Riding from Memories

by Jim Cox

  The afternoon had warmed up considerably, and Buck’s head was bobbing in a semi-catnap state when suddenly, a piercing growl echoed, and then, out of nowhere came a huge cougar flying through the air from an overhead tree limb onto Bell’s back. When Black heard the growl and saw the big cat, he quickly jumped sideways sending Buck sprawling. After Buck caught his breath and looked up to see the cougar on top of Bell, he jumped up, drew his handgun, and fired. The animal was dead before it hit the ground. The excitement and fear quickly set Black and Bell to running, but they eventually stopped after several whistles from Buck and stood wide-eyed with flared nostrils. Buck approached them slowly, and after calming Black, he went to Bell and was surprised to find only a few light scratches. The tarp bag on her back had several deep claw tears in it and had protected her. “That backpack saved your life, girl,” Buck said, as he scratched her forehead.

  An hour later, Buck had the cougar’s skin rolled up and placed inside of Bell’s backpack. The cat’s hind legs and loin were in his food bag. By now the horses had grown more accustomed to the cougar’s smell and had gotten over most of their nervousness.

  Nothing out of the ordinary occurred after the cougar incident, except for a bear running across their path into a thicket, making the horses a mite jumpy.

  Darkness was a couple hours away when Buck detected a slight incline to the terrain he was riding through. Not long afterward, the landscape turned into a prairie-like setting of rolling hills and vegetation with only a few scattered trees. It had been a long hard day, especially for the horses, so Buck started looking for a suitable stopping place for the night. A place with water and firewood if possible.

  Twenty minutes or so later he topped a hill and stopped, looking at a circle of trees around a pond about a half a mile away. It was a small pond, but plenty large enough for his nightly needs, including water for him to bathe in. I feel like I have things crawling all over me after riding through that bug-infested swamp.

  He started off with a wide grin but pulled up after a few strides. “Was that a whiff of smoke I smelled?” he asked himself. He sat squinting toward the distant pond—nothing. Then he smelled smoke again, so his gaze returned to the circle of trees. Minutes passed before a faint plume of white showed itself against the blue sky above the trees, and then disappeared. “There’s someone in those trees,” he mumbled, “no telling who it might be.” He sat in thought, trying to determine his next moves. He considered Indians but dismissed the thought since he’d been told the natives were no longer a problem in this area—that most of them had been moved to the Oklahoma territory. I won’t be troubled with Indians ’til I get to Texas, he reasoned.

  The horses seemed to be aware of Buck’s cautious approach, so their footfalls were nearly without sound as they walked downwind toward the South edge of the trees. Long shadows were being cast as the evening sun started sliding behind the cloudless western horizon with a soft breeze brushing Buck’s face.

  Buck had stopped to make last minute plans when someone called out, “Might as well come on in and set if you’re friendly—the coffee’s hot. If you ain’t friendly, you’d better keep on going. I’ve got a gun pointed your way.” Buck was a little disgusted about being detected, but he grinned as he headed in. The voice sounded neighborly.

  Buck saw a donkey and a sway-backed old mare before the fire came into sight. He tied Black and Bell to a sturdy tree limb and was walking toward the fire when an old timer walked out holding two cups. “Howdy,” he said, handing Buck a steaming cup of coffee, and then, waving toward a log not far from the fire, said, “Have a seat.”

  The old timer took a seat on another log running crossways to Buck’s and started getting acquainted. “Josephine let me know you was a coming before you come over that rise out yonder. She’s better than any dog or guinea hen I’ve ever saw—ain’t no one gonna slip up on me. I saw ya’ coming the whole way. Made me laugh the way you tried slipping up on me, coming on from downwind.” The old-timer laughed and took a couple of gulps of coffee causing his Adam’s apple to bob up-and-down. “Josephine’s my donkey,” he said, “we’ve been together nigh on ten years, but that ain’t as long as I’ve had Sadie—had her nigh on fifteen years.”

  The old man kept on talking about his donkey and horse while Buck sized him up. He was a tall, slender man approaching six-foot-one or two who Buck guessed to be in his mid-sixties. His gray hair hung from under his ’coon skin hat to his shoulders and blended into his rather long beard and bushy mustache. His shirt and pants were both made from deerskin and covered with streaks of dirt and what looked like dried blood. Buck grinned when his eyes fell to the old man’s western boots. But the most noticeable thing about the old timer was his body odor—it was terrible. He probably ain’t had a bath for a year or more, Buck thought.

  The old man rose to put another log or two on the fire. When he sat back down, he said, “Folks here-about call me Slim. ’Course that ain’t my real name, but it’s been so long since anyone’s called me what my ma named me I’ve almost forgotten it,” he said laughing.

  “I’m obliged to know you, Slim. My name’s Buck,” Buck said with a smile. “Course that ain’t my real name either, but it’s what I go by.”

  Slim had filled the cups and was returning the pot to the fire when he said, “I was a mind to start fixing supper when Josephine told me you was coming, so I put it aside, but if we ain’t cooking before long, we’ll be eating in pitch black.” The old man rose and started for his pile of gear but turned and said, “I’m running low on fixins. Ain’t got nothing but hard tacks and a few pieces of porcupine I can split with ’ya. I’ll hunt me a critter of some kind tomorrow.”

  “I’ve got some fresh meat in my food bag, Slim,” Buck said enthusiastically. “A cougar attacked my mare a couple hours back, and I shot it—cut out its hind legs and loin. We can fry a couple pieces of bacon in my skillet for the grease and then fry up several pieces of the cougar. I’ve also got some hominy we can heat up. Let me tend to my horses and belongings first, and then I’ll bring in the vittles.” The old man’s face was beaming when Buck left.

  Twilight was setting in when the men sat down on their logs with full plates. “Ain’t had vittles this good fer a long time,” the old timer said as his fingers pushed in the last bite of meat he was holding. After spooning-in two spoons of hominy, he picked up another piece of the cougar meat and bit off a big chunk. “Cougar is some of the best tasting meat there is,” he said, talking with his mouth full. “I rate it right up there with antelope, and that’s saying a mite.”

  After the food was gone, the pot and skillet were wiped off with a few handfuls of prairie grass, and coffee was poured. It was uncharacteristic for Slim to be quiet, but several minutes went by in total silence except for the crackle of the burning wood. Finally, Buck asked, “Where’s home, Slim? What brings you to this forsaken part of the country?”

  It took a while for Slim to react. “I was born in southeast Missouri, but Pa moved us to Colorado in 1807 when I was five. There was six of us young’uns, me being the baby. Some’ers during our travels to Colorado, we got the pox, and by the time we got to where we was going, there was only Pa, Suzie, and me left. We got the pox, too, but somehow, we survived. Suzie is my big sis. She run off with a drummer two years later when she was thirteen.

  “It was hard on Pa due to his recollections, but he and I did right good ’til I was ten, that’s when he got his foot caught in one of his live bear traps, and he couldn’t get it out. It was a terrible sight. The teeth of the trap had chewed its way through pa’s skin and flesh all the way to his leg bone, tearing the flesh away, leaving three inches of his splintered bone exposed. It looked like a hog had been stuck from all the blood. I found him two days later and got ’em out of the trap. He had a high fever and was unconscious a good share of the time, which I figured was because he’d lost so much blood. A few days after I got him home, his leg swelled up, turned a deep red with puss, and stunk something
awful. Two weeks later he died. I figured blood poison had set in.” The old man took another swallow of coffee. It must have been cold because he tossed it out and poured himself another cup.

  “What happened to ya’, Slim? You was only ten, how’d you get by?”

  The old man eyed Buck for a second or two and said, “Pa learned me good. I could trap and shoot near as good as him by that time, and my cabin was high-up in the mountains away from folks. It was over a year after I buried Pa when I saw a white man, and he looked the same as me. Like he belonged in the mountains.”

  “You said you only seen one white man in a year, Slim. Did you see any Indians?”

  The old man laughed. “There was lots of ’em roaming the mountains around me, especially in the summer. They was mostly Utes who don’t get along with white men, but Pa and me didn’t have any problem with ’em. I killed meat for ’em, and they killed meat for me. Ever-so-often, I’d find a deer or some other critter, skinned and gutted-out, hanging on a tree by my cabin. I even spent a tolerable amount of time in one of their camps not far from my cabin. Always treated me like a guest.”

  After another gulp or two, Slim continued, “That’s where I met Wildflower, my wife. We’d been eyeing one another for quite a spell, so one day I told her we should get hitched, and she agreed. She was fourteen, the chief’s daughter, and I was sixteen.”

  “Did you live at the Indian village or in your cabin?” Buck asked.

  “I wished we would’ve lived with the Indians, but we didn’t. We lived at my place. ’Course we visited her people quite often since her camp was close by.” Slim sat in silence—Buck waited him out.

  “Our son was born a mite over a year later. We were happy. There was plenty of game for food and skins to make clothes from. Wildflower planted a big garden and knew how to put up food for the winter.” Slim stopped again and waited for a long minute before going on. “One day, five years after we married, I left the cabin before daylight to set a string of traps in a new area. I got home late expecting Wildflower to have supper on the table, but when I walked in, I saw her necked body next to our son in puddles of their own blood laying by the fireplace. Each had been shot twice. Once I got myself settled, I examined and cleaned their bodies before wrapping them in blankets. It was obvious Wildflower had been roughly handled and raped.

  “I buried ’em, and then I scouted around for tracks and found plenty. The men who did it must have been watching the house for a while because tobacco spit and cigarette butts were laying around where I found hoof prints from five horses. One of the horses had a unique shoe on its left front hoof, and another horse had a loose shoe. I figured from the marks the horses were left with one man while the other four men slipped to the cabin. One of the men who went to the cabin was extra tall, and another was shorter than the rest. I could tell from their strides. Another man, who wore good-sized boots, had Mexican style spurs with large rowels that marked the ground where he’d walked.”

  Buck cut in, “Why do you think they had your cabin staked out, Slim? Surely it wasn’t just to molest your wife.”

  “They was after my hides. I had two years of beaver pelts in the barn, worth nigh-on to five hundred dollars.”

  “What happened, Slim, did you catch ’em?”

  The old-timer nodded. “It took some time, but I tracked all of ’em to Golden. A few days later there were five new graves in Boot Hill, and I had a pocket full of money. I didn’t know it at the time I was hunting ’em, but I found out later the men were thought to be law-abiding citizens in Golden and a warrant was ready to be issued for the arrest of whoever was responsible for their deaths. I knew if they caught up with me and could associate me with them, I’d be hung, no questions asked. I wasn’t ready to get my neck stretched, so I lit out and came to this part of the country. I’ve been wandering about these parts for forty years and still feel like a stranger.” Slim took on a serious expression and then said, “I’d kill those men who murdered my wife and son all over again if they were standing here in front of us.”

  Slim seemed relieved to have told his story as the men jawed for another couple of hours, mostly talking about Buck’s past and where he was traveling to. When the coyotes started singing, Slim said his goodnights and went to bed. Buck fetched clean clothes and a bar of soap and headed for the water.

  The next morning after breakfast, as Buck was giving the old timer one of his two cougar legs, Slim said, “Mind if I give you some advice, Buck?”

  “I’d appreciate any you can offer,” the young man said with a smile.

  “Your money belt is showing. Take it off and hide the money someplace where thugs ain’t able to find it.” Buck nodded knowing it was good advice.

  “Anything else?” he asked.

  “Yaw,” he said, “if I was you, I’d get clean away from this part of the country, go someplace where cotton ain’t grown. Southern folks around here are still fuming about the Yankees giving the blacks their freedom. They think cotton production will come to an end without slaves. There’s even vigilante groups springing up, trying to revitalize the war—they’re killing folks and burning the property of anyone known to be helping in the reconstruction process.”

  “Where should I go, Slim?”

  “Ride northwest from here to Arkansas. Texarkana would be a good place to stop over for a day or two. It’s about a five-day trip, but you won’t mind. You’ll ride through some mighty pretty country—hilly with plenty of game and water.

  “When you’re ready to move on from Texarkana, head due west. It won’t take long before you come to Texas where the rolling prairie stretches as far as the eye can see. Folks out there are ranchers who keep to themselves and ain’t all wrapped up in the war like they are around here. There’s an abundance of game in east and central Texas, mainly buffalo and antelope, but the water’s a mite scarce. You’ll need a couple good-sized canteens.

  “You’ll also need to be watchful for Indians, Buck. They’re thought to be confined to reservations in the Oklahoma territory north of Texas, but that ain’t always the case. Sometimes the young bucks, especially the Comanche and Apache, break out into Texas causing trouble, so ya’ need to be on the lookout.”

  “Thank you, Slim. I’ll follow your advice.” Buck started to turn, but Slim called him back.

  “There’s one more thing.”

  “What’s that?”

  “When you get to Texarkana, buy yourself some western clothes. At least a new hat and some boots.” The old man paused, and then with a wide grin said, “Just be sure to get rid of them farmer clothes you’re wearing if you wanna avoid sticking out like a sore thumb.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  The streets of Texarkana showed evidence of the war but not nearly like the destruction Buck had seen in Enterprise. Houses were similar to what he was accustomed to, and none had been torched like those in the South. The streets were active with buggies scurrying about, unlike the war-stricken streets of Enterprise.

  The business district was similar too but also different from other towns he’d been to. Similar because it held a bank, a hotel, livery, saloons, and a café, but different because the mercantile and the rest of the businesses were geared toward cattle ranching, not farming.

  It was mid-afternoon, and Buck was hungry. He had purposely skipped a noon meal during his travel in anticipation of sitting down to a hot cooked meal in town. After tying Black and Bell to a hitching rail, Buck entered a café through bat-wing doors and stood taking in the room. Two of the five tables were occupied with coffee drinkers, and a couple men had cigarettes dangling. Their eyes turned to the skinny newcomer as he went to the back-corner table and sat down with his back against the wall. The service seemed slow to Buck, but finally, a rather robust, gray-headed woman wearing a dark blue dress came through the door from the cooking area heading toward him with a cup of steaming coffee. She set the cup down without bothering to say a word and turned back toward the kitchen. She’d only taken a step or t
wo when Buck called to her.

  “What is it? Don’t you want the coffee?” she asked with a blank face.

  “I’d like something to eat if you've got any food left over,” Buck said, smiling. The waitress didn’t acknowledge his request one-way-or-the-other. She simply turned and headed back to the kitchen.

  The coffee was good, stronger than he was used to, but good. As he drank he noticed a potbelly stove in the corner on the opposite side of the cafe with a large coffee pot on its top, and a fire burning just enough to keep the pot hot and take the chill off the room’s late November coolness. From time-to-time, the men at the tables rose to refill their cups.

  Buck didn’t know whether he could expect to get food or not, but he remained calm while drinking his coffee in hopes it would be coming. As he waited, he sized up the men at the other tables. They were true cowboys, or so it seemed to Buck. Each had a pulled-down, out of shape, western style hat, and wore cotton shirts of various colors with tobacco strings hanging from their pockets. A few had sacks of chewing tobacco laying on the table with a spittoon off to their side. They all wore bandannas around their necks, and three of the men wore leather vests. Buck didn’t know for sure because their legs were hidden under the table, but he imagined they all wore the customary wool pants tucked into their pointed toe, western boots. He had noticed when he entered the café that one of the men had on denim pants, which was new to this part of the country, and another man wore leather chaps.

  Buck’s thoughts were interrupted when a young woman approached and said, “I believe this belongs to you, sir,” as she sat the plate of food on the table.

  Buck immediately thought of his appearance. Not only was he dirty from head to foot, but his clothes were that of a cotton farmer and not suitable for this area. He looked like a freak and was ashamed of his appearance. The young woman serving me food is probably laughing at me on the inside, Buck thought. “Thank you, ma’am,” Buck finally said in his unmistakable Southern drawl.