Kate Wingo - Western Fire 01 (17 page)

Her mother, inconsolable at hearing the news, had retired to her bed, the muffled sound of her weeping still reverberating throughout the house. Pru, poor thing, was not holding up any better, having run out of the house, wailing like a banshee. And Gabriel, overwhelmed by the tears and mournful sobs, was hiding in the protective arms of the old oak
that shaded the springhouse.

Clutching the daguerreotype to her bosom, Mercy offered up a silent
plea that she and her family would be granted the spiritual fortitude to withstand this most painful of tragedies. Although she sought comfort in prayer, her mind was bombarded with an unbidden array of painful, heart-wrenching images – Ethan charging into a hailstorm of bullets; Ethan, mortally wounded; Ethan, in his death throes, waiting for the shadow of death to relieve him of his agonies. And then there was the worst image of all: Ethan’s body interred on enemy soil in an unknown, unwept grave, far from hearth and home.

Even in the midst of this terrible
sorrow, Mercy was certain that her brother had been a brave and honorable soldier. One who did not deserve to die at the hands of vicious Southerners like Bloody Ned Sykes.
And Spencer McCabe.

Shoving the letter into her apron pocket, Mercy wearily rose from the settee. As she stepped over to the fireplace, she
felt as though her body was weighted with lead. Reverently, she set the daguerreotype on the mantle next to the framed picture of her father. As she had several times already over the course of the last two hours, she asked the Good Lord to keep her eldest brother Benjamin safe from harm. And to return him as soon as possible to the bosom of his family.

About to retire to her room, Me
rcy, instead, stood motionless as she listened to the incessant pound of hooves in the near distance. Enraged, she rushed over to the cupboard and retrieved the pistol that she’d confiscated two weeks earlier from a slain bushwhacker. Her family had endured enough tribulation to last a lifetime. She would not allow them to suffer any more. It didn’t matter whether the approaching riders were bushwhackers or jayhawkers. Whoever they were, they would be met with deadly force. She was not in a mood to be trifled with.

Pistol in hand, Mercy peered out the parlor window, her blood running hot at the sight of the McCabe brothers riding down the lane
. A few moments later Dewey veered in the direction of the barn while Spencer headed toward the house. Her heart hammering against her breastbone, she watched as he made his approach, his jaunty manner suggesting that he had some sort of proprietary right to be there.

Unable to expunge from her mind
’s eye the image of her brother killed at the hands of southern rebels, Mercy’s hand tightened around the pistol butt. Although she tried to control her anger, she was powerless to do so. Particularly when she spied the dead game animals hanging from Spencer’s saddlehorn.

In the next instant, she charged
out of the house with the speed and fury of an unchecked summer storm.

No sooner did she reach the front yard than she extended her right arm, the loaded pistol unerringly pointed in Spencer’s direction.

“You’re nothing but a low-down, dirty Southerner,” she railed, tears streaming down her cheeks. “And I want you to leave my farm! Right now!”

Wearing a befuddled expression,
Spencer dismounted from his horse. “Now, hold up, honey. It’s obvious that something is wrong and—”

“
You!
You’re what’s wrong. You and all of the murdering southern fiends just like you.” Holding the pistol with both hands, Mercy cocked it, took aim and fired, the bullet hitting the ground near Spencer’s feet.

“Goddammit!” he bellowed, wobbling unsteadily on his bad leg.

“Yes, I hope that he does damn you.” Mercy raised her arm, this time taking aim at his chest. “Damns you to the eternal pits of hell.”

“All right. I get the message,” Spencer growled as he swung himself back into the saddle. “Obviously, you’re not woman enough to accept what happened between us.”

“How dare you even broach that disgusting episode? You forced me to have relations with you, making me behave like an animal in rut!”

“The hell you say
! I didn’t make you do anything that you didn’t want to do. And from the way you moaned and whimpered, I’d say you enjoyed every minute of it.”

“That’s now true and you know it!”

Spencer leaned forward in the saddle, a deprecating sneer on his face. “All I know is that you damned near begged me to fuck you.”

Dewey, having heard the gunfire, came running
towards them.

“Go fetch your horse,” Spencer
hollered at his brother. “We’re getting the hell out of here.”

“But, Spence, we just got here.”

“It seems that we’ve worn out our welcome.” As he spoke, Spencer unhooked several dead rabbits from his saddlehorn. Cursing profanely, he tossed the trussed-up game at Mercy’s feet before charging toward the barn in a cloud of dust.

“Good riddance to you, Spencer McCabe!” Mercy called after him, sorely tempted to fire another round.

Wide-eyed, Dewey turned and ran after his brother. No doubt, he was afraid that she’d next take aim at him.

Not about to let her pride get in the way of practicality, Mercy walked over to the
discarded rabbits. It had been nearly a week since they last had fresh meat on the supper table.

As Spencer and Dewey galloped past, she didn’t so much as give them a sideways glance.

Returning to the house, she made her way to the kitchen and deposited the pistol in an empty crock for safekeeping. Satisfied that the firearm was well hidden, she next retrieved a skinning knife and an old bucket. Since her chore would best be accomplished outside, she opened the back door.

Sitting
on one of the large native stones that served as a stoop, Mercy stared at the blades of grass that gently undulated in the breeze. Emotionally drained, she couldn’t find the energy to begin the unpleasant task of skinning and gutting the dead game. However, if she didn’t perform the chore, their supper would be meager, indeed.

Shoving aside her natural repulsion, sh
e cut through the piece of string that trussed the animals together. Then, with a resigned sigh, she held one of the rabbits over the bucket and commenced to skinning it.

A few moments later
, she paused, her gaze momentarily arrested by the sight of a white cotton shirt hanging on the clothesline to dry.
It was Spencer’s shirt
. Since he and Dewey had already galloped away, she could only assume that he’d inadvertently left his clean laundry behind
.

I
should have shot the man while I had the chance
.

Because of Spencer McCabe and other fiendish men of his ilk, her brother
Ethan would eternally sleep in southern soil.

Pausing every now and then to swipe at the unbidden tears
that trickled down her cheeks, Mercy forced herself to finish her task. As she did, she recited aloud the words of her favorite psalm, her lips moving in swift, almost mechanical fashion.

“
The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want . . .”

‘The wages of sin is death.’

And before one dies, they must endure shame-filled days of bitter remembrance.

At least that’s how Mercy interpreted those
condemnatory words. For no matter how many times over the course of the last five weeks she’d tried to expunge from her daytime memory those lustful hours that she’d spent with Spencer McCabe, come nightfall, the memories always returned.

To her disgrace, she’d behaved no better than a harlot.
No
, worse than a harlot. She, at least, knew the difference between right and wrong; and had still chosen the latter course. But even more damning, she’d known all along that Spencer was a southern bushwhacker who paid allegiance to Bloody Ned Sykes and his gang of roving thugs. And yet she’d elected to walk the wanton’s path, having willingly engaged in licentious, sinful congress with the man.

And I rue the day that I did,
Mercy thought bitterly as she knelt in front of the parlor fireplace. Flannel rag in hand, she rubbed a tarnished brass andiron with a bit of oil. Because it was a laborious chore that she did not particularly relish – one that caused her knees to swell and her arms to ache – she looked upon it as a penance of sorts.

Although no amount of kneeling and polishing could possibly atone for her craven
behavior. Having been seduced by the temptations of the flesh, she’d vowed that it would never happen again. A wolf in sheep’s clothing, Spencer had wooed her with his whiskey-eyed gaze and his deep southern drawl. And though she had no proof, she had good reason to suspect that she was not the first chaste maiden to have succumbed to his manly charm.

“Sister,
you polished those andirons only last week,” Prudence gently reproached.

Craning her neck, Mercy glanced
over to where Pru sat on the settee, a basket of mending on the floor at her feet.

“
They were quite tarnished,” she mumbled, unable to look her sister in the eye.

“Well, they aren’t tarnished any more.” Pru reached into the basket for one of Spencer’s old, faded shirts which had been left behind in his hasty departure. “In fact, they look good as new.”

Frowning, Mercy stared at the shirt in Pru’s hands. “I thought that I told you to rip that shirt into rags.”

“But what if Spencer returns and
—”

“He’s not returning.
Ever
.”

Prudence’s face went ashen. “But if he doesn’t return, I’ll never see Dewey again.”

Taking a deep breath, Mercy tried not to let her annoyance get the better of her. “We’ve been through this a dozen—”

“I hear riders approaching!” Pru
suddenly exclaimed as she pointed to the parlor window.

Mercy jumped to her feet, nervously wiping her hands on her soot-encrusted apron. Earlier that day Sam Guernsey had stopped by to warn them that jayhawkers had been sighted in the area.
Despite the fact that jayhawkers paid lip service to the Union, it didn’t stop them from brutally attacking innocent northern-born folk. As well she knew.

Dropping her mending, Pru rushed
over to the window. “There’s a whole gang of m-men heading t-t-toward the house,” she sputtered, her eyes round with terror.

Dear Go
d in heaven, not again!

Nervously, the two sisters
glanced at each other, neither of them willing to voice their fears.

Seeing the panic in Pru’s eyes, Mercy tried to maintain at least
a semblance of relative calm. “Gabriel is in the back yard. Quickly fetch him. And then I want the two of you to hide in the springhouse.”

“But what about you and Mama?”

Mercy knew that there wasn’t enough time to rouse her mother. Since receiving word of Ethan’s death, Temperance Hibbert’s health had steadily declined, a good part of her waking hours spent in bed.

“We’ll be fine.”
Mercy peered out the parlor window, anxiously noting that the cloud of dust from the approaching riders was getting closer with each passing second. “Just do as I say. And be quick about it.”

Prudence turned on her heel and ran to the kitchen, the back door slamming
shut a few seconds later. Taking several deep breaths, Mercy tried to calm herself. Whether the riders were friend or foe, the situation would require steady nerves, something she sorely lacked at the moment.

Scurrying down the hall to the kitchen, she grabbed the first knife
that she came upon, a small bone-handled paring knife. Because there wasn’t enough time to run upstairs and retrieve her pistol, she slipped the knife into her apron pocket.

Her fear escalating with each passing second
, Mercy belatedly realized that it may have been shortsighted to have sent Spencer packing. For all his faults, and he had many, the man was a warrior without peer. Although with a gang of riders beating a swift path to the house, such regrets were a pointless waste of time.

As she stepped
through the front door, Mercy braced herself as the riders, six in all, came to a halt not far from the porch. She hoped that if she kept calm and explained to them that they had nothing worth stealing, the gang would continue on their way. Noticing that each of them wore a pair of fringed red leggings, she reckoned them to be Kansas jayhawkers. As she recalled, several of the men that they’d buried last February had been similarly attired.

Mustering her courage as best she could,
Mercy made her way down the porch steps, unnerved at having six pairs of male eyes intently watching her every move.

“Good day,” she
greeted the assembled riders, striving for a courteous tone.

A barrel-chested man with a misshapen nose leaned forward in the saddle. “Where is he?” he asked
gruffly by way of greeting, asserting himself as the leader.

Mercy gave an inward sigh, relieved that Spencer wasn’t there, after all. While she
didn’t want to see him ever again, it certainly didn’t mean that she wished him to meet his death at the hands of jayhawkers.

“Hey, little sister, I asked you
a question: where is the boy?”

‘
The boy?!’

Guessing Spencer’s age to be somewhere in the neighborhood of one score and ten,
he could hardly be considered a ‘boy.’

“I . . . I don’t know who . . . who you’re talking about,”
Mercy sputtered, mystified by the rider’s demand.

“The one
that you call Gabriel, where is he? We’ve been sent to get him.”

W
hat could these men possibly want with Gabriel?

“I don’t understand. Who would instruct you to do such a thing?”

“That’s none of your damned business. Just tell us where the boy is,” the leader snarled, clearly a man of little patience.

“I sent
Gabriel and my sister into town for supplies,” she informed him. Admittedly, it was an unoriginal lie; however, it was the only one that she could fabricate on such short notice.

The gang leader eyed her suspiciously. “The nearest town is five miles
away.”

“So it is.”
Baffled by his adamancy, Mercy was unable to fathom why a gang of armed men would want a nine-year-old boy.

“There’s no use lying to us, little sister. We know
that you’re a southern sympathizer.”

“How dare you even suggest such a thing,” she huffed, appalled at having such an insulting a
ccusation leveled against her.

One of the other riders, a short man with a bushy
, rust-colored beard gestured in her direction. “We heard that Bloody Ned Sykes himself stayed here.”

“
Rest assured that I did not invite him.” Although her heart fearfully thumped, Mercy tried to hide her fear as best she could. Her recent experience with Ned Sykes had taught her that such men prey on the weak and defenseless.

The bearded man’s eyes narrowed. “How do we know that?”

“What reason would I have for lying?”

The man licked his lips, his gaze sweeping up and down her person. “Reason aplenty if you thought we intended you any harm.” He turned to the lead rider, a speculative gleam in his eyes. “Hey, Rawlings
. What do you think? Is the little gal lying to us?”

Not about to let
the gang of riders get the better of her, Mercy squared her shoulders and looked their leader, Rawlings, straight in the eye. “I will have you know that both of my older brothers donned Union blue. Not only that, but one of them –” Mercy’s voice trembled with emotion – “one of them has even given his life for the cause of freedom.”

“Is that a fact?” Rawlings scrunched his face into a derisive sneer. “
You southern sympathizers are always able to conjure up a Yankee relative or two whenever you see us coming down the pike.”

“Yeah, some folks will say just about anything to keep the bogeyman at bay,” his red-bearded cohort added. “But we know different. We know
that you recently gave aid to some of those Missouri riffraff.”

“There are no bushwhackers here,” Mercy avowed. “Although please feel free to search the premises if you don’t believe me.”

Rawlings eased his large-boned frame out the saddle. “Well, now, I think I might just do that. Beames, you take a couple of the boys and search the house. Wilcox, you check the barn and other outbuildings.”

After dismounting and hitching their horses to the porch railing, the jayhawkers scurried to follow orders
. Rawlings remained behind, presumably to guard her. Mercy prayed that no one would wander down to the creek. If they did, Gabriel and Prudence would surely be discovered in the springhouse.

Several minutes
passed before the men assigned to search the house returned to the front yard.

“
Except for an old lady hiding out in an upstairs bedroom, we didn’t find anything,” one of them said with a shrug.

“Hey, Rawlings
! Looky what I uncovered.”

As if on cue, everyone swung their head toward the red-bearded man named Beames
as he sauntered through the front door. In his hand was Spencer’s mended shirt.

“You damned lying bitch,” Rawlings
hissed, his face turning red with anger. “What kind of fool do you take me for anyway?”

Mercy’s knees nervously knocked together. “None at all,” she warbled. “I was in the process of mending that shirt when . . . when you arrived.”

Rawlings snatched the shirt out of Beames hand, shaking it in front of Mercy’s face. “The man who belongs to this shirt, where is he?”

“He’s . . . he’s not here,” she answered
. When, in the next instant, Rawlings reached for his sidearm, she hastily amended her reply and said, “By that, I mean he’s dead. My father died last year, and, um, well, I frequently wear his old clothing when I, um . . . when I muck the barn.”

Rawlings eyed her long and hard,
silently assessing her rambling reply. Several moments passed before he said in a low-pitched voice, “When was the last time that you mucked the barn?”

“Day before yeste
rday,” Mercy readily replied.

“But you ain’t got no animals in that barn,” one of the men
astutely pointed out.

“Is that a fact?” Rawlings spat a stream of brown tobacco juice, splattering the hem of Mercy’s skirt.

Terrified, Mercy took a faltering backwards step, inwardly groaning when her inquisitor countered with a forward step. Her lies had compounded at such a dizzying rate that she was now unable to extricate herself from the tangled web of her own words.

Rawlings, his face mottled with anger, extended an arm in her direction. Grabbing her bodice by the neckline, he yanked her toward him.

“One way or the other, I’m gonna get it out of you. Now whose shirt is it?”

Mercy stood silent, unwilling to reply. If she told him
the truth – that the shirt belonged to Spencer McCabe – it would undoubtedly precipitate untold harm to her and her family.

Surmising
that she had no intention of answering him, Rawlings roughly shoved Mercy to the ground, knocking the wind out of her. Several of the jayhawkers snickered as she staggered to her feet.

“All right, boys
. Go ahead and torch the house.” Rawlings’ order met with a chorus of exuberant whoops as his underlings ran toward the house. Only Beames remained behind.

“No!” Mercy screamed, gasping to catch her breath. “My mother is still in
side the house! You must let me go to her!”

When
her pleas fell on deaf ears, Mercy rushed headlong toward the porch. She’d gone no more than a few feet when Rawlings caught up with her. Once again, he roughly shoved her to the ground.

“What
are you plannin’ on doing with her?” Beames asked, speculatively stroking his beard with a grimy palm.