Jingo Django (14 page)

And then I struck something. I yelled out and we both got down on our hands and knees and began scraping away the dirt.

In a minute or so we uncovered a pair of fat saddlebags. The leather was dry as paper, but it held together as we unbuckled the first sack and looked inside.

“Splendid,” Mr. Peacock-Hemlock-Jones remarked.

“First rate and a half!” I declared.

The sack was gleaming with gold pieces. They shone in our faces like mirrors.

“Cactus John wasn't a common thief,” Mr. Peacock-Hemlock-Jones grinned. “He was no doubt the meanest,
pettiest,
most astonishing
sneak
thief the West has ever known. He'd wait for the dark nights and then lift out his corner posts and move his fences. He was stealing land from his neighbors — a couple of feet at a time! That's what the sheriff told me. He swore it was true — you can see for yourself it was. I paced back to where the northwest corner post must have originally stood — the fool must have uncovered these saddlebags in the night without knowing it.”

“And covered them over again!”

“Exactly.
If your gypsy eye hadn't recognized that
patrin
we'd still be digging thirty feet off the mark. Now, let's get back to town. We've a race to run.”

We began lifting the rotting bags carefully when a voice came rumbling through the air.

“That will do, gentlemen! Aye, and thank ye both for saving us the labor!”

General Scurlock halted twenty feet away, with a cocked pistol in his left hand. Beside him in the blazing sun stood Mrs. Daggatt, and she looked mad as a whole nest of hornets.

“You!” she bellowed. “You insolent little snip! You ungrateful offcast of creation! Is this the way you repay me for raising you up a little gentleman?”

“Yes, m'am,” I said calmly.

“Trying to snatch away my treasure!”

“Our
treasure, me dear Daggatt,” General Scurlock said.

She kept her baggy, scowling eyes fixed on me. “Thought to cheat me of a few comforts in my old age, didn't you?”

“Yes, m'am,” I answered, matching her scowl for scowl.

“Come, come, Daggatt,” said General Scurlock. “Lost treasure belongs to him what finds it. Or can get away with it, eh?” He turned to Mr. Peacock-Hemlock-Jones. “Now, sir, if you and the lad will kindly step clear I won't be obliged to use this pistol.”

Mrs. Daggatt whipped a furious look at him. “Don't be more of a fool than usual. Can't you see it's them or us?”

“On the contrary, madam,” said Mr. Peacock-Hemlock-Jones. “We are totally unarmed. The boy and I relinquish all claim. The treasure is yours. It was far more important business that brought us to the border.”

General Scurlock gave a satisfied snort, but he kept the pistol leveled in our direction. We clambered out of the hole and they clambered in. Mrs. Daggatt was quick to lay open the gold, but the slow way her eyes took in the feast you'd think she was counting every piece.

“I believe you'll find it all there, madam,” said Mr. Peacock-Hemlock-Jones.

General Scurlock chuckled and addressed himself to the problem of lifting the heavy saddlebags across his shoulder.

“Me dear Daggatt, I don't have three hands. If I can trust ye to hold the pistol I'm sure ye won't do anything rash.”

Mr.
Peacock-Hemlock-Jones and I exchanged quick glances. General Scurlock meant to see us dead, but a trace of military pride must have kept him from shooting unarmed men. He knew Mrs. Daggatt was not a woman to balk at anything. So did I.

She took the gun in her hand as if it were the treasure itself. Slowly I reached for the fetching stick in my hip pocket. As I watched her I saw a new and treacherous gleam spring into her eyes. The way she now gazed at General Scurlock I calculated she meant to use the pistol on
him
as well.

“Come along,
chavo,”
Mr. Peacock-Hemlock-Jones murmured, as if to say the greater the distance the better the opportunity for Mrs. Daggatt to miss.

But I stood my ground, letting the string uncoil from my stick. As General Scurlock heaved the saddlebags over his shoulder I eyed a hornet's nest hanging directly above their heads.

In an instant I flicked out with the
kidda-kosh.
It whipped around the nest and I jerked back. The nest fell, split at their feet and a great roar of hornets erupted.

Then
I ran. And so did Mrs. Daggatt. And so did General Scurlock, leaping madly toward the river.

When I glanced back Mrs. Daggatt had gone over the fence like a stampeding bull. And she kept going, with a cloud of hornets following along in an unholy temper.

Mr. Peacock-Hemlock-Jones yanked me off my feet and threw me into the underbrush. We lifted our heads and watched General Scurlock wading into the river. The rotting saddlebags had already begun to break apart and now gold pieces fell like leaves from his shoulder.

He stopped short, up to his knees in the river, and his arms going like a windmill to fend off the swarm. The saddlebags slipped from his shoulder. He was howling something fierce. I thought at first it was the hornets, but he appeared to be sinking in the mud.

“Daggatt! Daggatt!” he bellowed. “Quicksand!”

I raised myself a little higher. Mrs. Daggatt couldn't hear him. She was hopping about like a jackrabbit on the distant horizon. I looked back at the river.

“The gold's sinking away,” I muttered.

“So is General Scurlock.”

We watched for a while, until the swarm of hornets found more interesting business to attend to. Then we ventured closer. Mr. Peacock-Hemlock-Jones loosened a fence pole and held it
out
like a fishing rod.

“The gold's been sucked under!” he remarked. “That was very clumsy of you, General!”

General Scurlock's lumpy nose was swelling up and red as live coals. “Save me, sir! Haul me out!”

It was about as easy as hauling a hog out of a scalding tub. Finally he was sprawled and panting at the edge of the river. A moment later he raised his head and gave us a weak little smile.

“All that treasure quicksanded, eh? How deep do ye reckon it'll sink?”

“Clear to China,” Mr. Peacock-Hemlock-Jones replied.

23

THE HORSE RACE

It was only when we mounted our horses that I realized I was hornet-stung, and so was Mr. Peacock-Hemlock-Jones. He had trouble sitting his horse and I watched him ease the torment as best he could.

“I'm dreadful sorry, sir,” I said.

“Sorry? Why, you saved our lives with your
kidda- kosh,”
he answered.

“But now the gold is lost!”

“We don't need it. Never did.” And unaccountably he emptied out the goatskin of drinking water.

I gazed at him in stark wonderment. It seemed a buffle-brained thing to do, the day already afire, and I was not accustomed to Mr. Peacock-Hemlock-Jones doing buffle-brained things.

“You feverish again, sir?” I asked.

“Never felt better,” he said, with a squint of pain. He slipped off his horse to walk the rest of the way. “But I must confess I'm not in proper shape for that confounded J. Cooter Williams. I'd be obliged, Django, if you'd run the competition for me.”

I tugged at the green
diklo
knotted about my neck. “You're feverish for certain.”

“What gives you that notion?”

“You poured out all our drinking water.”

He nodded. “I did. In order to win the race.”

By the time we reached Crooked Elbow my mouth was so dry I could have spit cotton. It was past noon, and the whole town seemed to have turned out for the occasion. I wished we would just keep moving. The only thing we were going to win in that race was a monstrous horse laugh.

Mr. Peacock-Hemlock-Jones led the way straight to the hotel. J. Cooter Williams watched
us
approach, guzzling beer in the shade of the porch. His polished boots were still propped on the rail. You'd think he was a hotel statue someone put out in the morning and took in at night.

“That man was born tired and brought up lazy,” Mr. Peacock-Hemlock-Jones said. “I don't think he's well thought of. Look at the crowd watching us. Unless I miss my guess they'd like to see us beat him.”

It was true. The faces along the boardwalks seemed uncommonly warm and friendly. But they didn't look especially hopeful. Just kind of sad about the whole thing.

“You're late,” J. Cooter Williams smiled. “I was beginning to figure you were all talk and no horse race.”

“You figured wrong,” Mr. Peacock-Hemlock-Jones said.

J. Cooter Williams barked out a laugh and rose to his feet. “Then what are we waiting for? There's my filly tied to the rail and rarin' to go. How far do you want to race?”

I gazed at the filly, a silky chestnut that had the look of harnessed lightning.

“Merely to the end of the street and back,” said Mr. Peacock-Hemlock-Jones.

J. Cooter Williams' face sagged. “That ain't much of a race, mister.”

“You'll find it long enough. As I recall, you said any distance and any conditions.”

“I said it
then
and I say it
now.
Put up your money.”

“One moment,” Mr. Peacock-Hemlock-Jones remarked.

“That takes care of the distance. I'll hold you to two conditions.”

“Take six,” J. Cooter Williams laughed. “Why, both your horses together couldn't outrace a bull-maggot!” Then he pulled a heavy purse out of his shirt and tossed it to a loose-jointed man wearing the tallest hat I ever saw. “Sheriff, you hold the stakes. There's my five hundred cash dollars. Count 'em. I want this all done legal.”

I came close to giving out a great sigh of relief. We couldn't race. We didn't have a cent to put up.

But I hadn't counted on Mr. Peacock-Hemlock-Jones. “Mr. Bodger,” he called. “May we exchange a few private words with you.”

The leading citizen of Crooked Elbow joined us between the horses, and you never heard such whispering.

“Wouldn't you like to dislodge Mr. J. Cooter Williams from your hotel porch, sir?”

“Indeed,
I would,” answered Mr. Bodger. “But he's too ornery to move on. Won't do a lick of work, except to keep his boots polished. Racing's his game.”

“What would happen if we beat him in this contest, sir?”

“He'd be laughed out of town. Couldn't show his face.”

“You're a man of property here in Crooked Elbow. A reversal in fortunes this morning has reduced us to an acute embarrassment of funds. We can't match Mr. William's purse. I'm asking you to put up the necessary stakes for us.”

Mr. Bodger began to scratch through his squirrel tail sideburns. “It's a terrible temptation, sir. But you can't beat his filly.”

“There's always a first time, Mr. Bodger, and if you're any judge of character you can see that I'm not a fool.”

There was a silence and then J. Cooter Williams called out impatiently. “We going to race horses or have a jawing match?”

Mr. Bodger glanced at the porch and tightened down one eye. “Cooter, I reckon you've met your match. Sheriff, is my word good enough for you? I'm backing these plow horses, five hundred dollars guaranteed.”

J. Cooter Williams whipped his hat to the ground and almost laughed himself out of his boots.

“Mount your filly, Cooter,” said the sheriff. Then he turned to Mr. Peacock-Hemlock-Jones. “Cooter has agreed to your conditions, sir, but I don't recall hearing what they was. Do you mind repeating them? We want everything legal-like.”

By that time I was so thirsty I was gazing longingly at the water in the horse trough. But Mr. Peacock-Hemlock-Jones had firmly instructed me not to touch a drop of water.

“As I am unable to engage in equestrian competition,” he said, “the boy here will substitute for me, riding my veteran racehorse, Sunflower. That's the
first
condition. Now let me see, gentlemen. The
second.
I counted five saloons along this side of the street and six on the other. At the shot of a pistol each rider will race to the first saloon, dismount, rush in, have a drink, rush out, mount up, ride to the next saloon, dismount, rush in, have a drink, rush out, mount up, ride to the next saloon, dismount, rush in, have a drink, rush out, mount up and continue in this manner. The first one to make it back, without missing a single saloon — wins the race.”

“Agreed!”
J. Cooter Williams roared, and began barking again. “Agreed! Agreed, sir!”

“The beverage will be milk.”

The laugh strangled in J. Cooter Williams' throat. He turned chalky white.
“Milk!”

“Certainly, sir,” said Mr. Peacock-Hemlock-Jones. “I don't intend to have the boy served hard liquor.”

I was perishing with thirst. I won the race by three saloons.

24

THE MAN IN THE DARK

The last time I saw Mrs. Daggatt and General Dirty-Face Jim Scurlock they came straggling into town, leading their horses and wagon. They scuttled along, red as lobsters.

She was so hornet-stung and puffed up you could hardly see the eyes in her face. General Scurlock's nose had blossomed out like a ripe tomato. I think they would have snarled at each other, but I calculated it hurt too much.

“Howdy,” Mr. Peacock-Hemlock-Jones said, tipping his straw hat to them. But they weren't feeling exactly social toward us and when they learned there was no doctor in town they kept moving. As far as I know they didn't stop until they reached Matamoros.

I spent a good part of the afternoon on the hotel porch with my buckskin boots propped on the rail. Once or twice I thought about the quicksand sucking down the saddlebag treasure deeper and deeper. It was enough to make a parson cuss, but Mr. Peacock-Hemlock-Jones had shrugged it off and I shrugged it off, too. I reckoned myself uncommon lucky. He had plucked me out of the orphan house and here we were more than two thousand miles away in Crooked Elbow, Texas.