Chapter 2

A Clamor in the Barn

By the time the sun began to set, Clarence and Walter had already taken off and headed toward town, no doubt to attend some business with Tulsa’s resident banker, Solomon Driscoll. Almost certainly, the U.S. Deputy Marshal Bass Reeves, who had overseen the incident in Coffeyville, would also be present, flagging Tulsa as prepared for any trouble the approaching Doolin-Dalton gang may be foolish enough to try.

A tallow candle flickered rhythmically on the brick mantle, casting a dancing glow over the hearth. Harper was curled on her daddy’s cracked and dusty-smelling leather armchair with a tattered copy of Washington Irving’s Adventures of Captain Bonneville, when Marshall entered the room and pointed his index finger at her, cocking his thumb like a pistol. 

“What do you want, Marshall Maddox?” she sighed, and flipped the page. 

He brushed a tawny strand of straw-like hair off his slightly dewy brow.  “It’s a quiet night,” he observed, sinking into the sofa across from her. “Let’s go for a swim or somethin’.”

Harper flipped another page without looking up. “We’re supposed to see there is no trouble tonight,” she pointed out. “Not go lookin’ for it. However,” she said, setting the book aside, “if you wanna go jump in a river, be my guest.” She smiled at him with mocking brightness, and he pointed his finger gun at her again.

Suddenly, there was a commotion outside, and out in the barn the chickens clamored while the horses brayed and whinnied. Harper and Marshall could hear the cruel snickering of coyotes, and Marshall immediately reached for a rifle that hung over the mantle. 

“Won’t it do to just make some noise?” Harper pressed, not wanting to get the gun involved. “I’ll go grab the pots and pans-”

“Don’t be a sissy,” Marshall sneered as he cocked the gun. He headed toward the door, stopped suddenly by Harper reaching for his sleeve, who then tripped over a washbucket half an inch full of runoff leaked from the last rainstorm as she did so. She fell to the floor with an uncomfortable thud, sending the bucket and rainwater sprawling into a bookshelf, and knocking some tomes and a globe to the floor with explosive force.
 

There was a sudden silence outside. The two listened a moment before Harper rose to her feet, and they ventured together to the barn where all was quiet and the animals were calm. Harper gently pat Babyface while Marshall fed Crane a sugar cube. 

Outside, cobalt clouds enshrouded the opalescent moon, casting an otherworldly dimness over the summer night. Fireflies visibly flickered in a lulled cadence over the blackened bank of the Arkansas river in the distance.

“Way to go,” Marshall snorted as they returned to the cabin. “Your clumsiness scared them off. At least we know how you’d have handled it on your own.”

“I would have grabbed the pots and pans,” Harper retorted, shoving past him and into the entryway. She patted some dirt off her wool skirt. “Scared them off either way. Reachin’ for the rifle was unnecessary and stupid. My daddy will kill me if he finds it’s been touched.” She flicked back some hair that had fallen from the bun at the back of her neck.

“Not if he knows it was me that did it,” Marshall replied with some confidence. He sank forcefully into Clarence’s armchair. “Your daddy trusts me, which is more than you can say.”  

That was more than Harper could take. She pursed her lips then turned and swung back out the door, letting Marshall leap to catch it before it slammed. 

“Where you goin’?” he demanded. 

“I’m goin’ for that swim,” she shouted as she thundered alone out into the darkened prairie.

She reached the marshy edge of the river bank where the churning current drowned all but Marshall’s booming voice calling distantly behind her.

“Come back!” he was hollering. “You know I didn’t mean that.”

Right this second, though, Harper didn’t care. She was angry at Marshall, she was angry at her daddy, and she was angry at the coyotes. Tears welled in her eyes, and with nothing else to do, she began scooping up mounds of mud and sediment and hurling them into the rushing water.

Suddenly, there was a smooth, solid texture in her hand. She reeled, fearful at first it might have been a snake, then immediately realized she was holding a muck-covered string of beads. 

She turned them over in her hand, examining their intricacy. Wiping away some mud, she could see that they were native, flecked with lavish turquoise that in the night air and against the blackness of the river very nearly seemed to give off an ethereal glow.

Marshall’s voice rang out in the distance again. 

“Harper McCoy!” he was shouting. 

Without hesitation, Harper slung the beads around her wrist but found that they immediately wound snug against her skin. Startled, she tugged quickly at the bracelet, but found it would not slide over her hand. Panicking, she pulled harder but the cord dug firmly  into her flesh. 

She kept pulling, stumbling a bit in the tarry shallows, but before she knew it, Marshall was grabbing her by the elbow. 

“Let's get you home, girl.” He locked arms with her and led her  back to the cabin.