by Lucy Inglis
Cal took a bottle of water from the noisy refrigerator, just as a police cruiser slid to a halt right in front of the pick-up’s nose. Two men got out. Both were large and intimidating. Their belts bristled with batons, handcuffs and firearms. Cal’s pace, returning to the vehicle, slowed. ‘What now?’ Hope heard him say under his breath.
‘Well well, young Caleb Crow,’ the older man said. He wore mirrored sunglasses on his craggy face and his uniform looked more senior than the young man’s. He had muscular arms he folded over his chest. Joe came back on to the porch of the shop, and the dog lifted its head, suddenly alert. The tall woman stuck her hands in her back pockets and watched, her glossy shoulder-length hair caught by the breeze.
‘Chief Hart, Officer Jones,’ Cal said politely, with a slight nod.
Despite the man’s sunglasses, Hope knew his gaze had shifted to her. She ducked her head.
‘What have we got here?’ The chief sauntered over to the rolled-down driver’s window and stooped to look in at Hope. ‘Hello, miss. You from out of town?’
‘Hello. Yes, I am.’
‘Listen to that pretty accent. You English?’
‘Yes.’
He straightened up, speaking to Cal again. The other officer was standing intimidatingly close. ‘You gotta go some distance these days to make sure they ain’t heard your reputation, don’t you, son?’
Cal’s face was impassive, but Hope saw his hand tighten around the water bottle. The chief saw it too.
‘Ah now, boy, don’t get riled. I ain’t gonna tell her what a no-good piece a-shit you really are.’ He bent to the window again, looking in at Hope. ‘Now, miss, you take real good care of yourself around this boy, OK? He ain’t to be trusted. Enjoy your stay here in our fine county.’ He slapped the door of the pick-up, then his eyes shifted to the flatbed in the back, seeing the wine. A triumphant smirk spread across his face. ‘Now, would that there be alcohol I see you just purchased from our upstanding ethnic storekeeper here in town?’
Cal said nothing and Hope suddenly remembered that the legal age for drinking in America was twenty-one. Cal was underage. Joe’s expression was unreadable, but Hope could feel the tension in the air.
The policeman walked back to where his fellow officer was standing, almost toe to toe with Cal.
‘Looks like I got me an open and shut case. Shame to close down these fine stores, but I ain’t got no choice. Can’t condone the selling of alcohol to Montana’s minors.’
Cal didn’t move, his jaw set. Joe said nothing.
‘Knew I’d get you in the end, Black. Just a matter of time. Your kind just ain’t good around liquor, are you—?’
‘He was collecting an order,’ the tall woman interrupted, knocking a cigarette out of a soft packet. ‘That’s all.’ She and the policeman stared at each other for a long time, his eyes unreadable behind the glasses.
‘No one asked you . . . Officer,’ he said. ‘So I suggest you get along to the rez and do whatever it is you do there.’
The woman lit the cigarette. ‘No business there today. Business here,’ she said around it.
His face hardened further. ‘This place is under my care, you remember that.’
‘I remember,’ she said placidly.
Meredith came out of the restroom. ‘Is there a problem, Officers? We’ve only parked here for a few moments so I could use the conveniences. I’m sorry, we’ve just come from the airport and I was quite insistent.’
The police chief nodded in her direction. ‘Ma’am, I’m afraid we have an incident of the sale of alcohol by Mr Black to young Mr Crow here. There are serious penalties for that in this state.’
Meredith didn’t even blink. ‘Alcohol? Do you mean the wine?’
‘Yes, ma’am, I do.’
‘Oh, but I purchased it. We’re here for a month, you see, and I do like a glass of wine at the end of the day.’
Hope breathed a sigh of relief. The police chief looked seriously disappointed, almost as if he was grinding his teeth. The tall woman was trying not to smile.
‘You got a receipt?’
‘I’m afraid not. I paid in cash so I didn’t take one. Two hundred and twenty dollars.’
After a pause the police chief spoke again. ‘Then there’s no problem at all, ma’am. I’d like to welcome you and your daughter to Montana. You take good care of her out at that ranch.’
There was a silence. Meredith refused to fill it, her face hardening at the mention of Hope.
‘Because, you know, anything could happen,’ he finished. With that, both men turned, got back into the police cruiser, taking their time, and the car lumbered off. Hope looked down, wishing she were as brave as her mother. Meredith got back into the pick-up through Cal’s door, sliding across the seat and buckling her belt.
Cal eased back into the pick-up and turned the key. ‘I’m obliged to you, Dr West.’ He looked out of the window. ‘You too, Officer.’ The tall woman threw down the end of her cigarette and stamped on the stub, then turned and left with a small nod in his direction.
Meredith clicked the seat-belt fastener. ‘Not at all. I loathe men throwing their weight around.’
‘How did you know how much it cost?’ Cal looked genuinely bemused.
Meredith shook her head. ‘Have you heard the acoustics in that bathroom? You can hear every word that’s said right outside the store. Dreadful. I hope it doesn’t work the other way round.’
Hope hid a smile.
As did Cal. ‘Still, thanks again. Joe could have been in real trouble.’
‘Yes, so I imagine. As could you. But we’ll say no more about it. And I’d far rather have the wine than not.’
Hope sat listening in silence.
‘It’s not far now, I promise,’ Cal said, leaning across and holding out the bottle of water to Hope. ‘We live off Highway 89.’ She looked at the water, surprised, before taking it. He said nothing about what had just happened, but there were stripes of red high on his brown cheekbones.
He turned off on to a single-track road and stopped the pick-up, jumping out and checking a sturdy white mailbox on a post, emblazoned on the front with ‘Broken Bit’ and beneath, the words ‘Oro y plana’.
Gold and silver. Montana’s state motto, Hope had learnt from a cursory check of Wikipedia when Meredith had announced the tickets were booked.
A bundle of envelopes in his hand, Cal got back into the vehicle and drove on, heading for the mountain range to the west. The land rose in waves. Stands of trees clumped here and there and rocks dotted the landscape. After a short while, they passed beneath a huge wooden arch, seemingly fashioned from massive, scavenged, tree branches, burnt repeatedly with a motif Hope hadn’t seen before. The sign that hung from it held only one word in rusted iron letters: CROW.
‘What does the burnt symbol mean, please?’ Hope asked.
‘It’s our brand, for the livestock and the horses. Broken Bit ranch. Everyone puts theirs on their gatepost round here, if they’re ranching. Ours is a little unusual – it’s a broken D-ring snaffle bit, hence the name of the ranch. But it’s also two Cs turned to face each other.’ He curled his thumbs and forefingers to face each other in the shape of two letter Cs on top of the steering wheel. ‘Crow. And Caleb. We’re all Caleb. I’m the fifth.’
Post and rail fencing appeared. Cattle dotted the landscape.
‘I thought your ranch was horses,’ Meredith said.
‘It is. The finest American horses,’ he said, matter-of-factly, glancing across at Hope. ‘But we also raise pedigree cattle. Rare breeds that are under threat. It’s a family thing. We have buffalo here too. We’re one of the original five families who saved them from extinction back in the nineteenth century. We’ve been here for almost a hundred and fifty years, kept the ranch intact through the fence wars, the Depression. My great-grandma kept it going while my great-grandaddy was a prisoner in the Pacific during World War Two. All the time we’ve been working on bringing back the buffalo. Still trying t
o even out the gene pool with them.’
‘Cattle are detrimental to the delicate environmental balance you’ve got here.’ There was a note of accusation in Meredith’s voice.
‘We keep an eye on it,’ he said mildly. ‘We have to manage the cattle and the buffalo separately on the land anyway, because of the disease risk.’
The pick-up raised a dust cloud behind it as they headed further up the track. When they had been driving for some time, a group of red-roofed buildings appeared, nestling into the edge of a forest. In front of them were corrals, where groups of horses gathered in the corners, quiet in the afternoon sun.
They arrived at the cluster of buildings. Hope looked up at the house. The central building was huge, constructed from timber and stone, and looked like a cross between a barn and a cathedral with a wide porch wrapped around all sides. The bleached boards had long since faded to silvery grey and it had a timeless, frontier feeling about it. Above the vast front door was the skull of a cow or a bull, with gigantic horns.
A tall, lean man came out of a large and much-repaired stable barn, and walked towards them. He was almost exactly like Cal, just older.
‘Meredith? Hope?’ He held out his hand. ‘Caleb Crow. Hope the drive wasn’t too long after your journey.’
Meredith shook. ‘Not at all, Mr Crow, thank you.’
Caleb shook Hope’s hand too. ‘Well, Miss Hope, this is a real pleasure.’ Caleb Crow Snr had a stronger accent than his son. ‘A real treat to have your pretty face around the place.’
Meredith’s expression cooled. Cal hauled their bags out of the pick-up.
‘You going to show these girls to their quarters?’
‘Yep.’
Caleb gestured for them to follow his son. They walked up the steps, on to the porch and then into the cool, wooden house. Beyond the door was a huge room, right up into the roof. More horned cattle skulls adorned the rafters. Battered leather sofas were covered with throws in Indian patterns. Hung on one wall was a flat TV. Through a wooden archway beyond was a bright, clean kitchen.
‘This way.’ Cal tipped his head towards an exposed spiral staircase, all wood and glass. At that moment, a leggy bundle of grey and white fur hurtled into the room, banging into Cal’s leg. ‘Hey, Buddy.’
Hope started back. There was what appeared to be a grey wolf in the room.
Cal pushed the creature away affectionately. ‘We’ll get you something to eat in a minute.’
The wolf bounded up to Hope, planting both his huge paws on her chest. She stumbled back, clutching the strap of her holdall.
‘Buddy,’ Cal snapped. ‘Where are your manners?’
The animal retreated instantly, tail wagging.
‘Sorry,’ Cal said, rubbing the side of the wolf’s head against his thigh. ‘He’s just a baby.’
‘A baby wolf?’ Hope asked uncertainly.
‘Nah. Well, half. He’s a cross with some kind of domestic breed. Probably a stray. They call them wolfdogs. I found him last year, near a dumpster on the edge of Fort Shaw, when he was just a few days old.’
Meredith moved closer, fascinated. ‘He seems more wolf than dog, but very tractable. Is his behaviour consistent?’
Cal shrugged. ‘We’ve never had any problems with him. I’ll show you your accommodation.’
Upstairs, he walked along a balcony which overlooked the huge sitting room. Pushing open a door with his toe, he put Meredith’s bag inside.
‘Dr West, you’re in here.’
Hope’s mother turned, frowning. ‘We’re not in the same room?’
Cal hesitated. ‘We . . . thought you’d like your own space.’
‘We would. We do,’ Hope said quickly.
Meredith backed away and walked into her brightly decorated room, saying nothing. On a trip away they had never slept separately before. Cal led Hope to another door along the balcony. The room behind it was massive, like everything in the house. The back wall was all glass, looking out over the bluff and forest at the back of the house. A white cowhide covered the wooden floor. On a table was a television and a computer. The door was open to a shower room.
He put her bag on the bed. ‘I didn’t know if you were bringing your own laptop, or—’
‘Yes. But thank you,’ Hope said, grateful.
‘Is there anything you need? More water or anything?’ He stuck a hand in his back pocket and gestured over his shoulder with the other thumb in the vague direction of downstairs.
She shook her head.
They watched each other for a few moments. Hope struggled to breathe normally.
‘OK. We eat around seven.’ He closed the door behind him.
It had taken us another three days to do what did not seem like so very many miles. The staging posts had been tolerable, although I hadn’t been able to manage much sleep and the arrangements often left a lot to be desired. Still, we were making progress. Mostly, the track that passed for a road was hard and reliable.
In Fort Shaw we slept in a military tent, but I had managed to find some new books and newspapers to pass the time, given to me by an Army captain’s wife who had proved very kind and a welcome change from Miss Adams. There had also been a large family there, intending to settle in the area. Their clothing was plain but brightly coloured and the women wore pretty handkerchiefs on their hair, covered with dots. There were two girls around my age and I attempted to speak to them; they would not talk to me, only turned away in silence without meeting my eyes. I learnt later that they were very religious and do not speak to people who are not like them.
As we set out from yet another staging post that morning, I opened my book, already vetted by my companion, and began to read. The day passed, sunny and fine. When I wasn’t reading, I looked out of the window at the ever more dramatic scenery and attempted to draw in my sketchbook.
The air was thin and cool and I breathed in as much as I could. The ends of the steel stays of my long corsets, even though they were covered with padded material, were wearing red welts on my hip bones and the ribs of my back. I had worn, for most of my life, corsets stiffened with cane or whalebone, but Mama had taken a notion that a steel-strengthened corset was the way to proper posture. Underneath one shoulder blade, it had broken the skin. Miss Adams had applied a stinging salve to it the previous evening. I knew she could not fail to notice the other marks, but she said nothing and had laced me up just as tightly that morning. When I asked if I might travel in a looser, shorter set she refused. Apparently, Mama had told her that upon my arrival I should be straight into the smartest of San Franciscan society and I must not let myself down with a sloppy figure. Accustomed as I was to being constrained, the days had become very painful and more than once I had had to hide a tear whilst waiting to dress in the mornings, facing yet another day of imprisonment.
We met few people on the trail and the team had seen or heard little regarding the whereabouts of the Indian tribes. Supposedly, it was common for bands of the young men, sometimes as few as two but other times as many as two dozen, to roam the country whilst the others stayed in one place. According to Mr Goldsmith, who had travelled this trail more than once, some of the local Indians were even farmers and did not use horses much, although others lived almost their entire lives on horseback.
The horseback tribes, Mr Goldsmith told me, were great hunters of the buffalo, of which we had seen so many on the plains on the way here. Thousands, in such multitudes it was hard to imagine before seeing them. I had smelt them from the train window. The bulls, as they were called, were gigantic, far more massive than even the largest of the London dray horses. Abundance seemed to be everywhere, here in America: once, the train had followed an astonishing migration of birds, pigeon Mr Goldsmith said, so many we were with them for hours and they darkened the sky above us.
And it was not only the animals that caught my attention: here and there, we had seen Indians, all on horseback, usually sitting stock-still and watching the train passing. Now we were heading throu
gh the country of the southern tribe whose name I could not spell towards the Blackfoot territory, before skirting the edge of the Flatheads’ land. Part of me quaked in fear at the idea that we would encounter Indians, but now I know another part of me wanted an adventure before we reached San Francisco. I did not know at that moment, of course, what an adventure I would have.
My eyes stayed on the page but lost their focus as I thought about my new life. Before we had separated at Portsmouth, Mama had given Miss Adams a pamphlet that I was to read on the crossing, about wifely duties. I suspect she thought that, had I read it before leaving Portman Square, I may not have boarded that steamship.
It spoke only of duty and tolerance. My tolerance, that is. Tolerance towards what was expressed as my marital duties and my husband’s natural physical needs. I had no knowledge of what form this ‘tolerance’ was to take, or what ‘physical’ part I might play in it. I regretted that Mama had not given me the pamphlet herself, so that I might have been able to ask her, but I also guessed that this was precisely what she had been trying to avoid. There were, I knew, issues of some delicacy surrounding private married life. I just wished I knew what they were. Mama and I had shared a bedroom all my life. Papa had suggested the year before that I might take one of the other six bedrooms, but Mama had refused, saying she required my company. He lived in a different wing of the house and the only ‘physical’ thing I had ever seen my parents do together was walk into dinner, my mother’s hand on my father’s arm. Miss Adams proved herself, once again, no great help, by staunchly refusing to discuss the pamphlet’s existence after handing it over to me.
The coach slowed. Mr Goldsmith leant down from his perch on the roof. ‘Bridge, ladies,’ his disembodied voice said somewhere above the open window.
It was customary for the driver to halt the coach before a bridge, whilst one of the team jumped down and inspected it for soundness. Then we would proceed, with some caution. Many of the bridges on this remote trail were over a decade old, and were wanting repair. I tried to see out of the window, but Miss Adams’s look of reproach meant I sat back again in my seat and turned my eyes to my book. I listened though as the teamster returned and spoke to the driver in his American brogue.
