buried him in the hills, then scattered his sheep for the wolves.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “They said it.” He slid his hand along the bunk until it rested on top of her wrist. “There’s something else.”

  “No.” She jerked her hand away. “That’s all I want to hear right now. I can’t ….”

  “It’s time,” he said, his voice growing weaker. “I wish it wasn’t. I feel like I’m running out on you again.”

  “God dammit, Shorty.”

  “I told her about us, that widow woman I used to see … in Miles. I told her.”

  Rose swallowed hard, lifting her eyes to the rafters. “What’d you tell her?”

  “That I wouldn’t … be seeing her any more. That I’d met someone else. Then I … ran like a frightened colt.” There was a rattling in his chest now, growing louder with every breath. He made an effort to clear it, but when he couldn’t, he pushed on doggedly. “I guess I ain’t … ain’t much of a romantic … but I won’t lie about it. I knew I didn’t want to see her again, not that way.”

  “Nellie?”

  “Yeah, Nell. She’s a good woman. You would’ve liked her. But it just … didn’t feel right after … last winter. You ’n’ me, that felt right. Comfortable, you know. Like an old pair of boots. But instead of telling you that, like I should’ve, I ran. I wish … wish to God … I hadn’t. I don’t know, maybe I had to sort it out … in my mind, and Stroudmire and Haus was my excuse. But I was wrong … to leave. I know that. Knew it as soon as I heard about you standing up to Stroudmire … there in the Silver Star.” He smiled. “The funny thing is, it wasn’t Stroudmire or Haus I was … was running from. It was you who scared hell outta me.”