The Cassidy Posse (14 page)

Maureen came to the doorway and posed prettily for the two men at the table, gracing them with a girlish smile.

“She can get it herself,” Mary said curtly before Butch and Elzy even got the idea of volunteering to help.

“My life will be a lot easier when I get that one properly married,” she said in a motherly tone. “The oldest Jacobs’ boy has been coming around real regular, but they had a fight last night because he was talking to Caroline Haliday after church on Sunday. We got to get this patched up because Mrs. Jacobs wants that boy married and out of the house. She needs the room. Imagine having a nineteen-year-old son and still having babies. That’s the way it is out here though.”

Mike watched the concern on the face of the handsome woman across from him. She was maybe in her late twenties but had somehow over the years slipped into the role of the mother. Ironically she bore no resemblance to the two younger siblings who had the characteristic Irish sandy red hair and upturned noses. Her darks eyes, copper colored complexion and high cheekbones suggested she was part Indian. He remembered that Jack had made a point of saying she was only his half sister.

Several hours had passed before a springboard buggy drawn by a tired-looking old horse pulled up in front of the Cassidy ranch house. The aged physician needlessly pulled back on the reins to stop. He was assisted as he stepped down by a tall young man who was glancing anxiously at the door. When it opened, Maureen was the first person through it. She hurried to the end of the porch and took Doc Fellers by the arm, escorting him in without even a sidelong glance at young Eldon Jacobs. The farm boy was being gently manipulated in ways he would probably never understand. Someday as a tired old man with grandchildren surrounding him, he may silently wonder how it all happened, but it really wasn’t important in the way of things that he ever knew.

“Where’s this lad who’s all busted up?” Doc Fellers demanded once inside.

“He’s over here,” said Mary. “What took you so long?”

“I don’t even know why I’m here,” he retorted. “You usually take care of these things yourself. Besides, it just so happens I was delivering a baby.”

“That’s what I heard,” said Mary enthusiastically.

“Young Eldon here has a baby sister,” he announced proudly.

“Oh, Eldon, that’s great!” shouted Mary, temporarily deserting Pat’s side to give the embarrassed farm boy a hug. A smile lit up her face and she looked a decade younger.

“Oooh,” groaned Pat, trying to get the doctor’s attention where he felt it belonged.

The doctor spotted his new patient and parted the crowd of well-wishers to get to him. He gently felt Patrick’s arm and the bone poised to break the surface of the skin. He looked at the ashen-faced young man staring at him apprehensively.

“Boy, this is a bad break,” the Doctor concluded. “I bet that hurts like hell.”

Mary leaned over to Mike and whispered, “Doc Fellers isn’t known for his bedside manner, but he is really good.”

“Okay, all you people clear out and give the boy some air,” yelled the Doctor. “He don’t need a crowd of gawkers standing around. Mary, you stay close in case I need you.”

Butch and Elzy went out to tend the horses and made themselves scarce. Maureen and young Eldon went out on the porch and circled about waiting for the other to speak first. That left Mike alone with Mary. They sat at opposite ends of the large oak kitchen table.

“This is uh fine table,” said Mike in an attempt to make small talk.

“Oh, yes, it’s been with us since I was a little girl. It was made in England. My father traded it for a horse. This family was trying to haul it all the way to Oregon with them and had to give up the idea before they went over South Pass.”

“Sound like damn fools. This thing must weigh uh couple hundred pounds,” he said gruffly. “Were they English?”

“No,” she laughed. “Actually they were from Ohio.”

“Why are yuh laughin’?” asked Mike.

“You sound like my father. He hated the English too. He never explained why.”

“Hundreds ov years ago the English took over Ireland,” said Mike. “They treated us like prisoners in our own country. You had to kiss an Englishman’s arse to be allowed to live.”

“I guess I should be twice as bitter as you then, Mr. McGhan,” she said coolly. “I’m half Irish and half Sioux.”

She had him there. Mike felt like Bockleman had him in one of his checkmates. He grunted an acknowledgement of agreement and watched his own nervous hands as they drummed on the fine English table. A lot of questions came to mind that he didn’t want to ask.

“He was in the cavalry, my father,” she said, reading his thoughts. “He deserted. It was nothing to be ashamed of. At least he never was. It was quite common. It was hard to get troops to come out here to fight during the Indian Wars. He was recruited right off the boat in New York City in ‘66. The year after the great war back East ended. He only joined as a way to get out West where he heard there was free land.”

“How did he and your, uh mother, uh,” stammered Mike.

“He won her in a poker game,” she said with a smile. “She told me that. He always said that God brought them together.”

“How’s that?”

“The night my father planned to desert he had picketed two horses with supplies in a ravine by the camp. He had money because he was quite a good cardplayer. What he was worried about was sneaking past the sentry after ‘lights out.’ When he went out to see who was posted nearest his escape route, he found the sentry and another drunken trooper arguing over an Indian girl they had captured that day. She was a virgin and they both wanted to be first with her.”

Mike squirmed in his seat at her frankness.

“He thought she was beautiful,” she continued, “and could in no way leave her with these two. He told them he would give them each ten dollars and bet them he could win it back from them by ‘lights out’. If he did, they would have to let him have her for the first night and he would leave her tied up in the ravine for them the next night.”

“He musta won since you’re here,” Mike concluded, “but why didn’t he just give them each duh ten dollars to have her? Wouldn’t he uh got out ov there faster?”

“Ten dollars was a large part of a trooper’s pay back then,” said Mary. “My father may have been smitten, but he wasn’t ever foolish with money.”

“So did they come after him?”

“They made a half-hearted effort. There were lots of desertions and he got a pretty good head start. The sentry was supposed to cover my father for bed check. I guess when he didn’t come back from the ravine the next morning, the sentry wasn’t any too anxious to report my father missing since he was involved. My father always felt there was some kind of divine plan involved that allowed him to save my mother and give him time to make his escape.”

“A religious card sharp,” said Mike. “He musta been an unusual fella.”

“I guess he was unusual,” she agreed. “He never played cards after that. His father was a card sharp and a no-good to hear him tell it. Never worked a day in his life. Just hung around the local Irish pub and let his wife and son take in laundry. My father learned how to play cards from his father, but he never approved of it. He only used the skill when he needed to. He always wanted to own land and be a farmer. My father wanted to be a respected member of the community. He was helping members of the church when he and my stepmother caught the influenza and died.”

“Yuh said stepmother. What happened to your mother?”

“Oh, she died when I was a child,” she said sadly. “After they escaped, he planned to turn her over to some government agency because she was quite young. When he saw how things were, he couldn’t bear to do it. He put her in the care of some sisters at a church up around Sheridan. He would come and check on her regularly. She became a Catholic and they were married when she was probably about sixteen. I was born a year later. When I was five, smallpox killed her. She had no immunity to the white man’s diseases.”

“Do yuh remember her?”

“Yes, I do,” she said fondly. “She was beautiful. Tall and graceful. I think she felt she was not completely accepted but she never mentioned it. My earliest memory of her was when someone had called her a squaw. She walked past the man proudly without looking his way. Then she broke down in tears and held me and told me I was part of her people, the Sioux. I should never be ashamed of that.”

“So do folks around here accept you?”

“On the surface,” she said, turning in her chair and staring out the window. “Somewhere in the back of their minds, I will always be a half-breed though. That’s the way it is out here.”

“Why dun’t yuh leave then?”

“I have responsibilities that I just can’t walk away from,” she said defensively. “I’m a teacher in the local school. There’s this place and my sister and brother.”

“Dun’t you mean your half brother?” asked Mike. “He seems to make it a point ov letting everyone know you’re only his half sister.”

She gave Mike a hurt look and quickly got up and went to the sink to busy herself with dishes. Mary must have inherited the graceful form that made her mother an enchantress. She was one of those people you just enjoyed watching as they went about doing what might be very ordinary tasks like stretching to put cups on the top shelf.

“Mary, come over and give me a hand,” shouted the cantankerous old doctor. “I’m going to need some help setting this arm. And bring a bottle of whiskey. I know Jack must keep one around here someplace. It will be all the anesthetic this young feller needs.”

Mary went to his aid, and soon Pat was screaming as if he were being murdered. When they had finished, Doc Fellers came over and sat at the table with Mike.

“Bad break,” said the Doc, putting the bottle of whiskey on the table. “Mary, you got a couple of glasses? I’m sure where Mr. McGhan comes from they don’t just pass the bottle around.”

“You know where they’re at Doc,” shouted Mary. “I haven’t finished forming this cast yet.”

“Ah, hell, I tried to be civil,” said Doc, taking a swig from the bottle and passing it over to Mike.

“No, thank yuh, Doc,” said Mike waving off the half empty bottle.

“Suit yourself,” he said, taking another swig. “I’m getting too old for this shit. That buggy I bought claimed to have the best ride ever and my ass still hurts.”

“How’s Pat goin’ to be?” Mike finally asked.

“Well, he ain’t gonna be riding out of here too soon. He’s got a compound fracture. I’ve seen worse, mind ya. The bone didn’t splinter but it’s still bad. He also has a couple of cracked ribs. All we could do was wrap them and try to keep him from moving around too much.”

“For how long?” Mike asked anxiously.

“At least a couple weeks before he should ride.”

“Damn,” said Mike in exasperation.

“I’m sorry if that doesn’t fit your timetable,” said Doc. “These things happen.”

“Yuh dun’t understand,” said Mike. “We’re chasin’ a fella that some very important people back in Chicago want found. He’s runnin’ with a bunch ov no-goods that already got uh couple days head start on us.”

“Oh, yeah, Red Alvins and his bunch,” said the Doc. “Jack got into a bottle of whiskey over at the Jacobs’ and was telling everybody about it. He don’t understand how Butch Cassidy could be leading a posse.”

“It’s not really Cassidy’s posse,” Mike said with a shrug. “I didn’t put it together, but I guess it’s mine.”

“Well, I wouldn’t worry about it. Butch Cassidy is an outlaw, but he just steals from the rich Eastern cattle barons and bankers. He spreads the money around to the little people when he’s got it to spare. I don’t know whether he’s a Robin Hood or just smart like a politician, but he’s well thought of in these parts.”

“I guess. It’s just we never sprung anybody outah jail tuh lead a search party in Chicago.”

“Things are different out here. A man is known by his reputation. Cassidy once rode all night through a blizzard to get medicine for a little girl. He’s always been good for his word, so nobody has a problem with him leading a posse. Nobody except Jack, that is. He has been fretting for the last couple years about Butch making the Cassidy name famous before he had a chance to.”

“That’s his problem?” asked Mike.

“Well, young Jack is quite a hand with a gun. He wins the shooting contest every year at the Fourth of July celebration. He wants to make a name for himself too.”

“As an outlaw?”

“I don’t think it makes that much difference to Jack whether it’s as an outlaw or a lawman,” Doc said thoughtfully. “He seems to change direction every time I see him. He’s been reading those dime novels about Wild Bill Hickock and Dead Eye Dick ever since I taught him to read. He just seems to want to be famous, and it’s eating him up that he ain’t.”

“Did yuh say you taught him tuh read?”

“Oh, yeah,” Doc said. “He wouldn’t learn from his sister Mary. Said some terrible things about not learning from a half-breed. I didn’t want to take him on with his attitude and all, but Mary begged me to. I agreed if she would help me out doctoring. She has a natural gift for healing. I heard her father was a powerful Sioux Medicine man. Don’t know if there is any truth to it. Anyhow, it’s a damn shame she couldn’t go to medical school. She has a fine mind. Good with the books.”