Wilderness Double Edition 13

by David Robbins

  “What?”

  Shakespeare had done what Shakespeare loved to do. He’d quoted his namesake. “ ‘To be or not to be, that is the question. Whether ‘tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, or to take arms against a sea of troubles, and by opposing end them.’ ” McNair had squeezed him. “Do you understand?”

  Zach had nodded. Usually when Shakespeare quoted the Bard, Zach had no inkling whatsoever of what the quote meant. This time he did. It meant people would dislike him even when he did nothing to deserve it. They would despise him simply for being himself.

  From that day on, Zach associated less and less with his father’s kind. His eyes opened. He learned that many he had formerly regarded as friends in fact only tolerated him because they liked his father. And many who had always welcomed him with smiles in fact could not abide his guts.

  They did not come right out and say so. They did not have to. Zach read the truth in fleeting glances, in subtle expressions. He grew to sense when others loathed him, and he avoided them ever after.

  It was not quite as bad among his mother’s people. By and large the Shoshones were more tolerant of his mixed blood, but not as tolerant as he would have liked. Quite a few warriors made no secret of their loathing.

  To be fair, not all whites were bigots. Decent men like Scott Kendall accepted him and treated him no differently than they treated everyone else. Zach was grateful, but it did not change his outlook.

  He had made an important decision. In order to live happily, he must avoid whites except when absolutely necessary.

  Zach never explained his decision to his folks. He doubted they would understand. Or if they did, they wouldn’t approve. On numerous occasions one or the other had commented that he was becoming too much of a loner. That he should have more dealings with people.

  If his father and mother only knew!

  Zach shook his head to clear the cobwebs and prodded the sorrel into a brisk walk. It was no use feeling sorry for himself. Warriors were not whiners. As his pa had impressed upon him again and again, “A man must learn to stand on his own two feet. Don’t be one of those puny coons who never grow up. Only spoiled weaklings moan and groan when things don’t go their way.”

  The elk’s tracks led down a steep incline into thick firs. A deadfall had to be skirted. Beyond, the trail meandered at random, as if the elk were confused. Pools of blood were evidence the bull was on its last legs.

  Zach would be glad to butcher it and head home. He had been gone five days, more than he’d intended. But game was hard to find close to the cabin. On every hunt he had to range farther and farther afield.

  The pack animals were flagging. In his eagerness to overtake his quarry, Zach had not stopped to rest all day, not even to permit them to drink. A gleaming blue ribbon to the northwest tempted him, but he continued due west for the time being.

  The elk had climbed a ridge. Zach prodded the sorrel upward, tugging on the lead rope. He was two thirds of the way to the top when the sorrel snorted and shied. “Steady, fella, steady,” Zach said soothingly, then rose in the stirrups. A brownish bulk lay amid scattered boulders.

  Zach dismounted and slowly moved higher, his heavy Hawken pressed to his shoulder. Elk were not aggressive by nature, but any cornered creature could be dangerous.

  A trapper by the name of Bascomb had found that out the hard way when he’d shot a ten-point black-tailed buck and gone to skin the critter without verifying it was dead. The deer’s antlers had sliced his throat wide open. If not for a couple of friends, Bascomb would surely have died.

  Yet another reminder that in the wilderness a man could not afford to be careless. One mistake was all it took. One measly mistake might result in an “untimely demise,” as Shakespeare called it.

  So Zach neared the elk with his rifle cocked and ready. Not much blood surrounded the body, but the bull had already lost a lot. Zach circled to the right to better view the animal’s head. The eyes were wide and glazing, the tongue jutted from foam-flecked lips.

  “Finally,” Zach said, and wanted to kick his own backside for talking to himself again.

  Lowering the Hawken, Zach let down the hammer. On the verge of drawing his butcher knife, he turned into the breeze when a faint acrid odor tingled his nostrils. It was smoke. And where there was smoke, there were men.

  Quickly, Zach ran to the crest. On the summit he hunkered to avoid silhouetting himself against the sky, as his father had taught him. Crabbing to the west rim, he scoured the rugged terrain below. Isolated mountains were separated by a maze of valleys, ravines, and canyons. Perhaps a quarter of a mile off, gray tendrils wafted above a stand of pines.

  “Idiots,” Zach said. It had to be whites. Indians would not make camp so early, or reveal their whereabouts so openly. So stupidly.

  Zach shrugged and started to turn back. It was no business of his. Whoever they were – trappers, most likely – they meant nothing to him. So what if they were making a blunder that could get them killed? It was their mistake, not his.

  Then he paused, thinking of how Scott Kendall had helped him at the Rendezvous. And of times when other whites had treated him kindly. What was it Shakespeare was fond of saying? “We are our brothers’ keeper. Whether we want to be or not.”

  Maybe it wouldn’t hurt to take a gander at the yacks, Zach reflected. Just out of curiosity, of course. Few whites ever penetrated so deeply into the mountains. Either these were uncommonly brave – or uncommonly dumb.

  After tying the horses to convenient limbs, Zach set forth on foot. A quarter of a mile was nothing to someone who daily hiked ten or more. Plenty of brush provided ample cover. On cat’s feet he crept into the stand, flattening when he spied a glimmer of red and orange. He crawled the rest of the way.

  A fire burned at the center of a small clearing. Two horses were tethered where they could graze to their heart’s content. Two saddles and two saddle blankets had been draped over a log. So there must be two whites, Zach deduced, but neither was present.

  Typical. The fools had gone off after something for their supper pot, leaving their animals unprotected. Any wandering Blackfoot or Piegan could help himself. It would serve them right if their horses were stolen and they were stranded afoot.

  Zach rested his chin on a forearm. He should leave. Just go on about his business and leave the whites to their own affairs. But part of him, a very small part, bid him stay and see what the pair were up to.

  Time dragged by. Zach was restless, anxious to tend to the elk and light a shuck for the cabin. The scent of blood might lure a cougar, or worse, a grizzly, and his horses were as unprotected as those of the whites.

  A yellow butterfly flitted across the glade. Sparrows frolicked in a bush. A raven flew overhead, the rhythmic beat of its wings uncommonly loud.

  Zach was about at the end of his patience when a figure appeared. A slender figure in very baggy buckskins, a stripling whose close-cropped hair and smooth cheeks marked him as being about the same age as Zach. Over the youth’s shoulder was slung a rabbit.

  Of the second white, there was no sign. Zach stayed put, content to merely observe. The white youth knelt beside the fire and commenced to skin his catch.

  Right away, Zach noticed something peculiar. The youth was in the grip of obvious sadness. Downcast, glum, he worked at a turtle’s pace. As empty of zest for life as an upended keg was empty of ale. Zach did not know what to make of it.

  Eventually the rabbit had been carved up, and dripping chunks were roasting on a makeshift spit. The youth sat with slim arms wrapped around bent legs, wearing melancholy like a shroud, staring blankly into the depths of the dancing flames.

  Zach checked on the sun. In another three hours it would be gone. He must be done with the elk by then. Scavengers would be abroad at the advent of twilight, and he had no yearning to contest possession with a pack of hungry wolves or a ravenous silvertip. Still, he could not tear himself from the youth. Why was the white so ups
et? Where was the other one? What were they doing so far from the usual trapping haunts?

  At length, Zach concluded enough was enough. Either he should show himself or he should leave. And since he would rather shun whites than suffer their spite, he slid backward.

  Just then, the youth lowered his face to a sleeve and began to quietly weep.

  Stupefied, Zachary stopped. He’d seldom seen a white person cry. Years ago his father had informed him that they considered tears a sign of weakness. That it was against their custom for men to weep openly. Whites were expected to hold their sorrow in, to vent it only when alone. A silly concept.

  The Shoshones took the opposite view. They made public displays of their grief. When a loved one died, the women wailed and gnashed their teeth. Those who were blood relatives frequently chopped off part of a finger as a token of their misery. The men took part in a formal ceremony, some slashing themselves with knives, and if tears were shed no one thought poorly of the party who shed them.

  Two extremes. And who was to say which was right? Zach certainly was in no position to judge. To his way of thinking, both sides could learn a lot from each other.

  The youth was sobbing now, great, racking sobs, as if pent-up torment had found delayed release. His whole body shook as he bent low to the ground, the beaver hat he wore perilously close to the fire.

  A strange urge to go comfort the white brought Zach to his knees, but no higher. He was being childish. It would be wrong of him to intrude on the other’s woe. He would go butcher the bull and return later.

  A twig cracked as Zach padded off, but he thought nothing of it. The youth would not hear. He jogged to the ridge, swinging wide to come up on the site from the north. A precaution, in case unwanted visitors were abroad. But the sorrel and the pack animals were dozing, the bull undisturbed.

  Carving up an elk, or any large animals, was not for the squeamish. First, Zach slit the hind legs down the backs of each, cutting entirely around the tail. Next he opened the pelt in a straight line from the chin to the tail, along the belly. The front legs had to be cut, too, starting at the knee joints and ranging to the stomach. Only then was the hide ready to be slowly peeled off, like a glove from a hand. Ligaments and muscle had to be sliced, always keeping the sharp edge of the blade away from the pelt so as not to damage it.

  The Shoshones, and most other tribes, did not think highly of elk hides. The pelts did not endure rough use or the elements very well, and were widely rated as inferior to those of deer and antelope. Which was why nearly all the buckskins worn by Indians were fashioned from the former.

  Winona, though, never allowed any part of an animal go to waste. She used elk hides mainly for robes worn only indoors. All four members of the family owned one, but Zach rarely used his. It was unseemly. A true warrior did not let a trifling morning chill affect him.

  Shakespeare McNair, however, owned a robe Zach would not mind wearing. The fur was solid white and luxuriously thick. McNair had traded a Piegan for it decades ago, back when Piegans were still friendly to whites. The Piegan, in turn, had obtained it from a member of a tribe rumored to live near the top of the world. No one knew what kind of animal it came from. Shakespeare claimed a bear, but everyone scoffed. White bears? It was preposterous.

  Zach shifted position to slice into the abdomen. He had to dig out the innards. Then he would treat himself to the heart, raw. The first time his father had offered him one, he had about gagged. Now he could bite into any blood-drenched organ without a second thought. Inserting the blade, he grasped the hilt with both hands.

  There was a metallic click to his rear, the unmistakable sound of a gun hammer being cocked.

  “Don’t move! Don’t so much as twitch – or you’re dead!”

  Three

  Zachary King was fit to be tied. He prided himself on his woodcraft, on being able to sneak up on anyone, anywhere, anytime. It was unthinkable that someone should do the same to him. He was a Shoshone warrior, or would be soon enough, and warriors did not let themselves be taken by surprise. His mind racing, he started to ease the butcher knife from the elk’s belly, but froze when the hard muzzle of a gun was jammed against the back of his head.

  “I said don’t move!” warned the one who had jumped him. “I doubt you savvy English, you mangy Indian, but this ought to make my meaning plain.”

  Anger flared in Zach’s chest, but he held it in check. It was easy to mistake him for a Shoshone, what with the beaded buckskins his mother had made him and the style in which he wore his long black hair. But mangy! “If you can understand me, raise your hands. And no tricks.”

  Should he or shouldn’t he? Zach wondered. There could be an advantage to playing dumb. It might be easier to catch his captor off guard. So he didn’t move.

  “I guess you don’t speak my lingo, huh? Figures.”

  Out of the corner of an eye Zach saw the youth sidle around to the left. A pistol was trained on Zach’s temple, and knowing how jumpy whites could be, he did not so much as lift a finger. Up close, he could see the youth was haggard and grimy. Blue eyes studied him intently.

  Louisa May Clark would never admit as much, but she was struck by how handsome the Indian was. Neatly braided hair and broad shoulders added to the allure. She chided herself for admiring him when by rights she should shoot him dead. Indians had killed her pa, hadn’t they? But this one was different; his hair and buckskins were not the same as those who were responsible. He might well be from a friendly tribe, for all she knew. “Take your hands off that pigsticker.” She motioned to accent her demand.

  Zach complied.

  “Hands in the air,” Lou said, lifting her left arm to demonstrate.

  Doing as he was told, Zach coiled his leg muscles, hoping the youth would step just a little bit closer.

  “Now move back.” Lou pumped her hand, and when the Indian had done so, she yanked the knife out of the elk and tossed it into some weeds.

  Zach almost lit into the cuss then and there. Knives did not come cheap. That one was a prized gift from a Shoshone uncle, Touch the Clouds, who had bestowed it on him on his last visit to his mother’s people.

  Lou gnawed on her lower lip. What was she to do? Earlier she’d heard a twig snap and glimpsed him fading into the undergrowth. Suspecting he was part of a war party and had gone to fetch the rest, she had given chase. But all he’d seemed interested in was the elk. Odd, she mused, that he had spied on her and not tried to harm her. Maybe he really was friendly. “What tribe are you from?” she asked, even though it was pointless.

  Zach branded the youth a greenhorn. Most any white who had been in the mountains for any length of time would be able to tell. He noticed dark bags under the youth’s eyes, and how extraordinarily slender the youth’s hands were.

  Fatigue clouded Lou’s mind. Four days had gone by since her pa was slain, and she had hardly slept a wink in all that time. Today, she’d made camp much sooner than was her custom for the express purpose of finally catching up on her sleep, but now she had a young savage on her hands. How young, exactly? She figured he couldn’t be much older than she was, and that was encouraging. An adult would be more difficult to manage.

  Being stared at annoyed Zach. He wished the youth would say or do something to give him some clue as to what was in store. That he had not already been shot dead was a good sign. He would just like to be permitted to go on with the carving. The white boy could jump off a cliff, for all he cared.

  Louisa wagged her pistol. “Move to the horses,” she directed, nodding. When the Indian did not obey, she assumed he did not comprehend. To make it plainer, she whinnied.

  It took all of Zach’s self-control not to bust out laughing. Any Shoshone five-year-old could whinny better than that! Imitating animal calls and sounds was a favorite childhood pastime.

  “The horses!” Lou said, stamping a foot in frustration.

  Zach was not pleased at how the pistol jiggled. The slightest accidental pressure, and the flintlock might di
scharge. At that range it would blow a hole in him the size of a melon. To calm his captor down, he backed away, halting when he reached the sorrel.

  Louisa was delighted she had gotten her point across. Sidestepping to the pack animals, she helped herself to a coil of rope. More like rawhide cord, it suited her purpose perfectly. “I want you to kneel and put your arms behind your back,” she instructed, sinking onto her own knees as an example.

  Zach would have leaped if not for the pistol. It galled him to be bound. His little charade had gone far enough. He would confess who he was and she would see he was no threat, then go her merry way. He cleared his throat.

  As edgy as a mouse in a barn full of cats, Lou jumped up. “Don’t you try anything, damn you,” she growled. “I’d as soon kill you, you rotten red bastard. Every last one of your kind should be exterminated.” It was her grief talking, not her heart. Her misery at her loss caused her to express sentiments she did not believe.

  Bigotry again. Zach clenched his fists in outrage. This youth was no different from the vast majority of whites, who liked to say that the only good Indian was a dead one. No less a personage than President Andrew Jackson had pushed for the removal of every last red man from all land the whites coveted, by any means deemed necessary.

  “Do it!” Lou ordered.

  Zach would rather eat glass. He could still avoid being bound, but he was not about to grovel. Not after that last comment. Scornfully, he knelt and thrust his arms out.

  Louisa could see the Indian was mad. She couldn’t blame him. But her own safety came before all else. She looped the rope around his wrists enough times to insure he’d never break free, then tied a knot one-handed. Only when she was confident he couldn’t harm her did she put down the flintlock to finish the job and cut the extra rope off.

  “There. That should hold you.”