The Valley

by William Meikle

  Doing a fine job of looking after everybody here Jake. A damned fine job.

  Another spear thudded into the ground a foot from Jake’s right foot.

  “We need to retire and regroup Gaffer,” the Squire said weakly.

  Jake nodded.

  “But where can we go that is safe?”

  Pat’s head came up. He almost smiled.

  “We know a good place, don’t we Frank? We can get a fire going and be safe and warm in no time. Can’t we Frank? Can’t we?”

  Frank nodded. He looked too weak to speak.

  Pat hefted the Pastor’s body over his shoulder as if he was little more than a bag of flour.

  Two more spears landed nearby. That decided the matter for Jake.

  “Lead the way big man,” Jake said. “You’re the boss.”

  31

  By the time they made it back to the rock ledge Frank was dead on his feet. Fresh blood leaked through the bandages at his shoulder. His wounds throbbed hotly in time with his heart. He leant heavily on the walking stick all the way up the hill and had to be helped bodily up the short clamber to the overhang.

  Once there he sat on the ledge beside the Squire while Pat and Jake buried the Pastor. It looked to be hard going for them, as the ground was rocky and partially frozen and they only had the axe as a tool. But Pat worked at it like a man possessed and only rested when Jake insisted on taking his turn.

  The Squire and Frank shared several pipes from the Squire’s supply while the Englishman calmly cauterized the slice wounds in his hands and wrists. Several times he winced in pain, but still he smiled when Frank passed him a chunk of meat.

  “Meat thickens the blood,” Frank said. “At least that’s what Pat kept telling me last night.”

  “I’ve heard it said,” the Squire replied. He turned the meat over in his hand before taking a bite. “Wolf eh? I ate a jackal once. In Ethiopia. I remember…”

  Off he went on another tale, one that helped pass the time until Jake and Pat stood up from the grave. Frank and the Squire helped each other down. They stood around the grave, heads lowered.

  After hearing that all the men from the settlement were dead, killed by the scorpions, Pat had gone quiet and still. He insisted on wearing the Pastor’s clothes. They were a tight fit. Where the cassock had hung loosely on the Pastor it was snug against Pat’s broad chest, and he was never going to be able to fasten the duster at the front. But he insisted that he would wear them. Why, Frank had no idea but guessed it might have to do with some churching Pat might have had as a lad. Whatever the reason, he cut an imposing figure in the cassock and black duster. Somehow it made the big man look intimidating.

  The valley is doing something to Pat. Making him into something.

  Pat led them into the Lord’s Prayer, then the big man sang Abide With Me in a high tenor which seemed to send the whole valley into hushed reverence. They left the Pastor’s big bible on the packed earth of the grave. Afterwards Pat stood there for a long time, tears streaming down his cheeks.

  Frank and the Squire went back to rest next to the fire, keeping it stoked.

  Jake came to join them.

  “Well ain’t this a fine day,” he said wearily, and sat down beside them.

  The Squire laughed.

  “What we need is a plan of action Gaffer. Something on which to focus our minds.”

  Jake laughed in reply.

  “What I need is some whiskey. But I don’t fancy our chances of getting back to Ruby Creek alive.”

  They sat watching the valley and brought each other up to date on their stories.

  “Eggs? There were eggs?” Jake said.

  “Thousands of them,” Frank replied. “Might even be hatched by now.”

  Then Jake whistled when Frank told him about the big cat.

  “Sounds like the big man has been holding us all together.”

  Frank looked over to where Pat still stood over the grave.

  “I wouldn’t be alive without him. From now on, where he goes, I go.”

  “And there’s the question,” Jake said. “Where do we go? God knows how many of them scorpions there are between us and safety.”

  At first Frank had no answer. He stared down at the valley floor.

  He heard them before he saw them, the same deep bellowing from the day before. The herd of shaggy beasts lumbered into view. They stayed well back from the water.

  And just as well.

  Out on the lake black shapes seemed to glide, just below water level, grouping just off-shore.

  They are waiting for the beasts.

  The shaggy beasts stamped and bellowed. They tore at the turf with their tusks and threw grass high in the air all around them.

  The scorpions lay still, quiet, waiting.

  The noise of the bellowing resounded like thunder through the valley.

  Still the scorpions didn’t move.

  Jake looked down, following Frank’s gaze.

  “It’s a stand off,” Frank said. “The beasts need water, but can’t get any closer, and the scorpions need meat for their young, but I’m guessing they can’t get too far out of the water… not in daylight anyways.”

  “What do you mean, need meat for their young?”

  Frank told Jake about the line of scorpions carrying meat back to the cave, and what he thought it meant.

  Jake’s face broke into a grin.

  “You’ve given me an idea. But rest-up a bit. I need to chew on it a while.”

  After a while the shaggy beasts gave up and retreated out of sight back up the valley. Slowly the gray shapes under the water drifted off to other parts of the lake, leaving the white bones of the carcasses as the only evidence they’d ever been there.

  32

  Jake left Frank and the Squire sitting on the ledge and went to sit at the fire. After a while Pat came and sat beside him.

  “Are you okay Pat?” Jake asked.

  The big man was quiet for a long time. Sitting there in the Pastor’s cassock and duster he looked like a monk deep in prayer. When he looked up at Jake his eyes were red and rheumy.

  “They’s all dead Jake,” he whispered. “George, Jim, Farting Bill. Everybody. They’s all dead.”

  Jake looked down into the fire.

  “I know,” he said softly. “But we’re still here. The best thing we can do is remember them.”

  Pat started into the fire for a while longer.

  “I aim to do better than that,” he said after a time. “I aim to make sure they ain’t dead for nothing.”

  “How are you planning on doing that big man?”

  But Pat was in no mood for talking. They sat in silence. Eventually the Squire came and sat with them.

  “Frank said you had an idea?” he said to Jake. “A campaign plan?”

  Jake nodded.

  “I’ve been thinking. If them scorpions are so keen on taking meat up to the cave, then maybe we need to make sure they get plenty of it. That way, we can slip past them real sneaky-like, while they’re occupied, and get back to the Creek.”

  “Good thinking Gaffer,” the Squire said. “The sooner we get out of this place the better.”

  “And then what Jake?” Pat said quietly.

  Jake smiled.

  “Then we pick up George’s gold and high-tail it back to somewhere we can spend it.”

  “No,” Pat said.

  Just that one word, but it was the first time that Jake could remember Pat disagreeing with him.

  “Have you got a better plan big man?”

  Pat was quiet for so long that Jake didn’t think he was going to answer. And when he did, he stunned Jake into a shocked silence.

  “The way I see it, we brought the beasties here,” he said. “We started all this death… brought it on ourselves. If we hadn’t been so greedy for the damned motherlode, all of this ain’t never needed to happen. We gotta fix it Jake. For George’s sake. For the Pastor’s sake. For the sake of all our friends, and of everything
in this valley, and outside. We ain’t gonna let more of them scorpion things out into our world. We can’t.”

  That was the longest speech Jake had ever heard from the Irishman, and the most heartfelt. It also echoed in Jake’s conscience alongside the promises he’d made back in the cave; to George, to the Pastor…and to myself.

  “Okay Pat. Let’s hear it.”

  “I’ve been thinking,” he started.

  “Be careful you don’t strain anything,” the Squire said, then went quiet when he saw the look on Pat’s face.

  “I’ve been thinking about Ruby Creek. Well, not about the Creek, but about what we left in the cabins. We’ve got a lot of black powder Jake. A whole lot.”

  Jake smiled.

  “And if we get all them scorpions down into the cave? Have we enough to send them all to Hell?”

  “Well, we surely got enough to stop them climbing back out of it,” Pat said. “But first we gotta get them there.”

  “Leave that to me big man,” Jake said. “You ain’t the only one who’s been thinking.”

  33

  Frank heard the conversation from his spot at the ledge, but was too tired to take any part in it.

  But I was right. The valley has changed Pat. Whether it’s for the better or not only time will tell.

  The Squire had left his tobacco pouch, and Frank helped himself to another pipe.

  Across the valley floor smoke once more rose from the cave mouth. But there was no more drumming.

  I don’t think I could take any more drumming.

  Images of the fight against the scorpions kept flitting in and out of his mind, and the smell of powder still stung in his nostrils. His hands shook as he lifted the pipe to his lips, and not all of that was due to his tiredness.

  The shoulder wound seemed to have stopped seeping for the moment. The Squire had taken a long look at it earlier.

  “You should live man,” the Englishman said. “But you won’t enjoy it for a while.”

  The valley lay quiet beneath him. Twice now he had seen an eagle dip towards the lake, only for a scorpion claw to try to snatch the bird from the air. Both times the eagle had escaped; the second in a flurry of feathers.

  I was right. Everything in this valley is starving from lack of food or water. The scorpions are killing everything.

  Jake came and sat beside him.

  “How’s the shoulder?”

  Frank laughed grimly.

  “The arm is still attached. But if you offered me that axe and promised an end to the pain I might take you up on it.”

  “When we get back to the Creek, there’s a case of hard liquor that’ll take the edge off that.”

  Frank laughed again.

  “It might as well be on the moon.”

  Now it was Jake’s turn to laugh.

  “If you can survive until tomorrow, I’ll help you drink it.”

  “What happens tomorrow?”

  Down in the valley the shaggy beasts started to low. Jake smiled.

  “Tell me Frank. Have you ever seen a stampede?”

  34

  Jake gave them the whole of that day and night to rest. He shared most of the watches with Pat while Frank and the Squire rested and recovered as well as they could from their wounds.

  Jake spent some time taking inventory of the weaponry. He had the Pastor’s pistols. That made four handguns in total between them. The Squire also had a rifle, they had the two sabers, and Pat had his axe. They had sixty cartridges for the pistols and forty for the rifle.

  Ain’t much to take on a small army of beasts. But it will be enough. It will have to be enough.

  He too noticed the change in Pat. The big man spent the time when not on watch just sitting, staring into the fire. He seemed to have soaked up some of the Pastor’s quiet stoicism through the cassock. He was calmer somehow.

  And maybe smarter.

  In the depths of the night, when the other three were asleep and the fire was well stoked, Jake finally allowed himself to think about George.

  Pat put me to shame big brother. I was ready to run. Take the gold and find a warm whore. But the big man is on the side of the Lord now, and I guess I’ll be doing his bidding. I’ll keep my promise to you George. Or die trying.

  They ate the last of the wolf for breakfast, helping it down with hard tack and water while Jake laid down his plan.

  “A stampede?” the Squire said. “That’s your plan? You can’t control a stampede of cows. How are we going to control beasts such as those pachyderm? I’ve seen their like in India. They are docile creatures, hard to rile.”

  Frank laughed.

  “Not these ones. Trust me, we’ll get them riled up in no time.”

  Jake nodded.

  “Ain’t no beast that can’t be riled. Get them in a group, and they can be riled real fast.”

  The Squire still did not look convinced as they left the rock ledge and made their way down into the valley once more.

  “How do we get them to go where we want them to go?” he asked.

  Jake smiled. He patted the pistols slung at his hips.

  “I’ve found these to be persuasive in the past. And that rifle of yours is noisy enough to wake the dead themselves.” He looked over to where Frank and Pat walked slowly and silently down the trail. Pat had the axe slung over his shoulder. “And if that fails, we’ll just set the big man on them. I don’t know about you, but he’s starting to scare the bejeesus out of me.”

  The Squire smiled.

  “I look at Pat, and think the Pastor himself is still around, watching over us. A good shepherd watching over his flock.”

  “Let us hope the shepherd can actually do some herding,” Jake said as they came out onto the level plain.

  All was quiet down by the lakeside, but up the valley to the west Jake could see the lumbering figures of the herd. They seemed to be grazing, moving slowly in a long line, from one side of the valley to the other.

  The men walked westward, taking their time, being careful not to spook the beasts.

  As they got closer to the herd the men slowed down further, but the animals were too busy eating to pay them any notice. Jake tallied their number and stopped counting at fifty. There were at least ten bull males, with the rest a mixture of females and adolescents. There were no small young. They looked placid, almost like a corralled herd of cows.

  “What now gaffer?” the Squire whispered.

  Jake sent Pat and Frank in a wide circle round the back of the beasts while he and the Squire stood between the herd and any escape to the south. The cliffs bounded the north side, leaving the only route for the beasts to be to the east… towards the lake.

  “Ready,” Jake said.

  “As I will ever be. I’d just like to say, this is the daftest plan since Bonaparte wanted Christmas in Moscow.”

  Jake waved to Frank, who raised his pistol and fired a round into the air.

  Things started to go out of control seconds later.

  The beasts took fright immediately, turned away from the noise and lumbered, slowly at first, towards Jake and the Squire. The Squire fired into the air and the beasts stopped as one.

  The largest male raised its trunk in the air and bellowed turning in the same movement and heading, not east, but back towards Pat and Frank.

  35

  The rest of the herd turned to follow the large male. They started to pick up speed as they came. Frank saw their death coming for them; several tons of it, on the hoof and coming fast.

  He shot in the air again. When that had no effect he fired straight at the lead male. He saw a hole appear in the beast’s face just below the left eye, but it didn’t slow. It trumpeted loudly in rage. The noise of the herd’s feet on the ground rolled like distant thunder.

  We’re dead.

  But Pat had other ideas. He opened the duster coat and held it out on either side like large black wings, flapping, like one of the eagles.

  Then he started to run. Not away, but toward
s the big male.

  He let out a roar that was as loud as anything made by the beasts. He flapped the tails of the coat as he went, like a giant bird trying to take off.

  On Pat’s second roar the large male stopped, too quickly. Three other males ran into it and almost knocked it over. For several seconds the herd was in complete turmoil and the valley was filled with the sound of bellows and trumpets.

  Finally the male got its footing. It turned towards the south, but Frank saw that Jake and the Squire had been waiting for that. Jake fired two shots in the air and he too ran towards the herd.

  The big male finally turned eastward, gathering speed. The rest of the herd followed suit. Soon the four men ran behind, roaring and hollering, as the beasts thundered towards the lake.

  The scorpions were already there, waiting.

  The carnage started almost immediately.

  The large male had too much momentum. He hurtled headlong through a line of scorpions, trampling and squashing some of them underfoot at the shore before stumbling into the water. Six scorpions scuttled over him in less than a second. He rose, twice, trying to shake them off, but the thud of their stings sinking into flesh could be heard even at a distance. More of the herd stumbled at the water’s edge, trampling on the scorpions, running into each other in a vain attempt to escape. Scorpions came out of the water in wave after wave, ranging in size from four to nine feet long.

  There are scores of them. Hundreds.

  Claws clacked and chopped at legs and trunks. Blood sprayed high in the air and the trumpeting took on a panicked frenzied note that was terrible to hear. A dozen of the shaggy beasts were down in the water already, little more than heaving mounds of scorpions slicing and dicing through flesh. More were dying by the second as the weight of those at the rear kept pushing the others towards the massed ranks of scorpions. The air was heavy with the tang of coppery blood. There were five or more scorpions for every one of the beasts and soon thirty or more pachyderm lay dead and dying in the water.