The Thicket (20 page)

“Finally the light came and I could easily see the tracks of Winton’s horse mingled among the tracks of the Comanche ponies. Winton should have known he was being led into a trap, but he was too blind with anger. They were making it easy for us to follow, and a little later on I saw they were adding to Winton’s anger. His tracks led to a draw that dipped down into the land, and there was a stream running there, so small and weak of flow it was more like the run from a snotty nose than a real stream. The draw itself was enough to grab some shade, though, and I walked down in it, and leaned against a cool wall to escape the rising heat of the day and to rest my weary self. I took off my boots and laid my heels in the little bit of water for perhaps an hour. I judged it by the sun. I carried my boots with me and walked barefoot down the stream to cool my heels and to give my feet a rest from the boots. I came upon a hollow at one side of the draw, and in that indentation I saw naked feet, and the rest of whoever was in there was in the shade. I took a look, and it was Winton’s wife, or what was left of her. I knew she had been raped to death, as her legs were spread and her sex was bloody. Her nose and lips had been cut off and her mouth was stuffed with dirt. They had raped her and tortured her, and then killed her by stuffing her mouth and throat with dirt so she could not breathe. They had most likely held her feet while they stuffed her mouth, and I could tell from looking around, seeing horse tracks, the tracks of Indian feet, and the booted feet of Winton, that he, too, had found her. Felt he was close enough to her attackers he did not bother to bury her, feeling that he would come back to take care of the body later. I knew his thinking under the circumstances, and it was not good thinking. Those he had wanted to rescue were lost, and it would have been better to have shored up the body inside the hollow and to have collapsed the dirt on top of it. At least until he could go back and find a wagon and come for both the woman and the child. But his anger had overtaken him and made him as blind and savage as the Comanche.

“I put on my boots and plodded ahead, knowing full well I should not. My fondness for Winton kept me going, even though I knew that he cheated in cards and that he had hornswoggled me out of several bounties in my time, and had lied to me on frequent occasions, and had even spoken badly to me when he was drunk. But he was a boon companion otherwise, and I could at least always depend on him to be himself. I followed the stream until it trickled out into a spread and finally into nothing. It was really more of a runoff from recent rain I had not experienced, which accounted for its slimness. I would have known that sooner had I been thinking. I had, however, fortified myself by drinking from the stream, had found a lizard and bit its head off and sucked out its guts and had managed not to puke it. So I was not as weak as I might have been, which, considering what I was to discover, was a good thing.

“I think the Comanche thought Winton was the only one tracking them, had no idea I, too, was in pursuit. They had been purposely slow about drawing him in, and it had worked. By midday it was hot enough to sweat a Gila monster to death, and I was exhausted from walking and carrying the Sharps. I saw ahead a dark shape on the plain, and near it I saw other dark shapes. There were all manner of buffalo bones about, scattered in all the directions of the compass. In that spot there had been a mass slaughter of buffalo and a piling of bones. I got down on my belly and began to crawl. I crawled until I came upon one of the mounds of bones, a couple of big buffalo skulls among them. I laid up behind one of the skulls, eased an eye over it, saw that a pole had been put up right there in the prairie; and then I saw it was not a pole at all. It was an old scrub tree that had grown out there in the midst of nowhere by its lonesome, as if its sole purpose was to provide a stake for Winton. He was tied there, and there was a fire built of dried dung and sticks, or some such thing as the Comanche are able to do. They find sustenance and all their needs where no one else can find enough in the way of wood to pick their teeth. There were six Comanche, and I decided then and there they were the bulk of the war party, their number matching the horse tracks. The horses themselves were hobbled nearby, and all the Comanche were taking part in working on poor Winton, who by this time had begun to scream. They had removed burning sticks from the fire and were applying them to his face, and they were cutting him with knives, sawing off one of his ears. They were working on his ear when I placed the very Sharps I carry today, the one Winton used himself the other night, on top of the buffalo skull and took a bead. My first inclination was to kill Winton himself, to spare him the torture, and then it would be up to me to try and kill the Comanche or run them off before I myself could be killed. But when I looked down the barrel, I decided Winton was not too far along for rescue, so I beaded up on one of the Comanche, who at that very moment was slowly bringing a fiery stick toward Winton’s eye. I made that one my focus, and though it was nowhere near the dynamic shot that Billy Dixon made on a Comanche, it was a good shot. Of course, their delight and preoccupation with what they were doing, and not thinking anyone else was in pursuit, had allowed me to come quite close with less effort than would have normally been needed.

“I usually aim for the body, as it is a surer and larger target, but I caught this buck in the head—exploded it with that Sharps round as if it were a ripe squash. Now, I do not know if it is the way my memory works, or if it is the true event, but that Comanche’s head seemed to come completely off, and the body turn in my direction of its own accord, without a head, before collapsing. By that time, I had already without looking or thinking about it slipped another round into the rifle and was taking aim. I potted another one of the Comanche braves before the rest of them could decide to shit or go blind; got him in the back. That left four, and as is the practical nature of the Comanche, they bolted for their horses to make a run for it, possibly thinking those two accurate shots in rapid succession meant they were being pursued by a larger posse. By the time it takes to blink hard twice, the rest of them were on horseback, trying to make a break for it. Also in Comanche tradition, they were attempting to lead along the now-spare horses they had stolen as well as those belonging to their dead comrades. That gave me another shot, and I fired. I did not know for sure if I had hit one of them, but the rear-line Comanche dropped the guide rope on the stolen horses and lit out. They were gone before I could reload, having gathered their wits about them.

“When I was sure they were gone and not just trying to trick me, I went and cut Winton down and laid him out under that tree, which provided no shade at all. I then went and caught up two of the horses. Winton was not up for much, as you might suppose, so I took a little bag off one of the dead Comanche, found some awful mess of seeds and such in it, and gave it to Winton to eat, to build up his strength. I tore off some of the Indian’s clothing to make bandages for Winton’s head and put dirt on the burns to quell some of the pain. I tell you, with one ear cut off and bleeding, and burned up good and raw, you would have thought that at this point Winton would have been a quitter. But he was not. He got to his feet after a short rest and we took to the horses and he insisted on going after them, though he no longer had a rifle, only a knife we had taken off one of the Comanche dead.

“We went on ahead, though, and before long we come upon a dead Comanche they had laid out and covered with a blanket, being practical about the matter. My shot had been a good one after all. Winton took to the body like a butcher. I had to walk off and find a place to be alone while he carved it up, yelling and cussing it all the while, as if it might hear him.

“When he was done with his butchery, we went after them. After two days passed we had to give it up. They had by this time taken to all their Indian tricks and melted away, perhaps into Palo Duro Canyon. Thing is, we never saw them again, not even a track of them. We started back, and by this time we had both grown weak. Except for me shooting a rabbit with the Sharps, tearing it up a might, we didn’t have anything to eat for the next couple of days heading back home. The horses lived on what grass was growing, and a bit of trapped water here and there. When we arrived back at Winton’s homestead we rested up a couple days, then we went out and found the bodies of his family and brought them back and buried them under a large oak tree, Winton’s place being the only spot around with ample greenery and water. We stayed on another day and put some supplies together, and after Winton visited the graves, we burned down the cabin because that is what he wanted, and we rode off, and that is how Winton got his scars.”

B
y bright morning we were well back at it. As we went, Eustace looking for sign, I glanced over at Winton with his scars, thought about the story Shorty told me. I remembered what Winton told me, too, about killing. Considering his past I supposed it made sense he might have a different picture of it than I had. It also begin to come down on me why he had wanted to go on this hunt. It wasn’t just the money but the chance to save someone where before he hadn’t. That was as clear to me as the sun in the sky.

I thought about what Shorty had said about humans all being pretty much of the same nature. I couldn’t get it out of my mind, and couldn’t place God’s grace in there and make it work.

I was also thinking on thoughts that were more practical, like we were in country far less open than what Shorty and Winton had been in when chasing the Indians. It was easier to hide here, and Fatty was, in his own way, as dangerous as any Comanche. He was just mean as a snake for no other reason than it pleased him; all those men he had been with were like that, and I wondered then what made a man that way. I didn’t come up with any answers.

Where we were riding was a rolling hill country full of trees, and there was no good sure path to take. I was fearful one of the horses would find a hole to step into, or get snake-bit, or some such thing. The tracking seemed good, though, and Eustace was leading us along at a right smart pace. We hadn’t heard a peep out of Shorty about Eustace’s lack of tracking skills, but this may have been due to the fact that Eustace had lost his sense of humor on the matter.

We startled some birds and deer as we went, and every time a bird flushed or a deer leaped, I nearly messed myself thinking it was Fatty with a rifle. Each time the birds flushed, Hog dashed off in the bushes after them as if he might sprout wings and fly up to bite them.

Winding along on a narrow trail, a deer path, really, we rode mostly in single file. Jimmie Sue was right ahead of me when she turned and said, “It don’t appear like Fatty is trying to be careful. Maybe he don’t know we’re still after him. Eustace seems to be following him easy enough.”

Shorty, riding ahead of her, said without turning to look back, “Or he is bringing us where he wants us to go.”

I thought then of the Comanche and how they had led Winton into an ambush; all my fears about Fatty with a rifle came back, though they were appeased a might when Shorty said, “The benefit we have is I believe Fatty is trying to make his escape, perhaps find someplace to lick his wounds, which I would think are considerable. No one can say he is not a tough one, though. He took a pistol-whipping, got shot full of holes, has bled all over East Texas, killed folks along the way, run an automobile out of gas, and is still making time.”

Eustace said he figured Fatty was well ahead of us, but it was most likely a good idea to serve ourselves a supper of the things we had brought along and not even think about shooting. We determined a small fire to heat our supper was of no importance, as with all the trees and what distance Fatty had gained it wouldn’t serve as any warning. We were also careful not to use dry leaves or damp wood, as both would give off with too much smoke.

Eustace reckoned we might come upon Fatty the next day, him having fallen off his stolen horse, bled out, and died. I liked the sound of that, and I hoped for it. It made me feel as if that was a choice of God and not a bullet from one of our guns or a scatter from Eustace’s cannon.

That night me and Jimmie Sue didn’t go about the business of the night before, though this time I made no secret of us lying together, even if it was only in fitful slumber with an occasional touching of her on my part to make sure she was still there. I found her somewhat overwarm beneath our blankets, but it was comforting to have her there just the same, so I stood it just fine.

Eustace took the first watch, and then Shorty, and then Winton. It was supposed to be my turn thereafter, and then Spot’s. Jimmie Sue was ruled out, her being a woman, but it occurred to me she would have done right well at it, being of sound mind and a certain determination. She had shot at Fatty back at the trading post, so it stood to reason she was no shrinking violet. Nonetheless, the others weren’t for it.

Way it worked out, though, was the first three watched and never woke me or Spot. I don’t know if it was them being polite, or if they feared I’d be inadequate and that Spot, during the night, might decide to go home.

When I awoke the next morning, it was to the others preparing their horses. Hog was sitting on his haunches, watching as if he were a supervisor of some sort. Jimmie Sue was already up as well, along with Spot. I was the last to rise. I thought to say something about it, but the truth was, much as I wanted to find my sister, I had begun to feel powerfully tuckered out. Like down in my bones there were weights of some sort, and the weights were dragging me deep into the ground and I didn’t have the gumption to climb out. I felt older than I was and meaner than I wanted to be.

The country grew rough enough we were not always able to ride, and had to lead the horses through the forest, traveling the way Fatty had gone, the way Eustace was tracking. I stole a number of sidelong glances at Jimmie Sue, and the more I looked at her the prettier she got. She was in the rough, so to speak. Anything that might have passed for makeup had long since vanished. Her hair was tied back and bound with a black ribbon, and the tail of her bound hair flapped against her back in such a way as to excite me. I was uncertain what it was that caused this. It was just hair, but there you have it; it was making me yearn to be with her again, to hold her—and, of course, I had discovered the pleasure of what my grandfather used to refer to as carnal company.

That thought, when it came to me, was heavy as a brick-built disaster. To think I had shared Jimmie Sue with Grandpa, as well as the sheriff, was not a fine thought. Soon my attraction to her developed a limp, so to speak. But even with that knowledge in my head, I pretty soon pushed it aside, began to think it was me she had left with, none of the others, and that meant something. Again, this was not practical thinking, and one thing I have learned about women by now is they have a tendency to wound your logic. I propped it up by thinking she could have abandoned me at any time, gone her own way, instead of sticking to a hard trail and possible danger.

I began to wonder if she was with me to stay, and if I could pin any hope to her, or would her old profession draw her back. I couldn’t at first see the reasoning behind such a thing, her wanting to go back to such, but when I thought about Mama and what little I remembered of Grandma, it was mostly about them washing up and cleaning up, feeding and caring for men. In her own way, that was what Jimmie Sue was already doing, but on her own terms and for a price. It gave me mixed feelings. I didn’t know which side of the predicament to land on. There was actually something appealing about a woman that was willing to tote her own water and speak her own mind, and she certainly had me drawn up tight like a fish with a hook buried deep in the gills.

All this musing was stepped on when about high noon we came upon Fatty’s stolen black horse. It was lying on its side, up a slight rise, in a clutch of pines. It was alive, but its leg was broke, and it was breathing heavy and near done in.

We were leading our horses at the time, letting them blow, when we come upon the dying horse. Eustace handed me his reins and went over and looked at the animal. Even from where I stood, next to Jimmie Sue, I could see there was dried blood on the horse’s saddle. Fatty hadn’t taken it with him, though the saddlebags were gone. I figured he had food in them, or weapons, and that’s why he wanted them, and it wouldn’t be smart to try and lug a saddle, even if it was a good one.

Eustace squatted down and petted the horse gently on the head, said something soothing. Hog came over for a look, but Eustace asked him to go on, but polite-like. Hog went off into the bushes in that kind of mad way he had of doing things from time to time.

Shorty walked over with his knife and cut the horse’s throat, the way he told me he cut that horse’s throat the time he was on the trail of the Comanche. The poor horse quit tossing its head pretty fast, bled out, and died. It was getting so every time I turned around I was seeing something hurt or dying, and if I wasn’t seeing it, I was hearing about it.

“It stepped in a hole right here,” said Eustace, “and that bastard didn’t have enough decency to put the beast down. I don’t like him for sure now. That’s two horses he’s rode out.”

“I suppose he reckoned a shot would give us notice,” Winton said.

“He could have gone on and cut its throat,” Eustace said. “He could have done that.”

“It’s all about him,” Jimmie Sue said. “He was always like that. You’d have thought when he come to the pleasure house he would have known he was ugly as a pile of horse shit, but he always acted like he was the best-looking dude that ever oiled his hair and come down from New York City. It was like he looked in a mirror and saw someone else.”

“Well,” Spot said. “That was some mirror he had.”

Eustace moved to another squatting position next to the dead animal, studied the dried blood on the saddle. He said, “This here blood means the horse must have fell some hours ago. That blood is Fatty’s cause it’s dry. It dried fast in this heat, so he’s ahead of us, but not by all that much.”

Standing up, Eustace looked about, found something that interested him. He said, “He’s gone off to the west there. He’s walking with a limp, but damn if he ain’t walking.”

“He must be near run out of juice, way he’s been bleeding,” Spot said.

Eustace shook his head. “I don’t think he’s been bleeding the whole time. I think he got it all plugged up, but when the horse fell, it started him leaking again. Still, he’s got some kind of sand in him to be able to keep going like that.”

Eustace disappeared into a thick of trees. He wasn’t gone long, though, and when he come back, he said, “I think what ought to happen is I should follow him and see I can catch up with him. We all go, then we got to worry about the whole line of us, but I can go on foot and maybe spot him. I might be able to put him down.”

“You should take my long gun,” Shorty said.

“Nah,” Eustace said. “I’m gonna get up close to him with the shotgun, see I can get his attention.”

“I’m walking with you,” Winton said. “It’s all right to keep it a small hunting party, but you ought to have some backup. Ole Fatty seems to have more wit about him than I would have suspected. Like a wounded bobcat, he could turn on you—could be laying for you someplace and lead you into it. It might be better if there’s at least two of us.”

“All right, then,” Eustace said, “but come on and let’s get to cracking.”

They put together a few supplies in some saddlebags and Winton threw them over his shoulder. He had a Winchester he had taken from the trading post, and of course Eustace was carrying his cannon and had a pistol stuck in his right front pants pocket. I had seen once that that pocket was lined with leather. His other pants pocket was filled with shells for the shotgun. He was still wearing his vest, and he had his hat pulled low down and tight, which is the way he pulled it when he felt like doing serious business.

“Way I observe it,” said Shorty, “is you two follow the trail as swiftly as you might, and we will attempt to follow your trail, though I am not a tracker, as you know, and have never claimed to be.”

“But I am, right?” Eustace said.

“You are less likely to get lost,” Shorty said. “That much I will give you.”

Eustace smiled, reached out, and touched Shorty on his hatted head like he was a little boy. “I get killed, you can have any of my dung you find along the way while you’re following. I wanted you to know that.”

They shook hands, then Eustace grinned at the rest of us. Winton waved, and they were off, leaving us there holding the horses.

When they were out of sight, Shorty said, “What we need to do is give them lead time, so that we will not be behind them sounding like a herd of cattle. We will give them two hours and then go after them, leading the horses. When the terrain is appropriate, we will mount and continue our pursuit. That will help us catch up and give them time to put the sneak on Fatty.”

To kill our two hours and allow Eustace and Winton to make their way quietly ahead, we stopped and made a fire and cooked some white beans and salt pork in a little pot. I made up some simple makings with cornmeal and water and stuck it all together with a bit of the lard. It wasn’t a real good way to make cornbread—even fried bread—as an egg mixed into the batter would have been better. While it was cooking, Hog showed up and watched me doing the frying. I got some cornmeal and tore up a paper sack we had, put it on the ground, and poured him some of the cornmeal on it. He ate the cornmeal, and he ate the brown paper sack, too. I might as well have just poured it in the dirt.

After we finished eating, we heated up some coffee, drank that, then put the fire out. Shorty took out his pocket watch and looked at it.

While he did, Spot said, “I ain’t heard no shooting.”

“Nor have I,” said Shorty. “But it is unlikely they have had time to catch up with him, and it is also possible that he has given them the slip. It occurs to me that if he has, he may be circling back on us.”

That had not occurred to me, but now I took notice of my surroundings and laid my hand on the pistol I had in my belt. I thought that if I had to pull it again, I would be sure the sight didn’t snag.

“You think he even knows where we are?” Jimmie Sue said.

“Unlikely,” Shorty said. “I think his nose is forward and his ears are laid back, and he is trying to find some sort of sanctuary. If his wound is bad enough, that may be his only thought. It may be that his planned sanctuary is not where we intend to go, but he is still our best bet. If that fails, then we know where the Big Thicket is at its fullest, and we will go there and nose about. There is always a way. That said, I suggest we not become too casual and depend too much on Eustace’s tracking skills.”