“Now, Willie—”
There was no chance to learn how Willie's boys handled him. The rattle of wagon traces drew Willie's attention. He clopped Ben Chaplin one to the head and said, “You trying to fool me?”
Ben Chaplin said, “I am not.” His glance moved to the jar of nuggets, and I knew he regretted that he had not agreed to putting them in Willie's coffee.
Willie got to the door with surprising speed and threw it open. “You good folks going somewhere?”
MRS. NEWCOMB SHRIEKED, THOUGH WILLIE HAD NOT yet done anything to give her cause. I hoped she would not inspire him. Mr. Newcomb's voice was high and reedy when he answered, “We hoped to get an early start.”
Willie whined, “It's still icy out here. It isn't safe to travel on ice in a wagon.”
“We are experienced with the wagon,” Mr. Newcomb said.
“Come in and set a while,” Willie said in a manner that was both cordial and would not be ignored.
After a long moment during which they must have weighed their chances and found them slim, the Newcombs climbed down from their wagon. Ben Chaplin got up from the table, clearing his place.
I washed the plates, for we were short of plates, and put them back on the table.
The Newcombs looked washed out and scared as they sat down. I thought we'd have done well to serve them some beef liver. I had been somewhat peeved with Mrs. Newcomb the evening before, but I could only feel sorry for her now.It was not a comfortable thing to bear the burden of Willie's attention.
Maude filled the platter again, more eggs and bacon, and I set it on the table. “Fresh biscuits aren't ready yet,” I said. “Sorry.”
“Right unfriendly of you folks to go without saying goodbye,” Willie said. “You've hurt my feelings.”
The Newcombs had nothing to say to this.
“Eat up,” Willie said, since neither of them had lifted a fork. “I have to think about how you're going to make it up to me.”
The hair stood on the back of my neck. I had no doubt it was standing on the Newcombs' necks as well. All those at the table had stilled their bodies in some way. No one drummed their fingers on a mug, no one scratched their whiskers, and no one cleared their throat.
Joe slumbered on.
Maude turned and stuck a tin mug and a spoon in my hand. The mug was filled with fluffy scrambled eggs and two slices of bacon. She pointed to the corner where I'd pushed our stuff out of the way.
I went. For one thing, I was hungry. The Newcombs were in big trouble, but my stomach either didn't know or didn't care. It started to growl the minute I had some eggs to call my own. The other thing I knew, in the saddlebags was the only gun, save Marion's, that might be turned against Willie. As I sat down there, I just hoped the business would wait until I had eaten.
Mrs. Newcomb began to cry.
In much the same way he might have said, my coffee has gone cold, I'll have some hot, Willie said, “Shut up that cater-wauling or I'll have to shoot you to get some peace and quiet.”
Mrs. Newcomb only got louder.
“Now, Willie, you don't want to go shooting this woman here,” Marion said, loudly enough to be heard over her voice.
“Why not?”
“For one thing, you have all these witnesses,” Marion said. “Seems to me, if you want to go around killing someone, you want to do it quiet like, so you don't get yourself hung.”
Willie said, “I don't plan to get myself hung, but I can't go around all quiet like. I can't make myself a reputation that way.”
This surprised me. Maude had done next to nothing, and a reputation dogged her like her own shadow. But nothing Willie said served to ease the tension in the room. It didn't help that everyone had to yell to be heard, since what Mrs. Newcomb was doing now could indeed be termed caterwauling.
“Now there's the other thing,” Marion said, pushing his chair back from the table a bit. He took up his cup of coffee and balanced the chair on the back legs, probably to make it look like the usual push back from the table, but I noticed he held his cup with his right hand, leaving his gun hand free.
He went on to say, “She's a defenseless woman. Killing her won't get you the kind of reputation you're looking for. You have to gun down some fast-draw sheriff or somebody like that.”
I rummaged through the saddlebag as quietly as I wasable. Considering I had to work under a layer of blankets and feel around for the six-gun without anyone taking notice of me, it was just as well the talk was turning excitable.
“Where'm I going to find anybody of that description?” Willie asked, Mrs. Newcomb now forgotten. She took note of this, and her noise worked its way down to a kind of keening.
“Texas,” Marion said.
“Don't let's get started on Texas again,” one of Willie's boys complained. It was not the one who had spoken up about drowning, but the other one. “It's a long ride, and no guarantee that we're going to find anything but rattlesnakes and wild Indians when we get there.”
I pulled the pistol to the top of the bag. I had never realized how heavy it was till then. I guessed it to be heavier than my shotgun overall, even though it was much smaller. I put both hands into the saddlebag and eased back the hammer.
Maude had meanwhile gone over by the woodpile and sat down. This put her a little out of the easy line of fire, and it also put her in easy reach of the gun rack. I admit to a jittery feeling in the general area of my breakfast, which felt like a mistake, now that it lay like a brick in my middle. But if there was trouble brewing, I couldn't sit here in the corner and watch it happen without trying to help out.
“I'm thinking of Tennessee, myself.” This boy had a fair amount of nerve.
“You don't mean you're thinking of leaving me in the lurch,” Willie said. He was not smart, but he was, nevertheless, quick on the uptake.
“Now, Willie, don't get like that,” this boy said. “Yourmomma and mine are sisters, and they won't either one of them take kindly to you shooting at me.”
“What kind of gang only has two people?” Willie complained.
“The kind that is a loner,” the other boy said, setting both hands flat to the table as if to say, and that's that. “For Tennessee is sounding good to me too.”
“I don't want to be a loner,” Willie shouted. “I am the leader of this gang. You are both coming to Texas with me!” He did a most unexpected thing. He snatched up the knife he'd used at breakfast and stabbed that boy's hand.
I saw the spurt of blood in the air, and the boy leaped up, screaming, going for his gun. Marion and Maude were on their feet, both reaching for guns, even as I pulled the six-gun from the saddlebag. Willie stood too, his chair falling as he shot wildly, all of this happening at once.
Willie was quick on the draw, for he had stabbed the boy and shot Marion before anyone else got off a shot. The only gun coming out near as soon was mine, and not because I was fast but because I'd gotten a head start, and it went off at the same time Willie's did.
And then Willie dropped to the floor.
While pulling the gun out of the saddlebag and pointing it in the general direction of all the fuss and bother, I accidentally pulled the trigger. The gun was heavy and took firmer handling than I realized. I didn't mean to be so firm with it in the trigger area, but I was not experienced enough with the rifle. I was not at all experienced with this.
The gun fired, and I felt it like a wave running backthrough my wrists, up my arms, and into my neck, rocking me. It was almost as if that gun cuffed me on the head.
I was the only one who knew what happened at first. Marion and that boy were both holding on to their injured parts, and Maude's rifle was pointed at Willie, or at least at the air where Willie had been.
His cousin rolled him over and said, “He's been shot. Which one of you murderers has killed him?”
No one replied to this. From where I sat, I could see that there was a good deal of blood pouring out of Willie. It made me feel a little sick to the stomach, and
I was glad Maude stood where she did. She did not do well with the bloody towel; she would do even worse with this mess. The floor would probably have to be pulled up and new wood laid.
“I'm only shot, not dead,” Willie said. “But I would like to kill the one that backshot me, so who was it?”
“It looks to be that boy over there,” Willie's cousin said, pointing at me.
“That's no boy,” Mrs. Newcomb shouted, her eyes gone large. “They are girls, wild girls!” And then she fainted. Which was good, because it wouldn't have taken much more to convince me to shoot her too.
Willie said, “I've been shot by a girl?”
HIS COUSIN SAID, “LOOKS THAT WAY.”
“Promise me,” Willie said, “that you won't tell anybody?”
“Ever'body done seen it,” his cousin said.
Willie coughed a long, strange cough. And then, when I waited to hear what was to happen next, he said nothing. Nothing at all.
“Well, the bullet may not have done him in,” his cousin said sadly, “but that news sure did.”
“You mean it?” the other boy said. His hand was bleeding nearly as good as Willie had been. I could see why he sounded hopeful. “He's dead?”
“I mean it,” Willie's cousin said. “He already looks a little dead.”
“You boys get over there by the wall with your hands in the air,” Maude said.
“Now you don't need to take that attitude with us,” the cousin said. “It's Willie here who you want to be mad at.”
“I can decide for myself who I'm mad at,” Maude said. “I shoot every bit as well as my sister, so I'd advise you to dowhat I say. I don't give out third chances, and you're on your second.”
“We ain't gonna be captured by no girl,” the cousin said. He was the one that was not bleeding. The other was in a more agreeable frame of mind and shuffled a few steps closer to the wall.
“She can shoot the head off a rattlesnake,” I said, to discourage the cousin from making a run for it.
I had gone weak all over. I still held the pistol with both hands, but it rested on my knees and was pointed at the floor. I did not feel ready to shoot again. Marion was not bleeding especially much, but he was unusually quiet.
“She shot the eye out of a painter while it was attacking our mule,” I added when the cousin did not give in right away. “It's laying out there in the snow. I tell you this because I don't think she'll let you off as easily as I let Willie.”
“You killed Willie,” his cousin said.
“He died quick,” I answered him.
The boys continued reluctant and grumbled about unfair treatment, but they moved over to the wall. Finally Ben Chaplin said, “Well, I see you girls had your way.”
Without letting her rifle drop, Maude said, “You can't blame us for what happened here.”
“I have lived in these hills a long time with no talk of rat poison being put in the coffee. If you girls were the peaceable sort, not the kind who go around dressed like boys and causing trouble, things might have turned out differently.”
Marion said, “That kind of talk is uncalled for. This girl saved lives today.”
Ben Chaplin said, “I see three on the floor.”
“Only one is dead,” I said.
Marion said, “If somebody would give these girls a hand and tie up these two rowdies, I'm in need of some medical care.” He did not look good.
Nor did Mrs. Newcomb, who Mr. Newcomb had just gotten to sit up in a chair. When she saw Maude's rifle was still aimed at those boys, she wilted right to the ground again to lie beside Joe, who began to snore.
Maude went over to the boys and told them to lay their guns on the floor very gently. It seemed they didn't think they ought to, so they began to raise a complaint. Maude swung the butt of her rifle up between them and, with one twist of her shoulders, swatted them both upside the head. This moved even the unshot cousin to a change of attitude.
The boys dropped their guns on the floor. This set the tone for the room. Mack got up and found a piece of rope while Ben Chaplin got out his needle and thread. He got started on Marion, who seemed glad of the chance to sit back down.
Ben Chaplin sat next to him, saying, “You don't even have a bullet in this arm. It just left you a furrow to plant beans.” If Marion had any remarks in mind, he did not utter them. Ben Chaplin poured spirits over Marion's arm, bringing a noise from the back of Marion's throat.
Mrs. Newcomb was once more brought to her chair. I was beginning to feel some impatience with Mrs. Newcomb. Her antics pretty much meant that Mr. Newcomb could be no help at all to Maude. I was of no help either, and so it was easier to be rankled with Mrs. Newcomb's weakness than with my own.
Maude did not, in any case, appear to need all that much help. She looked over Mack's shoulder to be sure of the job he was doing. “Hobble their feet like a horse,” she said, “for good measure.” Willie's cousin tried to kick Mack, but Maude poked him in the ribs with the rifle. “If you are feeling your oats because you don't have a bullet hole in you, I can remedy that,” she said.
She reminded me of Aunt Ruthie, and some place deep inside me smiled. I don't think Aunt Ruthie had managed very often to bring a smile to my heart in life; it seemed strange it could happen at that terrible moment.
When the boys were well tied, Maude came to sit beside me. She took the pistol. “Are you okay?” she asked me.
I whispered, “Will they hang me for this?”
“You defended yourself,” she said. “You defended all of us. Didn't you hear Marion?”
“It was purely accidental.”
Maude said, “Well, I know that. It was the kind of happening that Aunt Ruthie would have said was meant to be.” Maude was right about this, Aunt Ruthie always considered bad luck to be meant to be. Good luck, she didn't trust at all.
Marion fared better for taking a few stitches, in that the bullet only grazed him, but the boy who had traveled with Willie and his cousin was not so lucky. Not only did he need a stitch or two, but also his wound needed to be washed out with lye.
“It's a puncture wound,” Ben said with a sorry shake of his head. “Nothing else that looks so no-account that's likelier to kill you.”
The boy was not brave about it either; he started out withthe towel in his mouth but tore it out to make a loud yell at the first touch of the solution. He carried on like a babe in arms, with Mack and Mr. Newcomb finally having to hold him down so his hand could be cleaned out. Marion sat square on the boy's legs.
Mrs. Newcomb had the good sense to retire to the bed while this was going on. I was tempted to remind her who had spent the night there, but figured if she picked up some lice, it would serve her right.
When it was done, the boy said, “I'm going home, and I'm never going to stray to the wrong side of the law again. I'm not cut out for it.”
Ben Chaplin was not in a forgiving mood. He said, “That's as may be, but there is a dead body on my floor that somebody will have to account for.”
“I didn't do it,” he said. “That girl is the one you ought to be jawing at.”
“You and this other fellow held us at gunpoint, in case you forgot,” Ben Chaplin said, “and you will have to answer for that.” And once more I had to be grateful that Ben Chaplin was a clear thinker, if nothing else.
“I didn't plan to shoot nobody,” the boy said, and I knew how he felt. I didn't plan either, it just happened, and now my hands were shaking so hard I had to keep them pressed flat between my knees. I had not yet stood up. I was not at all sure I could.
“I'll tell you what else,” Ben Chaplin said, “and this goes for everybody but Mack and Joe. I want you all out of here before nightfall. You girls pick yourself a horse, the rest of you take your own, and get on your way.”
IWAS HURT BY THE CHANGE IN BEN CHAPLIN'S MANNER, but Maude didn't appear to be. When Willie's boys had departed, it was our turn. Maude said, “What will the horse cost us?”
“Nothing,” Ben Cha
plin said, “if you will just be on your way.”
If he thought he'd get an argument from Maude, he had another think coming. She said, “I want you to throw in a saddle.”
“Done.”
But Maude was not satisfied. “You'll get the mule back to Cleomie?”
“I will,” Ben Chaplin said. “And I'll put a flea in her ear when I see her too, sending me such as you to sleep under my roof.”
“You've got a deal,” Maude said, still unaffected by his rough attitude. I wished I could say the same. “Roll those blankets up tight, Sallie,” she said, making it necessary for me to test my legs. “I will get our horse.”
“I'll go with you,” Marion said.
“Sallie and I can get along on our own, thank you very much,” Maude said, and shut the door behind her. Marion stood helpless.
At this moment Joe chose to rise from the dead. He stood in an unsteady fashion and looked around the room. Mrs. Newcomb shrieked as if she'd seen a ghost. Ben Chaplin lost his temper entirely and shouted, “Good grief, woman, will you shut up!”
At this she went into her same loud crying act that we were all greatly tired of. Her husband hustled her out the door without so much as a thank-you to Ben Chaplin for the use of his floor or the barn for their wagon and horses.
“Good riddance,” Ben Chaplin said.
“You may say good riddance to us,” I said shakily, “but I thank you for your hospitality. It's not your fault things went so wrong. Of course, it was not our fault either.”
He said nothing to me, but I found I didn't mind, knowing I had said the things I should. Marion said nothing too, but he could see how it was with me. He rolled up the blankets and made our things ready by the door. He made us a meal out of the bits and pieces left from breakfast and wrapped it in a napkin. I watched to see that he chose Maude's napkin, which I had not shared when setting food down for the boys.
Maude did not waste time. She was back shortly with the saddled horse. It was not built for speed. But it was a sizable creature, much younger than Flora, and more than enough horse to carry the two of us with all our belongings.
The Misadventures of Maude March Page 18
