It were a sight harder followin’ sign here than it had been earlier, too. Dead leaves an’ pine needles lay thick over the road ’most everwhere I looked. Still, them three horses an’ a mule couldn’t help but leave some marks of their passin’. And a good hard rain the night before had made the sand more inclined to hold its shape whenever I got a chance to see it. But it weren’t until I come into this open place at the crest of a ridge some two, three miles further on that I had any idea how far ahead them riders was, or what they was up to.
There was a fork in the road here, with the left branch headin’ southeast towards Newnansville and then on to Gainesville some fifteen mile beyond. I’d traveled that way a couple months before, whilst I was huntin’ work or some other means of puttin’ change in my pockets.
The second road led more south, and I’d heard it caught up with a old stage route from Newnansville to the railroad at Arredonda, and then past it to the town of Micanopy.
It was mid-afternoon now, and there’d been enough traffic since daybreak so that it took me some several minutes to sort through all the tracks at that crossroads and locate the ones I’d been followin’. Turned out when I did, they wasn’t headed for Newnansville a-tall. They’d took the right-hand fork towards Micanopy, and near as I could tell they was maybe two, three hours ahead of me by this time.
I happened to notice in passin’ that the gent an’ lady in the surrey had went the other way, and it almost made me sorry to see they had. I’d been half thinkin’ about meetin’ up with them folks someplace along the road, just long enough to explain to ’em that I wasn’t no drunkard, and maybe offer a opinion or two about what I thought of travelers who’d leave a man layin’ hurt on the ground, and go makin’ spiteful comments about him to boot.
But what I’d got to say to them two weren’t near as important as the business I’d got with Lila and her compadres. So I pointed my feet to the south just soon as I’d got finished makin’ certain of their trail.
A two-, three-hour lead weren’t hardly nothin’ over a long day’s trek like this. Their mounts would be needin’ to stop and rest a heap more than I would, and to graze too, sooner or later. That’s why a man afoot in tolerable good condition can run down just about any horse in time. You could ask the Apaches about that, or some of their Mex Injun neighbors who never did bother learnin’ to ride.
’Course I knew I wasn’t makin’ anything like the kind of speed a Indian might. I hadn’t much practice travelin’ on shank’s mare lately, and I weren’t accustomed to it. Besides, I didn’t know no Injun alive who’d be fool enough to wear riding boots whilst he were a-hoofin’ it. Though I meant to keep mine on, I’d got to admit they was something of a hindrance.
But I figured I’d catch up to them three before morning, regardless. They’d be wantin’ to make camp for the night somewheres, soon or late. And without no particular worries about what was on their back trail, I expected they might do it early, leavin’ theirselves plenty of time to fix a meal and settle in comfortable before it got too dark to see good.
Me, I hadn’t no plans for doin’ any of those things until I’d got my outfit and my Ole Roan horse back. An’ that there was enough of a thought to keep me hikin’ right steady an’ purposeful through the afternoon, blisters or no blisters.
When I was maybe two, three hours further along that south fork, still not seeing much in the way of folks except a occasional farmer with his mule way off in a field, I begun to hear this peculiar clatterin’ and clankin’ noise comin’ up the road behind me. It was kind of faint at first, but kept gettin’ louder an’ louder by the minute. Nearest thing I could liken it to was some kind of a altercation between two bull gators in a li’l ole kitchen shack piled high to the rafters with pots an’ pans.
I was out amongst some open rolling fields by this time, without no proper cover for a mile or better in any direction. There wasn’t no question of hidin’, even if I’d a notion that clankin’, creakin’ she-bang were something needed hidin’ from. And I’d a pretty fair idea it weren’t. Nothin’ what made that kind of a racket was goin’ to ever get close enough to do nobody harm, without their havin’ plenty of warnin’ and time to take measures to protect theirselves first.
But I was growin’ almighty curious to find out what it was. So I kept slowin’ my steps and peekin’ back over my shoulder, until finally I just stopped altogether and waited alongside the road whilst that unruly contraption come over the top of the rise behind me.
3
IT WERE A MULE-DRAWED WAGON, the like of which I hadn’t never seen in all my borned days. The bottom part appeared to be somethin’ like one of them Conestoga cargo carriers what folks out west took to callin’ prairie schooners. Except it was made out of cypress, and smeared with black tar everplace around the cracks. Up above, instead of a canvas cover, was what looked to be one of them box-top medicine show rigs I’d come acrost a time or two here an’ yonder. The fact it was painted all over in bright reds an’ greens an’ yellows sort of helped that last impression along.
But then the owner or somebody had added a assortment of special touches what just made a fellow pause and scratch his head.
First, the back wheels was a deal bigger’n you’d expect on a rig like that, real wide at the rims and almost tall as a man was high. It made a kind of sense I reckon, for travelin’ through these Florida swamps and the deep sand hereabouts. But it give the outfit a kind of a funny, lopsided look, like maybe the wagon body had got itself drenched in a rain so it shrunk up between them outsized wheels.
The varnished roof had this fancy trim what stuck out several inches all around, cut with ever manner of twists an’ curlicues like you’d see on some big house in the city. And hangin’ from each loop an’ cranny of that there carvin’ was the mixed-up-est assortment of fryin’ pans, coffee pots, lanterns, kettles, tin plates, cups, bottles and other gew-gaws that anybody ever seen. They rattled an’ crashed and banged together ever time them two black mules took a step, causin’ a big part of the noise I’d been hearin’ for the past half hour without guessin’ what it was.
On either side of the driver’s seat was a couple wood cabinets, and the stuff inside there seemed to be makin’ noise too, along with who knew what-all might be in the wagon proper. And then to top it off, when this rig pulled up alongside me to give the mules a blow from climbin’ that last hill, I seen some other little doors in the body, and this window what appeared to have a mechanical music box behind it. I could make out pipes, drums, chimes, and even a ole steel-stringed banjo through the dusty glass, each part shakin’ and chinkin’ and bangin’ together to beat the band.
I mean anybody would of had to smile. And though I’d turned halfway round to keep the driver from seein’ the grin comin’ acrost my face, I couldn’t help but take just one more little peek back over my shoulder to make sure I’d really seen what I seen.
And that’s when I lost it en-tire.
I was bent over at the waist, a-whoopin’ and a-guffawin’, throwin’ my arms up in the air and slappin’ my knees, till the tears run down my cheeks and my sore ribs clutched up so’s I couldn’t hardly breathe. Afterwards I just hunkered down beside the road for a bit, clutchin’ at my sides and grinnin’ between gasps, while the driver climbed down from his perch and ambled over to have a look at me.
“Something troubling you, friend?” His voice was kind of mild and gentle when he asked the question, but I could tell right off that he weren’t finding near as much amusement in the situation as I was. I sat back on my heels and pushed my hat off my forehead to study him better.
He was kind of a short, heavy-set gent, dressed in what appeared to be a right fine store-bought suit, but with the coat off now and the vest unbuttoned on account of the heat. When he lifted up his black stove-pipe hat to dab at the sweat