"I'll die without him!"
Chapter Twenty
"It's been a week now. There ain't no place in this whole valley I've not looked. Neither me nor Murphy's found a trace of other folks about, not closer 'n them miners up the trail we come in on. They ain't seen nobody come past since us."
"What about the pass to the south?"
"Malachi, there jest ain't no sign. Not nowhere about. If she's still alive and around here, she's so well hid it'd take a better tracker than me to find her."
The old muleskinner looked his age, for the first time since Malachi had known him. He's worn out. We all are. Except the professor. Willard had been on the go from first light 'til full dark every day, combing the hills, seeking any sign of Nellie. With the kid not up to snuff, that left all the camp chores and taking care of the professor to Malachi and Murphy.
"I'll go out tomorrow," he said. "You rest up." I won't give up. I know she's alive.
"Ain't it about time you looked the truth straight in the eye? She's gone, lad. We'll never find her."
"No--"
"Yeah. Likely she's lying dead at the bottom of a rock fall or a cliff somewheres. Either that or the bastard what took her made it over the pass without leavin' ary sign."
"I'm going out to look," Malachi said. "You and Murphy and the kid can manage here. I'll be back when I find her."
Willard simply shook his head slowly. "You're a fool, Malachi Breedlove. A fool for love. But I reckon I can understand. I had a woman, once...."
"That's not it. She's my responsibility."
"Ahuh! And you'd be just as worried if it was the professor or the kid was took, now wouldn't you?"
The skin of his ears burning, Malachi looked away. "No, I guess I wouldn't," he admitted. He studied the peaks up beyond the lake. "But shoot fire, Willard, I can't just give up. Not yet."
"Wal, you do what you've got to do. Whatever you decide, me an' Murphy'll go along."
Still not looking at Willard, Malachi nodded. "Thanks, John. I'm...I'm obliged." He heard the other man walk away, but didn't turn around. The mountains blurred in his vision, as if a curtain of fog had descended over them.
Malachi didn't know how long he stood there, fighting the desolation burning in his gut. He knew Willard was right. He had to give up, to accept that Nellie was gone. He had to live up to his responsibilities as leader of this expedition. He'd given his word, and he'd never gone back on it, not since he'd been old enough to understand the value of a man's sworn word. Giving up was about the hardest thing he'd ever faced, though, and it would take him a while to resign himself to it.
When he heard someone approaching behind him, he pretended he hadn't.
"I heard what he called you. Turn around!"
It was the kid, more on the prod than ever as he'd got better. He'd been spoiling for a fight ever since Malachi had made it plain that he and he alone had been to blame for his injuries and the loss of a good horse.
Malachi was getting consarned tired of him.
"You hear me? Turn around, Malachi Breedlove!"
Slowly he turned around. "That's my name," he said, in a mild tone.
"Yeah? That ain't what you told me. 'Malcolm Bradley' you said. Polite and mild and actin' like you was yellow clear through. 'Watch your language, Tom,' you said. 'Be polite,' an' 'don't rile the clients.''' His hands, hovering above the stocks of his Colts, clawed, as if he was ready to draw and just waiting for Malachi to twitch.
"You was my hero, did you know that? The great Malachi Breedlove, the best shootist ever lived. Fastest gun in Montana." The kid's voice cracked. "I wanted to be just like you. To shoot as straight, to draw as fast. That Eastern dude what writ of you would've put my name in his stories, just like he done yours." He took a deep, shuddering breath. "An' look at you! You ain't even a man! Lettin' that old fart boss you around. Moonin' over that prissy girl."
"Tom--"
"Shut your face! Malachi Breedlove! Shit. You ain't worthy of the name."
Knowing it would do little good, Malachi said, "Those were made-up stories, Tom. I never did half the things he said."
"Shut up, I said! It don't matter what you done. I'm a'gonna kill you, and I'm a'gonna tell everybody I done it. 'I killed Malachi Breedlove,' I'll say. 'I outdrawed him and I shot him down.'"
"You do that and you'll have every would-be shootist in the territory after you. Just like they've come after me."
"Let 'em come! I'm fast. I'll take 'em."
"Yes, you're fast, Tom. But fast isn't everything. Have you got eyes in the back of your head? You'll need them, because not every man plays the game fair. Once you're famous, once you've the name of a shootist, there will be those who'll shoot you in the back, just to say they killed Tom Ernst."
"Shut up, damn you! You ain't a'gonna talk me out of this!"
The kid was keyed up. Full of piss and vinegar, and maybe only one way to calm him down. Malachi spread his hands wide. "I'm not wearing iron, Tom. Will you shoot me in cold blood, then?"
"Don't give me that! I saw that belt gun you wear, tucked in alongside your backbone." Once again the hands hovering above tied-down holsters twitched. "I'll give you a count of three. One!"
"I don't want to kill you, Tom."
"Two!"
Malachi willed his body into relaxation, reminded his shoulders to stay loose.
"Three!"
Tom's first shot whistled past Malachi's knee. Before he could get off a second, Malachi had shot him.
A familiar, sick feeling clutched at Malachi's gut as he stared at the young man on the ground. Dreading what he might see, he walked across the five yards that separated them.
Tom's face was white and twisted with pain. His eyes were closed and his chest heaved with sobs. Beside him, his guns lay forgotten in the sand. A spreading patch of blood wet the ground around his right shoulder. A small bloody blotch was centered just above and in from his right armpit. I hope I didn't hit his lung. Fool kid. He hurried me, or I'd have hit higher. He knelt, slit the shirt with his boot knife. Blood flowed sluggishly from the entry hole.
"What the hell!" Murphy sounded like he'd run a ways.
Malachi didn't look up. He was busy folding the kid's neckerchief to cover the wound. "He heard Willard call me by name," he said. Once the pad was in place, he held it there and lifted the kid to look at his back.
"Oh, shit," Murphy said, when the jagged, gaping exit wound appeared. Blood ran freely from it.
"Give me your kerchief." Malachi ripped his own from his neck, folded it, and jammed it against the hole. It was soaked in nothing flat.
"You ain't gonna stop it like that. It's too big. We'll have to cauterize."
"It'll kill him. He's in bad shape already."
"I'll get the kit." Murphy took off like a shot. Quickly Malachi slipped the kid's belt from his trouser loops, used it to bind both blood-soaked kerchiefs over the exit wound.
The kid's eyes fluttered open. He groaned again. "Hurts...like...hell..."
"I'll bet it does. Hang on." He picked the kid up and worked his all but limp body around so it lay across his shoulder. After taking a deep breath and letting it out, he rose, feeling the strain in his legs. The kid outweighed him by a good forty pounds.
Murphy had laid a pallet down next to the circle of stones where the big cookpot sat on a built-up fire. With his help, Malachi lowered the kid, unconscious again, and laid him on his belly.
"Keep an eye on him. I'll get blankets." The kid's pulse was thin and faint, his skin clammy. Malachi had seen shock and blood loss kill more men in the War than the bullets that hit them, and this was what he feared would happen to young Ernst. Having just recovered from the infection in the cat scratches, he wasn't in the best of shape.
I should have tried harder to talk him out of it. He dropped the blankets from his and Murphy's bed beside Tom, set Murphy's medicine case within his reach. "That water hot yet?"
"Just about. Get his shirt cut off, will you?"
Malachi didn't argue. Murphy Creek was as good a back-country doc as he'd ever seen. He'd do far better for the kid than Malachi could. I wish Nellie was here, her and her yarbs. "Nellie has...had medicines. They're in that big carpetbag in the tent."
"I'll look at 'em later. No sense givin' him medicine if he's gonna die anyhow." He rummaged in the hard leather case, pulled out a needle and a card of thread. "Pour some of that water in the small stewpot, will you?."
When Malachi had complied, Murphy dropped the needle and thread into the water. "Set it on the fire. I want it to boil"
Bending over, Malachi blew across the coals under the cookpot, making them flare into life, bright red and glowing. Both pots were hot now, the water in them steaming.
He kept his eyes carefully averted from what Murphy was doing, poking into the big wound on Tom's back.
"Looks like the bullet nicked a vein," Murphy muttered. "We'll have to sew it up."
"Can you do that?"
"Done it before." He looked over at the fire, where the water in the small pot was now boiling vigorously. "'Course, the fella died of fever afterward, but my stitches held."
Malachi swallowed, not even wanting to think about it. He wrapped the blankets around Tom, imprisoning his uninjured arm close to his body, but leaving the wounded shoulder uncovered. When he finished wrapping the kid's legs, he threw a turn of thong around the ankles. They'd be easier to hold if they weren't free to kick separately. Once again he checked Tom's pulse. It was still thin and thready, but slower. The kid's skin didn't feel quite so clammy, either.
"Ready," Murphy said. "Can you hold him?"
Straddling the kid's body, Malachi grasped his upper arms and pinned them to the ground. "Just be careful you don't poke me with that needle," he said.
"Then don't you wiggle." Murphy picked up the threaded needle. "Let's do it," he said.
Malachi closed his eyes when he saw the wound. Before it had been bleeding hard enough that he couldn't see much of the torn flesh. Now, as Murphy wiped it yet again, the meat showed plain. "Get on with it," he said.
When the shelling had stopped, back home, Malachi had crept out of his hidey-hole by the creek and gone into the wreckage. His Pa had been lying crushed under a beam, his head all red and bloody. His gram had still been abed, pinned to her blood-soaked mattress with a sharp splinter of roof beam. He had freed both of them and given them a decent burial, before he headed north.
The sight of blood still sickened him.
Tom bucked under Malachi, screamed, then went limp.
"Got it," Murphy muttered. "Can you hold him a little longer? I need to poke around and see if there's any bone chips or cloth in here."
"Long as you need, if he stays unconscious."
Murphy worked on Tom for what seemed like hours. All the time Malachi kept his eyes averted and tried not to think about what was being done to the kid.
Finally he heard the slosh of liquid, felt the kid jerk under him.
"Moonshine," Murphy said. "Burns like hell, but I've seen it keep wounds from goin' bad." He laid the small glass bottle back in its padded space in the medicine bag.
A moment later he said, "All done. Set back and let me have a look in front."
Malachi got out of the way.
At last Murphy pronounced himself satisfied that he'd pulled all the scraps of fabric and particles of sand from the entrance wound that he could. He poured 'shine into the small hole, making the kid jerk again, for all that he was unconscious.
"Now we hope," he said, "that there ain't nothin' in there that'll give us trouble."
"What is going on here? Have we been attacked?"
Malachi looked over his shoulder. It only needed this! "No, sir, we haven't Young Tom was cleaning his gun and it went off."
"I told you he was careless," Dr. Kremer said. "Young whippersnapper! Shouldn't have ever been engaged for this expedition. Insolent, recalcitrant, lazy..." He walked toward the common tent, still muttering. Beckett followed, carrying a vasculum and the professor's saddlebags.
"You think Tom will admit to that?" Murphy said, as they laid the kid back onto his belly and tucked the blankets back around him.
"Of course not, but as long as he's unconscious, I won't have to explain why I shot him. I'd just as soon not. Not yet, anyhow."
"Don't blame you. Now, where did you say Miss Sanders' bag of yarbs was? I want to see what she's got in there I don't have."
"In the big tent, back with the supplies. But the one thing I forgot, she doesn't have either. No coal tar."
"Never held with it myself. Salts work better."
* * * * *
Gertie tossed a bundle at Nellie. "Here. See if these fit you."
Curiously, Nellie untied the leather thong that wrapped it. Inside a soft, well-tanned hide, was a pair of moccasins, much like those worn by Mr. Creek around camp. The tops were decorated with small beads in an intricate pattern. She slipped one on her foot, now bare after her stockings had worn through from abrasion against the rough rock floor.
"It's a little large," she said, "but I can always wrap the lacing around my ankle to keep it on." After she had both moccasins laced and tied, she stood and took a few experimental steps. "Yes, they're fine. A little too long, but not enough to flop."
"Good. Let's go, then." Gertie sounded impatient. She swung a pack onto her back.
"Where?" This was the first time Gertie had even mentioned leaving the cave. Since her hunting expedition several days ago--Nellie was still having trouble keeping track of time--the old woman had stayed close. The few times she had gone out, she had left Buttercup with Nellie.
"Never you mind. C'mon!"
More than impatient, Gertie sounded angry. Although she had developed a certain affection for the crazy old woman, Nellie still was cautious around her. Mad people were unpredictable, Gertie more than most, she suspected. Meekly she followed, out through the pitch black tunnel. Once again she counted her steps. When she had reached fifty-nine, she saw a faint glow ahead.
"Sharp corner. Watch your step." Gertie's warning came almost too late, Nellie put her hands out and they scraped against a rough wall. She felt her way to the left and rounded the corner. Bright sunlight filled an opening right ahead of her. She clamped her eyes shut, and still saw red spots.
"Stand still!"
Since Nellie had no intention of falling off the cliff she knew was just ahead, she obeyed.
"I forgot you wasn't used to this. I always close my eyes way down when I come to that corner. Just stand there a bit and you'll get used to it."
After a while, Nellie eased her eyes open. The light still seemed terribly bright, but she could see, at least. About half a yard beyond her feet the ground dropped away in a sheer cliff. Off to the right, a narrow ledge extended along the steep mountainside for perhaps ten yards, then became even narrower before it disappeared.
She looked to her left. A shoulder of rock barred passage in that direction. Leading to it was a shelf, perhaps a handspan wide, that someone with iron nerves and perfect balance might step upon.
Nellie had neither. She closed her eyes, this time in defeat. She would die in the cave, for there was no way on God's green earth that she could make her way down the rocky cliff to the trees growing far below.
Gertie edged past her. She put her foot on the small shelf, sprang into nothingness.
Behind Nellie, Buttercup made an impatient sound before he too edged past and leapt off the ledge. Nellie heard a clatter of rock when he landed, but she refused to lean forward to see why.
"Well, come on, My Girl. What're you waiting for?"
Gertie didn't sound all that far away. Nellie leaned back against the rock wall, clung with her fingertips to any and every small projection that offered a sense of safety. Her eyes were tightly shut, because not seeing where she was going was far less frightening than knowing she stood on the edge of nothingness. With great care, she moved one foot, then the other.
"You comin
', My Girl?"
"Yes. I'll be there..."
"Well, get a move on. The day's a'wastin'."
Nellie had reached the end of the ledge. Her left side was pressed solidly against the rock shoulder, her back against the wall. If she went ahead she had to put one foot on the small shelf--when she opened one eye for a quick peek, it looked even smaller up close than it had before--and leap into empty space as Gertie had.
"My Girl! What're you waiting for?"
Nellie inched her foot out and onto the shelf. She opened one eye again. To her surprise, she could see Gertie, standing on solid ground not far below. The old woman had both hands on her hips and wore an impatient expression. She looked old as the hills and about half as strong. If she can do it, I surely can. Nellie took a deep breath and jumped.
She hit off balance and fell, but Gertie caught her before she could roll down the hillside. "What was you doin' up there?" Gertie said.
"I don't like edges," Nellie said. The pounding of her heart slowed gradually as she sat, willing herself into calmness. After a while, she turned and looked up at the cliff she'd jumped off of. To her great surprise, it was no higher than she could have reached with her hands. Six feet? Not much more than that. Sheepishly she got to her feet. "I don't like edges," she repeated, "and I couldn't see where I was jumping to."
Gertie's cackle echoes off the cliffs above. "My Girl, when I first found that cave, I was scramblin' down from up above. I near dropped off that edge afore I got me a hold. For a while I wondered if I was goin' to have to make up my mind between starvin' to death up there or jumpin' off. Took me a while to see that step."
"Weren't you frightened?" Nellie knew she would have starved, for she could not have deliberately jumped.
"Naw. I'd a welcomed dyin' about then. 'Twas just after the angels took my...took you. Good thing I didn't, 'cause now I got you back." She patted Nellie's shoulder. "You ready to go?"
Nellie stood. "Yes, of course. But where are we going?"
"Why, back to your man. Didn't I say so?"
Knight in a Black Hat Page 25