Another rattlesnake. Nate told himself it was nothing to be bothered about. Rattlesnakes were as common as rabbits. Most years, he would spot a few. Unless they were close to his cabin he usually left them alone. That there were so many of late was troublesome, but after the fiasco of his hunt, he figured he wouldn’t make an issue of it.
The dodger was delicious. Winona had learned to make them just for him, and she added honey to the cornmeal. No sooner did he think of her than the bedroom door opened and out she came tying the purple robe he had bought for her.
“Tsaangu beaichehku.”
It was Shoshone for “good morning.” “Tsaangu beaichehku,” Nate replied, drinking in her beauty. He never tired of looking at her, of being with her. That she cared for him as deeply as he cared for her was a gift beyond measure. “Sleep well?”
“Haa.”
Shoshone for “yes.” “We are speaking your tongue today, I take it?” Nate said.
Winona smiled and ran a hand through her hair. She padded in her bare feet over to the rocker and bent and kissed him lightly on the lips. “We can speak whichever tongue you want, husband.”
“We’ll speak yours, then. It embarrasses me that you speak mine better than me.”
Winona rubbed her fingers over his beard. She loved to do that. As she loved to feel his muscles and to listen to him breathe in the quiet of the night. “I will fix breakfast.” She moved to the counter. “How soon do you go off to chop more trees?”
“I’m supposed to meet Shakespeare about an hour after sunup. Should give me enough time.”
“For what?”
Nate told her about the rattlesnake.
In the act of smearing grease in a pan, Winona looked up. “Why not let it be?”
“Can’t.”
“I have never known you to make such a fuss over snakes. It reminds me of Lame Bear.”
“Isn’t he that old man who can hardly walk? Kin of yours on your mother’s side?”
“He is the one, yes. With him it is flies. He goes around the village killing all the flies he can.”
“Are you saying I’m feebleminded?”
Winona smiled sweetly. “Not yet. But you are working on it.”
Chapter Nine
Nate didn’t find the snake. He poked among the rocks and turned over some of the larger ones, but it was gone. In annoyance he kicked the ground and then headed for the cabin site.
Shakespeare and Zach were already there and Shakespeare was regaling the Worths with a tale of his early years. McNair winked and grinned at Nate and went on with his story.
“So there I was, all alone in Blackfoot country in the cold of winter with the snow so deep only a few treetops showed and—”
“Wait a minute,” Randa said. “Are you tryin’ to tell us the snow was so deep it buried the trees?”
“Oh, come now, Mr. McNair,” Emala said.
Samuel and Chickory both grinned.
“Believe it or not, ladies,” Shakespeare responded. “I’ll have you know that I am a veritable fount of veracity.”
“A what?” Randa asked.
“It means he always tells the truth,” Nate explained, “except when he opens his mouth.”
The Worths all laughed.
Shakespeare feigned indignation. “Your fine wit, Horatio, is something stale and hoar ere it be spent.”
“Was that that dead guy you always talk like?” Chickory asked. “It sounded peculiar like this talk does.”
Nate smothered a laugh of his own.
“Yes, that was William S.,” Shakespeare answered. “The finest scribe who ever drew breath.”
Emala said, “Go on with your story. That other fella I can’t hardly ever understand.”
McNair cleared his throat. “Very well. So there I was, alone in Blackfoot country, with snow and ice everywhere. The Blackfeet had taken my horse and my pack animal and I was stranded afoot. I had to walk out. I’d gone about ten miles in the fifty-below weather when—”
“Wait a minute,” Randa interrupted again. “Did you say fifty below?”
“Why, Mr. McNair, nothin’ is ever that cold,” Emala said.
“I will have you know, madam, that in some parts of the north country it does, indeed, get that cold, and colder. With the wind blowing it can easily reach seventy-five below.”
“Land sakes. The tales you tell,” Emala said.
“Go on,” Samuel urged.
McNair cleared his throat again. “So anyway, I came to a river that was frozen over and—”
“Which river?” Chickory asked.
“What?”
“Which river was it?”
“I don’t know as it even had a name. A lot of rivers back then didn’t and many still don’t. But if it’s a name you need, some of the Indians called it the Sweet Grass River.”
“Why did they call it that?” Randa asked.
“Because it cut through the prairie, I believe,” Shakespeare said with a trace of exasperation. “The name isn’t important. The important thing is what happened when I tried to cross it. You see, it had frozen over, but when I was about halfway across the ice crackled and started to break just like—”
Emala held up a hand. “Hold on. You told us it was fifty below. Why, mercy me, that ice had to be five feet thick. How could it crack?”
“It just did.”
“But you don’t weigh all that much and back then you were likely skinnier. Am I right?”
“Yes, you are, but you see—”
Emala shook her head. “No. It don’t hardly seem possible. But go on with your story if you want.”
“Thank you.” Shakespeare sighed. “I was in the middle of the river and the ice started to crack. I tried to run, but the ice was too slippery and I kept falling. Just when I thought I might make it, down I went. I managed to catch hold of the edge of the ice with my arms but I lost my rifle and it sank out of sight and—”
“You must have been powerful cold,” Randa said.
“It’s a miracle you didn’t freeze solid,” Emala mentioned.
“I might have,” Shakespeare acknowledged. “But just then a grizzly happened by and spotted me dangling there. I was scared to death, as you can imagine. I was even more scared when he came over and sniffed me and—”
“Wait a minute,” Randa said. “The ice was thick enough to hold one of those giant bears, but it wouldn’t hold you?”
“It came from the shore side where the ice was thicker,” Shakespeare said. “I was out in the middle. Anyway, it sniffed me a few times and then opened its mouth and I figured I was a goner. I expected it to chomp on my head and that would be the end of me. But—”
“What was its breath like?” Chickory asked.
“What?”
“Its breath. Dog breath always stinks. I bet bear breath stinks even worse. Did it make you gag?”
Shakespeare looked at Nate and Nate pretended to be interested in some clouds.
“I was too scared to pay much attention. All I remember is its teeth and how I thought I was doomed, when lo and behold, that griz went and bit down on the back of my shirt and lifted me right out of the water and dragged me in to shore.”
“Let me guess the end of your story,” Samuel said. “It dragged you to shore and ate you.”
Emala and the children tittered and cackled.
“I am done,” Shakespeare declared.
“No. Please,” Emala said. “We want to hear the rest. What happened next? How did you get away?”
“I think the best grace of wit will shortly turn into silence, and discourse grow commendable in none only but parrots,” Shakespeare quoted.
“I don’t know what any of that meant,” Emala said.
“Maybe I’ll finish my tale later. We have a lot of work to do.”
“Now you’ve done it,” Emala said to Samuel. “You’ve hurt his feelings.”
Everyone got busy. Nate stripped to the waist and went in among the trees with his ax. Today t
hey needed logs to use as ceiling beams. The logs had to be not only big but strong enough to support the weight of a heavy snowfall.
McNair tagged along, muttering to himself.
“Something the matter?”
“I am feeling old and grumpy.”
“Maybe you should have told them about the time you rode an elk. It’s more believable.”
“I did, consarn you. On a dare.” Shakespeare rubbed his white beard. “I was young and stupid in those days.”
“I saw another rattlesnake this morning,” Nate said.
“Imagine that. In the wilderness, no less.”
“Have you come across any since the hunt?”
Shakespeare shook his head. “I don’t make it a point to look. I’m not as fond of them as you are.”
A stand of oaks drew Nate’s interest. Several were more than thick enough. He patted a trunk. “What do you think?”
“That there isn’t enough respect in this world for those with white hair.”
“I meant the trees.”
“Oh.” Shakespeare walked around it. “Nice and straight. And oak is stronger than pine.”
“Let’s do it.”
Shakespeare nodded and chose another.
Nate settled into a rhythm, swinging smoothly and powerfully. Chips flew with each bite of his ax blade. When the oak gave a lurch and there was a loud crack, he yelled, “Timber!” and quickly backed away. With a tremendous boom, the giant oak fell. It took a few smaller trees with it and when it hit, raised bits of grass and dust into the air.
A few minutes later the tree Shakespeare had picked came crashing down. He walked over, his brow glistening with a sheen of sweat. “That felt good.”
“See,” Nate said. “You’re not as old as you keep saying.”
“Because I can chop down a tree?”
“You never once stopped to rest. Many men would have.”
“I have never been puny,” Shakespeare said. He gazed about them at the untamed wilds. “You can’t be and survive out here.”
“Neither puny nor careless,” Nate said.
Evelyn appeared, carrying a pitcher and two glasses. She was wearing one of her best dresses and a bonnet Nate had never laid eyes on before. He had seen her sewing something a few days ago and now he knew what. “That’s new,” he said, nodding.
“Yes,” Evelyn said absently.
Shakespeare studied it. “I’ve never seen you in a bonnet, young one. It becomes you.”
“I’m not so young anymore,” Evelyn replied in the same absent tone, “and I was hoping it would.”
“You act down in the dumps,” Shakespeare remarked.
Evelyn gave a toss of her head and smiled. “Sorry. It’s just that Dega isn’t here today.”
Nate and Shakespeare exchanged covert glances.
“Not here?” Nate said.
“No. He’s off with his pa, hunting. His sister says he wanted to come but Waku promised you he would do the hunting and Dega had to go with him.”
“It’s rough having a stomach,” Shakespeare said.
Evelyn blinked and then grinned. “You say the strangest things, do you know that?”
Nate said, “You’ll get to see Dega later probably.”
“I hope so.” Evelyn gave each of them a glass. “I brought blackberry juice. Ma made it as a surprise.”
“Daisies and nags rolled into one,” Shakespeare said.
“Excuse me?”
“Women,” Shakespeare said.
“That’s awful. Not all women nag, I am sure.”
“Girl, you’re, what, sixteen? You’ve lived long enough to know that females will be females and males will be males and never the twain shall meet.”
Shakespeare chuckled. “Well, except under the blan—”
Nate nudged him with an elbow, hard.
“Except what?” Evelyn asked.
“Except in the heart, where it counts the most,” Shakespeare said, and rubbed his side. “If it wasn’t for love we’d likely kill each other off.”
“Love,” Evelyn said dreamily.
Nate wagged his glass. “Are you going to pour or do we do it ourselves? I’m right thirsty.”
“Sorry, Pa.”
Shakespeare waited his turn, took a long sip, and smacked his lips in satisfaction. “Delicious. Tell your ma if I wasn’t married to my personal nag and she wasn’t hitched to this lunkhead next to me, I’d dang well propose to her.”
“I’ll tell my ma no such thing,” Evelyn said. “You’re terrible.”
Shakespeare drank more juice and said, “Marriage isn’t a bed of roses, fair maiden. You’d do well to remember that.”
“But you believe in love. You just said so.”
Shakespeare smiled and said kindly, “Yes, precious. I believe in love as much as I believe in anything.”
“Me, too. I think about it a lot.”
Shakespeare took another sip and looked at a pair of finches that flew past and then at the sky and then at his moccasins and then he said, “Have anyone in particular in mind when you think about love?”
“Who? Me?”
“I wasn’t talking to Horatio, here. I already know he loves Winona. The wisest choice he ever made in his whole life.” Shakespeare raised his glass and stared at her over the rim. “How about you?”
“I’m too young to be in love.”
“Really?”
Nate bit his lower lip to keep from laughing.
“And even if I was, I wouldn’t talk about it,” Evelyn said defensively. “Love is personal and private.”
“Do tell.”
“It’s true. When we talk about it, we spoil it.”
“I never knew that.”
“Unless it’s with the one we love. Then it’s all right to talk about it. Sort of like heart to heart.”
“I will be sure to mention that to Blue Water Woman. We have been making a spectacle of ourselves talking about our love in public.”
“You’re teasing, aren’t you?”
“Perish forbid,” Shakespeare said, and launched into a quote. “With love’s light wings did I o’er-perch these walls, for stony limits cannot hold love out, for what love can do, that dares love attempt.”
“What are you saying? That it is all right to talk about our special love with just about anybody?”
“There is talking and there is talking. But you are right, princess. There are things we talk about with those we love that we wouldn’t say to total strangers.”
“Are you teasing again?”
“Never about the shrine we hold most dear. That is, if we are talking about the same shrines.”
“I’m so confused,” Evelyn said.
Nate drained his glass and handed it to her. “Tell your mother we’ll be trimming a while. And don’t ever come into these woods again without your rifle.”
Evelyn was reaching for Shakespeare’s glass, and stopped. “I had the pitcher and glasses to carry. Besides, I have my pistols and my knife. And I heard you chopping and knew you weren’t far.”
“Never ever,” Nate said.
Frowning, Evelyn took the glass and wheeled on her heels. “I’m not a child. I can take care of myself.”
“Blue Flower,” Nate said sternly, using her Shoshone name.
Evelyn glanced over her shoulder.
“I don’t want to have to bury you.”
She walked on without saying a word.
A gust of wind stirred the trees and farther in the forest a raven squawked.
“It has long amused me,” Shakespeare said, “that when we are young we think we know everything and when we are old and look back we realize we didn’t know much of anything. She’s growing up, Horatio. She has a mind of her own.”
“Doesn’t make it easier.”
“No, the older they get, the harder it is. But look at the bright side.”
“I shudder to ask,” Nate said.
“In a year or so you might be a grandpa.”
/> Chapter Ten
The chickens needed to be shooed in at dusk. Bobcats and foxes and coyotes and wolves loved to gorge on chicken flesh.
It was Evelyn’s job. Or, as she preferred to think of it, her chore. She didn’t much like chickens. When they were fresh out of the egg they were adorable. They chirped sweetly and looked so cuddly she always wanted to pick them up. But as they aged they lost their cuteness and would often as not peck anyone who tried to handle them.
When her pa first got them there were ten, but now there were eighteen, counting the rooster. Evelyn liked him, liked how he strutted around with his chest puffed out and put on displays for the hens. She didn’t like how he crowed each morning at the crack of day and woke her. She would as soon sleep in.
On this particular evening, most of the sun had been devoured by the maw of hungry night. Evelyn had herded eleven of the chickens inside the coop but couldn’t find the rest. She went toward the lake and spied five close to the water. One was a big hen she called Matilda. Matilda thought she was a rooster. She had her own little band that followed her everywhere and did whatever Matilda did.
“There you are,” Evelyn said as she slowly circled to get behind them so they couldn’t run off. They clucked and Matilda dug at the dirt and flapped her wings. “It’s time for bed.” Evelyn waved her arms. “Get going.”
Matilda in the lead, they moved toward the coop. They took their time, as they always did, in no rush to be locked in.
Evelyn stamped her foot in irritation. “Faster, darn you. I am meeting Dega later and have things to do.” A secret meeting, as they had been doing for a while now. She would tell her folks she was going to bed and slip out her window and spend an hour or so with him and slip back in again with her parents none the wiser.
Evelyn never imagined there would come a day when she would do anything so brazen behind their backs. She loved and respected them. She truly did. But she doubted they’d approve and might even try to stop her, and she couldn’t have that. Dega meant too much to her. The thought made her cheeks grow warm. She hadn’t been honest with Shakespeare. She wasn’t too young to be in love. She had, in fact, been in love for some time and not realized it until recently. Peculiar how the heart worked, she reflected. Even more peculiar that the mind sometimes denied what the heart was feeling. She had denied hers until her feelings for Dega washed over her in a tidal wave of desire.
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