Authors: Leaving Whiskey Bend
Eli’s jaw hung as if on broken hinges. “Wh-what are you saying? They never caught Caleb’s killer? In all this time, in all the years I’ve been gone, they never found the son of a bitch that did it?”
“Oh, they thought they had, at least at first,” she explained. “’Bout the same time you became settled in your new life, the sheriff saw fit to arrest Will Jenkins for the crime.”
Will Jenkins was a fixture in Bison City. Whenever there was a bar fight, a drunken episode, or any other occasion that required the sheriff’s attention, Will was almost certain to be there. To hear his name now was of no surprise to Eli.
“What happened?” he asked, a lump in his throat.
“A couple of days after Caleb’s murder, there was Will, stumbling into one of the saloons wearing Caleb’s hat. To make things worse, when the sheriff questioned him, he couldn’t remember what he’d been doing the night Caleb was shot. Your father and I, we both thought that justice had been done and that Will would hang for the crime.”
“Why didn’t he?”
“It wasn’t him,” his mother said matter-of-factly.
“What?”
“A gal in the rooming house said that he was with her the whole evening,” Mrs. Morgan explained. “When he was spotted coming out of the alley, he’d been leaving her room. He said that he found the hat just laying there, slipped it on, and that was that. There wasn’t anything for the sheriff to do but to let him go on his way.”
“Then who did it?”
“If you hadn’t walked away from us, if you hadn’t left your father and me here alone, then maybe you could have looked into it, asked around—but there was no one to do it. Not your father, with his heart broken and all, and then Abe had his spell soon after. You were Caleb’s only hope, but you let him down just like you did the rest of us!”
Eli had no answer to give his mother. Everything that he thought he knew about life in Colorado was dumped on its ear! His father’s death, Abe’s bizarre slide into a kind of madness, and Caleb’s unsolved murder shook his very being.
“Things have changed, Elijah,” she said coldly, “with or without you.”
When his mother turned on her heel and made her way back toward the house, the cold scowl still etched across her rigid face, there was nothing for Eli to do but watch her go.
Eli leaned against the large barn door and watched the fading summer sun streak the horizon in deep crimson and purple hues. A pair of eagles turned in lazy circles, their sharp eyes still looking for unwary prey. Sweat trickled down the sides of Eli’s face as he watched the birds hunt; the hot summer day had begun to slowly slide into night, but there still wasn’t much of a breeze and the early evening was humid.
Ever since he was a small boy, Eli had felt at ease among the ranching tools that lined the barn walls. Leather straps, cattle brands, hammers, and saws filled the large space. In one corner lay a fire pit and anvil that was used to repair broken clasps and hooks, as well as to shoe horses. Drawing in the rich and musky smells, Eli could still see his father bent over his labors, beads of sweat and streaks of grime lining his face.
And now all of that is gone . . .
With his father’s passing, Eli realized that life would never be the same. As much as it pained him, there would be no going back to those simpler times before the fighting, before the harsh words that he’d give anything to take back. First Caleb; then his father; and then, in a sense, he’d also lost Abe.
What more do I have to give?
“I reckon you’d like to slug me one.” Hank had come up behind him.
Eli turned to look at his uncle. Hank ducked his head sheepishly, his hat in his hand like a man who’d stepped inside a church. In many ways, Eli knew that that was exactly what the barn was to the old cowhand; ranching was in Hank’s blood as deeply as a tick’s grasp on a mangy dog.
“The thought had crossed my mind,” Eli admitted.
“If it’ll ease your head a bit, I won’t stop you.”
Ever since he’d spoken with his mother, Eli had mulled over every word, every curse, and every look that they had exchanged. He’d spent the rest of the day alone, uncertain what he should do next. Try as he might, his thoughts kept returning to Hank and the one question for which he had absolutely no answer.
“Why, Hank?” he asked, finally giving the question voice. “Why didn’t you tell me about my father?”
“Because even though your mother is a hard-nosed, thickheaded, iron horse of a woman, she’s still my sister and the only family I’ve got left.” Running a hand through his salt-and-pepper hair, Hank leaned against the large barn door opposite his nephew. “When your father died, I tried to get her to write you, to tell you what had happened, but she wouldn’t hear of it. She made me promise that I’d hold my tongue and, like the good brother I’ve always tried to be to her, I gave her my word.”
“Then why’d you send me that telegram?” Eli asked. “Why get me all the way back here to Bison City, to the ranch, when she’s made it clear she doesn’t want me?”
“Well, then . . . maybe my word ain’t as good as I thought it was,” Hank said.
Eli looked at the ragged, dust-worn crags of his uncle’s face and could see that he was telling the truth; Hank Gallows had been unable to resist the force of his sister’s anger. He’d simply looked after both her and his nephew; and that was certainly something that Eli could respect.
“You gonna forgive me?” Hank asked.
“How could I not?”
“Good.” The older man nodded. “Now, what happened with your mother?”
“Nothing good,” Eli said with a shrug. “I just couldn’t believe some of the things she said. She blamed me for what happened to Pa and for Caleb and Abe. It made me mad as hell!”
“Your mother’s had it rough. I ain’t gonna make no excuses for her, but she’s been through enough to put most folks into the grave. Her bite can be as sharp as a snake’s, but that don’t mean her heart’s bad. I suppose that ain’t gonna make it no easier to bear, huh?”
For a while, both men were silent, content to stare out into what little of the day remained. A sliver of sun clung tenaciously to the horizon; the moon had already risen in the east, accompanied by the hundreds of stars already visible in the sky.
“I’m thinking about leaving,” Eli finally said. He’d been rolling the thought around in his head from the moment his mother had walked away and, try as he might, he hadn’t thought of a reason to stay.
“I was afraid you might be.”
“It’s just like you said, Hank. Things change whether we want them to or not. Hell, I’ve changed, too. I’ve got a life waiting for me back in Galveston and I can’t think why I shouldn’t get back to it.”
Hank crossed the short distance between them and placed his worn hand on his nephew’s shoulder. “Give it time,” he said solemnly. “Spend some time helpin’ me out with the work around here, maybe do a little ridin’, and then make up your mind. Leavin’ now ain’t gonna do nothin’ ’cept make the break wider and deeper.”
“It’s just that—”
“Stay for this here old cowboy,” Hank said, silencing him. “Just give it a couple of days’ time before you make up your mind. You still feel the same way then, I’ll help you pack up and go.”
Looking into Hank’s eyes, Eli knew that he couldn’t refuse him. With a deep sigh, he nodded. “All right. I’ll stay for a while and help out with the cattle. Maybe with time, Ma will be able to stand the sight of me.”
“I hate to tell you, Eli, my boy,” Hank said with a chuckle, “but that face of yours ain’t one that gets easier on the eyes!”
“Watch yourself, old man,” Eli said as he punched his uncle’s shoulder.
As they made their way back to the house, Eli knew that, as hard as it was, staying for a couple of days was the only choice he had. As bad as things were between him and his mother, as pitiful as Abe’s condition was, there was one other matter that he simply couldn’t ignore.
I have to find the answer to the mystery of Caleb’s murder!
“I
SHOULD HAVE
just shot that bastard where his brains are—between his legs!”
Hallie turned in the wagon seat to look at Pearl. The older woman’s face was drawn into a tight mask of anger and regret. She looked tired. They had been on the rough road for the last two days, bumping and jostling their way to the north and west. All around them stands of elm and oak trees dotted a hilly landscape overgrown with tall grass.
Every mile seems to be as trying as pulling teeth,
she thought. They’d planned to travel only at night in order to avoid the orange sun that blazed above them, but the fear of being followed gnawed at their nerves, and they had kept moving.
“You did what you had to do,” Hallie said simply.
“I know, I know.” Pearl nodded, her hair loosened and flowing in the scant breeze afforded to them. “I swear I didn’t go there with the intention of shootin’ him, but that worthless son of a bitch wasn’t gonna just let us walk out of there with Mary without a fight. No sir, he wouldn’t have! He woulda killed us both.”
“Do you think he’s dead? Do you think you killed him?”
Pearl was silent for a moment. The only sound came from the clopping of the horse’s hooves against the dirt road. Hallie could tell that her friend had given the matter a great deal of thought.
“I can’t say for certain,” she finally said. “I only shot him in the leg, but he was all alone out there. He might not have been able to make it to town and a doctor in time to stop all the bleedin’. Whether he was dead or not, we didn’t have a choice but to leave Whiskey Bend.”
“I suppose not.”
In many ways, leaving Whiskey Bend was something that Hallie had been prepared to do for quite some time. It hadn’t begun that way. She’d arrived in town two years earlier after a long journey from Ohio. Deciding to travel alone, she’d incurred the wrath of her overprotective parents, a minister and his wife, but she had been determined to escape the stifling atmosphere in which she had been raised. She was trained as a teacher, and she’d headed west full of excitement, confidence, and hope in her quest to find a better life.
At first, her initial months in Whiskey Bend had been all that she hoped: she settled into a healthy work life at the one-room schoolhouse, had become involved in the community and church, and had no shortage of new friends. But the fact that she had been both unmarried and attractive had brought unwanted attention. It wasn’t that she wasn’t interested in finding a husband; on the contrary, it was something that she deeply desired. The problem was that she had yet to find the right man. Thankfully, most of the men whose advances she had politely turned down had taken her at her word, tipped their hats, and moved on.
But not Zachary Wall
.
Even when she rejected him, telling him as firmly as she could that she was
not
interested, Zachary pursued her relentlessly. It hadn’t mattered to him that he was already married or that two of his children were Hallie’s students. His interest only seemed to grow with every no. Every time she came into contact with him, whether it was in the mercantile or even in church, she cringed, waiting for an inappropriate look or word. In the end, when he seemed to realize that she would
never
take him to her bed, he turned vicious, spreading rumors around town that accused her of drinking, immoral sexual conduct, and being generally unfit to have charge of the townspeople’s children. Slowly Hallie began to hear whispers when she entered a room.
Finally, it all came to a head. One night, he came to her boardinghouse room, drunkenly pounding on her door and demanding entry. Against her better judgment, she relented and let him inside, thinking to quiet him and then . . . The details of what occurred that night haunted her, filling her with disgust and dread. Since the passing of those horrible hours, she’d confided what happened to only one other person, Pearl, and Hallie knew that she’d never again give them voice.
In the end, leaving Whiskey Bend had been an easy decision.
“Do you have any regrets?” Hallie asked her friend.
“About leaving Whiskey Bend?” Pearl laughed. “If there’s one thing I’ll
never
regret, it’ll be leavin’ that fleabag town. Like my momma always used to say, ‘Ain’t no point in stayin’ where you ain’t wanted.’”
“I suppose you’re right.”
“Damn right, I am.”
Hallie knew that Pearl also had more than her share of reasons to leave Whiskey Bend, although the matter had roots that had been formed many years earlier.
In the heady years after the completion of the trans-continental railroad, Pearl and her husband had done as thousands of others had and headed west. They’d settled in the aptly named town of Simple, wedged next to a river just across the Colorado state line from Nebraska. There, they’d built a tavern with the idea of establishing something they could be proud of and that would grow right along with the town. In the back of their minds there was even the idea of a child or two or three. It had all seemed ideal and attainable, but something had gone wrong.
Pearl’s husband always had a taste for whiskey, but now, with unfettered access to the tavern’s stock, he imbibed as never before. Soon, a slap here and there turned into a closed fist. One night, deep in the blistering cold January of their second year in Simple, he came to their bed not in the mood for love but for blood and beat her nearly half to death. The next morning, her meager belongings hastily packed into a rickety wagon, she left without regret and without ever once looking back. Six months later, Pearl received word that her husband had gotten drunk and burned the tavern to the ground, killing himself in the process.
For the next ten years, she drifted from one town to another, tending bars and doing other odd jobs before yet another ruined relationship forced her to once again move on. Finally, she came to Whiskey Bend determined to do things differently.
The biggest change in her life was to refuse to take another lover; after all her failed attempts, she’d come to realize that she just didn’t know how to pick them. But there was one thing about herself that she was unable to change: all the years behind alcohol-soaked bars had given her both a salty vocabulary and a wit quick enough to sharpen her tongue.