“It surely don’t, brother. And it don’t seem right that a lotta folks born with a white skin somehow think it’s a better colour than yours. It’s a goddamned impossible notion to me. But throwin’ a fit and runnin’ off ain’t worth a pinch of coon shit either. Sounds like you’re whinin’ and that ain’t a bit like you.”
Mulling over Duffy’s words, John said nothing.
Duffy added, “Could be that they was pickin’ on you so’s you’d know you belonged.”
“That’s a funny way of showin’ it.”
“That it is. But like the Devil, a man’s admiration for another man comes in many disguises.”
•
John decided that he would not return to the Bar U, at least not right away. When he went to collect his pay, Stimson apologized for allowing the pranks to get out of hand and offered John a five dollar a month raise to return. John was tempted to stay, because he was beginning to believe that maybe Duffy was right, that perhaps flattery and admiration actually did hide behind different masks. But he felt in need of a change, and it wouldn’t hurt to stay the course in order to let everybody know that he, like Lynch, was not a man to fool with.
John shook his head. “I took work somewhere else for a while, Fred. Maybe in the fall.”
Stimson looked off into the distance. “The offer might not be good in the fall, John.”
But John didn’t hear much conviction in the manager’s voice. He looked at Stimson, holding his eyes. “Well, that may be, but it ain’t in me to accept right now.”
He was about to mount up and depart when Tom Lynch hailed him. His old trail boss was with George Emerson and the pair came over.
“Glad I caught you, John,” said Lynch. “George and I are heading to Montana to bring back another herd and wondered if you’d care to join us.”
George nodded in agreement. “First thing, John, I owe you an apology. It was me who coiled that dead snake on your saddle and me who put the rope under your bedroll. It was a damned fool thing to do and I regret it. When it comes to a good horse or a good man, colour doesn’t mean a thing. And you’re a good man. I know that.” He offered his hand to reinforce his sincerity.
“Well, I mighta overreacted some,” John admitted, taking Emerson’s hand, “but when it comes to snakes, I ain’t never been shy about lettin’ my feelin’s show. Anyway, if a man takes the time to apologize, I ain’t one to deny it. Much obliged.” To Lynch, he smiled and said, “I appreciate the offer, but I found the country that’s gonna be my home and I ain’t leavin’ it. Not even for a little while.”
He mounted up, touched the brim of his hat, and rode off. He did not know if Lynch and Emerson believed him when he said he was never leaving Alberta, but he had never spoken truer words. He would have his own ranch here one day, of that he was certain. He would have a wife, too, although of that he was less certain. The country was not exactly crowded with black folks—in fact, he had yet to see another one—which made him a bit of an oddity. But maybe Calgary held the solution to that problem, and he decided that it wouldn’t hurt to make a trip there one day to see if it harboured any similar oddities of the female kind.
He took work, with a couple of other men, digging a long irrigation ditch near the town arising at the Highwood River crossing. The hours were long and the labour hard, but it at least relieved the stiffness in his large frame, put there by long hours in the saddle. He also discovered that he felt lonesome not being around Duffy, so he rode out to the Bar U from time to time for a visit, and Duffy would come to the crossing. They found a comfort in each other’s company that was not available in other men.
Astonished, John watched, with the knowledge that his decision to stay in Alberta was the correct one, as herd after herd poured into the country. By summer’s end, there were more than twenty thousand cattle in the district. The word was that many more herds were expected. It seemed he was not the only one bent on making these prairies and foothills home.
He stayed away from the budding town and also from Calgary, saving his pay. He returned to the Bar U in the fall, rejoining Duffy, who was happier than anybody with his return. There were friendly nods from the other ranch hands who knew him, even a “good to see you back” from one man. Fred Stimson showed his pleasure by making good on his promise of a raise.
ELEVEN
Some things are worth holdin’ on to in a man’s memory.
The Bar U Ranch had fallen into a predictable rhythm of work—buildings rising from the earth, corrals and fences built. In the fall, the crew gathered hay for winter feed and moved the herd to a closer pasture. During the winter, hay had to be taken to it and ice broken in the ponds so that the animals would have water to drink. It could be rough work when it was forty below, and only those with hardier dispositions stayed on. In the spring, the roundup began again, the cycle repeated itself, and another year passed.
During the summer of 1884, John took some time away from the ranch and went with Duffy and a couple of friends to look for gold. There were rumours of a lost mine somewhere in the foothills, and John and the others were no different from prospectors the world over: they set off in search of a lost treasure, believing they could find it. But after a summer of traipsing up and down creeks and rivers, they had to admit defeat. It was not a complete waste of time for John, though. The foothills became lovelier as they rose into mountains, and Alberta impressed itself even deeper on his mind. It became part of him as he had become part of it.
•
After his return from prospecting, he rode into Calgary to make a homestead claim. While ranchers used thousands of acres of land for grazing their cattle, they leased it from the government and did not own it. The railroad from the east to the west coast was near completion, and the government was encouraging settlers to the North-West Territory by offering homestead rights on rangeland. Most of the ranchers opposed this, but their complaints went unheeded. John paid ten dollars and claimed a homestead west of the Highwood River crossing.
He left the government office not feeling anywhere near as buoyant as he should have. The frigid reception he had received from the clerk disturbed him, as did the cold stares and snide comments made by passersby. The atmosphere made him shiver. He discovered what was going on from a man who stopped and warned him that he would do well to get his “black hide” out of town without delay. It was not welcome in Calgary and could be downright dangerous for the man wearing it.
“Why’s that?” asked John. “I ain’t been in town long enough to have offended anyone.”
“It’s not so much you, personally,” the tobacco-chewing stranger sneered. “It’s your kind.”
“My kind? What’d my kind ever do to you?”
“Your kind are heartless, murdering devils. Your kind took a good man from us, slit his throat wide open over at McKelvie’s store. We just hung him for it. Our first nigger hanging, and with any luck at all, the last one.”
The news and the vitriolic nature of the encounter stunned John. At the crossing and at Fort McLeod, where the spring roundups began, the townsfolk and his fellow cowboys treated him with respect and in some cases showed deference because of his enviable skills. But the only thing Calgarians noticed when he entered their town was his black skin. To them, it was no different from the one they’d strung up for murder, a hanging that must have taken place while he was roaming the foothills, because this was the first he’d heard of it.
Wanting to avoid trouble, he did not linger in town. But he wondered about the killing. Was the black man the real culprit? Because this was not the South, he supposed there must have been witnesses. Perhaps it was a violent reaction by a man fed up with others denying him the right to buy food for his table. Granted, that was no cause to take another human being’s life, but if it was the last insult heaped on an ever-growing pile . . . Some men might snap under the onerous weight.
He told Duffy about his experience and his concerns, but his friend was optimistic. “I wouldn’t take it t
oo much to heart, John. Word’ll eventually spread up there about the kind of man you are and life’ll get better. Wait and see.”
“The only way it’ll get worse is if they lynch me for somethin’ I didn’t do.”
“That ain’t gonna happen. There’s law and order in this country.”
“Well, from what I heard up in Calgary, the law is pretty quick to order a hangin’.”
•
John chose a good building site on his claim, about a half mile back from the river, and he and Duffy cut several poplar trees upstream, trimmed them, lashed them together into a raft, and poled them to where they could be hauled to the site with a horse. They had four tiers of logs up when Fred Stimson sent word that he would appreciate their presence back at the Bar U for the fall roundup and work over the winter. It meant more dollars saved toward his ranching future, so John accepted, as did Duffy.
The roundup and winter passed uneventfully, but spring ambled in bringing trouble. In late March, near the tiny village of Duck Lake, some five hundred miles to the northeast, a skirmish between half-breeds and the police left a dozen men dead. It did not come as a surprise. Word of a possible uprising along the North and South Saskatchewan Rivers had been in the rumour mills for some time. Then Cree Indians, members of Big Bear’s band, massacred nine civilians at Frog Lake, which was a bit closer to home, and the entire territory was on alert. Government soldiers were on their way from the east, while a local rancher mustered a force in Calgary.
John considered enlisting but Stimson advised against it. He did not think it prudent for all the able-bodied men in the area to be absent. Several horses had been stolen and cattle killed recently, the meat cut away cleanly with knives rather than torn out as a predatory animal would do, raising concerns that the local Indians could not be trusted. To deal with these problems, Stimson organized John and several others into a militia referred to as Stimson’s Rangers. Members received government rifles, and their job, in addition to ranching duties, was to patrol the area and keep it clear of Indians. Meanwhile, all the women in the area sought the safety of the mounted police fort in Calgary.
John patrolled but never ran into any real trouble. Whenever he or the authorities thought Indians were within threatening distance of the cattle, he ordered them to move on, back to their reserves. When one small band refused, John offered encouragement by throwing his lasso over the top of their teepee and pulling it down. He dragged it off a hundred yards in the direction he wanted them to go. Sullen and angry, the band moved on.
The need for such tactics was rare. John’s presence usually provided the incentive for the Indians to obey. His size and black skin were mysterious to them, and they believed he might have special powers. Anyone who was not an Indian was by default a white man, so they called him the “bad black white man.” John could not have cared less what they called him. He did not think much of the Indians, especially the men, whom he considered lazy, spending most of their time sitting around talking while the women did all the work.
Meanwhile, battles between government soldiers and the half-breeds and Indians flared up along the North and South Saskatchewan Rivers, but by May, the rebellion was over, with government forces victorious. Life in the territory eased back to normal, and John and Duffy rode to Fort McLeod to join the spring roundup.
The first thing John did when they arrived was visit the government office and register the brand “9999” as his own. He liked the number 9, the way it curved in on itself like a contained stampede. It would be his lucky number, four times over, and it would soon be on his own cattle. Most likely because he was the first black man to register a brand, the agent asked, “How many cattle do you have?”
John did not like the agent’s tone of voice and detected a hint of suspicion and malice in the question. “None,” he replied, “but I aim to fix that directly.” He caught the man’s eyes. “And I ain’t stealin’ ’em, either, if that’s what you’re thinkin’.”
The agent looked chagrined and said nothing.
Fort McLeod was spilling over with drovers, most of them down from the several ranches on the southern ranges below Calgary. John reckoned there must have been a hundred riders, fifteen wagons, and five hundred horses that set out on that first day. They would spread out between Pincher Creek in the west and Willow Creek in the east, and head north, like a vast net, gathering in the cattle that had drifted south, separating the brands into herds for the owners to return to their home range. Mavericks were considered property of the group, or “association,” and could be sold to help defray expenses.
Such was John’s popularity on the drive that the Fort McLeod newspaper ran a story on him, lauding his outstanding skills as a cattleman and rider. Duffy bought a copy and read the full article to him. John was flattered by the accolades and pleased that there was not a single mention of his skin colour. It made him think of the bitter reception he had received in Calgary, and he grew determined to return there in hopes of changing a few minds.
After the roundup, John bought nine young mavericks from the association. He and Duffy branded them and headed for his claim near the Highwood. Even if it was a small herd, it was his, with his brand, and he was driving it to his ranch. He would have been fooling himself to say he did not feel proud.
Duffy, on the other hand, was quieter and less talkative than usual. Up until the morning they struck out on their own, he had shared John’s enthusiasm, but now he seemed gathered within himself. John recognized this as a sign that his friend was holding something back.
“Somethin’ botherin’ you?” he asked.
“Nothin’ that’s worth talkin’ about.” But a few moments later, Duffy added, “I still got all the body parts I was born with, but I gotta admit that some of ’em are feeling a little the worse for wear these days. Been thinkin’ that maybe I’ve ridden my last roundup. Not even sure about the work anymore. Maybe Fred’ll take me on as a cook or somethin’.”
John was concerned. “No need to worry about that, Duff. We’ll get the cabin built and you can take it easy there. Put your feet up. You earned it.”
“Well, I got a little cash put aside, so I could pay you some.”
“Pay me for what? You don’t eat more than a bird, and it’ll be good to have someone to keep an eye on the property when I’m away. I oughta pay you, and I will when I get the money. And if you wanna turn your hand to cookin’, you won’t hear me complain. I ate your cookin’ before and it ain’t killed me.”
Duffy was silent for a bit. “Can’t say I feel good about eatin’ from another man’s plate, but I guess I could earn it.”
“Since when do partners get bothered about whose plate they’re eatin’ from? Besides, it ain’t nothin’ you wouldn’t do for me, so it don’t make much sense to waste good breath talkin’ about it.” John spurred his horse to the other side of the small herd so Duffy could not argue. He heard him mutter something but ignored it.
Upon reaching the Highwood crossing, John bought a tarp and supplies, and at the homestead, the friends set up a lean-to as sleeping quarters. They got a fire going and John cooked some bacon and beans. He ended up eating most of it, as Duffy claimed that his appetite was “takin’ the evenin’ off.”
The following day dawned bright and sunny, with mosquitoes already swarming. When John asked, Duffy said that he was feeling better and that a little hard work would do him good. He even ate breakfast, observing, “It musta been somethin’ passin’ through me, I guess.”
The first thing that needed doing was to collect more trees, so they rode upstream about a mile to where there were several stands of large poplars. In order to avoid getting in each other’s way, they worked in different stands.
John liked this kind of physical activity, swinging the axe, getting into a smooth rhythm, relishing the thud of the blade slicing into the tree that sent tremors up his arms, seeing the chips fly. Sweat poured off him, which held the mosquitoes at bay but attracted pesky flies and other inse
cts looking for a drink. Still, it was easy to forget the surrounding world at such times, and he failed to notice that Duffy was not making a similar sound. When it finally penetrated his mind, he looked over at the copse where his friend was working and was startled to see him leaning against a tree, doubled over, clutching his stomach.
“You okay, Duff?” he called.
Duffy answered with a series of moans and dropped to his knees.
John flung his axe aside and ran over.
“Goddamned pain in my gut,” Duffy gasped. “A real son of a bitch!”
“What can I do?” John asked, more concerned than he let on.
“Let me rest a bit. I’ll be right soon enough.”
Duffy lay on the ground, still clutching his midriff, trying to suppress his moans. John knelt beside him and laid his hand on his friend’s arm, hoping it would provide at least a modicum of comfort. He waited anxiously for what seemed an eternity before Duffy began to breathe more easily. “Seems to have let up,” he said grumpily. “Whatever the hell it was.”
“Maybe you shouldn’t be swingin’ that axe for a while’s what I’m thinkin’.”
“I ain’t settin’ on my arse while you do all the work, and there’s a fact you can chew on.”
With some effort, Duffy rose, grabbed his axe, and went back to work. Before long, the pain had him doubled over again. “Get the horses, John,” he croaked. “I think I oughta see a doc.”
“Nearest doc’s in Calgary.”
“Too far. There’s a vet at the crossing. Maybe he’s got somethin’ that’ll kill this pain before it kills me.”
John retrieved the horses and helped Duffy into the saddle. He seemed to teeter for a few seconds before mustering enough strength to catch himself.
“Okay?” John asked.
Duffy nodded. “If we take it slow, I’ll be all right. If I die, this saddle’s as good a place as any.” He managed a half-smile.
High Rider Page 14
