“I did hear of ’em coming through here some time back.”
“Who?” Jonah asked, taking a step forward that caused the old man to snap the rifle up.
“Keep your ground, traitor!”
“I—ain’t—no—traitor,” he growled each word as menacingly as he could. “Tell me who come through here?”
“They was like a army,” the hired hand volunteered.
“Shuddup!” Hosking shouted at his man, his eyes flicking into the hills again.
The old man’s furtive look now meant something to Hook. He recognized it for what it was. “You’re afraid they’ll come back—whoever it was. Ain’t you, Hosking?”
“We got no way of knowing, Hook. Now—for your own sake and your cousin’s hide—just turn around and get!”
“I ain’t leaving till I got me some answers.”
He wagged the muzzle menacingly. “You’re gonna get—and you ain’t never coming back.”
“C’mon, Jonah,” Artus pleaded, pulling, yanking. “We go on and find someplace else … somebody else what can tell us.”
Over Moser’s shoulder, Hook called to the hired man who had let too much slip from his tongue. “What army was they? Reb, or Yankee? How many, goddammit! Where was they headed?”
Hosking raised the muzzle of his rifle and fired it into the air, shocking both unwelcome visitors.
“C’mon, Jonah! Now!”
“You best listen to your cousin, boy,” Hosking’s voice followed them doggedly down the lane. “Get your ass outta here—and forget you ever had that family of your’n. Just g’won and count ’em gone ’cause your people is good as dead!”
Sometimes Jonah Hook could downright scare a man.
Even his own cousin.
Artus Moser shook his head over the smoky fire where they were roasting five squirrels. Thinking maybe he really didn’t remember all that much about Jonah, like he thought he did. What with the way he had acted down at Hosking’s place yesterday, it had given Artus the willies.
Like what Hook had done out west fighting Injuns or maybe even something that Moser couldn’t begin to figure out—something had gone and made Jonah different from the man who left this valley with General Price back in sixty-two. Jonah sat on the far side of their little fire cleaning and recleaning those guns of his.
“Yankees let you keep your pistol?”
Hook looked up, squinting through the smoke as a gust of breeze snuffled it toward him. “You carried yours home, didn’t you, Artus?” He pointed his cleaning rod at Moser’s hip.
“Yeah,” Artus answered, still uneasy and unable to know why. “But that don’t explain the rifle. Yankees don’t give away rifles, Jonah. Been meaning to ask—”
“No, the goddamned Yankees didn’t go and give me this rifle. I brung it here all the way from Virginia,” he replied quietly, shutting his cousin off.
“Lord, how come them raiders didn’t—”
“Gritta kept it hid for me. Under the stones of the hearth. I put in a special place there for hiding things when I built the fireplace.”
“Thank God you got your hands on it, Jonah.”
“Thank me for putting that hiding place there.” He wagged his head, dragging the cleaning rod and oil-soaked rag up and down the full length of the barrel. “Maybe if she’d had the rifle out to use—wouldn’t she and the kids be gone to who knows where now.”
“Then again, Jonah—Gritta might be dead.”
Artus watched that jerk Jonah’s head up, a hateful, glaring look smeared across his thin, wolfish face. About to leap across the fire at Moser, if not say something stinging. But in a moment he went back to wiping the oilcloth around the percussion nipple and hammer on the rifle’s action.
“I thought of that myself,” Hook finally admitted. “She used this gun when those riders come through, chances are her bones be laying down in my yard where I come across what was left of old Seth.”
“Least you got family to find. They ain’t dead like mine.”
“I know they ain’t dead. In my gut—I know all four of ’em is still alive. Somewhere. For sake of us both right now, you remember your daddy and mama was my family too, Artus. I grieve ’em bad as you.”
“Didn’t mean no offense, Jonah. Just that—if it weren’t for you—don’t know what kin I’d have.”
“We’re riding the same horse, cousin. We both got to shuffle back to the Shenandoah down under Big Cobbler Mountain if we’re to look up any kinfolk of ours now. That”—Jonah nodded into the growing darkness of the hardwood forest thick around them—“or out yonder.”
“Lord, how I’d like to believe strong as you that we’ll find Gritta and the young’uns.”
He looked hard at Artus across the smoke made a sickly orange color as it rose from the coals. “I gotta count on finding ’em. Every last one of ’em. I’ll keep looking till I do. If I didn’t believe I could do it—I’d curl up and die inside and couldn’t go on.”
With his belt knife, Hook picked a string of meat from one of the squirrel haunches. “I’ll find every last one of my family—and them that took ’em—if it takes the rest of my life.”
Moser rolled himself in his blankets that night after eating. Hook turned away and settled into his bedroll without having said a word while they ate. Both knew morning would come soon enough. And the silence between them was all right.
The gray of dawn nudged both awake, scraping tongues around the insides of their mouths. Without saying it both men realized they shared a deep desire for the heady taste of a cup of coffee. The two men pulled at scraps of meat on the squirrel carcasses and sucked at the bones to satisfy the gnawing they likewise shared in their bellies.
“I hope we don’t have to go all the way to Neosho,” Artus said as they started north and east down the rutted road toward Cassville.
“You counting on us not getting any help in town?”
Moser said, “No. We got to get you some other clothes.”
“Goddammit—folks round here oughtta know me for what I am—not for wearing this Yankee uniform.”
“I wanna shet myself of this raggedy old uniform myself.”
“Then we gotta do it in Cassville.”
“They know you there.”
“That’s what I’m counting on. That, and sneaking into see Boatwright without being seen.”
“What you wanna see him for?” Moser asked, his suspicions pricked.
“He’s sheriff, ain’t he?” Hook waited a moment. “He’ll know about who come through here in the last few months—any bunch looking suspicious and up to no good.”
But when they found Boatwright, he was no longer sheriff.
They had slipped into the small town, hugging the treeline until they got to the man’s house, tried the back door, and found it unlocked. Figuring to let themselves in and wait until Boatwright came home, they instead walked into the kitchen and found the old peace officer sitting in a chair, pointing a double-barrel scattergun at the intruders.
“Sounds like there’s two of you bastards,” Boatwright said, his milky eyes blinking in the gloom of midmorning. “That’s why lil’ Ethel here has two barrels: blow the balls off both of you.”
“Eldon? That’s you, ain’t it?” Moser asked.
The man’s face twitched a little, as if placing the voice there in the dark of the hallway separating the two rooms of the small house. “I know you?”
“Artus Moser.”
“Who’s with you?”
“Jonah Hook.”
“Jonah?”
“It’s me, Eldon.”
“C’mere and give this old man a hug.”
“You ain’t gonna shoot us?”
“I hear better’n I ever have these days,” Boatwright said. “Don’t see so good no more.”
“Jesus God!” Moser exclaimed as he moved closer to the old man in the chair. “What happened—”
“Let’s say I got burned.”
“Your eyes, Eldon,” Hook
whispered.
“Sit. You boys come and sit,” he said, easing the scattergun off his lap and motioning for them to go into the far room. “No thankee,” he replied to the nudge of help from Hook at his arm. “I know where everything is.”
“Then—you’re blind,” Moser whispered.
“As a cave bat.”
“Fire, you said?” Hook asked.
“Freebooters.”
Both of them rocked forward from the bench where they had plopped.
“Freebooters? How long ago?”
“Not long. A few months. End of summer as I can remember. Hot as hell.”
“Why’d the bastards do this to you?”
Boatwright chuckled. “You don’t see no star on my shirt no more, do you, boys?”
“What’s that got to do—”
“They took it.” Boatwright sank back into his chair. “Don’t matter none. I don’t really need it now after all. Just me in this house, waiting for someone to come bring me something to eat, help me out. Jesus Lord! But you boys both been gone a long time—”
“Tell us about the freebooters and what they done to your eyes,” Hook said impatiently.
Boatwright turned toward the sound of the voice. After some thought he began, his scarred, whitish eyes seeping the moisture that no longer stung his fire-battered flesh.
“They had me tied down, not far north of your place, Artus. I had been down to call on your daddy and was heading out of the valley by way of Jonah’s place. That’s when I spotted a bunch of horsemen on the Hook farm. Sat there awhile, watching them gut your place for what you had, Jonah—and then I figured I’d better get back to town and get me some help. But I never made it into the saddle again. That bunch must’ve had guards on their backtrail, ’cause they came out of the woods on me.”
“How many of them was there altogether?”
“More’n thirty I’d say—by what I could see moving around on your place. I don’t figure I ever saw ’em all.”
“Why’d they tie you down?” Moser asked.
“Hold me down is more like it—’cause when their leader come up from behind where I was staked out, all I heard was his voice. Never saw his face. But he told the others I’d have to die ’cause I could identify ’em. I told him I wouldn’t dare—just let ’em get on out of the territory.”
“And what then?”
“He laughed some at me. Said that if I didn’t want to die—he’d make it so I would beg him to kill me soon enough. But … I didn’t ever beg, boys.”
“He burned your eyes?”
“With a hot poker.”
Something inside Artus curled up in a tight ball and would not loosen.
“We need clothes, Sheriff,” Hook asked.
“Told you, I ain’t sheriff no more.”
“You always will be to us. You stake us a couple sets of clothes?”
“Ain’t got much, but what there is—you’re welcome to it. You going after them?”
“They got my family, Boatwright.”
“Too many of ’em, Jonah.”
“How many guns you got in the house, Sheriff?”
It was as if by some unseen power, Boatwright’s smoky eyes behind the scarred lids and cheeks were staring right into Moser’s tall, skinny cousin for the longest time.
“Back there, behind that sideboard. You’ll find what you boys need. Just leave me the pistol and this here old bird gun. I do fine by them.”
“I’ll pay you back,” Jonah said, pulling the old sideboard away from the wall. “Don’t know how or when—but I’ll pay you back for everything you done to help me get my family back.”
16
Early February-Late April, 1866
JONAH HOOK KNOCKED the damp earth from his hands, then finished brushing them off on the worn clothing Boatwright had given the two former Confederate soldiers as a homecoming gift. They had both hurried back to the valley south out of Cassville.
The work in the dark Missouri loam had been more than Jonah had thought it would be when first he decided to dig in that spot back of the cabin. After finding a small bit of lamp oil left in the cabin, Jonah and Artus burned their old clothing out at the edge of the fields now gone to weed. Jonah didn’t stand there long, watching the oily smoke rise into the cold winter afternoon air.
“We got work to do, Artus,” he had directed.
And work they had.
Four holes, a good six feet long and some two feet wide. Another six feet deep. All lined in a row behind the cabin he had built for Gritta and Hattie, and the two boys yet to come when first they settled in this narrow valley. Now something had made him return to the homestead for this final ceremony. His digging of the four graves was some dark journey into the deepest recesses of his rage, and the despair he suffered at ever finding them again.
The cousins had spelled one another at that single spade, cursing the hard ground wrought of winter, thankful for the recent cold rains that had soaked some softness into the unforgiving flintlike, and frozen soil. Now they rested, gasping over the fourth and final hole.
“You understand, don’t you, Artus?”
Moser swiped a streak of dirt across his cheek, smearing sweat off with his dirty hand. “No. I don’t.”
“You got two graves up there to your place. That’s your family buried there.”
“But, Jonah—you don’t know what’s happened to your family.”
“That’s why I’m leaving the graves open.” He dropped the spade beside the last hole and turned away toward the cabin. “Maybe it’s like old man Hosking said it—they’re good as dead. Until I find ’em. And find who dragged ’em off.”
“Jonah!”
Hook turned, finding Moser pulling his misshaped hat from his head.
“Man never walks away from a grave without saying a few words.”
“What you mean?”
Moser waved a hand helplessly, searching for the words. “This is some like a funeral to you, ain’t it?”
He thought a minute. “I suppose it is.”
“We ought to say some special church words over these holes afore we leave.”
Hook came back, then dragged the floppy slouch hat from his long hair. “You’re right.”
Jonah stood there a few moments, sorting through a lot of thoughts. Mostly struggling to swallow down the rage and despair so that he could speak some of those few church words he could remember now without making them come out like he was flinging his anger up at God and the heavens.
“I really ain’t any good at this, Artus,” he whispered as if some-one or some-thing near might overhear.
“We gotta say something.”
“All right,” Hook sighed. “This is tough, Lord. The worst it’s ever been inside of me. Feel damned near gutted—I’m sorry for swearing. Do too much of that, I know. I’m not always what you want of me, I suppose. Never been much of one to get down on my prayer bones and taffy up to you, God. Hell, you know what’s in my heart better’n anyone. No sense me telling you what you already know’s inside me. All that’s left inside me now.”
Jonah knelt and picked up some of the fresh spoil beside the last grave. “This is for little Zeke. Born and baptized as Ezekiel before you, Lord.” Jonah tossed the moist clods into the dark hole.
Moving to the next hole, he spilled some loose soil through his fingers. “This is for Jeremiah. Until my boy and me can fill this damned hole up together.”
“You ain’t supposed to swear when you’re talking to the Lord, Jonah.”
“I’m sure He’s heard me swear enough that he thinks nothing of it now, Artus.” Hook stopped by the third grave. “And dear little Hattie—until you and your daddy can plant some wildflowers here on this spot.”
He felt it welling and didn’t know how to make it stop as he stepped to the final hole. And stared down into its emptiness, much like his own center, except for the anger and the despair—nothing else there but black emptiness.
It shook him a moment, ri
ght down to those old boots Boatwright had given him.
“Sometimes I curse myself, dear woman,” he began, quietly. “Ever bringing you out here from our home at the foot of Big Cobbler. Curse myself for wanting to make a home that would be ours—not your family’s or mine. Something that could be ours alone.”
As he began to sob, some of the tears fell on the back of his dirty hands he held clasped in front of him, trembling as they crimped a hold on that slouch hat.
“This never would happen back in the Shenandoah. Out here—in this land where there’s no law to speak of, where the guilty can ride in here and murder and steal, then run and hide in the Nations—” He stopped of a sudden, feeling out of control as he let the words spill.
“Pray that I find you, Gritta. Wherever they’ve taken you and the children. For the sake of them. For the sake of what we could be again—pray that I find you.”
He turned away suddenly, unable to go on, the last words choked with bile. Angrily he wheeled and kicked dirt into the last grave, then spun again and set off toward the cabin.
It was long after they had started out, on foot, south toward Fort Smith, that Jonah finally felt like he could talk again. The sky had cleared the last two days, and winter’s cold had gripped the land with an unrelenting hold. Their breath formed frosty streamers behind them as they moved along at a brisk pace, not only to cover ground, but to keep warm as well.
“Someone’s gonna have to prove to me they’re dead. You put your daddy in the ground—so you know he’s dead. Me—I ain’t got none of that. Not for the children. Not for Gritta.”
“Don’t have to explain it to me, Jonah. Just tell me why we’re headed south. I figured we’d be heading west, into Kansas where them Yankee jayhawkers always came from before.”
“No, not this time,” he shivered with the cold. “We’re going someplace else.”
“The Nations?”
Jonah stopped, dragging Moser to a halt. “How’d you know?”
Artus shrugged. “You said it there at the graves—about the Nations.”
Then Jonah remembered. “Yeah. I gotta watch that—getting angry and spilling things like that. Always done it.”
“Why there?”
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