Maude March on the Run! (18 page)

He pushed his visor back. “She likes to read,” Maude said, as if she were apologizing for me. “But she's always looking for true stories.”

“What true story would you have me tell?” he said, still looking at me.

“There are stories all around,” I said. “It's only the lack of recognizing them that keeps them a secret from you.”

There was a silence while he digested the fact he didn't get the whole of what there was to know, but he didn't get a lie, either.

“That's the right spirit,” he said finally. “Out here, a man with the right spirit is his own boss. He only needs a printing press.”

“He needs more than that,” I said. “He needs readers.”

This got a short laugh. “My name is John Kirby,” he said. “I'm easy to work for.”

“Why is that?” Maude said.

“Because I'm a poor man of business.”

For reasons I can't explain, this made Maude smile. “It's too bad, then, that we aren't looking for a job. Only a newspaper.”

I saw Rebecca outside and nudged Maude. We said a speedy good-bye that brought John Kirby to the door to see us off.

“You haven't told me your name,” he said to Maude, holding out his hand to be shaken.

“Maude Waters,” she said, after a moment. “This is my sister, Sallie.”

I didn't care for the sudden light in his eyes.

We went with Rebecca to the store. Standing by the window, I saw John Kirby didn't make a hurried trip to any other office, such as the sheriff 's. In fact, I could see him at his window, bent over pen and paper.

Rebecca bought ham and potatoes and stewed dried corn, ready to eat, and some greens that hadn't been boiled quite gray. I couldn't fault her choices, though I couldn't cheer the last.

But then she turned to me and said, “Greens are not my preference, but the doctor insists on them.” We smiled in the way of having a secret to share.

She asked then for a dried apple pie. I had already seen she hardly considered the price of a thing. She considered first the wanting of it, which was a thing I wasn't used to but was most prepared to admire.

Me and Maude carried the purchases on the way back to the wagon. We trailed behind Rebecca like ducklings on the busy boardwalk.

We were coming up on a glass-fronted barbershop. Maude pulled at my sleeve and whispered, “Sallie. If there's a newspaper to be found, it'll be in there.”

“It would've been easier to get in there whilst I was dressed like a boy,” I said. We had come to a stop, and so did Rebecca, although I didn't think she could hear much of what we said.

“Just dawdle past,” Maude said.

I would, of course, but I couldn't resist saying, “That isn't much of a plan.” Maude pinched me, though Rebecca was looking on. The terrible thing about being orphaned is big sisters do not have to worry about being caught at picking on the younger.

I slowed as I passed a fellow sitting outside, waiting on a haircut. He was cleaning his fingernails with a pocketknife. At the back side of him, in the shop, another fellow held a St. Louis paper. I was able to read it through the thinly soaped window.

The article interested me.

I read as fast as I could, stepping to one side where the window was too cloudy to see through. Then his turn came up, and he folded the paper away.

Maude and Rebecca were some three or four shops distant, waiting to go inside. Rebecca went inside when I looked that way.

I hurried over to Maude. “They've shot her,” I whispered.

“Who?” But I could see on her face she did know.

I said, “They tried to arrest her, but then she was killed in the shootout.” By my lights, this was cause for dancing.

Maude looked confused. “There, where we left them?”

“Not that one,” I said. “There's another. This one was over St. Louis way.”

Maude didn't look overjoyed. “That's awful.”

“It's awful for her,” I said. “But it's fine by us.” “Sallie, I don't like it you're so cavalier about that girl's death.”

“Cavalier?” I said. I could see Maude was not in her dancing mood. Maybe I ought to care about that other girl; I could see Maude's point of view. But I didn't know that girl. She wasn't my sister. And she may not have been a nice person, either.

“I don't want to see that article,” Maude said. “It's up to you what you read, but I don't want to read of my death.”

I had not thought of it in this light.

W
E STUCK CLOSE TO THE
A
LDORADONDOS THE REST
of that day. I looked over my shoulder once or twice, worried about the light John Kirby had in his eyes.

“Sallie.” Maude called me away from
Digger McGee, Gold Miner, Forty-niner.
I snatched up my basket and stopped at the doorway as I threw the strap over. I caught a glimpse of John Kirby, standing on the boardwalk. He was watching Maude.

“Come on, Sallie,” she called, and I climbed down.

I had lost interest in the selling of tobacco. I may have given a packet or two away without collecting the funds. Each time I looked again, I couldn't see him, but I didn't doubt he was there in the shadows.

I hoped Marion was somewhere about as well.

My fingers trembled over taking money, and I chided myself for the nerves. I rode on the wagon seat as we left town and glared into every dark corner. I kept my shotgun beside me as I slept, but it was no help with the bad dreams.

I rolled the gun up in my bedroll the next morning, ready to hand, as I stared out the back door of the wagon. I didn't
see a telltale billow of dust following us, and I was glad of it. I didn't mention the matter to Maude.

I had this to say for the doctor, he made good time. This was as much due to the horses' strength and willingness to move that wagon as it was to grease on the wheels, but I credited the man.

Still, I had a place I needed to be. To Maude, I said, “Have you seen Marion and forgot to mention it?”

“No.”

“When do you expect him to show himself ?” I said.

Maude said, “It won't be much longer.”

“Does that mean tomorrow? The next day?” I said this because I had grown fond of Rebecca. “Maybe we should tell them they have to look for another helper.”

“Don't pester me,” Maude said.

From this I knew she was troubled about it.

We made a stop at midday. Wandering Creek looked much the same as any other town, except smaller than most we had stopped in so far. “It looks too small a place to bother with,” I said.

“No stop is too short to make a dollar,” Dr. Aldoradondo said.

I shrugged, putting my basket together. I tended to pick from the bottles I liked best. I went outside to stand near Maude, who was in her dress with the spangles. Her hair was mostly hidden by the daytime bonnet Rebecca gave to her.

Dr. Aldoradondo threw open the side of the wagon and started talking. “Ladies, I bring you sure relief from all your ills and a rapid recovery!”

For a town so minor, we drew quite a crowd over the
course of the afternoon. Once finished, we turned right around and began the evening business.

For such a small place, Wandering Creek was lively after dark. It had only the one saloon proper. On the other hand, any number of establishments stayed open after regular business hours, pouring from gallon jugs. I had a clear view from where I stood.

I had only to see the grimace on the face of a man who swallowed it down, and see how he shook his head, to know how fierce was the stuff he was drinking. I figured he was soon to be a customer.

At the boot maker's place, they had a piano, and a woman with a loose gray bun of hair on the top of her head bounced around on the piano seat rather vigorously as she played. Despite the odor of glue and boot polish, they had a fair turnout.

We worked late into the evening and then readied ourselves to go. I'd just brought my horse away from the water trough when we heard a commotion coming from the end of the street.

The flickering torchlight showed us there was a tight group of people coming our way.

T
HINGS COULD LOOK STRANGE IN THAT LIGHT. SHAD
ows could turn the kindest face into a fearful mask, but even weighing that in, these didn't look like a friendly bunch.

To Maude, I said, “We can ride away from this whole mess,” but I wasn't surprised to read in the look she gave me that this trouble was our trouble. “Get in the wagon,” I said. “I'll ride my horse till we're out of here.”

Maude said, “Don't let anyone stop you.”

The team had begun to stamp and snort. Dr. Aldoradondo climbed into the wagon seat. My horse turned in place nervously; I fought to get my foot in the stirrup. I was still in my gingham.

I flung my leg over. I couldn't be bothered to be ladylike.

There was a woman at the center of maybe a dozen people. “He called it a sure cure,” she yelled. I remembered her from the early crowd, for her eyes were wild then, too.

There were men coming out of the saloons and greeting the noise with wild hoots of their own. I urged my horse forward, thinking Dr. Aldoradondo was likely to make a run for it any second.

“Here now, what's all this about,” he said over the noise.

Mostly women made up this angry crowd, but a few men stood bunched in front of the horses. They were shouting things like, “Here, don't you be going anywhere,” and, “Catch 'ose hosses, don't let 'em run.”

Voices rose, calling Dr. Aldoradondo a quack, a fake, a death monger. This last was a new word but sounded to me like a serious accusation to throw around.

A man yelled to someone else to come on out and catch the show and was answered with the clomp of boots and a swing of bat-wing doors.

“I paid my money, and I fed it to my mother,” that woman shouted. “Warn't ten minutes later she rolled over and give up the ghost.”

“Hang 'im,” someone on the edge of the crowd shouted. Matters were getting out of hand. A gunshot into the air could have a quieting effect if it came at the right moment. But our cache of pistols was in the wagon with Maude's rifle.

“How old was this woman in question?” Dr. Aldoradondo said. “How ill? Perhaps she was simply too far gone to expect medication to do anything for her.”

The woman shouted, “She warn't taking your potion for illness, just her back hurt.” And then she broke down and sobbed loud sobs.

I would've liked to say these were what Aunt Ruthie used to call crocodile tears, but they looked and sounded genuine to me.

“It poisoned her,” another woman called out. “There is nothing in my elixir that could do any harm,” Dr. Aldoradondo said.

His voice overshadowed those raised in question and in anger, but now something else was at work besides the actual grievance. Some of the men gathered there had come away from drinking, and they had come away in the mood to look for trouble. They would find it. Or cause it, either one.

I could see I had the right of it. Others of the men who had lately joined in were deciding it was just good sense to back out of the tide of anger and resentment, rather than try to fight it.

At least I figured that might be why a few of them were going back to the saloons. However, this left several people in the street who would never listen to reason.

In the next instant, the noise rose suddenly to sound as if twice as many men were shouting. Three fellows jumped the wagon and pulled Dr. Aldoradondo to the ground.

One of those men hit his own head on the wagon seat.

It started in to bleed, real fast. It wasn't Dr. Aldoradondo's blood, but the sight of it running down that man's face made my heart thump all the harder. I was yelling at the top of my lungs. I tried to ride into this fray, but my horse sidled off to one side, away from the racket.

One of the wagon horses had begun to fight the traces by lifting off his front feet. He couldn't buck, but he jigged the other horse into more frantic snorting and blowing and stamping around. Their jostling knocked a man into the horse trough.

The team shied and danced at the splash, flinging their heads up and down, unnerved by the racket of so many voices raised to shout, and maybe the smell of blood.