E
IGHT
Gamble left the tent shortly after ten o'clock with forty-eight dollars in paper and coin tucked into the pocket of his vest. He had won steadily, beginning with the clerk in the mail-order suit, and continuing with a pair of bachelor farmers, the city prosecutor from Caldwell, some hired hands on their way back to Kingfisher, and a widower who played and lost a couple of five-dollar hands while waiting for Penny Dreadful's show to start.
It was snowing again, but there was no wind, so the big flakes drifted down from the black sky as if somebody were sprinkling powdered sugar on a cake. It didn't make the Porch look any prettier, he thought.
If it hadn't been the middle of the night in winter, he would have walked back to Caldwell, redeemed his fiddle from the pawnshop, even if he had to roust the owner from home. Then he would buy a ticket on the next southbound Santa Fe at the depot. But he was tired, the path to town was covered in a fresh blanket of snow, and his joints ached. He didn't relish the thought of sleeping outside the depot, if it was locked. It was New Year's Day, and Gamble was uncertain of what kind of schedule the station master in the sleepy cow town of Caldwell would keep on a holiday.
He glanced over to the lodge that housed the opium den. It was glowing warmly.
“Damn, I hate winter,” he muttered. “Almost as much as winter hates me.”
He started trudging for the lodge. He would give Burns a dollar or two to sleep there again, have a bite or two of whatever Little Door Woman might be cooking, and set off early in the morning. The Porch gave him an uneasy feeling, and the sooner he left, the better.
Gamble ducked into the lodge. Opium lanterns glowed in the dark corners.
“Happy New Year,” Burns called from his chair near the fire. “It's 1898. Seems a strange number, doesn't it? You know, we might not have that many years leftâsome say that 1900 is going to be the end of the world.”
“Predictions are risky. Ask the Millerites.”
“Come, sit by the fire,” Burns said. “I understand you've been speculating on pasteboard at Buell's. Any luck?”
“Enough,” Gamble said, lowering himself into the chair. Little Door Woman brought him an enamel cup of coffee. She still wore the Chinese costume. Gamble murmured his thanks, and she smiled at him.
“You left before Penny Dreadful's show.”
“That's right.”
“A moralist,” Burns said, then laughed. “You would change your mind if you saw what she can do with a billiard ball.”
“I will sleep here for the night, if it's square with you,” Gamble said. “Just let me know what I owe in the morning, counting breakfast.”
“Didn't think you were here for the dope,” Burns said. “Let us greet the new year together. Girl, bring us some whiskeyâmake it bourbon, not the awful stuff the lotus eaters drink.”
“All right,” Gamble said. “I'll take some in my coffee.”
Little Door Woman brought over a bottle of Old Crow and poured some in Gamble's coffee. Burns took the bottle from the girl, then held it up in a toast.
“To the twentieth century,” Burns said, touching the bottle to the rim of Gamble's cup. “Who would have thought we'd live to see it?”
“We haven't, not yet.”
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Gamble woke shortly after sunrise. He was still in the chair, but someone had placed a blanket over him in the night. Little Door Woman was already up, throwing some meat into the skillet. The coffee was boiling beside the fire. She had on the silk robe, but not the hat.
“Breakfast soon,” she said.
“Bacon?” Gamble asked, wary.
“No,” she said, allowing herself a smile. “Fresh ham. And eggs. He who is still asleep brought it back from town last night. Grandfather, wake up. It's time for you to refuse to eat.”
Gamble glanced over at the old man. He was still motionless beneath his robe.
“He used to be up long before dawn, every day,” the girl said. “But now because of the dope he sleeps later and later, lingering among the winter counts.”
Gamble rose, pulled on his boots, and stepped outside for a necessary trip to the other side of the horses. The sun was rising in a splash of copper and red, the sky was blue and nearly cloudless, and the prairie was a gently scooped white blanket. It would be a pleasant walk to town.
He patted the chestnut mare on his way back.
After seating himself in the wicker chair, Little Door Woman handed him a plate of ham and eggs. He placed it carefully on his lap, took up the fork, and began to eat.
“Thank you,” he said.
The girl placed a hand on Burns's shoulder and shook him.
“Wake up, smelly drunk,” she said. “Your breakfast is ready. You too, grandfather.”
Neither man stirred.
Gamble took twenty dollars in coins and held them out.
“What's that for?” the girl asked.
“Traveling money,” Gamble said.
“I cannot take it.”
“You can,” Gamble said. “Light out at the first chance you get. Go back to Fort Sill and live among your people. Grow up in peace.”
“But my grandfather needs me,” she said. “Put your money away.”
Gamble reluctantly returned the coins to his pocket.
“Grandfather!” the girl said. “Get up. Breakfast.”
The old man rolled over and brushed a tangle of gray hair from his face.
“Granddaughter, I had a dream,” he said, staring up at the blue sky beyond the smoke hole of the tipi. “White Buffalo Woman came to meâoh, how beautiful she was!âand she showed me all of the winter counts that you will paint before you die.”
“But grandfather, I cannot keep the winter count.”
“But you will!” he said. “White Buffalo Woman has decreed it, for in your lifetime you will see things beyond beliefâthe entire world will shake twice with war, the fire gourd will fall from the sky and burn everything it touches, an eagle will fly around the moon and back, thoughts will be sent around the earth, connecting the dreams of all people. And in the end, many years from now when you are an old woman, older than I am now, the Kiowa will be free.”
“Was Jesus in your dream?” the girl asked. “Did he bring the buffalo back?”
“No,” Laughing Bear said, puzzled. “He was not. But White Buffalo Woman said you must keep track of all of these things to come so that you can tell those of our people who sleep through them, and then are awakened.”
The old man sat up, sloughing the robe off.
“Grandfather,” she said, placing his breakfast before him. She picked up the robe and put it over his shoulders. “The dope even brings dreams to the whites.”
“No food,” the old man said. “It will be wasted. You eat it.”
“Grandfather ...”
“It is time for me to die. Thank you for being kind to your grandfather. Remember what I have told you about White Buffalo Woman and the winter counts to come.”
Then the old man closed his eyes. His chin fell to his chest and his breathing stopped.
“Grandfather?”
She touched his shoulder. The old man slumped to the floor.
“Grandfather!” the girl screamed, shaking the body.
“Goddamnit,” Burns said, sitting forward in the chair and blinking hard against the light. “What it is?”
“The old man died,” Gamble said.
“For sure or just threatening?”
“Oh, this time it's for sure.”
The girl threw herself over the body, shaking with tears.
“All right, then,” Burns said, yawning. “Little what's her name has now become my property. God knows I've waited long enough. But I promised her grandfather that as long as he was alive, she would not be whored out. That's changed.”
The blanket around one of the sleeping opium smokers rustled, and then was flung away. Penny Dreadful propped her head on her hand and asked what the hell was going on.
Gamble told her.
The woman blinked, absorbing the information. The she wiped the drool from her mouth and sat up, hugging her knees.
“You're not actually going to sell her to old Buell, are you?”
“What's it to you?” Burns asked. “Afraid of the competition, I reckon. She'll put you plum out of business, billiard balls or no.”
“What I do is one thing,” she said slowly. “My choice. Nobody has to understand it but me. But this little girl doesn't have any choice.”
“Nobody has a choice in this life,” Burns raged, standing. “Do you think I wanted to be the proprietor of a third-rate opium den on the fucking Kansas prairie? What child dreams of that? Christ, my brother-in-law is
governor
of this flat, godforsaken excuse for a state. But I did the best with the hand I was dealt. This little bitch will just have to do the same.”
The other opium addicts were awake now, and they began scurrying for the entrance. In a moment, they were gone.
“If I was you, honey,” Penny Dreadful told the girl, “I'd run.”
The girl made for the entrance, but Burns grabbed the hem of her silk robe and pulled her back. She turned around, clawing and kicking, while Burns bunched the silk in his hands. But then the fabric tore and the robe came away, and she was suddenly nakedâand free.
She began to run, but Burns lunged and grabbed an ankle with his right hand, and she fell. When he had dragged her back to him, he wrapped his left arm around her narrow shoulders and, with his right hand, took a straight razor out of his pocket. He flicked it open.
“Is this what you want?” he asked. “I'll slit your throat before letting you go, you little bitch.”
Penny Dreadful gave a cry and then covered her mouth.
“Her name is Little Door Woman,” Gamble said. He was standing and was holding the Manhattan easy in his left hand. “You'd best close that razor and let go of her.”
“Or what, moralist?” Burns asked. “You going to shoot me?”
“That's the size of it.”
“Ha!” Burns said. He put the razor against the girl's neck and began backing toward the entrance, dragging the girl behind him. Her feet were kicking out wildly, and as they passed the crates on which the whiskey sat, one of her pink heels struck the bottle of Old Crow a glancing blow. It teetered for a moment, then fell and shattered on the bottles beneath.
“Oh, that's coming out of your hide,” Burns said.
Gamble cocked the Manhattan and advanced, trying to get a clear shot that wouldn't endanger the writhing girl.
A puddle of whiskey had formed beneath the broken bottles, and as it grew it began sending rivulets downhill toward the fire in the stone circle.
Gamble cursed.
The whiskey ran between the stones. Suddenly, blue flame was zipping uphill toward the bottles of liquor.
“Get out of here,” Gamble shouted to Penny Dreadful.
“No,” she said.
The liquor ignited with a
whump
as Gamble followed Burns and the girl outside. The razor had drawn a smear of blood where it touched her neck.
“Let her go.”
The lodge was brilliant with the glow of the alcohol fire and flames were shooting from the smoke hole.
“After I trade her off,” Burns said, “I swear I'm going to come back and show youâ”
He didn't get the last of it out, because the girl had sunk her teeth into the hand that held the razor. The muscles in her jaws stood out as she bit down, and there was the sound of teeth grinding on bone. The razor fell from his hand into the snow, and Burns cried out.
With his other hand, he made a fist and struck the girl in the temple. She fell backward, a strip of his skin still between her teeth. Blood welled on the back of his hand and fell in splatters upon the ground.
“Run,” Gamble said.
Burns reached out and grabbed a handful of the girl's long black hair, jerking her back. Gamble took his shot, shattering the man's wrist apart with a .38-caliber slug.
Now free, the naked girl ran.
“What the hell is going on out here?” Buell asked, standing in the snow twenty yards away. He was wearing only his union underwear and a pair of unlaced boots. His stick man and other motley residents of the Porch were arrayed behind him.
Burns held up the hand which dangled from the ruined wrist.
“Goddamn you,” he said.
“I'm sure he will,” Gamble said.