Time of the Wolves

by Marcia Muller

  His mother, in spite of it being the hottest day of the year, was stirring a stew pot on the black iron stove. She turned, her eyes stern. “Will, where have you been all day?”

  “I . . . where’s Pa?”

  “Out east. A ewe and her lamb got through that fence you were supposed to mend and fell into one of the lava pits. Honestly, Will, I don’t know what’s the matter with you lately. Your father shouldn’t have to attend to your chores.”

  Clay Reese returned an hour before sundown. Immediately he called Will outside and reprimanded him for neglecting to mend the east fence. “The ewe and her lamb weren’t badly hurt,” he said, “but they might have been killed.”

  “I’m sorry, Pa.”

  His father grunted and started to turn away.

  “Pa,” Will said, “I was at the ice cave today. I saw you come out with the men from town.”

  “What? I thought I told you not to go there.”

  “Yes, sir, you did. But why didn’t you tell me you planned to sell the ice?”

  “Because it’s not your business, that’s why.”

  “Pa, it is my business. I found that cave. And we’ve always talked about things before.”

  “That’s enough!” Clay Reese’s lean face was flushed. “We won’t discuss it. You stay away from that cave. Understood?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Baffled and hurt, Will tried to bring the subject up again the next day. But his father once more refused to discuss it. Will went about his chores, a sad, empty feeling growing inside him.

  Ever since he’d been small, his father had treated him as an adult. The ranch was not a prosperous one, and all three Reeses worked in partnership to keep it going. Yet now his father was shutting him out, and it hurt; it was making him lose respect for a man he had always looked up to. Will couldn’t bear that. He began to think of leaving the ranch, striking out on his own.

  He could go to a city—Boise, perhaps—and find work. Then, later on, he could enter college, for his father’s thirst for knowledge had been instilled in him, too, and Clay Reese’s dream had become his dream. He knew that leaving home would be a form of betrayal, but no more of one than his father’s.

  He determined to try one more time to talk to the man. It was Saturday noon, and thunderclouds were piling up in the east, when Will approached his father again. Clay Reese was hitching up the wagon for a drive somewhere.

  “Pa,” he said, “I have to talk to you about the ice cave.”

  His father’s face seemed to cloud as darkly as the sky. “How many times do I have to tell you, Will? There’s nothing to discuss. I can’t talk now, anyway. I have business to attend to.” He climbed into the wagon seat, flicked the reins, and drove off.

  Resigned, Will went to his room and packed a bundle. He would leave that night, after his parents were asleep.

  The storm broke around 4 p.m., with thunder and lightning and gusty winds. Clay Reese did not return for supper, and finally Will and his mother ate without him. He had probably decided to wait out the storm in town.

  Will spent a restless night as thunder grumbled and rain pelted. It would have been foolish to start his journey in this storm, and, until his father returned, he didn’t feel right leaving his mother alone.

  Sometime toward morning the storm passed, and he fell into a heavy sleep. It was well past dawn, with the sun blazing again, when his mother awoke him. “Get up, Will,” she said. Her voice was anxious. “Your father still isn’t home, and I’m worried. You’d best ride into town and try to find him.”

  “Right away, Ma.”

  Will dressed quickly, saddled his roan, and rode into the clear, rain-fresh morning. He’d only gone half a mile toward Volcano, however, when he thought of the cave. His father could have gone there yesterday, instead of to town; the ice might have been the business he’d referred to. And it wouldn’t take long to check. Will turned his horse off the road and pointed him across open land.

  He saw his father’s wagon as soon as he came in sight of the lava pit. He sent the roan into a hard run, reined up beside the wagon, and jumped off. There was no sign of Clay Reese, or of any of the laborers, this being Sunday. Will scrambled down the newly graded wagon ramp and ran to the cave opening. It had been enlarged considerably, shored up with timbers. He entered, fumbling in the pocket of his pants for matches.

  In the flare of the first match he struck, he saw a jumble of equipment piled to one side; among the axes and picks and coiled rope was a lantern. He used a second match to light the lantern’s wick. Now he could see more of the cave—gouges and holes in the once-smooth walls where ice blocks had been cut away; narrow wooden ramps built into the passageway, close to the floor, so that the blocks could be easily dragged out. But there was no sign of his father.

  Carrying the lantern, Will hurried deeper into the cave. He went all the way to the solid barrier, then came back and checked some of the smaller chambers. All of them were empty.

  He had to fight down panic as he ran back into the main chamber. His father must have come into the cave; where could he be? Then Will’s gaze picked up the stone steps, the ledge at their top, and the chill air seemed to grow even colder. He climbed the steps, moving as fast as he dared on the slippery surface ice. When he reached the top, he leaned into the fall with the lantern extended.

  Down at the bottom of the slide, a huddled form lay alongside the bones of the long-dead animal.

  “Pa!” Will shouted the word, shouted it again. But the huddled figure didn’t move.

  Will half ran, half slid, down the steps and got one of the coils of rope. Back on the ledge, he found a projection of rock and tied one end of the rope securely around it. He played the other end down the fall, tested the fastening, then swung his body onto the slide and let himself down to where his father lay.

  Clay Reese was unconscious, but still alive. Will’s relief didn’t last long, however. Try as he might, he couldn’t revive his father. The man had been here all night, lying on the ice. He seemed half frozen. If he did regain consciousness, Will knew, he wouldn’t have the strength to climb out by himself.

  Will swiftly tied the rope around his father, under the arms. When he struggled back up to the ledge, he tried to pull his father out, but he didn’t have the strength to move the inert figure more than a foot or so. He had to have help, yet if he left, his father might die before he could bring men back.

  Then another idea came to him, and he wasted no time putting it into action. He got a second coil of rope from below, unfastened the first rope from the projection, and tied the two ropes together to make one long one. When he took the free end down across the cave and outside, he had ten feet left.

  He climbed to where the roan stood, caught the bridle, and urged the animal to the cave’s entrance. He tied the rope to the saddle horn, mounted, and backed the roan until the rope was taut. Then he and the horse began to pull.

  It took agonizing minutes, the roan stumbling a time or two, almost losing balance. But finally the rope slackened somewhat, and this told Will his father had at last been drawn to the top of the fall. Dismounting, he raced back into the cave.

  Clay Reese lay sprawled across the ledge. He was starting to regain consciousness when Will reached his side.

  He managed to get his father to his feet, then down the steps, out of the cave, and to the far end of the pit where the day’s heat penetrated. Exhausted, they both sank to the rocky ground. Clay Reese gave his son a weak smile.

  “You saved my life,” he said when the sun began to take away the chill. “I thought I was a dead man for sure.”

  “What happened, Pa?”

  “I climbed those steps out of curiosity, slipped on the ice, and fell down the slide. I couldn’t get back out again.” His expression turned rueful. “I told you it could be dangerous in there, Will . . . that you shouldn’t go in alone. I should have obeyed my own orders.”

  “Why did you go in alone?”

  “To do some e
xploring, see if I could tell how big the cave really is. If there’s enough ice to last another couple of summers, I reckon we’ll start making some money.”

  “Start making money?” Will asked, surprised.

  “Will, you have a right to know the truth.” His father spoke slowly, the words coming hard for him. “The reason I didn’t talk to you about selling the ice is that I was afraid to face up to you. I didn’t want anyone to know how close we were to losing the ranch. Until you found the cave, I hadn’t been able to make the mortgage payments for some time . . . the bank was getting ready to foreclose.”

  “So that’s why you’ve been so troubled lately.”

  “Yes. I worked out an arrangement with Jess Lacy and with Harmon Bennett at the bank. Jess buys the ice at a fair price, and I turn the money over to Mister Bennett. The mortgage will be paid off by next summer. Then we can start saving for your college education.”

  Will was silent for a time; he felt ashamed at having doubted his father. Finally he said: “Pa, I understand now. But I wish you’d told me all of this before.”

  “I guess I should have,” his father admitted. “But my foolish pride wouldn’t let me. I’m sorry, Son.”

  “I’m sorry, too,” Will said. “I . . . well . . . I felt like you didn’t need me any more. I was going to leave, go off to Boise and hunt work. I’d be gone now if it hadn’t stormed last night.”

  His father grimaced, his face etched with pain. “This has been a bad misunderstanding, Will. From now on, we’ll both be honest with each other. As for the cave, well, we’ll explore it together next time. And work together on our ice business, too.”

  “I’d like that, Pa.”

  Will stood and began to help his father up the ramp to the wagon. As he did, he glanced over at the mouth of the cave—not his cave, but their cave, the family’s cave. Then his eyes met his father’s, and they both smiled.

  Time of the Wolves

  “It was in the time of the wolves that my grandmother came to Kansas.” The old woman sat primly on the sofa in her apartment in the senior citizens’ complex. Although her faded blue eyes were focused on the window, the historian, who sat opposite her, sensed Mrs. Clark was not seeing the shopping malls and used-car lots that had spilled over into what once was open prairie. As she’d begun speaking, her gaze had turned inward—and into the past.

  The historian—who was compiling an oral account of the Kansas pioneers—adjusted the volume button on her tape recorder and looked expectantly at Mrs. Clark. But the descendant of those pioneers was in no hurry; she waited a moment before resuming her story.

  “The time of the wolves . . . that’s the way I thought of it as a child, and I speak of it that way to this very day. It’s fitting . . . those were perilous times, in the Eighteen ’Seventies. Vicious packs of wolves and coyotes roamed . . . fires would sweep the prairie without warning . . . there were disastrous floods . . . and, of course, blizzards. But my grandmother was a true pioneer woman . . . she knew no fear. One time in the winter of Eighteen Seventy-Two. . . .”

  Alma Heusser stood in the doorway of the sod house, looking north over the prairie. It was gone four in the afternoon now, and storm clouds were bulking on the horizon. The chill in the air penetrated even her heavy buffalo-skin robe; a hush had fallen, as if all the creatures on the barren plain were holding their breath, waiting for the advent of the snow.

  Alma’s hand tightened on the rough door frame. Fear coiled in her stomach. Every time John was forced to make the long trek into town she stood like this, awaiting his return. Every moment until his horse appeared in the distance she imagined that some terrible event had taken him from her. And on this night, with the blizzard threatening. . . .

  The shadows deepened, purpled by the impending storm. Alma shivered and hugged herself beneath the enveloping robe. The land stretched before her: flat, treeless, its sameness mesmerizing. If she looked at it long enough, her eyes would begin to play tricks on her—tricks that held the power to drive her mad.

  She’d heard of a woman who had been driven mad by the prairie: a timid, gentle woman who had traveled some miles east with her husband to gather wood. When they had finally stopped their wagon at a grove, the woman had gotten down and run to a tree—the first tree she had touched in three years. It was said they had had to pry her loose, because she refused to stop hugging it.

  The sound of a horse’s hoofs came from the distance. Behind Alma, ten-year-old Margaret asked: “Is that him? Is it Papa?”

  Alma strained to see through the rapidly gathering dusk. “No,” she said, her voice flat with disappointment. “No, it’s only Mister Carstairs.”

  The Carstairs, William and Sarah, lived on a claim several miles east of there. It was not unusual for William to stop when passing on his way from town. But John had been in town today, too; why had they not ridden back together?

  The coil of fear wound tighter as she went to greet him.

  “No, I won’t dismount,” William Carstairs said in response to her invitation to come inside and warm himself. “Sarah doesn’t know I am here, so I must be home swiftly. I’ve come to ask a favor.”

  “Certainly. What is it?”

  “I’m off to the East in the morning. My mother is ill and hasn’t much longer . . . she’s asked for me. Sarah is anxious about being alone. As you know, she’s been homesick these past two years. Will you look after her?”

  “Of course.” Alma spoke the words with a readiness she did not feel. She did not like Sarah Carstairs. There was something mean-spirited about the young woman, a suspicious air in the way she dealt with others that bordered on the hostile. But looking after neighbors was an inviolate obligation here on the prairie, essential to survival.

  “Of course, we’ll look after her,” she said more warmly, afraid her reluctance had somehow sounded in her voice. “You need not worry.”

  After William Carstairs had ridden off, Alma remained in the doorway of the sod house until the horizon had receded into darkness. She would wait for John as long as was necessary, hoping that her hunger for the sight of him had the power to bring him home again.

  “Neighbors were the greatest treasure my grandparents had,” Mrs. Clark explained. “The pioneer people were a warm-hearted lot, open and giving, closer than many of today’s families. And the women in particular were a great source of strength and comfort to one another. My grandmother’s friendship with Sarah Carstairs, for example. . . .”

  “I suppose I must pay a visit to Sarah,” Alma said. It was two days later. The snowstorm had never arrived, but, even though it had retreated into Nebraska, another seemed to be on the way. If she didn’t go to the Carstairs’ claim today, she might not be able to look in on Sarah for some time to come.

  John grunted noncommittally and went on trimming the wick of the oil lamp. Alma knew he didn’t care for Sarah, either, but he was a taciturn man, slow to voice criticism. And he also understood the necessity of standing by one’s neighbors.

  “I promised William. He was so worried about her.” Alma waited, hoping her husband would forbid her to go because of the impending storm. No such dictum was forthcoming, however. John Heusser was not one to distrust his wife’s judgment; he would abide by whatever she decided.

  So, driven by a promise she wished she had not been obligated to make, Alma set off on horseback within the hour.

  The Carstairs’ claim was a poor one, although to Alma’s way of thinking it need not be. In the hands of John Heusser it would have been bountiful with wheat and corn, but William Carstairs was an unskilled farmer. His crops had parched even during the past two summers of plentiful rain; his animals fell ill and died of unidentifiable ailments; the house and outbuildings grew ever more ramshackle through his neglect. If Alma were a fanciful woman—and she preferred to believe she was not—she would have said there was a curse on the land. Its appearance on this grim February day did little to dispel the illusion.

  In the foreground stood the h
ouse, its roof beam sagging, its chimney askew. The barn and other outbuildings behind it looked no better. The horse in the enclosure was bony and spavined; the few chickens seemed too dispirited to scratch at the hard-packed earth. Alma tied her sorrel to the fence and walked toward the house, her reluctance to be there asserting herself until it was nearly a foreboding. There was no sign of welcome from within, none of the flurry of excitement that the arrival of a visitor on the isolated homesteads always occasioned. She called out, knocked at the door. And waited.

  After a moment the door opened slowly and Sarah Carstairs looked out. Her dark hair hung loosely about her shoulders; she wore a muslin dress dyed the rich brown of walnut bark. Her eyes were deeply circled—haunted, Alma thought.

  Quickly she shook off the notion and smiled. “We’ve heard that Mister Carstairs had to journey East,” she said. “I thought you might enjoy some company.”

  The younger woman nodded. Then she opened the door wider and motioned Alma inside.

  The room was much like Alma’s main room at home, with narrow, tall windows, a rough board floor, and an iron stove for both cooking and heating. The curtains at the windows were plain burlap grain sacks, not at all like Alma’s neatly stitched muslin ones, with their appliques of flowers. The furnishings—a pair of rockers, pine cabinet, sideboard, and table—had been new when the Carstairs arrived from the East two years before, but their surfaces were coated with the grime that accumulated from cooking.

  Sarah shut the door and turned to face Alma, still not speaking. To cover her confusion Alma thrust out the cornbread she had brought. The younger woman took it, nodding thanks. After a slight hesitation, she set it on the table and motioned somewhat gracelessly at one of the rockers. “Please,” she said.