Crow Mountain

by Lucy Inglis

  The pilot announced that they would soon be starting their descent into Helena. Hope grabbed her wash bag and went to the back of the small aircraft. Inside the cramped space, the fluorescent light flickered as she threw the lock. She eyed her scruffy reflection, like a wary stork. After a slow start, the last couple of years had added inches to her height, and Hope was still settling into being considerably taller than her neat little mother. A pair of khaki shorts, a white singlet and a thin grey cardigan all hung from her, crumpled. There were violet smudges beneath her green eyes and her freckled skin was washed out in the harsh light. Only her long fair hair was full of life, streaming over her shoulders. The flush sucked out with a noisy whoosh and a blast of cold. She washed her face, brushed her teeth and her hair and applied some lip balm. Then she was back in her seat as the seat-belt sign came on and the little plane lurched into its final descent.

  On the tarmac, the terminal building came into view. Long, low buildings in a solid grey surrounded a green, barn-like building with a pitched roof. The airport was tiny. Behind it, huge mountains rose up in the distance, almost lost in the haze of the spring day.

  ‘Well, we’re here,’ Meredith said brightly, as the cabin crew mobilized and the aircraft rolled to a halt.

  ‘Great,’ Hope murmured under her breath.

  Her mother shot her a look. ‘At least give it a chance. How many people of your age get to travel like you?’

  Hope gestured towards the window. ‘A ranch? What am I going to do for a month, on a ranch?’ She stood up and opened the overhead locker, pulling down her rucksack and shoving her wash bag inside it. ‘If they don’t have proper WiFi, and the movie channel, I’m going to die.’

  Meredith stood. ‘They told me they do. In the emails they sent me,’ she said. ‘I asked especially. Though why you would want to fly five thousand miles to one of the last great ecosystems in the world and spend your time watching Hollywood films, I just don’t know.’

  ‘I didn’t ask to come.’

  ‘You’re sixteen. And you always come. It’s one of the great advantages of home-schooling,’ Meredith said, tucking her short, sleek dark hair behind her ears. ‘And what are other girls your age doing? Hanging around in a park, drinking? Taking drugs? Messaging boys naked pictures of themselves?’

  ‘I’ve never done that and I won’t.’

  ‘Men only take advantage if you let them. You must use your personal agency as a woman to stop that happening.’ Her mother tugged her handbag out of her cabin luggage, taking out a comb and running it over her head. Meredith disapproved of make-up.

  Hope slung her rucksack over her shoulder and looked down the gangway to where the few other passengers on the tin-can plane were pulling on sweaters and retrieving their bags. The cabin door opened and sunshine flooded in. She gnawed her lip, arms folded.

  ‘Will you just try and appreciate the time here? For me?’ her mum added. ‘Who knows, it could be a real adventure.’

  They crossed the tarmac into the green terminal building. Inside, it was lofty and utilitarian, smelling vaguely of cinnamon-scented cleaning products.

  They queued for passport control and then waited in silence for their bags with the dozen other passengers, the carousel squeaking. Theirs was almost the last stuff to come through. Hope grabbed her large, black nylon holdall, struggling with the weight. Meredith lifted her rolling case and popped up the handle efficiently. They went towards the exit, and emerged into the terminal building. There was a seating area and a bar called Captain Jack’s. Meredith came to a halt, Hope just behind her.

  ‘He said he’d be here . . .’ she said slowly, scanning the terminal.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Caleb Crow.’

  Hope raised an eyebrow. ‘Caleb? Sounds like a Mormon.’

  ‘No, he’s a hugely respected rancher. And he has no religious affiliations as far as I know. I told him what we looked like.’

  Hope wasn’t listening. She was staring at a tall boy wearing jeans, plain brown leather boots and a chequered shirt with the sleeves rolled above his elbows. He was on his phone with his weight slightly on one leg, shrugging as he talked and scanned the stragglers. Everything about him was narrow and angular, his hips, his chest, his throat. He had bright blue eyes, shiny brown hair pushed off his face, a sharp jaw and tanned skin that looked slightly dusty. Hope had never seen anything like him. She knew she was staring as she began to revise her expectations of Montana very sharply upwards. He caught her gaze and stopped talking. There was a long second before the person on the other end of the line gained his attention again, as Hope and the young cowboy stared at each other. He ended the call and walked towards them.

  Hope looked away, embarrassed to have been caught gawping and hoping he wasn’t going to try and talk to her, while wanting more than anything in the world for him to come over. But it always went badly if a boy tried to talk to her in front of Meredith. She looked at the floor, just as a pair of well-worn leather boots appeared.

  ‘Mrs West?’ asked a clear and very American voice.

  He’s here for us? Oh God. Please please let him be here for us. Maybe he works for the ranch. Oh God.

  ‘It’s Dr West, actually.’ Meredith’s voice was cool.

  ‘Ah, sorry, ma’am. Of course. Dr West,’ he said seriously.

  She raised an eyebrow. ‘We were expecting Caleb Crow?’

  He offered a tanned hand. ‘You’ve got him, ma’am. We’re both Caleb. Me and Dad. I’m Cal, for the sake of all our sanities.’

  They shook. ‘This is my daughter, Hope.’

  Cal turned to her. He radiated health and athleticism. Hope felt even more exhausted. His dry, calloused grip enveloped her hand. He shook once, then let her go. ‘Hey there,’ he said, not quite meeting her eyes. ‘Let me take your bag.’ He stooped and put his hand on the black strap of her holdall.

  ‘We only bring what we can carry ourselves,’ Meredith said. ‘We can manage.’

  Cal removed the bag from Hope’s hands without trying, straightening up. ‘Sure you can. But now you don’t have to.’ Turning, he took the handle of Meredith’s case and began to drag it behind him, loping off towards the bright glass doors of the terminal.

  Meredith took a deep breath. ‘Well. He seems very nice,’ she said, ‘chauvinism aside. But this is the Midwest, I suppose. Still living in a different century.’

  They followed him out into the fresh air. Hope took a deep breath and looked around. Cal was stowing their bags in the flatbed of a vintage white Ford pick-up. It was huge. He walked to the passenger door and opened it.

  Hope looked at him, and he gestured inside. There was room for three. A rifle was strapped into the rear window. She held back, looking at it and the spartan interior. Meredith climbed in, busying herself with fastening the lap belt. Hope sighed, not wanting to be cramped up again. Her limbs hadn’t started to loosen from a day’s flying and waiting around in JFK, then Salt Lake City.

  ‘It’s really not too far to home,’ Cal said in his steady, light drawl, as if reading her mind.

  Hope looked at him. He met her gaze, his eyes an even brighter blue in the sunshine. She bit her lip on a smile. Somewhere nearby a bird was singing. It swooped low above them, its wings a stunning blue. He watched it whip through the air, disappearing over the long-term car park, song fading out.

  ‘Was that a Montana bluebird?’ Meredith called from inside the pick-up, startling them out of their shared moment. ‘Astonishing to see one so close to an airport.’

  ‘Yes, Dr West,’ Cal replied. ‘Must’ve heard you were coming.’

  Hope swore he shot her the ghost of a wink. She got into the pick-up, pushing her holdall into the footwell, and he closed the door behind her.

  They skirted the edges of Helena, driving down a long boulevard with low buildings on either side. Traffic lights hung on arched gantries over the tarmac junctions. Gaudy signs for stores and restaurants clustered by the side of the road. There were the golden arches
, and a huge plastic pig was advertising a ribs shack. A drab motel had only a few cars outside. Hope stared out of the window, as Meredith attempted to make conversation.

  ‘So, Cal, how far are we going?’

  They were at a stop signal. He shifted in the seat a little, his elbow out of the window and long body lax in the seat. ‘Not too far. It’s just a few hours.’

  Hope’s heart sank, but she stayed looking out of the window.

  ‘We need to swing by Fort Shaw and collect a few things from the store.’

  Meredith nodded. ‘Well, thank you for meeting us. It’s very kind. It would have been such a nuisance to hire a car just to get to the ranch and back.’

  He shrugged. ‘A pleasure. And like I said in the email, there’s plenty of vehicles you can use back at home so pointless to get a rental for one journey.’ The light changed and they moved forwards. Hope wound down her window, wanting the breeze on her face.

  ‘I thought it was your father in the emails,’ Meredith admitted.

  ‘Did you?’ He sounded surprised. ‘No, it was always me. Dad’s not big on email. Not even sure he would know how to use it. The only thing he looks at on the computer is the weather forecast and the price of feed.’

  ‘I’m very much looking forward to seeing the ranch. I’ve heard a great deal about the ecosystem you’ve managed to maintain. I think it will be invaluable for my research.’

  He nodded. ‘The ranch goes back a long way in the family. The first deeded acres we have are from 1871. We’ve worked hard over the years to keep everything as natural as we can. We don’t use any pesticides and we cultivate as little as possible. It’s a working ranch though,’ he said after a pause. ‘Not much glamour about it.’ The way he spoke was slow compared to Londoners.

  Hope carried on looking out of the window, breathing in the fresh air. The buildings were thinning out.

  ‘I respect that and thank you for letting us stay with you. We don’t need glamour, do we, Hope?’ Meredith said.

  Hope shook her head, looking at her hands.

  ‘Hope’s rather shy, as you can see.’

  Great, thanks, Mum. The hottest boy ever, and you’re making me out to be a massive loser already.

  He said nothing, just indicated to turn on to a different road, a two-lane highway stretching into the distance, dead straight. On one side were the mountains, on the other, the plains stretched away.

  As they drove, Meredith questioned him. His answers were economical, but not unfriendly.

  ‘Yes, I’m nineteen.’

  ‘Which college are you attending?’

  ‘I’m not at college, Dr West.’

  ‘Oh, are you taking a gap year?’

  Hope sighed internally and let her head rest against the doorframe.

  There was a long pause. ‘I didn’t graduate high school.’ Hope sensed, rather than saw, him look sideways at her mother. She also sensed the judgement coming from Meredith, who thought that higher education was the meaning of life. Hope leant against the ribbed white enamel of the door and stared out at the landscape.

  Ahead of them by the side of the road was a tall, metal-clad building, almost like a tower with no windows. Around it were other towers, but round. They looked ghostly and abandoned. Parts of the metal cladding were falling away.

  ‘What’s that, please?’ Hope asked, trying to lighten the atmosphere.

  He looked across at her for a moment, surprised by the sound of her voice. ‘Grain elevator. Storage. That one’s not been used in a while.’

  ‘It looks like a lot around here hasn’t been used in a while,’ Hope said, feeling the colour rise in her cheeks, unsure of why she was even still speaking.

  ‘Yeah, we’ve suffered a little with the economy, depopulation, stuff like that.’

  Coming up on their left was a small fenced-off square. Inside, old wooden crosses mingled with the odd headstone. In front of one were artificial flowers in a jam jar. Hope leant a little to keep it in view, and realized as the square passed behind the driver’s side window that she was looking straight at Cal. She sat back, letting her hair fall in her face.

  ‘Do you study, Hope?’

  Hope looked at her hands in her lap, thumbs locked together around her empty water bottle, as her mother answered for her.

  ‘Hope is home-schooled, and we’re still discussing what she will study at university. A vocational or science degree is best. It’s very difficult for Arts graduates to find work in the UK at the moment.’

  He drove one-handed, putting his free hand on the roof rail at the top of the door outside. ‘Well, our vocation’s ranching. What’s your vocation, Hope?’

  Writing, I want to be a writer. More than anything. Hope took a breath to speak, the words seemingly stuck in her throat.

  ‘Hope will study a science, probably chemistry,’ Meredith said, and no one spoke much after that.

  They drove on. At one point they passed a low, dirty house with smoke coming from the single chimney. Scattered around it were more than a dozen old buses and trucks, their shapes familiar to Hope from old movies. Rusting and collapsing into the scrubby prairie, they looked like a herd of decrepit animals.

  A phone buzzed somewhere. Cal pulled it out of his pocket and looked at it for a second before putting it back. Hope was annoyed at herself for wanting to know who was getting in touch with him. She pulled out her own phone and checked her text messages.

  ‘Is the roaming turned off?’ Meredith asked for the tenth time.

  Hope stared out of the window. The landscape was changing again, with bigger dips and rolls, and to the right was a group of old wooden buildings. The land around them was cultivated and there was a group of women working in a field, weeding with long-handled hoes. Their clothes were brightly coloured, consisting of a pinafore dress and flat leather shoes. On their heads were black, white-spotted kerchiefs.

  Cal saw her watching them with interest. ‘They’re the Hutterites. Kind of like Amish. No cars, no electricity, nothing modern. Came from Germany in the nineteenth century, settled all over these parts and up into Canada. Folks round here call them the Hoots. They farm, mostly.’

  ‘This terrain is rather inhospitable to traditional arable agriculture, isn’t it?’ Meredith asked, gesturing out to the scrubby plant covering the miles of untended land. ‘That’s sagebrush, I think. Very hardy.’

  ‘Yeah, we got about sixteen types. It grows where other things won’t. And yeah, the land isn’t great. Lot of failed homesteaders around here back in the last century. Ranchers generally aren’t keen on little farms breaking up the land and farmers tend not to like waking up to a load of cattle trampling their fields. But the Hutterites, they work crazy-hard. And land is all they have.’

  A red sign on the side of the road informed them they had arrived in Fort Shaw. It was a small town, with one main street. There was an old military cemetery with a white sign proclaiming it dated from 1867. Cal halted the pick-up outside a white wooden shack with an ancient Pepsi sign sticking out of it, next to a faded silver convertible. Sitting under the shaded porch, humming, was a white refrigerator as ancient as the sign, with a glass front containing beers and sodas, and a large mongrel dog. A sign on the door behind the dog read ‘Open’.

  ‘I’ll be just a moment.’ Cal got out and went to the door, stepping over the dog and going inside.

  Meredith and Hope sat in silence.

  ‘Apparently lots of young Americans don’t graduate high school. It’s a shame, but we mustn’t let that affect our judgement of him.’

  Hope resisted the urge to say that she hadn’t judged him at all.

  ‘Look,’ Meredith’s tone softened, ‘I know you’re shy, but it would be nice if you tried just a little harder. I’m going to take this opportunity to use the loo. Coming?’

  Hope shook her head. Meredith got out of the pick-up on the driver’s side and went through a door that said ‘Restroom, Patrons Only’ just next to the shop. Hope watched the street.
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br />   Cal reappeared, a case of wine under each arm. He hooked the door open with his foot and stepped back over the dog. He put the wine in the flatbed and disappeared again, coming out a few seconds later with a vast bag of something slung over his shoulder. The pick-up bounced a little as he dropped it into the back. He went back to the store, pulling money from the rear pocket of his jeans, elbow sharp behind him. He stood in the doorway, talking to a bulky American Indian man as he handed over the money. Hope listened to him as they talked.

  ‘Nah, thanks anyway though. Two fifty, right?’

  ‘Yep. Two twenty for the wine and thirty for the dog food. I swear Buddy is sponsored by the pet-food people, the amount he eats. Thanks.’ He took the cash. ‘Send my best to your parents.’

  ‘Will do. Thanks, Joe. You guys coming up next weekend?’

  The store owner grinned as he tucked the money away. ‘Wouldn’t miss a Crow barbecue after all this time. And we’re looking forward to meeting your visitors.’ He waved towards the pick-up. Hope lifted her hand and smiled.

  Coming towards the pick-up on the quiet street was another truck, newer and shinier. It sped up as it got closer, engine loud and music pumping. The driver’s window was down, and as it passed shouts and jeers came from the blacked-out interior, and a large plastic cup smashed against Hope’s side of the pick-up, exploding in a spray of ice and watery Coke. She recoiled as the truck drove away, music fading as it turned the corner.

  Cal jumped down, leaning in the driver’s side window. ‘You OK?’

  Hope brushed a couple of splashes from her shoulder. ‘Yes. Thanks. Friendly locals.’

  He was scowling, looking after the truck.

  ‘Local idiots,’ the man called Joe said. ‘Sorry about that, miss.’

  Hope shrugged, unsettled, as a tall American Indian woman in jeans, a tight T-shirt, and a gun in a shoulder holster walked out of the store, letting the door bang behind her. On her belt was a police badge. Her narrow eyes were focused down the street, where the truck had disappeared.