Brothers in Blood

by Lee Lejeune

  There was a tense silence.

  ‘Like I said, the boys got a little out of hand,’ Jed Cutaway said after a moment or two.

  Sunshine nodded. ‘Out of hand is one thing, Mr Cutaway, rebellion is something altogether different, and it’s more than a matter of language, isn’t it?’

  Sunshine knew he was driving down a one-way street but he didn’t rein in his horses.

  James Cutaway leaned forward again and this time he glared at Sunshine.

  ‘You’re a smart young man, Mr Shining, but I think you’re a little too smart for your cowboy boots.’ He turned to Sheriff McGiven who was still blinking.

  ‘Speaking of Slam Smith,’ the sheriff said, ‘there’s a lot of things we need to get straight.’ He took a deep breath. ‘So I’m gonna ask you to hand in your artillery and walk right down to my office.’

  Sunshine looked into the sheriff’s eyes and saw him blink.

  ‘Are you telling me I’m under arrest, Mr McGiven?’

  The sheriff remained silent.

  ‘I think that’s what the sheriff said,’ James Cutaway growled.

  ‘On what charge?’ Sunshine said, looking right back at James Cutaway.

  McGiven was blinking quite fast now. ‘Could be homicide,’ he managed to bring out between tense lips. Sunshine smiled, but he didn’t feel happy.

  ‘Well now, Sheriff, I had the impression it was self-defence. When you shoot a man in the leg because he’s trying to shoot you dead they usually call it self-defence. If Slam Smith hadn’t been so well pickled with alcohol at the time he might have been quick enough to shoot me first. Now, I wouldn’t have cared too much for that, would I?’ He looked first at the sheriff and then at the Cutaway brothers for a reply. James Cutaway and Sheriff McGiven looked baffled, but Jed Cutaway was faintly amused.

  ‘You’ve sure got lip on you,’ Jed Cutaway said. ‘Did you ever think about going into the law business?’

  Sunshine smiled at him. ‘I have thought about it, Mr Cutaway,’ he replied, ‘but right now it isn’t going to help much since Bart Bartok is still being held by some rather ornery hombre who don’t give a shit about anything, especially when it comes to other men’s lives.’

  McGiven looked as though he was about to puke up his breakfast and James Cutaway looked angry but baffled. Nobody seemed to know what to say. Something had to give.

  At that moment something did give, in the shape of a very attractive young woman who approached their table. It was Miss Elspeth Bartok.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Elspeth was a pretty smart young woman. She was not only smart but beautiful. At least that’s what Sunshine thought, particularly at that moment. She had arrived just in the nick of time and she knew it. The men round the table all stood up like puppets pulled by invisible strings and looked at her intently but respectfully, which was unusual since unaccompanied ladies in bar rooms were often mistaken for calico queens.

  Jed Cutaway gave her a particularly welcoming smile.

  ‘Why, good day, Miss Elspeth,’ he crowed. The sheriff didn’t blink, he just went a deep vermilion colour. James Cutaway gave her a somewhat twisted grin of appreciation.

  Elspeth curtsied graciously and looked at Sunshine.

  ‘Why, Mr Shining, I’ve been waiting over there for so long I thought you were set to spend the night here in the saloon.’

  Sunshine was standing with his hat in his hand.

  ‘Well, Miss Elspeth,’ he drawled, ‘I’m right sorry to have kept you waiting. The truth is, I’ve been discussing business with these gentlemen.’

  Elspeth raised an eyebrow.

  ‘Indeed, what business would that be?’ she asked sweetly.

  Sunshine gave a slight bow and said, ‘We’ve been thinking about your brother Bart and how we can rescue him.’

  ‘Indeed,’ she repeated in a strangely artificial tone.

  Sunshine looked at her and wondered where she had learned to act so well. It was as though they were in a play. Romeo and Juliet sprang to mind.

  ‘Why don’t you sit down and join us in some refreshment, Miss Elspeth?’ Sunshine heard Sheriff McGiven say in a somewhat stagey tone. Maybe he saw her intervention as his own rescue from a somewhat tricky situation.

  A waiter rushed forward, bowed and brought up a spare chair, which he dusted down with a napkin. The outriders sitting at the other end of the saloon opened their mouths in astonishment and one of them let out a low whistle.

  The waiter held the chair ready while Elspeth arranged her long skirt and sat down. Then she ordered a sarsaparilla and nobody turned a hair.

  ‘Well now, gentlemen, this has gone on long enough, so what are you going to do about it?’ she asked.

  ‘What are we gonna do about what?’ James Cutaway growled suspiciously.

  She turned her large lustrous eyes on him.

  ‘What are you going to do about rescuing my brother from those vicious men who are holding him captive?’

  Vicious men who are holding him captive Sunshine thought to himself: Where did she learn to talk like that?

  The two brothers exchanged glances. Then Jed spoke up,

  ‘As soon as we know who’s holding him and where they’re holding him we’ll make sure he’s freed,’ he assured her.

  ‘Well, gentlemen, I think I can help you there,’ Elspeth said.

  ‘You mean you know where he’s being held?’ Jed Cutaway asked.

  Elspeth sipped her sarsaparilla and smiled. Sunshine was amazed by her poise, considering the situation in which she found herself.

  ‘Did you ever hear of Stinking Flats, gentlemen?’ she asked.

  It was as though someone had broken wind in public. The Cutaways looked at her in amazement and Sheriff McGiven gave a start.

  ‘You mean . . . Stinking Flats?’ he said.

  ‘I think that’s what I said,’ Elspeth replied.

  ‘Stinking Flats is an awesome place,’ Jed Cutaway said. ‘It’s a real stinking swamp, like it says, and a man could sink right down and disappear before he could cry out for help.’ He turned to his brother. ‘You remember old Jed Butcher?’

  James Cutaway gave a macabre grin. ‘I remember Butcher well.’

  ‘What happened to Mr Butcher?’ Sunshine asked.

  ‘Well, nobody knows for sure,’ Jed said. ‘Old Jed built a small cabin there. He didn’t give a damn about the rumours or what the Injuns said about the place. He’d go and live there on his own. He used to ride into town on his mule every so often for supplies but one day he stopped . . . and nobody has ever seen him or his mule since.’

  There was a pause.

  ‘You know where his cabin is?’ Elspeth asked.

  Sunshine saw expressions of horror and suspicion flit across the faces of the Cutaway brothers and the sheriff’s jaws were working like he had something distasteful in his mouth.

  ‘You can’t go there, Miss Elspeth,’ McGiven said.

  ‘Why not?’ she asked. Now the sheriff was trying to swallow the piece of gristle in his mouth.

  ‘Because it ain’t safe for man or woman. Certainly woman.’

  ‘Are you challenging me to go there?’ she asked him. The sheriff blushed purple.

  ‘I’m just saying it wouldn’t be advisable,’ he said.

  James Cutaway stirred himself. ‘I don’t believe they’re holding your brother in Stinking Flats, Miss Bartok. I have a notion it’s somewhere else entirely.’

  ‘Then maybe you know where he is being held?’ Elspeth said. James Cutaway slanted his head to one side.

  ‘I think that’s just a ruse to throw you off the scent.’

  ‘OK,’ she said. ‘Then why don’t you tell me where they are holding him?’

  The brothers exchanged glances again.

  Jed said, ‘We’d like to be helpful on that and I’ll guarantee one thing. If you use your influence with your ma to sell us that piece of land she calls the Badlands we’ll deliver your brother safe and sound before you can turn round and say
good morning, Mister Sun.’

  Now Elspeth was looking at Sunshine.

  ‘Well,’ Sunshine said, ‘I think we have to talk to Mrs Bartok about that.’

  Jed smiled. ‘Why don’t you do that, Mr Shining?’ he said.

  Since nothing more was said about placing Sunshine under arrest, he and Elspeth walked out of the saloon and across Main Street to where the buckboard horses were drinking at the trough.

  ‘So,’ Sunshine said, ‘you saved me from being locked up in the town jail. Thank you; that was a good move. I can’t stand jail food, anyway.’

  ‘You think the sheriff really would have locked you up?’ Elspeth asked.

  ‘I think that dumb sheriff does everything and anything the brothers tell him to do.’

  ‘So what do we do now?’ she asked.

  Sunshine shrugged. ‘I guess we ride back to the farmstead and talk to your ma.’

  ‘So you think she should agree to their terms?’

  ‘The main thing is we get your brother back in one piece. If that means selling off the land, maybe your ma should consider it, depending what price they offer.’

  They started down the trail towards the Bartok spread.

  ‘Where did you learn to deal with men like that?’ he asked her as they rode along.

  ‘Where did you learn to talk like that?’ she countered.

  They looked at one another and smiled. Sunshine felt his heart turn over.

  ‘I learned a lot back East,’ she said. ‘They wanted me to stay and train as a teacher, but I didn’t think that was quite my style. I’d like to be a lawyer, but that wouldn’t be quite seemly for a woman, would it?’

  Sunshine nodded. ‘My kin wanted me to become a lawyer, and maybe I will if I go back East.’

  ‘Are you planning on going back East?’

  ‘It depends.’

  ‘On what?’ she asked.

  He turned to look at her but she didn’t lower her head or blush; she just looked right back at him.

  ‘You know what,’ he said. ‘We’d make a real good team, you with your fine brain and me with my way of talking.’

  Then she did blush and he felt an overwhelming desire to kiss her. But as he leaned closer they heard the sound of horses approaching.

  ‘That’s Mr Gibson,’ Elspeth said. ‘He’s our neighbour.’

  Sunshine watched as the man approached. He was rangy and bony and looked as tough as old rawhide – a typical Western farming man.

  ‘Why, good afternoon, Miss Elspeth,’ Mr Gibson said, raising his battered hat. ‘So you’re back among us. My word, you do look smart!’

  ‘Thank you, Mr Gibson. How are you doing today?’

  ‘I’m doing real well,’ he said. ‘How is your ma? I haven’t seen her around lately.’

  ‘Oh, she’s bearing up well, Mr Gibson. How is Mrs Gibson?’

  He gave her a hillbilly smile. ‘Oh, she’s well, apart from the bunions and the rheumatics, you know.’ He looked at Sunshine. ‘Howdy, you must be the boy who’s helping out around the farm’. He reached across and offered his hand, which was big and bony like the rest of him. ‘I see you’re carrying a gun, boy.’

  ‘I don’t normally carry a gun,’ Sunshine said. ‘But you just don’t know who you will meet out here these days.’

  ‘True, true,’ said the man. ‘Why don’t you all come up to my place fer the shindig come Sunday next?’

  ‘We might just do that, Mr Gibson,’ Elspeth said. Gibson screwed up his face and nodded.

  ‘Good, good.’ He edged his horse a little closer and looked off to the left towards a stand of cottonwoods. ‘Hope you don’t mind me mentioning it, Miss Elspeth, but has your ma put the farm up for sale?’

  ‘Why do you ask, Mr Gibson?’

  ‘Well now . . . hucks,’ he said with embarrassment. ‘I don’t want you thinking I’m sticking my nose where it’s not wanted here, but there’s rumours circling around like big black buzzards in the sky.’

  ‘What do those big black buzzards say?’ Elspeth asked him.

  ‘Well . . .’ the poor man flushed red with embarrassment. ‘I don’t like interfering or nothing, that ain’t my style.’

  Elspeth flashed him a smile. ‘Everyone knows that, Mr Gibson. Please tell me about those rumours.’

  He leaned forward a little more. ‘Well, Miss Elspeth, rumour has it that your brother Bart has been kidnapped.’ Then he seemed to shrink back like a snail into its shell. ‘Mind you, I don’t listen none to rumours, Miss Elspeth.’

  ‘Of course not.’ Elspeth was still smiling. ‘And I can tell you something: my mother has no intention of selling the farm. But the rumours about my brother are right; he has been kidnapped.’

  Mr Gibson put on a shocked expression, but he wasn’t much of an actor and Sunshine wasn’t convinced.

  ‘Let me ask you something, Mr Gibson,’ he said. ‘Who started these rumours?’

  Gibson gave a furtive grin. ‘Well, sir, rumours are rumours. You don’t know who starts them or where they come from. They just come circling through the air, you know.’

  ‘Like those big black buzzards you just mentioned,’ Elspeth said.

  Gibson put an index finger against his nose and looked off into the trees again.

  ‘It’s just that I seed them,’ he muttered.

  ‘What did you see – those big birds?’ Sunshine asked him.

  Mr Gibson looked somewhat agitated. ‘I seed two men.’

  ‘You saw two men?’ Sunshine repeated. ‘When did you see them, Mr Gibson?’

  Gibson gave another furtive grin. ‘I seen them at least twice around here.’

  ‘Why don’t you tell us about it, Mr Gibson?’ Elspeth asked. Gibson’s grin turned even more furtive.

  ‘I don’t want you to think I go spying on folk, Miss Elspeth. That’s the last thing I want.’

  Elspeth shook her head. ‘You don’t need to worry about that, Mr Gibson. Tell me, what did those men look like?’

  ‘Well . . .’ he tilted his head to one side, ‘fact is, there were two of them. One of them was awful big and the other was much smaller and they both had terrible wide bushy moustaches on their faces.’

  Sunshine looked at Elspeth. ‘When did you see them?’ he asked.

  Gibson brightened up as though a sunbeam had struck his face.

  ‘Oh, I seed them just before I met you.’

  ‘You mean you met them on the trail?’

  ‘Well, not exactly. I just seed them, but when they saw me they just skedaddled off the trail and into the trees. Tell you the truth, I don’t think they knew I’d seed them.’ He moved uneasily in the saddle. ‘ ’Course, I knew who they were ’cause I’d seen them before.’

  ‘You’d seen them before?’ Elspeth queried. Gibson gave a knowing nod.

  ‘Well, you know, Miss Elspeth, I like to keep a watch on the birds and the beasts. I’ve been like it since I was half knee-high to a grasshopper. So I always carry my spyglass around with me and that’s how I seed them.’

  ‘So have you seen them often?’ Elspeth asked him.

  Gibson nodded. ‘Why sure, Miss Elspeth, I seen them around here a few times. And another thing, Miss Elspeth. Those men always carry shooters with them as though they want to put the frights on folk. So I put two and two together and wonder what they’re doing around here, you know.’

  Elspeth smiled. ‘Well, thank you, Mr Gibson,’ she said.

  Gibson grinned. ‘It’s been a real pleasure meeting you again, Miss Elspeth. You take care now.’

  He crammed his battered hat on his head and rode on.

  ‘What do you make of that?’ Elspeth asked Sunshine.

  Sunshine wasn’t smiling.

  ‘I think we have to get back to the farm as quickly as may be,’ he said.

  Elspeth whipped up the team and the buckboard moved on. They hadn’t gone far before something unexpected happened. A shot rang out and a bullet whined so close to Sunshine that it almost took off his hat.

&n
bsp; What’s happening? he asked himself.

  But Elspeth was way ahead of him and she pulled the team to a sudden halt.

  ‘Get down,’ she said. She flung herself over the side of the buckboard and pointed her Winchester over the top to where the shot had come from.

  Sunshine leapt from the buckboard and was crouching on the other side as a second shot came whining in. He drew the Peacemaker and held it steady, watching for another flash, but none came.

  ‘That was close,’ he said.

  ‘You’re exposed there,’ he heard Elspeth say. ‘Why don’t you come round here?’

  Sunshine didn’t need a second invitation. He scrambled round to the other side of the buckboard and joined her. Together they peered over the edge of the buckboard towards the trees on the other side.

  ‘So what was that about?’ Elspeth wondered, and once again Sunshine was amazed; she seemed so cool.

  ‘That was about bad shooting,’ he said. ‘An inch or two lower and you’d have been scooping up my brains.’

  ‘So you think they just wanted to scare us?’ she asked. Sunshine shook his head.

  ‘They certainly meant to do that,’ he agreed. ‘I guess we’d better get back pronto, see what’s happened to your ma. But hold on a minute. I’m going over there to see if those varmints are still around.’

  ‘I’m not sure that’s a good idea,’ Elspeth said.

  ‘Why don’t you cover me with that Winchester?’ he suggested. ‘But don’t shoot me in the back because I’ve still got a few more things to do before I shuffle off this mortal coil.’

  Elspeth stretched out on the buckboard with the Winchester pointing at the trees.

  But before Sunshine could move across to the treeline he stopped suddenly and swung to the right.

  ‘There’s someone on the trail,’ he said.

  Yes, there was someone and he was riding quickly in their direction. Sunshine thought it might be one of the moustachioed gents, but to his surprise, he recognized Mr Gibson. Gibson rode right up to the buckboard and peered into the woods.

  ‘Was that you fired those shots?’ he shouted.