The kid was a mess. He was still wearing Donny Charlton’s jacket but it was stained with mud and red rock dust, the seam was torn on one shoulder and a pocket was starting to break away.
He had a black eye and his face was smeared with dirt. Large front teeth and freckles, a formless kid’s nose and eyebrows that were barely discernible – this was Sammy Bale. His hair was tow-coloured like Donny’s, but there must be at least another dozen boys of varying ages in town with the same colour hair.
Cole could see how simple it would be for the kidnappers to make a mistake: likely they had been cowboys or hardcases hired for the abduction and not actually knowing Donny Charlton by sight; they would have been told to look for a tow-haired seven-year-old, probably wearing a reasonably new jacket if it was in the cool of evening near the start of the night-time fireworks’ show.
Sammy Bale had a heavy cold; he was sniffling and coughing occasionally even as Cole cleaned him up and gave him some food, It was obvious from the way Sam ate that he hadn’t been fed much lately.
‘What happened, Sam?’
The boy swallowed the last of his fifth corn dodger, wiped the back of a wrist across his mouth and started to use the same wrist on his moist nostrils. Cole stopped him, gave him a kerchief. Sam blew into it and offered it back. Cole lifted a hand.
‘Consider it a gift, Sam. Now tell me how come you were snatched instead of Donny?’
‘I dunno. I mean, I fell in the river and Donny pulled me out and I was shiverin’ with this cold an’ he give me his new jacket to wear.’ The boy’s bright-blue eyes lit up. ‘It’s a beauty. I wish it was mine.’
‘You ask Donny could you keep it on?’
‘Sort of.’ He hung his head a little, watching Cole’s face from under his thin eyebrows. ‘I – I said I was still cold and put on a bit of a wheeze or two. Donny said I could keep it on but I’d have to give it back when his ma showed up. She’s kinda – snooty, Donny’s ma, you know?’
‘Haven’t had much to do with her but I got that impression.’
Sam gave a quick smile, glad to have Cole agree with him. ‘Anyway, we was scavengin’ around for some spare rockets and these two fellers come up and said they had found three or four unfired ones. We started to go with ’em, but one grabbed Donny by the arm and lifted him clear off the ground, carried him off somewhere behind a wagon. I got scared and tried to run but I tripped and I hit my head.’ He pulled his hair back and a bruise and slight swelling were still obvious. ‘I was knocked out, I guess. When I come round I’m lyin’ over this dark feller’s lap on his hoss with my wrists tied behind my back. They brought me to this cave an’ I been here ever since.’
‘Know who the man was?’
‘Rooster – the first one you killed. The other was Blackie someone.’
Cole rolled a cigarette, lit up and smoked thoughtfully. Sam started eating again.
‘Not too much, too fast. If your belly’s been starved for a few days, you go easy.’
Sam looked as if he would argue but then thought better of it, wiped his hands down the front of the stained jacket.
‘Donny’s ma’ll throw a fit when she sees this.’
‘Yeah, could be. I’m wondering what happened to Donny. Everyone’s convinced he was the one kidnapped. And how come your ma didn’t raise hell when you went missing?’
‘Aw – I dunno.’ Small shoulders shrugged; he didn’t seem unduly worried that his mother hadn’t reported him missing. He wouldn’t meet Cole’s gaze.
‘You been running off from home now and again?’ Cole asked suddenly and the way Sam jumped and moved a little away from him gave him his answer. ‘You been skedaddling off for so long that your ma’s gotten used to it, no longer bothers if you don’t show up till you’re good and ready. That it?’
Cole’s voice had anger in it and the boy started to cringe, head on one side as if expecting a cuff. Cole immediately relented.
‘Hey, boy, don’t do that! I ain’t gonna hit you. Is that why you run away every now and again? Because your ma whips you?’
‘She don’t, but he does sometimes when he’s been at the likker.’
‘Who’s “he”?’
Sam took his time answering, pulled some grass and tore up the blades one by one as he spoke, eyes downcast.
‘Well, sir, my ma – she never been married, see?’ He waited, challengingly, but Cole’s face remained blank. ‘My pa was killed before he could marry her and she said she never wanted no other man for a husband….’
‘It’s OK, Sam. I understand. She feels the need now and again for a man’s company, is that it?’
Sam looked relieved and smiled briefly. ‘I guess. But this feller, this Winston, says he’s my uncle. He’s been hangin’ around, don’t seem to wanna leave. I know Ma wants to get rid of him but he’s sort of – taken over. She told me we’d run off if the farm wasn’t all she had in the world, and she wants to keep it – for me.’
There was a hint of tears in the boy’s eyes and voice now. He paused, gulping.
‘Sam, your ma sounds like a good woman to me. But we’ve got to get outta here before some other men involved in your kidnapping turn up. And I’ve got to find Donny Charlton! You any idea where the hell he could be?’
Sam didn’t and Cole figured it was time they were somewhere else. He stood, dropped the cigarette butt and crushed it.
‘C’mon, kid. I’ll take you home.’
‘Where the hell is he goin’?’ Red Carlin snapped irritably as Quinlan led the way down the dark slope. ‘Would be better if the damn moon was still out.’
‘Be a whole lot better if you kept your mouth shut!’ Quinlan growled.
‘We ain’t gonna pick up any trail in the dark, Quick,’ said the third man, Smoky Hill, trying to sound reasonable. No one wanted to stir Quinlan’s temper; when the man was crazy mad he didn’t differentiate between friend and foe.
‘Where d’you think he’s going?’ Quinlan asked, his deep voice rasping. ‘He’s gonna take the kid back home, for Chrissakes.’
There was silence and, riding side by side, Red and Smoky exchanged a glance, or as much of one as each could see in the dark.
‘Quick,’ Red said, licking his lips. ‘We heard his hoss while gettin’ our own mounts, and it wasn’t goin’ back towards Barberry.’
‘That’s a fact, Quick,’ added Smoky quietly.
Quinlan reined down, yanking the reins so hard his mount snorted and pranced in protest.
‘Is that right? Well, he had to find his way outta the canyon, didn’t he? It twists and turns like a snake with colic. After he clears it is where we’ll pick up his proper trail. It ought to be light enough then, and it’ll lead back to Barberry. Don’t make sense any other way.’
Smoky and Red were silent, then Smoky leaned out and nudged Red’s leg, urging him by nods of his head to speak up. After a few moments he heard Red clear his throat.
‘Quick, he could be makin’ his way back to the Bale farm.’ Quinlan snapped his head up and Red added, quickly, ‘All along that kid reckoned he was Sammy Bale, not the Charlton brat.’
‘Little swine was just actin’ up ornery,’ Quinlan said, harshly. ‘D. Charlton was sewed into the collar of the coat he was wearing. He was just trying to be smart so’s we’d let him go.’
Red sighed, glanced at Smoky for some back-up but Hill remained quiet. Red swore softly; now he was left alone to argue with Quinlan and he didn’t know too many men who’d won such a contest. Didn’t know any! But he had spoken now and had to back up his reasoning.
‘He had a good explanation for the coat, Quick. The Charlton kid lendin’ it to him after he fell in the river, ’cause he had a cold – and you can’t deny he sure does have a bad cold, snotty-nosed little hellion.’
‘Red, I’m convinced we had Donny or Danny Charlton, whatever the hell his name is. But, as I said, it’ll be light enough to read Cole’s tracks soon. Then we decide which way we go. Now, that’s it! Both of you shut up till we get outta these damn canyons!’
Red and Smoky were glad to obey.
*
Mattie Bale was in her late twenties, quite good-looking, though careworn from long years of hard work and worry about everyday living. The farm wasn’t large but it was a lot of work for one woman, with only the occasional help of an active eight-year-old boy, when she could nail him down for long enough.
She had actually been glad when Winston Bale had turned up, brother of Steven, Sammy’s father. He had been obliging enough at first, pitching in, making the place more like a farm should be – and then he moved into her bed.
‘I’d be your brother-in-law if Steve hadn’t been killed and you know a man’s brother can claim his rights from his sister-in-law when she’s widowed.’
‘That’s not a law!’ she argued. ‘It’s what some folk want to believe, is all.’
He was a handsome man, Winston. His smile had won him many a throbbing female heart since he was in his teens. He always had his way with women – always. And Mattie would be no different. ‘Well, I believe it,’ he told her, flashing that smile. ‘I surely do.’
And, in the end, the smile worked for him once again.
But his original eagerness to work and build up the farm had its edge blunted soon after and he spent a lot of time lounging around the cabin, or fishing down at the creek. He was good to Sammy, took him fishing with him, but didn’t care whether it was a school day or not and Sammy lost a deal of education. And he didn’t mind boxing the boy’s ears when Sam annoyed him in some way, either.
Mattie found she was working harder than ever now there were three of them – tending her vegetable patch, trapping rabbits and possums and squirrels and other small game just to put meat on the table. Once or twice Winston brought in a fish big enough to share, and one time he actually hunted down and killed a deer.
But mostly he did little around the farm and began to boss both Mattie and Sammy: ‘Time to milk the cow, boy. Get it done.’ ‘Go collect some more eggs from the chicken pen Mattie, I fancy a big omelette for my lunch.’ ‘Go into town and bring me back some fresh tobacco – oh, and a bottle of Mannering’s rye – he’ll give you credit.’
‘I hate going near that saloon,’ Mattie complained and his dark eyes narrowed.
‘You do what I say, woman! And tell Judd Reason I want to see him, too.’
She stiffened when he said that. ‘Why d’you want to see that snide land dealer?’
‘Why d’you just ask for a smack in the mouth by givin’ me an argument! You do what I say!’
She knew what he was about: he was negotiating the sale of the farm, somehow going to fix it with Judd Reason, although the farm title was in her name. But Winston Bale had some way around that, and she knew she and Sammy wouldn’t see any money from such a sale.
But it never came to that, for Winston devised a bigger plan to make him rich beyond his dreams, right after she arrived back from the Fourth of July hoedown in Barberry, and they found a frightened Donny Charlton hiding under the tarp in the rear of the buckboard.
‘Who the hell’s this? Where’s Sammy?’ Winston grabbed young Donny by his shirt and shook him, glaring at Mattie.
‘I didn’t know he was there, Winston! I swear!’
‘Where the hell is Sammy?’
‘I – I couldn’t find him,’ she explained, voice trembling. ‘You know what he’s like, always running off and hiding. I – I couldn’t find Donny here, neither, to ask where Sam was. I thought they’d both run off together. You know Sam always comes back after a few days….’
Winston shook Donny. ‘What’re you doin’ here, boy? Where’s Sam?’
‘They – they kidnapped, him. They thought he was me.’
Mattie and Winston stared, Mattie gasping.
‘Two men – they jumped us, said they had some sky rockets for us. But one grabbed Sam and t’other dragged me off and cuffed me hard – said I was to keep my mouth shut or some night he’d come an’ slit my throat. He showed me his knife an’ everything. He thought I was Sammy. I was scared and hid under the tarp in your buckboard, but I din’ know it was yours, Mrs Bale, honest Injun….’
‘That’s all right, Donny, it’s all right. But what’ve they done with my Sammy?’
‘I – I heard ’em say whoever they worked for was gonna ask for a big ransom, ten or twenty thousand dollars. Said Linus would pay it for me, that he’d be able to raise the money easy, him being with the bank.’
Winston leaned down quickly, holding Donny’s shoulder hard so that the boy squirmed. ‘Twenty thousand! For the likes of you! I don’t believe it!’
‘It’s true!’ Donny was upset now, tears brimming in hsi eyes. ‘I – I want to go home to my ma. Those men scared me….’
‘That’s all right, Donny. I’ll drive you home. But we’ll have some food first and—’
‘The kid stays here,’ Winston cut in, smiling crookedly, holding the boy’s arm in a crushing grip. ‘I mean, he’s what you call a valuable asset, ain’t you, kid? I bet they don’t care who they pay that ransom to, long as they get you back safe and sound. Hell, I ain’t greedy! I’ll even settle for a nice big fat re-ward for keepin’ this young man safe. ‘Course it might be a few days before I let ’em know we’ve got him. By then, they’ll be glad to pay just about anythin’ I ask!’
He winked at the shocked, white-faced Mattie.
‘Now, don’t say your brother-in-law ain’t got a brain or two in his head, eh?’
‘Does your brain tell you what happens to Sam when they find out he’s not the one they thought?’ Her voice trembled and she began to shake. ‘They’ll probably kill him so he can’t identify them!’
Winston composed his face. ‘Don’t reckon they will. Anyway, this one stays put. I ain’t gonna let him outta my sight till I decide to tell that banker where I got him – an’ how much it’s gonna cost to get him back!’