what they would require. Shifting into her whitest diction and demeanor, Rapture confused many of the merchants and shopkeepers, as well as the wily street traders. Others, like the Indians and the Spaniards, cared nothing about her ancestry or her plans—they had seen all sorts of people pass through and were concerned only for their own advantage.
Most of their purchases the Sitturds set aside to pick up later and some they arranged to have delivered to the Clutters’ doorstep, hoping to time their arrival back at the undertaker’s accordingly. Others they garnered some advance intelligence about, with the intention of returning to bargain more forcefully once they had a wagon and were ready to depart. The recognition that they had made it this far bolstered them both in their own ways, and the thrill and doubts about what lay ahead for them on the trail to Texas, and the possibilities of Micah’s property and a new life, filled both their heads with a new immediacy—a condition that was reflected in the weather, for the air was rich with the scent of rain.
Their conspiratorial sense of achievement was interrupted (at about the same time that Petrie was offering Hephaestus a cold-meat snack and proposing a price for a wagon and two draft horses that he himself owned) by an altercation in the main street. Mother and son had just dined on a pig-knuckle-and-collards revitalization purchased from an old cook wagon, when their attention was drawn to a row brewing between what looked like a heavyset young miscreant and a hardscrabble muleteer of indeterminate age.
On closer inspection, the muleteer proved to be female, but she had the posture and bearing of a man, and she appeared to have been interrupted in the midst of the same sort of supply-gathering errand they were on. Her hair was cut short under a flat storm-worn felt hat the color of dried blood. She wore the same kind of coat Lloyd had seen on the mail rider who passed through town earlier that morning, but with a store-bought shirt and pipe-leg trousers that contrasted sharply with her mud-flecked boots. There was a perceptible bulge under her coat, and, notwithstanding the straightness of her back, her hips seemed to lean as when a door needs a hinge tightened, so that even just standing she gave the impression of a swagger. Lloyd had never seen a woman with such a masculine aura. Rapture, sensing trouble they did not want to be a part of, pulled her son aside. But she, too, was curious, for the frontierish-garbed woman seemed to show no signs of concern, even as the young ruffian was joined by a foursome of shady comrades, one of whom cradled a bullwhip with a menacing gentleness.
“Hey there, sugar gal,” the meaty yokel gibed. “You want some help drinkin’ that?” He gave a phlegmy spit in the mud and laughed.
The woman dressed in man’s clothing had just added a small crate of what looked like whiskey bottles onto a horse-drawn cart loaded with sacks of rice, flour, and beans. She seemed to be ticking off items against a list in her head, not paying the question any mind. Her face was lined but expressionless, her thin, pointed jaw set, mouth tight-lipped, with a long sprig of chin hair brazenly jutting out. Both the Sitturds gathered that the hulking pupstart had been following her for a while, making increasingly unwanted overtures. There was a feeling of slow-burning animosity to the scene, and the other folk nearby either stopped to gawk or shuffled on faster, heads cast down.
“I need no help, sonny boy, as I’ve told you. Now get along and go do a man’s work.”
“Bet you know ’bout that,” the boor bellowed. “Look like you piss standin’ up!”
His fellows joined in his unsavory mirth. Rapture cringed, feeling a sympathetic twinge of female loyalty and fear. Lloyd wondered where the woman’s menfolk were, and why none of the other people around showed any signs of standing up for her. The woman herself showed no sign of alarm—just like Hattie. Only growing annoyance.
“At least I don’t need help when I do,” the woman replied, and finished stowing and securing the cart without so much as a glance at her provoker.
The Sitturds’ stomachs turned at this, for they saw that the men all stepped closer as a ripple of jeers spread around the ring they formed.
“Hey, Josh. I think this bearded lady is sassin’ you!” the one with the bullwhip said, chuckling.