The Carpetbaggers (11 page)

It was dark then and he got to his feet, fastening the club to his belt. He took the horse by the halter and started forward cautiously on foot.

He walked slowly, his ears alert for any strange sound, his nostrils sniffing at the breeze for the scent of a campfire.

He was in luck, for he caught the scent of the campfire from about a quarter mile away. He tied the pinto to a bush and pulled the rifle from the pack on the horse's back. Silently he moved forward.

The whinny of a horse came to his ears and he dropped to the ground and peered forward. He figured the horses were tied about three hundred yards ahead of him. He looked for the campfire but couldn't find it.

Cautiously he made his way downwind from the horses in a wide circle. The smell of the campfire was strong in his nostrils now. He raised his head from the tall plain grass. The campfire was about two hundred yards in front of him. He could see the man, sitting hunched over it, eating from a frying pan. The man was no fool. He had picked a camp site between two rocks. That way, he could be approached only from in front.

Max sank back into the grass. He would have to wait until the man was asleep. He stretched out and looked up at the sky. When the moon was up, a few hours from now, it would be time for him to move. Until then, it would do no harm for him to rest. He closed his eyes. In a moment, he was sleeping soundly.

His eyes opened suddenly and he stared straight up at the moon. It hung white and high in the sky over him. He sat up slowly and peered over the grass.

The campfire was glowing faintly now, dying slowly. He could see the shadow of the man lying near the rocks. He started to inch forward. The man snored lightly and turned in his sleep. Max froze for a moment, then the figure was still again and Max inched forward a little farther. He could see the man's outstretched hand, a gun at the tip of the fingers.

He crawled around behind and picked up a small pebble from the ground beside him. Silently he took the war club from his belt and got up into a half crouch. Holding his breath in tightly, he threw the stone near the man's feet.

With a muttered curse, he sat up, looking forward, his gun in his hand. He never knew what hit him as Max brought the war club down on his head from behind.

Max came back with the pinto about the time that dawn was breaking in the east. He tied his horse to the scrub near the others and walked back to look at the man.

His eyes were still closed. He was breathing evenly though there was a smear of blood along his cheek and ear where the club had caught him. He lay naked on his back on the ground, his arms and legs outstretched tautly, staked to the ground.

Max sat down on the rock and began to whet his knife along its smooth surface. When the sun came up, the man opened his eyes. They were dull at first, then gradually they began to clear. He tried to sit up and became aware that he was tied down. He twisted his head and looked at Max.

"What's the idee?" he asked.

Max stared at him. He didn't stop whetting his knife. "I’m Max Sand," he said. "Remember me?"

Max walked over to him. He stood there looking down, the knife held loosely in his hand. There was a sick feeling inside him as he looked at the man and pictured what must have happened in the cabin. The image chased the feeling from him. When he spoke, his voice was calm and emotionless. "Why did you kill my folks?"

"I didn't do nothing to them," the man said, his eyes watching the knife.

"You got my pa's hoss out there."

"He sol' it to me," the man replied.

"Pa wouldn' sell the on'y hoss he had," Max said.

"Let me up outa here," the man screamed suddenly.

Max held the knife to the man's throat. "You want to tell me what happened?"

"The others did it!" the man screamed. "I had nothin' to do with it. They wanted the gold!" His eyes bugged out hysterically. In his fear, he began to urinate, the water trickling down his bare legs. "Le' me go, you crazy Injun bastard!" he screamed.

Max moved swiftly now. All the hesitation that he had felt was gone. He was the son of Red Beard and Kaneha and inside him was the terrible vengeance of the Indian. His knife flashed bright in the morning sun and when he straightened up the man was silent.

Max looked down impassively. The man had only fainted, even though his eyes stared upward, open and unseeing. His eyelids had been slit so they could never again be closed and the flesh hung like strips of ribbon down his body from his shoulders to his thighs.

Max turned and walked until he found an anthill. He scooped the top of it up in his hands and went back to the man. Carefully he set it down on the man's pubis. In a moment, the tiny red ants were everywhere on the man. They ran into all the blood-sweetened crevices of his body, up across his eyes and into his open mouth and nostrils.

The man began to cough and moan. His body stirred. Silently Max watched him. This was the Indian punishment for a thief, rapist and murderer.

It took the man three days to die. Three days of the blazing sun burning into his open eyes and blistering his torn flesh while the ants industriously foraged his body. Three days of screaming for water and three nights of agony as insects and mosquitoes, drawn by the scent of blood, came to feast upon him.

At the end, he was out of his mind, and on the fourth morning, when Max came down to look at him, he was dead. Max stared at him for a moment, then took out his knife and lifted his scalp.

He went back to the horses and mounted his pinto. Leading the other two animals, he turned and rode north toward the land of the Kiowa.

The old chief, his grandfather, came out of his tepee to watch him as he dismounted. He waited silently until Max came up to him.

Max looked into the eyes of the old man. "I come in sadness to the tents of my people," he said in Kiowa.

The chief did not speak.

"My father and mother are dead," he continued.

The chief still did not speak.

Max reached to his belt and took off the scalp that hung there. He threw it down in front of the chief. "I have taken the scalp of one of the murderers," he said. "And I come to the tent of my grandfather, the mighty chief, to spend the time of my sorrow."

The chief looked down at the scalp, then up at Max. "We are no longer free to roam the plains," he said. "We live on the land that the White Eyes allow us. Have any of them seen you as you approached?"

"None saw me," Max answered. "I came from the hills behind them."

The chief looked down at the scalp again. It had been a long time since the scalp of an enemy hung from the post before his tepee. His heart swelled with pride. He looked at Max. The White Eyes could imprison the bodies but they could not imprison the spirit. He picked up the scalp and hung it from the post then turned back to Max.

"A tree has many branches," he said slowly. "And when some branches fall or are cut down, other branches must be grown to take their place so their spirits may find where to live."

He took a feather from his headdress and held it toward Max. "There is a maiden whose brave was killed in a fall from his horse two suns ago. She had already taken the marriage stick and now must live alone in a tent by the river until his spirit is replaced in her. Go now and take her."

Max stared at him. "Now?" he asked.

The chief thrust the feather into his hand. "Now," he said, with the knowledge of all his years. "It is the best time, while the spirit of war and vengeance still rages like a torrent in your blood. It is the best time to take a woman."

Max turned and picked up the lead and walked down through the camp with the horses. The Indians watched him silently as he passed by. He walked slowly with his head held high. He reached the bank of the small river and followed it around a bend.

A single tent stood there, out of sight of the rest of the camp. Max walked toward it. He tied the horses to some shrubs and lifted the flap of the tent and walked in.

The tent was empty. He lifted the flap again and looked out. There was no one in sight. He let the flap down. He walked to the back of the tent and sat down on a bed of skins stretched out on the floor.

A moment later the girl came in. Her hair and body were wet from the river and her dress clung to her. Her eyes went wide as she saw him. She stood there poised for flight.

She wasn't much more than a child, Max saw. Fourteen, maybe fifteen at the most. Suddenly he knew why the chief had sent him down here. He picked up the feather and held it toward her. "Don't be afraid," he said gently. "The mighty chief has put us together so that we may drive the devils from each other."

ASTRIDE THE WIRY PINTO, MAX CAME DOWN THE RAMP from the railroad car behind the last of the cattle. He waited a moment until the last steer had entered the stockyard and then dropped the gate behind it. He took off his hat and wiped the sweat from his forehead on his sleeve and looked up at the sun.

It hung almost overhead, white hot, baking into the late spring dust of the yards. The cattle lowed softly as if somehow they, too, knew they had come to the end of the road. The long road that led up from Texas, to a railroad that took them to Kansas City, and their impending doom.

Max put the hat back on his head and squinted down the fence to where the boss sat with the cattle-buyers. He rode down toward them.

Farrar turned as he stopped his horse beside them. "They all in?"

"They all in, Mr. Farrar," Max answered.

"Good," Farrar said. He turned to one of the cattle-buyers. "The count O.K.? Eleven hundred and ten head I make it."

"I make it the same," the buyer said.

Farrar got down from the fence. "I'll come over to your office this afternoon to pick up the check."

The buyer nodded. "It'll be ready."

Farrar got up on his horse. "C'mon, kid," he said over his shoulder. "Let's get over to the hotel and wash some of this steer-shit stink off’n us."

"Man," Farrar said, after a bath. "I feel twenty pounds lighter."

Max straightened up from putting on his boots and turned around. "Yeah," he said. "Me, too."

Farrar's eyes widened and he whistled. Max had on an almost white buckskin shirt and breeches. His high-heeled cowboy boots were polished to a mirror-like sheen and the kerchief around his throat was like a sparkle of yellow gold against his dark, sun-stained skin. His hair, almost blue black, hung long to his shoulders.

Farrar whistled again. "Man, where'd you get them clothes?"

Max smiled. "It was the last set my ma made for me."

Farrar laughed. "Well, you shore enough look Injun with them on."

Max smiled with him. "I am Indian," he said quietly.

Farrar's laughter disappeared quickly. "Half Indian, kid," he said. "Your pappy was white and he was a good man. I hunted with Sam Sand too many years to hear you not proud of him."

"I am proud of him, Mr. Farrar," Max said. "But I still remember it was white men killed him an’ Ma."

He picked his gun belt up from the chair and strapped it on. Farrar watched him bend over to tie the holster to his thigh. "You still ain't give up lookin' for them?" he asked.

Max looked up. "No, sir, I ain't."

"Kansas City's a big place," Farrar said. "How you know you'll find him here?"

"If he's here, I'll find him," Max answered. "This is where he's supposed to be. Then I'll go down into West Texas an' get the other one."

Farrar was silent for a moment. "Well, dressed like that, you better look out he don't recognize you and find you first."

"I'm hopin' he does," Max said quietly. "I want him to know what he's dyin' for."

Farrar turned away from the bleak look in the boy's eyes and picked up a shirt. Max waited quietly for him to finish dressing. "I'll pick up my time now, Mr. Farrar," he said when the man had pulled on his trousers.

Farrar walked over to the dresser and picked up his poke. "There you are," he said. "Four months' pay — eighty dollars — an' the sixty dollars you won at poker."

Max put the money in a back pocket without counting it. "Thanks, Mr. Farrar."

"Sure I can't talk you into comin' back with me?" Farrar asked.

"No, thank you, Mr. Farrar."

"You can't keep all that hate in your soul, boy," the older man said. "It ain't healthy. You'll only wind up harmin' yourself."

"I can't help that, Mr. Farrar," Max said slowly. His eyes were empty and cold. "I can't ferget it's the same breast that fed me that bastard's usin' to keep his tobacco in."

The door closed behind him and Farrar stood there staring at it.

* * *

Mary Grady smiled at the boy. "Finish your whisky," she said, "while I get my dress off."

The boy watched her for a moment, then drank the whisky quickly. He coughed as he went over to the edge of the bed and sat down.

Mary looked over at him as she slipped the dress up over her head. "How are you feelin'?"

The boy looked at her. She could see the vagueness already in his eyes. "All ri', I guess," he answered. "I ain' used to drinkin' so much."

She came over and stood looking down at him, her dress over her arm. "Stretch out and shut your eyes. You'll be all right in a few minutes."

He looked up at her dumbly, without response.

She put out her hand and pushed his shoulder. A hint of awareness sparked in his eyes. He tried to get to his feet, his hand locked around the butt of his gun, but the effort was too much. He collapsed, falling sideways across the bed.

Expertly Mary bent over him and lifted his eyelid. The boy was out cold. She smiled to herself and crossing to the window, looked out into the street.

Her pimp was standing across the street in front of a saloon. She raised and lowered the shade twice in the agreed signal and he started toward the hotel.

She was dressed by the time he got up to the room. "You took long enough gettin' him up here," he said surlily.

"What could I do?" she said. "He wouldn't drink. He's just a kid."

"How much did he have on him?" the pimp asked.

"I don't know," Mary answered. "The money's in his back pocket. Get it an' let's get out of here. This hotel always gives me the creeps."