Merkabah Rider: The Mensch With No Name (4 page)

His
hide bore the mark of that night now. Though the cuts had healed, they were
noticeable upon close inspection; tiny white lines crisscrossed his face and
the backs of his hands like cracks in old leather. Like the Solomonic seals on
his spectacles, they only appeared in a certain light, but they were with him
always.

“Just
hard country,” the Rider said dismissively. “If I rode a horse, they’d be on my
legs and you wouldn’t see them.”

Gersh
seemed to consider this.

“You
don’t ride?”

“I’ve
got an onager.”

“A what?”

“It’s
like a donkey.”

“How
come you don’t ride that?”

“I
took a vow not to burden an animal with my own weight.”

“To who?”

To
dead men, he almost said. It was an oath of the Sons of the Essenes, and they
were all dead at Adon’s hand.

“To HaShem.”

“HaShem?”

“The Lord.”

Then, as the Rider began to duck under his
talismans, Gersh held out the tallit to him.

The
Rider took it, putting his finger through the blackened, bloodstained hole and
frowning.

“My
father wore one of those,” Gershom said, breathless, as if he’d been holding it
in.

“Your
father was a Jew,” the Rider said, sliding the tallit over his head gingerly.

“I
don’t know,” said Gersh.

“No,
I’m telling you,” the Rider said. “He was. This is a tallit.
A
prayer shawl.
We are told in the Bible to wear fringes on each of the
four corners of our garments. We wear the tallit because modern clothes don’t
have four corners, see?” He held up one of the knotted fringes. “These are
called tzitzit. Each has six hundred and thirteen knots, so that we may
remember the six hundred and thirteen commandments.”

“I
thought there
was
only ten commandments.”

“God
gave Moses ten commandments on stone tablets, yes,” the Rider nodded. “But we
Jews are bound by six hundred and thirteen commandments found in the five books
of Moses, the Torah.”

“Shit,”
said Gersh. “That’s a lot of commandments.”

The
Rider smiled. It was like working a long atrophied muscle.

“Your
name’s Hebrew too. ‘Turiel’ means ‘rock of God.’”

“What’s
Gershom mean?”

“’Sojourner there.’
It’s like…someone who stays somewhere
only a little while.”

Gersh
repeated the words soundlessly to himself.

“You
don’t remember your parents?”

“Only
a little,” Gersh said. “I was five years old when the Comanche killed ‘em.”

“So
Hashknife’s story about you escaping from Indians is true?”

“Well,”
said Gersh, “I didn’t so much escape. Hash bought me. He was a
Comanchero—that’s like an Indian trader. He seen me at one of the big meets at
Yellow House Canyon and bought me for a couple buffalo robes and a knife.”

“Ah,”
said the Rider, smiling thinly, “so you didn’t break a Comanche chief over your
knee at six years old?”

“Well,
that part ain’t totally true either. He wasn’t a chief,” Gersh said. The Rider
smirked, but the boy seemed serious.

A
thought occurred to the Rider.

“Why
do you wear your hair so long?”

The
big youth shrugged.

“My
mother told me a story one night, while we were
layin’
in the wagon box out under the stars. It was about a man who never cut nor combed
his hair, never drank liquor…this man was sort of like I dunno, Davy Crockett.
He could whup lions barehanded, and he once tore the doors off a castle and
walked off with ‘em. I asked her if I could be like the man in that story, and
she told me I could. She called my father over and told him what I wanted, and
he put his hands, he had these big, warm hands…he put ‘em on my head and he
said some words. It’s the only time I ever remember being touched by my father
and my mother at the same time. I remember I felt real safe.”

“That
story comes from the Book of Judges,” said the Rider. “The man’s name was
Samson. His parents dedicated him to the Lord as a Nazirite.”

“What’s
that?”

“It’s
an oath a man takes, a promise to God. A Nazirite never cuts his hair or trims
his beard. He never touches strong drink or any sort of grape, and he never
sets foot in a graveyard, or handles human remains. Men can take this oath any
time as a way to bring themselves closer to God, but in the Bible there were
two men who were dedicated as Nazirites as children, and they were granted
miraculous powers. The first was Samson. He was given great strength. The other
was Samuel, who became a prophet and was granted sacred visions. He anointed
the first Hebrew kings.”

“So
it’s….sorta like your oath about not ridin’ horses?” Gersh ventured.

“Yes.”

“So….what
kinda
powers does
that give you?”

Presently
the tent flap was drawn back and Hashknife entered with a clutch of men behind
him. The Rider and Gersh both got to their feet.

“Well
now,” said one of the men, a gravelly voiced, mustachioed man in a flannel
coat. He was the oldest of the bunch, and carried a Henry rifle. “Here we are
waitin’ for you to mend so we can come and get you, and the breed comes and
tells us you’re up and askin’ for us. You ready to meet justice for the men you
killed, you villain?”

“Hold
on, Colonel,” said a black man in a wool vest at his side. “I wanna hear more
about these men he says are comin’ to get him.”

Several
of the other men in the tent voiced their agreement.

The
Rider slid his rekel coat on and held up his hands for quiet.

“The
one who got away—the dwarf,” said the Rider. “He’s gone to get friends. Like
the ones you saw.”

“Closest
town with a telegraph is a day’s ride to the east,” said the black man.

“That’s
right,” said the Rider. “So he’s on his way back by now.”

“He’d
have to wait at least another day for them others to show before he headed back
this way,” the Colonel said.

“I
wouldn’t bet on that,” the Rider said.

“What
the hell is he doin’ heeled?” the Colonel hissed at Hashknife, upon seeing the
Rider’s pistol belted at his side.

“I
didn’t have much choice,” Hashknife said.

“Shoulda
known better’n to parole a murderer to a couple a sideshow clowns,” the Colonel
said, cocking his rifle.

“I
didn’t murder anyone,” the Rider snapped. “Most of you here saw what happened.”

“None
of
us seen
what happened to Mickey Cashion,” said one
man, a freckle faced red head in a dirty shirt and duck pants.

“Yeah,
and what I seen was a man shrivel up and burn after bein’ shot by you,” said
another, a yellow bearded freighter in a threadbare sack coat.

“That’s
right,” the Colonel said. “Just what’re you packin’ in that pistol of yours,
mister?
Some kinda s’plosive bullets?
I heard about
such things bein’ developed for the war, but I never seen ‘em myself.”

“Explosive
hell,” said the man in the sack coat. “Their clothes weren’t even singed.”

“You
said these ones comin’ would be like them others,” said the black man. “You
mean….strong like them others?”

“That’s
what I mean,” said the Rider.

“What
are you goin’ on about, Purdee?” the Colonel said to the black man.

“They
wasn’t
natural strong, them men, Colonel,” said
Purdee. “That big Chinaman threw two grown men cross’t the bar, and nearly tore
Trib’s arm off with his fingers. I don’t think the way they died had to do with
his bullets so much as it had to do with the type of men they was.”

“I
never figured you for one of them superstitious coloreds, Purdee,” said the
Colonel.

“You
know I ain’t,” he said. “But I don’t discount what I seen with my own two eyes
neither. That gets a man killed. And I seen that Chinaman squeeze Trib’s arm
and put his fingers right in his flesh. Trib wasn’t
no
soft man.”

“How
is he, the one who had his arm hurt?” the Rider asked.

“Not
good,” said Purdee. “In a lotta pain, like
he been
snake bit.”

Gersh
nudged Hashknife with his elbow, nearly knocking the smaller man over.

“Will
you let me see him?”

After
a short discussion, they led the Rider out of the tent. He stopped by the
onager to retrieve his saddlebags,
then
they led him
to one of the picket shacks, where he found a Mexican man sweating and moaning
on a pallet on the floor. The woman he had seen earlier at the tanks was dabbing
at his forehead with a damp rag. Her son was fidgeting in the far corner. The
Mexican’s arm was swathed in bandages, but four red circular stains showed.

“His
bleedin’ slows, but it
don’t
stop,” said Purdee.

The
Rider knelt at the Mexican’s side and reached into his saddle bag.

“I
need these bandages off.”

“He
goin’ bleed all over,” Purdee said.

“I
can stop it,” the Rider said.

“You
a doctor?” the Colonel said from the doorway. “We got a doctor here and he
couldn’t stop it.”

“All
I said is I can stop it,” the Rider snapped. Then, “I’m sorry. I’m
sorry,
I’m…a little banged up. Yes, I can stop it.”

The
Colonel said something in Spanish to the woman, who shook her head. But when he
pressed her, she relented and began to unravel the tight bandage.

The
Mexican man looked at the Rider.

“What’s
your name?” the Rider asked him, taking a pouch from his bag.

“Triburcio
Perez,” the man said weakly.

“Triburcio,”
the Rider said, opening the pouch to reveal a packet of salt. “This is going to
hurt a lot.”

“What
is that?” Purdee asked.

“It’s
salt,” the Rider said, licking his finger and dabbing it in there.

“You
gonna rub salt in a man’s wound?” the Colonel exclaimed, horrified. “Get that
sonofabitch outta there.”

The
men stirred to grab him, but the Rider pulled away, causing his tender shoulder
to sing. He nearly swooned.

“I
know how it looks, but listen a minute. There’s poison in the wounds. It was
probably under his fingernails when they went in.
Salt’s the
only thing that will burn it out.”

“I
never heard of
no
such treatment,” the Colonel said.

“You’ve
never seen this kind of poison. The salt will kill it.”

“You
ain’t gonna let him are you, Coronel?” Triburcio pleaded.

“Just
hang on, Trib,” said Purdee. “Let the man take a look.”

The
woman finished
unwrapping
the arm. It was swollen
badly, but did not have the appearance of gangrene. The skin around the four
neat holes was puffy and
raised
like large insect
stings, and the blood spilled out in four steady rivulets. There was a fifth
hole
on the opposite side of the arm where Ormzud’s thumb
had gone in.

“It
ain’t blackenin’ up the arm like a snake bite,” Purdee said. “Otherwise we’d of
sawed it off. But he says it’s burnin’ him on the inside and it won’t stop
bleedin.’ Whiskey didn’t do nothing either.” He tuned to the Colonel. “I say we
let him.”

“No!”
Trib groaned.

The
Colonel stared at Trib, then at the Rider, and he narrowed his eyes as if
gauging him somehow.

“Alright,”
the Colonel said. “Try it, I guess.”

“No!”
Trib yelled and began to shimmy. Purdee leaned forward and pinned him down by
the shoulders.

“Gersh,
get in here,” the Rider called.

They
made way, Purdee stepping out. Gersh took his place quickly, and held the
thrashing man down like a child.

“No,
Coronel!” shouted the Mexican, shaking his head vigorously.

The
Rider placed his palm on the swollen arm, slick with sweat, and jabbed his
salted finger into the first of the bullet wounds, up t0 the cuticle.

Several
of the men crowding the doorway to the shack looked away, and the woman held
her boy to her breast and crossed herself.

Trib
screamed, in that unnerving, haunting pitch of a grown man in agony. The Rider
turned his finger all around in the wound, rubbing the salt in on all sides.
Between the sweat and blood, it was difficult to feel what he suspected, that
the shed had secreted some of its septic slime into the man’s arm somehow. If
he had, the salt would burn it
away,
just had it had
eaten away their malignant bodies in the bar. Of course, it was also doing
damage to the man’s arm, but it was necessary. The fluid of a shed could invade
a mortal body and kill it slowly. Some said it could even turn a man into a
shed himself, though he had personally never seen an infection allowed to progress
that far.