A Gift From Crick

by John McNally

  ‘Eddie, can you hear me? Wake up.’

  Carter opened his eyes in confusion.

  ‘Nate, is that you?’ he said in a puzzled murmur, his hazy mind still caught in his memories from their past.

  ‘Nate’s dead,’ said the voice. ‘Took one in the belly and bled out by the time I got here. Looks like you’re going be fine and dandy though.’ Carter squinted against the light and saw Arnie Short, a neighbouring placer with a claim further along, bending over him. Short was little more than a kid, small, and thin enough to be made of wire with dirty blond hair, a snub nose and jug ears.

  ‘I plugged your wound and tied it tight, Eddie. The bullet went clean through your side, made maybe a two inch tunnel.’ He paused and wiped his hands down the sides of his trousers. ‘I buried Nate over by the trees with a view of the mountains. Sorry, I didn’t have no words to say over him. He was a fine man and deserved better.’

  Carter struggled to sit up, he felt the bandages tight around his waist.

  ‘Them’s fine words, Arnie, they’ll do,’ he said.

  Carter looked about to say more when they both heard a wagon and team draw off the track and push through the trees. It looked hard going for the wagon but the driver brought them in. He sat in the shade for a moment and then flicked his reins across the backs of the mules, clicked his tongue and came out into the light. Birds squawked and flapped deep in the shadows, the grass grew tall and green up by the tree line and Carter watched two big boned mules and a canvas topped wagon sway out across the rough ground. The wagon looked fully loaded, the iron rims on the hickory wood-spoked wheels cut the ground and gouged tracks through the coarse grass out from the shade of the trees.

  The driver was Quincy Roof, a decent family man. His fourteen-year-old daughter Bethenia married a slacker called Legrand Hill and they had a baby named Henry. Quincy bought them a farm but Hill gambled and lost the farm to foreclosure. Then Quincy and his wife gave them some land and built a cabin on it for them. Quincy had a store in Marysville, Polk County. Now to help support his daughter and pay for the land, he needed to raise extra cash so he spent his summers in his wagon selling goods to the settlements and camps along the west coast while his wife stayed and minded the store.

  ‘Hello, the camp,’ said Roof. He stopped and waited. ‘I heard shooting and thought I’d best come by and see if anyone needed help.’

  Roof was a small man with a long grey beard that ran down onto his chest, and he wore a lumpy brown suit with a short brimmed hat. He raised the hat in greeting and he was as bald as a skinned onion. He held the reins one handed and gripped a scattergun in his right. When he saw the two men by the tent he relaxed, stretched back and put the gun in the wagon. He looked Carter over and said, ‘Can I come in, friends? The name’s Quincy Roof. I sell the best quality goods on the west coast. You sure look like you could do with a coffee and some grub.’

  Carter shrugged and said, ‘Come on in. I’m Eddie Carter and this young feller is Arnie Short.’ His dry throat made his voice gravelly. He took a deep breath and the heat went out of his face.

  Roof nodded to Short and studied Carter. He saw that he was hurt and suffering; his tired eyes did not look at anyone, he just stared off into the distance. Carter was maybe twenty-five or so, average height, clean shaved, friendly looking with bright blue eyes webbed with tiny lines at the corners. Roof watched him on the opposite side of the fire, favouring his left side with his hand pressed against his hip.

  ‘You hurt?’

  ‘Seems that way. That’ll be the shots you heard. Five men. Killed my partner and rode out that way.’ He pointed to a rutted track that wound through the woods with a thick canopy of branches and a layer of pine needles and dead leaves on the ground.

  Quincy Roof ran a hand down his beard and waited, he saw the grass by the fire flattened and stippled with blood dried on the dirt in reddish patches. The wagon axles ticked in the shade, he climbed down and the wagon boards creaked as his weight shifted. He caught sight of the newly dug ground and the grave mound.

  ‘You boys sit right there, I’m going to see to my mules and then I’ll cook us up some food.’

  Carter laid back on a tangle of grass and put an arm across his eyes. His back throbbed and the pain seemed to leech away his energy and he drifted off to sleep.

  The smell of fresh coffee and meat cooking woke him up. He propped himself on his elbows and Roof poured a coffee, laced it with molasses and passed it across, squinting through the smoke. He laid a pan across the flames and broke eight eggs into it and served them with grits. Roof grunted.

  ‘I heard the shots and riders heading out, riding hard enough to wear the hoofs off their horses.’ He took off his old derby hat and fanned the flames with it.

  ‘Figure I’ll find them and settle things,’ said Carter.

  ‘You look like you’ve been trampled by horses. What are you aiming to do, ride in and faint all over them?’ Roof said and smiled.

  ‘I’ll go now and I’ll rest up tonight, they’re heading for Sailors Diggings. Them killers don’t give two nothings about what happens to anybody else but they’ll be dead this time tomorrow if I get my way.’

  They ate in silence then Roof looked up, straightened his jacket and said, ‘I’ll patch you up proper if you like. I’ve bandages and a liniment that can seal the holes in an old boot. Cartridges too if you’ve got the money. I see you’ve got a Colt Navy and a Sharps carbine in your saddle boot. Well, I’ve got foil cartridges for the Colt with twenty-five grains of powder in them and paper ones for the carbine.’

  Carter said, ‘I’ve used paper before. How does that foil work?’

  ‘Well,’ said Roof, ‘I ain’t no expert but the powder and bullet are wrapped in the foil and it’s waterproof. The flame from the cap goes through the foil, sets the powder off and spits the bullet out. Easy, fast to load and guaranteed to fire. If it don’t fire you get your money back.’

  ‘If you’re still alive.’

  ‘Well, there is that.’ Both men laughed but Arnie Short’s washed out eyes clouded over with worry, his young face pink with heat.

  ‘Listen, Eddie,’ Arnie said, ‘I don’t like it. Meanness don’t happen overnight, that’s how they are and always have been is my guess. Hard men are used to gun play. There’s five of them and one of you. It’s like running against a pack of wolves.’

  ‘The boy’s right,’ said Roof, ‘doing what’s right don’t mean nothing to them. They’ve killed your friend and shot you in the back.’

  ‘It’ll work out different next time. I’ve been pushed around before and they lived to regret it. I cain’t rest until I make it right for Nate, I’ve got to do it.’

  Carter ate his meal and bought some beef jerky, a wide belt and cartridges for his two handguns and his rifle, a Sharps Saddle Ring. He pulled the belt as tight as he could around his waist to hold his bandages in place and support the wound. He said no to the liniment. He decided to rest for ten minutes before he set off and stretched out with his head on his saddle. He lit a cigar and watched the smoke curled upwards and break apart in the breeze.

  Roof played with his beard and never stopped talking, he began some tale about the cost of beef at the Angel Camp in Calaveras County compared to Sam Brannan’s store in Sacramento when Carter’s head started to dip. His eyes closed and his head kept nodding forward before he jerked it back. He sat up a little and tried opening his eyes wide but he drifted until he could not stop himself closing his eyes and gliding into sleep.

  When he woke he saw from the sun’s position it was well into the afternoon.

  ‘We let you sleep,’ said Roof. He held up a hand. ‘No, don’t say it. You looked as comfy as a goat in a nettle patch. You needed to rest, you know you did.’ He stretched across and handed Carter a tin plate heaped high with fried beans and spicy sausage.

  ‘You’re right,’ said Carter, his voice sounded thick and tired but he started to eat. He knew that he needed to get after them but saw no
point going all out at it. He realized that he needed to build up his strength.

  He felt guilty that he had not been able to save Nate’s life and then he decided to stop apologizing over and over again to him in his own mind. He remembered an old Army trooper he scouted with who used to say when someone died, ‘Look, he’s dead, we’re sorry. Now get back out there and kill someone for him.’ Carter realized that he wanted to kill Nate’s murderers because he felt ashamed that he hadn’t been able to save him.

  Carter turned when he realized that Roof was speaking.

  ‘I’m heading to Sailors Diggings myself. I’m a regular there, they know me well. Ride with me a piece, why don’t you?’

  ‘No, thanks, I need to make up some time. I don’t want to lose their trail.’

  ‘Suit yourself, you don’t want to lose your life though.’

  Roof watched Carter, he seemed a decent sort but he had a look about him that made Roof uneasy but he couldn’t say why. Finally it occurred to him that Carter was willing to die as long as he could take some of the killers with him along the way.

  ‘Why not let them go, partner? You’re wounded and there’s five of them, there must be a better way than this. Why not take the easy life?’

  ‘I don’t want an easy life, I just want to be quick enough with a gun to survive the one I’ve got.’ His eyes looked as bitter as strong black coffee. ‘Is there a lawman in Sailors Diggings?’

  Roof shook his head and said, ‘No, I reckon justice is paid out in gunfire and bullets.’

  Carter shrugged his shoulders.

  ‘The more I see the more I reckon that shooting is the only law we have in these parts. We might not like it but it’s all we’ve got. That’s all there is to it.’

  Arnie Short said, ‘What are you going to do now, Eddie? You cain’t take on the five of them.’ He watched Carter run his hand down his chin and stare off into the distance, lost in thought. The lines around his eyes and across his forehead deepened and looked like dry and rugged tracks. Finally he nodded to himself.

  ‘Listen, Arnie, I know your claim ain’t up to much.’ Short started to speak but Carter continued. ‘No, hear me out. Don’t worry none. You can be my new partner on this here claim, you deserve it for your help today. You work it while I’m gone. I’ve a score to settle for Nate first,’ He pointed with his chin over to the fresh grave. He struggled to his feet and tightened the gun rig on his hip. He took out the Colt and looked down at it. It had a brass back strap and trigger guard, he ran a hand over the barrel frame and hammer and they looked plum blue in the shadow of his body. He spun the cylinder, looking for the glint of the firing caps in each chamber as they ticked by one at a time before he holstered the gun.

  He picked up a black hat with a round hard brim and a low crown. He punched and shaped the crown, fitted it on his head and settled his gun belt on his hips.

  ‘If I don’t come back this claim’s yours, give me a week or so. We might not have a lot to say over Nate but I’ll find the men who did this and nail their hides to the nearest barn door. I’ll try my damnedest and just have to hope my damnedest is good enough. We’ll let my gun do the talking, it’s the only language some folk understand. I’ll just go in hard, shoot straight and pull them all down. Believe it.’

  As the outlaw Dave Mooney crossed from California into Oregon he paused, it felt like a cold hand just gripped his heart for a moment. He looked back but the trail was clear. He shrugged, kicked on and followed the other gang members towards Sailors Diggings.

  Fifty miles or so back down the trail, Eddie Carter picked up their tracks and set off to chase them down.

  CHAPTER 3

  The five-man Mooney gang rode into Sailors Diggings, a mining settlement near the head waters of the Illinois River just south of Cave Junction in Oregon territory, a few miles north of the California state line.

  Aside from Dave and Flem Mooney and Fred Cooper, there were two other men with them, Chris Stover and Miles Horn. They were handy with a gun and the right amount of red liquor made them a couple of tough critters. But they were more thieves than outright murderers like the others. You still wouldn’t want to bump into them down some alleyway on a dark night though.

  Chris Stover was a crook for sure, he served as a deputy sheriff in Yamhill County but they ran him out of town because they thought he was a horse thief; they were right on that score.

  Miles Horn worked a variety of jobs, he ended up breaking a leg in a coal slip. When the leg mended he was near starving and took to thieving. He had the gormless look of a stupid mule, they said his mind moved slower than Mississippi mud.

  The five of them found the livery, left their horses and headed for the nearest saloon. A wide boardwalk ran down the dusty street, the planking creaked with the heat and the thick smell of hot dust and horse sweat clotted the air. They went into the Rusty Nail saloon because it was open twenty-four hours a day. A long dull panelled bar, made of oak, ran the width of the room across the cigarette burned timber floor sticky with tobacco spit.

  They trailed across the room in a line that oozed hostility. Several regular drinkers glanced their way but quickly found something more interesting to look at in the bottom of their glass.

  They sat at a corner table and Flem Mooney brought over a bottle of Forty Rod whiskey. He took his jacket off, hung it on the back of the chair and loosened the top button on his red plaid shirt and they set to drinking it. Cooper threw the first glass back and sighed.

  ‘That’s good deadshot. Drinking a lot of Forty Rod’s like getting punched, it burns when it hits you, fogs your mind and then you’re out like a light. Perfect.’

  Dave Mooney took his tobacco pouch out of his jacket pocket and casually tossed it on the table. He concentrated on rolling his cigarette and only looked up as he ran his tongue along the paper. He struck a match on the rough board table and lit up. The cigarette paper flared in flame and he blew it, watched until it died to a glowing ember then he took a pull and held it in his mouth while he watched the others through the smoke. He let them settle before he spoke.

  ‘I’ll go down to the assay office and sell the gold we’ve got. There’s around two pounds that should fetch maybe $600.’ The cigarette bobbed in his mouth as he spoke.

  ‘Jesus H Christ, Dave, that ain’t much for a week of killing,’ said Flem Mooney.

  ‘Less than $100 a killing I reckon,’ said Fred Cooper. ‘That ain’t hardly worth the lead.’

  Flem looked at his brother and scratched at a spot on his throat, the others waited for him to speak.

  ‘Listen, Dave,’ said Flem, ‘me and the boys talked some, we all agree it’s time I ran things.’ He smiled as he spoke but his eyes were icy and intense, he looked taut enough to snap. He laid his hands on the table, they were big and square like sawn lumber and as rough as tree bark. ‘I think we need to hold up a bank or something. Make a whole lot of money.’

  Cooper nodded, leaned back, hooked his thumbs in his gun belt, looked Dave Mooney in the eye and said, ‘Any objections, us getting shed of you?’

  Dave Mooney sighed and tried to look bored. He glanced at Chris Stover. Stover had a narrow pock- marked face, arms and legs as thin as a rail and he was so tall his legs looked too long for his body.

  ‘Chris?’

  ‘I’m with Flem, like he said we all agreed it,’ said Stover, looking hard at the animal antlers racked above the bar rather than meet his eyes.

  He glanced over at Miles Horn, a morose man who looked to be made up of spare parts with a large nose, small chin and bad teeth that he tried to hide with a big drooping moustache. He had a face that only a mother could love. Horn hardly ever spoke. He just shrugged his thin shoulders and looked away.

  ‘Don’t make it hard, Dave,’ said Flem Mooney, ‘and I’d feel better if you put your hands where we can see them, you hear?’

  ‘No,’ Dave Mooney said, throwing the word down real hard as a challenge but Flem did not dare to pick it up. Dave did not move,
he enjoyed letting the tension build, he thought about slamming his hand on the table for the hell of it and watch them all fall about but he decided they weren’t worth the effort. The scar on his cheek shone a livid red, he brought his right hand out, without hurrying, scratched his beard and ran a finger down the scar tissue. He blinked slowly.

  ‘If that’s the way you want it I’ll leave,’ he said. ‘I’ll cash the gold and let you get about your business.’ He pushed his chair away with the back of his legs and stood up.

  Fred Cooper drew a gun and held it flat on the table with his hand on the butt and his finger across the trigger. Mooney glanced at the gun, leaned forward with his hands propped on the table, his knuckles round and hard. He said, ‘Put that back in your rig, Cooper or I’ll shove it down your throat sideways.’

  Cooper flushed and his eyes glowed like a mad dog.

  ‘Put it away, Fred,’ said Stover, putting an arm around Cooper’s shoulders. ‘We’re all friends here ... more or less.’

  Dave Mooney snorted and gave a deep nasty laugh that went on too long. He turned, went out and left them to their drinking.

  Outside Mooney walked to the edge of the settlement and just before the livery, found the assay office, a two storey clapper board building with large glass windows on either side of the door. Inside he crossed to the counter where an old timer in faded overalls and a strap undershirt stood and waited to be paid out. The clerk fiddled with the scales and mumbled in a bored voice.

  ‘That’s $300.’ He opened a drawer under the counter and laid the money out. The old timer picked it up and went out without speaking. The clerk dropped the gold into box behind him and said to a second clerk, ‘There he goes, George, the same every week, straight to the Lucky Legend. He’ll have nothing left by tomorrow morning.’

  ‘Pity he doesn’t save enough for a bath,’ said George, holding his nose.

  Mooney looked the place over, behind the polished timber counter stood an old desk and a chair pushed up tight against the back wall. Next to it was a closed door that led to a back room. The second clerk, George, sat at the desk and looked to be working in a big bound ledger, the shelf above the desk thick with papers and boxes. The clerk on the counter turned and looked up at Mooney, his eyes lingered on Mooney’s scarred face.