Butcher's Crossing

by John Williams

  Charley Hoge untethered the oxen and let them graze on the short yellowish grass. Then he returned to the wagon and broke out a package of dried biscuits.

  “Don’t eat too many of them,” Miller said. “They’ll dry you out.”

  The men squatted in the narrow shade cast by the wagon. Slowly and delicately, Schneider ate one of the biscuits and took a small sip of water after it.

  Finally he sighed, and spoke directly to Miller: “What’s the story, Miller? Do you know where there’s water?”

  Miller said: “There was a little pile of rocks a piece back I think I remember. Another half-day, and we ought to hit a stream.”

  Schneider looked at him quizzically. Then he stiffened, took a deep breath, and asked, his voice soft: “Where are we, Miller?”

  “No need to worry,” Miller said. “Some of the landmarks have changed since I was here. But another half-day, and I’ll get us fixed.”

  Schneider grinned, and shook his head. He laughed softly and sat down on the ground, shaking his head.

  “My God,” he said. “We’re lost.”

  “As long as we keep going in that direction,” Miller pointed away from their shadows, toward the falling sun, “we’re not lost. We’re bound to run into water tonight, or early in the morning.”

  “This is a big country,” Schneider said. “We’re not bound to do anything.”

  “No need to worry,” Miller said.

  Schneider looked at Andrews, still grinning. “How does it feel, Mr. Andrews? Just thinking about it makes you thirsty, don’t it?”

  Andrews looked away from him quickly, and frowned; but what he said was true. The biscuit in his mouth felt suddenly dry, like sun-beat sand; he had swallowed against the dryness. He noticed that Charley Hoge put his half-eaten biscuit into his shirt pocket.

  “We can still cut south,” Schneider said. “Another day, at the most a day and a half, we’ll run into the Arkansas. The stock might just hold up for a day and a half.”

  “It would put us a week off,” Miller said. “And besides, there’s no cause for it; we may get a little dry, but we’ll make it all right. I know this country.”

  “Not so well you don’t get lost in it,” Schneider said. “I say, we turn to the Arkansas. We’ll be sure of water there.” He pulled up a tuft of the dry, yellow grass that surrounded them. “Look at this. There’s been a drought in this country. How do we know the streams ain’t dried up? What if the ponds are empty?”

  “There’s water in this country,” Miller said.

  “Seen any sign of buffalo?” Schneider looked at each of them. “Not a sign. And you won’t find buffalo where there ain’t no water. I say, we ought to head for the Arkansas.”

  Miller sighed and smiled distantly at Schneider. “We’d never make it, Fred.”

  “What?”

  “We’d never make it. We’ve been heading at an angle ever since we left the Smoky Hill. With watered stock, it would take us two and a half days—almost as bad as going back to the Smoky Hill. Dry, this stock would never make it.”

  “God damn it,” Schneider said quietly, “you ought to have let us know.”

  Miller said: “There’s nothing to worry about. I’ll get you to water, if I have to dig for it.”

  “God damn it,” Schneider said. “You son of a bitch. I’m half a mind to cut out on my own. I might just make it.”

  “And you might not,” Miller said. “Do you know this country, Fred?”

  “You know damn well I don’t,” Schneider said.

  “Then you’d better stick with the party.”

  Schneider looked from one of them to another. “You’re pretty sure the party’s going to stick with you?”

  Miller’s tight face relaxed, and the loose ridges came again about the corners of his mouth. “I’m going ahead, just like I’ve been going. I just have to get the feel of the land again. I’ve been watching too close, trying too hard to remember. Once I get the feel of the country again, I’ll be all right. And the rest of you will be all right, too.”

  Schneider nodded. “Hoge will stick with you, I guess. That right, Charley?”

  Charley Hoge lifted his head abruptly, as if startled. He rubbed the stump of his wrist. “I go where God wills,” he said. “He will lead us to where water is when we are athirst.”

  “Sure,” Schneider said. He turned to Andrews. “Well, that leaves us, Mr. Andrews. What do you say? It’s your wagon and your team. If you say we go south, Miller would have a hard time going against you.”

  Andrews looked at the ground; between the dry thin blades of grass the earth was powdery. Though he did not look up, he felt the eyes of the others upon him. “We’ve come this far,” he said. “We might as well keep on with Miller.”

  “All right,” Schneider said. “You’re all crazy. But it looks like I’ve got no choice. Do whatever you want to do.”

  Miller’s thin flat lips lengthened in a slight smile. “You worry too much, Fred. If it gets that bad, we can always get by on Charley’s whisky. There must be nine or ten gallons of it left.”

  “The horses will be glad to hear that,” Schneider said. “I can see us walking out of here on ten gallons of whisky.”

  “You worry too much,” Miller said. “You’ll live to be a hundred and five.”

  “I’ve had my say. I’ll go along with you. Now let me get some rest.” He lay on his side, rolled under the shade of the wagon, and came to rest with his back to them.

  “We all might as well try to get some sleep,” Miller said. “It won’t do to travel in the heat. We’ll rest ourselves, and get the drive started this evening.”

  Lying on his side, his folded arm supporting his head, Andrews looked out of the shade across the level prairie. As far as he could see, the land was flat and without identity. The blades of grass that stood up stiffly a few inches from his nose blurred and merged into the distance, and the distance came upon him with a rush. He closed his eyes upon what he saw, and his vague fingers pushed at the grass until they parted it, and he could feel the dry powdery earth upon his fingertips. He pressed his body against the ground, and did not look at anything, until the terror that had crept upon him from his dizzying view of the prairie passed, as if through his fingertips, back into the earth whence it had come. His mouth was dry. He started to reach for his canteen, but he did not. He forced thirst away from him, and put thought from his mind. After a while, his body, tense against the earth, relaxed; and before the afternoon was over, he slept.

  When the edge of the sun cut into the far horizon they resumed their journey.

  Night came on rapidly. In the moonlight, Miller, ahead of them, was a frenzied, hunched figure, whose body swayed this way and that in his saddle. Though Andrews and Schneider let their horses go at their own paces, Miller spurred in an erratic zigzag across the land that seemed to glow out of the night. To no apparent purpose, Miller would cut at a sharp angle from a path they took, and follow the new course for half an hour or so, only to abandon it and cut in another direction. For the first few hours, Andrews tried to keep their course in his mind; but weariness dulled his attention, and the stars in the clear sky, and the thin moon, whirled about his head; he closed his eyes and slumped forward in the saddle, letting his horse trail Schneider and Miller. Even in the cool of the night, thirst gnawed at him, and occasionally he took a small sip of water from his canteen. Once they paused to let the oxen graze; Andrews remained in his saddle, sleepily aware of what was going on.

  They traveled into the next morning, and into the heat of the day. The oxen moved slowly; they moaned almost constantly, and their breaths were dry and rasping. Even Andrews could see that their coats were growing dull, and that the bones were showing sharply along their ribs and flanks.

  Schneider rode up beside him and jerked his head back in the direction of the oxen. “They look bad. Their tongues will start swelling next. Then they won’t be able to breathe and pull at the same time. We should have headed south.
With luck, we might have made it.”

  Andrews did not answer. His throat felt unbearably dry. Despite himself he reached behind his saddle for his canteen and took two long swallows of water. Schneider grinned and drew his horse away. With an effort of will Andrews closed his canteen and replaced it behind his saddle.

  Shortly before noon Miller pulled his horse to a halt, dismounted, and walked back toward the slowly moving wagon. He motioned to Charley Hoge to stop.

  “We’ll wait the heat out here,” he said shortly. He walked into the shade of the wagon; Schneider and Andrews came up to him. “They look bad, Miller,” Schneider said. He turned to Charley Hoge: “How do they drive?”

  Charley Hoge shook his head.

  “Their tongues are beginning to swell. They won’t last out the day. And the horses. Look at them.”

  “Never mind that,” Miller said. His voice was low and toneless, almost a growl. The black pupils of his eyes were shining and blank; they were fixed upon the men without appearing to see them. “How much water’s left in the canteens?”

  “Not much,” Schneider said. “Maybe enough to get us through the night.”

  “Get them,” Miller said.

  “Now look,” Schneider said. “If you think I’m going to use water for anything except myself, you—”

  “Get them,” Miller said. He turned his eyes to Schneider. Schneider cursed softly, got to his feet, and returned with his own and Andrews’s canteens. Miller gathered them, put his with them, and said to Charley Hoge: “Charley, get the keg and bring your canteen down here.”

  Schneider said: “Now, look, Miller. Those oxen will never make it. No use wasting what little water we got. You can’t—”

  “Shut up,” Miller said. “Arguing about it will just make us drier. Like I said, we still have Charley’s whisky.”

  “My God!” Schneider said. “You were serious.”

  Charley Hoge returned to the shade beside the wagon and handed Miller a canteen and the wooden keg. Miller set the keg carefully on the ground, rotating it a few times under the pressure of his hands so that it rested level on the stubby grass. He unscrewed the tops of the canteens, one by one, and carefully poured the water into the keg, letting the canteens hang above it for several minutes, until the last globules of water gathered on the mouths, hung, and finally dropped. After the last canteen was emptied, about four inches of water was in the keg.

  Schneider picked up his empty canteen, looked at it carefully, and then looked at Miller. With all his strength, he flung the canteen against the side of the wagon, from where it rebounded back toward him, past him, and fell into the grass.

  “God damn it!” he shouted; his voice was startling in the hot prairie quiet. “What good do you expect to do with that little bit of water? You’re throwing it away!”

  Miller did not look at him. He spoke to Charley Hoge: “Charley, unyoke the oxen and lead them around here one at a time.”

  While the three men waited—Miller and Andrews still, Schneider quivering and turning in an impotent rage—Charley Hoge singly detached the oxen and led them around to Miller. Miller took a rag from his pocket, soaked it in the water, and squeezed it gently, holding it carefully above the keg so that no water was lost.

  “Fred, you and Will get a hold of his horns; hold him steady.”

  While Schneider and Andrews grasped each of the horns, Charley Hoge circled the beast’s bony and corded neck with his good arm, digging his heels in the ground and pulling against the forward surge of the ox. With the wet rag, Miller bathed the dry lips of the ox; then he put the rag into the water again and squeezed it so that no water was wasted.

  “Pull up on the horns,” he said to Schneider and Andrews.

  When the ox’s head was up, Miller grasped the upper lip of the beast and pulled upward. The tongue, dark and swollen, quivered in its mouth. Again with care, Miller bathed the rough distended flesh; his hand and wrist were thrust out of sight up into the ox’s throat. Withdrawing his hand, he squeezed hard on the wet rag, and a few drops of water trickled on the tongue, which absorbed them like a dark dry sponge.

  One by one the oxen’s mouths were bathed. Sweatless and hot, the three men held the beasts and dug their feet into the earth; Schneider cursed steadily, quietly; Andrews breathed in heavy gasps the dry air that was rough like a burr in his throat, and tried to keep his arms from trembling loose from the smooth hot horns of the oxen. After each ox had been treated, Charley Hoge led it back to its yoke and returned with another. Despite the haste with which they worked, it was the better part of an hour before they finished with the last animal.

  Miller leaned against the side of the wagon; his dry, leatherlike skin stood out from his black beard with a faint yellowish cast.

  “They ain’t so bad,” he said breathing heavily. “They’ll last to nightfall; and we still got a bit of water left.” He pointed to the muddy inch or so of water that remained in the keg.

  Schneider laughed; it was a dry sound that turned into a cough. “A pint of water for eight oxen and three horses.”

  “It’ll keep the swelling down,” Miller said. “It’s enough for that.”

  Charley Hoge returned from the front of the wagon. “Do we unyoke them now and take a rest?”

  “No,” Miller said. “Their tongues’ll swell as bad standing here as they will if we keep on. And we can keep them from grazing better if we’re on the move.”

  “On the move where?” Schneider said. “How long you think them cows can pull this here wagon?”

  “Long enough,” Miller said. “We’ll find water.”

  Schneider moved suddenly, and whirled to Miller. “I just thought,” he said. “How much lead and powder you got in that wagon?”

  “Ton and a half, two tons,” Miller said, not looking at him.

  “Well, my God,” Schneider said. “No wonder them animals is dry. We could go twice as far if we’d dump the stuff.”

  “No,” Miller said.

  “We can find water, and maybe come back and pick it up. It ain’t as if we intended to just leave it here.”

  “No,” Miller said. “We get there like we started out, or we don’t get there at all. There ain’t no need to get in a panic.”

  “You crazy son of a bitch,” Schneider said. He kicked one of the heavy hickory wheel spokes. “God damn it. Crazier’n hell.” He kicked the spoke again, and pounded a fist on the rim of the wheel.

  “Besides,” Miller said calmly, “it wouldn’t make all that difference. On this land, a full wagon can pull almost as easy an an empty one, once the team gets started.”

  “It’s no good talking to him,” Schneider said. “No good at all.” He strode out of the shade and went to his horse, which had been tethered to the end of the wagon, its head held high so that it could not graze. Andrews and Miller followed him more slowly.

  “It does Fred good to blow off now and then,” Miller said to Andrews. “He knows if we left the load here we might be a week finding it again, if we found it at all. Looking for it might put us in as bad shape as we are now. We don’t leave a heavy enough trail to follow back, and you can’t mark a trail very well in land like this.”

  Andrews looked behind him. It was true. The wheels of the wagon in the short stiff grass, on the baked earth, left hardly an impression; even now the grass over which they had driven was springing erect to hide the evidence of their passage. Andrews tried to swallow, but the contraction of his muscles was stopped by his dry throat.

  Their horses moved sluggishly; and beneath Charley Hoge’s cracking whip and before his thin sharp voice, the oxen moved weakly against the pull of the wagon. They shambled unsteadily forward, working not as a team but as separate beasts struggling from the whip and the sound of the driving voice behind them. Once in the afternoon the party came near a shallow depression in the earth, the bottom of which was cracked in an intricate pattern of dried mud. They looked sullenly at the dried-up pond and did not speak.

  In t
he middle of the afternoon, Miller forced each of them to take a short swallow of Charley Hoge’s whisky.

  “Don’t take much,” he warned. “Just enough to get your throat wet. More than that will make you sick.”

  Andrews gagged on the liquor. It seared his dry tongue and throat as if a torch had been thrust into his mouth; when he ran his tongue over his cracked dry lips, they burned with a pain that lingered for many minutes later. He closed his eyes and clung to his saddle horn as the horse went forward; but the darkness upon his closed eyelids was shot with spears of light that whirled dizzily; he was forced to open them again and observe the trackless and empty way they went.

  By sundown the oxen again were breathing with sharp grunting moans; their tongues were so swollen that they moved with their mouths half open; their heads were down, swinging from side to side. Miller called the wagon to a halt. Again Schneider and Andrews held the horns of the beasts; but even though both men were much weaker than they had been earlier, their task was easier. The oxen dumbly and without resistance let themselves be pulled around, and did not even show interest in the water with which Miller bathed their mouths.

  “We won’t stop,” Miller said. His voice was a heavy flat croak. “Better to keep them moving while they’re still on their feet.”

  He stood the bucket on its edge and sopped up the last of the water with the rag. He bathed the mouths of the horses; when he finished, the rag was almost dry.

  After the sun dropped beneath the flat horizon before them, darkness came on quickly. Andrews’s hands clung to the saddle horn; they were so weak that again and again they slipped from it, and he hardly had the strength to pull them back. Breathing was an effort of agony; slumped inertly in his saddle, he learned to snuffle a little air through his nostrils and to exhale it quickly, and to wait several seconds before he repeated the process. Sometime during the night he discovered that his mouth was open and that he could not close it. His tongue pushed between his teeth, and when he tried to bring them together a dull dry pain spread in his mouth. He remembered the sight of the oxen’s tongues, black and swollen and dry; and he pushed his mind away from that image, away from himself, and tried to push his mind into a place as dark and unbounded as the night in which he traveled. Once, an ox stumbled and would not get back upon its feet; the three men had to dismount and with their little remaining strength pull and tug and prod the beast upright. Then the oxen would not or could not summon strength to get the wagon into motion, so the three pushed against the wagon spokes, while Charley Hoge’s whip cracked above the oxen, until the wheels began to move and the beasts took up the forward movement in a slow shamble. Andrews tried to wet his mouth with a little of Charley Hoge’s whisky, but most of the liquid ran off his lips down the corners of his mouth. He rode most of the night in a state that alternated between a mild delirium and intense pain. Once he came to his senses and found himself alone in the darkness; he had no sense of place, no knowledge of direction. In a panic he whirled one way and another in his saddle; he looked upward into the immense bowl of the sky, and downward at the earth upon which he rode; and the one seemed as far away as the other. Then he heard faintly the creak of the wagon, and prodded his horse in that direction. In a few moments he was back with the others, who had not noticed his lagging behind. Even with them, he shivered for a long while, the panic he had felt when he thought himself abandoned still upon him; for a long while the panic kept him alert, and he followed Miller’s dim movements, not as if those movements might lead him where he wished to go, but as if they might save him from wandering into a nothingness where he would be alone.