The Shasta Gate

by Dick Croy

  “Good, that makes it easier. Your right hand controls the gas—also the front wheel brake, like this. But you don’t ever want to use it without applying the foot brake first—with your right foot. You understand why?” She pantomimed a head-over-heels gesture with her hands. “Exactly. Now your left foot works the gearshift. Watch.”

  He started the engine, engaged the clutch, lifted the gearshift pedal with the toe of his boot, and eased out the clutch. The bike grabbed hold of the soft ground. “We’re in first. You see how the shift was made?”

  “Un huh.”

  “To go back into neutral, you just tap the pedal back down—with the clutch in. Do you think your foot will reach?” It did, just barely. And the square toe of her riding boot would give her sure control of the pedal. “Try the clutch.”

  “Oh, it’s really stiff isn’t it.”

  “Is your hand strong enough to move it?”

  She gripped it indignantly. No goddamn stubborn little lever was going to keep her from riding this bike. There was a bit of a trick to it, she found; twisting her wrist slightly while letting the clutch out gave her the extra torque she needed. She practiced engaging and releasing the lever in rapid succession, to Eugene’s satisfaction. “Now put it in first.”

  She lifted the gearshift pedal cleanly enough—but let out the clutch too quickly. The bike shot ahead on the wet grass, and the rear wheel, looking for traction like a cartoon character rounding a corner in a chase, spun around suddenly—fortunately ripping her hand from the throttle. The engine stalled and Eugene caught the weight of the bike and its riders with his leg and managed to keep it from going over. “Get off!”

  Catherine curled her leg adroitly over the gas tank and ducked under his outstretched arm. “I let the clutch out too fast.”

  “I guess you could say that.”

  “You’re not gonna ground me are you?”

  “Course not.” He righted the bike and she clambered back on. This time Eugene openly enjoyed watching what her slim graceful legs could do to tight denim. Catherine felt his eyes on her as surely as if they had been his fingers. It took her by surprise. Her concentration had been focused on learning to master this complex gleaming machine; Eugene’s sudden attention was an intrusion, and with her back to him like this, she felt awkward and exposed. Yet there was an undeniable warmth in her loins, and when she settled herself on the seat they shared, she had to do so with care. Once comfortable, she pressed surreptitiously against what she would have called the seat’s pommel.

  “You gonna drive this thing or just sit there?” Catherine was beginning to learn she could count on this guy to be where she wasn’t. “I mean, I hate to interrupt you, but…”

  Now it was her cheeks that were warm—hot! She hadn’t blushed so in years. She laughed off her embarrassment and got hold of herself. The clutch: she put it in and Eugene kicked the engine over. Catherine tapped the gearshift into first and this time eased out on the clutch as if she were cutting through butter. At first she wasn’t giving it enough gas, but her right hand caught up with her left before the engine died, and up through the woods they went. She kept it in first and concentrated on staying upright. It wasn’t the same as balancing on a bicycle: both easier and, she quickly discovered, more difficult to compensate for a clumsy move. Eugene’s booted feet were all that kept them up a couple of times.

  Her first turn. “Lean into it!” Eugene yelled. But she still came out of it too late, trying to do too much with the front wheel, like a bicycle again. They were about to get a lot more intimate with some pine trees than Catherine cared to. She tried to remember how to stop: which brake was she supposed not to hit first? Why didn’t she have a fucking rein to pull? No horse would be stupid enough to run into the trees, but this damn thing just kept lumbering straight ahead. Eugene reached around her with both hands at the last moment and managed to keep them out of the pines although underbrush clawed at them for their trespass.

  “You gotta use your body weight!” he yelled, relinquishing the handlebars. “We lean together. Try it on this straight stretch. To the right first!” They both leaned, not quite together and not in sync with her front wheel action, which was still somewhat exaggerated, but after repeating the move to the left and then back and forth several times, Catherine began to get the hang of it. It was exhilarating! She was doing it, she had the feeling now! The next curve was much better; she didn’t need to be bailed out.

  “Stop up at that fallen tree!”

  Masterfully she eased her hand off the gas and felt for the brake with her right foot while swinging in toward the rotting carcass of what had once been a proud cedar. The clutch! She suddenly remembered she had to put the clutch in. Her left foot kicked blindly at the gearshift lever as they headed for the tree. “Put the clutch in!”

  “I’m trying to! I can’t find fucking neutral!”

  “Down! Kick it down!”

  She tried to, but it was too late. All she could do now was slam on the brake. They skidded hard into the dead tree. The engine died, and momentarily so did her enthusiasm for riding bikes.

  “…Don’t feel too bad,” Eugene said after they’d had a moment to recover from the impact of tree and silence. “I ran into a fence once.”

  Chapter 19

  Okay, now it’s your turn.” Catherine put a devilish glint in her eyes to dramatize her “revenge”. Eugene was so taken with her when she lost herself in play like this. Her occasional tendency to pose or posture, to affect a sort of arrogant nouveau aristocracy—or so it seemed to him—vanished completely, and susddenly they’d be involved in the kind of play-acting he and his brother used to extend over hours or days at a time, stepping in and out of various roles between the world their parents and adult concerns forced them to attend and the others to which their own imaginations summoned them.

  He drove them back to the clearing, Catherine having had her fill of bikes for the time being and he himself not eager to collide with any more fallen trees, fences or obstacles of any kind. Catherine saddled Jebel Druze, who had breakfasted royally on the lush grass, and rode him out of the clearing along the narrow ledge. Eugene cut through the trees and met them where they crossed the stream into the open meadow. Catherine dismounted. “Après vous,” she said, with a florid bow toward the empty and waiting stirrup. Eugene mounted gracefully enough. “He’s hardly ever been ridden double before, but it won’t hurt him for a few minutes. He won’t agree with that though, so you’ll have to hold him in while I get on. Not hard! His mouth is really sensitive—you have to be firm but gentle. This ain’t no hawg, mister; it’s an Arabian stallion. Take your foot out of the stirrup and give me your arm.”

  She climbed up behind him, much to the stallion’s surprised annoyance, and grabbed hold of the back of the saddle. Between Eugene’s “firm but gentle” (emphasis on the firm) grip and Catherine’s cajoling words, they quieted the horse, winning his provisional cooperation.

  “We’re riding English so take a rein in each hand and when you want to turn him, press against him with the inside leg and frame him in with the outside.”

  “Frame him in?”

  “Make him follow the line of the circle. He’s not like your dumb motorcycle, he bends. And you want him to bend with the line of the circle. Got it?”

  “Got it.”

  “Remember, be gentle with his mouth—but if he starts to run away with you, don’t let him get the bit in his teeth. Keep a firm hold on the reins.” She stretched out her left leg and kicked the heel of his boot. “Put the balls of your feet in the stirrups.”

  Eugene was listening but most of his concentration was going into an attempt to feel out not just the stallion but the rapport, what there was of it, between himself and the horse. Even between a motorcycle and its rider there is a certain joining of two forces which must be experienced by the rider to get the most out of the machine. He assumed the same was true with a horse to a much greater degree and soon sensed that the stallion had accepted
him for the moment, no doubt because of Catherine’s presence despite the additional burden it entailed.

  “Canter him!” she yelled over his shoulder. “Squeeze his sides with your legs and when you feel him depart, give with the reins.” After a couple of attempts, his command got through to the horse; the trot, which felt to Eugene like the Harley running on one cylinder, feathered into four-wheel drive, without the wheels. Now there were at least three more cylinders firing. What a sweet ride on those powerful piston legs—like hitching a reciprocating engine to a cradle.

  Catherine pointed to a stand of sugar pines at the end of the logging trail and directed him alongside the line of trees to a path he’d never have seen otherwise. He pulled back on the reins and the stallion shifted back down into that damnable trot.

  “Use your knees. Don’t be a passenger. Come up off your butt with the same rhythm he’s in.” He got the idea although his execution was a little rough. “C’mon, use your knees! Get ‘em in tight against his flanks. That’s better!…Now we’re going to turn left onto the trail so you’ll want him on his left lead. Move your right leg back and then squeeze with both legs. Find his mouth—regain control with the bit.”

  They emerged onto the trail. “Canter!” Eugene reined sharply to the left. “My God, watch his mouth! All you have to do is tell him.” Catherine’s backseat driving was beginning to put him on edge, although it was hard to get too agitated rocked in this effortless gait.

  “…We’d better take him back now before he tires,” she said. This time as he turned the stallion, Eugene was extremely careful with the reins. “Better.” She gave him a little squeeze. “You’re doin’ fine.” She had something in store for him however. As they approached the end of the trail and slowed to a trot again, Catherine began to scoot back across the horse’s rump. When she was as far back as she could go, she suddenly pulled her arms away, planted her hands firmly on Jebel’s rump and vaulted off his back. It was a foolish thing to do, but she got away with it: the stallion was startled but didn’t kick. She landed feet-first and fell back on her butt, then scrambled back to her feet.

  Meanwhile, Eugene was soloing on the aroused stallion. Jebel reared and his rider leaned in against him. “Whoa, boy! Easy!” Breathless with the success of her little stunt, holding in a gale of fiendish laughter only with the greatest restraint, Catherine ran around in front of the horse and grabbed for his bridle when his front feet hit the ground. “Easy, Jebel! Easy…” Her childish glee put an hysterical edge in her voice, and the stallion refused to be pacified. He reared again, whinnying in anger, and still Eugene managed to stay on the small English saddle.

  When he came down again, Catherine lunged once more for the bridle and this time was successful. Jebel snapped his head up but kept his feet on the ground. Catherine kept her grip on the bridle, and the stallion gave in.

  Only now did Eugene feel his heart pounding. He’d had no time to get angry and realized now that the best way to get back at her was to shine her on. He looked down at Catherine with the most bored, disdainful expression he could muster and, with his best effort at an English accent, asked: “Is that the way you normally dismount, my deah?”

  Laughing, she became one of the Gabors. “Only ven I’m in a hurry, dahling. Or ven I’m getting even with some cla-zy biker who chases horses on his motorcycle.”

  “I see. Well are we even now?”

  “For the moment. You did pretty well, by the way.”

  “So did you. You see—bikes and horses aren’t so different.”

  “Oh I know—horsepower and all that; metal’s just a new kind of horseflesh.”

  He dismounted. “Well, what you’ve got in grace…and heart, I’ve got in range—endurance. But what we’re both talking about is freedom.”

  “I never quite looked at it that way, but you’ve got a point.”

  “I can see you’re not convinced.”

  “Very perceptive of you, dahling.” He shrugged and turned away. “Where are you going?”

  “To clean up our breakfast.”

  She caught up with him, leading Jebel behind her. “If you’d like to stay for a while, you’re welcome to.”

  “Thanks.” He gave her a sincere smile. “I’m goin’ up to Shasta though.”

  “Looking for that secret entrance huh?”

  “Whatever.”

  “Shasta doesn’t give its secrets up very easily.”

  “It wouldn’t have them if it did.”

  They crossed the stream and climbed the narrow trail to the clearing. Filled with wind and sun, Eugene’s white tent was like some exotic, mythical creature caught between worlds unawares. One could believe it had heard of this special place and become entranced by its gossamer reflection in the emerald pool. It was as if Catherine were seeing it for the first time again herself.

  “…I know this is kind of off the wall,” she began with uncharacteristic hesitation—“but I’d like to go up there with you. There are some places I’d like to show you that you’ll never see otherwise.” She stopped in her tracks, more surprised by her sudden request than he was.

  “That’s fine with me,” he replied with almost matter-of-fact cheerfulness.

  He was taking her for granted! Catherine was embarrassed for herself; that’s what she got for asking in the first place. But damn—she did want to go. Not just to be with him but to share the mountain with him. And to be with him, that was undeniably part of it. The way he stood there looking at her—maybe she was being too defensive. Yes, he seemed awfully sure of himself all of a sudden, but it wasn’t so much that masculine cockiness she simply couldn’t tolerate. It was something else.

  She began to feel the spontaneous adventure of it. Eugene could handle himself; camping with him would be fun. He wouldn’t be hanging all over her either—that was the positive side of what she’d seen last night. This could be exciting!

  “It’ll be good to have you along,” he said.

  “So when do we go?”

  “Soon as you can get some things packed, I guess.”

  “Great! …Well, let’s see—you know where the ranch is, right?”

  “Yep.”

  “Then I’ll go back and get ready, and you can meet me there when you’re all packed.”

  “I’ll be there.”

  Suddenly she was overwhelmed with excitement. There seemed to be more that needed to be said, but she couldn’t think what it was. She stood there a moment indecisively, then stepped forward and kissed him. “See you in a while.”

  Eugene seemed to have grown in her eyes—perhaps even to know that he had. He appeared older, more mature, and wiser all of a sudden. He smiled and cradled her cheek in his strong, gentle hand. Feeling flustered in the best possible way, Catherine mounted in a blur of sensations and emotions. She felt caught up in a whirlwind as she rode back to the ranch in a fever of plans and anticipation.

  Chapter 20

  Catherine came into the kitchen so fast Lucille, who was seated at the table, was taken by surprise. She slipped something she was holding out of sight onto her lap. Catherine noticed only the worried look on her face, which in her excitement she forgot immediately. “Where’s Ram, Lucille?”

  The older woman’s eyelids fluttered as she drew herself up. “I don’t know where Ram is, but I believe he’s gone up to the mountain. Where have you been, girl?”

  “Up to the mountain? Shasta?”

  “That’s what we generally mean when we say ‘mountain’ around here. Are you going to answer my question?”

  “I spent the night with a friend—out of the rain,” Catherine replied impatiently. “We’re going up to Shasta ourselves—to camp out for a few days. But how did…why’s Ram gone up there?”

  “Far be it from me to know why he does any of the things he does, child. I don’t suppose you’re going to tell me what you’re up to either.”

  “Oh Lucille—just what I said: camping. We’ll only be gone a few days. Will you tell Ram for me when he g
ets back?”

  “You bet I will, young lady.”

  Catherine frowned and shook her head, then darted out of the kitchen to get ready. With a sigh Lucille took from beneath the table what she’d been holding: a golden eagle feather. She hadn’t the slightest idea what its significance was, but she had found it this morning on the kitchen windowsill and known immediately that it was a message of some kind from Ram. She had no doubt that its meaning would be clear enough when it was time for them to understand. It seemed already to have reached some part of her feeling self. The long delicate amber feather was the color of ripening wheat; but, inexplicably, the emotion it inspired in Lucille was one of separation and sorrow.

  …Douglas was worried about Catherine. All morning as he mended fence, he’d been thinking about how she hadn’t come home last night. Now, on his way to the house for lunch, he stopped by the stallion’s stall to see if by any chance she had returned. The horse was there, contentedly munching hay. A surge of such relief and excitement suddenly welled up in him that he felt like a volcano about to erupt. When he did, it was out of the barn toward the kitchen.

  He wasn’t halfway across the paddock when an all too familiar and ominous sound brought him up sharply. The motorcyclists were back! For a moment Douglas was like some wild animal frozen in listening. It wasn’t a bunch of bikes this time, only one—coming up the drive. He walked into the middle of the packed gravel and waited.

  Eugene was admiring the neat, clean layout of buildings, green lawns and corrals as he swept up the gracefully curving drive. The gangly youth ahead of him seemed out of place at first: the only feature of the ranch with an ungainly appearance. Was he deliberately blocking his way? Eugene coasted up to him and stopped. “Hi. I’m here to see Catherine.”

  “Catherine?” Douglas eyed the idling motorcycle suspiciously.

  “I’m a friend of hers: Eugene.” He held out his hand. Douglas just stood there, his mind trying to make sense of this while attempting to avoid the obvious implications at the same time. It could do neither. He knew that this stranger who had appeared from nowhere—on a motorcycle!—had somehow become central in Catherine’s life. He couldn’t begin to comprehend how this could be.