True Grit

by Charles Portis

  MR. GOUDY: How did that come about?

  MR. COGBURN: I was trying to serve a warrant on him for selling ardent spirits to the Cherokees. It was not the first one. He come at me with a kingbolt and said, "Rooster, I am going to punch that other eye out." I defended myself.

  MR. GOUDY: He was armed with nothing more than a kingbolt from a wagon tongue?

  MR. COGBURN: I didn't know what else he had. I saw he had that. I have seen men badly tore up with things no bigger than a kingbolt.

  MR. GOUDY: Were you yourself armed?

  MR. COGBURN: Yes sir. I had a hand gun.

  MR. GOUDY: What kind of hand gun?

  MR. COGBURN: A forty-four forty Colt's revolver.

  MR. GOUDY: Is it not true that you walked in upon him in the dead of night with that revolver in your hand and gave him no warning?

  MR. COGBURN: I had pulled it, yes sir.

  MR. GOUDY: Was the weapon loaded and cocked?

  MR. COGBURN: Yes sir.

  MR. GOUDY: Were you holding it behind you or in any way concealing it?

  MR. COGBURN: No sir.

  MR. GOUDY: Are you saying that Dub Wharton advanced into the muzzle of that cocked revolver with nothing more than a small piece of iron in his hand?

  MR. COGBURN: That was the way of it.

  MR. GOUDY: It is passing strange. Now, is it not true that on November second you appeared before Aaron Wharton and his two sons in a similar menacing manner, which is to say, you sprang upon them from cover with that same deadly six-shot revolver in your hand?

  MR. COGBURN: I always try to be ready.

  MR. GOUDY: The gun was pulled and ready in your hand?

  MR. COGBURN: Yes sir.

  MR. GOUDY: Loaded and cocked?

  MR, COGBURN: If it ain't loaded and cocked it will not shoot.

  MR. GOUDY: Just answer my questions if you please.

  MR. COGBURN: That one does not make any sense.

  JUDGE PARKER: Do not bandy words with counsel, Mr. Cogburn.

  MR. COGBURN: Yes sir.

  MR. GOUDY: Mr. Cogburn, I now direct your attention back to that scene on the creek bank. It is near dusk. Mr. Aaron Wharton and his two surviving sons are going about their lawful business, secure on their own property. They are butchering a hog so that they might have a little meat for their table --

  MR. COGBURN: Them was stolen hogs. That farm belongs to the Wharton squaw, Minnie Wharton.

  MR. GOUDY: Your honor, will you instruct this witness to keep silent until he is asked a question?

  JUDGE PARKER: Yes, and I will instruct you to start asking questions so that he may respond with answers.

  MR. GOUDY: I am sorry, your honor. All right. Mr. Wharton and his sons are on the creek bank. Suddenly, out of the brake, spring two men with revolvers at the ready --

  MR. BARLOW: An objection.

  JUDGE PARKER: The objection has merit. Mr. Goudy, I have been extremely indulgent. I am going to permit you to continue this line of questioning but I must insist that the cross-examination take the form of questions and answers instead of dramatic soliloquies. And I will caution you that this had best lead to something substantial and fairly soon.

  MR. GOUDY: Thank you, your honor. If the court will bear with me for a time. My client has expressed fears about the severity of this court but I have reassured him that no man in this noble Republic loves truth and justice and mercy more than Judge Isaac Parker --

  JUDGE PARKER: You are out of order, Mr. Goudy.

  MR. GOUDY: Yes sir. All right. Now. Mr. Cogburn, when you and Marshal Potter sprang from the brush, what was Aaron Wharton's reaction on seeing you?

  MR. COGBURN: He picked up a ax and commenced to cussing us.

  MR. GOUDY: An instinctive reflex against a sudden danger. Was that the nature of the move?

  MR. COGBURN: I don't know what that means.

  MR. GOUDY: You would not have made such a move yourself?

  MR. COGBURN: If it was me and Potter with the drop I would have done what I was told.

  MR. GOUDY: Yes, exactly, you and Potter. We can agree that the Whartons were in peril of their lives. All right. Let us go back to yet an earlier scene, at the Spotted-Gourd home, around the wagon. Who was in charge of that wagon?

  MR. COGBURN: Deputy Marshal Schmidt.

  MR. GOUDY: He did not want you to go to the Wharton place, did he?

  MR. COGBURN: We talked about it some and he agreed Potter and me should go.

  MR. GOUDY: But at first he did not want you to go, did he, knowing there was bad blood between you and the Whartons?

  MR. COGBURN: He must have wanted me to go or he would not have sent me.

  MR. GOUDY: You had to persuade him, did you not?

  MR. COGBURN: I knowed the Whartons and I was afraid somebody would get killed going up against them.

  MR. GOUDY: As it turned out, how many were killed?

  MR. COGBURN: Three. But the Whartons did not get away. It could have been worse.

  MR. GOUDY: Yes, you might have been killed yourself.

  MR. COGBURN: You mistake my meaning. Three murdering thieves might have got loose and gone to kill somebody else. But you are right that I might have been killed myself. It was mighty close at that and it is no light matter to me.

  MR. GOUDY: Nor to me. You are truly one of nature's survivors, Mr. Cogburn, and I do not make light of your gift. I believe you testified that you backed away from Aaron Wharton.

  MR. COGBURN: That is right.

  MR. GOUDY: You were backing away?

  MR. COGBURN: Yes sir. He had that ax raised.

  MR. GOUDY: Which direction were you going?

  MR. COGBURN: I always go backwards when I am backing up.

  MR. GOUDY: I appreciate the humor of that remark. Aaron Wharton was standing by the wash pot when you arrived?

  MR. COGBURN: It was more like squatting. He was stoking up the fire under the pot.

  MR. GOUDY: And where was the ax?

  MR. COGBURN: Right there at his hand.

  MR. GOUDY: Now you say you had a cocked revolver clearly visible in your hand and yet he picked up that ax and advanced upon you, somewhat in the manner of Dub Wharton with that nail or rolled-up paper or whatever it was in his hand?

  MR. COGBURN: Yes sir. Commenced to cussing and laying about with threats.

  MR. GOUDY: And you were backing away? You were moving away from the direction of the wash pot?

  MR. COGBURN: Yes sir.

  MR. GOUDY: How far did you back up before the shooting started?

  MR. COGBURN: About seven or eight steps.

  MR. GOUDY: Meaning Aaron Wharton advanced on you about the same distance, some seven or eight steps?

  MR. COGBURN: Something like that.

  MR. GOUDY: What would that be? About sixteen feet?

  MR. COGBURN: Something like that.

  MR. GOUDY: Will you explain to the jury why his body was found immediately by the wash pot with one arm in the fire, his sleeve and hand smoldering?

  MR. COGBURN: I don't think that is where he was.

  MR. GOUDY: Did you move the body after you had shot him?

  MR. COGBURN: No sir.

  MR. GOUDY: You did not drag his body back to the fire?

  MR. COGBURN: No sir. I don't think that is where he was.

  MR. GOUDY: Two witnesses who arrived on the scene moments after the shooting will testify to the location of the body. You don't remember moving the body?

  MR. COGBURN: If that is where he was I might have moved him. I don't remember it.

  MR. GOUDY: Why did you place the upper part of his body in the fire?

  MR. COGBURN: Well, I didn't do it.

  MR. GOUDY: Then you did not move him and he was not advancing upon you at all. Or you did move him and throw his body in the flames. Which? Make up your mind.

  MR. COGBURN: Them hogs that was rooting around there might have moved him.

  MR. GOUDY: Hogs indeed.

  JUDGE PARKER: Mr. Goudy, darkness is upon
us. Do you think you can finish with this witness in the next few minutes?

  MR. GOUDY: I will need more time, your honor.

  JUDGE PARKER: Very well. You may resume at eight-thirty o'clock tomorrow morning. Mr. Cogburn, you will return to the witness stand at that time. The jury will not talk to others or converse amongst themselves about this case. The defendant is remanded to custody.

  The judge rapped his gavel and I jumped, not looking for that noise. The crowd broke up to leave. I had not been able to get a good look at that Odus Wharton but now I did when he stood up with an officer on each side of him. Even though he had one arm in a sling they kept his wrists cuffed in court. That was how dangerous he was. If there ever was a man with black murder in his countenance it was Odus Wharton. He was a half-breed with eyes that were mean and close-set and that stayed open all the time like snake eyes. It was a face hardened in sin. Creeks are good Indians, they say, but a Creek-white like him or a Creek-Negro is something else again.

  When the officers were taking Wharton out he passed by Rooster Cogburn and said something to him, some ugly insult or threat, you could tell. Rooster just looked at him. The people pushed me on through the door and outside. I waited on the porch.

  Rooster was one of the last ones out. He had a paper in one hand and a sack of tobacco in the other and he was trying to roll a cigarette. His hands were shaking and he was spilling tobacco.

  I approached him and said, "Mr. Rooster Cogburn?"

  He said, "What is it?" His mind was on something else.

  I said, "I would like to talk with you a minute."

  He looked me over. "What is it?" he said.

  I said, "They tell me you are a man with true grit."

  He said, "What do you want, girl? Speak up. It is suppertime."

  I said, "Let me show you how to do that." I took the half-made cigarette and shaped it up and licked it and sealed it and twisted the ends and gave it back to him. It was pretty loose because he had already wrinkled the paper. He lit it and it flamed up and burned about halfway down.

  I said, "Your makings are too dry."

  He studied it and said, "Something."

  I said, "I am looking for the man who shot and killed my father, Frank Ross, in front of the Monarch boardinghouse. The man's name is Tom Chaney. They say he is over in the Indian Territory and I need somebody to go after him."

  He said, "What is your name, girl? Where do you live?"

  "My name is Mattie Ross," I replied. "We are located in Yell County near Dardanelle. My mother is at home looking after my sister Victoria and my brother Little Frank."

  "You had best go home to them," said he. "They will need some help with the churning."

  I said, "The high sheriff and a man in the marshal's office have given me the full particulars. You can get a fugitive warrant for Tom Chaney and go after him. The Government will pay you two dollars for bringing him in plus ten cents a mile for each of you. On top of that I will pay you a fifty-dollar reward."

  "You have looked into this a right smart," said he.

  "Yes, I have," said I. "I mean business."

  He said, "What have you got there in your poke?"

  I opened the sugar sack and showed him.

  "By God!" said he. "A Colt's dragoon! Why, you are no bigger than a corn nubbin! What are you doing with that pistol?"

  I said, "It belonged to my father. I intend to kill Tom Chaney with it if the law fails to do so."

  "Well, that piece will do the job. If you can find a high stump to rest it on while you take aim and shoot."

  "Nobody here knew my father and I am afraid nothing much is going to be done about Chaney except I do it myself. My brother is a child and my mother's people are in Monterey, California. My Grandfather Ross is not able to ride."

  "I don't believe you have fifty dollars."

  "I will have it in a day or two. Have you heard of a robber called Lucky Ned Pepper?"

  "I know him well. I shot him in the lip last August down in the Winding Stair Mountains. He was plenty lucky that day."

  "They think Tom Chaney has tied up with him."

  "I don't believe you have fifty dollars, baby sister, but if you are hungry I will give you supper and we will talk it over and make medicine. How does that suit you?"

  I said it suited me right down to ground. I figured he would live in a house with his family and was not prepared to discover that he had only a small room in the back of a Chinese grocery store on a dark street. He did not have a wife. The Chinaman was called Lee. He had a supper ready of boiled potatoes and stew meat. The three of us ate at a low table with a coal-oil lamp in the middle of it. There was a blanket for a tablecloth. A little bell rang once and Lee went up front through a curtain to wait on a customer.

  Rooster said he had heard about the shooting of my father but did not know the details. I told him. I noticed by the lamplight that his bad left eye was not completely shut. A little crescent of white showed at the bottom and glistened in the light. He ate with a spoon in one hand and a wadded-up piece of white bread in the other, with considerable sopping. What a contrast to the Chinaman with his delicate chopsticks! I had never seen them in use before. Such nimble fingers! When the coffee had boiled Lee got the pot off the stove and started to pour. I put my hand over my cup.

  "I do not drink coffee, thank you."

  Rooster said, "What do you drink?"

  "I am partial to cold buttermilk when I can get it."

  "Well, we don't have none," said he. "Nor lemonade either."

  "Do you have any sweet milk?"

  Lee went up front to his icebox and brought back a jar of milk. The cream had been skimmed from it.

  I said, "This tastes like blue-John to me."

  Rooster took my cup and put it on the floor and a fat brindle cat appeared out of the darkness where the bunks were and came over to lap up the milk. Rooster said, "The General is not so hard to please." The cat's name was General Sterling Price. Lee served some honey cakes for dessert and Rooster spread butter and preserves all over his like a small child. He had a "sweet tooth."

  I offered to clean things up and they took me at my word. The pump and the washstand were outside. The cat followed me out for the scraps. I did the best I could on the enamelware plates with a rag and yellow soap and cold water. When I got back inside Rooster and Lee were playing cards on the table.

  Rooster said, "Let me have my cup." I gave it to him and he poured some whiskey in it from a demijohn. Lee smoked a long pipe.

  I said, "What about my proposition?"

  Rooster said, "I am thinking on it."

  "What is that you are playing?"

  "Seven-up. Do you want a hand?"

  "I don't know how to play it. I know how to play bid whist."

  "We don't play bid whist."

  I said, "It sounds like a mighty easy way to make fifty dollars to me. You would just be doing your job anyway, and getting extra pay besides."

  "Don't crowd me," said he. "I am thinking about expenses."

  I watched them and kept quiet except for blowing my nose now and again. After a time I said, "I don't see how you can play cards and drink whiskey and think about this detective business all at the same time."

  He said, "If I'm going up against Ned Pepper I will need a hundred dollars. I have figured out that much. I will want fifty dollars in advance."

  "You are trying to take advantage of me."

  "I am giving you my children's rate," he said. "It will not be a easy job of work, smoking Ned out. He will be holed up down there in the hills in the Choctaw Nation. There will be expenses."

  "I hope you don't think I am going to keep you in whiskey."

  "I don't have to buy that, I confiscate it. You might try a little touch of it for your cold."

  "No, thank you."

  "This is the real article. It is double-rectified busthead from Madison County, aged in the keg. A little spoonful would do you a power of good."

  "I would not put
a thief in my mouth to steal my brains."

  "Oh, you wouldn't, would you?"

  "No, I wouldn't."

  "Well, a hundred dollars is my price, sis. There it is."

  "For that kind of money I would want a guarantee. I would want to be pretty sure of what I was getting."

  "I have not yet seen the color of your money."

  "I will have the money in a day or two. I will think about your proposition and talk to you again. Now I want to go to the Monarch boardinghouse. You had better walk over there with me."

  "Are you scared of the dark?"

  "I never was scared of the dark."

  "If I had a big horse pistol like yours I would not be scared of any booger-man."

  "I am not scared of the booger-man. I don't know the way over there."

  "You are a lot of trouble. Wait until I finish this hand. You cannot tell what a Chinaman is thinking. That is how they beat you at cards."

  They were betting money on the play and Rooster was not winning. I kept after him but he would only say, "One more hand," and pretty soon I was asleep with my head on the table. Some time later he began to shake me.

  "Wake up," he was saying. "Wake up, baby sister."

  "What is it?" said I.

  He was drunk and he was fooling around with Papa's pistol. He pointed out something on the floor over by the curtain that opened into the store. I looked and it was a big long barn rat. He sat there hunkered on the floor, his tail flat, and he was eating meal that was spilling out of a hole in the sack. I gave a start but Rooster put his tobacco-smelling hand over my mouth and gripped my cheeks and held me down.

  He said, "Be right still." I looked around for Lee and figured he must have gone to bed. Rooster said, "I will try this the new way. Now watch." He leaned forward and spoke at the rat in a low voice, saying, "I have a writ here that says for you to stop eating Chen Lee's corn meal forthwith. It is a rat writ. It is a writ for a rat and this is lawful service of said writ." Then he looked over at me and said, "Has he stopped?" I gave no reply. I have never wasted any time encouraging drunkards or show-offs. He said, "It don't look like to me he has stopped." He was holding Papa's revolver down at his left side and he fired twice without aiming. The noise filled up that little room and made the curtains jump. My ears rang. There was a good deal of smoke.

  Lee sat up in his bunk and said, "Outside is place for shooting."