by Ralph Cotton
In a silver morning haze, the woman arose and looked at him with a soft smile and said modestly, “Thank you, Mr. Dawson. I’m not used to such kindness.” Then she moved away quietly, adjusting her hair with her fingertips.
With only a handful of cold jerked elk for breakfast, the three set out on foot, leading the animals up the dangerously sloping hillside and onto a narrow trail that reached deeper into wide rough terrain. At midmorning, having remounted the animals, they stopped at the crest of a rise where a long rounded edge of stone protruded through gravelly earth and a bed of sparse wild grass.
“There you see her, Dawson,” said Arden. “Your new home, here in the high gold country.” The old seaman stood in his stirrups on one leg, his peg leg serving as balance, and pointed at a weathered-gray shack. “I hope she’s what suits you.”
“It suits me, Cap,” Dawson replied. He nudged the horse forward. Clarity rode behind him now, her arms around his waist. She had made no further mention of riding the mule, and neither had Dawson.
Circling down around a narrow path leading to the shack, the three dismounted, Dawson stepping down first, then assisting the woman to the ground. “It looks like it’s been a while since anybody’s been here,” he remarked, seeing the front door standing open a few inches, a few dried leaves and pine needles lying in a thick layer of dust.
“Aye,” said Arden, “and even longer before that since the place had a good cleaning.” With his peg leg he kicked an empty tin can, one of many lying strewn about in the dirt.
Twenty yards away, half covered by brush, timber, and debris, Dawson spotted the jagged entrance to the mine shaft. “I’ll start cleaning and fixing things up later today.” He walked to the pack mule as he spoke and began loosening ropes and load straps. “Right now I’ve got to take my first look inside my gold mine.”
Arden had taken his briar pipe from his coat pocket and started to fill it. But upon hearing Dawson, he put the pipe away and said, “Maybe I’ll just go right along with you, if you have no objections.”
“Come right along, Cap,” said Dawson. He took out a small oil lantern from the loosened bundle of supplies he’d laid on the ground. “You can tell me if that hole in the hillside shows any promise.”
“Can—can I come too?” Clarity asked hesitantly, as the two turned toward the mine entrance.
“It’s bad luck, a woman in a mine,” Arden whispered just between himself and Dawson.
But Dawson turned as if not hearing him and said to Clarity, “Come along, let’s all look this place over together.”
She hurried in beside Dawson and slipped her arm around his waist. As if having heard what Arden had said, she whispered, “I won’t bring you bad luck. I’ll bring you only good luck, I promise.”
Dawson put his arm around her shoulders. “Good luck is the kind I need.”
Chapter 15
Giddis Black stood at the edge of the circling glow of firelight and watched the two Ute women do their handiwork on Sly Palmer’s face. One held the severed flesh together between her thumbs and fingers while the other ran the needle through the upper layer of skin and drew the black thread tight behind it. Curlin Newhouse stood at the head of the cot where Palmer lay groaning to keep from screaming in pain. Newhouse held him steady by both ears while the Ute women continued, against his mindless pleading.
“I can’t stand this infernal whining,” Giddis Senior growled. He swallowed a long drink of whiskey, then lowered the bottle from his mouth and blotted his lips on his coat sleeve. “Why don’t you shut up and take it like a man, Palmer? You make us all look bad.”
“Yeah, take a look at my head,” said Newhouse, keeping his firm grip on Palmer’s ears. “You don’t hear me bellyaching about it.” Where Dawson had cracked him with the pistol barrel his temple had swollen to the size of a goose egg and blackened to the color of spoiled fruit.
Standing beside his father, Junior, his swollen hand resting in a sling, shook his head and said, “Pa, you’ve got to let me go after this Cray Dawson. We’ve got to kill him if we ever want to hold our heads up around here.” He gestured with his good hand around the room. Willie sat slumped at a table, his forearm stitched from wrist to elbow, lying on a bloodstained cloth, seeping thin trickles of blood between knots. Across the table sat Chester DeLaurie, his broken nose purple, packed with strips of cloth, his eyes swollen almost shut.
Giddis Senior looked the men over, shook his head in disgust, then said to his son, “If you’re trying hard to convince me that you’re a complete idiot, you can relax. I see it in every word you’ve said since Dawson left town.” Now it was he who gestured toward the same wounded faces. “Until more of my men get back into town, who exactly do you suppose I send after him?”
“I can go,” Willie cut in, looking up from his thick forearm. “My arm’s feeling better.” He opened and closed his hand to show his improvement. “See? I can ride, shoot.”
“Yeah, Willie, you are the true star in my crown,” said Giddis in sarcasm. He watched Willie grin, either not knowing or not caring that he’d been mocked. Shaking his head, Giddis walked closer to the table and asked him pointedly, “Are you certain those whores are dead?”
“Yep, I’m certain,” said Willie. “I broke Violet’s neck, chicken style.” His grin widened into that of an evil jack-o’-lantern. “And I shoved Clarity off a cliff.”
Giddis stared hard at him for a silent moment, then asked, “A very high cliff, was it?”
“Yep, a high cliff,” said Willie, nodding his big shaggy head.
“And you saw her land . . . saw her dead on the rocks?” Giddis persisted, having demanded to hear the story repeated since Palmer and Willie returned to Black’s Cut, both of them badly cut and bleeding.
“Yeah, she is dead,” Willie declared. He had told it enough that he actually thought he’d seen her body below, her coat spread open, her skull crushed and oozing blood.
“If you are lying to me, Willie, God help you,” Giddis said in a threatening tone, raising a cigar between his fingers for emphasis.
“Pa, send Willie and me,” said Junior. “We can handle Dawson!” He gave Chester DeLaurie a frown for not joining in persuading Giddis Senior.
“And me,” said DeLaurie, his voice sounding nasal and full of pain.
“See, Pa. Chester wants to go too,” said Junior.
“Nobody’s going anywhere until I say so! Now shut up about it!” Giddis shouted, banging his fist down on the tabletop, causing a tin plate of leftover meat to fly off the table and fall to the dirty plank floor. Giddis kicked at the meat and shouted at a young girl from the brothel who stood by waiting to assist the Ute women if they needed anything. “Villy! Get this table cleared! Take this food out of here and feed it to the bear!”
“Yes, Giddis,” the girl said. She stooped quickly and snatched up the scrapes of meat and bone and dropped them back into the dirty plate. “And the man, too?” she asked meekly.
“Naw, to hell with the man,” said Giddis. “Didn’t you feed him yesterday, or the day before?”
“Yes, Giddis, I fed the man yesterday,” Villy replied in a trembling voice, always one to wither under Giddis’s harsh gaze.
“Well then,” said Giddis, as if she should know better than to have to ask about feeding the man two days in a row, “feed the poor bear today, child! Do not feed the man until tomorrow.”
“Yes, Giddis,” said Villy as she gathered the rest of the scrapes from plates sitting all around the long table. “I’ll see to it right away.”
She turned to leave and felt Giddis’s hand clamp firmly on her arm. “Have I made myself clear on that, Villy? If I find you are slipping food to the man, I will be very cross with you. Do you understand me?”
“Yes, Giddis, I understand,” the frightened girl said, her eyes growing wide with fear. “I will only feed the bear, not the man.”
“Look at me, child,” Giddis said, tapping a finger to his forehead. “Keep reminding yourself. Don’t
feed the man, don’t feed the man.” He watched her back through the door with a plate in her hand and pull it shut behind herself. “My God, why do I feel like I’m always talking to a bunch of imbeciles?” Giddis asked the ceiling with his hands spread.
Outside, Villy hurried along toward the old log jail behind the row of buildings, saying aloud to herself over and over, “Don’t feed the man. Don’t feed the man.” But once she’d gotten out of Giddis’s sight and looked back over her shoulder, she let out a tense frightened breath and stopped reciting. “Bastard,” she hissed.
Glancing all around she palmed a handful of meat scrapes and a half-eaten piece of bread from the high-piled plate and shoved the food down into her dress pocket. She grinned and said to herself, “I will feed the man. I will feed the man.”
At the door to the jail, she knocked and was met by Morse Tucker, aka the Jailer, who swung the door open just enough to allow her to squeeze in, having to rub slightly against him as she did so. “Who are you feeding today, girl, the man or the bear?” Tucker asked roughly, leaning his face down close to hers, his eyes wandering up and down her as he spoke.
“The bear today, sir.” Villy’s voice sounded frightened again.
“Yeah, I knew,” said Tucker, still close, still looking her over. “I’m just checking on you.”
“Excuse me, please.” Villy slipped from beneath his leering eyes and over to where a large ten-by-ten iron cage sat next to a single cell, in the darkness against the rear wall.
“Uppity baby whore,” Tucker growled to himself. He walked over, picked up a shotgun and a bag of tobacco from a littered desk. “Watch that bear,” he warned Villy, then stepped outside the door onto the rickety front porch.
In the bear’s cage, Villy saw the dark hulking grizzly swing back and forth restlessly, a big logging chain rattling against the iron floor. She could hear the deep hoarse breathing. The strong odor of bear urine and excrement caused her eyes to burn.
Hurrying, she stooped down and shoved the tin plate under an open feeding slot at floor level. Then she stepped back and froze as the big animal charged forward, stopping only as the chain ran out a few inches from the other side of the iron bars. For a moment the big brute stood raised on his hind legs and pawed at the iron cage, only the tips of his thick claws being able to reach the iron bars and rake down them.
The bear let out an ugly snarl into Villy’s face, then fell ravenously upon the food on the floor. Villy looked cautiously toward the front door as she slipped sideways a step and saw the haggard bearded face staring out of the darkness in the cell. “Villy?” the voice said in a weak rasp. “Can you help me?”
“Shhh,” she said, slipping the bread and meat from her dress pocket and through the bars into dirty trembling hands. “Don’t let Tucker catch you with it, he’ll tell Giddis!”
“No, I won’t let him,” the man said, talking through a mouthful of food as he ate hungrily. “God bless you, darling. Can you get me out of here? Can you slip me a gun? A knife? Anything?”
“No,” said Villy, “I can’t. This is all I can do for you! I’ll bring you some food whenever it’s safe.” She stepped back from his cage and looked over her shoulder toward the door, while in the bear’s cage the big grizzly had already devoured the food scraps and stood licking the iron floor and digging his claws at it as if more food lay hidden there. “That’s all I can do, please!”
“Wait,” said the weak voice, the man having downed his food almost as quickly as the bear. “Tell me what has happened out there! I saw through the window. Palmer and Willie Goode came riding in covered with blood! Who did that to them?”
“A lot has gone on,” Villy whispered. “Clarity and Violet have disappeared. They cut Palmer and Willie all to pieces!”
“Those two,” the man said, recalling how Violet and Clarity had doped him and set him up for Giddis Black.
“Hey, they were my friends,” said Villy.
“I know,” he said. “But go on, tell me more.”
“A gunman came to town and broke DeLaurie’s nose. He cracked Junior’s hand and Curlin’s forehead!”
“Who—who is this gunman?” the man asked.
“Dawson, or something like that,” said Villy. “I’m not sure.”
“Oh, Jesus!” the man whispered. He gripped the bars with both hands, getting excited. “Listen to me, Villy! You’ve got to get to this man! Tell him I‘m in here! Tell him what’s happened to me!” He stared at her wild-eyed, shaking the iron bars in his hands. “Will you do that for me, Villy, please?”
“Shh, calm down,” she warned him. “I can’t tell him, he’s already gone! Besides, what makes you think he’ll do anything for you?”
“He’s a friend of mine, Villy,” he said. “He’s the best friend—no, he’s the only friend I’ve got! You’ve got to go find him . . . Please tell him about me, before I starve to death in here, or end up in the stomach of that bear!”
“A friend of yours? A big gunman like that?” Villy said, sounding doubtful. “I bet.”
“Listen to me, Villy,” the man pleaded, “don’t you know who I am? Didn’t they tell you, Violet and Clarity?”
“Oh yes, they told me all right,” she said. “They told me you were out of your mind and thought you’re Fast Larry Shaw, the fastest gun alive.”
“I am Lawrence Shaw, Villy!” He gripped the bars even tighter. “I swear to you I am Shaw! Go find Dawson and bring him here! You’ll see, I am Shaw!”
She shook her head slowly, saying, “I don’t know who you are, mister, but we all know that Lawrence Shaw is dead. He was killed outside Crabtown. The town had a big funeral for him and everything.”
“That wasn’t me!” he said. “I had all that planned!”
“Of course it wasn’t you,” said Villy. “I can see that much.” She stepped back and shook her head. “I’m believing you really are touched in the head.”
“No, wait, listen!” he pleaded.
But just as Villy stepped over a few inches away from the iron cell, the door swung open and Tucker walked in, finishing a rolled smoke he held between his finger and thumb. “Hey! I said stay back from that bear!” he shouted. “Are you simpleminded?”
“Sorry!” said Villy, jumping back away from the bear’s cage as the animal let out a loud bawl and swiped a paw toward the iron bars.
Looking past her, Tucker noted the man in a dark clump on the floor. “Is he dead over there?”
“I—I don’t know,” Villy stammered, looking toward the downed man as if he’d not moved all the time she’d been there.
“Oh, you don’t know,” said Tucker. He chuckled and gave her a look as he circled back behind his desk, sat down, and lowered his hands out of sight. “You’ve got the cutest little voice I ever heard. Are you ever going to work at the brothel, or just keep cleaning up and toting food around?”
“I’ll be working there soon,” said Villy. “Giddis says he’s saving me for himself first. I’ve never done you-know-what before.”
“Oh, I see,” said the Jailer. “Well, I can’t blame him for that one bit. It makes me ache just seeing you walk in and out of here. Now you come right over here, little darling. Are your little hands awful greasy from handling that elk meat?”
“I can’t,” said Villy, hurrying toward the front door and grasping the handle. “I got to get back.”
“I ain’t going to hurt nothing of yours, girl.” Tucker half stood from his chair behind the cluttered desk. “Come over here,” he coaxed. “There’s things you need to learn right now.”
“I’ve got to go,” Villy said, hearing the clink of his belt buckle coming undone. She hurried out, giving a look over her shoulder, past the big grizzly on its chain, toward the dark cell where the man lay in a ragged ball on the floor.
“Baby whore,” Tucker chuckled. When the door had closed behind her, he stood the rest of the way up from the desk and walked around to the darkened cell, rebuckling his belt as he spoke to the dark ragged fi
gure. “Maybe you’re asleep, maybe you’re not, madman. But if it weren’t for you I wouldn’t be stuck here smelling bear shit day in and day out. Why don’t you be a good boy, tell me where that ten thousand dollars of Giddis’s is?”
After a silence, the weak voice said, “The money is all that’s keeping me alive, Jailer.”
Tucker grinned to himself. “You’ve got enough sense to know that, don’t you? But that ain’t going to keep you alive forever! Sooner or later Giddis is going to get tired of asking. When he does I’ll take delight in hacking off pieces of you and letting you watch me feed them to the bear.” He gave a dark laugh and kicked the bars. The man only lay in the same spot in silence, but the bear, startled by the sound, charged forward with a loud snarl, rising up and swiping its claws across the bars, sending Tucker backward so fast he stumbled and fell to the hard plank floor. “Sonsabitches!” he shouted.
Chapter 16
He should not have allowed this to happen, Dawson chastised himself. In the silvery glow of early sunlight through the window, he looked down at Clarity’s sleeping face. She lay with an arm over his side of the bed as if he were still there. We are both grown-ups , he remembered her saying the night he’d told her he had someone waiting for him near Crabtown. But now, picturing her that first night, the way she had drawn back the cover, seeing her lying there naked, willing, inviting him in . . .
All right, maybe he hadn’t really promised Madeline Mercer anything, but she’d said she would be waiting for him and he hadn’t asked her not to. That was enough to make him feel low, as if somehow he was betraying both women. Jesus . . . He turned away from the bed, pulled aside the blanket curtain they had hung for privacy, and walked past the bedroll where Arden lay sleeping near the stone hearth.
In minutes Dawson had stoked and raised a fire from a banked bed of glowing embers, and had boiled a fresh pot of coffee. Sitting alone at the table he ate a short breakfast of leftover hoecake and strips of jerked elk. He stood up and left quietly, the way he’d been doing the past two weeks, leaving Clarity and the old seaman to awaken to the smell of fresh coffee.