Paradise Sky

“Any idea where they was going?”

He shook his head.

“I have an idea,” Choctaw said. “There’s a fellow named Chet Williamson on the other side of the bluff, two, three days’ ride at their pace with the cows. He buys stolen anything that can be made into meat. He’s a butcher. He’s good at buying what ain’t his and butchering what ain’t his. We all know he does it, but ain’t no one ever caught him red-handed. He buys cows low and butchers them right away and makes his money off the meat by selling high. He don’t ask much in the way of questions. Them rustlers need some quick money, is my guess, and they’re gathering cows and horses, which Williamson also buys, kills, and smokes and says is beef. He wants what you got, you’re quick in and quick out. By the time money has changed hands and he’s got the stock, Williamson’s sons go straight to the butchering. They’re all butchers, though I heard one of them likes to make brooms or some such horseshit.”

“Oh, hell,” said Bump. “They butcher them. Ah, shit. I hate that to happen to my milk cows. They’re like family. They’re the only family I got, actually.”

“Maybe we can get to them before they sell the cows,” I said. “Tell me about them.”

Doolittle we all knew about by now, and then he described one that Choctaw said was definitely Pinocchio Joe. Then Bump said, “And the other one looked like he had been caught on fire and it had been put out by a stampede. Not only was he ugly, he was also mean, and he was in charge. I thought him and the long-nosed one was at each other’s throats a little, on account of I think Long Nose thought he should be ru

“That’s a note we’ll make,” I said. “All right, we’ll get you to your place then go after these assholes.”

“Hell with that. Go on and do your job. My place ain’t far, soon as I figure out which of the trails I see is really there.”

“We can set you on it,” Choctaw said.

“Just get my cows back,” he said. “Especially my milk cows.”

“We’ll do what we can,” I said.

We set Bump on the trail, and with his hand to his head, he went wandering along. Back on our horses Choctaw picked up their trail again, and we followed.

As we rode along, Choctaw said, “The cows are slowing them down quite a bit, and now that they’ve added some they’ll go slower still. We’ll catch up with them by nightfall is my figure. Not then, early the next morning.”

“Good,” I said.

“I want to remind you,” he said. “I only signed on to track.”

“When we find them, you can go back if you like.”

“Just so that’s understood that I can if I want to. I ain’t going to, just wanted it understood I’m my own man.”

“You’re sticking, then?”

“I think so, yeah.”

“When will I know so?” I said. “Something like that I ought to have a better idea of, considering the circumstances.”

“Yeah, I’m sticking.”

“I ought not look a gift horse in the mouth, but why?”

“You ain’t bossy like some of the others. Bass—damn, now, there’s a boss. I think him having been a slave taught him how to be a boss, too. He learned from his master. You know, story is he run off from being a slave, got clean free, and never went back. He was a good friend to his master is the story I heard, and they got in an argument over a card game, and Bass hit him and then run off and stayed run off.”

“Good for him,” I said.

“Yeah. But I think he did it not just because he was a slave but because he wanted to be boss. He likes being boss a little too much. Had his way, he’d have slaves.”

“But you’re fine with me?”

“You got an easy ma

It was all birdsong and roses right then, but we had yet to find them, and sometimes if you hunt bear, the bear wins. A thing I had solid in my mind as we rode along higher into the Ozark Mountains.

33

What I told you about how weather in that part of the country can change in the blink of an eye was coming true. The skies had darkened again, and not only was rain threatening to wet our heads, it was also threatening to darken our trail and wash it away. Choctaw had been able to follow it so far, but even he said another rain and he might not be able to stay on it, least not without some serious hunting here and there to pick up on it again. He said that wasn’t a worry, though, as he was certain where they were driving them cows and he didn’t need to track them anymore.

It made sense, but then again you can make all kinds of guesses that can get your ass in a tight crack. I was hoping we wasn’t making one, and I was hoping it wasn’t going to rain before we come up on them, as that would make our business more difficult. That hope got wet not long after.

It began to drizzle, and then real rain came down. It was a cold rain, driven by wind that near slashed you out of the saddle.

As it was dark with cloud cover and rain, we wasn’t trying to follow sign anymore. We pulled on our slickers, and Choctaw headed us where he thought they might be going. By nightfall the rain was still going full blast, and it was very dark, and we come upon a huddle of trees, hardwoods that had broad limbs and full leaves, and we decided that was the place to camp. As we was preparing to do that, we seen a red glow about three hundred yards away. Sitting on our horses just inside the trees, we could see that it was a huge fire built into the front of a cave that was hollowed out of a rise of rock; the kind of caves that litter parts of the Ozarks. What we couldn’t figure was just how far it went back, but we could hear cows mooing in there, and a couple of the critters seemed distressed.

“That’s them that are in need of milking,” Choctaw said.

“Yeah,” I said.

“Well, I don’t reckon you plan on just riding in on them.”

“I don’t. This is as good a place out of the rain as we got. I say we get our horses fed and do some pla

We dismounted, leaving the saddles on in case we needed to ride quick, and led our horses into the thickness of the trees and put feed bags on their snouts and tied them to tree trunks. We stood there watching them eat, glancing now and then at that big warm fire and that large-mouth cave. Here we was, representing the law, and we was cold and wet, and there they was, representing assholes everywhere, and they was warm and dry. That alone made me want to shoot them.

It was then that we seen a figure coming across the clearing between the cave and the trees. I think he had been coming all along, but because of the rain and the shadows we hadn’t made him out. He was wearing a hat pulled down tight and a rain slicker.

“It’s a little fellow,” Choctaw said.

“Doolittle?”

“My figure.”

We moved through the trees, in line to where we thought he’d enter, and waited.

Our man edged into the trees and walked right between us, as we was hid up behind some elms. As he got past us, Choctaw stepped out and whacked him a good one in the back of the head with the Yellow Boy barrel, knocking him down.

“Aw, hell, that hurt, shit, damn it,” said the man on the ground.

“Shut up or I’ll give you another one,” Choctaw said.

“That hurt,” the man said.

“I reckon so,” I said. “You Doolittle?”

“Who wants to know?” the man said.

“A fellow that’s going to smack you again with this rifle,” Choctaw said.

“Yeah, I’m Doolittle. What have I done to you?”

“Breathe air,” I said. “I’m Nat Love, deputy marshal, and you are under arrest for theft and a bunch of stuff that would wear me out to list.”

“You ain’t got nothing on me,” Doolittle said.

“Let me think,” I said. “Yeah. Yeah, I do. I got papers on you and your friends.”