by Jim Thompson
Old Ike and Old Tepaha retired to the bar room for a time, each napping briefly, head on chest, though both would have denied it. They awakened simultaneously, and went for a highly critical tour of the Junction's commercial facilities. It was nearing train time by then, so they walked down to the depot. The agent-telegrapher, a half-breed who lived primitively on the premises, treated them to coffee and amiable insults. In the distance, the train hooted its approach and they went outside to greet it.
It came and went, leaving not an iota of mail. Not a single dun or notice of creditor's judgement. It had been so for many days now, more days than Old Ike's memory—a memory that was responsive only to things in the distant past rather than the immediate—could accurately recall.
With relief and puzzlement, he pondered the riddle aloud.
Tepaha declared that the answer was simple. "All bad men. Bad men make bad enemies. Maybe so all get killed, I betcha."
"All "t once? That don't make sense."
"Huh! What makes sense, then, you so God damn smart?"
"Well...I reckon they just figured I was an A-1 honest fella that wasn't out to beat no one for his money—like they'd've knowed in the first place if they had any God damn sense—so they ups and decides t'stop pesterin' me."
"Ho! You one crazy shit, ol' Ike."
"What's crazy about it, you dried up ol' son-of-a-bitch?"
"Huh! I say maybe all get killed, all "t once, you say don't make sense. You say all get nice-nice all "t once, I say you don't make no sense. Same God damn thing, by God, only I smarter'n you. Enemies like fleas on dead dog. No nice-nice never. Bite him till he dies."
Arguing crotchetily, the two old men walked back toward the hotel. And at last Ike yawned, losing interest in the discussion. Ending it with the statement that he was content with the fact that his creditors were leaving him alone, and he didn't care a cow turd why they were doing it.
"Now'—he suppressed another yawn, turning into the hotel's bar, "we'll just have ourselves a little drink, an' then I'm goin' up to my room. Got some plannin' I got to do."
"I also have plans to make," Tepaha declared with great dignity, "and must do so in my room."
They drank.
They went up the stairs together. Each leaning slightly against the other, each supporting the other with his body.
At the head of the stairs, they stood panting for a time. Then, as they trudged slowly down the hall toward their rooms and beds, Tepaha addressed his friend. Speaking in Spanish as do all wise men when treating of delicate and painful matters.
"Great evil may derive from one pure in heart. He is blind to the mottled snake in the corn rows."
"And kindness can be as a dagger," Ike nodded. "Tell me thou, what is in thy heart?"
"So. Then I tell you that you are creating bad blood between your sons. In clutching Critch too closely to your bosom, you are thrusting Arlie aside."
"This...this I know." Old Ike bowed his head. "It is something I cannot help."
"Cannot? Cannot becomes unbelievable on the lips of Old Ike King." Tepaha hesitated. "Is it because of her? You see her image in Critch?"
"Perhaps. But I see much more than that. I see a small boy thrust away from me when I should have held him closely to my heart. The time I have to spend with him does not equal the years that I spent without him."
"But, Ike, my dear friend—"
"No. I cannot change what I was, friend Tepaha, and I cannot change what I am. Nor what I do. The heart is its own master, O, Tepaha, and you have entered a room where only I can dwell. Leave now, and do not return."
"It shall be as you say," Tepaha said.
Spanish was abandoned at this point, and they slid back into their everyday vernacular. Old Ike grunted that he would see Tepaha in an hour or so, as soon as he finished his planning, which was extensive and arduous since he had to do it for everyone.
"These God damn kids, nowadays, Tepaha; they ain't like we was. Have to tell "em when to piss or it'd be runnin' out their ears."
"Arlie plenty smart boy," Tepaha said. "Work damn hard, too."
"Yeah, hell," Old Ike said. "I guess so. Who the hell said he wasn't?"
"Course, Critch plenty damn smart, too..."
"You're God damn right he is! Brought more'n three thousand dollars home with him, an' he was all dressed up an' talkin' as fine as the president of the U.S. An'—an'—"
"Also, he be good worker, come by an' by. Maybe so as good as Arlie."
"What d'ya mean, maybe so, come by an' by?" Ike bellowed. "He's as good now, you stupid old shit!"
He yanked open the door to his room, entered it and slammed the door behind him. Sitting down heavily on the bed, he toed his boots off and sank back on the pillows with a grateful sigh.
He had not meant to be like this...
Stubbornly, he had set up certain barriers between himself and his errant son; grimly leaving it to Critch to surmount those barriers or to remain away forever. And Critch had surmounted them. Climbed over them unscathed, and returned home in grandeur. A young man handsome as sin, and smart as paint. And—
'An' hell. Hell, wasn't he entitled to a little favorin'? A little somethin' extra? Why, hell, he was kinda like a visitor, a guest, an' a fella that didn't put himself out a mite for a guest was a pretty sorry son-of-a-bitch. An' when someone was more'n a visitor, your youngest son that you hadn't seen in years, what the hell was wrong with makin' sure that he knew he was welcome?'
...The heart is its own master, and Ike dwelt in a chamber where there was room for no other.
And he slept.
Chapter Two
Now, in this first hour after dawn, the village of King's Junction was wide awake and working. A hammer rang on the anvil of the blacksmith's shop. At the feed store a wagon was being loaded. Apache clerks, apron bedecked over their buckskin and levi costumes, were washing windows and sweeping the wooden walk of the general store.
As the two King brothers rode out of town, Tepaha's two granddaughters riding behind them, Arlie was greeted by and gave greeting to the Junction's various workers. But he had not a word nor a glance for Critch. Similarly, Joshie and Kay rode in haughty silence, neither acknowledging the other's presence with so much as a look.
Critch lighted a cheroot, made a tentative gesture of offering one to Arlie. The latter looked stonily straight ahead, and Critch returned the cigar to his pocket.
He knew the reason for Arlie's attitude, or thought he did: Old Ike's cozying up to him, his youngest son. Yet there was nothing new in this: Ike had been behaving thus ever since his return. So why should Arlie take such great offense this morning?
Had Arlie simply had too much of it? Or had something else happened that he, Critch, was unaware of?
He didn't know, but he knew that Arlie's anger could not be allowed to continue. Until he recovered the money, he must stay on his brother's good side.
They crossed the railroad tracks, and took one of the rutted, reddish-loam roads which led out into the ranch proper. Wordlessly, they rode through the fine spring morning, threadily misted with the early sun's lifting of the night's dew. Stalks of young, uneared corn wafted in the breeze like long lines of green flame. The heavy-sweet smell of embryonically budding alfalfa drifted to them from distant acres.
Critch sniffed it with exaggerated interest, hoping to attract his brother's attention. Failing to, he cleared his throat noisily.
"Uh, about that alfalfa, Arlie," he said. "How do you find it as a crop?"
Arlie made no answer for a time; seemingly intended to make none. Finally, however, he asked Critch what the hell he was talking about. "What do you mean, how do I find it?"
"I mean, isn't it pretty hard on land like this? I've heard that it took a lot out of the soil, used several hundred tons of water per acre."
"Huh. An' just where did you hear that?"
"I'm not sure," Critch said. "It's just something I heard or read somewhere. For all I know, it's all nonsense, but I
thought you'd know the facts."
The implied compliment was more than Arlie could resist. He said, with forced grumpiness, that, hell, how would he know what was what? He'd never been nowhere nor read nothin'.
"But I guess it ain't a real good crop for out here," he went on, his tone warming slightly. "Not real fittin' for the soil an' climate, an' it can be damned bad for cattle. Bloats "em to beat hell they get too much of it."
"Yes?" Critch frowned. "Then why is it planted?"
"Because that's what the folks that planted it wanted," Arlie shrugged. "It's their land, the Indians, I mean, as long as they work it. They got the say-so of what goes on it."
"That doesn't sound like a very good way of running things," Critch said.
"It's 'their' land," Arlie repeated. "If a man can't do what he wants with his own, he ain't a man. That's the way the Indians look at it. That's the way Paw looks at it."
Critch nodded, subsiding. He had broken the ice with his brother, which was all he wanted to do. The Indians, for all he cared, could shove the land up their copper-skinned asses.
"I tell you something, Critch...'Arlie resumed, after a silence of several minutes. "I, uh, well—I think I'll just have me one of them seegars, after all!"
Critch gave him one, smiling inwardly. Unctuously courteous, he also held a match for his brother. The thaw in their relationship seemingly had its effect on Joshie and Kay. 'Seemingly.' For as the foursome jogged onward, a murmur of sporadic conversation between the sisters drifted up to the two men.
"About this morning, Arlie," Critch began a low-voiced apology, determined to keep things on their present happy keel. "I don't blame you for getting sore, and—"
"Oh, hell," Arlie laughed. "I can't blame you for Paw's doin'. Anyways, I wasn't "specially sore about that. I just sort of got my short hairs ruffled about, well, several things. Got myself kinda nervy, you know."
"I didn't want to come back here, Arlie. It was your idea."
"An' it still is," his brother said firmly. "I just wouldn't have it no other way."
"Well," said Critch, "as long as you feel—"
'"Yeow! Damn' bitch!"' shrieked Kay.
'"Fix you, mean bitch!"' screamed Joshie.
Arlie whirled around, cursing. "Now, what the holy hell—!" Critch also pivoted in the saddle; then, emulating his brother, he scrambled to the road and raced toward the two girls.
Each had her hands knotted in the other's braids. Each tugged with all her might as she screamed obscenities at the other. Each simultaneously released a hand and began slugging and clawing. The wild commotion caused their horses to rear and buck, pitching the two girls to the road. But the fight went on unabated. They tumbled and rolled in the dirt, hitting, scratching and gouging.
Arlie yelled for them to stop, profanely threatening punishment to come. Ignored, he tried to separate them and received a moccasined foot in his face.
"Now, by God!"—he fell back, rubbing an incipiently swelling nose. "By Christ, that does it!"
He whipped the knife from his boot-top. Hand darting deftly, he made two delicate jabs with the needle-sharp point of the blade, sinking it a minute fraction of an inch into each girl's flaring, pear-shaped bottom.
That ended the fracas. Yipping simultaneously, they came to their feet. Began doing a little dance of pain as they gripped their bottoms. Arlie took advantage of the distraction to seize his wife and hang on to her, and Critch did likewise with Joshie.
"God damn stupid squaws!" Arlie cursed. "What the hell was that all about, huh?" And as Kay began a sulky reply, he silenced her with a shake. "Never mind, by God! I reckon I already know. Now, just looky what you done with your crazy carryin' on."
He pointed. All four horses had bolted during the melee, and were now scattered, grazing peacefully, about the adjacent field.
"So start movin'!" Arlie commanded. "Get out there an' catch up them ponies. An' no more nonsense neither, or I'll make your ass smoke like a big baked potato!"
Kay backed a step or two away from him, then halted stubbornly. "Ol' Joshie's fault, too. I go, she gotta go."
"Now, God damn you, ol' squaw—!" Arlie took a warning stride toward her. "You gonna move, or you want me to move you?"
Kay moved...a few more steps. Again halted mulishly. "Is only fair," she asserted. "Joshie n' me, we both make fight. Both should go after ponies."
'"Uh-hah!' So's you could start yourself another fight, huh?"
"No. No more fight," Kay promised. "But Joshie gotta go with me. Is right thing to do."
"Well, but—" Arlie hesitated, awkwardly, cast a half pleading look at his brother. "Critch, I don't want t'do no buttin' in on your squaw—I mean, kind of your squaw even if she ain't really—but—"
"Kay is right," Critch agreed handsomely. "Joshie, you go and help your sister!"
Joshie tossed her head. "Ho, ho!" she jeered. "Looka who's talkin'. What you say I tell you go to hell?"
"He don't say nothin'!" Arlie snapped. "He just plops you over his knee and pounds your happy ass off! I mean," he added hastily, with a deferential glance at his brother, "I mean, uh, that's right, ain't it, Critch? Paw an' Grandfather Tepaha don't favor beatin' up a woman, but they got nothin' against a good ass-paddlin'."
"My own sentiments exactly," Critch declared firmly. "Joshie'—he pointed. "Go and help Kay catch those ponies."
"Huh! An' you gonna pound my ass if I don't?"
"You're damned right he is," said Arlie. "Right, Critch!"
"Uh, right," Critch mumbled. "I mean, I certainly will."
Joshie bowed her head meekly...with false meekness. Inwardly titillated, warmly content with herself, she departed with her sister. They started across the field, moving ahead and to the side—each intuitively accepting her role in catching the horses so as to come up and close in on the animals from opposite directions. The two men watched them for a few moments, Arlie opining that there was nothing like exercise for taking the orneriness out of a squaw; then, satisfied that the girls intended no more mischief, they sat down on the bank of the roadside ditch and lighted cheroots.
There was an amiable silence for several minutes. A silence at last broken by Arlie's good-natured declaration that the girls' quarreling was really Critch's fault.
"I mean it, little brother. You just bounce that Joshie around in a bed, like you ought to've done long ago, and there wouldn't be nothin' for her an' Kay t'fuss about."
"You mean marry her?" Critch laughed irritably. "Why, I barely know the girl."
"You know her well enough. How the hell you gonna get to know her if you don't marry her?"
"Forget it," Critch said. "It's out of the question."
"How come it is? You don't figure you're too good to marry an Indian, do you? After all, you're part Indian yourself."
"On Maw's side," Critch nodded. "Paw's, too, for all I know—or he knows. So, naturally, it's not a question of being too good for Joshie. I'm simply not ready to marry anyone yet."
"Well," Arlie grumbled. "It'd sure save a hell of a lot of trouble if you was ready. Anyways, it just ain't natural goin' on like this. You need a woman, an' Joshie needs a man."
Critch carefully studied the tip of his cheroot; cautiously remarked that he could not disagree with his brother's belief anent the need of man for woman, and vice versa.
"I find Joshie highly desirable, and she is obviously attracted to me, so there's no problem 'per se' about going to bed with her. But—"
"Sure, but you can't do it without marryin' her," Arlie nodded. "Naturally. An' you don't figure to marry her—not yet, anyways—so what's the use of talking about it?"
"Right," murmured Critch. "You're absolutely right, Arlie." And from the corners of his eyes, he studied his brother with veiled incredulity.
For Arlie's face was guileless, utterly free of mockery. He undoubtedly had meant what he said. He could not accept the notion of extramarital sex with a granddaughter of Tepaha.
"Lookin' kinda puzzled, Cr
itch," Arlie opined, giving his brother a direct look. "Somethin' I can help you with?"
"What?" Critch blinked. "Oh, no, not at all. I was just thinkin' that, uh—uh—"
"Yeah?"
"Well, uh—about us pairing off. I mean, you and Kay taking one area and Joshie and I covering another. Do you think I'm ready for that yet? Paw was saying this morning that we might give it a try—if you thought it was all right, of course."
Arlie hesitated, chewing a stem of Johnson grass. "Why not give it a try?" he suggested. "Ain't really no other way of finding out whether you're up to it."
"Right," Critch said, adding that they'd still be ahead of the game even if the experiment proved unsuccessful. "At least, we won't have to worry about the girls fighting for a day."
"Now, you're talking!" Arlie declared, and he stood up, dusting the seat of his pants. "Well, guess we're "bout ready to ride."
The two girls returned, each riding a horse and leading one. The four animals were portioned out to their proper owners, and the sisters were apprised of the change in plans. Then, Arlie and Kay rode off down the road together, and Critch and Joshie cut out across the field to the south.
Joshie kept her mount reined in close to Critch, ostensibly to advise him on the day's routine. As their legs brushed repeatedly, Critch attempted to pull away, but each time he was defeated. Ramblingly chattering of this and that—he could only guess at what was important—she clung close to him, pressing her thigh against his until he could feel its heat, and his nostrils were filled with the sweet smell of fecund flesh.
Unable to get away from her, he at last ceased to try. Deciding to let her have her own way, and see what she would do with it. Which, for the moment, was nothing at all. Seemingly, he had defeated her by ceasing to resist. For she suddenly became silent, her small round face creased with puzzlement. She even allowed her horse to draw away a little, relieving him of the tantalizing pressure of her body.
So they rode for a time, with Critch silently congratulating himself yet somehow disappointed by his victory. At last he risked a glance at her, and saw that she was smiling at him archly, her head flirtatiously cocked to one side. And again she brought her horse in close to his.