The Goodnight Trail Page 6

  “Not even your honor? Your soul?”

  She placed her hands on his shoulders. Her tears were dry. She was beyond them. In her green eyes there was a deep sadness, a wild sorrow, that shook him to his boots. With a sigh, reluctantly, she spoke.

  “My mama died in 1844, McCaleb. I’ve had to be a mother to Monte since the day he was born. From the time I was five years old, all I’ve known is drunks, gamblers, and outlaws. Would you leave your five-year-old daughter and newborn son with a whorehouse madam while you went upstairs to enjoy the favors of one of the girls? My daddy did.”

  McCaleb was silent. He knew she was about to reveal something that York Nance had done, some foul deed from her past that had left its scars on her.

  “He tried to make a whore of me, McCaleb, when I was twelve years old. Before God, I’ve never told this to anybody. I’ve been ashamed to. Daddy had gone broke in a poker game. It’s the one thing he’s genuinely good at. He’d lost his watch, his cuff links, even half a box of cigars. None of the other gamblers would stake him; they knew him too well. He would have even gotten on his knees and begged them if it would have helped. All he had left was me; a skinny twelve-year-old with one faded dress, no socks, and not a thread of underwear. So he offered me—promising that I’d go to bed with any man that wanted me—for twenty dollars. One man was an outlaw and killer, the rest, no-account, seedy gamblers; but they were decent men, McCaleb, and they refused his offer. Not only that, they beat him within an inch of his life, booted him out of the saloon and warned him never to come back.”

  “They should have cut him like a bull, gut-shot him, and then strung up what was left,” said McCaleb bitterly.

  “They were going to hang him, but I begged them not to. I wondered, in the years that followed, if I’d made a mistake.”

  McCaleb’s mind’s eye peered back over the years to that frightened child she had spoken of, and he found himself not just disliking York Nance, but hating the man. Suddenly he was sure that Nance had, indeed, promised this girl to a drunken, murdering Indian! That was why they hadn’t been molested and their horses stolen. The Indian was stalking the girl. But why hadn’t he simply taken her while she and Monte had been alone? What was he waiting for? Had the Indians’ presence been a subtle warning to McCaleb and his friends to shy away from Rebecca?

  “Please,” said the girl, “don’t ever tell…what I’ve just told you. You don’t know—nobody could ever know—how much it…it hurt me.”

  “You have my word,” said McCaleb. “Any man in this camp would gut-shoot Nance, and they’d have to do some hard ridin’ to get there ahead of me. But we can’t undo your hurt after all these years; it would solve nothing. We must devote our attention to these Indians. I can promise you one thing: despite what Nance may have promised that Comanche, he won’t have you as long as I’m alive.”

  She hadn’t removed her hands from his shoulders, and she was uncomfortably close. When his eyes met hers, his heart leaped like a sun-fishing bronc. Of all the precarious situations in which he’d found himself, none had been the equal of this! She threw her arms around his neck, kissing him long and hard. When she drew away, her cheeks were rosy, there was a smile on her lips and a twinkle in her green eyes.

  “You said I was brash and unladylike, so I reckon I’ve lived up to your expectations. But I’m not used to kindness from men. Despite being neck deep in ego, and mule-stubborn, you’re a decent man, McCaleb.”

  McCaleb, at a total loss for words, stood there in silence, feeling his neck, ears, and face going red. Suddenly he was aware that Monte was within sight of them, snaking down his first posts. Had he been close enough to witness the girl’s embrace? He would tell Will and Brazos, and none of them would ever believe he hadn’t planned to be alone with Rebecca with just such a result in mind. But Monte seemed not to notice them, loosing his catch rope from the posts and riding back. McCaleb cut his eyes to Rebecca and she flashed him a devilish wink, obviously enjoying his discomfiture. She knew what had spooked him, and it rankled, having her understand him so well.

  The ground—even the stream bed—was flint hard, and Monte, Will, and Brazos had the posts and rails cut long before McCaleb had even the first hole dug. They threw all their efforts into building the fence, and by sundown it was finished, standing six rails high, reaching from one canyon wall to the other. The cedar posts had been “doubled,” standing side by side, creating an enclosure for the rails so they could be easily lowered and just as quickly replaced. While they worked, Rebecca had set up her Dutch oven in their newly established camp. Her sourdough biscuits laced with sorghum molasses was, as Will and Brazos declared, the best supper they’d had since before the war. As McCaleb reached for another biscuit, his eyes met hers and again she winked at him. He quickly averted his eyes, and the others were startled by the girl’s merry laugh. It was the first time he’d heard her laugh. He marveled at the change in her. And in himself…

  CHAPTER 5

  The day after the fence was completed, before they could begin their cow hunt, a violent storm blew in from the west. Lightning—yellow, orange, and then blue-green—blazed jagged trails across lead-gray skies. Even the runoff from the spring became a roiling muddy torrent. They were comfortable in their sheltered, protected camp.

  “This is wonderful,” said Rebecca. “Without it, we’d be spending a wet, muddy, miserable day.”

  “Best get used to that,” said Brazos. “I talked to some riders that went up the Shawnee Trail to Sedalia, back in the fifties. They spent fourteen hours crossin’ the Red, stripped down to their drawers and boots.”

  Monte, Will, and McCaleb laughed. Rebecca’s face colored, but she was game.

  “I’m going on this trail drive, Brazos Gifford, if every cowboy there, including you, strips down to the bare hide!”

  Monte, Will, and McCaleb whooped, not at what the girl had said, but at Brazos. His face had turned a brighter shade of red than his hair, and it was a while before he could manage a sheepish grin.

  “Starting tomorrow,” said McCaleb, “four of us will ride into the brakes and start the cow hunt. One of us will have to stay here and watch over our extra horses, grub, ammunition, and the fence.”

  “Rebecca,” said Monte. “She makes the best biscuits.”

  “Leave me stuck in camp every day,” snarled Rebecca, “and I’ll see that you never get another biscuit. I’m sick of being a cook to ungrateful men who never think beyond their bellies!”

  “All right,” said McCaleb. “We’ll take turns in camp, but I’m warning the lot of you: I don’t make biscuits worth a damn.”

  By September 2, 1865, they’d roped and driven 275 longhorns into the canyon. It was Saturday morning, and they had begun branding their week’s gather. Two irons—one the Box N and the other a 3-R connected—heated in the small fire. Their next candidate for the 3-R connected iron was a bawling, kicking three-year-old that Will and Brazos had thrown and hog-tied. McCaleb and Monte, catch ropes horn-looped, were dragging another struggling animal toward the fire. One of their horses nickered and all activity ceased as they watched the mouth of the canyon. Four horsemen appeared, riding single file, the last one leading a pack mule. McCaleb looked at Will, then at Brazos, and they fanned out in the Ranger formation they’d used so often when facing unknown danger. Will took his position a dozen feet to McCaleb’s left, while Brazos moved an equal distance to his right. Twenty yards away the four reined up. Their horses looked sleek, grain-fed. A towheaded kid had no weapon in sight, but the other three wore well-used, slick-handled Colts in tied-down rigs.

  “Step down,” said McCaleb affably.

  The three foremost riders dismounted, but the kid leading the pack mule didn’t move. Except for the leader’s gray Confederate officer’s coat, they all wore range clothes, run-over boots, and used-up gray hats. They had shaggy, unkempt hair, and except for the kid, were unshaven. They wasted no time on formality. The apparent leader—the man in the Rebel coat—spoke.


  “I’m Captain Nathan Calvert, of the Independent Rangers. In the name of the Confederacy, we’re confiscating four of your extra horses.”

  “Mister,” said Brazos coldly, “it purely don’t make a damn to us if you’re Robert E. Lee, with papers to prove it. Lay a hand on just one of our horses and you’ll be as dead as the Confederacy.”

  “You are defying my order, then?”

  “We are,” said McCaleb. “We don’t recognize the Confederacy or your ‘Independent Rangers.’ Who is your commander?”

  “Colonel Cullen Baker.”

  “Cullen Baker is scum,” said McCaleb, “a deranged killer. All you’ll get from us is a chance to mount up and ride.”

  “Take them!” bawled Calvert, going for his gun.

  They were his last words. So swiftly did McCaleb draw and fire, the roar of Colts to his right and left might have been the echo of his own. His slug took Calvert in the chest, driving him back against the flank of his gray horse. The animal snorted and pranced away, allowing its dying master to slide to the ground, his unfired Colt in his hand. Both Calvert’s companions were down, neither having fired a shot. The towheaded kid had released the mule’s lead rope and sat with his hands shoulder high. McCaleb, Colt in his hand, beckoned him down and the kid dismounted.

  “One of these pilgrims is still alive,” said Brazos.

  The man lay on his back, the front of his Levi’s already blood-soaked from the wound just above his belt buckle. His eyes, dull with pain and the knowledge of impending death, met McCaleb’s.

  “I’m…hard hit,” he muttered. “Can’t you do…nothin’…fer me?”

  “We have plans for you,” said McCaleb. “Brazos, you and Will get your catch ropes and make us a pair of renegade neckties. We’ll ride this pair of skunks far enough back into the woods so’s they don’t stink up the canyon and decorate a cottonwood with ’em.”

  “My God, McCaleb! No!”

  Rebecca Nance stood there, fisted hands on her hips, sparks of green fire flickering in her eyes.

  “He’s just a boy, McCaleb, and he didn’t lift a hand against you. Why can’t you just let him go?”

  “I believe,” said McCaleb, his voice dripping sarcasm, “you promised to take orders from me, since this is my gather. Now shut up! That’s an order!”

  Will and Brazos said nothing. McCaleb half expected Monte to side with his sister, but the boy remained grimly silent. Finally, McCaleb turned to the towheaded kid.

  “What’s your name, boy, and how old are you?”

  “Tom Calvert. It ain’t none of your business how old I am.”

  “Related to Nathan?”

  “He was my brother,” said the kid sullenly.

  “Your brother was a fool, boy. Can you give me one good reason why we shouldn’t string you up and let the crows pick your bones?”

  “I won’t beg!” snarled the kid. “Whatever it pleasures you to do with me, then do it an’ be damned!”

  “Mount up, then,” said McCaleb with a grim smile, “and you’ll soon be shaking hands with the devil.”

  Brazos tossed a coiled, forty-foot rope and McCaleb caught it. Deftly, he tested the thirteen-knot noose, assuring himself that it would slide freely. Turning, he sought out Will Elliot.

  “Where’s the other noose, Will?”

  “Won’t be needing it. The jaybird that was gut-shot just cashed in.”

  “Well, kid,” said McCaleb, “looks like you’ll swing alone.”

  “McCaleb, please…”

  Exasperated, he whirled to face her, but his angry response died on his lips. Big tears rolled down her dusty cheeks. From the corner of his eye he caught Will and Brazos casting less-than-tolerant looks at him. Angrily, he turned on the towheaded little renegade responsible for this dilemma.

  “Kid, if I let you ride out, will you go home and stay there?”

  “I ain’t promisin’ you nothin’, ’cept I’ll kill you if I can!”

  To everybody’s surprise, Rebecca slapped him. Hard.

  “You little fool!” she snapped. “You make that promise and you keep it. If you don’t, I’ll put that rope around your neck myself!”

  “Yes, ma’am,” the kid gulped. “I’ll do it. I’ll ride!”

  He adjusted the offside stirrup. Going to the near side, momentarily shielded by the horse, he drew a Colt from beneath the folds of the too-big shirt. Dropping to his knees, he fired under the belly of the buckskin. The slug burned a fiery path across McCaleb’s left hip, just above his pistol belt. But McCaleb had been ready for him; stepping to his right as he drew, he fired once. His shot caught the kid in the belly, seeming to lift him to his feet, and then flopping him to his back. The skittish buckskin reared, nickered, and galloped away. McCaleb returned his Colt to its butt-forward position on his left hip. Monte lowered his eyes, ashamed that his sister had brought about a near tragedy. There was a shocked silence. The very last thing McCaleb needed or expected was a new outburst of anger from the girl, but she didn’t spare him.

  “You’re always right, aren’t you, McCaleb? Why can’t you be a little more human and a little less like the Texas answer to God Almighty?”

  McCaleb ignored her and peeled off his shirt. He hunkered down at the stream, soaked his bandanna and used it to wash away the blood from the angry wound just below his rib cage. He was bleeding like a stuck hog and it looked far more serious than it was.

  “McCaleb…”

  She was at last aware that he had been shot, and he experienced a grim satisfaction from the concern in her voice. It was time she worried about somebody besides no-account renegades! He slapped his bloody bandanna to the ground. He got to his feet, drawing as he turned to face her. Flipping the Colt, he caught the weapon by its barrel, offering it to her butt first.

  “Take it,” he growled in disgust, “and finish what you started.”

  “McCaleb,” she said timorously, “I…I didn’t know he…shot you.”

  “There’s just too damn many things you don’t know,” he snapped.

  He snatched the soggy bandanna; holding it against his still-bleeding wound, he turned to the others. Monte regarded him seriously, worry in his eyes. Will and Brazos had relaxed, sheepishly aware that he was dealing the headstrong girl a deserved reprimand and not faulting him for it.

  “Unsaddle their horses and unload the pack mule,” said McCaleb, “and then take those four scum outside the canyon somewhere and bury them. But nothin’ fancy; drop ’em in a coulee and cave in the banks. When you’re done with that, empty their packs and their saddlebags with an eye for food and extra ammunition. Be damn sure you take their gun rigs, and go through all their pockets before you plant ’em.”

  “Aren’t you going to take their boots and clothes?” snapped Rebecca.

  “Yeah,” said McCaleb grimly. “Take their boots and clothes too.”

  Will and Brazos turned quickly away before the girl saw their grins.

  With a clang, McCaleb kicked the branding irons away from the fire and put on some water to boil. He removed his gun rig; from his saddlebags he took a little jar of salve and an old undershirt. When the water had heated, he sloshed some of it on the wound, wiping it dry with part of the old shirt. He coated the angry gash with salve, and as best he could, folded the rest of the shirt into a thick pad, wrapping it around his lean middle and tying the ends together. The girl watched in silence until she could endure it no longer.

  “You’d die before you’d ask for help, wouldn’t you?”

  “God Almighty don’t need any help,” said McCaleb.

  “I’m sorry; I shouldn’t have said that.”

  “Then why did you?”

  That rekindled the fire in her eyes. Without another word, she went stomping off down the creek, and McCaleb chuckled to himself. He didn’t see her again until Brazos, Will, and Monte returned from their grim task, leading four riderless horses. The pack mule had wandered away and grazed a few yards down the canyon. The three dismounted,
strangely subdued. Brazos took something from his pocket and approached McCaleb.

  “Nothin’ much in their pockets,” said Brazos, “except for Calvert, the leader of the pack. Found this on him; reckoned you’d want it.”

  In McCaleb’s hand he placed a little golden locket on a thin gold chain. For a long moment McCaleb stared at it, his face pale, his mouth a thin, hard line. Brazos stood there in embarrassed silence. Rebecca stood beside him, her curiosity having gotten the better of her.

  “What is it? What’s wrong?”

  McCaleb took her hand, placed the locket in it, and walked away. He followed the creek, disappearing into a stand of young cottonwoods. Rebecca looked at the locket in her hand and then at Brazos.

  “Open it,” he said.

  With trembling fingers she found the clasp, opening the locket like a tiny book. There were two photographs; in the left frame, that of a pretty, dark-haired girl; in the right, that of a much younger Benton McCaleb.

  “His…wife?” inquired the girl.

  “I expect so,” said Brazos. “Whoever she was, it’s reason enough to gut-shoot Cullen Baker if he was a party to this.”

  “Then they took this…”

  “Off her dead body,” said Brazos.

  The girl turned toward the cottonwoods where they’d last seen McCaleb. At first she walked slowly, hesitantly. It was as though she were drawn by a force only she could feel. Her pace quickened, and by the time she reached the cottonwoods, she was running. Brazos turned back to his companions, saying nothing. He had no idea what was about to take place, and didn’t want to know. He would side McCaleb to the death against outlaws, thieves, or hordes of screeching, hostile Indians, but this time, Benton McCaleb was on his own.

  Rebecca found McCaleb at the very end of the canyon, at the spring. He sat on a mossed-over rock staring into the pool. There was no sound except the never-ending splash of water cascading down the stone face of the canyon. She seated herself on the rock beside him without a word. After a long, painful silence, it became apparent that he didn’t intend to speak to her. It would be up to her. She sighed.