by H. V. Elkin
Cutler asked Taylor, “You want him back tomorrow to mend those fences?”
“No,” Taylor said. “I’ll be happy if he never sets foot on this farm again for any reason.”
“Okay, Hedge,” Cutler said. “Mount up and get out.”
Bannister got on his horse. “Be seein’ you, Cutler,” he said.
“If I live that long,” Cutler said, “you can count on it.”
After herding the sheep into a field with all of its fences intact, the Taylors went to bed and Cutler sat on the porch, smoking a cigarette and stroking Red’s back. Out of respect for his hosts, who seemed to be religious and probably temperate, he left the bourbon bottle in the wagon. There was plenty of time for that on the way to Yellowstone.
Bill had been distant in the last couple of hours. Cutler respected the young man for not asking right out, but he knew Bill was bothered about Cutler having some kind of deal with Hedge Bannister. It would have been a simple matter to put Bill’s mind at ease, but Cutler did not. He was beginning to think he ought to ride out of here alone, after all. You couldn’t count on a man like Bannister to keep a promise. Bill might be needed to help protect the property. If Bill thought Cutler had dealings with Bannister that would bring Cutler down a notch or two in Bill’s eyes. Not going along to Yellowstone wouldn’t be such a bad pill to swallow.
If Cutler’s sense of his own death was true and he was not going to survive to get his own bear, Bill was the logical one to take up the cause afterward. But there wouldn’t be a better chance to train the boy than by his going after this other grizzly, the one in Yellowstone.
Cutler still had not worked it out by daybreak.
Before breakfast, Cutler helped Taylor, Bill and Jack fix the broken fences. He worked with Taylor while the boys mended a break in the next field.
The two men worked in silence until Taylor asked, “You’ll be movin’ on then?”
“Want to get there before the snow flies.”
“I can see you’re restless about something. You don’t have to help me do this if you don’t want to.”
“Wouldn’t miss that breakfast for anything. I want to do something to pay for it.”
“Glad to have you as long as you want to stay. But don’t want to hold you if you want to be goin’ neither.”
“That ain’t what’s on my mind.”
“Well, then, I guess I know what is.”
“Guess you do.”
“You know, it’s all he’s been thinkin’ about—you comin’ back here and teamin’ up with you.”
“Figure you’re gonna need all the help you can get.”
Taylor put down his wire stretchers and faced Cutler directly. “You remember what I said about takin’ opportunities when the good Lord sends ‘em?”
“Sure do.”
“Well then?”
Cutler shook his head. “Like I said ...”
“Shoot, John! This is my opportunity as well as it is yours.”
“How do you figure?”
“It’s like this. That boy’s never gonna be a farmer. It’s plain as day he’s got himself a different row to hoe. Now, you know that as well as I do. Isn’t that right?”
“Probably.”
“So it’s just a matter of time before he takes off. He took off once before on his own, and look what happened. If you hadn’t come along, and my boy could be fertilizin’ sagebrush from six feet under by now. Here’s the point. Long’s I know he’s leavin’ sooner or later, he’s a heck of a lot better leavin’ with you. So this is my opportunity to see he gets himself a good start and learns how to stay alive long enough to get the wanderin’ out of his blood. Maybe he’ll settle down someday and die with his boots off. Get me?”
“Yeah, Marcus. Thanks.”
After the breakfast blessing, Cutler made up his mind. “Tell me, Marcus. You bein’ a God-fearin’ man and all, you think I’ll get forgiven by lyin’?”
“If you mean last night, John, lyin’s better than killin’.”
“What lyin’?” Jack asked.
“Oh, that thing about lettin’ our wire-cuttin’ friend think we was business partners just to keep him off this spread for a while.”
Bill let out a long sigh. “I shoulda known.”
“May be a lot you should know,” Cutler said.
“That much I do know.”
“Your pa thinks maybe it’s time you went on and found out some of those things.”
Bill ate in silence, waiting.
Cutler went on. “I know you’re bound to be a nuisance like you always was, Bill. But if you want to come in with me, I’ll put up with you as long as I can.”
Mrs. Taylor disappeared into one of the rooms the family seldom used. Cutler thought she was probably crying.
“Holy tarnation!” Jack said.
Taylor looked at him. “Don’t cuss at the table.”
Bill found his voice. “This for real? Or is it like your lie to Hedge Bannister?”
“Guess that depends on how you work out.”
Bill nodded. “The fences are done.” And that meant yes.
“You’ll need a horse,” Taylor said. “You can have that black mare.”
Cutler remembered the horse that had seen better days.
“No,” Bill said. “I’ll just go out with what’s mine. When I get a horse, I’ll earn it myself.”
“You have earned it,” Taylor said.
“Bill’s right.” Cutler slapped him on the arm to show his approval. “You can ride on the wagon with me, Bill. When you need a mount, you can saddle one of the mules.”
‘That suits me fine,” Bill said and smiled his gap-toothed smile.
“Well, now listen,” Taylor said. “I guess I can give my son something if I want to.” He took out the pocket watch with the locomotive on the back and handed it to Bill. The way Bill looked at it you could tell it was his father’s most prized possession and on its way to being a family heirloom. Bill did not know what to say.
Taylor said, “Don’t know when I’ll be seein’ you again, Bill. But you’re the oldest, and I want to be able to give it to you while I’m alive, same way my pa gave it to me.”
Bill went to his father and hugged him. Then the both of them were embarrassed. “Go talk to your mother,” Taylor told him.
After Bill went into the other room and Jack had been sent off to get some potatoes for Bill to take along, Taylor said, “Keep an eye out for him, John, if you can.”
“We’ll probably be keepin’ an eye out for each other.”
“Know it won’t be easy.”
“He’ll learn.”
“Mean it won’t be easy for you neither, John. Figured you for a loner. Don’t know how you’re gonna cotton to havin’ a green sidekick.”
“Well, time comes when a man’s got to think what he’s gonna leave behind.”
“Know what you mean,” Taylor said. “Know what you mean.”
Chapter Four
There were more than five hundred miles between Cheyenne and Fort Yellowstone, closer to six hundred if you went over every hill and mountain, and they popped up more and more often and got taller the closer you got. The journey took almost a month of steady going, longer if you didn’t want to wear out the animals as the going got tougher. They couldn’t be pushed too hard at the beginning when the land was flatter and there were several good stagecoach routes. The animals needed their strength when the roads became trails and when man’s improvements on nature became few and far between.
You couldn’t dawdle too much, either, at this time of year. The breezes of southern Wyoming were already bringing warnings of winter. And those warnings were coming from the northwest, where you were headed.
Those were some of the things Cutler thought about at the beginning as he studied the map in his mind, figuring out the route for getting where he wanted to be at the end of each day. Bill rode on the wagon seat on the other side of Red, and sensed Cutler’s mood so he didn’t talk muc
h. Cutler appreciated that.
For the first week each man spent most of the time involved deeply with his own thoughts; it was hard for them to pull out far enough to give even a friendly nod to passing stage drivers. When one of these distractions did come, Bill looked around for a moment to admire a small band of antelope, an animal that was becoming scarce, or an owl circling over a prairie dog town, or a horned toad on a piece of sagebrush, taking advantage of the warmth of the sun.
Bill’s thoughts were more complicated than Cutler’s. He dreamed about what might happen, about the great adventure that was awaiting him. After three days out, it hit him that he had left home. The first time he had gone away, he was angry and obsessed about making himself into a respectable gunslinger, one cowboys would respect. This time he had done what Cutler made him realize he should do. He had a better idea of what he was leaving behind: a home and his own youth. There was no turning back, and he didn’t want to, but the ties of home held onto him an stretched thin before they broke.
Finding himself dreaming of the future, he wondered if he was ready. Nine days later, when they turned north at Red Desert, he figured he was. He had found an answer to most of his questions. Except one. Why wasn’t Cutler drinking? There was a bottle in the wagon and, by Cutler’s code, the only time he didn’t drink was when he was working. He wasn’t working yet. But at none of their nine campsites had Cutler once opened the bottle or offered any to Bill.
Something was very different about Cutler now. Whatever it was must have been the explanation of why he hadn’t touched the bottle. Bill figured it might have something to do with their going after a grizzly, even though it was not the one Cutler had spent so many years looking for.
The country became dreary, desolate, and sandy. The men and animals were covered with a thick coat of dust. The sagebrush-covered plain ahead did not look inviting. When they camped on the eleventh night at the bend in Lost Creek, Bill’s spirits were low. The Green Mountains to the east and the Rockies to the northwest seemed to be trapping him in a dark mood. And he was not about to stand for that.
“Damn it, John! When’re we gonna break out that bottle?”
Cutler looked at him across the fire from behind his tin cup of coffee. “Later.”
“Why later?”
“I’m savin’ it.”
That was not like Cutler, nor did it help the way Bill felt. Cutler smiled, and that did help.
“This may not turn out to be all you’ve got it cut out for,” Cutler said. “You beginnin’ to change your mind?”
“’Course not.”
“Sure about that?” Cutler stopped staring at him and drank some coffee.
“Yeah, I’m sure. Can’t see turnin’ back once you’ve set out to do something.”
Cutler nodded. “Neither can I. But you got to understand this part, because this is most of it. So you better learn to like it.”
“What part?”
“When men start arguin’ in saloons, they don’t talk about it. Not worth talkin’ about. ‘Stead, they figure out something excitin’ to talk about. How they almost got stampeded by longhorns once. How they had a run-in with the Sundance Kid. Or how I nabbed the Boone gang or the Thomas boys. Listen to it long enough and you get to thinkin’ a trail life is just one excitin’ time after another. Hard drinkin’, shootouts, women. Hear them talk about me and you’d think rogue animals was just waitin’ in line for me to get around to ‘em.”
Cutler poked up the fire around the coffee pot. “Well, this is the truth of it. Most of the time you’re eatin’ dust and growin’ saddle sores. Most of the time you’re alone. You got a lot to learn, Bill.”
“I know that.”
“Know you do. You got a lot to learn about animals and men.” He smiled again. “Women, too, probably.”
Bill blushed. “Want to learn about all those things.”
“But the hardest thing you’re gonna have to learn in the part that’s just plain nothin’. And since most of it’s nothin’, you better learn to take it. Then nothin’ll turn into something for you. It’ll be the sound of the creek there, or the way the flames look in a campfire, or what a coyote says at night, or that the wind is tellin’ you that winter’s comin’. When you start facin’ the nothin’ that’s gonna be most of your life, you’ll start readin’ the signs all around you. The land and the animals’ll start to talk to you, and you’ll learn to stay alive by understandin’ what they’re sayin’.”
Bill nodded. “That why you haven’t had much to say until now?”
“That’s part of it. A man gets used to livin’ that way, alone with what’s around him, and he can’t get used to havin’ a partner right off. Anyway, what I’ve been sayin’ nobody can teach you. So you get started learnin’ your lesson, and I’ll see what I can do about learnin’ mine.”
In the next two days, between that campsite and South Pass, Cutler became more talkative. “Remember what I told you about the nothin’?” he said. Then he told Bill about what he’d done since they had separated on the Oklahoma plains, about the town of Guthrie, and folks being scared of what they thought was a rogue eagle, about murders, the greed of the land grabbers, and about the Comanche warriors.
Bill whistled when Cutler stopped. “And you’re tellin’ me most of the trail life is nothin’?”
“You see?” Cutler shook his head. “There you go. I told you before I started to remember that nothin’. But one little story from me, and you’re ready to forget it.”
“Well, you got to admit it’s some story.”
“Sure, it’s some story. And maybe we’re ridin’ into some story right now. But that don’t change the weeks and months between.”
Cutler did not mention being bitten by the rattler or what it had done to his way of thinking. It was a story Bill would have been most anxious to hear.
They crossed a plank bridge over the Sweetwater River and stopped at a place called Gates’ Ranch. A stagecoach was in the yard and several women were climbing into it looking like birds whose feathers had been ruffled. The sound of carousing came from inside the ranch house.
“All in, ladies?” the driver said. “Okay, we’ll find us a better place for the night.”
Cutler told Bill, “This ain’t part of the nothin’, as those women would be happy to tell you. Go on in and get yourself that drink you’ve been wantin’, and I’ll see that the animals are tended to.”
“We’re stoppin’ here?”
“You can see those mountains gettin’ bigger, can’t you? The mules need a good rest first. More than you need that drink.”
“Hot damn!” Bill said as he jumped down. “Now I feel like I really got away from home!”
“Young man!” A lady called to Bill from the stage. She wore a flowered hat and eyeglasses.
Bill turned in his tracks. “Yes’m?”
“I wouldn’t be going in there if I was you. I’m sure your mother would not approve.”
Bill gave her a sheepish grin. “Yes’m.”
The woman craned her neck around at Cutler. “You this boy’s father? What must you be thinking of?” The stage pulled away before Cutler could answer. He looked down at Bill and winked.
“Yes’m.”
Bill grinned and went into the ranch house.
When Cutler got back, Bill was in trouble.
The main room had a large stone fireplace at one end, with an elk head hanging over it and a makeshift bar at the other end. In between, were half-dozen tables occupied by men who were laughing. The object of their humor was a burly, heavily whiskered man at the bar, who was grinning at Bill. Bill was at the bar holding a bottle of beer, drinking, and trying to ignore his tormentor.
“Come on,” the man said to Bill. “Let’s see a smile.”
Bill drank his beer.
Cutler went around the edge of the room until he had a better view of the bar. He was not going to do anything yet. He was just going to watch and see how Bill handled it.
“Beer
goes down easier,” the man asked, “when it don’t have no teeth to get in its way?”
A tall, lanky cowboy came up on the other side of Bill, laughing. “That’s probably true, Fred. Might be good for whistlin’, too.”
“Now there’s a thought,” Fred smiled. “Let’s hear you whistle, boy.”
Cutler could see the red creeping up Bill’s neck to his face. He took another swallow of beer.
“Boy,” the cowboy said, “it’s a rule here. First time you come in, you gotta whistle. Now do like Fred says. Let’s hear it.”
“Okay,” Bill said, he whistled. The room filled with laughter.
Cutler was glad to see Bill did not have a short fuse.
Fred laughed loudest of all. “That’s real good. Do it again. Whistle and dance on the bar at the same time.”
“Sorry,” Bill said. “I don’t dance.”
“Sure you do. Let’s see how you do.”
“I whistled for you,” Bill said. “Now that’s enough of an initiation.”
“We’ll say when the initiation’s over, boy.”
“You can say anything you want, but I’m done.”
The cowboy suggested to Fred, “Maybe he’d whistle better if he didn’t have so many teeth.” He grabbed Bill’s arms and turned him toward Fred.
Bill did not struggle to get away. He seemed to be holding out his chin as an invitation. Fred was surprised. It took awhile for the smile to show through his beard again.
A leathery man carrying a case of beer bottles came through a door near Cutler and started for the bar. Cutler stopped him. “You Gates?”
The man turned and scowled. “Yeah.”
Cutler nodded to the bar. “You see what’s happenin’ over there, don’t you?”
“What of it?”
“Nothin’. Just wondered if you was concerned about your place gettin’ busted up?”
“Way I see it, the only thing’s likely to get busted is that tenderfoot’s jaw?”
“And you don’t think you ought to do anything about it?”
“Mister, I never interfere with the regular customers.”
Cutler nodded. Gates took the case of beer behind the bar. Bill was still not struggling to get away, so the cowboy was not holding him as tightly as he would have been otherwise.
