Yellowstone

by H. V. Elkin

  “How you know Bill?”

  “I was his dentist in Tensleep.”

  The boy smiled. “John Cutler!”

  “That’s right.”

  “Holy tarnation!” The boy ran toward the wagon.

  Cutler held up his hand. “Slow down, son. My dog don’t understand sudden movements.”

  The boy stopped in his tracks, then wondered why. “That dog don’t look so mean.”

  “That dog’s name is Red. What’s yours?”

  “It’s John, just like you. ’Cept they call me Jack.”

  “Well, Jack, this dog is an Airedale. An Airedale can do anything any other dog can do, and it can lick the other dog besides. That’s just an ordinary Airedale. Red here can lick any dog livin’ and when he goes for a man, he goes to kill. You got a dog on your place? I wouldn’t want Red to fight it.”

  “No, no dog.”

  “Okay. Now just stand still, and put the rifle on the ground.”

  Jack did as he was told, ending up standing like a statue with his arms plastered to his side.

  “Red, down,” Cutler ordered.

  The dog jumped down and walked toward Jack.

  “Let him get the smell of you,” Cutler said.

  The dog sniffed at the boy, then wagged his tail.

  “Now scratch him behind the ears, and you’ll be friends.”

  A moment later, Jack was still scratching the dog behind the ears as he rode on the wagon seat with Cutler toward the farmhouse.

  Now Cutler saw that two of the fenced fields had sheep. He saw that barbed wire was strung between the fence posts. Cutler had mixed feelings about both of them. In a way, he could not blame the cattlemen for figuring they had territorial rights. They had come first, made peace or war with the Indians, and settled the land, making it somewhat livable. They figured that gave them the right to keep an open range, without fences, and without sheep who ate the roots of the grass. Then the homesteaders came with fences and sheep. They needed the fences to keep the ranchers’ cattle from destroying the crops. What happened in Johnson County was just a bigger version of what had happened all over the state at one time. But progress was inevitable, and so was change. The farmers had brought a greater degree of civilization with them, and that was good.

  Something else was lost, though, and Cutler was not sure it should have been. It was an uneasy peace. The ranchers who survived had to learn to bend, which was contrary to the spirit that had settled the land. With about five hard winters in a row, beef prices were now low. Many of the larger ranchers had been forced to sell land off to smaller ranchers and to the men who brought the sheep. The West had changed. The mayor of Cheyenne wanted to start something called Frontier Days to preserve the wild and wooly days in the form of play-acting.

  Cutler looked at Jack and decided it wasn’t so bad if boys like him had room to grow into men.

  “You always greet visitors with a gun?” he asked the boy.

  “Well, we’ve had some trouble. Some cowboys like to come out here and cut our fences.”

  They pulled up in the front yard of the house. A plump woman stood in the doorway, wiping her hands on an apron.

  “Ma!” Jack called. “Guess who this is?”

  She beamed. “John Cutler!”

  “Aw.” Jack was disappointed.

  Cutler tipped his hat. “Mrs. Taylor.”

  “Bill’s going to be so glad you’ve come. We all are.”

  “Couldn’t rightly expect such a greetin’. Not to the man who removed a couple of your son’s teeth for him.”

  She laughed till her belly shook. “He chews on the side just as good. And he’s got more sense now, so I consider it teeth well spent.”

  Cutler nodded. “Ma’am.”

  “You’ll find Marcus, Mr. Taylor, out by the barn. You get back here in time for supper now.”

  Yes, it really was a home.

  Marcus Taylor was busy sharpening a scythe in the barnyard. The sound of the file on the blade, and maybe the fact that he was a little on in years, kept him from hearing Cutler’s wagon approach. He was not a very tall man. He had intent eyes, though, and all the muscles you get from working hard for a living. Cutler stopped the wagon, and Taylor stopped filing to inspect his work.

  From behind the house came the sound of chickens squawking, two chops of an axe on a stump, then no more chicken sounds. Taylor looked around and saw Cutler. He smiled, a broad, cheerful smile. “Well, sir, I don’t know who you are, but I know you’re okay, because we’re havin’ chicken for supper, and it ain’t Sunday.”

  Cutler jumped down from the wagon and held out his hand. “John Cutler, Mr. Taylor.”

  Taylor’s smile became even broader. “I shoulda known. That rig, those animals, the way Bill described you. I shoulda known. Well, you just make yourself at home. Put the mules and the horse in the barn if you want to, or you can put ’em out in that empty field as you please. Maybe you wouldn’t mind puttin’ the wagon in the barn, would you?”

  “’Course not.”

  “Think it’d be fun if Bill didn’t see you until supper. This is gonna be one heck of a surprise for him.”

  After the animals had been tended to, Taylor took Cutler to the back of the barn and pointed out a small opening.

  Cutler looked out. He saw Bill standing on a rail fence, holding an empty bottle in one hand and his six-gun in the other. The boy looked the same. Light hair, crooked nose. The light down on his upper lip was a little closer to being a mustache, but not much. He looked very intent about something, as if he were standing at the edge of an icy stream waiting for the right moment to jump in.

  “He gets his chores done early,” Taylor said quietly. “Always asks me if there’s anything else he ought to do, and then he goes out there and practices. Same thing every day, except Sunday. We make him rest on Sunday. He does what we tell him, too.”

  As Cutler watched, Bill’s muscles tightened suddenly. Then Bill threw the bottle straight up in the air as high as he could. Before it started its descent, Bill did a forward somersault off the fence, landed on his feet, and shot the bottle before it hit the ground.

  “You teach him that trick?” Taylor asked.

  “I never seen anything like it.”

  “I don’t know.” Taylor shook his head. “I’ve never seen such a change in a boy in my whole life. It makes it hard, in a way.”

  “How’s that, Mr. Taylor?”

  “Name’s Marcus, John. I mean, we always loved the boy. But now we can really appreciate him, the way he’s taken hold and all. And he’s growin’ up fast. We know he’ll be strikin’ off on his own pretty soon.”

  “With your blessings, Marcus?”

  “That’s the way it goes, isn’t it? You bring up a boy to stand tall and on his own two feet. If you do the job right, it’s the same as gettin’ rid of him—gettin’ rid of him at the time you least want him to go. With my blessin’s? Sure. But there’s two ways about it. My heart won’t be in it.”

  “Well,” Cutler looked around at Jack who was roughhousing with Red, “at least you’ve got another son.”

  “Yes, and it’ll be the same thing all over with him.” Taylor shrugged his shoulders to get the weight of the world off them. “Jack!”

  “Yeah, Paw?”

  “John and I are goin’ into supper now.” He pulled out a handsome pocket watch with a railroad locomotive etched on the back. “Don’t know why I bother lookin’ at this thing. My stomach always tells me when it’s time.” He looked back to Jack. “Give us time to get washed up and set down, then go out there and call your brother. And don’t you tell him who’s here.”

  “Sure, Paw.”

  The inside of the house confirmed everything its outside promised. Cutler knew there was a parlor beyond the kitchen and that it was hardly ever used. Here, life centered in the kitchen, where there was always the smell of food cooking, even when the stove was empty. It looked like many another farmhouse kitchen: a cast iron stove; a wi
ndow with a flower bow; a big well-worn wooden table; and straight wooden chairs painted green, with a leaf design carved in the tops. It was something you couldn’t see that made this one special, something you couldn’t talk about. The closest you could come to the elusive feeling was the food smells: roast chicken, gravy, biscuits. Those things were close to it, but not all of it. It had something to do with the way the food was cooked, and why. It had a lot to do with Mrs. Taylor.

  “He’s comin’!” Jack rushed in and slid into his chair, eagerly watching the door.

  Bill came in. “Smells good, Ma.” His voice seemed a little deeper. He sat in his chair to Cutler’s left without noticing the guest. Instead, he looked in the opposite direction toward his father and puzzled over the mischievous expression on the old man’s face. “What’s the holdup, Pa? I’m hungry.”

  Taylor quickly blessed the food, then picked up a bowl of boiled potatoes and passed them to Bill. “Here. Pass these.”

  Bill took four potatoes from the bowl and passed them to his right. Then he caught sight of the hand that took the bowl from him, the one with the bullet scar near the thumb, and he didn’t have to look at the face to know whose it was.

  Everyone was expecting Bill to act surprised, to drop the potatoes or yell or react in a big way. The reaction they got instead was even better. When Bill looked from Cutler’s hand to his face, he smiled so broadly he neglected to hide the opening in his teeth. It was as if he had been expecting Cutler all along, as if his presence weren’t a complete surprise. It was the fulfillment of the promise Cutler had made out on the prairie after Bill chose not to shoot at a soaring eagle. “I’ll be seein’ you, Bill,” Cutler had told him.

  “John.” Bill held out his hand and Cutler took it. “Damn, but it’s good to see you.”

  This was the best supper Cutler had had in a long while. Most of the time, he lived off food he could carry on the trail, smoked or dried meats, and stuff in cans. Now and then a rabbit he caught and cooked over a campfire. When he wasn’t on the trail, it was usually restaurant food, which was good but, like a women, not the same when you had to pay for it. Mrs. Taylor’s food had the special ingredient of caring. The affection around the table added spice to it. Cutler ate more than he needed to because it made the Taylors feel good and because he might not get another meal like it in what remained of his life, for a long while again, maybe not again.

  What remained of his life ... He had heard that, when the end draws near, the past starts coming back to you a lot. He carried a part of his past around with him all the time, but he seldom had to deal with anything farther back than Doreen. Now he felt as if he were having supper with his own parents when he was a boy in Indian Territory. It was the same feeling, except now he was older. He was sharing the table with his family and, in Bill, with himself when he was a boy.

  “You ever take an interest in farmin’, John?” Taylor asked him.

  “No, Marcus, not lately. Sometimes I get tired of wanderin’ and think about settling down on some spread, but ...”

  “Well if you ever want to be a hand here, I might be needin’ one.” He was referring to Bill’s imminent departure. He was also keeping Cutler’s thoughts away from the grizzly that linked up with his dead wife. The whole family knew the story. Even Jack, young as he was, knew better than to bring it up.

  “Appreciate the offer, Marcus.”

  “You off on a job now, are you?”

  “That I am.” Cutler glanced at Bill. “They’re havin’ some kind of bear trouble up in Yellowstone.”

  “Like to get up there myself someday,” Taylor said.

  “Oh you!” Mrs. Taylor chided him. “You’re always talking about going somewhere, but you know as well as I do you’re going to never get off this farm.”

  “That such a bad thing?” he asked her.

  “No,” she admitted. “No, it isn’t so bad at all.”

  “I’m not goin’ anywheres,” Jack said.

  “Leastways,” Taylor said, “this ain’t no time of the year to be goin’ up there. Is it, John?”

  “No, Marcus. Not for pleasure it ain’t.”

  “Well, that’s the way it goes in a man’s work,” Taylor said. “You learn to make a good thing out of a bad thing. That’s what I had to do. Still do. Can’t worry none if it’s somebody else’s bad that turns out to be your good neither. Got this land from a rancher who had to sell. Got the lumber for the house from when they closed Camp Carlyle. Man’s just got to keep his eyes open for opportunities or God’ll stop sendin’ them around.”

  Bill said very little. Throughout the rest of the supper. Cutler knew why. Bill was waiting for an invitation to go with Cutler to Yellowstone and wondering if he should invite himself. Cutler wanted a partner, but his conscience was troubling him. Why should he be the one to take Marcus’s son away from him? Why should he get Bill off the farm any sooner than Bill would finally go under his own steam?

  Somewhere out in the night, Red let out a throaty howl.

  Mrs. Taylor went white.

  “It’s them, I’ll bet,” Jack said.

  Cutler was on his feet and rushing to the door, automatically grabbing his holster from a peg as he ran out. Bill was right behind him and strapping on his own gun. There was a full moon, but it still took a moment for their eyes to adjust to the darkness. Their ears did not have the same trouble, though. Red’s warning came again from a path between two fields, and they ran toward the sound. They heard a horse whinny, a gun go off once, then a man’s yell.

  When they got there, the horse was running away from them. The man was upright but pushed back against three strands of barbed wire. He was holding a pair of wire cutters in front of him to protect his neck from Red’s sharp, exposed teeth as the dog stood with its forepaws on the man’s chest and kept lunging to get around the cutters.

  “Red! Back!” Cutler ordered.

  The dog reluctantly backed away but stayed alert, growling, its eyes still on the man.

  Taylor and Jack came running up to them. Taylor had a rifle.

  Cutler grabbed the man by the shirt and pulled him off the wire. The clothes ripped. The man jabbed upward with the wire cutters to break Cutler’s grip. Anticipating the movement, Cutler raised his arms before the wire cutters made contact, and he swung one fist around in a complete arc. It landed with bone-crunching force on the man’s jaw to make him fall back against the fence. He was too dazed to yell, both from the force of the blow and from the stabs of the barbs in his back. The wire cutters fell to the ground. Cutler grabbed the man by the neck in an iron grip and brought him back to eye level.

  “It’s him,” Jack said. “It’s one of ’em anyway. Holy tarnation!” He held a lantern up as close as he could get it to the man’s face.

  Then Cutler saw the man was Hedge Bannister.

  He threw the man to the ground in disgust. “Red, guard!”

  The dog positioned itself near the prone body, its muscles rippling. Red was eager to lunge as soon as the order to attack was given.

  As they waited for Bannister to become conscious, they saw that the moonlit lines of wire had been cut in several places.

  Bill turned to Cutler. “You remember me tellin’ you about some cowboys who made fun of me when I was splittin’ fence rails? This was one of them.”

  “Damn loco cowboys,” Cutler said between his teeth. “They yell about sheep eatin’ the grass, then they cut the wires so the sheep can get out and do just that.”

  “Least he doesn’t have his sidekicks with him tonight,” Taylor said. “You know the man, John?”

  “I know him. He’s been doggin’ my heels since I got to Cheyenne.”

  Jack ran off to get Bannister’s horse.

  Taylor looked dismayed at the cut wire. “What have I got to do? Plant Osage orange?”

  “It’d take too long to grow to a fence,” Cutler said, “and they’d only burn it on you. The only way to stop your problem is right here.” He pointed at Bannister who
was sitting up and rubbing his jaw.

  It took Bannister a moment to focus beyond the lantern light. “Cutler!”

  “You gonna tell me you didn’t know I was here?”

  “I heard you was headed for Yellowstone.” Then he remembered to get mad about getting hit. “It’ll be a warm day in January before you ever lay another fist on me, Cutler!”

  “If you got to be killed,” Cutler said, “I’ll let the dog do it.”

  Bannister softened his tone. “I wouldn’t be here if I knew you was, Cutler. Hell, I don’t want to spoil your evenin’ and make you think you don’t want to do business with me.”

  “What’s he talkin’ about?” Bill asked.

  “Nothin’ important,” Cutler said.

  “Spoke out of turn, did I?” Bannister asked. Then he became aware of the pains in his bloody back. “Well, anyway, how about it? You made up your mind yet?”

  There were two ways of handling the situation. One was killing Bannister. Cutler chose the other.

  “Listen, Hedge. I couldn’t see it was you. Might not have hit you otherwise.”

  “Okay. Fair enough.”

  “A man comes sneakin’ onto my friends’ land and cuts their fences, how does he expect to get treated?”

  “You tellin’ me you’re friends with sheep farmers?”

  “Yes, I am. Now I’m on my way to trap one of the worst animals in the state, a big grizzly. It’ll make a fine trophy. If there’s gonna be any chance of you gettin’ it, I don’t want to come back here and hear any more fences have been cut or that the Taylors have been bothered in any way.”

  “Can I get up?”

  “Real slow.”

  Bannister staggered to his feet. “Won’t have any time to bother the Taylors for a few months anyway. So it’s a deal.”

  “It better be. Because if it ain’t, you got more than a trophy to worry about.”

  Bannister ignored his pain and showed his unpleasant grin. “The trophy is all I’m gonna worry about. It’s the only thing that’ll keep me off this farm.”

  “You and anyone else who rides with you.”

  “What I say goes for them, too.”

  Jack returned with the horse.