Gabriel's Story

by David Anthony Durham

  He stopped here and backtracked to make sure all around him understood the full import of the story thus far. She had seen her husband murdered. Seen her son swung up by his ankles and smashed against a post so hard he was nearly beheaded. She had been raped and raped again and enslaved and had her culture, her decency, and even her hair stripped from her. And yet she spat on that soldier and named his place of origin. Marshall said these things slowly and clearly so that all might hear.

  A full year and two months after her capture, she was traded back into civilization as the bounty paid for several chiefs the whites held. She found herself embraced by the white world, drawn into culture and religion and the English language. She was saved from her tormentors and delivered back to her own.

  Marshall paused here once more. This time he looked not at his fellows’ faces but straight into the fire. When he spoke again, his voice had dropped so low all the men had to lean forward to catch his words.

  Later, when she was asked and interviewed over and over again, she said little about her capture or rescue. People said she was ashamed, horrified by it, and didn’t care to live the nightmare again for anyone’s sake. “But do you know what she said one time when pestered just a little too much by some concerned citizens?” He held the group on the question and looked around as if earnestly expecting one among them to have the answer. “She said, I wish they’d never found me. They thought that she was talking about the savages when she said that. But is that how it sounds to you? That’s not how it sounds to me. Sounds to me like those redskins had filled her mind so full of their blood logic, pumped her so full of their juices, whispered so long in her ears, that she had become one of them. Worse than one of them, because she had once been one of us. They stripped her of two thousand years of civilization in one year’s time, left her nothing but a naked savage. One year, that’s all it takes. That’s why we’ve no choice, never before and still not now, other than to exterminate that beast among us. Tell me I’m wrong if you can.”

  If Dunlop found any fault in the man’s story, he expressed it silently, by shaking his head and tossing his coffee grounds into the fire. James raised his hand like a pupil posing a question to his teacher, but then he changed his mind and made to get up. Marshall had seen the hand, though, and set on him to speak his mind.

  James was slow to talk, but having been prompted, he did. “I thought you said you admired them in some ways.”

  Marshall stared at the boy so long that James was forced to look away. Only then did he speak. “You don’t understand a damn thing, do you? Yeah, I said I admire them. But I admire wolves too. You ever seen the way they hunt in packs? They got their own kings and queens. They cull the herds of the weak and let the strong prosper. Shit, they’re smarter than most people are. I admire them, but put one in my sights, and I’ll shoot it dead and hang its head on my wall. They may be God’s creatures, and for all I know the reds may be God’s lost tribe, but what place do they have in this world right here, in my world, in the white man’s world?”

  James could think of no answer to the question and replied only with the faintest of shrugs. The others sat still. Marshall leaned back and lit a cigarette. He seemed content with the silence he’d created and only broke it once more. “Yeah, some things are best admired hanging from a nail.”

  Before long the coyotes swept over the land on patrol, calling to each other and sharing their ownership of the night with joy or sorrow, it was hard to tell. Marshall walked off onto the prairie, rifle in hand, to converse with himself away from human interference. The tension eased with his absence. Dunlop patted James on the back and said that Marshall was just the argumentative type—“Should have been a politician.” James smiled timidly at this and looked over at Gabriel, who met his eyes for only a moment.

  WITH THE PASSING OF THE FIRST WEEK of the boy’s absence into the second and third, the family dug into their work with a resolve made stronger by their loss. The plots of turned sod stretched ever larger, the planted acres budded and grew, rows of corn took shape, and fields of wheat swayed in the breeze with a texture and motion different from those of the wild grass around them. The buildings grew as well. The new room was completed, making two in their simple dwelling. The barn, much because of the younger son’s labor, was roofed, and a chicken coop was built onto one side. Work became so consuming that it seemed the very purpose of life, the meaning of it, a holy act that, in the uncle’s words, could be “the prayer of this mortal coil.”

  Moments of leisure were few and far between, but when the uncle received a rifle in return for services rendered to a neighbor, he shaved minutes from the evening’s rituals to teach the younger son to shoot. The two would walk out some distance on the prairie and spend the last of the evening’s light in friendly tutelage. The rifle was a Kentucky long, an old creature born early in the century and well used over the years. The man handled it with care and asked the boy never to disparage its limited capabilities. He taught him how to calculate distance and to think of such things as the lay of the land, whether it rose or fell, the velocity and direction of the wind, and even to consider his own breath and to time his shots in accordance. He noted that with this particular gun you had only one shot at a time, so it was not the weapon of choice against numerous Indians or against even a single grizzly.

  Before he let him fire the rifle, the uncle asked the boy never to take life except with reverence, never without a prayer of thanks and forgiveness. Life is sacred, he said. Above all else, it’s a gift given to each creature by the creator. Us people should never get so big-headed that we kill without great need. I don’t care if it’s nothing but a field mouse, you still gotta respect that you undoing something what God done in the first place. So you better ask his permission first. He told the boy that he believed all creatures had souls, just like humans. He said that he knew this to be so because he’d seen it in their eyes. We all God’s creatures, true enough. He made the boy swear that he understood this and would take it to heart.

  The boy did so with quiet eyes and took the weapon into his hands. The first time he shot the rifle, he was satisfied to find the kick not as impressive as he expected, just a nudge against his shoulder. He welcomed the feeling of power within the barrel, the force projected outward, the small bullet that ripped through the air like a scream with teeth. From the first shot the boy showed a knack for marksmanship. He sent the tin target dancing across the prairie, and the uncle looked at him with new respect.

  But that evening as he tried to sleep, the boy found himself pained in the shoulder and jaw and, strangely, in the hamstring of his left leg. He couldn’t place the origin of these injuries, and he didn’t mention them to anyone, but he was to suffer from these ailments ever after, whenever he’d shoot a weapon, either pistol or rifle, whenever he took a life.

  THEY HAD JUST BROKEN CAMP THE NEXT MORNING when a lone horseman came in from the east. Gabriel watched him traverse the far bank and come to a stop across the river. He halloed once and held a hand up in greeting, then let it drop and studied the water before him. He bent low over his horse’s neck and spoke into its ear. The horse tossed its head and surveyed the water with mistrust, but stepped forward and took to it gently, like a bather testing the temperature with a toe. A few steps in and the horse sank up to its shoulders. It dropped into a swimming rhythm with the rider still leaning forward in the saddle. When the horse emerged on the near bank, it gleamed and shivered in the morning air.

  The rider was wet up half his body, but he did not acknowledge it. In a series of motions strung together so quickly they seemed only a single movement, he reined the horse to a stop in the center of camp, flung one leg over the horn of his saddle, and slid down to the ground. He landed hard but was standing straight-backed the next moment, chest pushed out and face anxious. He was just a few years older than Gabriel, thin, with sharp, almost delicate features and blue eyes that flicked from man to man uneasily. Rollins and Jack immediately began joking with him
, asking what in Christ’s name he was doing up here, comparing him to a faithful dog that couldn’t stand being parted from its master. The boy’s eyes flashed at this, but he held whatever words he had and directed his gaze toward Marshall.

  “Thank God I found ya! I been riding full chisel since midnight. Marshall, they’re fixing to hang you.”

  The boy spoke with all seriousness, but Marshall smiled. “To hang me? Well, that’s some news, Dallas. Damn if that don’t beat all. To hang me? What kind of fool would want to try that? I’m too big-headed to be hung.”

  Dallas yanked his hat from his head as if it had suddenly offended him, punched it with one sharp blow, and set it back in place. “This here’s serious, Marshall. It’s on account of them horses y’all stole from Three Bars. Y’all been found out, and now they’re fixing to hang ya sure as shit.” He let this sit for a moment, looking from one man to another with a frank accusation on his face. But he held the expression for only a moment. It slipped away, to be replaced by a sullen, almost childlike disappointment. “Y’all should have cut me in on it. You know I’d’ve rode with ya. I ain’t afraid of them halfbreeds . . .”

  Caleb walked up from the river, wiping his face with his handkerchief in slow, deliberate strokes. His presence seemed to give Dallas pause, although the boy bubbled with things still unsaid. Gabriel watched Marshall, looking to make some sense of this messenger’s news. The humor in Marshall’s features was undiminished. In fact, he seemed quite amused by the whole thing.

  “Which horses was that, Dallas?”

  The boy pulled his hat off and punched it again. “The ones y’all stole and drove up in broad daylight past Fort Concho and took up to Crownsville and sold right there at auction for the whole world to see. Jim Rickles from down at Three Bars been making sure every ranch in Texas knows it too. Y’all are being put out of the whole goddamn state of Texas. Word is that Richards might even turn y’all in. He—”

  “Wait a minute,” Marshall said, waving the boy silent with the palm of his hand. “Are we being put out or hanged or turned in? You’re making an awful confusion of it, son. Maybe you should have yourself a cup of coffee or something.”

  Dallas set his hat back on his head and struggled to control his growing exasperation. “Somebody just might want to listen to what I got to say. I ain’t here for my own health, that’s for damn sure. Richards has done gone and fired ya, right? I heard the words from his lips myself. And Rickles has been saying he ain’t gonna take it sitting down. And since nobody seems to want to hunt you, he’s talking about rounding hisself up his own posse and coming after ya. Is that clear enough?”

  “Hellfire!” Rollins said, throwing down the canteen he’d been holding and launching one of his instantaneous tirades. “I knew something bad would come of that whole business! I never was a horse thief, and this is exactly why.” Dunlop stood still, as if he hadn’t taken it all in, and Marshall said nothing, just kept smiling. Caleb had finished his long, slow cleaning of his face. He knotted his handkerchief around his neck and looked as nonplussed as Marshall did amused.

  Gabriel cast a quick glance at James, wondering if he too remembered the horses Dallas spoke of. The image of the market came back to him fully, the gaiety and activity of the day, the humor in Marshall’s voice, the command he held over the audience. It was that day that had most formed his perception of this man, and even if the days spent in his company had dimmed the image somewhat, it was still, in Gabriel’s mind, the moment of introduction to the world he now lived in. But if he’d heard this boy right, if he hadn’t misunderstood . . .

  Marshall ran his tongue across his front teeth and scented the air. “All right, Dallas, I heard your message. You can go on back to Richards now, if that’s what you had in mind.”

  Dallas was so quick to answer that he sprayed the air before him with spittle. “The hell I will! Richards is the biggest lily-livered dandy in the state of Texas. He’s a woman, is what he is. Should’ve been a sheepherder. And Three Bars, they ain’t nothing but a bunch of mixed-breed monkeys and whores. Ain’t an honest one among them. I’d’ve stole the horses myself if you’d asked me to. Hell, I’d ride with ya now and put bullets in the lot of them and hang em from the nearest tree. I’d . . .” He seemed to have more to say, but he faltered. “Shit, you know what I’d do.”

  Marshall had smiled from the boy’s first words. He stepped forward and punched him in the ribs, causing his horse to shy away. “Ain’t that perfect?” he asked the others. “Good ole Dallas—never one to shy from runction. Comes up here and volunteers to share the noose with us. That’s perfect. You’re a piece of work.” He thought for a moment, then motioned to Caleb to join him for a private conversation. He paused a few steps on and turned back. “Well, Jack, Bill, you all can head on if you want. Richards’ll know you didn’t have nothing to do with it. And I reckon he’ll be wanting his wagon back.” With that, he moved away again.

  Dallas stood with a stupefied expression on his face. He called after Marshall, as did Rollins and Dunlop, but Marshall and Caleb went and sat beside the river. Marshall bent to roll a cigarette as they talked. Dallas spat, swung his jaw loose, then spat again. It was only then that he noticed Gabriel and James. Derision curled his lips.

  “What’s with the coloreds?”

  Bill looked at the boys almost sadly. “Marshall hired them.”

  “For what?”

  “Just . . . Well, I don’t know. Help out the nigger Enoch, I guess. Make em punchers someday.”

  “Punchers?” Dallas squinted one eye at Gabriel and seemed to consider the probability of this. “Not a penguin’s chance in hell. You boys get on back where you come from.”

  “They’re some good boys. I’ll stand for em.”

  “I don’t care if you would stand for them. They ain’t about to get no work down there. Marshall should’ve left them back where they come from.” Dallas took a step closer and spoke to the boys in simple tones, loud and clear, as if they were foreigners. “There ain’t no work for you down there. If I were you, I’d pull foot before you get yourselves in trouble. That’s my advice.” Having given it, Dallas turned away and seemed to forget about the boys entirely. “What in tarnation are those two talking about, anyway? Marshall should be talking to me. I’m the one that just about saved his skin.”

  The young man went on complaining, interrupted often by Rollins’s outbursts and Dunlop’s questions. Bill and Jack exchanged silent glances. They spoke not a word in council to each other but seemed to be of one mind, as if they’d expected just such trouble all along and had no interest in hanging around any longer than they had to. They returned to their preparations to depart. Gabriel had the feeling that something was slipping away from him. The earth moved under his feet instead of he over the earth. He was aware of conversations taking place, but he played no part in them. He heard Jack express his regrets and say his goodbyes and watched him ride off, slow and quiet but still going. He heard the snap of Bill’s whip over the oxen and saw them enter the river. The creatures sank in up to their necks and surged forward in rhythmic thrusts, like aquatic beasts of burden harnessed in a fable from some pre-Biblical time. Gabriel watched them emerge on the other side and move off. He saw James’s face before him, troubled almost to tears and filled with questions. He turned and sought out Marshall and found only the man’s back, some thirty yards away. He was smoking and talking quietly with Caleb, oblivious of the shift in the earth and as calm as any wayward angel whose work is still blessed by providence. And still the earth rolled beneath the boy’s feet, like a slowly undulating ocean that did not yet drown him but might at any moment.

  FOR THE NEXT HALF-HOUR GABRIEL LISTENED silently to a tumult of threats and declarations, annoyance and denials. Rollins cursed the fate that would exile him from the land of his birth. He said it was an absurdity, and further treachery, and beyond that a blasphemy, that the halfbreed thieves of Three Bars might accuse them of the same crime they themselves were guilty
of. Dunlop was in less of a temper, but he admitted that the fact that the law had not been involved did imply some earlier guilt on the ranch’s part. Both of them sought to bring Marshall and Caleb into the discourse, but those two shared only each other’s council until a decision was made.

  At last Marshall approached the group, smiled at them, and set his hands on his hips. His cigarette dangled from the corner of his mouth. “Well, boys, who’s for the whorehouse at McKutcheon’s Station?”

  Gabriel felt James grasp his elbow, but what the touch might mean he didn’t turn to see.

  “What?” Dunlop asked.

  “There ain’t no whorehouse at McKutcheon’s,” Rollins said.

  “There’s women there, ain’t there?”

  “Yeah. I reckon. There’s them Mexicans he keeps all about the place.”

  “That’s right. If they ain’t whores yet, they will be tonight. Come on, I’ll buy you all a line of whiskies that’ll make your peckers point. First jab’s courtesy of yours truly.”

  He made to turn away, but Dunlop protested. “Marshall, we can’t just get pickled. We have to do something. Let’s go talk to Richards. He’ll see reason.”

  Marshall responded with a smirk. “I’d say he’s seen reason. Good businessman, he is. I never doubted it. Hey, ever had a Mexican, Dunlop?”

  “Marshall—”

  “They’re hotter than one of them habañero chiles. Burn your pecker if you’re not in and out quick.” He leaned forward and took the cigarette out of his mouth. “You won’t have no problem with that, though, will you, Dunlop? You’ve got the fastest pecker in the West, don’t you? Little lovely up in Crownsville told me that. Said she didn’t more than touch your thing before you shot your load all over her blouse. She was right well annoyed with you, son.” He straightened up and laughed heartily. “Made him pay extra for the laundering.”