Matthew Corbett 03 - Mister Slaughter

Slowly, slowly, the spider ascended. Palm pressing here, palm pressing there, right foot gripping a small outcrop of stone while the left foot sought a place to apply pressure, and all the time the tension of muscles could not be relaxed, for it was tension that gave the spider its balance. Upward and upward, carrying the rope that itself was pulled at by the water below, and then a few seconds to rest, but always keeping the muscles of splayed arms and legs taut. Upward once more, palms and feet pressing, moving, finding new purchase where the edge of a stone might be only a half-inch wide yet felt under his flesh like the edge of an axe.

Matthew lost his grip and fell again.

He scraped down three feet before he could right himself. This time he could not suppress a cry of anguish, and he squeezed his eyes shut until the wave of pain had crashed over him. In the echo of his own mortality he dared to look down. Greathouse was still hanging onto the shovel, about ten feet below him. He had half the distance yet to go.

As he continued upward, his arms and legs starting to tremble beyond his control, he thought very clearly of Berry Grigsby. Of when he'd fallen in Chapel's vineyard, with the hawks and the killers coming after them, how Berry-herself disheveled, terrified and bloodied-had shouted Get up! and paused in her own flight to help him to his feet, if only by nearly kicking him upright. He could use her kick, about now.

He intended to see her again. He desired it greatly. In fact, he intended to invite her to a dance at the first opportunity, if he lived through this. He'd never been much of a dancer, but damned if he wouldn't dance the floor to woodshavings. If he lived through this.

His right palm lost its grip and he scraped down another few feet before he checked the drop. What was pain, after all? A little thing to hold behind the teeth, and shed a tear or two over. Nothing more than that.

You just don't accept it yet.

He shut his mind to that voice, which threatened to weaken and destroy him. Slaughter might be physically gone, yet enough of him remained to finish the task of murder.

The spider stretched out arms and legs and continued up, not pretty, not graceful, but determined to survive.

Matthew lifted his head and saw, as if through a fog, the top of the well about two feet above. He had to be careful here, very careful, for this was where disaster lurked. He commanded himself not to reach for the top prematurely, or let his knees go slack. It was the hardest, most cruel distance he had ever travelled in his life. Then, with agonizing effort, his heart pounding and his strained muscles jumping and quivering, he was up. His fingers grasped the edge and he pulled himself over and let out a half-cry of pain, half-shout of victory as he fell to the ground.

But there was no time to rest. He staggered up, his stockings in tatters and his feet bloody, and peered into the well. 'Hudson!' he shouted. 'I've made it!' The man's face was downcast, though he was still clinging to the shovel. Were his mouth and nose underwater? 'Hudson! Do you hear?' Matthew got the rope off himself and hauled up the wooden rod, which had been hanging several feet below him. He started feverishly coiling the rope around one of the beams that supported the peaked roof, and that was when he heard a chuckling noise at his back.

Whirling around, the breath freezing in his lungs for fear that Slaughter was about to swoop upon him and complete the day's work, Matthew saw three Indians sitting cross-legged on the ground less than ten yards away.

They were not chuckling, but talking. At least, Matthew surmised it was their language. One had leaned toward another and was speaking and nodding, and now that he saw Matthew looking at him he put his hand up over his mouth as if to guard his words. The one who'd been spoken to shrugged and shook items from a bead- decorated pouch onto the ground. They looked to be mollusk shells, from the river. The Indian with the chuckling tongue now made a noise that was definitely a laugh, and scooped up the shells to put into his own similarly- adorned pouch. The third Indian, frowning fitfully, also poured some shells on the ground, which the happy deerstalker seemed delighted to claim as his own.

It appeared, Matthew thought, that a wager had just been won.

They were all barechested, but wearing deerskin loincloths, leggings and moccasins. The Indian sitting in the center, the winner of the shell game, looked to be much older than the two on either side, who might have been near Matthew's age. The elder man was tattooed with blue wave-like designs on his face, chest and arms and wore a metal ring in his nose, whereas the others-his sons, perhaps?-were not so heavily nor intricately adorned. The two younger men were shaved bald but for a scalplock that hung down behind the head, and on the scalplocks were fixed with leather cords a burst of three or four turkey feathers dyed in different hues of red, blue and green. The elder warrior wore a feathered cap of sorts, which had a number of turkey feathers splayed out on either side with a central larger eagle feather standing up straight as if to signify order out of chaos. On the ground beside them lay their bows and arrow quivers. The Indians were lean and sinewy, not an ounce of English fat upon them. They regarded Matthew with their long-nosed, narrow faces like aristocrats of the forest wondering what the cat had just dragged in.

'Help me!' Matthew said, and motioned toward the well. 'My friend's been hurt!' Of course that got no response. Matthew tried French, as he knew from experience that many Indians had learned the language-or a pidgin form of it, passed from generation to generation-from Jesuit and Sulpician missionaries. 'Aidez-moi! Mon ami est blesse!'

Still there was no reaction.

'Mon ami est blesse!' Matthew repeated, with greater emphasis on the French word for injured. He added, as a measure of urgency, ' S'il vous plait!' But it was clear the Indians did not know that language, as they continued to sit and regard him as if Matthew were speaking to stone statues. Matthew couldn't wait; whatever they intended to do, that was their own business. He set about finishing the job of tying the rope to the beam, and then he peered over and shouted, 'Hudson! I'm coming back down!' He grasped hold of the rope with his bloody palms, and just as he was about to swing over the edge a pair of hands that felt like iron covered with flesh caught his shoulders and moved him aside as if he had the weight of a griddlecake.

The three Indians looked down upon Greathouse, who had neither moved nor responded to Matthew's shout. Before Matthew could speak again, the elder man said something to the others in a more serious tone of voice-a phrase that sounded to Matthew's uneducated ear like huh huhcha pak-and without hesitation one of the young men grasped the rope and descended into the well so fast he was nearly a blur. He got down into the water beside Greathouse and smacked him on the back of the head with an open hand, and when Greathouse stirred and gave out a muffled half-groan, half-curse, the young Indian called up with what was certainly a word but was heard by Matthew as an exuberant whoop.

Another command spoken by the elder, this one a stacatto rat-a-tat not unlike the sound of a snare drum, and the young man in the well grasped Greathouse around the chest with one arm while holding onto the rope with the other and, amazingly, began to pull him up. If Matthew hadn't been witness to such physical strength, he never would have believed it. To act as safeguard, the second young man swung over on the rope, and as the overhead beam creaked and cracked he clambered down to meet the two men coming up. Greathouse was not entirely dead weight; he was feebly trying to use his hands and feet on the stones, but Matthew thought he was probably so dazed he imagined he was being flown to Heaven by an unlikely pair of angels.

They got Greathouse out of the well with an ease that made Matthew consider himself to be of a fiber so weak he could barely stand against the force of gravity, which in truth was how he felt. The elder Indian spoke again-heh ke shakka tey, it sounded to Matthew-accompanied by a gripping motion of his right hand and at once one of the sinewy braves heaved Greathouse up and put him across his right shoulder like a side of mutton. Hi, hi! the elder said, and pulled Greathouse's boots off. He emptied out the water and tossed them to the ground at Matthew's feet. Then, with a short sharp command from the elder that sounded like a spat-out tut! the young men began running in the opposite direction from which Matthew had entered the fort. The one carrying Greathouse seemed only a little burdened by the heavy weight, and in a few seconds the Indians had vanished amid the ruins.

The elder clapped his hands to get Matthew's attention, and pointed at the boots. Matthew understood; if he was going to travel, he had to have something on his feet. As he pulled the boots on and found them on the large size but thankfully useable, he noted that his tricorn was gone, and so were the safebox and pistol.

The Indian had scooped up the three bows and quivers and put them around his shoulders. No sooner had Matthew gotten the second boot on did the Indian turn and began running in the direction the others had gone.