Conagher (1969) (6 page)

From time to time she peered throug h the loop holes, but there was nothin g stirring. All was still, scarcely a breath o f air moving. She could see sunlight on th e grass out in front, the horses standing i n the corral, and the view down the trai l toward the Plaza, miles away. Within th e cabin it was shadowed and quiet, th e shutters closing out the light except th e little that filtered through around them.

The stage was due by now. Th e passengers would be stiff and tired fro m the long ride in cramped quarters. Charli e or Ben Logan, who drove alternate, woul d be up on the box. He would be right out i n the open and a perfect target. Evie wa s hoping there were no women aboard.

She checked the loads in the shotgun.

She was frightened, but she knew what sh e must do. How many Indians there wer e she did not know . . . she thought she ha d seen a dozen, although there might hav e been twice as many. The dead one still la y in front of the house, and at least one ha d been wounded, the one Ruthie had see n with the bloody leg might have been o n the porch when she fired through the loo p hole. And Laban might have hit one.

The minutes went slowly by. Sh e poured a cup of coffee for herself and on e for Laban, who never drank coffee excep t on the coldest days.

They're still out there, ma , Laba n said .
I saw a magpie fly up just now.

Something scared him, and the horse s kind of shied, too .

Where was the stage?

Suddenly Ruthie called out , Ma! It'
s comin'! The stage is comin'
!

Laban fired. The roar of the gun seeme d unnaturally loud after the long silence i n the shuttered cabin. Instantly he fire d again. And then they saw the stage.

The team was running wild, and th e driver lay slumped over the seat; how h e was staying up there on the jolting , bounding stage was more than she coul d guess. She saw the team charging towar d the cabin, and suddenly the driver sat up , swinging the horses right at the door.

Evie ran to the door and took down th e bar. The team swung toward the door an d the stage almost crashed against the side o f the building, then stopped.

Evie swung the door open as two me n and a woman almost fell from the stage.

One of the men was dragging another on e down. The driverit was Ben Loga n fell into the room, his chest and one ar m bloody. He clutched a .44 Colt and h e paused one instant to fire before the y slammed the door shut.

Hit us about three mile up , he said , around the Point. I figure we got a couple, but they hit us hard .

He staggered back and almost fell to a bench by the table, resting his gun han d on it.

The two active and able men, afte r dragging the wounded man inside, ha d gone at once to loop holes. There wa s almost steady firing now, and the roo m was filled with gun smoke.

What kind of a roof you got, ma'am ?
o ne of the men asked .
I didn't notic e when we came in .

It's a pole roof, covered with earth .

Thank God for that! They can't set i t afire .

The shooting slowed, then stopped.

The other man, short and stocky with a square, determined face, turned to Logan.

Ben, we've got to get that stage moved.

They'll set it afire and burn the cabin .

It's stone
, Evie said.

Makes no difference. They'll bur n down the door and fire through th e opening. Anyway, the smoke might do fo r us .

The horses are still hitched , Ben said , but I can't hold a rein .

The woman had been kneeling besid e the wounded man, gently unbuttoning hi s vest and shirt. Evie went to her .
If w e could get him on the bed?

The woman looked up. She was scarcel y more than a girl, with a round, pretty face.

We'd better not move him. He might b e gut-shot .

The rough term from her lips wa s startling. Evie started to speak, then sh e realized what the woman probably was.

Yes, yes, of course , she said.

There's hot water on the fire and we hav e bandages. I'm afraid I don't know muc h about wounds .

I do
, the girl said practically .
I'v e seen a good many. I've lived in som e shooting towns .

The stocky man was easing the doo r open, peering out .
One of the horses i s down. He'll have to be cut from th e harness first .

Then cut him
, Logan said .
There'
s no time to spare, man .

He tossed a bowie knife to the man a t the door, who hesitated only a moment , then slipped out and went to his knees.

Rising quickly, he slashed, then slashe d again. The bowie knife had a heavy blad e and was razor sharp. Seizing the whip, h e lashed the nearest horse and the anima l leaped, impelling the others. In an instan t they were gone, careening across the yard , running down an Indian who sprang u p suddenly from behind a cedar log.

The man who had done the cuttin g lunged for the door and tripped, and the n was dragged inside as several bullet s drummed on the door or ricocheted fro m the rock walls. And then again there wa s silence.

The girl had gone from the wounde d man on the floor to Ben Logan. Workin g with smooth skill, she cleaned and the n dressed his wounds.

Outside there was neither sound no r movement. The day wore on, the heat o f the afternoon changing to the coolness o f evening.

What do you think, Ben ?
the squareface d man asked Logan .
Will they sta y and fight, or will they pull out ?

Ben Logan shrugged .
I figure they'l l pull out. No Injun wants to fight a losin'
b attle, and they've lost more men toda y than in many a fight with the Army. I figure they'll try to get that dead one ou t yonder and they may try for the horses , but they're likely to go .

After a moment he added , They ca n count, good as you or me, and they kno w there's four, five guns in here, and we'r e behind a stone wall. They aren't out to wi n no medals .

It was a long, slow evening, and a longer, slower night. Several times, just t o keep the Indians away, one of them fired a rifle along the side of the corral. It was a moonlit night and from the cabin the fron t of the corral and both sides were covere d easily. Only the back of the corral coul d not be observed.

At daybreak the horses were still there , the body of the dead Indian was gone, an d by ten o'clock they knew the siege ha d been lifted.

Don't worry none , Logan said.

When the stage doesn't reach the Plaz a they'll come huntin' us .

And they did ... a party of fort y horsemen, heavily armed.

THE Apaches had come and gone , and they had left no scars on th e landscape. Those who had attacke d were a small renegade band who ha d come over the border from Mexico , from their hide-aways in the far-off Sierr a Madres.

Evie Teale looked out over the brow n grass of autumn, and thought of th e Apaches. Only a week had gone by sinc e the day the men rode in from the Plaza , but it seemed an age ago. Things had suc h a way of passing here and leaving no mar k upon the landpeople, events, storms , troubles.

But the Apaches had left a mark upo n her, and upon Laban and Ruthie. Fro m now on they would be more cautious , more wary, more aware that it coul d happen to them. But the attack had als o left them stronger, in that they had face d an enemy and they had survived.

Evie Teale suddenly became aware o f something else. For the first time she wa s at peace here, really at peace. She ha d believed the land was her enemy, and sh e had struggled against it, but you could no t make war against a land any more than yo u could against the sea. One had to learn t o live with it, to belong to it, to fit into it s seasons and its ways.

The land was a living thing, breathin g with the wind, weeping with the rain , growing somber with clouds or gay wit h sunlight.

When she had come to this place sh e had looked aghast upon desolation. No w the cabin no longer looked out of place, i t no longer looked like something droppe d alongside the way, for it had become a par t of the landscape, as she had.

As she had. ... She thought of that, an d knew that it was true, and that it had bee n the sun and shadow on the grass out ther e which had first won her; but now she mus t do something herself, she must not leave i t to the land alone.

Laban . . . Ruthie . . . we're going t o make a flower bed. We're going to plan t some flowers .

They looked at her, surprised, bu t eager, anticipating .
We'll dig up som e prairie flowers and plant them alongsid e the door , she said.

Laban, you have to start it. Take you r shovel and dig up a flower bed on each sid e of the door. From the corners of the cabi n to the doorstep, and about four feet deep.

Ruthie, you and I will go look fo r flowers. We'll get some daisies, and there'
s Indian paintbrush. . . . Come on !

By the time they returned with a baske t filled with carefully dug-up plants, Laba n had the earth spaded up, raked, an d watered ready for the planting.

We should plant some trees , Evi e said .
We've got water enough, an d there's some young cottonwoods down b y the creek .

It was dusk before they settled wher e the trees would be planted so that the y would offer shade for the cabin and at th e same time would not be in the way of th e stages.

Often, after the children were in bed, Evi e walked out in front of the cabin to look a t the stars and to feel the wind. These wer e the lonely hours, when at last she could le t down from the work of the day, whe n she could stand there and feel th e wind touch her hair, when she could loo k at the bright, silent stars, and hear a coyote's plaintive cry come from far out o n the plain.

Behind her the windows would show a faint light from her lantern, for the fir e would be banked for the night, the coal-oi l light would be out or turned low.

She could hear a faint stirring amon g the horses in the corral, and sometime s one would stamp or blow dust from hi s nostrils.

Jacob was gone. . . .

Now she accepted the fact. How or wh y he had gone she had no idea, but someho w he had been killed or had died or bee n injured in some terrible way. That h e might have simply gone off and left the m she did not for a moment consider. Jaco b was too much a man of duty, and both hi s place and his children meant too much t o him.

She had never been sure if he loved her , for he was not a tender man. In the fe w moments when he had approached tendernes s he had seemed oddly uncomfortable , yet she felt that in his own way that he di d care for her. He was simply one of thos e silent millions who have never reall y learned how to express what they feel, o r somehow seem to find it indelicate to d o so.

And she had needed love. She ha d needed tenderness. She was frightene d and she was alone, and the romance sh e had needed so desperately, of which sh e had dreamed so long, was simply not i n him to give.

This was the second time that deat h for somehow she felt sure that Jacob wa s dead and had left her alone. First, it had bee n her father. Suddenly she was alone in a strange place and her father was dead; bu t he had taken from her more than a father , more than financial support he had take n her dreams with him.

He had always been filled with plan s wild, impractical plans they might be, bu t plans, dreams . . . and a goal. He ha d always had that, and as swiftly as on e faded away he was busy with another, an d his stories as well as his dreams had fed he r own dreaming. Always, somewhere in th e offing there was a Prince Charming, a someone who needed her, someone wh o was young and handsome, and filled wit h romance.

When her father died she lost he r dreams. There was nothing of the Princ e Charming about Jacob Teale, but he was a rock to which she could cling, and she ha d been frightened. With no money, n o home, and no chance even to work, sh e had accepted his offer of marriage.

Now she was alone again, yet not quit e alone, for there were the children and the y needed her. They needed her as much a s she needed them. She had them, and sh e had this place; without them she woul d again be where she had been, a woma n alone in a harsh world where there was n o place for a woman alone.

The coolness of the night held a hint o f distant rain. Something far out upon th e grass stirred, and she heard the whisper o f sound. She stood a moment longer, an d then she went back to the cabin and le t herself in, barring the door behind her.

A moment then, she listened, hearin g the breathing in the loft above. She looke d around at the shadowed room, lighte d only by the lantern and a faint flickerin g from the fire.

A double bed, a table, some benches, a chair . . . the pots and pans shining upo n the wall or near the fireplace, the hardpacke d earth floor . . . Would she eve r have a plank floor, now that Jacob wa s gone?

She went to her carpetbag, the repositor y of the few things she had brough t with her when she came to Jacob, and too k out a thin volume of poetry. For an hou r she read, then stared into the fire for a lon g time. Her loneliness was with her always; o nly the hours when she was most bus y gave her respite, and each stage sh e awaited with a half-conscious longing, a hope that someone, or something specia l would come for her.