Kathleen Kent - The Outcasts

He gestured to Nate to help him out of bed, and the two of them shuffled around the room for a few minutes. Winded, Dr. Tom crawled back into bed. An hour later, he leaned on Nate again to walk out of the sickroom and into the doctor’s visitation room. By the fifth day, Dr. Tom could walk slowly, with only a little assistance, to the stable to see after his horse.

He ran one hand down the horse’s neck and then pointed to his old partner’s bay in the next stall. “He looks good, Nate. Few people could handle him. Has he reached around and bitten you yet?”

Nate smiled. “He tried it a time or two.”

“George had a scar on his thigh as big as Cleveland that he got from the very first day he was out with that big boy.”

Dr. Tom lowered himself onto a crate, supporting his lower ribs with one hand. “This lingering pleurisy is going to be a problem for me.” He closed his eyes for a moment, breathing shallowly, then reached into his back pocket and pulled out a vial of dark liquid from which he drank. Holding the vial up to Nate, he said, “As could this.”

Nate frowned. “The doctor said you needed it.”

“The question is for how long, though.”

Dr. Tom sat for a few minutes looking out of the open stable door. “I got wounded at Dove Creek during the war. Caught a ball in the left shoulder. The camp surgeon dug it out but it had broken the collarbone and was painful as hell. We didn’t stop until we got to Mexico, and the only way I could ride was if I had enough laudanum to take the edge off the hurt. It wasn’t but a week before it got its hooks in me. I spent the next few months taking the edge off everything with those little vials. George caught wise and threatened to shoot any doctor who gave me any more. He took me into his home south of Austin and let me stay there until I got well.”

Nate placed another crate next to Dr. Tom and sat down. “Did you ever meet his daughter?”

“Yes.” Dr. Tom looked at Nate. “I married her.”

Nate blinked a few times and raked his hat off his head. There in front of him was the relatedness he had sensed between Deerling and Dr. Tom.

Dr. Tom backhanded the sweat from his eyes. “Oh, it wasn’t a love match, at least not on her part. George thought I could somehow manage to reclaim her, get her to lead a settled life.”

“She agreed to the marriage, though.”

“If you mean did we tie her down and threaten the minister until he performed the ceremony, then no. Deerling knew I’d take care of Lucinda. And I did my best.” He stood up, clung to the boards until his dizziness passed, and again laid a gentling hand on his horse’s neck. “I loved her, and I thought that would be enough.”

Halfway up the street, Dr. Tom staggered but waved away Nate’s offer of a supporting arm. He said, “Nate, you’re a good nurse and you’ve been a good friend. But the next time you try holding me up, I’m going to flatten you.”

Five days later, Dr. Tom settled his accounts with the doctor, and he and Nate walked to the stable to retrieve their horses. Their plan was to travel in a wide arc so they could enter the town of Lynchburg not from the ferry side at the south but from the north, and under cover of darkness. It would take them the entire day and part of the night, crossing spongy wet ground and several smaller bayou rivers, but Dr. Tom wanted to give them every advantage should they find McGill’s men in town.

They breached the narrow, sandy-bottomed banks of the San Jacinto at its narrows and turned south at sunset, the clouds to their right hanging almost vertically in the sky like a curtain. Dr. Tom had been quiet most of the day, conserving his strength, but his eyes, sunken from exhaustion and opiates, reflected the yellow light dully, like a shot glass underwater. They stopped to rest for a few hours a mile from town, making a low fire so they could brew enough coffee to keep them awake.

Nate had seen Dr. Tom drink from the laudanum flask several times during the day, and the ranger poured some of the dark liquid into his coffee cup, then drained it in a few swallows. He saw Nate watching him but offered no commentary. They drifted off to a half sleep, huddling under their long coats in the night air, but covered over the fire at the sky’s lightening murk in the east.

They tied their horses to a stand of trees, took with them short lengths of rope, and walked past a few small houses at the edge of town. Arriving at the stable, Dr. Tom kicked at the door, rousing the stable boy, who asked, in Spanish, who was there.

Dr. Tom kicked at the door again and said, “Federales.”

They saw lantern light appear from one of the small windows, and when the door finally eased open, they slipped inside. Dr. Tom asked the boy, “¿Tienes una yegua grulla aquí?”

The boy hesitated, but finally pointed to a far stall. Nate walked to the back of the barn and saw the gray mare standing quietly. He turned and nodded to his partner.

Dr. Tom pulled out a coin and gave it to the boy. “¿Dónde está el hombre ahora?”

The boy looked at the two of them for a moment, brows knit, but answered, “En el hotel.”

Dr. Tom put a finger to his lips in warning and they left, crossing the street to the hotel. The door was locked but a low window, its bottom frame flush with the porch, was not. Dr. Tom eased it open, slid a shabby armchair aside, and the two of them stepped into the darkened lobby.

The night clerk was asleep at the desk with his head on his arms, and Dr. Tom took another coin out of his pocket and began tapping it on the desk. The clerk came awake with a start and, seeing the two strangers standing in the ill-lit room, began buttoning his collar, muttering, “I’m sorry, gentlemen. We’re closed right now. The door should have been locked.”

Dr. Tom scanned the lobby quickly and turned back to the clerk. “We’re not here for a room.”

“What are you here for?” The clerk looked nervously at Nate and the rope he was carrying.

“Information,” Dr. Tom said, his voice low.

“What kind of information?”

“William Estes McGill. Innis Crenshaw. Jacob Purdy. Any of those men staying here?”

The clerk had started shaking his head even before Dr. Tom finished speaking. “Look, you should leave.”

“One of the men rides a grulla mare that happens to be in the stable down the street.”

“If you don’t leave, I’m going to have to call the sheriff.”

Tom placed his Colt revolver on the desk. “You don’t have a sheriff here. Nor do you have a marshal; he’s in Harrisburg. But what we do have is a Texas state policeman.”

“A what?”

“A Texas state policeman.” Dr. Tom pointed to Nate, who opened his coat to show his badge.

“I’ve never heard of such a thing.”

“Have you heard of the governor of Texas?”

“Yes, of course I have. Governor Davis.”

“Well, then, you ignorant son of a bitch, this is one of the governor’s hounds, newly appointed judge, jury, and executioner, at his discretion. He’s been empowered to act with or without all local officers of the peace. So, if you don’t want to be taken out and hanged right now for obstructing state business, you’ll give me an answer.”

“Who’re you?”

“I’m the one that gets to tie the rope.”

The clerk swiveled his head from one man to the other. “You won’t waken the other guests?”

Dr. Tom tucked the pistol back into his belt. “We’ll be as quiet as the grave.”

The clerk pointed above his head with one finger. “Innis Crenshaw. Room twelve. Up the stairs and to the left. The other two are gone. Both of them.”

“If you’ve lied to us, or if you make any noise, you’re dead.” Dr. Tom held out his hand. “Key.”