Zeke’s Golden Crucifix
The dirt road was dusty and its ruts were deep, and the wooden bench on the stage coach was hard and unforgiving on Zeke’s bony ass. A great big load of TNT sat just behind Zeke in the coach, trailing behind him like a bad omen across the prairie.
Zeke had tried to explain that just a few sticks of TNT would do, but old man McGillis would not hear it. There are two types of men in the world: those who will listen to reason, and those who will not. Zeke figured that old man McGillis was of the latter breed. Zeke hemmed and hawed until he was blue in the face, trying to explain to that stubborn old coot that just a few sticks of dynamite would clear the tree stumps from his 30 acre plot, but there was no getting through. Old man McGillis was hell-bent on the destruction of those obnoxiously dense tree stumps, which just lied there lifeless and dumb under his ancient, unused soil. That was just fine, as far as Zeke was concerned. If the old bastard wanted a coach full of TNT, that’s just what he’d get.
Zeke’s trusty horse, Darla, would surely do a fine job pulling the deadly cargo from Eastville Creek to McGillis’s farm in Cold Shadow. But Darla couldn’t handle such a big job all by herself, as Zeke had that rickety old wagon overflowing with those mighty red bomb sticks.
A beat up old horse named Rusty would be helping Darla pull the hefty load. Rusty wasn’t nearly as pretty a horse as Darla, but Zeke figured that was just as well. Maybe his ugliness would give him some sort of magical strength in the mid-day sun. Perhaps ugly was not the right word to describe a tough old beast like Rusty. He had some serious character, though. Rusty had thick, short legs, which held up a stout body, with skinny ribs pressing hard and consistent against exhausted skin. Rusty’s old weathered coat looked, well, rusty. An underlying whiteness gave way too a patchwork of brown and orange splotches bleeding together, forming the quilt of a heartless God. Wet black lips sat beneath an even blacker snout. Soil and gritty bits of tumbleweed adorned Rusty’s muzzle, as some sort of medieval decoration.
Once Rusty and Darla were hooked up to their harnesses, Zeke just stood back for a moment and looked at the two of them, with a wry grin upon his face. Beauty and the Beast.
Zeke hopped up onto the wooden bench of the coach with the vigor of a spry young man, grabbed a leather rein in each hand, and with the unforgiving flick of both wrists, created a divine snap that bolted the two equestrian partners into immediate action. Darla and Rusty both seemed to understand that they had cargo to haul. Darla took the first steps forward, with Rusty pathetically lagging behind. With a few more unsympathetic snaps of the reins onto Rusty’s back, he started moving less like a sloth, and more like a horse.
Then Darla stopped suddenly, bringing the entire coach to a grinding halt. Rusty stopped too, and slowly twisted his head to the left, to see what Darla was up to. Zeke noticed Darla’s head shaking back-and-forth, like a confused kitten watching a ball of yarn tumble across the floor. Then her neck turned stiffer than a flagpole in a Minnesota ice storm, and Zeke would swear that he saw patches of her mane stand up as if she had been struck by the greatest lightning bolt of the 19th century.
Darla’s head jotted up into the air, with her front hoofs pawing in front of her, like a kangaroo pummeling a tourist deep in the Australian outback. Then Zeke saw it. The largest, meanest, fattest, ugliest diamondback rattlesnake this side of the Grand Canyon. And it just sat there. Curled up in the midday sun with its nasty little rattle hissing, and its evil split tongue flipping and flapping every which way.
A mighty storm was moving in faster than a mongoose in a potato sack race, and a hefty mattress of dark gray clouds suddenly devoured the heavens. A fierce crack of white lightning split the horizon in two, and before Zeke could get his wits about him, Darla was off, like the flash of a pistol firing at close range. She dragged old Rusty along and he kept up best he could. One of the front wagon wheels rode up and over that mean, ugly old rattler, as venom squirted from its soon to be dead mouth like an old worn out geyser.
The coach was really bumping and swerving now, and Rusty turned his old head back toward Zeke, with a look in his tired eyes that asked what in the hell did you get me into here, buddy?
“Ya old girl, yaaaaa!” Zeke screamed, but it was no use. Darla had always been a dependable old horse, but this day had simply gotten the better of her. She was in a full throttle sprint now, tearing up the dirt trail and taking no prisoners. Zeke whipped and snapped and pulled at the reins, but it started to feel as if Darla had been chiseled out of a hefty slab of Italian marble that would give no quarter. There’s only one thing I can do now.
Zeke had an old golden crucifix that his pappy had given him before he had gone off to fight the rebels in the Civil War. His pappy had told him to keep that crucifix around his neck nice and tight, and that as long as he did so, the Good Lord would be watching over him day and night — even before the crows get up at sunrise, his pappy would say. Zeke’s pappy never did return from the Civil War.
As his neck grew when he became a man, that crucifix became tight and the gold chain even cut into Zeke’s skin a little bit, but he never took it off. Zeke held both reins with his right hand, and reached his left hand down onto his chest to pull up the crucifix. He rubbed that golden cross with a mother’s precious love between his thumb and index finger, before giving it a sincere smooch. All right pappy. Let’s see if the Good Lord is watching over me today.
The reins dropped from Zeke’s hands. He stood up from the splintery wooden bench, swallowed hard, and took a flying leap straight onto Darla’s firm neck. Something mysterious and maybe even a little bit evil had taken hold of Darla, as she didn’t seem to notice all 220 pounds of Zeke plopping down onto her like a giant sack of potatoes from the heavens above.
Slowly but with purpose, Zeke slid his hand down each side of Darla’s neck, and held on with all of the strength he could muster. Zeke pulled himself up to Darla’s left ear, so there would be no question that she would hear him.
“Whoa girl, take it easy now. I’ve got a full load of dynamite behind us, just waiting to blow us all to kingdom come. Me and old Rusty here are counting on you to save the day. Just take a breathe deep, and we’ll make camp for the night and build us a nice warm fire, clear out of the rain.”
Darla was still galloping at a decent pace, but Zeke felt her legs quiver just a bit, and he could swear that she turned her head to the side, just enough to see him hanging on and trying to make things right before it was too late.
“Come on, old girl. We need you now. Take it easy, and slow this coach down.”
Darla’s gallop became a trot, which then melted into a fast walk. Darla was breathing so hard that with each inhale, Zeke fantasized that her insides were filling up with helium, and that she would float away into the clouds at any moment. Then her last step was taken, and she finally stopped.
Rusty was frothing at the mouth, as Zeke hopped to the ground and patted him lovingly on the head. “You did good too, old boy. Thanks for hanging in there, you tough old sucker.”
Zeke stood back and looked at Darla and Rusty, heaving and frothing and hanging on for dear life from their exhaustion. He reached down with his left hand and grabbed the golden crucifix, holding it tight within his calloused palm.
Thank you for watching over us today, pappy. Sleep well.
J.S. Lender’s new book “They Are Here Now (Short Tales)” is now available in paperback on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/They-Are-Here-Now-Short/dp/1708895272
