I soon wish I’d bought three.
I get bored and go saddle Ten Spot, who has finished his supper. I lead him out and ground tie him nearby. Hoss sniffs around a bit and pees. She comes over and curls up by Tenner’s head to catch up on her sleep.
About one a.m. Góshé runs out and reports.
“The deputy went out the back and snuck down that alley.” He points.
Sure enough, seconds later, the man appears.
We follow discreetly.
He turns a couple of corners and goes into the side door of the bar.
Góshé sits in a doorway just down the alley from the cell block and watches while I enter the sheriff’s office and go behind the desk, getting on my knees to reduce visibility. There are cuffs, with a key even, in the center drawer. And a badge in the left. Jackpot.
I stuff them in my pockets and start crawling for the cells.
Zastee’s on the bunk, lying under a blanket. I can see her hair sticking out from under the hat brim.
I hiss.
She lifts the brim and says, “They’re holding me until someone comes from Raton to take me up there for the hanging.”
Just then, the doorknob turns and Góshé runs in.
He says, “Hangin’?”
“Quite,” she says.
“Fuck.”
She nods.
Looking around, I spot the cell key on its hook. I walk over to get it.
“No. He’s comin’ up the alley, Ma, we gotta go. Now.”
“We’ll think of somethin’,” I say.
She grunts.
The boy has hold of my hand. pulling. I hear the alley doorknob turning again. I sweep Góshé up, sprint out the front, slow to a dignified, innocent walk, and veer right toward the other alley. The one where we left Tenner and Hoss.
Who, hopefully, are all rested up.
“You know,” I say, as I tighten the cinch. “We could ditch her now, easy.”
“Ma,” he says. “She’s my friend. We can’t let ‘em hang her.”
“Just kiddin’,” I say.
The little shit punches me in the gut.
74 Táági: Newcomer
Táági and Ma’cho jump off the train when it slows down. They’re just outside of town.
Ma’cho spots familiar tracks. “Kabó,” he says. “Here.”
“You’ve got a bloody good memory,” says Táági.
Ma’cho keeps walking.
They lead to a cabin. Door’s open.
Inside the dark little edifice, adjusting the logs in the fireplace, is Kabó. He has his back to them.
At that instant, he swivels and sees Táági standing, backlit, in the doorframe.
Kabó has a smoldering log in his gunhand which he tosses at the big guy. It lands short, in a bucket of paper and kindling. Which starts to smoke.
Kabó jumps sideways, knocking the kerosene lamp on the kitchen table to the floor.
It shatters, the kerosene spreads out across the rough-cut boards.
“Hold bloody still,” says Táági, weapon in hand.
“You’re not good enough for her,” Kabó tells him, pointing his stolen pistol at Táági. “She deserves better. I think the bullet should have meant kill. Hell, for all any of us know, short of you, it did say kill and you lied to save your own skin.”
“Obviously,” says Táági, “she deserves better. But, that’s neither here nor there. What we need to focus on is you holstering that bloody gun. We need to talk.”
Kabó starts to lower it, then stumbles forward. Raising the gun as he does. He also knocks the bucket over.
“Problem?” asks Ma’cho, stepping around the doorframe into sight. Revolver aimed.
Kabó swivels, gun still pointed.
Ma’cho shoots.
The slug hits Kabó, who pulls his trigger as he crumples to the floor.
The paper burns brightly. The rag rug catches and flares up.
Kabó spots it out of the corner of his eye and jumps up. Catching a toe under the edge, he falls into the flames.
Kabó pushes himself up, sprints out and rolls in the dusty street, slapping at himself in an attempt to put out the fire.
Táági brings out a coat, dips it in the trough and rolls it around Kabó. Smothering the flaming mass.
Ma’cho comes out with blankets from the bed.
Wetting them in the water trough, he goes back in and tosses the wet blankets on the flames. Táági joins him, stomping at the accessible edges in an attempt save the building. It takes a while, but they do get it subdued.
Outside, Kabó beats at a last few embers and sits up, looking himself over for more.
“Hands up,” says Ma’cho, walking up, pistol aimed toward Kabó.
“You bloody well might want to explain yourself before my friend twitches and sets off that hair trigger,” says Táági, gun also aimed, dead on.
“Yeah, right,” says Kabó, on hands and knees. “I bloody well should.”
He suddenly flicks both hands up, letting go with two fists full of dirt.
The big men are blinded.
Kabó feints right, then left, and ends up behind the trough.
From there he scampers on hands and toes on out of sight.
“He moves well, must have only been a scratch,” says Táági, gingerly rubbing at an dirt filled eye. “You?”
Ma’cho grunts, looking at his forearm. “Scratch.”
“Can’t be killing that bloody girl’s brother, can we?” says Táági, lowering his sixgun.
Ma’cho shakes his head.
“Bloody hell, we’re useless.”
“Soft heart, bad medicine,” says Ma’cho, holstering his.
Táági grins. “She’s a beautiful girl.”
“But, Cha’a?”
“Her bloody, too.”
Táági walks over, picks up Kabó’s revolver, checks that the hammer is resting on an empty chamber and sticks it in his belt.
75 Cha’a: All Tied Up
Góshé and I go back and camp in the livery stable for the remainder of the night. Cheap and warm enough. Ten Spot appreciates the feed. We humans and Hoss have a good feed of store bought beef and beans. Our cash funds are running low.
“I come to pick up the prisoner,” I say, showing the badge I just bought at the local gun shop. I realized I wouldn’t want them to recognize the one I ‘borrowed’ last night.
The deputy lets me, the Bob me, with a newly applied ash created five o’clock shadow, into her cell.
“They beat on you?” I ask, quietly.
Her new shirt is torn. There’s a fresh bruise, and a cut on her cheek, over the old.
“Not much,” she says.
“I’d hate to see much.”
As I pull out the manacles, she says, “Crikey.”
“Sorry,” I mumble, looking her in the eye. “You could cuff me, but it wouldn’t sell.”
She grimaces.
“Yeah, I know, yore whole black life sucks.”
I click the first cuff shut.
She looks alarmed. “Damn you.”
I pause.
“All right,” she says. “You might just sell it. It’s okay, as long as I don’t, in fact, get strung up. But how about if we…”
“Depends,” I say.
“On what?” she leans away, widened eyes on mine. I can see the whites.
“Click.” A satisfying sound as I snap on the second cuff.
She glances down at her wrists. “Damn you. I wasn’t finished.”
“Too late,” I say.
“Blast.”
“I feel superior,” I say, rattling the chain. “I like being on top of things.”
I lead her out past the deputy, saying, “Get yore uppity nigger ass movin’.”
I also yank the chain, so she stumbles a few steps.
I look over at the deputy and say, “Thanks fer catchin’ this nasty bitch for us.”
He nods.
“Anyhow,” I say, as we emerge onto
the boardwalk. “Too late fer second thoughts.”
“Blimey, you wouldn’t take advantage,” she says. “Would you?”
“Not today, anyway,” I say, looking toward the sound of the approaching steam engine. “Come on, my black as night friend, we got a train to catch.”
I shoulder my newly purchased rifle, put a hand on the chain between her wrists, the other hand on Tenner’s reins, and walk.
She drags back momentarily, but relents in the face of my superior strength and follows along.
“This bloody town seem to you to have a sinister aspect?” she asks.
“Of course,” I say, checking behind us, scanning all around and feeling the same itch. “It’s a town.”
Góshé and Hoss stop cuddling, come out of the alley and join us. At least they’re pals.
“Hey,” I say, looking back at her. “I been arrested. Even spent a coupla weeks in, believe it or not, mens’ prison once. As Bob. Trust me, I know how helpless it feels.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah, heard it bloody all before,” she says, frowning at me. Death writ large in her volcanic eyes.
We catch the westbound.
76 Cha’a: Angus
“Hey,” says a potbellied stranger. He’s sitting just across the aisle from me, in a shiny striped suit. “You see that blonde fella up yonder? He’s the spittin’ image of ole Angus Kittridge. You know, the outlaw that escaped the noose out to Yuma? He got burnt up by the heathen Apaches, he did. Hell of a deal.”
He seems to be talking to me. So, I raise my eyebrows and nod.
“That there bastard looks just like him,” he continues. “I seen them Kittridges in person once. Out to Las Vegas, after they pulled a robbery there. Must be ‘bout two year ago. They was gallopin’ out a town, lickety split. Posse hot on their tails. They got clean away that time. I got a eyeball full of his face as they rode by.”
I’m aghast.
“Not no more though,” he continues. “Plumb burnt to a crisp they are. Good to hear. Plenty a good folk lost all their money in that Los Vegas robbery. Lucky for me, I got ahead…”
The man stops talking, realizing that he’s patting his satchel. He glances around, then looks at the floor red-faced.
“Shit,” he mumbles.
I turn to see the back of a tall man, yellow blonde hair the color of Güero’s hanging below his hat, heading out the door and on into the next car forward. The dining car.
I’m thinking, Angus Kittridge? In Trinidad? Holy fuck. Maybe it really was them in the mine. I had myself convinced that it was my wild imagination getting the better of me.
After the blonde disappears, I look over at the speaker. Speculating.
When the potbellied fellow looks up, he notices me staring at him and reddens.
“Oh, my,” he says. “Er. Um. Pardon my French, miss.”
77 Kabó: Dead or Alive
Kabó is in Raton looking at the wanted posters. It’s them, on the one right in the bleeding middle. The artist did a decent job on the likenesses, also. Damn and blast. He pulls the tacks and rolls it up.
What craziness did she pull now? He steps inside and, unrolling the poster, asks if they have any further information about the pair.
“Stone killers, those bitches,” the deputy says. “Watch yoreself.”
Kabó asks, “Any idea where they were last seen?”
“They had the nigrah in jail over to Trinidad,” he says, picking at his nasty looking teeth with a toothpick. “Someone impersonating a lawman come took her out, I’m told. From the description, I’d say that it coulda been her partner. Manly she is, wouldn’t take her ass on if you paid me.”
Kabó nods encouragingly.
“Hey,” says the deputy, noticing that he has no sidearm. “How you gonna arrest ‘em? Say please?”
Kabó smiles secretively and touches his hat brim in thanks. He rolls the poster back up, stuffs it in his shirt and goes out onto the boardwalk.
He flips a coin. Tails.
He heads for the train station and buys a ticket to Trinidad. And wishes he hadn’t dropped his damn gun. MadDog bastards.
That whole Apache clan is crazy.
78 Cha’a: Hoosegow
“This is getting to be a habit with you,” I say, over my shoulder. “This hoosegow livin’.”
“Bloody bastards,” she says, trying to put her torn cuff back together. It sags apart again.
She trips over her boots. “Blasted heavy bastards.”
I shake my head and say, “Yore gettin’ the cussin’ down, but you got a ways to go to be a cowgirl. The torn shirt helps with yore look. You need to learn to walk in them boots and to ride a horse, too.”
She shoots me a dark look. Could she shoot a light look? Hey, teasing.
“Not even a thank you fer gettin you out?” I ask.
“You didn’t have to do it this way,” she says, holding up her cuffed hands.
“Hey, we can all ride together if yore my prisoner,” I say.
“I don’t bloody well want to ride with you,” she says.
“Seriously?” I ask.
“You’re bloody awful.”
“I just said that shit to get in good with them. I didn’t mean it.”
“Hah,” she huffs.
“Uppity nigger is used all the time here,” I say. “They liked it. And ‘they all look alike’ is what convinced them I was white. One of their people, you see?”
“Blasted blonde bitch,” she says.
“And proud of it,” I say. “And, it’s bastard until we get out a here. Bob, the blasted blonde bastard.”
I adjust my package just to be sure.
“How does my crotch look?” I ask. “I stuffed it with socks.”
“Balls.”
“Yeah, I got them in there, too.”
To put more space between us and the local law, we hop on the train to the next town, continuing west. Raton is east. To my way of thinking, we dasn’t even pass through.
79 Cha’a: Blighters
“Please take them off,” she says, as we climb the steps.
I stop on the open platform behind the car, so we can talk without prying ears around. I’ve taken the vest off, unbound and plumped my breasts. All girl, once again.
“We need the handcuffs,” I say. “And the badge.”
“Why?” she asks
“I already told you. If yore my prisoner. I can take you with me into anyplace I want.”
“It won’t bloody work.”
“It’s worth a try. We took Ma'cho, Many Horses and Mose on the train in Sonora. X, too,” I say. “There was a bunch of us, all heavily armed. Just had to be tough enough that the conductor wouldn’t challenge us. Hell, some of the passengers tried to run ‘em out. But failed. We didn’t even need handcuffs. Our hard demeanor and loaded firearms disabused ‘em of the idea.”
“Really?”
“You saw us on there with Ma'cho and X, right?” I ask. “They’re both dark brown Injins, no question.”
“True,” she says. “And they didn’t run me out of there, either. I mostly hid my face with my hood. Even when I went into your car. Of course, by that time, everyone had their guns out. All eyes were on the bloody confrontation.”
“Yep. Might makes right,” I say. “These train employees ain’t gunhands. The smart one’s value their lives.”
“How does a woman with a badge and a prisoner explain the child?”
“He’s yore’s and yore mammy is fixin’ to pick him up before I lock yore sorry ass up fer life.”
“Mammy?” she says. “That’s bloody disgusting.”
“It’s the term they’ll use. I ain’t judgin’,” I say, surprised. “You do know that X is my Ma, right? And Many Horses is my grandfather.”
“No bloody way,” she says. “I imagined you to be adopted.”
“Nope, I took after my Pa, Hell Raiser, is all,” I say. “All my siblings are brown, like Ma. You may have noticed that my son here is brown, too.”
“Unh uh, Güero is his blood father,” I say.
“Bloody hell.”
“Yeah, the white brother. Of course, Ma'cho is his uncle. And Coati’s his grandma. So sure, he could have got the brown skin from their side. Or my side.”
She’s silent, digesting our complicated family.
Even in thought, she’s a striking woman. But, the bad feelings remain. I dasn’t be suckered into trusting her.
“Come up with a better idea, Mammy,” I say. I just can’t keep myself from teasing her. “I ain’t married to that one.”
Zastee twists her mouth in disgust.
“Yore kids could be white, Kabó’s light skin shows that you have white ancestors. I’m bettin’ that the Rarámuri are a lighter race,” I say. “Wouldn’t white kids be a kick in the ass?”
She eyes me suspiciously.
“My clan,” I say. “We don’t judge. We do kick each other’s asses. It toughens us to the real world. We can take the slurs better because we use them among ourselves. Not as slurs, as badges of honor. We’re lovingly snide. I gotta tell you though, I’m still gettin’ used to all the motherfuckin’ pissants in the real world. Out on the ranch we all live together as equals. Nothin’ like this separate but actually unequal bullshit.”
She nods, looking brighter. “Bloody twisted, it is.”
“Get used to the cuffs,” I say, not sure I like her friendly. I’m too much of a sucker for kind words.
She scoffs.
Taking hold of the chain between her wrists, I lead her into the white car.
“Prisoners are required to ride in back,” says the conductor.
“She’s a crazed killer,” I say. “Can’t be left alone. My orders are to stay with her no matter what.”
“There’s an O-ring back there. Put in for cases like this,” he says, “Hook her up to it.”
“But, she’s an escape artist,” I say.
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