Crows & Cards

by Joseph Helgerson

  When Chilly saw the chief lay out four aces and a joker too, he looked gut shot. His face went all white and billowy as a sail, and he stared straight ahead at my little peephole. I hope I never live to see eyes burning toward me like that again. Fiery comets couldn't sear you no hotter.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  I TURNED ALL EGGSHELL—a single tap could have cracked me into a thousand pieces. Tight as I was gripping the chief's pouch, I must have been hoping for advice but none got delivered, leastways not in English. Think that didn't make me want to cry? No time though.

  Chilly had shoved back from the table, sending his chair tumbling as he straightened up and grabbed at his vest. His eyes were dancing wild, and he could only have been reaching for one thing: his pocket pistol. A second later he was pointing a barrel big as a cannon at President Washington's portrait and me behind it.

  I rolled off my shelf without a worry about knocking any crocks loose. Inside the chief's pouch, it felt as if a pair of wings was beating, trying to get out. When I dropped through the hole in the floor, I banged my hip a good one but bit back any whimpers, 'cause Chilly was bellowing, "I been double-crossed!" He sounded as though run through by a Pawnee war lance.

  There followed a bunch of other shouts, most of which came all at once and went along the lines of this:

  "Look out!"

  "Crazy fool!"

  "Ha ka ta!"

  "I'm done!"

  Judging from the thumps and crashes I heard, gents and Indians must have been diving for cover everywhere.

  All that went mum when Chilly fired his pistol, giving my ears the rings worse than a bell tower. Crockery exploded above me. Pickle juice rained down. I fell all the way to the ground and took off crawling.

  Fast as my arms and legs were moving, you might have mistook me for a centipede, if there'd been enough light to see by. Bumping into Ho-John's cache of runaway supplies, I raised my head too high and cracked against a timber. The conk laid me flat for a second or two, though not for long, not with Chilly roaring behind me, "He's gone!"

  The hole in the pantry floor wasn't a secret any longer, which I felt mighty bad about, considering the fix it would leave Ho-John in. But Chilly's shout sent me rolling again, for fear he'd reloaded. When I reached the edge of the house, I scrambled out and tore off into the darkness. Once I hit the road, I headed for the levee and the nearest steamer. If only someone would get me out of St. Louis, I'd do anything they wanted of me—wash dishes, scrub spittoons, even haul wood. I wasn't going to worry about slivers or deep water or nothing. I'd be brave if I had to.

  As I went pounding down that dirt road, Stavely's Landing and home popped into my head as if cast there by a magician. A whiff of Ma's cooking rolled right up my nose without the slightest hitch. This was to the good, 'cause it was fast becoming clear that planning ahead wasn't one of my strong suits. What had I been thinking of doing after helping out the chief? Well, I hadn't considered it one iota. Too wrapped up in everything else, I guess. Lucky for me that running home didn't take any foresight at all. Where else would someone stand up for me, whether I was right or wrong, and get around to boxing my ears only later, after all the company had left? Home was the place where I had a cabin full of brothers and sisters all looking up to me for no better reason than that I'd been there the longest. It was also where I had a ma and pa who'd mostly done their best by me without any pay and not too much thanks either. That's why every puny muscle I owned was pulling me there.

  But home was a long ways off. A hundred and sixty-some miles off, and every one of those miles was dark and full of woods and poisonous snakes and mangy dogs and half-starved panthers and ornery homesteaders and whooshing thunderstorms and lonesome wood ticks and ... The list wound around me tighter and tighter, faster and faster, till I could barely suck down a breath. One hundred and sixty-some miles looked to be the distance to the ends of the world.

  And not far behind me, Chilly was screaming and cursing and breaking things like a man who was three-quarters volcano and one-quarter jaws of hell. I'd barely got a stone's throw from the inn before I heard its front door slam open. Checking over my shoulder, I saw Chilly come busting outside, with the Professor right on his coattails.

  Well, if I was ever going to make it home, I had to do something and do 'er pretty quick, so I dove into a patch of woods along the creek. When I struck an old oak about four steps in, I gave up running and started climbing. Hiding in its limbs seemed safer than sounding like some bear thrashing through the brush. Needing both hands for pulling myself up, I stuffed the chief's pouch in a vest pocket and shimmied upward till the air went so thin, I couldn't hardly breathe. At first I didn't dast check how high I might have gone, but finally I chanced a peek and found I was barely off the ground. Four or five feet at the most.

  So upward I struggled again, going mostly by touch and smell, 'cause my eyes were nailed shut tight as coffins. The next time I looked, I found myself about as high as Ma and Pa's cabin roof. There I stayed, figuring if it wasn't high enough, they could have me, 'cause one foot higher would have done me in, fast as my heart was whim-whamming away. And the sound of Chilly's watch in my ears? Loud as a blacksmith clanging on a horseshoe. I'd barely got a good hug on the tree's back side before Chilly and the Professor come charging along. I swear they didn't look any bigger than sugar ants way down below me as they peered every which way in the dark.

  "I ain't got the foggiest how that old Injun did it," Chilly was roaring, "but when I get my hands on that boy I'll find out quick enough."

  "You sure Zeb was in on it?" the Professor asked, clearly not so quick to judge.

  "Why do you think he took off running?"

  "Maybe 'cause you was shooting at him. 'Sides, the boy couldn't have had anything to do with all them aces. How you going to explain them?"

  "I can't," Chilly growled. "And that's my point exactly. There's a whole lot more going on here than I can figure, like how come a deck from that satchel wasn't marked ten ways from Sunday. Answer me that."

  "You'll have to ask Goose," the Professor came back. "He's the last one I seen tinkering with them cards."

  "That old fool! And why didn't that worthless boy warn me a lick?"

  "Maybe the wire broke."

  "Don't give me none of that. Just fetch them hounds. When I get my hands on that boy, I lay I'll get to the bottom of all this."

  If my blood hadn't already been standing still, hearing that would surely have brought it to a halt. They were going to have me treed in no time. Sitting where I was, I'd already done half the job for 'em. And every tick of Chilly's watch seemed to be calling out, Here I am!

  "You want Ho-John too?" the Professor asked.

  "Can you name me anyone else can handle those mutts?" Chilly spat out. "'Course I want him, and I want him tonight. Not sometime next week. Just send 'em out here, then go help Goose hold on to that Injun."

  Once the Professor was gone, Chilly kicked dirt and thrashed about and called out my name some, sounding as if he had the sweetest, most special treat for me in all creation. Pretty soon the hounds started baying, and Ho-John in his chains was herding them down the road. All of a sudden my blood started moving again.

  "We're after that boy," Chilly shouted above the dogs.

  'Need something to sniff up," Ho-John said. "Well, go get it," Chilly yelled. "Do I have to do all the clang-blamed thinking around here?"

  Off Ho-John shuffled, leaving Chilly behind to lay out everything that had ever gone wrong his whole life long. It was quite a list and mighty impressive, ranging from his pa running off with that duchess to his ma being strict as a judge about his upbringing. Chilly was cussing out the crow that'd been plaguing him and wondering how it'd made his precious watch disappear when Ho-John came hurrying back with my blanket in one hand and a lantern in the other. I cracked open my eyes enough to see that the lantern threw shadows everywhere, especially across Chilly's face, which looked long and mean as an ax head. The dogs buried
their snouts in my blanket and got the idea right away. Drat my luck but they had to be the most intelligent pack of hounds I'd ever run across. First thing they did was make a beeline for the oak tree I was clinging to the back side of.

  There they were, howling and bouncing higher and higher off the oak's trunk. And there I was, clenching my teeth and squeezing my eyes shut as if that would somehow hide me better. But what saved me in the end was Ho-John.

  "Ain't nothing up that tree," he called out. "They just remembering some old coon they had up there last week."

  If Chilly had been paying attention to anything but the chief's crown, he'd have known that Ho-John was laying out a bold-faced lie. Nobody had had those dogs out in the woods since the telegraph had been up and running. No, what Ho-John was doing was saving my skin, even after I'd sunk his escape plans, and I daren't even sing out a peep of thanks.

  "Well, get 'em moving," Chilly shouted. "We ain't got all night."

  So Ho-John handed off the lantern and waded into the brush, where he lifted the lead hound up in his arms gentle as a lamb and carried him back to the road. Setting the dog down, he gave him a slap on the rump. The hound took off baying, with the rest of the pack close on his heels. Ho-John rambled after them, remarkable fast for a man shackled by irons. Chilly brought up the rear, swaying the lantern from side to side, searching for sign while cursing a blue streak and trying to keep up.

  I stayed way up that oak, trying to remember how to breathe. Once I got my lungs working, I tried backing down from my perch, 'cause it wouldn't be long before Chilly figured out they'd missed my track and come doubling back. Trouble was, I couldn't bring myself to let go of the tree trunk. The idea of climbing down churned me worse than going up had; the only thing I could sell myself on was jumping off all at once. 'Course, I might break a leg or arm, but that couldn't be any worse than staying put till Chilly doubled back, could it? I was still arguing with myself about that one when a whole new row broke out at the inn as a crowd pushed and shoved its way through the front door. There wasn't enough light to see much by, but I could hear Goose carrying on.

  "Now hold on, now!" Goose shouted. "Not so fast now! Who elected you sheriff?"

  The men answering him were facing away from me, so their voices didn't carry at all. Whatever they were shouting back sounded plenty hotted up though.

  "And I say," Goose answered, "that this old redskin stays here till Chilly gets back."

  That was when the grabbing and cussing started. There was yelling too, plenty of that, along with a bottle or two that got broke. Then came a gunshot. That got hold of everyone's ears real good and put the squabbling to rest.

  Then one voice started laying down the law to all of them about something or other. I couldn't make out the words exactly, but you could tell by the tone that whoever was talking sounded like a judge or turnkey or constable or someone official.

  "Ain't no good going to come of this," Goose warned, kind of whiny and defeated-like.

  The man barking orders turned my way, and now I could hear him perfectly clear. "If it takes Chilly Larpenteur down a peg or two, that recommends it to me. You and Chilly keep this inn and give this blind old man the rest. That sounds fair enough, considering how you tried to cheat him."

  It was the Professor talking, and there was a whole lot of agreeing from the crowd. Hardly anyone was bothering to tag along with Goose's view. Actually, I think he might have been entirely alone in the matter. I guess they were all plenty tired of Chilly's winning every time, especially now that they'd learned about the telegraph.

  "You two better get going," the Professor advised.

  A couple of people stepped away from the crowd, untied a pony from out front, and started down the road toward me. Goose tried to stop 'em till the Professor sicced a couple of men after him. Before long I saw it was the princess and the chief who were headed my way.

  The oak where I was holed up had a large limb stretching out a mile or two above the road. Dropping down to my hands and knees, I summoned every wisp of courage I could manage and crawled along it, nearly losing my grip and plummeting to a pulpy death a half-dozen times at least. But I managed to hang on long enough to pssst as the pony passed beneath me.

  They came to a stop, the princess searching around for me.

  "Way up here," I whispered.

  Looking upward, the princess said, "Excuse us, but we're running for our lives."

  "What do you think I'm doing?" I groused, kind of tart-like.

  "You can't run very far sitting in a tree," she pointed out.

  But the chief cut us both off. "Tsa ki ha!"

  Following that, the chief and princess gnawed at each other a short minute before the princess took a deep breath and said, "My father wants to know if you're done with his pouch."

  "Not exactly."

  "What else do you need it for?"

  "To help me get out of here."

  When the princess passed that on, the chief gave a quick answer back.

  "Swing down and ride with him," the princess ordered. "So you won't leave a trail for the dogs."

  "But you're headed right for Chilly," I said.

  "Not for long," she told me.

  I thought it over a tiny bit and didn't see as I had much choice in the matter.

  "All right," I grumbled. "I'm coming down."

  The princess walked the pony forward a step or two. Dying ten times over, I dangled myself off the branch till my toes could touch the horse's rump—maybe that limb wasn't so high up as I'd thought, though it was plenty high for my tastes. Laying one hand on the chief's shoulder for balance, I dropped down, feeling as though I was falling off the evening star.

  And that's how I got away: on the back of a broken-down old Indian pony, hanging on to the shoulders of Chief Standing Tenbears while fighting off sneezes due to horsehair and war bonnet feathers that kept tickling my nose. Soon as I handed the chief his pouch, he started chanting a song that sounded happy as a basket full of larks.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  WE STUCK TO THE ROAD AROUND A CURVE and up and down a dip, but then took to the woods on an old deer path. Narrow and grown over as that trail was, I never would have noticed it, not even come daylight, but the princess picked it out easy as one-two-three.

  Not too long after that a clingy drizzle started falling. It fit my mood like a black glove, 'cause I couldn't quite shake the notion that Chilly would sooner or later track me down. And when I got tired of trying not to fuss about what'd happen then, I switched over to feeling glum about Ho-John and how I'd sunk his chances. Once Chilly sat down and figured out how those pantry floorboards had got loosened, he'd be shouting for Ho-John's head. Oh, I tried to tell myself it had been an accident, that I hadn't meant to drag anyone else down with me, but that didn't smooth the waters any. All round, it was a pretty gloomy ride, especially after the princess got it in her head to start acting all chipper. What improved her mood so was the drizzle.

  "It'll knock down our scent," she said.

  Well, I knew that. I was about to tell her so too when the wind gusted, carrying the baying of Goose's hounds. My haunches went tight as springs above that pony, but soon as the wind died off, their barking faded away and I breathed easy (in between struggling not to sneeze). Then the wind came snaking back, this time from a different direction and carrying Chilly's shouts: "Ho-John? Ho-John!"

  He sounded close enough to grab my ankle, though I couldn't spy him anywhere near 'bouts. By and by, the princess spotted the tiniest twinkle way off through the woods, and we figured that for his lantern.

  "Ho-John!" Chilly was yelling. "Don't you go running on me!"

  Then the wind shifted directions again, covering up Chilly's voice with the creaking of tree limbs and the rustling of leaves and even the ringing of church bells clear from town, but hearing him that brief bit made the chief order the princess to hold up. He adjusted his warbonnet that way he did when listening to what the crow was saying. After a little, the chi
ef whispered a question to the pouch, which he'd dropped atop his head the instant I'd handed it off to him. Still hanging on to the chief's shoulders, I heard the pouch reply in Indian. It didn't sound none too happy. Back and forth the chief and crow went till the wind swung around, blowing Chilly's threats our way again.

  "You ain't going nowhere, Ho-John," Chilly yelled. "Not with those dogs giving away your every move."

  I asked the princess in a low voice what the chief and that crow were going on about, hoping they were figuring out some way to give Ho-John a hand, but that wasn't the case at all.

  "They're talking over which way to go," she said.

  "But Ho-John's in trouble," I pointed out.

  "And we aren't?"

  "I think maybe I need to go help him."

  "What could you do?" the princess scoffed.

  The way she made my rescuing Ho-John sound laughable gave me the pluck to say, "Maybe I can distract Chilly."

  "By getting yourself get caught?"

  "I hope not, but if that's what it takes..." The words trailed off on me, as happens when you're not exactly sure how brave you're prepared to be.

  "Well, don't let us slow you down," she said, though maybe with a touch of admiration. The only reason I say that is because she begrudgingly added, "We'll wait up the trail for a while."

  "Fair 'nough," I told her.

  Sliding off the back of the pony felt like going down in deep water for the third time. The woods were already mucky dark and the drizzle had soaked me to the skin, so I might as well have been sinking into the river. I'm sorry to have to say it, but I hung on to that pony's bristly tail till the princess walked him out of my grasp. Within seconds they'd disappeared down the trail, the chief and crow whispering all the way. That made it just me and the trees, the nearest one being a hickory with branches that seemed to be clawing at me, but even that wasn't enough prodding to move me toward that tiny light way off in the woods. Both my feet liked it right where they were, even when I tried reasoning with them. Pleading didn't work either. I was just about to try ordering them forward when Chilly shouted, "Wait up now, Ho-John. If you got any idea what's good for..."