Craig Johnson: The Dark Horse

Her eyes stayed steady with mine and, with three consecutive blinks, the muscles around her mouth relaxed. She finally smiled and let out a cautious laugh. “She’s okay then?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

She let go of my sleeve and stood there. “That’s good. She’s tough.”

“Yes, ma’am.” She didn’t move, and I looked into the shine of her eyes. “Maybe you should get some sleep?”

She nodded, turned, and crossed back to the bunk. “You’ll let me know how she is?”

“Yes, of course.”

She sat, tucked her legs back under the county-issued blanket, and turned away from me toward the concrete-block wall. “Thank you, Hershel.”

There was a disassociated quality to the entire conversation, and I stood there thinking about what had been said. I finally nodded, patted Dog on the head, and turned to go back to my office. Vic stood in the doorway with two cups of coffee. “Who the fuck is Hershel?”

I shushed her, and we took our coffee into the reception area near Ruby’s dispatch desk. I took a sip from my chipped Denver Broncos mug and sat on the bench. “She sleepwalks.”

“No shit.”

Vic sat next to me, Dog curled up in front of us, slowly rolling over onto his back. “Do you know anything about that stuff?”

“A little. My brother used to do it.” She sipped her coffee.

“Which one?”

“Michael. When he was a kid he used to get up and walk around the house with this dopey expression on his face. He grew out of it, sorta.” She lowered her mug and looked at me. “My mother says my uncle Alphonse says my father used to do it; it’s supposedly genetic.”

I leaned back and listened to the thin, wooden stays of the bench squeal. “Is it dangerous to wake them up?” I thought about the episode I’d just witnessed.

Vic shrugged. “I don’t know. I don’t think we could ever get Michael to wake up.” She watched me. “I’m still not sure we have.” I didn’t laugh at the joke, and she continued to study the concern that rested on my face. “What’d she talk about?”

“Horses.”

She petted Dog’s belly with the toe of her boot. “That would make sense. There are environmental factors that can bring sleepwalking on-insomnia, tension, post-traumatic stress disorder, or dissociative states-”

“It all goes back to those horses that got burned alive.”

“That’d be pretty traumatic.” She nodded and took another sip. “For the sake of more than conversation, I’ll ask again, who the fuck is Hershel?”

I chewed on the inside of my lip; it was a habit I would conquer someday. “Sandy mentioned that the man who worked for the Barsads was named Hershel-Hershel Vanskike, to be exact.”

October 27, 11:07 P.M.

Hershel Vanskike took two reasonably steady steps and then planted face-first into the dried grass off the pathway.

Dog turned and glanced up at me, unsure of the situation. I looked at the old puncher lying there, unmoving, and at the broken bottle on the flagstone. “Well, I think he’s had enough.”

Hershel had said he would just ride his horse home, but it was evident that he couldn’t sit a horse let alone ride one. I saw that the aged gelding was tied off to a fence post as I carried the unconscious cowboy to my car. I stood him up against the side of the Lincoln and held him there while I opened the passenger door.

He started mumbling, but I ignored him, stuffed him into the seat, wrapped the seat belt around him, and clicked it in place. I tossed the insurance folder into the back with Dog and then shut the door and looked at the horse. I took a length of yellow nylon rope that the Campbell County sheriff’s office had used to block off the drive and approached the bay. He crow-hopped, laid his ears back, and looked at me.

I stood there with the rope in my hands and tried to figure out what I was going to do when he lowered his head and stretched it out toward me. I didn’t move and watched him as the big, prehensile lips approached my face. I had a brief moment of panic, thinking that he might bite, when he took in a great breath and sniffed at me. I thought he was just smelling me, but I noticed that his breathing was matching my own and that he was breathing my breath. He took a step closer as I threaded the rope through the bridle and looked him in the eye. “You are one weird horse.”

After that, he seemed eager to leave, and I couldn’t blame him, considering the recent incidents.

Dog sat in the back and watched as I drove slowly, keeping the car under five miles an hour, as the bay kept pace behind us with the nylon rope held in my hand, dangling by the door from the open window.

It took the better part of a half-hour to get to the Barton Road corrals, and once we got there, there wasn’t much. An old sheep wagon was parked beside them, and the rounded top of the wagon gave off a silver sheen in the moonlight, bisected by the shadow of a pole where an electric cord was strung from an attached four-way plug. A soft yellow glow overhung the rear door where a few leftover miller moths battered themselves against the bulb inside the dish-shaped, porcelain fixture.

I parked the car and left Hershel sound asleep in the passenger seat.

I gathered the rope into a loop as I walked back to the bay and led him into the corral. After the same ritual of breathing my breath, I untied him. He stood there, waiting to be unsaddled, made a passing sniff, and then allowed me to pull the leather strap on the front cinch and the rear. I hooked the opposite stirrup on the horn and lifted the saddle onto the nearest pole. I took off the blanket and bridle and watched as the bay walked to the center of the fifty-foot ring and kneeled down to roll over, wiggling on his back with all four legs in the air. Half a roll, as the old cowboys say, and you’ve got a thousand-dollar horse; all the way over and you’ve got a fifteen-hundred-dollar one. Hershel’s went over one way and then all the way back-a two-thousand-dollar horse.

It looked like it felt good.

I walked back over to the saddle and pulled the antique repeater from the scabbard. It was indeed the real McCoy. I examined the rough-worn weapon, the brass receiver glowing dully in the starlight as did a small plaque, screwed into the stock, which read CORPORAL ISAIAH MAYS, 10TH CAVALRY, CONGRESSIONAL MEDAL OF HONOR, JUNE 18, 1892. In smaller print were the words GALLANTRY IN THE FIGHT BETWEEN PAYMASTER ROBERT EDWARDS’S ESCORTS AND ROBBERS.

I studied the scratches, chips, and dents-it hadn’t been treated like a museum piece, but it was one. I carried the historic rifle with me to the sheep wagon.

I’m smart about hauling people because I’ve done enough of it. I opened the door of the wagon so that I could carry Hershel to his bed unimpeded, propped the Yellow Boy in the corner, and started to go back outside to the vehicle to get the old cowboy. I stopped when I saw the far wall.

In the haloed light from the bulb behind my head, I could see pictures taped, pictures of Mary Barsad, hundreds of them. I leaned in and took a closer look. They were all from magazines, some dating as far back as the seventies: photographs of the woman when she’d ridden a white stallion during football games, some of her on cutting horses, and a few from when she must have been a print model. I studied the glossy surfaces and the stunning young woman. She had a broad smile and high cheekbones that were emphasized by her thinness, high-sky blue eyes, and long blond hair. She was a beauty, but I had to admit I preferred the edition who was in my jail. She was older and stiffer, but age had seasoned her and her grief had humanized her.

Mary had even starred in a Rainier beer ad. She was seated on a horse and trailed a six-pack tied off with a latigo strap. She had turned and looked at the camera and was all hair, teeth, and sex. Personal tastes notwithstanding, it was enough to stop your heart.