Paradise Sky

I thanked him for that parting information, and last on my list of good-byes was Bronco Bob. When I told him, he said, “Nat, I am going with you. You are a source of stories and a man of action, and I plan to write them all down and become rich for it, and you will, of course, receive a cut of the monies.”

“That would be grand, Bob, but mine may be a rough trail, and I don’t think white audiences much care to read about a colored man and his adventures.”

“We will see,” he said. “As for the journey, I can handle that, at least as far as Kansas. There I may choose another path. I’ve already sold my wagon and some of my guns, so I have traveling money. I’m willing to share it if the need arises. My days making my living as a shooter are quit. I have run out that string and have lost interest. I would delight in your company, as I have plans to leave anyway.”

This is how Bronco Bob became my traveling companion.

The night before the day I was leaving, in bed, I made a small effort to hold Win close, and she let me. It made me feel good to see she was getting better, if only in small doses, but it made me feel, too, that maybe I shouldn’t leave, that I should stay and help in her recovery. But I was too set in my plans to change them; at that point it would have been like turning a petrified tree back into common wood. Wasn’t going to happen.

Next morning I saddled up my horse, and Bronco Bob come and joined me, and Win even came out in the yard. I kissed her gently on the mouth, without any real response, hugged Wow and Cullen good-bye, and climbed on Satan. I said to Cullen, “Keep Win warm. Charlie Utter says the wind blows hard and sharp and cold come dead of winter.”

“She will be as warm as we are,” said Cullen, “and I like it warm.”

“Good enough,” I said.

As me and Bronco Bob rode away, I turned and looked back, seen Win turn quickly into the house. It hurt my heart to see her so eager to return to her spot in our room. But we hadn’t ridden far when I heard a sharp note cut the air, and then it was followed by a number of sweeter notes.

I turned on my horse for a look. Win had come out of the house with her flute and was playing us off on our mission. With a smile on my face, I raised my hand to her, and we rode on out of Deadwood to that high, sweet sound.

25

Having gone only a short distance, we realized we was being followed. This follower wasn’t so sneaky, as he was riding a mule and coming right behind us, purposely keeping some distance. I turned in the saddle, looked back, and recognized him. It was the boy Bronco Bob had hired to tote his guns and stuff at the match.

I said as much, and Bronco Bob said, “Tim?”

“Jim,” I said.

We slowed down, and Jim stopped coming, halting on his mule, just looking at us. Then Bronco Bob waved him in, and he put his heels to the mule and came riding up to us. We sat there on our animals and talked.

I tell you, that boy was worse-looking than the mule. He had gone down considerably since I had seen him last, the day of the shooting match some months back. His red hair was long and caked with mud, and his face was spotted with it, too. His knees and elbows, which was bony as an old cow carcass, was sticking through his clothes, and the soles on his oversize boots flapped like nags’ tongues when he came riding up. He was scummy around the eyes, and his teeth was a little green at the gums, like they was little trees with moss growing against them.

“What in hell are you doing out here, Tim?” Bronco Bob asked.

“I ain’t got no family. I been living under a porch. I hadn’t done nothing until you seen something in me and hired me, Mr. Bronco. It meant a lot to me.”

“Hell, boy, you just happened to be handy. It might well have been anybody.”

“Oh,” Jim said.

“He just don’t want you to get the big head,” I said, sensing right off that any confidence the boy had gained from having been the aide to Bronco Bob had just run down his leg. It was like someone had told a worm they was too high off the ground.

Bronco Bob seen how I was heading, and after having had that rare dull moment, said, “Yeah, I don’t want you getting all blowed up in your thinking, your head such a size you can’t walk through a doorway.”

“Yes, sir,” Jim said.

“Listen here,” I said. “You ain’t doing yourself any good out here with us. We got a long ride ahead of us.”

“I ain’t got nowhere to go,” said Jim. “Dogs like under that porch where I was sleeping, too, and when it rains I got to find a place higher. Just staying halfway dry and warm is some real work.”

“You’ll get wet out here, too,” I said. “And where’d you get that mule?”

“I borrowed it,” Jim said.

“I bet you did,” I said.

“It’s as poorly as me,” Jim said. “I was packing out goods for some miners, but they took to butt-fucking me and the mule, so I stole it when I seen you fellows leaving and come after you.”

“What was that you said about the miners?” Bronco Bob said.

Jim said it again.

“We should go back and kill them right away,” Bronco Bob said. This from a man who until a few days ago had never shot at a living human being.

“They moved on and left the mule to fend for itself cause it’s ski

“What say you, Nat?”

I didn’t like it, adding a responsibility, as I hadn’t managed so well my last time out with my charges, but I said, “All right. But we got to decide on something right now. Are you Jim, or are you Tim?”

“I got called Jim by somebody sometime back, and I’ve kept the name. I don’t recall what I was named when I was little, as my folks run off and left me with a boot-shine kit and a cold potato in a sack. They just moved off and took their tent and supplies with them. I stayed with a Chinaman for a while, but I couldn’t understand him, so I left.”

“How long ago was that?” I asked.

“I don’t rightly reckon,” he said. “But I think I’m about sixteen, and that’s been seven, eight years ago I left. I ain’t got that boot-shine kit no more.” He added that as if we was about to ask him for a boot polish.

“My God, you were practically a baby,” Bronco Bob said.

“I ain’t never been a baby,” said Jim.

“All right, then. We still don’t know which you prefer,” I said. “Jim or Tim.”

“I come to most anything,” he said.

“Naw, that ain’t going to work,” I said. “Decide on your name.”

The boy looked at Bronco Bob, said, “I like Red, actually.”

“Then Red it is,” I said. “And remember, you got to tote your own weight if you’re going to be with us.”

“I been doing that and can keep on doing it.”

And that’s how Red, formerly Tim and formerly Jim, became our companion.

That first night we stopped to camp, we did so down in a ravine. We had a cold supper of beans, as we was worried about Indians. It was a clear and dry night, so the ravine was fine. It was lined with rocks, and there wasn’t no water in it right then. It was dry and a good windbreak. Bronco Bob dug around in his bedroll, where he had wound up his possibles, and pulled that white fringed jacket he had worn at the shooting match out of it, tossed it to Red.

“Put that on, and take care of it,” Bronco Bob said. “It’s yours, but you got to take care of it. This one will fit you better than me. I’m gaining in girth, and I prefer my big cotton one. It’ll warm you well enough.”

Red held the jacket like he had just been given baby Jesus’s fresh swaddling wrap. “Thank you, Mr. Bronco.” It was obvious he wanted to say something else, but his tongue had grown too thick and was blocking his throat.

“I catch you leaving it laying about,” Bronco Bob said, “I will take it away from you and give you a kick. You understand?”