Decisions and desires
Chapter 9
Matt's first awareness was water. Water was on his face, in his nose and pouring down his neck. It was cold and he was shivering. He couldn't stop it. A voice was shouting but he didn't recognize it, he couldn't even figure out what the words meant. Someone was hitting his face, trying to wake him up, but it was a series of hard slaps, not soft and gentle like Kitty or Doc would use. He tried to turn his head so he could see where he was, but all that did was increase the pounding in the left side of his face. He wanted to speak, to find out what was going on. He had a feeling all was not well but couldn't remember what had happened. In the end he gave up trying and, as he vaguely heard footsteps retreating followed by a door being slammed, he floated back into a welcoming oblivion.
ooo000oo
The man known as Van joined his two partners in the main room of the shack they were inhabiting.
"I'm not sure what you plan to do with him, Chance, but he don't look too good if you ask me. I just poured some water over him, trying to wake him up but he didn't stir."
Chance Tanney turned away from the window where he had been watching part of the trail that passed within a few hundred feet of the house. Van was the younger of the two cousins, but was the taller and stronger. Even so, Chance seemed to be the natural leader of the pair, probably because of his two years seniority and the fact that he was the one who came up with ideas. There was a third member of the group, Ketch. They had gathered him up somewhere along the way. Ketch was an older man who had done a lot of drinking in his life so that now his mind was not always as sharp as it could be. Chance had kind of adopted the old drifter when he got caught up in a robbery they had carried out sometime before Cimarron. He had no idea why. The old man was useful for tending to the horses or making coffee but other than that he had very little sense or skill. He never asked for a share of the "profits", but Chance always saw to it that Ketch had clothes and food and kept an eye on him to make sure he stayed away from the whisky bottle. The old man seemed content to tag along, glad to have some friends to take care of him.
Chance himself had no love of corn liquor. He had watched his father drink himself to oblivion and saw what the result of that had done to his mother. His family had fallen apart when she passed away when he was about 15 years old. An uncle had taken him and his younger sister in, while an older brother, Raphe, had left home altogether. He had no idea where Raphe was now or even if he was still alive. It was while he lived with his uncle and aunt that he and Van had become close friends. He had heard somewhere that a cousin was the closest relative you could have, apart from a brother or sister. It had sure turned out to be that way. The boys, although two years apart in age, had become inseparable. They had worked side by side on his uncle's farm, together with three other cousins, but when Chance turned seventeen he decided it was time to leave. It seemed only natural that Van should go with him.
Life outside the family had not been as easy as the boys thought it would be. They managed to find employment on a few ranches, and one time even washed dishes in a small town restaurant, but the pay was never enough for them to live comfortably. One day, almost by accident, an opportunity arose. Van had been working for an old man who ran a feed store near Pueblo. The business did surprisingly well considering it was a long way from anywhere. The old man was taken sick and collapsed on the floor. Van, always the tougher of the two boys, saw a great opportunity. He emptied the contents of the business safe into his pocket and took off. No one really knew who he was or where to find him. When he met up with Chance later that evening they found they were the proud owners of over $200. It seemed to Chance, when he looked back, that that incident was the start of it all. From small robberies in small towns they advanced to larger businesses and then banks - after all, as Van had said, banks were where the money was. They had a good run of luck, but finally it came to an end in Cimarron, Kansas. They managed to rob the one bank in town but they had not figured on the aging Sheriff there. He had tracked them down and put them in jail to await trial. Van was ever the resourceful one and somehow managed to grab the lawman's gun. They had made their escape, but at the expense of the sheriff's life. Chance didn't like killing but had to agree that they had no other choice. Strangely, for all his tough ways, Van always looked to Chance for approval, and usually he found it.
They left Cimarron in a hurry, with no money and very little in the way of supplies. They had only just been lucky enough to be able to grab their horses before the townsfolk formed a posse and came after them. Van was good at surviving, and they managed to outwit the posse and two deputies who followed. He had shot and probably killed one of the deputies but never told Chance about that.
Now here they were, holed up in an old cabin, deep in Comanche territory with a dying marshal in the back room. For sure the Marshal's Service would be looking for them once it was reported that the lawman was missing. If it wasn't them, the army would come, or maybe the Indians would find them. He couldn't decide which fate would be worse.
Chance turned from the window to face the room. Both Van and Ketch were waiting for him to come up with a plan.
"Ketch," he turned to the old man, "Fix us some coffee and some stew or something from that meat Van killed this morning. We'll pack up from here and head out at first light tomorrow."
"What about him?" Van indicated the back room with a nod of his head.
"We'd better try to get some food and water down him if we want to keep him alive. You never know we might be able to use him if the law catches up with us."
"You should just let me finish him off now. He's only going to slow us down."
Killing had become Van's answer to most problems. Chance didn't like that. Somewhere in the back of his mind he knew that life was something to be preserved, not taken.
"There's been enough killing already," he said as he produced an old hand-drawn map from his pocket. He pulled up a chair and sat at the table to study it for a while. In the background he heard the slam of the stove door as Ketch added more wood on the fire. There was one large pan in the cabin and somehow the old man would manage to fix them something to eat. Finally he called Van over and pointed to the map spread out in front of him.
"If we head southwest out of here we can cross into Texas, I doubt anyone will recognize us there. If they do we can carry on to the border."
"It's an awful long way," Van pointed out unenthusiastically.
Chance was getting frustrated. He stood up and faced his cousin.
"Just what do you want to do, stay here, live with the Comanche? We don't have many choices." His voice was raised. Ketch looked up from his cooking. He liked the man called Chance. He felt safe with him, but somehow he did not trust Van. He hoped there wasn't going to be a fight.
"OK, OK," Van gave in, "you're the one with the brains. I'll go along with it, but there's no way we can drag him along." Once more he inclined his head towards the back room.
"We'll see how he does. We can always leave him in some town along the way if necessary. If we leave him here alone he's a dead man, and I don't want another killing on our hands."
TBC