Deadman's Lament (The Deadman Series Book 1)

by Linell Jeppsen

Parker heaved a sigh. “Yellow-belly fucker…excuse my language, Sis,” he grumbled.

  Mattie had almost forgotten about Top Hat in the rush of finding shelter from the storm. Now that he remembered, though, he was glad. He trusted Parker. He even felt safe around the huge, silent Negro. Top Hat was the threat and always had been so Mattie rejoiced that he was gone.

  The fire warmed the air; the buff hides thawed and discarded clothing steamed in one corner of the room. Marie yawned, curling up with her back to the stove. Within minutes, Parker was snoring as well. Mattie looked at Tulu who sat gazing at a leather-covered window opening. There was such sorrow on the man’s features Mattie could not bear to look.

  “Will you help me bury Mr. Penny tomorrow, Matthew?” Tulu whispered into the silence.

  “Yes, sir,” Mattie answered. He had no doubt that Tulu could carve a grave out of the ground with his own bare hands, but the big man seemed almost frightened of the prospect of burying his friend alone without someone there to stand witness.

  Silence crept over the cabin, and snow fell long into the night as Mattie and the others slept.

  “Wake up, son!”

  Mattie blinked in the gloom and saw shadowed figures moving swiftly in the woodstove’s firelight glow.

  Sitting up, he asked, “What’s going on? Is Top Hat back?”

  “Shhh!” It was Parker, leaning over him with a shotgun in his hand. He held the gun out to Mattie and the boy saw that the old man’s one good eye was wide with fear.

  “Tulu thinks it’s an Indian raiding party, son. Now you know and I know that we didn’t do nuthin wrong but those bucks out there won’t care whether we be innocent or not.” Parker curled his lips and spat at the fire. “Goddamn that cur, Top Hat!” he swore. “Took off and left us to pay for his crime!”

  Parker moved away and Mattie got to his feet with the shotgun in his hand. Marie was feeding what little firewood they had left to the stove so the room blazed bright with heat. There was a wooden bar across the front door but the door itself was as thin as paper. Mattie dragged a table in front of it, hoping that it might buy them some time if needed.

  Staring out at the early morning through a chink in the log wall, he saw at least twenty ponies and their riders riding in circles in front of the cabin. The horse’s hooves kicked up clouds of snow and Mattie gaped in awe, not only at the Indians and their pinto ponies but also at the two feet of snow that had fallen while he slept.

  One particularly fierce-looking customer was painted red all over as though he had been dipped in blood. He alone stood still, facing the cabin. Raising one hand, he called out something in his own tongue. His comrades slowed their mounts and waited by his side.

  “You know what he said, Parker?” Tulu hissed from one corner by the far side of the window.

  “Yeah, I think so.” Parker sighed. “He said, ‘Come out rapist’…or close to that, anyway.”

  Mattie saw one young brave slide off his horse and run quickly up to the side of the cabin where their animals were hobbled. A few moments later, they were loose and milling around with the Indian ponies where they were quickly caught and tied together in a bunch.

  “What do we do, Parker?” For all his size, Tulu deferred leadership to Parker, who shook his head.

  “We surrender. That’s what we do, Tulu,” the old man said softly.

  Mattie glanced up when he heard something creak across the mud and dried-grass roof overhead. There was a clatter and Mattie peered out front again as two of the braves yelled in derisive laughter. There was a hollow rumble and then smoke started pouring back down out of the stovepipe and into the cabin. Instantly, Mattie’s eyes began to water and his throat slammed shut.

  Marie squealed with fear and all four of them started whooping and coughing, Smoke was so thick, Mattie couldn’t see an inch in front of his face. A big hand seized his arm and then there was the scrape of wood on wood as someone dragged the table away from the doorway.

  Light filtered in through the escaping smoke. Although Mattie’s eyes still stung with tears, he saw the Indians lined up in a row facing the cabin and almost every one of them held their bows and arrows at the ready.

  Parker stuck a pair of long johns on a stick out the front door and, coughing, he hollered, “We surrender! Hey! You hear me? We surrender. Don’t shoot!”

  Turning around, he gazed through the hazy air and said, “You guys stay in here as long as you can. Now that the door is open, they’ll come in and fetch you easy instead of burning you out.” He looked at Mattie and his good eye winked. “I’m gonna go soften ‘em up fer ya…”

  “Parker!” Tulu exclaimed but the old man had stepped outside.

  Mattie’s vision was clear enough now to watch as at least a dozen arrows entered his friend’s body before Parker fell backwards with a crash into the cabin.

  Chapter 9

  Slingshot

  Three things happened simultaneously.

  Tulu, who had his rifle pointed up and over Parker’s shoulder, stumbled when the old man slammed into him. His rifle roared but his aim was off and the large caliber bullet blew a hole in one of the ceiling braces. Grass, wood splinters and snow filled the air, raining down on them. The interior of the cabin brightened as three braves suddenly flew through the window opening. Mattie heard Marie scream and he lifted his shotgun only to have it plucked out of his hands by one of the Indians.

  In the ensuing silence, Mattie heard a whisper. Looking down at Parker, he saw the old man gasping for breath. But his gaze was fixed on Mattie’s face and one arm reached his way. “Tom…Tommy, is that you?”

  “It’s Mattie, sir,” he whispered. Yet he knew that Parker had spoken his last words, that whatever spirit had caused him to see another boy in his final moments had fled.

  Abruptly, Mattie was lifted into the air from behind and carried outside. He struggled and squirmed but the hands that held him tossed him on the dirt directly in front of the “red” Indian’s pony. The painted horse rose up in alarm and kicked out his two front hooves, one of them dealing Mattie’s head a glancing blow; he shrieked and tried to scramble out of harm’s way.

  Mattie briefly lost consciousness but a sharp, nauseating pain woke him and he started retching into the snow. As he puked, Mattie saw blood splatter around him and knew the pony had dealt him a grievous blow. He closed his eyes for a second to stop the dizzy whirling but they opened again when he heard Marie scream. Blubbering in terror, she sobbed, “Mattie! Oh, Mon Dieu…no!”

  Struggling to sit up, Mattie watched as an Indian trussed her up on a horse. He tried to rise and run to her but a moccasin-clad foot pushed him back down into the snow. Then he heard a howl of agony. Turning his pounding head carefully to the left, he saw several Indians wrestling Tulu to his knees. The big man was putting up a hell of a fight but there were simply too many. As Mattie watched, the large Negro fell to his knees.

  Laughter and harsh war cries filled the air. The red-painted Indian grinned and got down off his horse. Strolling over to where Tulu knelt in the snow, the Indian picked up one of the black man’s long, fuzzy braids and said something to his triumphant braves.

  A young man shouted for joy and pulled a long knife out of his cloth belt. Mattie recognized him as the one who had set their livestock free and, later, threw rocks down the chimney pipe. It looked like he was being rewarded for his efforts now and Mattie swallowed against his grief and fear as the boy started sawing at Tulu’s scalp.

  Tulu wailed, staring at Mattie in horror. Suddenly, he remembered the slingshot in his back pocket. He had been trying for the last four days to find a good time and place to use it but there were always too many guns and too many eyes watching his every move. He had honestly expected the slingshot to be seized but had begun to think that it was overlooked or forgotten.

  On the other hand, he thought now, maybe Tulu and Parker did me a kindness and wanted me to have some sort of protection since I wasn’t allowed a gun. Well, it is my turn to repay T
ulu with a kindness of my own…

  The Indian boy was making a mess of things with Tulu’s scalp and the big man was squealing with anguish. Blood ran down the man’s face and his eyes were full of tears. Mattie reached into his back pocket with one hand, grabbing hold of his slingshot and two, perfectly round stones.

  He looked around, nodding in satisfaction. No one was paying him any mind. Marie was turned away from the horrifying scene and Mattie could see her shoulders heaving with sobs. The other braves whooped and hollered, jumping up and down with excitement and laughing.

  Mattie ignored the pounding in his head and the blood that obscured the vision in his left eye, trickling into his mouth. Lifting the slingshot, he sighted in on Tulu’s temple. His focus became narrow as he calculated the distance and the trajectory. If he was going to ruin the Indian’s fun and probably die for his efforts, he needed to get it right.

  For a second, Tulu’s cries eased off as he caught sight of Mattie and what the boy was trying to do; he nodded once and commenced to screaming again. Mattie took a deep, steadying breath and let his stone fly. Tulu’s cries were silenced instantly and the Negro fell over dead in the snow. A hush fell over the clearing and the Indian boy stared at Mattie in shock and anger. Then he snarled, grabbed his tomahawk and ran at Mattie with murder in his eyes.

  Mattie closed his eyes against his own death and waited for the ax to fall but he heard a sharp command. Many of the Indian braves had moved in his direction but now they all stood stock-still as the large, red-painted Indian came and stood over Mattie’s cowering body.

  Reaching down, Redbird snatched the slingshot out of Mattie’s grasp and turned it over in his hands. Smiling slightly, he put it in his belt pouch. He gestured at Mattie and then spoke in his native tongue to his fellow fighters. Mattie had no idea what the man was saying but the braves mumbled in wide-eyed respect and backed away.

  Gazing down at the boy, Redbird frowned and said, “You got big medicine?” The Indian spoke slowly, laboriously, as though struggling with the white man’s unruly words but Mattie understood and nodded.

  Redbird studied Mattie’s face. He had meant to take all these men’s scalps in revenge for his brother and thought the boy’s bright, blond hair was particularly attractive but now he wondered. He had seen the teenager sit up, take aim and shoot his stone at the big, black man to devastating effect even as his own blood ran down his face and blinded his vision.

  Something strange danced in the boy’s eyes at that moment, something mystical and wise that Redbird wanted no part of. He stepped back and looked around. One old man lay still in the cabin’s doorway and the white girl with clouds of long, black hair was secured tightly on his cousin’s horse. She will make a good trade, he thought.

  The black man lay dead in the snow and still another body lay frozen and stiff in back of the wagon. It was the man he, himself, had killed after his little brother’s throat was cut open. The golden-haired boy stared up at him from the ground with haunted eyes.

  Glaring, Redbird bent over and asked, “Where’s the other man?” Not having the words he needed, the Indian used his hands to sketch the outline of a tall hat on his own head.

  Mattie wondered for a moment what the brave was doing and then his eyes got big, “You mean Top Hat?”

  The Indian nodded and answered, “Yes, the hat man.”

  Mattie shrugged and said, “He’s gone…he left yesterday.”

  Redbird did not understand ‘yesterday’ but he knew the word ‘gone’ and believed the boy’s words. The Indian gauged his revenge by gazing around at the dead one last time and then shouted something to the others. They moved swiftly toward their ponies and mounted up.

  The war party spun their horses around and around where Mattie sat in the bloody snow. They shouted their victory, keeping a safe distance from the dangerous boy and brandished their weapons in the air. Then—with one final flourish—Redbird reared up his pony, hollered something, and rode away.

  The last thing Mattie heard was Marie’s anguished cry calling out to him before he fell down in a dead faint.

  Mattie woke up later with snow falling in his eyes and clogging his nose. Dried blood had hardened into a thick mask on his face and he sat up with a groggy gasp.

  “Ow!” he groaned, putting his hand up to the cut on his head. He felt around and found a flap of skin peeled away from his scalp. He knew even as he touched it that fresh blood was starting to flow from the wound again.

  He gazed at the devastation and unbidden tears fell from his eyes. Three dead bodies kept him company: Randall Penny, still in the back of the wagon covered in mounds of snow; old man Parker; and Tulu. Mattie allowed himself a small bit of pride. Although his stone had killed the man, he knew that Tulu would have died anyway. His shot had flown true, putting the big man out of his misery.

  Sighing, Mattie struggled to his feet and tried to keep from vomiting again. He staggered in place for a moment and then made his way over to where Tulu lay dead in his own frozen blood. He gazed about, wondering what to do, and then he remembered the kerosene in a small metal receptacle in the cabin.

  Walking slowly, he made his way up onto the porch and stepped over Parker’s body. He saw the small tin jug close to the woodstove and—groaning—bent over to pick it up. Sticking it in his back pocket, Mattie found his jacket and put it on before leaning over and grabbing hold of the old man’s ankles.

  Grunting with painful exertion, the boy strained backwards and began dragging Parker’s body out the door onto the porch. Blood was flowing freely down his face again and Mattie wiped it away with a snarl of annoyance.

  Stepping quickly down the one wooden step, he cringed when the old man’s grizzled head bounced hard on the wooden slat…then the snow acted as a sled. Mattie dragged Parker close to the wagon and stood still for a moment as his chest hitched and more of his own blood painted the snow pink.

  Mattie groaned as he looked over at Tulu’s corpse. He just didn’t know if he had enough strength to drag that huge body the twenty feet or so to the wagon but he knew he had to try. He walked away and stood still for a second, staring down at the Negro’s wide brown eyes.

  For some reason, Tulu’s scalp had been thrown aside like a piece of rubbish; Mattie bent and picked it up. There was only a small patch of flesh on this particular skein of hair but, for some reason, Mattie did not have the heart to throw it away. Brushing the snow off the long curly lock, Mattie wrapped it around his hand like a piece of rope and put it in his pocket.

  Then be knelt in the snow, picked up the man’s ankles and let out a cry of pain and sorrow as he pulled with all his might. It took a long time but Mattie finally placed Tulu’s body close to Parker’s.

  Although he was trembling from head to toe, Mattie understood that he needed to finish the job before he gave up altogether. He clutched the wooden slats behind the wagon and crawled inside. His chest heaved with effort and his eyes danced with stars but he managed to scoop most of the snow off Randall Penny’s body.

  He poked around, trying to see if there was anything useful and found a good rope and an empty canteen. Whispering an apology, Mattie also searched Penny’s pockets for money but only found a couple of coins. Sitting back on his heels, he remembered how Top Hat had rummaged around his cousin’s body on the pretense of paying his respects and suspected he had actually lifted all of Randall’s cash.

  Throwing the rope and canteen to the ground, Mattie eased down and took the items back to the cabin. Stepping in the door, he looked around and saw the two leather satchels Parker had used to carry gear and food. There wasn’t much left but he managed to stuff one of them full of biscuits, a hunk of smoked bacon and a few hard beans.

  Searching further, he also discovered a small amount of paper money and a few coins in the bottom of one along with a knife, fork, and some matches. He grabbed a tin plate, a cup and some medicinal papers. Then Mattie tied two long ropes around his waist and picked up the three canteens. Stepping outsi
de, he moved around the side of the cabin and saw the rain barrels. One of them was almost empty but there was still some green-tinged water at the bottom of the other, enough to fill a canteen and a half.

  A few minutes later, Mattie stepped up to the wagon where he had heaped the rest of the dried kindling and pinecones on and around the bodies. Checking the men’s pockets for the last time, he found a few more coins and then—saving some for himself—sprinkled kerosene over the corpses, the kindling, and the wagon bed. He tried to think of something good to say as a eulogy but he was too hurt and weary to think of anything besides a childhood prayer he and his sister used to recite before they went to bed.

  He struck a match from Parker’s stash and murmured, “Now I lay me down to sleep…” When the match didn’t ignite, he struck another. “I pray to God, my soul to keep,” and stepped back when small, red flames streamed across the kindling onto Parker’s shirtfront and over to Tulu’s leather vest.

  Mattie stepped away as the flames rose higher and continued, “If I should die before I wake…” Nodding in satisfaction as the fire enveloped the back of the wagon and the body of Randall Penny, he finished with, “I pray to God my soul to take.”

  The boy stood still for a moment watching the funeral pyre. Then he turned to follow the trampled snow and hoof prints that had carried his Marie away.

  Chapter 10

  Amber Eyes

  Snow fell in in heavy, white sheets through the trees and onto the forest floor. It gathered on branches and fell in great clumps, filling the air with crystalline explosions of frozen rainbows.

  Mattie had repeatedly tumbled over stumps and fallen branches. The road he and his companions traveled just yesterday seemed like a foreign place now, hushed and malevolent. His head wound had stopped bleeding some time back but his whole body trembled and shook as if caught in a tempest.

  He didn’t know much about medicine but his father had talked to him once about going into “shock” and how an insignificant injury could turn fatal; he wondered if that was happening to him now. Falling again, the boy acknowledged that he was hopelessly lost.