Etta: A Novel Page 9

But it was his rescue and subsequent protection of my little Indian, my Hantaywee, that changed for me his stature as a human being and brought forth an affection far beyond the base or carnal. A passion of the body, yes, but also of the soul. Since the very first moment she emerged into our little world at Hole-in-the-Wall, Harry Longbaugh has made it his mission to ensure the girl's protection. Harry Longbaugh, who told me an Indian's heart is where his kidneys should be! Even weeks before she finally emerged into camp, he made it clear to our assembled reprobates that any man who attempted so much as a whistle in her direction would deal with him directly. And since that courageous debut, he has approached her as he might the most refined of white women, speaking gently, touching his brim at her approach, bowing slightly before taking his leave.

  Last evening, I encountered him standing by the river. In one of his pensive states, he acknowledged me but said nothing. As we stood alone I could hear the ripple of the water. Feeling the approach of winter in the newly cold wind, I brought my great buffalo robe close about my shoulders.

  “Mr. Longbaugh,” I said, “I must thank you for all your kindness toward the Indian girl. But I also must ask: What could have precipitated such a change of heart that you now treat her as you would me?”

  Harry put his head down for a moment and then, gently taking my robe in his hands, pulled it more tightly around me, warming me against the cold. “I did only what was right,” he said, “and I knew it was right because it was what you wanted.” His dark eyes reflected the orange of the dusk.

  I put my hand on his cheek and brought his splendid head down toward mine. I kissed him deeply and for a long time. Perhaps it was the wind, perhaps it was the same instinct that had caused me to tremble, but as he brought his lips to my neck, I felt him shiver. It was then I remembered the story of how an Indian maid proves she has accepted the love of her brave. I stretched out my arm and, opening the robe, gathered him inside.

  I had never so realized my own softness until I embraced his sinew; never so delighted in the smoothness of my skin as when contrasted with the rough texture of his face and hands. It took all the will within me to part from him, though why I should have bothered I now cannot guess. Perhaps the last traces of the girl I once was still imagined a fine and upright husband gently taking me in a big clean bed of marriage, the two of us freshly consecrated by the laws of heaven and earth.

  But this is Hole-in-the-Wall. There are no laws here, save only those one carves for oneself. And by these I am certain that I shall soon be known among our band as the lover of a chief, a bride sealed in a union made holy only by the spirit of these canyons, the woman of the Sundance Kid.

  PINKERTON'S NATIONAL DETECTIVE AGENCY

  Founded by Allan Pinkerton, 1850

  “We Never Sleep”

  REPRESENTATIVES OF THE

  UNION PACIFIC RAILROAD CO., INC.

  $8,000 REWARD

  internal memorandum. confidential.

  do not remove from files.

  June 2, 1899, about 5:30 P.M., Medicine Bow–Wilcox, Wyoming, the express car of the Union Pacific Overland Flyer was “held up” by highwaymen, who ordered the engineer and conductor to slow the train so they might gain access to the car. They then proceeded to open the main safe by use of dynamite. The safe was blown open and the car totally destroyed. Such a method would indicate the involvement of GEORGE PARKER (alias “BUTCH” CASSIDY), HARRY LONGBAUGH (alias “KID” LONGBAUGH, alias THE SUNDANCE KID), and HARVEY LOGAN (alias “KID” CURRY).

  SUSPECT IN THIS ROBBERY

  Description of HARVEY LOGAN

  NAME: HARVEY LOGAN, alias “KID” LOGAN, alias “KID CURRY”

  AGE: 30 years HEIGHT: 5 ft, 2 inches

  WEIGHT: 135 lbs BUILD: slight

  COMPLEXION: light COLOR OF HAIR: black

  EYES: black MUSTACHE: black, handlebar

  NATIONALITY: American OCCUPATION: cowboy, rustler

  CRIMINAL OCCUPATION: Murderer and highwayman, train robber, cattle and horse thief, rapist, and sodomite.

  HARVEY LOGAN is known as a criminal principally in Wyoming, Utah, Idaho, Colorado, and Nevada. Unlike CASSIDY and LONGBAUGH, who eschew gunplay when possible, LOGAN seems to have a penchant for killing. He is currently wanted in Johnson County, Wyoming, for the murder of miner PIKE LANDUSKY. Additionally, he is the prime suspect in a revenge killing against Montana rancher JAMES WINTERS, who is suspected of killing Harvey's brother LONNY LOGAN in self-defense. Of all of the so-called “Wild Bunch,” LOGAN must be considered the most dangerous. He has stated publicly that he hates all lawmen and will not miss the opportunity to kill one. He is also suspected in several brutal rapes in Colorado and New Mexico.

  rom their first meeting, Kid Curry had hated Etta Place.

  He hated that, unlike most women of his aquaintance, she was neither a prostitute nor a full or half-breed Indian. He hated the way she insinuated herself into the world of men and was rewarded with near-instant acceptance by the members of the Bunch. He hated her perfect English and the way she poured coffee by a campfire as though it were tea at the Palmer House. He hated her abilities with horse and gun. They aroused his envy and irritated rather than impressed him.

  He hated that the meddling of Etta Place had cost him the use of Little Snake. An Indian, yes, but still flesh for his needs. He hated that now this Little Snake could laugh with the others, who would take grand pleasure in his humiliation; laugh with the likes of Dave Atkins, who now courted her as if she were a white Christian rather than a red, ruined pile of his own leftovers, too ignorant to even speak the American tongue.

  Even more than this, he hated the insult of Etta Place's height. A squaw is only a squaw, but Etta, like every man here, towered above him, the heels of her fashionable boots and haughty posture serving to aggravate the situation.

  But perhaps most of all, Kid Curry hated the fact that he owed Etta Place money.

  Curry was not alone in that situation. Little more than a year after her arrival, Etta had become the Hole-in-the-Wall's banker, mostly by virtue of the fact that she was the single member of the gang who could keep company with a dollar.

  After a robbery, all involved would be given equal shares, Butch and Harry being democratic leaders and not inclined to take larger portions for themselves. Plunder in hand, the men would descend upon the nearest town and get about the serious and expensive business of drinking and whoring, followed by a search for the West's most unkind pack of cards. By the time a week was gone, even the bandits themselves would be shamed by the sheer amount of money they had lost to those whose profession is the skillful trimming of suckers.

  But Etta refused to squander her treasure as the men would. Her money might buy a few yards of fine woolen fabric, later to see new life as a tailored suit or riding skirt. More might be allotted for a long-wished-for bath and the clean sheets of a hotel bed. And a few coins might go to share a good dinner with Laura Bullion, the meal often served at the closest Harvey House (on such occasions Etta would find the meal doubly delicious, served as it was with a side dish of irony). Rarely would the total of these luxuries exceed ten or perhaps twelve dollars, hardly a king's ransom even in these scattered towns. The rest she consigned to a purse, then a Gladstone bag, and finally to a large duffel of canvas duck.

  Thus did Etta Place eventually become the primary financial institution of the Hole-in-the-Wall Gang and their assorted outlaw brethren.

  Initially, her loans were small: ten or twenty dollars until the next robbery. But the meaner the cards and the dice became, the larger grew the loans: three hundred dollars, five hundred dollars, a thousand dollars. As a proper broker's daughter, Etta charged only the current rate of interest, carefully researched by telegraph whenever the Bunch happened near civilization.

  The largest loans were invariably made to Kid Curry himself. His luck at cards was second only to his subtlety with the opposite sex. Butch often said that the gang would only have committed half its number of offenses against decent s
ociety if Curry could keep his cards off the table and his cock in his pants. As it was, his losses were staggering, and even one as feared as he could ill afford the reputation of welsher. There were only so many games in any given state or territory; once a man was marked as a reneger on his debts, no decent group of cardsharps would welcome him, even if his skills were as rudimentary as Curry's.

  By October of 1900, with interest accrued, Etta was by far the richest of the Bunch, having received over ten thousand dollars in payments and interest from Curry alone. On the first of every month, the men, sometimes as many as twenty-five, would form a line outside her tent or hotel room and settle their obligations. The young ones were silent, ashamed to be in debt to a mere girl (or perhaps they were simply intimidated by her beauty). The older and more confident exchanged pleasantries and passed the day along with their currency.

  Not so Kid Curry. “Here is your money,” the little man would say, “and may you choke on it. You and your fellow Freemason bankers.”

  Having heard this recitation before, Etta would calmly glance through her green ledger and, in her neat hand, make the proper additions to the lengthening column of figures. “I am afraid you are mistaken when you honor me as one of that fine society,” she would say. “However, I accept your compliment and I thank you for your continued patronage. Here is your receipt. Please come again.”

  Kid Curry would spit into the dust and stomp away. The only thing he found more mortifying than borrowing money from Etta Place was paying it back, and the only thing more humiliating than this was his failure to discover where she hid her funds.

  It was difficult to follow her. Harry Longbaugh kept a wolf's vigil on the girl, and when they traveled from hideout to hideout, robbery to robbery, her strongboxes were well concealed and protected by young outlaws whom she could well afford to pay for their service. Curry believed that if he could only find the hole or mine or dead tree that served as her vault, he would become a man of independent means, able to buy off the Pinkertons and sleep among the most costly of whores.

  This would be no theft, he thought, no dishonor among thieves. It was, after all, his own money he was seeking.

  Of course, honor would also demand punitive action for such usury. The disgrace to which he had been subjected was unendurable; and more than justification for his fantasies of vengeance.

  s far as Butch Cassidy knew, the horse beneath Etta Place had no name.

  It was one of his few incontrovertable edicts. No one among his band was to name any mount for any reason. Not even numbers were allowed. If a horse was to be referred to at all, it was as “the bay,” or “the roan with the star,” or “the paint,” or “the little paint.” At any time, Butch reasoned, he needed to be able to assign the horse best suited to the task of the rider. On one day, Harry Longbaugh might need speed but not courage; another day, Dave Atkins might require courage but not jumps. It was Cassidy and only Cassidy who reserved the right to create these strategies. It kept his band from getting personal instead of practical with their mounts.

  Etta's horse today was the one they called “the big dapple.” He was a twelve-hand gelding, nearly solid black at his hindquarters. From the hooves up he was stippled with spots of black on a gray that grew lighter toward the head. Based upon his most valuable quality, Etta had broken Butch's rule and secretly given him a nickname: Won't Spook.

  On that morning Etta rode him into the town of Powder River dressed in new riding togs. The costume had arrived only the week before and she was excited to show it off, especially considering the trouble and expense to which it had put her. It had taken over three hours for Laura Bullion to outline her figure upon an enormous sheet of paper (itself the product of a two-week wait as it traveled from Meininger's artist suppliers in Denver to the post office in Buffalo, Wyoming). Laura had carefully measured every length and contour of her friend from leg to hip to head. What with letters and instructions and measurements changing hands between Buffalo and Henry Poole & Company, London, the whole had taken three months, but Etta reckoned the result worth the wait.

  The jacket was a smooth Italian black velvet, longer in the back than the front and with only the faintest hint of a lapel. Beneath it, she wore a white chemisette with tight bodice and wing collar, topped by a green silk tie. Its color matched perfectly the delicate organdy band that ran the circumference of her stunted black silk topper. The skirt of the habit was generous; had one not been paying full attention one could imagine that its rider preferred sidesaddle. But to suit Etta Place, the skirt had been designed to act like a pair of giant pantalones so that, in the event of a chase, its wearer might grip the sides of her mount, lay to with her spurs, and travel. Its sheer size might also prove handy when it came time to hide whatever might need concealing: a rifle, a bullwhip, a shotgun, or a bank bag.

  On this morning the task had called for the skirt to conceal a large canvas sack containing a six-foot diamondback rattlesnake.

  This early, Main Street in front of the Powder River Farmers Bank and Trust Company was deserted, but for a few drowsy horses tied to a hitching post. After a sharp look left and right, Etta slid the bag from beneath her blowsy folds and with a single clean motion dropped the snake to the rough boardwalk. Almost before the rattler hit the wood, the nearby horses began to whinny and rear, stomping and whistling in panic—all but Won't Spook, who remained stock-still amid the chaos.

  Normally, the bank guard would have been alerted by the confusion, but this morning William “Big Bill” Williams was absent from his post. The night before, Williams had been drinking in the Queen of Swords and encountered a young man who called himself Peg Leg. The cowboy said he had just come off a long cattle drive, and so, flush with cash, was buying. Never one to insult his host, Williams took full advantage of the new friendship and imbibed both beer and whiskey in quantity. (The day after the robbery, Big Bill attempted to explain to Mr. Helm, the banks president, that he had been “slipped a mickey” by the girl Peg had purchased for him, and so his absence was justified or at least understandable. Helm called him a numskull and banished him from the bank, even as a depositor.)

  As the morning sun began to cast its light past the bars of the teller cages, Helm and teller J. R. Finlayson jumped at a woman's shrieks from the street. They rushed through the big double doors and were dismayed to find a girl in a riding habit, near hysterical, shaking and pointing to the ground. They looked down to see the gigantic snake, in full rattle, coiling about the wooden leg of the hitching post. With the arrival of the bankers, the young woman's screams grew more dramatic, bringing other citizens running and causing the postmaster to faint.

  At the moment that Helm and Finlayson ran through the front door, Butch Cassidy and Harry Longbaugh were walking through the back. Between Etta's fourth and sixth screams they had picked the lock; as the electric alarm rarely saw use this far west, the intrusion had raised no warning. Butch had estimated that Etta's diversion would keep the locals busy for approximately three minutes, long enough to gather a reasonable amount of cash and achieve their getaway. If it did not, he had strategically placed several of his lieutenants throughout the town, their numerical strength hopefully sufficient to minimize any unwanted gunplay.

  Outside, a young man in farmer's clothes had attempted to take the situation in hand. As the snake clattered and hissed, the farmer poked at it with a rake while imploring the distressed young woman to mount her horse and ride away. Etta only screamed louder in answer and swooned into the arms of Mr. Helm, who, being not much bigger than Kid Curry, had considerable trouble not dropping her in the dust. Women shouted for water, men for whiskey.

  Twenty yards up Main Street, Curry stood before the main corral of Bradley's Livery and consulted his pocket watch. At exactly three minutes after nine, he began firing his two Navy Colts into the air, the shots bursting loud and in quick succession. At the sound of the pistols, the crowd in front of the bank all looked north, the two thieves exited the rear door, and S
heriff Fisher Holley who had been walking toward the Queen of Swords in search of coffee, dove headfirst into the alley between the dry goods and the barber.

  As soon as his irons were empty Curry jumped on his horse and rode for the town limit. In three more minutes he was met by Butch, Harry, and twenty-five thousand dollars. By this time, the farmer and two mail clerks were attempting to brain the rattler with ax handles retrieved from Gordon's General Store. So brave was this display that no one noticed that Etta had gathered her petticoats and quickly mounted the dapple. As she wheeled hard and began to gallop in the direction of her comrades, she could hear the confused Mr. Helm calling after her, inquiring as to her well-being. She was almost out of earshot when his words of concern dissolved into a fading string of curses.

  Well out of town, Harry turned his horse around to wait for Etta. He worried little about delay or capture. Butch had chosen the town because it had only two lawmen, and Holley a well-known coward, counted as less than one. When she at last galloped into his sight he was, as always, amazed at her presence, even at a distance of two hundred yards. Her riding habit billowed behind her like the wings of a raven, and its fluid blackness brought high contrast to the white of her face and her cheeks, now flushed crimson. Harry was proud that she rode with the practiced style of a champion, back straight, head high; but what thrilled him was the undisciplined abandon of the girl: the bank thief, the snake dropper.

  She was laughing.

  As she pulled within a horse's length of him, she reared the dapple up and suspended him there like a trick rider in a circus. Whooping like an Indian, she crashed Won't Spook to the ground, spun him around three times, and then shouted at Harry in happy, breathless defiance.

  “We are rich once again, Harry Longbaugh! I wonder if even now they know what hit them! But I refuse to give up such elation so quickly! Race me to the river, Harry Longbaugh! Or does the Sundance Kid decline?”