Chapter 33
Close to the head of the Camp Verde Road, they met most of his ranch hands and stopped in the road. They removed the cover as they rode up close and looked in at the boy’s small body. Many a tough hand had tears in his eyes.
Tom dismounted, holding his hat. “Word was out early today that you’d gone after some holdup men. We were coming to back you. We’ll make him a casket. Guess you’ll want to bury him on the ranch. We hope that suits you.”
“Thanks. That will be just fine. Let’s go home—” Chet swallowed hard and nodded for her to start on. As he looked off the dizzy heights at the vast valley beneath them, he wondered how his family would like his choice. Maybe this incident would draw them all together, closer. He simply dreaded to tell them about this loss. He closed his eyes as Marge fought the team to hold them back on the grade.
When they reached the next flat spot, he made her stop and give him the reins.
“I can drive alright,” she protested.
“That isn’t the problem, Marge. I can see on your face how strained you were driving. Let me do this. I’m going to have to go on living and face this loss like I have others. This is much easier than seeing my parents wilt away from life day by day, and them still alive.”
She hugged his shoulder and buried her face on his sleeve. “When did you eat last?”
“I’m not certain.”
“One of you boys have a canteen? He needs a drink.”
Wiley rode in and handed her his. Leaning over his saddle horn, he asked. “You making it, boss man?”
“Yes, Wiley, I’ll be fine.” He reared back to slow the team. “Easy boys, easy.”
Marge removed the cork and held it up to his mouth. Some sloshed down his dirty shirt and vest. But his dry mouth absorbed most of it. He swallowed and thanked her.
It was the longest trip off the mountain he could ever recall. Like looking down on ants to him, there was the small village, the army camp, and the cottonwoods along the Verde. Again, he leaned back on the reins to slow their pace. Tossed from side to side on the seat with her, he wondered if they’d ever reach the bottom. But eventually they did, and the wheels whirled up dust again, headed for the river road to the ranch.
There was plenty to do when they got there. Hoot had a fat yearling steer in the pens for the men to slaughter. Several ranch families were already camped there and helping the old man get things arranged and cooked.
With some help to get Heck out of the rig, Chet carried the limp body to the house. The anxious face of Marge’s friend Kay met them at the door, and she led Chet to a bedroom set up to lay Heck down on some raw boards over sawhorses.
The corpse there, Kay told Marge to take him out of the room. She and some of the others would prepare the deceased for the funeral. Like a spent person, he let Marge take him out of the room.
More rigs began to arrive. Jenny rushed into the house to hug him. “Oh, Chet, I’m so sorry—” Then she burst into tears and they huddled in the middle of the room, holding each other up.
“Take him to the table,” Marge whispered. “Hoot made him some chicken soup. He hasn’t eaten in two days.”
Chet caught the concerned look on Jenny’s face, who led him over to sit down at the long table. “My gosh, why haven’t you eaten?”
Warily, he shook his head at her. “I haven’t had time.” He looked over the growing crowd in his house. “I need to welcome all these folks that have come—”
The two women shook their heads at him.
“You need to eat,” Marge insisted and Jenny backed her.
What could he do? His head was in a whirl. He was lost. Better obey them.
He slurped soup off a spoon they used to feed him. Somewhere this scene had happened before—some time in his life. Then he knew the time. It was when the two rangers brought his father Rocky home in a buckboard. They’d found him miles to the west, face-down with no horse or water. Chet’s fifteenth birthday had just passed.
But the boy was dead this time. Chet would have to recover despite his dizziness. The salty soup slid over his tongue and he blinked his eyes to clear the vision. With rest, that would clear up, too. He hoped. Between spoons of soup, he sipped on coffee. His world was beginning to emerge.
“Why don’t you take a nap,” Marge whispered and Jenny agreed with her.
Chet didn’t argue. Everyone in the room was looking at him like he was naked. He could feel their eyes on his gritty skin.
“Can he make it to the shower?” Tom asked them quietly.
Marge shrugged.
“We can bring the water to him outside the back door. You two tell all the womanfolks to turn their backs. We’ll shower him down and we’ve found a knee-length nightshirt in his war bag to dress him in. He’s so dirty he’d never rest in those clothes.”
“Guess that’s why he hired you as foreman,” Jenny said with a laugh.
“Yes ma’am. We can handle this from here.”
Folks exited the house quietly and Chet held up his hands to ward off Hampt and Tom. “I can walk that far—out the back door, right?”
“Yes.”
Chet stood bare as Adam in the garden, outside the back door on the tile walk, as they began dousing him down with water. All of their sources were not as warm as the others. But he lathered up and then let them rinse him. He felt much better, and dried himself with some help from Tom. Then he put the nightshirt on over his head and he thanked them. Barefooted, he crossed the tile floor.
“It will be cooler upstairs,” Madge said. One woman on each elbow, they delivered him to the room. When he dropped to his butt on the bed, he smiled at the two of them.
“Don’t let me sleep forever.”
“We won’t. Now get to sleep,” Marge ordered as he lay down.
The last thing he heard were those two talking about him in low voices going out of the room. A soft breeze came in the window, and he slept.