That was when he made the mistake of pulling his pistol out of his trousers. He probably only meant to back Buster away with it, but Old Man Gordeau, who wasn’t five feet away, didn’t wait to find that out and shot him in the chest with his deer rifle, just left of the sternum. When his heart stopped, Lawton Butler shrugged his shoulders and made a sound like a man about to throw up, then raised his pistol, shot Gordeau once in the stomach, and fell down dead.
The old man sat down hard with a groan and said “Jesus” through clenched teeth as his sons clutched at him and everyone else, even the doctor, stood fish-mouthed at what had just happened. Gordeau kept saying “Jesus” until he passed out and that was when the spell broke and Dr. McElroy came over to him, felt his neck and lifted his shirt.
“He’s not dead, but the way he’s bleeding, he’ll die.”
“Ain’t there no chance?” Lester said.
“Maybe in a hospital. Not out here.”
“I just changed my vote,” Lester said. “Let’s get out of here. Please.”
THERE WAS NO good way to carry Old Man Gordeau.
In the end, the Gordeau boys used the hand-axe Charley Wade had brought and cut down saplings to make the frame for a crude litter. Saul stripped the jacket from Arthur Noble and the pants from Lawton Butler with little hesitation (even when Lawton’s eyes opened and the dead man belched, causing Lester to jump back as if from a rattlesnake), and the brothers stretched these between the poles.
Charley Wade asked about the propriety of abandoning their friends, but nobody wanted to haul them, not even Charley, so they stayed. Handkerchiefs over their faces were the only funeral rites the two of them got; Dr. McElroy, covering Arthur, said “Poor Sadie” in lieu of a prayer.
Buster took Arthur’s gun, saw that it was empty, and tossed it into the trees. Lester, whose rifle was almost dry, took his daddy’s six bullets. Each man checked his remaining load. I looked in Lawton Butler’s pistol and found it empty. The bullet in Gordeau’s belly had been his last.
We looked where Charley had slung his gun as he fell, but it was too dark and the brush was too thick. The gun was gone.
For the first hour, Gordeau came in and out of consciousness as his boys carried him along, groaning when his litter bearers encountered a root or shifted his weight clumsily. Dr. McElroy’s improvised dressings had soaked through and there was nothing clean for which to swap them out. The old man only spoke once; he looked at Lester tight-lipped and said, “Boy,” but then seemed too tired to say the rest.
He died some time soon after that.
When it was clear that he was gone, the boys set the litter down, as they had already done several times to rest their arms, and Lester started to cry. Saul looked away from him.
“Quit that,” he said. “Daddy wouldn’t cry over you.”
“I guess not,” Lester said.
But then Saul cried, too, less for his father than for himself; for what had happened to him, what would likely happen to him yet.
Nobody suggested they leave Gordeau behind, though all of them wanted to. I could see in Charley Wade’s eyes that it was all he could do not to sprint for the river.
The boys picked Gordeau up and moved along.
I was the one who recognized the trail.
I spotted a fallen log with two gnarled branches reaching up like someone asking to be lifted, an image I had noted in our last excursion. We found the path back to the river just on the other side of that. This cheered us, and, even though it was getting near midnight and the river was an hour away, Buster thought it might be smart to rest.
“Sit a minute, and smoke if you got it. We still got a ways to go.”
I accepted a cigarette from the doctor.
Lester and Saul, who had worn themselves out carrying their father, sat against the same large tree and napped, each holding his rifle in his lap, their heads nearly touching. Buster asked Dr. McElroy to look at his pocket watch and tell him when it had been fifteen minutes. He and I kept our eyes on the still, cold woods around us. Charley Wade melted against the fallen log with the outstretched limbs. The doctor sat next to him and smoked.
Nobody saw it happen.
“Time,” the doctor said.
Buster roused each man separately, quietly.
A moment after Saul awakened, he started and stood up fast.
“What is it?” Lester said.
“My rifle. Lord, my rifle.”
Saul was holding a branch with rotten bark.
He had been sleeping with that on his lap.
His gun was gone.
ONLY CHARLEY WADE saw where the first shot came from.
He was halfway through the words “Look out!” when the BANG of Saul’s stolen rifle bounced in the woods. Chips of bark flew near Lester as he scrambled to his feet.
“Gimme that!” Saul said, reaching for Lester’s rifle, which he held out to his brother, but Saul’s fingers had just brushed the stock when the next shot from the woods rang out and Saul fell down, grabbing his jaw. Screaming womanishly. I had heard this noise before.
Got the one behind Jesus God I’m next
The rest of the party crouched and ducked and now opened up, firing madly in the direction the shot had come from.
The half-moon had come out, throwing pale light down through the trees.
I saw that we were obliged to shoot over the body of Old Man Gordeau, whose face was bare and drawn in the moonlight.
Another muzzle flash from the trees; it had relocated. Or there were two. We kept shooting. I reloaded the clip with the shells from my pocket, fired two at a silhouette, then got a stove-pipe jam. I cleared it, then stopped shooting. The doctor flinched as a bullet passed quite near his head. He was otherwise frozen, holding his empty pistol in front of his face for no good reason.
Lester emptied his rifle and said, “I’m out!”
“Me, too,” said the doctor.
Buster said, “Shut up!”
“I think they shot six!” Lester said. “If all they got’s the Enfield, they dry, too.”
“Could be they got my gun. They’s still three in that,” Charley said.
“Shut the hell up about how many bullets you got,” Buster yelled.
It was hard to be heard over Saul.
He was shrieking, hoarsely now.
I had two bullets left.
I resolved then and there not to use them unless I was within ten feet of one; to save them until I was certain I would die unless I shot. My resolution would be tested very soon. I looked around at the group. Lester had his shirt off, his white limbs bare to the cold; the doctor had dropped his empty gun and now held Lester’s shirt bunched and pressed against Saul’s jaw, muffling his cries somewhat. Lester was looking around to see if there was a dropped gun he could shoot, but he could see none, and nobody was firing now. We all panted, crouching behind trees, our breath pluming.
Lester saw something and fixed his gaze on it.
I looked where he was looking.
The red dress. The boy with no pants walked out almost nonchalantly into the moonlight. Buster stood to fire, but the boy saw him and crouched low, fast, just as Buster squeezed. The bullet whined off into the trees. The boy now bent down and grabbed Old Man Gordeau by the pants legs and began pulling him across the trail to the trees on the other side. Lester Gordeau broke from where his brother thrashed and groaned and ran to the trail, grabbing his father’s arms.
“Let him GO!” he shouted at it, but it pulled grimly, stronger than Lester, jerking at the dead man’s legs in a series of short, hard tugs like a dog pulling at a knotted sock. Lester was losing ground. He dug in and tried to pull harder. He knew it was staring at him but he would not look at its face.