Read Online Falling From Horses by Molly Gloss - Free Book Online Page B

was blood in my eyes. Now that the fight was finished, I had feeling all over my body, throbbing pain in my shoulders and arms, my hands, my neck. Every breath hurt. I lay down for a while, my bloody cheek resting on the dirt, and maybe I even slept for a few minutes. Woke up with a jerk, thinking those two guys were walking up on me again, but I was alone.
    I was so stiff I had a hard time climbing to my feet. I went over to the little rill of water and gingerly washed my face—I had cuts on my eyebrow and chin that had already scabbed up, and this got them bleeding again. I felt around inside my mouth to make sure I had all my teeth. The inside of my lip was torn, so when I took a drink of water it tasted of salt and iron. My hands were bloodied and swollen. I soaked them a while, and then I rolled up my shirtsleeves and washed the dried blood off both elbows. I was bruised and sore all over, and it felt like I might have a cracked rib. When I looked through my duffle bag I found I was missing a few things—a pair of socks, a razor, things they must have pocketed before the fight started—but my dad’s old spurs were still there, wrapped in a rag at the bottom of the sack. So they hadn’t made off with anything important. It could have been worse. I had wakened thinking about Arlo Gantz, who had given me the Hamley saddle, and regretting that I had sold it, but if I’d had the saddle with me the bums might have picked it up quietly and walked off without bothering to rummage through my duffle. Even if they didn’t know the worth of a Hamley, they would know that a guy sleeping outside wasn’t likely to own anything more valuable than his saddle.
    I pulled on my boots and lay down with my hat and duffle resting on my chest, but I didn’t sleep. I didn’t have a plan for the coming day, but I wasn’t drawn to the idea of walking around the Gulch again, looking for work on an empty stomach and sore feet. On the other hand, I knew if I stayed there and tried to sleep off the fight, I’d be jerking awake every few minutes for fear somebody was coming at me again.
    The day had already warmed, and I could see some sunlight at the top of the ridge, so after a while I stood and limped my way up there, found the road again, sat down beside the pavement, and waited until a bus came along on its way down to town.
    I hadn’t had anything to eat since that bowl of chili with Lee Waters the day before, so I got off somewhere along Western, walked to the first diner I saw, and spent most of the money I had left on coffee and a short stack. I sat on the stool for quite a long time afterward, moving crumbs around in the last dab of syrup, until the waitress made a point of picking up the plate and wiping off the counter underneath it. By then the studio offices on Gower Street were open, so I limped around to the same ones I’d been to the day before.
    My face all beat to hell like I’d been in a bar fight didn’t improve my prospects any, and by noon I had run out of doors to knock on. I walked by a few men standing in the shade, leaning against lampposts, trying to look as if they were waiting for a limo to pick them up, and I tried doing that too. But finally I hobbled over to Western Avenue and caught a bus back up into Griffith Park.

7
    LEE WATERS HAD TOLD ME to look out for a dirt road with an arch over it, which was the ranch gate for the stables, but I was slumped down in the seat, half asleep and not paying much attention, until the bus driver called back to me, “You getting off at Diamond?” I guess I didn’t look like I was headed up to the observatory to look at stars. I said, “Yeah,” and he pulled the bus over where a dirt road poked back into a side canyon. The ranch sign didn’t have any lettering on it, just a big diamond carved into the flattened face of a log.
    It was half a mile up the road to the Diamond Barns corrals and sheds,