A Captive in Time

by Sarah Dreher

  She wanted to ask what the woman wanted it for, but everyone was being so close-mouthed it looked like one of those the-less-you-know-the-better-off-you-are situations. “No problem. Is something wrong?”

  “They won’t rent to me,” the woman said. “They won’t do business with a person of my race.”

  “You know,” Stoner said in frustration, “people out here have a real attitude problem. They don’t like other races, they don’t like certain professions, they don’t like orphans and out-of-wedlock children, they don’t much like women...”

  May looked up at her. “Is it different where you come from?”

  “Well, not really,” Stoner admitted. “But at least it isn’t so overt.” Or wasn’t, until the past few years when Mr. Reagan rolled us back forty years by looking the other way when hate crimes happened, by setting the classes and the races and the sexes and the sexual preferences against one another. By making bigotry fashionable once again.

  Dot turned back to the woman. “Tell Lu Kwan I’ll stop over one of these days soon. We haven’t had a good chat in ages.”

  Dismissed, Stoner hurried back to find Billy.

  “Think you might tell me what’s up?”

  Arms held straight out in front of her, Billy took careful aim at the tin can on the fence post. “Nothing.” She fired the pistol and missed the target. The report was numbing.

  “Don’t give me that,” Stoner said when she could hear again. “That man freaked you out. Scared you.”

  “Did not,” Billy snapped, and fired again. The tin can stood untouched. She pulled the trigger frantically, again, again, again.

  Stoner grabbed her arm. “Stop that and talk to me.”

  Billy pulled away and dug a handful of bullets from her pocket. “It’s nothing,” she said as she rammed the bullets into the chamber.

  “Billy.”

  She fired six times in rapid succession. The air reeked of gunpowder. The tin can was unmoved. “Damn it!” Billy said in a frightened voice.

  “Come on, tell me what’s wrong.”

  Billy dug in her pocket for more bullets. “I know him. Never met him. Seen him around.”

  Stoner waited.

  “He’s a bounty hunter from back home.”

  Fear gripped her coldly. “Do you think he’s…”

  “Hell, yes, I think he’s...” She looked at Stoner. The hand holding the gun slumped to her side. “What am I going to do?” Her voice was small.

  Stoner felt helpless. “I don’t think he recognized you.”

  “He will.”

  “How do you think he found you?” Stoner asked, stalling for time to think.

  Billy’s hands were trembling. Stoner took the gun and put it in its holster and wrapped her own hands around Billy’s.

  “If I knew that,” Billy said shakily, “I’d have stayed one jump ahead of him.” Her eyes got wet and glistening with tears. “Do you think my Ma sent him after me?”

  “Maybe,” Stoner said gently. “Or maybe your father isn’t dead after all.”

  “I can’t go back there, Stoner.”

  “I know. You don’t have to.”

  “I’d rather die.”

  “We’ll think of something,” Stoner said, trying to sound more positive than she felt. “There are other things you can do.”

  “I didn’t tell you all of it,” Billy said desperately. “He did stuff to me…”

  Stoner shook her lightly. “I told you you wouldn’t have to go back, and you don’t.”

  “...bad stuff, stuff I don’t like to talk about.”

  “You don’t have to tell me,” Stoner said, and took her in her arms protectively, not caring who saw or what they thought. “I know what you’re talking about.” She held her for a moment. “Look,” she said at last, “I’ll go inside and find out what he really knows, before we get ourselves in a state.” She kissed the top of Billy’s head. “Okay?”

  Billy nodded.

  “You can keep on practicing, but for Heaven’s sake, calm down. You’re wasting bullets.”

  ≈ ≈ ≈

  She was the most beautiful woman Cullum Johnson had ever seen. As beautiful as the red-haired gal, but with the added ripeness and dignity of maturity. He took his glass and went and sat at a table where he could sip his drink and look at her and try to catch his breath.

  She finished drying glasses and poured herself a shot of bourbon and came to his table. “Well, sir,” she said as she sat down, “What brings you to Tabor?”

  He was blushing like a school kid. He hoped his skin was weathered enough so she wouldn’t notice. “Business,” he said gruffly.

  “What kind of business are you in, Mr....Mr.?”

  “Johnson. Cullum Johnson.” He took off his hat and placed it carefully on the table and combed his hands through his hair.

  She held out her hand. “Dorothy Gillette. Most folks call me Dot.”

  His big, rough hand swallowed hers. “Pleased to make your acquaintance, Mrs. Gillette.”

  He waited for her to correct him, to say “Miss Gillette”. She didn’t. His heart cracked a little. “This your husband’s place?” Might as well try and take the measure of the man before he went any farther.

  She threw her head back and laughed. Sweetest sound he’d ever heard. Sweeter, even, than that traveling opera singer he’d heard some years back.

  “No sir,” she said. “My no-good husband would have run this place into the dust inside of two months.” She shook her head. “There’s no way I’d let that useless individual get his hands on what’s mine and mine alone.”

  Hope made his heart pound. “Separated?” He realized what he’d said, and blushed again. “I don’t mean to pry.”

  “As good as,” Dot said. “Haven’t seen the old coot in...” She sipped her drink. “...must be five, six years now. Last I heard he was drinking himself to death somewhere over in the Texas panhandle.” She took another sip. “Unless the Indians or Mexicans got him.”

  Cullum thought this must be one of the best days of his life. “Some folks don’t know when they’re well off,” he said philosophically.

  “That’s the Heaven-sent truth. Are you planning on staying with us long, Mr. Johnson?”

  “Depends. What kind of accommodations do you have in this town?”

  “You’re looking at it,” Dot said.

  He raised one eyebrow. “No hotel?”

  “No need for one since the railroad bypassed us. Tabor isn’t exactly the hub of civilization.”

  Cullum cleared his throat, feeling suddenly shy. “Well.” He cleared his throat again. “Don’t suppose you could put me up?”

  “You can stay in the spare room for tonight,” Dot said. “But we’re full up for tomorrow.”

  “That’s all right,” Cullum said. “By tomorrow night, I’ll either have my business done, or I’ll be moving on.”

  He glanced up as Stoner came in through the door under the stairs. “Now, there’s something you don’t see every day,” he said. “Woman in pants. Funny kinda shirt, too.”

  Dot looked over at her. “She says that’s called a ‘sweat shirt’. Isn’t that the darnedest name you ever heard?”

  Cullum grimaced. “Foreigner?”

  “Far as I can tell.”

  “You know where from?”

  “Well, she claims Boston,” Dot said, and shook her head. “I don’t know. Could be anywhere.”

  He took a swallow of his drink. “England, I’d bet. They got terrible words for things over there.”

  Dot smiled at him. “You seem to be a man of the world, Mr. Johnson.”

  Hearing his name said that way, by this absolute grand champion of a woman, almost made him wet his pants. “Oh,” he mumbled, “I guess I been around.”

  “You never did say what your line of work is.”

  For the first time in a long time, he was almost ashamed to say it. “I reckon you could say I’m in the lost and found business.”

  The w
oman’s eyes went flat a little, as if she didn’t entirely approve. “Well, now,” she said at last, looking at him hard, “I’ve always wondered what makes a man take up that means of making a living.”

  He searched his mind to try to come up with the truth. He wanted to tell this woman the truth. “Always been kind of restless. Don’t like crowds, though, so that let out cowboyin’ and leadin’ wagon trains. Gave some thought to looking for gold, but never been real lucky. And I’m good with a gun, and handy at tracking.”

  “Who are you tracking now?”

  He rubbed his hand over his chin and wished he’d stopped for a shave before coming in here. “Young gal from back home. Gave her Pa a good knock over the head and lit out. Thought he was dead, I reckon. But he ain’t dead, just mad as hell.”

  Dot frowned. “Doesn’t seem right. She probably had good reason.”

  “Probably did.” He was beginning to feel depressed.

  “What do you figure he’ll do to her if you find her?”

  He hung his head. “Nothin’ good, no doubt.”

  “No doubt,” Dot said disapprovingly.

  “Don’t suppose you’ve seen her around.”

  “Nope, but I wouldn’t tell you if I had,” Dot said. “It’s a reprehensible thing you’re doing, Mr. Johnson.”

  He wondered if he should shoot himself now, or wait until sundown. “Well, I didn’t really think about it that way.”

  Dot snorted. “That’s a man for you. What were you thinking about?”

  What the hell? She couldn’t think any worse of him than she already did. “I was broke,” he said, “and couldn’t come up with any other reason for living.”

  “Just because you were broke?”

  “Broke and a fool. Let myself get romantic over a young gal. Even asked her to marry me.” He laughed harshly. “An old buzzard like me.”

  Dot poured him another drink. “That’s how it is with young ones, Cull. Break your heart every time.”

  She gave his arm a sympathetic little pat and made the sun come out all over again.

  They sat for a moment in silence. The foreign gal was making herself busy washing clean glasses.

  “Stoner!” Dot called. “Leave that stuff alone.”

  She looked up. “Huh?”

  “If you want to be useful, try doing something that isn’t already done.”

  The gal gazed around. “What?”

  “Did you pick up the fancy linen from Kwan’s like I asked you?”

  “It’s in the wagon.”

  “Then give Cherry a hand in the kitchen.”

  “I don’t cook very well.”

  “Well, God Almighty,” Dot said. “You can take orders, can’t you?” She made a shooing gesture.

  The foreign gal sidled out of the room.

  “Stoner?” Johnson said. “That’s a different kind of name.”

  Dot rolled her eyes. “Want to hear something really different?”

  He nodded.

  “She claims she was named after someone that died before she was born.”

  “Nothing strange about that.”

  “Nothing except this person who died before she was born is coming here tomorrow.”

  He frowned and tried to think that one through, but it didn’t make any sense. “Know what I think, Mrs. Gillette?”

  “I told you,” she said in a flirty kind of way, “call me Dot.”

  “Dot.” The word was like warm muffins and strawberry jam on his tongue. “What I think, Dot, is the world’s turning much too peculiar, much too fast.”

  “Amen to that, Cull” Dot said, and poured them each another drink.

  ≈ ≈ ≈

  “You were right,” she said to Billy.

  Billy sank onto a wooden crate and let her hands dangle between her knees. “Shit.”

  “But you didn’t kill your father.”

  “Double shit.”

  Stoner sat down beside her. “I think Dot’s trying to talk him out of chasing you.”

  The woman looked up. “Dot knows? About me?”

  “I don’t think so. She disapproves on general principles.”

  Billy took off her hat and turned it around and around in her hands. The sun was going down, spreading liquid pewter across the prairie. A chicken set up a ruckus somewhere down the alley. That set the livery stable dog to barking. Billy looked up. “I guess I’d better hit the trail.”

  “Where would you go? You don’t have any money, do you?”

  Billy shook her head.

  “You don’t even have a horse.”

  “I can steal a horse.”

  “No,” Stoner said. “You can’t just go on piling one crime on top of another. You have to stop sometime.”

  Billy gave a sharp, humorless laugh. “I almost believed it,” she said. “For a few minutes back there I thought I could start making plans. God, Stoner, I don’t want to spend the rest of my life running.”

  Chapter Ten

  The cowboys began to drift in late Friday afternoon. By seven pm word had spread that the upstairs of the Dot’s Gulch was closed to business, and things started to turn mean. By eight pm they had frightened the Reinhardt’s cow so badly her milk went thin and she’d have to be freshened. Which led Gus Reinhardt to remark that he thought old Daisy Belle had just been looking for an excuse to get herself in the pasture with the Svensens’ bull all along. They tried to set fire to the livery stable, and shot out the upper panes of Doc Kreuger’s office windows, scaring the old man so bad he swore off the bottle for the next twelve hours.

  Dot took it pretty much in stride. She’d seen plenty of mean, disappointed cowboys in her life. As long as they did their helling outside in the street, she figured it was none of her affair. She broke up a couple of fights inside the saloon, and just as it seemed things were getting out of hand, Cull showed up and appointed himself bouncer for the evening. Lolly and Cherry flirted and teased and picked up a few dollars from boys who thought they still might have a chance if they tipped big enough for their drinks.

  At one point Cherry excused herself and went upstairs with a black cowboy from Alabama who’d served in the Union army—just for the unique experience of having a toss with a gentleman of her own race—and returned shortly to whisper to Lolly that black boys did seem more skillful than white boys but not by much.

  Someone started the rumor that Cullum Johnson wasn’t just Big Dot’s bouncer, but actually the town sheriff—so tough and ornery he didn’t have to wear a badge, his presence alone could quiet a mob. That put a considerable damper on things, and Dot congratulated herself for having the foresight to start that particular bit of gossip.

  Around nine, Lolly, coming behind the bar to fetch a broom to clean up broken glass, remarked to Dot that “if those suffergits are as rowdy as these cowboys, we won’t make it through the weekend.”

  “Suffragists, not suffergits,” Dot barked, her patience beginning to wear thin. “And I want you to treat those ladies with respect.”

  “Ladies,” Lolly moaned, and plunged back into the fray.

  ≈ ≈ ≈

  He’d expected to hear from the Beast before this. He’d thrown down the challenge. Surely...

  Suppose they hadn’t found the knife.

  He crossed his arms over his chest and stared into the twilight sky.

  A few wispy clouds hovered near the horizon. A flock of geese arrowed high overhead, their honking like the distant barking of dogs.

  What if he’d hidden it too well? In the excitement of the moment, he might have buried it too deep.

  The Sanctified Man chewed his lip.

  Careless. That’s what he’d been, careless. Just like his Pa always said. Careless and good-for-nothing.

  But Pa was one of Them. One of the Satan-people. Like the Stranger that followed the Beast. Not so powerful, maybe, but he’d had the ability to transform.

  What if the Beast called them back, all the ones who’d been destroyed? What if the Beast could rais
e his Pa from the dead?

  His hands were trembling. Trembling like quick sand.

  The knife would protect him. The Sacred Symbols would sap the Devil’s powers right through Its skin. They’d think they had found his own weapon. They’d pass it back and forth, gloating. They wouldn’t know the thing They passed between Them was the instrument of Their own destruction.

  But if they hadn’t found it...

  He couldn’t sit here wondering, thinking bad thoughts. He had to know.

  He scurried to the barn, threw a saddle on his horse, and set out for the burned-out farm.

  The night was cold, the stars hard and distant. Not much of a moon. But he knew the way. He’d ridden it a dozen times—to stop by for a pastor-ly chat, to offer comfort when the youngest child took sick and died. And last night.

  He sensed as much as saw the standing chimney. Got down from his horse. He stood for a moment to take his bearings, then crouched close to the ground and put a match to his lantern. Closing the shutter almost to a sliver, he swept the light back and forth among the ashes, then searched the earth close to the fire.

  He found the oil can. But not where he’d thrown it. Someone had been here, all right.

  He dropped down on his hands and knees and searched for foot prints. It didn’t take long to find them, the lantern light casting deep shadows with sharp edges. Two sets. And, most telling of all, one set showed a tread he’d never seen before. Deep triangular indentations scattered across the print’s surface. Nobody he’d ever heard of made boots with that kind of patterned sole. Nobody in this part of the country.

  It didn’t take a genius to figure out whose boots had made those prints.

  The Beast had the knife.

  A smile broke over his face.

  He could do it now. Tonight. All he had to do was lure them into town. The Witches would come, tomorrow, not knowing. With the Beast gone, their power would be nothing. Nothing compared to his.

  Already he could feel how The Power would surge through him from the very ground he stood on. Pulsating. Throbbing. He would be an unstoppable, relentless machine. A machine of Righteousness. Purity. Virtue. Justice. A machine of Vengeance.