Larry McMurtry - Comanche Moon

"Buzzard breakfast, serves him right," Monkey John said. He rattled his bear claws, hoping to entice some of the renegades into a game of cards.

Jake Spoon's decision to leave the rangers and go north caught everyone by surprise except Augustus McCrae, who, as he grew older, laid more and more frequent claims to omniscience.

Gus had stopped allowing himself to be surprised; when something unexpected happened, such as Jake abruptly quitting the troop, Augustus immediately claimed that he had known it was going to happen.

Augustus's habit of appearing all-knowing weighed on everybody, but it weighed heaviest on Woodrow Call.

"How did you know it?" Call asked. "Jake said himself he only made up his mind last night." "Well, but that's a lie," Augustus said.

"Jake's been planning to leave for years, ever since you took against him. It's just that he's a lazy cuss and was slow to get around to it." "I didn't take against the man," Call said, "although I agree that he's lazy." "Would you at least agree that you don't like the man?" Gus asked. "You ain't liked him a bit since he started bunking with Maggie--and that was back about the time the war started." Call ignored the comment. It had been some years since he had been up the steps to Maggie's room. If he met her on the street he said a polite hello, but had no other contact with her. The boy, Newt, was always around where the rangers were, of course; Pea Eye, Deets, and Jake had made a kind of pet of the boy. But what went on between Jake Spoon and Maggie Tilton had long ceased to be any concern of his.

"I don't regard him highly, will that satisfy you?" Call said.

"No, but I have passed the point in life where I expect to be satisfied," Augustus said.

"At least I don't expect to be satisfied with much. When it comes right down to it, Woodrow, I guess my own cooking beats anything I've come across in this life." Lately, due to a dissatisfaction with a succession of company cooks--Deets no longer had the time to cook, due to his duties with the horses--Augustus had mastered the art of making sourdough biscuits, a skill of which he was inordinately proud.

"I will allow that Jake has done a fair job with the bookkeeping," Call said. "That will be your job, once he leaves, and you need to be strict about it." They were sitting in front of a little two-room shack they had purchased together, at the start of the war, to be their living quarters. Augustus, after the death of his Nell, vowed never to marry again; Call gave marriage no thought. The house cost them forty-five dollars. It consisted of two rooms with a dirt floor. It beat sleeping outdoors, but not by much, particularly not in the season when the fleas were active.

"Bookkeep yourself," Gus said. "I will leave too before I'll waste my time scribbling in a ledger." Across the way, at the lots, they could see Jake Spoon, standing around with Deets and Pea Eye and several other rangers. His horse was saddled but he seemed in no hurry to leave. He sat on the top rail of the corral, with Newt, dangling his feet.

"He said he was leaving this morning, but it's nearly dark and he's still here," Call said.

"Maybe he just wants to spend one more night in safe company," Augustus suggested. "With the war ending I expect he'll have to put up with a lot of thieving riffraff on the roads." "I expect so," Call said, wishing Jake would go on and leave. Some of the rangers were using his departure as an occasion for getting thoroughly drunk.

"The question ain't why Jake's leaving, it's why we're staying," Augustus said. "We ought to up and quit, ourselves." Call had been thinking along the same lines, but had not pushed his thoughts hard enough to reach a conclusion. The distant war had ended but the Comanche war hadn't; there was still plenty of rangering to do-- yet the thought of quitting had occurred to him more than once.

"If we don't quit pretty soon we'll be doing this when we're ninety years old," Augustus said. "Some young governor will be sending us out to catch rascals that any decent sheriff ought to be able to catch." "And that will have been life," he added. "A lot of whoring and the rest of the time spent catching rascals." "I would like to see the Indian business through," Call replied.

"Woodrow, it's through," Augustus said.

"The settlers up in Jack County don't think so," Call said. There had been a small massacre only the week before--a party of teamsters had been ambushed and killed.

"I have no doubt a few more firecrackers will go off," Augustus said. "But not many. The Yankee military boys will soon come down and finish off the Comanche." Call knew there was truth in what Gus said.

Most of the Comanche bands had already come in--only a few hundred warriors were still free and inclined to fight. Still, it was too soon to say it was over; besides that, there was the border, as chaotic from the standpoint of law and order as it had been before the Mexican War.

Augustus, though, was not through with his discourse on the Indian question.

"In six months' time we'll have the Yankees here, giving us orders," he said.

"We're just Rebs to them. They won't want our help. We'll be lucky if they even let us keep our firearms. They'll probably have to issue us a pass before we're even allowed on the plains." "I don't think it will be that bad," Call said, but he spoke without conviction. The Confederacy had been defeated, and Texas had been part of the Confederacy. There was little telling what the future of the rangers would be. What Augustus had proposed on the spur of the moment--quitting the rangers--might not merely be something they ought to consider; it might be something they would have to consider.

"We've done this since we were boys," he said to Gus. "What would we do, if we quit?" "I don't care, as long as we go someplace that ain't dull," Augustus said. "Remember that town that wasn't quite there yet, by the river? I expect that Frenchwoman has got the roof on that saloon by now. Not only could she cook, she could barber. Lonesome Dove--wasn't that what they called it? It might be booming now. It wouldn't hurt us to ride down that way and take a look." Call didn't reply. He saw that Jake Spoon was shaking hands with all concerned.

Probably he had decided to leave that night, after all. Augustus noticed and stood up, meaning to saunter over and say goodbye.

"Coming, Woodrow?" he asked.

"No--he's got half the town to say goodbye to as it is," Call said--but Augustus, to his surprise, insisted that he come.

"You've been his captain since he was a boy," Gus said. "You mustn't let him go off without a goodbye." Call knew Augustus was right--it would puzzle the boys who were staying if he held aloof from Jake's goodbye. He walked over with Augustus and shook Jake's hand.

"Take care on the roads, Jake, and good luck," he said.

Jake Spoon was so surprised that Call had come to see him off that he flushed with gratitude.

It had been four years or more since Call had spoken to him, other than to issue the briefest and simplest commands--mostly, for the whole term of the civil war, Captain Call had treated him as if he were not there. It was such a surprise to receive a handshake from him that Jake was speechless, for a time.

"Thanks, Captain," he managed to mumble.

"I aim to go prospecting for silver." Call saw no need to extend the courtesies further. Even though Jake was mounted, Augustus produced a bottle and passed it around; soon the whole troop would be too drunk to notice whether he was polite to Jake Spoon or not. He noticed to his surprise that several of the rangers had been crying--ffPea Eye and Deets and several of the younger men, Jake was a pard, a friend who had rangered with them and shared the anxieties of youth. Jake had ever been a merry companion, except when he was scared; why wouldn't they mist up a little, now that he was going?