“I like those things they wear around their heads,” Lloyd remarked.
“You stay clear a-dem,” Rapture cautioned, noting the number of Negroes and Indians shouldered up beside the wild-eyed white people. In her mind, the last thing they needed, other than for Hephaestus to go off on a drinking binge, was to fall in with a rebel congregation of colored misfits and crazy folk. What they needed now was to lie low-to find a place to stay and plan their supply-gathering and transportation needs for the journey across the wilds of Kansas, a lawless outland of harsh weather, savage animals, desperate people, and mysterious unknowns.
Lloyd took the opposite view. He saw the presence of blacks and Indians in the ranks of the head-wrapped and plain-dressed whites as a good sign. After all, were not they, the Sitturds, refugees from Zanesville, just as much a mixed bag? Having shared those secret moments with Hattie, he felt different about his breeding now, and he was becoming aware that there are kinships and affinities within us all that we may never know or understand, but which attempt to reveal themselves in the people we gravitate toward and the paths our lives take. Rapture, however, stood firm on the matter and focused the family’s attention on getting fed and finding someplace to stay.
For refreshment they settled on thin flour tortillas, which they bought from a stumpy old man who worked from a stone fire and a foldup table among the Spaniards. To everyone’s satisfaction, Rapture handled the whole transaction without saying a word, and Hephaestus wondered if her mind talk was working again. Accommodation did not look as if it would be so easy to find. All that passed for the local hotels and rooming houses were crammed with human body heat. German families clung to their wagons, Irish to their carts. Blacks pitched makeshift tents, Indians threw up hide-framed shelters. Some stray men just overturned crates. The excuse for the town hoosegow was full and foul, as were the grim attempts at houses of worship. Everywhere one looked, there was more canvas than lumber and more people and animals than either.
While sawmills up and down the river had been busy, the rumor mills had been frantic. In addition to tales of the latest cholera scare, there were stories going around of far stranger outbreaks. Some Kansas Indians up from the South had appeared with bizarre deformities they insisted were due to bad medicine in the water. A small hamlet south of Kansas City had been struck overnight with what appeared to be some kind of religious mania. The Sitturds listened to an earnest mail rider recount scenes of communitywide speaking in tongues and nervous spasms. Children whispered about ghostly forms that were abroad in the night, and from the German that Lloyd understood he was able to pick up hushed mentions of a “monster” that had been sighted out on the prairie. He chose not to pass this intelligence on to his parents. There was enough to worry about as it was, and from the look of the sky and the smell in the air a weather change was coming on fast.
It was in the midst of these mounting anxieties that an incident occurred which punctuated the tension with special force. At first, it seemed to be a perfectly normal affair, given the surroundings. One of the Spaniards had a dog, a large, threatening thing with a mottled coat. Its ribs were visible, but it had a big, powerful head and shoulders, and what were obviously strong, bone-crushing jaws. The cur stood guard by one of the cooking ovens, drooling and sharp-eyed for any scraps it might be offered. Out of the crowd between the wagons there appeared a much smaller black dog, short-legged and ragged of coat.
The scent of the food wafted. The two dogs’ eyes locked. No one spoke up to claim ownership of the smaller mutt. The Spaniard’s dog gave a low warning growl. Then the two dogs were at each other’s throats. All the people in the vicinity stepped back, except a man who said that he was Australian. He stepped forward and proposed taking bets. Several of the men watching were about to take him up on this idea when the dust around the dogfight swirled up in a furious blast and a yelping rose out of the haze.
Everyone assumed the Spaniard’s dog had drawn blood, but then the beasts went silent. The dust settled, and to everyone’s surprise and horror the bigger dog had gone limp and hung from the teeth of the little one. Several of the men were about to express their regret at not having a wager down, when to their further amazement and disgust the small black dog began to eat the other. There was nothing rabid about it-the stunted canine acted with methodical, almost serene ferocity. The mouths of the onlookers, most of whom had seen and even bet on many dogfights in their time, dropped open.
The Spaniard leveled a hunting rifle at the mass of bloody fur and shining fangs. The victorious critter stared back at him with composed and utter disregard. Lloyd, along with several others, was in a position to see the expression in the creature’s eyes and he felt cold inside as a result. The Spaniard shot the dog in the head. He then took the rifle and walloped the mongrel’s rib cage and smashed its skull. When his temper had been vented, he wiped the rifle butt on the fur of what remained of his dead animal, then picked it up by its hind legs and took it off to bury it. The carcass of the murderous black thing was left in the dust for the flies. No one said a word, and it was a long minute before the crowd that had formed began to disperse. In the distance, down the dock road, Lloyd heard the whistle of the Defiance, on its way upstream, laden with new passengers and cargo, and a fresh stockpile of fears and dreams about the future. His heart ached for Hattie. He had never known such a sensation of longing, and it almost swamped him with its force and poignancy.
While all this had been happening, a huge white cumulous blob of shaving lather had transformed into a darkening thunderhead just beyond the town. There was that heady, sweet, dangerous smell of heavy rain in the air, and within the half hour the sky opened up and bucketloads began falling. What a scrambling mess of jostling, lunging, scurrying labor followed. Cooking fires were extinguished, kids were swept into or under wagons, people hopped and hobbled for awnings and doorways, horses and mules bucked and snorted, poultry squawked and darted. All the hammering ceased and workmen hustled down ladders. The deluge struck with genesis force, shimmering over the roofs and canvases like a collapsed wall. Umbrellas and tents strained and tore. Wagons lurched. Oxen lumbered. Indians, Negroes, settlers, and vagabonds were all caught in the same storm, lashing down on dry timber and dust, livestock and hardware.
The downpour did not last long, but it turned the town into a slippery, squishy, tinkling bog of wagon wheel-sucking mud and overflowing gutters. Anyone who had managed to reach one of the protected plank boardwalks or covered porches braced himself there, ready to defend his refuge. The Sitturd clan had headed for the open door of one of the stables, but even so had got soaked. Like their place of residence back in St. Louis, the building was alive with mice. Water dripped down through holes in the shingled roof. The smell of damp hay, leather, and dung greeted them. Worse still, the shadows within showed signs that several other families had already had the same idea, and the stableman, a fellow with a barrel body and arms as thick as the rafters, did not look pleased.