by Jack Martin
Other books by the same author
The Tarnished Star
Arkansas Smith
The Ballad of Delta Rose
Wild Bill Williams
Arkansas Smith: The Tumbleweed Trail
By Jack Martin
This one is for my father and offered with the greatest respect and affection.
(C) 2012 Gary Dobbs writing as Jack Martin
Author’s note,
Arkansas Smith first appeared in the 2010 novel Arkansas Smith, still available in print and eBook from Black Horse Westerns, and although this current work is a standalone story readers may also like to check out the earlier book.
From the diary of Ellie-May Preston
I fear the journey and I am convinced it is folly to travel as we intend; all our worldly goods packed in the small wagon Jake has purchased and travelling overland. It is a great distance to Kansas City and there are bound to be many dangers ahead of us. Dangers that we shall have no choice but face.
I have pleaded with Jake to change his mind. We have not much in the form of money but although I’m sure we can manage to raise the price of a train ticket for the family, Jake will not hear of it, he is as stubborn as a summer afternoon is fleeting. He says he wants to see the land again before it all vanishes and that it would be good for the children to undertake such a journey.
An education.
He claims it will be character building for them.
Honestly, sometimes I despair of Jake and his romantic view of the world but he is a strong man and I both love and respect him in equal measure. I have no choice but to trust in his judgement for there is no changing his mind. I pray to the Lord to give me the strength needed for such a journey. Life has been hard enough these last few years and I feel we are entitled some prosperity.
Once we had had a good life in Wyoming and there was a time when we thought we would have remained working the farm for the rest of our days. And then when we had gone our bones would have been buried beneath the Wyoming soil and the children would have worked the farm, had children of their own and eventually handed the farm on to them. It would have gone on in that way for generations and there would have always been Preston blood working the farm and the bones of Preston’s long gone nourishing the soil.
That was the way it should have been.
However after the war things had changed. Too many dry summers had withered the crops we grew and raped the goodness from the ground. And as the big corporations moved in and came to dominate the farming we found that a small farm such as ours could compete on neither price nor produce. The offer from Jake’s brother to take up a new life in Kansas City is indeed a lifeline for the family.
Still I have this sense of foreboding deep within my soul and I fear the future we have ahead of us.
One
The night brought with it a cold wind and Jake Preston shivered as he pulled his coat tighter around his shoulders. He shifted closer to the fire and relit the stub of a cigarette that dangled between his dry lips.
‘He’s out there,’ he said. ‘Protecting us. There ain’t nothing to worry about but worry itself.’
His wife reached over and gripped his arm, squeezing tightly and he suddenly felt warmth inside him. He looked at her and smiled, thinking, how beautiful she was as the flames of the fire reflected in her eyes. Then he looked at his children, two girls and a fine young boy who would grow up into a decent man if this damn land would only let him.
‘Time you young’uns was asleep. Come on climb up into the wagon,’ he said. ‘We’ve got to start out at first light.’
There were several token groans but the children knew better than to disobey their father and one by one they kissed their mother and then sulked off to the wagon. It had been pitched at a safe distance from the fire but close enough that the dancing flames cast their tropical glow against the canvas and would offer reassurance to the children. It reminded them of the fire and they knew their parents were by the fire.
‘What’s that story?’ Ellie-May asked, ‘What kind of hogwash was that?’
‘Ain’t hogwash.’
‘It is, too.’
‘No it ain’t,’ Jake rubbed his eyes and smiled playfully at his wife. ‘Tumbleweed’s real enough. My pa told it to me and his pa told it to him before,’ his eyes glazed over for a moment as he remembered the first time he had been told the tale. He had been little more than a babe in arms but it had stuck in his mind. ‘And I expect his pa told it to him even before that.’
‘And you believe it? You believe there’s a man out there,’ Ellie-May waved her hands at the almost pure blackness around them. ‘You believe that there’s a man out there who’d be,’ she paused, working out the arithmetic. ‘What, well over a couple of hundred years old? A man who protects folk travelling through these parts from any danger? From Indians? From outlaws? From the booger-man? A man who can change into a wolf, into any of the animals of the forest? You actually believe all that?’
Jake was angered for a moment but he shrugged his shoulders, figuring that it was Ellie-May’s spirit that made her the women she was. The woman he loved. He knew her questions were only half serious and that she was teasing him.
‘There’s no harm in believing it,’ he said. ‘It’s real enough in here,’ he added, pointing a finger to his heart.
Ellie-May looked at him with astonishment but then she grinned and reached across and kissed him on the cheek. She sidled over closer to him and hugged in beneath his arm. She stared at the flames and thought about the legend they called Tumbleweed. The tale may be hogwash but it was true that there was magic in the story and she did feel some comfort in believing that it was possible. That there could be some immortal man living in the wilderness, looking over the safety of weary travellers who journeyed along the trail that had been named for him.
‘I love you Jake Preston.’
‘I love you too Ellie May.’
‘I’d better be climbing in with the children,’ Ellie-May said after a short silence and when her husband nodded she broke their embrace. She groaned lightly as she stood, working a kink out of her back and went off to the wagon, wishing her husband would come too but knowing he wouldn’t. This wasn’t Montana now, this was Colorado, Indian country and someone had to keep watch during the night. There were too many dangers for a family to be caught napping. And although there hadn’t been any reports of Indian trouble for some considerable time there were many outlaws operating in the area.
She climbed into the back of the wagon and snuggled in between the girls. She looked over at Little Jakie and smiled to find her son fast asleep in the corner, a thick wollen shawl draped over him. She was glad she had a husband like Jake Preston and didn’t know what she would do without him. They still had some way to go before they reached Kansas City and it was comforting to know that Jake stood guard over them each and every night.
What need did she have of some mythical shape shifter when she had a real flesh and blood man to protect over her and the children?
Jake would never nod off, not even for a second. The little sleep he did get was taken during the day while she drove the four-horse team that pulled the wagon. She closed her eyes and felt herself drifting towards the inviting shroud of sleep but she would not dream of a fabled legend like the man called Tumbleweed, for there was only ever room for one man in her dreams.
And that man was currently sitting by the fire while he made himself another smoke from his makings. His brown papers were damp and he had to coax the cigarette to light but light it eventually did, and he sat there smoking and listening to the night.
He’d feel a damn sight easier when
they’d gotten a few more miles beneath the wheels. They had set out from Wyoming and taken the old Bozeman Trail, travelling down through some pretty inhospitable country that had led them to Fort Laramie. There they had rested for a few days and replenished provisions before setting off again, initially following the Chisum Trail.
Several days ago they had picked up on the ancient Tumbleweed Trail and Jake figured they were now somewhere around Pine Bluff which was very much Cheyenne country. They would stick to this trail until they reached the Arkansas River and then follow the river towards Dodge City. It may have been a roundabout route but Jake figured under the current situation it was the safest way to go. From Dodge they would travel onto Ellsworth and then Abilene before picking up on the Chisholm Trail that would take them onto Kansas City and the new life that waited there.
It wasn’t so much Indian trouble that Jake feared since relations between the whites and the Indians seemed to have eased somewhat in recent years, but one couldn’t take anything for granted and there were still renegades out there. However the threat that vexed his nerves the most was the possibility of an outlaw attack. There were outlaws hiding out all over this country and one man and his family would seem effortless prey to a bunch of owl-hoots in search of easy pickings.
There were terrible stories told of what outlaw bands did to women folk and it would be over his dead body before anyone laid hands upon Ellie-May or the children. Jake wasn’t a killer, although he had killed during the war. Three men had died at his hands and each and every time he pulled that trigger, blasted those men because they wore a different coloured uniform, he had cried for the souls he had sent from the world. But if any man ever attempted to lay a finger of harm against his family, Jake knew that he would gladly send their blackened souls to Hell and shed nary a tear.
He finished his smoke and flicked the stub into the fire. Then he stood and worked the cold out of his legs before grabbing his Sharps rifle, the weapon he called Old Reliable, and taking a look around. He wouldn’t go far though and would never stray further than shouting distance of the wagon.
It was said that the Comanche could make themselves sound like any animal they chose and Jake froze as he heard the lonesome call of a wolf from some far off distance and wondered if the lupine howl came from a red man. He stood there, rifle gripped tightly, wide eyed and staring into nothing but blackness while the wolf, if indeed that was what it was, sounded again.
And again.
Feeling foolish, Jake shook his head. He smiled to himself, once more recalling the tale of the man called Tumbleweed. It was a legend he once believed but he had been a child, and now he was a man and had no time for such fancies. Though, and he admitted it to himself, the legend was part of the reason he intended on sticking to the Tumbleweed Trail as much as was possible. If the legend wasn’t true, which logically it couldn’t be, then there was no harm in sticking to the trail, which would get them to where they were going as good as any other. And if indeed there did prove to be even the slightest grain of truth in the legends then it wouldn’t hurt to have the added protection, supernatural or otherwise.
He was about to move further when he heard a sudden movement in the darkness. It came from ahead of him and not too away far. He pointed Old Reliable towards the sounds but could see nothing to aim at.
‘Who is it?’ he called and then in Mexican: ‘Quien es? Quien es?’
There was no answer though and Jake shook his head. He was getting jumpy and he scolded himself for his lack of courage. If he went around jumping at each and every sound he heard he’d twitch all the way to Kansas City. He shook his head again, muttered something beneath his breath and started back towards the wagon.
Whoosh!
There was no mistaking that sound and Jake knew an arrow had just flown over his head. He turned suddenly and fired off blindly into the night and then started running towards the wagon, screaming for Ellie-May to arm herself and prepare for a fight.
Jake didn’t look back but kept running towards the wagon, concentrating on reaching his family and he ignored the blood chilling screams that now filled the night air. They seemed to be coming from all around – to the left of them, the right of them, behind them and, mother of mercy, in front of them.
Jake screamed louder and broke out of the covering of trees. He could see the wagon in front of him. Ellie-May, her arms filled with the big old shotgun, was peering through the flap in the canvas. She saw her husband coming towards her and her eyes widened in terror.
Jake saw his wife raise her weapon towards him and he didn’t have time to think about what was happening before the blast sent pellets whizzing over his head. He took a quick look back and saw the shadowy figure of a man, an Indian more likely, rolling about on the ground.
Whoever it was Ellie-May had hit him.
‘You darn nearly killed me,’ Jake said.
He continued to run and he heard Indians in pursuit now. Terror filled his soul and he quickened his pace even more. He was almost at the wagon when he felt something underfoot as he kicked up a rock awkwardly. He couldn’t keep his balance and he found himself pitching forward. He managed to hold onto the Sharps, but as he hit the ground he both heard, and felt the bone in his left ankle snap.
‘No,’ he screamed, both in pain and frustration and rolled over onto his back. He let off three shots from the Sharps in quick succession and then heard Ellie-May jump from the wagon to come to his aid.
‘Go back,’ he screamed but the damn fool woman was true to her stubborn ways and she kept coming. She reached him and skidded to the ground on her knees. She grabbed him; eyes alert and placed a hand in the crook of his arm.
‘Have you been hit?’
Jake shook his head. ‘Broke my fool ankle,’ he said just as two arrows thudded into the ground perilously close to their position. ‘We’ve got to get to the wagon.’ He fired the rifle again, the powder flash momentarily lighting up their surroundings.
Ellie-May glanced back at the wagon as if she were only then remembering her children. Little-Jakie, God Bless him, all of nine years old, had armed himself with a rifle and was in the door flap of the wagon. He stared at his parents with both fear and an immense courage in his eyes.
‘Run, Pa,’ he screamed.
‘Come on get me up,’ Jake said and with his good leg pushed upwards at the same time as his wife lifted him. He placed Old Reliable in one hand and draped the other over Ellie-May. And with man leaning upon his wife they made for the wagon as quickly as they could. Little-Jakie shot over their heads, aiming at nothing because he could see nothing but giving his parents some cover. The Comanche wouldn’t be too eager to stick their heads up if there was a chance a stray bullet would take it off.
They reached the wagon and Jake leant against it while Ellie-May jumped up. Another arrow thudded into the side of the wagon and Jake tossed the rifle to Little-Jakie and pulled himself up and through the doorway. Despite the pain in his ankle he grabbed his rifle and stuck his head out, holding the rifle at the ready should he see a target.
He saw nothing, though.
Nothing, but a night as black as velvet.
Behind him the girls were crying and he could hear Ellie-May comforting them. Suddenly Little Jakie’s head emerged through the canvas flaps and he smiled bravely at his father. He motioned to show he was still armed with the rifle.
Jake couldn’t chide the boy and he felt an immense pride but that was quickly replaced by the most horrifying fear for his safety. He peered back out into the night but could see nothing and was greeted by a deathly silence. The Indians had ceased in their screaming and chanting. Jake wondered if the Indians were at this very moment sneaking on silent feet, surrounding them. He had no idea how many were out there since he had yet to see a single brave other than the shadowy figure Ellie-May had shot.
Suddenly he heard gunfire in the distance and he recognised it for what it was – a rifle but no bullet struck out anywhere near them.
&n
bsp; Who was shooting?
And at what?
And then suddenly the night was once again filled with the roar of rifle fire and this was answered by further fire and the war cries of the Indians. It sounded like there was a full-scale battle going on but neither man nor boy could see anything, not a single powder flash.
‘What’s happening?’ Ellie-May asked, her head suddenly appearing between the two Jakes.
‘Someone’s giving it to the Indians, I think,’ Jake said.
‘Who?’ Ellie-May looked at her son and frowned when she saw the gun, looking impossible big in his hand.
‘It’s Tumbleweed,’ Lucy said, her head appearing over her mother’s left shoulder, the doll she called Miss Sally, dangling from a hand. ‘Come to save us.’
There was hope in the young girl’s voice and Jake would no nothing to contradict it, but all the same he told his wife to get her back inside. The shooting had stopped and Jake could hear the sound of horses receding into the distance while the yells of the Indians grew fainter and fainter. The Indians, still unseen, were retreating. Whoever it was out there they had saved their lives and he suddenly felt an immense gratitude for their saviours, whoever they were.
‘Is it over, Pa?’ Little Jakie asked.
Jake looked at his son and nodded.
‘I think so, son,’ he said. ‘I think so.’
Two
Jake didn’t dare move and he lay there prone with the top half of his body poking through the wagon doorway, Sharps ready to be fired at the slightest hostile movement from the darkness. Inside the wagon Ellie-May bound his injured ankle with strips of material she had torn from an old dress. He had to grit his teeth against the pain. He’d taken nothing for it, not even a slug of whiskey; he’d never drink in front of the children, a rule that came from his own godly upbringing. Little Jakie maintained his position behind his father and he too lay on his stomach and stared into the silence of the night.
