The Rock Child (9 page)

Surely this was impertinence. Burton cocked an imperious eyebrow at the dolt. The factotum’s face, he observed with pleasure, turned to watery whey.
Splendid to be able to addle a man with just an eyebrow
.

They turned into an ill-lit hallway. “Not physically alike,” he added, mumbling now. “Something in the …” The sentence petered out. Burton suppressed a smile.

Outside a rough-looking frontiersman waited, dressed in the outfit Burton had come to associate with army scouts. “Sir Richard Burton,” said the factotum, “Porter Rockwell.”

Burton suppressed a laugh.

“Sir Richard,” said Rockwell, offering his hand, and Burton had to suppress another.

“Pleased to see you again,” he said, shaking.

They had met at a stage station on Burton’s previous trip, the explorer and the avenger, introduced by the owner.

Burton corrected, “
Captain
Burton.”

“
Not
Sir Richard?” asked Rockwell.

Burton decided on a policy of largesse. These Americans, or rather Mormons, were simply unacquainted with the social niceties. “One should be delighted to be so honored, but alas not yet.”

“You wanna be Sir Richard, then?”

Burton was at a loss for words. “Naturally, one …”

“A man should have what he wants when he wants it. Sir Richard you be to me,” said the scout, grinning monstrously.

“It’s improper.”

“I was borned improper,” answered Rockwell. “Sir Richard.”

Preposterous,
thought Burton.
But utterly American
. He was amused.

Now Burton regarded two fine-looking mounts. “If you’re ready,” said the big man.

“Of course,” said Burton.

Porter Rockwell
. Burton almost laughed out loud. He turned to the factotum. “Thank you,” he said in dismissal.
Splendid. Brigham Young provides me with a tour of his country guided by a notorious killer. More than notorious
. To Brigham Young’s virtues of subtle and discriminating intelligence and powerful will, Burton now added a virtue he wouldn’t have guessed, a sense of humor.
At the same time this is an admonition,
Burton realized.
Assigning the head of the Danites as my guide is a warning
.

Rockwell mounted and waited.

Oh, Mr. Rockwell, I know your reputation, the Destroying Angel of the Mormon Church, the most feared man in Utah Territory
. Burton had traveled widely in the East, the Middle East, and even to deepest Africa.
Yet I doubt I have had the privilege of beholding a man as purely dangerous as this one
.

He swung into the saddle and drew alongside Rockwell. He was exhilarated.

And that dolt all but said Rockwell and I are alike in spirit!
Burton was vastly amused.

“Your call, Sir Richard,” Rockwell said. He gave a mirthless smile.

“I understand there is good whisky to be had in Ogden,” said Burton.

Rockwell laughed, a rough sound, a child’s fantasy of an evil laugh, and touched his heels to his horse.

What similarity was the factotum imagining? Intimidating aspect, I suppose
.

The two men rode down the middle of the wide road as though it were theirs not by command or even ownership but by natural law. Burton eyed the other man curiously. They were both in middle age yet bore an aura of physical power. Each was about six feet, strongly built, rugged-looking. Each sat his horse like a saddle-toughened soldier. Each had an air of readiness, capability, self-assurance. Each was graying a bit, though Burton wore his hair as a gentleman and Rockwell as a border ruffian, long and plaited into a braid. They had faces much aged by hard experience, Burton forty-two, Rockwell somewhat older. They had the eyes of soldiers who have seen many battles, many deaths, and much savagery. Both had the courage, Burton would guess, to admit to much that is evil in all men, including themselves.

But doubtless the factotum saw that each of them had a face that by itself could make men quail. Burton had a mad-looking scar on his left cheek, where a Somali spear passed through. He also possessed what was called the Gypsy eye, which focuses on a man severely until he feels his innards are exposed, then refocuses beyond him, on something visible only to the beholder. The Gypsy eye was unnerving.

Rockwell’s look was simpler. It was careless violence, a love of mayhem, a look of pure malevolence as fine as Burton had seen even in Asia and Africa.

He chuckled to himself. He imagined the effect of the two of them simply walking into a bar for a drink. The Americans would see two very dangerous coons, as they quaintly put it. Some would go quickly elsewhere, and ease the constriction in their throats with the whisky the Mormons opposed, made illegal, and provided illegally at high prices.

“What would you care to see beyond Ogden?” asked Rockwell civilly. Then he added softly, “Sir Richard.”

Burton shot him a glance meant to be withering, but answered only, “I’m at your disposal.”

“Bear’s ass!” said Rockwell, and gave a mocking sideways grin. Burton was delighted to hear this Mormon expression, which he had already recorded in his notebook. It was an ejaculation of approval. “Bear’s ass! So you have come to see the elephant. I will by God show him to you
every bit, trunk, legs, and twitching tail.” A flick of amused eyes. “Sir Richard.”

“To the queen!” Burton proposed, and lifted his whisky.

“To Deseret!” answered Rockwell, ever the Mormon partisan. He downed his in one toss.

“Wheat!” Rockwell exclaimed.

Burton couldn’t second “wheat,” but he recognized it. A few nights before he had listed it in his copious notes as a “Mormon neologism for
good.
” To Burton’s educated tongue, however, no Western whisky was wheat. The only standard of quality for Western whisky, Burton had heard, was how far a man could walk after he drank it. The shorter the walk, the better the whisky.

Rockwell slugged down the second glass.

During the last two days Burton had satisfied some of his curiosity. They were doing very well, the Mormons. Brigham Young was shrewder and far more determined than the U.S.-appointed governor of the territory, and the vast majority of politicians. With the advantages of the vast distances of the West and the fanatical devotion of his followers, he would outwit the United States in nearly any way he cared to. Burton had no doubt that the Saints would succeed.
People of religious fervor usually do
.

However, he remained befuddled and intrigued by his companion. Was Porter Rockwell a Saint in spirit? Abundant signs said he wasn’t. For one thing, Rockwell liked his whisky.

As Rockwell brought another glass to his lips, Burton said, “Do you not agree with ‘The Word of Wisdom’ then? Are you a free thinker?”

“A man holds truths he cannot live to,” said Rockwell. “Yet a square drink will not condemn a man to eternal dying.”

Burton noted the language of Joseph Smith on Rockwell’s tongue. He also thought one of the drinkers at the next table was showing undue interest in the conversation.

“You’re a good chap to lift a glass with,” Burton said.

“I’ll drink Valley Tan, mint juleps, brandy smashes, whisky skies, gin slings, cocktail sherry, cobblers, rum salads, streaks of lightning, and morning glories,” said Rockwell, his eye slyly on the eavesdropper. “I’ll imbibe tarantula juice, awerdenty, coffin varnish, rattlesnake juice, or Pass brandy. Some months I exist mostly on bottles, flasks, demijohns, corbozes….” Rockwell seemed to take sudden thought. “Occasionally
I even drink with gentiles.” He smiled at Burton. “Like you, Sir Richard.” He held the bottle out toward the back of the stranger. “And you, eavesdropper.”

The eavesdropper turned his head and regarded them. Then he gave a slow smile and arose, glass in hand. “Believe I will,” he said. His companion also rose and extended a glass. Rockwell poured, and the men joined Rockwell and Burton. Names and handshakes were not exchanged. From the look of curiosity on his face, Burton supposed that the gentile knew Rockwell by reputation.

Eve, Burton named the eavesdropper in his mind, because Eve is the source of all human troubles. Gent, he named the other, short for gentile, and because the fellow was not genteel. From their accents both were Southerners. Eve had the look of a gentleman, Gent a ruffian.

“I was asking my companion his view of sin,” Burton began.

“The two blasphemies against the Holy Ghost,” intoned Rockwell, “which shall not be forgiven in this world or out of it, are shedding innocent blood and adultery. Those who commit these abominations shall be destroyed by the Lord our God.”

“You Mormons commit adultery every night,” said Gent.

Burton eased his chair back. If the Destroying Angel took a notion to purify Deseret of one gentile, Burton wanted to be able to stand clear.

Rockwell gave him a grin. “You gentiles have hearts filled with lust,” he said. “So you imagine we …”

Burton smiled to himself.
Is it possible I’m going to hear a rousing debate between a Mormon and a gentile about the system of plural marriage?

“I am no polygamist,” Rockwell told Gent ominously. “I have but one wife.” He did not add, a wife I see only now and then.

Burton wondered if Gent or Eve knew danger when he saw it.
I hope neither of them is the sort of idiot who imagines to make his reputation by whipping a notorious bad man
. Without looking at it, he let himself be aware of his knife, an
assegai,
a short sword of the Zulu, which would be very effective in these close quarters.

He tried diplomacy. “I have observed polygamy firsthand in Asia and Africa,” said Burton. “I don’t believe it will work among us, but it works among them.”

“Are you saying,
Sir
Richard, that you think plural marriage is a nigger thing?” Rockwell’s gaze was amused and malicious.

Tingle
. Burton was surprised and delighted by the pleasure this whiff of danger gave him.
If Rockwell and I fight, one of us will die very quickly
.

“I’m saying it works in many parts of the world.” He held Rockwell’s eye.

“Hooray,” said Gent. “Listen to John Bull stick up for the Mormons.” The fellow at least drew Rockwell’s venomous gaze away from Burton.

“I merely report what I have observed, which is that it works well among the Muslims.” Now he addressed Rockwell. “Are you aware of Mohammed’s teachings on the subject?”

Rockwell cocked an eye. He was willing to change moods, be amiable.

“‘If you have only one wife,’ says the Prophet, ‘she will think herself your equal and take on airs. If two, they will quarrel eternally. If three, one will be nicer than the others, and they will collude against her, making her life miserable. Four, however, is a different story. Four wives will give each other companionship and become a family. It is the ideal number.’”

“And higher numbers?”

“To have more than four is forbidden,” said Burton. “So says the Prophet.”

Rockwell’s eye glinted. “Not our Prophet, Sir Richard, not our Prophet.”

“You don’t see nothing wrong with them marrying all them wives?” whined Gent.

“Indeed I do. My complaint of womanhood in Salt Lake City is what the sailor says of the sea.” He embraced the city with his outspread arms. “Water, water everywhere, nor any drop to drink.”

Rockwell chuckled. So did Burton. Rockwell laughed heartily, and Burton joined him.

“Amazing that anyone would defend polygamy,” said Eve, “in this day and age.”

Amazing that you bait Porter Rockwell!
Dressed head to toe in black, his hair loose and wild and hanging to his waist today, Rockwell looked a Destroying Angel right enough, or a devil.

“Abraham was a polygamist,” said Rockwell, eyeing Eve.

Eve is detached. Fascinating
.

“King David, too. Nor does the Constitution of the United States say anything against it.”

“We of the South hold no brief for that document on any account. What would
you
say for polygamy?” Eve said to Rockwell. He spoke in a genteel drawl, Gent in an uncouth mountain twang.

“Our people are virtuous, our cities and villages are clean. Yours are cesspools of sin.”

“Such a gracious description,” said Eve. He turned to Burton. “What about the cities and villages of your Asia and Africa?”

“Yeah, how does it sit among the niggers?” added Gent.

Burton looked at them with the greatest curiosity.
Perhaps they are simply mad
. He replied, however, judiciously. “We might better ask ourselves how the system of monogamy is working in our countries—adultery rampant, divorce frequent, houses of prostitution everywhere.”

“Everywhere but Deseret,” put in Rockwell.

“Yes, of course, the utopia of Deseret,” said Eve.

“What do you think about niggers, Rockwell?” The ruffian Gent again.

“Yes, it is Mr. Rockwell, isn’t it?”

So they do know. Curiouser and curiouser
.

“I prefer people white and delightsome,” said Rockwell.

Burton eased his chair back. He wanted a clear field of fire. He did not feel afraid, except of a murder charge in a Mormon court.

“No doubt you think God does, too,” said Eve. “I agree. So why do you Mormons act like niggers?”

Burton felt the air turn electric. He waited. His hands tingled wildly.

Rockwell jumped up and roared.

Burton went for his
assegai
and leapt forward—
get inside their muzzles
.

Eve and Gent jerked up and retreated, going for their sidearms.

Rockwell raised the entire table in his massive hands and charged.

Eve and Gent fell over chairs and their feet and each other. Rockwell slammed the table down, crushing them to the floor. He leapt into the air and stomped the table with both feet.

It’s over. Will he kill them?

Rockwell took a slow step next to Gent and kicked him viciously in the head. Gent’s head snapped, and his eyes glazed.