the Thundering Herd (1984)

by Grey, Zane

  It did not take long for her to discover that this place had much to distract her from meditation or work. Suddenly it awoke in her a feeling that she did not know she possessed. Solitude she had always yearned for, but beauty and nature, the sweetness of sylvan scene and melody of birds, as now revealed to her, had not heretofore been part of her experience. They seemed strangely harmonious with the vague and growing emotion in her heart.

  Milly did not read or sew. Wild canaries and song-sparrows and swamp blackbirds were singing all around her. A low melodious hum of many bees came from the flowering brush above. Somewhere under the bank water was softly rippling. A kingfisher flew swiftly downstream, glinting in the sunlight. At the bend of the stream, on a jutting sandbar, stood a heron, motionless and absorbed, gazing down into the water. The warm fragrant air seemed to float drowsily toward her.

  The peace and music of this scene were abruptly dispelled by crashing, thudding sound's from the slope opposite. Milly gazed across. Shaggy dark forms were passing from the open plain down into the woods.

  "Oh!--buffalo!" cried Milly, at once delighted and frightened. Her heart beat high. Gathering up her book and sewing, she was about to answer to the instinct to run when it occurred to her that she was on a steep bank high above the stream, out of danger. She decided to stand her ground. Sinking low behind a fringe of grass and flowers, she peeped over it, with bated breath and wide eyes.

  Everywhere along the sky line of the wooded slope she saw the dark forms, not in a thick troop, but straggling in twos and threes.

  Lower down the foremost buffalo appeared, scattering dead leaves and raising the dust. A hundred yards below Milly the first buffalo came out of the woods upon the sand and crossed it to drink. Then gradually the line of bobbing brown humps emerged from the trees and grew closer and closer to Milly until she began to fear they would come right opposite to her. What wild, shaggy, ox- like beasts! If she had been fearful at first, she now grew frightened. Yet the wonder and majesty of these buffalo were not lost upon her. On they crashed out of the woods! She heard the splashing of the water. Like cattle at a long trough they lined up to the stream and bent huge woolly black heads.

  "If any come close--I'm going to run!" whispered Milly to herself.

  It did not appear, however, that she would have to resort to flight. The line of buffalo halted some fifty yards below her position. Thus she managed to avert utter panic, and as the moments passed her fears began to subside. Suddenly they were altogether dispelled. A number of buffalo broke ranks and turned again to the woods, leaving open spaces where tawny little buffalo calves could be seen. Milly experienced a feeling of utmost pleasure. All her life on the farm she had loved the little calves. These were larger, very wild looking, fuzzy and woolly, light in color, and did not appear, like the calves she had seen, weak and wabbly in their legs. These young animals were strong and nimble. Some left their mothers' sides and frisked along the sand a little way, in an unmistakable playfulness, yet unlike any play Milly had ever seen. They lifted themselves off their front feet and gave their heads a turning, butting movement, quite agile, and nothing if not aggressive. Then they fled back to their mothers.

  Only a few of these calves drank from the stream, and they did not appear thirsty, as did the matured buffalo. Gradually the ranks thinned, and then the last of the grown buffalo turned to the slope. The calves, though loath to leave that enchanting spot, did not tarry long behind. The herd leisurely trooped up the slope and disappeared.

  To Milly it did not seem possible that she had actually seen buffalo close at hand. The reality was strikingly different from the impression she had gathered. Huge beasts, yet not ugly or mean! They seemed as tame as cattle. Certainly if unmolested they would never harm anyone. Suddenly the bang of heavy guns rang from far over the slope.

  "Oh, Jett and his hunters!" she exclaimed, in quick comprehension.

  "They are killing the buffalo!"

  Not until that moment had the actual killing of buffalo--the meaning of it--crossed Milly's mind. Bang--bang--bang came the shots. They made her shrink. Those splendid beasts were being killed for their hides. Somehow it seemed base. What would become of the little calves? There dawned in Milly's mind an aversion for this hide-hunting. If the meat was to be used, even given to the hungry people of the world, then the slaughter might be condoned.

  But just to sell the hides!

  "Tom Doan is a hide-hunter, too," she soliloquized. "Oh, I'm sorry! . . . he looked so nice and kind. I guess I--I don't care much about him."

  What a man's vocation happened to be was really a serious matter to a woman. Milly recalled that one of the troubles between her mother and Jett had been his hatred of farm labor. Manifestly this hunting buffalo was to his liking, and perhaps he did not call it work.

  Thus the incident of the buffalo coming down to drink had upset Milly's short period of revel in the sylvan place. Even when the muddy water cleared out of the stream, and the dust clouds disappeared from the woods, and the melody of birds and bees was renewed Milly did not recover the happy trend of feeling.

  Realization of the fact that Tom Doan was a hide-hunter had spoiled everything. Milly tried to read, and failing that she took up her sewing, which occupation had the virtue of being both necessity and pastime. For an hour or more the bang-bang of guns upon the plain above disturbed her. These reports appeared to get farther and farther away, until she could not hear them any more.

  Some time after this, when she was returning to the dreamy mood, she heard a crashing of brush opposite and below her. Listening and peering in this direction, where the wood was thicker, she waited expectantly for buffalo to appear. The sound came at regular intervals. It made Milly nervous to become aware that these crashings were approaching a point directly opposite her.

  A growth of willows bordered the bank here, preventing her from seeing what might be there.

  Then she heard heavy puffs--the breaths of a large beast. They sounded almost like the mingled panting and coughing of an animal strangling, or unable to breathe right.

  Another crash very close sent cold chills over Milly. But she had more courage than on the first occasion. She saw the willows shake, and then spread wide to emit an enormous black head and hump of a buffalo. Milly seemed to freeze there where she crouched.

  This buffalo looked wild and terrible. He was heaving. A bloody froth was dripping from his extended tongue. His great head rolled from side to side. As he moved again, with a forward lurch, Milly saw that he was crippled. The left front leg hung broken, and flopped as he plunged to the water. On his left shoulder there was a bloody splotch.

  Milly could not remove her eyes from the poor brute. She saw him and all about him with a distinctness she could never forget. She heard the husky gurgle of water as he drank thirstily. Below him the slow current of the stream was tinged red. For what appeared a long time he drank. Then he raised his great head. The surroundings held no menace for him. He seemed dazed and lost.

  Milly saw the rolling eyes as he lurched and turned. He was dying.

  In horror Milly watched him stagger into the willows and slowly crash out of sight. After that she listened until she could no longer hear the crackling of brush and twigs. Then Milly relaxed and sank back into her former seat. Her horror passed with a strong shuddering sensation, leaving in her a sickening aversion to this murderous buffalo hunting.

  The sun mounted high and the heat of the May day quieted the birds.

  The bees, however, kept up their drowsy hum. No more buffalo disturbed Milly's spasmodic periods of sewing and reading and the long spells of dreaming. Hours passed. Milly heard no horses or men, and not until the afternoon waned towards its close did she start back to camp. To retrace her steps was not an easy matter, but at last she wound her way through the brush to the open space.

  Camp was deserted, so far as any one stirring about was concerned.

  Milly missed one of the wagons.

  Some time later, while she
was busy making her own cramped quarters more livable, she heard the voices of men, the thud of hoofs, and the creak of wheels. With these sounds the familiar oppression returned to her breast. Jett would soon be there, surly and hungry. Milly swiftly concluded her task and hurried down out of her wagon.

  Presently the men came trooping into camp on foot, begrimed with dust and sweat and manifestly weary. Catlee was carrying a heavy burden of four guns.

  Jett looked into his tent.

  "Come out, you lazy jade," he called, roughly, evidently to his wife. "A buffalo wolf has nothin' on me for hunger." Then he espied Milly, who was in the act of lighting a fire. "Good! You'd make a wife, Milly."

  "Haw! Haw!" laughed Follonsbee, sardonically, as he threw down hat, gloves, vest, and spread his grimy hands. "No water! Gimme a bucket. If I had a wife there'd be water in camp."

  "Huh! You hawk-faced Yankee--there ain't no woman on earth who'd fetch water for you," taunted Pruitt.

  "Wal, if Hank thinks he can teach Jane to fetch an' carry he's welcome to her," responded Jett.

  This bluff and hearty badinage, full of contention as it was, marked a change in the demeanor of Jett and his men. Catlee, however, took no part in it. He was connected with Jett's outfit, but did not belong there.

  Mrs. Jett then appeared among them, and her advent, probably because of Jett's remark, occasioned ill-suppressed mirth.

  "I heard what you said, Rand Jett," she retorted, glaring at him.

  "You can't make me welcome to any man, much less a hide thief like Hank Follonsbee."

  "Shut your face," returned Jett, in an entirely different tone.

  "You know your job. Rustle to it."

  That ended the approach to humor. When Follonsbee fetched the water they all washed and splashed with great gusto. This pleasant task finished, they showed plainly what little leisure was now possible to them, for they got their kits and began reloading shells and sharpening knives.

  "Catlee, you clean the guns," ordered Jett.

  While thus busily engaged they talked of the day's hunt--of the half hour of shooting that was fun and the eight hours of skinning that was labor--of the hide-stretching still to do before sleep could be thought of. Milly listened with keen ears in the hope they might drop some word of the Hudnall outfit, but she spent her attention in vain.

  Presently Mrs. Jett called, "Come to supper."

  "Or you'll throw it out, huh?" queried Jett, rising with alacrity.

  They ate hurriedly and prodigiously, in silence, and each man reached for what he wanted without asking. Jett was the first to finish.

  "Fill up, you hawgs," he said to his comrades; "we've work to do.--

  Jane, you an' Milly clean up--then go to bed. We'll be just outside the grove, stretchin' hides."

  Milly lay awake a long while that night, yet did not hear the men return. Next day they had breakfast before sunrise and were off with a rush. Milly spent quiet hours on the shady bank, where the sweetness and music were undisturbed. Another day passed in which she saw nothing of the men except at the morning and evening meal hours. Jett and his helpers were settling into the strenuous routine of hide-hunting.

  On the fourth day they broke camp and traveled twenty miles down the same side of the river, to halt in the only clump of trees Milly had noted for hours. Next morning Jett's men were again hunting buffalo. That night they did not return until long after dark. Milly had gone to bed, but she heard their gruff, weary voices.

  The following day was again one of breaking camp and traveling south. Milly observed that the country changed, while yet it seemed the same; and she concluded that it was the vastness and wildness which grew. Next morning she heard shooting up until noon. She was so grateful to be left alone that the hours seemed to fly. There was always a place where she could hide near camp, and Jett seldom forgot to mention this. As they journeyed farther south his vigilance as well as his excitement increased day by day.

  From the camp-fire talk Milly gathered that both the number of buffalo and of hunters were augmenting. Yet Jett appeared to have established the rule of traveling one day and hunting the next. As he progressed the work grew more arduous. There was no road over this endless plain, and the level stretches were cut up, sometimes necessitating the unloading and reloading of the wagons. May warmed to June. The plain was now one wide rolling expanse of green, waving gently to every breeze; the stream courses were marked by a line of deeper green, trees now in full foliage. Herds of buffalo began to show to the east of this stream Jett was following. His hunting, however, he did on the west side, where Milly understood the buffalo ranged in larger numbers.

  At length Jett traveled two days southward and then crossed the stream to its west bank. Following it down on that side, he was halted by a large river.

  "Ha, boys, here's the Red, an' it's our stampin' ground this summer," he rolled out, sonorously.

  For a camp he chose a spot hard to reach, as well as hard to espy from above. A forest of timber and brush bordered both sides of this Red River, and once down in it neither river nor plain could be seen. Jett spent the remainder of that day making permanent camp. Follonsbee, whom he had sent on a reconnoitering ride up the river, returned about sunset.

  "Believe I saw fifty square miles of buffalo," he announced, impressively, sitting in his saddle and gazing down at the leader.

  "Huh! I took that for granted," replied Jett. "How far did you go?"

  "Reckon about five miles up an' climbed a big bluff above the river. Could see for miles. An' shore that sight stumped me.

  Why, Rand, I couldn't see the end of buffalo, an' I was usin' the telescope, too!"

  "That's more to the point--how many outfits could you spot?" demanded Jett, impatiently.

  "Wal, I spotted enough, an' some to spare," drawled the other.

  "West of the bluff I seen camp smokes all along the river, as far as I could see."

  "Any camps close?"

  "Only two between ours an' the bluff," replied Follonsbee. "Then there's one on the point across the creek. Reckon outfits are strung down the river, too. Buffalo everywhere."

  "Ahuh! It's the main herd. Now, I wonder will they run north."

  "Reckon so. But if they do they'll turn back."

  "You figger on their bein' blocked by the gang of hide-hunters behind us?"

  "Prezactly. We couldn't be in a better stand. This big herd is massed in a triangle. River on the south; Staked Plain on the west, an' on the third side thousands of hunters."

  "Yes. It's seems that way. Mighty big bit of country, but it IS a trap."

  "Where do the Indians come in your calculatin'?" queried Follonsbee.

  "Nowhere. If they get mean the buffalo-hunters will band together an' do what the soldiers couldn't do--chase the damned redskins up in their Staked Plain an' kill them."

  "Wal, it looks like a hell of a summer, huh?"

  "I reckon so, all around. It means the end of the buffalo, an' that means peace with the Indians, whether they fight or not."

  "Rand, this is the huntin' ground of Comanches, Cheyennes, Kiowas, an' Arapahoes. The land an' the buffalo are theirs."

  "Theirs--hell!" exploded Jett, in contempt.

  "Shore I know your sentiments," returned Follonsbee, rather shortly. "Like most of these hide-hunters, you say wipe the redskins off the earth. To me it looks like a dirty trick. I'd rather steal from a white man than an Indian. . . . But I'm givin' you my idee for what it's worth. We'll have to fight."

  Jett appeared for the moment in a brown study, while he paced up and down, swinging a short rope he had in his hand.

  "If the Indians are on the war-path, as we hear, won't they wait till this bunch of hunters has a big store of hides on hand--before startin' that fight?" he queried, shrewdly.

  "I reckon they would," admitted Follonsbee.

  "An' when they do come raidin', we're goin' to get the hunch in plenty of time, aren't we?" went on Jett.

  "We shore have a fine stand. With hu
nters east an' west of us, an' millions of buffalo out there, we can't hardly be surprised."

  "Wal, then, what's eatin' you?" growled Jett.

  "Nothin.' I was just gettin' things clear. We're agreed on the main points. Now one more. The sooner we make a big stake, the better?"

  Jett nodded a significant acquiescence to that query, and then went about his tasks. Follonsbee, dismounting, took the saddle off his horse. Soon after that Mrs. Jett called them to supper.

  At this camp Milly lost her wagon as an abode, a circumstance, on the moment, much to her displeasure. The wagon, being high off the ground, and with its box sides, had afforded more of protection, if not comfort. Jett had removed hoops and canvas bodily and had established them as a tent, a little distance from the main camp.

  Milly pondered apprehensively over this removal by some rods from the rest of the tents. Perhaps Mrs. Jett had inspired this innovation, and if so Milly felt that she would welcome it. But she had doubts of every move made by the leader of the outfit.

  Upon entering the improvised tent Milly found that she could not stand erect, but in all other particulars it was an improvement.

  She could lace both doors tightly, something impossible when the tent was on the wagon. She unrolled her bed and made it up. Then she unpacked and unfolded her clothes and hung them conveniently at the back. Her bag, with its jumbled assortment of things she had thought so poor, now, in the light of this wild travel, assumed proportions little short of precious. She could have been worse off--something which before had never crossed her mind. Without soap, linen and muslin, a sewing kit, mirror, a few books, and many other like articles, she would have found this camp life in the wilderness something formidable to face.

  When she went outside again daylight was still strong and the afterglow of sunset was spreading in beautiful effulgence over the western sky. Milly gazed about her. It appeared that a jungle lay between camp and the river. Jett and his men were in earnest and whispered council, with guns and tools and ammunition for the moment forgotten. Mrs. Jett sat a forlorn and sullen figure in front of her tent. Milly needed and wanted exercise. She began to walk around the camp. No one paid any heed to her. Indeed, since reaching the buffalo fields, she had become a negligible attraction, for which she was devoutly thankful.