The Carpetbaggers

by Robbins, Harold

"They come from the direction of town," Kaneha said. But it was too late. He was already outside the door.

  "Howdy," he called as they pulled their horses up in front of the cabin.

  "You Sam Sand?" the one in the lead asked.

  Sam nodded. "That's me. Whut kin I do for you gents?"

  "We got a load we want hauled up to Virginia City," the man said. He took off his hat and wiped his face on his sleeve. "It's pow'ful hot today."

  "It shore is," Sam nodded. "Come on inside and cool off a bit while we talk about it."

  The men dismounted and Sam walked into the cabin.

  "Fetch a bottle of whisky," he said to Kaneha. He turned back to the men. "Set yourself down. What kind'a freight yuh got?"

  "Gold."

  "Gold?" Sam asked. "They ain't enough gold out heah to haul in a wagon."

  "That ain't what we hear," one of the men said. Suddenly there were guns in their hands. "We hear you got enough gold buried out heah to fill up a wagon."

  Sam stared at them for a moment, then he laughed. "Put your guns away, gents," he said. "Yuh don' believe that crazy yarn, do yuh?"

  The first man came slowly toward him. His arm flashed and the gun whipped across Sam's face. Sam fell backward against the wall. He stared up at the man incredulously.

  "Yuh’ll tell us where it is befo' we through," the man said tightly.

  The air in the cabin was almost unbearably hot. The three men had drawn off into a corner and were whispering among themselves. Occasionally they would glance across the room at their captives.

  Sam hung limply, tied to the support post in the center of the cabin. His head sagged down on his naked chest and the blood dropped down his face, matting on the graying red hair of his beard and chest. His eyes were swollen and almost closed, his nose broken and squashed against his cheek.

  Kaneha was tied in a chair. Her eyes were fixed unblinkingly on her husband. She strained to turn her head to hear what the men were saying behind her but she could not move, she was bound too tightly.

  "Mebbe he ain't really got the gold," one of the men whispered.

  "He's got it all right," the first one said. "He's jus' tough. Yuh don' know them ol' buffalo hunters like I do."

  "Well, you ain't never goin' to make him talk the way yuh're goin'," the short man said. "He's gonna die first."

  "He'll talk," the first man answered. He went to the stove and took a burning coal from it with a pair of fire tongs. He walked back to Sam and pulled his head back against the post by his hair. He held the tongs in front of Sam's face. "Wheah's the gold?"

  Sam's eyes were open. His voice was a husky croak. "They ain't none. For God's sake wouldn't I tell yuh if they was?"

  The man pressed the burning coal against Sam's neck and shoulder. Sam screamed in pain. "They ain't no gold!" His head fell sideways. The man withdrew the burning coal and the blood welled up beneath the scorched flesh and ran down his chest and arm.

  The man picked up a bottle of whisky from the table and took a swig from it. "Th'ow some water on him," he said. "If'n he won't talk for hisself, mebbe he'll talk for his squaw."

  The youngest man picked up a pail and threw water over Sam. Sam shook his head and opened his eyes. He stared at them.

  The oldest man put the bottle down and walked over to Kaneha. He took a hunting knife from his belt. The other men's eyes followed him. He cut the rope that bound her to the chair. "On yer feet," he said harshly.

  Silently Kaneha rose. The man's knife moved quickly behind her and her shift fell to the floor. She stood there naked before them. The youngest man licked his lips. He reached for the whisky and took a drink, his eyes never leaving her.

  Holding Kaneha by the hair, his knife to her back, the oldest man pushed her over toward Sam. They stopped in front of him.

  "It's been fifteen years since I skinned an Injun, squaw man," he said. "But I ain't fergot how." He moved swiftly around in front of her, his knife moving lightly up and down her skin.

  A faint thin line of blood appeared where the knife had traced from under her chin down her throat through the valley between her breasts across her stomach and coming to a stop in the foliage of her pubis.

  Sam began to cry, his own pain forgotten, his body wracked with bitter sobs. "Leave her be," he pleaded. "Please leave her be. They ain't no gold."

  Kaneha reached out her hand. She touched her husband's face gently. "I am not afraid, my husband," she said in Kiowa. "The spirits will return evil to those who bring it."

  Sam's face fell forward, the tears running down from his eyes across his bearded and bleeding cheeks. "I am sorry, my dear one," he said in Kiowa.

  "Tie her hands to the legs of that table," the older man commanded.

  It was done quickly and he knelt over her, his knife poised at her throat. He looked back up toward Sam. "The gold?" he asked.

  Sam shook his head. He could not speak any more.

  "My God," the youngest man said in a wondering voice. "I'm gittin' a hard on."

  "That's an idee," the man with the knife said. He looked up at Sam. "I'm shoah the man wouldn' min' if’n we used his squaw a little bit before we skinned her. Injuns are downright hospitable that way."

  He got to his feet. He put the knife on the table and unbuckled his gun belt.

  Kaneha drew back her legs and kicked at him.

  He swore softly. "Hold her laigs," he said. "I'll go first"

  It was almost seven o'clock when Max rode up to the cabin on the bay horse that Olsen lent him. The cabin was still and there was no smoke coming from the chimney. That was strange. Usually, his mother would be cooking when he got home.

  He swung down off the horse and started for the cabin. He stopped suddenly, staring at it. The door was open and moved lazily in the thin breeze. An inexplicable fear came into him and he broke into a run.

  He burst through the door and came to a stop in surprised shock, his eyes widening in horror. His father hung tied to the center post, his mouth and eyes open in death, the back of his head blown away by the.45 that had been placed in his mouth and fired.

  Slowly Max's eyes went down to the floor. There was a shapeless mass lying in a pool of blood, which bore the outline of what once had been his mother.

  The paralysis left him at the same moment he started to scream, but the vomit that rose in his throat choked off the sound. Again and again he gagged until there was no more inside him. He clung weakly to the side of the door, the sour stench from his stomach all around.

  He turned and staggered blindly out of the cabin. He sank to the ground outside and began to cry. After a while, his tears were gone. He rose to his feet wearily and walked around to the back of the house to the watering trough.

  He plunged his head in and washed the vomit from his face and clothing. Then, still dripping, he straightened up and looked around.

  His father's horse was gone but the six mules were browsing unconcernedly in the corral and the wagon was still under the lean-to in back of the cabin. The four sheep and the chickens of which his mother had been so proud were still in the pen.

  He wiped his arms across his eyes. He had to do something, he thought vaguely. But he couldn't bring himself to bury what was in the cabin. They weren't his mother and father; his parents could never look like that. There was only one thing to do.

  He walked over to the stack of firewood and gathered up an armful. Then he walked back into the house and put it down on the floor. It took him almost a half hour until firewood lay covering the floor like a blanket, three layers thick. He looked at it thoughtfully for a moment then turned and went outside again.

  He took the harness down from the lean-to wall and hitched the mules up to the wagon. He picked up a crate and went through the pen, throwing all the chickens into it. He placed the crate in the wagon. Then one by one, he lifted the sheep into the wagon and tied them to the floor rings.

  He led the team of mules and the wagon around to the front of the cabin and tied the bay horse
's lead to the back of the wagon. Then he walked them all to the road about two hundred yards from the house and tethered the team to a small scrub tree and went back to the house.

  He picked up the pitch bucket and went inside. Slowly he smeared the pitch over the firewood that lay on the floor. He kept his eyes down and away from the bodies of his parents. He stopped at the door and smeared the last of the pitch on that.

  He hesitated a moment, then remembering something, he went back into the cabin. He reached up on the shelf where his father had kept his rifle and pistol but they were not there. He pushed his hand farther along the shelf and felt something soft. He took it down.

  It was a new buckskin shirt and breeches his mother had made for him. It was bright and soft and clean-chamois colored. Again his eyes filled with sudden tears. He rolled it up under his arm and went back to the door.

  He held a match to the pitch stick until it was blazing brightly. After holding it for a second more to make sure, he threw it into the cabin and stepped back from the open door.

  He looked up at the sky in sudden surprise. The sun had just gone down and night had fallen in quick anger. The stars stared balefully down on him.

  A cloud of heavy, billowing smoke poured out of the doorway. Suddenly, there was a crack like thunder and a flame leaped through the doorway as the tinder-dry wood caught fire.

  He walked down to the road and got up on the wagon and began to drive to town. He did not look back until three miles later, when he reached the top of a small rise.

  There was a bright-orange flame reaching high into the sky where his home had been.

  5

  HE DROVE THE WAGON INTO THE YARD BEHIND Olsen's Livery Stable. Then he got down and walked across to the house that stood next to it. He climbed up the back steps and knocked at the door.

  "Mister Olsen," he called out.

  A shadow darkened the light of the window. The door opened and Olsen stood there. "Max!" he said. "What you doin' back here?"

  Max stared up into Olsen's face. "They killed my ma and pa," he said.

  "Killed?" Olsen exclaimed in surprise. '"Who killed?"

  Attracted by the sound of her husband's voice, Mrs. Olsen appeared in the doorway behind him.

  "The three men," Max said. "They asked me an' I gave them the directions to my house. An' they killed 'em." He hesitated a moment and his voice almost broke. "An' they stole Pa's hoss an' took his rifle an' pistol, too."

  Mrs. Olsen saw into the shock that lay behind the boy's facade of calm. She pushed her husband out of the way and reached out to Max. "You come inside an' let me fix you somethin' hot to drink," she said.

  He looked into her eyes. "They ain't time, ma'am," he said. "I got to be gettin' after them." He turned to Olsen. "I got the mules an' the wagon an' four sheep an' sixteen chickens outside in the yard. Would you give me a hundred dollars an' the pinto for 'em?"

  Olsen nodded. "Why, sure, boy," he said. The mules and the wagon alone were worth three times that. "I’ll even give you the big bay if you want. He's a better hoss. An' I'll throw in a saddle, too."

  Max shook his head. "No, thank you, Mr. Olsen. I want a pony I can ride without a saddle an' one that's used to the plains. He won't have as much to tote an' I'll move faster that way."

  "All right, if that's the way you want it."

  "Can I have the money now?" Max asked.

  "Sure, boy," Olsen answered. He turned back into the room.

  Mrs. Olsen's voice stopped him. "Oh, no, you're not," she said. She drew Max into the house firmly. "First, he's goin' to eat something. Then he's goin' to sleep. Time enough in the morning for him to start."

  "But they'll be further away by then," Max protested.

  "No they won't," she said with woman's logic. "They got to stop to sleep, too. They won't be any further ahead of you then than they are right now."

  She closed the door behind him and led him over to the table. She pushed him into a chair and placed a plate of soup in front of him. Automatically he began to eat.

  "I’ll go outside an' unhitch the team," Mr. Olsen said.

  When he came back into the house, Max was sleeping, his head resting in his crossed arms on the table.

  Mrs. Olsen gestured her husband to silence. "You just can't let him go after those men by himself," she whispered.

  "I got to go, ma'am." Max's voice came over her shoulder.

  She turned around and looked at him. "You can't," she cried out. "They're grown men an' they'll hurt you. Why, you're just a boy!"

  He looked up into her face and she was aware for the first time of the pride that glowed deep in those dark-blue eyes. "They hurt me all they're goin' to, ma'am," he said. "I'm 'bout sixteen, an' with my mother's people, a boy ain't a boy no more once he's sixteen. He's a man."

  On his second day out of Dodge, he slowed his pinto to a walk and studied the side of the road carefully. After a few minutes, he stopped and dismounted. He looked along the edge of the road carefully.

  The four horses had stopped here. They had milled around for a little while and then two of them had gone back onto the road toward Virginia City. The other two had gone eastward across the plains.

  He remounted and rode along the plains, his eyes searching out the trail until he found what he was looking for. One of the horses had been his father's. He recognized the shoe marking in the soft earth. It was lighter than the other marking, which meant he was not being ridden, but led. It also meant that the man up ahead must have been the leader, otherwise they wouldn't have let him take the horse, which was the most valuable thing they had stolen.

  A few miles farther along the trail, he saw some horse droppings. He stopped his horse and jumped down. He kicked at the dung with his foot. It was not more than seven hours old. They had wasted more time along the trail than he'd thought they would. He got back on the pinto and pushed on.

  He rode most of that night, following the trail in the bright moonlight. By the evening of the next day, he was less than an hour behind his quarry.

  He looked up at the sky. It was about seven o'clock and would be dark soon. The man would be stopping to make camp if he hadn't already. Max got off his horse and waited for night to fall.

  While he sat there, he cut a forked branch from a scrub tree and fitted a round stone onto it. Then he bound the stone to the crotch with thin strips of leather, winding them down the branch to make a handle. When he was finished, he had a war club as good as any he'd learned to make the summer he spent with the Kiowa.

  It was dark then and he got to his feet, fastening the club to his belt. He took the horse by the halter and started forward cautiously on foot.

  He walked slowly, his ears alert for any strange sound, his nostrils sniffing at the breeze for the scent of a campfire.

  He was in luck, for he caught the scent of the campfire from about a quarter mile away. He tied the pinto to a bush and pulled the rifle from the pack on the horse's back. Silently he moved forward.

  The whinny of a horse came to his ears and he dropped to the ground and peered forward. He figured the horses were tied about three hundred yards ahead of him. He looked for the campfire but couldn't find it.

  Cautiously he made his way downwind from the horses in a wide circle. The smell of the campfire was strong in his nostrils now. He raised his head from the tall plain grass. The campfire was about two hundred yards in front of him. He could see the man, sitting hunched over it, eating from a frying pan. The man was no fool. He had picked a camp site between two rocks. That way, he could be approached only from in front.

  Max sank back into the grass. He would have to wait until the man was asleep. He stretched out and looked up at the sky. When the moon was up, a few hours from now, it would be time for him to move. Until then, it would do no harm for him to rest. He closed his eyes. In a moment, he was sleeping soundly.

  His eyes opened suddenly and he stared straight up at the moon. It hung white and high in the sky over him. He sat up slowly and pee
red over the grass.

  The campfire was glowing faintly now, dying slowly. He could see the shadow of the man lying near the rocks. He started to inch forward. The man snored lightly and turned in his sleep. Max froze for a moment, then the figure was still again and Max inched forward a little farther. He could see the man's outstretched hand, a gun at the tip of the fingers.

  He crawled around behind and picked up a small pebble from the ground beside him. Silently he took the war club from his belt and got up into a half crouch. Holding his breath in tightly, he threw the stone near the man's feet.

  With a muttered curse, he sat up, looking forward, his gun in his hand. He never knew what hit him as Max brought the war club down on his head from behind.

  Max came back with the pinto about the time that dawn was breaking in the east. He tied his horse to the scrub near the others and walked back to look at the man.

  His eyes were still closed. He was breathing evenly though there was a smear of blood along his cheek and ear where the club had caught him. He lay naked on his back on the ground, his arms and legs outstretched tautly, staked to the ground.

  Max sat down on the rock and began to whet his knife along its smooth surface. When the sun came up, the man opened his eyes. They were dull at first, then gradually they began to clear. He tried to sit up and became aware that he was tied down. He twisted his head and looked at Max.

  "What's the idee?" he asked.

  Max stared at him. He didn't stop whetting his knife. "I’m Max Sand," he said. "Remember me?"

  Max walked over to him. He stood there looking down, the knife held loosely in his hand. There was a sick feeling inside him as he looked at the man and pictured what must have happened in the cabin. The image chased the feeling from him. When he spoke, his voice was calm and emotionless. "Why did you kill my folks?"

  "I didn't do nothing to them," the man said, his eyes watching the knife.

  "You got my pa's hoss out there."

  "He sol' it to me," the man replied.

  "Pa wouldn' sell the on'y hoss he had," Max said.

  "Let me up outa here," the man screamed suddenly.