18
NED STAYED TWO DAYS IN THE TAHLEQUAH JAIL, WAITING FOR THE Becks to come back in force and try to take Zeke.
Zeke was in a low mood, and spoke little. When he did speak, it was to complain about Judge B. H. Sixkiller and his arbitrary ways. The Judge had led him to believe that he would be released and allowed to go home, once the threat of white marshals had passed. Then the threat did pass, but the Judge unaccountably lagged about the release order.
Zeke pestered Sheriff Bobtail unmercifully. Several times a day, Charley Bobtail had to chase all the way across the street to the courthouse to see if Judge Sixkiller had changed his mind back so that Zeke could go home.
The news of Davie Beck’s fit soon spread far and wide. The common opinion was that both Zeke and Ned were dead men. All the Becks were vengeful, but Davie Beck was vengeful far beyond the norm. Men who had done Davie Beck the most trifling slight months or even years before still slept with two or three guns at the ready in case Davie, bent on vengeance, showed up. Sooner or later, he always showed up, generally with a club in his hand. Given a choice, Davie Beck would usually choose to beat on people. The knife and the bullet were too gentle, in his view.
The only person in Tahlequah who was not apprehensive about Davie was Ned Christie. He considered himself a match for Davie, no matter when he came or what he chose to arm himself with. Ned spent most of his days playing Chinese checkers with Zeke—it was one of Zeke’s favourite games. Every time Ned would decide to go outside and stretch his legs, Zeke would demand one more game, and Ned usually gave in. He usually won, too. Zeke had watery vision up close and as a result was not very good at Chinese checkers.
On the afternoon of the third day, Tuxie Miller came to pay Zeke a visit and was immediately sent to the Proctor home to fetch Pete. News had come that Pete was poorly. The dog was so upset by his master’s absence that he would take no food.
“Go get him for me, Tuxie, he’s pining away,” Zeke said. He had said the same thing to Ned several times, but Ned turned a deaf ear. He was not going to put Zeke at risk by going to fetch his dog.
“I expect he’ll eat when he gets hungry enough,” Ned said.
“I doubt it,” Zeke said, gloomily. “He’s a one-man dog, and I’m the man. I expect he’ll just die.”
Tuxie had a soft spot for Pete. The little black dog’s ferocity amused him.
“I doubt Pete knows how big he is,” he said, several times. “He may think he’s as big as a bear.”
“No, he don’t know how big he isn’t,” Ned corrected. His view was that Pete was a noisy little nuisance. He was beginning to be lonesome for Jewel, and he wanted to kiss her—badly. He could not keep his mind on Zeke’s dog.
“Go get him, Tuxie,” Zeke said, again. “Davie Beck might go take vengeance on him. He will, if the thought crosses his mind.”
So Tuxie went. He was hoping Becca might make him up some taters and cornbread, but all he got when he arrived at the Proctor house was a little gravy and some salt pork—plus a lot of slobbering from Pete.
“I want my husband home. I want to know about that woman,” Becca said to Tuxie.
“Why, Ma? She’s dead. I’d just let it be,” Liza said. She was trying to make Tuxie stay the night, but with no better grub at hand than gravy and salt pork, he declined.
“You ain’t me,” Becca replied, to Liza. Becca sat at the table pulling grey hairs out of her head.
Watching a sickly woman pull grey hairs out of her head took the edge off Tuxie’s appetite. Dale, his wife, was secretive about all things involving her womanly appearance. Only once or twice had he glimpsed her attending to her hair, or any other part of her person. She had made it clear early on that she was a modest woman who expected to have her modesty respected. She wore thick cotton gowns and knee stockings to bed every night, no matter how sultry it happened to be.
“I’ve known men to get in trouble from too much looking at females,” she informed Tuxie, on more than one occasion.
“I’m already in trouble. I’m married to you,” Tuxie said meekly, when the subject of male and female came up.
“That’s not trouble. That’s your salvation,” Dale informed him crisply. “You’d be a rolling-down-the-hill drunk if you didn’t have me to keep you on the straight and narrow.”
Liza hated to see Tuxie go. With her pa in jail, things were so dull around the house that any company would have been welcome, though she particularly enjoyed having Tuxie around, even when her pa was at home. Liza decided she would make an effort to marry Tuxie, in the event his scrappy wife Dale should happen to die.
Becca Proctor watched Tuxie ride off with Pete, feeling bitterness in her heart—not toward Tuxie, but toward Zeke, her husband. She loved Zeke; she knew she would always love him, but she could not excuse his behaviour. He had sent a friend fourteen miles to fetch his dog, but had sent her no message. Was his dog more important to him than his wife?
More importantly, there was the matter of the woman he had killed. The killing was surely an accident, for Zeke was not a violent man. In their years together, he had never hit her, though he had cursed her several times. She herself was more prone to hitting when her temper was up than Zeke had ever been.
What also bothered her was that he had gone to where the woman lived. Maybe he had gone meaning to kill the woman’s husband for some reason—or, maybe there was more to it than that. Maybe he had been slipping out with the woman.
With Zeke gone, Becca had plenty of time to think, and some of her thoughts were painful. She recalled that, more than once in recent months, Zeke had casually talked about the fact that in Cherokee society it was appropriate for a man to have more than one wife. Both times, Zeke had made the remarks while they were in bed. He had his eyes half shut at such times, but he was not asleep. Maybe he had been feeling her out; maybe he had meant to bring the Beck woman home as a second wife.
Becca had not responded when Zeke made his remarks about more than one wife. Her grandfather on her father’s side had kept two wives, but that was in the Old Nation, many years ago. Zeke knew well enough that Becca had been raised Christian, her father being a Baptist preacher and all. He must have known she married him intending to be his only wife.
Probably the woman had been younger than Becca, and prettier. No doubt the woman had encouraged his rutting. Becca had been too poorly to do much more than accept it, since the triplets were born. The thought grew in her that Zeke had meant to bring the woman home to her house—a younger woman, with a harlot’s ways.
With that thought came anger, and Becca began to pace the floor. Liza saw the change in her mother, and kept out of her way.
It was a long walk to Tahlequah, but Becca thought she might have to make it. She was Zeke Proctor’s wife, and she wanted answers to the questions that were rising up in her. Zeke had sent for his dog, and not for her, but he might get more than he bargained for, on a day when she felt up to the walk to Tahlequah and the jail.
Tuxie tried to carry Pete in front of his saddle the way Zeke did, but
Pete was too full of beans. Twice he jumped off to chase after squirrels; once he ran right along the horse’s neck and jumped off his head, which the horse failed to appreciate.
“If you’re so dern full of beans, you can just trot along behind,” Tuxie informed the frisky dog.
In the jail, Pete jumped up in Zeke’s face, licking him and slobbering on him a while. Then he put an end to the jail’s one amusement by swallowing four or five marbles right off the Chinese checkerboard. Not all of the marbles went easily down Pete’s throat—he ran around in circles trying to wheeze them back up and then he collapsed, rolling on his back with his tongue lolled out and his legs kicking. Zeke got shaky. Here he had just got his dog back, and now the dog was choking to death on a bunch of marbles.
“Spit ’em up, Pete!” he yelled.
“Grab him, Ned!” Tuxie said.
“Grab him, Sheriff!” Zeke said, throwing Sheriff B
obtail a look of desperation.
“Why would a dog eat marbles?” Sheriff Bobtail asked. “They’d make poor grub, even if a fellow was hungry.”
“He ain’t a man, he’s a dog, you fool!” Zeke said. Pete was rolling around with his tongue all the way out of his head, right in front of him, and he himself felt paralyzed. Somebody else would have to save Pete, if he was to be saved.
Ned thought the marbles would finally go down, though it was true Pete was struggling ever more weakly. He picked Pete up by the tail and pounded him a few times across the back. Sure enough, two marbles dropped out. When Ned sat him back down, Pete coughed and staggered for a bit, but then he turned back into his old self and began to snarl at Sheriff Bobtail, who was annoyed at the dog’s bad manners.
“It’s against the rules to have dogs in jail,” he suddenly remembered.
Zeke ignored this comment. Pete jumped up in his lap and growled at the Sheriff, who decided it might be best to let the matter drop. Old Mandy Springston had been pressed into service to cook for the prisoner, but her grub was so terrible only a starving man could have forced much of it down. With Pete in jail, there would be somebody to clean up the leavings.
When it came time for Tuxie to start home, Ned decided he would go along, too.
Zeke did not protest. He knew Ned had marital responsibilities. Besides, Sheriff Bobtail had agreed to let him keep his guns in the cell, in case Davie Beck showed up again. Even a prisoner in jail had a right to defend himself.
“I’ll be at the trial, Zeke,” Ned assured him. Zeke just waved. He looked a lot more cheerful, now that he had Pete for company.
“Say howdy to Jewel,” he said, as Ned left.
It began to cloud up toward the west, as Ned and Tuxie rode home. It quickly came up a monsoon, rainwater dripping off the leaves.
“I miss Jewel. I guess I was needing to be married,” Ned said, as they rode along.
“I expect so,” Tuxie allowed.
“Do you miss Dale?” Ned asked, annoyed that it was so hard to get Tuxie to make conversation when it rained.
“Miss Dale? Why would I?” Tuxie asked. “Dale ain’t gone.”
“I mean if you’re away overnight,” Ned said. “Don’t you miss her when it’s bedtime?”
Tuxie thought of Dale for a moment, in her heavy gown and woolly knee stockings. Even at night, Dale insisted on her way. Still, he was loath to say anything unkind about his wife to their neighbour Ned Christie.
“It’s seldom I stay out overnight,” he answered, finally. “I guess I might miss her, though, if it was a long night.”
Tuxie rode on a little ways, thinking about how it would be to miss Dale. But the fact was, Dale was always there—he had no idea how it would feel to miss her, because she was never gone.
Later still, when they were at the foot of the Mountain, Tuxie began to feel that he might have inadvertently slighted his wife, by being wavery about whether he would miss her or not.
“If it was two or three nights, I’d miss Dale bad,” he said.
Ned Christie was not paying Tuxie any attention. He had begun to think of Jewel. In two hours, he would be holding her in his arms. He remembered that she was young; he remembered her fearful look, as he and Zeke were riding away. Suddenly, a wave of remorse swept over him. Why had he left his young wife, just to ride Zeke Proctor to jail? Zeke was a grown man. True, they were Keetoowah brothers—but that hardly meant he had to leave his sweet wife unprotected on Zeke’s account.
He had lost interest in the question of Tuxie and Dale. He had little concern whether Tuxie missed Dale or not. He wanted to get home to Jewel and lay in her smooth arms. The first thing he meant to tell her was that he would not leave her again.
It began to rain harder as they made their way up the Mountain. Soon, the horses were slipping and sliding in the thick red mud.
19
JUDGE ISAAC PARKER and JUDGE B. H. SIXKILLER HAD ONE THING IN common: they both hated expense—neither man believed in using two stamps when one would do.
Judge Sixkiller had been in Fort Smith buying a pump, when Judge Parker walked into the hardware store looking for a good axe. While he was chopping firewood that morning, the head of the axe had flown off and struck his milk cow. The milk cow had not been seriously injured, but Judge Parker considered it a close call—jersey milk cows were not easy to come by in Fort Smith. He could not afford to jeopardize the one he had, a family favourite named Belle Starr, after the notorious female bandit.
The two judges met at the cash register. Judge Sixkiller, recognizing Judge Parker from pictures in the newspaper, quickly introduced himself.
“Good Lord,” Judge Parker said. “How are you, sir? I never expected this pleasure.”
“Neither did I, Your Honour,” Judge Sixkiller replied.
“You’re the very man I need to speak to,” Judge Parker said. “Providence must have sent you.”
“No—it was my wife,” Judge Sixkiller informed him. “The pump broke, and she says she can’t tolerate being without one.”
“Is that rascal Zeke Proctor still in your jail?” Judge Parker asked.
“He’s in a cell in the Tahlequah jail, yes,” Judge Sixkiller assured him.
“Well guarded, I expect?” Judge Parker inquired.
“No, poorly guarded,” Judge Sixkiller admitted. “Sheriff Bobtail would be hard put to guard a stump—if it grew fast, it might escape him.”
“They’re an affliction, sheriffs,” Judge Parker agreed. “Several I’ve known have been too dumb to count up money. Do you think your prisoner will survive until the day of trial?”
“It depends on the Becks,” Judge Sixkiller observed. “Davie Beck come for Zeke once already, but a friend of Proctor’s named Ned Christie happened to be there at the time. Ned stood off Davie Beck. There’s not many a man could do that.”
“Let’s walk along to the back,” Judge Parker said, taking Judge Sixkiller by the arm. He had become uncomfortably aware that the customers were staring at them. He could hardly blame them, of course. It was not often that a white judge and a Cherokee judge could be found passing the time of day in a hardware store.
Judge Sixkiller, too, had become a little nervous. If news got back to Tahlequah that he was friendly with Judge Parker, his own fate would be as uncertain as Zeke Proctor’s. Not a few Cherokees had climbed Judge Parker’s gallows and dangled from his noose. Most of them had been renegades who would have been hung sooner or later, but not all their relatives had accepted Judge Parker’s verdicts. Friends of Judge Isaac Parker would not be likely to last long, in the Going Snake District.
Nonetheless, Judge Sixkiller followed Judge Parker to the back of the store. He was hungry for some judge talk, and so was Isaac Parker. The men found two nail kegs behind a pile of harnesses. The kegs made ideal seats, and the hanging harnesses a nice barrier. They could talk without having to bear much public scrutiny.
“I expected you to send a marshal and relieve me of my prisoner,” Judge Sixkiller said, once they were settled. Judge Parker lit a stub of a cigar, which he had extracted from his coat pocket. Judge Sixkiller preferred chewing. He sat close enough to the back door so that he could spit off the porch, there being no spittoon nearby.
“No, I can’t afford to waste a marshal on adulterous killings,” Judge Parker said. “The truth is, I can’t afford marshals, period. When I do get the funds to hire one for a few days, I try to point them at the whiskeysellers.”
“I believe you have a bailiff, though,” Judge Sixkiller said. “I am forced to conduct court without a bailiff, unless I can find a volunteer.”
“Yes, I have Chilly Stufflebean,” Judge Parker told him. “He has lived in our courthouse since he was a boy. Maybe I ought to loan him to you for the Proctor trial. I expect you’ll have an unruly audience. It’s hard to keep track of the evidence and the statutes if you don’t have a bailiff to shush the crowd.”
“I’d be grateful, sir—real grateful,” Judge
Sixkiller said at once. “I’ll have to disarm the crowd at a trial like this. Your man could help stack the guns.”
“Then I’ll send him,” Judge Parker said. “With the court low on money, there’s not much for Chilly to do. He has not traveled that I know of. It would do him good to see a little of the world.”
The judges chatted for a few more minutes, hidden by the curtain of harnesses. Funds, or the absence of them, came up several times in the conversation. If the two judges saw eye to eye on one thing, it was that the judiciary was seriously underfunded.
“The fools call me the hanging judge, but three new hang ropes came the other day, and I didn’t have the funds to pay for ’em. I sent ’em back,” Judge Parker confessed. “Now that’s a scandal when a court can’t even afford ropes to hang low renegades.”
“I can barely afford the ink it takes to write up the verdicts,” Judge Sixkiller told him, not to be outdone.
After a little more commiseration and a friendly handshake, Judge Sixkiller rode off toward Tahlequah with the pump strapped behind his saddle.
Judge Parker watched him go, before bargaining for another cigar. He could afford three cigars a week, but only because he struck a hard bargain.
Chilly Stufflebean was taking a short nap on his bench when the Judge walked in and informed him that he had been loaned out to Judge Sixkiller as bailiff for the Proctor trial.
“All that way?” Chilly asked. He had rarely left the precincts of Fort Smith. A journey to the Cherokee country seemed a frightening prospect.
“What if I get lost?” he asked, nervous at the thought of having to journey so far.
“Why, you won’t get lost, Chilly—there’s a road,” Judge Parker said.
20
WHEN BECCA WALKED INTO THE TAHLEQUAH JAIL, ZEKE WAS nonplussed. It was the last thing he would have expected.
Becca rarely traveled, except by foot. As a girl, she had taken a bad fright, once; some mules ran off with a wagon her folks had left her in, and a wild, one-horned cow charged the mules and spooked them. Becca had not been hurt in the runaway, but as a result developed a fear of animal locomotion which had proven lifelong. If Becca Proctor needed to go somewhere, she walked.
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