by Darrel Bird
The Crosses
The next morning Zack and Willard rode out for Bakersfield. They would ride past the Kilgore ranch, then hook the county road which would take them in the back way through Oildale, a suburb of Bakersfield. Willard was his usual stoical self as he rode, his face told nothing. They rode silently past the Kilgore ranch with only the sound of creaking saddle leather, and an occasional snort of a horse.
Eventually, they came to the county road that would take them down out of the foothills, and to Oildale. The road was paved, but they rode on the dirt shoulder, and sometimes off the road completely. They passed other lone houses, and ranches, but saw no signs of life in or around them. They came to a boggy creek, and turned down a fence line road to camp by the Creek. They followed the Creek down about six hundred yards before stopping. The Creek had lots of Willows growing along it, and the soft wood off dead Willows was easy to break up into fire wood, and they quickly had a small fire going.
Zack fished a can of Spam out of his saddle bags, along with a can of tomato’s, and a loaf of home-made bread, that was to be their supper. “Spam… I like Spam, but most folks don’t like it.”
“I can eat most anything, long as it’s not still movin’.” Willard said. He had wolfed down his half of the can of tomatoes, and handing the other half to Zack, had begun on his Spam sandwich.
“Where did you come from before this Willard?”
“My wife, and I had a little cabin back up in the high country west of here; she died, and I just couldn’t stay in that cabin, so I lit out, and found the ranch.”
“So you are used to horses, and stuff?”
“Yeah…you gettin’ used to riding yet?”
“Yeah, I would still prefer a Motorcycle though.”
“Never had much use for’em myself…you done talkin’?” Willard laid his head back on his saddle, and pulled his hat down over his eyes.
Soon, there was nothing but the sound of crickets, and frogs along with Willard’s gentle snore. Zack thought back to all that had taken place since they had left the L.A. basin behind. He walked a little way away from the camp, and sat with his rifle. He would wake Willard at midnight to stand guard until just before daylight.
Willard woke him just as the sky was growing pink in the east. The nights had grown cold, and he shivered as he pulled on his coat and his boots in the early-morning light.
“let's get up some breakfast, and take our time, we don’t want to get into Oildale before along toward sundown.”
Willard turned toward a dead Willow tree, and began to break dead wood, saying nothing.
They had a leisure breakfast, then fed the horses with the nose bags, and checked the horse’s hoofs for any rocks embedded in them. By that time, the sun was getting high, and they rode on, stopping often to rest the horses. By the time they came to flat ground the sun was just going down.
The horse’s clopped along by the side of the road, not making much sound, “What is that up there Zack?”
“Where?”
“Up there on that electric pole.”
“Can’t make it out from here.”
The sound of the soft clop of the horse’s hoofs, and the creak of saddle leather accompanied them as they drew closer to the object of their interest.
“My God…” Willard’s voice trailed off.
Then Zack realized why. There was a new two by six nailed to the electric pole, and a body hung with its arms nailed to the two by six, and its feet nailed to the pole with large spikes. As they drew closer they could see that the man was stripped completely naked, and the blood had run into the ground below his feet. His facial features were completely erased.
“That man was beat to death.” His skin hung in tatters off his face and chest.
“I ain’t never seen anything this bad Zack, and I was in the war.”
“I guess that’s the new societal conceptions of morality.”
“What?”
“Never mind, just something I read in college.”
“Looks like another one up ahead.”
“This is beginning to look like a place we don’t want to be Willard.”
They passed the gruesome spectacle, and rode on. The last one of five people was a woman, stripped completely as the others. Zack leaned to the off side of his horse, and vomited. When he straightened up in the saddle, he saw tears rolling down Willard’s face.
They were entering the outskirts of Oildale before Willard spoke again, “Zack, if I get out of here alive…I’m not ever coming back for any reason.”
“I’m with you on that hoss, let's just turn down one of these streets, see whether anybody will talk to us, get our information, and get the hell out of here.”
“How about this one coming up Zack?”
“Good as any, if we find someone who will let us in, keep a sharp eye out for a radio, or walky talky. We don’t want to stir up this den of wolves.”
They turned right off the main drag, and down a dark street, until they came upon a house with the flicker of candle light in the living room.
Zack got down, and tied his horse to a porch rail, “Keep your hand on your gun Willard; I'm going to knock on the door.” He walked up the concrete steps to the door, and knocked.
A man pulled back the curtain, and looked through the glass at him, “Hello; we are strangers in town!” Zack called out.
The man opened the door a crack, “What do you want?”
“We just came in out of the hills, and would like to come in and get warm.”
“We don’t have any food mister.”
“We have our own food, could we maybe come in, and get warm?”
“Have you got horses out there?”
“Yes sir, we do.”
“You better hide them in the back yard. I’ll let you in the back way, tie your horses to the fence, and they can graze on the yard, ain’t like its been mowed in a while.”
They rode around the house, and through a chain-link fence gate, and then ground tied the horses, so they could graze in the high grass.
The man held the door open for them to come into the house. The man was about sixty five years old; his bearded face looked honest to Zack. A woman, sat in an old easy chair looking scared out of her wits.
“My wife is crippled, and can’t get up; my name is Floyd Tennyson if you fellows care to introduce yourselves.”
“I’m Zack Taylor, and this is Willard Mosley.” Zack held out his hand, and Floyd shook it; Willard did the same, then turned toward the woman, and nodded, “Ma’am.” He said tilting his hat.
The woman still looked frightened, but relaxed a little. Zack noticed Floyd's hand was rough, which meant he wasn’t a bean counter. He and Willard took seats on the old, but comfortable couch.
“To get right to it Floyd, we would like to get information before we proceed into a town we know nothing about; we thought maybe the local people would be able to help us more than, shall we say… the government?”
“I understand. First of all, I don’t think it would be a good idea to go across the bridge into Bakersfield.”
“We saw the crosses outside town, what was that?”
“Those were some of the people that said they had turned Christian, and wouldn’t take the chip. There’s been a lot more I’m sorry to say. I had to let them inject their chip to feed my wife. They said they would give us food, but they haven’t, we're starving anyway. Before you came up tonight we were going to end it.”
“End it?”
“Yes, we have some pills, and we were going to take them, and go to bed.”
“I’m sorry Floyd.”
“I’m sorry too, but we have been married over 40 years; we'll go together.”
Floyd's wife spoke up for the first time, “I didn’t want Floyd to have to die on my account. It's not his fault, I am so crippled up.”
“Rena, you know we have to finish this life together, now hush up.”
“Isn’t there soldiers in town?”
“
Oh yes, but they are all liars; they promised they would be helping us get back to normal, but they are not even making an effort at raising crops, they’re just scavenging what they find. They are feeding themselves plenty, but they are giving the people so little they are slowly starving.”
“What’s keeping the people from raising their own food?”
“The soldiers are; there was a group got together over at Rosedale, and the soldiers rounded them up, and executed some of them. The soldiers said they had to wait for authorization from Israel. That’s where they say the Christ is, and that he will send word soon, but Zack, that man ain’t no Christ, he’s a devil, a Christ wouldn’t do what they are doing. I hate to tell you boys, but you’ve come to a bad place, and its best you ride on out of here tonight, and don’t come back to Bakersfield no more.”
“I’ve got something I want you to have; I'll be right back.” Zack went out to the horses, dug through his saddle bags, and came back through the door.
“Here, I want you to have this; it's a Bible, and maybe you would take a couple of days, and read it. Can you get that chip out of you hand?”
“Oh yeah, it’s just under the skin…see?”
Zack saw a little hump about the size of a grain of rice, “Want me to dig it out? I’d dig it out, and read that Bible.”
“Yeah, if you would, please go ahead, and dig it out, I don’t want it.”
Zack heated the end of his buck knife with a match, and lanced the skin, then squeezed, and the chip popped out, “Mind if I take this along with us tonight?”
“Go ahead, I want it out of the house, and I don’t want to see it again.”
Zack carefully wrapped the chip in a piece of paper, and then stuck it into his pocket to show Virgil.
“We have to go before we are spotted…Willard, can you do without food for a day or two?”
“Yeah Zack, I know what you are thinking, I’ll get it.” He got up and walked out the back door.
“I hate to leave you folks with no help, I really do.”
“You have helped us more than you know, if just to know there are still free people out there. That’s enough for us Zack.”
Willard walked in, and dumped their food on the table, “You boys don’t have to do that.”
Floyd looked at the food in amazement.
“Yes we do. It's not much, but it will give you a little longer to read that Bible before you do what you feel you have to do.”
“We’ll go now; God bless both of you.”
Floyd got up to shake their hand, and his wife asked, “Could you lean down so I could hug the both of you?”
They both leaned down to hug the woman who had tears in her eyes. Her face had grown old with constant pain, but her blue eyes were alive with spirit, and looking into them Zack saw the eternal spirit resting there.
They both shook Floyd's hand, walked out, gathered the horse's reins, and stepped into the saddle. They turned the horses quickly down the main drag, then kicked the horses into a run, until they cleared the town of Oildale, then headed out into the hills, leaving the road behind.
They rode steadily for several hours before again coming to the county road that would take them home. It was about three hours to sundown when they came to the Creek again.
“We have to rest the horses, or we will be walking back Willard.”
“Yeah, but let's ride further down the Creek, I don’t want to camp anywhere near this road.”
“I know what you mean buddy…lead on.”
Willard rode down the Creek about a quarter mile before stopping, “I’ll gather wood while you water the horses, plenty of grazing for them here.”
Zack watered the horses, then removed the saddles, and by that time Willard had a small fire going. They sat the rifles down near the saddles then leaned back on the saddles to rest.
Willard tapped him with his boot, “Would you look at that?”
A rabbit hopped up to the outskirts of the camp, and sat there sniffing the air. Zack eased his hand to the extra .22 rifle, raised it and fired, and the rabbit flopped over. Willard walked over, and picked it up, “Supper.” He announced, grinning.
After they cooked the rabbit, and had it eaten Willard leaned back against his saddle again, “Zack…” He fished around for words, his lips moving.
“Don’t you think it’s a little strange the first house we went to was them folk? And now this consarned rabbit, now that beats all I have ever laid eyes on in my whole consarned life. We gave them food and a Bible, which is what they needed, then this here rabbit just hop’s right into camp, which is what we needed.”
“Willard, that’s the longest sentence I have ever heard you use.” Zack looked at the man, and grinned.
“Well goldern it, its something to talk about ain’t it?” Willard looked at Zack with a perturbed look on his face.
“Yeah Willard, it is.”
“Well…I know we was just part of two miracles, even if some folk could take issue with me on it, but how come God would give us a rabbit, yet not protect our group from getting shot up like that?”
“Willard, you saw those crosses back there, maybe death in this day, and time is a gift a whole lot bigger than a fat rabbit, or a few cans of food with good folk to share it with.”
Willard looked at him steadily for thirty seconds, “I reckon you might be right at that.” Then he pulled his blanket over him, covered his eyes with his hat, and three minutes later Zack could hear his soft snoring. Somewhere a night bird called its sleep song, and Zack Taylor laid there tossing, and turning, wishing for morning for he was restless to get back to the group.
The next morning when the east began to lighten under distant pink clouds, they hurriedly saddled the horses, and rode back to the county road that would lead them back to the only place they called home.
That afternoon they rode past the silent Kilgore ranch house, the only sound was the horse’s hoofs chuffing in the dirt, and the creak of saddle leather. Willard pulled on his horse's reins, stopped and looked at the house where his friends had lived.
“Whoa up horse, what are you looking at Willard?”
“I reckon you was right about what you said yesterday.”
“I hope so Willard.” He kicked his horse into a trot.
They came to the ranch gate, and Ben stepped out to unlock the gate, “Thanks Ben.”
“What did you boys find out?”
“Tell you at meeting Ben, right now both of us, and these horses need some grub, and rest too.”
Zack, and Willard walked the tired horses on up to the ranch house. A man walked up to take the horses, and Zack walked into the house, and flopped into one of the easy chairs. Rosy came running in from the kitchen, lit atop him, smothering him with kisses.
After fifteen minutes, he tiredly climbed the stairs, and slept three hours before coming back down. When he re-entered the room, Virgil was sitting in a chair going over the endless lists of chores that ran the ranch.
“So, how bad is it? Do you want to tell it to me, or the whole group at meeting?”
“Willard spoke more than four words at one time Virgil.”
“That bad huh? Well, it’s best to tell it at meeting then.” He sighed. “We’ll crowd in the barn at nine in the morning. It's getting too cold to meet outside.”