Mitchell Smith - Kingdom River

Patience unwrapped the note from the Mailman's leg, tucked the paper into her mouth, chewed thoroughly, and swallowed. "Instead, let's adopt the Warm-time attitude of wait-and-see."

"'Wait and see,'" Webster said, his voice thin as the piece of string, though he had no idea what those words meant. He had suckled his white cheese too greedily, and proved it by burping a mouthful up.

Howell Voss, having restrung the banjar with true cat-gut – two silver pesos a coil, shipped from Imperial Trading & Market in Cabo – leaned back on his cot and played a tuning chord, Warm-time G. Or so it was assumed. He'd long had the suspicion that ancient tuning was slightly different from the present's – different enough so the music said to have been theirs, notated as theirs in surviving copy-works, now probably sounded somewhat off.

He twisted his pegs, plucked… twisted his pegs again, and was in modern tune at least.

He'd just taken a singing-breath, when someone scratched at his tent-flap.

"I heard you tuning," Ned Flores said, stooping to come in out of gathering darkness. He wore an ice-spangled army blanket as poncho, and was pale as a weary girl. "- Thought I'd better interrupt before the camp suffered."

"You might remember that wasn't your sword hand you lost."

"No." Flores dropped the blanket, gently kicked open a folding camp chair, and sat. "But you wouldn't duel an officer for an act of mercy."

Voss sighed and set the banjar down. "Truly refined taste is so rare… And how is that wound? Should you be up and walking?"

"Well, after five days in a mercy wagon with a fresh-sewn stump, I'm glad to be up. As for this," holding out a thickly bandaged left wrist, " – not, by the way, as comic as your fresh-trimmed ear – I'm told I can have something made, and strapped on."

"What something?"

"Your Portia says, a hook."

"The doctor's not 'my Portia.' But I think a hook would do." The sleet was rattling, coming down harder.

"I've been considering tempered steel, Howell, forged from knife stock a flat inch and a quarter wide by a quarter inch thick – in-curving to a wicked fish-hook point. And, and its outer edge filed and sharpened."

"The whole outside curve of the hook?"

"Hollow ground to a razor edge. Hook in, slash out."

"Mountain Jesus. You'll have to be careful with that thing, Ned."

"Others… will have to be careful of it. I don't suppose you intend to share any tobacco. You're getting damned rude, Howell – or should I say 'General'?"

"A curtsy will do." Howell dug in a trouser pocket, tossed a half-plug over. "Don't take it all. That's Finest."

Ned bit off a chew. "Oh, of course it is; it only smells like dog shit. Who sells you this stuff?" He tossed the remainder back.

"Maurice."

"Maurice, the Thief of Reynosa?"

"He was acquitted. And that was about mules; the store was not involved."

Ned tucked the chew into his cheek. "Remind me, Howell…" he leaned far back in the camp chair, paged the tent-flap aside with his bandaged stump, and spit over his shoulder out into the rain. "Remind me to play pickup sticks with you again. For money."

"Yes, I will – and what the fuck happened at This'll Do?"

"What's the Warm-time for it? Got… 'too big for my britches.' "

"Elvin always gets that wrong." Howell bent to pick up the banjar.

"Please don't. I'm an invalid."

"Healing music." Howell commenced soft strumming. "So, what happened at This'll Do?"

Ned shifted his chew. "Absolute dog shit… Well, nothing as wonderful as the Boca Chica thing, from what I hear. Our Sam standing aside to watch you make an ass of yourself – which, by some miracle, you did not."

"Which – by some miracle, Ned – I did not." Howell struck a chord, then lightly muffled it with his fingers. Struck… muffled. Struck… muffled.

"At This'll Do, I thought… Howell, I thought there was a very good chance to beat those people."

"You did?"

"And I would have, if they'd had the usual old fart commanding them."

"But they didn't; I know. He gave us a hard time. Rodriguez, one of the new ones."

"So" – Ned leaned back to spit again – "a lot of our people killed. All my fault."

"Ned…" Howell plucked out a soft fandang rhythm. "What in the world were you doing down there at all? And with only half a regiment of Lights? Why would Sam send you? We could have waited for those people to come up, get into real trouble."

"Oh, both of us thought it seemed a good idea."

"At the time."

"Yes. Seemed a good idea at the time."

"Mmm…"

"Change of subject from my command blunders, Howell… I'm interested in going up into Texas with you. Map-Fort Stockton."

"No."

"No?"

"If you were four weeks better healed, Ned, you wouldn't have to ask. I'd have asked for you."

"I can sit a horse."

"Not for a three-day ride north, and then a fight. You're not going."

"I'm not going…"

"No, you're not."

"And if Sam says I am?"

"You're not going."

"Well… play me a tune on that fucking thing, if you're going to sit there with it."

Howell bent his head to the instrument, watched his large hands as if they were another's, and picked out a swift, soft, twanging melody.

"That's not… not terribly offensive." Ned, grown paler, leaned back to spit the chewing tobacco out.

"'Camp Ground Racers,' supposedly," Howell said. "But I doubt it."

Ned sat back with his eyes closed, listening.

"Ned?"

"I'm not dead. Though I'm sure I look it."

Howell stopped playing, set his instrument aside. "Come use my cot. Lie down for a while."

"Tell you something funny, Howell…"

"Come on, lie down."

"Tell you something funny." Eyes still closed. "I have – had – always assumed I'd be next in line. Take command under Sam. Take command if anything happened to him. Always assumed it would be me."

"Ned – "

"And of course, that very assumption demonstrated I would never be any such thing. But I didn't see it."

"Stop the horseshit, and lie down."

"I don't know how it happened." Ned sat up, looked across the tent as if there were distance there. "When Sam and I were kids, I led, more often than not. Then, when we got older – when the fighting started – I don't know how it happened. Just… after a while, people were coming to Sam and saying, 'What now?' "

"Ned – "

"They asked him. They didn't ask me. And that fucking This'll Do thing is beside the point. I've made damn few mistakes in seven, eight years fighting. I've been a hell of a commander. Better than you, Howell, Light Cavalry ranging."

"That's true."

"It wasn't that I made mistakes. It was just that people didn't come to me and say, 'What now?' "

"Come on." Howell got up, took Ned's good arm. "Come on. Lie down and get some rest."

Ned stood, and staggered. "Lie down, or fall down. Not ready for Map-Fort Stockton, after all…"

Coming back from john-trench in gusting sleet – and regretting he hadn't moved into his rooms at the fort, after all – Sam heard music, banjar playing from Howell Voss's tent on officers' row. Bright music; surprising how lightly those big fingers strummed… It was a temptation to walk over, sit laughing, listening to sleety rain and music, while talking army. Three years ago, even two years ago, he would have done it. But the distance of governing had grown between them, or seemed to have, which made the same difference.

Voices over there. Ned; certainly off his cot too soon after wagoning in. – Interesting that loneliness was never mentioned in the old tales of kings, presidents, generals and heroes. Those men and women somehow told as sufficient of themselves, and never, after crapping, walking alone under freezing rain.