Winter in the Blood

by James Welch

  The salesman wasn’t even happy about selling the car. He laid the papers on the hood and told me to sign in a couple of places. Then he gave me the keys and the airplane man gave him two one-hundreds, a fifty and a ten.

  It didn’t start. The salesman got a mechanic from the Ford garage who fooled with the wires, took the distributor cap off, then hit the solenoid a couple of times with his screwdriver. Everything seemed to be in working order. The three of them pushed me out onto the gravel shoulder beside the highway, grunting, swearing, building up speed. I popped the clutch and the motor coughed two or three times—then to my everlasting surprise, it caught. I pushed the clutch in and raced the motor, slowing to a stop. The airplane man caught up and heaved himself into the seat. We sat there for a minute while he caught his breath. I clicked on the radio.

  “Where are the cherries?” he said.

  “Uh-oh.” I skipped back to the car lot. They were sitting on the hood of the white Chrysler. The cherries were probably floating in chocolate soup, but I took them back to the car and threw them in the backseat.

  I twirled the dials on the radio, then punched the buttons beneath it. I stuck my hand up underneath the dashboard to see if the radio was warm. There was nothing there.

  “Well, let’s go get a bite—all this exertion has whetted my appetite.”

  We drove downtown in first gear in order to charge up the battery.

  “Pull over beside this hotel.”

  He took the teddy bear in his arm. I gunned the motor a few times before shutting it off. A cloud of blue smoke seeped in through the back windows.

  “She claimed she was your daughter’s sister.”

  He didn’t answer.

  “She claimed she used to dance for you—you used to give her a dollar to dance.”

  He opened his door.

  “How much money did you abscond with, anyway?”

  He entered the hotel. I watched him through the plate-glass window. The clerk handed him his key and a piece of paper, which he looked at intently before bounding up the stairs.

  I felt under the dashboard again. The radio just wasn’t there. I got out and pushed down the aerial, then leaned against the fender to wait. I glanced up the street, and there she was, the girl who had stolen my gun and electric razor, standing in front of The Silver Dollar. She seemed to be waiting for someone. I ducked back. Even though she was in the middle of the next block, I knew that she would recognize me. Dougie had probably told her that I was looking for her. That would sharpen her eye. I pulled the aerial up again, and there was Dougie standing beside her, pointing in my direction. He took her arm. She shook her head, her short dark hair flaring for an instant. He let her go and walked quickly into The Silver Dollar. There was something almost defiant in the way she stood, feet spread slightly, looking at me, but her short blue dress and short hair made her look bewildered, like a child caught roaming the halls in school. She turned and walked next door to Gable’s, glancing back as she opened the door.

  I wanted to follow her, to forget about the airplane man and his crazy business, his daughter and the purple teddy bear. I wanted to buy her a drink and sit with her and talk about whatever we had talked about before she stole my gun and electric razor. I wanted to be with her, but I didn’t move. I didn’t know how to go to her. There were people counting on me to make her suffer, and I too felt that she should suffer a little. Afterwards, I could buy her a drink.

  The airplane man had changed clothes. He was wearing a white shirt with a dark blue handkerchief knotted around his neck, a blue-and-white striped sports coat and white pants. He had dusted off his safari boots.

  “What do you think?” he said.

  “You look like a regular dude.”

  “That’s the ticket, just the sort who would be catching a plane out of Calgary, wouldn’t you say?”

  “I don’t know—that’s where the Calgary Stampede is.”

  “Well, must be a lot of dudes around there. Incidentally, we’re going to be delayed—we’ll leave at midnight.”

  We ate a couple of chicken-fried steaks apiece. As the airplane man explained the details of the plan, I experienced a funny feeling of excitement and sadness. If I went through with it, I would become somebody else and the girl would have no meaning for me. Seeing her in front of The Silver Dollar had sparked a warmth in me that surprised me, that I couldn’t remember having felt in years. It seemed funny that it should happen now, since I had felt nothing for her when we were living together.

  “I have some business to take care of,” I said.

  “Now? But we should stick together now.”

  “No, I have to do this thing now. Tell you what—I’ll meet you in the Palace Bar at ten. It’s just across the street.”

  But I didn’t go directly to Gable’s. I needed to walk alone for a while. I crossed to the intersection and walked south down the other main street of Havre. I passed the spot where the airplane man had given the girls the chocolate-covered cherries. A couple of blocks later, I stood in front of a movie house. There was a double feature playing, one Western starring John Wayne, the other Randolph Scott. Both movies looked familiar. They had probably played in every town in Montana once a year for the past twenty. On the billboard, Randolph Scott, dressed in a red double-breasted shirt, white hat and blazing guns, grinned cruelly at me.

  The twenty years slipped away and I was a kid again, Mose at my side.

  Do you suppose he shoots as well with his left hand as he does with his right?

  I’ll bet he’s plenty fast. Those guys practice.

  I’m talking about accuracy. Have you ever shot a pistol with your left hand?

  I can’t remember. It would be hard to aim. But, see, he doesn’t even have to.

  I’m talking about handling the gun. You just try it.

  Maybe he’s left-handed.

  How about his right hand then?

  25

  Fall had been brief that year. The heavy August days had lazed into September with a heat that denied the regular change of seasons. The days did not become shorter, the nights did not cool off, nor did the stars turn white. It seemed that the hot, fly-buzzing days would never break, that summer would last through Christmas. Mosquitoes swarmed in the evenings outside the kitchen window and redwing blackbirds hid in the ragged cattails of the irrigation ditches.

  Then, toward the end of September (when everyone was talking of years past), fall arrived. The leaves of the cottonwoods changed to dusty gold and fell; the fields of alfalfa, long since cut and baled, turned black beneath a black sky that refused to rain. Mosquitoes disappeared one night as if by magic, and the blackbirds flocked up for their flight south. At night the sky cleared off, revealing stars that did not give off light, so that one looked at them with the feeling that he might not be seeing them, but rather some obscure points of white that defied distance, were both years and inches from his nose.

  And then it turned winter. Although it had not snowed and no one admitted it, we all felt the bite of winter in our bones. It was during one of those bitter nights that my father, First Raise, who had not even had time to make his plans for the taking of elk in Glacier Park, decided to bring the cows down from their summer range. We had been expecting it, so the announcement came as no great surprise. First Raise said to Mose, “You and your brother bring the cows in tomorrow.” Teresa packed a lunch that night—sandwiches and hard-boiled eggs. We went to bed early, not really expecting to do much sleeping but to lie and think of the several places on the range where the cows would be this time of year. Huddled beneath the star quilt, we plotted routes that would allow us to sweep the ravines and reservoirs, the buttes from which we could see the washouts and cutbanks that would shelter the cows from a high wind. In the glass cupboard by the door, the circles of arrowheads, the jackknife and skulls, the coin collection were as distant as the stars.
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br />   First Raise woke us up about four in the morning. Without a word he shook Mose awake, then me (but I had been waiting). We dressed quickly—long johns, blue jeans, flannel shirts and boots. As we tiptoed through the living room, my grandmother, who was old even then, watched us without sign of recognition.

  First Raise cooked breakfast on the wood stove. He wore a pair of Levi’s and a work shirt. He would be fixing machines later in the day. We watched him break the eggs on the side of the frying pan, then jump back as the grease curled the edges black. In another frying pan, he dropped slices of bread into bubbling butter that hissed a keen smell through the kitchen.

  First Raise set the plates of food before us. The eggs were yellow and white and black, the bread golden brown. He went over to the bucket beside the washbasin and dipped us each a glass of water, then sat silently watching us eat. The eggs were like rubber. First Raise smiled. It was beginning to get light.

  First Raise got us each a cup of coffee and watched us drink. It was beginning to get light. He loved us. He watched us drink the bitter coffee down. In the living room beside the oil stove, my grandmother snored. Behind the closed door leading off the kitchen, Teresa slept or didn’t sleep. First Raise watched us drink the coffee down, then stood.

  “Ride the west fence first,” he said.

  Mose was fourteen.

  “Ride the west fence. That’s where they were the other day; that’s where the grazing is,” he said.

  I was twelve.

  We walked down to the corral. It was beginning to get light as we saddled the horses. Bird, just three years old, sniffed the morning air as I tightened the cinch. Mose saddled up the bay, then swung aboard. First Raise stood in the doorway up at the house and watched us ride out. We waved. He smiled.

  The horses were strong beneath us when the first orange appeared on the eastern horizon. We rode out past the alfalfa fields, past the gumbo flats. Mose got down and opened the gate. The horses clattered across the highway, shy of the hard surface and alive in the morning chill. There were no cars.

  We rode up the west fence, pushing cows out of ravines and cutbanks. Nearly every one of them had a calf by her side. Things went smoothly, even the bulls cooperating, sauntering easily before us. Occasionally a calf would break from the herd, but one of us would ride it down and bring it back. The wild-eyed roan was dry that year but fell in with the rest of the herd. Like a spinster aunt, she avoided the small kicking calves with outraged dignity.

  About midmorning we reached the first reservoir. It was almost dry, three or four muddy pools providing the cows with water. Mose loped over to a knoll just south of the reservoir from which he could look down into the surrounding ravines. He rode easily atop the bay, kicking it once or twice in the ribs, his straw hat which he had soaked and shaped pulled down low over his ears.

  It was beginning to warm up a little, but the cattle just stood beside the reservoir, neither grazing nor drinking. From the southeast the clouds, which came every day now, began to appear over the Bear Paws. Within a couple of hours they would erase the sun, bringing with them not rain but a bitter wind.

  From the top of the knoll Mose motioned me to continue pushing the cows east, then dropped out of sight down the other side. I kicked Bird in the ribs and he started the herd, moving from side to side behind them, nipping at a calf which lagged behind. The herd was still small, some twenty cows, most with calves, and the two bulls ambling in the middle.

  An hour later, Mose appeared on the south horizon, driving five or six cows with calves. As soon as they saw the others, they broke into a trot and began to call.

  Mose fell in beside me. His horse’s shoulders and flanks were shiny. “Goddamn baboons,” he said.

  “Striped-ass green suckers,” I said.

  He laughed and swatted the wild-eyed cow on the rump with the end of his rope. “I saw three coyotes,” he said. “Two of them were pups.”

  “I wish I had my gun with me,” I said. “I’d have blasted them.”

  “You don’t have any shells left.”

  “I might have a couple you don’t know about.”

  “I might go after those deer I saw the other day.”

  “There aren’t any deer around that slough,” I said.

  “How come I saw four of them the other day?”

  “How come you always see them when nobody else is around? I don’t notice anybody else seeing any.”

  “One of them was a buck, six-pointer.”

  He handed me a piece of gum. It was Juicy Fruit. I unwrapped it and stuck it in my mouth. It was brittle.

  “Anyway I might bring my gun tomorrow,” I said.

  “That’s a laugh—you couldn’t hit a bull in the ass with a peashooter. Besides, we aren’t coming back, we’re going to get them all today.”

  “How many altogether?”

  Mose worked a piece of paper out of his hip pocket. “Seventy-eight cows and four bulls—no, three, not counting that one that got into Rankin’s range.”

  From the southeast I could see the dark shadows of the clouds glide across the tan hills. “You better be right—it’s liable to be blizzarding by tomorrow!” And the sun disappeared.

  We ate lunch under a cutbank out of the wind.

  26

  Randolph Scott had plugged me dead with a memory I had tried to keep away. I turned back toward the bars. It was almost dark but no stars had come out, not even the evening star; the moon was a pale globe above the post office. The cars filled with teen-agers had begun to circle the downtown blocks. The streetlights suddenly flared, then settled to a steady glow. The dots of the clock above the bank said 8:54.

  I crossed the intersection and started for Gable’s. I looked back up the block at my Falcon. It crouched beside the curb, all but invisible behind a shiny station wagon. As I turned, my eyes caught the light of the Palace Bar. The airplane man was standing to the side of the open door. I stopped. He was talking to a woman. Although she had her back to me, there was something familiar about her hips. She was dressed up in a yellow pants suit cut narrow at the waist. Her hips swelled under the jacket and tapered into long legs that also looked familiar. Legs can’t look familiar, but hips … nice little twitch—it had to be the barmaid from Malta. What was she doing here? The airplane man put his hand on her shoulder and gestured toward the hotel. Then I saw her face and it was the barmaid. In my mind I saw the hotel room in Malta—the button between her breasts popping—she had come to my room. She crossed the street and went into the hotel. The airplane man watched her enter, then turned into the Palace Bar.

  I looked back down the street to the spot in front of Gable’s where the girl who had stolen my gun and electric razor had been standing that afternoon. I felt the car keys in my pocket. Two of them were identical, a third was shorter with a rounded head. I pulled them out and studied them. There was a white tag hanging from the thin wire ring: “Falcon (move!).” I threw the keys into the air. They landed with a clink in the gutter between two parked cars.

  She was sitting at the far end of the bar. It took only a moment to pick her out from the crowd of laughing, yelling Indians. She sat with her legs crossed, holding a cigarette away from her eyes. Her dress was hiked up over her lean brown thighs. Above the din, the jukebox belted out a brave old song:

  From loneliness to a wedding ring

  I played an ace and I won a queen

  “How’s it going?” I said, and sat down beside her.

  She looked at me quickly and her eyes were dark.

  “You shouldn’t have come here,” she whispered.

  “Don’t worry about it,” I said. “Do you think I care about that gun?”

  She dismissed the gun with a wave of her cigarette. “That’s not what I mean.”

  “I couldn’t even find a plug-in for that electric razor. I won it.”

  A ro
und glass of crème de menthe sat on the bar in front of her. I could almost feel the smoothness of her face with my eyes. Except for a gaunt darkness beneath her cheekbones, she could have been a grade-school girl. Her dress was cut almost to the waist in back, her back as smooth as her face. In the high light, her short straight-cut hair glistened like tar. She ran her finger across her upper lip in a sudden gesture of agitation.

  I looked around. “What’s going on? How come you’re so nervous?” All of a sudden I felt nervous too. My mind fluttered back to the airplane man and his plot. I began to suspect that she was in on it.

  But she was worried about something else. “Dougie and a couple of his friends are going to beat you up,” she whispered.

  I looked at her lips and nodded my head stupidly, expecting her to say something real, but she didn’t. I looked into her eyes to see if she was serious and she was. The roof of my mouth went dry and my tongue came away from it with a clack. “But what for?”

  “He thinks you’re looking for him; that’s what you’re doing here, so he’s going to beat you to it.”

  My expression must have amused her. She smiled. Her teeth were green from the crème de menthe.

  “Where is he now?”

  “Looking for you. He wants to take you by surprise.” Her tone was sympathetic but impersonal. “I don’t like it,” she said. “I believe in a fair fight.”

  “Thanks.”

  “I tried to talk him out of it, you know. I hate that kind of thing.” She sounded like an adult, but then she said: “Have you missed me?”

  “Where do you think he is now?”

  She dropped her shoulders in irritation and sipped at her drink.

  I glanced around behind me. Three women were standing in front of the jukebox, looking at the selections and moving their hips to a slow number. One was barefoot. Her feet were flat.

  “Look,” I said, “maybe I ought to get out of here. We could go someplace else. I have a car now.” Then I remembered I had thrown the keys in the gutter. I stood and started for the door.