“Just what are we being arrested for and where’s your arrest warrant?” My defiant Jim refused to raise his hands.
Bothwell snickered, waving the gun and announcing, “You know why, and this is all the warrant we need.”
By now Jimmy could see I looked both angry and worried. “Are you alright?” he yelled over to me, and I nodded. He turned to men he knew by their first names and started with the obvious. “Just what in the hell do you think you’re doing? Tom, what’s up here?”
But Tom Sun didn’t say a word. It was obvious Bothwell was running this show, so Jim turned all his attention to him.
“Bothwell, put that gun away. I don’t know who you think you are, but we’re not going anywhere with you—Ella get out of that buggy—and you’ll be lucky if I don’t call the law myself and have you arrested for kidnapping….”
He would have said more, but he heard the click of a gun being cocked and that’s a sound that can stop a grown man in his tracks.
“Get…in…the…wagon.” Bothwell stretched each word.
“I’ve got a horse and wagon and I can drive myself into Rawlins. I’m not leaving them out here,” Jim declared, as though this were the most obvious thing in the world. “John, you wouldn’t want me to abandon my rig,” but John Durbin offered no solace and the other men didn’t show any sympathy either.
“I’m not saying it another time, Averell. Unhitch your horses and get in that wagon or I’ll shoot you where you sit.”
I knew Bothwell well enough to know the man needed little excuse, so I called over, “Come on Jimmy, come on. Let’s go with them to Rawlins and I’ll get my papers to prove we aren’t rustling.”
“Rustling? RUSTLING?? You think Ella is rustling? Are you out of your goddamn minds?” Jim’s face got red and he was flinging his arms around. I coughed real loud to calm him down, and he took the cue.
He put on his politician’s voice: “Gentlemen, you know better than that. She bought a small herd last fall and they calved in the spring and they’ve been in her corral, big as life and there for everyone to see. Bothwell, you can see them from your place, for God’s sake. Tom, you must have seen them when you went looking for your own cows. John, you know damn well the last thing we would do is rustle cows.”
He sounded like a man who believed common sense would kick in any second.
“How would it look to have your justice of the peace rustling?” He actually snorted at that one.
“It would look really, really bad. And you think anybody would let me keep the post office if they thought I associated with rustlers? Of course not. I wouldn’t jeopardize my business and my appointments like that. And Ella sure wouldn’t jeopardize her claim by becoming a common rustler. You’ve all seen how hard she’s worked to build that cabin and those corrals. People all over this valley brag about what a tireless worker she is. She’d throw that away for a couple cows? Think about it—why would she ever do that? Gentlemen, this doesn’t make any sense. So, stop this so I can get to Casper and this lady can go about her business.”
I was real proud of my Jimmy for saying things so clear and honest. But the next second, it was clear Bothwell was doing all the thinking for this group. He laughed out loud at Jim’s recitation and declared, “You homesteaders are all alike—you think you can take our cows and we can’t do nothing about it. Well, that might be the way things were lately, but that’s not the way things are today.”
Not one of those men said another word. If this was a play, the only character was Bothwell and everyone else was just a prop. I couldn’t believe men this powerful and this important to the valley could be this stupid.
Neither could Jimmy. His common-sense speech hadn’t worked so now he launched a shame speech. “I cannot believe you gentlemen are letting this young hot-head lead you around like a bull with a ring in his nose! You’re all in your forties—he’s just in his thirties, and yet he’s the one I see running this show. Every one of us has years on him. Since when do mature, seasoned men take orders from a young bully? You’re going to look ridiculous when the newspapers…”
“SHUT UP!!” Bothwell screamed so loud, I saw birds fleeing the trees. It so startled me, I jumped. Jimmy did too, a little. Enough that it was clear his shame speech was over.
Bothwell waved his gun from Jimmy to the wagon. Jimmy unhitched his horses and climbed in next to me. Bothwell led the caravan north, away from the roadhouse and away from other ranches. He led us toward the hills where other eyes couldn’t see what was happening.
“Hey, this isn’t the way to Rawlins,” Jimmy piped up, like he was the only one who knew the geography around here. That didn’t even get a response. My stomach turned.
Jimmy held my hand and talked to me with his eyes.
“Don’t worry, they’re just trying to scare us.”
I prayed he was right.
***
Have you ever watched drunk men trying to make a decision? It’s an ugly thing. Nobody is thinking straight. Some can’t even talk straight. I don’t think McLean ever got a decent sentence out all afternoon. Cap’n Galbraith tried to sound like the educated man he was, but alcohol has its own language and it isn’t the one sober men speak.
Bothwell and Durbin rode side by side and they’d exchange words now and then, but I couldn’t hear them.
What I did hear, all afternoon, was a barrage of commands that Jimmy and I give up and move away and forget our claims. “You can start over someplace else where you’re wanted,” Cap’n Galbraith instructed, like it was as easy as changing your shirt.
“You know damn well you’re right in the middle of Bothwell’s pasture. Now that just isn’t fair.” John Durbin had a perverted sense of fairness.
“You’re just troublemakers and we don’t like troublemakers in the Sweetwater Valley. You’ll be happy someplace else.” Conner wasn’t much of a thinker on his best day, and this wasn’t his best day.
“Don’t worry,” Jimmy whispered. “They got to sober up soon. And they’re just bluffing.” Jimmy sounded certain. I had to trust he was right.
Here’s how stupid drunk men can be. Bothwell took the entire group into the Sweetwater River—it’s real shallow there. He had us driving down the river for a good part of the afternoon. Was he trying to erase any tracks? Na, I decided that was far too complex a thought for a man in his condition. He was just being an idiot. I wasn’t the only one who thought so.
“Bothwell, this is stupid.” Tom Sun finally found his tongue. “We’re not getting anywhere. This is getting out of hand.” He argued to turn around and go back to the roadhouse.
“We delivered our message, loud and clear.” That was Cap’n Galbraith, trying to sound like they’d just won.
“We should…should..should…” but nobody waited for the stuttering McLean to finish his thought.
Those men shouted at each other for a good half hour, while Jimmy and I sat there, seeing our prospects improving by the second.
Jimmy couldn’t help himself. “Gentlemen, I think we’ve had enough for one day. I’ve got a helluva lot to do and so does Ella and our behinds are getting tired sitting in this buggy. Nice buggy, Tom. But enough is enough.”
Bothwell exploded. “Close your trap or we’ll drown you right here in the river.”
And then I couldn’t help myself. I started cackling and snorting and giggling and it grew into a full-throated laugh that spit out, “There’s not enough water in this river to give a land hog a decent bath.”
Jimmy hooted like that was the best joke he ever heard.
But we were the only ones laughing. Those men stared at us like we were from China.
Bothwell reined his horse around and started upstream. Everyone else followed. Nobody was saying anything now. We went on like that forever. Must have been two, three miles.
I figured they had to be sobering up and comin
g to their senses. I tried a nice approach.
“Gentlemen, I’m getting hungry. You know, it’s almost supper time.”
“Me, too,” Jimmy then tried to take charge. “Hey, if you boys want a great steak dinner, my Ella will cook one up for you back at the roadhouse. How about it? No hard feelings. I don’t have any beer, but I’ve got some good rye whiskey and tonight, it’s all on the house.”
“And I can whip up a great pie by the time supper is done. I’ll make you a mince pie, Mr. Bothwell. Like your Ma used to make. Remember how you love that? I’ve got some berries. Plenty of pie for everyone.”
Bothwell turned in his saddle and aimed his gun right at us and poured out his rage in a wrath that stunned everyone. “You think this is a joke? You think we’re just gonna forget about all this? You think you can buy off your rustlin’ with a steak dinner—probably a steak from one of our cows? You think this is funny? You don’t see us laughing, do you. You fuckin’ people are just disgusting, and I’m not standing for any more.”
“You’re not standing for any more!?” I exploded. Jimmy pulled on my sleeve, but he couldn’t hush me. “Bothwell, you are a lyin’ fool and I’ve had all of the nonsense I’m gonna take today. You men have had your fun, but that’s enough. I’ve got things to do and boys to feed and I’m sick of being hauled around by a bunch of liquored up idiots who know damn well those cows are mine. Now turn this buggy around and take me home!”
It was about four o’clock. In that instant, everything changed. Bothwell whipped his horse, took us out of the river and headed for a rocky canyon. Nobody tried to stop him. They just followed along like sheep. He was in a real hurry now. Jimmy threw me a worried look.
We stumbled into a canyon where things got really bad. Bothwell climbed off his horse, charged over and yanked me out of the buggy. McLean pulled Jimmy down.
“Get me a rope. Get me two ropes.” Bothwell screamed the words like they came to him naturally. Conner handed over the rope from his saddle. Durbin added his. Bothwell grabbed one and threw the other to McLean.
They dragged us over to a big, flat rock under a tree that didn’t know where it wanted its limbs to go. One hung over the rock, others stuck out in every direction. It was an odd-looking tree.
“Just a minute, just a minute. This is going too far. Come on, Bothwell, you can’t do this.” Jimmy was yammering. “WE NEVER RUSTLED ANY CATTLE. We can prove it. Please stop. For Chrissake.”
But nobody was listening to him.
Bothwell threw one lariat over the limb, then the other. He grabbed Jimmy and forced a noose around his neck.
McLean was trying to get his noose around my head, but my new bonnet was in the way. He ripped it off my head and stomped it in the dirt. In the dirt! I kicked him good in the gut. He rolled on the ground holding his belly like it was about to burst. Then the bastard got up and came at me with that rope again. I was bobbing and weaving so much, he kept missing his mark.
“Please, if you’re going to kill us, please give me a chance to say a prayer, let me meet my maker with a prayer on my lips,” I begged.
Bothwell taunted me, “You can deliver it in person.” He was the only one doing any talking. Only McLean was helping him. The rest of the men stood back, like they were silent spectators at a ball game.
Bothwell was clearly enjoying himself. “Hey, Averell, if you’re so brave, why don’t you be game and jump off?” He chuckled, but he was the only one.
Suddenly there was a shot. I had no idea where it came from or who was coming to our aid, but I thanked the Lord for whoever it was! Durbin was hit in the hip and he screamed like he was mortally wounded. The men jumped down from their horses and grabbed their Winchesters and started shooting back. There was a lull—our savior had to be reloading, and it seemed he had a smaller gun, probably a handgun. Then the shooting started all over again. And then it stopped. I knew there were no more bullets to save us.
McLean finally settled the noose around my neck. He picked me up and forced me onto the rock. I screamed with every ounce of strength in my body. “No! No! If you have a mother—a sister—No!”
Bothwell rushed forward and pushed Jim off the rock. He didn’t fall but two or three feet—not enough to break his neck. Jimmy kicked wildly, trying to pull himself up on the rope. But even when he gained an inch or two, he couldn’t hold it.
I shrieked again as McLean pushed me off the rock. Now I was kicking. I couldn’t get a toehold. In my jerking, I banged into Jimmy, and we both spun around. We grabbed for each other, but that failed. I was wrenching so frantically, I kicked off the moccasins. First one. Then the other.
Bothwell was laughing like a man being mightily entertained. Even as I choked, I could hear him jeer, “Look at the bitch—she’s wearin’ Indian moccasins! What kind of decent white woman puts on dirty Indian moccasins? Maybe she’s sleepin’ with ’em too. Wouldn’t put it past her. What a lowlife.”
Those words weren’t important now. What was important was my prayer. “God, please make it break, PLEASE MAKE IT BREAK!”
But the limb held.
***
And all the while, I could hear Bothwell’s ridiculous laugh. I prayed it would so sicken the others, they’d rush over to rescue us. Cut the rope. Shoot it free. Take control.
But they turned away, like they didn’t want to see what was happening. Like they weren’t witnesses to their own crime. Like they couldn’t be as guilty if they hung back and didn’t join Bothwell’s pushes. Like it had to be his sin alone, and not theirs, too. They stayed in the background, cowards until the very end. And I hope they never slept another night of their lives without seeing what they had done. Because they knew they were just as guilty as the monsters who actually pushed us off that rock.
But how will they explain to everyone in the Sweetwater Valley—and probably everyone in W.T.—that they went so low as to hang a woman? There’s nothing to compare this to. Nobody hangs a woman in W.T. I’ve never heard of them hanging a woman anywhere—oh, that woman who they say helped the killers of Lincoln, but other than her, women don’t end up on a vigilante’s rope. What’s the old saying, ‘women and children get saved first’? That sounds good, even if it’s a phony chivalry. They pretend they’ve got this respect for women and put us on a “pedestal,” but really, they’ve put us under their thumb. Except for drunkards like my first husband, most stop short of physical harm. So women play along because we learned long ago that when you’ve got so little, you cling to whatever you got.
I didn’t even get the benefit of fake chivalry to save me from the noose.
These men strung us up like we were a side of beef. They have some powerful answering to do for that. Justice can’t abide that kind of vigilante lawlessness and belly-draggin’ sin.
The only thing justice can really do is tit for tat. It can string up each and every one of these horrible men, just like they did us. Let them dangle with their toes not quite touching and slowly strangle to death, just like they killed us. But their execution wouldn’t be done out in a private gully, where no one but God could see. Theirs would be done in broad daylight in the middle of town. I’d stage it on the front lawn of that new prison they’re building in Rawlins. The whole town can come out and see that men who murder innocents are the worst men there are.
***
No, I won’t die like that. Until the very last second—the very, very last second, before it is mercifully over—I won’t believe this is my death.
Not at the end of a plain rope, like you find on any saddle in the territory.
Rope I have at home by my corral. Rope tied to the water pail when I go down to the creek. Just a simple rope.
But it isn’t a simple rope when it’s thrown over your head and settles on your neck. It’s so rough and so strong. It makes you think of a snake strangling you, and since I hate snakes so much, that makes the terror even worse. T
his is silly, but I am thankful the good dress I’m finishing has a high neck, so nobody at the summer dance will see the rope burns.
See, I still hope I’ll be dancing at the summer fandango. My Jimmy will be doing his best jig, and all my good neighbors will share a night that nobody wants to end. I’ve dreamed about this night for so long, I refuse to give it up.
So I keep twisting and kicking, hoping to get a toehold on the rock.
Just got it! I’m standing on the rock! I steal a breath. I’m balancing and…My foot slips off.
Jimmy has his hands above his head, holding the rope and trying to pull himself up, but I can’t reach up that far. Oh my Jimmy—seeing him like that breaks my heart, but crushes my soul. That good man, that good, decent man. I love him so. Is this the last time I ever touch the man I love, when we bang into each other in our ugly death jig?
Jimmy. Jimmy. Ma. Oh Ma. Pa. Gene. God help me.
***
When that rope tightens, it cuts off any air getting to my lungs, so I last as long as the last breath I have. As that seeps out, it feels like my chest is on fire. I’ll just start burning up, that’s how hot it gets.
My eyes seem to blow up, like they’re looking for their own air out there, outside my body.
My nose starts bleeding into my throat because there’s this putrid taste in my mouth.
Most of all it hurts. It hurts so bad I can’t believe a vicious pain like this exists.
It hurts so much it makes me blind, so the blackness comes first.
Then it closes my ears.
All I can hear is the sound of my heart beating like a whole bunch of Indians were banging on a drum, really hard and really fast.
Then they stop.
And that is the last beat my heart sings.
***
I want to tell that Jimmy and I didn’t die so rich cattlemen could have our land and water.
I want to tell that justice stepped up, like any decent citizen would demand.
Cattle Kate Page 23