Don't Poke the Bear! (an Emmett Love Western)

  “What about the damage to my store?” I say.

  “Sam Hartman owes you for that.”

  I frown. “Do you three always travel together?”

  “What three?”

  I count out thirty-nine dollars and hand it to him.

  He gives thirteen each to Bob and Harry. Then says, “What I’m about to ask is meant as a compliment.”

  “Ask it then.”

  He puts three dollars in his pocket and holds the other ten where I can see it. Then says, “Is Gentry still taking customers?”

  I try to keep the edge outta my voice, and the steel outta my stare when I say “No.” But he can tell I’m simmerin’ inside.

  “Relax, Sheriff. It was a fair question, and now I’ve got my answer.”

  It was a fair question, given Gentry’s history. But that don’t mean I approve of it.

  Mayor Ha-a-a-averhouse says, “We’re gentlemen here, there’s no cause to be insulted. The subject will never come up again. You have my word.”

  I nod. “See that it don’t.”

  The little man smiles what I take to be a genuinely warm smile. “I’m very happy for you,” he says. “Gentry’s clearly a wonderful woman. I’d even go so far as to say she’s a one-in-a-million. Please accept my apology.”

  He bows.

  It were a hell of an apology. I had to take it.

  “Fair enough,” I say. “Bygones.”

  I notice he’s still holding the ten dollars out. “Somethin’ else I can do for you?”

  “Another question,” he says.

  “Ask it.”

  “What about the bear?”

  “Rudy?”

  “Yes.”

  “What about him?”

  He waves the ten dollars and licks his lips.

  What he’s askin for don’t sink into my brain immediately, but when it does I give him a double look and start rollin’ up my sleeves. I don’t care how short, tall, and wide these circus folk are. You don’t come into my place and ask to fuck my woman and my bear in the same conversation.

  The Mayor gets a frightened look on his face and starts movin’ away at a quick pace. “Let me know if you recover any money from Hartman!” he calls over his shoulder.

  Gentry comes up behind me and puts her hand on my shoulder.

  “You okay, honey?”

  “Them fellers got me riled.”

  “I can tell. You were rolling up your sleeves. I was worried.”

  “Well, everythin’s fine. For now. But you need to stay away from them fellers.”

  “Are they dangerous?”

  “I don’t think so. But they’re mighty disgustin’. At least the Mayor is.”

  “What did he want?”

  “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

  “I’ve seen and heard a lot in my seventeen years.”

  “You ain’t heard this.”

  “Try me.”

  “He wants to poke the bear.”

  She cocks her head. “By poke, you don’t mean…”

  “I do.”

  Gentry ain’t as disgusted as I figured she’d be. In fact, she starts laughin’.

  “You think that’s funny?”

  “Just the picture it puts in my head,” she says. Then laughs again, harder.

  “What now?”

  “I was picturing it going the other way.”

  “What other way?”

  She giggles. “Rudy poking the Mayor.”

  “What?”

  She laughs again.

  I try not to think about it, but now she’s put the picture in my head and I can’t shake it out. I don’t laugh with her, ’cause it’s Rudy we’re talkin’ about.

  But I can’t help smilin’.

  33.

  “HEY, SUGAR, HOW about standin’ over the top of these boards so I can look up your dress!”

  Bose Rennick has come to and is watchin’ Rose through the wooden slats. She’s sittin’ at the kitchen table, drinkin’ tea. He moves around a little, to get a better look. Then says, “Say, I know you! You’re that bitch who spooked our horses a few months back. How’d you do that, pretty lady?”

  Me and Gentry are hearin’ all this from the other side of the kitchen table where he can’t see us. I’m checkin’ the bullets from my gun belt carefully, and loadin’ ’em in my gun. One thing about Bose, he’s got a voice to warm the devil’s heart. It’s a thing of beauty. So deep, rich, and clear it is, I imagine he could make a fortune singin’ in opry houses back east. Not that I ever been in one. But that’s the kind of voice them fellers probably have.

  Bose starts up on Rose again. “I didn’t mean to call you a bad name, Sugar Britches. I’m right sorry I said that. Don’t know what happened to my manners just now. Maybe it’s ’cause you smacked me over the head with a gun awhile ago. But I don’t hold you personally accountable. Although I’d love to hold you!”

  Bose continues with that luscious voice of his, tellin’ Rose what he’d do with her once he got her naked. Gentry keeps grinnin’ at Rose, and raisin’ her eyebrows, and I have to say, the idea of someone doin’ any a’ them things to Rose is funny to think about, ’cause I never knowed her to be anythin’ but a very proper young lady. On the other hand, she appears to be twenty and claims to have buried six husbands. I have to think them husbands were dead when she buried them, and if so, it crosses my mind for the first time to wonder if she might a’ wore some of ’em out under the bed sheets!

  Though Gentry and me are grinnin’ at Rose through all this nasty talk, she’s thinkin’ other thoughts about how to set him free and keep him away from me, at least till our common purpose thing has happened.

  She motions me and Gentry to follow her into the main room, and we do. She picks out the far table, the most secluded one where I’d listened to the Murphys tell me how to sheriff earlier. Rose hadn’t wanted to include Gentry in the scheme, but I insisted. I have too much pride to let Gentry think I lost a prisoner after spendin’ all that time buildin’ the jail hole. Plus, if I put another prisoner in there, she’d never be able to sleep at night if she thought he could escape. I explained all this to Rose, and she agreed to involve Gentry in the discussions.

  “Any ideas?” Rose says.

  “What if you cut his arms off?” Gentry says.

  “Excuse me?”

  “If Emmett cut his arms off, he wouldn’t be able to shoot. Wait. You could probably just cut his hands off and get the same benefit.”

  Rose looks at me like she might be concerned for my safety.

  “What?” Gentry says.

  “He needs to be able to defend himself,” Rose says. “He needs to live. We’re just trying to keep him from killing Emmett.”

  “What if you broke his gun hand? Then he’d have to teach himself to shoot left-handed.”

  I look at Rose.

  She says, “That’s more humane. But he shoots quite well with both hands. He might still come after Emmett. And a broken hand wouldn’t prevent him from using a shotgun or rifle.”

  “What if we train him like they trained Rudy?” Gentry says.

  She’s beginnin’ to amaze me with how many ideas she can come up with to disable a gunman.

  “What,” I say. “Put a rope through Bose’s nose? I’d like that!”

  Rose frowns at me.

  Gentry says, “No. I’m talking about conditioning him. That’s what Sergio called it when they trained Rudy. He said they conditioned him to dance when the music was played.”

  “Tell me your idea,” Rose says.

  “Well, say we turn Bose loose five miles away. Shrug can be out there in the dark. If Bose starts heading toward Dodge, Shrug can chunk a rock and smash his head. Not enough to kill him, but enough to hurt him. Then, when he gets up again, if he starts heading toward Dodge again, Shrug would hit him again. Bose wouldn’t know where the rocks were coming from, but after a few days of this, he’d be conditioned not to head toward Dodge.”

  I look at
her like it’s not much of an idea, but Rose surprises me by sayin’, “Not bad, Gentry. That could actually work.”

  Gentry beams.

  Rose continues, “But it’s probably not a good long-term idea, because the conditioning might take weeks or months, and it’s not fair to poor Wayne to make him do that. Or to be responsible if something goes wrong.”

  “What could go wrong?” Gentry says.

  “He was shot in the shoulder. He won’t be able to throw as hard or accurately as he used to, at least, not for awhile. He might kill Bose by mistake. Or have to get close enough to where Bose could just start shooting in a circle. If that happens, Wayne could get shot again.”

  “Wow, you’re right,” Gentry says. “Can we cut his pecker off?”

  I say, “How’s that gonna help?”

  “It’ll make every woman in the west feel safer.”

  Rose shakes her head and says, “No. I need him to survive. And I especially need his pecker.”

  I almost fall out of my chair.

  Gentry gives her a double look, smiles, and says, “Rose?”

  Rose gives us a confused look, then realizes what she’d said. Then she does somethin’ I only seen her do a few times in all the years I’ve known her.

  She laughs.

  “Oh, my!” she says. “I didn’t mean it that way! What I meant was…oh, never mind!” She laughs again.

  And we laugh with her.

  “I’m Hollis Williams!” someone shouts from outside the Spur. “Where’s the Sheriff?”

  Hollis Williams stomps through the wide hole that used to be my front door. He pauses to frown at the shot up piano, looks across the room at Rudy and instinctively puts his hand on the gun handle in his holster. He decides Rudy’s not a threat at the moment, spies me, and stomps right up to our table. With each right step, his spurs jingle. With each left, they jangle. His walk is quite musical, and Rudy thinks so, too, because he starts dancin’.

  “Stop right there!” I holler.

  He does.

  “Turn sideways.”

  He frowns. Hollis looks like a man used to givin’ orders, not takin’ ’em. But he’s never seen a gun go from a holster to a man’s hand as fast as mine just did, and he’s in shock. Though he’s unhappy about bein’ ordered, he does what I say.

  Before he finishes turnin’, I fire two quick shots and his spurs go flyin’ across the floor. I twirl my gun, put the barrel near my mouth and blow the smoke away, like the eastern dandy did in a stage show me and Gentry saw in Wichita one night. Then I put the gun back in my holster with a flourish, same way the dandy did, and Gentry grins at me and claps her hands.

  Rose rolls her eyes.

  Hollis scowls me with an angry sneer to show me he’s the kind of man who makes his own rules. I can tell he’s wealthy by his clothes and his manner. He also strikes me as the type of man who might be willin’ to flog Patti’s whores in the middle of the street if it suits him. He takes a deep breath to puff himself up to full size, and says, “You the Sheriff?”

  “I am. But I’m talkin’ to these ladies at the moment.”

  “Well, I’ve rode eight hours to see you, and you can either pour me a whiskey or take my meetin’ now. I’ve got a serious complaint to file, and I’m a busy man.”

  “We’re all busy,” I say, noddin’ at the fellers I’ve paid to finish cleanin’ up the main room so I can open my card tables for business.

  “You don’t look busy to me.”

  “Is that what you came to talk about? Whether I’m busy enough to suit you?”

  “In part. And you should take a better tone of respect with me. I’m a man of influence.”

  “With who?”

  He shows me a self-satisfied smirk and says, “The Governor.”

  “Meanin’?”

  “You want to keep that badge, you’ll get your ass in motion and do your job.”

  “Well, I just killed Sam Hartman and locked up Bose Rennick.”

  “So?”

  “I ’spect the Governor would call that a good day’s work.”

  “Sheriffin’ ain’t about what you did earlier today. It’s about what you do next.”

  “Do tell.”

  “We can talk in front of these women, or we can talk alone. Your choice. Either way, you’ll pay me for them spurs.”

  “You saw the sign on the piano. No music allowed.”

  “I didn’t play the fargin’ piano. I was wearin’ spurs.”

  “Those were musical spurs if I ever heard any. They were like tiny cymbals. You can take ’em with you when you leave.”

  Rose and Gentry can tell my fuse is lit. For the safety of this rude man of influence, Gentry says, “Rose, let’s go up to Shrug’s room and keep our conversation going. I have lots of ideas.”

  She nods, and they get up to leave.

  34.

  HOLLIS AND I watch the ladies go up the stairs. Then he says, “Someone shot and butchered one a’ my cows.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that.”

  “Sorry don’t cut it. I want you to ride out to my place, find out who done it, and arrest him. Or them.”

  I take my hat off, smooth my hair down, then put my hat back on, and shape it some.

  “Your spread’s an eight-hour ride?”

  “That’s right. And it takes four hours to cross, from one end to the other.”

  “And how many cows you got?”

  “About sixteen thousand.”

  “About?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Might you have sixteen thousand and three?”

  “I might have sixteen thousand three hundred. What’s your point?”

  “My point is, you could lose three hundred cows and not know the difference. Why come all this way for one cow that some hungry feller probably ate to survive?”

  Hollis Williams jumps to his feet.

  “Is that the type of attitude we’re to expect from you as a sheriff?”

  “Let me think on that a minute,” I say, reviewin’ the words I’d spoke. After doin’ that a minute, I get up from the table, walk to the bar, remove a good bottle of whiskey from under the counter, bring it back and hand it to him.

  “Yes,” I say.

  “Yes, what?”

  “That’s the type of attitude you can expect from me about wastin’ what could amount to days or weeks of my time over one cow from a herd that’s so big you can’t even count it. The whiskey’s to let you know I’m sorry about your cow. I hope it brings you comfort on your long ride back.”

  “That’s it?”

  “No, there’s one more thing.”

  He don’t speak, so I say, “If you ever come across the person who butchered that cow, I hope you’ll be charitable toward him.”

  The red creeps from his neck into his face. A vein on the side of his head, just below his ear, looks like it’s about to bust.

  “You can bet this ain’t over!” he snarls.

  “Well, I’m sorry to hear that.”

  He grabs his whiskey and stomps off the same way he stomped in, except that his spurs ain’t makin’ music. When he gets to the front, he suddenly remembers the spurs, turns, and walks back to retrieve ’em. He puts ’em in his pocket, gives me one last scowl, and leaves.

  I’d sheriffed once before, but back in them days, people didn’t have time for these sorts of problems. I ain’t sure this type of sherrifin’ suits me.

  I head up the stairs, knock on the guest room where Shrug had slept. Gentry opens the door and beckons me in. Then closes it behind me, and sits on the bed next to Rose.

  Rose says, “Gentry and I came up with an idea, but I need to ask you a question.”

  “Go ahead.”

  “Are gunfighters superstitious?”

  “Very.”

  “You think Bose is?”

  “I’d count on it. Why?”

  “If we could make him believe his bullets won’t work in Kansas, would he stay away?”

  ??
?Well, he misfired six times in a row. But he might be inclined to blame the gun or bullets before blamin’ the state of Kansas.”

  “But if we plant the idea in his head,” Gentry says, “maybe we could condition his mind to believe it.”

  “He’d need more proof.”

  Rose says, “I aim to give him plenty.”

  “You gonna put a spell on his gun?”

  “Do I look like like a witch to you?”

  I look at Gentry. She mouths the word Yes!

  I smile at her, but direct my answer to Rose.

  “I don’t know enough about witchery to say. But I had three perfectly good bullets in my gun that didn’t work awhile ago, and that ain’t never happened before. Nor have I ever known a gunfighter like Bose to have six straight misfires.”

  “So if Bose had thirty or forty straight misfires, with different guns, what would he think?”

  “He ain’t likely to blame Kansas, no matter how much proof you give him.”

  Rose says, “But if we put enough doubt in his mind, would he feel unlucky in Kansas?”

  “If he’s superstitious enough, and has enough proof, he might not want to rely on usin’ a fire arm in Kansas, but I reckon he’ll cross the border and take a few shots from time to time to see if it’s really true.”

  The ladies look at each other.

  Rose says, “What do you think?”

  Gentry says, “I think it’s worth a try.”

  They look at me and I say, “What’ve you got in mind?”

  35.

  WE ALL GO downstairs together, past the few men who just came in lookin’ to play cards. Leah and Hester are standin’ with ’em, takin’ drink orders, tryin’ to talk ’em into goin’ upstairs now and playin’ cards later. Rose enters the kitchen alone. Gentry and me listen from just outside the doorway, out of sight. Wing sees us from the other side of the kitchen, by the back door, where he’s standin’ guard with a shotgun. I put my finger to my lips so he won’t speak. Rose walks over to the table where Bose can see her from inside the hole.

  “Well, hi there, Sugar Britches,” Bose says with a voice bathed in honey. What would it take to get you to just stand over the top of these boards?”

  “Maybe if you rip your eyes out of their sockets,” she answers, sweetly.