Hard Twisted (24 page)

Christ, I already told you. They just moved on. Or maybe they fell into the goddamn river. How the hell should I know?

They arrived in John's Canyon after dark. They parked the car by the line shack, and Palmer bade her wait as he disappeared into the frozen night. After a while returned with a lantern.

The sky outside was starless. He took her arm and led her to his old excavation, where a humped mound now rose in the yellow
lamplight like some ancient tumulus. He lifted the lantern to reveal a low stone facade framing a small crate-plank door.

Surprise! he told her.

Lottie crawled forth into the bitter dawn with her blankets still around her. She stood, blinking and shivering. Frost was on the car and on the roof of the line shack, and a vast and glistening sea of frost blanketed the canyon floor, broken only by the smoking hulks of the cattle.

From the lee of the shack rose a wisp of woodsmoke, and she heard after a moment the thin and tinny melody of a harmonica.

She walked toward the sound, moving quietly, and upon rounding the corner saw the broad back of Jake Shumway, the old sheriff's grandson. He sat before the cookfire with his sheepskin collar raised, his head wreathed in semaphores of breath frost as he played a song of delicate beauty that contrasted starkly with his brute size and with his bleak and empty theater.

She listened for a long time. Until, although she'd made no sound, the playing stopped abruptly and the boy stood as though bitten and turned to face her in blank and wordless wonder.

He removed his hat.

The ground was black and trampled where the sheep stood bleating near the canyon narrows, and although their winter fleece was thick, she could see that the animals were thin, and listless, and that many of the yearling lambs were gone.

Ain't there any better forage than this? she asked Palmer, who sat the new pinto horse with the new JP brand, smoking and watching the flock.

Yeah, he said. Right through that pass yonder.

How long have they been out here?

Palmer took a final drag and flicked the glowing butt, startling the horse. They brung the car on Friday. That makes it four days.

You reckon they'll be goin anytime soon?

He fished his makings from his shirtfront.

They been tradin off the watch. The old man stays a few days, then Harrison, then the kid. Sometimes they overlap. They was all gone for Christmas, but now they're back at it. He chuckled mirthlessly. I'm startin to think maybe they don't trust me.

Lottie slacked the reins and rose from the seat of the old buckboard wagon and gathered the blankets to her chin. These sheep need water, Clint. They need food.

You think you're tellin me somethin I don't know? The horse backed at the rise in his voice. You think I got stupid while you was off layin in a warm bed havin breakfast brought to you on a tray?

He sawed the horse and kicked it, hazing the sheep as he went.

When Lottie woke the next morning, the Oliver car was gone. She walked behind the line shack to where the cattlemen's firepit lay black and cold, and she shielded her eyes to count the horses moving loose among the beeves.

As she circled back to the dugout, a shape draped on the shack's door handle stopped her. It was, she realized, a coat. A heavy, sheepskin coat.

By the time Palmer crawled from the dugout disheveled and blinking like some wild thing undenned, Lottie had already groomed their horses and built a fire and started the coffee. Now
she stood looking westward, her shadow long before her on the hard and frozen ground.

What'd you do, skin a bear?

She was all but lost inside the coat, which hung from her shoulders and sheathed her hands and almost trailed the ground.

They're gone.

He looked to the shack, then he looked to the girl.

What's the matter? You get your heart broke?

What?

Don't give me what. He flapped his arms over the fire. I was born of a night, but it wasn't last night.

You don't know what you're talkin about.

I'll tell you what I know. Two days you been back, and I ain't had so much as a hug from you. He crouched and blew into his hands. I reckon that's the thanks I get for freezin my ass out here, mindin them sheep and buildin you a nice home.

I didn't ask you to build no home.

But you'll sleep in it though.

Maybe I will and maybe I won't.

By God, would you listen to this. You'd think she'd gone and growed a backbone in that hospital.

Maybe I did. Maybe when you was too busy to pay me a single visit or write me a single letter, maybe you just didn't notice.

Write you a letter? How? With what? And who'd be mindin them sheep if I went off to go visit?

Seems like when it's somethin you want to do, you always find a way.

I told you that baby was your own damn affair!

She turned and stalked off toward the buckboard.

Hey, where you goin? I ain't done with you. Hey!

He grabbed her by the collar, yanking her backward. She struggled and thrashed as he pulled the coat from her shoulders and then from her grasp, walking it to the fire.

You think you're too good for me now, is that it?

He held the coat over the flames until the shearling caught and crackled and the flames rose almost to his hand. He dropped the smoking heap onto the fire.

You're a bastard! You're a no-good murderin bastard!

That's right, sister. You finally got me figured out.

He kicked at the coat, and the coat flipped over, and the fire flared anew.

And I'll tell you somethin else. You even think about tryin to leave me out here and I'll kill you. And I'll kill every last one of them lambs. And then I'll kill that boyfriend of yours just for the fun of it.

You're crazy.

He laughed. Damn right I'm crazy. I been crazy all my life.

Three days later, Palmer reined the pinto horse as twin plumes of dust rose thin and soundless from among the distant monuments. He lit a smoke and watched for a long time as the cars came into view.

Who is it?

Damned if I know.

The cars as the riders approached them had stopped on the roadside with their doors open, and three figures now stood waiting in the wind. Lottie recognized the Goulding Chevrolet and the Oliver Model A Ford behind it. She trotted Henry up beside the pinto and brought him to a halt.

Mike Goulding held her fluttering kerchief at her chin.

Hello, honey! We missed you at the hospital! We ran into Mr. Shumway on the road, and he told us you were out here!

That was right thoughtful of Mr. Shumway, Palmer said as the boy Jake removed his hat and stood a foot on the running board.

I'm sorry, Lottie said. They was supposed to tell you.

Goulding stepped forward to stand beside his wife.

How you making out with them sheep?

Fair to middlin, Palmer replied, looking again to the boy. Given the limits of the situation.

How's your chuck holding out?

Palmer spat. Could use some tobacco.

Oh! Mike said. I almost forgot!

She hurried to the Chevrolet and returned with a package wrapped in paper that she handed up to the girl.

Merry Christmas, honey.

Lottie held the box with both hands and rested it on the pommel. She looked at Mike and shrugged. I ain't got nothin for you.

That's all right. Maybe you can come visit soon, and that'll be gift aplenty. In fact, maybe we could wait right here while you run and—

That's enough, Goulding told her.

The wind gusted and the pinto horse backed and fidgeted and Palmer walked him in a circle.

Go ahead and open it, baby.

Lottie tore at the paper. She opened the lid and lifted a baby doll pink and naked from the box and pressed it to her shirtfront.

Do you like it?

She nodded, her eyes tightly closed.

What do you say? Palmer chided her as Mike turned with a hand to her mouth and ran back to the car.

Goulding kicked at the ground. Well, he said, I guess we'll be getting on. I'll put tobacco on the list.

He walked to the driver's door and stopped there and nodded once to Palmer, who nodded in reply. When the doors had closed and the engine started, the Chevrolet swung wide in the roadway, leaving in its wake a swirling cloud that when it cleared left only the boy still standing with his hat in his hand and his foot on the running board.

It was a Thursday late in February when the coast was next clear and they drove the bleating sheep in through the bottleneck, Lottie on Henry and Palmer on the little pinto, and no sooner did she close the gate behind them than the snow began to fall.

She trailed the flock into the canyon with her collar raised and her hat brim lowered as the sheep jostled and cried and fell away in a mad rush toward water, leaving her alone with no sound but her horse's footfalls on the frozen hummocks and these yet muffled by the lightly falling snow.

The ride was several miles along a narrow bench shaped to her left by the horseshoe bends of the river gorge and to her right by the red mesa rising from its steep buttresses of talus. She passed by tilted boulders pocked with ancient petroglyphs, and she passed the old Seeps campground where stone dolmens stood as mammoth cairns to mark the river's progress.

By the time she'd reached the dugout the storm had already passed, and she dismounted and moved among her charges counting heads. She shooed the bellwethers and divvied up the sub-herds and noted the various markers. When her count was finally
finished, she walked to where Palmer sat huddled and shivering by the fire, like something swept in with the flock.

They's four missin, she told him.

Four? You sure it ain't three? Or six?

Speckles' bunch is missin one, and Blackie's bunch is missin one, and—

All right already, you're givin me a headache.

He'd fished his makings from his pocket and was rolling a smoke with stiff and frozen fingers.

I'll take the wagon, she told him. I'll need help if they's one needs liftin.

Shit! He flung the half-rolled cigarette and stood and wiped his nose with his sleeve. I said I was comin, didn't I?

Back outside the cattle gate, Lottie drove the buckboard north and east along the mesa while Palmer, riding Henry, cut a straight path eastward toward the Garden. The snow had already melted and the ground was soft in places and she looked for tracks or sign left since the thaw. The buckboard rasped and sawed as the Appaloosa horse marked a steady pace with Lottie rising at intervals to scan the broad horizon.

She was almost to Bell Butte when she heard the engine sound. She whoaed the horse and stood again listening. Then she sat and clucked and turned the wagon back again toward the canyon.

Palmer and Henry were stopped and listening, skylighted on a low rise. She rolled to a halt beside them, and he nodded in the direction they faced.

You hear it?

It sounded like Mr. Oliver's car.

Palmer leaned and spat. That's what I thought. Shit.

What're we gonna do?

You got the rifle back there?

I think so.

He stood down and loosed the catchrope and tied Henry to the back of the wagon.

Move, he said as he climbed over the wheel with the pistol in his hand. He laid it on the floorboards by his feet.

Put that away before you get us both shot.

Shut up.

He hawed the Appaloosa forward, and they crossed the rolling plain tilting and jostling in the direction of the roadway. From there they headed westward, and as they wove their way along the escarpment, they came at last upon the open cattle gate. Farther on they encountered the first of the sheep streaming outbound from the canyon.

Goddamnit.

Soon the sheep were flowing past on both sides of the wagon. Farther still they saw the old sheriff on his walking horse, cutting and shouting and swinging a lariat.

You son of a bitch! Oliver bellowed as the wagon pulled abreast. He dropped a loop and swung the rope, lashing at Palmer's face. Palmer ducked, blocking the rope with his arm as he bent for the gun.

Don't!

Palmer came up firing.

His first shot blew a pink cloud into the air and onto the neck of the walking horse. Lottie screamed as the Appaloosa reared in its traces, sending the other shots wild.

The walking horse bolted. Palmer turned and reached for the rifle, and when he found it, he jumped clear of the wagon.

More shots rang out behind her. Lottie grabbed the reins,
turning in time to see Palmer in a firing crouch and Henry backing on the catchrope and the Oliver horse snubbed and twisting as the sheriff drew a rifle from his scabbard. The old man tried to turn his horse, but his arm fell limp and his lone shot went wide as he toppled from the saddle.

Clint!

The echo of the final gunshot died among the boulders. The only sounds remaining were the bleating of the sheep and the tinkling of bells and the wind in the river gorge below them. Palmer rose and wiped his face with his shirtsleeve.

You see that? He gestured with the rifle. Whoo!

He sauntered toward the walking horse, which stood now with its head lowered and its reins trailing beside the fallen rider.

Lottie clambered down and rushed to where the sheriff lay splayed on his side. Palmer rolled him with a foot. Blood was everywhere.

Is he dead?

The old man's forehead was scraped where he'd fallen. His mouth was open and his eyes were senseless and red mud was caked in his mustache and on his eyebrow.

He's dead all right. I guess he wasn't so tough after all.

Palmer's eyes scanned the trail by which they stood.

You seen what happened. Self-defense is what it was.

He left her stunned and staring, and he walked back to the buckboard. He returned holding his pistol by the barrel.

Take it, he said.

What for?

I want to see you shoot him.

What?

Shoot him. Hit him right there in the chest.