Authors: Elmer Kelton
Texas Rifles (2 page)
Cloud coiled the stake rope as he moved toward his horse. He tucked the coils under his belt, where he could yank them out into use if there came a sudden need for the rope again. He eased into the saddle, still watching warily the dip in the hills where he had seen the Comanches disappear. The only thing a man could know for sure about Comanches was that they were likely to do what he didn't expect. Since he didn't expect them to come back, it was a good idea to watch.
Staying in the brush as long as he could, he angled across toward the cabin he had seen. Good chance the Indiansâsome of them, anywayâwere hanging back to see how many Texans were in that timber. An Indian might not be able to read, but he could blamed well count.
Two hundred yards from the cabin the timber had all been cut away. Besides giving the settler material for his house and fences, this also afforded him a clear view of anyone approaching. It cut down the chance of surprise. But the farmer had left some of the tree trunks where they had fallen, and these had given the Indians some protection from rifle fire. Cloud would bet it wouldn't take the man long to drag these up into a pile.
Moving into the clearing, he could feel the rifles trained on him, even though he couldn't see them. Two dogs set up an awful racket. “Hello the house!” Cloud called, keeping his hands up in clear sight and making no quick moves. Nobody answered him at first, but he saw a slight movement at a glassless window. Then a man stepped out from inside the corral.
Cloud's sorrel snorted and shied away from a dead Indian the others had been in too big a hurry to pick up. Cloud stopped twenty paces from the corral. The two men
stared at each other. Cloud finally opened the conversation with, “Howdy.”
stared at each other. Cloud finally opened the conversation with, “Howdy.”
The black-bearded man who stood there was in his late fortiesâfifty, maybe, for streaks of gray glistened in the sun. He had the broad, strong body of a blacksmith, the homespun clothes of the pioneer. He studied Cloud, the rifle still high and ready in his hands. Distrust lingered in his brown eyes. White renegades were not unheard of in this country. Now and again there was talk of such men riding with the Indians, turning against their own kind. For all this man knew, Cloud could be one.
“Howdy,” the man finally said, evidently satisfied with Cloud's looks. “You one of the bunch that was doin' the shootin' across the hill yonder?”
“I was the bunch.”
Incredulous, the man lowered the rifle and stood with his mouth open. “You mean to tell me you're by yourself?”
“It ain't the way I'd rather've had it,” Cloud replied, getting down.
The settler grunted an oath and shook his head. “Luck. Just puredee luck. But give me luck and you can keep your money.” He stepped forward, hand outstretched. “Name's Lige Moseley. Elijah, you know, like in the Bible.” The man began to grin, the tension leaving him.
Cloud grinned too. “Sam Houston Cloud. I don't reckon the Bible had much to do with my name, though.”
“You must be a sure-enough born Texican to be named after old General Sam.”
“My folks always thought a heap of the general.”
“Then I reckon you live up to your name. He always was a scrappy old booger.”
Moseley turned toward the cabin. Cloud dropped his reins over a post and moved along beside him, looking over this ruddy-faced, bewhiskered settler. Steady as a
rock, Moseley showed no sign he had ever been scared.
rock, Moseley showed no sign he had ever been scared.
“Indian-fightin' don't seem like it bothers you none,” Cloud commented.
“Fit âem ever since I was a button. Started back in Tennessee, fit 'em all the way west. Reckon I'll fight 'em clean to the Pacific Ocean.”
“You mean you expect to keep on movin' west?”
“What other direction is there for a man to go? Got to move now and again, git to a fresh, unspoiled country. Man sits in one place too long, he just naturally goes stale. Are you a movin' man?”
“Have been, kind of. Ever I find me a place that suits me just right, though, I'll probably light and stay there.”
They reached the cabin. Moseley spoke through the open window. “Everybody make out all right?”
“All right,” came a woman's voice. Moseley moved on to the other side, beyond the dog run. A boy of thirteen or fourteen stepped out with a rifle in his hand.
“How about you boys?” Moseley asked. The boy, whittled from the same oakwood as his father, stared with open curiosity at Cloud. He said, “We done fine.” He frowned then. “Now that we got 'em on the run, Pa, don't you think we ought to chase after them and give them a real proper chastisement?”
The old man proudly laid his big hand on the boy's shoulder. “I reckon if they want to fight some more, they'll come back.”
To Cloud, Moseley said, “Raise âem right, they don't panic at the sight of a few Indians. I've taught 'em this is a white man's land. The Lord meant it for crops and cattle, not for painted heathens and the buffalo. The Lord'll see to it that the Christian man comes out all right, long as he keeps his faith.”
He motioned with his rifle. “Downed a couple of them out yonder. We better make sure they're dead. Don't want
'em sneakin' up here cuttin' our throats while our backs are turned.”
'em sneakin' up here cuttin' our throats while our backs are turned.”
Cloud said, “I saw one of them as I rode up. He was dead.”
Moseley grunted. “Other one's over thisaway, then. Want to go with me?”
Pistol in his hand, Cloud walked along beside Moseley, carefully watching the grass.
“Tall grass, it give them redskins a little of an edge on us,” Moseley said. “It was hard to see them. I'd've burned all this off, only I been afraid I'd burn the house down too.”
They found the Indian lying on his back, his chest still heaving up and down. He had dragged himself partially under the dead foliage of a downed tree, trying to find shade from the blistering sun. His open eyes were glazed. Fresh blood made tiny bubbles on his lips. Cloud could see a gaping hole in the Comanche's belly.
“Done for,” he said quietly. It seemed proper to speak quietly in the presence of a dying man, whether he was Comanche or not.
The old frontiersman nodded. “No easy death, either. It'd be God's mercy to go ahead and put him out of his misery.”
“I reckon it would,” Cloud agreed. “He's yours.”
Moseley raised his rifle and held it a moment. There was no sign the Indian was even aware of what was happening. Moseley raked his tongue over dry lips. The old man slowly lowered the rifle.
“I can't do it. How about you takin' care of him for me, Cloud?”
Cloud was silent a moment, his hand cold-sweaty on the grip of the six-shooter. “I can't either. I can shoot at a man when he's shootin' at me. But one like this ⦔
Moseley shook his head. “He can't bother us none, the
shape he's in. So I reckon now it's just between him and the Lord. He ortn't to've been here, that's all.”
shape he's in. So I reckon now it's just between him and the Lord. He ortn't to've been here, that's all.”
The two turned and started back toward the cabin. Moseley said, “I'll have to set the boys to diggin'. Job like that can't wait very long in this kind of hot weather.”
“There's another one over the hill,” Cloud said. “But I expect the Comanches carried him off. They generally do, they get the chance.”
The Moseley boys were out poking around now for Indian souvenirs. They picked up the dying Indian's bow and arrows and the bull-hide shield that lay where the man had fallen. They held it up and looked through the bullet hole in it.
Moseley stared at Cloud with unabashed curiosity. “Been tryin' to figure you out. Most fellers that's been through here lately has been yellow bellies headin' west, tryin' to git out of havin' to go fight the Yankees. You don't look like that stripe to me.”
“Well,” said Cloud, “I'm not on the run.”
“What
are
you doin'?”
are
you doin'?”
“I'm huntin' for Captain Barcroft's company of the Texas Mounted Rifles. I'm supposed to join it.”
“One of them new Ranger outfits, eh? Out to help save the home folks from the Indians while the rest of the boys go whip them Yanks?”
“Not Rangers, exactly. State troops, more like. But you got the job rightâpatrol the frontier, keep John throwed back.”
“John” was a frontier nickname for the Indianâany Indian.
Moseley grinned. “Well, looks to me like you've done started to work. If that Barcroft asks you for any references, just tell him to come and see me.”
The cabin door opened in front of them. A woman stepped back out of the way. “Go ahead in, Cloud,” said
Moseley. Moseley's wife stood in the middle of the plain room, staring at him. She was a gaunt, wide-hipped woman in her early forties, shoulders bent by a hard-lived life of work and strain, face dried by sun and wind. But there was a strong set to her jaw, a sturdy determination in her eyes. Moseley might be a strong man, but he would be no stronger than this woman he had married, thought Cloud.
Moseley. Moseley's wife stood in the middle of the plain room, staring at him. She was a gaunt, wide-hipped woman in her early forties, shoulders bent by a hard-lived life of work and strain, face dried by sun and wind. But there was a strong set to her jaw, a sturdy determination in her eyes. Moseley might be a strong man, but he would be no stronger than this woman he had married, thought Cloud.
It took this kind of woman to stand beside a man and keep pushing west, to hold ungiving against a harsh daily existence in a raw land, to stand firm in the face of the savage red tide. She wasn't much for looks maybe, but looks didn't count for much in this country.
“How do,” she said. “I heered what you told Lige. You really come by yourself, mister?”
“Yes'm.” He had his hat in his hands.
“Well, that's really somethin'. Really somethin'.”
Cloud heard a knocking and looked around him for the source of it. Mrs. Moseley said, “Like to've forgot about the youngsters. Would you kindly he'p me move this chest, Mister Cloud?”
The three of them scooted a battered oak chest out across the packed-dirt floor. Beneath it appeared a wooden trapdoor. Moseley grasped an iron ring and swung the squeaky door up. “You-all can come out now. One at a time, don't be a-steppin' on one another's fingers.”
One by one, children of various sizes began to appear from the depths of the hole. Cloud reached down and helped each one make his way out. The kids were dirt-smeared from rubbing against the sides of the narrow tunnel. Each of them eyed Cloud warily. They weren't used to strangers.
One of the boys, who looked to be about five, complained, “Why don't you let us stay down there, Mama? It's cooler than up here.”
“That's just for the needful times. Snoopy redskins see you-all playin' around the escape hole outside, they'd know what it was. It wouldn't do none of you any good then. Git on outside now, and brush that dirt off of you.”
Last up was a girl of seventeen or so, carrying a two-year-old boy in her arms. The girl glanced quickly at Cloud with pretty hazel eyes, then handed the baby to her mother. “It was scared,” she said. “Had a hard time a-keepin' it from cryin'. I was a-feered them Indians might hear it and find the hole.”
Mrs. Moseley took her baby and rocked it in her arms. The harshness in her face faded to a mother's gentleness. “There now,” she soothed the child, holding its cheek to hers. “Everything's all right now. Nothin's goin' to hurt our baby, nothin' atall.”
With Cloud's help, the girl finished the climb out, watching Cloud timidly. Self-consciously she began to brush the dirt from her clothes.
“Outside, Samantha,” Mrs. Moseley said. “We don't want none of that dirt in the house.”
Cloud couldn't help wondering how it would ever be noticed, the floor being of dirt anyway. But that was woman's business, and none of his.
Moseley showed Cloud the escape tunnel. “For the kids,” he said, “case the Indians ever swamp us. Comes out in a little clump of brush yonder. Gives the kids a chance to git away. We cover it with that big chest, so the Indians'll never even know it's there.”
A chill worked up Cloud's back. Anytime Lige Moseley and his wife put the kids down that hole and moved the chest back over the trapdoor, they were committing themselves to fight to the death.
“Just such a tunnel as that one saved my life when I was a button in Tennessee,” said Moseley. “Pa and my uncle, they put Mama and us kids into the tunnel and shut
the door behind us. Indians killed them and set fire to the cabin, but they never knew about us. It ever comes to that, my kids're goin' to have the same chance.”
the door behind us. Indians killed them and set fire to the cabin, but they never knew about us. It ever comes to that, my kids're goin' to have the same chance.”
Cloud looked at the Moseleys and wondered what it all led to. It wasn't just Moseley, for there were others like him, all up and down the western line of the Texas settlements. This was the kind of life Moseley and a great many others had lived since boyhood, treading on the thin edge of disaster. They didn't follow the frontier, they led it. They were the “movin' kind,” always on the go, always looking west. Most men who moved west talked of a better life ahead, and Moseley probably talked that way too, when a man sat him down and started him putting his dreams into words. But it wasn't really the better life that motivated Moseley. It was the search itself that gave him his satisfaction.
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