The Widow's War

by Mary Mackey

  Come out, you stubborn bitch! he thinks. Don’t burn to death in there!

  But it is Jane, not Carrie, who runs out of the door screaming for her children. William runs after her, throws himself on her, and tries to shield her body with his. Jane trips and falls to the ground, and William falls with her.

  Perfect targets, Deacon thinks, and discharges one of the pistols. He has never been an especially good shot, but this time luck is with him. He hears William yell, and sees him grab at his leg. Only lamed. Not dead. Too bad. But Deacon has shot him. He looks around for Clark, wants him to see this moment and approve it, but Clark has gone off somewhere.

  A few seconds ago, Deacon would have been terrified to discover he was alone, but his stepbrother is wounded and unarmed, and what can a wounded, unarmed man do against a man with loaded pistols and a knife?

  The female slave William has been shielding gets up and begins to run toward the main house. Deacon lets her go. Clark’s men will catch her. Kicking his horse into a slow walk, he rides toward William to finish him off.

  He is just taking aim when Carrie charges out of the burning clinic holding a double-barreled shotgun. Deacon sees her point the gun at him.

  “Don’t!” he yells, but his plea is drowned out by the sound of the shotgun going off. The next thing he knows he is flying through the air, knocked off his horse with his chest on fire. The pain is terrible and the fall to the ground seems to take an extraordinarily long time. When he finally hits the dirt, he screams and thrashes like a beached fish.

  Looking up, he sees Carrie bending over him. She puts the shotgun to his head.

  “Don’t kill me,” he begs.

  “Why not?” she says.

  Chapter Thirty-seven

  Would she have killed Deacon as he lay there helpless, and if she had, would it have been murder or an act of war? John Brown could have told her, but he is twenty miles away riding for his life after his defeat at Osawatomie.

  Carrie is so full of rage that all she can think is that Deacon has brought death to Two Rivers and she wants him to pay for it. Still, she pauses. Perhaps that means she would not have pulled the trigger after all. In any event, she never has a chance to find out, because before she can decide whether to let Deacon live or send him to hell, a shadow falls over both of them, and she hears a voice say: “Drop the gun.”

  When she looks up, she sees a young man mounted on a brown stallion. She sees his hair—curly and blond—his cold blue eyes, his nickel-plated revolver, the red bandanna around his neck. He is not pointing his revolver at her. He doesn’t need to because in his right hand he holds something more powerful than any weapon, holds it upside down by the ankles like a dead rabbit.

  Clark gives Teddy a shake and lifts him higher so Carrie can get the full benefit of the sight of her little boy screaming for his mama to come rescue him. “Drop the gun now.”

  “Teddy!” William yells. Clark ignores him. Deacon’s wife’s lover can only crawl now and not very fast at that. So let him yell, threaten, curse, command. It’s all just noise. He grabs Teddy’s head with his free hand.

  “Drop the gun. I’m going to start counting. If it isn’t on the ground by the time I reach three, I’ll snap his spine. One . . .”

  “For God’s sake!” Carrie begs. “Please, don’t hurt my boy!”

  “Two . . .”

  Carrie throws down the shotgun, steps back, and lifts her hands over her head. “Don’t hurt Teddy! I’ll do whatever you want. Just don’t hurt him!”

  Clark ignores her. “Rab!” he yells.

  The raider who goes by the name of Rabbit trots over. He’s a big, bucktoothed man, the kind who kills for sport. The only human being Rabbit has ever feared is Henry Clark. Reining in his horse, Rab touches the brim of his hat respectfully.

  “Yes, sir, Capt’n?”

  “Hold this,” Clark says, handing him Teddy. Rab takes Teddy by one arm, and Teddy begins to scream with redoubled fury.

  “Don’t dislocate the little brat’s shoulder, you idiot! Hold him like you were his mama, but if this one,” Clark points to Carrie, “or that one,” he points to William, “give me any trouble, dash his brains out on that chopping block over there.”

  “Yes, sir, Capt’n.”

  “My God!” Carrie says. “Teddy’s just a baby—”

  “Shut up.”

  Carrie closes her mouth and bites her lips to keep from screaming at him.

  The evil-looking raider with the buckteeth has ridden off a few paces. He’s holding Teddy under the arms now, shaking him to make him shut up. Everything in Carrie urges her to run to Teddy and pull him out of the bushwhacker’s grip, but she’s afraid if she does, Clark will carry out his threat.

  Clark dismounts and inspects Deacon. “Looks like you’re fixing to die,” he says.

  Deacon has clasped his hands over his chest. His fingers are stained with blood, and those green eyes Carrie saw for the first time in her parlor in Brazil are growing cloudy.

  “I’ll make it,” Deacon gasps. He grits his teeth, spits in Carrie’s direction. “Bitch shot me.”

  “You’ve always had a talent for the obvious,” Clark says. He steps over Deacon and walks to where William lies. “Good evening, Doctor Saylor. I’m Henry Clark.”

  “I don’t care who you are, you evil bastard.”

  “I don’t fancy being cursed at,” Clark says. “If you were a whole man, I’d have to call you out, but since you’re crippled, I’ll just warn you: Keep quiet, or you’re going to see that child’s brains scattered all over creation.” Clark turns his back on William and cups his hands to his mouth.

  “Zeb!” he yells. Another raider gallops up to join the group in front of the clinic. This one is burly and short with a barrel chest and powerful arms.

  “Drag the doctor over to Mr. Presgrove,” Clark orders. “The doctor can’t walk, and I don’t want to soil my hands on him.”

  Zeb grabs William under the arms and lugs him to where Deacon lies. It must hurt, but although William turns pale, he doesn’t make a sound. Carrie also remains silent, afraid of what will happen if she speaks. She wants to go to William, tend to his leg, stop the bleeding, and wash out the wound before it festers. Tears fill her eyes, but she chokes them back. She won’t give Clark the satisfaction of seeing how terrified she is. If he hurts Teddy or hurts William any more than William is already hurt, he had better kill her, because she will never rest until she has hunted him down.

  “Turn Mr. Presgrove on his side so he can see the doctor.”

  Zeb shambles over to Deacon, grabs his left shoulder, and starts to turn him on his side. As he does so, Deacon shrieks.

  “Hurt?” Clark says. “I’m afraid that’s something you must endure. Turn him, Zeb.”

  Zeb turns Deacon so Deacon is facing William. A small pool of blood begins to form on the ground between the two, most of it Deacon’s. Clark puts his hands on his hips, looks down at Deacon, and shakes his head. He looks disappointed. Not horrified, not upset, not even angry. Just disappointed.

  “You didn’t kill your wife’s lover, Deacon. You botched things as usual, and honor hasn’t been satisfied. So what do you want me to do with him? Shoot him dead where he lies? Torture him for a while? Hang him? I’m offering—”

  “No!” Carrie cries. Clark turns and looks at her. Clapping her hands over her mouth, she falls silent.

  He turns back to Deacon. “I’m offering you a choice of revenge. How would you like this man who has sullied your name to die? It’s a free lunch. Pick your dish.”

  Deacon spits out a mouthful of blood. “Hang the abolitionist son of a bitch,” he gasps.

  “Excellent choice. I’m always happy to oblige a friend. How are you doing? Still in pain?”

  Deacon nods and groans.

  “Bad, is it?”

  Again Deacon nods.

  “Well, I wouldn’t let a dog suffer like you’re suffering. I think it’s time to put you out of your misery.” Clark draws
his pistols and approaches Deacon.

  “No!” Deacon screams.

  “Hush now,” Clark says, and putting one of the pistols to Deacon’s temple, he fires.

  Chapter Thirty-eight

  Ice pick, knife blade, sewing scissors, twine: Carrie is sitting on a rock making a weapon no one in Kansas has ever seen, although anyone living on the upper Amazon would recognize it immediately. The weapon consists of a straight tube four feet long and about two inches in diameter. If she were in Brazil, she would construct the tube from bamboo, but she has been forced to make do with a stick, and finding a piece that fits her needs has been difficult.

  She holds the stick at arm’s length and sights down it to make sure it’s perfectly straight. Satisfied that it is, she slices it in half lengthwise and begins to dig out the center. She works mostly with the knife blade, but for the final hollowing she uses the tip of the ice pick. She was lucky to find the pick in the ruins of the main house at Two Rivers and even more lucky that Mrs. Hulett brought it with her from New England. They never had ice in their drinks at the plantation, never even saw it—although presumably the Marais des Cygnes froze in winter. Perhaps Mrs. Hulett kept the pick around to remind herself that someday, when Kansas came into the Union as a free state, there would be icehouses in every town and cold lemonade in August.

  Poor Mrs. Hulett. Every time Carrie thinks of her, she begins to cry. Shot down in cold blood: a gentle, intelligent woman who had dedicated her life to abolishing slavery. Despite the way she died, hers was a life to be proud of; but still, what a sad, terrible waste.

  Carrie wipes away her tears and goes back to hollowing out the stick. She cries a lot now that there is no one to see her do it: cries when she remembers finding Mrs. Hulett lying in the ashes; cries when she thinks of the men, women, and children Henry Clark kidnapped, all of whom he will undoubtedly sell into slavery if she can’t rescue them.

  She does not cry about William and Teddy—at least not in the daytime. At night when she lies in the tall grass shivering and not daring to light a fire, she sobs herself to sleep. But in the daytime when she thinks of William and Teddy, she only feels anger. She never knew she could be so full of rage. She will never forgive Henry Clark. She wants him dead for what he has done, and if she goes to hell for killing him and those bastards who ride with him, it will be worth the price.

  Clark should have shot her when he had the chance. Instead he left her alive to suffer. He thought that was all she would do. After all, she was only a woman. He has no idea how straight she can shoot, how ingenious she is, what a deadly adversary she can be.

  “I’m leaving you Deacon’s horse,” Clark said as he and his gang rode off. “Go to what’s left of Osawatomie and tell your New England friends what happens to abolitionists. Tell them to get out of Kansas or we’ll shoot them down like dogs, hang them, chop them into mincemeat.” He smiled when he said this as if he were merely informing her that tomorrow was likely to be exceptionally warm. Carrie will never forgive Clark for that smile.

  His men had brought chains with them to shackle the black residents of Two Rivers. As they left, they drove their captives down the road moaning and crying. Carrie will never forget the sight of Jane’s little girls stumbling and being whipped for falling.

  The bucktoothed raider had held Teddy in front of him, trussed up to the neck in a pillow case like a kitten about to be drowned. Clark bound and gagged William, tied him to his horse, slipped a noose around his neck, stood back, and mocked him.

  “Hemp,” Clark said pointing to the rope. “Highest quality.” He turned to Carrie. “You can ride out and cut your paramour down when we’re finished, but not until we’re finished. If you follow us—” Clark had a habit of not finishing his sentences.

  He and his men had ridden off leaving Carrie behind. As William rode past, he gave her a look that could have meant Don’t come after me. Be careful. Save yourself. Go for help. It could have even meant Good-bye. I love you. In fact, that’s what Carrie is afraid it meant.

  She spent almost no time grieving. If she didn’t follow them at once, she might lose the trail, so as soon as Clark and his men were out of sight, she ran to where the main house had stood and started digging in the ashes. They were still hot, but she didn’t have time to wait for them to cool. She needed a weapon because Clark’s men had taken all the guns. Knives don’t burn, she thought; and sure enough, where the kitchen had been, she found a knife blade. A few moments later, she also found the ice pick. A gift, perhaps even a good sign.

  As soon as she located the knife and the pick, she ran to her cabin. The raiders had looted it but had not bothered to burn it. Inside, she found her sewing basket, a feather pillow, a bottle of glue, the buzios, some dried meat, and the tin box that contained the plants she’d brought from Brazil. She took a moment to stuff a dozen packets of dried herbs into a saddlebag that had once contained Deacon’s socks and cigars, but what she was really after was a small gourd that contained a sticky, black substance used by the Indians of the Upper Amazon to tip their hunting arrows. There were all sorts of things in that black mixture, including the secretions of poisonous frogs, but the main ingredient was the sap of a pretty, white-flowered plant called Strychnos toxifera, commonly known as curare.

  Now that gourd sits at her feet next to the ball of twine. As soon as she has hollowed out the stick properly, she will bind the halves back together with the twine. Then she will take her sewing needles and glue feathers to them. The needles will become tiny darts which she will dip in the curare. Curare kills slowly but effectively. In fact, if she pricks herself with one of her own needles she will die within ten or fifteen minutes. It won’t be a pretty death. Her lungs will stop working, and she will suffocate. But she doesn’t intend to die.

  For three days, she has been tracking Clark and his men, and every hour of those three days she has feared she will find William’s body dangling from the rope Clark threw around his neck.

  A knife, an ice pick, a pack of needles, a handful of chicken feathers, sap from a tropical plant, and an ordinary bottle of glue. They are no use against men with guns—unless, of course, you know what to do with them.

  Chapter Thirty-nine

  That night Clark’s men begin to die. The first walks away from the campfire to relieve himself. In the morning, the others find him facedown in a patch of poison ivy. Clark strolls up to the body and kicks it over with the toe of his boot.

  “Dick must have died of natural causes,” he says. “There’s not a mark on him.” He nudges the body again. “Blue lips. That’s odd.” He stands there for a few seconds trying to figure out what might turn a man’s lips blue. Poisonous mushrooms? Apoplexy? In the end it doesn’t much matter. A dead man is useless. “Strip him,” he commands.

  Clark’s men strip the dead raider of his guns, knives, tobacco, money, and ammunition and leave his body for the vultures. By seven, they are on their way again, driving their captives in front of them, and by seven-twenty Carrie is riding after them wearing Dick’s hat and boots, all too big for her but better than no hat and no boots, which was what she had before.

  Clark’s band originally consisted of Clark and thirteen men. Clark killed Deacon; now she has killed Dick. That leaves a total of twelve armed men between her and the prisoners. Given enough time, she can probably eliminate all twelve, but does she have time? She has to take them out one by one, and they are obviously headed somewhere specific.

  Yesterday they crossed into Missouri. When they reach their destination, more pro-slavers may join them. Twelve men could easily turn into twenty, thirty, even a hundred. The best she can hope for between now and then is to spread terror. If Clark’s men panic, they may desert before he gets reinforcements.

  She lists her advantages. The blowgun is silent and the darts small and hard to notice. It’s unlikely that Clark or any of his men are acquainted with the effects of curare. Since the slaves are not only on foot but chained together in a coffle, the raiders are
forced to travel slowly. Unaware that they are being followed, they are making no attempt to hide their tracks. Still, she needs to be extremely cautious. Although she aches to catch a glimpse of William or Teddy, she must keep her distance.

  Actually, the hardest part may prove to be not catching up with Clark’s men by accident. The chains are heavy and the captives often stumble, bringing the entire coffle to a halt. Sometimes no amount of whipping can make them go on—at least no amount that won’t permanently hurt Clark’s chances of getting a good price for them. So from time to time, the raiders are obliged to halt and let their human cargo rest.

  Once Carrie nearly rides straight into them. She’s only saved by the sound of metal hitting rock. Dismounting, she crawls up, peers through the grass, and sees that the sound is being made by the prisoners’ chains. They are leaning their heads on one another’s shoulders, perhaps for comfort, perhaps because they are so tired they can no longer sit upright. They don’t speak. Maybe Clark has forbidden them to. A skinny raider with a sunken chest passes down the line distributing water from a folding leather bucket. Jane refuses it. She once told Carrie she would rather die than be a slave.

  Drink the water, Carrie thinks. Don’t despair. Hang on. I’m going to rescue you and the girls. But Jane can’t hear her. Reaching out, Jane tries to touch six-year-old Franny, but the chain is too short. For a little while, Jane’s fingers grope at the empty space that separates her from her daughter. Then she lets her arm drop.

  Carrie feels her eyes filling with tears again. Oh, Jane! she thinks. She puts her hand over her mouth to keep from making a sound that will give her away. The tears choke her, and she comes within a second of sneezing. She is far too close to the raider with the bucket. She should not have been tempted to draw so near.

  Silently, she inches her way back to a safer distance. She had hoped to at least catch a glimpse of William and Teddy, but she doesn’t dare linger, so for another day she goes without seeing them.

  That evening just after dusk, she puts a dart into the neck of Zeb, the burly raider who dragged William over to Deacon. Zeb swears and slaps at the needle as if it were a mosquito bite. He must knock it loose, because fifteen minutes later when he drops dead, the raiders can find no indication of what killed him.