Maude March on the Run!

by Audrey Couloumbis

  Maude said, “Don't let anyone stop you.”

  The team had begun to stamp and snort. Dr. Aldoradondo climbed into the wagon seat. My horse turned in place nervously; I fought to get my foot in the stirrup. I was still in my gingham.

  I flung my leg over. I couldn't be bothered to be ladylike.

  There was a woman at the center of maybe a dozen people. “He called it a sure cure,” she yelled. I remembered her from the early crowd, for her eyes were wild then, too.

  There were men coming out of the saloons and greeting the noise with wild hoots of their own. I urged my horse forward, thinking Dr. Aldoradondo was likely to make a run for it any second.

  “Here now, what's all this about,” he said over the noise.

  Mostly women made up this angry crowd, but a few men stood bunched in front of the horses. They were shouting things like, “Here, don't you be going anywhere,” and, “Catch 'ose hosses, don't let 'em run.”

  Voices rose, calling Dr. Aldoradondo a quack, a fake, a death monger. This last was a new word but sounded to me like a serious accusation to throw around.

  A man yelled to someone else to come on out and catch the show and was answered with the clomp of boots and a swing of bat-wing doors.

  “I paid my money, and I fed it to my mother,” that woman shouted. “Warn't ten minutes later she rolled over and give up the ghost.”

  “Hang 'im,” someone on the edge of the crowd shouted. Matters were getting out of hand. A gunshot into the air could have a quieting effect if it came at the right moment. But our cache of pistols was in the wagon with Maude's rifle.

  “How old was this woman in question?” Dr. Aldoradondo said. “How ill? Perhaps she was simply too far gone to expect medication to do anything for her.”

  The woman shouted, “She warn't taking your potion for illness, just her back hurt.” And then she broke down and sobbed loud sobs.

  I would've liked to say these were what Aunt Ruthie used to call crocodile tears, but they looked and sounded genuine to me.

  “It poisoned her,” another woman called out. “There is nothing in my elixir that could do any harm,” Dr. Aldoradondo said.

  His voice overshadowed those raised in question and in anger, but now something else was at work besides the actual grievance. Some of the men gathered there had come away from drinking, and they had come away in the mood to look for trouble. They would find it. Or cause it, either one.

  I could see I had the right of it. Others of the men who had lately joined in were deciding it was just good sense to back out of the tide of anger and resentment, rather than try to fight it.

  At least I figured that might be why a few of them were going back to the saloons. However, this left several people in the street who would never listen to reason.

  In the next instant, the noise rose suddenly to sound as if twice as many men were shouting. Three fellows jumped the wagon and pulled Dr. Aldoradondo to the ground.

  One of those men hit his own head on the wagon seat.

  It started in to bleed, real fast. It wasn't Dr. Aldoradondo's blood, but the sight of it running down that man's face made my heart thump all the harder. I was yelling at the top of my lungs. I tried to ride into this fray, but my horse sidled off to one side, away from the racket.

  One of the wagon horses had begun to fight the traces by lifting off his front feet. He couldn't buck, but he jigged the other horse into more frantic snorting and blowing and stamping around. Their jostling knocked a man into the horse trough.

  The team shied and danced at the splash, flinging their heads up and down, unnerved by the racket of so many voices raised to shout, and maybe the smell of blood.

  They were hemmed in by the crowd and, in yanking the wagon around, did step on two or three people and knocked another fellow clean over. The worst of these cases was a young man I'd seen swatting at the horses with his hat like he didn't have good sense. He rolled out of range and wasn't stomped. It was an additional piece of good luck he lost his taste for trouble and crawled back to the boardwalk.

  All of this was the happenings of less than a minute, probably less than half a minute, and at the same time there was some yelling and fists a-flying. The noise was such that I couldn't hear if anyone called for help. I couldn't tell how Maude or Rebecca were faring inside the wagon.

  Dr. Aldoradondo tried to hold his own against the men who'd grabbed him. He was taking a beating. When someone struck him from behind with the butt of their gun, it was probably a kindness.

  The doctor sank to the ground.

  I fought my horse into riding forward again, with an intention of riding into the midst of things and trampling on the bulliest of them. Maude clambered over the wagon seat. She didn't grab the reins but looked like she might climb down into the fray.

  “Maude,” I shouted at her.

  The horses pulled forward, traces jangling, and another man fell with an injury. Someone dealt the lead horse a blow to the nose. The horses pulled back, then gave another try.

  It happened that jerking the wagon kept Maude clinging to the seat long enough to know I was part of the noise. I thought it a wonder she could hear me at all, the shouting around us had reached such a pitch.

  “Maude, you can't get down there in that ruckus,” I yelled. “You ain't dressed for it.”

  I heard this last thing I said more clearly because the men began to move off, carrying Dr. Aldoradondo with them. “Get in the wagon, Maude,” I said, and I was near to crying. There were several men against the one, and as far as I could tell, there wasn't a blamed thing we could do about it.

  Maude pulled the brake on the wagon, although once the crowd moved off, the horses didn't appear to be ready to go anywhere. They shivered all over like bugs were biting at them, and flashed their tails and manes about.

  “Tie your horse and come inside,” Maude said.

  She was staring down the street at that pack of ruffians. Their womenfolk had come together in a clump at one point and let the men move on. That one woman still shouted her accusations.

  I looped the reins on the hook at the back door and swung myself inside the wagon. Rebecca's shape could be made out in the light from the torches. Her hands shook as she held the long dropper of that clear bottle that I couldn't put in my basket. She put a measure of the cure in a cup, sloshed in a little water, and drank it down fast.

  “Rebecca, what is it they mean to do?” Maude was asking. She was shedding herself of that dress. “Surely they won't hang him.”

  “More likely tar and feathers,” Rebecca said in a weak way. She settled into her rocker, somehow older than ever I'd noticed her to be.

  Maude tore off that feather headdress hard enough to make me cringe; hairpins flew. She tossed stuff out of a drawer and came up with her rough pants and shirt.

  THIRTY-FIVE

  I'D HEARD OF TAR AND FEATHERS BUT HAD NEVER KNOWN the thing to be done. “What can we do?”

  “It's a worse end than hanging,” Rebecca said, and her face crumpled for a moment. But then she gained control of herself. “Some live through it.”

  “Has this happened to you before?” Maude asked her.

  “To my brother,” she said, her voice coming on a little stronger now. “The burns are a slow and painful way to die.”

  Rebecca acted as if now it had come to this, she could sit back, almost peaceful. I couldn't leave her be while the doctor was being carried down the street by his four limbs. “Rebecca.” I jogged her rocker. “Should we go for the sheriff ?”

  “I have no doubt the sheriff has just been called out of town,” Rebecca said in a voice now firm and full of knowledge. She reached for her knitting and began to rock gently. “It takes time for the tar to boil,” she said. “We'll be here awhile.”

  I stood back. It chilled me the way she had settled into knowing disaster had fallen on her doorstep and would do nothing to try to stop it.

  “I'm going to need both our horses, Sallie,” Maude said. “G
et them ready for me.” I did what she asked. I wished I had put on my boy clothes.

  When Maude jumped out of the back of the wagon, she carried her rifle and the doctor's. I said, “What are you about?”

  “I'm going to take him from them, Sallie,” she said. “You take the wagon back the way we came. Fast. I want you out of this town before I am. I'll circle around with him and meet you back where we camped last night.”

  “I can't let you go on your own, Maude.”

  “You saw her,” Maude said, nodding toward Rebecca. “She can't drive this wagon. Besides, I don't want you there. Do just what I'm telling you and nothing else.”

  I said, “But there's hardly any cover. It's all grass.”

  “Just ride,” Maude said, getting on my horse. She took the reins to the sorrel she'd been riding. He was larger than my horse and the better one for a man to ride. Maude surprised me with how clear-thinking she could be at times like this.

  She slid one rifle into the boot, clearly meaning to ride with the other rifle in hand. I might have argued some more, but she said, “Get up there, Sallie, and move this wagon,” and rode off.

  I soon took up the reins. I'd never driven a team before, and I was counting on them knowing more about it than I did. I loosed the brake and yelled, “Yah!” They broke into a run, all right, and nearly yanked me off that wagon.

  I dug my heels into the corners of the foot well and sat back, leaned on the reins, but I couldn't turn those horses or slow them down. They pulled on my one arm and then the other, and I had all I could do to keep to the seat.

  I could see the dark outline of Maude riding away ahead of me, well past the edge of town. I saw the crowd of men beyond her, their figures lit up by a good-sized fire as they threw tree limbs onto it.

  As Maude rode into them, startling a few men into rearing back, she shot her rifle into the air. I saw the flicker of movement that was a man drawing on her, but before he could shoot, his gun was shot out of his hand.

  Another fellow screamed and pitched to the ground, as if hit by the same bullet.

  There were three more shots, spitting into the dirt at the mob's feet and breaking up the wall of them. None of these shots came from Maude's rifle, by my guess, although my guesses were hampered by the jerky movement of our onrushing wagon.

  I tried mightily to slow the horses, but I was doing no good at all. The shots didn't give those animals pause but may have added fuel to the charge.

  I was bearing down on the scene with a racketing wagon. I sawed at the reins, trying to turn the horses, but I had no control over them. The mob scattered, yelling, and Maude pulled her horse to one side, giving me just about enough room to pass her by.

  I was moving like I had a steam engine pushing from behind. I had only the moment to register the sight of Dr. Aldoradondo trying to pick himself up from the road, and then I was past them and charging like a freight train into the full darkness of the night.

  I still didn't know who had been doing the shooting.

  If I was scared for myself, I was also scared for Maude. She was still back there behind me, and I didn't know what was likely to happen to her.

  I fought the horses, trying to make them know I meant to take charge, but they ran on as if the weight of that wagon was nothing. Maybe that was the case of it, for we had only the day before greased the axles. The wagon didn't feel like a dead weight behind them.

  Although they hadn't been called upon for any great speed during the time we had traveled with the Aldoradondos, the horses were used to the idea of leaving a town in the dead of night and going on for an hour or two. If I couldn't bring the wagon to a halt soon, I would be knocking on the door at Fort Dodge before Maude caught up to me.

  I didn't really believe the horses could run for that long, but I wasn't able to stop them—stopping was an idea that had to dawn on them.

  It hadn't dawned on them as yet.

  I leaned my weight to one side and the other, trying to hold them to the middle of the trail. It felt like riding a butter churn, the reins yanked at me all the time, and when I leaned, it must have been felt only slightly by those horses.

  I'd been lucky so far to have a smooth trail before me, the dried-out ruts had crumbled into dust. Yet there remained the risk of hitting something I couldn't see in the dark and damaging the undercarriage. Or worse, the horses. Or worse yet, me.

  What it came down to, fighting the horses meant only to stay braced against the wagon seat and pull back on the reins for all I was worth. It was some time before I saw signs of reason in them.

  By then, spit foamed out of their mouths and sweat shone on their hides, and some of this splashed back in the wind of them to land on me. But as they slowed to a trot, I started to watch the ground at each side of the trail. I looked for a place to stop.

  THIRTY-SIX

  I DIDN'T HAVE TO WORRY ABOUT BOGGY GROUND; WE hadn't seen rain in some time. But the horses were weary, the moonlight was unreliable, and I couldn't be considered an experienced wagon handler.

  It was simple good luck the horses slowed just as I spied a roll in the land. I snapped the reins and coaxed them to walk through the prairie grass.

  The night was quiet here, like all else had been a bad dream. Only the rush of my blood and the heaving breath of the horses told the real story.

  I climbed over the seat to look in on Rebecca. Glass crunched underfoot when I stepped inside. An overhead cupboard had opened and spilled its contents on the floor.

  “Rebecca?”

  I'd hardly given her a thought once that wagon was on the move. I could only just see her.

  She lay on the bunk with an arm threaded through a strap nailed to the wall for that purpose, so she hadn't been thrown around.

  “Is it over yet?” she asked me.

  I reached for her hand in the dark, and she clung on to me. Her hands were damp and cool, which surprised me, the cool part anyway. Mine were so hot.

  “Is he suffering?” She meant the doctor, of course.

  “I don't rightly believe it happened,” I said, speaking of the tar-and-feathers part. I didn't care to mention the broken look of him. I felt a welling of tears rising, and I brushed all thoughts of him and even of Maude from my mind.

  Rebecca was holding my hand and didn't let go. “I don't feel well, Sallie.”

  “You just stay here, Rebecca,” I said, “and I'll come back as soon as I see to the horses. I can't leave them to stand wet.”

  “I think I may sleep,” she said, and appeared to me to swoon away. Likely it was just the darkness lent that look to her when she shut her eyes.

  The horses were lathered up and nervous. It was a time before they let me put the feed bags on them. I gave them small rations, having it in mind only to calm them. I hoped when I took the feed bags off, the horses would graze.

  If I stayed out of range of getting kicked, we could manage all right together. I wasn't large enough to move all the hardware off them but could do a fair enough job of wiping them down.

  During this time, Rebecca called out to me twice, and I answered that I would be inside shortly. Maybe I should have gone right away, but there was a part of me that didn't know what to do with her and didn't want to try to figure it out. It was a kind of fear took hold of me, I knew this well enough to be ashamed. I knew how to take care of the horses, and that is what I did.

  While running my fingers around the horseshoes to check for stones, I heard horses coming. My hopes rose at the sight of two horses in the moonlight, then slid when I saw only one rider.

  I waited, praying for it to be Maude. I was sure I'd know her. But they were some distance off yet, and I couldn't be sure.

  “Sallie,” Maude called. She hadn't yet seen us.

  “Over here,” I called, but remained where I stood. I was still in the grip of cowardly fear—when I heard the worst, I didn't want it to be more than I could take.

  Then I saw Maude had Dr. Aldoradondo with her; he had fallen forward ove
r the horse's neck. “Is he dead?” I cried, running to him. I hadn't realized I'd gotten so fond of that old man in the short time we'd been riding together. But he and Rebecca had treated us as kindly as anyone could hope, and paid us for working alongside them.

  “Sallie, he's alive,” Maude said, “and look who turned up to help me.”

  He rode out of the darkness. Likely he'd been riding a little apart so three horses wouldn't leave much of a trail, the way I'd read of in dimers. It was John Kirby. I knew his horse, too.

  There was a great deal to take in all at once. “Silver Dollar,” I said. “You're the one who rented Silver Dollar? Where's Uncle Arlen's rig?”

  “A little the worse for wear,” he said. “I traded it in some miles earlier.”

  I was for a moment torn between arguing the loss to Uncle Arlen's business and wanting to know what he traded it for and knowing it really only mattered that he'd come to Maude's aid, even though at the back of my mind I questioned the why of it.

  I said, “Have you followed us from Independence?”

  “I didn't follow you,” he said. “I got there a few days ahead of you, if you remember.”

  We couldn't spend time arguing. The doctor needed help. Maude and John Kirby each took an arm over their shoulders as he slid off the horse and helped him walk. I was glad to see his feet weren't dragging.

  “Let's get him on the cot,” Maude said. John Kirby took most of the doctor's weight over his shoulder as Maude scrambled inside the wagon. Then he pushed the doctor through the door to her and followed them both inside.

  Rebecca had slipped to the floor.

  Maude said, “Are you hurt, Rebecca?”

  Her eyelids fluttered, and when Maude lit the lantern, she tried to sit up. She put her hand down on a piece of glass. She didn't appear to notice.

  “Wait,” Maude said, and helped her up.

  The glass hadn't caused but a tiny cut that hardly bled. I helped Maude to prop her in a corner at the end of the bunk, and John Kirby was able to put his burden on the greater length of it.