Gone to Texas (20 page)

"You'll see. Especially when we get to Texas. From what I hear, there aren't enough women to go around down there."

Rebecca shook her head. "I'll never marry again," she said, and sounded quite adamant.

Nathaniel dropped the subject and took her inside.

Cully's inn was a two-story log building, built to last, with the first floor given over to Cully's quarters and the common room. The latter reminded Nathaniel of his father's inn at Louisa, Virginia. The sights and sounds and smells triggered boyhood memories.

They were provided with a good meal—ham, stew, spoonbread, and fresh summer vegetables. Cully was a widower. His wife and two sons had perished eight years ago, victims of a cholera epidemic. He employed a young woman to cook and clean.

After dinner, Nathaniel sold the wagons and mules to Cully, who counted on turning a quick profit by selling the lot to the lumber crews. Business concluded, the Scotsman broke out his bagpipes and regaled the women with some lively tunes from his homeland, while Nathaniel, Christopher, and O'Connor went to work transferring the furniture and provisions from the wagons to the broadhorn. They took the horses aboard, too, the three Elm Tree thoroughbreds as well as Nathaniel's.

"There is no shortage of thieves in these parts, I'm sorry to say," the Scotsman told them, "and those splendid animals of yours will draw many a covetous eye. I would strongly suggest you take turns standing guard—and continue to do so until you reach New Orleans."

"Will it be any better there?" wondered Nathaniel, who thought of big cities as cesspools of iniquity.

"You have a point, Flintlock. Probably worse."

Leaving O'Connor to watch the boat and their belongings, Nathaniel and Christopher returned to the inn.
Night was falling, and purple shadows had gathered beneath the trees. The town of Cully's Landing was quiet. The boat builders and lumberjacks had called it a day. The errant pigs had been rounded up. And Cully was no longer playing his bagpipe.

They found that Rebecca and Prissy had already gone upstairs to their room. Christopher went up to say good night. Nathaniel purchased a jug of corn liquor from Cully. He and Christopher were about to return to the broadhorn when a sudden commotion in the street drew their attention. Before they could go to investigate, a man burst into the common room, his face flush with excitement.

"Klesko stole a pig, Cully, and now they're talkin' about hangin' him for it!"

With that he was gone.

"Good God," breathed Cully. He reached for a rifle hanging above the fireplace and turned to Nathaniel and Christopher. "If you're of a mind to, I could use your help to save a man's life."

He did not linger long for an answer, disappearing into the night.

There were people out in the street, all of them running in the direction of the river, mostly men, with a few women and children among them, dogs yapping at heels, some of the men carrying lanterns to light their way. A babble of excitement rose from this stream of humanity. Cully plunged into the stream, wearing an expression of grim resolve. Nathaniel and Christopher followed him.

Down near the wharf, a crowd had collected, and Cully shouldered his way through the press toward the water's edge, where angry voices were raised. Emerging from the crowd in the wake of the innkeeper, Christopher paused to take in the scene.

Three men were holding one of the biggest characters
he had ever seen. One was gripping the Goliath's left arm, another his right, and the third had an arm locked around his neck from behind. Christopher assumed their prisoner was the pig stealer named Klesko. Klesko wasn't fat, just big. Barrel-chested, bull-necked, his arms bulged with muscles, his legs as stout as the trunks of full-grown oak trees, and just about as solid. His hands were the size of hams. He wore a torn and dirty linsey-woolsey shirt and ragged dungarees that ended in tatters at the knees. His feet and head were bare; his hair was long and matted and black as the ace of spades, like his beard, which so covered his face that Christopher could see little else besides a bulbous nose, obviously broken more than once, and blazing blue eyes so dark they looked black.

He wasn't trying to escape, exactly—had he tried he would have tossed his three captors around as though they were rag dolls. Of this Christopher had no doubt. But he was standing rigidly, legs braced apart, head raised in a defiant pose, and shouting at the top of his lungs. Christopher wondered if he was drunk. Yet his stentorian voice was quite clear, the words not the least bit slurred.

"Cast your eyes on me, boys! You know who I am? I'm the original, brass-mounted, copper-bellied corpse-maker of the Cumberland!"

"You're a windbag and a thief," said someone in the crowd.

The Goliath seemed not to hear. "I'm the bloodiest son of a wildcat you'll ever see," he declared. "My mama was an earthquake and my papa was a hurricane. I'll have a dozen alligators and a barrel of corn liquor for breakfast—and that's when I'm not hungry."

"I'll believe the corn liquor part," said another, and the crowd laughed.

"Stand back! Stand back and give me some
elbow room. Blood's my favorite drink and the wails of the dyin' is my favorite music."

As he spoke, the Goliath shook his head and glowered fiercely about him, and moved his arms up and down, seeming unaware of the fact that two strong men were attached to those limbs.

"Better get some rope and tie him up," growled the man who had Klesko by the throat.

"Rope hell!" gasped the man clinging for dear life to Klesko's right arm. "Somebody fetch some iron chain!"

"Bow your heads and say a prayer if you know one!" boomed Klesko. "The massacre of entire communities is my favorite pastime."

"Next to stealing pigs," said someone with a laugh.

"Where's the pig?" cried a man who stood facing Klesko, his face congested with anger, his fists clenched.

"Klesko cooked it," said the man dangling from Klesko's left arm. "He'd already done et most of it by the time we seen his campfire back up in them woods yonder and found him."

"Ate it!" cried the man. "That was one of my best sows. You know how much I could have got for that sow down in New Orleans? You damned thief!" he snarled at Klesko. "I say hang him. Hang the thief!"

Klesko just glared at him. He didn't seem to comprehend what was happening. "My heart's as hard as petrified wood. My bowels are made from boiler iron. I'm a child of calamity, and when I raise my voice I still the thunder. I comb my hair with bolts of lightning, and I've been known to drink large rivers dry when I've worked up a thirst."

"Hang him and be done with it," someone said.

"Hold on," said Cully, stepping into the center of the circle. "You canna hang a man for stealing a pig."

"You'd hang him for stealing a horse, wouldn't you?" asked the owner of the dead sow. "What's the difference?"

"No, I wouldna hang him for stealing a flaming horse, either. I wouldna take a man's life unless he was a murderer."

"He murdered this feller's pig," said one of the wits in the crowd, and several men laughed.

"This is no laughing matter," scolded Cully.

"Klesko stole my axe."

"Yeah, and he stole some of my chickens."

"My dog turned up missing a fortnight ago. I'd bet Klesko stole him and ate him. I declare, he'll eat anything that ain't been dead too long."

"A lot of things have turned up missing since he started hanging around here. He's a no-good thief."

"This is a bloody nonsense," said Cully. "You canna hang a man like this, without a fair trial, not in this country. That's the kind of rough justice many of us sailed across the flamin' ocean to escape."

"Why are you defending Klesko, Cully?"

"Yeah. Klesko don't mean nothing to you."

"No, by God, I hardly know the beggar from Adam. But he's an American, and he deserves a trial by a jury of his peers. He's guaranteed as much by the bloody Bill of Rights, isn't he?"

Christopher admired Cully's determination to stand up for what he thought was right. Clearly he was the last person who would want Cully's Landing to get a reputation as a den of cutthroats and thieves. A reputation like that could destroy a town, and could easily be created by a relatively harmless man like Klesko. The Scotsman's argument seemed to work on some of the spectators, but the majority still cried out for Klesko's blood.

It was then that Nathaniel intervened. He stepped forward, placing himself shoulder-to-shoulder with Cully.

"There'll be no hanging today," he said.

"Who are you?"

"What gives you the right . . . ?"

"This is Flintlock Jones," said Cully.

The effect of the name on the crowd was instantaneous. Everyone fell silent, as though struck dumb by an act of God. Christopher was astonished. He scanned the faces by the light of the lanterns some of the men held aloft. They looked to him as he imagined the people of ancient Greece might have when they chanced to gaze upon Zeus or Apollo or some other deity down from Olympus. They looked at the rifle in Nathaniel's hands, too, knowing what wonders he had wrought with the weapon. Here was a living legend, standing up for Klesko, and none of them were willing to go against him.

"Take him to the inn and lock him in the cellar," Cully told the men who were holding Klesko.

"This is an outrage!" cried the owner of the dead sow. "What about my losses?"

"Well," said Cully, with a smile. "You could stay here with us for a spell, Mr. Krueger, until the circuit judge comes around. I'm certain he'll make some kind of arrangement for restitution. Of course, it might be weeks before we see the gentleman again."

"Weeks? I can't wait weeks. My boat is loaded. My son and I have got to get down the river."

"Then perhaps you will be so kind as to tell me where I could send the money, if restitution is ordered."

"If? Is there any question? Wasn't that my sow? Isn't it dead?"

Unruffled, Cully said, "Fine.
When
restitution is made. Does that sound better to your ear?"

Krueger snorted. "And I'm to trust you? This whole town is a nest of thieves, if you ask me."

Christopher thought he could actually hear Cully's teeth grinding together as the Scotsman, by an astonishing act of will, kept his temper in check. "Perhaps it would be better if you got started on your journey right away, Mr. Krueger," he said, frosty with cordiality.

Krueger glowered at the innkeeper, then looked to
Nathaniel. His expression changed when he saw the old leatherstocking. He turned abruptly and stalked away.

Klesko's three captors were hustling their prisoner to the inn, and the crowd began to disperse. Watching them go, Cully mournfully shook his head.

"They're not bad people, Flintlock. But even good people, when they become a mob, seem to lose their common sense. They might have hanged Klesko in the heat of the moment. As a lark, you might say. And when they woke in the morning they would have felt flamin' bad aboot it."

"You saved them from themselves, Cully."

"I think you had a lot to do with it. Your name carries a lot of clout in these parts."

"What will become of Klesko?" asked Christopher.

"He's rough around the edges, and, yes, a bit light-fingered. A river rat. Can't seem to hold a job. Been in these parts for several months. Lives by himself in the woods. He's not a bad sort, really. Down on his luck, is all."

"Will he get a fair trial?"

"I doot it," said the Scotsman. "He's not well-liked here, as you might have noticed. I'm sure he's stolen a few things, though not half of what he's been accused of stealing. But he's an outsider, a loner. He won't hang, but I wager he'll spend a good bit of time languishing under lock and key once the circuit judge gets through with him."

"Does he know the river?" asked Christopher.

"Aye. He's an old keelboat man, I'm told."

"We could take him with us, Grandpa. We could use another man, especially one who knows the river."

"I'm not sure your mother would approve."

"I'll take care of that. What do you think?"

Nathaniel shrugged, turned to Cully. "Do you think he would agree to come with us?"

Cully grinned. He thought Christopher's solution to
the problem was an excellent one. "I'll see to it. Leave everything to me. After all, what are his options?"

The next morning they got under way early, in the pearl gray light of dawn. Nathaniel took the helm, while O'Connor and Christopher used the long poles to guide the broadhorn into the deep channel. In a little while Rebecca and Prissy emerged from the cargo box and moved forward, planning to sit there in the cool of the morning and take in the scenery. Both of them were captured by the novelty of traveling on a river. There was no place to sit aft of the cargo box, for there the four horses were secured. Having spent the night on board, the horses were quick to accustom themselves to the pitch and roll of the boat. But when Prissy let out a shriek, the animals spooked, and if they hadn't been firmly tethered Nathaniel figured they would have gone right over the side.

Lashing the rudder in place, the frontiersman moved forward. O'Connor and Christopher were already there, trying not to laugh. Most of their provisions were lashed down in the front of the broadhorn and covered by canvas tarpaulins stripped from the wagons they had sold to Cully. Prissy had settled her considerable bulk on what she assumed were some sacks of grain for the horses. But it was Klesko, not grain sacks, and he was struggling to crawl out from under the canvas—no easy task with his hands tied behind his back. Though gagged, he managed to growl like a bear rudely awakened from its winter hibernation. Eyes wide as saucers, Prissy cast about for something with which to defend herself. She discovered a tree axe, and advanced on Klesko, weapon raised. Christopher was the first to reach her. He wrestled the axe away from her before any damage was done.

"Don't kill him, Prissy," he said, laughing. "We went to a lot of trouble to smuggle him aboard without the folks back at Cully's Landing knowing."

"Who is he?" asked Rebecca.