“That bell mare the new teacher?” Jasper was beside him, not yet too full of drink to watch the dancers.
“She is,” Fenton said.
“She does have them eatin’ from her hand.” Jasper looked at Fenton as though an idea had just hit him. “Let’s get us a drink.”
Jasper had some liquor out in his truck, which surprised Fenton. Usually he spent his time angling for someone else’s. Out in the lot they found Buck Conner arguing with a cowboy who had danced too long with Angie, the Murphys’ new hired girl. Buck’s face was getting red, but Fenton stepped in with his big voice and his big body and got them laughing. It was as easy for him as separating two nipping horses. Jasper watched Buck and the cowboy head off together to find Angie and got out his bottle. They warmed there, drinking and talking about Fenton’s mountains.
Fenton thought of the schoolteacher off and on during that winter but didn’t see her again until spring, when he stopped for coffee at Murphy’s all-purpose store, his truck so loaded with gear he wasn’t sure he’d unload by dark. Angie got him coffee, and when he turned to leave he almost knocked Cody Jo over. She clutched at her groceries as if to protect them.
“The big one,” she laughed, her face coloring. “I remember you because you’re the only one I haven’t seen at the recitals.”
Fenton waited, not knowing how to answer.
“Come now.” She enjoyed his confusion. “Culture won’t hurt this valley. They even claim you,” she tapped him with a long finger, “are a very cultured man.” She seemed to like how uncomfortable she made him.
“But you’re in luck. There’s one more.” She shifted her bag to the other arm. “I’ll save a seat. Seven tonight. Cookies. Entertainment.” She turned and left but poked her head right back in. “I’ll hold your ticket.”
Fenton, who hadn’t been able to think of anything to say while she stood there making fun of him, still couldn’t think of anything to say.
“Better go,” Dan Murphy advised. “She’s got that ticket for you.”
“I got gear to unload....You goin’?”
“Yep. Better than hearin’ her tell me why I should of.” Murphy wiped at his counter. “She arranged a season ticket for me.”
There were dark clouds over the Missions by the time Fenton unloaded. He washed up and before he’d thought much about it was back on the road headed for the schoolhouse. The sky was black. He knew a wind would kick up soon, the rain not far behind.
It was blowing hard when he pulled into the lot, the sky so dark he wasn’t surprised to see only a few cars. When he was given the little program he saw the reason wasn’t just the weather. Four performances were scheduled: a reading of “Invictus,” the singing of “My Buddy” accompanied by violin, a recitation of “The Cremation of Sam McGee,” and a piano recital of “The Parade of the Wooden Soldiers.”
Bump Conner was scheduled to sing “My Buddy,” which explained why all the Conners were there, Buck and the Murphys with them. Other parents were there too, but not many. Fenton thought the idea of a ticket must have been one of Cody Jo’s amusements.
He found a chair by a screen they’d set up and was listening to people move around behind it, when a clap of thunder rifled through and made everyone jump. The lights blinked, held, blinked again, stayed on.
Fenton decided to get his slicker. By the time he got to his truck the rain had started. He put the slicker on and got out a lantern. When he got back to the porch, the rain settled in to stay. He took the slicker off and went back inside, putting it by the wall with his lantern. He heard the rain ease for a minute before starting in even harder.
When the lights began to blink, Cody Jo came from behind the screen, not nearly as cheerful as she’d been that afternoon.
“Might rain,” Fenton said.
“You found your seat.” Her eyes were wide. “We saved it.”
“Have to fight off many people?” Sheets of rain were hitting the windows.
“I have cookies.”
“Could sog up in this weather.”
The lights blinked and went. Fenton scratched matches and got his lantern going. He held it up, peered around for Buck.
“Should I get them?” Cody Jo’s eyes were round in the uncertain light.
“Hard to pass ’em in this dark.” Buck appeared in the circle of light.
“Who told me this place has a generator?” Fenton asked him.
“I told you this place has a generator. If someone hasn’t thought they knew better, it’s right where I set it up in the first place.”
“Hope you remember. Not much help out there in that dark.”
They went out into the rain, leaving the room in darkness. Cody Jo knew she should do something, but the rain made it hard to think.
Rosie Murphy began to sing “Ten Thousand Goddamned Cattle,” about a cowboy whose sweetheart leaves him for “a son-of-a-bitch from Ioway.” It was the song Buck’s mother sang when she was putting her children to sleep, so all the Conners joined right in. When it ended someone started another. They were on “The Zebra Dun” when the generator kicked in and they had light. They finished the last verse anyway, liking the singing and wishing someone had a bottle so they could keep going.
Fenton and Buck stomped and shook off water on the porch. “Where’s your slicker?” Fenton asked. “You could get wet.”
“I am wet.” Buck looked out at the rain. “I don’t see the sense of puttin’ a slicker on now so I can keep all this water inside it.”
“Which means you didn’t bring one in the first place. Trainin’ you is like relearnin’ a mule.” Fenton took Buck’s hat and poured the water from the brim. “Let’s go listen to that music. I hear they got cookies.”
As they left the porch the rain became hail.
Cody Jo had to play chords on the piano to let people know Sue Jamison was going to recite. The hail sounded like hammers across the roof. It was easy to see Sue was scared. Fenton wasn’t sure whether she was scared of the hail or of having to stand up and speak.
“Out of the night that covers me.” She tried to lift her voice above the sound. Hailstones were hitting the window so hard Fenton was afraid it would break. He stood and flattened his back against the glass to keep it from shattering. The girl smiled as though she finally understood the meaning of the words. “Black as the Pit from pole to pole.” Fenton still had his slicker on, which might have kept him from getting cut up when a big hailstone shattered the pane and splashed glass across the room.
“Shit goddamn,” Buck said as people and chairs moved this way and that to avoid the glass. Fenton spread his slicker wide and backed into the opening, nodding to the girl to continue.
The hailstones were as big as golf balls now, seeming even bigger to Fenton, who thought some might be giving him bruises. “Under the bludgeoning of chance . . .” The girl smiled at Fenton, her face going blank as she searched for the words.
“My head is bloody . . .” They heard Cody Jo’s prompting even above the hail, and everyone laughed. Sue finished with no more trouble, though Fenton had to take that on faith. The hail was hitting his slicker so hard he could only hear a word here and there until “I am the master of my fate: I am the captain of my soul.”
“I sure as hell ain’t the captain of my fate.” Dan Murphy was beside him even before the little round of applause ended.
“You mean you didn’t arrange this hail?” Fenton was thinking of a way to get free of the window.
“ Yo u’ll have to bring Cody Jo back. I gotta make tracks. This could wreck my store.” Others were getting up now, Buck protesting, saying he wanted to hear Bump sing “My Buddy.” Fenton called him over.
“ Yo u’re still damp.” He patted Buck on his soggy shoulder. “Won’t hurt to stand here. I gotta fix somethin’.”
He had Buck in the window before Buck could think up an argument. Fenton took an old bulletin board, held a geography book over his head and went out through the hail to get a hammer and som
e nails from his truck. Pushing Buck inside enough to get the board flat, he tacked it over the broken window, then went back inside with the hammer and nails, sure something else would break any minute.
“Them hailstones smart.” Buck was dripping water again.
“Which is why you need your slicker.” Fenton got him into Bump’s, and they found a sheet of plywood, lifted it high over their heads to ferry the Jamisons out to their car. They got others out too, then began covering the most exposed windows, working until the hail began to let up.
Buck went out to check his truck for broken windows, finding some dents but no serious damage. He came back across a yard white with hailstones. Only Fenton and Cody Jo and Bump were left.
“You best get in this,” Buck said to his brother, taking off the slicker. “Don’t want to ruin your fine tenor voice.”
“I’m glad for the hail.” Bump took the coat. “Singin’ that song wasn’t my idea.”
“Don’t worry.” Cody Jo put her hand on Buck’s arm, startled by how soaked he was. “You can hear him next time.”
“With the violin?” Buck asked. “That violin’s important.”
“If she can get him to sing,” Fenton said, “she’ll get the violin to squeak along too.”
“I have cookies,” Cody Jo said to Buck. “You and Bump must be hungry.... And you need dry clothes.”
“Don’t you worry.” Fenton saw that Cody Jo was worn out. “Buck’s like a duck. I doubt he knows he’s wet.”
“I’m bruised some.” Buck rubbed at his back.
“Let’s shut things down.” Fenton looked around. “Won’t be all that easy gettin’ home through this hail.”
Buck and Bump went out and moved their truck so its headlights were on the generator. Fenton got Cody Jo into his truck before crunching across the hail, shutting the generator off. Cody Jo saw his shadow on the schoolhouse growing bigger and more crooked and then he was in the truck beside her, Buck’s headlights still on the hail, which looked ghostly in the last misty rain.
“Bring your slicker next time,” Fenton called to Buck. “Keep you from gettin’ crippled up.”
“I ain’t crippled. Just stung some.” Buck waited until Fenton got his engine started. “I’d repair quicker if Angie could rub me.” He wound up his window and headed north toward the Conners.
Fenton eased his truck south toward Murphy’s store, the road a strip of white, his headlights making a tunnel of the trees. He drove slowly, hunched forward in his slicker, careful not to get into a slide.
“Glad you brought us some culture.” He looked over at Cody Jo. “Don’t know how we got by so long without it.”
“That wasn’t at all what you expected, was it? That poem . . .”
“Didn’t know what to expect. I sure didn’t think we’d get a storm like this. I believe we’d have done better in my tents.”
“You seemed to know just what to do.”
“Not that many choices. . . . How many people you roped into these ‘cultural’ events?” He enjoyed the way she sat so straight on the seat.
She felt his big presence waiting for her to answer.
“Have a cookie,” she said, holding out the plate. Somehow she’d gotten the cookies out to the truck without getting them wet or crumbled or even very broken. She handed him one.
“You do beat all.” He took a bite. “And they hold right up. Unless I’m so hungry I can’t tell. I slid right past dinner tonight.”
“No wonder you looked so anxious in that window. Can’t be captain of your fate on an empty stomach.” She smiled and held up the plate of cookies again. “You were good with little Sue.”
“Not a cheerful poem.” He took two more. “She needed a little encouragement. Suppose you could make some of these up in the mountains?”
Fenton was always on the lookout for cooks for his pack trips. He couldn’t help playing with the idea now, even though he was pretty sure that was the wrong thing for Cody Jo.
“Oh yes. The big packer. That can’t be too hard. Put everything on those poor mules and loaf around all summer in the mountains.”
“It gets more complicated.” He looked at her. She realized again how much there was of him, how focused and uncluttered he was. He was about to say something when Dan Murphy appeared in their headlights. He was waving at them with a shovel, his little Ford tilted almost on its side in the ditch behind him. Rosie Murphy tried to climb out, but the pitch was too steep and she dropped back in.
“See you been practicin’ your trick drivin’,” Fenton said.
“This stuff is slick.” Dan opened Fenton’s door. “We was all right until Rosie got edgy. I overcorrected.”
Fenton got the lantern going again. “You done fine, Daniel. Hardly anyone else could of tilted her so tidy.”
“Buck put them store windows in. Had his eyes on Angie so much I believe he only partly did his work. Bet we’re knee deep in hail balls.”
The Murphys had hired Angie off a ranch outside of Whitefish. She was the hardest worker they’d ever had, and the spunkiest. Everyone knew Buck was courting her. And everyone knew he wasn’t doing very well—not since he’d made a scene at the schoolhouse dance. She’d even refused to come to the recital because she’d heard Buck would be there.
“Buck ain’t my problem right now,” Fenton said. “You are.” He hauled Rosie up out of the Ford and she gave him a little hug.
Fenton rummaged around in the bed of his truck for a lash rope. “Pull you free, maybe you won’t charge so much for what you call coffee.” Cody Jo was holding the lantern and trying to calm Rosie. Fenton tied the lash rope onto the bumper so fast Dan Murphy didn’t realize it was done. He pulled his truck ahead, getting the rope taut.
“Buck just needs to get Angie off his mind when he wants to hit a nail. Pop her into gear, Daniel. Help me snake you out.”
The moon came out, reflecting off the white road. Fenton’s truck pulled the Ford along in the ditch for a way, the Ford’s wheels spinning as it tried for a purchase. Finally the front wheels came up, the car sliding along almost sideways before the rest of it bounced up onto the road. Rosie trotted alongside it the whole way, shouting encouragement as though she were driving a team.
“Damned if them lash ropes don’t come in handy,” Dan Murphy said. “I been doubtin’ you on that.”
“Just don’t drive so fast we got to tie onto you again. Wet is tough on knots. And we might twang Rosie into next week.” Fenton looked at her. “Never told me you was a mule skinner, Rosie.”
They decided Cody Jo would go on with the Murphys so Fenton wouldn’t have to drive to the store and back out again. Cody Jo got her things and came over to say good-bye, saying that maybe packing was useful, if packers could tie knots like that. She said she was leaving the cookies for him so he could be “captain of his fate.”
Fenton drove home and started the fire, doing some chores before eating a cold supper. Then he started in on the cookies, wondering what it was in the schoolteacher’s voice that touched him so.
8
Lost Bird Canyon
Fenton saw the schoolteacher only a few more times that year, meeting when they were moving so fast in different directions that he simply avoided thinking about it—as though something were wrong with enjoying that look on her face just before she started to laugh.
Then just before Fenton’s big August trip, Jasper nearly severed his thumb with his cleaver and was out for the season. When Rosie Murphy heard Fenton planned to use Buck and Bump as cooks, she threw up her hands and volunteered, if Fenton would keep Buck on as wrangler. She knew Angie would be a lot more help to Dan if Buck were elsewhere.
The next thing she did was talk Cody Jo into helping her. Before he knew it Fenton found himself riding toward the pass with seventeen pack animals, two green cooks, and a lovesick wrangler. He had Tommy Yellowtail to help with the mules, but if Gus Wilson hadn’t agreed to come, he didn’t know what he would have done. That was before Gus got the b
ig chunk torn from his face. And with the unexpected turn the trip took, Fenton felt lucky to have him.
Three Chicago grain traders had brought their families out to look at the country Fenton had shown them the year before. They’d come for elk, but the country was what won them over, the country and the big packer who handled their horses, kept them fed and dry, found elk for them in the thin light of morning. Now they wanted to show it to their families, acting like old-timers themselves, talking with Fenton about routes, helping saddle, herding their families around as though they’d done this all their lives.
Except for the trouble in Lost Bird Canyon—and nearly drowning Goose in the South Fork—the trip went the way Fenton’s trips always did. But there was nothing ordinary about any of it to Cody Jo. It seemed to her she learned something new every step of the way, a matter she wouldn’t admit at first, even to Rosie. She insisted on riding her flat saddle, but it took only a day of watching Fenton tie her slicker onto other peoples’ saddles to see she’d been wrong. She wouldn’t admit that either, just as she wouldn’t admit how much she wanted to stay in her bedroll when Rosie prodded her awake the first morning.
“Time to make coffee,” Rosie said. “They’re saddling.” “What’s the matter with them?” Cody Jo looked out at the night.
“They can make their own coffee.”
“They look for tracks.” Rosie nudged her again. “Our job is to send
them out happy so they won’t be discouraged when there aren’t any.” “What?” Cody Jo was up now, shivering. “Will the horses run away?” “Maybe.” Rosie lit the kindling. “But the sooner they find tracks the
less likely it is.”
An hour later they heard the bells and saw the horses. It was lovely to watch as Fenton and Tommy Yellowtail eased the herd into the meadow so they wouldn’t run through and out the other side. Cody Jo watched them feinting and kicking at one another before circling around Gus Wilson, out in the frosty meadow moving among them with a nose bag. She saw Buck and Tommy Yellowtail begin to catch them up, taking the gentle ones first, sometimes moving too quickly and spooking one off. There were over forty head to take care of; it took time.
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