Devils Unto Dust

by Emma Berquist

  Burn to the socket.

  —William Wordsworth

  43.

  Ben spots three shakes before we hit the second mile. Micah and Sam scramble for their guns while Curtis barks orders; I wait for the fear to hit me, but I’m too sluggish to feel much of anything except resignation. It happens quickly this time, workmanlike and grimly common. Curtis fires the first shots and the shakes come running; we all fire and one by one they fall down screaming with bullets in various parts of their bodies. The last gets close enough for me to see his eyes are a lovely dark blue. Ben yells at me to get back, but I stay in place and watch as the light goes out of them, watch as that lovely blue begins to cloud. I don’t know which bloody holes belong to me, my aim is so unsteady that I reckon not even one. At least I was right to hire the Garretts; I would never have been able to shoot this many shakes dead with only my gun. I make up my mind to practice shooting at moving targets, until I remember that it’s pointless.

  I’m starting to feel like I’ve been walking forever, like everything else is simply a dream, a life I imagined for myself while I keep walking. One foot goes in front of the other, the movement repeated infinitely. I can’t remember not walking, I can’t remember my feet not aching.

  It’s strange not to be able to trust myself, not to know if my mind is still mine, or if it’s starting to break apart. If I’m not sure, if I doubt myself, does that mean I’m still sane? If I’m worried, am I still me? I can only hope.

  We pass another mesa, the flat ridge even with the horizon. We pass a clump of long-dead shakes, too decayed to even smell, their bones riddled with bullet holes from some other hunters in some other nightmare. The land is rockier here, more uneven, the dirt redder. The road slants uphill over a small crag and shale crunches underneath our boots. It’s slippery where the rock is crushed fine, and I turn my feet to keep from skidding. We reach the crest of the hill and Curtis pauses, pointing ahead as if we can’t see the massive walls rising up.

  “Best,” he says.

  Sam whistles low, impressed. The wall is nothing like the fence we have in Glory; the reach isn’t as high, but it’s made of stacked stones, not wire choked with tumbleweeds. It looks like it would hold against cannon fire, let alone shakes.

  “They ain’t fooling, are they?” I ask, staring at the thick iron and wood gate set into the stone. This place is a fortress, not a town.

  “No ma’am,” Curtis answers. “You stay in Best, you stay safe.”

  “Come on,” Ben says, pushing forward. “We ain’t getting any younger.”

  I’ve never been to another town, and only now do I realize how little of the world I’ve seen. It’s pathetic, really, that I’ve spent seventeen years in one small spot. Pathetic, and unfair, because I never had a chance. There are so many places I never got to see, cities built wider and taller than I can imagine, oceans stretching farther than I could see. If things were different, would I have actually done it? Packed up and moved north, after the twins were grown? I’m not so sure anymore. Underneath it all, maybe I’m just a coward, too afraid of anything new or different. Who is to say I wouldn’t have spent the rest of my life in Glory, till I was old and blind and full of could-haves and what-ifs. Maybe I was never meant to leave.

  The walls look even sturdier up close, the stones fitting snug against one another. I put a hand out and let my fingertips graze along it, the rock rough and warm from the sun.

  Curtis approaches the two-door gate, reaching for one of the heavy iron knockers. It makes a loud bang that sets the whole gate ringing.

  “At the gate,” he calls loudly, his voice half drowned by the banging.

  “How many?” someone calls back from behind the gate.

  “Five,” Curtis answers. “All well.”

  There’s a scraping sound, and a grunt, and then the gate starts to open inward, revealing a young man standing between the doors. He has brown skin and a smattering of freckles, and he balances a long rifle against his shoulder.

  “Garrett,” he says, surprised. “What the hell are you doing here this early in the morning?”

  “Long story. How you been?” Curtis and the man shake hands briefly while we file in past the wall.

  “Aw, you know. Can’t complain. Ben,” he says, nodding.

  “Hey, Levi,” Ben says, tipping his hat up so he can see. “Now y’all folks I don’t know,” he says, turning his attention to the boys and me. “And I never forget a face.”

  “Levi, this is Willie and Micah Wilcox and Sam Kincaid. We brung them up from Glory.”

  “Glory,” Levi repeats, and whistles. “What the hell you want to live in Glory for?”

  “Y’all, this is Levi Mason, one of Best’s finest gunmen.”

  “Only one of?” Levi laughs. “I’m a better shot than you, Curtis. Nice to meet y’all.”

  Sam and Micah mumble some pleasantries and I give a quick nod.

  “You work the gate often?” I ask him.

  “Now and then.”

  “We’re looking for someone in particular, Harrison Wilcox.”

  Levi chews on his bottom lip. “Name sounds familiar.”

  “He woulda been coming through here the past couple days.”

  Levi shakes his head. “I only got back from Savage yesterday, but I ain’t seen anybody leave since then. You might want to check with Yao or Clarence. Hunters usually keep to the bars, that’s where you’d find them most like. Sorry I can’t say more than that.”

  I nod and give him a tight smile. “That helps. Thank you kindly.”

  My eyes fix beyond Levi, on the city spread out before us. I’ve never seen the like; even walking through Silver didn’t prepare me for a town this size. I can’t see where the streets end, they crisscross and turn into further roads. Like Glory, many of the shops are boarded up, the lumber yard empty and the mill quiet. But the banquettes are crowded with displays of dry goods and dress forms draped in patterned cloth. Even early there are people in the streets, not hunters but normal folks just going about their day, ducking out of the drugstore and smiling at one another. There’s life here, real life that makes my jaw ache with want.

  “You ready to find your pa?” Ben asks me.

  “I reckon so,” I tell him, my mind racing. He’s here; I need him to be here. But I’ve got a question for Ben, too. “How the hell am I supposed to find one man in a city choke-full of them?”

  44.

  I stick close to the others; it’s too much for me, the sounds of wheeling carts and striking hammers and the smells of sour mash and smoked meats threaten to overwhelm my senses.

  “Would you settle down?” Micah whispers to me out of the corner of his mouth. “Stop twitching every time you see something new.”

  I punch him lightly in the shoulder; he’s as wide-eyed as I am, he just cares enough to hide it. I can’t help staring and craning my neck up; none of these structures are less than two stories high.

  “This way,” Curtis says, leading us through a series of turns. “We always stay at Mrs. Keen’s when we’re in Best. You’ll like it, she’s—” he pauses, trying to find the right words. “Well, she’s the best cook in the south, though I’ll thank you not to mention that to Elsie.”

  “Why would you ever leave here?” Sam asks, his eyes following a girl with ribbons in her hair and a basket full of apples in her arms.

  “Have to, to work,” Ben answers. “Supply runs, patrols, fares when we can get ’em. So many folks turned hunter, there ain’t always enough jobs to go around.”

  “Don’t it bother you, always bein’ on the move?” I ask, but Ben just shrugs.

  “It’s that or stay in Glory, doing whatever dirty work the Judge needs doing.”

  I snort in distaste and Micah frowns.

  “So you don’t got a place you call home?” he asks.

  “Ennis, I reckon, though we ain’t been there in months and it’s barely more than a patch. Part of the life.” It doesn’t seem near worth it to me, but then
I’m no hunter.

  “Here we are,” Curtis says, stopping in front of an older but cheerful-looking house. The front porch is swept clean and bordered by five columns, each one framing a window in between. The windows are repeated on the second story, these ones outlined with dark shutters.

  We follow Curtis up the porch, the worn steps slick beneath our feet; the wood is old and sagging and smooth, sanded down from dust and boots making the same journey over and over.

  The door opens even before Curtis knocks, and a plump woman wearing a patterned shirtwaist and a dark green skirt clasps his hands delightedly.

  “Mr. Garrett,” she says, beaming at him. Her smile takes up half her face, her eyes disappearing into her cheeks. “I’m so happy to see you again.”

  “It’s good to see you too, Mrs. Keen,” Curtis says, carefully extricating his hands from her grasp.

  “And now where’s—oh yes, there he is, hiding behind you,” Mrs. Keen goes on, wagging her finger at Ben. “As if I wouldn’t see you there.”

  “Hello, Mrs. Keen,” Ben says, staying safely out of her reach.

  “Well, come in, come in, y’all are all welcome,” she says, bustling us inside. I catch Micah’s eye and he bites his lip, both of us trying not to laugh.

  “Mrs. Keen, this is Sam and Micah, and that’s Willie there,” Curtis says, pointing us out to her.

  “Well, don’t that beat all? It’s so nice to have young’uns in the house again. Now sit down and I’ll bring y’all something hot. Are you hungry? We’ve had breakfast already but I always make extra in case of stragglers.” Mrs. Keen doesn’t wait for us to answer; she ushers us through the entrance hall and into the parlor and disappears through a door, still talking.

  I glance around, feeling slightly dazed by the woman’s energy. The parlor is small but well furnished, with a number of plush chairs and a long divan set around a polished wooden table. I sink down into one of the chairs, wishing I fit into this pretty room.

  “Well, she’s . . . something,” Sam says, flopping down onto the divan.

  “Aw, she’s a good woman and charges fair,” Curtis tells him. “Even if she could talk a donkey’s hind leg off. We’ll get some food in us and then we can figure out where to start looking for your pa.”

  “Well I doubt he’d be staying at a place like this,” I say, looking at the heavy clouded mirror on the wall.

  Micah lets out a bark of a laugh. “Pa? He’d stick out like a sore thumb.”

  I wince at his choice of words and tug my sleeve down to make sure it’s covering my hand. The swelling is getting worse, and I don’t know how long I’ll be able to hide it from the others. I need to find Pa before that happens, and before the delusions get worse.

  “Then where do you reckon we should start?” Ben asks.

  “The saloons first. Or any gambling halls.” I suck on the inside of my cheek, considering. “He used to sell to a man here, I think the name was Allen. Might be worth checking with him, if he’s still around.”

  “We should split up,” Curtis says. “It’ll be faster, we’ll cover more ground. I need to take some time to buy supplies anyway, since we lost most of them. I’ll take Doc Junior with me, he knows what your pa looks like. Willie and Micah, you go with Ben.”

  “Here we are,” Mrs. Keen interrupts, backing into the room with a tray balanced in her hands, the bright smell of coffee following her. “Now it’s nothing fancy, but it should set you to rights.”

  Curtis jumps up and tries to take the tray, but Mrs. Keen shoos him away.

  “Don’t be silly, dear, I can handle it. Y’all just sit and rest awhile.”

  She sets the tray on the table gently and plants her hands on her hips. Along with the coffee, the tray is stocked with biscuits and a fat pat of butter, a bowl of thick jam, and a plate of sausages.

  “There. Now eat your fill, and when you’re finished leave the tray. How many rooms should I set up?”

  “I think three will suit us just fine,” Curtis answers. “Mrs. Keen, do you know a man named Allen by any chance?”

  She wrinkles her brow, considering. “Can’t say that I do, but there’s an Ellis as runs the feed store.”

  “We’ll ask around,” Ben tells me.

  “Dinner’s at two, like usual,” Mrs. Keen goes on. “Tea you can take before you retire for the night. And I’ll get those rooms aired. Is there anything you’re wanting especially?”

  “No, Mrs. Keen, thank you,” Curtis says. “This looks mighty fine. We’ll have a look about town, but we’ll be back shortly.”

  “Oh, bless your heart, it does me good to have company.” Mrs. Keen smiles at us contentedly from the door, then she’s gone in a puff of green cloth and coffee.

  “Well,” Curtis says, reaching for a biscuit, “eat up. Time’s a-wasting.”

  45.

  The city looks much kindlier with a belly full of coffee and grease. We walk from the Keen house back to the street we came through, and then Curtis and Sam split off, headed left while the rest of us go right.

  “We got till dinner,” Ben reminds us. “Then we meet back up.”

  It doesn’t seem like enough time, but Ben knows the town and it’s not like I won’t recognize my own father.

  “We might not find him today, Will,” Micah says softly to me, trying to prepare me for disappointment.

  “We just have to keep looking,” I say, my mind on my hand. I can’t spare a day, I can’t waste the heartbeats. “There are only so many places a man can hide.”

  The banquettes rattle under my boots, the wood old and shrunken around the nails. I stare inside the shop we pass, impressed by the order of it; here holsters, lanterns, pails, and ropes are hung neatly on a wall for all to see. My full belly allows me to simply admire the jars full of candy, frosted and glowing like colored glass.

  “We’ll try the Occidental first,” Ben says, directing us toward a squat brown building with a bright green roof. “It’s a hotel, but they got a barroom where folks like to gamble.”

  We follow Ben into the hotel, and he stops to talk with a man at a desk while I admire the lobby with its shining tin ceiling and embossed wall coverings.

  “This way,” Ben says, motioning to Micah and me. “Through here.”

  Micah has to pull me away, my head still tilted up to see the patterned ceiling. “Come on, Sis, we ain’t staying here.”

  Ben walks us down the hall and into the barroom, which has a number of deer heads that must be at least ten years old mounted on the wall. Maybe more; I don’t remember when the last deer died out, but I’ve never seen those pale, branching antlers in my life. There are only two men in here, one on each side of the counter. Maybe it’s too early, or maybe folk in Best don’t lose themselves in drink like we do in Glory.

  “’Scuse me,” Ben says, rapping his knuckles on the bar.

  The bartender looks up and makes his way over to us, smoothing his moustache.

  “Can I help you?” he asks.

  “We’re looking for someone. Harrison Wilcox, he’s a gambler. You seen him?”

  “Can’t say I have. No one name of Wilcox in here.”

  “Right,” Ben says. “Well, we’re staying at the Keen house. If he does show up, we’d be obliged if you took note of where he goes.”

  The bartender nods and fiddles with his moustache again. “Anything else I can do for you?”

  “No,” Ben says. “Thank you for your time.”

  We file out of the barroom and back through the lobby.

  “Well that’s one down,” Micah says, letting the door swing behind him. “Where to now?”

  We try the feed shop and a general store next, and they both yield the same answer. At least the woman at the last stop is nice about it; from her we get a smile and a headshake, but the result is still the same: Pa’s not here, and no one’s seen him.

  “We’ll try a saloon next,” Ben says.

  “You think they’re lying?” Micah asks him as we’re directed towa
rd another door.

  “Could be,” Ben says. “Best folk are closemouthed, but I don’t see what cause they’d have to lie.”

  “Maybe Curtis and Sam are having better luck,” I say, my gut tightening. Pa’s always been good at weaseling out of tight spots, but there’s five of us and one of him.

  “Fourth time’s lucky?” Ben asks, holding the door open for us.

  “I don’t think that’s the saying,” I tell him, ducking under his arm.

  We follow him into the saloon, and I wait for my eyes to adjust to the dimness. I wrinkle my nose; it smells rancid in here, like old milk mixed with the sharp fumes of alcohol. Spittoons are scattered around the ground, but from the state of the floor it seems most folks have chosen to ignore them. There’s some quiet chatter from two hunters at a corner table, and one sitting alone, looking full as a tick. I can’t tell if he started early or if he’s still drunk from last night.

  The bartender takes his time acknowledging us, giving a glass a few extra wipes. My temper rises as he slowly walks over to us.

  “Can I help you?” he asks grudgingly, folding his arms across his chest.

  “We’re looking for Harrison Wilcox,” Ben says.

  The bartender sucks on his teeth, looking from Ben to me and then to Micah. “I ain’t seen him and he ain’t welcome here,” he says.

  Ben glances at us and I shrug.

  “Pa has that effect on people,” Micah says.

  “Anything else?” the bartender asks, and he doesn’t give us time to answer before he walks away.

  “This is getting us nowhere,” I say, impatient. I glance at the drunk sitting on his lonesome; he looks too addle-headed to lie.

  “You,” I say, weaving around a chair to stand in front of him. “I’m looking for someone.”

  The man looks up at me with bloodshot eyes set in a shiny face. “I don’t know ’im,” he says, pouring whiskey into a cup of coffee, sloshing some down the side of the mug.

  “I didn’t give you a name.”

  “I don’t know ’im,” he says again, and he spits out a gob of tobacco juice and sputum that lands squarely on my chest.