Shotgun (19 page)

“Whath abouth my thare of gold?”

Creed said, “You're family, I carried you. But the prisoners' escape is on your head. That's what happened to your share.” Creed turned his eyes to the sound of Fat Gut's heavy breathing. “I had other plans, but these men are saving your life. You should appreciate that. Now get the hell out.”

Gut was about to say more, but thought better of it, as he brought the nag around, spurring her side too hard, and taking off at a run. Heading into Wyoming, leaving the rest behind.

Smythe looked down at Hector, who was amazed at the events of the previous minutes. “You're gonna catch flies in that mouth, you don't close it.”

Creed, settled into his Pride, said, “He needs a ride.”

Smythe said, “That horse's your eyes?”

“Better.”

“Okay, boy-o, let's see what mama feeds ya.”

Smythe extended his good arm, and pulled Hector onto the back of his saddle with a single, sweeping motion. Pain gripped him, but he didn't give it away. Fire Rider Smythe angled his skeleton-horse around, heading back toward the horizon, as Hector settled in. Creed's Pride followed, the captain holding the reins easy, with Fuller behind the bunch, keeping everyone in his sights.

No one was in a hurry against the snow and the darkening sky.

Smythe smiled at Hector. “You look like a veteran. Been with the captain a long time?”

“Pa rode with him, and he got killed, so he took me in. I'm his eyes and ears sometimes. Other times, he ain't too happy with me.”

“I imagine you'll have a few more years together, yet.”

“If I can ask, how you know each other? You don't sound like anybody else who rides with him.”

“No, you can't ask that. But I'll tell you I hail from the coast of England. You know where that is?”

“Across the ocean someplace. That's how come you talk like you do?”

“Right.”

“And does everyone there paint up their horses?”

Smythe reached behind his back, giving Hector his red hood, “In my business, sometimes it works best if people are a little scared of you. Throws 'em off their game.”

“I never seen nothing like this before.”

“When I was your age, my dad told me about the demons of Romney Marsh. You never heard of that one, right?”

“No, sir.”

“They were pirates, did up themselves and their horses like demons, raiding French ships for booty. Come riding right out o' hell, scaring everybody to death, sometimes taking a shipful of goods without firing a shot.”

“What happened if anybody tried to fight back?”

Smythe made a slashing motion across his throat. Hector's voice was small. “And you're the leader here?”

“Not the leader boy-o, but the painting-up was all mine.”

Hector nodded, as a sting of wind rushed by his ear. There was a sound like bee wings, and a tiny pain. The snow blew heavier, and he brushed the cold from his ear, coming back with bloody fingers.

“H—Hey, I think I been shot!”

Fat Gut's second and third shots were distant puffs of smoke that ended in ground strikes. He pressed the nag full-out, galloping toward Creed and his men, with two pistols firing. His hands flailed in all directions, sending the bullets every which way.

Creed called out, “Hector!”

“I'm okay, sir! I can still do my duty!”

“Good. Sniper!”

Fuller had the Morgan-James, his thumb locking the hammer in place, steadying his shot.

Fuller said, “He's a mighty big target,” before pulling the trigger, and exploding Fat Gut's chest. The slug passed clean through, hitting the trunk of a bare tree some yards behind him.

The nag carried Fat awhile longer, before he slipped off her back and hit the ground, eyes locked open.

Creed said, “I could hear it. That was a clean shot.”

Fuller lowered the rifle. “Yes, it was. And at a good distance.”

“Hector! Report!”

Hector was blotting the blood from his ear with Smythe's hood. “I'm fine, Captain. Had to earn my wound sooner or later.”

“You're a good boy.” Creed gently nicked Pride to start again. “Sniper Fuller, why didn't you take the target when I asked the first time?”

Fuller eased alongside Creed. “The fat bastard never shot at me before.”

 

 

The snow was gentle in the air, large flakes dancing around Bishop and White Fox, as they rode along the edge of the stream, thin bits of ice cracking under their horses. The sun was dipping, bringing a snap to the cold coming out of the woods, but Bishop didn't shield his face with collar or scarf; he wanted to feel the purity of it. The clean.

Bishop said, “That was a good thing you did, helping that child.”

“Ugly child.”

He laughed. “Like a two-snout pig. Never argue with a father.”

White Fox smiled. “
Néhnéšétse
.”

“Yes, I guess it was both of us.”

“She needed a doctor, not just me.”

Bishop let that thought hang for a moment, and then: “We helped her, and a few hours before, we killed a man. More than one. A hell of a lot more.”

Her voice waa flat. “Your journey became a war.”

“And you knew it was going to happen.”

Bishop looked at her. “We're riding in the wrong direction. We need to go back to the Goodwill.”

Fox didn't return it. “This is right.
Anôse
.”

“It isn't right. We don't know where the hell Beaudine went. We almost did.”

Fox finally met him. “Their horses had an army brand.”

“So, they were rustled.”

“There's a man, past the deep trees, who'll know about the stolen horses, and the red ones. Everything.”

“
Ma'êhóóhe
.”

Fox didn't respond to her given name, she just repeated, “Everything.”

They leapt across a small, leaf-filled gully, to an open break in the woods where a row of pines had been cut into a semicircle, their branches bent back, tied to stakes in the ground. The cones that had fallen around the trees were neatly stacked beside them.

Bishop brought up the bay, looked around. “Did we just cross a line?”

Fox turned, about to call out, when a large branch whip-snapped from the side of the largest pine, slamming Bishop in the chest, and knocking him hard, backwards off his horse. It was a trip-wire cannon shot that had the bay rearing, front legs chopping the air.

Bishop's head slammed onto the flat of a rock. He turned over in sharp pain, trying to find his way back to full consciousness, when the heavy rope slipped around his ankles, hoisting him into the air.

He was spinning.

He heard Fox's voice: distant, screaming, in Cheyenne. They were twisted half words that Bishop struggled to figure, if he could just hang on to the edge of the light. And stay there.

That's when the dark swallowed him.

There were five talons to it, each pointed at the end and sharpened raw along the side. They were attached to a metal wristband by precise welding, with just a hint of a bump where the iron pieces were joined. The bumps actually looked to be knuckles on someone's hand, and not sloppy workmanship.

The spots marking the sides of the talons could have been blood, or flecks of rust. Bishop's eyes weren't focused yet, and he couldn't tell. The claw was mounted on a cut-stone wall just feet from where he was lying, between a Cheyenne warrior's shield crossed in black and white hide, and several long-knives, each in its own colorfully beaded sheath.

Bishop moved his head, and water tear-drizzled down his face. He bolted up, the bear rug covering him falling forward, as he pulled the wet cloth from his forehead, tossed it aside.

Noah Crawford picked the cloth up from the hard-dirt floor. “I keep a clean house, goddamn it!”

Crawford's voice was an explosion. His face, something carved from the side of a mountain, was surrounded by an acre of matted, grey hair. Brows were wild tufts over two lumps of coal, his mouth and nose shapes hammered to fit into this mess that'd been blasted apart, and put back together wrong.

There was a hogleg tied down to one thigh, and a Colt Lightning in his belt, almost covered by his wave of a belly. He slapped Bishop's feet to the floor with saddle-sized hands, “You took it hard, but I've had worse. What are you drinkin', and don't say well water.”

“Anything.”

Muttering thick in Cheyenne, Crawford lumbered to the other side of the rounded dugout, stopping to sniff at a cook pot in the fireplace. The curved ceiling and sides were rough-cut logs, cemented by sloppy mud and straw, while the wall Bishop rested against was bare rock, protected by animal skins crazily quilted across it.

Crawford said, “Sorry about the trap, but a man's got to protect his patch.”

Bishop threw his legs over the bed, catching the edge of a spear with his foot. War clubs, bows, and blades of mountain tribes were all within reach, propped against the wall or under the furniture. By the door, there was a cabinet with ten books, all worn cloth binding, placed neatly on its top shelf. A double-blade fighting axe took up the rest of the space.

White Fox handed Bishop oily whiskey in a small bowl. “You can drink.” She touched Bishop's hand, lifting the bowl to his mouth. He drank. She looked to Crawford, who brought a large knife down on a slab of salted beef he was cutting, the meat not pulling from the bone.

Crawford swore, and she said: “I'm needed outside,
ného'éehe
.”

Fox moved to the door, taking one of the books from the shelf before leaving.

Bishop waited for her to leave, then said to Crawford, “I know what that means.”

The sun was actually showing its face as White Fox sat on a rail of the corral fence,
Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque,
by Edgar Allan Poe, open on her lap. The corralled horses nickered and nudged, and she would absently stroke a mane, but stayed lost in the pages.

Crawford stood against the planked front door, watching, before looking down to Bishop, who was beside him, finishing the whiskey in the bowl. “Always the same book, always the same place on the goddamned fence. That's how she learned to talk, that book.”

Crawford waited another few minutes for a look from White Fox that never came, then stomped around to the back of the dugout, grunting at the Morning Star and five-talon claws painted on its walls. Bishop followed him to the smith's shop tucked in the back. It was a clean space, with bricked stove, crated scrap, and tools of all types, some for finer work, neatly laid out. It reminded him of his medical office, not a place to forge horseshoes.

“I didn't even know all this was back here 'til a month after I settled in.”

“I thought you built this house.”

Crawford took down a hammer and tongs. “Hell, no. I been living above the Platte River for a couple of years, and come down to get away from the goddamned Indian wars. Came out of them woods, saw this place and thought it damn nice. I figured to kill whoever was inside, and take it. These other boys beat me to it, hanged the foreigners what built it. So I took care of them, moved in. I guess the foreigner who put it up was a smithy, so after drinking everything in the house, I wandered back here and learned myself. Come on, use that one hand you got, give it some air.”

Bishop pumped a small bellows to feed the coals in an iron scuttle. Crawford watched him. “You get why I'm tellin' you this?”

“I think I do.”

“I know she never says nothing about me; what about her mother?” The coals began to glow, and Crawford inserted the tongs and several iron punches into the heat.

“She doesn't speak about herself.”

“Well, she's back on that fence, and if I believed in anything, I'd say that was a miracle.”

“She came here on her own, to talk to you about horses.”

Crawford's beard shifted with his face, almost revealing a smile. “I think you're here for this.” He dropped the blasted-open shotgun rig on the workbench.

“I know what happened to you. That son of a bitch she married build this thing?”

Bishop couldn't hide his surprise. “Yeah. I told him what I needed.”

“A new arm.” Crawford inspected the weapon, before shoving the barrel into the hot coals. “Piss-poor job, but I ain't surprised. Worked for me right here. That's how come she knew him. When he said he wanted to marry her, her mother said no, but I figured it was better than the other trash that was hangin' around.”

Crawford turned the rig over, as the barrel started smoking. “How many times you sew her up, Doc?”

“Twice. Set a few broken bones. My wife always helped.”

Crawford pulled the rig from the scuttle, breaking apart the last of the barrel and breach, the pieces dropping. “If I'd known what was going on, I would've had a great time killing that streak of piss.”

“She did it all right.”

“He suffer?”

Bishop's silence was answer enough for Crawford. “Nice to know she took something from her daddy. This how you firing these barrels?”

Crawford held out the rig, so Bishop could grab hold of the leather harness and pull it away from the scorched remains of the gunstock. Crawford snatched the leather back. “I don't like this trigger line. Get tangled, move the wrong way, kill the wrong man.”

Bishop said, “It does the job.”

“Not good enough, and you know it. I'm a whitesmith, too. Work in cold metals, and damn good at it. I'll rig it new.”

“I've seen your work. They still call you
Vóhpóóhe
?

“She's teaching you, right? Painted them symbols on the side of the place when she was a kid.”

They both looked back at Fox, who remained buried in Poe's words, never glancing up. Her father continued, “Before I ever married her mother, Crow warriors would come down, snoop around, and I gutted a few. That's when the Cheyenne started with that White Claw. Had to get special permission from the chief for the wedding, but we got it because I'd killed his enemy. Nobody's bothered me since. Helps to have a reputation.”

Bishop said, “Yeah, it can.”

“I already know your'n. You made that breather for her. We ran out of medicine to help with that when she was a kid, but you figured something out. Probably saved her.”

“She gave it to a little girl she thought needed it more.”

“Gets that from her mother.”

Crawford threw the pieces of the double barrel onto the scrap pile. “Doctor, I'm going to build you a weapon you can use.”

 

 

Howard held old man Kirby down, one massive arm across his chest, and a hand tight on his mouth. Kirby twisted and kicked as Beaudine withdrew his blade from the man's belly, while Chaney pretended to check the dynamite wagon. He sorted through a few boxes of fuses and caps, found a dead mouse and tossed it—did anything not to hear the last bits of that old man's struggle.

Kirby finally went slack, and Howard let out, “Was he stronger than I thought, or just being stubborn?”

Beaudine said, “I gave the right order, not to shoot. Who knows who'd hear it? It was good strategy.”

“Damn, it took a long time for Kirby to give it up.”

Chaney stepped up to the wagon's driver's seat. “All he had to do was drive us, didn't have to fight.”

Beaudine took a place beside him. “That wasn't Kirby's way. I've known that old man a lot of years, and he'd want paying, or go to the law. He always had his hand out.”

Chaney said, “His dynamite sure helped the fight.”

“As long as I was throwin' it.” Howard counted the cash from Kirby's pocket, stretched out in the back of the open wagon, comfortable between two dynamite cases, his legs dangling over the side. “And those idjit buddies he sent us all got dead.”

Beaudine slipped the cleaver beneath the driver's seat, “Kirby lived his life in the rough country, and this is how he knew he'd end. I feel good not to disappoint him.”

Howard said, “Hey, he's got a plunger back here! Use that instead of them damn cigars. Made me sick as hell.”

Chaney looked to Beaudine. “Now what? Who do we throw the dynamite at? Or shoot at?”

Beaudine measured his words. “Lem always claimed you to be a gambler, but you don't know strategy. You must not be a very good one.”

Chaney said, “Lem mouthed off. A lot. This capture did not go as planned, so I want to know about the new plan. Major.”

“It's simple. We are the target and Bishop wants us. So we'll let him come, and be ready to meet him.”

“Like all that craziness that just happened? What about them riders?”

“You don't get that many attacking for nothing. That's more proof the gold is there for taking.”

Chaney pressed. “By who? And when?”

Beaudine shut his eyes. “If you want out, we can leave you with Kirby.”

“You're not answering the question. Try and game me now? I'll kill you.”

Chaney looked at Kirby and didn't answer Beaudine, who was now rubbing his temples, his head rocking back. “If you're driving, Mr. Chaney, head the team for the next town and wake me when we're near a clean bed and hot food. And we'll strategize to your satisfaction. I believe you want to be going northeast.”

Chaney snapped the reins on the two mules harnessed in front of them, heading the wagon down a half-frozen trail leading out of the foothills.

 

 

Bishop dipped into the cook pot, trying to balance a clay bowl on his knee. Fox swatted him away. “You're no help, so sit and enjoy it.”

Bishop settled on the floor in front of a small tree-stump table, tucking his shirt behind his back, then running the palm of his left hand over his clean-shaven face.

“A man shouldn't hide behind a beard.”

“I've had it for so long, it feels strange.”

“Because you've changed.”

Bishop couldn't deny it. His fingers told him the soft roundness of his face was gone, the scar from Chester Pardee's knife as much a sign of who he was now as the shotgun rig on his right arm.

Fox smiled. “From now on, you shave yourself. Do you want my vanity glass?”

She ladled jerky soup and dumplings into clay bowls with intricate designs of deer running around the edges.

“This is all he lives on. All he ever lived on.”

Bishop took his bowl. “And whiskey.”

“And whiskey.”

Bishop said, “
Vé'ho'émahpe
.”

Fox sat opposite. “That's right. You can eat.”

“Shouldn't we wait, for your father?”

Fox set out a plate of cornbread. “He's at my mother's grave. He'll be back in the morning.” She held out her right hand. “You can give thanks.”

Bishop squeezed her hand, and they gave silent thanks, for the food and the warmth. Bishop squeezed her hand again, and Fox broke his grasp, started eating.

“Why didn't you tell me about Edgar Allan Poe?”

She said, “I read to learn, and haven't learned it all. Yet.”

“‘Morella'? I go back to that one most.”

“Still, not perfect.”

Bishop smiled. “You don't speak so you can find out what everyone else is thinking.”

Fox cast her eyes to Bishop, ate a dumpling from her spoon. “When I'm perfect. When will you be perfect?”

Bishop grinned. “
Nenóveto
?”

“Good. Then soon, we can both talk the way we want.”

“Did your father buy those books for you?”

“No.” Fox broke a piece of cornbread, put the rest in front of Bishop. “He killed a man for his horse. They were in his saddlebags. My father is
not
like your father.”

Fox's words dropped off. Bishop gave her time before saying, “He knows about your life.”

“Memories of what
náhko'éehe
said.”

“Your mother told him, about when your husband hurt you.”

“Right before she died.” Fox poured the last of the soup into Bishop's bowl. “You saved me. And I will do for you. Until I can't.”

 

 

The lantern cast stale yellow on the two grave markers. One was flat steel, polished, with fine scrolling and the Morning Star hammered into its surface. Just below the star were the words, A
RCHISHA
. M
OTHER AND
W
IFE
. S
HE
L
IVES
A
LWAYS
. The other was a wooden cross with H
ORACE
S
MITH
burned onto it.