Father unto Many Sons

by Rod Miller

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  The farther he rode from the Canadian or the creeks that fed the river, the more the wide-open spaces disconcerted Richard. Like his brother Melvin, something about the emptiness made him uncomfortable. The farther west the wagons rolled, the more the sun absorbed the humidity, and on days of powerful heat his very breath seared his throat. With no trees to stem the wind, it rolled across the prairie like a tide, rippling the grass before it in waves. Thunderstorms sometimes boiled up in the afternoons, flashing across the plains and down-pouring rain so intense it raised a dust. With no real shelter anywhere, he would seek a low spot in the rolling terrain and hunker down beneath the horse. Fortunately, the storms passed quickly and he was soon back in the saddle, with a fresh smell and thin layer of mud the only reminders of the rain.

  Despite the loneliness, the emptiness, and the ever-present perception of danger, Richard took to the saddle at every opportunity, often finagling Melvin out of his turn to scout or hunt. Richard saw buffalo frequently, but seldom shot one unless close enough to the coming wagons to get help with the butchering. He bagged an occasional deer and once took a shot at a lone and distant pronghorn, unsure what the strange animal might be.

  But mostly he rode aimlessly. And brooded. His inability to please his father befuddled him. Try as he might, his every effort soon deteriorated into a useless contest of wills. He wondered at Abel’s ability to please their father—a gift he lacked and did not understand. Lee’s recent dream offered no encouragement; rather it added to his feelings of hopelessness and helplessness. Hell, even in the old man’s dreams I ain’t no good, he thought. He worried over Emma, and her ambivalence about, even dismissal of, his interest in her. And her attraction to Abel, despite his brother’s apparent lack of intentions where she was concerned. He stewed about what they would find in Mexico, and what kind of life, if any, he could build there.

  And he wondered when he could get another drink.

  One day, he sat in the saddle, stopped atop a low rise and lost in contemplation. He did not hear the approach of the Indians and ignored his horse’s warnings. And so he was startled, even terrified, to find a mounted man on either side of him. He raised the rifle from where it rested across the fork of his saddle, but the Indian to his left grabbed the barrel and held it still despite Richard’s best efforts to move it—he jerked and yanked and twisted, but could not wrest the gun from the Indian’s grasp.

  The man holding the barrel said something in a language Richard did not understand and the other man laughed. After a moment, the Indian said, “Stop it. I will not let go until you do.”

  Richard’s eyes widened at the Indian’s words and the smile on his face. “You speak English!” he said.

  “Yes. Yes I do.”

  The man’s smile and the grin on the other Indian’s face convinced Richard he was in no imminent danger. He stopped pulling at the rifle and after a moment the Indian let it go and Richard lowered it to rest on the saddle. “What do you want?”

  The man spoke to his companion in whatever Indian language they spoke, and again the other rider laughed. This time, he spoke. “You were so still here for so long, we were worried you had turned to ice.” He waved an arm across the landscape. “And yet it is summer and the sun is hot. Maybe you slept—or maybe you were dead, we thought.”

  “Well, I ain’t. So I reckon I’ll be moving along.”

  “Wait,” the first Indian said. “You are with the wagons? The two drawn by oxen and another with mules?”

  After a moment, Richard realized it would do no good to lie as the men obviously knew the answer.

  “We saw your wagons. The chickens. The cow and calf. The women gathering buffalo wood and the men driving the teams.”

  “What of it?”

  The Indian dismissed the question with a wave of his hand. “We mean you no harm—nor your people. But we do not see many travelers here. We will ride with you to your wagons for a visit. Catch up on the news from the East.”

  Skeptical, but realizing any objection would be wasted, Richard reined his horse around and started toward the distant river.

  “Wait.”

  “What is it now?”

  The Indians laughed. “If you go there, you will not find your wagons. They are far past there by now. You slept too long.”

  “I wasn’t asleep.”

  The Indians laughed as they rode off. “This way,” one said over his shoulder with a grin. “Follow us.”

  The wagons, so far ahead it surprised Richard, had already halted for the day when the trio arrived. They rode up and stopped, met by Abel, pistol in hand, Lee with the other revolver, Daniel with a rifle, and Melvin with a single-shot pistol that belonged to Daniel.

  “Put the guns down,” Richard said. “These men don’t mean no harm.”

  The men lowered their weapons and the women stepped into the open. The travelers studied their guests. They looked to be well mounted. Their dress was much like their own, but embellished with some beadwork and other decorations. One of the men had a tattooed face.

  “Might as well step down,” Lee said. “We’ll have a fire going soon and you-all will be welcome to coffee.”

  “Do you have sugar?”

  As Richard had been earlier, the people in the camp were surprised to hear the question in English.

  “Why, sure,” Lee said. “A little.”

  “Good!” the Indian said with a smile.

  Melvin led the unhitched mules to water, Emma following along leading one of the oxen with the other three plodding behind. Sarah untied the milk cow from the wagon and shooed it off in the direction of the oxen, knowing it and the calf would follow. Mary kindled a fire and piled on buffalo chips as Jane wrestled kitchen boxes out of the wagons.

  When the coffee was ready, the men sat and talked while the women went about their work preparing food.

  “How come you-all to speak English so good?” Lee said.

  “Our people have lived among the white men since beyond memory. We are from what your people call the Five Civilized Tribes.”

  “Cherokee?”

  “Chickasaw.”

  “Ah,” Lee said. “I remember you-all comin’ through Memphis a couple years back. On your way to here, I reckon?”

  “That is so. It took years to negotiate our ‘removal’ with your government. But we were forced out of our homeland and sent here to the Indian Territory to live on land leased from the Choctaw. It is not what we would have chosen.” They talked some more about the removal; the difficulty of transplanting nearly 5,000 tribal members, more than a thousand slaves, and thousands of well-bred horses that attracted thieves and rustlers every step of the way and ever since.

  Daniel said, “We have seen no other Indians for donkey’s years. Where are the rest of your people?”

  “You passed our settlements long ago. While this is Chickasaw land, most of our people live near the Choctaw. We two—well, we were stricken with what you people call ‘cabin fever’ and are out here seeking a cure. Just to look over the country, maybe do a little hunting.”

  Melvin said, “There ain’t much to look at in this country. It sure is different from home.”

  The Chickasaw men nodded agreement, and the conversation turned to the emigrants, who explained their intention to settle in Mexican Territory. Lee preached his sermon on the evils of slavery and the pending destruction of the United States in recompense for the sin. The Indians only laughed.

  “Our people have hoped for the demise and departure of the white men for hundreds of years and it has yet to happen. Perhaps your prediction will finally bring it to pass,” the most talkative of the two said. “But I am worried it may come to our harm as well, if what you say about slaveholding is true. The Chickasaw have kept black slaves for many, many years, as have the Cherokee, the Creek, the Choctaw. It is a practice we learned from your people.”

  “Well, I reckon there may be some forgiveness for you-all on account of that,” Lee said.

>   Mary approached the men, wiping her hands on her apron. “Now that you-all have emptied the coffeepot, you may want to put something more substantial on your stomachs. Supper is ready.”

  Talk continued as the men ate. Their guests assured the travelers there was no danger from relocated Indians, as they were well past the settled areas and even the possibility of a chance encounter—such as theirs—was remote.

  Before they rode away, the Chickasaw visitors warned that Comanche raiding parties from the south sometimes crossed the Red River, and as the wagons traveled west they would be passing through Comancheria, crossing lands frequented by wandering bands of the tribe. They would not find the Comanche so good-natured.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  The wagons threaded their way through the Antelope Hills and at some unrecognized place crossed out of Indian Territory and into the panhandle of Texas. Soon, they reached the breaks of the Canadian River, the gorge deepening as they wended their way west. Climbing out of a rocky ravine one afternoon a rear wheel of the Pate wagon slid sideways off a boulder and dropped, the rock snapping the axle as if it were a stick of kindling and leaving the wheel spinning in the wind.

  Lee stooped under the wagon and studied the broken axle and backed out on his hands and knees. He stood and dusted off his pants legs, shaking his head, then turned to the family circled around. “It’s gone. Busted clean through.”

  Sarah said, “Can it be fixed?”

  Brushing his hands together, Lee shook his head.

  “So what do we do?”

  “Don’t know. Have to think on it some. We’d have carried a spare had I known.”

  “We’re in a hell of a fix, then, is what you’re saying.”

  After a moment, Lee said, “That ain’t exactly how I’d put it, Sarah, but I suppose that explains it.”

  By now, the Lewises had parked their wagons on the plain above and were walking back down the slope to see what the matter was. Lee explained the situation. “Thought about bringin’ a spare, but didn’t,” he said.

  “Nor I,” Daniel said. “What is to be done?”

  No one offered an answer until Abel crawled out from under the stalled wagon. “We’ll make a new one.”

  Richard laughed. “Two things, baby brother. First, we ain’t seen a tree for weeks except for cottonwoods in the river bottom. That wood ain’t stout enough to make a crutch for a three-legged coon hound. And second, you don’t know one damn thing about makin’ a wagon axle.”

  All eyes turned to Abel, awaiting his response and knowing Richard’s contention, while crude, was logical. “We’ve got it to do,” Abel finally said. “I’ll find a way.”

  He chocked the front wheels of the wagon with rocks. “Pa, you might unhook the team.” He untied the milk cow from the tail of the wagon and handed the lead rope to Jane. “Would you mind leading her on up?” She started up the hill and the calf followed. He lifted out the endgate and set it aside. “Rich, Mel— load up. We’ll have to tote most all this stuff to the top. Anyone else cares to lend a hand, well, your help is sure welcome.”

  It took most of the afternoon to carry the wagon’s goods and pile them on the rim. With that job nearly done, Abel gathered up the axe and rode the saddle horse down the ravine and into the gorge. He came back after a while with two six-foot lengths of cottonwood limb stripped smooth of twigs and branches tied to the saddle skirts alongside the horse.

  “What the hell’s them for?” Richard laughed. “Looks like Mel’s been whittlin’ on your poles there.”

  Abel swung out of the saddle and loosened the load, dropping the limbs beside the wagon. “What you said about a crutch gave me an idea. You’ll see.”

  Richard looked on while, with Melvin’s help, Abel set up the wagon jack on the side of the wagon with the wheel still on the ground, removed the linchpin and pulled the wheel. Trusting the stability of the jack, he crawled under the wagon, dragging one of the lengths of cottonwood with him and wedged it between the hounds and bottom of the wagon box and lashed it in place with the tail end poking out behind the wagon.

  “I get it,” Richard said as Abel got the process underway on the other side of the wagon. “It’s a crutch.” He laughed as if it was the funniest thing he had ever seen.“A wagon crutch!You’re a bigger fool than I thought, little brother.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “How far you think you can drag that wagon on them sticks?”

  “Only have to get to the top of the hill.” The other wheel, spinning idly in the breeze, came off easily. But finding a place for the jack and lifting that side of the wagon, high-centered on the rock, proved a challenge. “Rich, why don’t you get off your butt and lend a hand. Sooner we get this prop put on and the wagon up top, the sooner we can figure out a more permanent fix.”

  It took a considerable amount of straining and groaning and grumbling and swearing, but they eventually got the wagon off the ground, the boulder out of the way, and the prop installed. Melvin backed the mules to the wagon and saw to their hitching. He urged the team forward and Abel watched the props gouge shallow trenches in the dirt and bounce over rocks, hoping with every jolt they would hold. The poles were uneven, causing the wagon to list, and it didn’t track straight, but the props held and with much screeching and scratching and creaking and cracking the wagon finally lurched over the rim.

  Supper was on the fire and the Pate boys ladled generous portions of venison and gravy over biscuits, saving room for a sweet rice pudding with raisins. Lee and Daniel, under Sarah’s direction, had arranged the unloaded wagon goods under a canvas fly staked to the ground and lashed to the side of one of the Lewis wagons. With the other supper dishes already done, Emma and Jane played singing and hand-clapping games as they waited for the Pate boys to finish eating. Mary sat on a rock a ways off from the wagons with a book in her lap.

  Richard handed his plate to Emma, and held on to it for a second or two when she tried to take it. With a sigh, she rolled her eyes and stopped tugging and waited for him to let go. He grinned and loosened his grip and, after she walked away, lifted himself to his feet and walked out to where Mary sat.

  “You don’t look to be readin’ much—you holdin’ that book for some other reason?”

  Mary caressed the open page then closed the book on her thumb to mark the place. “No. I meant to read, but my mind wandered.” She looked off into the distance. “The sun is down now. It will soon be too dark anyway.”

  “Me, I never took to reading much.”

  “I enjoy it. Martha was the smart one, though. Had her nose in a book any spare minute. She wouldn’t go to the privy without book in hand.” Mary realized what she had said, ducked her head and giggled behind her hand.

  “What is it you was reading? Or meaning to?”

  Mary studied the cover of the book. “It is a book of poems Martha left. By an Englishman named Wordsworth.”

  “Poems. We had to learn a poem by heart in school. I don’t remember mine anymore. What’s this English fellow’s poems about?”

  “Oh, many things. Nature—death—philosophy—his feelings.” She opened the book to the marked verse and read the first stanza:

  I wandered lonely as a cloud

  That floats on high o’er vales and hills,

  When all at once I saw a crowd,

  A host of golden daffodils;

  Beside the lake, beneath the trees,

  Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

  Richard laughed. “Daffodils? Ma had some of them flowers planted at our place. Come up ever’ spring.” He laughed again. “Sure as hell that feller who wrote that wasn’t wandering around this country. Ain’t no daffodils here.”

  For a long moment, Mary studied Richard. He squirmed, embarrassed. Then, “Wordsworth writes more about the flowers,” she said. “But I do not believe it is the flowers themselves he finds important. It is the beauty they represent, and that beautiful things stay with us, in our hearts. And the pleasure such memories brin
g.”

  Her thoughts brought only a blank stare.

  “Listen, Richard, to the end of the poem”:

  For oft, when on my couch I lie

  In vacant or in pensive mood,

  They flash upon that inward eye

  Which is the bliss of solitude;

  And then my heart with pleasure fills,

  And dances with the daffodils.

  Again, no response from Richard. Mary smiled and closed the book. “Richard! Do you not ever remember beautiful things you have seen?”

  “Don’t know. Never really thought about it.”

  “Oh, come now! Surely your thoughts turn from time to time to beauty! Do you never think of Emma in a quiet moment? Does not her image ‘flash upon your inward eye’ when you are in a ‘pensive mood’?”

  Richard blushed. He had no answer for Mary’s teasing. She stood and smoothed the front of her dress. “Come,” she said. “It is dark. We should be getting back.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  Abel was under the wagon at first light, studying the break in the axle. It looked more snapped or sheared than shattered. The break was just outside the through-bolt that joined the axle, hound, and bolster. He could see where the sharp edge of the boulder had bitten into the bottom of the axle, with gravity and the weight of the wagon doing the rest. Other than a few splinters at the edges of the break, very little wood was missing. He did not know why, but Abel thought that a good thing.

  He unhooked the brake linkage and pulled out the brake beam. He called the other men to help and they lifted off and set aside the wagon box, laying bare the running gear. The buffalo hide he’d tied atop the reach was still there and he cut it loose. Abel looked the works over to determine how best to get to the broken axle, and removed the hound braces and through-bolts and each end of the axle dropped free in turn. He laid the ends together on the ground and, squatting with forearms on knees, stared at them as minute after minute after minute passed, as if they would magically rejoin.

  “Any ideas yet, Abel?” Lee said. “You been staring at that axle for a long time.”