by Jory Sherman
John ranged high and low, taking his time, making little or no noise. He found game trails unmarked by iron hooves, examined disturbed earth and overturned pine needles. He listened. Late that afternoon, he heard a man’s voice. It was very distant, and muffled, but unmistakably human. He stopped, turned his head in a half circle. Moved a foot and turned his head another 180 degrees.
Nothing.
Had he imagined it?
A man by himself could hear all sorts of sounds in the silence of a forest, or in the emptiness of a town. John had learned not to trust too much at such times. He waited, turning his head, cupping a hand to his right ear.
There, he thought, there it was again. Two voices this time. The voices seemed to be bouncing off something, a rock or a boulder, a bluff. The trees dampened a lot of sound; the leaves soaked up sound or mangled it as it passed through branches. He moved closer to where he thought the sound was coming from. When he heard a man’s voice again, he realized it was coming from somewhere below him.
He breathed a heavy sigh. That was good. He was above them.
Were they moving?
He moved closer, stepping carefully, quietly.
He stopped, listened, and heard a voice say: “Good spot.”
John couldn’t identify the speaker. But he was almost sure it wasn’t Krieger’s voice. This one was deeper, gruffer, throatier.
He moved from tree to tree, ever closer, until he could hear two or three men talking in low tones. He knew they were staying in the same spot, so they must have made camp. Or they were just resting. But if they were going to scout his property, they would not want to be much higher. Not yet.
He moved still closer, but knew he was still above Thatcher’s camp. Something between him and them distorted their voices and made it difficult for him to hear actual words. He just knew there were three or four men talking. But they weren’t discussing anything that he could make out. It sounded more as if they were just engaged in some activity that required them to speak to one another.
He saw a large rock outcropping. The sounds seemed to be coming from the other side. From somewhere below it.
John knew he dared not get too much closer. If Thatcher was camped, his men might be scavenging for squaw wood or deadwood to make a fire for the night.
He descended a few yards until he thought he was parallel to the camp. He could see the top of the large rock, like an elephant’s shoulder. He heard noises beneath it. He lay flat on his belly and crawled to some bushes and raised his head.
He saw the men and the horses. Or parts of them: a hat, a shirt, an arm, a leg, a horse’s rump, another’s head and mane, a saddle.
He listened, his head on the ground.
Still, he could not make out the words, but he heard his name mentioned, and someone said the word “Messicans.” He knew they were talking about him, his cattle, and his hands.
“Figure about six miles due south from here,” Krieger said, and John almost jumped up. It sounded as if Krieger was looking right at him.
“You take that spyglass with you, Al,” another voice said. The deeper, gruffer one.
John held his breath.
He heard the word “blaze” and a few more words.
That was enough, he thought. He wasn’t going to go up against four men with only his pistol. His rifle was still in its boot attached to his saddle.
He crawled away, then got to his feet. He made his way back to where he had left Gent. The sun was setting by the time he slid the saddle back on Gent’s back.
It was quiet, and he knew he had a decision to make. He could return to the creek, but that was not where he was needed. If he was only six or seven or eight miles from the tabletop, it was about the same distance to their mine above the creek.
He thought of Eva, and realized how much he missed her.
Ben and Whit would ride to the plateau if he wasn’t there by sunup. So, he need not worry about them.
He turned Gent toward the south. By his reckoning, he should come out on the tabletop, well above the bluffs. Dead reckoning would take him where he wanted to go.
The sun fell out of the sky and dropped behind the western mountain spires. The timber filled with shadows, and he heard elk moseying through, on their way to feed and drink. He startled a mule deer, who jumped and ran away, scaring Gent, who sidled away and backed down on his rump until John nudged him in the flanks.
The stars appeared and gave John light. He found the Big Dipper and used it as his guide. The peace of the mountains descended upon him and he felt at home. It was tempting to make camp and just bask in the solitude and the serenity. It had always been that way with him. When he went into the mountains, he never wanted to leave. When he left them, it was like tearing off a part of his heart and leaving it behind forever.
He rode on, over deadfalls and through silent pines, stately spruces, and shadowy firs, knowing he was in another world, a world where men had no dominion. There was only the stars and the shining moon and the everlasting mountains, and each moment seemed both fleeting and an eternity.
He did not think of Thatcher and his bunch. He did not think of the past or the future. He surrendered himself to the mountains and let the night claim him. He knew that he and Gent somehow belonged there, with the deer and the elk, the wolves and the owls. This was their country and this was their proper home.
No matter what happened. This was John’s home.
27
THE THICK MUSKY ODOR OF BEAR SCAT FILLED THE AIR AS JOHN rode slowly through the shadow-filled timber. Gent’s ears stiffened into cones and twisted in all directions. John guided the horse up a ridge that turned out to be steeper than he had thought. He wanted to get away from the bear scent. Spring, he knew, was when bears were hungry and by now, the sows had cubs and were very hostile and protective.
“Easy, boy, easy,” John said to Gent as he felt the horse move like an island beneath him, shifting its weight as if it wanted to run, to turn back and flee the cloying aroma that filled its rubbery nostrils.
The tree-lined ridge was wide and steep, a muscled rib that arose from the land like some ancient artifact, the remains of a giant creature that once stalked the earth. There, on the ridgetop, the darkness was intense, and John rode blind through a corridor of trees, with Gent fighting the bit, the reins taut as barrel straps.
Then, without warning, John heard a pounding of heavy feet off to his left. Gent sidled sideways, the bit in his teeth, his neck arched, ears flattened.
With a mighty growl, a large black bear hurled itself out of the darkness, its arms extended, its claws spread like a fan. John felt the rake of the sharp claws down his left leg. The bear gouged furrows in Gent’s flank, and the horse staggered under the weight of the charging animal.
John flew out of the saddle as Gent’s terrified whinny rent the night with blood-curdling force, then tumbled over the edge of the ridge as Gent galloped straight ahead, the bear’s roar in its ears. John heard the galloping hooves for about two seconds as he tumbled downward, somersaulting over rocks and brush. Then, he hit the botton of a shallow ravine with a thundering crash, and saw the stars spin in the velvet sky just before everything went black in front of and behind his eyes.
A pair of small cubs emerged from the brush and ran squealing to their mother, two furry balls rolling along at high speed.
The bear stood up and roared once more, the sound of hoofbeats gradually getting softer in the distance. Then she dropped to all fours and embraced her cubs before falling to her side to rest and give them suckle.
Far below, John lay unconscious, a lump swelling on his head and blood streaming through the tear in his trouser leg. An owl hooted from a nearby tree and flapped its wings like a crowing rooster. It swiveled its head in silent survey and waited, listening for any furtive sound in the brush below. Its throat pulsed as the scent of fresh blood wafted upward to its nostrils. The owl flexed its talons and sat on its perch, its feathered body a brown sculpture with huge ey
es that blinked and focused on anything that stirred its interest. Anything that moved or breathed.
Anything small enough to kill.
28
BEN AWOKE BEFORE SUNUP THE NEXT MORNING. THE CAVE WAS still dark and dank from the night dew, and Whit’s bedroll was tousled and empty. Ben searched the cave for him, but of the boy there was no sign. When it grew light, he was already across the creek seeing to the horses. The packhorse they had loaned Whit was gone. Corny had the other one, he knew. There was only Rusher and, although he was hobbled, he was still saddled.
No sign of John Savage.
Ben called Whit’s name once as he crossed the creek on Rusher. He ground-tied the horse and cached all their tools with the rifles John had taken from Krieger, Short, and Rosset. He left the tents up and rode toward the trail leading up to the plateau. He saw the tracks of the horse Whit had taken sometime during the night.
“The little bastard,” Ben muttered, and wondered if he should now consider the boy a horse thief. “If so,” he said to himself, “it will give me great pleasure to hang the ungrateful sonofabitch.”
But as he rode up the trail, his thoughts were not on Whit Blanchett, but on John Savage. What had he found out? Had he run into trouble? Was he alive? Or dead? Ben batted those thoughts, and others, around in his brain until he rode up on the tabletop and saw the grazing cattle, the Mexican herders riding through them and counting head.
The high peaks were shining in the sunlight as they towered majestically over the entire back range. The grasses had given off their dew, but the scent still lingered in the air, mingled with the perfume of wildflowers and the heady aroma of pines and spruce trees.
Off to his left, Ben heard a gabble of voices. Men surrounded something large and dark. The men sounded excited as they jabbered in liquid Spanish. They were either arguing, Ben thought, or they had captured a bull elk. He started riding toward them as the men with the cattle galloped toward the group, calling out to their companions.
As Ben approached on Rusher, he saw Carlos break away from the group and step out to face him. Carlos took off his hat and waved it semaphore fashion.
“Ben, you come quick. Hurry, hurry,” Carlos yelled.
Ben put Rusher into a lope, then raked his flanks with his spurs until he was galloping toward the confusing scene.
“What’s goin’ on, Carlos?”
“Come. You see. It is the horse of John Savage.”
Ben felt his heart jump, then plunge down into his gut. A nameless fear clawed at him as he saw Gent standing among the chattering men, the burnished leather of John’s saddle gleaming like polished teak in the sun.
Ben hit the ground running, leaving his reins trailing and Rusher slowing to a stop.
“Es su caballo,” Pepito said to the others.
Carlos had a sorrowful look on his bronze face. His eyes were narrowed, the skin wrinkled at the edges.
“The horse he walk from the trees. He limps. He is much hurt.”
“Where’s John?”
“I do not know. Just the horse, Ben. Look.”
Ben walked to Gent. Gasparo held the reins, but the others were looking at the horse’s rump. When Ben saw the deep wounds, his knees turned to gelatin and he sagged a few inches. There were long claw marks and streaks of dried blood on Gent’s flanks. He stood hipshot, favoring his wounded side.
“Lord A-mighty,” Ben said. “What in the hell happened to old Gent?”
“I think it was a bear,” Carlos said.
Ben heard the word “oso” several times and nodded.
“That what it looks like, all right. A damned bear made them claw marks. Show me where you first saw Gent, Carlos.”
“Pepito, he see him first. He come through the trees over there.”
Carlos pointed to a spot beyond the creek. Some hundred yards off to the right lay stacks of stripped logs, a house halfway built. Other skinned and stripped logs, some already notched, lay beyond the felled trees that had been skidded in by horses. Two horses in harness stood hipshot next to the log structure. Ben looked in that direction as if expecting to see John walking out of the timber. But there was only emptiness. No sign of John. Nothing. His gut rippled with fear; his brain filled with dread. Deep dread. Dread such as he had never known before this one terrible moment.
“You take Gent up to Ornery, see if he has some salve or liniment in that chuck wagon. Ask Mrs. Blanchett if she can help doctor John’s horse. Get that saddle and bridle off of him and put a halter on, tie him to a tree. Make sure he can bed down.”
“I will do this,” Carlos said.
Manolo stepped up.
“I will lead the horse. Emma, she has the salve.”
“I will go with you,” Gasparo said.
“What you do now, Ben?” Carlos asked.
“I’m going to look for John. Can you and Juanito come with me? We might be able to backtrack old Gent and find John.”
“We will come,” Carlos said.
“Say, did you see that Blanchett kid this mornin’? Any of you?”
“We see him,” Carlos said. “He come in the dark and we hear bad words in the log house. Then the boy ride off with food and I think he had a rifle.”
“Didn’t any of you try to stop him?”
“His mother, she scream and yell at the boy, but he just keep riding away.”
“Where did he go?”
Carlos pointed to a place up the creek on the same side of the pasture.
“He rode into the timber?”
Carlos nodded. “Yes. He rode fast and we did not have our horses saddled. He just ride away and we no see him. He had the rifle and his saddlebags. They were full.”
“Get your horses, Carlos, and let’s look for John. I’ll talk to Emma later about what happened with her boy.”
“She has much anger.”
“What about Eva?”
“We no see the young girl. Just the mother. She cry and she scream, and then she go back inside and we no see them.”
“Damn,” Ben said.
Gasparo and Manolo walked a limping Gent up toward the cabin. Carlos and Juanito walked to their horses and climbed into their saddles. Pepito and Ben walked to their horses.
“I wonder what in hell got into that wet-nosed kid,” Ben said, more to himself than anyone else. “Gettin’ his ma all riled up like that and just lightin’ a shuck.”
“That boy, he got much trouble, I think. Here.” Pepito pointed a finger at his own head.
“Yeah, he sure does.”
Just before the two reached their horses, there was a rifle shot. It cracked like a bullwhip and Ben heard it echo up through the hills. Pepito staggered to one side, uttering a small muffled cry of pain. Then he toppled over, blood gushing from his side like a crimson fountain.
Ben stood there, paralyzed for a moment.
Carlos yelled something in Spanish and jumped from his saddle. Juanito sat his horse, stunned, unmoving.
Ben felt the mountains closing in on him, smothering him, shutting off his breath. His stomach boiled with acid juices and he felt a sickness rising up into his heart, rising like the bile in his throat.
Pepito’s horse looked down at him.
Pepito’s left leg was twitching and blood poured from a small black hole in his side. Pieces of white rib bones jutted from the bloody mass and there was a pool of blood staining the grass.
Ben saw that much before he could move, and then Carlos, down on his knees next to the fallen man, blocked his view.
But he heard the Spanish words Carlos breathed, and something iron-fisted squeezed his heart.
“Poor Pepito. He is dead.”
Ben’s world spun on a careening axis, tilted like a crazed carousel, throwing him into a deep dark pit of despair. And the fear snarled in his ear as he heard Carlos sobbing, holding Pepito, and rocking back and forth as if he held his own dead son.
29
GASPARO SAW THE MUZZLE FLASH OUT OF THE CORNER OF HIS eye. The r
eport sounded a split second later. He thought someone was shooting at him. He ducked and drew his converted Remington .44. Manolo twisted in his saddle and saw Pepito fall.
“Cuidado,” Gasparo said to Manolo, and cocked his pistol. He began firing toward the brush where he had seen the orange splash of light, but he knew he was too far away to hit anything. And he did not see anyone. But he cracked off three shots and saw the bushes move.
“I think Pepito was shot,” Manolo said.
Gasparo turned in the saddle and saw Carlos racing toward Pepito, followed by Ben.
“Quick, Manolo, to the wagon.” Gasparo holstered his still-smoking pistol and the two men led Gent up to the chuck wagon. By then, Ornery was outside the wagon, a towel in his hands. The door of the cabin opened and Emma stood in the door looking out onto the pasture.
“Somebody’s shooting,” she called out, and Eva pushed her through the door and came out to look.
“What’s going on, Ma?”
“I-I don’t know. Isn’t that John’s horse with Manolo?”
“I don’t know. Look, there’s something going on in the middle of the pasture.”
Emma looked in that direction.
“Whit,” she breathed. “They’ve shot Whit.”
“Oh, Ma, don’t be silly. Why would they shoot Whit?”
“I don’t know. It’s the first thing that came into my mind.”
Eva saw Ornery and started toward him.
“What’s the shooting about, Ornery?” she said.
“I dunno. But looks like one of the hands dropped out of the saddle. I don’t know what Gasparo was shootin’ at.”
“Whose horse is that?”
She pointed toward Gent.
“Dunno that neither. But it looks a mite lame.”
“Oh, Ornery,” she shrieked, “what in heaven’s name is going on?”
Then Manolo rode up, leaving Gasparo and Gent behind, and he called out to Emma.
“Emma, bring some of that salve you used on your horse’s leg when it got cut.”