SNOWFALL

by Mitchell Smith

  Sam sat up. "Trouble?"

  "No. But I think we better bring in our traps before those tribesmen steal the whole line. We can't afford to lose trade-steel traps. Other families are out getting theirs."

  "All right." Sam eased his leg a little, saw it was bending better at the knee. "Why don't you go at daylight, pick 'em up. Take Jack with you."

  Torrey glanced at Jack. "I guess that's all right."

  Jack looked at him and said nothing.

  "We go at first light," Torrey said, stooped, and went out.

  "Trying to get rid of me, Sam?"

  "Damn right, Jack. Damn right I am. I won't have—I just think we have enough trouble with the Crees. And speaking of those damned people, what got into them? That's what I'd like to know. Murdering a man…."

  Catania laid her harp down. "They've come south lots of times, in little bands, and never hurt anybody. We've traded hatchets and snare-wire to them for white furs.... They didn't want copybooks."

  "Tribesmen think copybooks are unlucky," Jack said, "—part of Warm-times' going away. They say book-people live in the past, instead of dealing with the present."

  "But there was no trouble with them," Susan said. "They were friendly—and they looked like us, except for their furs."

  "Most tribesmen are white-bloods, now," Jack said, and tilted up the leather bottle for another drink. "Ojibway told me the whites went to the tribes when the ice came—went to be taught how to stay alive. So now, most are white-bloods. Red-bloods still run things, though—war chiefs ... medicine people."

  "Sounds like you know them," Sam said. His leg was stiff, but better. There was an ache, but it felt like a good ache.

  "I know the Ojibway. Doubt the Cree are much different."

  "Potatoes are done as they're going to be." Susan dipped out a wooden bowl of stew and brought it to Jack, along with a carved spoon. "Is that where you've been—with the Tribes?"

  "Honey...."

  "It's all right, Sam.—This smells wonderful." Jack took a spoonful, blew to cool it. "I was with the Ojibway for a while, in Map-Michigan."

  "Mountain Jesus," Sam said. "That's a thousand miles away!"

  "Eat," Susan said, and handed him a bowl of stew.

  "More," Catania said. "More than a thousand map-miles." She took a bowl of stew from Susan. "Too much," she said. "You gave me too much."

  "I went to them," Jack said, "—and they let me stay a while." He ate some stew.

  "A while?" Catania said.

  "Three years and a little...."

  Sam swallowed a spoonful of stew. "Three years up on that ice?" Susan never put enough onions in stew, but he hadn't been able to tell her, she was so proud of her cooking.

  "Good hunting up there, Sam. There are valleys, canyons cut back into the ice, right down to tundra. Some of them go back twenty, thirty Warm-time miles. You can hunt caribou, moose, white bear...."

  "But if the hunting is good up there," Susan said, "—then why would they want to come to our mountains?"

  "Pushed." Jack ate a spoonful of stew. "This is good. I've missed our food."

  "Pushed?"

  "That's right. The Abenaki and New Englanders moved the Mohawks out, so the Mohawks had to move the Ojibway out, drive them west." Jack stopped talking to have another spoonful of stew. "... And I suppose now the Ojibway have driven the Cree. That's why these tribesmen are down here. No choice."

  Sam set his dinner-bowl aside. "If all that's true, Jack, then these people are coming here to stay."

  "Yes."

  "And you're sure that's what's happened?"

  "Pretty sure, Sam." Jack finished his stew, handed the bowl to Susan. "I was in Map-Michigan when the Mohawks came."

  "And your host people lost?" Sam said.

  "Yes ... we lost. New Englanders came into it. They're enemies of everyone—want all the tribesmen out—but they were helping the Mohawks, then." Jack picked up Catania's vodka bottle, took a drink. "The Ojibway said those Boston people can make things with their minds ... make monsters out of babies while they're growing in their mothers' bellies, change them in there."

  Catania stopped eating. "But I thought those were just Salesmen stories—monsters and wicked people flying through the air."

  "An Ojibway I knew—Raymond Grace—told me he saw a man flying through the air when they were fighting one night by Empty Creek." Jack stoppered the vodka and put it down. "—Said he saw a blue-robe from Boston sitting in clouds of blowing snow just over the trees, waving on a war-band of Great Lake Mohawks."

  Jack was quiet for a while ... seemed to be remembering. Catania finished her stew, stood, and handed her bowl to Susan. The hearth fire ticked, thumped as a piece of wood burned through.

  Then Jack said, "A few days later, old Eleanor John told us that while we were gone fighting, a Boston person flew down on the village like a blue bird, like Rain-bird, and stood resting while the Mohawks killed the women and children.... If old Eleanor hadn't been out for firewood, they would have killed her, too."

  "People you knew?" Susan asked that, then wished she hadn't.

  "... Yes," Jack said.

  Silence in Sam's house, except for the fire's soft snap and rustle.

  "Jack, I don't believe there is really such bad and un-scientific wisdom," Catania said. "Cruel flying ... and, you say, monsters?"

  "Ghost-Owl Ojibways said one of their bands was fighting Mohicans four years back. Said they were fighting on lake ice, and a thing the Boston people had made inside a woman—mixed with a wolverine's coming, then cut out of her—said that Made-thing came over the ice. And when it did, the Ojibway ran."

  "But Jack, you didn't see it."

  "No.".

  "I can tell you," Sam said, "—we've seen no such creature in the mountains."

  "And hope you don't, Sam," Jack said. "These Crees are enough bad luck."

  He sat silent after that, and no one asked him any more questions.

  Catania, watching Jack in firelight, saw what he would look like when he was old. Saw that even now, though he was years younger than Sam, slight touches of gray were feathered above his ears.... Those tribesmen-tales of bad people flying, of wolverine-persons. Tales told to explain away defeats, slaughtered women and children. What woman, what child had Jack known, to fall so sadly silent, remembering?

  "Honey," Sam said, seeing Susan quiet, frightened by the talk, "—that stew was so good. You never put in too many onions. It's always just right."

  "Potatoes took forever," Susan said, but was pleased.

  "It was very good," Jack said. "It brought the Range back to me."

  Everyone sat quiet for a while, the only sound the dying fire's soft ruffling.... It occurred to Catania that small fires had filled many silences over the centuries.

  Jack stood and stretched, his hands touching the hide roof. Then he reached for his bow and quiver, and slung them over his shoulder. "Goodnight. And thanks, Susan. My brother's a lucky man." He picked up Catania's vodka jug, touched her on the shoulder, and she stood with her harp to follow him outside.

  After they left, Susan said, "He brought bad news."

  "Nothing to worry you, Little Mouse. Come here and lie with me."

  She did, and Sam lay back on the bed, hugging her gently. His leg felt fine, only aching, and he touched Susan's breasts ... then started to tug her pants down a little, despite her belly, but she stopped him. Soon she was asleep in his arms.

  Sam lay awake for a while, looking into the fire. I'm getting stupid as Dummy Olsen. Poor William dead, and jack's back—. which, can't be allowed. Yet here I lie, a happy man, full of stew and vodka, and Susan with me. Happy as the Warm-time hunters must have been, when they went out camping with heat-stoves and liquors.

  The one foolish thing back then, was hunting with powder guns. Old Eric Sorbane's great-grandfather had known a man who'd seen a gun, long ago. Old Eric said the man told his great-grandfather that it threw a little metal piece—a copybook 'bullet' for sure—a f
ar distance, and that piece hit hard when it hit. But it made so much noise it scared the other game away. And a handful of the Warm-time powder had cost thirty-one prime wolf or lynx pelts, when a Salesman had that so-old powder to sell. Also, that the gun didn't always do bang and throw the metal, but often made only a pissing sound.

  Susan's weight was on his sore leg. Sam shifted her gently, so she murmured but didn't wake.

  .. .Of course, it was possible a powder-gun was good for hunting in Warm-times. But not now, not for the Range. Those hunters should have seen Jack use a bow, or Torrey. Or me, for that matter. We could have shown them some real hunting.

  Sam began to doze. He woke, kissed Susan while she slept... then fell asleep himself.

  * * *

  Just before dawn, Torrey Monroe was at the Gully's far-side bank, hitching his team to a light sled. Torrey's sled was narrower than most, with a fine frame steamed and formed of sapling members. Its steel runners were polished with creek-bed sand.... He'd harnessed the team, all but Three-balls. Three-balls gave him trouble, but Torrey booted him quiet and hitched him up.

  When he finished, Torrey saw Jack Monroe standing behind the sled, watching him. Jack was carrying his bow, quiver, an extra quiver, and a parfleche of pemmican on a strap. He had a rolled bear-skin under his arm.

  Torrey didn't like people coming up on him quietly, and didn't care for a killer's company in any case.

  "People guarding all night?" Jack set his bear-skin on the sled, and gestured to the ledge. Two Auerbachs were standing up there, just visible as the sky lightened to the east. They had their bows on their backs, and carried slender lances.

  "That's right.. . and Richardsons out scouting. Most of the rest of them getting their traps in." Torrey coiled the kennel line and lashed it to the sled.

  "So, say forty men still home here?"

  "Maybe more. Why?"

  Jack didn't answer... went to the back of the sled, took the grips, and rocked the runners free.

  "You ready?" he said.

  "Yes, I'm ready—and I'll be driving my sled."

  "All right," Jack said, stepped away from the back of the sled, and started running. He didn't speed up from a stand, to a walk, to a trot. First he was standing—then he was running. And Three-balls, seeing him go past, lunged after him, so Torrey had to scramble to get to the grips as the team hauled the sled away past potato tubs and store-huts.

  Torrey rode the sled for a moment, then stepped down to run, hauling the grips a little left to miss a patch of thaw. Then they were out into the open, onto the plains of snow, and the harness bells rang like made music through the dark morning air.

  . .. By noon, they'd eaten some jerky, and were resting cross-legged on hides high in the ridge of forested hills south of Mount Geary. The Olsen-Monroe traps had been set along these slopes for three years—after Jack's time. Before that, their two-families' line had been set west of Butternut Creek. Good country for lynx, marten, and fisher-cat. Not much for wolf.

  "What are you getting up here?"

  "Lately, mink," Torrey said, thinking that Sam had sent Jack up here to keep some Auerbach from killing him. "Mink and tree-marten. Three wolverines so far this season. White bears come through sometimes, break the traps. But not this year."

  "Tigers?"

  "No snow-tigers now. But Tod Sorbane said he saw one near the melt lakes last year." Torrey had been a little boy when Web Monroe killed one of the first tigers seen in the mountains—and died doing it. Snow-tigers trailing over the ice from Map-Russia, Doctor Monroe had said.

  "So they come around...."

  "Well, one took two dogs five years ago. Bunch of Edwards killed that one. Hide traded for three very fine bucksaw blades, an ax, five pounds of steel rod, and two metal-files, also very fine."

  "That's a high price," Jack said.

  "Yes, it was." Torrey thought he and this exile had had enough conversation, so he stood and went to kick up the dogs. "Let's get onto those traps."

  They both rode the sled as it raced down the ridge's reverse slope. The dogs, at a dead run, were barely able to keep out front.

  Jack laughed with pleasure as they flew down, the dogs yelping before them, the bitter wind of their passage whistling in their ears. Torrey, sitting up front, looked back when Jack laughed. What is in this man's head? The families will decide to kill him, Sam or no Sam, if the Crees don't kill us first. And here he is, laughing like a vodka drunk. ...

  At the bottom of the ridge, they found the first set. It was empty. The fine trade-trap lay sprung and uncovered, its steel jaws snapped shut on nothing.

  "Shit." Torrey bent to tug the trap's light chain and stake out of the snow. "—Damn jays."

  Jack stooped to look. "Fox sprung it."

  "Sure, after the birds scratched the cover-snow off it, showed the steel."

  "If you have bird trouble, use little spruce branches for cover."

  "Don't tell me my business." Torrey threw the trap and chain onto the sled, then called to Three-balls to follow. He led the team past a dense stand of evergreens and across an open meadow to another line of trees.

  There was a wolf in the next trap. They heard it snarling at their noise and scent before they left the dogs and pushed their way through sapling hemlock. It was a big male with a silver-frosted pelt. The wolf stared at them with yellow eyes, and trembled, heavy muzzle wrinkled back from its fangs. Its left hind leg was chewed almost through at the first joint. Only a twist of wet red fur and white tendon still held the wolf to the trap.

  Torrey went back to the sled for the hardwood club to kill the wolf with, so as not to ruin the pelt with a lance.. . . The wolf kept his eyes on him, then tried to rush, dragging the trap's anchor chain and snapping at the air as Torrey stayed out of reach. Each time he tried to step in, the wolf lunged to meet him, foaming with rage.

  Then Jack, gone round behind, called softly, "It's time to go."

  The wolf turned toward him—and Torrey swung the club, cracked its skull, and crossed himself as the animal died.

  The next two traps were empty, robbed and fouled by a wolverine. But farther down the line, they found a red fox, then a mink, then two marten. Fair-enough trapping for so late in the season.... By late afternoon, the sled was stacked with frozen hides, traps, and chains. They had seen no tribesmen.

  Swinging back west over the ridge, they coursed down through old snow into scattered spruce and dwarf birch, and ran along a frozen creek. The dogs were tired, and it was getting colder as the sun sank. West of Mount Geary, the Wall was silent as its ice-cliffs chilled with approaching evening.

  The round shadows of the hills slowly flooded the creek bed as they traveled along, shading them from the orange glare of sunset off the fields of snow. Torrey, running ahead of the dogs, breaking trail, slowed, then stopped. He shoved his slit-goggles up on his forehead to be certain he'd seen an elk standing in the birch saplings more than a hundred long paces away. The elk was there, an antlered bachelor buck—and safe at that distance.

  He heard the harness-bells sound softly to a stop behind him, and knew Jack had seen the elk too. The animal was alert, standing staring right at them. Torrey slowly eased his bow off his back, braced, and strung it. He nocked an arrow to the string... and started off to the left through the snow, one slow shuffling step at a time, to circle wide for at least a possible flank shot if the elk started and happened to run close enough past him.

  After four slow steps, he saw there wasn't time—the elk was already shifting in place, high stepping and ready to run.

  He stood to watch it go. More than a hundred-fifty Warm-time pounds of good meat set to run away, the best eating there was, except for grouse. He pressed his bent knee to his bow-stave to unstring it—and jumped a little in surprise at the ringing thump of a bow-shot just behind him.

  Torrey stood, eyes wide as a fool's, and watched a tiny ghost of goose-feathers flick away through evening air in a high, swift, looping arc—then whisk out of sight past
a slender birch just as the buck, reacting to the sound of the shot, leaped into the saplings to meet it.

  He heard the buck grunt—and the crackle of frozen small branches as it ran through the trees... . Then the sound of thrashing in the brush as it fell.

  Torrey began to run, and Jack ran up alongside him, the longbow on his back again. He was pacing along, not grinning at Torrey at having made such a shot. It was the finest bow-shot Torrey had ever seen. Not only because of the distance—more than a hundred paces—but because Jack had planned it so well, judging just where the buck, hearing the bow, would leap to meet the arrow. Men who want to kill this one for coming back, had better catch him asleep.

  They found the elk lying tangled in frozen branches fallen in an ice-storm. The long arrow had taken him behind the left shoulder. The buck was still alive but dreaming, its eyes already glazed.

  Jack went to him, murmuring softly as if to an injured sled dog, "It's time to go...." He stepped over a long branch behind the buck, bent to cut its throat, then touched a fingertip of blood to his forehead.

  They camped at nightfall farther down the creek-bed, camping low to keep their fire out of sight. It would be only a morning's run to home.

  Torrey unharnessed the dogs, staked them out, and fed them an armload of elk guts—Three-balls fighting to keep it all, as usual. The guts were freezing as the dogs snarled over them. It sounded as though they were chewing bones.

  Jack had dug some twigs and old branches from under the snow, broken them, and stacked them into a small cone. He took a handful of powdered birch-bark from his pouch, tucked it into the branches, and struck sparks into it with flint and steel. He blew gently into those, and the fire budded ... then blossomed as bright red far-southern flowers were said to do.

  Jack sat cross-legged on his bear-skin, and watched the flames.

  Torrey cut two thick wide loin-steaks from the butchered elk, then slit the gall bladder and sprinkled some of that on the meat. He took two branches Jack hadn't used for the fire, sharpened the ends, and stuck them up in the snow to lean by the flames. Then he draped a steak over each, went to get a rolled caribou hide from the sled, and sat across the fire from Jack.