Open Road

by M. M. Holaday

  “You’re makin’ that up!” Charlie interrupted Jeb, who was reading Win’s letter aloud on the shady side of the porch. Jeb raised his eyebrows at the boy and held the page so he could see for himself.

  “Hmmm . . . I think you owe your father an apology,” Meg said.

  “I’m sorry, Pa.” Charlie sighed deeply.

  Jeb knew it had been a difficult week for the eleven-year-old. James got to help Jeb get one of their new horses saddle ready, and he caught two more fish than Charlie that morning. When Charlie went to town with Jeb, Mrs. Carter had given him a big hug at the store, which he said he didn’t mind, but Penny Smith, Billy’s little sister, had seen him and smiled evilly. Jeb knew that on Monday Billy would have something to say about it. Now Win was talking about some mystical power. Jeb figured that Charlie might draw comfort from the fact that somewhere, an Indian boy was having as hard a day as he was. “May I continue?”

  Jeb got a sullen nod from the boy.

  “Let’s see . . .”

  . . . how lucky you are to have parents who have high expectations of you, but who are kind and fair as well.

  I am waiting for the rest of my party in a town that has seen much over the decades in spite of being so isolated. Although it seems like I am at the edge of the world, the fur trade had a route through this area for generations. Gold seekers worked claims nearby as recently as a decade ago. A Jesuit priest lived here, as evidenced by a small chapel built from logs and stone, but he isn’t around anymore, and no one seems to know what happened to him. I met an old Indian woman wearing modern eyeglasses who was creating a beautiful pair of beaded moccasins for her granddaughter. She spoke crude French, so we could communicate a bit, but I was unable to discern if she was senile or merely playing with me when I asked her where the beads came from. She answered “la Chine,” which I assumed to be China. I asked her how long she had had the beads, and she answered that her grandmother made moccasins for her with the same beads when she was young. I looked at her design and realized they were letters from an odd-looking alphabet that the Russians use, which is quite different from our own. Bouchard and I met a Russian once who carried a book written in his language. I remembered the letters, as they were so unusual looking. I asked her if she knew Russian, but she just laughed at me with a toothless grin and said she thought they were pretty designs. I made the mistake of asking her what tribe she was from. She got angry then and shooed me away, although why it was wrong of me to ask, I cannot say. Perhaps all of my questions simply became annoying.

  Before I become annoying to my dear family as well, I will end this missive. It is my hope that I have more news to share soon. Although I am eager to see the next horizon, I am even more certain that buying the land adjacent to the Dawson ranch was prudent for this old wanderer.

  Win

  “Did the old Indian really have beads from China?” Charlie asked his father. “How’d she get them?”

  Jeb started to explain how furs were traded for other things all over the world when Meg rose from her chair suddenly and wrapped her arms around him.

  “I’m so glad you’re here with me, Jeb. I’m so glad . . .” She buried her face in his neck.

  He leaned into her embrace, her wild hair soft on his neck. After all their years of marriage, her touch still felt like coming home—every time.

  Shortly after Win’s letter arrived, Mick galloped up the trail from town, waving a telegram, shouting for Jeb and Meg.

  Meg, working with a yearling inside the corral, ran to the fence. “Mick, my goodness, what’s wrong?”

  Mick handed the message to Jeb, who’d hustled out of the barn and over to their friend.

  Jeb stared at the words, panic in his throat. He read aloud:

  BEAVER CREEK, IDAHO TERRITORY

  AVERY ATTACKED BY BEAR stop JEB COME IMMEDIATELY stop

  Meg gasped; her hand flew to cover her mouth. Jeb turned to Meg. “The boys can handle things here. I’ll ask Wash to stay close until I come back.”

  “No!” Meg glanced uncomfortably at Mick.

  A married man, Mick needed no more signal that the couple required privacy. “I’ll let you two alone to figure this out. Let us know if we can help.” He turned his horse and rode out of the yard.

  “He needs me, Meg,” Jeb said as Mick disappeared.

  “I need you, too, right here.”

  Jeb tilted his head. “This isn’t like you. What’s going on?”

  “He’s God knows where, in some remote corner of the world—”

  “It’s settled enough for a telegraph office.”

  “There! Exactly. He probably has plenty of help.”

  “But he’s asking for me. That’s concerning.”

  “Well, I’m concerned about you!”

  Jeb gathered his thoughts for a moment, searching for the right words to reassure her. “Don’t let a bad dream cloud your judgment, Meg. I know it scared you, but sometimes a nightmare is just a nightmare . . . nothing more.”

  Days earlier, Jeb woke to Meg whimpering in her sleep next to him. He gently shook her awake, repeatedly assuring her she was safe until she emerged from sleep and recognized him. She clung to him, saying she hadn’t been in danger in her dream—Jeb had. Since Gray Wolf believed spirits spoke to him in his dreams, she worried she was receiving a message. Jeb had replied that while he would never dismiss Gray Wolf’s beliefs, he’d had plenty of nightmares during his lifetime that never materialized into anything real.

  “But you were in danger . . .” she said now, covering her face with her hands. A desperate sob escaped.

  “Meg,” he said softly, pulling her close. She wrapped her arms around his waist and buried her face in his chest. “We’re all he has. How can I not go?”

  Meg held on to him for a long time. When she released her grip, her brow was furrowed. “I’ll get some food together for you.”

  Four days later, Jeb rode into Beaver Creek, a muddy, gloomy little place—perhaps because it was raining, although he couldn’t imagine how the sun shining on it would improve it much. He found Win asleep, lying face down and naked from the waist up on a dingy cot in a dimly lit back room of the town saloon. Jeb learned from the saloonkeeper, Dal Peyton, that a mountain man found him barely alive and half buried in pine needles in the Bitterroot. He brought him down the mountain to Peyton because his wife was a healer.

  Win’s fever broke just the day before, Peyton said, and he had had a good night’s rest.

  Jeb dozed in the chair next to Win’s bed, listening to his friend talk in his sleep. When Win finally stirred, he cursed in pain.

  “Drink this.” Jeb held a cup to Win’s lips.

  Win recoiled. “What is it? Peyton’s squaw concocted something that gave me visions. I couldn’t feel my face for two days.” He rubbed his cheek as though reliving the experience.

  “Willow bark tea. Meg’s recipe.”

  “Meg’s? Oh, God, this will probably kill me.” But he drank, swallowing noisily. He lay his head back down. Jeb felt his ailing friend’s forehead, relieved that it was cool. Win wasn’t fighting a fever and had already made a joke. Convinced he wasn’t going to die, Jeb leaned back in his chair. “You were talking in your sleep.”

  “Hmmm . . .” Win furrowed his brow. “Can’t remember my dream.”

  “No matter. What the hell happened to you?”

  “You want the tall tale I’ve been working on, or the truth?” His voice was hoarse.

  “The truth, if you remember how to tell it.”

  Although fuzzy with the details, Win told Jeb that he was a hundred yards ahead of his party on a well-traveled Indian path when he surprised a grizzly. His horse reared in a panic, threw him, and bolted. The grizzly chased him through the woods. He could hear his party shouting at him, and even heard someone fire a rifle, but the bear was relentless and pursued him to an outcropping next to a waterfall. Win stumbled and landed on the precipice. The grizzly took a swipe at him, ripping open the flesh on his back
. He rolled off the edge and fell twenty feet into the icy, rushing water. He banged himself up on the rocks as he was swept downstream. Barely able to pull himself up on to the riverbank where the river finally slowed, Win lay there all night, unable to move. How he got to the bed he was in he couldn’t say.

  Jeb stretched his long legs out and folded his arms across his chest. “You’re gettin’ old. You used to be able to outrun a grizzly.”

  “Well, goddamn, don’t get all sappy and sentimental on me.”

  “Goddamn yourself. That telegram scared the hell out of me. I thought you were a goner. You could at least still be shivering with a fever or something.”

  “Sorry I can’t be sicker for you! I felt someone go through my pockets to see if they could find out who to notify. That scared the hell out of me!”

  Win kept Jeb’s name and address in his vest pocket. The military escorts on his expeditions had made this a habit during the war, saying it gave them comfort to know their loved ones would be notified if they were killed. Jeb admitted that having someone fish on his person for next of kin information would scare him, too.

  “I can’t believe you came all this way.” The banter ended. Win sounded grateful.

  “Well, I’ve always admired that rifle of yours. Figured now was my chance to get it.”

  Win chuckled, but grimaced again. “Damn, my back hurts. How’s it look?”

  Jeb lifted the bandage loosely covering the oozing wounds. Win had four long, deep scrapes on his right shoulder and several other smaller scratches and bruises all over his back. Two of the deeper cuts had been crudely sewn to close them. His whole back was covered with some kind of greasy salve. “Someone sewed a chunk of skin back together. That’s probably what’s bothering you—the stitches pulling, I mean. They put something on the scrapes, looks like Indian medicine.”

  “The bartender’s squaw put something on my back. I hope it isn’t moose shit. Smells like it.”

  “Nah, I think that’s just you.”

  “The rest of the team went on without me.” Win sounded disappointed.

  “I thought you were their guide.”

  “Hell, they don’t need me. Damn maps.”

  Win had spent years with surveyors making maps of uncharted territory. There was hardly a stream or mountain that hadn’t been marked on paper. Jeb leaned back and pondered the irony as Win drifted back to sleep.

  Jeb stayed ten days in Beaver Creek, tending to Win. It was a peaceful village, and the people living there were used to traders and mountain men. Jeb saw the old woman Win wrote about in his letter who had made the moccasins for her granddaughter, but saw no young woman wearing them. Miners came into the saloon; Indians came and went—Win said he still didn’t know what tribe they were from.

  When Win was feeling better, they went fishing. Jeb found a spot where Win could sit comfortably. It was a sunny day, and although the golden aspen leaves shivered, it was unseasonably warm for late October.

  “This is beautiful country.” Jeb breathed deeply and gazed at the green and gold hills.

  “It’s prettier when a bear isn’t chasing you down.”

  “I imagine so. How’s the back?”

  Win leaned forward and grimaced. “The scabs itch. That tea helps, though. Takes the edge off.”

  They were quiet for a while. Win watched a trout take a look at his bait and snap at it. He pulled up on his line so quickly he let out a sharp cry of pain, but held on to the fish nonetheless. “Ach, I think I broke something open.”

  “Here, let me.” Jeb reached for the line and grabbed the flapping fish. He unhooked it and tossed their dinner up on the bank. “You ever think your luck might run out someday?”

  “I spent the last week thinking of nothing else.” Win shrugged. “Buying that mountain next to yours got me thinking. When I signed my name on that deed, I realized it was the only place my name was written somewhere permanent. It was the only record of me ever being here.”

  The bear attack had brought about a level of introspection Jeb had not seen in Win since their youthful pact years earlier. “The world is a better place for you being in it, my friend.”

  “Not sure you’d get complete agreement on that, but thanks.” Win was quiet for a moment. “You ever feel burdened, tied down by that ranch?”

  Jeb wasn’t sure whether Win was changing the subject or about to make a point. In either case, it was an easy question to answer. “Well, the work never ends, but it is satisfying. Meg and the boys . . . they’re all I need, or have ever wanted. I am . . . fully content.” He glanced at Win, wondering if he’d think Jeb was bragging, but he didn’t seem to notice.

  “The government sends threats: assimilation or annihilation. Church groups send aid, expecting converted souls for their trouble. You and Powell are among the few who make no demands on these people. I wish they could all live like Gray Wolf.” Win squinted at the sun. “And I don’t mean hiding in the mountains. I mean able to decide their own future.”

  “He’s had to compromise, too. He’s had to watch his way of life fade away, no matter how much he tries to isolate himself. We all have to live in a changing world, like it or not. Hell, I took the train halfway here! I remember when Ma and Pa died. You sat at their kitchen table and said I had to get out here and see this country before it filled with people. You saw it coming.”

  “You make me sound like a shaman. But it is true that I’ve watched progress come with a price, and with great uneasiness on my part. I bought that mountain next to yours so I could control what happened to it. I wanted to keep the government, the railroads, miners—hell, even the scientists, away.” He picked up a pebble and tossed it into the stream. Unlike a lake, where ripples form in widening circles, the pebble simply disappeared. “Jeb, I think in our lifetime, Indians will be given citizenship. There’s been talk. When I bought that mountain, I told Brewer what I wanted to do with it eventually. The disclosure was a little risky, but he was really great when Meg and Gus bought your land, and I felt I could trust him. He advised me to get a good lawyer in a reputable law firm to draft the documents I needed.”

  “What do you want to do?”

  “I want to leave it to Gray Wolf. The laws won’t allow it right now, but I think they will in time. Meanwhile, a safe alternative was to leave the property to you. If I die, the mountain is all yours. That’s all legal. But I’m hoping you’ll honor my wishes and see it through when it is possible and make it legal for the mountain to belong to Gray Wolf and any of his descendants. Permanently.”

  “No wonder you’ve been so sober and serious,” Jeb said. “You thought you might die without anyone knowing of this? Of course I’ll honor your wishes. Does Gray Wolf know?”

  “That old Indian believes in spirits more easily than he believes in land ownership. Just wait ’til they pass legislation that makes Indians citizens! He’ll either laugh at the irony, or he’ll be so confused his head will explode. He knows I bought the land; he doesn’t know I want him to have it. I figured I’d let you tell him.”

  “Ha! Thanks a lot. You tell him yourself. That’s the hardest part about all of this—explaining your generosity to that man.”

  “I can’t be sure Gray Wolf will see it as generous. Land ownership is touchy with him already. He may be offended by the idea of me giving it to his family.” He settled in; now that his wishes were known, he looked ready to enjoy the day. “I’m doing it for myself, really. Maybe you can help him see it that way.”

  “Was Gray Wolf the real reason you bought it? I thought you might be getting tired of all this roaming and would settle down with the riverboat singer, Jeannette.”

  “Nah . . . didn’t work out. She’s too much of a free spirit. Sent a telegram to the Missouri Star in Omaha—that’s the riverboat she was on. Telegram came back from the captain saying Miss Bordeaux had moved on. No forwarding address.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Hell, we had some fun, but it wasn’t like you and Meg.” He p
retended to focus his attention on luring another fish to his bait.

  When Win had recovered and was ready to rejoin his crew, Jeb came home. He got off the train at Big Bend. He had done business with the livery there and knew the owner would let him borrow a horse to get the rest of the way home. He wasn’t sure he’d get the same reception in Lyonsville. The folks in Lyonsville didn’t like the fact that an Arapaho and a Pawnee worked for him. The last time he tried to sell some horses there, he was told they had plenty, even though he could see for himself that the stables were nearly empty. So he got off at Big Bend and rode twenty extra miles cross-country, but at least he rode on a horse he had trained himself and no one gave him trouble about it.

  It was rejuvenating to ride through open country. If he looked in the opposite direction of the railroad tracks and telegraph poles, it still looked like the plains they had crossed with the wagon train. What a twist of fate it had been to find Meg out on the prairie. What a life he had made with her. As he crested the last hill, his home came into view. Meg came out of the barn leading a young colt and when she saw him, she dropped the reins and climbed over the corral fence with such urgency Jeb thought surely she would hurt herself. She rushed toward him, waving excitedly. It was a splendid sight.

  Jeb sat with Meg on the porch and enjoyed a quiet evening alone. It was Saturday; Anne had left for the day and Etta had requested the help of the boys to unload a shipment of books. Running Elk and Wash had plans of their own.

  “So this is what it will be like when the boys are married and gone.” Jeb sighed contentedly and stretched his long frame.

  “It’s too peaceful and quiet. Besides, they are far too young to be marrying!”