by Gary D. Svee
Mac stared at Sparks. “Stilson said he would do that?”
“Said it was the least he could do. Isn’t that something?”
Mac agreed. That was really something.
Pierson leaned over the counter and winked. “Mac, this is really going to be something special.”
A frown crossed over the stationmaster’s face. “There’s still plenty to do, but one of the toughest jobs is up to you.”
Mac looked up in despair. They left the hardest job to him, a scarecrow.
“You need to tell us exactly when she’s coming.”
Mac sighed in relief. “That’s no trouble.”
“No, but then we have to figure out how to get Frank out of town two or three days before she arrives. Think you can help us with that?”
Mac’s mind went blank. In all of his young life, he had been at the beck and call of adults. “Cover this story for me, Mac, and I’ll give you a quarter.” “Spade this garden, and I’ll pay you a dollar.” “Make sure you get your assignment in.” “Wash your hands, Mac.”
Sparks Pierson was asking him to switch roles, to bend an adult’s will to his own. Mac felt both intimidated and exhilarated. He stood dumbfounded, and then Big Jim Thompson’s name popped into his head. Big Jim would know what to do. He would write to Big Jim Thompson, one sorry son of a bitch to another.
“I think I can do that, Mr. Pierson.”
“Sparks, Mac. Sparks. I’m the spark, and this good town is the tinder and we’re going to set a fire that will warm the cockles of Frank Drinkwalter’s and his intended’s hearts. That’s what we’re going to do, Mac.”
The door to Sheriff Frank Drinkwalter’s office was closed, and Mac McPherson hesitated. Drinkwalter might be talking to one of the people who came to the sheriff because he was the last resort for settling grievances short of fisticuffs or court.
But Mac couldn’t discern the murmur of voices inside, so he knocked tentatively.
“Come in, Mac.” The words came muffled by the door.
When Mac stepped in, the sheriff was staring out the window as though the meaning of life were written on the clouds hanging over the north hills. Mac settled into his chair, wondering what so preoccupied the sheriff. The minutes stretched on, and finally Mac cleared his throat.
“Do you want me to go home, come back sometime later?”
The sheriff jerked around as though he were aware for the first time that Mac was in the room with him.
“No, Mac. I’m sorry. Let’s get to business.”
But the letters and stories didn’t pull the sheriff away from his solitary thoughts. The sheriff’s mood was contagious. Mac went through his mind, imagining what might so preoccupy Drinkwalter. Only Catherine could touch him so. Something had happened to her. She wouldn’t be coming.
“Can’t she come?”
Drinkwalter turned, trying to fathom Mac’s words. Then he folded his arms and smiled, a wan little smile.
“No, nothing like that, Mac. You’d be the first to know if it were anything like that.”
Mac cocked his head, the unasked question stretching between the two, and Drinkwalter nodded. Mac had become his confidante as well as his Cyrano de Bergerac that spring. He deserved an explanation.
“Mac, have you ever walked out to the west hill, where that ridge comes down to squeeze the valley almost shut?”
“I go fishing out there once in a while.”
“Have you ever climbed that ridge?”
“Nope.”
The sheriff leaned back in his chair. “The first time I did it was one of these fall days when the cottonwoods go gold, and the grass is still green and some of those bushes are red and yellow as fire. The air was so clear I thought I might be able to see to the end of the world, so I started climbing. I found a little swale there, about halfway up. Off to one side there was a big rock, and I climbed it.”
The sheriff stopped, his words bringing that day back to him. “The sun was full on my face, and I was damn near dizzy with what I saw. The Yellowstone was low and green and bright as a string of emeralds. It looked like a necklace set in the gold of the cotton-woods. And the Beartooths were blue and white and pure, sapphires and diamonds.”
“I thought I might be in heaven. I thought that maybe the strain of climbing that hill had done me in, and I had left my body someplace down below. But I knew it couldn’t be heaven without sego lilies. So I climbed off that rock and got down on my hands and knees to go through the grass in that swale. They weren’t in bloom, of course, but there are sego lilies up there, the biggest patch I’ve ever seen. I came back the next spring, and there they were.”
“Mac, if music were made from the beauty of each of those flowers, the sound would reach clear to heaven. They are an orchestra fit to play for the angels.”
“That place has a special magic to it, Mac, and I wanted to share it with Catherine. I dreamed about building a home there for the two of us. I would build stairs up to the top of that rock, and we could sit there together, and I would be in the presence of such beauty that the crown heads of Europe would be in envy. I swear God must have made that vale so he could sit there and glory in the beauty of his creation.”
“There’s a natural seam in the sandstone that goes down to the valley floor. It wouldn’t take but a little cleaning up to make it fit for a road. The spring is good water, cold in summer and winter alike, and it tastes like nectar on a hot summer day.”
“I wanted to build a house up there, so when Catherine came, she would have a home suitable for her. Us two-legged creatures generally put more value on money than on beauty. I thought I might be able to buy that swale. It sits on just a quarter section, and most of the land is up and down. Not an awful lot of grass except down on the river bottom and in that vale.”
“So I talked to Mort Jenkins down at the bank about it. Turns out, it was let go for taxes, and the bank had picked it up. Told him about the vale, and the spring and the lilies. Even sketched it for him, so he could see what I was seeing in my head. He seemed to be interested in selling the piece to me.”
Drinkwalter pulled the chair back from his desk and sat down, propping his head up with his arms. “I thought everything was going along all right. I rode out there this morning, just so I could be there again, just so I could think about the kind of house I would put there.”
Drinkwalter, eyebrows knitting together, focused his attention on Mac. “Somebody is already building a house there. They’re putting in the foundation just where I would have put it. They ran a pipe from the spring down to the house. Whoever has that house won’t even have to pump water. They’ll just open a valve, and water will come out, pure as can be.”
“Nobody was there, so I couldn’t ask who had bought it. All I could think about was that Catherine and I couldn’t have it.”
The sheriff leaned back in his chair and ran his hands over his face and down to his chin, staring up at the ceiling.
“It made me realize how little I have to give to Catherine. That place I rent is good enough for me, but not good enough for her. You should see her house, Mac. It puts any house in Billings to shame, and I can’t put her in that place where I live.”
Drinkwalter pushed himself back in his chair, straightening his back. “I came out here to build something for us, so I would have something to offer her. I’ve just come to realize how little I’ve done. I’ve got nothing for her. I’ve worked all my life as hard as I can, and I’ve always tried to do what’s right, and I haven’t got a thing to offer her.”
“You’ve got yourself,” Mac whispered.
Drinkwalter rolled his eyes and shrugged his shoulders.
“And you’ve got your friends,” Mac added.
“Friends aren’t the same as having a roof over your head.”
“Sometimes they are.”
“I suppose,” the sheriff said, unconvinced. “I have half a mind to go down to the bank and ask Mort about that land. But it wouldn’t do any good,
and I don’t know how I would ever have had the money to build a house, anyway. I’ve been living in a dream world, Mac, made up of a woman I haven’t seen for damn near ten years. I built a house for her made of dreams. That’s a flimsy place to live.
“When Catherine sees what a failure I’ve been, she might just step back on the train and go home. At least she’s got a roof over her head there.”
Mac wanted to tell the sheriff that the people of Eagles Nest were building the home up on the hill for him. He wanted to tell the sheriff that he had laid up a treasure of friendship and appreciation in his time in Eagles Nest. He wanted to say all of that, but he couldn’t, not without breaking his word to all the people who wanted to surprise the sheriff.
Mac swallowed, choking down the words he wanted to say. “It’ll work out,” he squeaked. He left the sheriff’s office then, and Drinkwalter rose, leaning against the windowsill, eyes focused on the rims north of Eagles Nest, and mind focused on the failure he was.
18
“I didn’t know what to say,” Mac said, polishing the dinner plate his mother had just handed him. “I didn’t want to leave him like that, but I didn’t know what to say.”
Mary McPherson finished the last spoon, leaning back, hands on hips, willing the dull ache in her back to go away.
“Mac, would you mind dumping the water? I’ve been on my feet all day, and I’d like to sit down for a minute.”
“Sure, Ma.”
Mac took the pan of rinse water, walking as carefully as a man on a tightrope so he wouldn’t spill the water on the way to the door. Only after he reached the door did he remember that it took two hands to carry water and one to open the door. He set the pan on the stove and opened the door. Light streamed into the night as though eager to leave the little cabin, and standing in the light, eyes dead as a snake’s, stood Jack Galt.
“Hello, Mac,” Galt said, his words little more than a whisper. “I’ve come calling on you and your mother.”
Mac dropped the pan; it bounced off the wooden step, sending a spray of steaming water toward Galt. Mac slammed the door then and locked it. He stood at the door shaking, listening to Jack Galt choking as he tried to stifle his laugh outside.
The boy jumped when his mother’s hands touched his shoulders. “What is it, Mac? Who’s out there?”
The words jarred Mac into consciousness. The boy ran past his mother’s arms to the windows. But as he was drawing the curtain on the window, Jack Galt’s face appeared. Galt was laughing, laughing at the boy’s attempt to shut him out. Mac ran to the other window, and Galt was there, too. His face lit only dimly by the light leaking through the window. Mac couldn’t see Galt’s body, only his face suspended like a skull in the darkness. Mac could only hear Galt’s laughter.
And then Galt’s fists were pounding on the front door, the cabin shaking with the force of the blows. Crash. Crash. Crash. Mac could see the hinges tearing loose from the doorframe, yielding to what seemed to be an inexorable force.
Mac ran for the corner of his cabin where he kept his rifle. He could stop Jack Galt with his rifle. But cartridges: Where did he put the cartridges? Max pawed through his shelf, strewn with everything the boy owned. No shells. No shells for stopping Jack Galt, but then he saw the gleam of brass beside the bed. The box of shells had fallen from the shelf, cracking open and scattering the shells on the floor.
Mac scooped up two. He should be able to stop Jack Galt with two shells. His hands were shaking, and he dropped the shells twice before he squeezed them into the magazine. He pulled the lever back and up, and the shell slid into the chamber with a click. And almost as though the click were a summons, Galt burst through the door.
Galt was the devil incarnate, an aura of dull-red evil hanging like mist on his body. He looked at the rifle in Mac’s hands and threw back his head and laughed. Mac didn’t see Galt pull his knife from his sheath; he saw only its flash as it cut through the air in wide threatening arcs.
Mac squeezed the trigger on the rifle, but it wouldn’t move. He pulled on it as hard as he could, but it seemed to be locked in place; he pounded the hammer with his hand, willing it to move forward and strike the firing pin, but it only tore bits of flesh from his hand. Mac screamed and screamed and screamed, the sound of it lost in Galt’s triumphant laughter.
“Mac! Mac! Mac!”
Mac opened his eyes. His mother was standing beside him in her bedclothes, holding a lamp.
“Run, Ma! Run for your life.”
“Mac, it was only a dream. Just a dream.”
Mac sagged back on his bed. “It can’t be a dream. It was too real.”
“It was a dream, Mac. Just a dream.”
“What time is it?”
“About four. I was going to get up early today, anyway. How about I start a fire—”
“Don’t go outside, Ma! Don’t go.”
“I don’t have to, Mac. I’ve got a fine young son who takes care of his mother. Kindling and firewood right beside the stove. You just lay here, and I’ll get a fire going. Maybe you’d like some hot chocolate. I’ve been saving some, and there couldn’t be a better morning for it. You just stay here, and I’ll be back in a minute.”
Mac pulled the covers up to his chin. Then he sat bolt upright in his bed. His rifle! Where was his rifle? He saw the gleam of the rifle’s blued barrel, propped in the corner beside his bed. Shells! The boy’s eyes darted to his shelf. No shells. His eyes dropped to the side of the bed. The shells were there, spilled from the box just as they had been in his dream.
“Ma!”
Mary McPherson dropped the stick of firewood she had been putting in the stove and darted to the boy. “Mac, what’s wrong?”
“Prop the chair against the door, Ma. He’s coming.”
“No one’s coming, Mac. No one’s going to hurt you.”
“Prop the chair against the door. Please, Ma?”
Mary nodded, shoving the back of a spindly chair firmly beneath the doorknob.
“Is that better, Mac?”
Mac nodded.
Mary McPherson busied herself at the stove, first some paper Mac picked up every Thursday from behind The Eagles Nest Expository. Ben Simpkins didn’t mind if people helped themselves to his garbage. Every man has some generosity in him; that was the full extent of Simpkins’s. Mary stacked a handful of kindling on top of the paper, just so. Lighting the range in the morning was a liturgy. This morning the rite would chase away Mac’s dreams.
Mac had filled the boiler on the stove the night before, but it would be an hour or two in the warming, so Mary filled the coffeepot with cool water from the boiler and set it on the range front. The kindling was burning now; the fire talking to itself as it licked at its morning offering. Mary slipped some larger pieces of wood in the stove, and a little coal on top of that. She left the draft open, hoping that the coal would catch. She and Mac had some coal oil for lighting coal, but she didn’t like to use it. Coal oil was a luxury.
Mary slipped the lid back on the range and the coffeepot on the lid. She was done now with the morning routine. It had soothed her, given her mind time to fit itself around Mac’s screams.
Mac hadn’t had a nightmare for years, not since the first year after his father had left them. They had tried to follow him, spending most of their nights in railroad cars or cheap hotels. Danger hides in strange beds in strange hotels with flimsy doors and the sounds of drunken men. Mac had nightmares then, and Mary would comfort him, as much to give ease to her own fears as his.
But now she had to help Mac through this time, talk him away from the night and lead him into the day. She returned to the boy, sitting beside him on the bed.
“What was it you dreamed about, Mac?” she asked, running her fingers through the boy’s hair.
“Jack Galt. He was here, Ma. Last night. I went outside to empty the water, and he was there. He was laughing, Ma. It was the most terrible thing I’ve ever heard. Laughing shouldn’t be like that, Ma.”
“I wish Sheriff Drinkwalter hadn’t told you about Galt. Stories like that get into your mind, and you can’t get them out. That’s all your dream was, Mac. Jack Galt wasn’t here last night. It was just you thinking about what the sheriff had told you.”
“But, Ma, in my dream, I couldn’t find the shells for my rifle. Then I found them on the floor. The box had popped open when they fell, and some of the shells were scattered on the floor. That’s the way they were this morning, Ma. The shells were scattered on the floor just the way I saw them. It wasn’t a dream, Ma.”
“Mac, you probably saw those shells on the floor before you went to bed. You probably thought about picking them up, but forgot. So they were all ready for your dream. That’s all it was.”
Mac sagged back into his pillow. “It was so real…”
“Sometimes dreams seem more real than reality. Now, if you think this dream of yours is going to give you an excuse to lay slugabed, you’ve got another think coming.”
Mac smiled. “Ah, Ma.”
“Ah, Mac.”
The two laughed together and Mac climbed from his bed to begin the day.
Mary had some bacon she had been saving. She fried it, Mac wolfing down the chunks and three fried eggs. How that boy could eat, and yet he never filled out. He might grow up a little, but not out. What kind of mother would people think Mary McPherson was to keep her child so skinny?
Mac thought he would stop over at The Eagles Nest Expository. Could be Ben Simpkins would have something for him to do. There wouldn’t be much money to show for his labor. Mac could work at the paper all day, and Simpkins would send him away at night with less than a quarter in his hand. But Mac liked the smell of ink, and the sound of the press hard at work. He would go there early. Mac knew he would spend most of the day running errands for Sparks Pierson. There was a lot more to building a house than Mac had realized.