The Mule Tamer III, Marta's Quest

by John Horst

  “Where are you going?”

  “The captain warned us about a masher on board. He didn’t want to alarm you. I’ve got to check on a lady in third class.”

  “I’ll go with you.” Rebecca stood up and smiled, waved her sister over. Marta and the marine were back in due course. Rebecca relayed the news and told Marta of her plan to go with Curtin to check on one of the ladies he’d met earlier in the day. “Do you have your friend, Marta?”

  “Always.” She looked back at the marine, grabbed him by the hand and led him back to the dance floor. “Now, let me sing for you a couple of tunes I learned at the Gaiety down on Baltimore Street…”

  On deck Curtin grabbed Rebecca by the hand. He pulled her into his arms and kissed her passionately. “I missed you.” He kissed her again. She grinned and kissed him back. She loved kissing him.

  “We just spent the whole evening together.”

  “But I couldn’t kiss you. I couldn’t kiss you.” He kissed her again, and reluctantly pulled himself away. “Come on,” he grabbed her by the hand. “We’ve got to check on someone.”

  “The lady with the rebozo?” She smiled as he looked back at her a little confused. “I was spying on you, before we met. You were playing with the little girl.”

  “Yes, our ship’s captain doesn’t want a panic, and he’s likely to keep it quiet, especially among his less important passengers. I don’t want her caught unawares.”

  They wandered through the decks and moved steadily toward the third class cabins. Rebecca kept feeling his eyes upon her. She looked every now and again and he was beaming, entranced, enthralled. He remembered what she’d said to Marta in the dining room. “What did you mean by your friend?”

  “Oh, a little gun my mother gave us a long time ago. She told us to always have it when we were among strange men.” She winked at him, gave a little sideways glance.

  “Really?” He was pleased and reached over to kiss her again. He leaned back and looked her over.

  “Where do you keep a gun?”

  She gave him a sly grin and reached over, whispered in his ear, so close it tickled. “In my garter, way up high.” She laughed as he blushed and kissed him again.

  Neither of them noticed the figure in the shadows. The attacker was on him at once, knocking Curtin senseless. The bad man now turned his attention to Rebecca, throwing her into a wall. She worked frantically to pull the derringer from her garter but he was too quick, upon her instantly, cutting her air as he steadily began to crush her windpipe. She squirmed to free herself, but he was too big, too powerful.

  Curtin was on him, on his back, reaching around, grabbing his nose, tearing at eyes, he fought much more savagely than anyone would ever imagine from his outward appearance. He made progress and pulled the man off Rebecca. The attacker knew how to fight as well, taking advantage of his significant girth, he threw himself backward, falling onto his back, pinning and crushing Curtin between himself and the ship’s steel deck. They rolled about as Rebecca breathed deeply. She remembered her hatpin, pulled it from her hair and jammed it into the man’s left eye, pushing with all her might until it met the significant resistance of the sphenoid bone. He screamed out in pain and fury, pushing Rebecca away with a thrust of his great meaty hand, giving Curtin enough time to pound him several times hard on the nose. The man buckled, and then with renewed energy threw himself once again on the young engineer.

  They hurdled toward the outer rail, flipping over and onto the next deck below. Rebecca chased after, trying her best to call out for help, but no sound would come. Curtin was holding his own now, he had the man fairly stunned, but the miscreant was big, bigger by forty pounds and Curtin now was beginning to tire. The man got onto him, holding Curtin by the throat, working on the windpipe as he had done to Rebecca. Robert Curtin was dying and it would be her turn next.

  She was on them again, watching desperately as Curtin was beginning to fade. She looked about, frantically, it was up to her if this attack was to ever end without the loss of her new love. She spotted a fire axe hanging on a nearby wall, retrieved it, and with one resolute blow, drove the pick end into the back of the man’s head. He was dead.

  Curtin was up, crab walking out from under the big bloody corpse. He stood over the body, dumbfounded, then looked on at Rebecca in disbelief. “Jesus, woman! Jesus! I thought your sister was the one to watch!” He grabbed her, looked her over for wounds, looked at her darkening, bruised neck and kissed her gently all over. She was going to be all right.

  Rebecca looked on at the dead man. She’d not seen one for many years, yet surprisingly, she was calm. She did not shake and she was not sorry that she’d killed the brute. She was proud of Curtin. He was not a big man compared to the animal who’d attacked them, yet he was holding his own. He was trying his best to protect her and he’d put up a good fight. She was glad to have saved him. They were both all right now. They’d taken care of, protected and fought for each other.

  She reached over and pulled the fire alarm. Everything came to life. She wanted them to be disrupted, was suddenly angry that they’d let this happen, that they’d let such an animal roam the ship so freely.

  Marta was there first, the marine in tow. She grabbed Rebecca by the arm and looked her over. She was appalled by the condition of her neck. She looked down at the corpse draining blood and brain onto the deck. She looked on at Curtin, impressed and he read her mind.

  He held up his hands in surrender. “Not me, Marta.” He pointed toward her sister with his head as he handed her his freshly lit cigarette.

  “Oh, sweetheart, bravo!” She looked down and saw a glint, a shiny metallic object protruding from the dead man’s face. With a significant exertion of energy she rolled the big animal over onto his back, reached down and with some difficulty plucked Rebecca's hatpin from the corpse's eye. She wiped it clean on the lapel of the dead man’s jacket and handed it to her sister. “That's a nice hatpin, no sense in letting it go to waste.”

  The captain was on the scene by now. He looked about, checked Rebecca over and began barking orders. The ship’s physician was called in and attended to the young couple. The captain was impressed. “Anything you would like, Miss Walsh, say it and it’s yours. Rebecca looked on at the woman from third class. She’d been roused from her sleep, rebozo and all. Rebecca pointed at her and looked at the captain. “The best available room for her and her daughter.” The man nodded. “And her passage free, and everything they can eat and drink.”

  “Absolutely, Madam.”

  Little by little the crowd moved away, in short order the corpse was removed and all vestiges of the battle scrubbed away. Curtin escorted Rebecca back to her room. He didn’t want to leave her, but they were both spent, both ready to turn in. He kissed her again, looked her in the eye, looked on at the darkening bruises on her neck. He kissed them gently and bid her a good night, but before he could leave she grabbed him, grabbed him in her trembling arms and held on as if her life depended on it.

  They stood that way together for a long time, both needed to come down from the high of battle and neither one wanted to be alone now. He kissed her again and whispered in her ear. “I wish I didn’t have to leave you tonight.”

  “Don’t.”

  He regarded her, regarded the statement. Don’t. Don’t leave, stay, go to bed with me. Lie naked next to me, love me and worship me. He looked on into her eyes and thought a dozen thoughts, played out the rest of the night, what would come of it through his mind in an instant and every fiber in his being wanted to stay, pick her up in his aching arms and carry her across the threshold of her cabin door and climb into bed with her. He wanted to do this so badly and simultaneously pushed himself away.

  “Go to sleep, Rebecca. Go to sleep and rest and I’ll be with you in the morning. Go to sleep, darling.” He went to his cabin and to bed.

  Robert Curtin sat guarding the door to Rebecca Walsh’s stateroom. He could no longer sleep and watched the sunrise as the ship cruised
steadily south. They were in the gulfstream now and the water went from green to jade to a lovely blue. Porpoises emerged periodically alongside, racing the ship until they tired of it and went on their way. They seemed to be playing a little game of cat and mouse with the flying fish and it was a nice distraction as he waited. The rebozo lady emerged just after six from her new quarters, next to the girls. She beamed at him then walked up on him, a little self-consciously and shook his hand. She wandered off to get breakfast for her little girl, too ignorant of the ways of first class to know that she would be served, if only she’d requested it.

  He wrote in his journal until seven, when the door opened and Marta emerged, looking as fresh and feisty as ever. She immediately acknowledged and greeted him as Curtin jumped up, looked around her, looked as best he could into the room to catch a glimpse of Rebecca sleeping.

  “Is she all right, Marta?”

  “Slept like a newborn babe, except that she kept muttering a man’s name every so often. Clive, I think it was.” She watched Curtin’s face fall. “Just kidding, silly. She was saying your name, of course.” She reached over and kissed him resolutely on the cheek, touched his bruises gently. “I never did thank you properly.”

  “Oh, it’s Rebecca who should be thanked. I just served as the punching bag, kept the big ape occupied ‘til Rebecca could finish him off.”

  “You went to bed so early, you never heard. That man the two of you killed attacked an elevated ticket agent two days ago. Luckily she was in a cage and he couldn’t get her, nearly tore the damned thing down with a bailing hook trying to get at her. She called for help and he beat the hell out of three Irish whales who were trying to arrest him, got away and that’s how he ended up on the ship. You two did all right.” She laughed as she pulled back the lapels of his coat, patted his chest until she found his cigarette case and retrieved it. She let him light a cigarette for her. “The woman in the cage jabbed him with a hatpin as well, right through the hand. He was a regular pin cushion.” She looked off in the distance at the clear blue sky and ocean and then on at Curtin again. She liked him. “Where’s that lunkhead of a marine?”

  “He was by an hour ago, looking for you.”

  She reached over and kissed him again. “I’ll track him down. We’ll be in Nassau earlier than expected, I hear. Seas have been calmer than normal.” She began to march away.

  Curtin smiled and called her back. “I forgot.” He handed her a telegram. “This came for you this morning. The boy was going to slip it under the door but I took it.

  She opened it, read quickly but did not share. She looked on at Curtin, as if she was taking inventory. “Very interesting.” She walked on, then looked over her shoulder. “You take care of her, Robert Curtin.”

  “Yes ma’am.”

  Rebecca peered out the door of her cabin just after eleven. She never slept so late. She saw Curtin sleeping in a lounge chair in the sun. She crept up on him and kissed him awake. He smiled until he saw the state of her neck and wanted to cry.

  She saw it and did her best to reassure him, so happy to see him worry so much. “I’m okay.”

  “You’re not! That son of a bitch. I’d like to kill him if you hadn’t already.” He kissed her again and again. “I thought you’d never wake up. I missed you.”

  “You did?” She looked up and down the deck and no one was around. She sat on his lap and kissed him more passionately. She kissed him the way the characters kissed in the naughty books Marta used to read to her after lights out. She loved kissing him and she thought that she might not ever want to do anything else ever again except sit on Robert Curtin’s lap and kiss him.

  She finally pulled away and looked on at his journal. She began to open it. “What’s this?”

  “My journal.”

  She closed it quickly. “Oh, I’m sorry. That’s personal.”

  “No, no. Just some silly writing. Nothing really. You can see it, if you want.”

  “Don’t let Marta know about it. She’ll tease you. She’ll say you’re keeping a diary, like a girl.” She laughed at the thought of her sister teasing Curtin.

  “Oh, that’s okay, too. I like when Marta teases.” She reached down and kissed him again.

  “Does anything get you riled, Robert Curtin?”

  “Not much.” He kissed her again. He loved to feel her body on his. It was beginning to distract him, bring him back to the thoughts he had when he put her to bed. He looked on at her as her lovely raven hair shone in the bright sunlight. “How is that such a one as you would have such a one as me?”

  “I don’t think it’s such a stretch.” She kissed him again and now scooted down until she was lying next to him. She snuggled against his shoulder and held him tightly.

  “I don’t think you are so terrible.”

  “I’m not much to look at. And, I’m not very manly.” He smiled at her. “Certainly don’t rate you.”

  She leaned up and looked him over. “I think you’re quite handsome.” She regarded his physique. “You’re no Olympian god, but that’s not what I like.”

  “The men up in Alaska, I overheard them once, they called me the baby, because I’m so young looking,”

  “Oh, like my daddy.”

  He looked down at her and knew it was a great compliment. “Really?”

  “Oh yes, my daddy. Everyone says, now, what was that my uncle used to call him, an old timey name? Oh yes, a bully trap.”

  “Bully trap.” Curtin thought on it.

  “Yes, my daddy. My uncle used to say the bully bad men, they thought they’d push my daddy around and then it was like grabbing a tiger by the tail. That’s a bully trap.”

  “Hmm.” He kissed her and held her more tightly in his arms. He felt a new confidence at that.

  “Where’s my sister?”

  “Off looking for Del Calle. That poor fellow.”

  “Oh, I think he likes it. She likes him.”

  “Really?” He smiled down at the top of her head, breathed deeply. She smelled good.

  “Oh, yes. You can always tell when Marta likes someone. She teases them. If she doesn’t like someone, she ignores them. She likes Del Calle all right.”

  “She’s fearless, isn’t she?”

  “Do you think so, Robert?” She sat up and regarded him, watched him answer the question.

  “I do. I do think so. Why?”

  “She’s very…frail. I don’t know why I’m telling you this.” She looked him in the eye again and kissed him. “Or maybe I do. I’ve never met anyone like you. I feel like I could tell you anything and everything.”

  “And I you.”

  “Marta and I aren’t really sisters, you know?”

  “No. Well, you don’t look very much alike, but I never gave it much thought.”

  “We have a long and strange history, Robert.”

  He pulled out his watch, looked at it and wound it. He looked out at the ocean. “I’m not going anywhere.”

  She lay back down on his chest again and snuggled against it. “Okay, then. Where to begin. The life story of the Walsh family.”

  “And Del Toro family.”

  “Right, right.” Curtin pulled out a cigarette and offered her one. She waved it off.

  “I don’t like to smoke.” He put the pack away. He resolved to never smoke in her presence again.

  He sat back and held her tightly in his arms. “This is good. When I am an old, old man, and lying in a hospital, waiting to go on to the great beyond, and the nurses will say, “aren’t you Robert Curtin, the man who once loved the famous Rebecca Walsh? I can say, yes, my dear, and let me tell you all about her.” He held out his hand, “and here is what I will say.”

  She felt giddy. He said that he loved her. He didn’t say it to her, but he said it and it made her feel weak. “Let’s see. Well, it all starts with my grandmother.”

  “Abuelita.” She kissed him for remembering her grandmother’s name.

  “Yes. My grandmother had the most wond
erful son in the world and she taught him to be kind and generous and nice to all people, and he had a fine wife and a child, but sadly, they died.”

  “Oh, that is sad.”

  “And my daddy became a famous ranger in the wilds of Arizona and he met a wild Mexican woman and fell completely in love with her and they had me.”

  “Thank the gods.”

  “And then, in nineteen-hundred, I was traveling on a train and I got captured by a band of horrible cutthroats.”

  “Now, Rebecca, you’re getting silly.”

  She sat up and looked him in the eye. “Robert, this does sound silly, but what I am going to tell you is true, it’s all true.”

  “I see.” He kissed her before she had a chance to put her head back on his chest. “Please, continue.”

  “I got captured and was taken by force to Mexico. I met Marta there. She’s the daughter of the most horrible villain of the time. His name was Sombrero del Oro.”

  “Not del Toro.”

  “No, that’s later in the story. Anyway, Marta was around my age. She was magnificent, Robert. She was amazing but she’d not had a good life. She saw, many many horrible things, women and children abused, innocent people murdered. It was very hard for her. I know you think she is fearless and confident, but she has many scars Robert.”

  “I see.” He shifted and breathed in her hair again. “And your father came and rescued you?”

  “No, my mother.”

  “Really?” He was genuinely surprised.

  “My mother grew up like Marta. She was a bandit and she lived among horrible people. Oh, she was a terror, Robert. Actually, she still is a terror.” She grinned. “She saved me.”

  “So, she and Marta are much the same?”

  “Yes. My father calls me light Chica and Marta dark Chica. That is his name for my mother. Her real name, as far as we could ever tell, is Maria. You’ll like her, Robert.”

  “And she, me?”