Powder River

by S. K. Salzer

  All in all, Jack Reshaw’s cabin was a good place to be that winter, sparsely furnished but comfortable, with a table and three chairs, a washstand, mirror, and a rough plank counter along the back wall. A bucket served as a sink. Above were rows of shelves lined with bags of flour, sugar, coffee, and tins of canned milk, vegetables, and fruits. The two back rooms had bed frames built into the walls at the corners, each tautly laced with ropes and covered with tick mattresses. Billy stuffed his with blue-green needles of Douglas fir that filled the room with a sweet, fresh fragrance. The scent reminded Billy of his childhood in the Crow mountain village when his mother would make him a tea of crushed fir needles whenever his stomach hurt.

  In late January, they were blessed with a two-day thaw. The warm sun melted the top layer of snow, forming pools of water that the grateful cows drank greedily. The three men celebrated the thaw with a bottle of whiskey, hoping the worst of winter had broken but knowing in their hearts it had not. Indeed, they were punished for their short respite, for it was followed by a brutal freeze with temperatures plunging to forty below zero. The wind was constant and merciless. Billy, warm in his bed, heard the storm bearing down during the night, howling, screaming, and bringing death. He pitied the living things caught in its teeth, and knew that soon he and Sugarfoot would be out among them, trying to save Jack’s brainless beeves. The animals turned their tails to the wind and let it push them wherever it wanted. Too often it drove them into a fence where they piled up, one on top of the other, and died; sometimes it forced them down into the gullies or railroad cuts where the snow was deepest and they froze to death. Horses were smarter; they understood it might be necessary to head into the wind to reach a better place. They could break through ice with their hooves to get water. Billy didn’t know whether cows were stupid or just lazy, but, whatever the reason, they needed a man’s help to survive.

  “You awake?” Nate spoke from his bed across the room. Billy, who was entertaining impure thoughts of Odalie Faucett, and not for the first time, feigned sleep, so he could finish the sweet show playing out in his head. But Nate felt like talking.

  “You ever think about giving this up?” he said. “You ever think about finding some other way to make a dollar?”

  In fact, Billy had already decided this would be his last year of working cattle. “I’m done with this,” he said. “Horses, that’s what I’m good at. No more cowpunching for me. What about you? You thinking about ditching Jack and going to work in town for Tom Raylan, like he asked you? That don’t sound like much.”

  “Hell, no! That Raylan’s a scoundrel, a unhung thief. No, I like cowboying but I want a place of my own. Jack wants me to go shares in the Lazy L and B, and I thought about it, but no, I’ve got to have my own brand, my own herd, my own place. That’s what I want, and I will have it.”

  “The WSGA won’t let you, Nate,” Billy said. “Not you, or Jack, neither. Faucett and Dudley and them, they let him get this far, but they’ll put the kibosh on it soon enough. Jack’s twisting their tail, and they won’t have it. When I was in town last week, I heard Frank Canton’s been saying Jack stole the steers we’re running, says he’s been slapping the Lazy L and B mark on mavericks, blotching other brands, you name it. Canton’s getting folks stirred up. It’s dangerous for Jack—me and you, too. But I’m not telling you what you don’t know.”

  A blast of icy pellets struck the window, rattling the glass in its wooden frame. “Canton,” Nate said with contempt, “Faucett’s favorite ass-kisser. He’s made a full-time job outta that.” There was a moment of quiet, then Nate said, “I don’t know why you stick around, Billy. Me and Jack, we go back a long way. We’re like kin. But you don’t need this. You could go. I’d get out if I was you.”

  Billy had not told Nate about a letter he’d had from Nelson Story in the fall. “I can’t find a man with half your skill for busting ponies,” Story wrote. “I’ll give fifty a month if you will come back.” But even if he hadn’t promised Jack his help through the winter, Billy would not have taken Story up on his offer. He was in Powder River country to stay, he would never give up on his dream to make his way in Absaroka, the land of his forefathers.

  “I’ll stick it out,” Billy said, “through the winter leastways. I told Jack he’ll have to find someone else in the spring, when the new horses come in.”

  The banshee scream of the wind rose an octave. Soon it would be light enough to ride. Jack was already up. They heard him get out of bed with a groan, then shuffle from his room to throw wood on the coals still glowing in the stove’s firebox.

  “Well, you’re right about one thing,” Nate said. “What we’re doing is dangerous. I’ve gotten used to your red Injun face. I’d be sad to see anything happen to it.”

  Billy grinned in the darkness. “That’s real white of you,” he said.

  Billy Sun

  Billy wore nearly every piece of clothing he owned, but even so he was chilled to the bone. Around noon the sun broke through the gray ceiling of clouds, and though it lessened the cold, the glare reflecting off the snow scorched his eyes. Billy blacked his high Indian cheekbones with soot from a lamp chimney, but still he was blinded. Sugarfoot suffered, too. The ice that had formed when the melted snow refroze cut the animal’s legs when he broke through the crust. Billy wrapped them in strips of torn-up burlap feed sacks, but even so his horse left a bloody trail in the snow.

  “Damn beeves,” Billy said as he and Sugarfoot fought their way toward one of the herd’s favorite gullies. If he found any alive, he would drive them to a more sheltered place, maybe the south side of a mountain, where he would shovel through four feet of snow with the hope he would uncover enough grass to keep the starving animals alive for one more day. Often as not there was none, the range having been grazed or burned bare during the long, scorching summer. Cattle were stupid, but Billy was soft on four-leggeds of all kinds and he hurt for them. He had never seen suffering on such a scale. One poor steer he found wandering on four bloody stumps. His hoofs, Billy reckoned, must have frozen and broken off. He put the animal out of its misery, then cut off and packed as much meat as he could carry and left the rest for the wolves. They were the only creatures getting fat in Powder River country that winter.

  He raised his face to the sun. It was about two o’clock, and Billy was getting hungry. He was dreaming about a hot plate of elk stew with onions, carrots, and potatoes and a steaming mug of sweet Arbuckle’s coffee when he heard the crack of a rifle shot as Sugarfoot’s muzzle exploded in a spray of blood and teeth. The horse screamed and rose on his rear legs, blindly churning the air with his feet. Billy fought to keep his seat, at the same time scanning the treeless, snow-covered hills for the shooter. A second shot struck Sugarfoot in the head and he dropped, first onto his knees and then, with a groan, rolled over onto his side. Billy barely had time to jump free.

  A third shot plunged into Sugarfoot’s belly. Billy threw himself down on the snowy ground behind the horse’s body and again searched the horizon. This time he saw him, a black shape on the line where the white of the ground met the blue dome of sky. “Damn you,” Billy said. “Damn you to hell.” He was lucky Sugarfoot had not fallen on his rifle. Billy slid the .38 Winchester from its sheath, levered in a shell, braced the barrel on the saddle, and squeezed off a shot. The black shape disappeared.

  Billy waited. Had he killed the son of a bitch? Billy didn’t know, but he would. He would find the cowardly horse-killing devil and put him through. He’d do it if it was his last act in this world. Billy’s throat was thick, and he felt a rotten sickness in the pit of his stomach as he stroked Sugarfoot’s muscular neck. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

  The shooter did not reappear. Billy got to his feet and started walking, rifle fully cocked, toward the place where he had been, hoping to find a corpse. He kept a sharp eye out; the killer could have doubled back and gotten behind him. Could have, but Billy didn’t think so. When he reached the base of the rise where the shoo
ter had been, Billy stopped and listened. Hearing nothing, he began the climb, holding the rifle before him. Just before reaching the crest, he dropped into a crouch and moved forward crab-like, close to the ground. At the top, he saw blood in the snow where the assassin had lain in ambush. Billy smiled. Good, he had hit him. Farther down, he found the place where the coward had left his horse and deep tracks marking their departure.

  The snow was starting again. Billy looked to the southeast, toward Jack’s place a good fifteen miles distant. It was getting on to three o’clock. There was a pair of snowshoes hanging from his saddle, but even so there was no way he’d make the ranch before dark.

  He retraced his steps to Sugarfoot’s body and kneeled beside him, trying not to look at his destroyed face. He placed his hand on the horse’s neck and closed his eyes, speaking to the animal’s risen spirit. “You were a brave and loyal friend,” he said. “We came together at a time when I doubted myself as a man. I could not find my place, not in the Indian world and not in the white man’s world, but you showed me a path to follow. You showed me that I was worthy of trust. You never failed me, you never disappointed me. You were my true friend. Thank you.” Billy tasted his own salty tears. He had not wept since the day Rose was taken.

  He went through his saddlebags, discarding everything he would not need but keeping two waxed paper–wrapped biscuits, each split in half and dipped in bacon grease with a thick slab of bacon in the middle, two cans of peaches, and an extra pair of socks. Even though it weighed a good thirty pounds, he would take the saddle, too. It was too valuable to leave behind. Before getting under way, Billy unsheathed his knife and cut long strands from the horse’s black mane and tail and put them in the saddlebags. Later he would weave a lariat of the horsehair so Sugarfoot would be with him always.

  He started walking, with a heart heavy but blood warmed by hate. He entertained himself with thoughts of how he would put the killer through; his relatives the Mountain Crows had been creative in this regard. He had grown up with stories of tortures the women inflicted on Sioux captives the men brought back to the village, and he took pleasure in remembering them now; fingers and toes removed one by one, hot coals dropped in ears . . .

  The snow stopped after about an hour. It was at least two feet deep on the ground and in places much deeper. Billy trudged forward, awkward in his snowshoes and sheepskin coat but glad of them, glad also he had thought to stuff his boots with newspaper. It was a good thing too he brought his rifle, something he did not usually do when tending cattle, because a long gun interfered with access to his lariat. He only thought to bring it this time because of the danger he and Nate had spoken of the night before. Billy raised his eyes to the sky, thanking his protector in the Spirit World for looking out for him. If only the protector had done the same for Sugarfoot.

  It was about four o’clock and the cold was cruel, at least twenty below. For the first time that day, Billy felt a chill that had nothing to do with the temperature. He was young and strong, but far from home. How would he survive the night? “Keep moving,” he said aloud. “To stop, to sleep, is to die.”

  He walked steadily for hours but the snow was deep, and even with the snowshoes he did not make good progress. Thirst plagued him, but he had foolishly allowed the water in his canteen to freeze. Even now, though he carried it inside his coat, it remained solid. He felt it bumping against him with each step, heavy as a blow. From time to time he bent to take a mouthful of snow, and though this slaked his thirst it made him colder. He ate the bacon biscuits without pausing, though these, too, were frozen and he was forced to hold each bite in his mouth until it softened enough to chew. Despite their iciness, the greasy biscuits were delicious, perhaps the most delicious food he had ever eaten, though the saltiness of the bacon increased his thirst.

  The time came when he could no longer carry the saddle, and he acknowledged he had been foolish to try. He told himself he could come back for it later, maybe it wouldn’t be too damaged, but now all he could think about was getting closer to the round-bellied stove that threw good heat. He turned a circle in the moonlight, trying to find a protected place to hide the saddle, or at least a landmark so he would know where to look later. Finding nothing in the rolling mounds of sparkling white, he dropped it where he stood. That saddle cost him forty dollars, more than a month’s pay. It was the first thing he bought when he started earning real wages. Nelson Story himself helped him choose it. Abandoning the saddle felt like defeat.

  Before midnight Billy noticed a wolf following him, about fifty yards behind. He turned to challenge the animal, and though the wolf stopped as well, he made no move to run. Clearly, he saw in Billy no menace, only meat on the hoof. Billy walked on, followed by his gray, yellow-eyed companion.

  When he came to the creek, and the skeletal cottonwoods that lined it, Billy knew he was fewer than five miles from the ranch, but it might as well be five hundred. His feet were numb, despite the newspaper and thick woolen socks. He wore a wool scarf over his hat and tied under his chin to cover his ears, but even so they were frozen, so cold they had stopped hurting a long time ago. As a boy in the Crow village, Billy and the other children had been fascinated and repelled by an old warrior who, as a young man, had been wounded on a horse-stealing raid against the Sioux and had lain in the snow for hours until his friends found him and carried him to safety. The warrior kept his fingers and toes but his frozen ears had rotted off, leaving red, angry mounds of misshapen flesh on either side of his head. Billy put his mittened hands over his ears and sent a plea to his protector in the world behind this one. Please, do not take my ears.

  Without realizing it, Billy had stopped walking and stood swaying like a solitary tree about to fall. He caught himself just in time and looked over his shoulder at the wolf, inching closer. Billy forced himself to keep moving. Maybe I should make for the trees, try to make a shelter, a wickiup, with downed branches. Maybe I could make a fire.

  Even as he considered, he knew any branches he could find would be wet, covered in snow; still he had no choice but to try. Otherwise he would freeze. He started down the slope toward the frozen creek. Gradually, he became aware of a sound, barely audible above the crunch of his shoes on the snow and the ringing of his ears. What was it? He hesitated, searching the dark stand of trees ahead. Was something—or someone—in there? Someone, like him, seeking shelter from the cold and, if so, friend or foe? He pulled his rifle from its canvas sheath and raised it to his shoulder.

  “Billy!” He froze. Was his mind playing tricks or did someone actually call his name? No, it was real—the wolf heard it, too. He turned his head toward the sound, which came again. “Billy!”

  A man on horseback came toward him, leading a second horse. Billy laughed with relief as the wolf, with one last, hungry look in Billy’s direction, loped away.

  “I’m disappointed in you, Billy,” Nate said with a grin. “I thought you redskins were better at this type of thing.”

  Billy struggled to speak, his frozen mouth could barely form words. “Someone shot Sugarfoot. He got away, but I wounded him.” He walked to the second horse and, after removing his snowshoes, tried to mount, but his foot was so leaden he could not lift it to the stirrup. Nate dismounted and vaulted Billy into the saddle.

  “Can you ride?” Nate said. Billy nodded.

  “We’ll get you home and thaw you out. Then you can tell me what happened.”

  Now that he knew he was going to survive, Billy’s thoughts returned to revenge, He would ask Dr. Dixon if anyone had come seeking treatment for a bullet wound. And when Billy found him, he would give him another.

  Odalie

  She sat at her dressing table, still in her chemise, brushing her hair. Downstairs she heard the guests arriving, all of them lumpen, uninteresting people she would not bother to say hello to if she were in New York or New Orleans. The people of Wyoming Territory had no understanding of style, of glamour, and she had yet to meet anyone, male or female, with a sense of
humor. She’d almost given up looking. She sighed and dropped her brush. Things weren’t a complete loss, she thought. Some of the men, at least, were good to look at.

  Richard would be wondering where she was; Odalie knew she should be dressed, already downstairs greeting the arrivals at her husband’s side, but she was in no hurry. After all, she’d be putting up with them until the wee hours. These cow merchants never knew when it was time to go home.

  She leaned forward to examine her face more closely in the mirror. Were those freckles? God, they were. Soon she’d look like an Irish washerwoman or one of those high yellow girls who wove baskets in the French market. With a sound of disgust, she walked to the window where she concealed herself behind the white gauzy curtains to watch the scene below. Men in high hats and bowler hats escorted women in silks and brocades, some in pearls and diamonds that glittered in the lamplight. Odalie felt a wave of sadness wash over her. She had not bargained for this desolation, this crushing tedium, when she married Lord Richard Faucett four years ago, though her mother had tried to warn her. “He might have money, my dear, but he is not an interesting man. Think about the boys you’ve grown up with, the Landreneu brothers, Felix Robinett, Wyatt—think about Wyatt, Odalie! How could you be happy with Richard Faucett when you’ve had the love of a man like that?”

  Her mother had been wise to mention Wyatt Tarwater, a childhood friend who had grown into a beautiful man, tall and athletic, with unruly brown hair that was forever falling into his eyes, full, pillowy lips and a wonderful, knowing smile. Yes, she loved him—indeed, he had been her first lover and she could not have hoped for better, in every regard—but the Tarwater family had fallen on hard times after the war, and Wyatt, charming though he was, would never be the kind of man to put his shoulder to the wheel. Much as she loved him, she had refused his offer of marriage. A life of genteel poverty was not in the cards for her—or so she thought. Had she made a mistake? She still pictured him in her mind’s eye every time she was with Richard. With her eyes closed, it was still Wyatt’s face she saw, his voice she heard. That is, until recently. There was another man who had something of Wyatt about him. Now it was sometimes his face she saw when she performed her wifely duty.