09

I thrashed out of a dream with a rushing in my ears, tangled in sweat-damp blankets, convinced Davey was trying for me again, and this time he was going to win. I could feel the knife. Still mostly asleep, I struggled against my imaginary attacker for some moments before the sound that had startled me in my sleep came again: the roar of a shotgun, not far outside my window.

It brought me awake enough to address reality in a dazed kind of way. First I slapped the bedpost where my guns should be, but found nothing there. All my kit was still hanging in the barn with my horses' tack. Throwing my blankets aside -- much easier now that I didn't half believe them to be Davey's strangling hands -- I cast about the room for something else I could use as a weapon. My side hurt as if the knife was still in it, though the pain lessened as I moved around.

I had about settled on the hat stand as the only halfway useful object when a light passed by my door and May's voice called, "Augustus, what on earth are you shooting at?"

Murphy rumbled some reply at a distance, which made May sigh. The light moved back the other way. It sounded as if I wouldn't be needed after all.

There was no question of going back to bed, though. I pulled my boots on and went out to meet the lady of the ranch. May was wearing a quilted robe over a flannel nightdress. Peeping from beneath the hem, her small feet were thickened by woolen socks. Her hair streamed down her back in braid-rippled waves, a black river threaded with sparse glimmers of silver. She had a lamp in one hand and a rifle in the other. There is something about a brave little mother that makes me wish to throw myself heroically against some enemy; I simply can't help it.

"Give me the rifle, ma'am, I'll go see what's the matter." I don't think I actually puffed up my chest like a pigeon, but something about my manner made her smile as she handed me the weapon.

"Just a coyote," she said with another sigh. "It'll be gone by now."

The last twinge in my side faded while I went in search of Murphy. Whether it was a remnant of the dream or a passing cramp, it was gone now. I felt quite strong, if still a mite sleep-addled.

The night was frosty. There wasn't much moon, but I hadn't brought a lantern to spoil my night sight. While I waited for my eyes to adjust, I listened. Offended chickens pucked and rustled in all the places they'd taken shelter. I heard them under the porch as I went down the steps.

As I grew accustomed to the darkness, I saw more and more chickens, like a puzzle picture coming clear. One hen had achieved the porch roof, where her plumed and ruffled silhouette resembled the result of an unlikely mating between an owl and a dance hall girl. On my way across the yard, I spotted a barely more plausible pair of strange bedfellows: the yellow barn cat was sharing the peak of the henhouse with a rooster, neither of them willing to spare a thought from watching for coyotes to cause each other grief.

Rifle at the ready, I made a circuit of the place, calling out for Murphy from time to time. At last he emerged from the pine wood behind what I'd already come to think of as Davey's cabin. Shirtless and barefoot despite the cold and the rough ground, shotgun propped against his shoulder, hair wild from sleep, he looked every inch the noble savage. Though I would've liked to admire the scene, mostly the sight made me feel like an effete Easterner, and I repented of my foolish puffery. I was going to protect his mother from wild animals, was I? When she already had such a magnificent brute at her disposal?

"It's black as the Devil's asshole in there," he greeted me. "Can't track a thing."

"Miz May said it was a coyote."

"Didn't get a good look. Could be a wolf." With a motion of his shaggy head, he invited me to walk with him back toward the yard. "I been told they don't come near human places 'less they're starved, but the critter took one bird quick and neat-like and absconded. Coyotes, they'll go on a kind of rampage if they get the chance. But it might be the birds got out of the way before he coulda got more'n one anyway, so I can't say for sure."

"Maybe we should fence in a run."

He snorted. "Might as well roast 'em and pile 'em in a basket for him. Naw, if they can scatter they'll mostly get clear. Pen 'em up, a coyote will dig under the fence and kill every damn one."

I shrugged. "You know best."

We reached the place where the animal had taken its prey. Murphy sat on his heels to look at the ground more closely. I took a look as well, though I couldn't get as close without blocking the moonlight. I didn't see any tracks. The ground was too hard. After a moment he stood up with a sigh. "I know I got a few pellets into him."

"Birdshot don't do more'n annoy a big animal, not unless it's right up close."

"Had the bird gun standing by the kitchen door, no time to go for something else. It scared him off, at least. Didn't slow him down, but there oughtta be a blood trail. I'll find it when it gets light."

"I'll come with you. I'm fine," I added vehemently as he began to object. "And I've had enough of being treated like I'm liable to drop dead at any moment. I believe I can withstand a morning's slow walk."

"Yesterday you was clean wore out from sitting in a chair."

"That was yesterday." I reached to block the house door as he made to open it, so he'd have to stop and look at me. "I'm sensible of your kind concern, Murphy, but now I have had enough of it."

He studied my face for some moments, brow stormy, and I thought he was about to light into me. But I glared right back, and in the end he looked aside and shrugged, though his jaw was still tight. "It's your life."

I opened the door without another word and let him go in first. I was a little surprised to have won the argument. I could've followed it by demanding to know my duties, making it clear I expected to be a proper working hand from now on, but it didn't seem a good time to push my luck. There was an anger I saw in him sometimes which I did not want to turn loose on myself. Not because I feared he'd harm me, though considering he outweighed me and looked to be near as fast, the outcome of an affray would certainly be in some doubt. But it isn't my nature to shrink from a fight once it's been presented to me. No, what inspired me to leave him space when his look darkened that way was a feeling that we would not emerge from that fight as friends.

I found May in the front parlor, gathering up a mass of blankets from the hearth rug, presumably where Murphy had been sleeping since I put him out of his bed. I returned her rifle to her and repeated Murphy's judgement of the situation. Hearing our intention to track the wounded animal, she offered to make an early breakfast.

"There's not much point going back to bed for less than an hour, is there?" she said. "Just let me get dressed."

Murphy was in the kitchen. He was grinding coffee when I joined him there. He seemed to be putting a bit more shoulder into turning the handle of the grinder than was strictly necessary, so I neither spoke nor caught his eye, choosing instead to stoke up the stove. I filled the big copper kettle and set it on, then took the bucket out to dump what was left and pump it full of fresh water. My side twinged me a little while I worked the pump handle, but it was pretty bearable.

May was in the kitchen when I returned. Murphy's vendetta against the coffee mill seemed to be over. I sat down beside him.

"Are we taking Davey?" I said.

He snorted. "Now, why would we wanna take Sidewinder Davey along?"

"Another hand in case we shoot something worth carrying back," I said with an indifferent shrug. "Don't stick him with a name like Sidewinder, Murphy. He'll never reform with that hanging over him."

"You're the one who wants to reform him."

"That's right."

The look he threw me wasn't angry, just skeptical, and gave way shortly to a halfway smile. "Might be Jonah would suit him better if your scheme pays out. Got a hunch he's the type who has to get ate by a whale 'fore he'll wise up."

I laughed. "Sounds about right to me."

"How'd you never get stuck with a colorful name?"

"Maybe I'm not a colorful guy."

"The hell you ain't."

"Then tell me, what suits me better than the name I already have?"

Murphy looked me over, frustration dawning. "Damn it, I think you might be right. It don't make sense. How can somebody look like a Zeke? What's a Zeke even look like?"

As an answer, I spread my hands and grinned. Murphy snorted.

Suddenly, May thumped a slab of bacon down in front of him. "Mr. Moss doesn't need a rude nickname any more than you do, Augustus," she said with an impish smile. "Slice this, please." She turned to me as my mouth began to open, and before I could speak, she said, "No, thank you, but it's kind of you to ask."

I shut my mouth, taken aback, and it was Murphy's turn to laugh. I muttered, "You don't know what I was going to say."

Murphy, still chuckling, said, "Same thing you say any time you got your hands empty. 'Gimme something to do.' You're just a mite predictable, Zeke."

"I prefer 'reliable' if it's all the same to you." My huff was put-on now, because of course they were both right. While they both smiled at that, I got up and took a lamp from the row of them on top of the dish cabinet. "I'll get kitted and fetch Davey, then." I held the unlit lamp up to squint into it, tilting it judgingly. "Um, where...?"

"Red can on the bottom shelf," Murphy and his mother chorused together. They looked at each other and laughed.

While I got the lamp filled, Murphy sliced bacon and May stirred flapjack batter. It was a homey little scene, just the kind of thing I'd been missing. Not that good cheer in a kitchen was never an occurrence in my life as a migrant cowpuncher, but it had been the laughter of a dozen men, a slopping wave in a sea of noise and humanity. This felt more like being part of a family. I didn't kid myself that I really was. I just liked feeling it for a minute or two.

The warm silence couldn't last long, of course. It was Murphy who broke it. "Don't know as I like having the rattlesnake here at the table."

"Quicker if we all eat at once. What's he going to do? Keep the bird gun by your chair if you're scared of him."

"I ain't scared of him," Murphy snapped.

May said indignantly, "No one is to even think of firing a shotgun in my kitchen."

"He's not going to do anything," I insisted reasonably. "He's going to sit and eat. He's a hired thug, not a... a... dime novel villain. He's not going to leap across the table, wrest my guns from me, and kill us all before we can do anything but shout 'Help!' Anyway, he's probably bored out of his mind. I know I would be. He'll be grateful to get out."

After a moment's consideration, Murphy gave a snort I chose to take as agreement. "Not everybody's as fond of work as you," he said. But he didn't stop me when I lit the lamp and went out.

The sky was just hinting at a lighter color now, but it was still pitch-dark inside the barn. Beyond the island of lamplight, the milk cows lurked like flatulent icebergs. I took a moment to greet my horses. Sleepy as they were, they still managed to convey a sense of hopefulness, but I had to disappoint them. Tracking in that pine wood would be a job for pedestrians. The horses would spend another boring day in the paddock with the tamest of Murphy's saddle band. They needed the rest and fattening, but all they knew was they didn't like being fenced in, poor beasts.

I found my belongings nearby. I got on my coat and hat and guns. I thought of bringing the saddlebags in, but decided to leave them where they lay. Much as I needed a change of clothes, there wasn't time for it now. My rifle was with my horses' gear, still in its saddle sheath. After a moment's thought I took that too. I'd been thinking it'd be my task to watch Davey and I'd leave the hunting to Murphy, but now I changed my mind. I believed my own logic, after all. Davey was too smart and too weak to make some mad bid for freedom when all we were demanding of him to do was eat breakfast and then go for a walk in the woods. He wouldn't be any trouble for the two of us.

I knelt to rummage in my bags for the rifle cartridges. They eluded me. I searched for some time before realizing that nothing in these saddlebags was quite familiar. They weren't mine. They were Amos's.

Davey's. They were Davey's.

My mental slip made me shake my head in anger at myself. What was I thinking, that Amos had turned into Davey? There had never been an Amos. It'd been Davey all along. I had to get that through my fool head or I was going to be in trouble.

Resisting the temptation to paw through Davey's belongings in search of -- hell, I didn't even know, sealed orders from the Agency or something -- I just flipped the bag closed and went to look in the right ones. Murphy would've searched Davey's baggage anyway. He wasn't burdened by sentimentality. I found my cartridges and went to wake up the traitor.