Adam Steele 35, page 12
‘I’m sorry?’ Her tone made it a query.
‘I reckon it’s all right for me to ask when you last ate, Miss Remmick. Maybe less so to even think about what kind of warm underwear you have on.’
There was another pause, longer than the last time. Which she ended with a sigh as she came forward and dropped down on to her haunches next to where he sat on the saddle. She winced at the pain in her knee, then finished the coffee and agreed: ‘Crazy is right, Mr. Steele. But I was going to get that way for ever if I stayed in Braddock much longer. When Uncle Harry made me help with the hanging and all, I felt like I already had lost my mind. After I went off to catch my horse, I just decided to leave town there and then. With the clothes you see me in. No supplies. Not even a bedroll.’
He had transferred half the bacon and beans on to a plate while she was speaking. Now took the empty cup from her in exchange for the food. She had the fork to eat with while he used his spoon to eat directly from the skillet. Then she moved away from him a little, but only so she could be more comfortable, sitting with legs splayed on the ground and her back leaning on the wall. Said as she changed position:
‘Stupid; I guess I knew at the time I left. Same as I maybe knew I was making matters worse for myself when I set my horse to running. But I knew, too, you’d know I was following you on a horse.’
She began to eat and had to will herself to do it slowly. He ate at the same rate without effort and there was a verbal silence between them until the meal was finished. When Steele poured more coffee into the only cup and sipped at it himself. Asked:
‘Why should I give a damn, Miss Remmick?’
She was bewildered. ‘What? Why, you told me in no uncertain terms you wanted nothing to do with me and then you told me to go home!’
‘I don’t own you and I don’t own the trail. Seems to me you’re free to do whatever the hell you like.’
‘But I don’t have any food, any money, any anything!’
‘But you did have some good advice. Fact that you didn’t take it is nothing to me.’
He finished the coffee at a swallow and gestured with the empty cup toward the pot. She shook her head and it was obvious her mind was racing up and down many crisscrossing lines of thought as she watched him collect up the dirty cooking and eating utensils and take them to the creek.
‘But you’ve just shared your food with me!’ she said, having got to her feet so she could look out of the hole in the wall at him. ‘You let me warm myself at your fire. Surely you must think something …’
‘I told you the last time we met up, Miss Remmick,’ Steele answered as her emotions got in the way of her words and she needed all her concentration to keep from weeping. ‘Are you listening?’
She sniffed and nodded, dry-washing her hands as she watched him bring the cleaned items back to the fire.
‘I still have some principles left. Providing I know he – or she – doesn’t mean to do me any harm, I’d always share my camp and food with somebody in need on the open trail.’
‘And then abandon her to her fate!’ she accused as he started to pack away his gear.
‘Leave her to attend to her business while I mind my own,’ he corrected.
‘I could die out in this kind of country at this time of year! Of cold or starvation!’
He eased the saddle on to the back of the black stallion and stooped to cinch it in place as the sun, yellow now, crested the tree-clad slope above them and dropped its bright but cool light on the camp in the angle of the two walls.
‘If that’s what you want to happen to you, Miss Remmick. You told me there are three stages a week in each direction along this trail. And you also told me a bunch of Braddock men are heading out along it. So I reckon—’
‘You’re just like all of those small-town hayseeds, aren’t you?’ she snarled, and as her temper tantrum rose her claim to be eighteen years of age was undermined again. ‘And to think when I first saw you in town, then more so the second time, I pegged you for a man of the world who didn’t give a fig for … for … for just about anything! And I thought for real sure you’d understand about why I wanted to get away from there and would help me and all!’ Her glowering stare became more intense as she watched him swing up into the saddle. And her voice rose to a high pitch of shrillness as she challenged: ‘But you’re exactly like them and you think everybody else should be the same! You’re a damn washout, that’s what you are!’
He looked steadily down at her, waiting patiently for her to be through and trying again to believe that she was an eighteen-year-old young woman instead of a boy at least three years junior to that.
‘That part’s true enough,’ he allowed vaguely. ‘But I’m trying to change.’
He nodded to her as the tears began to run across her freckled cheeks, and looked away without feeling the merest pang of sympathy as he touched the heels of his boots to the flanks of his mount and started all three stallions moving.
‘You bast—’ Josephine Remmick began to shriek. But as she at last summoned sufficient emotion-charged will to voice a strong expletive, a fusillade of rifle shots masked the end of it. And she clamped her hands to her ears and hurled herself to the ground as sparks flew up from the fire and chips of stone exploded out of the walls. While Steele flung himself out of the saddle and chose to grip the lead lines rather than attempt to slide the rifle from the boot. Ice-cool in making the decision to try to calm the Arabs before they injured themselves in their panic at the gunfire; instead of launching a counter-attack at men who would have killed him already if they wanted him dead.
There was just the single volley that rained bullets down into the angle of the walls from out of the sunlit timber on the high ground of the valley side. But Josephine Remmick started to howl her terror in its wake and that kept the white horses in a state of high nervousness as the Virginian hauled on the lines and spoke placatingly to them. Thankful his mount remained calm during the turmoil of sound and movement, for he knew as the Arabs at last began to quieten and he became aware of the aches in his arms, that he would not have been able to hold them alone. They attempted to rear once more, then scraped at the ground and snorted when they failed to get their forehooves into the air. The girl ended her howling and Steele moved close enough to the still-disturbed animals so he was able to release his hold on the lines and run a gloved hand over each nose as he spoke a few final words of comfort to the stallions.
‘All right, mister!’ a familiar voice called with enmity in every syllable: Oates who ran the Alamo Saloon. ‘Now back off from there and reach for the sky!’
The Virginian had to crack his eyes almost shut against the brightness of the sun through the foliage of the trees as he looked toward the speaker – and failed to see him – while he did as instructed. Then answered:
‘Reckon I’ve been reaching for something even harder to get hold of, feller.’
‘Maybe it just could be what you’ve reached is the end of the line, Steele!’ another familiar voice threatened. This was the Braddock liveryman, Ralph Peabody. He also remained out of sight in the timber, as he backed the ominous words with a fast pumping of the lever action of a repeater rifle.
‘In a manner of speaking,’ the sheepskin-coated man with his hands raised to just above his shoulders growled softly, ‘that’s what I had in mind to do.’
‘Uncle Harry?’ Josephine Remmick yelled as she staggered to her feet and had to lean against one of the walls to keep from falling down again. ‘Is Uncle Harry with you?’
Steele raked his gaze along the fringe of the timber. Then, like the girl, concentrated his attention on one spot when somebody was heard to move without secrecy. And both were in time to see Harrison Coles emerge, his left arm still in a sling to ease the pain of the bullet wound and his coat draped over his shoulders, cape fashion, as back in town. His gaunt face looked grim over a distance of some fifty yards and the expression did not alter as he approached the Virginian and the girl. He was not armed, so with a free hand was able to take a cigar from a pocket of the draped coat, bite off the end and spit it out.
‘Uncle Harry, it’s not what it looks like!’ Josephine Remmick blurted as Coles clenched the cigar between his teeth.
Adam Steele turned his head around to eye the girl with surprise. And then was able to keep any trace of emotion out of his voice and off his face when he told her: ‘You want to give them the message I said—’
‘Do you know how old the judge’s niece is?’ This was snarled by the short and slightly-built farmer with the very pale face – Nathanial Curtis. He was in hiding somewhere between Oates and Peabody.
The Virginian switched his gaze from the girl to the patch of timber which hid the farmer and then looked at Coles to reply: ‘I’ve had a little trouble sometimes remembering she’s your niece and not your nephew.’
‘Oh yeah!’ an unfamiliar voice – another man – challenged.
‘She won’t even be fourteen until two days before Christmas, man!’ Ernest Tucker shouted, a husky tone in his voice.
‘And that means we could have a case of statutory rape here,’ Harrison Coles said evenly, speaking for the first time as he reached the ruined building and the other Braddock men emerged from the trees behind and above him.
Peabody to the left, then Tucker, Curtis, Vernon Harper who shared a farm on the wrong side of town with Morgan Manning, and the gammy-legged Oates on the far right. All of them with rifles aimed from the hip and all of them looking like they were eagerly awaiting the signal to fire them again.
‘Just a little kid, stranger!’ Oates rasped as Coles held up his free hand without turning around and the line of men halted.
‘A minor!’ Tucker snarled, and could not have been more bitter in tone and expression had he been talking about one of his own children.
The Virginian nodded as the Braddock townsmen and farmers stared at him with almost palpable force emanating from their unblinking eyes. And drawled: ‘But it’s not the girl who’s shafting me.’
Chapter Thirteen
JOSEPHINE REMMICK WAILED: ‘I don’t understand any of this!’
‘We oughta let him have it here and now, Judge!’ the almost-trembling-with-shock Tucker snarled through gritted teeth.
‘No, it’s not like that!’ the girl shrieked, and threw her hands up to cover her face.
Coles, the cigar bobbing at the side of his mouth, demanded in a brittle tone: ‘Jo, I want you to do something for me!’
‘Uncle?’
‘Our horses are over the other side of the ridge.’ He gestured with his head to take in the timber slope he and the other men had advanced on. ‘Want you to go and bring them to us.’
She dropped her hands to her sides and her tear-stained and ashen-under-the-freckles face was seen to express a depthless brand of dread. Then she began to tremble and her voice was a rasping whisper when she asked: ‘Uncle, what are you going to do to him?’
‘Not kill him, girl. We aren’t the murdering kind.’
There were nods and some grunted sounds of agreement. The girl looked almost faint with relief, then directed an expression toward Steele that seemed to be comprised of both contrition and arrogance, which she confirmed in words.
‘I’m sorry I’ve caused you trouble, Mr. Steele. But if you had believed me when I said they were coming—’
‘The horses, Jo,’ Coles reminded as he sensed a rising impatience among the men behind him.
‘Yes, Uncle,’ she acknowledged, and moved to do his bidding, still slowed by her injured knee.
Coles went to where she had been standing beside the fire, stooped to pick up a glowing stick by the cold end and used it to light his cigar.
‘Judge?’ Ralph Peabody posed as the girl disappeared into the timber.
‘I’m still that?’ Harrison Coles asked as he turned from what had been a window in what had been a building, to look at each of his fellow citizens in turn.
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ Curtis growled.
‘Ain’t nobody gonna question your decision about this, Judge,’ the black-bearded Oates assured.
‘That’s right!’ Tucker affirmed and this triggered another round of nodding as the farmer added: ‘Except for the stranger!’
‘I was just meaning we should get on with it, Judge,’ the Braddock liveryman said, apologetic.
‘Let’s see about that,’ the elderly attorney said, ignoring Tucker and looking quizzically at the Virginian.
‘I don’t seem to be in any position to disagree, feller,’ Steele said. ‘To any effect.’
Then he caused a flurry of nervousness and renewed aggression among the line of riflemen as he lowered his arms to his sides, backed off a few paces and sat down on the highest section of one of the collapsed walls – his posture such that the slit in the outside seam of his right pants leg was on the blind side to all the Braddock men.
‘No one told you to—’ the black-bearded, bloodshot-eyed Oates started to snarl.
‘What harm’s he doing?’ Coles put in evenly.
‘Aw, shit!’ the lame keeper of the town saloon snapped, and leaned his back to a tree. ‘If somethin’s gonna be done, doit, I say!’
Peabody also allowed some of the high tension to drain out of him, but remained erect. Curtis and Harper lowered their rumps to the trunk of a long-ago-fallen tree. Nobody put down his rifle, but only Ernest Tucker continued to keep the Virginian carefully covered.
‘It can hardly be a surprise to you to know just how much you are disliked by the people of Braddock, son?’ Coles posed, and half sat in the wall aperture. ‘And these men are merely a representative section of our citizens, of course.’
‘I got the message before I left town, feller,’ Steele answered, his tone as empty of feeling as were his eyes. ‘You even spelled it out for me. The message I gave your niece to—’
‘Just listen, son,’ Coles counseled. ‘Bill Oates is correct. Quicker we can get this business over and done with, the better. So we can go our own ways. Firstly, let us deal with the matter of Jo. You did not touch her, did you? In a way that would constitute sexual assault?’
There was abruptly a tension in the bright, cold air of morning that acted to stretch the passing seconds of silence.
‘Reckon if you’d thought there was a danger of that, you’d have included the town doctor in your bunch of vigilantes,’ the Virginian answered.
Coles took a deep breath and let it rasp out. Tucker seemed to be on the point of snarling a challenge to the even-voiced response, but confined the venting of his feelings to the spitting of a globule of saliva at the ground. The other Braddock men shared in the Judge’s relief with various expressions and gestures, but all made it patently obvious Tucker was the only member of the group who had ever seriously suspected Adam Steele of fooling with the girl.
‘We ain’t vigilantes!’ Nathanial Curtis protested forcefully.
‘No point in us getting in a discussion about how adolescent girls are likely to act up, son,’ the judge said, the cigar still bobbing at the side of his mouth. And there was a degree of melancholy in his eyes now. ‘I’m willing to accept the blame for her being the way she is. On account of how an ornery old bachelor like me has only been able to do the best he can at raising a young girl who only got to knowing what she was herself while she was still playing the tomboy. You’re not the first passing-through stranger she tried to fasten herself on to, and I guess you won’t be the last. Before she’s of an age to do whatever the hell she likes – as regards staying in Braddock or taking off with whatever man strikes her fancy.’
‘You said you weren’t going to get into that kind of talk, Judge,’ Vern Harper reminded.
‘That’s right, I did say that,’ Coles agreed absently, and peered into the dying fire for several seconds, like he was wishing he could continue along the same line. But then he returned his faintly apologetic gaze to Steele and went on quickly: ‘Fact is, though, son – even taking it as read you didn’t harm the girl in any way, shape or form, all the evidence points to you being guilty of something else. Known in the law books as contributing to the delinquency of a minor.’
‘What evidence is that?’ Steele asked evenly.
Coles had taken the cigar from his mouth, now clenched it between his teeth again and held up his right hand, its back toward the Virginian with four fingers splayed.
‘Item one,’ he said and folded down his little finger. ‘The girl rode out of town soon after you left and her horse returned. Item two.’ The next finger was folded. ‘She was found by several eye witnesses to be having breakfast with you after a night camp. Item three. You were seen to be abandoning her, by the same eye witnesses, after whatever happened at the night camp.’ The final finger was folded to make the hand into a fist. ‘Item four. You are known to the witnesses, and to all their fellow citizens, as something of a troublemaker. Were seen to shoot down a man in the manner of a person conversant with the use of guns. This after you were, albeit indirectly, involved in the violent deaths of three other individuals. Also, in conversation with a prominent member of our community – Mr. Byron Nolan – you confessed to the murder of a man who was your best friend. Thus you are not, I have to say, a suitable companion for an impressionable young girl who has seemingly become infatuated with you.’
‘I’m with him,’ Steele said, and jerked a gloved thumb toward the scowling Oates. Who came upright from the tree trunk, startled at being singled out of the group.
‘I fail to understand you, son?’ Coles said.
‘I think we should forget about Little Miss Itchy Feet and get to the point.’
Again there were nods and sounds of agreement from all the Braddock men at the fringe of the timber. And Harrison Coles came angrily erect from the hole in the wall. Prepared to snarl at his fellow citizens, but unable to speak for several moments as the sudden move erupted agony in his wounded shoulder. So that the Virginian had the time to continue:
‘The point being, I reckon, the two Arab stallions I beat you people to?’
