Spake As a Dragon (34 page)

A few hours later they had reached the
fork in the road. Malinda did not hesitate; she drove her wagon
onto the fork headed to the right. William in the cart behind
followed her closely. “Sary pick us out a place to camp and we will
make that river sometime tomorrow afternoon. We’ll camp out on this
side and at first light we will drive these wagons across that
river like ‘Moses to the Promised Land’.”

They camped the night in a grove of
trees with a spring nearby, but at first light they were once again
driving down the road to, hopefully a place to ford the river. The
road was flat, muddy but wide enough to allow passage in a
favorable manner by mid-afternoon they had reached the river;
however, the rains of the past few days had swollen the river to
almost flood stage.
No way,
thought Malinda
, is this
river only three or four foot deep
.

“
Sary, old friend, I don’t
think God ever intended us to get to South Carolina. We’re just
going to camp here for a few days until the flood water subsides so
we can ford over to the other side.”

“
Mizz Malinda, you be
wrong that ole Devil has done throwed everthang in our way but
don’t you never don’t believe it was God that has got us through
each and ever time, and He’s gonna help us again. Don’t give up now
girl, we’s will jest keeps on prayin’, you’ll see it’ll work
out.”

After supper Stephen went to the edge
of the water and poked a straight stick about eight feet long down
into the water.

“
What’s you doin’ Stephen
are you crazy?” One of them asked.

“
Nah, this is my measuring
stick – you see each day we can see how much the water in the river
has dropped, once it gets down to the three or four foot mark we
can move on across. I took some axle grease and marked the four
foot line.”

“
Thank you Stephen, that
was really smart for you to think of the stick,” Malinda said
patting Robert on the back.

The first day the water dropped almost
one whole foot, a foot dropped the second day. “At this rate,”
Malinda said, we may get to move out of here in a couple of more
days.”

It is the afternoon of the fourth day,
“Mama! Mama!” Hollered Stephen.

From the campfire Malinda yells,
“Lands sake what is the matter with you child?”

“
The stick, I can see the
grease at the four foot mark!”

They all run to see Stephen’s stick
for themselves.

“
Sary, you and the kids
pack up the wagons tonight, tomorrow we’re going tocross this
river! In a week, we’ll be home at Scarlett.”

The next morning they awake to a
slight frost, “Sary, we didn’t get out of those mountains a day too
soon.”

Malinda moves out into the water
first, at four feet deep the water would come about half way
between the wheel hub and the top rim. She checks her wheel, half
way it is. William follows in the second wagon, it is a bit smaller
and the water is almost to the top of the wagon wheel
rim.

About half way across Malinda checks
her wheel again, the water is at the top of the rim. William is
ever worse; his wheels are below the top of the water. His wagon is
about to start floating. Any deeper and he is going to lose control
of his wagon. Malinda is really worried, what if the water gets
deeper?

To keep Blaze close to the front wagon
little Lizzie is in the back of the wagon feeding grass with one
hand to Blaze with the other she held the wooden box containing the
big old family Bible. William and Isaac are in the wagon
seat-urging Blaze onward. “Oh no!” Yells William looking to his
left. A large tree branch broken off by the floodwaters is floating
swiftly toward them. “Hang on everyone, a tree is about to strike
us!”

It was too late the tree rammed into
Malinda’s wagon with a sharp “thud.” William had stopped Blaze to
let the limb past between the two wagons, but the impact knocks
Lizzie from her perch in the rear of the wagon into the cold water.
William yells, “Grab the wagon Lizzie!” But it is too late she is
being carried down the raging, rain-swollen river. Handing the
reins to Isaac, William without hesitation jumps into the swirling,
ice cold, waters and swims as hard as he can toward Lizzie. Malinda
and Sary can hear her calling for help. They are helpless. Both sit
and watch as the muddy floodwaters carry Lizzie and William out of
sight and out of hearing. “Do something,” yells Malinda at Sary,
“Do something!” There is nothing they can do – Malinda’s two
children have disappeared into the murky waters!

Both wagons forge on and reach the far
bank, they are now in South Carolina, but no one cares – Malinda
has just lost her oldest son and youngest daughter to a river whose
name she can hardly pronounce.

Malinda sits in the wagon seat head
buried in her hands crying. Crying as only a mother who has just
witnessed the loss of two children can cry. Finally, she pulls
herself together and steps down from the wagon, walks over to the
riverbank and collapses into the mud.

Sary sets up camp with the hope
William and Lizzie might, by chance, come walking back in. In her
heart, she knows it is hopeless. No one could survive in the muddy,
cold, rain-swollen river, no one, not even William as big and
strong as he is.

They sit around the campfire, but no
one speaks. The silence is deafening. No one knows what to say.
Finally, it is Mattie Ann who asks, “Mama, what are we going to
do?”

Just the sound of one of her children
speaking brought Malinda back to reality – she has four other
children that are still alive and must be seen after. She remembers
the verse from Matthew, ‘
But Jesus said unto him, Follow me; and
let the dead bury their dead.’

“
I’ll tell you what we are
going to do – we are staying here a couple of more weeks in case we
hear from William and Lizzie, then we are leaving
this...this...place and going to our old home with our family
cemetery. The cemetery where Little Paul, Cecelia June, Lester,
Grandfather and Grandmother Scarburg, and Robert’s uncles William
and Isaac are buried; Robert’s father and his mother, my mother and
father, oh Sary I cannot forget about your little girl Sarah, and
Uncle Willie and his wife are all there too. We are going to add
two new graves to our family cemetery at Scarlett. We may not ever
see William and Lizzie’s earthly bodies again, but we are going to
have a funeral, and there will be a place for them where we can
always go talk to them when the need arises. Now let’s all get some
rest, we have a long day ahead of us tomorrow.”

Chapter Forty

QUARTER HORSES

Luke and Nate buried the four
gunslingers in the horse trot that led from the barn to the
pasture. Luke figured the graves will be trampled down by the
horses and the burros, so anyone coming looking for them will never
find their graves.

After returning to the house, they
take inventory of the items retrieved from the men at the cabin and
now those from the gunfighters that were just buried. Laid out on
the sitting room floor is an assortment of pistols, rifles and
knives.

From the men at the cabin are a
collection of three Colt handguns, two Henry carbines and two
six-inch and one eight-inch skinning knife. From the gunfighters
add five more Colt .44s, two additional Spencers, two Henry’s, two
more six-inch skinning knives and enough ammunition to supply an
army. “At least,” said Luke, “we will have enough firepower on our
trip to Alabama; however, one of the gunfighters recognized the
Henry with the initials “B.T.” carved on the stock, he said it
belonged to a Buck Thomson. Now I don’t know who this Buck Thomson
is, but he might have more friends that could recognize his old
Henry. As bad as I hate to Nate take it to the fireplace and burn
that rifle. We can’t have anyone poking around and seeing that old
Buck is no longer among the living.”

“
Luke, I love me them
Henrys. What about if I just take the stock off the main part and
jest burn the wood part. Won’t that work? Maybe later I might find
me a nuther stock and fix’er backup.”

“
Sure Nate, that will
work, just get it done. And throw all their saddle gear in the loft
above the barn, cover it with hay so no one can see what is hidden.
And Nate, while you’re at the barn take all their saddle horses
over to the back pasture and turn them loose and let them graze,
there is plenty of grass and water. We do not want them around if
someone comes prying.

A couple of weeks later Nate enters
the house. Luke is changing the bandage on Sam’s leg. “Looks good,
it is healing nicely, you need to get out of this room and begin to
move around soon.” The bedroom door opens, “Yes, Nate was there
something you need?”

“
No sir Luke, I mean yes
sir Luke, there’s riders coming to the house. Appears to be ‘bout
ten, as fer as I can see.”

Luke arrives on the front porch as the
riders approach. “Gentlemen,” said Luke, “get down from your mounts
and rest yourself, I’ll have the missus bring out some cool water.
Speaking of water that’s a trough over next to the barn let your
animals refresh themselves also.”

Nate, standing back near the door,
couldn’t understand what Luke was up too, but he didn’t
speak.

“
You men been long on the
road? If you’ll allow, I’ll get my missus and my man here to get
you some vittles.”

Catherine, standing just inside the
door, thinks to herself,
“My Missus? My man? What is he
doing?”

“
Uh, thanks, but we’re in
a hurry,” spoke the group’s apparent leader. “My name is Burt
Black, I need to ask you some questions?”

“
Questions sir? Are you
gentlemen law officers?”

“
No, not exactly, we are
just looking for a few of our friends. One of them is my
brother.”

“
Well, of course, but
won’t you dismount and we can talk cordially here on the porch in
the shade.”

“
No, we must be on our way
– my brother and the other three were riding western style riding
gear. They were all mounted on Texas quarter-horses.”

“
Huh? Western style riding
gear? Texas quarter-horses? Sir we are just simple farmers working
the land with a couple of old plow horses, I don’t know if I’ve
ever seen western gear or a quarter-horse, I don’t believe I would
have known what they look like,” Luke answered.

“
The saddles and the
horses would appear like ours. That’s what they’d look like –
they’d look like ours you nitwit!”

Luke steps from the porch walks around
Bert’s horse paying special attention to various features of the
animal. He slid his hand over the horse’s flank, “Quarter horses
you say? Fine animals, yes Sir fine animals, Nate,” Luke said
gesturing toward Nate standing on the porch, “I’d wager you could
plow two or three acres a day with these fine animals, what’d you
thank?”

“
Yes sir, boss, we might
git a good three outta ’em.”

“
Plow ’em, you idiots,
these are prime Texas quarter-horses!”

“
But Sir, they appear to
me to be full size,” said Luke to the leader.

“
Full size! What are you
some kind of a nit-wit? Yeah! They are full size.”

“
Oh, I’m sorry, I thought
you done said your friends wuz riding quarter-horses, but your
quarter of a hoss is full size.”

“
It’s a breed you
dirt-farmer, just a prime breed of horse from the great state of
Texas. Plow ’em? Are you two stupid, these are the countries finest
cattle horses, not dirt-farmer’s plow horses!”

“
I’m truly sorry,”
pretended Luke to be embarrassed, “well then, there was these four
riders who passed here two or three weeks ago riding, as you say,
regular size horses like these of you’rn, but they headed up and
over the mountain.”

“
They say
anything.”

“
Yeah, they wuz talkin’ to
each other, but I couldn’t hear from here to the road what they wuz
a sayin’. It’s jez to fer, you see.”

Turning to his men, “These two are too
stupid to get anything out of them, water the horses at the trough
and check the barn.”

In a few minutes the men mounted their
horses, one turned to Bert, “Nothing in the barn boss, ‘cept a
couple of old plow nags and two burros.”

The leader dug his silver spurs into
the side of his horse and off the men galloped toward the front
gate. At the gate, they turned left and continued up the
mountain.

Wildly swinging the screen door,
Catherine burst onto the porch, “What are you doing Luke, you
sounded like a pure hayseed!”

“
Great, then it worked!
That was exactly what I wanted them to think – we didn’t want those
fellers searching about, the leader said one of the outlaws we
killed was his brother. I don’t think he would have taken it too
kindly if he found out it was us who killed him.”

“
Good thankin’ on yer
part, what now Luke,” asked Nate?

“
I suppose that bunch is
going to get to the top where the snow hasn’t melted yet, they will
quickly see there have been no tracks leading over the mountain.
They may or may not know of Lucas’ cabin, if so they may go there
next. Regardless, in a week or so they’re going to be coming back
down here and they will have figured I lied to them. Do I need to
tell y’all it’s going to get nasty, and we’re outnumber three or
four if we count Sam to ten. Those aren’t good odds in our favor.
We’ve got those Spencer and Henry carbines, but I noticed most of
them had Spencers too.”