Comanche Moon

  He didn't say a ^w. He preferred to pretend that his officer's wife wasn't astraddle him, rubbing his bony leg against herself.

  It was a predicament so unexpected that he could not think clearly.

  Madame Scull continued with her activity for what seemed like several minutes. Gus began to hope, desperately, that a servant would wander upstairs on some chore, in which case surely she would stop her rubbing.

  Just when he thought Madame Scull might be ready to stop she suddenly peeled off his sock.

  Once she had it off she stroked his bare foot for a minute and then threw the sock across the room.

  "That sock's too filthy to wash," she said.

  "I'll give you a pair of Inish's, when you leave." "Well, I guess I ought to get along and help Woodrow, pretty soon, ma'am," Gus said. He was beginning to be actively fearful, his suspicion being that Madame Scull was a madwoman--no doubt that was why Captain Scull had decided to leave.

  Inez Scull didn't reply. Instead, to his horror, she pulled his bare foot up under her skirt and began to rub it against herself. Then she reached back, grasped his other foot, peeled the sock off, and stuck that foot under her too. She began to sway from side to side, rubbing herself with first one foot and then the other. Gus couldn't see her face, but he could hear her breathing, which was hoarse and raw.

  Then Madame Scull dropped his feet and whirled on him. He had been pulled half off the bench by her exertions already. Before he could scoot back Madame Scull grabbed his belt and began to yank at it. She was breathing hoarsely and there was sweat on her forehead and cheeks.

  "You said your friend Captain Call was stiff as a poker with the ladies--now let's see about you," she said.

  Augustus suddenly realized what Inez Scull had been talking about when she made that remark in the yard. He felt feverish with embarrassment as Madame Scull proceeded to unbutton his pants. What would Clara think, if she knew?

  But then, as Madame Scull opened his pants and began to probe in his long johns, Augustus remembered that Clara was getting married. In only two days she would be Clara Allen. What he did with Madame Scull or any woman would not be something she would want to know. The thought filled him with hopelessness, but, hopeless or not, Madame Scull was still there, hoarse and insistent.

  When he slipped down to the floor he thought, for a moment, that she might smother him with her skirts. But Clara was gone--gone forever. He had no reason to resist--in any case it was too late.

  Madame Scull managed to scoot them over onto a big green rug in front of a closet of some kind.

  "This will be better, Gussie," she said. "We won't be bumping our knees on this hardwood floor." "What about ...?" Gus said--he was still nervous about the servants; but he never got farther with his question. Madame Scull overrode it.

  "Hush up, Gussie, let's trot!" she said. "Just be my ranger boy, and let's trot!"

  Call was at a loss to know what could be detaining Augustus. He had got himself well barbered, haircut and shave, and had a dentist look at a back tooth that had been bothering him from time to time. The dentist wanted to pull the tooth immediately, but Call decided to take his chances and keep it. He waited in Gus's favorite saloon for two hours, hoping Gus would appear and they could decide what men to take on their search for Captain Scull.

  Mrs. Scull had said she might require Augustus to have tea with her--but why would it be taking so long to sip tea? He inquired of the old Dutch bartender, Liuprand, how long tea took to make, thinking there might be some ceremony involved, one he didn't understand.

  "Tea ... why, five minutes, if it's a big pot," Liuprand said. He was a small man with no skill at fisticuffso--in the course of trying to subdue unruly customers his nose had been broken so many times that it now bore some resemblance to the fat end of a squash.

  Call had already decided that he wanted to take the black man, Deets, who had been the most useful member of the company on the recent trip north. Deets could cook and sew and even doctor a little, and had shown himself able to work whatever the weather.

  He knew he could not linger over his choosing too much longer. The sun was setting; the men chosen would be expected to leave when it rose at daybreak.

  He wanted to ask Long Bill Coleman to go with them--there was no steadier man available than Long Bill Coleman--but he had just been reunited with his wife, Pearl, and might not feel like leaving her again, so abruptly. Even if Long Bill wanted to go, Pearl might not be willing to relinquish him again, so soon.

  No more, for that matter, would Maggie want to see him leave again, so quickly. He dreaded having to go inform her of the order. She had brought up the subject of a baby, a problem he would hardly have time to consider, given all he had to do before leaving. In fact, he would have liked to linger with Maggie a few days and let her indulge him and feed him beefsteak. His dread at having to tell her the Governor was sending them off again was so strong that he had three whiskeys, an unusual thing for him. It was not something he would have done had Gus McCrae come promptly.

  Call's suspicion was that Augustus was somewhere in the Forsythe store, spooning with Clara.

  It was a strong enough suspicion that he went outside and sent Pea Eye Parker across the street to check. Pea Eye had few friends; he was merely sitting in front of the barbershop when Call sent him on the errand. Call liked the tall lanky boy; he thought he might take him with them if Gus had no objection.

  Pea Eye was back in the saloon before Call had had much time to even lift his glass.

  "Nope, he ain't in the store--I asked the lady," Pea Eye said. "She ain't seen him since the two of you left for the Governor's, that's what she said to tell you." "Now, this is a dern nuisance," Call said.

  "I need to pick the men and get them together. How can I make decisions with Captain McCrae if he's disappeared?" Jake Spoon wandered into the saloon about then and heard the discussion.

  "Maybe he got kidnapped," he said, mainly in jest.

  "He just went to take tea with Madame Scull, I can't imagine what's detaining him." "Oh," Jake said. He got a kind of funny look on his face.

  "What's wrong, Jake? You look like you et a bug," Pea Eye said.

  Jake was thinking that he knew exactly what Captain McCrae was doing, if he was with Madame Scull. He remembered his own hot actions with her, in the closet, all too well-- the memories of their active lust were a torment to him at night.

  "I ain't et no bug--I ain't that green," Jake replied. "I just swallowed wrong." "But you ain't eating nothing," Pea Eye persisted. "What did you swallow, anyway?" "Because I had air in my mouth, you fool," Jake said, irritated by Pea Eye's questioning.

  "Captain, if you're going off again, can I go?" Jake asked, boldly. "There ain't much to do in town, with the boys gone." The question took Call unprepared. In fact, the new assignment took him unprepared. The Governor, mainly to placate Madame Scull, had given them a task that seemed more ridiculous the longer he thought about it.

  There were thousands of miles to search, and the man they were looking for had the tracker with him. Captain Scull's departure had been wild folly to begin with, and now he and Augustus were being asked to compound the folly.

  "I'll discuss it with Captain McCrae, Jake," Call said.

  "I'm anxious to go if there's a place," Jake said. He thought it unjust that Pea Eye had got to go on the last expedition, while he had had to stay and run errands for Stove Jones and Lee Hitch, two rangers who had both suffered broken limbs from trying to ride half-broken horses. Though unable to travel, the two men were easily able to come up with twenty or thirty errands a day that they demanded Jake run. Mainly, they themselves stayed in their bunks and drank whiskey.

  On occasion they even tried to get him to fetch them whores.

  Now there was another expedition forming, and Jake was determined to go; life in Austin had become so boresome that he'd even put his scalp at risk rather than stay. If the captains wouldn't take him, he meant to quit the rangers and try to get on
as a cowboy on one of the big ranches down south of San Antonio.

  Call grew more and more vexed. He was also a little drunk, thanks to Gus's lagging, and needed to get on with their decision making. He got up and left the barroom, meaning to walk up to Long Bill Coleman's house--or rather, Pearl's. Long Bill never had a cent to his name, but Pearl had been left a good frame house by her father, a merchant who had been ambushed and killed by the Comanches while on a routine trip to San Antonio. Call was on his way to see whether Long Bill had the appetite for more travel when he happened to spot Augustus, coming down the street in the deep dusk. Augustus usually strolled along at a brisk pace, but now he was walking slowly, as if exhausted. Call wondered if his friend had fallen ill suddenly--in the Governor's office he had been somber, but not sick.

  "Where have you been? We need to be choosing our men and getting them ready," Call said, three hours of frustration bursting out of him.

  "You choose, Woodrow, all I want is a bottle and a pallet," Augustus said.

  "A pallet? Are you sick?" Call asked.

  "It's not even good dark." "Yes, sick of Austin," Gus said. "I wish we were leaving right this minute." Call was puzzled by the change in his old friend.

  All energy and spirit seemed to have drained out of him-- and Gus McCrae was a man who could always be counted on for energy and spirit.

  "You didn't say where you'd been," Call said.

  Augustus turned and pointed up the hill, toward the Scull castle, its turrets just visible in the darkening sky.

  "Up there--t's where I've been," Augustus said.

  "Gus, it's been three hours--y must have drunk a fine lot of tea," Call remarked.

  "Nope, we never got around to the tea," Augustus said. "Not the tea and not the biscuits, either. And while we're on the subject I don't think we ought to bring the Captain back." "Why not?" Call asked. "That's the only reason we're going, to bring him back. Of course, we've got to find him first." "You don't know Madame Scull, Woodrow," Gus said. "I'd say running off might be the Captain's only chance." "I don't know what you're talking about," Call said. "I've no doubt they squabble, but they've been married nearly twenty-five years --the Captain told me that himself." "He's a better man than me, then," Augustus said. "I wouldn't last no twenty-five years. Twenty-five days would put me under." Then, without more comment, he walked off toward the bunkhouse, leaving Woodrow Call more puzzled than he had been before.

  When Call came in with his saddlebags over his shoulder, Maggie's spirits sank. She was too disappointed to speak. Woodrow only brought his saddlebag into her rooms when he was leaving early --he was meticulous about checking his gear and would spend an hour or more at his task whenever he had to leave.

  "You've only been here a day," she said sadly. "We haven't even talked about the baby." "Well, you ain't having it tomorrow, and this may be a short trip," he said, not unkindly. "I expect we can discuss it when I come back." What if you don't come back? she thought, but she didn't say it. If she spoke it would only anger him and she would risk losing the little sweet time they might have. Austin was full of widows whose husbands had ridden off one morning, like Pearl Coleman's father, and never come back.

  What Maggie felt was the fear any woman felt when her man had to venture beyond the settled frontier, and even the settled frontier was far from being really safe. Every year, still, settlers were killed and women and children stolen from their cabins, almost within sight of Austin. There was not much safety in town, but there was no safety where Woodrow had to go.

  Worry about him sank deep in Maggie's gut, where it mixed with another grave worry: the question of what she would do if Woodrow refused to marry her, or accept her child as his. A woman with a child born out of wedlock had no hope of rising, not in Austin. If she wanted to raise the child properly she would have to move to another town and try to pass herself off as a widow. It would be hard, so hard that Maggie feared to think about it.

  Unless Woodrow helped her she would be as good as lost, and the child as well.

  But Maggie swallowed her questions and her doubts, as she had many times before. After all, Woodrow was there; he had come to her on his return and now again, on the eve of his departure.

  He was there, not somewhere else; she did her best to push aside her worries and make the best of their time. The depth of her love for Woodrow Call gave him a power over her that was too great --and he didn't even know he had it.

  "All right, I'll make you a meal--there's still two beefsteaks, if you want Gus to come," she said. It made Maggie happy if Woodrow brought Augustus home to eat with them: it was as if he were bringing his best friend home to eat his wife's cooking. She wasn't really his wife yet, but they were jolly on those occasions. Sometimes she and Gus could even tempt Woodrow into playing cards, or joining them in a singsong. He was a poor cardplayer and not much of a singer, but such times were still jolly.

  "Gus went off to Madame Scull's and stayed three hours--t's why I'm late," Call said. "He just went to drink tea with her--I don't know why it took three hours.

  Now he's too tired to eat. I don't think I've ever seen Gus too tired to eat before." Maggie smiled--everyone knew that Madame Scull took young men as lovers, the younger the better. She had taken Jake Spoon for a while; everyone knew that too. Lately Jake had come mooning around, wanting to make up to Maggie for his bad behaviour. He had offered to carry her groceries twice, and had generally tried to make himself useful; but Maggie remained cool. She knew his kind all too well.

  Jake would be nice until he had what he wanted, and then, if she denied him a favor, he would pull her hair or slap her again. There was no changing men--not much, anyway; mainly men stayed the way they were, no matter what women did. Woodrow Call was not all she wanted him to be, but he had never raised a hand to her and would not think of pulling her hair. Jake could offer to carry her groceries if he wanted but she would not forget what he did.

  Call noticed her smile, when he mentioned Gus's fatigue.

  "What's that grin for? What do you know?" he asked.

  "It's just a smile, Woodrow--I'm happy because you're here," Maggie said.

  "No, it was something else--something about Gus," he said. "If you've a notion of why he stayed at Madame Scull's so long I'd like to know it." Maggie knew she was treading on dangerous ground. Woodrow had strict notions of what was right and what was wrong. But she was a little riled, too: riled because he was going away so soon, riled because he wouldn't talk about the baby, riled because she had to keep swallowing down the way she felt and the things she needed to say. If he wouldn't think about her baby, at least she could get his goat a little about their friend.

  "I know why he's tired, that's all," she said, pounding the beefsteak.

  "Why, then, tell me," Call asked.

  "Because Madame Scull took his pants down --if you'd gone she would have tried to take yours down too," Maggie said.

  Call flinched as if he had been slapped, or jabbed with a pin.

  "Now, that's wrong!" he said loudly, but without much confidence in his own conclusion. "How could you know that?" "Because that's what she does with any man who goes home with her, when the Captain's away," Maggie said. "It's the talk of all the barrooms and not just the barrooms--she don't care who knows." "Well, she ought to care," Call said. "I expect the Captain would take the hide off her if he knew she was stirring up talk like that." "Woodrow, it's not just talk," Maggie said.

  "I seen her kissing a boy myself, over behind some horses. One of the horses moved and I saw it." "What boy?" Call said. "Maybe they were cousins." "No, it was Jurgen, that German boy the Captain hung for stealing horses," Maggie insisted. "He couldn't even speak English." "They could still have been cousins," Call said--but then he gave up arguing. No wonder Gus had come down the hill looking as he sometimes looked when he had spent a day in a whorehouse.

  "If it's true I just hope the Captain don't find out," Call said.

  "Don't you think he knows?" Maggie asked.


  Sometimes Woodrow seemed so young to her, not young outside but young inside, that it made her fearful for him; it made her even more determined to marry him and take care of him. If she didn't, some woman like Mrs. Scull would figure out how young he was and do him bad harm.

  "How could he know if she only does it when he's gone?" Call asked.

  "You don't have to be with somebody every minute to know things about them," Maggie told him. "I'm not with you every minute, but I know you're a good man. If you was a bad man I wouldn't have to be with you every minute to know that, either." Her voice quavered a little, when she said she knew he was a good man. It made Call feel a touch of guilt. He was always leaving Maggie just when she had her hopes up that he'd stay. Of course he left because it was his duty, but he recognized that that didn't really make things any easier for Maggie.