Lonesome Dove, Page 34

  It made no sense at all to Augustus. "Why?" he asked. "Planning to run off after ten years, or what?"

  "No," Clara said. "But I'd want my children to know you. I'd want them to have your friendship."

  It struck him that he was already years late — it had been some sixteen years since Clara held his hand in front of the store. He had not watched the time closely, but it wouldn't matter. It might only mean that there would be more children for him to be friends with.

  "I may just balk in Ogallala," he said out loud.

  Dish was surprised. "Well, balk any time you want to, Gus," he said.

  Augustus was put out with himself for having spoken his thoughts. Still, the chance of settling near Clara and her family appealed to him more than the thought of following Call into another wilderness. Clara was an alert woman who, even as a girl, had read all the papers; he would have someone to talk to about the events of the times. Call had no interest in the events of the times, and a person like Pea Eye wouldn't even know what an event was. It would be nice to chat regularly with a woman who kept up — though of course it was possible that sixteen years on the frontier had taken the edge off Clara's curiosity.

  "Can you read, Dish?" he asked.

  "Well, I know my letters," Dish said. "I can read some words. Of course there's plenty I ain't had no practice with."

  A few hundred yards away they could see Call and Deets riding along the riverbank, studying the situation.

  "I wisht we was up to the Red River," Dish said. "I don't like this low country."

  "I wish we was to the Yellowstone, myself," Augustus said. "Maybe Captain Call would be satisfied with that."

  When they reached the river it seemed that it was going to be the smoothest crossing possible. Old Dog seemed to have an affinity for Deets and followed him right into the water without so much as stopping to sniff. Call and Dish, Augustus and Pea and Needle Nelson spread out on the downriver side, but the cattle showed no signs of wanting to do anything but follow Old Dog.

  The water was a muddy brown and the current fast, but the cattle only had to swim a few yards. One or two small bunches attempted to turn back, but with most of the crew surrounding them they didn't make a serious challenge.

  Despite the smoothness, Newt felt a good deal afraid and shut his eyes for a second when his horse went to swimming depth and the water came over the saddle. But he got no wetter, and he opened his eyes to see that he was almost across the river. He struck the far bank almost at the same time as a skinny brown longhorn; Mouse and the steer struggled up the bank side by side.

  It was just as Newt turned to watch the last of the cattle cross that a scream cut the air, so terrible that it almost made him faint. Before he could even look toward the scream Pea Eye went racing past him, with the Captain just behind him. They both had coiled ropes in their hands as they raced their horses back into the water — Newt wondered what they meant to do with the ropes. Then his eyes found Sean, who was screaming again and again, in a way that made Newt want to cover his ears. He saw that Sean was barely clinging to his horse, and that a lot of brown things were wiggling around him and over him. At first, with the screaming going on, Newt couldn't figure out what the brown things were — they seemed like giant worms. His mind took a moment to work out what his eyes were seeing. The giant worms were snakes — water moccasins. Even as the realization struck him, Mr. Gus and Deets went into the river behind Pea Eye and the Captain. How they all got there so fast he couldn't say, for the screams had started just as Mouse and the steer reached the top of the bank, so close that Newt could see the droplets of water on the steer's horns.

  Then the screams stopped abruptly as Sean slipped under the water — his voice was replaced almost at once by the frenzied neighing of the horse, which began to thrash in the water and soon turned back toward the far bank. As he gained a footing and rose out of the water he shook three snakes from his body, one slithering off his neck.

  Pea Eye and the Captain were beating about themselves with their coiled ropes. Newt saw Sean come to the surface downstream, but he wasn't screaming any more. Pea leaned far off his horse and managed to catch Sean's arm, but then his horse got frightened of the snakes and Pea lost his hold. Deets was close by. When Sean came up again Pea got him by the collar and held on. Sean was silent, though Newt could see that his mouth was open. Deets got Pea's horse by the bridle and kept it still. Pea managed to get his hands under Sean's arms and drag him across the saddle. The snakes had scattered, but several could be seen on the surface of the river. Dish Boggett had his rifle drawn but was too shaken by the sight to shoot. Deets waved him back. Suddenly there was a loud crack — Mr. Gus had shot a snake with his big Colt. Twice more he shot and two more snakes disappeared. The Captain rode close to Pea and helped him support Sean's body.

  In a minute Pea's horse was across the deep water and found its footing. Call and Deets held the horse still while Pea took the dying boy in his arms — then Deets led the horse ashore. Augustus rode out of the water behind Call. The cattle were still crossing, but no cowboys were crossing with them. Bert, the Rainey boys and Allen O'Brien were on the south bank, not eager to take the water. A mile back, across the long clearing, the wagon and the horses had just come in sight.

  Pea handed the boy down to Dish and Deets. Call quickly took his slicker off his saddle and they laid the boy on it. His eyes were closed, his body jerking slightly. Augustus cut the boy's shirt off — there were eight sets of fang marks, including one on his neck.

  "That don't count the legs," Augustus said. "There ain't no point in counting the legs."

  "What done it?" Dish asked. He had seen the snakes plainly and had even wanted to shoot them, but he couldn't believe it or understand it.

  "It was his bad luck to strike a nest of them, I guess," Augustus said. "I never seen a nest of snakes in this river before and I've crossed it a hundred times. I never seen that many snakes in any river."

  "The storm got 'em stirred up," Deets said.

  Call knelt by the boy, helpless to do one thing for him. It was the worst luck — to come all the way from Ireland and then ride into a swarm of water moccasins. He remembered, years before, in a hot droughty summer, stopping to water his horse in a drying lake far up the Brazos — he had ridden his horse in so he could drink and had happened to look down and see that the muddy shallows of the lake were alive with cottonmouths. The puddles were like nests, filled with wiggling snakes, as brown as chocolate. Fortunately he had not ridden into such a puddle. The sight unnerved him so that he shot a snake on reflex — a useless act, to shoot one where there were hundreds.

  He had seen the occasional snake in rivers along the coast but never more than one or two together; there had been at least twenty, probably more, around the boy. On the south bank, the horse he had ridden was rolling over and over in the mud, ignored by the frightened cowboys. Maybe the horse was bitten too.

  Pea, who had been the first to the rescue, swimming his mount right into the midst of the snakes, suddenly felt so weak he thought he would fall off his horse. He dismounted, clinging to the horn in case his legs gave out.

  Augustus noticed how white he was and went to him.

  "Are you snake-bit, Pea?" he asked, for in the confusion a man could get wounds he wasn't aware of. He had known more than one man to take bullets without noticing it; one Ranger had been so frightened when his wound was pointed out to him that he died of fright, not the bullet.

  "I don't think I'm bit," Pea said. "I think I whupped them off."

  "Get your pants down," Call said. "One could have struck you down low."

  They could find no wound on Pea — meanwhile, the cattle had begun to drift, with no one watching them cross. Some were making the bank a hundred yards downstream. The cowboys on the south bank had still not crossed.

  "Gus, you and Deets watch him," Call said, mounting. "We've got to keep the cattle from drifting."

  He noticed Newt sitting beside Pea's horse, his
face white as powder.

  "Come help us," he said, as Pea and Dish loped off toward the cattle.

  Newt turned his horse and followed the Captain, feeling that he was doing wrong. He should have said something to Sean, even if Sean couldn't hear him. He wanted to tell Sean to go on and find a boat somewhere and go back to Ireland quick, whatever the Captain might think. Now he knew Sean was going to die, and that it was forever too late for him to find the boat, but he wanted to say it anyway. He had had a chance to say it, but had missed it.

  He trotted beside the Captain, feeling that he might vomit, and also feeling disloyal to Sean.

  "He wanted to go back to Ireland!" he said suddenly, tears pouring out of his eyes. He was so grieved he didn't care.

  "Well, I expect he did," the Captain said quietly.

  Newt held his reins, still crying, and let Mouse do the work. He remembered Sean's screams, and how much the snakes had looked like giant wiggly worms. When at last the cattle were started back toward the main herd the Captain put his horse back into the river, which startled Newt. He didn't see how anybody could just ride back into a river that could suddenly be filled with snakes, but this time no snakes appeared. Newt saw that Mr. Gus and Deets had not moved, and wondered if Sean was dead yet. He kept feeling he ought to leave the cattle and go talk to Sean, even if it was too late for Sean to answer, but he was afraid to. He didn't know what to do, and he sat on his horse and cried until he started vomiting. He had to lean over and vomit beneath his horse's neck.

  In his mind he began to wish for some way to undo what had happened — to make the days run backward, to the time when they were still in Lonesome Dove. He imagined Sean alive and well — and did what he had not done, told him to go off to Galveston and find a boat to take him home. But he kept looking back, and there was Deets and Mr. Gus, kneeling by Sean. He longed to see Sean sit up and be all right, but Sean didn't, and Newt could only sit hopelessly on his horse and hold the cattle.

  Augustus and Deets could do little for Sean except sit with him while his life was ending.

  "I guess it would have been better if Pea had just let him drown," Augustus said. "He was an unlucky young sprout."

  "Mighty unlucky," Deets said. He felt an unsteadiness in his limbs. Though he had seen much violent death, he had not seen one more terrible than the one that had just occurred. He felt he would never again cross a river without remembering it.

  Before his brother crossed the river, Sean O'Brien died. Augustus covered the boy with his slicker just as the horse herd came clambering up the bank. The herd passed so close that when some of the horses stopped to shake themselves the fine spray wet Deets's back. The Spettle boys came out of the river wide-eyed with fright, clinging to their wet mounts. On the far bank Call had the other men helping to ease the wagon down the steep crossing.

  "Now if them snakes had come at Bol, he would have had a chance," Augustus said. "He has his ten-gauge."

  "The storm stirred' them up," Deets said again. He felt guilty, for he had chosen the crossing in preference to one up the river, and now a boy was dead.

  "Well, Deets, life is short," Augustus said. "Shorter for some than for others. This is a bad way to start a trip."

  Bolivar was unhappy. He didn't think the wagon would make it, even across such a small river, but he was not willing to leave it either. He sat grimly on the wagon seat, Lippy beside him, while the cowboys got ropes on the wagon.

  "You mean Sean's dead?" Allen O'Brien asked the Captain, so stunned he could barely speak.

  "Yes, he's dead," Call said — he had seen Gus cover the corpse.

  "It's me that done it," Allen said, tears on his round face. "I never should have brought the boy. I knew he was too young."

  Call said nothing more. The boy's age had had nothing to do with what had happened, of course; even an experienced man, riding into such a mess of snakes, wouldn't have survived. He himself might not have, and he had never worried about snakes. It only went to show what he already knew, which was that there were more dangers in life than even the sharpest training could anticipate. Allen O'Brien should waste no time on guilt, for a boy could die in Ireland as readily as elsewhere, however safe it might appear.

  Jasper and Bert had seen the snakes, and Jasper was so terrified that he couldn't look at the water. Soupy Jones was almost as scared. The Rainey boys looked as if they might fall off their horses.

  More than anything, Jasper wanted to quit. He had crossed the Nueces many times, and yet, as the moment approached when he would have to do it again, he felt he couldn't. Pea and Dish and the others who had already crossed seemed to him like the luckiest men in the world.

  "Captain, do you reckon them snakes are gone?" he asked.

  "Well, they're scattered," Call said.

  As they got ready to go in Jasper drew his pistol, but Call shook his head. "No shooting," he said. He had no confidence that any of the men could shoot from a swimming horse and hit anything, as Gus had.

  "Just quirt 'em if you see any," he added.

  "I hope none don't crawl in this wagon," Lippy said, his lip quivering with apprehension.

  The wagon floated better than expected — Bolivar barely got his feet wet. Jasper flinched once when he saw a stick he thought was a snake, but the moccasins had scattered and were not seen again.

  Allen O'Brien dismounted and stood and cried over his brother. Jasper Fant cried, too, mostly from relief that he was still alive.

  While they were having their cry, Deets and Pea got shovels from the wagon and dug a grave, back from the river a hundred yards, beside a live oak tree. Then they cut off part of one of the wagon sheets, wrapped the dead boy in it and carried him in the wagon to the grave. They laid him in it and Deets and Pea soon covered him, while most of the crew stood around, not knowing what to do or say.

  "If you'd like to sing or something, do it," Call said. Allen stood a moment, started singing an Irish song in a quavering voice, then broke down crying and couldn't finish it.

  "I don't have no pianer or I'd play one of the church hymns," Lippy said.

  "Well, I'll say a word," Augustus said. "This was a good, brave boy, for we all saw that he conquered his fear of riding. He had a fine tenor voice, and we'll all miss that. But he wasn't used to this part of the world. There's accidents in life and he met with a bad one. We may all do the same if we ain't careful."

  He turned and mounted old Malaria. "Dust to dust," he said. "Lets the rest of us go on to Montana."

  He's right, Call thought. The best thing to do with a death was to move on from it. One by one the cowboys mounted and went off to the herd, many of them taking a quick last look at the muddy grave under the tree.

  Augustus waited for Allen O'Brien, who was the last to mount. He was so weak from shock, it seemed he might not be able to, but he finally got on his horse and rode off, looking back until the grave was hidden by the tall gray grass. "It seems too quick," he said. "It seems very quick, just to ride off and leave the boy. He was the babe of our family," he added.

  "If we was in town we'd have a fine funeral," Augustus said. "But as you can see, we ain't in town. There's nothing you can do but kick your horse."

  "I wish I could have finished the song," Allen said.

  36

  THE WHISKEY BOAT STANK, and the men on it stank, but Elmira was not sorry she had taken passage. She had a tiny little cubbyhole among the whiskey casks, with a few planks and some buffalo skins thrown over it to keep the rain out, but she spent most of her time sitting at the rear of the boat, watching the endless flow of brown water. Some days were so hot that the air above the water shimmered and the shore became indistinct; other days a chill rain blew and she wrapped herself in one of the buffalo robes and kept fairly dry. The rain was welcome, for it discouraged the fleas. They made her sleep uneasy, but it was a small price to pay for escaping from Port Smith. She had lived where there were fleas before, and worse things than fleas.

  As the boat inched its
way up the Arkansas, the brown river gradually narrowed, and as it narrowed the boatmen and whiskey traders grew more restless. They drank so much whiskey themselves that Elmira felt they would be lucky to have any left to sell. Though she often felt them watching her as she sat at the end of the boat, they let her alone. Only Bowler, the chief trader, ever spoke more than a word or two to her. Fowler was a burly man with a dirty yellow beard and one eyelid that wouldn't behave. It twitched and jerked up and down erratically, so that looking at him was disconcerting: one minute he would be looking at you out of both eyes, and then the eyelid would droop and he would only be looking with an eye and a half.

  Fowler drank continuously — all day and all night, so far as Elmira could tell. When she woke, from the fleas or the rocking of the boat, she would always hear his hoarse voice, talking to anyone who would listen. He kept a heavy rifle in the crook of his arm, and his eyes were always scanning the banks.

  Mainly Fowler talked of Indians, for whom he had a pure hatred. He had been a buffalo hunter and had had many run-ins with them. When the buffalo ran out he began to traffic in whiskey. So far neither he nor any of his men had offered Elmira the slightest offense. It surprised her. They were a rough-looking bunch, and she had taken a big gamble in getting on the boat. No one in Fort Smith had seen her leave, as far as she knew, and the boatmen could have killed her and thrown her to the turtles without anyone's being the wiser. The first few nights in her cubbyhole she had been wakeful and a little frightened, expecting one of the men to stumble in and fall on her. She waited, thinking it would happen — if it did, she would only have her old life back, which had been part of the point of leaving. She would stop being July Johnson's wife, at least. It might be rough for a while, but eventually she would find Dee and life would improve.

  But the men avoided her, day or night — all except Fowler, who wandered the boat constantly. Once, standing beside her, he knelt suddenly and cocked his rifle, but what he thought was an Indian turned out to be a bush. "The heat's got my eye jumping," he said, spitting a brown stream of tobacco into the water.