The Carpetbaggers

13

MAX CAME INTO FORT WORTH TO MEET THE TRAIN that was to bring Jim Reeves's daughter from New Orleans. He sat in the barber chair and stared at himself in the mirror. The face that looked back was no longer the face of a boy. The trim black beard served to disguise the high cheekbones. He no longer looked like an Indian.

Max got out of the chair. "How much do I owe you?"

"Fifty cents for the haircut, two bits for the beard trim."

Max threw him a silver dollar.

Mike came off the side of the building against which he had been leaning and fell into step. "It's about time fer the train to be comin' in," Max said. "I reckon we might as well walk down to the station."

Three and a half years before, they had come into Fort Worth one night with seven thousand dollars in their saddlebags. Behind them they had left two empty banks and two dead men. But they had been lucky. Not one of them had been identified as other than an unknown person.

"This looks like a good town," Max had said enthusiastically. "I counted two banks comin' in."

Reeves had looked up at him from a chair in the cheap hotel room. "We're through with that," he said.

Max stared at him. "Why? They look like setups."

Reeves shook his head. "That's where I made my mistake last time. I didn't know when to quit." He stuck a cigarette in his mouth.

"What we goin’ to do, then?" Max asked.

Reeves lit the cigarette. "Look aroun' for a good legitimate business. There's lots of opportunity out here. Land is cheap and Texas is growin'."

Reeves found the business he was looking for in a little town sixty-five miles south of Fort Worth. A saloon and gambling hall. In less than two years, he had become the most important man in town. Then he started a bank in a corner of the gambling house and, a little time later, began to acquire land. There was even talk of electing him mayor.

He bought a small ranch outside of town, fixed up the house and moved out of the rooms over the saloon. A little while after that, he moved the bank out of the saloon, which Max then operated, and ensconced it in a small building on the main street. In less than a year, people began to forget that he had ever owned the saloon and began to think of him as the town banker. He began to grow quietly rich.

He needed but one thing more to complete his guise of respectability. A family. He sent discreet inquiries back to New Orleans. He learned that his wife was dead and his daughter was living with her mother's relatives. He sent her a telegram and received one in return, saying that she would arrive at Fort Worth on the fifth of March.

Max stood looking down the platform at the disembarking passengers. "You know what she looks like?" Mike asked.

"Just what Jim tol' me and it's been ten years since he saw her."

Little by little, the passengers walked away until the only one left was a young woman, surrounded by several valises and a small trunk. She kept looking up and down the platform. Mike looked at Max questioningly. "You reckon that might be her?"

Max shrugged his shoulders.

They walked down to the young woman. Max took off his Stetson. "Miss Reeves?"

A smile of relief appeared on the young woman's face. "I declare, I'm glad to see you," she said warmly. "I was beginnin' to think Daddy never received my telegram."

Max returned her smile. "I'm Max Sand," he said. "Your father sent me to meet you."

A fleeting shadow crossed the girl's face. "I half expected that," she said. "Daddy's been too busy to come home for ten years."

Max guessed that she didn't know her father had been in prison. "Come," he said gently. "I've got a room for you over at the Palace Hotel. You can clean up and sleep there tonight. We got a two-day trip home, so we won't start till morning."

By the time they reached the hotel, twenty minutes later, Max was in love for the first time in his life.

Max tied his horse to the hitching post in front of the Reeves ranch house. He climbed up the steps and knocked at the door. When Reeves's daughter opened it, her face looked tired and strained, as if she'd been weeping, "Oh, it's you,' she said in a low voice. "Come in."

He followed her into the parlor. He reached for her, suddenly concerned. "Betty, what's wrong?"

She slipped away from his hands. "Why didn't you tell me you were an escaped convict?" she asked, not looking at him.

His face settled into cold lines. "Would it have made any diff'rence?"

She met his look honestly. "Yes," she said. "I'd never have let myself get this involved if I'd known."

"Now that you do know," he persisted. "Does it matter?"

"Yes," she said again. "Oh, don't ask me. I’m so confused!"

"What else did your father tell you?"

She looked down at her hands. "He said I couldn't marry you. Not only because of that but because you're – you're half Indian!"

"An' just because of that, you stopped lovin' me?"

She stared down at her twisting hands without answering. "I don't know how I feel," she said finally.

He reached out and pulled her toward him. "Betty, Betty," he said huskily. "Las' night at the dance, you kissed me. You said you loved me. I haven't changed since then."

For a moment, she stood quietly, then pulled herself away from him. "Don't touch me!" she said quickly.

Max stared at her curiously. "You don' have to be afraid of me."

She shrank from his hand. "Don't touch me," she said, and this time the fear in her voice was much too familiar for Max not to recognize it. Without another word, he turned and left the room.

He rode straight into town to the bank and walked into the back room that served Reeves as an office.

Reeves looked up from the big roll-top desk. "What the hell do you mean bustin' in here like this?" he demanded.

Max stared at him. "Don't try to bull-shit me, Reeves. You already done a good job on your daughter."

Reeves leaned back in his chair and laughed. "Is that all?" he asked.

"It's enough," Max said. "Las' night she promised to marry me."

Reeves leaned forward. "I gave you credit for more brains'n that, Max."

"It don't matter now, Reeves. I’m movin' on."

Reeves stared at him for a moment. "You mean that?"

Max nodded. "I mean it."

"You takin' the nigger with you?"

"Yeah," Max said. "When I get our share of the money."

Reeves swung his chair around and took some bills from the safe behind him. He threw them down on the desk in front of Max. "There it is."

Max looked down at it, then at Reeves. He picked up the money and counted it. "There's only five hundred dollars here," he said.

"What did you expect?" Reeves asked.

"We came into Fort Worth with seven thousand. My share of that alone was twenty-three hundred an' we ain't been exactly losin' money in the saloon." Max took a ready-made from Reeves's desk and lit it. "I figger Mike an' me's due at least five thousand."

Reeves shrugged. "I won't argue," he said. "After all, we been through a lot together, you an' me. If that's what you figure, that's what you get."

He counted the money out on the desk. Max picked it up and put it in his pocket. "I didn't think you'd part with it so easy," he said.

He was halfway to the saloon when someone hailed him from the rear. He turned around slowly.

The sheriff and two deputies advanced on him, their guns drawn. Reeves was with them.

"What's up, Sheriff?" Max asked.

"Search him," Reeves said excitedly. "You'll find the money he stole right on him."

"Stole?" Max said. "He's crazy! That money's mine. He owed it to me."

"Keep your hand away from your gun," the sheriff said, moving forward cautiously. He stuck his hand in Max's pocket. It came out with a sheaf of bills.

"See!" Reeves yelled. "What did I tell you?"

"You son of a bitch!" Max exploded. He flung himself toward Reeves. Before he could reach him, the sheriff brought his gun butt down along the side of Max's head. It was just at that moment that Mike looked out the window of the room over the saloon.

Reeves walked over to Max and looked down at him. "I shoulda known better than to trust a half-breed."

"Pick him up, boys, an' tote him over to the jail," the sheriff said.

"Better get over to the saloon and get his nigger friend, too," Reeves said. "He was probably in on it."

Mike saw the sheriff look over at the saloon, then begin to walk toward it. He didn't wait any longer. He went down the back stairs and got the hell out of town.

Reeves rode along the road to his ranch, half humming to himself. He was feeling good. For the first time, he was secure. Max wouldn't dare talk; it would only make it worse for him. And the nigger was gone. Leave it to a nigger to run when things got rough. He was so wrapped up in his thoughts that he never heard the crack of the snake as it whipped out from behind the trees and dragged him down off his horse.

He scrambled to his feet and reached for his gun but the next crack of the snake tore it from his fingers. Mike walked slowly toward him, the big whip coiling slowly back up his arm.

Reeves screamed in terror.

The big snake cracked again and Reeves spun around and tumbled over backward into the dust. He got to his hands and knees and began to crawl, then scrambled to his feet and tried to run. The snake ran down the road after him and crept between his legs, throwing him to the ground. He turned his head and saw Mike's arm go up into the air, the long black whip rising with it.

He screamed as the snake tore into him again.

Sometime early the next morning, the sheriff and his deputies came across a body lying at the side of the road. During the night, someone had torn the bars from the window of the jail's only cell and Max had escaped.

One of the deputies saw the body first. He wheeled his horse over beside it and looked down.

The sheriff and the other deputy wheeled their horses. For a long while, they stared down at the mutilated body. Then one of them took off his hat and wiped the cold, beaded sweat from his forehead. "That looks like Banker Reeves."

The sheriff turned and looked at him. "That was Banker Reeves," he said. He, too, took off his hat and wiped his face. "Funny," he added. "The only thing I know of that can do that to a man is a Louisiana prison snake."