Hard Twisted (14 page)

They bypassed the downtown, meeting the main road from behind the depot and following it out to the river. Water streaked the windscreen, and Palmer's head moved like a boxer's in time with the beat of the wiper, and soon they were climbing into a fogbank.

What're we gonna do?

Get as far from here as we can in two days' drivin, that's what.

What about the bail money?

That'll be McGuirk's problem, come Wednesday.

They topped out above the fog, and there the day brightened and the rain softened to a light and drizzling mist. Lottie caught sight of the Animas, brown and newly turbid, coursing in the valley below them. Along its far bank, train cars snaked eastward under the white pennant of a locomotive.

What about my pa?

I got word on that last night. Man said they's a letter waitin on you at the post office in Bayfield.

What man?

Just a man in the game.

Where's Bayfield?

He nodded. It's up ahead. We passed it comin in.

The drive took under an hour, through rain-slicked grasslands spotted with cattle steaming in the afternoon sun. They recrossed the Florida, angry and swollen, and then the Pine, and
they parked the Buick at last on the puddled main street of a tidy Western hamlet.

Come on, he told her, palming his hat crown. Let me do the talkin.

The building stood on a street corner, its flagpole barren, its stone-faced entrance angled to the covered sidewalk. Inside were wooden cubbies, and a wide oak table, and behind the counter a storklike man in what appeared to be a printer's apron.

Afternoon, he greeted them, his smile wilting at the sight of Palmer's face. Had us some rain.

General delivery for Lucile Garrett.

The man waited as if expecting more, then retreated to the back. There was sheet glass on the countertop, and beneath it postage stamps in golds and greens pressed like leaves in a child's scrapbook. Palmer bent and tilted his head, studying his own reflection.

Here you go, miss. The man eyed Palmer warily as he handed her the letter.

The postmark read DURANGO, COLO. She tore at the envelope, extracting a folded sheet etched with the Strater Hotel logo. The letter bore no date. Her lips moved as she read the words to herself.

Dearest Lottie,

Missed you in Durango. Must head to Missouri now, but will see you in Utah come Christmas or New Years. Stay with Clint Palmer, as he will take care of you. Do as he says, and give him no trouble.

Love,

Dillard Garrett

Is everything all right, miss?

Give it here, Palmer said, taking the sheet and folding it into his pocket.

They stood outside on the covered sidewalk in view of the mud-spattered Buick. Here, Palmer said, handing her the letter, and she read it again.

Tear it up.

What?

I said tear it up.

How come?

On account of your daddy bein hot, stupid. And if someone was to get hold of it, they'd know where to find him, that's how come.

He nodded, and she tore the folded paper into smaller and smaller pieces, dropping them like storybook bread crumbs as they made their way to the car, the breeze behind her catching them and herding them off the sidewalk and into the muddy street.

BY MR. HARTWELL
: Your father was a notorious bootlegger?

A
: I don't know.

Q
: He made applejack?

A
: Not that I ever seen.

Q
: You saw him drink moonshine?

BY MR. PHARR
: Your Honor, the deceased is not on trial here.

BY MR. HARTWELL
: Deceased? What deceased?

THE COURT
: That's enough. The objection is sustained.

BY MR. HARTWELL
: Your father had enemies?

A
: No, sir.

Q
: Men were after him?

A
: I don't know.

Q
: Then why did you think he was on the run?

A
: I don't know. Clint said he stole a car.

Q
: And you believed him when he told you that?

A
: I didn't have no reason not to.

The mountain was exactly as Palmer had described it, in the shape of a sleeping Indian.

It rose in black silhouette against the blood horizon, stark and
unmistakable in its human aspect. Recumbent body. Folded arms. Long and trailing hair.

There it is! she cried, leaning forward and pointing.

They had skirted Durango to the south, crossing the Animas and rejoining the main roadway where it rose up through Hesperus and then the Mancos valley, the Buick straining and smoking in search of the corridor of which Palmer had been told that ran through a warren of canyons and mesas and would carry them through to Utah.

They filled the Buick and their spare gasoline can in Cortez, where a uniformed attendant cleaned the glass and checked the oil and cautioned that the car was low and leaking badly. Parts could be ordered, the man told them as he wiped his hands with a rag, but a proper repair would take two weeks to complete.

The road past the Indian's head led them under cover of darkness into a wide canyon of saltbush and sage that curved with the streambed of its origin, through a blue landscape of ancient cottonwoods and pocket hayfields. Stone houses appeared at intervals, dark watchtowers set against the purple bruise of nightfall. No cars were on the road, and no riders, and none but the glowing eyes of mule deer bore witness to their passing.

Farther on, the canyon narrowed, and boulders and giant walls of slickrock scrolled past the edges of their headlamps.

The sound, when the engine finally seized, was terrible. The Buick bucked and the headlamps flickered and died, and they ground to a shrill halt in darkness so complete that neither could read the other's face.

Shit!

What happened?

What do you think happened?

The driver's door squeaked, then slammed with a bang. Lottie smelled the oilsmoke and heard the crunch of Palmer's footsteps circling the car.

Shit, he said again.

When the door reopened, she heard him take up his valise and rummage its contents.

We ain't passed a car all night, he told her, so I don't suppose you'll get hit. But I was you, I'd get off this road just the same.

What are you gonna do?

The gun clicked and ratcheted and clicked again.

You might like to grab your bedroll and get some shut-eye. I could be a while.

She opened her door and stood her foot on the running board. The night air smelled of burning tires. There was no moon and there were no stars, and when Palmer spoke again, his voice was disembodied in the void.

If you do see a car, don't flag it down.

His footsteps faded in the roadway.

Wait! she called. What if they stop? What if they's Indians?

The footsteps halted. Hell, the voice replied. If they's Injuns, ask if they got any firewater.

The sound to which she woke was the slamming of a car door in the roadway. She sat up in her bedroll, a vague premonition of sunrise lighting the eastern mountains.

Clint?

A horse snuffled. She rose and tiptoed to a boulder and, from that vantage, saw the slender shape of a man wreathed in the breath frost of a scrawny broomtail bay.

You ain't exactly quiet, you know.

Palmer wore his pistol in his waistband and his bridle slung over a shoulder. He turned the horse and led it from the Buick by a neck strap that she realized was his belt.

How's about a hand over here.

The horse was wild-eyed, and it sidled at her appearance in the roadway. Palmer talked to it and leaned on the belt strap and dropped the bridle to his free hand.

He looked like a broke horse, but now I ain't so sure. Here.

He handed her the bridle. The horse balked at the exchange, and Palmer shushed it and turned it and walked it in a circle.

Fetch me a shirt from the car.

The rattle of the shirt snaps spooked the horse anew. Palmer stroked its neck and whispered to it as he slipped the shirt over its head, covering its eyes, bunching the fabric at the jaw.

The horse quieted. As Palmer released the belt strap, she handed him the bridle.

You'd best stand over there.

As he raised the bridle, the steel bit clacked at the horse's teeth, issuant and yellowed, and the horse jerked away. He tried again, and again the horse jerked and backed a step.

Come over here, he told her. Take your finger and stick it right in there.

The horse's cheek was silken and whiskered, its breath hot against her hand. She ran her finger to where Palmer had indicated, at the high corner of its mouth.

What if he bites?

He ain't got no teeth there. Go ahead.

She slipped her finger between the bony gums, and the mouth loosened, and the bit slipped into place. Palmer lifted the headstall
over the horse's ears, and with an easy dexterity buckled the throatlatch with the fingers of his free hand.

There you go, big fella. Like the man said, you got nothin to fear but fear itself.

He worked his shirt from under the bridle, and when he yanked it free, the liquid eyes blinked and the long head dipped and nodded placidly.

Here. Palmer passed her the reins as he walked to the car and removed his saddle and leaned it against the wheel hub. He then emptied out the backseat, dragging all that was theirs to the side of the road.

What're we doin?

I'll tell you what we ain't doin, and that's waitin no two weeks to get this thing fixed. It'll be hot by then anyways. Hell, it's probly hot already.

He squatted and spread his bedroll and placed within it the skillet and the tin dishes, the cups and the utensils, and a mixed assortment of food and clothing. She watched him in silence beside the breathing horse.

Anythin else? he asked her.

The Bible.

He hung his head. Then he added the book to their swag pile and rolled it tightly and cinched it off at the ends.

Palmer next took up the gas can. She watched as he opened the car doors each in turn and rolled down the windows and closed the doors again. When he circled the car a second time, splashing gasoline through the windows, the horse rolled its eyes and tried to back.

The sun had by then risen, and the vapors from the open
windows shimmered over the curving roofline. Palmer spun and flung the can clattering into the rocks. He wiped his hands and hoisted his saddle and lugged it to where she waited.

Go on and fetch your bedroll. Hurry up.

The saddle was already in place when Lottie returned, with Palmer's soogan tied behind it and the canteen hanging by its canvas strap from the saddle horn. Tied to one side of the saddle was the calfskin valise, while to the other he was fastening the blackened coffeepot.

The horse stood perfectly still.

Bring it here, he said. He handed her the reins and he lifted her bedroll, wedging it tightly behind the cantle, forming with his larger soogan a kind of crude pillion.

Okay. Now let's see what we got ourselves into.

He looped the reins and stood square to the horse, and with one hand gripping the saddle horn he kneed the horse roughly in the ribs. The horse wheezed as it lurched sideways, and Palmer tightened up the cinch.

Watch out now.

He tried his weight in the stirrup. The horse backed a step as he swung his leg, then it jigged sideways, bucking and crow-hopping with the satchel flapping and the coffeepot clanging until Palmer had turned it and steadied it and brought it to a halt. Now the horse stood backlit by the sunrise, blowing and trembling.

You ever rid before? he called to her, and she nodded. He trotted the horse forward in a neat figure-eight. He stopped it and backed it three steps and walked it to a rock.

Take a hand, cowgirl.

He dropped his foot from the stirrup. She gripped his offered
hand and stepped into the empty stirrup and swung her leg wide over the bedrolls. She hugged his waist with both arms as she scooted forward and settled into her seat.

Ready? he called, and she nodded against his shoulder. He turned the horse and walked it through their scattered remnants and into the roadway.

Good-bye, car, Lottie whispered as Palmer pressed his hat crown with his free hand and drew a match from his shirt pocket and popped it with his thumbnail.

Hang on!

At the
whoomp
of the fireball, the horse flattened its ears and bolted. Palmer whooped and Lottie shrieked, and in the galloping clatter of hoofbeats she turned to watch as flames rose black and orange in a tall and twisting column, the smoke and flame blotting out the sun and all the world that lay behind them.

Three days later the riders appeared before sunset on the main street of Monticello, Utah. The bay horse exhausted, impervious to the weary urgings of Palmer's bootheels. Its coat streaked and salt-rimed, its sunburned riders of a piece. The camel shadow of horse and riders aslant before them on the cracked macadam.

They had provisioned that first day at the Ismay trading post, where Palmer had bartered while Lottie secreted the horse in a rocky side-draw. That evening, encamped on the willow brakes of the San Juan River, Palmer had snubbed the horse to a treetrunk and altered its brand with a glowing length of fence wire.

The next day they'd followed the river westward, through a high desert landscape of mud cliffs and telescopic mesas, past faceted red-rock escarpments pocked with the arching eyebrows of ancient rockfalls, and thence into the Mormon settlement of
Bluff. They'd had their supper on the ground by the old Bluff Fort, and by nightfall they were south of Blanding, camped on the open sage plain with the Sleeping Ute to the east and the dark promise of Blue Mountain looming silently to the north. The dry nightwind ragging their campfire, tousling their stiff and salted hair. The moon a scythe, the stars the scattered chaff of its reaping.