Outlawed(50)

“This fine animal,” said the man, gesturing at the billy goat, “is of Colorado stock, a champion mountain climber. And this lass by his side is a lowland breed, called an Arizona red. The two come from entirely different climates and conditions, and under ordinary circumstances, they would never cross paths. But in the spirit of scientific inquiry, I have induced them to breed with one another.”

The woman led them away, and came back with a miserable-looking animal, scrawny and pink-eyed, its hips twisted and gait painful to watch. On its head were not two but four horns, intertwined like the branches of a sticker bush. As soon as I saw it, I realized I must be watching Dr. Edward Lively.

“Now this unfortunate beast,” the doctor said, “is the product of two vibrant, beautiful animals, as you just saw. Bred with their own kind, both have produced many perfectly healthy kids. But bred, as you might say, against their kind, they have engendered this poor creature, who suffers a total of thirteen types of deformity, those you can see from where you sit being only the most obvious.”

The crowd began to murmur with interest and approval. I saw something I had not noticed when I first entered the tent: while I had seen black buyers and sellers at the market, and heard Arapaho and other languages I didn’t recognize, almost everyone gathered to watch Dr. Lively was white.

“Tell me now,” the doctor said, “if these animals, who are relatively simple in their bodily structure, revert to such monstrosity when bred against their nature, how much worse must it be when man, the most complex creature of all, takes up with a mate who is of different stock?”

The murmur grew louder. Then a woman stood up, blonde and pink-cheeked, a little younger than my mother.

“My son’s wife still hasn’t given him a child, and it’s been nearly two years,” she called out to Dr. Lively. “I suspect there’s mixed blood in her family. Could that be the reason?”

“It could indeed, madam,” Dr. Lively said. “According to my research, nearly half of all cases of barrenness are caused by some form of racial mixing or another, sometimes quite far back in the family tree. And of course this is far from the only ailment—”

“Nate,” Henry said.

This time News nodded, and Lark and I followed them out of the tent.

For a long time no one said anything. We bought moonshine from a wagon stall. News’s hand shook around the glass. The stall also sold patent medicines, bright blue and red and green, with labels that said things like “Pleasant Dreams” and “Vim and Virility.” Traveling salesmen had come through Fairchild with bottles like these from time to time; I knew they were colored water at best.

Lark was the first of us to speak. “That man is nobody,” he said. “The main event today is the Reverend Delano, from Laramie. He won’t preach until long after nightfall. The crowd will be five times the size.”

“Lark—” said Henry, a warning. I wondered how much he knew of News’s past.

“No, Lark’s right,” News said. “He’s nobody.”

She was smiling, but her eyes glittered with rage. She drained her glass.

“Adam,” she said, “why don’t you get us another round?”

As I stood, a young woman approached the stall. Her stride was purposeful but when she reached the makeshift counter where the owner stood, she hesitated as though nervous. “Do you have anything for fertility?” she asked finally, lowering her voice on the last word.

“Absolutely,” the stall owner said. “You’ll want our Fruitful Womb tonic. I’ve sold all the bottles, but we have more in the back. I’ll just bottle some up for you now.”

He came out from behind the counter—no more than a pine board balanced on sawhorses—and disappeared around the back of his wagon.

“I’d save your money if I were you,” I said to the woman when he was gone.

She was short and strong-bodied, with a raspberry-colored birthmark at her throat. When I spoke, she looked frightened, and I remembered that to her I was a strange man, interrupting what must be, for her, a sensitive transaction.

“I don’t mean to intrude,” I said. “It’s just that I’m a doctor. And these tonics are a waste of money. How long have you been married?”

The woman still looked suspicious, but she answered, “Nine months.”

“Give it a year,” I said. “If you’re not pregnant by then, there’s no medicine can help you. The safest thing is to get away. There’s a convent, the Sisters of the Holy Child—”

The stall owner came back with two large glass bottles, one full of blue liquid and one full of green. “Either one of these is effective on its own,” he told the woman, “but for the quickest results, I’d advise you to take two tablespoons of the Fruitful Womb every morning”—he held up the blue bottle—“and then a tablespoon of this one, the Mother’s Friend, before you go to sleep.”

He tapped on the green bottle with his index finger. “They work together, you see, to regulate the feminine fluids.”

The woman looked at me as she opened her pocketbook.

“I’ll take both,” she said.

That night the four of us pitched a tent alongside dozens of others on the outskirts of the fairgrounds by the banks of the river. While Lark and Henry looked for a spot, News spoke to me under her breath.