by John Shirley
Seth reached out and took her hand. “That’s all over and done with. We’ll be married Monday. He’ll have nothing to say.”
Seth had been relieved Sol had welcomed them in when he’d been told about the affair with the shotgun. He’d been afraid Sol would have sent them away in the night for fear Dubois might come around, guns blazing. But both Sol and Daisy had insisted they were welcome. Sol had sand, Seth thought. They both did.
“Would you come with us?” Josette asked.
“I can’t leave the farm,” Sol said, shaking his head firmly. “I’ve got a feller coming to talk about buying my harvest.”
“I could go!” said Daisy briskly.
“Nope, my dear, I won’t hear of it,” Sol said, patting her shoulder. “It’s a long ride. Dubois might come after them. Maybe get some of those drunken friends of his from the saloon to go, too!”
“It’s all right,” said Seth, smiling. “We’ll be fine. There’ll be someone at the courthouse in Freeman who’ll witness for us.”
Josette looked at the door, chewing her lip nervously. “Did you hear a rider?”
Seth got up and went quickly to the front door, reflecting that he had to start wearing his gun more often. His gun belt was hanging in the barn.
Opening the door he was both relieved and a little worried to see Slim Coggins on the porch.
Slim nodded impassively at him. “Need to talk to you and Josette.”
“Was kinda expecting you.”
“Come on in, Slim!” Sol called out. “Have a seat!”
Seth returned to the table with Slim, and they sat, Slim taking off his hat and leaning back in his chair a little before saying, “I reckon you know why I’m here.”
Seth nodded. “I was thinking of going to see you myself. Dubois took a shot at me. If I hadn’t flattened, he’d have taken off my head with a double-barrel ten gauge.”
“He failed to mention that,” said Slim dryly. He looked at Josette. “That what happened, Miss Dubois?”
“Yes, sir, it is. Seth wanted to ask for my hand in marriage. That’s all there was to it. Papa was drunk! He went mad!”
“He says Seth knocked him into the wall, took his gun, and busted it!”
“Knocked him into it?” Seth shook his head. “I stopped him reloading and took it away rightly enough. I didn’t hurt the man.”
“That’s how it was,” said Josette, looking the marshal in the eye.
Slim nodded thoughtfully. “I believe you. He was smelling like a still when he came to see me. I am inclined to take your word and Seth’s.”
“Me and Daisy,” Sol interposed, “we sure believe it! We’ve known Dubois a good long time. He’s capable of all that and more!”
Slim smoothed down his mustaches with a thumb. “Seems a case of Seth protecting himself and Josette. But I’ll have a look at the Dubois place and see what I see. He couldn’t hide the damage from that shotgun.”
“How about some pie?” Daisy asked, brightening. “We’ve got cordial. Or I could make you some coffee?”
“My wife is fond of cordial, and I’ve come to almost like it. But . . .” Slim stood up and put on his hat. “I’ll take you up on that another time.”
“Can I give you some cherry cordial to take to Lou Ellen?”
“Why, if it’s ready to go, ma’am, she’d like that, I’m sure. . . .”
Carrying his little bottle of homemade liqueur with him, Slim left, and Seth sat quietly with the others, holding Josette’s hand and wondering if he was doing the right thing.
Dubois had said one thing that had at least some truth to it. He and Josette hadn’t been reunited long before she’d agreed to marry him. Seth felt that Josette cared for him—and he knew she was comfortable with him—but it could well be that she was thinking of the marriage as a way to escape her father and Heywood Kelmer to boot.
Was that so bad? People married for all kinds of reasons. If they hung on and got to know each other, they could make something good of it.
Admittedly it was a kind of rushed courtship. But he felt the rightness of it. It was one of those things he just knew. Just as he knew the bottomland he so prized in Chaseman was destined to be his; just as he knew that day followed night and summer followed spring. He and Josette truly belonged together. He felt a solid, deep-down confidence that once they were married, she’d feel that way, too.
* * *
* * *
It was still dark at the Willow Pool, on Black Creek. And Heywood Kelmer was nervous. He did not take to this stranger. The man seemed far too sure of himself. With his lavender bowler hat and his pin-striped trousers, this fellow who called himself Bitterman resembled a tinhorn gambler more than any kind of hired gun. The other man, Gaines, seemed mighty rough around the edges, too.
They stood around a small campfire, rustled up purely for their meeting. Chiefly, Heywood supposed, so they could see one another’s faces. Sweeney was staying with the horses and keeping watch on the trail. Heywood wondered why this Bitterman needed someone to stand guard.
“I rode with Colonel Dexter in the Sand Valley War,” said Bitterman. “Me and Gaines here, we were regulators, protecting Dexter’s land. The sheepherders were threatening to burn his fences.”
“I read something about Sand Valley,” Heywood said. “We nearly got into a range war a couple years back, me and Pa. The other side backed away. Just in time, too. Well, now, if you rode with Harland Dexter, I guess you know what you’re doing. Now the question is, what can you do for me, and how much is it going to cost?”
“We’ve got six men to pay. That’s two thousand dollars, half in advance. And what we do is, we take care of Seth Coe. And we’ll deliver that Dubois filly to you.”
“I’ll pay one thousand.” Heywood’s pa was the wealthy one. Heywood had but three thousand dollars in the bank himself. Fine duds could be expensive.
“Fifteen hundred.”
Heywood sniffed. “Twelve hundred is the best I can do.”
The man who called himself Bitterman kicked a little dirt at the fire, frowning. “You know where this Coe can be found?”
“I do. But he’s tight with the marshal.”
“You hear that, Hannibal?” Gaines shook his head. “I don’t know about this here deal.”
Bitterman scowled and shook his head at Gaines.
Hannibal? Heywood puzzled at that. Hadn’t he heard recently of a notorious man named Hannibal? But then, with Bitterman’s history, no doubt he was notorious.
“Anyhow,” said Heywood, “I know where he’s going to be on Monday, him and the girl.”
Bitterman took off his hat, fanned himself with it, then seemed to make up his mind. “Twelve hundred, it is. Half in advance by noon tomorrow.”
* * *
* * *
Hannibal, I reckon the Seth Coe angle is more trouble than it’s worth,” said Gaines. He and Sweeney were riding on either side of Fisher, the three of them headed east toward Buffalo Junction. The crescent moon hung low over the prairie. Coyotes warbled their eerie cries from somewhere to the south. “Twelve hundred dollars don’t seem like much between all us men.”
“Following the plan, he’ll bring a heap of money with him,” Fisher said. “We don’t have to hand this Dubois girl over to Heywood Kelmer. We could say, Nope, you want her, you’re going to have to come up with five thousand more! If that sticks in his craw, why, I bet you Feathers would give us a pretty penny for her. Then we hit the bank and head south.”
“I’m thinking we should just take that bank and go, Hannibal.”
“See, there’s your mistake—you thinking. I’m the one who does that. You’re the one who carries out what I’ve thought up.” He kept his tone affable, but he knew Gaines would be rankled.
“Is that right?” Gaines snorted. “Now, I don’t think I like that kind
of talk.”
“There you go again! What I mean, Buster, is we all got our specialties. Now, me, I’ve always been a planner. I’ve got a plan for the Town Marshal. And then that bank will be all the easier. But, Buster—make no mistake. It’ll start and end with Seth Coe.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
You figure on me needing to use my Colt?” Seth asked as he washed his hands under the pump. It was Saturday afternoon. The water threw a little rainbow on the ground in the slanting light. “I’m pretty good with a rifle.”
Slim Coggins gave a grunt of assent. “That Hannibal Fisher—from what Dawson tells me, he’s a man who doesn’t forgive. He’ll come back looking for you, and not alone. You’ll need all the firepower you can muster. Then there’s Dubois and Kelmer. How far will they go—I can’t say. But just in case.”
“I expect you’re right, Marshal,” Seth said. “I’m game, long as we don’t stray far from Josette. I’m not sure she’s safe here. Sol does enough already—don’t want him to have to pick up a gun, too.”
It was a hot late afternoon. Seth was just back from the fields. Since close on to sunup, Seth had been walking along behind Goliath and the McCormick reaper, Sol guiding the machine along and Seth raking the stalks into piles that he made into shocks. It was hot, demanding work and Seth was about worn out. His back ached, and his hands burned. But getting shooting lessons from an old hand like Slim Coggins was a chance he couldn’t pass up.
“Slim, how about we get some biscuits and coffee, and I’ll rest my bones some, and then we can go out to that windbreak? There’s a stump out there we could use. . . .”
They were soon sitting at a worktable under a little plains cottonwood behind the house, and Josette brought them coffee, biscuits, and jam.
“Slim, it’s sure comforting to see you here,” she said, pouring the coffee.
Slim smiled and gave her a long slow look, at last saying, “Is it unfitting for me to say . . .”
“What?”
“That you are going to make the prettiest bride Prairie Fire has seen since my Lou Ellen. And that’s been a good long while.”
“Oh, not at all!” she said, waving dismissively, but blushing all the while. She hurried back into the house. She was helping Daisy replace the ticking on a mattress. Seth had noted her taking up more than her share of Daisy’s chores. She’d cooked a meal for them all, too, and Seth had been able to give her a hearty compliment on it without a word of exaggeration.
“Lord, she’ll look pretty in a wedding dress,” Slim said.
“I don’t know if there’ll be time for a wedding dress,” Seth said, “but Josette would shine in a gunnysack.”
“Is that how you’re going to clothe your wife?” Slim asked, grinning.
“Franklin would say so. He thinks I’m a penny-pincher.”
“Never could put much by myself. Nor does the town pay me well. But we grow a good deal of our own food. And I hunt. We don’t go without. Bullets, now . . .” He put his Smith & Wesson Model 3 revolver on the table. “Good cartridges are costly. Don’t want to waste any. Wild Bill, he makes his own. I saw him do it in sixty-seven. Mine, the town ships in for me. I used to carry a dragoon, but I decided I needed a lighter gun. Now, here’s something you got to think of—how to reload quick if you’re under fire.”
“Had to do it once with my rifle on a drive. We were trying to drive off a raiding party of Comanches. Only man I ever shot was a Comanchero. He was firing in the air to drive the cattle, and they were like to run the camp down so—I had to stop him.”
“Sounds like you’d rather not a-had to.”
Seth nodded. “I don’t like to think of ending a man’s life. I shot that fella off his horse with my Winchester—most like a lucky shot, too—and went to see if he was alive. There he was, stone dead, and I just thought, Here’s a man went on a long trail to get to this spot. He was born and grew up and lived his whole life, traveling here and there, doing all kinds of things, like anyone else. Trying to make his way in the ways he knowed year after year. And me, I cut it all short with one pull on the trigger. He wasn’t much older than me.” He shook his head. “I’ll tell you straight, Slim. I was sorry to do it.”
“I understand,” Slim said, unloading the gun. “But sometimes killing one man—or even a few men—can save a lot more lives. And it can make things more peaceful, too.” He spun the gun’s cylinder. “Now, let’s see you load ’er up without taking too much time, and we’ll see if you’ve got your skills right. Then we’ll head over to that windbreak and find us a target. . . .”
A little while later, they were standing in the shade of a tall ash about twelve yards from the target, Seth bracing himself, hand hovering over his holstered gun. It was just a tree stump, a snag in the screen of trees along the property line. On the other side of the windbreak, the ground sloped up enough to catch any stray bullets. There was no one around but a flock of blackbirds twittering in the foliage of the windbreak.
The stump was a tall one, broken off jaggedly; it had belonged to a lightning-struck tree that had burned, its upper part keeling over into the windbreak.
“You don’t really need to be ready to quick draw there, Seth,” Slim said, chuckling. “Relax. Just let your hand fall to your side any way normal. Not even on the gun. When you pull, take your time. Better to move smooth and to shoot true. And to stay cool and calm.”
Seth relaxed, and Slim said, “Now, I know you’ve pulled your pistol and fired it many a time, maybe at a wolf, maybe at a tin can, but that don’t mean you’ve done it right.”
“My pa only showed me the rifle and the shotgun. Never could hit much with a pistol.”
“Just pull it and point it. Don’t fire it yet.”
Feeling awkward and self-conscious, Seth did as he was told, over and over.
“Just keep a-going till you can do it smooth and with no wasted motion,” said Slim.
It felt like an hour, making that same draw over and over, but it was probably only fifteen minutes. In time it came more naturally, more quickly. Seth’s gun was unloaded, and next they practiced aiming and dry firing till Seth was right sick of it.
“Now, young Seth, load the gun, holster it—then you’ll pull, extend it full, point ’er like you’re pointing out some damn thing, cock, and fire. Later on, you can cock as you pull it, but that’s a mite dangerous at first.”
“Never tried that,” Seth said. “I was afraid I’d shoot myself in the leg.”
“You might, too. Those gunsmiths in Europe over there, they’re working on something called double-action. You just have to pull the trigger, and it cocks for you and fires. Not even up for sale yet. Us, we got to go the slow way. Now, let’s load ’er up.”
Seth loaded the gun, trying to do it in the quick, efficient way the marshal had shown him at the table, but still dropping one of the bullets. Embarrassed, he picked up the bullet, blew a bit of grass off it, and chambered it, closing the cylinder. Then he holstered the gun.
Slim nodded. “Here, you see that place at the top of the snag where the wood forks? Right below it, there’s a big ol’ drip of tree sap. Point at that. Don’t even aim, not yet. Pull, cock as it comes up level, look at the spot you want to hit, point at it—and shoot.”
Seth nodded, drew, cocked, and fired—the whole cycle seemed to take forever—and the gun bucked in his hand. The blackbirds were startled by the gunshot and rose to whir about overhead. There was no effect on the tree snag whatever.
“Missed the whole durn thing!” Slim said, grinning. “Which is about normal right now. Do it again. We’ll just holster, draw, and fire now. Later on we’ll fire all the rounds without holstering. . . .”
Five shots, and two of them took a splinter off the side of the snag.
“Now reload ’er and do it again. This time, line up the sights with what you’re aiming at, but don’t fuss about it. Just ta
ke ’er easy. . . .”
They went through it over and over again, the marshal bringing endless boxes of shells from an old railroad mail sack. Seth’s wrist ached from the recoil, and so did his right arm, but he began to relax more, to find his focus.
“Just stay calm and cool,” Slim said maybe half a dozen times. “That goes for being in a gunfight. If you want to live, stay calm, line up on your target, and fire.”
The sun was getting low, and the revolver was getting hot by the time they quit, but Seth had started hitting the tree snag close to the sap mark he was aiming at.
“Gettin’ there for sure,” said Slim. “Just remember, if you want to live—”
“Stay calm, line up on your target, and fire!” Seth interposed, grinning.
“That’s it. Calm is half of what you need in a fight! You keep your cool, you’ll outshoot the man who’s angry and flustered! Maybe we should use up another box . . . ?”
“My arm’s about to fall off, Slim.”
“Well, then, pick up all that brass there. That can be taken to the gunsmith. He’s got a use for it. He’ll give you a penny a shell. We’ll be back tomorrow, after you’ve done your farmwork, and see if we can cut that big splinter sticking up there right in two. . . .”
* * *
* * *
The next day Seth and Sol finished harvesting wheat and moved to the cornfields. Normally Sol would take Sunday off, but the harvest was pressing him. They were joined in the afternoon by Daisy and Josette, armed with bushel baskets. They twisted off the ears of corn, sometimes picking armyworms out of the corn silk. They dumped the corn, not too roughly, into the back of a wagon. There would be another harvest of corn, later in the season, Sol predicted, as he and Daisy climbed up on the wagon to take the corn to storage sheds. Sol handed Seth’s rifle down to him—the young man kept it close now—and Seth and Josette walked, holding hands, back to the farmhouse.