“Were these all newcomers, the Canadians? The ones been drifting in this year?”
“Oh, not all. There were some around here who came in during the seventies, after that dustup on the Red River. They were using up good pasture here, and welcoming the new ones, so I told the boys it was time for a bonfire or two.”
“The Sylvestres,” Dirk said. “In the churchyard.”
Bain smiled blandly. “They can be moved, boy.”
Strothers stared at Dirk, as if he had entirely forgotten he had a prisoner sitting at the saloon table.
“I did the arithmetic, Bill,” Bain said. “Each breed family that moved into the basin, here, cut my pasture back by fifty head. I’ve pushed about ten families out now, and that means I’ve saved pasture for five hundred beeves I would’ve lost. That’s a lot of meat, and a lot of profit.”
“Ten, you say?” Strothers asked.
“Oh, about that. My boys don’t tell me, and I don’t want to know, but just between us, it’s ten or eleven. They won’t be found. Just ash and bones and a rag or two, once the wolves get done. We never burned powder. Not one bullet. That was my rule. Just let nature rip.”
“How many to a family?” Strothers asked.
“Those breeds are breeders, Bill. Lots of kitties in their litters.”
“Lots of children, right?”
“I imagine so. That keeps the population down and keeps the basin open for the right people,” Bain said.
Dirk had never seen the man so talkative. There were moments when he was so absorbed he scarcely remembered the manacles around his wrists.
The keep came over with the Old Orchard and refilled the glasses, and stared long at Dirk’s wrists, and the chain knotting his wrists together.
“I didn’t have to tell my boys a thing,” Bain said. “They got the whole idea without my saying much. Just the general idea. I just told them to keep me out of it. I had five in particular, great fellas, Shorty, Swede, Lucas, Nate, and Barney. When they were out, I knew the country was being cleaned up fine.”
The gents at the bar were staring, especially a pair of skinny ones with high boot heels.
Bain was sipping again, but Bill Strothers had stopped, and was staring off into the gloom of the lamplit saloon. The other patrons stared ahead, pretending not to notice or hear, but in fact nothing escaped them. Dirk eyed the door, wondering whether he could break into the night and escape before Strothers, in his cups now, could pull a gun and shoot. But he knew better.
“Skye, lay your arms ahead of you on the table, palm up,” Strothers said.
Dirk did as he was told, and then Strothers pulled a small key from a vest pocket and unlocked each of the wrist manacles.
“There,” he said.
Harley Bain smiled.
“Harley, lay your hands out on the table,” Strothers said.
Bain thought that was pretty funny until Strothers snapped the manacles over the rancher’s wrists and tucked the key back in its vest pocket niche.
“What’s this, a joke?”
“Pretty funny, burning out people and leaving them to the wolves and the weather, I guess, Bain. Clever too, not leaving anything behind, no thread connecting any of it to you, even telling your men not to let you know what was happening out there in that dark. It was pretty dark out there, Bain. People dying of the cold, barefoot, couldn’t walk a hundred yards. Not a shoe or a boot or a moccasin that might have given them life.”
“I thought I was speaking in confidence, Bill. Between old friends.”
“Long trip to Helena, Harley. Do you want me to rent a saddle horse, courtesy of the territory, or shall we ride in that fine hooded carriage out of the weather? It’ll take three, four days, more if we run into weather.”
“Talk to the governor, that it?” Bain said.
“No, Harley, talk to the territorial courts and the prosecutor.”
Bain stared. “Well, damn. I guess I’m going to have to fight you.”
Strothers turned to Dirk. “Thanks for bearing with me,” he said.
“Am I free?”
“I said thanks, dammit.”
Only then did it dawn on Dirk that he was not a prisoner.
“I may need you to testify. And I’ll get the names of everyone in the saloon. No one in this joint missed a word.” He eyed the staring crowd. “Don’t leave here before I get your names and addresses.”
But the two little ones with the high heeled boots slapped coin on the bar and walked into the evening.
“Your riders, Harley?” Strothers asked.
“I didn’t notice,” Bain said, sounding like a church bell.
“Probably the last you’ll see of them,” Strothers said. “I’ll get some warrants sworn out and go for a visit. But first we’ll see about you.”
Dirk stared at his freed wrists, arms he could move hither and yon, lift and lower, arms that could rein a horse, lift him into his saddle, and lift into a prayer of thanksgiving.
“And, Skye, if you haven’t married the lady, do so. She’s as sweet as they come.”
thirty-seven
Reilly was furious. “He treated ye badly, putting irons on like that, letting you suffer and lose hope, while the pair of them downed their whiskey. Dirk Skye, ye’ve been done wrong.”
“It was Strothers’s game. It opened Bain up. It got him to blabbering.”
“I don’t care what it led to. It was wrong of that marshal to clap you in steel like that. It’s enough to make a radical out of me. Give me some powder and I’ll ignite it.”
Dirk held up his wrists. “See?”
“Bloody bad business, if ye ask me, which ye won’t because nothing I say matters to you or anyone else.”
Dirk nodded. “It’s not over. There’s not a white judge or jury in the territory that’d convict Bain, and he’ll be back in a fortnight.”
“And his henchmen are sitting on his place, waiting for him to come back, I’ll wager.”
“Strothers told me there was more in the works. He said he’d get warrants for Bain’s riders. Let’s let them deal with it. This thing was planned by the marshal, and planned well. And he’s taking Bain south to the railroad, so Bain can’t count on being rescued by his gang.”
“A lot of killers going free, that’s what I think. Them that burned people out of their wagons and left them near naked in the winter, they’re killers every one.”
Dirk didn’t have an answer to that. Bain had named five of his men, and those five had put humble and helpless people to death. And now they perched out on the Bain headquarters ranch waiting for the boss.
The mild December day had invited work on the church, and all the Métis people in the area had somehow assembled, along with Dirk and Reilly. There were more of them than Dirk had ever seen there, men and women from heaven knows where who mysteriously got the word and were present to help. How did they know to come? It was as if they had a secret telegraph furiously shuttling messages into obscure coulees and forests. But here they were, peeling and scraping the ridgepole and then hoisting it into the walls that had been prepared to receive it. It seemed almost as if these forest-dwellers had been trained all their days to work wood into whatever was needed. And even as the ridgepole was being anchored, other cohorts were laying on the rafters, while still others were sawing roof planks.
And overseeing this amazing effort was Therese, wrapped in a blue shawl, her gaze and smile settling on one and another of her people. She said nothing, but somehow her very presence inspired them all. Often she watched Dirk, who was carefully splitting shakes from rounds, a skill he had mastered only at this task. He was good; an easy strike with the axe shot a new shake free. These would soon shingle the whole roof and draw away the rain and snow. Yet another cohort of Métis was sawing out window apertures and framing the openings. Still others were fashioning massive doors, each one of carved pine, and hanging them at the front. Still others were hauling gravel that would form a walkway at the front.
&n
bsp; How many? Dirk paused, catching his breath. Maybe fifty men and a dozen more women, and a few children too. Even the little ones found things to do, things to carry. If they continued at this pace, and it didn’t snow for a few days, they might complete the shell of the church swiftly. But then there would be pews and an altar to build, and other interior fittings.
She drifted his way, and he wrestled with the welter of bitterness and love that welled up in him every time they came close. But this would be all right. She would thank him and go on to someone else, preferably one of her own people.
“You came to work,” she said, “and that is a mystery.”
He paused, leaning on his axe. “Some things need finishing,” he said.
“By the Métis.”
“By anyone who cares.”
Her smile vanished, and she looked sad and even disconcerted. “Why would you?” she asked.
He grinned. “Beats me.”
“You brought the marshal here.”
“I wrote the governor and the marshal.”
“That is what was whispered. And this man Bain, when will he return?”
“I think he’ll be back and start in again. You’re up against a lot of white people making common cause.”
Her gaze fled him.
“We will find a way,” she said. “For this I have prayed.”
“Your prayers count a lot more than mine,” he said, faintly amused.
“Will he burn this church?”
“I have no idea. I think it will cross his mind.”
“I have written the diocese for a priest.”
“A congregation they didn’t know about?”
“We are the world’s unseen,” she said. “The invisible people. But we are also the church.”
“That will be a great moment, that service.”
She smiled uncertainly. “When this is done, what will you do?”
“Look for work. And you?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “I await those days. But … oui, I know. My people are half starved, and cold, and without homes in a strange land. Most cannot even be understood by white men. I must give myself to them. I must find food and warmth and shelter for them. I must cook for them and mend their clothing and fill their hearts and minds and stomachs.”
She seemed so distant, her gaze upon distant shores, and for a moment he thought she wasn’t even aware of him. She smiled. “We are blessed,” she said.
And with that she hurried off. He wondered what she meant. Who was blessed, and by what?
He raised his axe and let it drop in its familiar arc, and another shake flew off the sawed off round. He could do that all day and not tire and feel rewarded. He chopped through the mild day, and then food came in wicker baskets borne by the Métis women. It was their stew, meat and potatoes and all the vegetables carefully put away in root cellars or spring houses, and now well seasoned and hot and fulfilling.
Dirk ladled some into an iron bowl, drank, and felt refreshed. He would cut hundreds of shakes this day and count it good.
The faint clop of hooves caught the winter air, and men turned from their work to see what might be coming. And what Dirk saw was a blue column, a large patrol from Fort Maginnis, wending its way through Lewistown and climbing the long grade toward the churchyard. The soldiers wore their thick woolen coats and the heavy forage caps which the army had adapted, and there were carbines nesting in saddle sheaths.
Dirk felt ice water pour through his veins. He didn’t want this. He couldn’t endure it. He’d rather be shot than see these people driven away from their church. But the blue column riding frosted horses wended serenely up the long trail, even as work stopped entirely. Métis men, straddling the ridgepole, stopped. Men with saws and axes stopped. The women serving a noon meal stopped. There now were, in all, close to a hundred of these Canadians there at the churchyard, and now not a one moved. None fled. Most would rather die right there than flee. Most would turn their churchyard red than flee.
Dirk knew he would be needed to translate, so he slowly set down his axe and made his way toward the road where the troops were coming to a halt. At least they weren’t bulling into the churchyard, but reining their mounts on the rutted road. They looked cold, far colder than the hardworking Métis, whose lungs plumed the air with moisture.
Dirk approached, dread coursing his every fiber, and discovered this column was commanded by Major Brevoort himself, rather than some subaltern, and that meant that this was an important event.
“You, is it, Skye?” Brevoort said.
“I will translate, sir.”
“That would be welcome.”
Therese approached now, slim and straight, with that light blue shawl wrapped tightly over her jet hair.
“Oui?” she asked.
“Nice church there, madam.”
That required no translation.
“It is our church, and soon we will dedicate it to God.”
She stood there so fiercely it raised the hairs on Dirk’s neck.
Brevoort lifted his field cap from his head. “I’d be honored to be invited, miss.”
Dirk could scarcely imagine words like these issuing from a commander who a few months earlier was sending out patrols whose purpose was to drive these very people out of the country.
The Métis, still sitting on the ridgepole or standing near the structure, watched, bitterly. They knew those blue uniforms all too well.
“Mister Skye, tell them we’ve been asked by Governor Hauser to keep the peace in the Judith country. Now, you know, the army can’t get into law enforcement, except during an insurrection. There’s laws and rules galore that say it’s not going to happen. But once in a while, when a governor requests it, some wiggle is allowed in that straight line. He says the territory hasn’t the manpower to deal with disorders out there, and after burning up wires with Washington, I received orders to assist Governor Hauser. What we’re looking for is some cowboys, up from Texas, who took to burning out people who were traveling under the protection of the flag of the United States, namely these people here. So we’re going hunting. I got some warrants for the arrest of five John Does, and permission to take into custody these and any others we find out were leaving people to die in the cold.”
Dirk started to turn all that into the peculiar cobbledup tongue of the Métis, but Therese stayed him. “Merci, and I thank Governor Hauser, and I will tell my people here what you have told me.”
Dirk could scarcely imagine this outcome.
“Well, you build that church, miss, and we’ll go on.”
She knelt deeply, a curtsy to the major, who looked embarrassed.
Brevoort lifted an arm, and the column rode smoothly along the road and soon topped the western skyline and vanished.
She stared at Dirk. “This too is your work.”
“I didn’t do anything.”
“Yes, you did.”
She walked toward the long walls of the church, even as her people clustered about her, and she told them what had been said, and even as she told it, she saw smiles break out. And he knew that somehow, some way, the fiddles would sing and the brandy would flow this eve—and that if a priest were on hand, there would be a Te Deum sung in that half-done building.
Instead, they set to work, for every hour counted. A blizzard could stop them; a long cold spell could shut them down for all season. And with that, the Métis plunged almost frantically into their labor, and Dirk watched the rafters slide upward and lock into place, and the roof planks rise from the walls and gradually shut out the sky, and by December dusk there was a plank roof over the church, ready for the shakes that Dirk had cut.
As darkness settled and work was no longer possible, the men reluctantly put aside their tools and stretched in the frosty dusk. The Métis were grinning, as if anticipating something. One of them elbowed Dirk.
“Hey, hey,” he said. “La jig.”
Step dance. A party. That sounded fine to Dirk.
; The man was speaking in the Michif tongue.
They were drifting toward Trouffant’s wood yard and cabin, and Dirk drifted along with them. Reilly had vanished. The coward had disappeared when the soldiers came. Well, too bad for him.
The chill settled swiftly, hurrying these people along, but soon enough they collected at the wood yard, where merry fires lit the eve, and the cabin door was wide open, its lamps throwing light into the night.
One of the fires glowed red and hot, mostly embers, and there was Pappy Reilly, overseeing a pig roast. So, the man had been busy after all. And Dirk spotted pint bottles of brandy handed swiftly from one Métis to another, and separate ones for the ladies, and Dirk traced all that back to Reilly also. Leave it to a renegade to put a party together.
Therese welcomed him with a brief smile, but she was busy in the cabin, preparing food for dozens of hungry people.
Dirk heard the squall of the fiddles and then the place began to hop, with the fiddlers stamping the rhythms even as they scraped their bows over the catgut. Those fiddles were remarkable, cunningly built out of whatever wood was at hand by people with a genius for shaping wood. Dirk saw a lot of smiles, white teeth in bronze faces, as the brandy sailed down gullets, warming the cabin and the whole wood yard.
The tongues these people spoke were almost beyond his comprehension: Canadian French, Michif French, Michif Cree, and everything in between, including some English. Some of them had Scots blood and Ojibway blood. But a man who knew French, as Dirk did, could fathom these people—mostly.
He saw Reilly swallow a slug from a flask and smile beatifically. Dirk enjoyed it all, and every passage of a flask to his lips added to his pleasure. The gorgeous Métis women kept improving as the night raced on, and the smoke rose into the ice-chip sky, and the smell of roasting ham filled the evening.
But no one ate. It was as if they were waiting for something, some moment that Dirk could not imagine. And then, at last, Trouffant waved, the fiddlers stopped, and an odd silence filled the merry night.
“Monsieur Skye,” he said, and beckoned Dirk with his finger.
Dirk didn’t know what this was about, but hoped it would end fast.
The First Dance Page 25
