Shotgun (18 page)

White Fox opened the medical kit, as Bishop reached inside for a small mirror. “How long has it been since she's washed?”

“I try my best. We got a bathtub, but it's packed away.”

“Part of getting her well is keeping her clean.”

Bishop handed the mirror to Fox, who angled it to catch a ball of sunlight, which she focused on May Showers' chin. May hit her father with furious eyes, clutched the sides of the hammock, and was about to twist.

Albert stammered something about behaving, but Bishop cut into it: “May, I don't look like a doctor, but I am, and I know how to make folks feel better. All I want you to do is open your mouth just a little bit, so I can look inside with this glass. I promise not to sneak in any nasty medicine. And, I do anything you don't like your sister's going to shoot me with her squirrel gun. Okay?”

The girl's jaw was clenched angry-tight. White Fox ran her hand across her forehead, brushing her unwashed hair out of her eyes, and letting it rest there. May sagged her mouth open. Bishop adjusted an examining lens to see into her throat, illuminated by the sunlight reflected in the hand mirror.

“There's no infection.”

“The Little Rock docs said it was the bronchitis.”

“Her airway's blocked. That's different.”

Bishop held out his hand, and Fox automatically gave him his monaural stethoscope. He placed it on May's chest, and listened, looked to Fox and said, “She sounds like you.”

White Fox reached into the medical kit.

The reservoir of the oxygen pump filled instantly with running water from the stream. White Fox picked out slivers of ice, while May Flowers peered over her shoulder.

“What's that thing? It worth any money?”

“For your sister.”

“What's it worth?”

Fox stood, checking the rubber tubes. “It will save her life.”

May Flowers stayed on Fox's heels as they walked back to the wagon. “But what's it worth?”

May Showers' hands fought the celluloid oxygen mask, clawing at it until Bishop pulled it back. “May, this is what you need. You don't have to do anything but breathe. Won't that feel good? No more coughing?”

The little girl screamed, throwing a tiny, balled fist, before doubling over, her chest racking. Fox held her hands as Bishop fitted the mask over her mouth and nose, tightening the strap around her head.

“Turn it!”

Albert jumped at Bishop's voice, and started to crank the device, bringing the oxygen from the water through the tube to the mask. May Showers took the new air in, but her hands went to the mask again, her fingers clawing.

Albert said, “Daughter May Flowers? Mr. Foster's song, now.”

May Flowers stood behind her sister, her downturned face sullen and dark, but she began to sing, “Slumber, my darling, thy mother is near, / Guarding thy dreams, from all terror and fear,” bringing her voice up from someplace beyond her, filling the wagon.

May Showers settled in her hammock, breathing quietly, her sister's voice wrapping around her.

May Flowers carried Stephen Foster's lullaby out of the wagon on wings, to the edge of the stream and the horses, where Bishop and Fox were checking their saddles. They listened to that perfect voice, clear as mountain air, and a smile traveled between them. Albert shrugged at his daughter's talent.

Bishop said, “That's an amazing gift she's got.”

“Like their mama. Not much to look at, but they do have those voices. Both of 'em.”

“I didn't presume, Albert. Did your wife pass?”

“No, sir, she run off. So guess I'm divorced, but without papers. Uglier than a two-snout pig, but she found another fella.”

The song hid White Fox's reaction, and she sneezed her laugh, as Bishop nodded toward the dresser. “Then, I suppose if it doesn't pain too much, sell one of her pieces, get that wheel? You can go to town now, your girls will be all right.”

“Now.” Albert dug his hands in his pockets. “That's just what I'm going to do, get fixed up, and to my new job. But I don't have no money to pay you, Doc. You want to take a chair? They're nice sitters. Frenchie imports from New Orleans.”

Bishop secured his med kit in the saddlebag. “Your daughter's sleeping easy because of this young woman. That breather belongs to her.”

“Then I thank you greatly, ma'am. Maybe you'd like to take something with you?”

White Fox got on her horse. “I am.”

“There are a lot of good reasons to kill a man, but target practice ain't one of 'em,” Fuller said.

“Is he being ironic? Is there a smile there?” Creed asked.

Hector gently gaffed Creed's Pride to quicken his pace, so that he was now riding parallel with Fuller. The sniper glanced at the boy and Captain Creed, who were saddled together. There wasn't a hint of a smile on Fuller's face, or anything to read in his eyes, except the burning from the bullet in him.

“Satisfied?”

Hector nodded his approval of Fuller's expression and response, a kid pretending to be an officer in a mirror.

Fuller returned his eyes to the horizon, and the storm roiling there, its light pre-snow just starting to reach them.

“Report?”

Hector spoke over his shoulder. “Sir, I'm looking at Mr. Fuller, and I think he's saying exactly what he means.”

“I won't make it a direct order, but you'd be doing the company right, getting rid of that useless sack.”

Fuller kept riding, his hands almost going to his sniper's rifle. Almost.

Creed's Pride whinnied. The captain leaned in, squeezing Hector's shoulders to the bone. “You're holding Pride back. Appreciate the honor of where you are; let him have his way.”

Hector loosened his pull, trying to fall into the rhythm of Pride's gait, but was still a plowboy on a thoroughbred. The boy's awkward movements, sputtering and gangly, got a half smile from Fuller, but he stayed fixed on the flattening land, and the mountains that were changing shape and color the farther they rode into Wyoming.

Behind them, a ways back, Fat Gut was running his nag hard across the flats, trying to catch up. He yelled to everyone at the top of his lungs, but there was no attention paid to his mush.

Fat Gut tried calling again, and Creed said to Fuller, “You still favoring that shoulder?”

“I expect to for some time.”

Creed considered the sniper's response by adjusting his sunglasses, new snow collecting on the lenses. “We still have a mission, and I expect every man to do his part.”

“I will, sir.” Fuller let that stand, and then: “I already have, as best I could.”

“Thinking of your failure in the woods?”

“I'm thinking about my wife and son.”

Creed's voice rose. “Want to do right by them? Then you need to know just how much your skills have been compromised, to make sure you can claim your fair share of that money. There's a target running up on us, and I'm giving you a direct order to fire at it.”

“I'll get myself back up. You'll see.”

Creed said, “Actually, I won't. But I'll know.”

Hector yanked Pride to a sudden stop, jolting the saddle. Creed slammed the boy hard with a double-fist against his side, knocking him clean out of his stirrups, and landing him hard.

“What are you doing, boy? You don't treat this animal with disrespect!”

Hector stood, rubbing the feeling back into his elbow, his eyes trying to focus on a rider in the distance. “Truly sorry, sir. It's that, ahead. I-I never seen nothing like it.”

He took a rosewood and dragon's blood rosary from his pocket, and held the simple wooden cross close to his lips. “My mama, she swore me a Catholic. Don't know why.”

The horse was a living skeleton, skull head mounted on bleached bones, with fire pouring from its sides. A red, faceless demon, was running the animal straight out of hell, cutting through the grey of the horizon, to come for Creed, Fuller, and Hector.

“Report! What is it you're seeing?”

Fuller put his arm through his rifle sling, and brought up the weapon. “Man in a hood, sir.”

“Sniper, I imagine you've already got your finger on the trigger.” Creed patted his horse's neck. “It's not needed.”

Fuller steadied the butt of the Morgan-James against his still, blood-wet shoulder, shutting one eye to site this new target. “We'll see.”

Fat Gut short-pulled on his horse, bringing it to a stumbling halt beside Creed's Pride. Gut and the nag were both sweat-winded, and his words still beaten by broken teeth: “It'th about timeth you thtopped! Dinn't you hear me, cousin?”

Creed said, “We heard.”

Gut squinted in the direction everyone was looking, at the Fire Rider getting closer. “Who the thell is dat?”

“Exactly.”

The skeletal horse eased its run, the flames in its mane and tail relaxing, as it slowed to a perfect stop before Creed. Fuller kept his rifle steady, aiming at the place directly between the eyeholes of the crimson hood.

The Fire Rider waved. “Captain, you're fighting light.”

Creed said, “These men are my handpicked best.”

“Not all of them.”

Smythe pulled off his hood, smoothing his wiry red hair with one hand, while keeping the other resting in his lap. He looked to Fuller, bit off a chaw, then rubbed his shoulder where White Fox had left her arrow.

“You look to have the same problem I do, boy-o. That shoulder? Little whore stick you with an arrow, too?”

Fat Gut got out between laughs, “Nopeth! A bulleth!”

Smythe looked directly at the inescapable barrel of the long-range rifle. “That's a beef-headed way of doing things, ain't it? You loaded? Capped?”

Fuller nodded, and Smythe said, “Then lower it. You've all made too many damn mistakes. Don't make another. I'm taking you in, so you can alibi yourselves.”

“Stand down, sniper Fuller.” Fuller let a few heart-beats pass, then followed Creed's order, pulling the rifle up, resting it on his hip, arm still through the sling.

Creed said, “Did you get the prisoners?”

“No, Captain, we ain't.”

“We sent a message, and you had a lot more men than I did.”

“Beaudine brought the whole Goodwill down on their damn heads.”

“I'm a military officer—”

“A blind man.”

Creed continued as if Smythe hadn't uttered a thing. “—who captured Bishop, and held on to him. Most of my volunteers are left frozen in those mountains, but we were better than you. A hundred fighting a madman, and you lost.”

Smythe ran his fingers through his beard, thoughtfully eyeing Fat Gut before saying, “Looks to me like
you
lost, mate. She kicked your teeth out? You know, there are a half dozen I could name that I'd rather see on that horse than you.”

Creed said, “Now, I can agree with your blather.”

Gut swallowed his spit, forcing his words out slow and dry: “I-am-a-good-fighter. Always-do-wath-my-cousin-saith.”

Smythe said, “You can't even defend how worthless you are. Ride on, I'm not taking you in.”

“You're justh a pristhon guard! You got nothin' to thay about nothin'.”

“I was a guard, and what I am now doesn't matter. What you've got to remember is that whether I'm wearing a uniform or a hood, I'll kill you just as soon as sneeze.”

Fat Gut tried a busted-teeth smile, to show he wouldn't be backed down, so Smythe drew a Colt six-shot with a worn handle from his red tunic. “I said, ride on. Or be dinner for the wolves. Either way.”