I was sent out to gather firewood and I took the lamp, or rather the bull’s-eye lantern, for that was what it was, and kicked about in the snow and turned up some sticks and fallen saplings. I had no ax or hatchet and I dragged the pieces in whole, making several trips.
Rooster made another pot of coffee. He put me to slicing up the salt meat and corn dodgers, now frozen hard, and he directed Quincy to pick the feathers from the turkey and cut it up for frying. LaBoeuf wanted to roast the bird over the open fire but Rooster said it was not fat enough for that and would come out tough and dry.
I sat on a bench on one side of the table and the thieves sat on the other side, their manacled hands resting between them up on the table. The thieves had made pallets on the dirt floor by the fireplace and now Rooster and LaBoeuf sat on these blankets with their rifles in their laps, taking their ease. There were holes in the walls where the sod had fallen away and the wind came whistling through these places, making the lantern flicker a little, but the room was small and the fire gave off more than enough heat. Take it all around, we were rather cozily fixed.
I poured a can of scalding water over the stiff turkey but it was not enough to loosen all the feathers. Quincy picked them with his free hand and held the bird steady with the other. He grumbled over the awkwardness of the task. When the picking was done he cut the bird up into frying pieces with his big bowie knife and he showed his spite by doing a poor job of it. He made rough and careless chops instead of clean cuts.
Moon drank whiskey and whimpered from the pain in his leg. I felt sorry for him. Once he caught me stealing glances at him and he said, “What are you looking at?” It was a foolish question and I made no reply. He said, “Who are you? What are you doing here? What is this girl doing here?”
I said, “I am Mattie Ross of near Dardanelle, Arkansas. Now I will ask you a question. What made you become a stock thief?”
He said again, “What is this girl doing here?”
Rooster said, “She is with me.”
“She is with both of us,” said LaBoeuf.
Moon said, “It don’t look right to me. I don’t understand it.”
I said, “The man Chaney, the man with the marked face, killed my father. He was a whiskey drinker like you. It led to killing in the end. If you will answer the marshal’s questions he will help you. I have a good lawyer at home and he will help you too.”
“I am puzzled by this.”
Quincy said, “Don’t get to jawing with these people, Moon.”
I said, “I don’t like the way you look.”
Quincy stopped his work. He said, “Are you talking to me, runt?”
I said, “Yes, and I will say it again. I don’t like the way you look and I don’t like the way you are cutting up that turkey. I hope you go to jail. My lawyer will not help you.”
Quincy grinned and made a gesture with the knife as though to cut me. He said, “You are a fine one to talk about looks. You look like somebody has worked you over with the ugly stick.”
I said, “Rooster, this Quincy is making a mess out of the turkey. He has got the bones all splintered up with the marrow showing.”
Rooster said, “Do the job right, Quincy. I will have you eating feathers.”
“I don’t know nothing about this kind of work,” said Quincy.
“A man that can skin a beef at night as fast as you can ought to be able to butcher a turkey,” said Rooster.
Moon said, “I got to have me a doctor.”
Quincy said, “Let up on that drinking. It is making you silly.”
LaBoeuf said, “If we don’t separate those two we are not going to get anything. The one has got a hold on the other.”
Rooster said, “Moon is coming around. A young fellow like him don’t want to lose his leg. He is too young to be getting about on a willow peg. He loves dancing and sport.”
“You are trying to get at me,” said Moon.
“I am getting at you with the truth,” said Rooster.
In a few minutes Moon leaned over to whisper a confidence into Quincy’s ear. “None of that,” said Rooster, raising his rifle. “If you have anything on your mind we will all hear it.”
Moon said, “We seen Ned and Haze just two days ago.”
“Don’t act the fool!” said Quincy. “If you blow I will kill you.”
But Moon went on. “I am played out,” said he. “I must have a doctor. I will tell what I know.”
With that, Quincy brought the bowie knife down on Moon’s cuffed hand and chopped off four fingers which flew up before my eyes like chips from a log. Moon screamed and a rifle ball shattered the lantern in front of me and struck Quincy in the neck, causing hot blood to spurt on my face. My thought was: I am better out of this. I tumbled backward from the bench and sought a place of safety on the dirt floor.
Rooster and LaBoeuf sprang to where I lay and when they ascertained that I was not hurt they went to the fallen thieves. Quincy was insensible and dead or dying and Moon was bleeding terribly from his hand and from a mortal puncture in the breast that Quincy gave him before they fell.
“Oh Lord, I am dying!” said he.
Rooster struck a match for light and told me to fetch a pine knot from the fireplace. I found a good long piece and lit it and brought it back, a smoky torch to illuminate a dreadful scene. Rooster removed the handcuff from the poor young man’s wrist.
“Do something! Help me!” were his cries.
“I can do nothing for you, son,” said Rooster. “Your pard has killed you and I have done for him.”
“Don’t leave me laying here. Don’t let the wolves make an end of me.”
“I will see you are buried right, though the ground is hard,” said Rooster. “You must tell me about Ned. Where did you see him?”
“We seen him two days ago at McAlester’s, him and Haze. They are coming here tonight to get remounts and supper. They are robbing the Katy Flyer at Wagoner’s Switch if the snow don’t stop them.”
“There is four of them?”
“They wanted four horses, that is all I know. Ned was Quincy’s friend, not mine. I would not blow on a friend. I was afraid there would be shooting and I would not have a chance bound up like I was. I am bold in a fight.”
Rooster said, “Did you see a man with a black mark on his face?”
“I didn’t see nobody but Ned and Haze. When it comes to a fight I am right there where it is warmest but if I have time to think on it I am not true. Quincy hated all the laws but he was true to his friends.”
“What time did they say they would be here?”
“I looked for them before now. My brother is George Garrett. He is a Methodist circuit rider in south Texas. I want you to sell my traps, Rooster, and send the money to him in care of the district superintendent in Austin. The dun horse is mine, I paid for him. We got them others last night at Mr. Burlingame’s.”
I said, “Do you want us to tell your brother what happened to you?”
He said, “It don’t matter about that. He knows I am on the scout. I will meet him later walking the streets of Glory.”
Rooster said, “Don’t be looking for Quincy.”
“Quincy was always square with me,” said Moon. “He never played me false until he killed me. Let me have a drink of cold water.”
LaBoeuf brought him some water in a cup. Moon reached for it with the bloody stump and then took it with the other hand. He said, “It feels like I still have fingers there but I don’t.” He drank deep and it caused him pain. He talked a little more but in a rambling manner and to no sensible purpose. He did not respond to questions. Here is what was in his eyes: confusion. Soon it was all up with him and he joined his friend in death. He looked about thirty pounds lighter.