The Whippoorwill Trilogy - Sharon Sala Page 0,160

Eulis could tell that she wasn’t going to get off that pity horse unless he dragged her. As badly as he hated to get close to her again, he held his breath and waded back in the water.

Letty staggered when he grabbed her by the wrist and started pulling at her. She kept rubbing her eyes with her hand and bending over to puke, only there was nothing left to come up.

When she could catch her breath, she begged for him to stop.

“Eulis… wait. I can’t walk in these clothes.”

He frowned, then took a knife out of his pocket and started cutting at the cloth.

Letty screamed and started grabbing at herself. “What do you think you are doing?”

“Taking off your clothes so you can walk.”

“You can’t do that! They’ll be ruined.”

“Hellsfire, Sister Leticia, they’re already ruined.”

She ignored the sarcasm as she swatted at his hand. “What are you talking about!”

Eulis paused. “The smell. It ain’t never gonna come off the clothes, and it’ll be a while before it comes off of you.”

“Smell? What smell?” Letty asked.

Eulis gawked. She had to be kidding. Then he realized that if her eyes were swelled shut, she’d probably gotten it square in the face, which meant that the smell had so overpowered her senses that they were most likely damaged. On the one hand, that was unfortunate, but on the other she wouldn’t be likely to be complaining about farts anymore.

“You got skunked,” he said. “Real good… or I guess I should say, real bad. It swelled up your eyes some and that’s what’s makin’ you sick. That will pass, but you’re gonna stink for a while.”

Having diagnosed her situation, he ripped off the last of her dress, leaving her standing in her bloomers and a short shift that covered most of her top parts.

Letty, on the other hand, was so shocked by what he’d said that she didn’t even object when he ripped away the last of her clothes.

“It was a skunk? That’s what I heard in the bushes? That’s what did me in?”

“I reckon so,” Eulis said, and tossed her clothes into the brush. They were too wet to burn and their camp was across the creek, so the smell shouldn’t bother them much. Letty’s presence, on the other hand, was going to be a hindrance to a good night’s sleep.

Letty groaned and then gagged. “I still wish you’d just shoot me.”

“I can’t,” Eulis said.

“I know… I know. You don’t have the guts.”

Eulis glared, although the emotion was wasted on Letty since she couldn’t see his face.

“No, ma’am that’s not it at all. It ain’t from lack of guts, I just don’t have a gun.”

His answer was as rude as a slap to the face. Just as she was about to give him a piece of her mind for making light of her plight, her stomach turned on itself and she began gagging all over again.

Eulis cursed beneath his breath, tightened his grip on her wrist, and pulled.

“Follow me, and for once, don’t argue. We’re goin’ back across the creek. You’re gonna lay down and be quiet while I cook us some supper. Then—”

It was the word supper that did her in. She bent all the way over until her forehead was nearly touching her knees and puked until she finally passed out.

Eulis thought about leaving her where she’d dropped, and then realized he couldn’t do that again. Like it or not, he was responsible for her welfare.

He tried to pick her up, but he’d spent too many years lifting nothing heavier than a full bottle of whiskey. Not even his intermittent jobs of grave-digging had prepared him to be able to lift Sister Leticia’s dead weight. So he grabbed her by the wrists, dragged her off the bank, back into the creek, and then out the other side. By the time he got her to the camp sight, she was covered in a thin layer of dirt which was rapidly turning to mud and doused with a second layer of grass and leaves.

He retrieved the firewood and quickly built a fire so that she wouldn’t catch cold, then covered her up with one of their blankets. It was a shame to use it because the smell would stick to it, too, but he could hardly leave her there to catch pneumonia and die. Like it or not, they were in this together.

Later, after the fire had burned down some, Eulis cooked up a piece of fat back and made a pan