Don't Poke the Bear [western 02]

by John Locke

WE ALL GO downstairs together, past the few men who just came in lookin’ to play cards. Leah and Hester are standin’ with ’em, takin’ drink orders, tryin’ to talk ’em into goin’ upstairs now and playin’ cards later. Rose enters the kitchen alone. Gentry and me listen from just outside the doorway, out of sight. Wing sees us from the other side of the kitchen, by the back door, where he’s standin’ guard with a shotgun. I put my finger to my lips so he won’t speak. Rose walks over to the table where Bose can see her from inside the hole.

  “Well, hi there, Sugar Britches,” Bose says with a voice bathed in honey. What would it take to get you to just stand over the top of these boards?”

  “Maybe if you rip your eyes out of their sockets,” she answers, sweetly.

  “It’s a deal! Come on!”

  “You first,” she says.

  “Oh, what I’d give to get inside your drawers!” he says. “I bet you got fire in them britches!”

  “You have no idea.”

  “How about you slide that bolt and let me out of here?”

  “If I did, what would you do?”

  “Anythin’ you want.”

  “Would you kill yourself?”

  “Why, sure I would! Just get my gun and slide the bolt. If you want me dead, you can pull the trigger yourself.”

  “It wouldn’t matter,” Rose says.

  “What wouldn’t?”

  “I couldn’t shoot you.”

  “’Cause you got feelins’ for me? Is that why you didn’t let Emmett shoot me awhile ago?”

  “I do have feelings for you, Bose. But all of them are bad.”

  “Aw, you don’t mean that.”

  “What I mean to say is, your bullets won’t work in Kansas.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “It’s a fact.”

  “If it’s a fact, you shouldn’t mind lettin’ me have my gun.”

  “I don’t mind.”

  “Really? You’d give me my gun?”

  “I might.”

  “Don’t tease me, sugar. Them townies are gonna come for me in a couple hours. That’s how it works. They’re off somewhere, drinkin’ up some courage. In the end, Emmett’ll stand aside and let ’em take me. I’m as good as hung if I can’t defend myself.”

  “You’ll never be able to defend yourself. Not in Kansas.”

  “Why not?”

  I walk in and say, “Because she’s a witch. And she put a spell on you, just like she put a spell on your horses last fall, when you got the drop on us near Copper Lake.”

  I close the kitchen door so Gentry can guard it from the main room.

  Bose says, “There’s no such thing as witches.”

  “Then you and your men must be the worst horsemen in the world.”

  “That was some sort of fluke,” he says.

  “You think?”

  “I know.”

  I tell Rose to fetch me Bose’s gun and gun belt. “Wing? Come here and lift the lid.”

  Bose suddenly gets nervous. “What’re you up to, Emmett?”

  “I’m gonna give you your gun.”

  “Bullshit.”

  I nod at Wing. He slides the bolt and lifts the floor boards up and swings them all the way back. The only thing between us and Bose is the second set of wooden slats. I nod and Wing unlocks that hatch, too, then lifts it out of the way. Now Bose’s head is about two feet from our boots. Rose tosses him his gun belt and holster. He can see his gun in the holster.

  “You’re gonna shoot me and pretend I’m tryin’ to escape!” he says.

  I point to my gun. It’s in my holster. I put my hands up.

  “Shoot me,” I say.

  I’ll give Bose credit for one thing. He can recognize an opportunity when he sees it. Before I got the words completely out of my mouth, he pulls his gun and makes it click three times. He frowns and checks to see if there are bullets in it.

  “What’ve you done to my gun?”

  “Nothin’.”

  “You’ve ruined my bullets somehow!”

  “Nope.”

  Bose tries to fire three more times, turns the gun sideways, pops the cylinder, lets the bullets slide out, pulls six more from his gunbelt, takes careful aim, and pulls the trigger six times.

  And gets six clicks.

  “This is bullshit!” he says. But he holsters his gun and straps on his gun belt anyway.

  “Try mine,” I say, tossin’ him my gun.

  He catches it, turns it toward me and pulls the trigger.

  Click. Click. Click.

  “You think that’s funny?” he says.

  “I do. Toss it back and I’ll show you how funny it is.”

  He tosses it back and I shoot a hole in the bottom of his holster. The sound is deafening. We hear Gentry outside the door, tellin’ the folks in the main room, “Don’t worry, Emmett’s just shootin’ a rat. A small one,” she adds, “Not Bose Rennick.”

  I hear the customers laugh. If Bose is right, and a bunch of men come for him in a little while, these men won’t be a party to it. They’re steady customers.

  I toss my gun back to Bose.

  “You try it,” I say.

  He does. And gets two more clicks.

  “Reload it with your bullets,” I say.

  He does.

  “Shoot me a couple times.”

  He shoots twice.

  Click. Click.

  I hold out my hand. He frowns and tosses me the gun. I shoot his gunbelt again.

  “Another rat!” Gentry calls out.

  “Remind me not to order supper!” one of the customers shouts back, which causes a loud roar of laughter from the others in there.

  The customers ain’t worried, since Gentry ain’t.

  I toss the gun back to Bose. He tries to shoot it again, gets another click for his trouble. Then tosses it back to me.

  “I don’t know what type of trick you’re playin’,” he says, “but I ain’t buyin’ she’s a witch.”

  “Wing,” I say. “Toss him the shotgun.”

  He does. Bose turns it on me, cocks one of the barrels, pulls the trigger.

  Click.

  He opens the action to see two shells inside, shuts it, cocks the second barrel, and pulls that trigger.

  Click.

  “Toss him two more shells,” I say to Wing.

  He pulls two shells from his pocket and tosses ’em to Bose.

  “Load ’em both, but just shoot one,” I say.

  He does, and gets a click.

  I reach for the shotgun and he hands it over.

  “You ain’t gonna shoot my gun belt with that thing, are you?”

  “Do you think this barrel will fire?”

  He nods.

  “How many bullets you need in your gun belt?” I ask.

  He counts. “Eighteen.”

  I fetch a box of bullets from one of the kitchen drawers and toss it to him. “Load it.”

  “Why?”

  “We’re gonna let you escape.”

  “Why?”

  “What do you care?”

  He shrugs. “You’re right. I don’t care.”

  36.

  NO ONE’S EXPECTIN’ us to let Bose go, partic’larly in broad daylight, so we check out back and, sure enough, there’s no one out there. I tell Bose to leave his hat in the hole. Few folks have seen his face, but his hat’s distictive.

  “How about I carry my hat?” he says.

  I don’t blame him. In the same situation, I’d want mine. It’s harder to break in a new hat than a new horse. Which reminds me of somethin’ I need to tell Bose.

  “I can’t return your money or your horse. But the two finest horses I ever seen are saddled up and tied to the post behind my store. Pick one and ride off.”

  “Ain’t you worried I’ll shoot you?”

  “Accordin’ to my witch, you can’t shoot nothin’ in Kansas. And I believe her. Before you climb out, pick up all them bullets you dropped and hand ’em to me.”

  When
all the bullets are accounted for, Wing drops the bucket in the hole. Bose turns it upside down, stands on it, and climbs out of the jail hole.

  “I appreciate you doin’ this for me,” he says. “I won’t forget it. You and me are square after his.” He winks one of those god-awful eyes at me, and I nod.

  “I’m glad to hear that, Bose.”

  “You’ve got my word,” he says.

  “That means a lot.”

  I still can’t get over his voice. So special is it, if he told me to go to hell, I’d actually look forward to the trip.

  “When you walk out of here, move slowly,” I say, “so as not to draw any attention to yourself.”

  Bose hesitates at the back door, looks around, and walks out. He chooses one of the horses, climbes on its back, and heads away, at a steady walk.

  Rose, Wing and I sit at the kitchen table. We aim to give Bose enough time to make a clean getaway, so Wing and I fill the time by checkin’ our guns and ammunition. Suddenly, I hear four clicks behind me, and turn to see Bose Rennick aimin’ a gun at my back. He grins and says, “Can’t blame a guy for tryin’!” Then he says to Rose, “Last chance to come with me, Sugar Britches!”

  From somewhere—who knows where—Rose flings two rats at Bose. He fires two clicks that no doubt would a’ hit both of ’em in mid air, had the bullets worked.

  Wing lifts his shotgun and cocks one of the barrels, and Bose takes off.

  Then I say to Rose, “Sugar Britches, are you certain Bose is part of my destiny?”

  Wing laughs out loud. Rose says, “I know it’s hard to believe, but yes. And Emmett?”

  “Yeah?”

  “If you call me Sugar Britches again, you’ll wish you hadn’t.”

  “Okay. Sorry.”

  She looks at Wing, implyin’ the same thing. He nods and mutters somethin’ in Chinese that makes Rose’s eyes go wide. When Rose answers him in Chinese, Wing’s eyes grow twice as wide. He jumps on the floor and lays himself full-length, face down, while shakin’ all his limbs and makin’ all sorts of babblin’ sounds.

  “What’s he doin’?” I say.

  “Begging my forgiveness for what he just said about me.”

  “In Chinese?”

  “Mandarin.”

  “Can you let him up? I’m sure he didn’t mean it.”

  “He meant it all right.”

  “How bad could it be?”

  “We don’t have words for it in English.”

  “Wing! Why would you speak like that to Rose?”

  “I not know she understand. I act brave. In my culture woman not speak down to man. Not mean what I say.”

  I look at Rose. “We got more important things to do.”

  She says somethin’ to him in Chinese or Mandarin or whatever the hell they speak. He says somethin’ back, gets up, says somethin’ else, and bows deeply to Rose. She says somethin’ else, and he nods and runs out the back door to the out house.

  “Is everythin’ worked out?” I say.

  “Yes.”

  “Then why’s he so upset?”

  “I forgave him, but told him to sleep alone tonight, and have a large bucket of water handy.”

  “Why?”

  “Because at some point in the middle of the night, his private parts are going to burst into flames.”

  “You’d do that?”

  “Of course not. But he will.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “I plant the seed. His mind does the rest.”

  “So when his privates burst into flame it’s all in his mind?”

  “Yes.”

  “So it’s not really happening?”

  “Of course it’s happening! It’s just happening in his mind.”

  She sees I’m confused, and adds, “That’s where all the real things happen, Emmett. It’s where the pain is.”

  “In the mind?”

  “Exactly.”

  “What about Bose?”

  “What about him?”

  “How long is the spell on him gonna last?”

  “What spell?”

  For the hundredth time since I’ve known Rose, I find myself wonderin’ how much I know and how much I dreamt about somethin’ that just happened. I wonder if somethin’ happened, or nothin’ happened, or if whatever happened was only in my mind. I give up wonderin’ about it, and go to the back door to whistle the sound a wood warbler makes. When Shrug shows up I ask him how he’s feelin’. He hits his hurt shoulder and grins. Then winks at Rose, and she gives him some sort of secret smile.

  To Shrug I say, “If you’re willin’, I’d like to lock you in my jail hole.”

  Shrug shuffles to the jail hole, looks down into it a second, then hops in.

  I stand over him and look down. “You need anythin’?”

  He shakes his head.

  A very shaken and humbled Wing Ding comes back inside and helps me lock both of the wooden doors above Shrug’s head. Then I get one of the chairs, put it on top of the hinged floorboards, and have Wing sit there, holdin’ his shotgun.

  Then Rose, Gentry, and I go back into the main room, where I see a line of people at the far side near the quiet table, waitin’ to talk to the Sheriff.

  Rose says, “I’ll move my things into Wayne’s room.”

  Gentry says, “I’ll tend bar awhile.”

  I kiss Gentry and head over to my sheriffin’ table.

  37.

  MAVIS BEECHUM IS upset her layin’ hen went missin’. Bill Hardy wants to register an assault charge against Gideon Rigby for givin’ him a black eye. Two angry neighbors want me to ride out to their place to make a rulin’ on a fence line. I decide to go with ’em, since it ain’t far, and because it’ll help establish my alibi when the town discovers Bose Rennick has escaped.

  I tell the rest of the complainers I’ll be back in an hour. I also ask someone to volunteer to sit in the kitchen with Wing Ding till I get back. One of the card table groups says they’ll all go in there and sit if they can play cards and drink some free whiskey. I offer ’em a bottle, and they move their game into the kitchen.

  “Leave the main door open, boys!” I call to ’em, so everyone from the main room can walk in and out as they please. The more activity, the better the alibi.

  When I get back from rulin’ on the fence line, I find a small mob in the main room.

  “Where you been?” Ben Dover yells.

  There’s probably twenty of ’em, and a half-dozen more in the kitchen. Some of my regular customers walk over and stand next to me.

  “I appreciate that,” I say, “But I’m no longer sheriff.” I take the cloth badge out of my pocket and hand it to Ben, who appears to be leadin’ the mob.

  “I ain’t takin’ this,” Ben says. “But we aim to take your prisoner and hang him.”

  “Take him then,” I say, “but it’s on you when the Marshall shows up and asks about it.”

  “I reckon he’ll blame you,” Ben says.

  “Not if I ain’t the sheriff.”

  “Where’s the Mayor?” Ben says.

  Everyone looks around, but no one sees him.

  Ben frowns and says, “I reckon the Marshall and Governor can’t punish the entire town. Plus, there’s no judge to hear the case anyway.”

  We all stand there a minute, and Ben says, “What if we open the hatch and let him try to escape?”

  “If you’re gonna gun him down, make sure he’s outdoors first,” I say.

  “Done.”

  He turns to the mob and shouts, “How about it, are you with me?”

  They all let out a hoo-raw.

  “Okay then, let’s get him!”

  They open the hatches and see nothin’, ’cept a small area under the second hatch that’s been dug away. Ben makes all the shocked noises you’d expect him to make, then gets on his hands and knees and looks into the hole, where the earth has been dug away, and follows the path with his eyes.

  Ben says, “Best I can tell, he’s dug himself
out and traveled under the floor, toward the back. Some of you need to go outside and see if there’s a hole where he’s busted out. If not, he’s still under the foundation somewhere!”

  Within seconds someone finds the hole Shrug kicked open when he broke out.

  Forty men are now lookin’ around in the open area behind the buildin’. One of ’em yells, “There’s someone hidin’ in the out house.”

  Ben Dover rushes over and yells, “You inside the shit house! Come out right now!”

  From inside, a huge voice roars back, “Stand back, or you’ll wish you had!”

  “That’s Bose Rennick’s voice!” someone shouts. “I’d recognize it anywhere!”

  The crowd begins shooting into the out house from all angles. They fire about fifty rounds before Ben gets them to stop.

  “He’s either dead by now, or jumped into the shit hole,” he says.

  Someone kicks the door open and tentatively looks down into the shit hole. “He’s in there all right, but it ain’t Bose Rennick!”

  “Well, who the hell is it?” Ben yells.

  “The Mayor. And he’s in deep shit!”

  38.

  BY THE TIME we get the Mayor out, half the crowd is angry, the other half is laughin’ their asses off, but all are thirsty. We head back into my saloon and do a banner night, till someone gets the idea in their head to organize a posse. Someone else tells ’em he’s done posse work before and it was a big waste of time. They come to the conclusion there’s more to be gained by whorin’ and drinkin’, which is music to any saloon keeper’s ears.

  But someone else has been thinkin’ things through and remembers me firin’ two shots a few hours ago, while Bose was still under my care. I notice Rose is on the balcony, lookin’ down on the proceedin’s. Gentry’s standin’ next to her, lookin’ very nervous.

  Ben Dover stands up on his chair to publicly confront me. When he speaks, the crowd quiets down.

  “What about them rats, Emmett?”

  “What rats?”

  “The ones Gentry claims you shot a few hours ago. From behind the closed door of the kitchen.”

  “What about ’em?”

  “You have the carcasses?”

  I grin. “Not on me!”

  Some of the men chuckle. But not many.

  “Well, I ain’t accusin’ you of shootin’ your prisoner,” Ben says, “but I’d like to see them carcasses. Wouldn’t the rest of you?”