Larry McMurtry - Lonesome Dove

Instead of climbing in the wagon, he turned away and sat down near the pigs. They had found a cool spot where the water barrel had dripped, and were lying on their stomachs, watching the proceedings alertly.

"If I ain't back in a month, you girls feel free to start without me," Augustus said. Then he drove off, amused that Dish Boggett looked so out of sorts just from being in love with a woman who didn't want him. It was a peril too common to take seriously.

A half mile from the main camp he came upon the very woman who had given Dish the pain. She was attempting to cook some fryback, and was getting no help from Jake Spoon, who hadn't even provided her with a good fire. Jake was sitting on his bedding, his hair sticking up in back, trying to dig a thorn out of his hand with a pocketknife.

Augustus stopped the team and got down to chat a minute.

"Jake, you look like you slept standing on your head," he said. "Is that a bullet you're digging out? Has she shot you already?"

"Who invited you to breakfast?" Jake said.

"I've et," Augustus said. "I just stopped by to set the table, so you two could dine in style."

"Hello, Gus," Lorie said.

"Don't start no conversation, else he'll stay all day," Jake said. "I'd forgotten what a pest you are, Gus."

He had got the thorn in his thumb hobbling the horses the night before, and had been unable to get it out in the dark. Now his thumb was swollen to twice its size, for a green mesquite thorn was only slightly less poisonous than a rattlesnake. Besides, he had slept badly on the stony ground, and Lorie had refused him again, when all he wanted was a little pleasure to take his mind off his throbbing thumb. They were camped only two miles from town and could easily have ridden back and slept comfortably in the Dry Bean, but when he suggested it Lorie showed her stubborn streak and refused. He could go back if he cared to-she wasn't. So he had stayed and slept poorly, worrying most of the night about snakes. As much camping as he had done, it was a fear that never left him.

"It's a wonder you ain't froze to death years ago, if that's the best fire you can make," Augustus said. He began to gather sticks.

"You don't need to bother," Lorena said. "I've already burned the meat." It was good Gus had stopped, for Jake was in a temper already, just because she had turned away from him the night before. He had a quick pride; any refusal made him angry. As for sleeping on the ground, she didn't mind. It was at least fairly cool.

"I never expected to find you to be still in bed at this hour, Jake," Augustus said. "You'll have a time keeping up with us if you don't improve your habits. By the way, Soupy hired on this morning. He inquired about you."

"There goes the easy money," Jake said. "Soupy will win ever cent you boys can earn in the next ten years. He's been known to win from me, and that ain't easy."

"Well, I'm going to town," Augustus said. "Want me to pick you up a Bible or a few hymnbooks?"

"Nope, we're leaving," Jake said. "Soon as we pack."

"That won't be soon," Augustus said. "You've scattered stuff over three acres just making this one little camp."

That was true. They had unpacked in the dark and made a mess of it. Jake was looking for a whiskey bottle that wasn't where he thought he'd put it. It was plain camping wasn't a neat way of life. There was no place to wash, and they were carrying very little water, which was the main reason she had refused Jake. She liked a wash and felt he could wait until they camped near a river and could splash a little of the dust off before bedding down.

Augustus watched them eat the poor burned breakfast. It was eternally amusing, the flow of human behavior. Who could have predicted Jake would be the one to take Lorena out of Lonesome Dove? She had been meaning to leave since the day she arrived, and now Jake, who had slipped from the grasp of every woman who had known him, was firmly caught by a young whore from Alabama.

The quality of determination had always intrigued him. Lorie had it, and Jake didn't. Hers was nothing compared to W. F. Call's, but hers would probably be sufficient to get her to San Francisco, where no doubt she would end up a respectable woman.

After accepting a cup of coffee from Lorie, he took a look at Jake's thumb, which was swollen and turning white.

"You better be sure you got all that thorn out," Gus said. "If you didn't you'll probably lose the hand, and maybe the arm that goes with it."

"I won't lose no arm, and if I did I could still beat you dealing onehanded," Jake said. "I hope you invite us to breakfast one of these days, to repay the favor."

When Augustus reached Lonesome Dove, the one street was still and empty, with only one horse twitching its tail in front of the Pumphreys' store. The dust his wagon stirred hung straight as a column before settling back into the street. Augustus stopped in front of the deserted blacksmith shop. The blacksmith, an uncommunicative man named Roy Royce, had ridden out of town some months before and had not come back.

Augustus found a small crowbar among the tools the man had cavalierly abandoned, and rode up the street to the Hat Creek corrals, where he easily pried his sign off the fence. The Dutch ovens were more resistant. They showed signs of crumbling, so he left them. There would be no time for leisurely biscuit making on the trail anyway.

He walked through the house and had a look at the roofless barn, amused at how little trace remained of their ten years' residence. They had lived the whole time as if they might leave at any minute, and now that was exactly what they had done. The barn would stay roofless, the well only partially dug. The rattlesnakes could take the springhouse, for all he cared-he had already removed his whiskey jug. It would be a while before he had such a good shady porch to sit on, drinking the afternoon out. In Texas he had drunk to take his mind off the heat; in Montana, no doubt, it would be to take his mind off the cold. He didn't feel sad. The one thing he knew about Texas was that he was lucky to be leaving it alive-and, in fact, he had a long way to go before he could be sure of accomplishing that much.

He drove down to the saloon for a last word with Xavier. At first he thought the saloon was empty, but then he saw Xavier sitting at a little table near the shadowy end of the bar. He had not bothered to shave for two days, a sign of profound demoralization.

"Dern, Wanz, you look poorly," Augustus said. "I see the morning rush ain't started yet."

"It will never start," Xavier said in a desperate voice.

"Just because you lost your whore don't mean the sun won't rise again," Augustus assured him. "Take a trip to San Antonio and recruit another whore."

"I would have married her," Xavier said, feeling too hopeless even to conceal that he was hopeless.

"I ain't surprised," Augustus said gently. It was one thing to make light of a young man's sorrows in love, but another to do it when the sorrower was Xavier's age. There were men who didn't get over women. He himself, fortunately, was not one of them, though he had felt fairly black for a year after Clara married. It was curious, for Xavier had had stuff enough to survive a hellion like Therese, but was devastated by the departure of Lorena, who could hardly, with reason, have been expected to stay in one room over a saloon all her life.

"I would have taken her to San Francisco," Xavier said. "I would have given her money, bought her clothes."

"In my opinion the woman made a poor bargain," Augustus said. "I seen her not an hour ago, trying to cook over a dern smoky fire. But then we don't look at life like women do, Wanz. They don't always appreciate convenience."

Xavier shrugged. Gus often talked about women, but he had never listened and didn't intend to start. It wouldn't bring Lorena back, or make him feel less hopeless. It had seemed a miracle, the day she walked in the door, with nothing but her beauty. From the first he had planned to marry her someday. It didn't matter that she was a whore. She had intelligence, and he felt sure her intelligence would one day guide her to him. She would see, in time, how much kinder he was than other men; she would recognize that he treated her better, loved her more.