Boswell's Luck Page 3

  “But you promised Ma … ”

  “Don’t you sass me, boy!” Plank shouted, backhanding Erastus hard across the forehead. “Boy eats my food, he puts in a day’s labor. Now get yerself ready. And keep yer ’pinions to yerself. Hear?”

  Erastus nodded sourly, and Plank cuffed him again.

  “Best you unnerstand, boy. Yer ma offered you to every man from here to Mexico, and nobody else spoke up. She’s off to her new life, and she’s shed herself o’ you. World starts and finishes with Otto Plank now, and if you don’t want worse’n my hand on you, you take it to heart.”

  “And yer promises to Ma?”

  “Oh,” he said, laughing. “She didn’t believe ’em anymore’n I did. You do as I tell you, you’ll eat well enough. Maybe in time, I’ll even find you some pocket money.”

  “And if I don’t?”

  “Man’s got a right to shoot a boy who tries to steal a horse,” Plank said, grinning. “Won’t be a soul to say otherwise. No neighbors for miles, you know. Unnerstand how it be?”

  Erastus nodded bitterly. And that very moment he determined to show Otto Plank his heels the first chance that came along.

  Chapter Three

  The opportunity for escape didn’t come. What did were hours and hours of back-breaking work that left Erastus haggard and blistered, little more than a ragged, barefooted slave.

  To be truthful, Erastus wasn’t alone in his suffering. Otto Plank had four boys of his own. Peter, who was nearly seventeen, shared the barn loft with Erastus and fourteen-year-old Efrem. The younger boys, Randy and Veston, spread their blankets in an empty stall down below. The whole bunch were locked in the barn by night, and there wasn’t a one of them escaped their father’s harsh words or ready hand. At the slightest sign of rebellion, the old man would take a rawhide strip to the back of the offender.

  Once, when young Veston dropped a china plate at breakfast, Plank bent the child over a chair and whipped him raw.

  “That’s ’nough!” Erastus cried when he could stand Vesty’s howls no longer. “Cain’t you see he’s bleedin’?”

  “I can see I got to find another chair,” Plank growled.

  The other boys scurried for cover as Plank headed for Erastus. For a moment he only waited. The scowl on Plank’s face and the upraised strap struck terror. He hadn’t been raised to shy from trouble, but he knew the sting of that strap, and he couldn’t help retreating.

  “Where you goin’, Rat?” Plank called. “Rat! That’s what they call you, ain’t it? Gutter rat. Own ma wouldn’t even take him. Ingrate! Don’t you know more’n to talk back to your betters!”

  “Betters?” Erastus shouted. “You may be bigger, but you ain’t better. Why if Pa hadn’t … “

  Erastus never finished. Plank reached out and threw a chair out of the way. Then, like a pouncing wildcat, the big farmer was on the boy. The strap stung Erastus’s neck and shoulders. He flinched as it ripped open his shirt and tortured his ribs.

  “How’s it feel, Rat?” Plank howled as he laid on blow after blow. “I’ll teach you some respect.”

  “Pa, no!” Peter called. “You’ll lame him. Won’t be no good to us then!”

  “Please, Otto,” Mrs. Plank added as she fought to calm the shivering Veston. “You’ll kill him.”

  Plank turned toward his wife a moment, then tossed the strap aside. He lifted Erastus by the chin and gazed hard into the boy’s defiant eyes.

  “You’d like to kill me, wouldn’t you?” the old man asked. “Well, you’ll be a long time buried ’fore you have the chance.”

  The words had the ring of truth to them. While Peter and Efrem dragged him along to the barn, Erastus shuddered from pain and shock. And also from the notion that he would live out his days on that accursed farm.

  Seven days a week Erastus labored slopping hogs, feeding chickens, chopping kindling, and tending the fields. He rarely lifted his eyes past his feet, and he spoke only when the barn door was bolted and Otto Plank beyond hearing. Even then he rarely joined in the boastful jabbering of the Plank boys. No, he kept his vengeful dreaming to himself.

  The sole bright spots in an otherwise grim existence were the infrequent visits of Mitch Morris and his folks. The first two Sundays Otto Plank met their questions with claims that Erastus was ill. The third Sunday Mrs. Morris would not be put off by excuses.

  “It’s the Lord’s day,” she declared. “That boy should be at meeting.”

  “Lord ain’t payin’ him!” Plank barked.

  “You promised his mother he’d attend Sunday meeting,” she complained, “and I promised her I’d look in. If he’s still sick, best we take him into town for some doctoring.”

  “You take him, you keep him!” Plank replied.

  “I’ve a notion we should’ve offered in the first place,” Mr. Morris answered. “My boy’s been by your fields. Says you’ve worked Rastus skinny and beaten him to boot.”

  “He’s a headstrong boy and needs a firm rein.”

  “Then he’s done a lot o’ changin’!” Mitch yelled. “Where is he?”

  “Where I put him!” Plank yelled. “Now get yerselves off my farm. I’ll tend my own business. You tend yours!”

  Erastus watched it all through cracks in the barn wall, but the door remained bolted, and he was a prisoner yet. The Morrises left reluctantly. They didn’t let the matter lie.

  Those next few days as Erastus bent himself to Otto Plank’s will, he couldn’t ignore the sense of being watched from afar. Twice while chopping weeds in the cornfield he saw a shape dart through the trees a hundred yards away. Once he thought he heard his name called. Then one morning after emptying a bowl of foul mush that passed as breakfast, he noticed Mitch Morris sitting atop a horse a hundred yards away.

  “Rat! I come to take you to town!” Mitch called.

  Otto Plank heard the words and rushed outside cradling a twin-barreled shotgun.

  “Make a run for it and I’ll chop your legs from under you,” the big farmer warned. “And I’ll do the same for that yellow-haired jaybird up yonder.”

  Erastus took a glance at Mitch and studied their chances. If he were to make a lunge at Plank, make him fire the shotgun, there might be a prayer.

  “He’ll do it, too,” a sour-faced Peter said, stepping over beside Erastus. “You ain’t been the first hand we had here.”

  The fearful look in Peter’s eyes erased all notions of escape. A shotgun wouldn’t leave much of Erastus Hadley, and Mitch would be poorly rewarded for his efforts by like treatment.

  “Get clear o’ my place!” Plank then shouted, firing one barrel in Mitch’s direction. Mitch was well beyond range of the scatter-gun, but the blast unsettled his pony. Erastus gave his friend a disheartened wave, and Mitch rode off.

  By late afternoon Mitch was back. Not alone, either. Sheriff Lem Cath-cart led the boy along the fringe of the Plank cornfield. The lawman rested a pistol across one knee, and he seemed in no mood to tolerate any nonsense.

  “Mornin’, Sheriff,” Otto Plank shouted as he hurried over to where Erastus and Efrem were laboring to wedge a stump from the ground. “Visitors’s mighty rare. What can I do for you?”

  “If what I expect’s true, you can go straight to perdition!” the sheriff replied. “What’s this I hear from Mary Morris ’bout you holdin’ the Hadley boy against his will?”

  “Pure lies, Sheriff,” Plank said, eyeing Erastus nervously. “Boy’s mother ’dentured him to me. I feed him and give him a place to bed down. He’s like my own son.”

  “Judgin’ by what folks say, that’s a poor return for his labors,” the sheriff countered. “Young Mitch here says you fired off your shotgun at him yesterday when he stopped by to visit.”

  “Well, I fired into the air, Sheriff. You know how life is on a farm. There’s never time to get everything done. If I let my neighbors do it, they’d have the boys off swimmin’ and fishin’ every day. I can’t feed the seven o’ us without clearin’ this new section. Can’t do th
at alone.”

  “That the way it is, Rastus?” the sheriff asked, glancing past Plank to where Erastus leaned against the defiant stump. “You just out to fool away the day with Mitch?”

  Erastus started to reply right away, but he noticed Otto Plank plunge one hand in his right pocket. The old man favored carrying a pocket pistol, and the sheriff was certain to catch the first bullet. And afterward …

  “I did have work,” Erastus answered. The sheriff glanced back at Mitch, and Erastus felt his heart die. There would never be any escaping the old man now. Never! It seemed like his insides went all cold and hollow. He felt his fingers tremble.

  “Ask him ’bout the beatin’s,” Mitch yelled accusingly. “I seen it with my own eyes. Look ’neath his shirt, Sheriff. There’s welts left.”

  “Some boys need a hard hand now and again,” Plank muttered. “I take a boy in, I expect him to walk the straight and narrow.”

  “Lemme see your back, Rastus,” Cathcart called. “I got children. I expect I can judge what’s fit handlin’.”

  “That’s a father’s job,” Plank objected.

  “He ain’t his pa!” Mitch shouted.

  “Shut up, boy!” Plank warned as he moved over and let the hidden barrel of the pistol fall upon Mitch’s angry face.

  “Now that’s funny,” the sheriff said as he slid down from the saddle. He then reached out and grabbed Plank’s hand. The pistol discharged, blowing a hole in the farmer’s overalls and sending a ball into the adjacent live oaks. “None too friendly, Plank,” Cathcart added as he pried the pistol from the old man’s fingers.

  “You got no business here,” Plank grumbled as he stepped back from the steel-eyed lawman.

  “Rastus?” Cathcart called.

  Erastus stumbled over to the sheriff’s side. It was all he could do to steady his legs. The sheriff held his pistol on Plank with one hand and squeezed Erastus’s shoulder with the other.

  “Show him your back, Rat,” Mitch urged.

  Erastus stared hatefully at Plank, then wriggled out of the oversized shirt and stood bare to the waist. Cathcart frowned as he stared at the pale, emaciated skin stretched over Erastus’s ribs. Then, turning Erastus slowly, the sheriff scowled at the sight of the long, whitish scars and the fresher red ones left by the rawhide strap.

  “Veston, boy, come over here and show off yer own back!” Plank barked. The youngster hurried over and stripped off his shirt. The sheriff studied the criss-crossed scars and wiped his forehead.

  “Ain’t a thing under the sun I can do ’bout how you handle yer own boys, Plank!” Sheriff Cathcart declared. “Till you kill one o’ them anyhow. But I’ll not see you turn a whip to Rastus here.”

  “Suit yerself, Sheriff,” Plank said, grinning. “Take him along. I got no use for him anyhow. He ain’t worth a nickel. You know wasn’t another man in the county offered to take him in.”

  “Well, it may be that’ll change,” Cathcart replied. “As to you, I’ll put charges together so you answer a judge, Plank.”

  “What charges?”

  “Well, to see Rastus here, I’d say attempted murder on him, not to mention that bitty matter o’ aimin’ a pistol at me. Should have gone right on and shot you, I expect. Done the world a service. Just between the two o’ us, I might happen along out here in a week or so, maybe bring my boy so he can swim with your youngsters. If I see any fresh whip marks, I might have a bit o’ a huntin’ accident, maybe shoot you through the head. You understand me?”

  “You can’t talk that way to me, Sheriff! I got witnesses. Peter, Efrem, Veston, Randy, you boys heard.”

  “Did they?” Mitch asked. “I wonder if they’d remember.”

  Erastus turned to gaze at Vesty. The boy was buttoning his shirt, but the hateful gaze directed at his father was not to be missed.

  “Rastus, you climb up on that horse with Mitch there,” Cathcart instructed. “I’d judge it best you come along with me.”

  “Where?” Erastus asked.

  “Jail, to start with,” the sheriff explained.

  “Jail?” Erastus cried. “I done somethin’ wrong?”

  “Not anything I seen,” the lawman said, laughing at the boy’s wide eyes. “It’s just I got a tub there we can use to scrub you up. Cora’s mighty sour on company comin’ to dinner without washin’.”

  “Sir?”

  “I figure to put some o’ Cora’s chops in you, Rastus. You’re too old to have folks countin’ them ribs, son. And we’d be sore put to explain your britches slidin’ off in the middle o’ Front Street.”

  Mitch offered his hand, and Erastus gripped it. With one foot in the stirrup, Erastus managed to climb up onto the back of Mitch’s pony. In moments they were riding toward town—and away from the Plank place and what Erastus Hadley would always envision as hell come to earth.

  Chapter Four

  Ordinarily Erastus had little use for bathtubs. In point of fact there were whole stretches of the frontier that had never seen one of the contraptions. If a body were to get tired of the dust or sweat Texas could heap on him, he found himself a creek or a river and washed himself. Now, though, with more folks turning to town living, somebody or other was apt to purchase one from a mercantile catalogue.

  Erastus had heard of them. His father once told how at trail’s end a hundred cowboys would line up at the bathhouses in Abilene or Dodge City to have a tum at a tub. After soaking in perfumed soap, they’d deck themselves out in new boots and fresh duds so as to enjoy the favors of the town’s female population. Erastus and Mitch had quite a hoot listening to the tale. Later they swapped boasts of one day joining the drives and lavishing their attentions on the prettiest girls in Kansas.

  It was just talk, of course. Erastus had a fair amount of trouble exchanging words with the Delancy girls at Sunday meeting or even looking at pretty Heather Hanks without turning redder than a beet. So when he found himself turned over to Sheriff Cathcart’s twelve-year-old daughter Becky at the jailhouse, he was struck completely dumb.

  “Well?” she finally asked. “Pa says I’m to bring you soap and carry off them rags you call clothes. You can fetch the water your own self. Won’t be warm comin’ straight from the pump and all, but it’s too hot to light up the stove, and I never knew a boy to care much ’bout warm water anyway.”

  “Give a lot o’ boys baths, do you?” Mitch asked, grinning.

  “Well, I scrub my brother Busby regular. Or near to regular anyway.”

  “He’s just seven,” Erastus pointed out. “I’m twice as old.”

  “Twice the bother, too,” she observed. “We had bigger men’n you in jail here, you know. I get ’em washed.”

  “Well, you ain’t washin’ me,” Erastus insisted. “Mitch can bring you my clothes. We’ll fetch the water. You give me the soap now.”

  “Pa says I’m to see you wash,” the girl argued.

  “Well, you cain’t do that without seein’ a whole lot more, and ain’t that goin’ to happen, hear?” Erastus barked. “Now git.”

  “He means it,” Mitch added, opening the door and prying the soap from her hand. “Becky, ain’t any winnin’ arguments from Rat Hadley, either. He’s stubborn as a bottomland mule. I’ll bring you his rags in a bit.”

  “All right. I’ll be by later on, though,” she said, turning toward the door. “If I don’t smell somethin’ better’n ole cow dung, I’ll just keep the clothes and leave you to soak.”

  “I’ll bet she will, too,” Mitch said after closing the door on her. “She’s sure to ride herd on some poor fellow one o’ these days. Lord help the fool.”

  “Yeah?” Erastus asked. “I always thought she was kind o’ pretty.”

  “Fallin’ in love, eh?” Mitch asked, laughing as he turned his attentions to the pump. “Well, there’s fresh trouble for you. Sheriff finds out you’re messin’ with Becky, he’s sure to turn you back over to Plank.”

  “Just might,” Erastus said, forcing a smile onto his face in spite of the wave o
f pain such a thought brought. He then dragged the tub into the back room and began carrying the filled buckets of water there. In short order the tub was half full. Erastus then shed his clothes and hopped into the tub. The water was cold, but it felt refreshing in the hot, stuffy store-room. And as he washed away the accumulated grit, it seemed he was also ridding himself of pain and grief.

  It was hard to believe one boy could carry so much filth on his body. When Erastus abandoned the tub and wrapped himself in a linen sheet Mitch had set on a chair, the water remaining in the tub was little more than a muddy swill. As for Erastus, scrubbed pink he looked thinner and more wretched than ever.

  “Lord, didn’t they feed you at all, Rat?” Mitch exclaimed. “Ain’t anything to you.”

  “Give me a few o’ Miz Cathcart’s chops. I’ll fatten up.”

  “Be a time doin’ it. I tell you, Rat, I close to found me a rifle the day that ole man fired off his scatter-gun. I was of a mind to shoot him if the sheriff hadn’t come.”

  “Like as not you saved my life, Mitch. I won’t be forgettin’ that.”

  “Good. Ma says I’m sure to need friends, what with my habit o’ findin’ trouble.”

  “Yeah? I got the same talent.”

  They shared a laugh. Then Mitch handed over a wrinkled old shirt and a pair of patched trousers.

  “Not too good a fit, eh?” Mitch asked as Erastus draped the shirt over his bony shoulders. “Were mine till I started this last batch o’ growin’. I’ll ride out and see if maybe Tommy Newton might have some things he don’t altogether need. Be tomorrow, though.”

  “Cut me a length o’ rope for a belt, and they’ll do,” Erastus suggested. “Later on maybe you can find me some drawers, though. These britches itch some thin’ awful.”

  “Yeah, Ma uses a heavy dose o’ lye when she washes. I generally give my things a rinse off under the pump ’fore I put ’em on.”

  “I’ll do the same in the future.”

  They might have talked away the day had not Sheriff Cathcart popped through the door.