"Now you all turn around," Galloway advised, "and ride slow out of town. I want all these good people to know you ain't bad boys - just sort of rambunctious when there's nobody about to discipline you a mite."
"Your guns," I said, "will be in the bank when it opens tomorrow!"
So James Black Fetchen rode out of town with all that rowdy gang of his, and we stood with our rifles and watched them go.
"Looks like we made us some enemies, Flagan," Galloway said.
"Sufficient to the day is the evil thereof," I commented, liking the mood, "but don't you mind. We've had enemies before this."
We collected the guns and deposited them in the bank, which was closing, and then we walked across the street and settled Pa's account.
Everybody was chuckling over what happened, but also they warned us of what we could expect. We didn't have cause to expect much, for the fact was we were going back to the buffalo prairies. Back home there was nothing but an empty cabin, no meat in the pot, no flour in the bin.
We had done well our first time west, and now we would go back and start over. Besides, there were a lot of Sackett kinfolk out there now.
We started off.
Only we didn't get far. We had just reached the far end of town when we sighted a camp at the edge of the woods, and an oldish man walked out to meet us. We'd talked with enough Irish lads whilst working on the railroad to recognize the brogue. "May I be havin' a word wi' you, boys?"
So we stopped, with Galloway glancing back up the street in case those Fetchen boys came back with guns.
"I'm Laban Costello," he said, "and I'm a horsetrader."
More than likely everybody in the mountains knew of the Irish horse-traders. There were eight families of them, good Irish people, known and respected throughout the South. They were drifting folk, called gypsies by some, and they moved across the land swapping horses and mules, and a canny lot they were. It was in my mind this would be one of them.
"I am in trouble," he said, "and my people are far away in Atlanta and New Orleans."
"We are bound for the buffalo lands, but we would leave no man without help. What can we do?"
"Come inside," he said, and we followed him back into the tent.
This was like no tent I had ever seen, with rugs on the ground and a curtained wall across one side to screen off a sleeping space. This was the tent of a man who moved often, but lived well wherever he stopped. Out behind it we had noticed a caravan wagon, painted and bright.
Making coffee at the fire was a girl, a pretty sixteen by the look of her. Well, maybe she was pretty. She had too many freckles, and a pert, sassy way about her that I didn't cotton to.
"This is my son's daughter," he said. "This is Judith."
"Howdy, ma'am," Galloway said.
Me, I merely looked at her and she wrinkled her nose at me. I turned away sharp, ired by any fool slip of a girl so impolite as to do such as that to a stranger.
"First, let me say that I saw what happened out there in the street, and you are the first who have faced up to Fetchen in a long while. He is a bad man, a dangerous man."
"We ain't likely to see him again," I said, "for we are bound out across the plains."
Personally, I wanted him to get to the point. It was my notion those Fetchens would borrow guns and come back, loaded for bear and Sacketts. This town was no place to start a shooting fight, and I saw no cause to fight when nothing was at stake.
"Have you ever been to Colorado?"
"Nigh to it. We have been in New Mexico."
"My son lives in Colorado. Judith is his daughter."
Time was a-wasting and we had a far piece to go. Besides, I was getting an uneasy feeling about where all this was leading.
"It came to me," Costello said, "that as you are going west, and you Sacketts have the name of honorable men, I might prevail upon you to escort my son's daughter to her father's home."
"No," I said.
"Now, don't be hasty. I agree that traveling with a young girl might seem difficult, but Judith has been west before, and she has never known any other life but the camp and the road."
"She's been west?"
"Her father is a mustanger, and she traveled with him."
"Hasn't she some folks who could take her west?" I asked. Last thing I wanted was to have a girl-child along, making trouble, always in the way, and wanting special treatment.
"At any other time there would be plenty, but now there is no time to waste. You see Black Fetchen had put his mind to her."
"Her?" I was kind of contemptuous. "Why, she ain't out of pigtails yet!"
She stuck out her tongue at me, but I paid her no mind. What worried me was that Galloway wasn't speaking up. He was just listening, and every once in a while he'd look at that snip of a girl.
"She will be sixteen next month, and many a girl is wed before the time. Black Fetchen has seen her and has told me he means to have her ... in fact, he had come tonight to take her, but you stopped him before he reached us."
"Sorry," I told him, "but we've got to travel fast, and we may have a shooting fight with those Fetchens before we get out of Tennessee. They don't shape up to be a forgiving lot."
"You have horses?"
"Well, no. We sold them back in Missouri to pay up what Pa owed hereabouts. We figured to join up with a freight outfit we once worked with, and get west to New Mexico. There's Sacketts out there where we could get some horses until time we could pay for them."
"Suppose I provide the horses? Or rather, suppose Judith does? She owns six head of mighty fine horses, and where she goes, they go."
"No," I said.
"You have seen Fetchen. Would you leave a young girl to him?"
He had me there. I wouldn't leave a yeller hound dog to that man. He was big, and fierce-looking for all he was so handsome, but he looked to me like a horse-and wife-beater, and I'd met up with a few.
"The townsfolk wouldn't stand for that," I said.
"They are afraid of him. As for that, he says he wishes to marry Judith. As far as the town goes, we are movers. We don't belong to the town."
It wasn't going to be easy for us, even without a girl to care for. We would have to hunt for what we ate, sleep out in the open, dodge Indians, and make our way through some of the worst possible country. If we tied on with a freight outfit we would be with rough men, in a rough life. Traveling like that, a girl would invite trouble, and it appeared we would have a-plenty without that.
"Sorry," I said.
"There is one other thing," Costello said. "I am prepared to give each of you a fine saddle horse and a hundred dollars each to defray expenses on the way west."
"We'll do it," Galloway said.
"Now, see here," I started to protest, but they were no longer listening. I have to admit that he'd knocked my arguments into a cocked hat by putting up horses and money. With horses, we could ride right on through, not having to tie up with anybody, and the money would pay for what we needed. Rustling grub for ourselves wouldn't amount to much. But I still didn't like it. I didn't figure to play nursemaid to any girl.
"The horses are saddled and ready. Judith will ride one of her own, and her gear will be on another. And there will be four pack horses if you want to use them as such."
"Look," I said. "That girl will be trouble enough, but you said those horses of hers were breeding stock. Aside from the geldings you'll be giving us, we'll have a stallion and five mares, and that's trouble in anybody's country."
"The stallion is a pet. Judith has almost hand-fed it since it was a colt."
"Ma'am," I turned on her. "That stallion will get itself killed out yonder. Stallions, wild stock, will come for miles to fight him, and some of them are holy terrors."