Phil didn’t bother to look at the boy. He brought out a sack of tobacco and — as he always put it — ‘manufactured’ himself a cigarette with one hand.
‘… my boy,’ Edward finished.
The boy’s voice was high and clear. ‘My grandfather was the chief.’
Phil lighted his smoke, blew out the match, broke it in two, and pinched the charred end cool with his fingers. He inhaled smoke.
‘He’s right about that,’ Edward said.
Phil still stood between Edward and the gate. ‘Right? Right about what?’
‘My father,’ Edward Nappo said, ‘was the chief.’
‘Is that right?’ Phil asked. ‘Well let me tell you. I don’t care who in hell he was. You, now. You get yourself back in that contraption of yours, and you and your kid hightail it out of here as fast as that old nag can go.’
Edward’s face was so fixed in a smile he couldn’t change it. ‘We’d only stay a coupla days,’ he said. ‘Long enough for the horse, for the horse to rest. It’s a real old horse.’
‘Nothing doing,’ Phil said.
So Edward turned, then, and went back to the cart, afraid of the boy’s eyes. The boy watched Edward reach down under the seat and then he looked away. But then, what could the father do, but shoot the man? Then they would go into the mountains and live forever, the two, the two hunted ones. But free, free as never before!
Edward turned on the man with the thing he’d brought out from under the seat, but it wasn’t the gun. He offered the box with the gloves. The man facing Edward was poorly dressed, and he had no gloves. Edward smiled, removed the cover of the box, and held out the box.
‘Just one or two days?’ What he would tell Jennie, he couldn’t imagine. Maybe thirty dollars’ worth of gloves. Edward lifted out the gauntlet gloves rich with beadwork. ‘One or two days, mister.’
‘Hey,’ Phil said. ‘Those are pretty slick-looking gloves.’
‘Worth five bucks,’ Edward said. ‘Two or three days.’
Strange how the man made no move to touch the gloves, and no move, either, away from the gate. ‘You get your contraption turned around,’ he said. ‘I don’t take bribes, and I don’t wear gloves. You picked the wrong customer, old-timer.’
So Edward climbed back up into the seat with the box of gloves. He turned the old horse around, and they started back for the reservation, two hundred miles away. Edward wondered if the horse could make it. If the horse died, what about the cart? He couldn’t look at the boy but he said, ‘Anyway, we saw the mountains. We saw my father’s mountains.’
The boy’s cap had slipped down over his forehead.
‘I couldn’t do nothing,’ Edward said. ‘You saw, I couldn’t do nothing.’
Phil watched. In a way, he felt for the poor devils, and he untied his jacket from behind his saddle and took out the lunch wrapped in it. Mrs Lewis had thrown together a lunch of an apple and two thick roast beef sandwiches. Good, but Phil got so thirsty he thought he’d ride back to the spring and wet his whistle.
The Burbank ranch house was of huge logs; seen from a distance, it resembled one of those story-and-a-half bungalows that sprang up in California around the First World War; but it was a bungalow gone wild. The sensitive viewer paused, looking at it. One’s distance from the place could not make so small a house as a bungalow look so large. In fact, the ‘half-story’ contained a bathroom and six vast bedrooms off which ran closets with gradually sloping ceilings where Burbank junk collected. The roof sheltered a vast porch, and Peter often stood in the dormer windows of his room and looked over the roof at the blank face of the sagebrush hill where sometimes there was barely perceptible movement — the dart of a gray bird or the hop of a cottontail. Sharp-eyed hawks glided overhead, alert to the dead, the dying or the stupid. The hill was so high the sun was late striking the windows of the house, so steep that all sounds echoed against it. Peter heard the latch of the bunkhouse door, the cursing of a hired man, barking dogs, bawling cows, the pop of the exhaust of the electric light plant, and on Sundays the pistol shots in target practice, the bright sound of horseshoes ringing on steel.
Thunderheads reared up over the mountains to the west; their shapes changed but gradually in the faint breeze — the shapes of England, of animals, rabbits.
‘Will it rain, George?’ Peter heard his mother ask, her light voice floating up with embarrassing clarity from the porch below.
‘Smells like it,’ George’s voice. ‘But search me.’ Peter smiled. When George used that little phrase he’d shove his hands into his pants pockets and look at his feet.
‘I want to get those trees in,’ his mother was saying. ‘And more grass. Isn’t it funny your people didn’t do more about the yard.’
‘My mother tried. The soil’s so poor. Oh, she talked of the trees in New England. You’d think it was a country of trees. She had some little elm trees sent out. They came in sacks, but they died. She used to talk about something called bayberry, and how the fog looked on it, and the sound of the ocean. When she talked, you could hear the ocean. I used to wish, sometimes.’
‘Wish.’
‘Oh, to see it all.’
‘I never heard you talk like this.’
‘Why, I don’t suppose I ever did. Rose, there wasn’t anybody to listen.’ Peter imagined George’s smile.
Before the house, sick unto death, two cottonwoods languished, their thin leaves edged in a sort of soot, their little remaining strength sucked out by ravenous aphids; beyond them a patch of grass turned brown, and could be watered by diverting the ditch that ran beside the house; but if allowed to run long, the water found secret holes and flooded the cellar — drowning the mice down there, or a batch of new kittens.
‘Wouldn’t fertilizer help?’ Rose asked.
‘Might, at that. Rose, is Peter happy?’
‘Peter?’
‘A few days ago, I saw him watering the trees. I was thinking of him.’
‘I think he’s happy. He certainly likes his room, and it was good of you to give him that bookcase.’
‘I don’t forget I’m a stepfather. I imagine a stepfather’s got to try a little harder than a father. I’d imagine there’s no reason for a boy to like a stepfather unless a fellow tries. I know how I’d feel.’
‘And he’s always liked to explore. He explores around.’
Peter listened, expressionless. He had been exploring when he came upon Phil, naked. He still saw the white, hairless body. He said nothing of the incident to his mother — naturally — and he had a hunch Phil hadn’t mentioned it, either. In a way, he and Phil had a kind of bond — a bond of hatred, maybe, but Peter felt that one kind of bond could be just as useful as another. Peter had walked with his mother out on the hill, and they had found bluebells in the cool of sage, bitterroots and waxy cactus flowers with the baffling sheen of pearl. ‘Why, I walk out here a lot,’ his mother had said.
‘You didn’t walk much in Beech,’ he said, glancing at her.
‘I forget. Didn’t I walk much there?’
‘It’s the brother, isn’t it. He makes you nervous.’
She paused and stooped to pick up a small stone. Everyone he knew winced at the truth. ‘Makes me nervous?’
‘He doesn’t speak when he comes into the room. He brings in the cold.’
‘Oh, Peter, he doesn’t speak to anybody.’
Now George was saying down on the porch, ‘… came here, I never had a nice afternoon like this, just loafing.’
‘Why shouldn’t you enjoy an afternoon? I shouldn’t call it loafing, bringing in those little trees from out back. Maybe we need a little fertilizer.’
‘Well, let me think.’
Peter thought, George is a good man. Then he went down and joined them on the porch. He surprised them, he came so quietly. Doors opened and closed softly for him. He thought of telling them how clear their voices were, and then tucked the information into a corner of his mind. His world required secrets, and he stored them
away.
‘Peter, you walk so quietly. Is it those tennis shoes? Look at those little trees George brought. Would you help plant them? I think we might need a little fertilizer.’
‘Blood,’ Peter said. ‘Blood’s the best fertilizer.’
‘Why, how awful! Rose said.
‘I’ve heard he’s right,’ George said. ‘Think of those tall weeds out by the butcher pen. They’re as tall as a man.’
‘If you don’t mind, sir, I could take the wheelbarrow and bring soil in from the butcher pen. It must be mostly blood.’
‘Why, you just hop right to it. And thanks.’
They watched Peter move around the side of the house, his clean trousers and white shirt a strange outfit for loading up blood-drenched dirt, some of it not quite dry and heavy with the stench of recent death. Clouds drifted over the sun, moist and cool as water. ‘I wish sometimes he wouldn’t call me sir,’ George said.
‘It was his father’s habit,’ Rose said.
‘Blamed if I ever ran up against such a neat boy,’ George said. ‘Beats me he doesn’t mind going out to the pen and digging up — digging up fertilizer. Isn’t it a funny thing, to know about blood.’
‘Maybe not, if you only want to be a doctor. He’s …’
‘He’s what?’
‘Well, it’s a kind of coldness. You see, I love him, but I don’t know how to love him. I want love to do something for him, but he doesn’t seem to need anything. I think his father would have been more successful if he’d had more of that coldness.’ They watched the clouds sweep over. ‘Would you hand me my sweater? Thank you. I don’t suppose what I mean is coldness. Detachment? I don’t mean any criticism. Nor of John either. He was a good person.’
‘I’ve heard that said,’ George remarked. ‘I’ve heard he wouldn’t get after people about their bills. What a fine way to be.’
Now came a distant rumble of thunder. ‘Maybe rain, now,’ George said.
‘… when the lightning strikes close. You can even smell it, Rose said. The thunder came again, and before the rolling echo died, Rose said, ‘There’s that Indian cart again.’
‘… cart? What Indian cart?’
‘Why, this morning. It was so funny — I saw them up the road coming around the point of rocks, and George, they were talking, and leading the old horse. I watched, and they stopped, and got up into the cart, and drove by, not looking one way or another, and then at the top of the rise out there — see? — they got out and led the horse again.’
‘Some sort of pride, I’d say,’ George remarked.
‘But where do you suppose they were going — going this morning, I mean? Wherever, it seems they didn’t stay long. And where did they come from?’
‘I expect they came from the reservation. Wait till I get the binoculars.’ He got them.
‘That must be two hundred miles away.’
‘Anyway, I expect they wanted to camp up in the mountains. You know, they’re not supposed to be off the reservation.’
‘Whyever not?’
‘They’d get — oh, to bothering. If some of them got to coming back and bothering, they’d all get to coming back, and bothering.’
George kept watching them. The wind whispered in the hopvines that grew up the side of the porch. They sat, and George kept watching, and then he handed the glasses to Rose. ‘I didn’t realize one of them was a little boy,’ Rose whispered.
‘No? Eleven or twelve, I’d say. He wouldn’t have been born when the Indians lived around here. He wouldn’t remember what the country looked like.’
‘Then, the one in the black hat is the father? You think the father brought the boy back here to show him?’
‘I expect so.’
‘And they stayed so short a time in the mountains.’
‘They wouldn’t have got to the mountains at all, I expect.’ He coughed.
‘Why not? Because of the old horse?’ The Indians had passed the house now, and in a few minutes would disappear around the point of rocks.
‘Phil went out of here this morning to check on one of the riders. I expect he turned them back.’
‘Turned them back? After two hundred miles? Why would he do that?’
‘Well, like I say, if they get started coming back. And Phil never cottoned to Indians, no matter who they were.’
‘How do you mean, who they were?’
‘Unless I miss my guess — hand me the glasses — that old Indian is the son of the chief.’
‘The son of the chief!’
‘He died up there a little time before they sent the Indians away. They buried him up there under the slide rock. We could see the grave sometime. Go up with a picnic.’
‘I suppose they meant to see the grave.’ Rose stood up suddenly. ‘George, can’t you imagine how that little boy feels?’
‘Feels, Rose?’
‘A white man able to turn back his father, the son of the chief. Imagine that. He’ll never forget that all his life.’
‘Well, I expect you’re right. But strictly …’
Strictly what, she never heard, for she was hurrying down the steps. One of the hired hands, riding in from out back, saw her running as if she’d lost her mind, and calling out something.
Her shoes were not walking shoes. Stumbling in her high heels, running and pitching, she cried out to the Indians. ‘Stop, please stop.’ She was breathless when she caught them, and leaned for support against the side of the cart. She smiled up at the old Indian, and at last she had breath to speak. ‘I saw you this morning,’ she said. The old Indian removed his hat, but the boy sat looking through the old nag’s ears. ‘I would have come out to see you,’ she said. ‘I didn’t know you were the son of the chief.’
Edward Nappo spoke. ‘Did you know my father?’
‘My husband did. You see, we would be proud if you would camp with us. My, but that would make us proud.’
Edward Nappo looked down at her, a tiny, lovely little woman who could not have been much help to a man with a cow, or for cooking, or for making gloves. You might have said, looking into her face, that she wouldn’t last many winters, if the winters were hard at all. ‘Thank you,’ Edward said. ‘My son and I, we will be proud to camp with you.’ And as Edward turned the old horse around, the little boy looked at his father with haughty pride, and he fixed his cap.
When a horse trots, his legs move in diagonal pairs — the left front and right hind leg go forward at the same time, and so forth. It’s a rough gait, and you have to post, have to rise in your stirrups and take the jolt in the flex of your knees, and no matter how you do it, it’s bobbing up and down like a fool jack-in-the-box.
But when a horse paces, his legs move laterally in pairs — the right front and right hind legs move forward at once, an easy gait, a swift, rolling gait you can sit out in the saddle by letting your body twist easily with the movements of your horse. Any damned horse can trot: few can pace. Phil’s sorrel was a fine, smooth pacer, with a controlled power behind each thrust of leg that reminded Phil of pistons. He rode swiftly down the canyon, tall and straight in the saddle, occasionally relaxing by standing in the stirrups and sniffing the odor of approaching evening, the cooling off of rock and soil. It had showered in the mountains; the tail end of the small downpour had caught Phil, but he fancied getting a little wet, and the damp caught and held the odor of the new sagebrush and the wild roses that bloomed beside the road. Phil had always enjoyed certain odors. Beside the road the creek splashed over the rocks; wild chokecherry had flowered in white and a deer bounded back up into the timber and cowered, foolishly believing it had hid itself.
The young fellow at the cow camp had not come back while Phil waited there after quenching his thirst at the spring, so maybe the young geezer was going to pan out, after all. Phil had been careful not to touch anything in the cabin that might reveal he had been there, and the path leading up to the cabin was so packed and hard you couldn’t see a fresh footprint. Phil would check again soon, perh
aps uselessly. But the letter the punk had started there hinted that he might take his work lightly, look on it as a lark.
Phil felt good; he took the shortcut to the ranch — from the rear, through the horse pasture, and it meant getting off his horse four times to open the crude ‘Mormon’ gates constructed of barbed wire that drylanders had strung up obstructing the wagon road that was old when Phil was a child, but so little used — now that four gates blocked it — it was growing up in bunchgrass. Sometimes Phil left the gates open, to show what he thought of them and the nuts who had fallen for the pamphlets the railroads had broadcast, promising big things to Swedes and Finns and God knew who. Take up land! Grow wheat! Well, plenty had took the bait. They took up a section or half-section from the government, bought their seed, plowed, planted and waited for rains that seldom came. Few remained now. They had crawled back to the mines and factories they’d come from. All over that country you saw their shacks, open to the winds, a bed rusting where once a man and woman had slept and loved. The print on the newspapers they’d used for wallpaper had faded. You’d see a kid’s doll pitched into the corner. It honestly made you think. In a way, you had to feel sorry for the poor devils, they were human beings, too. But what Phil, for one, couldn’t forgive, is that they hadn’t used their noodles in the first place, and looked into things.
He scratched the back of his hand a bit on the last gate, barely enough to draw blood, but it warned him to expect some other small unpleasantness; he had noticed in his life that one such thing led to another. And it came. Crouching low over the pommel of his saddle to avoid some willows that arched over his head, one slapped him smartly across the bridge of his nose. He seized it and broke it.
Now he rode through the willows in the horse pasture, not a hundred yards from where he went to bathe. In the open again, where the timothy and redtop was growing good and thick, he suddenly pulled up the sorrel.
He couldn’t believe his eyes.
Alone, apart from the rest of the bunch of horses, was a strange Cayuse. Well, if Phil didn’t see red! Every muscle in his long body stiffened. He sniffed. He turned his head, and there in a bend in the line of willows near the creek he saw where the Indians had pitched their tent, had built a fire. The thin smoke drifted over the willows in wisps.
The Power of the Dog Page 17
