House of the Rising Sun: A Novel Read Free Page A

of working for the government. They were going to bury me alive.”
    “What did Ishmael do to Huerta’s men?”
    “He killed them. The general and his men are outside. They’re going to ambush him.”
    “They’re going to ambush my son?”
    “Yes, why do you think they’re still here? They’ve already slept with all my girls. Now they will kill your son.”
    “He’s a customer here?”
    “No, he is not. But he’ll come for his men when they don’t return to their camp.” She began sawing through the rope on his wrists. “There’s a gun under the mattress. I let one of the girls keep it there after she was beaten.”
    “Who are you?”
    “Why do you care?”
    “You have such anger toward me.”
    She reached into a pocket on her dress and took out a half-filled pint of whiskey. “Drink this.”
    He tried to get up. Then his knees caved and he sat down on the mattress, hard, his hands shaking. He drank from the bottle, then closed and opened his eyes, the room spinning. “Answer my question,” he said. “You’ve never seen me before. Yet you judge and condemn me.”
    “You smell of the blood you’ve shed. You’re a mercenary, no matter what you call yourself,” she said. “Get up from the bed and go. Do what you can for your son. But leave my house.”
    He felt under the mattress until his fingers touched a hard object. He retrieved a nickel-plated derringer and opened the breech. Two .41-caliber cartridges were inserted in the chambers, one on top of the other. He closed the breech and rested the derringer on his thigh. “This won’t cut it.”
    “What does that mean?”
    “It means do you have a rifle or a shotgun?”
    She seemed hardly able to control the animus that lived in her face. “There’s one in the closet. It belongs to the Austrian who beat the girl.”
    “What Austrian?”
    “One you do not want to meet. He’s coming today.”
    “You have a French accent. You look like a Creole. I think you’re from the Islands or New Orleans.”
    “Be glad I’ve saved your life.” She opened the closet door. A .30–40 Krag rifle was propped in the corner. “The Austrian shoots coyotes with it. The shells are in the leather pouch on the floor.”
    “I’ve got a feeling all this is about the hearse.”
    “That’s because your mind is always on personal gain. We may all be dead by the end of the day, but you think more about profit than your own survival. Your son told me what you did to him.”
    Hackberry felt himself swallow. “He still hates his father, does he?”
    “I don’t think he would go to the trouble of hating you. You’re a pitiful man, Mr. Holland.”
    “Are you Ishmael’s lover?”
    “I’m his friend.”
    “You’ve hauled his ashes, too.”
    She slapped his face.
    He waited before he spoke. “I’m sorry if I’ve brought my difficulties into your house. I was at the attack on the train, but I told the general the truth when I said my intention was to find my son. I’m in your debt for speaking up to the Mexicans on my behalf.”
    But she was looking at his feet and not listening, the disdain and anger in her face focusing on practical considerations. “They burned the soles of your feet. You won’t be able to walk. Stay here.”
    She went out in the hallway and returned with a pan of water and a pair of socks and sheep-lined boots. She knelt and bathed his feet and rubbed them with butter, then slipped the socks over his blisters and torn nails.
    “Thank you,” he said.
    She raised her hand, indicating for him to be silent. She stepped closer to the window, her body perfectly still. The curtains were puffing in the wind. She turned around, her eyes charged with light. “There’s a wagon on the trail. It’s them.”
    “Who?”
    “American soldiers.”
    “How do you know they’re Americans?”
    “Their wagons have iron rims on the wheels. Mexican wagons do not.”
    “Whose boots did you give me?”
    “A functionary of the government in Mexico