For the Love
of a Woman
A Balum Series Western no.4
A novel by
Orrin Russell
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is completely coincidental.
Copyright © 2018 by Orrin Russell
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever.
Cover design and illustration by
Mike Pritchett
1
In the first hour after he ate them, Balum felt nothing.
He had left Frederick Nelson slumped belly over the saddle, tied hand-to-foot and swearing, and walked into the featureless swath of land stretching out to the rim of the earth where he sat with his back rested against a bur oak. He had opened the small leather pouch, eaten its contents, and sat watching the sun dip below the farthest reaches of the land, all the while wondering if there had been some misunderstanding.
The Shoshone who had presented him with the gift spoke no English, and neither did Balum speak the Indian’s tongue. The medicine man had made fantastic gestures with his hands, bringing them against his temples and expanding them outwards as if to tell Balum what was in the pouch would expand the very consciousness of his mind.
Doubtful, thought Balum. But he was in no hurry, and Nelson’s constant complaining was wearing thin. The Shoshone, robed in a buffalo skin tunic with a face as solemn and deep as though carved from sandstone, was one of a group of starving Indians who had clamored along behind the wagons making up Frederick Nelson’s Oregon Expedition. It was Balum’s kindness that had helped them survive. Whatever the nature of the gift, it was meant in good faith.
With that thought in mind, he had dumped the contents of the leather satchel into his mouth and chewed what tasted like dirt mixed with the sweepings of a cattle yard, and waited. The sun finished its decent and night took up its shift over the earth.
Time passed. Stars glimmered overhead. Balum stood, then sat back down. A wave whipped suddenly over the plains. The ground buckled and the heavens drew closer, shimmering like a lake under moonlight, bobbing gently on currents of starlit galaxies. The corners of the earth curled up and cupped him in its breast. He stood again, stumbled, then laughed. In circles he turned, a lone madman spinning on the darkened Wyoming plains, cackling and screaming, and finally falling to the ground and wallowing in crazed convulsions as he spun in circles and rolled from back to belly. The concept of time took leave. He walked, crawled, sat in a daze of existential laughter, thoroughly enjoying the levity of a weightless mind, until suddenly, like an ax falling over an oak log, it shifted. Memories swept over him; the darkest and most garish, locked away in the hollows of his mind for too long. Memories of La Cárcel de Belén erupted. Dark cells, wet stone, cries of anguish. An odor of mold and mildew. The stench of unwashed prisoners cramped in cages and kept from sunlight.
He reeled, hands clutching his head, and fought for happier memories.
Into reminiscences of women he fled. He fought to remember their names, their faces, the touch of their fingertips upon him and the sweet caresses dolled out in the throes of passion. He remembered Charlise and Cynthia, Consuelo, Suzanne Darrow. Deborah DeLace’s moans of pleasure, and the way Leigha had held him in the night.
The rush of names sped through him, the faces, the bodies, breasts and thighs and lips all converging together, and though it took him from the pain brought by memories of a Mexican jail, it brought with with it a new anguish. The lengthy list of conquests was not recollected with a sense of pride or self-aggrandizement. As the faces drifted through his mushroom-riddled mind, he felt the sorrow and the loneliness and the vacuous pit of emptiness that was his inner self.
He had had women. By the dozen. Yet he yearned for one and one only; a companion, a friend, a lover who understood him and he her. Someone to grow old with, to walk hand in hand through fields of wildflowers; two souls blended into one.
Tears ran down the lines of his face. A face beaten and scarred by the harshness of life, tanned by the sun and the wind, struck by fists, chapped and cut and healed over countless times. He dried them absentmindedly, taking in large breaths that came stuttering out in desperate exhales, as if each one were an admission of guilt.
Under a ceiling of starry skies he stretched his body over the grass and finally, as the effects of the Shoshone’s medicine wore off, as the earth released him from its breast, as the shimmering rocks came back into resoluteness, he was granted sleep.
Throughout the night he dreamt of Angelique.
In the morning he woke and walked toward the rising sun. An hour’s march over the grasslands brought him to the horses standing in the shade of a cottonwood stand. Frederick Nelson’s body rested motionless, draped as it was over the saddle. Balum’s roan gave a snort when it caught wind of him and turned. The movement prodded Nelson from his slumber.
‘Balum, is that you?’ his voice croaked like a dying bullfrog.
‘It’s me,’ said Balum when he reached the roan.
‘Goddamn you, Balum. Where have you been? This isn’t any way to treat a man. Look at me!’ he barked. His face was splotched with red and white patterns laced like spider webbing over the skin. His hair stuck to his forehead, matted in sweat and blown awry by the wind. Snot dripped down his nose. Mucus formed in his throat and was hacked out in thick strands as he cursed his captor.
‘Untie me, would you?’ he begged. ‘I’ve got saddle sores on my ribs for the love of God.’
‘Sounds miserable.’
‘What kind of a lawman are you anyway?’
‘Not much of one,’ said Balum, and pulled the rope end from the knot at Nelson’s wrists.
The big man fell from the horse and collapsed into a pile on the ground. He rolled to his side and spat, rubbing his blood-filled head and taking in great gulps of air.
Balum paid him no mind. He untied a pan from the saddlebags and filled a kettle with water from a canteen. In short time he had a small fire burning. The smoke drifted and dispersed through the cottonwoods above. He fried salt pork in the pan and made coffee which he drank before giving it the chance to cool completely.
From the ground Frederick Nelson watched Balum click his singed tongue.
‘You plan on giving me some of that food?’ he asked.
‘You ate yesterday.’
‘Give me some water.’
‘Maybe later.’
‘Goddamn it, Balum. I’m going to tell Pete Cafferty how I’ve been treated. There’s laws, you know.’
Balum glanced sideways at the man on the ground, uninterested.
‘It’s only a week to Denver,’ said Nelson. ‘You can starve me out, but I’ll last.’
‘You’re right, it’s a week to Denver,’ Balum nodded. ‘Not counting the detour.’
‘What in the hell detour are you talking about?’
‘Figured we’d swing through Cheyenne first. I’ve got some things to attend to. Now let’s get you back in that saddle.’
It took a couple boot kicks to Nelson’s backside, but Balum got the man moving and once again thrown belly-first over the saddle, hands tied to feet and the blood rushing back into his face.
They rode out over the junegrass with the sun watching them from above. Nelson eventually quit his griping, not from lack of outrage, but from lack of strength. Balum wouldn’t have paid him any mind anyway. His thoughts leaned back to the visions of the night before. For a man who enjoyed time to ponder over his thoughts, Balum had days and nights in their entirety. The more he sat wit
h his feelings, the more solidified they became. He rode with his prisoner over long stretches of nothingness, through fields of tall grass and dotted stands of trees, through streams and the occasional river, stopping only to drink from the canteen and lay out at night under the warmth of a blanket.
By the time they reached Charles and Will’s ranch on the outskirts of Cheyenne, Balum’s mind had come into agreement with his heart. A bit of joy rose up in him on the thought of sharing his decision with his old partner.
He pulled up on a small rise a half mile out from the ranch and smiled softly at the progress made over the short time since he had last seen his friends. The house was finished, as was the bunkhouse and stable in back. A corral had been built and in it grazed nearly two dozen well-built horses. The well had a cover built over it, and flowers of all things had been planted around the front door of the house. Scattered farther to the north he could see cattle grazing in great numbers on the free range. Smelted iron had been bent into the letters CW and hung between two poles on either side of the makeshift road leading into the compound. Beneath these letters Balum paused to look at the ironwork. Charles and Will. The CW Ranch.
Out from the shadows of the stable doors, Charles’ figure emerged. The man put a hand to his eye, squinted, then leaned back with his hands on his hips when he recognized Balum’s roan. Had the distance been any shorter, Balum would have seen the smile stretch across the man’s face.
No words were spoken until after Balum had swung down from the saddle and the two had hugged, gripped each other by the shoulders and had a laugh at the mere delight of the unexpected visit.
A look was thrown toward Nelson strung over the saddle.
‘That’s one stinking son of a bitch you’ve got thrown over that saddle, Balum. I take it that’s Nelson? Why’s he stink so bad?’
‘That’s him. It’s slipped my mind a couple times to untie him. He’s taken to relieving himself in the saddle.’
‘Christ Almighty,’ Charles wrinkled his nose and shook his head. ‘I’m guessing he deserves it. Come on inside. Let me get you a plate of grub and you’ll tell me all about it.’
They sat at a table set for two, prepared by a middle aged Mexican woman in a gingham apron. She wore her hair up in a bun and her eyes lingered on Charles when she set the plate before him.
‘Start where you left off,’ said Charles, forking huevos con machaca into his mouth.
Balum thought for a moment on where to pick up the story. Not all that long ago, U.S. Marshal Pete Cafferty had assigned him the task of riding along with a wagon train full of Easterners clear to Oregon. The man leading the expedition was the very man cursing out in the sun over the back of a horse. Cafferty had known something wasn’t right; Nelson having a dodgy reputation, and outfitted with a band of murderers for a crew. In the end, Balum and Joe had loaded a wagon, paid their dues, and set out. They had stopped in at Charles’ ranch on the way west, told Charles and Will of their situation, and ridden on into the unknown.
‘I take it you didn’t make it to Oregon,’ Charles prompted him.
‘Not me. Joe took over as wagonmaster. They’ll make it.’
‘So what happened?’
‘Nelson had a gatling gun stowed in his wagon. They veered off trail, got folks up in a chain of mountain valleys that led into a box canyon. Joe and I saw it, saw where he’d taken the last group of settlers and massacred them. He aimed to do the same this time,’ Balum’s eyes clouded over at the memory. ‘That type of gun can cut down a herd of people in the space of a minute. All hell broke loose. Several folks died, a lot more maimed and injured. Me and Joe, we picked off his crew, ended up taking Nelson alive. I’d just as soon of shot him and left him for the wolves, but Atkisson, the man left in charge, he insisted I take him back to Denver for a trial.’
‘They’ll give him a trial and a hanging,’ said Charles. ‘And you? What’ll you do now? You aim to keep on as Deputy Marshal?’
‘No I do not,’ Balum said emphatically. ‘I’ve been at it for six months, and that’s five months and three weeks more than I ever planned on. We made plenty of money off that drive, Charles. First time I’ve had any money in my life. Near ten thousand dollars sitting for me at the Denver Commercial Bank, and it’s calling me.’
‘Enough to keep you up to your neck in women.’
Balum shook his head. ‘No more chasing women for me.’
‘You ain’t serious.’
‘I am. I aim to settle down.’
‘And just how did this all come about?’ asked Charles.
Between mouthfuls of food, Balum told Charles the story.
‘You mean to say,’ said Charles, ‘that you ate a bunch of mushrooms an Indian gave you, the world turned inside out, and you come out of it set on finding a gal and marrying her?’
‘That about sums it up.’
Charles laughed out loud. ‘Well first off, anybody with their head tapped on solid knows not to go eating nothing no Shoshone medicine man gives you.’
‘I’m glad I did.’
‘You want to end up like Will?’
‘What’s Will up to?’
‘Getting married.’
‘Married?’
‘Found himself a nice young lady. Tessa. He’s plum in love, can’t concentrate long enough to ride a horse without falling off. They’ll be hitched within the month.’
Balum had cleaned his plate. He set his fork down. ‘That’s what I want.’
‘Falling off horses and writing love letters?’
‘Don’t act like you don’t want it too, Charles. You’ve had one eye on that señora this whole time. And she’s looked your way plenty of times. What’s the story there?’
Charles blushed. It turned his face red, and he looked at his plate. ‘Didn’t know it was so obvious,’ he muttered.
‘Like a five legged bull.’
‘Alright, you got me. Her name’s Juanita. I met her at the rodeo over summer. She said she could cook, so…Anyway, that’s that.’
‘That’s good.’
Charles frowned across the table at his old partner. Balum could see the man’s mind turning over. After a while a glimmer struck in his eye.
‘I know why you’re here,’ Charles said. He spread his hands over the table and drummed his fingers.
‘Just came to say hello is all.’
Charles rocked his head back and forth. ‘No, no. That ain’t it. You come for Angelique.’
Balum didn’t respond.
‘Ha!’ clapped Charles. ‘And there’s nothing wrong with that. I was surprised when you left for Denver. The way you two look at each other, why anyone can see it.’
‘It’s complicated.’
‘Everything’s complicated.’
‘She says we’re too wild, the one for the other.’
‘Bullshit.’
‘Maybe.’
‘What do you plan on doing then?’
‘Ride over. Let her know how I feel.’
‘With that stinking son of a bitch riding along with?’
‘Nothing I can do about that.’
Charles pushed his chair back and stood. ‘You’re making a good decision. Guess that wasn’t a bad idea eating those mushrooms. Tell her how you feel, what you want, then drop that bum off in Denver so they can hang him, and come back and settle down. We’ll be neighbors’
‘That easy.’
‘That easy.’
‘You tell Will I send him my regards,’ said Balum on his way out. ‘I’ll be expecting an invitation to the wedding.’
2
Cheyenne rose up out of the earth larger than Balum remembered. His last visit had been but one drunken night of debauchery of which he remembered little apart from being beaten near to death by the Farro brothers. Still, it had only been a matter of a few months since he had first ridden in with Charles and the boys and called Cheyenne a temporary home. In that short time, streets had been laid out, not in any orderly fashion, but following the same
unorganized sprawl of before, only more numerous. Buildings had been slapped together, most of them ramshackle affairs, others built solid and supporting two stories.
From a mile out he could see the railway on the far eastern edge of the city. The station platform had doubled in size and a ticket booth had been built. It was not only cattle shipped from the rail yards anymore, but people, merchandise and money.
The streets were busy. He rode through them, the roan seeming to size up the town with the same measured eye as its rider. Frederick Nelson, hung across the saddle like a bag of cornmeal, drew attention. People stared. When they realized who they were looking at, they shouted.
‘Hey! It’s Balum!’ yelled a drunk from the boardwalk.
Balum smiled. He felt like a hero in this town. Hell, he thought. He was a hero. Ned Witney had pushed this town around and had folks pinned under his thumb until Balum and Charles had their cattle stolen. In a flurry of blood and bullets they had reclaimed what had been stolen from them and freed the town from oppression. It was not something to be forgotten.
‘Who’s the prisoner, Balum?’ asked the townsfolk and children as they encircled the riders. ‘Is he gonna get the Ned Witney treatment?’
‘I’m taking this man to Denver. There’ll be a hanging, you can count on it.’
The drunk who had first shouted did so again. ‘You want a drink and it’s on me.’
‘Much obliged,’ said Balum. He’d reached a mercantile shop a few blocks from Angelique’s place, and swung down from the roan. The townsfolk were good people, but not without prying eyes. ‘If you folks would like to do me a favor, keep an eye on this stinking mess right here. He’s tied up tighter than a suckling pig, but it doesn’t hurt to be careful. I’ll be back shortly.’
He left the two horses at the posts outside the mercantile and snuck away from the crowd and down the back alleys. Down narrow streets, dust covered and walled by wood slatted store fronts. Past a dog with a sore eye, the puss-filled orb following him in disinterest.
For the Love of a Woman Page 1