Delphi Collected Works of Max Brand US

by Max Brand

  But they did not close. He released the arm as suddenly as he had seized it, and, raising his head, he looked far off at the flashing of the sun on a young poplar. It was almost as though he were ashamed. But when Lee raised the leg gently and placed the fetlock joint on the edge of the hole, the relief from pain was so instant that Moonshine lowered his head again and snuffed at the merciful hand of the man with trembling nostrils.

  The worst part of caring for the hoof was no doubt passed when Moonshine submitted to his touch. He went on with more assurance. With his clumsy shovel he drove a trench from above his own dam and let down a clear, sparkling rivulet that he enlarged to a pool just in front of Moonshine.

  The washing alone filled the hour until sunset. It was work that brought out a perspiration of sympathy on Lee. He had to pry the loose shell away from the sensitive laminae, and then pour cold water into the opening. It was like flooding the naked nerve of a gigantic tooth, but although the horse dropped his head, and, although the muscle of his foreleg kept jumping, he did not stir his hoof.

  After the cleansing ended, Lee delicately, but firmly, pressed the hoof shell into place and bound it with supple willow bark. Around this he packed thick layers of the cooling clay, laid splints of fir over the clay to keep the hoof rigidly in place, and covered the whole with withes of creeping vines and another wet layer of mud. That done, he must leave the rest to time and chance.

  * * * * *

  A time of hard work began. Moonshine ate voraciously, and every mouthful had to be carried from the meadow far away where Lee tore up the grass. There was his necessary bedding, also, for he could not lie continually on the bruising gravel. All this was in a broken season of rain, wind, and sun of alternate fierceness, so he built Moonshine a shelter. First he felled saplings with circles of fire and then fixed them up deep in the earth around the horse. When he bent their heads and tied them together with creepers, he had the frame of a wickiup upon which he laid a thatching.

  For his own food he skirmished with stones or stick for the clumsy, sleepy grouse or laid deadfalls for the birds where their established paths wound through the grass, baiting the traps with dried seed. Best of all he invented fishhooks whittled out of wing bones, and with these and a strong creeper, or a strand of rope, he fished successfully in the river a half mile below.

  He could not make these excursions long, however, for there was never a day when he did not hear or see evidences of mountain lion or wolf prowling near and waiting for their prey. Moreover, a long absence sent the horse into a frenzy of neighing. Even when Lee was in the meadow, plucking the grass, he would wait for the stallion’s neigh and then answer with a high, wailing whistle that pierced through the heaviest wind.

  It was strange how swiftly and joyously the days drifted by while he waited for the time when Moonshine could be safely helped to his feet. He himself was greatly changed. Sometimes when he fished, leaning over still water, he saw himself masked in a savage beard with hair straggling down his shoulders. He was naked to the waist, and below the waist his ragged trousers did not reach his knees. His feet had been bare for many days, and the soles were horny as leather. But with hardships came perfect freedom with only one shadow clouding his mind, and that was the great question of Moonshine’s hoof. When he removed the bandage he might find only a ragged, shriveled parody of a hoof. When he thought of that, he could not help looking into the sky where the buzzards still hung. His patience was great, but theirs was endless.

  It became increasingly difficult after the first few days to keep Moonshine quiet. He gained in strength and flesh with amazing rapidity, and, with the addition of vigor, he waxed more eager to find his feet. After that, it was necessary to pet and amuse the stallion like a sick child until Lee decided that he might safely get up.

  To ensure that safety, however, was a great problem, for Moonshine must get to his feet without once putting an ounce of weight upon the injured hoof. To prevent that, Lee made of tough vines a sling that passed over the withers, fastened at the elbow, and again, firmly, around the fetlock joint, that was drawn close to the upper leg. He now began a course of lessons, teaching Moonshine to rise on one foreleg, throwing part of his weight upon the shoulder of the man. It was prodigiously hard labor for the cowpuncher to take that great forward thrust as the mustang lunged up, but it was finally accomplished. Moonshine came swaying to his feet and hobbled out of the wickiup with Lee at his side, supporting all he could of the weight. The horse stayed up only a short time the first day. Before he became unsteady on his three feet, Lee had to maneuver him back into the wickiup.

  Inside it, Moonshine turned around like a dog in his kennel, found the exact old spot, and lowered himself cautiously into it. It was a triumph for both of them, and Lee spent an hour foolishly gathering the seeded heads of grasses, a work that Moonshine devoured in two or three careless mouthfuls.

  Still the end was far away, and, if the hurt hoof were exposed and used a single day too soon, all their weeks of effort would be spent in vain. He examined it with painful interest each time he changed the dressing, and always the hoof looked worse, for while the other three were worn down nearly to normal as Moonshine hobbled around on them day after day, the bandaged foot grew steadily and became a disproportional, hideous thing, with a great hard rim where the wound was knitting. But Lee knew that his eye could not tell him. Not until Moonshine put his weight on that foot and limped or walked straight would he know.

  X. THE MASTER

  ON TOP OF a hill that was burned brown by the fall heat of summer stood Moonshine, a bright form against the blue sky beyond him. He went readily on three legs, now, hobbling everywhere, and even managing occasionally a broken canter. Each day he roamed farther, and Lee, marking this journey to the distant hills, mused somberly over it. For all these excursions were toward the north. “He’s turning back to his kin,” Lee decided. “Hoof and hide and hair, every inch of him wants to be back there with his wild devils.” What made the conclusion doubly important was that this day he had determined to cut the sling and let the injured hoof strike the ground. He raised that keen whistle, and the mustang swung about with a whinny and came at the hobbling canter down the slope to him.

  “Old hoss,” the man said, “this is your day. Either you’re as free as the clouds, blowing yonder, or else you’ll be fodder for them.”

  He lifted the chin of the stallion and made him look up where the buzzards hung, waiting. Then he ripped away the covering of withes and clay at last and cut the sling at the withers. Down came the foot, but, as it struck the earth, Moonshine heeled over and barely saved a fall by lurching off on three feet with the lame hoof raised high. Lee Garrison closed his eyes.

  “Buzzard food — him,” whispered the cowpuncher. And with his eyes still closed, he groaned: “Moonshine.”

  Moonshine came at a trot, and Lee listened sadly for the bobbing break in the rhythm. But true and clear the rhythm of that trot was beat. He opened his eyes. It was true. The injured hoof was striking the ground in its turn — gingerly, to be sure, but regularly.

  “Run, damn you!”

  Moonshine threw himself about and stretched across the meadow at a gallop- -a leaping gallop, but a true one, with healed foot pounding in its turn. Halting, he looked back with ears pointed in suspicion, as if he had seen a new creature jump out of the form of his companion. But Lee neither stirred nor shouted; joy had closed his throat.

  They did not leave the old camp even then, but, day by day, they roamed through the hills together until the weak leg grew strong, and the long muscles were once more down to the shape of its fellows, with only the disappearing ridge to mark the wound. Then he broke camp. He threw away the rope, for, if it came to a battle, he could never ride this revivified stallion. He felt it as he stood, on this morning, beside the stallion, with his hand on the withers. Once before he had been on that back, but in those days it had been a ridge of bone, and now that hollow was filled with rounding, smooth muscles.
r />   “Moonshine,” he said.

  The stallion turned his head.

  “This part was never written into the contract, old fellow,” said Lee, “but the straight of it is that I figure on using your feet as much as you use ’em. You still got the right to have your own say and dump me on my head — no hard feelings, if you do — but here goes.”

  He swung back, made a quick step forward, and vaulted onto the back of Moonshine. There, with his hand buried in the mane, and his knees feeling for a firmer hold, he waited while the strong body under him quivered, settled. He set his teeth for the leap straight into the air, but, instead, Moonshine sprang into a gallop as smooth as the run of an ocean wave. Or, freer still, it was as though wings buoyed him and shot him forward with wind whipping his face. A hill drifted past them, a valley was devoured by those flying hoofs, and still the flight was not abated. They shot over a hill. Below, a long slope tumbled east toward the red of the dawn, and the gray flung himself out with head lowering. Like the rush of water down smooth rock, they shot into the heart of the morning. To try to stop him now would be like trying to recall a loosed arrow. Yet, Lee stooped till the tips of the mane were snapping on his face and called softly. Behold! The head went up, the run checked to a swinging canter. The arrow had heeded the voice.

  In the days that followed Lee Garrison learned that no matter how easily the horse could be swung from side to side or halted, he continually swung back toward the north as a boat struggled to come before the wind. At last, feeling that the test must come sooner or later, he let Moonshine follow his own will, and before sunset of a still, hot day they came over a hill and saw wild horses in the hollow beneath.

  The herd was not caught unawares. Already the outposts had brought in the warning of a man’s approach, and now a fine chestnut stallion was whipping in the laggards, grouping his herd together. Finally, with a neigh he started them away at full gallop. Moonshine tore off in pursuit. Lee drew back on the mane and shouted. The pace of the silver-gray shortened, not to the rolling canter, but to a gait like a choppy sea. He called again, and the stallion reared and stopped, but with head strained high he stared at the fleeing herd. Was this his own band? Lee slid to the ground. Still with the weight of his two fingers on that arched neck he held the horse.

  “Moonshine, there’s one thing,” he said, “that time isn’t going to change. Your kind isn’t my kind. Here I am, and there run your horses. Make your choice.”

  There was not even a turn of Moonshine’s head in answer. When the fingers lifted, he was off with one high sway of his tail and a neigh that rang across the hill ridges and to the herd. Some of them, as if they recognized the command, shortened their gallop. There no longer remained much doubt that they were recognizing the old leader. Indeed, in a few more moments, the whole crowd had slowed to a trot, and the chestnut came swinging back to investigate. Moonshine went down the hill to meet him.

  It was a beautiful thing to see the two come together, falling from gallop to canter, from canter to trot, from trot to nervous, high-stepping walk. Behind them the herd scattered into a semi-circle, the wise old mare in the rear calling to the yearlings to keep them back, and restless young stallions coming curiously forward to watch and get points from the two champions. Nose to nose they met, arching necks. The pricked ears snapped suddenly back. With a squeal of rage the chestnut plunged at the throat of Moonshine with gaping teeth.

  A spring to one side, as if the wind had blown him, took the gray out of danger, and the new leader, floundering at the end of his rush, whirled and charged again while Moonshine watched with his head canted thoughtfully to one side. But he was ready for blood now. Up he reared and rained blows at the chestnut’s snaky head. The new leader gave back with sinking hindquarters, dazed, but he had the bulldog blood that runs in all mustangs. He charged again, and this time he also reared. Apparently that was the opening for which the gray had hopes, as the old pugilist waits to shoot his favorite blow. He sprang forward with a short whinny, like a snarl almost, drove through the barrage of the striking forehoofs, and caught the new leader by the throat. The new leader went down, and Lee covered his eyes to shut away the rest of the horrible picture as Moonshine charged over the fallen horse.

  A moment later there was a great neigh and a beat of hoofs running toward him. It was Moonshine, his bright coat spotted with red. He swept about Lee in a spiral that ended when, with all fours planted, he slid to a halt. His muzzle was red, and his eyes were devilish. Behind him, down the slope, was the shapeless blotch that had been the chestnut leader. Lee neither moved nor spoke.

  Moonshine danced away, sidewise, like a boxer, and at the little distance he whinnied. It was clear to Lee, at last, that he was invited to Join the herd, but still, although his heart was thundering, he would neither move nor use the persuasion of his voice. He found a sullen, tormented pleasure in leaving the choice to the horse.

  The herd no longer waited, but moved down the valley at a trot, and at the heard ran a fine bay — a new aspirant for the vacancy. When Moonshine neighed, the ranks wavered and spread, but the bay called in turn, and they went on. Off went Moonshine down the slope, but halfway to the herd he whirled as suddenly as he had started, and, looking back, he neighed and stamped in a fretful fury of impatience. Another feint of going on with the herd brought no movement from Lee, so at last Moonshine came slowly up the hill, plodding with head fallen.

  By Lee he stopped and turned, and, together, they watched the wild horses drop over a ridge.

  XI. THE BACK TRAIL

  THE UPPER SAMSON Mountains crowded together behind them as Lee Garrison rode Moonshine into the southern range, bound for the Staked Plains. It was a long trail, but over every mile that he had labored on foot he would now gallop on the back of the stallion. Indeed, he almost wished that the trail would never end; on such a horse he felt that he should go on to some glorious destiny. What bright goal was possible to a cowpuncher? Like a child on a feast day, shutting out the thought of tomorrow and its school, he lost himself in delight of the moment.

  They came out, on a day, to the shoulder of a hill, the arm of which had been chopped off. They came at a swinging gallop, and Moonshine slid to a halt, knocking up a shower of pebbles that dropped silently out of sight beyond the edge. A more clumsy animal might have plunged with its rider where those stones were falling, but so accustomed had Lee grown to the goat-footed surety of his horse that he merely laughed at the dizzy thought and let Moonshine step still nearer to the verge until they could look down between the hollow walls of the caqon to its floor.

  At this season the stream that had plowed the gorge among the mountains was a muddy trickle among big, sun-whitened rocks that its spring current would roll again toward the sea. At the head of the little valley there was a hundred-foot cliff above the broad scar of the waterfall where now only a few streaks glistened on the flat, rock face. Close to it was the first house he had seen in all the hunt from the southland, and now his heart fell at the sight of it.

  Here ended his holiday. The world from which he had run away returned to him. He could not play forever. Inescapable duty called to him. Duty to what? He was answerable to no man. Yet the heavy truth oppressed him. There was something he must do. It bewildered him, and the harder he grasped at an understanding, the more completely it evaded him. There could be nothing less imposing than yonder little wedge of a roof, unpainted and melting into the weathered brown of the cliff, but yonder little house sheltered one of those outlyers of civilization, one of those hardy fellows who tear a livelihood out of rocks and sand. The very thought of his labor cast a burden of weariness upon Lee. He wrinkled his forehead; there was an ache in his heart. For tomorrow he must go and do likewise.

  He groaned at last so that Moonshine, who with wise head canted had been studying the descent into the valley, now pricked his ears suddenly and turned with eloquent question to watch the master. So brave was that lifted head that Lee was shamed for his falling of the heart, a
nd although instinct warned him to shut this caqon and its house from sight and mind, yet a perverse impulse forced him on. He loosed the reins, but, having learned long before that Moonshine’s unguided way was generally the best in mountain work, he made no effort to pick a course. The gray, accordingly, after considering his task with another glance, started to the side. Thirty seconds of plunging, sliding, and leaping like a mountain sheep, and they came out smoothly upon the caqon floor. There the rider looked back at the course where they had slid, like water down the rock, and with that past danger exhilarating him he turned with a laugh toward the house. Yonder fellow should pay for these pains with a cup of coffee, at least.

  But now that he was close, he saw that the shack was unoccupied. He dropped the saddle and stepped toward it with Moonshine, dog-like, at his heels. Under the pressure of his hand the door gave way from the rust-eaten hinges and crashed in, sending a heavy ripple of dust across the floor. It was obviously intended as a summer house only, no doubt for use through a single season. How old it was he could not guess, for one winter night might have rotted these flimsy boards, and the interior was in hopeless confusion, owing to the fall of a boulder from the cliff above. It had carried the major portion of the roof with it in its fall, and now arose in the exact center of the floor, littered over with the ruin of its own making. On the whole, it was as dreary a bit of spoiled carpentry as one could hope to find, but Garrison looked about him with painful interest. The collapsing shack was a sharp reminder that beyond the foothills lay a world that claimed him, to which he must return, in which he must accomplish a man’s work. A sense of truancy made Garrison as hollow of heart as the small boy when he hears the school bells chiding.