Beast of Burden

WEGMAN OPENED ONE eye. Dust floated in morning's beams of light. The windows still lacked glass panes in his apartment above the store. His head throbbed, pain increasing as he recalled the events of the night before. Jimmy sloshing whiskey into his cup. Wegman betting his horse. The smug cattleman across the table laying down his cards. All night Wegman had dreamed of a pig with sad brown eyes. There were many things that Wegman Smith would rather forget.

Wegman heard the scuffle of boots on the porch and the jingle of the front door opening.

"Mornin', Weg!" Jimmy yelled. Jimmy thumped up the stairs, two steps at a time.

"Jimmy, I told you about fifteen times, don't you go barging into my property!" said Wegman. "I'll be down in a minute!" The stomping stopped briefly and then went back down in the same robust fashion as they had come.

A while later, when Wegman descended into the store, Jimmy leaned his torso across the counter, foot on the boot rail. The glaring white washed walls in the morning sun did nothing to help his head.

Wegman's shop of sparse clapboard walls measured fourteen feet square. It was a big store for a place like Ragtown. Wegman's large cast iron stoves sat in the corner. It was now the most expensive thing he owned.

Wegman scratched his eye and sighed. Jimmy's eyes seemed suspiciously cheerful this morning.

"Did you come for coffee?" asked Wegman. "Or did you come to talk about the fact I lost my horse?"

"Well, sure as shit isn't going to talk about the horse without coffee," said Jimmy, holding his tin mug out.

Wegman lit the stove. The smell of coffee filled the dusty air.

"I made it weak," said Wegman.

"Without my horse, I don't know when I'll be able to get more," he said. The closest rail road station was a two-hour ride away.

Jimmy grasped the mug with both hands, smile fading.

"Well friend, feel partly responsible egging you on but it seemed like you were having a hell of a time, you so rarely partaking of the drink. I thought it my duty as your friend to keep you going," said Jimmy.

"But what in tarnation were you thinking?"

"It doesn't matter now. It's done," said Wegman.

"Unless I can get a horse for my wagon, I can't retrieve supplies at the junction." Wegman turned to the window. In his drunken sadness or maybe anger he'd bet all his money and his nag. Everyone who had a horse out here needed it desperately. Getting another without cash was impossible.

"That's why I come over," Jimmy blurted. "When I went to sweep my porch this morning my cactus was all ate up."

"What?" asked Wegman, tilting his head. "Some drunkard from last night probably has needles all over his rear this morning. Wouldn't be the first time a cowboy lost a fight with a cactus."

Jimmy shook his head. "There weren't no boot prints. There were other prints though. Look like that over there." Jimmy pointed to the label on the canned peaches.

Jimmy licked a finger and drew in the dust on a window. Two ovals longer than they were taller joined at the side, an indentation where a stem once grew.

Wegman furrowed his brow.

"I seen that print before," said Jimmy. "Back in, I had this lieutenant who was always talking about how hospitable this here desert terrain was suited for our horses." Jimmy paused, going for drama.

Wegman pried open a wooden crate. "Out with it, Jim," said Wegman. "Molasses is faster than you telling a story."

"Now now," said Jimmy. "The point is, I heard from a buddy that this here lieutenant of mine got the War Department to send him thirty thousand dollars to fix his problem."

Wegman blinked hard at Jimmy. "And?"

"Camels!" Jimmy smacked the counter. His green eyes danced with mirth. "That lieutenant asked the army to send him camels! And that there outside my stoop — I reckon it was a camel hoof print."

Ignoring the fact that Wegman was now stocking a shelf he went on. "See that experiment went belly up what with the War between the States," explained Jimmy. "But they used them for riding on the count that camels don't need as much water as horses. When the Army quit on the program the soldiers just let them go. I suspect there's a camel 'round here free for them who needs it."

Wegman turned his head slightly in Jimmy's direction.

Jimmy smiled and raised his cup in thanks to Wegman's back. The door jingled as Jimmy went back over to the post office.

Wegman had been a major for the Georgia Sharp Shooters at Batalion. He was the only child of two Atlanta store keepers — a happy and loving family. Wegman could still feel the dry lips as his mother kissed his cheek. His batalion marched that day for Savannah. Her swollen brown eyes told him she'd already shed her tears for him. It was the last time he saw her.

Wegman felt awkward among the land-owning gentlemen in the officer corps. Despite their middle-class disdain, the batalion's generals soon found Wegman's mercantile skills useful. It was lack of supply not the Yankees beating the Confederacy. While other units starved, Wegman could haul corn meal and bullets back to outfit his companies. With each procurement, Wegman hated himself and the Confederacy more and more.

He valued order. The battlefield had none. The batalion carried the smell of blood and rot wherever they went. Wegman often confiscated supplies from starving families giving them useless Confederate bonds. He preferred not to remember the more vicious ways they'd had to acquire the things they needed.

The leadership knew the war was over long before the surrender. Killing and suffering dragged on and the South called it bravery and dedication to the cause. Wegman hated waste. To him that's what this war was.

Wegman ventured home to Atlanta after the surrender. Like all the others in town, a handshake filled his street. He hung around but there was no sign of his parents. He had no other family. He had status and he had money from the war.

What he didn't have was the will to surround himself with the remnants of the Confederate aristocracy. Any time he heard Gettysburg, Shiloh, or Tientament he could smell blood. The blank vastness of Texas appealed to him.

With a horse and a pack he set out on the road. His boots were new luxury after the war. For weeks along he rode toward the sunset. He liked it that way.

Around dusk one night he stumbled onto a small collection of buildings. He squinted in the darkness. He'd come across a few abandoned towns before. Kneeling down he ran his forefinger across the porch. It was clean. Whoever lived here was fast asleep. He'd introduce himself in the light of day.

Wegman walked toward some nearby trees. Below the treeline black water sparkled in the moonlight. Wegman shuffled in the dark, setting up his makeshift campsite under a large cedar. His small fire crackled. Wegman's eyelids grew heavy with sleep. This place felt like home.

The small outpost called Ragtown had a post office and not much else. Without a railroad to feed the town its growth was slow. Wegman befriended the owner of the clean stoop, Jimmy.

Jimmy's face was always red from either drink, desert sun or both. Wegman wondered how such a friendly man had ended up in such a lonely town. One of the unspoken rules was that you didn't ask about a man's past. If he wanted you to know he probably wouldn't have ended up here to begin with.

Yesterday Wegman had received a letter. A farmer had come to his parents' store looking for him. The farmer had found his family's store wagon under a bridge outside of Jonesboro. From the looks of it they'd been shot in the wagon. Wegman tried not to wonder whether the farmer found bodies or just the blood. Most likely hungry Union soldiers had attacked them when they refused to hand over their wagon filled with food and supplies. His parents had fled Atlanta only to be run over by Sherman's March to the Sea. Another cruel waste thought Wegman.

As he closed the letter an image of his mother reading the Bible came to mind. "Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap," she'd read in her southern drawl.

A man of routine Wegman waited until the store hours concluded. He calmly locked up the store and walked to the town's brand new saloon. He was going to get drunk.

In yellow paint the sign out front said Wegman's General Store.

Ten years ago he'd been annoyed at the missing apostrophe. It was Sunday and the town's new chapel attracted more people than ever.

Good for my business, thought Wegman. Unlike that new saloon.

The door jingled as a man and young woman entered the store.

The woman was plain but the man looked at her lovingly. Newly-weds thought Wegman.

Wegman collected the items the man requested — corn meal, coffee, lard.

"It was the strangest horse I've ever seen," said the woman. "It looked half-starved, poor thing."

"I told you love, I didn't see it," said the man. "I don't think you did either. It must be the desert sun playing tricks on you."

The woman huffed at her husband's dismissal. Wegman heard her say "I know what I saw" under her breath.

Wegman wrapped the parcels in burlap. He was used to folks talking as if he weren't there.

"Thank you for your business," said Wegman. "Say if I might ask, your wife, where did you see this strange horse?"

The husband rolled his eyes and spoke before she could. "She says it was out by that lake but I doubt she saw anything. Good day to you."

The husband turned to leave, gently steering his wife out of the door.

Again Wegman waited until store hours concluded. Looking around his eyes landed on a length of rope. Grabbing it, his pistol and the store key he set out to find the camel.

The lake was his favorite place. Cattle raisers, buffalo and the odd mustang often came here to water. It was the only dependable source for miles and yellow wildflowers grew plentiful around its waters.

Wegman's feet dragged and his heart pounded. Why am I out here? He stared out at the lake. In his mind his mother's face merged with the faces of the widows he had stolen supplies from during the war. He once had to take a pig from a skeletal woman. "We'll die without that," she'd pleaded. "There's nothing else." He'd kept saying. She'd clutched to the rope tied to the pig. Even something that small could feed ten soldiers. She was still holding it when she fainted after Wegman had threatened her with his pistol. He'd left her there. The rope he held now was similar, the plaited fibers rough to the touch.

Just then he noticed slow strange movement across the lake.

There it was. A tall horse drinking from the lake. He blinked. Was this real? The animal lifted its head higher. That long-necked beast was no horse. Wegman shaded his eyes against the setting sun.

He squinted in the dusk. A camel. It was really a camel.

First walking numbly, Wegman started to run.

About ten feet away, Wegman could see its profile was skinny in the way that all wild things are. It had golden tufts of hair. It drank peacefully from the lake. Wegman's hand reached for his pistol. His heart was beating so fast.

He didn't know what to do. He needed this animal but he was hardly a cowboy. Even if he were able to get a rope around it how would he get it home? Slowly the camel brought its head around to look at Wegman. Its large brown eyes blinked slowly. If he could just get this one thing the camel could save his business from ruin. He'd felt this sort of thrill of a challenge before and with its sadness flooded his heart.

Wegman turned away. He didn't want to look back. He couldn't take this thing and make it into another beast of burden. It had already escaped that fate once. He didn't want to be haunted by brown eyes. It was starting to get dark so he headed home.

THE NEXT MORNING he heard a clatter on his front step. Jimmy again. "Open up, Weg!"

When Wegman came down, Jimmy pressed his red face to the glass. Wegman opened the door to see not just Jimmy, but Wegman's horse tied to the store post.

Jimmy looked proud. "I know you were sad about losing your horse. So I won it back for you last night. That whole camel idea was ridiculous, anyway."

***

"Beast of Burden" was first published in Saddlebag Dispatches: Between Hell and Tombstone: Where Legends Are Forged in Silver and Lead (January 5, 2024).

A heartfelt thank you to editors Dennis Doty, Amy L. Cowan, and Anthony Wood for giving my fiction its very first home in print.