The Complete Western Legends Omnibus, page 23
He leaned forward to hear her say in a hoarse whisper, “Where’s Bobby? Is he all right?”
“He’s fine, Mrs. Bonham. I put him to bed. He’s still sleeping.”
She remembered that night. And she couldn’t believe Bobby was safely tucked away in bed. “I want to see him,” she demanded, her voice weak, but her will as strong as ever.
“Look, Mrs. Bonham, he’s had it tough. Let him sleep and ...”
“You’re lying to me! I know!” she said, hysteria suddenly rising within her. “He’s dead and you won’t tell me ...” She tried to get out of bed, for what reason, Matt had no idea.
He gently, but firmly, took hold of her shoulders and pushed her back down and said, “I told you Bobby’s okay. Now be still. If you insist, I’ll go get him.”
She was panting and her eyes were full of fear. “Yes,” she said. “Please bring him to me. Please ...”
“All right ... all right. Just you rest easy now and I’ll go get him.”
The boy was groggy and the woman was as weak as a kitten, but with it all, Matt never saw so much hugging and kissing in all his life. Sharee was crying and the boy was crying—Matt had to leave the room. He kept himself busy by unloading the last of the supplies and putting everything away where it was supposed to go. Then he poured another cup of coffee and ambled into Sharee’s bedroom and handed it to her.
“About time you had something to eat and drink,” he said. “I’ll make you some bacon and eggs—and I’ll open a can of peaches for you. Meantime, Bobby, you take care of my horse, will you?”
“Which drawer you got your sleepin’ clothes in?” Matt continued after the boy left.
“Second drawer, on the right side.”
Matt threw her a plain long nightshirt. “You’d best put that on, then we better get you outta that bed for a minute, so’s I can change that bottom sheet.”
“Is that what I’m smelling?” she asked.
“The very same. Call me when you’re dressed and I’ll put you in the chair. And don’t get cocky and try to get up by yourself, neither. Your leg is in pretty nasty shape and I don’t want you movin’ it.”
Less than a minute later she called him. The nightshirt was still in her hands. “I can’t lift my arms up over my head. It hurts. Could you help me?”
“Ma’am ... I don’t know ...” he stammered.
She smiled at him. “You’ve seen me without my clothes on, haven’t you?”
“Yes, but you was hurt and unconscious then.”
“It’s the same body, awake or asleep. And I’m still hurting. Really, Mr. Howard—please help me. I’m asking you.”
“Okay. Hold your arms straight out in front of you.” The sheet fell down below her breasts. They both tried to ignore it. Her arms went through the sleeves, then he found the place to put her head through. Slowly, trying to avoid her bruises, he pulled the nightshirt down over her head and down to her waist.
She thanked him politely, even blushing a bit, and said she could do the rest. When she had it down to her thighs, he picked her up and placed her gently down in the chair by the bed. He stripped the mattress, then turned it over.
“There’s some more sheets in the closet,” she said.
He found them and put them on. Then he put her back in bed. “I’ll have your breakfast for you in a little while. Drink your coffee while it’s hot.”
“Mr. Howard ... thank you,” she said simply.
“You’re welcome, Mrs. Bonham.”
Chapter Fourteen
“Have you seen or heard anything about Sharee Bonham in the last few days?” asked Ballenger.
“No, sir, not a word,” answered Archie Walker.
“Do you think you killed her?”
“She was breathin’ when I left, though I did hear her boy come into town lookin’ for the Doc, but the Doc wouldn’t have no part in seein’ her.”
“I heard that too,” said Ballenger.
“If she’s livin’, maybe she got the message and she’s packin’ her stuff, gettin’ ready to go.”
Ballenger didn’t believe that for a minute. But his mind was on something else. “What about the Howard feller? Do you think he pulled out for good?” he asked, rubbing his slow healing wrist.
“I’d say he’s gone, Mr. Ballenger. Sure looked to me like he wasn’t comin’ back.”
“That’s too bad. I wouldn’t have minded seeing him get splashed with a little hot tar too ...
“Anyway,” he said firmly, “you better stay out of town for a while. Let’s wait and see what happens.”
“I guess we’ve switched places ... I mean you taking care of me instead of the other way around,” Sharee said, sitting comfortably up in bed.
Matt smiled, but made no comment. He had been back for nearly four days now and was noting how much Sharee had improved. He had also finally gotten her to tell him more or less what happened. Now Matt knew who he had to kill. He was sorry he didn’t put a bullet in Archie Walker that first time when he had the chance.
“How about giving that knee a little more exercise this afternoon,” he suggested.
“Okay. It’s feeling much stronger, you know.”
“Good.”
“I should be able to get up and around on my own in a couple of days,” she said. “I suppose you’ll be going then?”
“Yeah,” he answered, but there was something vague about the way he said it.
“Any place in particular?”
“Someplace far enough away so that I won’t hear what Ballenger and Taren and their good friends will do to you after I’ve gone.”
“I thought we weren’t going to discuss that anymore.”
“We aren’t. You asked me where I’m goin’ and I told you.”
She frowned.
Just then Bobby came in. “You ready for lunch, Matt?” he asked.
“Good idea,” he said, and rose to his feet. “Why don’t you get yourself a little sleep, Mrs. Bonham.”
“Yes I will, but ... Mr. Howard?”
“What?”
“Nothing. Never mind.”
Matt knew what the boy wanted to hear. Every afternoon at lunch, Bobby pestered him for a story about him and his two friends, Griff Stewart and Cort Lacey. And every afternoon, Matt protested, but always gave in. Today was no different ...
“You said once that the three of you came west together after the war. What did you do? What happened?” Bobby prompted.
Laughing, Matt said, “Aren’t you tired of all these goin’s on? It’s old history.”
“No ... come on. What happened?”
“Well, I could tell you about the Snake River thing. That’s a good story.”
Bobby said nothing—just looked at Matt with eyes wide open, full of expectations ...
“We’d been travelin’ around together, the three of us, for a couple of years after the war, and trouble just seemed to follow close by. Cort, he was already a pretty well-known gunfighter. And Griff and me, we backed him every bit of the way. But he didn’t much like havin’ the reputation.
“Well, one winter we holed up in the high country of Eastern Oregon, up around the Nez Percé country, near the Snake River. Cort, he fell in love with those high plateaus, mountains, and empty spaces. We was set to head for California come the spring but not Cort. He decided to stay. He was tired of the wanderin’ and the gunfights. I couldn’t blame him.
“Griff and me, we figured to go to California anyway. But without Cort, it wasn’t the same. Long about the time we reached Ruth, California, we knew it was time to go our separate ways. Griff said he’d be heading for Texas. I figured to go on to San Francisco. We shook hands and said goodbye, just like we done with Cort a couple weeks before.
“A lot of time rolled by. I thought about Griff and Cort just about every day at first but as the seasons passed, I got to thinkin’ of other things. Got me a sit-down office job with a shipping company in ’Frisco, made some friends, put some money in the bank, fell in love. After a year’s time I hardly thought about Griff and Cort at all except when I got to drinkin’ too much.
“Then one summer day, maybe two ... no three years after I’d last set eyes on either one of those two fellers, I got a telegram from Griff. It said Cort was hurt and in trouble up near the Snake River.
“There I was in my office, dressed like a dude, married, with a child on the way, holdin’ that telegram, and there wasn’t but a single thought in my head. I got up and went into my boss’ office, showed him the telegram, and told him I had to leave. He told me if I left, I was fired. So I quit.
“I went home and told my wife I was goin’. She was none too happy. But she understood. I never loved her more than I did that day.
“I dug out my guns from the bottom of a trunk, bought me a horse and booked passage on the first boat headin’ up the coast. Got to the Willamette Valley near the mouth of the Columbia in just a few days. Took a steamship upriver and got off at Boardman. Then I rode like the devil the last two hundred miles toward the Snake where I figured Cort to be.
“Well, he was there. And so was Griff. And so was about twenty hardcases, hired by a mining company to clear the area of settlers. They should of known Cort wasn’t about to be run off. Still, he wasn’t lookin’ none too good. He’d caught a bushwhacker’s rifle bullet in his side and had lost a lot of blood. But he was game. He always was.
“Griff had gotten there the day before and, well, when I showed up, the three of us, bein’ together again, we felt unbeatable. We figured the odds to be pretty even now. Twenty of them to three of us.
“Cort, he was the strategist, and he had a plan. He’d stay put ’cause he was hurt. Griff and me, we’d move out on both sides of Cort’s position, keepin’ outta sight, and outflank the hardcases on the north and south. When they moved in to attack, we’d swing in behind ’em and have ’em trapped between us, in a three-cornered cross-fire. The one danger in the plan was that with the two of us comin’ at ’em from behind, they’d over-run Cort’s position. He said he’d run the risk.
“Well, we left Cort with three loaded Winchesters so’s he’d have a chance. Griff and me, we figured to handle our end usin’ just our six-guns. Cort didn’t like it, but Griff and me, we’d have it no other way.
“I spent most of the night edgin’ way around the south side of those hired guns. Took maybe seven hours, movin’ quiet as could be, just a little at a time. A couple hours before dawn I heard Griff’s owl call comin’ from the north side. I answered. We was set and ready. It was a good thing. They broke camp early, figurin’ to attack before sun-up, to catch us off our guard.
“I got a good look at those coyotes before Griff and I opened fire. They were armed to the teeth and walkin’ light an’ easy, feelin’ real sure of themselves. Twenty, they were, stalkin’ a wounded man, ready to kill him for more than a payday. Made me mad. Made Griff mad.
“We tore ’em apart.
“Before they knew what was happening, Griff and me, we must of dropped five or six of them hardcases. The rest, like we figured, made tracks away from us, toward Cort. We followed, keepin’ the pressure on, and then they met a stone wall of lead. Cort was firin’ those Winchesters like he had a Gatling gun. And accurate too.
“There was maybe eight of ’em left, that hunkered down, takin’ cover. They wasn’t fightin’ for no payday now. They was fightin’ for their lives. But the same held true for us. We had ’em pinned, but we couldn’t hold ’em long. We was outgunned and pretty soon they’d realize it, and we’d be in trouble.
“Then Cort yells out, “I been doin’ a little minin’ of my own! Find that a little dynamite can save a feller a lot of work. I’m gonna give you thirty seconds to throw down your guns and step out into the clear, or I’m gonna start tossin’ this into your cover. Thirty seconds, startin’ now.”
“Griff and me, we figure Cort is bluffin’. If he had dynamite, he’d have either used it long before this, or he’d have told us. We figured them hardcases would guess it a bluff too. And they did. When the thirty seconds run out, they just kept on of shootin’. But then, all of a sudden, somethin’ comes flyin’ outta Cort’s position, headin’ straight for them hardcases. And just when it hits, the damn thing blows up. I tell you, Griff an’ me, we were almost as surprised as them eight hired guns. Except now they wasn’t eight no more. They was six. And they was throwin’ down their guns, yellin’, ‘Don’t shoot ... Don’t shoot ... We’re comin’ out.’ And they come out.
“Cort tells ’em to tell their boss to either clear outta the territory, pronto, or the three of us will run him out on a rail. Well, fightin’ Cort Lacey was a dumb thing to do in the first place. But to fight Cort Lacey when he’s got help, you gotta be crazy. So the boss man, he finally gets the message and crawls back under his rock.
“Later, when we went into the town of Enterprise we asked Cort why he held out on us, not tellin’ Griff and me about the dynamite.
“He said, ‘What dynamite?’
“I said, ‘The dynamite you threw at them hardcases. What do you mean, “What dynamite?”’
“He laughed and said there was no dynamite. He emptied the powder out of every shell he had, put it in a long, thin metal container that had once held a fancy cigar that someone gave him, set a lit fuse to it, and heaved the damned thing, hopin’ to God it would blow up before they got a look at it.
“‘That was a helluva chance,’ I said. ‘If it hadn’t worked, you’d have been defenseless.’
“‘Best chance we had,’ was all he answered. Then he said, ‘Let’s go to the saloon and celebrate before we see the Doc.’
“And let me tell you, did we celebrate. Before we got too drunk, we dragged Cort over to the Doc. Then Griff and me, we caught up on old times. Turned out he had a small cattle ranch up in the Texas Panhandle near Tascosa, right by the Canadian River.
“Well, later we all got to talk some more—we stuck around till Cort was full healed. And it was nice. Real nice. But finally, I had to get goin’. My wife would be worrying and besides, the baby was due pretty soon and I wanted to be there. Griff had to get back to his place too. So we shook hands, the three of us, and said goodbye ...”
The boy hadn’t moved an inch while listening to Matt’s story. His mouth was slightly open, and his lunch remained untouched.
“What’s the matter, Bobby,” asked Matt, “ain’t you hungry?”
“Huh?”
Matt grinned and said, “Go heat that up again before you eat it.” Then, more seriously, he added, “I’m goin’ out to the barn. Got some stuff I gotta take care of.”
Bobby never had a chance to eat. A few minutes later his mother called to him.
“What is it, ma?” he yelled back.
“Come here. I want to talk to you. Hurry now.”
“I’m just about to eat,” he exclaimed.
“Now? What have you been doing all this time?”
“Matt was telling me about his friends, Cort Lacey and Griff Stewart.”
“Not those tall tales again. Well, just come on in here now anyway. You can have lunch later.”
A moment later he was standing by her bedside, thinking he was about to be scolded for not helping Matt carry water into the house that morning, but instead, she pulled him close and said, “I saw Mr. Howard walking over to the barn. He was carrying his rifle and his Colt. Did he say what he was gonna do when he left the house?”
“No, ma. Just said he had stuff he had to do.”
“Go over there and see if he’s cleaning his guns and come back and tell me,” she ordered.
“I can’t do that, ma,” he protested. “It ain’t right to go spying on Matt.”
Sharee was surprised. The boy was all of a sudden bucking her authority. Yet, she was just a little bit pleased, too, that her son was standing up to her on a principle. He was, indeed, growing up.
“Listen, Bobby,” she said “this is important. You mustn’t say anything about this to anyone. Not even Mr. Howard. Especially not Mr. Howard ...
“I’m not sure, but I think your friend Matt is planning on doing something that’s gonna get him in a lot of trouble. Something too big for him to handle.”
“You mean he’s gonna try to kill the man who beat you up?”
Sharee’s eyes widened. “How did you know that?” she asked with astonishment. “Did he say something to you?”
“No, ma. He didn’t say a word to me.”
“Then what makes you think he’s gonna do anything about it?”
“Because.”
“Because, what?”
“Because that’s what pa would do,” said the boy.
“Mr. Howard is nothing like your father,” she stated flatly.
“In this, he is, ma. I know it.”
She would have dismissed her son’s talk as a child’s foolishness, only she had the same feeling herself. “Well, do as I say then,” she said flustered. “Go see if he’s cleaning his guns.”
“But why, ma? You wouldn’t stop him from getting the man who did this to you, would you?”
“Yes, I would—if I could—Bobby. I don’t know if you can understand all this now, but if Mr. Howard kills anyone on account of me, the people of this valley, they’ll lynch him sure. There won’t be a soul to help him.”
The boy stood quietly, then nodded and went out to the barn.
Matt, grim and purposeful, was cleaning his guns.
Chapter Fifteen
Bobby knew Matt a lot better than his mother did. The boy knew that there were no words to stop this man from doing what he felt must be done. The only thing Bobby could do was to try to help him. But how?
He wandered down by the creek, lost in thought. His mother would be waiting to hear what he had seen in the barn, but the boy didn’t want to tell her. He had to think. He had to do something so that Matt wouldn’t leave him like his pa had left ... stone cold and forever. But it was hopeless, he thought. What could an eight-year-old kid do to help? Not a thing. Just mope along sadly, wishing that the creek was the Snake River and that Cort Lacey and Griff Stewart would come to the rescue ...
