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John Peters Ringo dabs the last of the fried chicken grease from his mustache and stands. “That was some damn fine chicken, Sheriff. This next patrol will go hell of a lot easier with that in my belly.”
Sheriff Miller chuckles. “I’ll let the Missus know. Maybe she can teach Belle how she makes it.” Johnny grins at the mention of his bride. He still wasn’t sure how he’d managed to snag the beautiful rancher’s daughter. From the moment he’d ridden into town, she’d made her intentions plain to marry and bed him, without much regard for the order. His new father-in-law had welcomed him with open arms and was already teaching him how run the ranch, not just the cattle. Maybe Texas really was the place for a new start. Johnny’s exhaustion betrays him as his thoughts drift, and his gait falters slightly as he settles his hat on his head. “You know what, Johnny?” the Sheriff's words stop him, and he turns his head back to see his boss’ face. “You’re dead on your feet. I can handle anything that comes up till Buck gets back. You go on home to that pretty little wife of yours.”
“Yessir,” Johnny replies eagerly, already dreaming of sinking into the luxurious feather bed while running his hands up and down Belle’s silky-soft skin. “Good night.”
Johnny’s horse knows the way, and so he gives her a loose rein. He just closes her stall door back in their little shed when he hears a shriek, followed by another. “Belle?” He skids out of the shed, and listens. Another scream, definitely coming from his cozy little cabin. Johnny runs, hell for leather, and bursts through the door. The noise had stopped. His shotgun at the ready, Johnny’s eyes search every inch of the little kitchen and sitting room but find nothing. “Belle?” he hisses. He proceeds to the door to their little bedroom and kicks it open so that he can keep his shotgun poised.
His wife Belle stares at his frame in the door with wide eyes, the duvet pulled hastily around her body. Behind her on the bed, naked as the day he was born, is Reverend Smith. Johnny blinks. The screams - surely Belle had been being assaulted? “Come here, Belle, you’re safe now.” Instead of running to the safety of her husband, Belle stays where she is, her eyes wild. Ok , Johnny reasons. She’s scared . “Reverend, you keep your hands where I can see them, and you get away from my wife.”
Reverend Smith looks down at Belle, who glances back at him, and then moves towards the handsome young minister, her body shielding his. “Belle?” Johnny repeats, his voice wavering. “Preacher?” he questions, his breath coming heavy as the realization overtakes him. A million puzzle pieces snap together in Johnny’s swimming head - his father-in-law’s barbs to Belle about Johnny being far better than her last suitor, the way the minister always sought Belle out at church functions, her long visits to the parsonage to cook and housekeep until the minister found a bride, the rumors he’d heard when he first got here. Raising his shotgun towards the minister’s chest and sighting down the barrel, Johnny demands. “Preacher, you get off that damn bed right now. Belle, you get down low.” She seems to obey, but stays planted on the bed.
“How long?” Johnny chokes out, his eyes pleading with his wife to deny it.
“Two and half years,” Belle whispers, unable to meet her husband's eyes.
Johnny recoils from the words like a physical blow. “Long before you ever got here, Deputy.” The reverend finally speaks. “But her father wouldn’t let us marry.”
“Preacher?” Johnny implores, one more time, searching the minister’s face for a shred of remorse or guilt, and finding only defiance and contempt. Johnny’s shotgun roars, and Belle cries out, “John, no!” as she rises up in front of her lover again.
Her chest erupts in red as the shell tore through her and the reverend. Johnny drops the shotgun and pulls his pistols, emptying both into the dying man of the cloth.
Johnny’s body works automatically as a series of memories plays in his frenzied mind.
Johnny is ten. He’s known for a long time that, no matter the infraction, his mama always gives him twice as many blows with the switch as any of his fair-haired siblings. He can’t reason it out. He’s not the oldest (that’s Annie at 14) or even the first boy (that’s James at 12), and the pranks are rarely his idea. This time it was something with a flattened frog that James found and they took into the church with them to scare the girls. The other reason he knows about the disparity is that Mama always makes them count the blows out loud.
“Fifteen!” Johnny cries out, through his tears. James had only gotten ten, and Michael five (he’s 7). “Mama, please,” Johnny begs. “James found the frog, and you only hit him 10 times.”
She doesn’t answer, only continues until twenty, when Johnny loses his grip on the back of the chair and collapses on the floor. Her lips are a thin line when Johnny looks up at her with pleading eyes. “I see the devil in you, John. Them last five were for talking back, and I reckon there’s five more if you’re still in my sight in a minute.”
It’s Pa who picks Johnny up with a brusque, “that’s enough, Mary.” He doesn’t apologize or explain, but he does pat the side of Johnny’s face with his rough hand and whisper “Good night, Johnny,” after he helps him to bed. “I love you, son.”
Johnny is twelve. James and Pa are off on a trip, and Mama assigns Johnny and Annie to take the younger children on the church picnic. Mama begs off with one of her headaches. Johnny woke up a little feverish that morning and he asks if he can stay home and rest, too, but Mama chases him out of the house with a glare. They’ve barely been there an hour when Johnny’s stomach does a somersault, and he just makes it to some bushes before he’s retching up his breakfast. The Sunday school teacher and the schoolmaster drive him back home in the wagon, assuring him that they’ll make sure that his brothers and sisters get home safe. Mr. Shelton, the Sunday school teacher, offers to help him into the house, but Johnny declines - he’s almost a man, he can get inside on his own. As he stumbles down the hall to fall into his bed, he hears the squeaking of his parent’s bed, and his mother’s voice keening as she calls out the name “John!” repeatedly. Momentarily confused, he replies “Mama?” and peeks into the bedroom.
His brain can barely comprehend the scene. His mother on her back, with his father’s best friend naked between her legs. John Kidd, a deacon of the church, Pa’s best friend. John Kidd, a man who has been in and out of Johnny’s entire life, always either preceding or following the Ringos as they move from town to town. John Kidd, a man with dark intense eyes and black hair.
Johnny is still twelve the next week when he sees the deacon at church, and the deacon stares back, daring Johnny to speak. He uses Annie’s hand mirror that same day to stare in horror at his own reflection and see John Kidd’s features reflected back. Pa must know, Johnny thinks, but if he does, he doesn’t show it. If anything, Pa favors Johnny, and that makes Johnny’s insides twist again. He’s only twelve when he comprehends that he is living, breathing proof of his mother’s sin.
Johnny is still twelve when he asks the schoolmistress, Miss Rose, and the Sunday school teacher, Mr. Shelton, what he should study if he wants to be a minister. Maybe, Johnny reasons, being a minister is enough penance to make up for what he is. Miss Rose is particularly delighted, and he discovers she went to a place called Mount Holyoke College. Johnny comes to school early and stays late most days, exchanging cleaning and repairing the schoolhouse for her tutelage. He expects his mother to be angry that he’s not at home, but she mainly seems relieved. Pa encourages him, buying books that Johnny finds slipped into his boots or under his hat when Pa returns from his trips back east. Learning Latin is his favorite part of all, as he watches Miss Rose’s perfect rosebud lips carefully pronounce the dead language.
Johnny is thirteen when his heart gets broken the first time. He enters his classroom, eager for this morning’s Latin lesson, but the Latin book isn’t out on the desk. Miss Rose is standing at a window, looking out at the other children playing in the yard before the bell rings. “Miss Rose?” Johnny asks hesitantly.
“John.” She turns from the window with one of her bright, encouraging smiles, but it doesn’t reach her eyes. “Come sit down.”
A lead weight fills Johnny’s stomach. “What’s wrong, ma’am?”
“Mr. Shelton has proposed to me.” she begins.
“That’s wonderful, ma’am.” Johnny lies politely. It’s not like he really thinks that he, more than ten years her junior, could ever court her. And he likes Mr. Shelton, even if the man is sometimes quick with a switch. “Isn’t it?”
“It’s a good match. I haven’t any family or fortune. But the school board won’t let me teach once I’m married, Johnny.”
“Oh.” Johnny is embarrassed when he feels moisture dampen his eyes.
Johnny sits through the wedding next to his father, and he’s surprised when Miss Rose - now Mrs. Shelton - hands him a package at the picnic after the wedding. It’s wrapped in fancy paper, and she beams at him as he opens it and traces his fingers over the gilt lettering on the side of each volume: Virgil , Horace , Ovid . “Just because I’m not your schoolteacher any more doesn’t mean we can’t have tea and read Latin sometimes.” She explains. Then Mr. Shelton appears at the table and grabs her arm to pull her away.
He only goes for tea once. The Sunday after Miss Rose explains that Mr. Shelton only wants him to come over when he can join them, too, and Johnny can’t ignore the bruises he sees when she adjusts the sleeves of her dress. At church, Johnny watches every Sunday as Miss Rose becomes a shadow of her former self, with dark circles under her eyes, and bruises on her wrists and then eventually her neck the size of a man’s hand. The week before his family moves away, the funeral is announced. Miss Rose fell down the stairs and broke her neck, the story goes, but Johnny can’t even look at the murderer standing up there, teaching Sunday school and pretending to be a man of God. A righteous God, Johnny thinks, would smite Mr. Shelton where he stands.
Johnny is fourteen. He’s leaning against the polished wood of their wagon as the sun hangs low in the west. The wagons have circled for the evening. His mother and several other women are hard at work at the cookfires, while the younger children play under the watchful eyes of Annie and a few others. Johnny spots his brother James hanging on a nearby wagon, flirting with a girl with long blonde braids.
“We’re going to do a patrol,” Johnny hears over his shoulder, and he takes a few short steps to see the men on the outside of the circle.
Pa’s head is poking out from the wagon. “I’ll get my shotgun and join you.” He glances up and spots Johnny. “John, you want to join us?”
Johnny is eager to prove himself, and takes the rifle his father hands down. Puffing his chest a little, Johnny joins the small cluster of men and teenage boys. They’re waiting for his father, and so all watching him climb down from the wagon when his foot slips, he stumbles to the ground, and his shotgun goes off with a deafening crack.
Johnny cannot tear his eyes away from the horror. A ragged entry wound mars Pa’s right cheek and the top of his head is gone.
For three days, Johnny doesn’t speak. During the hasty memorial service and burial, while everyone around him prays, Johnny can’t form the words. While the rest of the wagon train murmurs words of comfort to his mother and siblings and tells them to trust in the Almighty, Johnny rages and seethes inside his head. On the fourth day, with the cookfires lit again as the sun sets, Johnny wanders off. Away from the wagon train, he pulls out the bottle of whiskey Pa hadn’t gotten to finish, sits down against a tree, and begins pouring the alcohol down his throat. In between swallows, he curses God with every invective he can come up with before he sinks into blackness. By the time he comes to, he’s back in a wagon, the steady movement making his stomach tumble and lurch, and he barely stumbles to a bucket before violently retching.
Johnny is fifteen. California isn’t so bad, he muses, as he sits up taller in the saddle and whistles for the cow dog. He’s made a friend, Billy, and Billy got him a job working on his uncle’s ranch. This is his first long ride, and Johnny’s trying to hide his excitement from the older more experienced cowboys. Just as his dog rounds up the last few strays, Johnny hears it.
“Johnny!” Pa shouts. Johnny freezes in the saddle, and his horse stills. “Johnny, I need you!” Pa’s dead, Johnny’s rational mind insists, but the voice comes again. “Johnny!”
The voice is closer now, lower, almost a whisper. “Johnny,” Pa repeats over and over. Johnny drops the reins to cover his ears, but it doesn’t make any difference. The voice continues, but now Johnny has muffled all other sounds but this one inside his head, calling his name over and over in his dead father’s voice.
“Johnny!” a different voice calls, and Johnny Ringo squeezes his eyes shut.
“Please stop,” he begs under his breath, as the two voices now chant his name. He fights the tears that are threatening to fall, before startling as a hand comes down on his.
“You okay, Ringo?” Billy asks, clear concern in his eyes.
Johnny shakes his head a little, fearful, but the voice of his father has stilled. “Yeah, I just…I think maybe the sun was getting to me,” he lied.
“Yeah, you gotta watch that,” his friend nods in agreement.
Johnny is sixteen. He’s back from another cattle ride, his pockets flush with cash, when he rides up to his mother’s front porch. He’s heard his Pa’s voice a few more times, but he’s learned that a few shots of whiskey will quiet the sounds and dampen the rushing in his head, so he carries a flask with him. Sometimes he does the shots before the voices start, if his head is feeling particularly woolly.
There’s a strange black mare in the pen, as well as a brown gelding. Johnny dismounts, puts out fresh hay and checks the water trough. His spurs jangling, Johnny ascends the front porch steps and comes face-to-face with John Kidd.
“Johnny,” Kidd says. “We’ve been waiting for you.”
“Sir,” Johnny replies, the honorific almost catching with the bile in his throat. Johnny holds the door for Kidd to enter the house, on edge.
The sitting room is full: all of his siblings, his brother-in-law, and a few of the neighbors. Johnny realizes there’s a preacher standing in front of the fireplace. The minister nods at Johnny and then at Kidd, and Annie plays a few notes on the piano.
Johnny’s mother enters the room then, a small bouquet in her hands, and Johnny realizes with horror that he has arrived just in time for his mother’s wedding to her lover John Kidd. His eyes bounce from person to person, incredulous. He suddenly feels his heart pounding in his head, and he has to get out of this room. Out of this house. He pushes past the neighbor man leaning on the sitting room door frame, and he’s out the door like a shot. Sweating, shaking, and gasping for air, Johnny Ringo clenches his eyes shut as his heart beats a staccato rhythm against his ribcage. Hands on his knees, fine black hair hanging in his eyes, Johnny doesn’t even hear the footsteps until he feels a hand on each shoulder.
“You all right, son?” The minister inquires,concerned. Johnny can only shake his head, and the minister continues to hold his shoulder, clearly uncertain of what to do.
On his left, John Kidd glowers. “You get back inside immediately. You’re embarrassing your mother, boy.” He grabs Johnny's shoulder roughly, yanking him towards the house and Johnny spins away.
“Embarrassing my mother?” Johnny sputters. “She wasn’t too embarrassed to fuck you behind my Pa’s back for fourteen years! She wasn't too embarrassed to be your whore!” Kidd’s backhand almost knocks Johnny off his feet, but he recovers and spits in his biological father’s face. When Kidd lunges for him again, Johnny dodges. Spitting venom, he bares his teeth. “You ever lay a hand on me again, and I’ll put a bullet between your eyes.”
“John Peters Ringo.” He hadn’t heard his mother’s approach. “That is no way to speak to your father.”
“My father is dead,” Johnny screams, and he steps menacingly towards Kidd.
“All right, son,” The minister grabs Ringo from behind and pulls him back. “Hush now.” Ringo’s head is so full of static that he allows the clergyman to stop him, collapsing around the strong arms that are holding him in place. He’s panting, unable to catch his breath, and he closes his eyes to try to refocus.
When Johnny reopens his eyes, it’s just him and the minister. “I’m going back inside, son,” the reverend says softly.
“You’re still going to marry them?” Johnny asks through gritted teeth.
“Whatever sins they may have committed in the past, they…” Johnny has heard enough. He turns his back on the minister in disgust. Tonight, when everyone else is asleep, he’ll break in and gather his few belongings. Tomorrow, he’ll be gone.
Johnny is twenty-two. His satchel contains his Latin books and a few clothes. He glances at the bloody bodies of his wife and her lover and feels the old familiar rushing in his head. The delicate gold cross Belle has always worn glints in the lowlight, and Johnny snarls. Ripping the matching crucifix from the chain on his neck and the silver deputy’s star from his shirt, he throws both on the feather bed, followed by a lit match.