Several men burst out laughing, but Kelly was hot now, as was several others, for the men growed impatient.
“Kelly, let’s hang Pardee and get up the road,” one said.
“Let’s tar and feather him.”
“What you fooling ’round for, Kelly? Let’s go.”
Kelly waved them to silence, then blew out his cheeks, hemming and hawing. He didn’t know whether to shit or go blind. Being full of gulp sauce weren’t helping him, neither. He said, “Let’s vote on it. All in favor of hanging Pardee for being a nigger-loving Free State Yankee and an agent of the New England Emigrant Yellow Belly Society, raise your hand.”
Eight hands were raised.
“All in favor of not hanging?”
Eight more hands went up.
I counted sixteen men. It was a tie.
Kelly stood there swaying, drunk, in a quandary. He tottered over to Nigger Bob, who sat in the wagon driver’s seat, trembling. “Since Pardee here’s an abolitionist, we’ll let Nigger Bob decide. What’s your vote, Nigger Bob? Hang Pardee here or not?”
Pardee, setting in the back of the wagon, suddenly leaped up in a snit. “Hang me then!” he howled. “I’d rather hang than have a nigger vote on me!” he cried, then tried to leap out the wagon, but fell flat on his face, for his feet were tied.
The men howled even more. “You pukin’ abolitionist egghead,” Kelly said, laughing, as he helped Pardee up. “You should’a read them resolutions like I told you.”
“I can’t read!” Pardee said.
That stopped Kelly cold and he took his hands off Pardee like he was electrified. “What? You said you could!”
“I was lying.”
“What about that land title at Big Springs? You said it was ...”
“I don’t know what that was. You wanted it so damn bad!”
“You blockhead!”
Now it was Kelly’s turn to be on the spot while the other men laughed at him! “You should’a said something, ya damn dummy,” he growled. “Whose land is it then?”
“I don’t know,” Pardee sniffed. “But you been told. Now. You read these resolutions to me and I’ll sign ’em.” He thrust the paper out to Kelly.
Kelly hemmed and hawed. He coughed. He blew his nose. He flustered around. “I ain’t much on reading,” he muttered. He snatched the paper from Pardee and turned to the posse. “Who here reads?”
Weren’t a man among them spoke. Finally a feller in the back said, “I ain’t setting here watching you fiddle with your noodle a minute more, Kelly. Old Man Brown’s hiding out near here somewhere, and I aim to find him.”
With that he galloped off, and the men followed. Kelly rushed to follow them, staggering to his mount. When he swung his horse around, Pardee said, “At least gimme my gun back, ya knobhead.”
“I sold it in Palmyra, ya mule-face abolitionist. I oughta kick your teeth out for screwing up that land title,” Kelly said. He rode off with the rest.
Pardee and Nigger Bob watched him leave.
When he was out of sight, Nigger Bob moved from the driver’s seat to the back and untied Pardee’s ankles without a word.
“Ride me home,” Pardee fumed. He said it over his shoulder as he rubbed his ankles, setting in back of the wagon.
Nigger Bob hopped into the driver’s seat, but didn’t move. He sat atop the wagon and looked straight ahead. “I ain’t riding you no place,” he said.
That floored me. I had never heard a Negro talk to a white man like that before in my entire life.
Pardee blinked, stunned. “What you say?”
“You heard it. This here wagon belongs to Mr. Settles and I’m taking it home to him.”
“But you got to pass Palmyra! That’s right where I live.”
“I ain’t going nowhere with you, Mr. Pardee. You can go where you want, however you please. But this here wagon belongs to Marse Jack Settles. And he ain’t give me no permission to ride nobody in it. I done what Mr. Kelly said ’cause I had to. But I ain’t got to now.”
“Git down off that seat and come down here.”
Bob ignored him. He sat in the driver’s seat, staring off into the distance.
Pardee reached for his heater, but found his holster empty. He stood up and glared at Nigger Bob like he was fit to whup him, but that Negro was bigger than him and I reckon he thought better of it. Instead, he jumped down off the wagon, stomped down the road a piece, picked up a large stone, walked back to the wagon, and chinked out the wood cotter pin on one of the wagon wheels. Just banged it right out. That pin held the wheel on. Bob sat there as he chinked. Didn’t move.
When Pardee was done, he throwed the pin in the thickets. “If I got to walk home, you walking too, ya black bastard,” he said, and stomped up the road.
Bob watched him till he was out of sight, then climbed down from the wagon and looked at the wheel. I waited several long minutes before I finally come out the woods. “I can help you fix that if you take me up the road a piece,” I said.
He stared at me, startled. “What you doing out, little girl?” he said.
Well, that throwed me, for I forgot how I was done up. I quick tried to untie the bonnet. But it was tied tight. So I went at the dress, which was tied from behind.
“Good Lord, child,” Bob said. “You ain’t got to do that to get no ride from Nigger Bob.”
“It ain’t what it looks like,” I said. “In fact, if you’d be so kind as to help me take this thing off—”
“I’ll be heading out,” he said, backing away.
But I had my chance and I weren’t going to lose it. “Wait a minute. Help me. If you don’t mind, just untie —”
Good God, he jumped atop the wagon, hustled onto the driver’s seat, called up that horse to trotting, and was off, pin or no pin. He got about ten yards before that back wheel got to wobbling so bad—it just about come clean off—before he stopped. He jumped down, pulled a stick from the thickets, stuck it into the pin hole, and commenced to banging it into place. I ran up on him.
“I got business, child,” he said, chinking away at the wheel. He wouldn’t look up at me.
“I ain’t a girl.”
“Whatever you think you is, honey, I don’t think it’s proper that you unstring that dress from ’round yourself in front of ol’ Nigger Bob—a married man.” He paused a minute, glanced around, then added, “Less’n you want to, of course.”
“You got a lot of salt talking that way,” I said.
“You the one asking for favors.”
“I’m trying to get to Dutch’s Crossing.”
“For what?”
“I live there. I’m Gus Shackleford’s boy.”
“That’s a lie. Old Gus is dead. And he ain’t have no girl. Had a boy. Wasn’t worth shit neither, that child.”
“That’s a hell of a thing to say ’bout somebody you don’t know.”
“I don’t know you, child. You a sassy thing. How old are you?”
“It don’t matter. Take me back to Dutch’s. He’ll give you a little something for me.”
“I wouldn’t ride to Dutch’s for a smooth twenty dollars. They’ll kill a nigger in there.”
“He won’t bother you. It’s Old John Brown he’s after.”
At the mention of that name, Bob glanced around, taking stock up and down the trail, making sure nobody was rolling toward us. The trail was empty.
“
