by Alix Hawley
I have never been fond of wolves. To turn my thoughts I begin to sing, and Stewart sings with me though he does not know the words.
In late autumn, Findley is singing alone in the camp. We hear him before we arrive, his voice cutting through the quiet. His singing is quite sweet. I call:
—Has an angel condescended to land in Kentucky?
Findley looks at us from where he lies, his feet outstretched and bare. Two pups are fighting beside him. My limbs tense when I see their shady fur. Well. Wolves. Findley smiles at us and says slowly:
—Angels have always walked here as they please. And fed upon buffalo tongue.
Stewart dumps a bale of skins at Findley’s bony toes and says:
—Where is Squire?
—And good day to you as well.
Findley cocks an eyebrow. He looks slow and pained. He says:
—I am not enough for you, I can see, fallen angel or no. But! I shall gratify your curiosity in telling you that your good Squire has seen fit to leave for Carolina for more shot and traps.
He gets up stiffly and makes one of his aggressive little bows, putting me in mind of a terrier holding itself back, waiting for something to reveal itself as a rat to worry and shake. He says:
—And have you no interest in your other friend?
—Have you killed him?
I say it jokingly but I would not be surprised to see Findley point to a mound: Here Lies Hill. Findley shakes his head. His eyes look tired. They are a flower-blue like those of the little wolves. He says:
—My compliments to you this beautiful day, Danny boy. Winter coming, and still so warm.
One of the wolves runs up and bites Findley’s ankle. I say:
—It is a beautiful day, Findley. What are you doing with such pets?
—Orphans. I thought I might train them up in the way they should go. I might trade them for something, who could resist a beast so trained? But they only bite me and fall in the fire when I am not looking. Still. They provide companionship.
The pup charges at me and clamps its milky teeth around the toe of my moccasin. I shake it off and grab it by the neck to return it to Findley. It bites him again and cocks its ears. He gives a tired chuckle as he swats it away.
I take him to see the horses packed with the skins we have brought in, and his jaw relaxes. He says:
—Good. That is money in the bank.
I say:
—Hill would like a look.
But Findley sets his mouth and goes back to the lean-to, where there is no Hill, and where Stewart has sat down. He plucks a turkey we shot on the way, which we roast on a rope over the fire for our meal. The wolf pups draw close to the turning meat. They whine and look to me and dart back to the shelter again, where they lay their heads upon their paws.
—No salt left.
Findley says so mournfully, but he brightens when Stewart offers the last of his little stock. I bring out mine also, which is less. In doing so I spill a little from the bag and I say:
—Clumsy. Bad luck.
Findley says:
—Ah then, our Boone is a mortal, only a mortal.
Stewart spits on the ground where the salt scattered. The sun makes it glitter. I say:
—That a remedy? Salt into gold?
Stewart grins and says:
—If you say so.
We sit under the lean-to. The wind ruffles the roof. The wolves tumble about and I move away. Among the bedding I catch a whiff of Hill. I have to ask:
—Well and where is Hill after all? I would not have thought him likely to miss a meal.
Findley is silent for a moment, his eyes closed. He says:
—A man restless all through. Our friend left a day after Squire. Had to get home, he said, though I offered him the best of my hospitality. And after I nursed him with my own two hands.
He holds up his pale hands in proof. I say:
—Did his throat heal?
—Of course.
—He looked human again then.
—Somewhat so, yes.
I laugh, but I have some worries over Hill alone in the wilderness. I say:
—Well boys, a drink to Hill making his way home.
Findley says:
—And remaining there, and remaining there.
His face lightens for a moment and then closes again.
—Do you wish to go back, Dan?
Stewart does not say home. I do not slow my horse.
—No.
I know that Squire will return with supplies. I wonder about Findley’s state, but he seems healthy enough, and he has his wolf pups to amuse him. He can guard the skins. I dismiss Hill from my mind for the present. Stewart and I make for the Kentucky River once more, it is our best ground, where we will check the traplines. The beaver will be thick and perfect now that winter is coming back. We make a camp, and I sleep very sound but for a dream of my Daddy walking towards me. I reach out to shake his hand but he pushes mine away and looks fierce. When we wake I am glad to move on.
We come across a smooth flat lick. The horses bend their heads to the salty ground. I say:
—We can make salt here one day. Get the kettle from camp.
Stewart agrees and digs his heels into his horse. Now he says urgently:
—Bear. Bear. Bear.
He dismounts and lopes into the beech trees to the east. He has a craving for the sweetness of bear bacon, as we have eaten all the old jerked bear meat. He has said in his loud fashion that bear is the hunter’s true food and that killing one gets a man closer to being one, as the Indians believe. He has been carting a heavy bearskin about as his bedroll for some time and smells of its dusty underground whiff. It is dull black with no shine. He calls to bears in his mind, he says, and he thinks they will see fit to answer.
The wilderness does grow such fancies in some people but I would not have expected it of Stewart. He is still very thin, he has never quite come back to his old self. And I have seen no bear sign, but off he goes. The horses carry on with their licking, having caught no scent of anything in the wind.
I walk up a hill not far from the riverbank. My gun on its strap rubs at my shoulders. A huge custard-apple tree stands on the hilltop, its branches stabbing out in all directions. Its fruit is scattered around it like fallen shot. A few hang still from the branches. Winter coming, and apples, and my shirt open. Kentucky.
Stewart fires, the echo rings back like a bell. I call down:
—You had best waste no more shot, Stewart.
I hear him roaring in triumph:
—Got you, got you!
I laugh and pick an apple and throw it in his direction. It bounces down the hill. Perhaps I ought to be thinking of Eve and Adam and my old dream of them in the garden, or of my dream of Daddy, but I am not. I walk round the tree for a bigger apple and I say:
—Your fondest wish granted. What powers of attraction you have, Stewart. The Indians will be calling you She-Bear.
And there just over the top of the hill I see them as I reach to pick the fruit. Dozens of them, all very still, their guns and eyes, only their hair and feathers stirring in the light wind, as if they have been waiting unweary here all along for Fate to take me to this place and to them.
FINDLEY, I think of your flowery blue eyes watching over the station camp. I think of you whistling or singing one of your high mournful songs, stirring some unsalted thing in the pot. I think of you standing alone in your ripe smell, crooking the wolf pups under your arm, waving us off, saluting a little goodbye.
I think of you still there.
—He will be long gone. I have never even seen Findley shoot.
Stewart says so to me through his teeth as the Indians walk us down the trace.
—We will see soon enough.
The Shawnee are lovers of peace and this is a peaceful time for once, their leader tells us in his soft voice when we stop at the small camp Stewart and I last made. He speaks some English, many trade words. Their language is somet
hing like Delaware and so we are able to hobble along in conversation. The others look about. He motions to me and Stewart to sit and we do so, though we have to keep our arms aloft as they are tied to Shawnee warriors who stand at our side. My guard’s leggings are coloured red with bits of deer hair sewn to them. He reaches down and fingers my shirt.
The leader sits facing us. His expression is patient. He points to his chest and says:
—Captain Will.
I can see why this is his English name. He has a military look about him, straight back and closed face. He wears a blanket over one shoulder and beneath it a yellowish army coat, English or French, the true colour faded out of most of it. His hair is shaved but for a long lock at the crown, and the rims of his ears are stretched and split with silver bangles leaving huge open loops of skin. He looks over Stewart and me with resignation. Two more animals to deal with at the end of the autumn long-hunt.
His men are loosing our pack of skins from the tree. Stewart is trying to contain his bafflement at this turn of events and drops his head between his knees. He snuffs as if to summon the spirit of the bear he shot. The Indians picked it up and took the skin but left the meat, and Stewart cannot forget it. I say:
—Let them have the skins.
—God damn me, Dan.
Well I must say the blasphemy is a small shock. Saintly Hannah’s husband, who has insisted on keeping the Sabbath through our hunt for her sake, though in truth we only pray when it occurs to us that it might be time for a Sunday. Now he appears to be coming apart, he sags as if his seams will soon gape. I say:
—Well it might have been God damn you, Dan, so I thank you, Stewart. Let them have it. It is only the one pack.
But there are the other small camps where we have cached our furs. I will not think of them. I will not let them show in my face.
Captain Will speaks briefly to a few of his men in words I do not catch. They cheerfully wave their clubs as if they were puppets in a Punch and Judy, and one of them chuckles aloud at us. They can see we have been out a good long time. I cannot pretend to be lost or witless. They know I am not so, and I know the game is up.
I want to laugh myself as I lead them to each of our caches with a knife pointed casual at my back. Stewart roils all the time like a sick stomach. They tie us back-to-back at night with tugs made from green buffalo hide, each wound about a Shawnee’s wrist.
—John. Try to be calm. Try to sleep.
—I cannot sleep like this.
Stewart’s voice is loud, the Shawnee move and mutter. His guard sits up, his hand over his eyes. I turn my head and whisper close to Stewart’s good ear:
—It does not matter. None of this matters. We are alive yet.
—But—God damn them all, they have got everything we have taken this hunt!
—Not the station camp. Go to sleep.
But he does not sleep and I do not much either.
In the very early morning, Captain Will sits down before me, wrapped in his blanket against the frost. His eyes are calm as they roam my face, forehead to chin. He says:
—A long time you have been here, Wide Mouth.
He reaches out to finger the ends of my beard. He touches it as if it is a curious moss. His own face is very smooth, like my brother Neddy’s. He goes on:
—You have more.
—No. You have all of it.
The fingers travel up to my cheek. They are cool and dry, and at once I think of Ma’s hand on my forehead when I was a sick boy. He says:
—Poor white. I see you turn red when you lie. Even up under your hair you turn red.
I breathe out and laugh a little, I pull my head back from his hand. Stewart is looking at me hard and folding his lips, trying to understand what is being said. The Captain smiles:
—Your hunt is better than ours this year. You will take us to your big camp where you have put the rest of your skins.
His tone is cordial. When I say we have no more camps, he gives a still more cordial smile and puts out his hand for me to shake. It strikes me that this is the longest conversation I have had with an Indian in some time. I feel myself like a printed page, he reads everything. I say:
—All right. We will take you.
What else is there to say? Stewart pulls at my arm, his face tight with hope:
—What did you say you would do?
—We will take them to the station camp. We have no other choice, Stewart, this is their ground. They know where everything is. They will find it for themselves at any rate. They might do harm to Squire and Findley there.
Stewart’s face collapses:
—Let them find it for themselves! Let them mince Findley into bits! You can damn well mince me into bloody bits rather than let me watch you give it up. I will not do it. I told my wife, your sister, that I would get a good life for us here, that is what I have been doing, that is everything—
He raises his fists but quickly lets them drop. His body collapses, his big shoulders rolling inwards and his back sagging. The Shawnee look on quietly. Some smirk, some are sorry for him. They walk us along again, Stewart stumbling and dragging behind me. Our keepers talk with one another. They have our horses loaded with our furs and skins. The air is cooler, most of them wrap their blankets about their shoulders now, and some cover their shaved heads. But it is still pleasant out, the sun shines white. I find myself strangely untroubled, and I sing “Over the Hills and Far Away.” It is one of Hill’s favourites, I bellow it out as he would:
I would love you all the day,
Every night would kiss and play,
If with me you’d fondly stray,
Over the hills and far away.
My voice cracks but I carry on. Still singing, I turn to see Stewart, who looks as if he would like to lop off my head and parade it about on a pike.
—Sing with me, Stewart.
He looks at me, his lips tight. I say it again:
—Go on, sing with me. Who does not like a song?
—No.
—Stewart.
—No!
—John, I am only asking you to sing.
—I will not, Dan.
He is like a smothered fire, all damp misery. He no longer believes in me, but he is sorry for it, which makes him worse.
I sing on wild, my voice all over the scale. A few of the Shawnee are amused and turn the unaccustomed sounds around in their mouths like thick crusts. The hells, they say. Over the hells. This seems true enough and so I sing it that way as well as we march along through the trees and canebrakes and yes, over the hills.
Captain Will looks back from his place near the front of the queue, faintly amused. His stretched ears swing and shine with their silver loops.
I strain my brains and send my thoughts out to carry on any wind. Findley, hear us. Get out. Get everything out. Hide it.
I sing loud as I can. I sing to stop the noises of my dead rising behind me. It seems they might touch my shoulders and claim me any minute. I sing on, getting the words wrong myself, but the words do not matter.
I keep us alive.
But Findley is long gone, and he took only what he could carry easily. The station camp is cold and lifeless. No wolves, either grown or pups. No bones. The packs still sit on the platform like so many fat, stupid pigeons. The singing Shawnee get everything.
ONE WORKING GUN, a little shot and powder. Two pairs of moccasins each and one doeskin for patching soles. It is snowing in fat light flakes when Captain Will gives these items to us and presses our palms.
—Now brothers, go home. Stay there. Black Fish would not like to hear of you here. This is our hunting ground, and all the animals and their skins and furs are ours.
He explains this gently, as if we are very young. Stewart chews his underlip, his jaw muscles twitch. He looks feverish again. I find myself not wanting Captain Will to leave us, and not only because we have nothing. I say:
—Black Fish. Your chief? We have heard of him. Perhaps he would like to hear of us.
Perhaps we might interest him.
I think of Hill pulling terrible faces with his tongue lolling, playing the victims the terrible Black Fish has had burned over superb slow fires, so slow they almost go out. The burnings last all day. Hill acts this with moanings and eye-rollings if there are any children about to watch. I am done for, he moans.
The Captain only smiles briefly and goes on:
—Do not come back. You may be sure the wasps and yellow-jackets will sting you.
I point to his drained-looking colourless coat and say:
—Was your jacket ever yellow? Perhaps we could get you a better one. We know a trader.
He shows no interest, but I go on:
—Hornets stung our friend Hill here. He left. I do not think he will come back. You would not want him, but we are not so bad.
—You English brought the hornets and bees to this place. None came here before.
—You are fond of honey, surely. Not all that we have brought is bad, is it?
He turns away, and his eyes show no sign of knowing us when I say once more:
—Captain.
They are going. There is only the creak of the heavy packs on the horses moving off towards the Warrior’s Path, heading north. My guard with the red leggings gives me a nod. The soft chatter, the movement through the light snow, and the humming of a song drifting away.
—That is your song.
Stewart speaks wretchedly. He coughs and says:
—They have everything, even our songs.
We stay among the cold ruins of the station camp for two nights. Only now does my heart fail for a time. They have left us no horses. The real winter has begun to gnaw at last, and we are so far from anywhere. I try to shore up our spirits with talk of all we have seen, the beautiful lands and the abundant game, all of it like nothing else on the earth.
In talking of it, I feel myself like Findley, curiously free. Why not begin again? Why not? Another new life. I say so to Stewart, but he rolls over on his pine boughs and seems to sleep, though I can tell he does not.