Elizabeth Bear: Karen Memory

“U.S. Deputy Marshal,” he said. A big voice to go with a big man, and I’d put him in Texas or Arkansas. “If I were you, mister, I’d put that knife away.”

Bill drew himself up, but he didn’t cringe. Pity. It’d make my life easier if he was cowardly as well as stupid. His voice dripped scorn and disbelief as he sneered, “ Marshal .”

He lowered the knife, and the gun didn’t come out.

Bill said, “This slommack broke my teeth!” His voice came out hissy and bad, on breath flecked with red spit. I ducked back behind the Marshal so I wouldn’t have to see. It’d probably impress my rescuer less if I shot the cat all over his shoes.

“Is that so?” said the Marshal. He didn’t look back at me. “This little thing?”

There aren’t a lot of men who can get away with calling me a little thing. But I could of walked under this one’s arm, if he held it out straight, and he was about twice as broad as me.“She tried to stab me with that sword stick!”

“Miss?” the Marshal asked. “I’d like to hear your side of the story.”

Well, I don’t know when the last time was that a man called me miss when I wasn’t buying a chicken from him. “More or less,” I allowed. “Except when I stuck him with my umbrella, he was trying to cut me. And when I hit him in the face with a bag of onions, he was trying to kidnap me.”

“Huh,” said the Marshal, drawling. He had a good voice with that flat Arkansas accent laid over it. “I guess it goes to prove what they say. There’s two sides to every story.” He paused, tipped his head under the hat, and said, “Mister, I’d guess you’d like to get to a dentist.”

I peeked around the Marshal’s shoulder. Bantle’s man’s mouth did a funny thing, that must of hurt like hell over what was left of his teeth. My mama had bad teeth — they killed her when I was nine and that’s why Da pretty much raised me as a mustang-camp hellion — and I had an idea of how much pain Bantle’s man must be in. His eyes were glassy with it, his skin sweat soaked and pallid now that the fury was draining out of him. His jaw worked, and he swallowed — spit and blood, I imagined.

Thinking about it made me want to up my chuck. I swallowed, too.

The Marshal’s gloved hand alighted on the butt of his gun. Bill’s eyes followed the soft movement, and when he looked up again you could tell all the fight had puddled in his boots.

“Who gives a damned Negra a badge?” he asked no one in particular, and faded back into the crowd.

I blinked. The Marshal turned sideways, towering over me but keeping one eye on Bill’s retreating back. Once the crowd hid Bill, the Marshal’s hand came off his gun and he ducked down a little to talk to me more level like, so I could see more than the line of his chin.

He said, “Then I reckon my reputation don’t precede me.”

He was a stone handsome man, and I say that even though for me humping with men is just how I earn my crust and covers. His cheeks and chin were scraped clean around a thick, well-trimmed mustache, and his brown eyes shone. His face was also brown and shiny as a toasted coffee berry, and he smelled like fresh coffee, too. I thought he might of been about forty years old. He weren’t forty-five.

“Ma’am,” he said. His duster’s black canvas strained over his shoulders when he tipped his hat. “U.S. Deputy Marshal Bass Reeves, at your service.”

And then Miss Francina burst through the crowd in a flurry of lace and wrath. She nearly took Deputy Marshal Reeves’ head off before I got between ’em, and we had some explaining to do while we picked the onions up.

* * *

Deputy Marshal Reeves had a gallant streak, and never so much as gave Miss Francina a double take — well, fair enough, a small second look, but he didn’t say nothing, and Miss Francina’s tall enough and pretty enough to deserve a second look under any circumstance and he didn’t say nothing. He offered me one arm — I had to reach way up to take his elbow — and Miss Francina the other and insisted on escorting us home.

Since me and Miss Francina had previously discussed it and elected to walk rather than rattling along in the cart with the turnips, this was not only no hardship — it was pleasure. I informed Marshal Reeves that in my opinion, his offer was downright neighborly of him. He explained that he was up from the Indian Territory in pursuit of a fugitive — that’s how he said it, “fugitive”—and it had been his pleasure to render assistance. Which is also how he said it.

He gave me and Miss Francina each a brand-new Morgan silver dollar, as a keepsake, too. I hadn’t seen one before, except in engravings in the newspapers, for they was new that year and only minted in Philadelphia. A dollar weren’t a lot of money in Rapid City, what with the big hissing ships chugging their way back and forth from Anchorage every couple of days, but it was a pretty thing.

The coin was large and heavy, bigger than a hub wafer candy. Much bigger than the fish-scale gold dollars I was used to, more like an eagle. It did have a woman’s face on it like a gold dollar, though, side on. Profile, I think you’d say. But it weren’t no Indian princess. It was a Lady Liberty, like on the gold dollars from before the war.

Except this was a different Liberty. She had a sterner look to her, a lifted chin, a good strong nose, and a plump line of her jaw. She made me feel stubborn, and like getting things done. Something about looking at her eased that funny shameful itch I’d been carrying since the night before, and I slipped her into my bodice for safekeeping.

“Karen honey,” Miss Francina said, “she could be your sister.”

She held her coin up beside me as if studying the likeness, and I laughed. I knowed she was just pulling my tail.

It felt good to laugh, though. At first, it felt like I hadn’t done it in about a thousand years, like I was creaky and my laugher needed to be oiled, but then I warmed up a little and it flowed naturally. I did catch Marshal Reeves looking at me sort of odd and sideways, however, as if he’d caught the false note and wondered.

He didn’t wonder long, because we passed what by the banners and placards must of been a Democratic Party meeting spilling out into the streets on every side of the folded former bank where the Brotherhood of the Protective Order of the Sasquatch met. There was men of every shape and size, but only men and those men only of one color, and nearly every one of ’em had a Klondike beard like he’d just landed from Alaska. They were too well fed for that, though, and they wore city shoes, though most of them didn’t quite fit in their clothing.

I saw the Marshal frowning after them, and Miss Francina frowning at her boots. A black man had reason to hate Democrats, for sure, but I felt like there was more to it that I wasn’t understanding. When we were far enough along to be out of earshot, I asked.

Miss Francina fluffed her lace sleeves, a sure sign of irritation, but I didn’t think it was aimed at me. She chewed her lip as if trying to find the right words to explain but never quite had to. Because after a look over to her for permission, the Marshal huffed his mustache out, glanced over his shoulder, and said, “Voter fraud,” in a voice that dripped frustration. “Every one of those bearded men is going to vote two or three times, in different wards, depending on the skill of the Party’s barbers.”

“Oh,” I said. I was alive for the war, of course, but I mostly remembered it with a child’s jumbled sense of uneasiness, disconnection, and lack of self-determination. And it wasn’t as if I could vote. But I did remember President Hayes’ election, and the scandals instantly telegraphed across the nation when because of voter fraud three different states submitted two different slates of electors — one Democratic and one Republican. Congress had to decide, and some people said Republican Hayes had made a corrupt bargain with the Democrats to get his slate of electors ratified.