Gold Dust

Chapter One

The Devil was beating his wife when the rusty green cattle trailer backed through an assortment of oak, pecan, elm, and hackberry trees surrounding a warped and sun-splintered catch pen. The rough gray corral full of bawling cattle almost disappeared in the shadows despite the rain cloud moving quickly to the east. The loading chute was rickety at best. The odor of wet dust, crushed milkweeds, and cowshit filled the air.

Nervous cattle bawled as two hard-looking men ignored the brief shower falling in the sunshine and herded them with whoops and hollers up the wooden ramp and into the trailer hitched to a two-toned blue and white Ford truck. The mama cows wore brands, but the red white-face calves and more than a few heifers were unmarked.

The current hit Harper Valley PTA came through the pickup’s open windows.

The men were halfway finished loading them when a green 1955 International pickup turned off the highway and crunched to a stop on the red gravel turnout at the gate. A slender, slow-moving farmer in a sweat-stained straw cowboy hat shoved the cranky door open with his shoulder and stepped out to wrestle aside the limp wire gate. He grunted at a sharp pain in his back that was iffy, even on good days.

The long shadows of the surrounding hardwoods almost prevented the landowner from seeing the trailer a hundred yards away. The glittering shower focused most of his attention on the streaked windshield made worse by wiper blades baked hard as a rock by the northeast Texas sun.

The front chrome bumper of the unfamiliar two-toned truck caught his eye through the open window. The farmer frowned at the sight, turned the wheel, and cut through the bitterweeds, throwing debris and tiny grasshoppers into the air and across his unpolished hood.

He killed the International’s engine twenty yards from the catch pen and popped the door open, sitting half-in and half-out to study the scene. The men working the cattle stopped, as if expecting what came next.

Coming to a decision, the farmer de-trucked and stuck both hands into the pockets of his overalls. Hey, fellers. What are y’all doing? His voice rose above the bawling cattle and wavered, either in fear or anger.

A man, dark-complected under a cracked and battered straw hat, climbed over the corral. His shaggy, greasy brown hair hung limp over large ears that looked like the open doors of a Buick.

A redhead in a faded, thin plaid cowboy shirt stretched tight across a bulging belly lit a cigarette and rested his forearms over the top sun-dried board to watch. He unconsciously rubbed the edges of untrimmed fingernails crusted with dirt against each other.

Greasy Hair left the trailer’s back gate and met the agitated rancher in the open pasture. The shape of his face and abnormally close-set eyes along with the flapping ears suggested mental issues, something he often played in his favor when people misjudged him. Howdy.

I said what are you doin’? Don’t y’all know you’re on private property?

The restless cows on the ramp stomped into the green trailer and the others paused, bawling. The crew of sweating men who’d been loading the cattle were silent.

Greasy Hair ran long, slender fingers along the side of his head. We’re loading cattle. Balancing on one leg, he used a boot to rub at a smear of brown cowshit on the opposite leg of his jeans. It’s hot and nasty work, ain’t it?

Them cows are mine. Nobody said you could load ’em up in anything.

Guy Harris did.

The farmer shook his head. I don’t know no Guy Harris.

Greasy Hair frowned as if deep in thought and couldn’t believe a mistake had been made. He sold us these cattle. I got a bill of sale in the truck there.

If he did, y’all got took. These are mine, and they ain’t for sale. Y’all let ’em out and get gone.

Greasy Hair hooked both thumbs into the front pockets of his khakis. His shoulders were wet from the rain shower. A smell like sour milk rose from his sweaty skin.

He turned to gaze across the pasture at the milkweed and bitterweeds scorching in the sun. Cicadas cried in an undulating chorus from the surrounding hardwoods, their song rising and swelling in rhythmic unison. He slipped a hand under his untucked shirt and scratched his stomach. Well, I don’t know. See, Guy said this was his place and he gave us directions directly to this pen. Said we could round up all we wanted, ’cause he was selling out.

The farmer’s face reddened in anger. Mister, this is my land and them are my cows. Now you get shed of this place or I’m calling the laws.

Aw, I wish you wouldn’t do that. Look, it’s too hot to stand here in the sun like we got good sense. Come on in the shade and let’s work this out. I got some ice water over there.

Nope. I’m staying right here.

Greasy Hair swiveled around to eye the cattle. A horsefly buzzed his head and he waved it away. Well, I guess the mistake is ours. We watched this place for two weeks and never saw nobody.

What are you talking about?

We never saw nobody come out here. Greasy Hair sighed and looked defeated. Didn’t see nobody feed, nor scatter so much as a bag of nuggets. And now you show up. Dale! He called toward the truck. C’mon over here and help us work this out.

Nothing to work out. The farmer’s attention flicked back and forth between Greasy Hair and the redhead coming their way.

Greasy Hair shrugged. There’s always something to work out.

I been down in my back and ain’t had time to come out… the farmer trailed off, as if realizing he was volunteering information they didn’t need.

The redhead named Dale was built like a fireplug. He took his hat off and joined them, wiping sweat with his left hand. A Newport cigarette bobbed between his lips. What’s the trouble?

Y’all’re loadin’ my cattle, that’s the trouble. The farmer pointed at the trailer. What do I have to say for y’all to get gone? How about I’m going to call the laws and they’ll take care of this? Is that plain enough?

Greasy Hair smiled. Now, hang on a minute. See, I believe we made an honest mistake here.

Dale squinted from beneath thin eyebrows. Like most redheads, he couldn’t tolerate the sun and his nose was burned. He drew on the cigarette and exhaled through both nostrils without taking it from his lips. Owen, did we come to the wrong pasture?

Looks like it. Greasy Hair stuck out his hand. Hey, I’m sorry. My name’s Owen. What’s yours?

The farmer refused the offered hand and backed away to put more distance between himself and the strangers. Name’s Pat Walker and I’ll be back with the constable and then we’ll see what’s what.

I wish you wouldn’t do that. Dale spoke to the retreating farmer’s back.

Pat turned to address the redhead and Owen pulled a German Luger from under his shirt. This is on you.

He shot Pat Walker in the back of his head.

The 9mm round punched through the hat’s thin crown. Blood flew in a red mist. His hat went spinning away as the farmer collapsed with a heavy thump. Thick gushes of blood from his nose and the huge exit wound flowed into the barely damp ground.

Dale rubbed at his own blistered nose. Possum, I told you we didn’t need to do this in broad daylight.

Owen slipped the Luger back into his waistband and studied the still corpse at his feet as if looking for signs of life. He tilted his head along the line of Walker’s body and raised his gaze. I’ve told you I don’t like that name. Don’t ever call me that again.

People from his hometown called him by the nickname until one night outside of a bar when he beat a young man half to death with an axe handle for calling him that.

Fear flashed across Dale’s face when he realized what he’d said. I meant, it wasn’t a good idea to shoot him right here in broad daylight.

Owen exaggerated a look around the pasture. I don’t see no grandstands full of people or nothin’. Like I told this fool, we watched the pasture for two weeks. The least he could have done was to send somebody around to check on his cows and we’d have knowed. He spun toward the trailer.

Dale paced him. What now?

Owen looked surprised at Dale’s question. Why, we finish loading these cattle and get gone. I got buyers waiting in Austin. Owen started back toward the catch pen. When we’re done, you drag him in the corral and pull his truck in, too. We’ll have plenty of time before anyone misses him.

The rustlers turned toward the west at the throaty roar of an airplane. A crop duster suddenly burst into view over the treetops, dangerously low. A widening trail of mist spread over the pasture, covering the men standing in the open.

What the hell!? Despite his hat, Owen ducked his head as the cloud settled around them.

Dale used one hand to protect his eyes as a light mist blew under the bill of his cap. "What’s he spraying here for?"

Must be some kind of weed killer, maybe?

Naw, nobody sprays weed killer on a place while there’s cattle on it.

"They don’t spray people, neither. Owen wiped his sleeve and sniffed. It don’t have any smell." He absently rubbed at his dandruff-covered shoulders.

Do you think he saw this dead sonofabitch?

Probably not. It’s hard to see directly below you in one of those things, and he came over the trees so fast I doubt he even knew we were down here. That’s why he hit us with that crap. It don’t make no nevermind. Let’s finish up here and go.

Dale took a deep drag down to the filter and dropped it on the ground. A deep, wet cough rattled his lungs and he shook another cigarette from the pack. This next one’ll help my cough.

A buzzard floated high above as they laughed and ignored Pat Walker’s cooling body.

Chapter Two

A cow bawled in the pasture beside our little frame farmhouse, the sound hoarse and mournful. A mockingbird sang in the sycamore near the southwest corner, doing his best to brighten the already warm and sticky November day. A covey of quail caught my eye, working in single file down the bobwire fencerow separating what Miss Becky called the side yard from the woods beyond.

Fully dressed in jeans and a plaid button shirt, I was on my bed, reading in a soft breeze blowing through the rusty screen, when she called from the kitchen. What’s it gonna take to get you two up and out of this house?

Mark Lightfoot was drawing on a sheet of lined paper. His jeans and button shirt were fairly new, because my grandmother, Miss Becky, threw out all of his old clothes when he came to live full time with us several months earlier.

He’d been drawing on what he called some house plans. He’d been at it for a couple of days, and when I peeked, it was our farmhouse with a wraparound porch and an extra room that we didn’t have.

He’s not blood kin and his last name is different from us Parkers’. Miss Becky and Grandpa Ned had Judge O.C. Rains draw up some papers last year so Mark could live with us full time since his people couldn’t take care of him anymore. They were poor Choctaws from across the river in Oklahoma, and barely had enough money for coal oil.

We will in a little bit. I had to raise my voice so she could hear me over the rattling pans. I think she made noise in the kitchen to run us out. Then we’ll gather the eggs and feed the cows.

Five, four… Mark pulled a strand of his long black hair out of his eyes spoke around the yellow pencil in his teeth, …three…

I marked my place in the book with a finger. What are you doing?

…two, one.

Miss Becky appeared in the door, studying us with that same eye she used when she was trying to decide on making us go with her to Wednesday night services at the Holiness Church across the pasture. I believe I’m fixin’ to get a come-along out of the smokehouse to drag you two out on the floor.

We’re just feeling lazy.

It’s comin’ on to nine o’clock already. She studied at us for a while. Good Lord, deliver me from teenage boys. Y’all figuring on stayin’ in bed all day? Your Grandpa Ned’ll get y’all’s goat when he comes home.

My Grandpa Ned had been the local constable for Center Springs since the beginning of World War II. We’ll get going in a minute.

You’ll get up right now. Y’all can’t laze a whole Saturday away.

We have plans. We’re gonna camp out tonight.

Mark raised an eyebrow, knowing we hadn’t discussed it. The idea’d popped into my head that second, because some kids in my book by Fred Gipson were coon-hunting and sitting around a campfire. I was burying myself more and more in books, on account of I was having trouble with one of the kids at school and it was the best way to escape to somewhere else.

It wasn’t the first time. Cale Westlake gave me holy hell the year before, picking on me every day and beating me down with threats, pushing me around, and wartin’ me to no end. It started the first week of school and didn’t let up until him and my girl cousin Pepper ran off together to California.

He was the Baptist preacher’s boy and learned a lesson while he was out there. After they got back he kind of faded into the background. But like Ms. Rosalie Russell always said in science class, nature despises a vacuum. When Cale straightened up, one of his former toadies, Harlan Ketchum, moved in and took over, and he was mean as a snake.

I swanny. Miss Becky worked the dishtowel around her hands. She flipped it over one shoulder and absently wiped them on the sides of her blue and white house dress that reached midway to her knotty old calves. Where do y’all figure to camp out?

I propped my head on one hand and watched a white-face cow slap her tail at a swarm of pestering flies beyond the smokehouse. I knew how she felt. Me and Judge O.C. Rains hated flies with a passion.

How about right down there by the old hog pen?

She glanced out the window toward what was left of the empty pen by the bobwire fence. Fine then, but y’all don’t chop up nothing but them rotten planks off the pen to make your fire. Leave the good ’uns. Your granddaddy might want them for something.

Mark crossed his eyes to be funny. It’ll be hotter’n blue blazes out there today. Why’re you wantin’ to go camping?

I didn’t tell him about the book. I’m bored. It’ll give us something to do.

That’s all you Parkers have is adventure. He swung his legs over the side of the cotton mattress.

Half an hour later we finished putting up a smelly old canvas tent. I don’t know why we need this. It’s too hot to breathe and there’s no way we’re gonna sleep in there tonight. Mark pulled his headband loose, pulled his hair back, and settled it back around his head.

My dog Hootie who’d been watching from the shade of a big bodark tree caught a scent and took off past the barn. The humid air was thick enough to cut with a knife and the only thing that broke up the blue bowl of sky was a couple of skinny little clouds off to the southwest.

What are you two up to?

I looked up to see Pepper standing back at the gate in her Sunday clothes. We hadn’t heard the car come up the red gravel drive. Her mama, Aunt Ida Belle, was talking to Miss Becky beside the porch. Hootie ran ahead to greet Pepper, wagging his tail and barking to beat the band.

Mark and I left our camp and met her at the fence fifty yards away. I seldom saw her in a dress. Ain’t you purty standing there in the weeds. Where you going?

My near-twin cousin rolled her eyes. Kiss my lily white ass. We’re going to town. Mama’s aunt is visiting from California and I have to go sit and look at that old lady for a couple of hours.

Standing there in a bright jersey pullover shift, she didn’t look like herself, softer and not as hard-edged.

She won’t let you stay here? Mark patted her head like she was a puppy.

She grinned and slapped at his hand. If it’d been me, she’d-a got mad, but they’d been making goo-goo eyes at one another since Mark showed back up. "No, dummy. Don’t you think I asked? I’m not interested in going to Aunt Earline’s house to sit on her plastic-covered couch and try not to get her white carpet dirty. I swear, I can’t stand that old woman."

Miss Becky and Aunt Ida Belle went inside at the same time Curtis Gaines popped up over the big red oak tree in the pasture. His Stearman crop duster was lower than I’d ever seen.

Afraid of the low-flying plane, Hootie made a bee-line for the house and slipped under the porch. Mr. Curtis was so low I could see him twisting around, busy with something behind him.

Whoo wee!

Mark whistled. Man, he’s low!

He’s going down!

The plane’s engine roared and started to climb, like Mr. Curtis does when he gets to the end of a field. He was spraying something right then, but it wasn’t the crop-dusting cloud I was used to seeing. Two thin streams of white vapor widened out overhead.

A white mist settled on us. Mark and I ducked and squinched our eyes shut.

Pepper covered her hair with both hands. Well, shit!

The mist fine as a cloud collected on my arms, but disappeared as quick as our breath in the winter. I rubbed my hair. What was that?

Well, it wasn’t cotton poison. Mark looked toward the bottoms where Mr. Curtis’ plane disappeared. "I know what that smells like, and this ain’t it."

I sniffed at my hand and arm. There was no odor at all. I wonder what he’s doing.

Probably running water through his tanks to clean ’em out and wanted to aggravate some kids. Pepper ran her hands over her clothes and hair. And he damn-sure did it.

The women came back outside before we could answer. Miss Becky looked up at the sky, probably to see the airplane, but it was long gone. There wasn’t anything up there but a couple of turkey buzzards spiraling high overhead, looking for something dead or dying.

Aunt Ida Belle waved her arm. Let’s go, hon.

Pepper looked like she was going to the electric chair and I could tell Aunt Ida Belle was getting frustrated with her daughter’s slow speed, walking like she had dead lice falling off of her. When she got in their old yellow Bel Air and slammed the door, Aunt Ida Belle started giving her the what-for as they backed up and drove away.

Chapter Three

Come on, baby. Curtis Gaines pulled back on the stick and cleared the trees at the end of his dirt runway. Despite a long flying career, he could never get past that pucker moment when the wheels of his Stearman left the ground and the air finally took hold of the biplane.

The Stearman growled toward the sky and he banked right, toward the Red River Bottoms north of Center Springs. The workhorse crop duster was as familiar to Curtis as his Chevrolet pickup. His heart was pounding with excitement, not from the job, but from the thousands of dollars tucked in his shirt.

He’d been flying the biplane since coming home from the Japanese Theater in the second World War, but for the first time in his life he had the money to put down on a new plane. The last year of the decade, 1969, was less than two months away, looking to be a banner year at the Gaines’ castle. He was even thinking of asking his girlfriend to marry him.

The two retrofitted canisters attached to the spray bar hung just beyond each wing’s aileron were much smaller than the standard setup mounted below the wings. They didn’t add any noticeable weight. The plane was light as a feather, an unusual feeling directly opposite of when he was spraying fields and loaded with liquid chemicals.

The wind was cooler on his face than at ground level and he breathed deeply. He flew to the western tip of Lake Lamar, Texas’ newest water impoundment. The blue, dragon-shaped lake quickly came into view. It was the starting point of the experiment funded by two men in dark suits from the Department of Agriculture waiting back at Curtis’ dirt airstrip, along with the remainder of his money.

He pushed the stick forward as he’d done tens of thousands of times and dropped fifty feet above the tree-lined lake, as instructed. He opened the valve and glanced backward, expecting to see the usual wide spread of thick mist, but this time there were only two streams of vapor stretching out behind.

Mr. Brown did most of the talking when they hired him that morning, but both well-dressed men told him not to expect the usual cloud. We’re testing air currents and water movement. We need you to drop low and spray the lake, then up along the river. The wind is from the northwest and we need to see which distribution method reaches Chisum first.

Won’t that be dangerous? Curtis had never been asked to do anything like that before. I don’t believe it’s a good idea to put chemicals in the water.

Blank-faced, Mr. Brown and Mr. Green exchanged glances. Mr. Green spoke up for the first time since they shook hands, talking around the ever-present cigarette in the corner of his mouth. These canisters don’t contain dangerous chemicals. They’re full of microscopic metallic particles our scientists call ‘Gold Dust.’ It will dissipate in the water without harming fish, animals, or humans. We have people at the pump station who will be testing for the particles to see how fast they reach Chisum. It’s all very scientific and as safe as Pepsodent.

Is it real gold?

No. That’s just what the eggheads in the research labs call it.

So there he was, flying only forty feet above the lake. The dam quickly came into view and he shut off the flow. He pulled the stick back and the plane rose. The boomerang-shaped dam quickly disappeared under the wings. He banked over the Sanders Creek bottoms toward Arthur City, Texas, five miles away.

His next target was the muddy, serpentine Red River.

Two gas stations and a country store on Highway 271 were his markers. He thought of the stories he heard when he was a kid of a bustling Arthur City before the turn of the century, perched on the edge of the river thick with runoff in wet weather. Wide in places and narrow in others, the river twisted like a snake between sandbars and hardwood-lined banks.

He banked into a sharp U-turn on the Oklahoma side of the river, buzzing the cluster of rough cinder-block gun and knife honky-tonks nicknamed Juarez. They looked worse than the trio of structures in Arthur City, and were the source of trouble and worry for both states.

When Curtis passed over the iron railroad bridge spanning the Red, he checked his altitude once again as instructed. At one-thousand feet, he followed the river west for four miles. The contents streamed out until he saw Palmer Lake in the distance. He pushed the lever into the Off position and relaxed.

His job was finished and he settled back to enjoy the flight, thinking of the Ag Rep’s explanation. It made sense that the light breeze would catch the particles and they could estimate the time it took to travel from the point of distribution to the county seat in Chisum twenty miles south.

Lots of potentially dangerous chemicals came out of Curtis’ nozzles in the course of a year and he’d always said the cotton poison and defoliants were dangerous to bugs, plants, and people alike, despite what the vendors said. This one seemed as safe as…what did they say?…toothpaste!

You’ll wonder where the yellow went when you brush your teeth with Pepsodent! Curtis checked his watch and grinned as he recalled the familiar commercial.

For the past two years it had become his habit to buzz Constable Ned Parker’s house after he finished a job so Ned’s grandson, Top, could wave. He felt sorry for the skinny, asthmatic youngster who reminded Curtis of himself when he was that age. He’d already decided to ask Ned if the boy could go up with him soon for a ride.

He winced when a sudden sharp pain lanced from his colon to knot his abdomen. Hissing, he tightened up, waiting for the familiar jolt to go away. They were getting fewer as the weeks passed, and he was thankful for that.

The polyps Dr. Heinz had removed were gone, but it was taking longer than he liked for his body to heal. Doc told him not to worry, that he’d been forced to be what he called more invasive than he’d planned, but the doctor had removed everything during the surgery that had posed a danger and said Curtis was well enough to fly.

The jolt passed and he relaxed. That one was much shorter than they’d been only a few days earlier. In the aftermath of that brief spasm, Curtis felt remarkably better.

He banked into another U-turn and bled off enough altitude to fly over Center Springs’ two country stores and domino hall. He wig-wagged the Stearman’s wings at the farmers, who stuck their heads from under the porch overhang at Neal Box’s rural general store. The Wilson boys jogged down the unpainted steps and waved their arms, pointing behind the crop duster.

Curtis frowned and twisted around to look over his shoulder. Twin streams of vapor stretched as far as he could see. Oh hell! Something was wrong and he forgot he’d been hurting only moments before.

He hit the shutoff valve again and again, but the streams continued uninterrupted. The unfamiliar equipment worried him from the start and he’d argued that they should use his spray rig, but the Ag Reps wouldn’t hear of it.

Damned low-bid government crap!

He reached under the dash, thinking it might be an electrical short. After jiggling the wires with his fingers, he twisted in the seat to peer over his shoulder at the flow that was much thicker than he expected. Curtis fought the malfunctioning equipment until he caught a flicker in his peripheral vision of drifting down to barely above the treetops. Ned Parker’s house appeared dangerously close off the point of his starboard wingtip.

"Jesus!" Muscle memory took control and Curtis pulled back the yoke, accelerating at the same time. The wasp junior Pratt and Whitney engine roared and the plane quickly regained altitude. He banked left over Sanders Creek and the pastureland beyond. When he was clear and in a safe zone, he thumped the solenoid, hoping it might close the valves.

When he glanced back up, he was too close to the tall oak trees again. Putting both hands on the yoke, he flew straight for several minutes, deciding what