by Les Weil
For a while he kept pointing, then swung his arm to the north which the valley sloped down from before bending cast. To the left, to the west, over the benches, stood the snow-white and rock-blue of the mountains. "Tansy," he said. He had trouble with the word. "Tansy-town."
Lat answered, "Me see," but the chief jabbed with his linger as if to dispute him. Looking closer, he saw what the chief's sharper eyes saw -a building, a cabin, two cabins or more in the bed of the valley.
The chief's hand came down and moved in front of him, the back of it turning under and the thumb sprouting out. "No!" he said. "Go Benton better." His eyes fixed on Lat.
Lat bowed low over the horn of his saddle. If the chief feared Tom and he might ride to -the cabins and recruit a war party let him rest easy.
The chief bobbed his head and heeled his horse without saying goodbye and then, as the rest were about to set out, swung around and came back. "Rising Moon, me."
Lat tapped his own chest. "Lat Evans."
The chief had a try at the sounds and made a poor out.
"Medicine, you. Heap Medicine." He gestured toward Holein-the-Leg. "Little Runner."
Hole-in-the-Leg smiled, his teeth showing strong in his still peaked face, and went grave again.
"What do you call me?" Tom asked, reining closer.
The chief answered, "Injuns go now."
He heeled his horse again and stopped it before it could start and, as if not enough had been said or done, held out his hand. When they had shaken, Hole-in-the-Leg pulled over. "Brother," he said as their hands met.
They rode away at a walk, and after them went the others, the bucks, the squaws, the little papooses, all of them making little signs of good luck and good-bye.
"By God, the ball's over," Tom said, watching them go, maybe feeling himself the close emptiness left in the emptiness everywhere.
There were the Indians, step by step drawing off. There was the valley, close and sweet to the west wind, and the river and trees sleeping winter away. "Which way?" he asked Tom, knowing the answer.
"You got one guess." Tom's smile moved his whiskers. "I been around, pard, too much, I s'pose." The smile had faded and Tom's voice gone soft. "I don't know why, but damn if that Jen don't rub 'em all out."
The sweeter the meat.
"Benton," Lat said, and together they aimed for the far wall of sky.
PART THREE
16
"YOU AWAKE, Lat?"
He was lying out on the plains again, and it was Tom's voice speaking, sounding curiously soft and light, and then the words lifted him from his dream and opened his eyes. Callie stood at the bed holding a breakfast tray, her mouth smiling a little asking smile, as if she were eager to feed him or go away, whichever was his pleasure.
He hitched himself up on one elbow and saw through the window that it was snowing outside, and yet, when he looked back at her, her hair seemed to shine even in this dull light. The little wood stove by the sidewall was crackling cheerfully, sending out a pleasant warmth, and for an instant he could see her firing it, trembling in the chill dawn while he lay asleep, working with quiet, careful movements so as not to rouse him before the room was comfortable.
For nothing he had things so nice. The wages of sin were a warm nest and breakfast in bed. A no-good's delight!
He said, "Wide awake."
"Hungry?"
"Uh-huh. Thanks."
She looked with open curiosity at his bare arm and bare chest. "You're getting back some weight. I swear, you were the thinnest thing!" She set the tray on the stand by the bed and then sat down in the straight-backed chair close to him. As usual, she would watch him eat, insisting that he consume the last crumb. "Now go to it," she said, "and don't start fussing because I bring you breakfast."
He took a bite, wondering how much she was out of pocket for bacon and eggs and other good fare. "I'm leaving here today."
"Not yet, Lat! Please!"
"Why not? You want me to sponge on you forever? Tom went out and got a job."
"But you were hurt. You didn't know how weak you were." She reached out and put a hand on the covers, over his foot. "I like to take care of you."
He sipped the coffee and savored the taste of it before answering. "I'm strong enough now."
She waited until his eyes came to her and then moved in the chair, lithe as a kitten, maybe purposely tempting, as if, where all was understood, all was open and innocent. "Here you had what you wanted, you said once."
It had been what he wanted, not just to have her but to lie in bed, in a good bed, and be warm, and warmer for the warmth of the small body alongside, to eat and to rest and to sleep and to love in the warm, lingering mist of sleep, lost to all wishes but these, lost in the good of them to the right and wrong. What did guilt matter then or what people could say? And it was true he hadn't known his own weakness on reaching Fort Benton, half frozen and famished from bucking a storm that howled down from the north after he and Tom had said goodbye to the Indians. They had managed to get clean clothes, mostly on credit, and had tidied up at the barber's and come straight to Miss Fran's, and Callie somehow seemed to be waiting, and he had given himself to her comforts.
She raised her hand from the bed and spread the small palm in a gesture of asking. "Isn't this good enough?" Her voice was wistful. "Aren't I?"
"Better than I deserve, but don't you see?" While he studied what more to say, footsteps sounded in the hallway outside. The door opened without a knock and let in Miss Fran. She eyed them as if she had caught them in sin, in the sin of not being together in bed, or in the sin of being in bed without money to pay, which was more to the mark. She hadn't put her hair up yet or changed to her company dress. She looked like a ruffled goose -big breast, big tail, tilted on sparrow feet.
Her tone was more fussy than harsh. "I just thought I'd tell you again, Callie, that it's about time to hustle," she said, her eyes on Lat. "More of them traders and such is driftin' back."
Under her gaze Lat asked, "More?"
"Buffalo's peterin' out, like you know, which means we got to shake our tails not to peter out, too."
Callie said, "All right, Aunt Fran. Now please leave us alone."
Miss Fran looked from Callie to Lat and to Callie again, saying more with her eyes than she could say with her tongue. ''Sometimes I wisht you wasn't my niece, Callie. It's a bad example for the house." To Lat she explained, "We got to have money."
Callie gave her a hard stare, which the soft cap of hair made harder yet. "Please go!"
"Oh, I ain't faultin' you, dearie. You're a good earner, I know." Aunt Fran half turned with an air of discouragement. Her head went down, and her eyes studied the floor, over the outthrust of bosom. One hand came up, asking for understanding. It was a teensy hand, crowded with flesh at the wrist. Her voice held the note of soft grievance. "I'm just tryin' to look out for you, like I promised." She sighed as if the job had been almost too much for her. Her gaze lifted to Lat and held on him while she spoke to Callie. "I don't know what your folks would say to this, was they around."
"I'll make it up, every cent," Lat said.
"Please leave us alone," Callie asked.
Miss Fran kept on looking at Lat. "Yes," she said finally. "Leastwise I hope so."
She pivoted herself clear around and pegged to the door on her tiny feet. She opened it and went out and drew it to and opened it again. Half of her came back in. "It's a high price to pay for lally-gaggin'," she told Callie, as if she could have this little triumph and seal the door upon it. "And it won't get you anywheres. Never, anywheres." The latch clicked sharply after her.
Lat listened to the tap of her heels, tapping down the hall like overloaded canes on the march, to money and business and the responsibilities of a going and respectable house where the likes of him was too low, being broke, and lower yet, being so high-minded about virtue and sin. One working hive and he the drone, damning the work while swimming in honey; the drone listening to the now-and-th
en daytime visitors, to the male voices at night and the shrill come-ons of Amy Lou or Jen and the scuff of feet down the hall and the re-scuff as someone ankled out, satisfied; and here he stayed, a guest of the house, keeping a good earner from her honest business.
"Don't mind Aunt Fran," Callie said.
"Mind her? She's right. I'm no better than a tinhorn P.I."
"Eat your breakfast," she said and, as the words struck her: "Not you, Lat! Not us!"
"Not a dime to my name. Nothing in sight but a bill that Jehu won't pay."
"It doesn't matter. We'll get along."
"You want me to be known as a pimp?"
She spoke in a small voice. "Don't call yourself that. It's dirty words that make things dirty, like -like whore. Don't call me that, either, Lat, ever."
He was half of a mind to ask her what she was then, but he held back the question in the face of another. "What have I got that you waste your time and your money?"
She got up without answering and pulled down the shade, darkening the room to all but the shadow of light and the flicker of fire through the damper. She came back and moved the tray to the side of the table and sat on the edge of the bed and laid her hand on his face. "You're just upset with yourself, Lat. I know. I know you."
"What do you see?"
"Someone that's kind," she answered, low-voiced, her head turned away while her hand stroked his forehead. "You don't know how hungry a girl gets for someone that's kind."
There flashed into his mind a picture of her, small and forlorn, knowing only the rough and heartless embraces of rough men and the heartless concern of Aunt Fran. Because he was kind, she loved him, because he never spoke sharply, like now, and never wanted to hurt her, being sore himself, like now. His hand closed over the hand on his face.
The low voice went on. "You're a gentleman, Lat. That's why you're mad at yourself, thinking you're not being one. But you are. You always will be."
She turned to him and slipped her hand out of his and cradled it under his head and leaned slowly forward, with the torn look of hurt, and caressed his face with her lips. Against his chest one of her breasts arched and moved.
This was what she knew to give, the great and pitiful little. This was the natural relief, the final comfort, the first and last of woman's services, for money or for love. As a man believeth in his heart, so was she-warm, all-giving, bound and blind to wrong, through use useful. The drawn shade, the lips on his face, the breast on his chest, all were of one piece, all done with the one wish to soothe and restore him, to make him forget in the flooding act of forgetfulness.
All done to bind him closer perhaps, all binding him closer at any rate-but he lifted his face and found her mouth.
"Lat," she said, her lips moving on his, "just be happy! Be happy for now!"
He brought her down by his side, under the covers, and fumbled at her dress, and her hands joined his and unbuttoned it and slipped it off. Another time, an earlier time, and she would have undressed out of bed and let him warm to the sight of her, as she just now would have done had he asked her to. Somehow she seemed to know that immodesty by itself bothered him.
She stretched out beside him, awaiting his wishes, and he pushed his hand under her neck and cushioned her head on his shoulder and lay flat on his back while one thing and another took turns in his mind, putting off for the time the time that was bound to be. This place. This stage in his life, and what did it mean for the rest? This wheat-yellow head against his and thigh against thigh. This accepting of charity. This almost pimping. This branding himself, if decent men knew. This branding himself, anyhow, before God. The way of the transgressor was hard, and the sins of the father passed on. Then be gelded, like Sugar. Sugar, the good horse, the fast horse, being kept on the cuff by old Whitey, who liked his whiskey, while Jehu dodged honest debts. Where were Moo Cow and Godwin and Carmichael? Dead yonder on the shrill plains, worse treated. than another transgressor whose wages were a girl at his side? Worse treated than Tom, who was happy with Jen and by day did rough work so as not to be on charity, too? Transgressor Tom, who took little stock in the Book, asking who made such rules and where was the why of them. Let Pa answer that one. He could lay down the law. Don't question! Don't doubt, son! Only fear God, Who loves one and all, and keep your hands out from under the covers!
Callie kissed him behind the ear and said, almost whispering, "I save myself for you, Lat. When you're gone, I will."
She might have been a good wife swearing faithfulness, and for a moment he didn't know what she meant. Then it came to him. By keeping cold with others, by just pretending warmth, she kept love pure for him in her sight. He saw them, the lines of grinning men, obliged and billed, who thought they'd had her but within herself left her untouched. Public body, public vessel, pure and secret heart!
He answered with a little flex of the muscles under her head and lay still, feeling her breath light and warm on his neck. She pressed closer to him so that he felt her all along his side, from her feet to her knees to the warm triangle of groin to her breasts and back to the triangle. The proud and shameful strength was ready in him, but Pa stood in his mind's eye with the whip in his hand and the wrought-up righteousness in his face.
"Don't you want me to?" she asked.
"I'm glad," he said and nodded his head against hers while the words drifted out into the edge of things, away from him and the hay shed in Oregon and the small neighbor girl and the unbuttoned trousers and the raised yellow dress and the young curiosity. They were only looking. They knew nothing but that. But there stood Pa in the door of the shed, his eyes squinting and hardening, his face like the tool of God's, his face God's itself. The girl cried out faintly and dodged around and ran off, and the will of the Lord came on.
Callie's voice breathed in his ear, "Tell me what's in your head, Lat," and he answered, "Nothing much," and was silent, for the whip was whistling justice, was visiting the divine wrath on the trespasser. There were the sing and the hard cut of it and the blow of Pa's breath and the sing and the cut and the blow. They stopped, and Pa stood, breathing deep, and slowly his face changed, from the set of wrath to the twist of some torment. From what was left of the wrath his mouth got out, "Now take care! Pretty soon you'll be old enough to ruin a girl. I'd rather see you dead!" Pa looked up then, as if to find word he'd done right, and afterwards down at the ground. His shoulders sagged, and the eyes he turned on Lat seemed deserted and beaten. He wasn't God any longer or God's tool or Pa himself, but a stranger on whom God's hand lay too heavy. At last he said, "I'm sorry, son," and stood there, unsure and lonely; and this was the worst, worse than the shame and the wrath, to see Pa undone, lost somewhere between the Lord and himself. This was the end of things. Lat cried out, "Oh, Pa!" and ran to him and felt the whip hand kind and sad on his shoulder.
Lat moved in bed, hardly knowing he had until Callie spoke. "You think too much, Lat."
She was inside him somehow, partner to the beat of his heart and the tick of his mind. Her hand trailed down gently, from his face to his chest. It lay warm on his stomach.
He reached over and put his other arm around her and turned her to him and kissed her, and the strength reared in him again, and Pa backed off into shadow. Whatever this was, it couldn't be ruination for her.
But before they went on, she drew her face away from his and smiled a small, half-joking smile and said, "I know how to handle you, mister. I'll always know how to handle you."
Her face sobered then. "Will I, Lat?"
17
LAT OPENED the door and stole a look around before letting himself out. No one was watching, and he stepped ahead and cased the door shut, hearing behind him Happy's soft Negro voice. "Come back, Mist' Lat. Jes' feel at home any time."
Yesterday's light snow was thawing under a sky in which one cotton cloud sailed. The footpath was slippery and the road at its end raw with half-melted clods. Down from the house the Missouri lay frozen, slush-white but dark-patched with the promise
of reviving life underneath. Ahead, a couple of birds dared the footing, stepping dainty but hopeful, their heads cocked as if they expected a bug to pop up any minute or a ripe berry to push through the frost. The slanting roofs of houses and stores dripped melted snow and, where the snow had withered away, shone moist and sunny. A man could imagine spring was just around the corner.
It was a day for decision, a day to take a new hold, to put plans in action. But how? Get a job as a puncher at forty or fifty a month, saving bit by bit over the years so as to set up for yourself in old age? Ask for work with I. G. Baker and Company or the T. C. Power outfit or others who bought and sold and freighted goods by steamboat and wagon? A slow way to work up to rancher. Badger work, Tom would say, though he was doing it now.
A bull train, its wagons half up to the hubs in the mud, lurched along Front Street, held to the churn of earlier wheels by the river on one hand and the close-facing stores on the other. The whacker would pull up by and by and quit cursing and whipping and, with his chores done, would look for women and liquor and so waste what he'd slaved for and, like a slave, go back to work, hard up and sore-headed and wiser for maybe one day.
It was a quiet time, Miss Fran and her returning traders regardless. Along the whole street there were maybe a halfdozen men, idling in and out of stores or saloons with the mud squeezing out from under their boots. The river shore was dead, emptied of the hogsheads and kegs and lumber and packing cases that the steamers brought up and of the rough cargoes they carried down. One hammer pounded somewhere, rapping shame on loafers. A team stood hip-shot at a rack, both horses half asleep -dumb muscle waiting for a ruler who maybe couldn't rule himself. Across the river a clutch of tepees rose, tan-white in the sun, with smoke lazing from two smoke holes and a dog sniffing for a scrap that wouldn't be there. Here at the side of a store an old, blanket squaw stood still and unwinking as if counting time until at last it came to its end.