Graham motioned to the Indian. The horses were ready. The Indian moved past us and over us, and went down the steps. He tested the straps and balance of the packs, his biceps ballooning as he tugged. Then he gathered the leads into one and moved to his mount. There was a blanket over the horse’s back, but no saddle, and the Indian was so tall that he virtually stepped on to the animal. He arched his back and the horse moved off at a walk, the pack animals following.
I mounted and settled. Graham came down the steps.
“Good luck,” he said.
The anxiety was gone now. I felt fine. I felt like thundering out of town in a swirl of dust. But I heeled gently and we moved off at a walk, behind the pack animals, which was much more sensible.
V
The Indian paid no attention to me as I rode behind him. He seemed totally unaware of my presence, an eerie feeling once Ushuaia was behind us, and we were the only two people in sight. We went at a moderate pace and I kept about ten yards behind the pack horses, realizing again how much energy it takes to ride a horse over broken ground, even at such a slow gait. The Indian, however, seemed to use no energy. He rode with an easy grace, his long body relaxed and shifting to the horse’s motion, a technique well suited to a long journey, functional rather than stylistic. Although his horse was of a good size, it looked more like a burro beneath this vast man, and his feet almost brushed the ground.
The sun was abnormally bright and I began to sweat in my heavy clothing, and down my temples. After a while I shrugged out of the knapsack and balanced it on the pommel while I took the quilted windbreaker off and stuffed it in the saddle-bags: slid into the knapsack again. During these gyrations I dropped farther behind, and had to urge the horse into a trot to catch up. The ground was firm and the gait jarred me. I knew I was going to be stiff and sore in a short time, but discomfort earned in such a genuine way didn’t bother me; the slight ache of bones and joints lends a certain awareness of one’s body and of being alive. It would be a dull existence without pain.
The landscape changed gradually.
We had passed the farthest point of my walks, and I observed this new terrain with interest. The contours were lunar. Large, smooth boulders loomed on all sides and our path wound around and between them. There were few marks of civilization here. Indeed, few signs of life. A few stunted trees grew between and above the rocks, dull moss covered the stony surface, the odd wild sheep peered at us from impossible perches, an ostrich raised its curious head and turned its long neck until it resembled one of the twisted trees. I had had some idea of making a rough map of our journey, but gave the idea up without attempting it. The landmarks were all of a sameness that made recognition difficult – impossible, with my limited knowledge of cartography and compass reading. I knew only that we were heading westward, but not directly. The trail, where there was a trail, curved and zigzagged, following the broken face of the land. We were climbing steadily, the land rising and falling in changing pattern, but always drawing higher in the end. The sun pursued us until it drew level to the north of us, following its eternal path over the equator, and our truncated shadows shifted away from it. The light caught blinding points in the rocks. Time lost objective meaning for me, I was dulled by the heat and the motion and the unchanging contours, and did not even refer to my wristwatch. I’d had no breakfast, and my stomach was empty, but the effort of opening my pack and eating in the saddle was too great. My throat was parched, but I did not raise the waterbag. I slumped in the high Spanish saddle and rode on.
And then, some time in the afternoon, I became aware that the land had changed. It had been an unnoticeable transition, but suddenly we had come into the genuine foothills, the rising plain was behind us and we were ascending into the mountains.
There was no longer even the semblance of a trail, and the going was more difficult, the trees thicker and the rocks higher. The Indian seemed to know the way without having to pay attention, turning and detouring for no apparent reason, but never pausing or backtracking. My horse was placidly confident of his footing. Loose rocks clattered from beneath his hooves, soft mud sucked at his legs between spaces of bare rock, but he never faltered; he lurched but recovered instantly and smoothly. Graham had made a wise selection.
The sun had outdistanced us. It slanted into my face now, hotter than before. I turned to look behind, and found that the plains were already hidden by the folding hills. I knew that I was lost; that I could never have retraced our path back to Ushuaia. I wondered whether we had yet crossed the frontier into Chile. There was no possible way to tell, and it didn’t matter in the slightest. Time and distance had both become completely subjective, and my mood was almost stoic; eventually we would be at our destination, and what more did I need to know or concern myself with?
It was in this mood that I nearly rode past the Indian before I noticed he’d dismounted; I didn’t, in fact, notice until my horse had the sense to stop. I slid stiffly from the saddle and stretched. It must have been mid-afternoon. Our steady pace had taken us quite a distance, but the path had been so devious that it was impossible to estimate how much actual progress had been made.
We were in the shadow of a large, flat-sided overhang of rock, and trees grew all around, draped with thick yellow moss and stretching down to the dense shrubbery of the undergrowth. The moss stirred restlessly, and cast tangled, shifting shadows. I started to ask my silent companion whether we were halting very long, and then realized the futility of that. He was squatting beside the horses, thigh muscles bunched as great in circumference as a normal man’s torso. There was a leather pouch at his waistband and he drew some coarse bark from it and commenced to chew it. The aromatic fumes hung on the air: Winter’s-bark, stimulant and tonic, and apparently all the nourishment that vast body needed for this tedious journey. I watched his jaws work methodically and opened my own pack. I had no idea if there would be time to prepare a meal, and had a hasty bite of dried meat and a bar of chocolate. I would have had time for nothing more. I had not even fastened my pack again before the Indian stood up and approached his horse, stooping under the overhanging limbs. My muscles throbbed as I hauled myself back into the saddle, but my seat was all right. The Spanish saddle was very comfortable with its high, square cantel. I pushed my horse up level with the Indian as he started off, and volunteered with obvious gestures to take my turn leading the pack horses. He didn’t actually refuse. He simply failed to acknowledge the offer, and a moment later I was once more trailing along behind.
Some time later, we came to a shallow stream bordered by steep, soft banks, and moved along beside it for a while. The water ran in the opposite direction, strangely rapid for such slight depth and bursting over the rocks that lined the bed. Trees burrowed their roots down to the water and mossy limbs stretched over in an arch. We weaved through the foliage and the moss clung to my shoulders, the soft earth gripped the horses’ hooves. The Indian had some difficulty leading the pack horses here, and had to move slower. I was closer behind him, wanting to make sure we followed in his exact footsteps, close enough to notice the long scar that ran diagonally over his naked ribs, down to his hip. It was an old scar and not very visible against his dark, dust-covered skin, but it must have been a hideous wound when it occurred, a deep gouge with lesser marks on either side, not clean enough to have been caused by a knife or bullet and yet following a straight course that seemed to imply a purpose to the infliction. Perhaps the talons of some powerful beast, I thought, and wondered what animal might have dared attack this giant.
We came to a break in the bank, where the land had cracked and folded back in a gully, and here the Indian urged his mount down, leaning back from the waist as the horse slid down on stiff legs. The pack horses followed him down reluctantly and my horse stopped, tossing his head nervously and looking for an alternative route. I tugged the reins and heeled to little effect. The Indian was already moving away, riding up the centre of the stream, and I felt a moment of panic thinking I might not be
able to get the horse down and would be abandoned here; I heaved heavily on the reins, bringing the horse around and off balance. He sidestepped and missed the edge of the bank and we went down sideways, the horse snorting and kicking, and somehow managed to stay upright. I took a deep, relieved breath, and the horse shook his head, then started off again behind the others. The bed was strewn with rocks and the pack animals kicked spray up at me. It felt refreshing. We rode through the water for some time, perhaps an hour, and then ascended the far bank, lurching and heaving up through the slippery mud.
The land had changed once more on the far bank of the stream. We were traversing dense forest. The rocks and boulders were still there on all sides, but they were hidden and engulfed by the trees and shrubbery. The undergrowth was heavy, and I could not see the horse’s legs beneath the knees, yet he carried on steadily enough on this invisible ground. Moss braided my shoulders and clung around my neck like Hawaiian leis. It was cooler here, the sun blocked out and the earth damp. I put my windbreaker on again. We passed through an open space and back into the shade, through patterns of light and shadow, moving chiaroscuro imprinted on the senses. I was still sweating, but the moisture was cold, and I was aware of my discomfort now, the blunted sensations of the hot afternoon sharpened unpleasantly. I became conscious of time again, hoping we had not far to go, and looked at my watch. It surprised me to find it was seven o’clock. We had been riding, virtually without pause, for ten hours. The Indian seemed as fresh as he had when we started, and who knew how long he’d ridden to reach Ushuaia that morning. It seemed impossible that anyone, even that extraordinary man, could have travelled through this terrain through the night, and yet we pushed on with no sign of a halt.
We emerged once more into an open space, a hill scarred with stumps. A waterfall sparkled from the ridge to the south and a fallen tree leaned like a buttress against the cliffs below. Halfway up the hill we passed a grave, an indented rectangle of earth and a weathered wooden cross lashed, leaning, against a stump. It amazed me. What solitary shepherd or recluse woodchopper had died in this forsaken place, and who had been here to bury him? Yet, in a way, this forlorn grave gave me a sense of security. I was not at the end of the world, man had been here before, if not civilized at least Christian, and they would be here again. In Ushuaia I had burned with the urge to get away from civilization and to explore undiscovered secrets in forgotten lands, but somewhere along this tedious journey those thoughts had modified and science had yielded to instinct. I would have been very happy indeed to have a drink with Clyde Jones at that moment . . .
We approached the top of the hill and yet another line of trees, silhouetted in tormented tangles against the darkening sky. Small birds watched from the safety of the limbs and butterflies waifed through the vines, catching the last sunlight in their brilliant wings. We drew near and I started at the sudden battering of wings, jerking around to look as a dark form rose up beside me, hovering for a moment and then rising slowly and heavily – a giant condor, a dozen feet between its wingtips, elevating from some disturbed feast. The Indian seemed as unaware of it as he was of me. I shivered and bent over the pommel. We brushed a tree, the rough surface scraping my cheek, but I was too exhausted to feel the pain, scarcely aware of the mountains ahead, capped with snow and fingers of white running down the slopes. They did not seem high, and then, dimly, I realized that we were high; that we had come to the peak of this range of hills, and a long valley was spread out before us.
I gripped the pommel and relaxed my aching knees, knowing I would be unable to go much farther, hoping we would be there soon, or that night would come and force a stop. It couldn’t be long now, the mist was low and the light feeble. The horses were tiring, too, heads down and legs weary and uncertain. We were moving on level ground, crossing the flattened top of the hill towards the descent. A jagged arroyo yawned before us, we passed along the ridge and came out through a field of blasted and broken trees where the wind snarled. There was no shelter here, and the wind had conquered. It was moaning over us, and then, suddenly, it was raging and howling across the surface of the land. It struck without warning, nearly dragging me from the saddle. The horse whinnied and I clutched at mane and pommel and leaned far over. Even the Indian seemed to sway in the unexpected blast. Streamers of yellow moss ran over the ground and a dead tree cracked and splintered. This was not the swirling wind of Ushuaia, but a straight shot from beyond the shoulder of the world, hauling the clouds behind it.
Clinging tightly to the horse, I faced into the wind. I caught my breath. I was looking out beyond those last rocks that stumbled from the edge of the land and sank beneath the towering walls of clouds, looking over the edge of the earth. For an instant the view was clear, and then the rain whipped in and the mists blanketed the sea. It was, in the lapse of seconds, black night.
Even the Indian yielded to this storm. He turned the horses back to the treeline and dismounted in the scant shelter of a rock castle, towers and pillars and spires of ancient stone, stroked smooth on the southern side and harbouring tenacious moss on the north. The horses stood quietly, facing the rocks, their tails rippling as the wind curved around behind, while he unburdened them of their packs. This, obviously, was to be our home for the night, or the duration of the storm. I didn’t know which; I didn’t know if the Indian had intended to stop or if the storm had brought about the decision, and didn’t care about the reason, so long as we had halted. I could scarcely slide from the saddle, every joint was stiffened and I ached through the length of my bones, as though the very marrow had petrified.
I unsaddled the horse and unpacked my sleeping bag and groundsheet, going through the motions mechanically. I hobbled the horse and put the feeding bag on as Graham had demonstrated, feeling hollow with hunger myself but much too weary to make the effort of eating. The horse shuffled off to join the others, dark outlines against the trees, grouped together. The Indian was wrapped in a blanket, lying close to the base of the rocks. I could barely see him. The end of his blanket was lifting as the wind tried to find us, curling around the edges and lashing through the columns, and then hurtling on to vent its fury in the trees.
I slid into the warmth of the sleeping bag, too numb to feel the hard ground under me, and looked up at the raging sky. Darts of rain stabbed my eyes and I turned toward the rocks. I thought for a moment of Susan, of the comfort of being with her in her flat, and decided I was mad to be here, as I drifted into sleep.
Some sound awakened me.
It was early and bright. The world was fresh and clean, and the wind had risen up above the clouds again. I sat up, all my muscles objecting, and saw that the Indian was already arranging the packs. I wondered if he would have ridden off and left me sleeping, and felt certain he would have, through indifference rather than maliciousness.
It was agony to slide from the sleeping bag, and I recalled my thoughts of the morning before – that I didn’t object to genuinely earned discomfort – and decided that this principle could be taken too far. But necessity forced me on.
My horse stood patiently while I saddled him and removed the hobble. The Indian was already moving off through the broken trees as I painfully hauled myself into the saddle. My stomach muscles ached and my thighs throbbed as they gripped. I doubted that I could last through another day like the last, and yet there was no choice now. I couldn’t turn back and I couldn’t go on at my own pace, I had to follow the Indian at whatever speed he travelled, and pray we found Hodson before I collapsed.
Strangely enough, however, this second day was not so bad once it had started. We were descending now, and this threw new muscles and balance into use, fulcruming against the grain of the old stress, but my body was deadened and the pain was a dull constant which could be ignored. The muscles, being used, did not stiffen. I found it easier to keep my balance without conscious effort, and was able to eat dried meat and chocolate from my pack without slowing or faltering. Perhaps we travelled at a lesser pace, as well, for the
horses must have been feeling the efforts of the long day before. Only the Indian seemed incapable of fatigue, and he was wise enough not to push the animals beyond their endurance.
At first I kept my mind from my discomfort by observing the landscape, and after a while my thoughts turned inward and dwelt on any number of unrelated subjects. When I came back to reality from these wanderings, I was surprised to discover how well my body was standing up to the rigours of the journey – far better than I would have thought myself capable of when I lurched painfully into the saddle that morning. There was a touch of pride and self-respect in this, and there might have been vanity as well, but for the example of the Indian riding on before me, relentless and enduring, and looking at him I felt that it was only luck that kept me going.
I had no idea how far we’d travelled when, in the late afternoon, we came to Hodson’s.
VI
We came around a fold in the hills and Hodson’s house was below us, in the basin of a narrow, converging valley. The sun was in the west. It lighted the surrounding hilltops but hadn’t slanted down the valley, and the house was shrouded in gloom. It was a bleak structure, rough grey wooden walls and a corrugated iron roof, protected from the wind by the shoulders of land that rose on three sides and a sheer rock face towering behind.
I was surprised. I’d expected something more, or something less – either a rough field camp or a civilized home, perhaps even a laboratory. But this was a crude, makeshift building, sturdy enough but poorly finished. Still, it fitted in with what I knew of Hodson. He wasn’t a man who needed or wanted the fringes and frills of modern convenience; perhaps, with no income I knew of and only his limited personal funds, he could afford nothing else.
The Mammoth Book of Frankenstein (Mammoth Books) Page 68
