by Bill Brooks
She glanced at Toussaint who sat the mule holding
the reins to Jake’s horse.
“I don’t know,” she said.
Jake wiped dirt from her cheeks, smoothed her
hair, his ministrations gentle.
“Come on, Martha. Toussaint and me are going to
take you home.”
She didn’t offer to get up. Jake lifted her and set
her on behind Toussaint.
“It’s all right,” he said. “Everything will be all
right. Just hold onto Mr. Trueblood.”
“We did okay,” Toussaint said as they started back
to town. “We didn’t have to kill anybody and we got
Martha back.”
“It’s a good day,” Jake said.
“I’m still wondering something,” Toussaint said.
“What’s that?”
“Who that Indian stole those three nice saddle
horses from.”
“It’s enough we got Martha back,” Jake said.
“Let’s not concern ourselves with other mysteries.”
“Yeah,” Toussaint said. But it didn’t stop his won-
dering.
24
Where the roads diverged, Toussaint stopped
and said, “I been thinking I’ll ride over and see
Karen. Can you handle the rest of this by yourself?”
“Sure,” Jake said.
They transferred Martha to the back of Jake’s
horse. She still seemed a bit lost in the head.
“I’ll swing round sometime tomorrow to collect
my pay,” Toussaint said.
Jake nodded, said, “Thanks for your help on this.”
“Didn’t have to kill nobody, didn’t have to bury
nobody. Nice way to make a living. See you back in
town.”
Jake put spurs to the horse, anxious to be back in
Sweet Sorrow again.
He stopped near Cooper’s Creek to water the horse
and allow him and the woman to stretch their legs.
“This is where it happened,” Martha said. “Right
near here, where me and Otis was having a picnic . . .
and . . .” Tears spilled down her cheeks thinking
about it, the joy of that day before the Swede came
along and the sorrow that followed after he came
along.
“It’s over now,” Jake said. “That man who took
you—the Swede—he’s dead. He won’t be bothering
you again.”
“That old fellow killed him, didn’t he?”
“Yes, it looks like maybe they killed each other.”
“Good,” Martha said. “Wasn’t a one of them any
good.”
“Best not to think about it further,” Jake said, then
helped her on the back of his horse and rode on to the
town.
Once arrived, Jake reined in at the general store.
He helped the woman down and walked her to the
front door. She hesitated, pulled back.
“Go on in,” Jake said.
“I’m afraid,” Martha said.
“Of what?”
“I’m afraid Otis won’t want me no more . . . now
that I been . . .”
“Don’t be silly. You were all he talked about when
we found him. Go on and go in.”
Jake waited until she did, then rode his horse over
to the livery where Sam Toe sat repairing a cinch
strap. Sam Toe looked up, looked at the horse. As-
sured it had not been abused he toted up a paper bill
and handed it to Jake. Jake looked at it, then
reached in his pocket and paid for the rent of the
horse.
“I don’t see that mule,” Sam Toe said. “You lose
him?”
“Toussaint’s still got him. He should be in later to-
day, maybe tomorrow. When he does, come and see
me and I’ll pay what I owe you on it.”
Jake started to walk up to the school. Sam Toe
said, “You get that fellow you were after?”
“In a manner of speaking,” Jake said and contin-
ued on.
“In a manner of speaking?” Sam Toe said to him-
self, shaking his head. “Sure enough some high talk
for a damn lawman.”
Jake found Clara at the school—a series of addition
problems written in chalk on the board, the children
with heads bent doing the problems on smaller chalk-
boards, the click and clack of their chalk like some-
thing with bad teeth chewing bone.
Clara saw him standing in the doorway and came
to the back of the classroom.
“You’ve come back for the boy,” she said.
“Yes, but if you could watch him just a bit longer,
until I can arrange to take him tomorrow to the or-
phanage down in Bismarck, I’d appreciate it.”
She hesitated with her answer, then said, “There’s
a favor I’d like to ask you as well.”
“Sure, name it.”
“Can you go to my house and have a look at my
father?”
“What’s wrong with him?”
She explained how William Sunday had come to
dinner and how she’d found him later lying in the
rain, how he seemed to have a fever and she didn’t
know what to do for him, and how he’d told her
there’d be men coming for him—to kill him.
“Kill him?”
She hesitated, wondering if she should tell him
everything. He wore a badge, after all, and maybe it
wasn’t such a good idea to tell the law about William
Sunday. But then again, what did he have to lose at
this stage of the game? She needed to trust someone,
and this was a man she felt she could trust. She’d seen
an uncommon kindness in him with the orphaned
boy.
“My father is William Sunday,” she said. “Have
you heard of him?”
The name was familiar enough all over the west.
William Sunday was known as a dangerous gun-
fighter, maybe as dangerous as Wild Bill Hickok or
any of his ilk. Only Sunday was a man with the added
reputation of killing for hire, unlike Hickok.
“Yes,” Jake said, “I’ve heard of him.”
“He’s dying,” Clara said. “He told me he doesn’t
have long to live and he’s come here hoping I’d see
him through his end days. But I can’t put my girls in
harm’s way if he’s correct about men coming for
him,” she said. “And I can’t just pitch him out on the
street either. I don’t know what to do.”
Jake noticed then how handsome a woman she
was, or at least seemed to be in that solitary moment
of worry. Handsome but not your typical beauty.
“I’ll go have a look at him,” Jake said.
“School will be out in a couple of hours,” she said.
“Could you remain at the house until I get there?”
Jake nodded.
“I’m grateful,” she said. “And don’t worry about
Stephen. He can stay with me as long as you need to
make the arrangements.”
Jake felt like touching her arm, perhaps her cheek
to let her know it would be all right, the situation
with her father. But instead he turned and left, and
walked to the house where she lived.
William Sunday was there, lying sideways across
/>
the bed because it was too short for him to lie length-
wise.
Even though he’d knocked before coming in, he
could see the feral look in the gunman’s eyes, could
guess he’d had time to reach one of his pistols and
hide it under the blanket covering him.
“Your daughter, Clara, asked me to come have a
look at you.”
“Who are you?”
Jake realized then that he was still wearing the city
marshal’s badge.
“I’m a man who knows a little something about
medicine,” Jake said.
“And a lawman too, I see.”
“Yeah, I’m that too. Clara says you’re running a
fever?”
He saw William Sunday’s face relax a bit.
“I’m about dead, she tell you that?”
“Yes. She mentioned it.”
“What else did she mention?”
“She told me who you were.”
“That a problem for you, who I am?”
“As far as I know you’re not wanted for anything
around here.”
“As far as you know.”
“Yes, that’s right,” Jake said. “You want me to
have a look at you, or would you prefer we shoot it
out?”
He saw Sunday’s eyes shift, looking him over, try-
ing to make a judgment on him.
“I don’t know what it is you can do for me,” he
said.
“There are things to treat your fever.”
Sunday closed his eyes momentarily.
“I’d be grateful for anything you can do to get me
back on my feet,” he said. “I don’t want to be a bur-
den to Clara.”
Jake walked to the bed and laid a palm atop the
gunman’s forehead, felt the fever, said, “I’ve got med-
icine, but I’ll have to go and get it.”
“You a doctor?”
“No, but I had some training in the war.”
“Whose side were you on?”
Jake looked at him.
“Does it matter, that war’s been over sixteen
years.”
Sunday smiled, said, “I guess it has.”
“One thing,” Jake said.
“What’s that?”
“Clara’s worried the men you say are coming for
you will find you here, possibly put her and her chil-
dren in harm’s way if what you’re saying is true. How
would you feel about moving to someplace safer—for
their sake?”
Sunday nodded.
“I don’t want to put them in the middle of it. I’ve a
room at the hotel. Just that I fell sick here the other
night. Maybe you could help me back to the hotel.”
“I know a better place,” Jake said, thinking Doc
Willis wouldn’t mind a guest now that he’d passed on
to the great beyond and that big house was just sitting
empty, complete with a cabinet full of medicines, a
big bed, and all the conveniences.
“I’m willing to pay my way, whatever it takes,”
William Sunday said.
“Can you stand?”
“With some help, I reckon so.”
Jake watched as Sunday threw back the blanket,
and saw he’d been correct: there was a pistol clutched
in one of his hands, a small silver pistol with pearl
grips, deadly as a viper.
Once settled inside Doc Willis’ house, Jake said to
William Sunday, “It is probably best that as few peo-
ple as possible knows who you are, but surely there
will be those who will ask and wonder why you’re be-
ing put up here at Doc’s.”
“It doesn’t matter to me if folks know who I am,”
Sunday said. “Not at this stage of the game. Anybody
who has it in them to take me on will do so, and those
who don’t won’t come bothering me.”
His eyes were sleepy from the laudanum Jake had
administered, his voice thick and slurred.
“I thought you might prefer a private death.”
Sunday looked at his benefactor.
“You have a relationship with my daughter?”
“No. Just a man trying to do her a favor.”
“This your place?”
“Used to belong to the town physician; he passed
away not long ago. It’s for sale, but so far nobody has
come up with the money to buy it. I used to help Doc
out, and until the new physician shows up, I’ve been
granted use of the place.”
Sunday looked around.
“Nice house,” he said, noting the flocked wallpa-
per, the fireplaces, the Belgium carpets, the stain large
as a dinner plate that looked like old blood there near
the edge of one of those nice Belgium carpets.
Jake showed him where the bedroom was, said,
“There’s a honey pot under the bed, might save you a
trip to the privy out back if you’re not up to it.”
“Christ,” Sunday said disgustedly. “Look what
I’ve become.”
“We all get there sooner or later.”
“I’m not yet forty-five.”
“You need anything else before I go?”
“Clara’s a good woman. She just married the
wrong man.”
Jake wondered what the point of Sunday telling
him this was.
“I’ll bring you in an armload of wood for the fire-
place before I go. I can also check around town and
see if I can find someone to nurse you if you like.”
“No nurse, not yet.” Sunday slumped on the bed.
Jake went out back and got the wood and brought it
in and got a fire started.
“Clara said she’d be around soon as school was
over,” he said to the gunfighter. Sunday waved a
hand, then closed his eyes.
Jake closed the door behind him, then went to the
Fat Duck Café for his dinner knowing he had yet an-
other hour or so before Clara let school out. He
thought maybe he should check further on William
Sunday, see who if anyone might come looking for
him. It didn’t fail to register that William Sunday
wasn’t the only man in town others might come look-
ing for.
Crossing the street, he saw a stranger riding a roan
horse just as he reached the café. He paused long
enough to observe the rider: long cinnamon hair
spilling out from under a pinched sugarloaf hat,
dressed in a nice wool suit. A man who looked like
the sun wouldn’t set without his approving it. A man
he figured it was best to keep an eye on.
Hell, it would be just his luck the town would start
filling up with strangers.
Toussaint sensed rather than knew by evidence that
something was wrong at Karen’s. Generally she knew
well ahead of someone’s arrival they were coming and
would be there at the door. He halted the mule a
dozen yards from the house. Something cold went
through his limbs. His first instinct was to call to her,
to hello the house.
The sun had dipped to the horizon, seemed to
teeter there, a reddish yellow ball quivering, with
banks of smoke gray clouds gathering. The shadow of
the house stretched out darkly across the grasslan
ds.
He noticed then the busted window. He backed the
mule up, walked it in a wide circle around the house.
Nothing else looked amiss except Karen’s little bay
and Dex’s gelding weren’t in the corral. Could mean
she was gone, maybe left like she said she was going
to the last time he talked to her. But why the god-
damn window busted?
Toussaint unhooked the shotgun hanging from the
saddle horn by a leather chord. He broke it open to
check the loads—the brass bottoms of a pair of dou-
ble ought buck looked like old money. It was enough
to blow a heavy door off its hinges or a man clean out
of his boots. He snapped shut the breech and curved
his finger around the triggers.
He watched the house, watched the sun till it sank
below the line of earth and grass like some fiery liquid
draining into an unseen glass. His first instinct was to
just go in there and kill anyone who might be in there
bringing harm to Karen. But his logic told him if
there was someone in there and they had harmed her,
a few more minutes of waiting wouldn’t make any
difference. He couldn’t do her any good if he got shot
out of his own boots trying to save her.
One good thing about the Mandan in him, Indians
were good at waiting.
I’m coming to get you, Karen. Maybe you’re al-
ready dead. But if you are, those who did it to you
will soon enough be dead, too. And maybe I’ll be
dead by the time this is over. And maybe if that hap-
pens, I’ll see you in the afterlife and we can start over.
He waited, the shadows of the house began to fade
in the gathering dusk. Out at the edges of the earth,
the light ran gold below the purple.
Hurry on night, he thought. Hurry on so I can go
in there and kill those sons a bitches if they’ve even so
much as looked wrong at her.
25
Toussaint patted the extra shells in his pockets.
The shotgun felt like a length of iron in his hands
as he came up to the house.
There wasn’t any light on inside. If Karen had been
in there she’d have lighted a lamp. She’d have wanted
light to cook by, to read a book, maybe darn holes in
some of her shirts. The house was as dark inside as it
was out.
He came up close to the window off the back and
looked in. Didn’t see anything. He listened and didn’t
hear anything. He moved around front to the door,
turned the knob quietly. It turned easy and the door
fell open and when it did the leather of its hinges