Legends of the Lost Causes

by Brad McLelland

  “Don’t hurt anybody!” Patrick said, his hair pasted to his cheeks by tears.

  Keech turned to Sam. “Go on up. I’ll be back.”

  “Where are you going?” Sam had grabbed his Holy Bible and was holding the book close to his chest.

  “Outside. Pa may need me.”

  “But he said to help Granny protect the little’uns.”

  “Then you stay and keep watch. I’m going back out.”

  “Pa will whip your behind!”

  Keech shook his head. “Doesn’t feel right to make him stand alone. I’ll stay out of sight unless he gets in trouble.”

  Sam opened the door for him. A frigid breeze circled in from the porch. “Once you’re outside, I’ll throw the latch.”

  Keech nodded quickly, grabbed his hat, and slipped out. Before the bar locked in place, Sam shouted through the door, “Be careful!”

  * * *

  Keech passed the stretch between the southern edge of the Home and the chicken coop without the stranger or Pa spotting him. He paused behind the coop to catch a quick breath, ignoring the snorts of displeasure from Granny’s sow in the pigpen. Keeping low, Keech scurried the remaining distance to the narrow back door of the woodshed and hurried inside. He squatted behind the workbench and peeked through a wide crack in the shed’s front door, which had been left partly open. From this vantage point he could now clearly see Pa and the man in black.

  Keech was panting so hard he had to cover his mouth, but he could still hear Pa’s voice, filled with anger.

  “I don’t know where it is,” Pa was saying. “Haven’t known for a long time. That’s not my life anymore.”

  Bad Whiskey grunted. “You swore an oath, Raines. All of ya.”

  “The Enforcers are disbanded. I have nothing to do with Rose or that blasted Char Stone. I care only for my kids now.”

  “Yer kids? Who gives a hoot about them? The Char Stone is all that matters.”

  “That foul thing is cursed, Bad. You and I both know what comes from it. It never should have seen the light of day.”

  “Yer a bad bluffer, Raines. You know where it is.”

  “If I did, I’d never let the likes of you touch it.”

  “You know what the Reverend will do if ya don’t surrender it.”

  “I know what the Reverend would do if he got his hands on the Stone. It’s you who don’t know. You’re under the control of a scorpion, Bad Whiskey. One day soon you’re bound to get the stinger.”

  Keech tried to make sense of what was being spoken. Who was this Reverend and what was a “char stone”? Pa Abner had never breathed a word about either of them.

  Bad Whiskey ground his cigarette butt into the dirt. “Give me the Stone now, or tell me the name of the Enforcer who’s got it. Does Horner have it? O’Brien?”

  Pa answered, “Ride off my property now or leave in a box.”

  Bad Whiskey bared what few teeth he had left. “You think yer the patron saint of orphans? You think this house washes you clean of yer sins?” He pointed a dirt-stained finger at Pa Abner’s face. “You still belong to Rose. Nothin’ can free you from that bond. Not even that silly trinket.” He pointed at Pa’s pendant, which gleamed bright orange in the rising sun.

  With a sweep of his hand, Bad Whiskey snatched his Dragoon from its holster and leveled the barrel at Pa. Keech steadied himself for the deadly gunshot. Instead, Bad Whiskey said, “The amulet shard. Take it off.”

  “I figured Rose would want this,” Pa said. “He’s too vulnerable without it.” He tugged at the charm’s leather cord. With a snap the pendant came free. Pa tossed it aside. The gleaming pendant clunked in the dirt.

  Bad Whiskey took three strides and came face-to-face with Pa. He pressed the end of the Dragoon against Pa’s gut. Whiskey grinned, and from where he hid, Keech could see the shabby man’s pink tongue through the gaps of his putrid teeth.

  “Now take me to the Stone, Enforcer. Else I put a hole in yer gut and drag yer bleedin’ hide across this county.”

  He cocked the revolver.

  From the corner of his eye, Keech saw a coiled rope hanging by a peg on the wall next to Pa’s work lantern. It was the rawhide lariat Pa Abner used for his rope lessons. The past couple of years Keech had grown lightning fast and dead accurate with the lariat. He could put his horse, Felix, into a fast gallop and lasso the head of a cedar post at ten yards. The barrel of a Dragoon might be no different, if he worked fast.

  Pivoting on one foot, Keech grabbed the coil. He remembered one of Pa’s rules of survival from their wilderness training: Hesitation means death.

  Drawing a deep breath, he prepared his feet at the woodshed door. He had no plan other than to charge across the yard and rope the revolver out of Whiskey’s hands, but before he could take another step, Keech saw an amazing thing.

  Pa Abner moved with the speed of a striking rattler. His left hand lunged for Bad Whiskey’s revolver, and his fingers wrapped around the cylinder. At the same time, he sank his thumb into the space under the Dragoon’s hammer.

  Bad Whiskey pulled the trigger. Instead of firing, the hammer landed without a sound on Pa Abner’s thumbnail. The one-eyed fiend barely managed to grunt before Pa planted his right fist into the man’s nose. Black blood poured from his nostrils. The man stumbled back, stepped on the tails of his own coat, and toppled to the ground. As he fell he lost his hold on the Dragoon, leaving the revolver in Pa’s hand. Pa deftly spun the weapon and aimed it at the scoundrel’s head.

  Keech was so surprised, he could barely breathe.

  “Here’s what you’re going to do, Bad,” Pa said. “You’ll forget you found Abner Carson, and you’ll set your sorry rear back on that saddle and ride away.”

  “I am the Gita-Skog!” Whiskey spat. “Don’t you know what I can do?”

  Pa Abner squared his aim between the man’s eyes. “A member of the Gita-Skog would never let his sidearm be taken. You may fancy yourself a part of that depraved militia, but I’d wager you lick their boots every day, low dog that you are.”

  “How dare you!” Bad Whiskey yelled.

  “Tarry one moment longer, I’ll make you eat dust.”

  The outlaw burned with fury. “I got a thousand eyes, Raines! And every one of ’em is now trained on you!”

  Pa Abner dipped the Dragoon and fired a shot. The revolver thundered, and a cloud of dust kicked up between Whiskey’s boots. He jerked backward in surprise. “Bullets won’t stop me, Enforcer! I’ll come for ya!”

  “Mount your mangy horse. Don’t look back, Whiskey Nelson, or it’ll be the true end of you. I swear it will.” Pa Abner stepped over to the fallen silver charm and scooped it back out of the dirt. In his hand it appeared to reflect the sunlight all the more brightly.

  At the sight of Pa retrieving the charm, Bad Whiskey turned tail and ran for his mount.

  Keech slumped beside the woodshed, the coil of rope hanging useless by his side. Pa Abner’s back was to him, but once the outlaw had ridden away and disappeared over Low Hill, Pa turned toward him.

  “What are you doing out here?” Pa hollered. He stormed at Keech. “I told you to take the kids and hide in the bedroom.”

  “Granny and Sam are watching them,” Keech mumbled. He’d meant to speak loudly and courageously, but the look of righteous fury on Pa’s face made him wince, though he knew Pa would never hurt him.

  Pa’s chest heaved. “Why in the name of Saint Peter are you carrying a rope?”

  Keech hoped a respectable answer would pop into his brain. All he could muster was, “When Whiskey pulled his Dragoon, I thought I could help.”

  “With a lariat? Son, we were standing clear over there.” Pa pointed back to where he and Bad Whiskey had scuffled. “If you had run out, Whiskey would have shot you lifeless! You can’t just rush an armed man, and you sure can’t lasso a sidearm out of his hands. I thought I taught you to think before acting.”

  Keech’s head dropped. “I’m sorry.”

  Pa Abner tossed
the Dragoon onto the workbench. “You’re a brave boy, Keech. Brave as any man I’ve ever known. But I worry that bravery will get you hurt. If you can help a man in need, fine. But remember, if you’re ever in danger, be smart. Weigh every decision with care. And for Pete’s sake, remember your training. You can’t help anyone if you’re lying dead in the dirt.”

  “I understand, Pa. I’ll do better.”

  “Come here.” Pa Abner wrapped his arms around Keech and squeezed. “You’re practically a man now. But I hope you’re not too old for one of these.”

  Keech returned Pa’s hug.

  Pa Abner broke away from the embrace and stepped over to the workbench to examine Bad Whiskey’s Dragoon. Narrow slices of sun stabbed through the rusty holes in the tin roof and flickered on the revolver’s black barrel. Keech thought the weapon looked far less frightening up close. He still couldn’t believe how skillfully Pa had removed the Dragoon from Whiskey’s grip.

  But Keech couldn’t shake an unpleasant thought. He didn’t know who his pa was anymore. The man he’d known to be kind and strong had once been someone else. Perhaps someone wicked.

  Sunlight flashed on the silver charm, which Pa tied back around his neck. The metal now looked dull and lifeless compared to the gleam it had captured in the yard.

  “Son, I need you and Sam to do me a favor,” Pa said, his face bleak with thought. “I need you to saddle up Felix and Minerva and ride to Big Timber.”

  Keech was surprised. “Just me and Sam?”

  “It’s not safe for me to leave the Home undefended.”

  “Pa, what’s going on?”

  Pa Abner gazed out again at the northern forest, at the verge of Low Hill where Bad Whiskey had disappeared. Dark clouds had begun to amass over the land. “Not here. Let’s head to the house. I have something to give you. And I’m afraid it cannot wait a moment longer.”

  CHAPTER 4

  A MESSAGE OF GRAVE IMPORTANCE

  Patrick and Little Eugena were hollering at the back door when Keech and Pa stepped inside. The orphans clutched the man’s legs.

  “Pa, you broke that man’s nose!” Patrick yelled.

  “I don’t suspect it broke,” Little Eugena said.

  “He fell right to the ground. That means Pa broke it.”

  “Nuh-uh. He tripped on his coat. That’s why he fell.”

  “Granny,” Pa Abner said, working to pry the kids off his legs. “A little help.”

  “Sam, Robby, you heard your pa,” Granny Nell told the older boys. “Let’s go.” Working together, they herded Patrick and Little Eugena to the other side of the house. Along the way, Sam glanced back with a wounded face, a look intended to make Keech feel guilty for excluding him. Keech only shrugged.

  Pa Abner led him to the study, the small room next to the kitchen where Pa enjoyed his private readings and painting sessions. It was the room where the orphans received their weekly lessons on the Native peoples, particularly the Osage, who had once inhabited the river lands south of the county. Having been close friends with important Osage leaders, Pa kept the study festooned with a veritable treasure trove of gifts and traded objects—a beaded vest of red, yellow, and blue; a pair of dress moccasins; a hand-carved box full of sumac leaves and dried tobacco for smoking. It was here, in this room, that Keech and Sam had first learned how to make Osage parfleches from rawhide and how to speak the names of all the sacred animals of the forest.

  “Shut the door,” Pa said, as he sat behind his red cedar desk, one of the many pieces of furniture he had built for the Home.

  Keech bolted the door and took a seat. His eyes drifted to one of Pa’s paintings, a colorful but dreary portrait of a tall, lonesome mountain of red stone, painted over an old, yellowed page of the Daily Missouri Republican newspaper. A few ominous numbers were scrawled in black across the bottom. The image of the red mountain always gave Keech the willies and made him wonder what bitter secrets Pa could have possibly dreamed to conjure such an eerie landscape.

  Pa folded his hands on the desktop. “Son, do you remember the new telegraph office in town?”

  Keech knew the office in Big Timber well. The telegraph was five months old there and only ran across the state to the towns that could afford it. In a couple of years, word had it, every message in the States would be dispatched by telegraph and a person would be able to send a letter all the way to New York City in a matter of minutes. The owner of the Big Timber office—a lively, white-haired gent named Frosty Potter—had promised Keech a part-time job as a telegraph clerk once the company expanded.

  Pa Abner said, “I want you and Sam to ride to Frosty’s office and deliver a telegram. This task is of utmost import, so you and Sam must act like serious men. No shenanigans, understand?”

  Keech nodded.

  Pa Abner drew the silver pendant from his shirt. A solemn look fell over his face. “Remember what I’ve always told you and Sam? If you look hard enough—”

  Keech finished the old proverb for him: “You might find two ways to look at a thing.”

  Pa smiled. “Just so.” He lifted a wooden chest from the floor, a strongbox of stained oak secured by a lock with a narrow, strange-looking slot for a keyhole.

  He then turned, bent, and slid the pendant into the warded lock on the oak chest. The fit was perfect in the narrow slot, a keyhole that Keech realized Pa had fashioned specifically for the silver charm.

  Pa Abner turned the pendant clockwise. The opening hinges made a loud popping noise—the sound of old secrets coming to life.

  He opened the chest and reached inside.

  What came out was a folded piece of paper, a document sealed with a fat dollop of stamped scarlet wax. The wax made the paper look threatening, as though blood itself had done the sealing. Pa handed the paper to Keech. When Keech turned it over, he could see the faintest impression of Pa’s handwriting visible through the paper.

  “This here is a letter that needs to be telegraphed to a man who lives in Sainte Genevieve,” Pa said. “Do you know where that is?”

  Keech shook his head.

  “It’s a good ways down the state. On the west bank of the Mississippi. Tell Frosty this message must go to an old friend named Noah Embry. Do you have that? Noah Embry. Memorize the name.”

  “Noah Embry,” Keech repeated.

  “That’s right. In Sainte Genevieve. And make sure Frosty puts in all the stops. It’s important this letter reads exactly as written. Say all that back.”

  “Mr. Potter is to wire the letter to Noah Embry of Sainte Genevieve.”

  “And what else?”

  “He’s to put in all the stops. Make the letter exact.”

  “Very good.”

  Keech examined the sealed paper. This note had something to do with Bad Whiskey’s arrival; he was sure of it. Maybe something to do with Pa’s old life as a man named Isaiah Raines.

  “After the telegram is sent, I want you to stand and watch Frosty burn it.” Pa leaned forward. “He is not to throw it away, but to burn it to ash. It’s very important this letter be destroyed after it’s sent. This world has many crows, Keech, and those crows can see far, and take what they see to dangerous places.”

  “Crows?”

  “I don’t want to say too much. But when you were hiding in the woodshed, I’m sure you heard Bad Whiskey speak of the Reverend, did you not? Tell the truth.”

  “Yessir,” Keech said.

  “This Reverend is a terrible man, Keech, and not what folks think. Neither are the crows that follow his men.”

  “Pa, does this all have to do with the…” Keech rooted through his memory for the proper name. “The Char Stone?”

  Pa’s face darkened. “Never mention the Stone again. Forget you ever heard of it.”

  “But what is it?”

  “A cursed thing. But it’s gone, never to be touched by another man.”

  “Gone where?”

  Pa gritted his teeth. “Beyond reach. I have taken precautions. I’ll say no more.”r />
  “What about Whiskey?” Keech was so full of questions he was almost bursting. “Why’d he call you Isaiah Raines? And what’s an Enforcer?”

  A small silence. “Someone I used to be, a long time ago. There were many of us, and we followed a man, an explorer. He called himself the Reverend Rose. He was a missionary, of a sort, and we were his disciples. We did everything he ordered.”

  “Bad things, Pa?”

  Pa Abner’s eyes cast down to his desk. “We had forgotten where we came from. We had forgotten our honor. Then one day things turned worse. Far worse. Six of us abandoned him, and scattered to the wind. The rest of his Enforcers, the ones who stayed loyal, changed their name. They now go by the Gita-Skog.”

  “And they’re hunting you,” Keech said.

  Pa nodded. He seemed to be holding something back. “Someday, son, I swear to tell you everything. All I’ll say now is, the day your real ma and pa died, Bad Whiskey Nelson was there.”

  Keech’s mind churned with memories of screaming. Of dry, burning heat. A whirlwind of dust and terror.

  “Did he kill them?” he asked.

  Pa Abner heaved a sigh. “Just know Whiskey is only a messenger. Less than pig slop and doesn’t deserve an ounce of the life given to him. He’s not the one to be concerned about.”

  “Pa, did he kill my folks?”

  Another silence. Then: “He was part of the gang that did, yes.”

  Keech didn’t quite know how to feel about this news. All his years of wondering who had killed his parents, and one morning the very rattlesnake responsible comes riding up to his home.

  “I wish you had just killed him,” he said.

  “Killing is never the answer, boy. Bad Whiskey is lower than dirt, but killing him wouldn’t have solved anything.”

  Keech felt his face go red with shame. But it didn’t change the fact that Bad Whiskey was now free to torment his family all over again.

  “Keech. Son.” Pa’s solemn voice pulled him back into the moment. “The message on this telegram is of grave importance. Send it, and then have Frosty burn it.”

  Keech slid the paper into the chest pocket of his coat.

  “Consider it done, Pa. But why does Sam have to go? Shouldn’t one of us stay and help you guard the Home?”