“If I knew who they were, I’d hang ’em as traitors,” Roy added, having ridden over with the rest of the crew.
“We ain’t hanging anyone tonight, and we’re a bunch of fools if we’re still here when the sun comes up,” I said. Although I’d already sent Jim up to the store with the pack horses and gold, I still had the $210 Ashworth had given for those last six cows. Digging the poke from my saddlebags, I tossed it to Casey with the instructions to take the boys up to the Havana House and buy them a drink.
“Just be ready to ride as soon as I get there with the supplies,” I added.
Punch and Calvin hooted loudly at the prospect of free booze, but I noticed it was Pablo who was quickest to pivot his mount toward the saloon, driving his spurs into the animal’s sides. I winced at the Cuban’s casual brutality, but kept my feelings to myself.
With the boys gone, I reined my little marshtackie toward the beachside trail I’d used when I left Müller’s. Jim already had his mule and the extra horses tied up out front when I got there, with most of the supplies already stowed inside the panniers. He looked relieved when he saw me taking shape against the faint glow of the bay and turned to call into the store.
“He’s here now, Mistah Müller, like I said he’d be.”
Werner Müller came out of the store with a lit pipe in one hand, an invoice sheet in the other. He stopped at the front edge of the veranda, the lamplight at his back stretching his shadow across the street. Although he’d pulled on a pair of britches and some shoes after treating Punch’s wound, his hair was still tousled, stray wisps waving back and forth in the Gulf’s breeze.
“Boone, the cattle you have finally brought back to Punta Rassa.” He was grinning broadly, as if the sharp, green-manure scent of the herd had been sorely missed. “By dingy, I wasn’t sure I would live long enough for another cow to see.”
I laughed at the elderly German’s elevated mood and wondered how much of it came from his pleasure at seeing another herd, and how much stemmed from the merchandise he’d sold me that night. I’m not criticizing the man, mind you. No one has to tell me how a little extra coin jingling in a man’s pocket can lift his spirits.
“You about got everything stowed away, Jim?” I asked as I hitched my horse to the front rail.
“Near ’bout, marse. Just a smidgen more of these grits and such, and we be ready to go home.”
I reached inside the near-side pannier for one of the sacks of doubloons to pay Müller. It might seem kind of perplexing to you that, as poor as the rest of the South was, Florida always seemed to have a plentiful supply of gold. The fact is, most of that gold came from Cuba or one of the other Caribbean islands, almost all of it for the purchase of beef on the hoof.
Nowadays Florida lives on snowbirds and its citrus harvest, but, before that, cattle was king. I’m not saying we didn’t have fruit trees or that wealthy families from cities like New York, Philadelphia, and Boston hadn’t been coming south for the winter long before the war. But it took the railroad to make those enterprises profitable enough to nudge the cattle industry off its throne, and the rails didn’t start showing up in earnest until well into the 1880s. Before that, just about the whole state was an untamed frontier, with few towns of any significance and even fewer banks.
Not that most of Florida’s cattlemen would have trusted a bank, even if there had been one handy. It was a rough-and-tumble land, and we took care of our own. Later on, you’d hear about cattle barons such as Jake Summerlin and Judge Ziba King, woolly old coots who kept their gold in trunks in their bedrooms. Pa kept his buried in the hollowed-out section of an ancient oak tree about fifty yards behind the house. Worked just fine, too.
After settling up with Müller, I led my horse over to where Jim was checking the cinch on his mule. “The boys are up at the Havana House,” I told him. “Do you want a drink before we head back?”
“I reckon I’d best not,” he replied without much conviction.
“If you want one, Jim, we’ll get you one.”
“I don’t wants to cause no trouble, marse.” He hesitated, as if weighing the pros and cons of his next words, then said: “I reckon if it weren’t too much bother, I wouldn’t mind havin’ me a drink outside.”
I nodded, and although it chapped my hind end that Jim felt too intimidated to stand at bar with the men he’d shared a hard trail with, I understood his reluctance. The injustice of a system that viewed a man as equal in one place but inferior in another might have angered me, but it would have been Jim who’d have to live with the consequences if someone took offense at the Negro’s presence in a white man’s saloon.
“How about a bottle?” I asked, swinging a leg over the cantle of my saddle.
“A bottle do sound mighty temptin’,” Jim allowed. “’Though I reckon Josie’d feel different about it.”
“Well, hell, we just won’t tell Josie.”
Laughing happily, Jim mounted, and we reined toward the Havana, the pack horses lined out behind us. Jim’s words brought Josie to my mind, and I knew she wouldn’t have been too pleased to think of me going into a saloon, either.
Jim was Pa’s first slave, but he’d bought Josie for him so many years before that their oldest boy, Joe-Jim, was only a couple of years younger than me. Joe-Jim was with Pa, helping him move that larger herd into Georgia, while Josie was back at the Flatiron with another colored woman Pa had only recently purchased to be Joe-Jim’s wife—when that time came. Her name was Lena, and although she hadn’t even been with us a year by then, everyone liked her. Joe-Jim was pulling at the traces to get married, but Pa said she was still too young and had refused to grant permission to the union until she turned fifteen later that summer. Jim and Joe-Jim were already hard at work building a small home north of the main house for the newlyweds, close to the cabin where Jim and Josie lived.
We hauled up in front of the saloon, and I dismounted at the rail. “Wait here, and I’ll grab you a bottle,” I said, then climbed the steps to the boardwalk.
Earlier, while I was paying for our supplies, I’d heard the boys whooping and hollering in the distance, just like old times, but as I pushed through the swinging doors that night, I could feel the tension in the room. It was like walking into a beard of Spanish moss, just after a heavy downpour.
“You know what that son of a bitch Jacob Klee is sayin’, Boone?” Roy demanded before the batwing doors had stopped flapping.
“I heard.”
“He’s saying it was you and Casey what throwed that half-witted nephew of his into a ’gator hole to get et.”
I’ll admit I felt oddly pleased that most of them seemed as outraged by Jake Klee’s accusations as I’d been. Everyone was there except for Dick Langley, who Casey had sent out to keep an eye on the Fort Myers road. The others were gathered in a close group by the bar.
“It’s a lie, and we all know it,” I said, approaching the bar. “Word will spread soon enough.”
Casey shook his head. “I ain’t sure it will, Boone.”
His reply caught me off guard. “I don’t see how anyone who knows the McCallisters or Davises would believe a tale like that from a Klee,” I said.
“Not everyone thinks as poorly of the Klees as you do,” Ardell pointed out. “I’m not saying you’re wrong, but a lot of people haven’t had to deal with them the way your Pa did with old Judah.”
“Ardell is making good sense, Boone,” Eric interjected. “Stories like that can take on a life of their own after a while. It ain’t just Dave Klee’s death that’ll fascinate people; it’s the way it happened.”
“The way they’re saying it happened,” I reminded him. “Besides, Dave Klee ain’t the first man to get pulled under by a ’gator because he wasn’t watching where he stepped.”
Casey turned to the bar, leaning over it with his shoulders hunched like he was chilled. “I sure hope so” was all he said, but I could tell he didn’t think it was likely and that the others felt the same.
“What d
o you want to do about it?” I asked abruptly. “If anyone’s got an idea, spill it out here where we can all see it.”
“I’ll tell you what we ought to do,” Roy Turner growled. “We ought to go get that fat son of a bitch, then drag him back here by his heels, and make him confess. Make him do it where the whole town can hear, and know what a lying whore’s son he really is.”
But I was already shaking my head at that. “Jacob Klee isn’t just one man. He’s got nearly a dozen hardcases riding with him, and kin scattered all through these parts. Pull a stunt like that, and we’d have a hundred men dogging us, screaming for our blood.”
“So what are you going to do? Just let it slide?”
“Unless someone’s got an idea that ain’t likely to start a range war, I don’t see where I’ve got much choice.”
An uneasy silence greeted my words. When several of the boys exchanged furtive glances, I swore softly.
“What do you want me to do, dammit? Go after Jacob Klee with a gun?”
“What’s wrong with that?” Roy demanded.
“I told Pa I’d look after the Flatiron until he got back, and that’s what I intend to do.”
Almost apologetically, Eric said: “I should have mentioned this earlier, Boone, but Klee was promising revenge when he rode out of here yesterday. He seemed pretty set on it.”
“What kind of revenge?”
“The usual bullshit. How he was going to make you regret ever being born, and that you’d be howling like a baby and begging to die before he got through with you.” Eric shrugged. “A lot of guys’ll make threats like that when they’re drunk or mad, but . . . well, Jake Klee ain’t like a lot of guys, Boone. He didn’t seem all that drunk, either.”
I glanced at Casey, still leaning into the bar with his shoulders up to his ears. “What do you want to do, Case?”
“Much as I hate to admit it, I guess you’re right. There’s not much we can do right now.”
“You’re both gonna let this slide?” Roy burst out.
“I reckon we are,” I replied softly. “At least for now.”
Roy swore and spun toward the bar. Eric refilled his glass, then poured a shot for me. “On the house,” he said.
I nodded my thanks and threw the whiskey against the back of my throat. It was kind of raw to be gulping, but I’ve had worse and kept a straight face as I stared into the backbar mirror. The reflection was of the rear of the room—the empty gaming tables and dust-layered chuck-a-luck cage. No one spoke. Jacob Klee’s threats had smothered the drovers’ good humor like wet sand on a campfire. I had another whiskey out of the bottle the boys were passing around, then ordered a full one for Jim. Eric brought out a brown quart bottle stoppered with a chipped cork and sealed in beeswax.
“It ain’t fancy from Kentucky, but it ain’t bad, either. It’ll cut varnish or wipe out a bad memory as quick as the good stuff.”
I turned the bottle in my hand, smiling at the crude marks scratched into the glass—a pair of Xs separated by a short, crooked line, like this. [Ed. Note: A slip of paper, like that from the back of an envelope, was included in the McCallister file, containing a penciled inscription similar to the following: X~X.]
That was Norm Wakley’s mark, burned into the hides of his cattle and carved into anything that wouldn’t burn. Wakley was another Pease River settler, although he lived farther back in the scrub than most, where he spent more time making bush whiskey than he did popping cows out of the swamps. I liked Norman well enough and would often ride up to his place on Whiskey Creek to visit, although I suspect my pa was right when he claimed I liked Norman’s sixteen-year-old daughter, Trudy, a whole lot more than I did the old man.
“How much?” I asked, tapping the side of the bottle with a finger.
“Two bucks,” Eric replied.
That was high for rotgut, but I had more money than options at that point, and forked it over without comment. Taking the bottle outside, I handed it to Jim. “You figure you can find your way back to those pines where we last stopped?”
Admiring the amber reflection of the saloon’s light on the bottle’s shoulder, Jim took a second for my question to sink in. Turning to me with a worried look, he said: “You wants me to go back that-away by my lonesome? That be a mighty long way for an old Negro like me, ’specially with a couple pack horses carrying so much good truck.”
“You won’t have to go all that way by yourself. We’re going to stay here and wash out some problems, but that won’t take long.” I slapped his mule lightly on the hip, then stepped back out of the way. “Go on, Jim. You’ve got plenty of food and a good shotgun. You’ll be fine.”
Jim hesitated, glanced at the bottle like it was a friend about to embark on a long and dangerous journey, then twisted around in his saddle to shove it into his war bag.
I couldn’t help grinning at his woebegone expression. “You don’t have to wait until you get there to pull that cork,” I said. “Just make sure you’re sober enough when we catch up that you can still ride.”
“I will, marse. I’ll be there, and sober, too. Or leastways more sober than not.”
He gave a tug on the lead rope to the first pack horse that set the whole string into motion and started down that lonely stretch of road into the night. I watched him go for a minute, then turned back to the saloon with the smile sliding off my face. The drovers hadn’t stirred in my absence, and I walked to the bar and ordered a fresh shot, not bothering to mask a quick, painful wince as I swallowed it down. Norm Wakley made good getting-drunk whiskey, but no one ever complained that it was too smooth.
Standing across the bar from me, Eric said: “This is the sorriest excuse for a hooray I’ve ever seen, Boone. I been to wakes that were more cheerful.”
“I doubt if it’s just Jacob Klee that’s thrown water on everyone’s spirits,” I replied. “It’s the whole damn’ war that’s got everyone feeling so glum. Last time I was here, you had a banjo picker sitting on the end of the bar playing his heart out, and whores enough for everyone. We could’ve gone down to Müller’s and spent our hard-earned cash on just about anything we wanted, too. Nowadays you’ve got to sneak in through the swamps just to come to town, and be careful you don’t make too much noise doing it.”
Eric shrugged and moved off. I guess the conversation was too close to the one we’d had earlier to warrant further effort. After a while, I took my whiskey and edged down the bar to where the rest of the crew were talking among themselves.
“It’s time we did something,” Roy was grumbling. “And I ain’t talkin’ about Jacob Klee, either.”
“Then what are you talking about?” Ardell Hawes asked.
“I’m talkin’ about going north and gettin’ in some licks against those Yankee sons of bitches,” Roy replied. “I’m tired of stayin’ home nursin’ cows while ever’one else is fightin’.”
“Go on, then,” Ardell said bluntly. “Nobody’s stopping you.”
“I intend to,” Roy declared, his voice rising defiantly. “Maybe even form my own company. What about it, boys? Anyone here got the spine to do some good for the South?” His face fell when no one spoke up. “By God, are you tellin’ me you’re all a-scared to fight?”
“No one is afraid to fight,” Ardell said sharply. “We wouldn’t be here tonight if we were. But if I do decide to join, it won’t be you I’ll follow.” He slewed partway around to peg me with a hard stare. “I’d follow you, Boone, if you wanted to put an outfit together.”
“Boone!” Roy hooted. “Hell, Boone’s too yellow to fight. You saw the way he led us here. It’s a damned wonder we didn’t all get et by ’gators.”
“Boone took on a job and saw it through,” Ardell said. “Didn’t lose too many cows, and only one man hurt in a bushwhack. He’d suit me to lead.”
“I’d join if Boone led,” Punch affirmed.
“Hold on, boys,” I interrupted. “I appreciate what y’all are saying, but I’m not going anywhere. I told Pa I’d stay home a
nd look after the place, maybe start putting together another herd to run north. That’s what I aim to do.”
Ol’ Roy, always one to start barking before he saw a squirrel, said: “Boone ain’t got enough gumption to lead a honest-to-God fightin’ outfit. He’s only fit to stay home and keep outta the way, like his daddy told him to.”
“Shut up, Roy,” Ardell said, although he was still looking at me as he spoke. “You sure, Boone? I meant what I said about following you, if you put an outfit together.”
“Yeah, I’m sure. Sorry, boys, but I gave Pa my word.”
“All right, that’s fair, but I still think Roy has a good idea. Not about forming his own company, but about those of us who want to go north where the real armies are fighting to start riding. Who’s in?”
“I am,” Calvin Oswald replied promptly.
“Count me in, too,” Punch added.
Ardell looked at Roy and Pablo. “What about you two?”
“Not me,” Pablo replied, shaking his head. “I go back to the Flatiron with Boone.”
“Roy?”
Roy swore, then nodded. “Yeah, I’m in, dammit.”
“Casey?”
“Naw, I’ll go back to the Flatiron with Boone, but then I need to mosey on home and see what’s doing. Pa put me in charge of the Cloverleaf, just like Boone’s pa did him. I reckon that’s what I’ll do until he gets back from Georgia. I can decide then if I want to go fight Yankees.” [Ed. Note: The Davis Ranch was known as the Cloverleaf in the 1860s; its brand was a four-leaf design said to represent Matthew Davis’s four sons, of which Casey was the youngest.]
“Don’t think on it too hard,” Roy grumbled. “You wouldn’t want to tax your brain.”
“Dang if you don’t grow as irritating as a bog full of ’skeeters when you start drinking,” I said to Roy.
“Don’t worry about Turner,” Ardell added with a grin. “A couple of months in a real cavalry’ll take the starch out of him. Main thing is, there’s four good Rebels about to join the fray. I say that ought to equal about two dozen Yankee shopkeepers.”
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