“I’m sorry for what they did. I couldn’t stop them.
And if they come in and ask, you tell them I did what
they wanted me to do or else they might kill you and
me, too. You understand that, lady?”
He looked at her to see if she understood, but she
simply stared at him. He waited a few minutes longer
then went out where the others were sitting around
the table.
Zeb said, “That sure didn’t take no time, boy. You
sure are quick on the trigger.” And he thought Zack
might laugh or something, but he didn’t say a thing.
They left her tied up to the bed like and began rum-
maging through her things, the cupboards and an old
trunk where they found some men’s clothes and
changed out of their still-wet shirts into the dry ones
they found. The shirts were all too big for them.
“She must have a husband,” Zack said trying on a
dry shirt.
“Big son of a bitch,” Zeb said, “by the looks of it.”
Zane kept thinking of her lying in there and said fi-
nally, “I ought to go and put a blanket over her, it’s
terrible cold and wet.”
“Go ahead, little sister,” Zeb said sarcastically.
He went in there and she had her eyes on him like
a wild creature trapped in a corner and he put his fin-
ger to his lips and said softly, “Don’t fear. I just aim
to put a blanket over you, is all.” And he took up one
of the blankets that had fallen or been tossed on the
floor and laid it over her and she never said anything
except he could hear little wet sounds coming from
the back of her throat and from her nose that had still
some blood leaking from it.
He tried not to look at her nakedness when he put
the blanket over her.
“I’m sorry this all happened,” he said.
He started to leave but then he realized she was
trying to say something. He was worried Zeb would
come in and finish her. He shook his head and put his
finger to his lips again warning her to be quiet. But
she was trying to say something and so he came closer
to the bed again and leaned down, his ear near her
mouth and said, “What is it?”
And she said, in a wet raw whisper: “Kill me.”
He pulled back from her as though she’d bit him.
“Please,” he said. “Please be quiet.”
She mouthed the words again and her eyes went
soft this time and he could see tears leaking from
them down the sides of her face and she said it once
more, her voice a rasp, and he turned and went out of
the room where his siblings now sat around the table
eating beans out of cans they’d opened.
“You in there taking another turn, wasn’t you?”
Zeb said. He had a rough growth of dark beard and
his teeth were crooked in front and yellow as hard
corn and he looked like he had a rodent’s mouth
when he talked.
“I just put a blanket on her, is all,” he said and sat
down at the table and took a spoon and started eating
beans from a can, too.
“I’m thinking we ought to finish her,” Zeb said.
“Thing like this could get us hanged.”
“We shouldn’t have done it all,” Zane said.
Their eyes met, held.
“Who died and left you in charge of things is what
I want to know?”
“Nobody.”
“Then keep your damn mouth shut.”
They ate the rest of the beans and some salt pork
they found, then they took a half jar of clover honey
they found and leaked it onto slices of hardtack and
ate that, too, Zeb taking his time. The others sat ner-
vously awaiting his orders.
“Well, that’s it, then,” he said, finally standing
from the table.
“What’s it?” Zack said.
“Go on in there and do her,” Zeb said.
Zack held up his hands.
“You ain’t got the stomach for it, do you?”
“No sir, I ain’t.”
“Well, we know this one here ain’t, either,” Zeb
said pointing at Zane. “I might as well get you girls
some dresses and poke bonnets to wear.”
Neither of the younger brothers spoke.
“I guess the old man’s juice got weak after he had
me,” he said. “I guess what he put into the old
woman later was nothing but weak juice and out
come you two.”
He turned toward the bedroom door.
Zane said, “Don’t do it, Zeb. Don’t go in there.”
And when Zeb turned around to look at him, Zane
had that Smith & Wesson .44 single action with the
hardwood grips pointed at him. He held it steady, too.
Zane hadn’t planned on pulling his piece on his
brother. He hadn’t even thought about it. It was just
there in his hand next thing he knew. And he knew
something more: that if he had to, he’d pull the trigger
because of the way he was feeling about the woman,
what he’d helped do to her. He’d just as soon beat a
puppy to death with a stick as to have to watch any-
