The man-eating ground, or so the Apache called it, that she had heard stories about. No wonder those bucks had gone away. Indians were mighty superstitious. They wouldn’t cross this section of the cauldron, considering it bad luck.
Jessa stood a foot from the edge and peered in. The moonlight highlighted Topper’s bare skin. She lay at the bottom, twenty feet down, quite a horrible drop. Her legs bent in an unnatural position. Her head cocked weirdly to the side. The glazed-over look in her eyes told that she was dead. Jessa plopped down and wept.
Jessa woke with the sun. It was barely light, and a songbird chippered a sad song. She rolled over, and there down in that deep hole buzzed flies around Topper’s stiff, bloated, and gray body. Bruises from her attack discolored her skin, largely around her midsection. Jessa swallowed down her stomach. The same fate might befall her.
She needed to go, but where? Now that Topper was dead, should she keep to their plan and run for the train with the money? If the money was still there at the wagon. She’d have to go back and look. Going alone to catch that train somehow just didn’t seem right. She hated to leave Topper that way, for the critters would eat at her, but she had no way of getting down there to bury her. The sidewalls were sheer, too steep for a body to climb down with any hope of getting back out alive. If she had a rope and someone to pull her up… but she had neither. Time was against her too. The Apache might come back hunting for her just outside the pit of the cauldron where they weren’t afraid to tread. Jessa said a silent good-bye to Topper, then made her way solemnly toward the wagon, hoping to find Bean.
The wagon lay in ruins, torn to pieces, not worth trying to fix. Supplies that the Indians didn’t want or couldn’t carry on their horses littered the ground, including lots of green bills. Both money sacks had been opened and one dumped, the sack empty. Pots and pans, some canned goods, and a sack of flour had been poured out. Pages from her mother’s books were scattered everywhere. Both horses were gone. Bean stood off a ways, chewing on blades of grass near a seeping spring.
She rummaged through what was there around the wagon, finding her Bible intact. Then with trembling hands and hating the heartless feel of touching that money, she picked up every sickening dollar and threw it all into the empty sack. It wasn’t worth the death that surrounded it. Topper was gone and maybe Mississippi. Possibly Doc too, if Clint had found Butch, who might have passed by now. Was anything worth all those lives?
She would need at least some of it to buy a ticket at the station and for eating. The rest she would bury and think on what best to do with it, then come back if ever that conviction hit her. She was used to surviving on little to nothing, so not a thing as far as that had changed. Leaving these mountains was her dream, wasn’t it?
She thought of Piketown and Stan and Doc, and there were others who were always friendly with her, although it chafed the sheriff. That had forever been her home. Then Booker planted ideas in her head. How they could swindle the world with her pretty face, used as a distraction, and his card skills. Together they could take the table every night. Plus, she was a better-than-average poker player herself. That’s how she’d met Booker. Before him, she hadn’t been happy, with Sheriff Pike always bossing her, but she’d had no intention of leaving his town.
She hunted near the sinkhole for a good place to rid herself of that burdensome money for now. When she had it buried, she climbed on Bean and lit a shuck. She rode through the noon hour, having no appetite. The aged mule’s plodding pace usually didn’t annoy her. Today, though, she wanted to get as far as she could from that money. Every time she thought about it, an image of Topper at the bottom of that wide-open grave made Jessa shiver. It was strange to think that they would never confide in one another again. The last of her kin gone. There was one other, but he had cast her out and she had no use for him. When he discovered her gone—and who knew when that would be—he probably wouldn’t care.
Two days later, with Bean’s feet dragging and his head hanging low, Jessa reined in next to the ashen remains of Topper’s trade post. She put flowers on Uncle Buckhorn’s grave, which Topper would have liked. Jessa camped in the small barn, leaving Bean in the corral after feeding him some hay she’d found and a portion of grain that the Apache hadn’t spilled out of the wagon. She had a supper of canned peaches, then stretched out and slept.
And sleep she did—for three days off and on while Bean recovered his strength. His gray muzzle seemed to be smiling at her. She, on the other hand, was not feeling so well. Dry-heaving both morning and evening, she couldn’t seem to hold down anything but tea, and she had used the last of her mint tea that morning. What she craved was pickles, of all things. Inwardly, she chuckled, thinking she was plumb loco. She didn’t even like pickles all that much.
In the morning, with her stomach churning for no reason that she could come up with, she crawled onto Bean’s back and headed for the town of Burnt Cabins.
Burnt Cabins was bustling, folks mingling everywhere along the boardwalk. Buckboards, like the one of Topper’s that the Apache had destroyed, rattled in the street. Some fancy blacktop buggies careened past. Single horses dotted the hitch rails on either side in front of the many businesses. The train whistle blew. Jessa nudged Bean.
After she bought a ticket, she took Bean to the corral where he would wait to be loaded into a stockcar by one of the railroad stockmen. She then found her way with the other passengers and settled into a window seat. She clutched the sack on her lap, holding her Bible and the apple she had bought in case she got hungry on the train. Her mind drifted over Blacklog Mountain, through the hills near her cabin, and landed in Piketown. Was the posse still trailing Mississippi, keeping him on the run, or had they caught him?
She stared out the window, the reflection of her teary face looking back at her. Someone roughly plopped into the seat beside her. She turned. Instantly, her eyes stretched wide.
He pressed a finger to her lips. “Shush”
Porter had never put the fear of God into her before, but there was something crazy in his eyes. He had never hinted at raising a hand toward Topper. He’d spouted love sonnets and strummed an old guitar, light and easy, over an evening fire when courting her. He had always been friendly with Jessa. Not overly so, but certainly, he had done nothing in those times to make her shrink away as she was right then. He had a murderous look about him. His pistol was shoved into her side. She winced and bit her tongue to keep from screaming, a sure way to get shot.
“I found Topper.” His voice was shrill, unlike his normally deep timbre. Lovesickness had poisoned his mind. He must have thought Jessa killed Topper.
Tears sprang to her eyes. He was going to kill her, though maybe not there on a train in front of dozens of witnesses. He would get her alone, and there was an ironclad hate shining in his eyes that said he would, without a doubt, snuff her out.
“She was your mother’s sister, for God’s sake. You that damn greedy? Why couldn’t ya have stayed, got help, or at least seen that she was buried proper?”
He wasn’t going to believe her. Jessa had been scared and wanted to run away from the whole situation, as simple as that. But Porter was beyond listening to reason. The gun pressed into her gut convinced her of that.
She glanced over her shoulder at the conductor collecting tickets. Did Porter have one? Or had he sneaked onto the train and would be thrown off? She would refuse if he tried to force her to leave with him. Surely, he wouldn’t shoot in the middle of a train car filled with innocent people.
Porter chuckled. “I used to work on the railroad, so I have friends on this train. You ain’t gettin’ any help.”
She began to spill out the truth, every awful detail. Port shook his head a few times. Maybe he didn’t believe her, or maybe he didn’t want to. Wetness enlarged his sad hazel eyes. He was the picture of a man who’d just had his heart ripped out. Tears flowed down Jessa’s face for Port, for Topper, for the memory of Mississippi. For her little girl who had died too young
and for a father who pushed her away every chance he got. They only ever argued, both of them too damn stubborn to let anything go.
Now that she was facing death, she wanted her old life back in the worst way. Maybe she would say sorry to the old man. He was her father. She had lost her mother, Aunt Topper… What if she never again saw that cantankerous, argumentative man who used to bounce her on his knee when she was just a grasshopper?
Porter cleared his throat and blinked rapidly to keep his tears held back. “Where’s the money?”
“I left it with Topper. I mean, I buried it near that hole.” Her voice quivered.
Port had slid his gun back into his holster, but he still looked meaner than ever. She wasn’t sure if that hate was aimed at her or not. She hadn’t killed Topper. The Apache had, but they weren’t there for Porter to take out his raw frustration on.
“We’re getting off.” He stood, and Jessa obediently followed
Topper had said she would marry Porter and live the lifestyle she wanted once they had the money. It was weird to think that Port would have become Jessa’s uncle had her aunt not been killed. Topper trusted him. So would Jessa, although at the moment, he kind of scared her. Grief could make a person do strange, perhaps violent things. And she was with a man bred to violence. He was wanted, a killer. Violence was a way of life for him and for the man she had fallen in love with.
They stepped off the train. Baggage handlers loaded trunks. Last-minute passengers boarded in a rush. The pair made their way slickly through the throngs and retrieved Bean, then fetched Porter’s horse. They saw nothing of Sheriff Sam Curry and left town quietly and without notice. Was he still in the Blacklog mountain range, hunting the men Porter used to ride with—one of them being Mississippi—or had he dealt justice to them and was now searching for the money?
Porter only stopped to rest when Bean began to wheeze. He didn’t want to ride double, especially with a posse out there somewhere, plus Clint and the others. Although, he counted Mississippi as an ally.
The next morning, they lumbered wearily down into the basin. The closer they got to the pit, that man-eating ground that had swallowed Topper, the damper the air grew, giving them a ghostly feeling of being watched. It all around spooked Jessa. She kept Bean riding right up the ass of Porter’s horse. He turned and frowned at her a couple times. Then she’d back off, but only a step or two. She held her rifle across her lap. Port, his pistol in hand, was watchful from under the brim of his hat. Maybe the Indians were smart for holding store by superstitions. Fog hung low over the ground, and that songbird wasn’t singing. No critters were making noise. It was eerie and about half made her believe in spooks.
Ahead of them loomed the sinkhole, big and blank and deathly still and silent. Porter pulled up reins ten feet from the drop. Neither of them, she suspected, wanted to look in there and see what had become of Topper after days of heat, animals, and natural decay. And Jessa was thankful the hole was deep enough that they couldn’t smell her rotting.
“So where’s it at?” Porter snapped. Being there wasn’t easy for either of them.
“Over there.” Jessa pointed with a shaky finger.
They worked together and dug feverishly. She figured they both just wanted to get the hell out of there. Porter lifted the first sack out of the ground. The other sack she had buried in a different spot, not putting all her eggs in one basket. Topper had taught her that. Porter grinned, then opened it and peered inside. His face beamed. It was half, fifty thousand dollars, except what she had taken to buy the train ticket. He gave a whoop, and she laughed.
“Well, looky thar. Would’ve never guessed yous two was workin’ together.” Clint’s mean voice came out of nowhere, followed by Rascal’s crude laughter.
Both Jessa and Porter sprang to their feet. Jessa’s rifle was out of reach, propped against a tree three feet away. Porter had his pistol, but his hands were on the money and he was facing two armed men whose guns were drawn. Where was Mississippi? Had the posse gotten him and the other one, Jay?
Not a word was said to negotiate their lives for the money. Clint’s pistol blasted once. Porter got slammed with a bullet in the gut, throwing him backward, stumbling toward the hole where Topper lay at the bottom. Jessa would be next. She rushed in a flying leap toward Porter before Clint could fire again. There was simply no chance of them surviving Clint’s bullets at point blank range, but they might live through the fall. She tackled him, and they fell balled together as one. Her scream echoed up as they plummeted. All sound was cut off when they whacked the ground. Blackness overtook her as she rolled off Porter. As her eyes closed, the last thing she saw was Topper’s maggot-ridden face.
CHAPTER 7
When Jessa groggily came awake, next to her in the dirt were the aged bones of someone not so lucky. A skull lay separate from what looked to be an arm bone. It was yellowish-brown with decay and had been chewed on, so she wasn’t sure. Maybe a leg. Pieces of gray-colored marrow were scattered everywhere. Some of the bones had been there so long they were growing moss.
Porter moaned listlessly. He was alive! Oh, thank God. He was gutshot, though, and most didn’t survive a wound like that or a twenty-foot drop. The stench of death shrouded them, turning Jessa’s stomach. The odor was so foul she was afraid to open her mouth for fear of tasting it. She listened for voices above. The stupid songbird chirped his sad song, and that was it. She didn’t count that to mean they were alone, though.
Jessa leaned over, holding her pounding head. Every bone in her ached with stiffness. She lightly shook Porter. “Port, wake up.”
He stirred for a moment. Then his eyes fluttered open. The damn fool. She could be on a train to a new life if not for him. She could shoot him herself, but at the moment, in this pit with dead littering the ground, she was just glad to see something alive. She grinned, but they weren’t out of this yet. He probably couldn’t move, or he’d start bleeding again. If he could move, it wouldn’t be fast or far.
Jessa didn’t have her rifle. That left them with six shots in his holster. Clint or one of them likely had run off Bean and Port’s horse, which left them on foot, and that was only if they could find a way out of that pit. Porter wasn’t climbing out. Jessa doubted she could climb out, and she was only scraped up and bleeding some, no major injuries.
They would both need water soon, as the sun rose overhead. She must have been out for hours. She looked around, trying to keep her eyes off of what was left of Topper. There in the dirt near the body were animal tracks. Not the small critter prints that she had expected to nibble at the remains. Those were wolf tracks. No animal that big could climb down the sides of that hole. It was basically a dirt cliff in the rough shape of a circle. There must be another way in.
Unsteadily, Jessa got to her feet, then walked along the nearest wall, suddenly canopied by the ground above. The hole extended underground, forming a long, cavernous room. Seventy-five feet wide and deep, if not eighty. Dirt and stone naturally formed pillars here and there, holding up massive sections of earth over her head. Crumbles of dirt specked her shoulders as she slowly crept farther into the dark. None of it could be seen from above. Just the opening, the gap they had fallen through, and the ground directly below was exposed to the eye when standing at the top. Light from behind her, where Porter groaned painfully, scantly lit her path. Then, unexpectedly, not far in front of her, a speck of sunshine shone through from above. She walked faster, a hope rising within her. Was this the way out?
She stopped and looked up at the hole directly above. The bright rays touched her face. Dirt, stone, tree branches, and whatever else had been on the ground at one time or another had caved in there, forming an incline. Lots of animal tracks had stamped the ground, coming and going over the years.
The hole wasn’t big enough for her to shoulder some of Porter’s weight and climb through together. One at a time, they could fit, if Porter was strong enough. He wasn’t, and Jessa refused to leave him. If he was lucid enough to m
ake a thought, he’d expect her go get help. He needed the bullet dug out of him. Before she left, she brought him water in the bowl of his hat and made him as comfortable as possible. He might not have to worry about Clint or the Apache, but that wolf might come back and fresh meat was better than scavenging.
Jessa hustled toward town. She’d been right. Bean and Porter’s horse were gone. A quick glance told her they hadn’t found where she’d buried the other sack of money. Had they even noticed that they only had half? After all that time of hunting, they were probably just celebrating and hadn’t taken a close look. Today, they would, and they might come back.
Porter was hidden well. She’d never heard, not even from the old timers, about that second hole. But when she brought Doc back with her, she didn’t want to run into Clint again.
It was past midnight when she banged on Doc’s door. She was breathless, and her legs quivered. Lamplight erupted inside, flowing through the window into the dark.
“Who is it?” Doc said through the door.
“It’s me, Jessa.”
The door swung open. “Get inside.” He quickly ushered her in, closing the door with a bang. “Sam Curry is here in town. He and his posse have been riding roughshod over everyone. They want those men, your friend included.” Doc’s deep sigh was both troubled and hinted at relief. “Butch is still alive and talking a little, enough to make his needs known when he’s with it. If Sheriff Curry finds him, I’m afraid there won’t be a thing your father can do to help me.” He slumped into a chair.
What she had to say wouldn’t be any easier for him to swallow, maybe tougher if they were spotted leaving town. Sam Curry had seen Jessa with Clint and his gang at her cabin that day. He hadn’t seen them fighting her. But he’d witnessed Mississippi saving her and her mule. From that, assumptions could be made. She was in the middle of it, neck deep in crap. Doc was in it too. Not as deep maybe, but there was no explaining Butch in the other room without looking guilty of something.
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