Chapter 16
Chapter Sixteen
Caleb stopped dead, astonished by the suddenness of the strike. His instincts about impending danger seldom let him down, but this viper had taken advantage of him in his wounded state.
The snake was nearly the same color as the dusty, faded grass on the edges of the newer, greener clumps. The pattern of darker diamonds painted along its back and sides only added to the disguise.
Because Caleb was favoring that ankle, his foot was in midair when the rattler struck.
The bite felt like a hornet’s sting, but it wasn’t done yet.
In a flash, it had pulled its hooks out of the sock and was rearing back with a hiss.
Its body was as thick as Caleb’s arm, but looked even bigger when it drew back into a coil.
With its forked black tongue flicking, it let go with a rattle that they probably heard in Elkhorn.
The damn thing was ready for another go.
That creature was one sinuous corkscrew of death, but before it could hurl itself at him again, Caleb flung his boot hard at the snake’s head. The heel connected. The rattler, clearly having decided that it’d made its point, started running its undulating body though the grass away from him.
The only problem was that the snake was heading straight toward Pirate, who had backed up and was looking on with wild, flashing eyes.
Caleb wasn’t about to leave it to his horse to fight off this viper. Pirate probably could have handled the rattler on his own, but it made no sense to risk him being bitten, as well. One of them needed to be able to walk.
The Colt was in Caleb’s hand and spitting fire in an instant, and the serpent jumped into the air as two slugs tore into its body.
He scuffled over to the reptile, picked it up by the rattles, and flung the limp carcass as far as he could away from them. They say a snake can’t die until sundown. Caleb knew that was just an old myth, but he was taking no chances.
He sat on the ground, shoved the sock down past his ankle, and inspected the wound. The thickening bruise on his injured ankle was now matched by a rising welt on his calf. One small pinprick stood out on the whitening skin. Blood oozed from the hole.
“Well, at least you couldn’t get both of your damn hooks into me.”
Somehow, in all his time on the trail, he had never given much thought to being bitten.
He had seen a whole passel of rattlers over the years.
He didn’t like the critters much and stayed clear of them.
But he’d seen two men die from bites. They were both tough fellas.
One had been a young Ute warrior scouting for the army.
It had been incredibly painful for them, and it wasn’t pretty to watch.
They’d both been dead inside of an hour. Both had wished it was quicker.
And now, here he was, taken down by a rattler.
It all seemed so unreal to him. He’d been bitten, but everything around him was so peaceful. Only the lingering smell of gun smoke gave a hint that any violence had occurred at all. That and the hole in his leg.
Across the pond, a beaver slapped his tail on the water, drawing Caleb’s attention. Two of them were swimming down by the dam, and they didn’t seem to care much about working or about his plight. The boss beaver had disappeared.
Sheila would have had something to say about that beaver. Would have had more to say about the snakebite, though.
Caleb’s eye was drawn to the golden sun descending toward the mountain peaks and the various shades of green in the stretches of forest on either side of the valley.
Above him the sky was a wide-open field of pale blue, with just a few wisps of clouds that seemed to hang motionless up there.
Two hawks sailed across a ridge and began circling lazily.
He shook his head, trying to focus. This might be a pretty place to die, but he wasn’t ready to go yet. He had more living to do.
A couple of months ago, that thought might have been enough. Now another followed close behind it. He'd promised Sheila he would come back. And she'd trusted him enough to believe he would.
Caleb looked down at his leg and then dragged himself to the water’s edge.
As he scrubbed at the snake bite with water and sand, Pirate clopped over to him and nosed his shoulder.
“Stay right there, big fella.”
Grabbing hold of a stirrup, Caleb hauled himself up and pulled Doc’s medical supplies out of his saddlebag. His side was killing him, but he had other things to worry about right now.
He had to think of others who’d survived a rattlesnake bite. He knew some. One was a young soldier who’d suffered from some nasty swelling of his leg and had spent a few days with a headache, puking, and fighting his way through a fever. But he made it through.
The others hadn’t fared so well.
Leaning against Pirate’s shoulder, he went through the bag to see what might be useful.
For one foolish moment, he thought about the handkerchief folded in his vest pocket.
Bring it back clean.
The memory of her smile steadied him. No matter what happened here, that handkerchief was staying exactly where it was.
He intended to put it back into her hands himself.
He took out some rolled white bandage cloth and a bottle of something. Uncorking the bottle, he smelled it and decided it was something with vinegar in it.
Caleb eased himself back down. Once he was sitting again, he pulled out his hunting knife and cut a piece of bandage long enough to go around his leg twice, just below the knee.
Twisting the cloth into a kind rope, he tied it as tight as he could.
He needed to slow the snake venom from traveling up his leg into his body.
The soldier who’d survived had been treated by an old-timer from the Missouri hills. The fellow had his own ideas about snakebite medicine, and somehow the young man had lived through both the bite and the treatment.
Putting his knife sheath between his teeth as a bit, Caleb did what he believed had to be done. The pain was fierce enough to make his vision blur.
When it was over, he sat very still for a moment, fighting a wave of dizziness.
He bound the injury as best he could and used the medicine Doc had packed for him.
The medicine burned like fire. For a moment the world narrowed to pain and sheer stubbornness.
When he could breathe and see again, he wrapped a second bandage over the wound and tied it tight.
The rattler's attack had been swift and sudden. It came when a snake bite had been about the furthest thing from his mind. If this trouble didn’t kill him, then it had to be a reminder.
Not that he was capable of dying. He'd known that for years. A reminder that there were now people waiting for him to return.
Henry, Doc, Gabe. Paddy. Bear, if the dog could be counted as people.
And Sheila.
He’d been too arrogant and unclear in his thinking. He’d been figuring he could simply ride to Bonedale and call his father out. Shoot Elijah Starr down in some fairhanded gunfight.
If he even got to his father, the man would be as swift and deadly as this snake. He’d never been one for fair play. Caleb had to be smarter. He had to be more alert and more prepared.
Slowly, deliberately, he pulled the sock up over the bandages. He crawled to where his boot lay in the grass and tugged it on. He slipped the knife into his other boot. After resting a few minutes, he stood up, whistled Pirate to him, and swung into the saddle.
Caleb realized that he wasn’t sure where he was going, but he felt a need to put some distance between himself and that place.
Riding toward the setting sun, he recalled that grizzled old Missouri soldier saying that a man was better off resting after a snake bite.
To Caleb’s thinking, it did make sense that the more worked up he got, the deeper that rattler’s poison would go.
True or not, he rode on, sticking to the easy ways wherever possible and not pushing Pirate at all.
Caleb wasn’t feeling too chipper. His stomach was up in his throat. It felt like his leg was about to bust the seam of his boot. But what was worse, his eyes were playing tricks on him. When he wasn’t seeing double of everything, his vision was blurred.
When he was able to blink the world clear for a moment or two, he was seeing snakes everywhere. One minute, there was a rattler coiled up at the edge of the trail. Or the next minute he saw one slithering through the grass. And the next, he’d see one curled around the branch of a cottonwood.
“Get a grip on yourself,” he muttered. “There ain’t no snakes.”
Doc would have said the poison was getting into his head. Sheila would have said something considerably less polite.
Caleb wasn’t sure how far he’d ridden, but he was suddenly aware that the sun had set and he hadn’t even seen it go down.
He wondered briefly what Sheila was doing. Maybe helping Doc close up his office. Maybe riding home with the boys. Maybe worrying about a fool who ought to have stayed in bed another day.
He was leaning forward, his chest resting on Pirate’s neck. It was a miracle he hadn’t fallen off somewhere.
He reined his mount in and sat up straight in the saddle, fixing his gaze upon a tall pine tree that rose close to the trail.
His heart was pounding, and he couldn’t stop himself from swaying back and forth in the saddle.
In the deep green of the bows, he saw the hard face of Elijah Starr sneering at him.
Caleb drew his Colt and the face disappeared.
A moment later, another face appeared in his mind. Dark hair. Blue eyes. Sheila standing beside his horse in the afternoon sunlight. The touch of her fingers against his vest. The warmth of her lips on his.
Come back soon.
The memory steadied him more than the revolver.
Caleb blinked and looked again. The branches of the tree moved a little in the light breeze that had started up. It was just a tree. He let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding.
He knew he needed to find a place to bed down for the night, but he couldn’t think straight. Somewhere up ahead, his father was alive and pursuing a livelihood inflicting pain and death on others. He drove his boot against the Pirate’s flank, riding forward past the tall pine.
The poison was into him. Every mile seemed harder than the last.
His thoughts drifted between Elijah Starr and Sheila Burnett, between old ghosts and impossible dreams.
The venom felt as though it were slithering through his veins like the snake that put it there.
He was losing strength. It was all he could do to stay in the saddle.
“Where can we get help, Pirate?”
His buckskin’s ears angled back at him, but man and horse both knew it was hopeless.
When Caleb opened his eyes again, it was dark. They’d stopped, and he clung to the pommel with a death grip. Still, his body was swaying from side to side.
The smell of a fire clawed its way through the fog, registering in his brain. Not just a fire. Food.
“Go, Pirate,” he mumbled.
He nudged his horse forward. Light flickered through the branches of scrub pine. The sound of voices. Getting closer. A clearing. The wood smoke was strong now.
He went past a few mules tied on a line. There lay a camp beyond. People. Someone to help. He nudged Pirate into the clearing.
Just stay in the saddle, Marlowe. One more minute. One more minute and maybe you'll get back to Elkhorn. Back to Sheila.
Blankets stretched around the fire. Dishes lay about. But there was no one around. No one anywhere.
“Need…help…snake.” He didn’t know if he’d shouted or whispered the words. Or if he’d even said them out loud.
Caleb tried to dismount, but his fingers refused to grip the hard leather of his saddle. He felt himself falling. And falling. A thick, soft, black darkness swirled around him. Down into some abyss he fell.
For minutes, hours, days, he dropped. And he never hit bottom.