Whatever We Have To

The Ballad of Abigail Lambert: Chapter 3

Abigail, age 13, laid on her belly upon the floor of the bedroom she shared with her brother. In front of her rested a canvas, with a few cups of different color paints beside her. As her brush glided up, down and around the canvas, the portrait of a butterfly in blue was beginning to take shape. It was then that her father, Roscoe, entered the room.

“Abigail?”

“Yes, Daddy?” She continued to paint, her gaze locked to the painting.

“Where’s your brother?”

“I remember him saying someth—“

“Look at me when I’m speaking to you.” He said. She turned to him.

“He said he was working in the barn.”

“What’s this supposed to be?” He asked as he stepped closer to get a better look at her artwork. She sat up on the floor and held up the canvas.

“It’s a butterfly!”

“That ain’t like no butterfly I ever saw.”

“What’s it look like to you, then?”

“Like it needs a lot of work.”

Abigail bit her lip.

“Where’d you get all this?”

“Momma picked up this canvas and some paints for me last time she was in town.”

“Momma paid for this?”

“Yes?”

Roscoe ripped the canvas off the floor and stormed out of the room. “Caroline!”

“Daddy!” Abigail chased after him. Downstairs, Roscoe stomped into the cramped kitchen where his wife, Caroline, cut vegetables for the evening supper.

“Just what in the hell were you thinking with this?”

“No, no.” She shook her head. “You ain’t gonna come in here barking at me like that.”

“What inspired you to waste our money on this kinda frivolity?” He threw the canvas at her feet. Abigail hid behind the wall at the foot of the stairs, listening in to the argument. “There ain’t enough work around here to keep her busy?”

“Life ain’t all about work, Roscoe!” she said. “ She’s just a child!”

“She ain’t much younger than you were when we got married.”

She dropped the knife on the counter and turned to him. “What’s it to ya? Honestly?”

“It’s a waste of my goddamn money.” He said.

“It’s not a waste of money!” Abigail shouted. She looked her father in the eye. “It’s a butterfly!” She wasted no time in stomping across the kitchen and out of the house. She crossed the yard, over to the clothesline and quietly sniffled to herself. The blankets and dresses swayed in the wind around her. She stared off into the distance, at the leaves of the trees as they blew with the breeze. Hiding behind the trunks, she spotted something suspect.

Something moved just behind the tree line. Could it have been a deer? The shadow’s shape seemed strange for a deer, and as she followed the path of the shifting shadow it became apparent that there was more than one of whatever was hiding in the woods.

An arrow arced downward from the sky, tearing a hole through a blanket on the clothesline before piercing the dirt. She looked down upon the arrow when another came down. Followed by another and another. Her eyes met the treeline once again, only to spot a tribe of Natives as they began to swoop in. Abigail burst back inside the house.

“Momma! Injuns!” Abigail cried. Caroline peered out the window at the coming wave. Roscoe shouted for Benjamin as he ran to the bedroom to retrieve his rifle.

“What are we gonna do, Momma?”

“Whatever we have to, sweetheart.” She held her daughter close, attempting to assure her with her embrace even if unassured herself.

Roscoe and Benjamin entered the living room with their rifles in hand. A rock crashed in through one of the windows. Abigail yelled and clutched tighter onto her mother’s dress. Roscoe cleared the broken glass out by wiping his rifle along the window frame. Cleared of debris, he started firing in the direction of every native he could see.

“Take that you savage sons of bitches!”

“Momma!” Benjamin shouted. “Get away from the windows!”

“How many of them are there, Roscoe?” Caroline asked.

“Hard to tell.” He popped off another shot, taking one of them down mid-stride. Roscoe tried to get a count on them, but for every one of them he gunned down, it seemed as though two more sprouted from behind the trees to replace them. The farm was being swarmed, and it would take nothing short of a miracle for the Lamberts to repel the invading force.

Another rock came flying in through a window on the opposite side of the house. Benjamin crossed over and took cover beside the window. Every time he popped his head out from cover, the Natives were flinging everything they had in his direction. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t get a clear shot on them. Not until they’d disappeared out of view of the window, along the sides of the house. When he brought up his rifle to see, one of them emerged from beneath the window frame and grabbed Benjamin.

“Roscoe!” Caroline shouted. He whipped around with his gun, but another native emerged from behind Roscoe and grabbed him through the window, much the same as his son. He held on tight to his rifle, barring himself against the window with the weapon. It was the only thing keeping him from being dragged outside to suffer the wrath of the Native at his throat. Roscoe’s vision began to go dark as the grip around his neck tightened. He reached for his pistol, but dropped it on the floor.

“Caroline!” He screeched out with strained breath. He kicked the gun over to her. She took it in hand and aimed at the Native attacking her son. She took her shot and Abigail screamed. Her son’s attacker flew backward from the shot to the head, and Benjamin collapsed to the ground, gasping for air.

“Take your sister upstairs!” She yelled. Benjamin crawled over to them.

“We’ve gotta go, Abby!” Abigail clutched her mother tighter. Benjamin grabbed her by the arm and ripped her off of her mother, dragging her up the stairs. The Native strangling Roscoe wrapped his arm around his neck, freeing up a hand so he could unsheathe the knife at his waist. Caroline aimed now at her husband’s attacker, but an arrow flew in through the window behind her—striking her through the back of the skull and springing her eye out its socket.

“Momma!” Abigail screamed as she watched her mother fall to the ground. She wrangled her way out of her brother’s grasp and crawled back down the stairs toward her mother’s body. Blood pooled beneath her, staining Abigail’s dress. The crack of Roscoe’s neck rung out over the commotion, and he was dragged out of the window he’d been clinging to so tightly. As Abigail took her mother’s pistol in hand, Benjamin scooped her up from behind and the Natives poured in from both sides of the house. The remaining Lamberts retreated upstairs and Benjamin barred the door shut by knocking over an armoire.

The sounds of the invaders scurrying beneath them like rats sent vibrations up through the wooden planks of the house. Benjamin and Abigail pushed themselves up against the wall by a window opposite the door. The chanting of the Natives summiting the stairs grew louder as they held each other tighter. It wasn’t long after that they started to break down the door, it could be seconds before they broke the meager defenses. Benjamin looked out the window behind them.

“Come on.” He opened the window and they climbed out onto the veranda. “I’ll lower you down,” he told her.

“What about you?”

“I can take the drop.” He took the gun from her hands and threw it on the ground. They were only a single story off the ground, but as she looked down at the drop, you might as well have been asking her to hop off a cliff.

“I can’t.” She cried.

“Yes you can.”

“What if—“ He cut her off before she had the chance to talk herself out of it.

“There ain’t no time for if’s, Abby!” She climbed down onto the ledge and Benjamin laid down on his belly, taking her arms in both hands and lowering her as far as he could reach. “I’m gonna let go now, okay?” She shook her head. “You’re gonna be fine.” He dropped her and she fell no more than two or three feet to the ground. As she stood up, she could hear the Natives crashing through the door upstairs, and a pair of them poured out of the window and grabbed Benjamin. She grabbed the pistol off the ground and took aim.

“Run!” He shouted at her.

“I can’t leave you!” She took a shot, but it flew past the heads of her brother’s attackers.

“You’ve gotta run, Abby!” He shouted as he struggled to keep the Natives off him. “Run and don’t look back!” They lifted him off the veranda and dragged him back inside.

She couldn’t see clearly through the tears that welled up in her eyes. She did as her brother demanded and ran. The Natives, too busy storming the house, did not notice her as she fled. She flew as quickly as her legs would carry her, but she stopped in her tracks when a Native boy emerged from behind a tree, bow and arrow at the ready. She drew her gun and for the moment, it was a standoff. They stood there as the seconds stretched out their anxiety over who would take the first shot.

Abigail’s arm grew heavy and she lowered her weapon. The Native boy lined up his shot, and she closed her eyes, ready for whatever he planned to do to her. In a single moment, every horror story her father recanted to her of Natives on the frontier scalping and dismembering men like her father and her brother. Roscoe had spared her the details of what tribes often did with the women they found on their raids, but she could only imagine it was a fate as bad, if not worse, than death. She felt the wind carry the arrow as he released it, and it flew past her ear and landed in the tree behind her. She gasped and opened her eyes. He crossed over to the tree and turned to look at her. She looked back at him. He took the arrow out of the tree and headed toward the farm.

Abigail continued to run. She cut her legs on fallen branches, leaving little splotches of blood in her wake like wounded prey. Rain poured down as she reached a creek with a raging current. She waded through the water, nearly losing her balance but making it over to the other side. She continued to run, as fast as she could until her lungs could barely keep any air at all within them. She collapsed to her knees.

The tears flowed freely, the moment’s respite bringing her adrenaline down and spiking her sense of isolation. She heard the snap of twigs nearby and quickly raised her gun.

“Who goes there!” She looked around and from behind the trees, a man no more than four years her senior dressed all in black save for the red bandana around his neck, emerged with his hands up.

“I mean you no harm, little missy.” He approached her and extended a hand. “What’s your name?”

“Abigail.” She kept her gun on him.

“Pleasure to meet you, Abigail. My name’s Sid.”

Photo by Michael Jasmund on Unsplash

Abigail awoke with a gasp on the bench inside this Valentine jail cell. She rubbed the bruises on her neck, still sore from the failed hanging the day before. How could she have been so naïve as to think that her escape would be granted at someone else’s hand? In hindsight she should’ve seen how this plan would get botched like all the others, but ruminating on her failures as she often did always brought similar conclusions. If there’s anything she should’ve learned by now it’s if you want to get something done right, you’ve gotta do it yourself. Now, if only she could get the right part down…

The door to the sheriff’s station opened and Abigail could hear a conversation in progress.

“Are they gonna have to come knocking on our doors before you do something about them?” She overheard a strange yet familiar voice say.

“My hands are tied, Jeb.” The other voice was that of the Sheriff’s. “I could deputize every man in this town and it’d still be a suicide mission.” Abigail’s ears perked up. She sat upright in her cell.

“So you’re just gonna let them have their run of the place?” Jeb asked.

“What would you have me do?” The Sheriff asked in reply. Jeb crossed the tiny sheriff’s station into Abigail’s view and mulled over what he might have to do himself since the Sheriff was proving useless. He turned his attention toward her and they instantly recognized each other.

“Makin’ friends, I see.” Jeb remarked. The Sheriff leaned into Abigail’s field of view.

“You two know each other?” The Sheriff asked him.

“I saved her from a bear a few days ago,” he explained. “She was none too thankful after the fact.”

“Perhaps you wasted the bullet,” said the Sheriff.

“That’s what I’d meant to tell ya.” Abigail replied. Jeb shook his head.

“If you’re not gonna do something about ‘em, then I’ll have to.” Jeb told him.

“You’re gonna get yourself killed.” He warned him.

“Then let me do it!” Abigail suggested.

“You even know what we’re talking about?” Jeb asked her.

“No, but if it would kill you then maybe it’ll get done for me what the Sheriff failed to.” She said.

“You watch your tongue, girl.” The Sheriff said, mulling it over. Jeb could see him play out the scenario in his head.

“Don’t tell me you’re entertaining this ridiculousness.” He asked the Sheriff.

“From what I saw yesterday, it would seem providence is on her side.” He replied.

“That ain’t no strategy I ever heard of.” Jeb said.

“Have some faith, Jeb!” Abigail said.

“That’s rich.” He grumbled.

“Would anyone like to inform me as to what has him so scared of action?” She asked as she pointed at the sheriff.

“A gang of outlaws has moved into Nigel Dicken’s farm.” Jeb said.

“And I assume Nigel ain’t too pleased?” She asked.

“They shot him dead.” The Sheriff said.

“Trouble is there’s twenty, maybe twenty five of them holed up there by my count.” Jeb said.

“Sounds fun.” Abigail said.

“You think you’re gonna take them all out?” The Sheriff asked her.

“All of ‘em? Probably not. But I’ll die trying which, it would seem, works out for the both of us.” She said.

“So we send her up there, she gets killed, pisses them off, and then we get their wrath sent down upon us.” Jeb explained. “That sound like a plan to you?” He asked the Sheriff. He said nothing as he opened Abigail’s cell and tied her wrists together with a rope. He led her out of the station and up onto the back of a horse out front.

“Don’t tell me you’re serious!” He pleaded.

“You wanted me to do something. This is something.” The Sheriff unhitched the horse and mounted up onto the same steed Abigail sat atop. “You ready?” He asked Abigail.

“Not like I have much of a choice.”

The Sheriff belted out a hearty laugh and they rode out for the Dicken’s.

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Continue on to Chapter 4:

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