They made up different stories about how they would survive after they had left the main group behind because they had never given up on the idea of departing the valley come spring time.
They could never have foreseen the destruction of the cave and the rest of them being forced to leave, but they were on the move, doing exactly what the four young people had intended on doing in the first place. They were going to see what was out there. He hadn’t had the opportunity to discuss with the other three what their future plans would look like, but maybe hunting alone with Matt would give him some idea of the thoughts that Matt and Olivia had. He had listened to them whispering when they’d thought everyone else was asleep.
“I need you guys to stay south of us and for damn sure, don’t fire in this direction.”
Both boys scoffed at Sam for even suggesting they would do something as foolish as firing in their direction.
He pointed ahead of them, “just go and don’t come back until you have dinner.”
They left following the direction in front of them. Sam could hear them laughing, and he wondered what could be so funny. Then he remembered how he and John always had something to joke about when they were told to go do something interesting, and Sam had no doubt the boys found this interesting.
“Tell them you were only joking about coming back empty-handed,” Evelyn hissed at Sam. “Those boys will take your words literally and not come back until they do.”
Sam cupped his hands around his mouth and bellowed, “That was a joke…about not coming back. Two hours, if you don’t see anything in two hours the two of you get back here.”
They all heard the boys laughing and saw Matt wave. Lucas turned and walking backward, waved to them. He tripped and would have fallen had Matt not grabbed him by his arm, holding him up. He magnified a shrug to them and turned around.
It seemed as if Bess had taken over the role as lead mare. Wherever Sherry led her, the others followed. Gus assisted by circling the pack of horses and cow, keeping them all together.
“You may as well turn them loose. At least they can forage while we wait,” Willy called to Sherry and watched while she slipped the halter off. When she walked up to him, he suggested, “Maybe we should gather some firewood?”
There was no use trying to build a shelter because looking around, there was nothing to build one out of. Willy hoped that they would not be there long enough to justify the amount of work it would take to make something large enough to house them all.
He’d turned to look at their progress and saw the tops of what he thought were the canyon walls. They were standing on a slight rise, but he had expected they’d gone further than they had. Willy had lived most of his life in Montana other than when he was recording in Nashville or doing a concert tour, in which he only participated if they were for charity such as Willy Nelson’s farm tours. He disliked the crowds and the young girls who clung and wanted a piece of him, but weren’t even old enough to drive let alone vote. Willy couldn’t imagine what a black man who sang about loneliness and heartache could offer the young listeners. Willy had few people who he considered friends and fewer still he had deemed to be close friends. He looked around at the folks gathering and helping each other and realized that these people were closer than friends, he felt humbled to call them family. His mother would have loved each and every one of them.
Willy shook his head, putting the memories aside and turned when he heard the excited voices of the girls. They’d been exploring and looking for anything edible.
“Look what we found!” Olivia and Abby came running down the slight incline their arms full of brown cattails. On the end of each stock hung a bulb. Both girls were wet from the waist down, and their arms and faces were covered in mud. Abby’s braids hung down dripping water off the swinging ends.
“There’s water too,” Abby hollered as she got close.
“She means there’s mud…with some water on top.”
Once the excitement of giving their food to Evelyn had worn off the girls led Charlie and Willy to the pond. They stood and surveyed the pool of brown mud. It didn’t appear to Willy that it was fed by a spring or flowing water and he wondered if the changes in the landscape had re-routed the water source. For there to be cattails, sticking up through the mud, they had to have had water and time to grow.
Willy was disappointed to not find the water source and told the girls to pull the rest of the stocks up. He felt that to leave them would have robbed themselves of a valuable food source. There was no chance of the dead cattails recovering once the mud dried out.
“We can’t even dig it out enough for the horses to drink from,” Charlie observed. “Let's herd them this way though, because if there's water anywhere close, they’ll find it.”
“Good call. I’ll go back and get them headed out here,” Willy told them. “I’ll see what I can find to dig with.”
“Joe put a handle on the spade from the folding shovel. You’ll have to ask where it was put,” Charlie, unlike the girls, had removed his shoes and his tattered socks, rolled up his pant legs, and was wading into the mud. He wrinkled his face as the cold oozing muck moved up his legs.
By the time the four of them had brought up every bulb they could find, they were covered in the thick mess. They sat on the edge of the mud hole congratulating themselves at their find. Charlie tried to wipe the mud off his feet with the idea of putting his boots and socks back on, but the clay clung to his feet and between his toes. Frustrated with trying to remove it, he looked at the girls. Abby had a stick and was trying to scrape the gunk from her feet, and Charlie began to laugh.
As if they realized the futility of trying to remove the brown mess, the girls joined him. Had their circumstances not been so uncertain, mud clinging to them would have been something to laugh about, but the ring of hysteria began to edge out the happiness in their laughter.
Charlie put his hand out to Sherry, whose eyes had begun to flood with un-shed tears. “It’ll be okay. If we sit and wait until it dries some, we can use my shirt to wipe it off.”
“But, your shirt is what we’re carrying the roots in,” Olivia told him and began unbuttoning her outer shirt. “We’ll use mine for wiping.”
“That sounds fair,” Charlie said and pulled out the front of his tee shirt for emphasis. “I’m down to my last shirt.”
Sherry sniffed and went to wipe her eyes until she noticed there was no part of her hand that was clean enough to put on her face. Journey was always harping on not touching your face or mouth with dirty hands. Sherry sighed and felt the tightness in her face as her tears began to dry. She imagined she had tear-streaks down both of her cheeks. Seeing the mud on everyone else's faces, Sherry began laughing again. She must look like them, but with tear tracks dividing the dirt on her face.
Abby, her hand under her shirt made to wipe Sherry’s face for her. Sherry let her because the drying mud made her face feel tight and uncomfortable. She remembered her mom used to deliberately put mud on her face and she called it a beauty treatment, but after experiencing this, there was no way that Sherry would call it anything close to beautiful. Sherry stopped laughing when she remembered her mother would never use the mud mask again. She wouldn’t bake cookies or wipe Sherry’s tears or tuck her in ever. The only family members that Sherry had left were Lucas and her Uncle Sam. Now that the immediate danger of the cave in had passed, Sherry felt the weight of grief settle on her shoulders.
Abby must have known exactly what Sherry was feeling and sat down beside her. “We’ll get through this you know. It won’t be easy, but like my Dad says, we’re strong, and we will find a way to persevere.”
Abby’s words were strangled at the end as if she had just realized what she’d said and Sherry realized that at least she had a family. Abby had no one left. She scooted closer to the girl but said nothing. She would let her actions speak for her and took Abby’s hand in hers and threaded their fingers. “We are strong, and he’s right. We will make it th
rough this. My parents and your father and Lucy are looking down on us, keeping watch.”
No one could have missed and lost count of the times that Abby had turned around looking behind them as if she expected her father to come walking up at any time. More than once when Lucas chided her for doing it, she had told him, “You don’t know. My dad is strong, and we never found him in there. What if he made it out and he’s hurt?” No one believed the people they’d left behind were anything but dead, but Abby had never given up hope.
“I don’t think I believe in heaven or God right now,” Abby said softly.
Charlie heard her in spite of how quiet Abby had spoken, “That’s okay. I’m not sure I do either, but if Mark is right, somehow, he’ll show us the way and if he’s wrong, well, by golly we’ll just have to manage on our own. Between the lot of us, we’re strong and fearless, and we will find somewhere safe to land.”
“I’m not fearless. I’m scared to death most of the time. Even when nothing was happening, I was still afraid.”
“We all were and are. Just because us adults are older, it doesn’t make us any less afraid. It just makes us more determined to keep the rest of you safe. I think that so far, we’ve been pretty lucky.” He saw the looks he was getting from the girls, “I don’t mean lucky in so far as our losses, I mean lucky in so far as us living where we do. I can’t even imagine how it must be in the big cities. If people are as desperate as these people we’ve already met out here in the middle of nowhere, think of the millions who are trying to survive without the same benefits that we have.”
“But at least they have stores for food,” Sherry said and realized how stupid she must sound. “Oh…I guess they don’t.”
Charlie nodded, “Their food would have been gone in the first couple of days. We at least have the ability to hunt. I’m afraid of what the city people will be hunting.”
“Yeah…my dad said they’d be hunting each other. That’s why we left when we did.”
“Why so somber here? You guys look like you’re discussing a heavy topic here,” Willy said, brandishing the shovel he’d gone to get. “Thought I heard you all laughing a few minutes ago.”
Gus had followed Willy and stood behind him. The mule had his ears forward and was looking past the group of people spread out around the edge of the mud hole. He walked to the edge of the pond, put his muzzle close to the sludge and then threw his head in the air with his upper lip rolled up, showing off his teeth. He brayed as if complaining about the stink of the mud and trotted away, headed for the rise of land the other side of the mud pit. He brayed from the top and disappeared over the crest. One by one the horses followed at a much slower pace than Gus had used. When he brayed again, the horses picked their heads up pointed their ears forward and jogged toward the hill, following Gus.
“Journey said he saved their lives more than once by finding them some water. Maybe he found some now,” Abby said as she stood and stomped her feet trying to shake some of the mud loose.
“Maybe he has,” Charlie said and brushed his feet as best he could, pulled his socks on, wiggled his toes and with a look of disgust at the feeling, and pulled on his boots. He didn’t bother with the laces, but tucked the ends into the top of the boots and rose. He followed Abby to the top of the hill.
Charlie stood beside Abby and looked down. To say the landscape had changed would be like calling the Rockies, foothills. But as near as Charlie could tell, that’s exactly what was spread out before them. Gone were the rugged peaks and tree covered mountains. It was as if the earth had sucked them down inside of her. There were rock protrusions, but nothing as grandiose as he remembered. They should have been facing the Lolo or Clearwater national forests and Illinois Peak at nearly seventy-seven hundred feet, should have been visible, but there was nothing noteworthy, except the lack of mountain tops. He turned in a circle trying to take it all in. To the east there were mountains, he didn’t remember being there, and to the north, he could see mountains and some with a smoky haze circling their tops, but south, the land spread out and reminded him of the prairies and desert from much further south.
Charlie stood staring until he heard Willy come up beside him.
Willy whistled through his teeth, long and low, almost inaudible. “Would you look at that…guess we’re going south.”
Charlie pointed below them, directing Willy’s eyes. The animals stood at the edge of what looked like a wide shallow river, drinking in the crystal clear water.
“How?” stammered Willy, “The mountains are all gone. Disappeared, and there shouldn’t be a river there or anywhere close to here. Maybe that’s the Saint Joe?”
“Right now, I’m not looking a gift horse in the mouth. The best example of ask and you will receive that I’ve ever seen.”
“Shall receive,” Charlie mumbled. “The word is shall, and to think I was having doubts.” He shook his head and turned back the way he’d come from. “I’m going to get Sam and the others. We may want to change the location of our camp.”
Chapter Eighteen
As Charlie came over the slope, he saw Matt and Lucas headed back to camp. The way their shoulders hung down and their feet dragged as if they didn’t want to return empty-handed, touched something in Charlie. He remembered the way his boys had bounced into camp whether they’d gotten any game or not. Back then it hadn’t mattered because he’d always packed enough food for the trip. Them eating or not hadn’t depended on shooting or catching anything. Charlie could only imagine how bad the two boys must feel, knowing they had failed to bring home dinner. Charlie knew they still had the smoked meat from the smokehouse and it would have to do. He hoped his news would put a smile on everyone's face.
As Charlie spoke the others stood and listened. He saw expressions ranging from awe to disbelief. Charlie knew they couldn’t comprehend exactly what he was saying until they saw it for themselves.
Sam turned to the low hill, blocking the view and shook his head, “We knew there were changes. But how could a mountain range just disappear? It’s impossible.”
He turned to the north and pointed, “but, when I look up there, I see peaks I’ve never seen before, but they’re running east to west and not north to south like they should be. The whole damn country has done an about-face, and I can’t help but wonder and worry about what’s in store for us.”
“No sense worrying about what we can’t change, but for now, maybe you’d like to move our camp down to the water?”
Sam grinned, “I’d put that part of the conversation out of my mind. A man can only handle so many changes at a time.”
They gathered whatever they could carry, taking Charlie’s word of what they would find beyond the hill and followed him up the rise. The river stretched as far south as they could see winding between low hills. While there was no green vegetation visible, the rolling hills and the river held the promise of new grass and weeds.
The horses and Gus had filled themselves with water and stood to pull the bark from the few trees that remained standing. Gus was nuzzling around in the dirt pulling up old roots and leaves. Journey had commented more than once that Gus could survive on dead branches and leaves and he was proving her right. Of their four-legged critters, Gus was the most filled out and looked ready to move on.
The other animals, as well as the people, were a different story. Not one of them looked capable of going far without some kind of nourishment. The tubers they had dug up would give them a couple of meals, but unless they found some real food, beyond the tubers and the bit of jerky they had left, Sam had confided to Willy and Charlie, they could expect to be digging graves along the way.
Both men had agreed. Sam decided it was time to butcher one of the horses. The scrawny bay that had returned with Charlie’s horses would be the animal of choice. He had been lame when Gus herded them in and had grown progressively worse with each passing day. Sam led the horse back over the hill not telling any of the young people or women his intention. When the gunshot so
unded, everyone hit the dirt, until Charlie told them it was Sam doing the shooting. He and Willy gathered up knives and whatever they could find to bring the fresh meat back to camp.
By the time the men reached Sam, he had already begun the butchering process. Without life coursing through its body, the horse looked far thinner than the men could have guessed. With the chance to feel the horse’s legs, Sam determined the horse had somehow broken its cannon bone, and while it had begun the healing process, it was not aligned properly. The horse would only get worse with time.
“Not that it justifies killing it, but feeding our group is a necessity, and that is enough justification for me. I would butcher Sham if it meant keeping just one of us alive.”
Charlie laid his hand on Sam’s shoulder, “It had to be done. Now, how would you like me to help?”
Sam frowned and looked up and down the length of the horse, “I’ve never had to butcher a horse before. I’m following what I know about the cows and deer. We can’t hang it, so I’m just doing the best I can do on the ground.” He slid his knife into the underbelly, being careful to not puncture the intestines and opened the horse up.
“I told Evelyn to get a fire going and to be prepared to cook some meat. Journey and Gina are down by the water with the girls. Journey said they have clothes and I suspect bodies to wash. They’ve asked Matt and Lucas to stand guard with their backs turned. So I’d say we have some time to get this done.”
Evelyn walked up to them carrying her Dutch oven, “I’ll take those,” she said pointing to the liver and kidneys that Sam had set aside with the intestines. “The heart too please.”
The three men jumped in surprise. They hadn’t expected one of the women to be coming to see what they’d shot.
“What? You think I hadn’t thought of this myself? It might surprise you, but Gina and Journey had the same idea. You all just did it before we spoke.”
Beyond the New Horizon: The Last Sun, Page 17