Roy came to the end of the last furrow and brought Samson to a stop. He walked up and patted him on the neck and said, “Good work.”
Samson flicked an ear.
Roy gazed out over the acres of overturned sod and inhaled the dank odor into his lungs. He loved the smell of dirt. That might seem peculiar, but he was a farmer, and when you got down to it, dirt was his stock-in-trade. All that he had, he owed to the earth under his feet.
Like many farmers, Roy had a reverence for the land that was more than the pride of ownership. He thought of it as a stewardship. He took care of the land and the land took care of him. Dropping to a knee, he scooped a handful of the cool dirt into his hand and felt the texture with his fingers, and smiled.
“Thank you, Lord,” Roy said softly.
Samson grunted and shook his head, his horns glistening in the sunlight.
Roy stood.
A rider was coming from the west.
“Thanks,” Roy said. He started around the field at a run to get to the stump before the rider reached him. He went only a short way, and stopped. He recognized who it was.
Moses Beard smiled as he brought his roan to a stop. He was riding bareback. The horse was a plow horse that doubled as his mount. “Afternoon, neighbor,” he said cordially. “How goes things?”
“Can’t complain,” Roy said. “How’s your new puppy?”
“He sure likes to pee,” Moses said. “He’s peed on the living room rug. He’s peed on the bedroom rug. He’s peed in the kitchen and he peed on the front porch. The only place he doesn’t pee is in the yard.”
“And how is your wife taking that?”
“Oh, Tilda is in love. She calls him her little darling. When I said we should rub his nose in the pee and spank him to get him to stop, she said if I so much as lay a finger on him, she’ll take a rolling pin to my noggin.”
Roy laughed. “Why, Moses, are you jealous of a pup?”
“It’s too stupid for words,” Moses said. “She treats that dog better than she ever treats me.”
“Does it have a name yet?”
“Didn’t I tell you? She’s decided to name it after her father. We’re calling it Aloysius.”
“Has he taken your place in bed too?”
“That’s not even a little funny,” Moses said, and sighed. “If I live to be a hundred, I will never understand women. What I call logical she calls silly. What she calls logical I call crazy.”
“Martha vexes me now and then,” Roy admitted. “But to be fair, I vex her, too.”
“Tilda told me once that if she had a double eagle for every time I’ve annoyed her, we’d be living in the lap of luxury.”
“So you rode over to vent your spleen?”
Moses smiled. “No. I came to extend an invite. Tilda would like for you and yours to come over to supper this evening. She’s making a special meal with all the trimmings.”
“In the middle of the week?” Like most of the farmers, Roy reserved his socializing for the weekend.
“I know. But she would be delighted to have Martha and you over.”
“What’s going on?”
“She hasn’t said but I suspect it’s the killings and the Jacksons leaving,” Moses said. “She’s worried that something else awful will happen.”
“Everyone is.”
“I think she wants to get together and have a good time and forget the worry for a while.”
Roy thought that a grand idea. Martha had been showing signs of frayed nerves and the kids went around as if they were walking on eggshells. “Tell your missus we’ll be there.”
“You don’t want to ask Martha and make sure it’s all right with her?”
“Go to hell. I’m not as browbeat as some men I could mention.”
Moses chuckled. “I’m grateful. It’ll do wonders for Tilda’s disposition. If there was time, I’d ask Tom and Irene to join us.” He paused. “Any word from Rondo James?”
“It’s too soon.”
“Tilda says it’s Providence, him being here when we need someone like him to help us.”
“Sometimes things just happen,” Roy said.
“Don’t ever say that to Tilda or you’ll get her lecture about how there’s a reason for everything.”
“She really thinks God sent James to help us?”
“Tilda is a God-fearing woman,” Moses said. “If they allowed lady ministers, it would fit her like a glove.”
Roy thought about his friend’s comments as he led Samson back. He wouldn’t pretend to understand the outworkings of the Almighty, but it seemed to him that sometimes a coincidence was just that.
Andy and Matt were on the porch, keeping watch, and came to meet him. Roy imparted the good news. Matt raced to the house to tell Martha and Sally. Andy, for some reason, frowned.
“Anything happen while I was out plowing?” Roy asked as he brought Samson into the barn.
“Mr. Nettles stopped by.”
“What did he want?” Of all the farmers in Thunder Valley, Roy liked Nettles the least. The man was always irritable, always griping. Being around Nettles was a test of his patience.
“To drop off his share of the money that you’re paying Rondo James.”
“He’s the last to pay up,” Roy said.
“And Matt saw some cowboys heading for town from the upstairs window.”
Roy wondered if they were Olander’s or Buchanan’s punchers.
“Life goes on,” he said.
“Pa?”
“We have to carry on, killings or no killings.” Roy held the Winchester with the barrel on his shoulder and put his other hand on Andy’s. “Let’s go in. I need to wash up and change my shirt.”
“The invite saved one of the chickens,” Andy remarked, and grinned. “Ma was fixing to cook it for supper.”
“It must have stopped laying,” Roy guessed. His wife couldn’t countenance a chicken that didn’t earn its keep. If a hen stopped laying for any length of time, Martha marked it for the supper pot.
And that wasn’t all.
Chickens had a lot of uses. After Martha chopped off the head, she always soaked the bird in a pail of hot water. It loosened the feathers to where they could be plucked out easy. Then Martha would shove the feathers into a flour sack. It took several chickens to fill the sack entirely. Martha would tie it off and slide a clean sack over the full sack and tie that off, too, and there it was: a homemade pillow. Sally complained that now and again the stems poked through and dug into her but Roy didn’t mind.
Martha never plucked the wings. She always chopped the wings off, cleaned them, and used them as feather dusters.
There wasn’t much left of the chicken after that except the bones, and Martha had a use for those, too. She crushed them into powder and fed the powder to the chickens.
It amused Roy no end, feeding chickens chicken feed made from chickens.
Martha was a marvel.
Roy leaned the Winchester near the front door and went down the hall to the kitchen. He’d heard voices, and a pot clang.
Martha and Sally were bustling about as if they had something important to do and no time to do it.
“Didn’t Matt tell you about the Beards?” Roy asked. “You don’t need to cook supper.”
“We’re baking a pie to take over,” Martha said without looking up from her dough-making. “It’d be rude not to bring something.”
“I’ll wash up then.”
“You might get the buckboard ready,” Martha said. “So we don’t have to at the last minute.”
“You always think ahead.”
“One of us has to,” Martha said, and she looked at him and grinned and winked.
“Oh, Ma,” Sally said.
Roy went out the back to the stand with the basin and pitcher. Martha didn’t like for him to wash up inside after a day out in the fields because he was always so dirty and he made a mess. Stripping off his shirt, he hung it on a peg. He upended the pitcher over the basin. It was Sa
lly’s job to keep the pitcher full and she hardly ever forgot. The lye soap was on a small wooden tray. He lathered up plenty of suds and used a washcloth on his face and arms and chest. By the time he was done, the water was brown.
Putting his shirt back on, Roy went to the barn and brought out the horse he used for the buckboard. The other horses didn’t take as well to the traces.
Andy came out to help and in no time it was ready.
Roy noticed that his oldest kept glancing at him. They walked around to the front and went up the porch steps and Andy cleared his throat.
“Pa, can I ask a favor?”
“You want to drive the buckboard?”
“No.” Andy looked down and brushed a hand along the rail as if he were nervous. “I wanted to ask if I could take the bay over to Mr. Haverman’s tomorrow evening to see Eb. I was going to ask to go tonight but now it will have to wait.”
Eb Haverman was two years younger than Andy, Roy recalled. “Doesn’t Haverman also have a daughter named Judith about your age?”
Andy blushed. “I don’t rightly remember how old she is.”
Roy would have laughed except he was his son’s age once.
“I guess it would be all right so long as Mr. Haverman doesn’t mind.”
Andy brightened and said, “Thanks, Pa. I—” He stopped and blinked and pointed. “Who are they?”
Roy turned.
Two strangers were approaching from the road. Even at that distance Roy could tell that one was big and burly and had a long gun across his saddle. The other was younger, and wore two six-guns.
“I reckon you’d better fetch my rifle,” Roy said.
26
Axel, Ritlin and Brule ate with the punchers in the cookhouse. They sat apart from the cowhands, who didn’t act friendly except toward Axel.
“Only five,” Brule said as he spooned his beans. “The rest are out on the range.”
“We should do it now,” Ritlin said.
“Olander would hear the shots,” Axel pointed out.
“So?” Ritlin said. “He’s a rancher. I can take him without half trying.”
“Some ranchers are fine shots,” Axel said.
“He’s from the East. How fine could he be?”
Brule stopped chewing to say, “That’s just dumb. You’re from the East. Wild Bill Hickok was from the East. Kid Curry, too. Bein’ from the East doesn’t mean a damn thing when it comes to squeezin’ a trigger.”
“Call me dumb again,” Ritlin said.
Axel set down his fork. “If you two infants are done, hush now. Here comes the foreman.”
Carver had risen from the other table and came over carrying a cup of coffee. “Thought I’d join you gents,” he said as he pulled out a chair. “Get better acquainted.”
“Fine by us,” Axel said.
“The boss was impressed by you,” Carver told him. “You have the look of a seasoned hand.”
“A man is what he is,” Axel said.
“Ain’t that the truth.” Carver moved the chair so he could stretch out his legs and sighed contentedly. “Next to breakfast, this is about my favorite time of the day. I can relax for a while.”
“You must have a lot to do, being foreman and all,” Brule said.
“The Circle O isn’t as big as some of those Texas outfits but it keeps me hoppin’.”
“What do you think of this killin’ business?” Axel asked.
About to take a sip, Carver peered at him over the cup. “I don’t know what to make of it. The farmer and his wife weren’t robbed. They were gunned down and left lyin’ in the dirt. And a lot of their critters were killed. That’s plain loco.”
“You would think so,” Axel said.
“Could be whoever shot them will come here next,” Ritlin said.
“I’d like to see them try,” Carver replied. “You might have noticed we’re all wearin’ our hardware. Boss’s orders. Until this is settled, we’re a gun bunch.”
“Wearing a gun and knowing how to use it are two different things,” Ritlin said.
“No argument there,” Carver conceded. “But more than a few of us are good shots, and Vern has killed a man.”
Ritlin gazed at the punchers at the other table. “You don’t say.”
“Down to Kansas. It was a fight over cards. Vern caught a man cheatin’ and words led to blows and the blows led to jerkin’ their hoglegs and Vern was faster.”
“Lucky for Vern,” Brule said.
“Luck is for amateurs,” Ritlin said. “A real shooter doesn’t let luck enter into it. He practices until it’s second nature. Until he can draw and shoot and hit what he aims at in the blink of an eye.”
Carver said, “You sound as if you shoot for a livin’.”
“I can think of worse ways to earn a dollar.”
“Than goin’ around killin’ folks?”
“It wouldn’t be dull, like being a clerk or a bank teller or an undertaker,” Ritlin said.
“Wouldn’t the killin’ bother you?”
Ritlin sat back. “I’ve never understood that. We kill all the time. We kill bugs that get in our bedrolls. We kill spiders and scorpions and snakes. We kill deer and rabbits and squirrels for the cook pot. We kill chickens and turkeys. We kill cows and serve them up as beefsteaks. And no one thinks twice about it. But kill a person, and by God, everyone squawks.”
“Killin’ animals ain’t the same as killin’ people.”
“Killin’ is killin’,” Ritlin said. “I’ve never seen a difference between bugs and people.”
Brule coughed. “Pay no attention to my pard. He has some peculiar notions.”
“I’ll say,” Carver said. He drained his cup and stood. “I’ve got to go see if the boss has made up his mind about hirin’ you.”
Brule drummed his fingers and when the foreman had walked out, he turned on Ritlin. “Wear a sign, why don’t you, that says ‘I’m a killer and proud of it.’”
“Don’t start.”
“He’s right,” Axel said. “That was careless.”
“I won’t put up with it from you, either,” Ritlin said. “Him and his Vern.”
“What the hell is the matter with you?” Brule said. “It’s like you’ve thrown caution to the wind.”
“Caution, hell,” Ritlin said. “I’m tired of holding back. In fact, I’m not going to.” He’d brought his saddlebags inside, and now he opened one and slid out a plain Colt. It was the first he’d ever owned, and he kept it for emergencies. Shoving it into his holster, he rose.
“Hold on,” Brule said.
“No.”
Axel rose, too. “At least give me a minute to get to the house.” He didn’t wait for an answer but wheeled and went out.
“I’m goin’ with him,” Brule announced, and did so.
Ritlin moved around the end of the table and stood where he could see the four punchers, and their hands, as they ate. “Vern,” he said quietly.
Vern was at the end, dipping a buttered slice of bread into his beans. He looked up. “Did you just say my name?”
“That I did,” Ritlin said.
“What do you want?”
“Your foreman was telling us how you’re a regular man-killer.”
“Carver wouldn’t say any such thing,” Vern said. “And it was only one.”
“One is more than most but nowhere near as many as me.”
“Oh?” Vern said, setting down the bread. “How many have you bucked out?” he scornfully asked.
“Seventeen.”
Another cowboy snorted. “Sure you have, mister. And your real name is John Wesley Hardin.”
The punchers had a laugh at that.
Ritlin turned so his left side was toward them. His right hand brushed his holster. “I used to not let it bother me but it does these days.”
“What?” Vern said.
“That men like Hardin and Rondo James become famous and I don’t when I’m every bit the killer they are.”
“
Sure you are,” said the cowhand who had snorted, and he and the others had another good laugh.
Vern didn’t join in. “Damn me if you don’t sound serious, mister.”
“A man should always be serious about what he does for a living.”
“This ain’t funny,” a puncher declared.
“Here’s how it will be,” Ritlin said. “I’ll give you your chance. Whenever you’re ready, start the dance.”
They looked at one another. One cowboy set down his fork, and another placed his hand on the edge of the table above his holster.
“Are you drunk?” Vern said.
“I don’t ever let myself be.”
“Have I savvied this right?” said the man who had snorted. “You’re threatenin’ to gun us?”
“What’s this about?” asked another.
Ritlin smiled. “That farmer and his missus? My pards and me shot them.”
“And now you ride in here and kill all of us?” the snorter said.
“That’s the idea,” Ritlin said.
Vern shifted in his chair. “You haven’t said why.”
“I’ll count to three,” Ritlin said. “You can go for your six-shooters, or not. Whether you do or you don’t, you’re all dead.”
“Bastard,” a puncher snarled, and heaving out of his chair, he stabbed for a Smith & Wesson on his right hip.
Ritlin drew and fanned a shot from the hip. The slug caught the puncher in the forehead and spun him half-around. The snorter was rising, his hand on a Colt. Ritlin fanned again and the lead smashed the snorter in the chest and flipped him back over his chair.
Vern and the last cowhand rose simultaneously, both unlimbering as they cleared the table. Vern was faster and almost had his revolver out when Ritlin fanned and the slug slammed into Vern’s jaw.
The last cowboy froze, his eyes wide with sudden fear. “No,” he said.
“Yes,” Ritlin said, and fanned a shot into the center of the man’s chest.
Brule had to run to catch up to Axel. “I hope he gives us time.”
“With him there’s no predictin’,” Axel said.
Up ahead, Carver had just reached the house and was climbing the steps to the porch. He raised his fist to knock and happened to glance back and saw them. Lowering his arm, he came to the edge of the porch. “You gents decided to ask the boss yourselves?”
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