The Butterfly - James M. Cain [17]
We got moving fast, then. She went inside, put on a coat, and went through Belle's bag for all the medicine that was in it. I went back to where Jane had been listening at the window, and told her she was to stay there with Danny no matter how long we were gone. Then I had her help me move Kady's bed on the truck, with sheets and all like it was, because in that shack was nothing but a dirt floor, and even if we weren't allowed to move her she had to have something to lay on. By then Kady was ready and got in and Moke got in. But all that time I had been thinking about what he had said, and the more I thought about it the more it didn't make any sense. "What's that you said about her trying to kill you?"
"You deef and can't hear me?"
"I asked you something."
"She crept in there while I was asleep. I don't know where she came from. First thing I knew somebody was slashing at me with a knife."
"I don't see any cuts on you."
"You will on the dog."
"What dog?"
"Birdie Blue's puppydog, that was out when I got home, and that I brung in for company. He was laying close to me, where I was sleeping on the gunny sacks, and he took the first stab and maybe some more. She stabbed like a wild woman, and when she felt the knife go in she thought she had me till I wrestled her off and the blood begun coming out of her mouth."
"Why did she do this?"
"I don't know."
"Come on, don't lie to me."
"Suppose you ask her."
There was no asking her anything, though, by the time we got there. By putting one side of the truck on the path and letting the other side bump, I got pretty close to the shack, and she was still laying on the floor, but two or three people from the hollow were there by that time with lanterns, and they were trying to get her up and move her. So the way Kady explained it to me, that was the worst thing in the world, so we stopped it and had those people carry the bed up, and the door was too small for it, but they began putting it up outside, and used the loose log, the one Wash and I had pushed out of the way, to wedge it up level. Then Kady rolled up a sheet to the middle, and laid it down beside Belle, and shoved the rolled part under her, then unrolled it, and we all helped lift and at last she was off the floor and on a bed. But the blood that was in a puddle on the other side of her, and the dead dog that was laying in the middle of it, you could see all that, and the blood began to run in a stream toward the door, and stunk, and it was a mess. So I told one of those people to take the dog out and bury it, and get started washing out the blood, but Kady said quit worrying about that, and get started after the ice. So I burned the road to the hotel, and called Wash, and told him to get a doctor out there, and told the man on the desk I wanted some ice, and be quick about it, so he hopped pretty lively. Because the last thing I did when I left the cabin on the way to the hollow was to strap on my .45 that hung across from my rifle, and there's nothing like having a six-shooter on you to get action when you want it.
The rest of the night was like a whirl-around dream you have when you're sick, with the doctor giving her some kind of stuff to inhale, and Kady tearing up sheets to make bags for the ice, and more and more people from the hollow standing around, watching what was going on and giving help whenever it was wanted. What they had heard when Belle and Moke were having it there in the dark, before he came to my place, if they heard anything at all, I don't know, but by the time Wash got there with the doctor the dog was gone and the knife was gone and nothing was said about anybody trying some killing. All the doctor saw was a woman bleeding from lung trouble, and so far as what was said to him went, that's all there was. Around daylight he got the bleeding stopped, and went home, but before he went he called Kady off to one side, and Wash and I drifted over to hear what he said to her.
"You're Mrs. Tyler's daughter, miss?"
"Yes, I am."