The Hider

by Loren D. Estleman

  At first I thought I hadn’t heard him right. I gave him my best bewildered expression, but he didn’t repeat the question.

  “Mister,” I said slowly, “the last buffalo in the U.S. was killed over ten years ago.”

  I thought the statement would anger him, but he didn’t blink. “There’s one,” he said simply.

  If anybody else had said this, I would have branded him crazy and ordered him off the property. But if anyone were sane, it was the old man who stood before me. If he weren’t, I would seriously have begun to doubt my own state of mind. “What makes you think there’s any buffalo left?” I asked. I thought, We might as well be crazy together.

  “Forty years ago,” he said, “there was so many buffalo that all the powder and all the hunters in the world wasn’t enough to kill them all. Once in New Mexico I had to stop a supply wagon for twelve hours waiting for one herd to pass; when I woke up the next morning, I could look out and see nothing but brown hides stretching all the way back to the Pinos Altos. Injuns tell me stories of a stampede in Arizona that lasted three days. Well, hunters got thick and buffalo got thin. Each hunt the herds got smaller, till you could count them on your fingers. I killed my last buffalo in ’92.” He paused, contemplating the horizon. What was he expecting to see? “I spent the last six years looking for something to shoot. Drifting all the time. Living off bacon, beans, and the land. Three years ago, I was spending time with a old buddy when he took to his bedroll. Just afore he died, he apologized for holding out on me. Said he seen a buffalo outside Tucson and was on its trail when I caught up to him. He was waiting for me to move on so’s he could have it all to hisself. Well, sir, I been chasing that buffalo for three years, going on signs and what people tell me. Arizona. Utah. Nevada. California. And now, Oregon.”

  I wet my lips. “How can you be sure this buffalo is for real? Maybe some people are having fun with you.”

  “I wondered about that off and on for three years,” he said. “But two months ago, I seen him!”

  “You saw him?”

  “Boy, he was standing on a ridge not sixty yards away from me. I got off a shot, but he was over the ridge and gone. I was close then, but I’m so close now I can smell him.”

  His last words rang in my ears for several seconds. For some reason I was excited. I’d never seen a buffalo outside of pictures, had never felt any urge to see one in real life, but at that moment I would have given my grandfather’s Confederate Army belt buckle for a glimpse of a hoof and a brush tail. My throat was dry, and my heart was thumping like a drum in a parade. “Are you sure he came this way?” I asked breathlessly.

  He swung his arm in a direction parallel with the front of the house. “He’s been following the same old buffalo trail for months. This one runs right through your spread. He’s on his way up to Canada, but he ain’t going to make it.”

  I don’t think my brain has ever worked as fast as it did in that moment after he’d finished speaking. Did you ever talk to someone who could make you want the same things he did, even though you knew with one part of your mind that it was impossible? A half hour ago, I would have been satisfied with money in my pocket for Pa’s worthless land and a train ticket east. Now nothing would do but that I talk this man whom I had never seen before, and whose name I did not even know, into including me in his plans. I looked around me, taking in the dead farm and the house, looking at what my life would be in the future, thinking of the life I had led so far and comparing it to the one I was likely to lead from here on in, and made my decision. I spoke quickly, lest I get a chance to change my mind.

  “Mister, would you care to take along a partner?”

  He regarded me for a long moment. What he saw was a tall, skinny kid with nothing to show for eighteen years of living but a gray work shirt, faded blue denim pants, a pair of work shoes, and a Stetson hat that I would never grow into, much less look good in, beneath which stuck out a shock of unruly brown hair. Although I had lived and worked my entire life on the farm, I had no muscles to speak of, and I could pass inspection in Teddy’s Rough Riders even if I went a month without shaving. I suddenly became conscious of the fact that I didn’t exactly look right for the task he’d be expecting of me. I knew he was going to say no.

  “All right,” he said decisively. “I can use someone to fetch and carry when I’m played out. But you’re going to take care of yourself. I’m too old to learn wet-nursing.”

  I could hardly believe it. I wanted to shout out loud. But I was proud of the way I controlled myself. “You don’t have to worry about me, mister. I’ve been taking care of myself for a long time.”

  “You got a horse, boy?”

  “My pa’s bay is ready to go. I’ve just got to toss a bedroll on him, is all.”

  “Then get to it, boy. I got to get supplies and a new pack animal and get back on the trail afore sundown.”

  I felt like running into the house, but I settled for a fast walk. Inside, I pawed through the debris in a corner of the kitchen and dug out the old woolen blanket Pa used to use when he went hunting. It was riddled with moth holes and it smelled of mildew: it hadn’t been used since before Pa fell sick with the liver ailment that killed him, but it was serviceable. I tucked it under my arm and headed for the back door. Spotting Pa’s Winchester hanging on the wall, I took it down, unrolled the bedroll, and wrapped the carbine in it. I grabbed my warm canvas jacket and a leather sack full of shells and dropped it into the jacket’s deep right pocket. Then I went out to the barn.

  The big bay was saddled for a trip into town. Two minutes later, mounted, my gear stowed away behind the saddle, I rode triumphantly around to the front of the house. My new partner was back on his mule when I got there.

  “You got a name, boy?” he asked.

  “Jeff,” I replied. “Jeff Curry.”

  He grunted. “Jeff’s a name for a man. The only Jeff I knowed was a deputy U.S. marshal that got hisself killed in Las Cruces riding through cross fire to give me a seat on his horse. You’re going to have to prove you’re more than a boy afore I call you Jeff.”

  “Yessir,” I said, automatically slipping into the response I had always given Pa. “What do they call you, mister?”

  “Well, I been tagged with a good many names, boy. I wouldn’t repeat none of them to my best girl. But you can call me Jack. Jack Butterworth.”

  Chapter Two

  If you have ever pulled the stopper out of a sink full of water and trash, and seen what it looks like after the water is gone and the trash has lodged in the drain, then you have a fair idea of what the town of Citadel looked like at the bottom of the Rogue River Basin. I’ll never know why the town’s founders chose that spot to build. At the end of each rainy season, I half expected to find Citadel beneath sixty feet of water. For some reason, however, it always seemed to make it through the storms intact. I understand a dam has been built in recent years that leaves the whole valley flooded, but I can’t say for sure because I haven’t been back in a long time. I will say this, though: If such a rumor is true, and the little town I knew is peopled only by fishes and fresh-water clams, it’s no loss. A more disreputable collection of misfits I should never hope to see. More about that later.

  We reached the town’s main street and made for the opposite end, where the livery stable stood perpendicular to the street. As I said before, Jack rode easily, surrendering himself to the mule’s swinging gait and letting the animal do all the work. He rode as tall as he stood; astride my bay, I would have had to stand in my stirrups to bring the crown of my Stetson level with the brim of his sweat-stained campaign hat. The conspicuous squeak of my newer saddle added to my feelings of humiliation, but he didn’t seem to take any notice of it.

  “So this is the Devil’s Citadel.” They were the first words he had spoken since leaving the house half an hour before.

  “This is it,” I replied. “It isn’t much, is it?”

  “I seen less. Virginia City looked like the world’s biggest chamb
er pot a week after the silver mines went dry.”

  Up close, Citadel didn’t look too bad, at that. The street was badly rutted from overloaded wagons rattling back and forth during the rainy season, but it was solid enough now. For the most part, the town was untouched by progress; the false-fronted wooden buildings and weathered boardwalk looked no different from the photographs taken during the 1860s which Henry Stockett had tacked up on the walls of his bank, in which you could barely see the street for all the horses and buggies parked along the hitching rails. But the effect was spoiled when we drew alongside Lloyd Slattery’s motorcar sitting with its engine running in front of the little one-story post office. It was a monstrosity of steel and dusty leather, with a gas lantern on each front fender. I thought it looked like a bug. I said as much to Jack.

  He glanced at it indifferently. “Seen a man put the butt of a Henry through the windshield of a horseless carriage last year. Owner shot him. Dead. Just couldn’t take it, I reckon.”

  He spoke calmly, with an air of detached interest that reminded me of a schoolteacher. Even so, I got the impression that he would have dearly loved to put the butt of his own rifle through the windshield of this particular vehicle. But he didn’t; Jack could take it.

  As we advanced, I noticed that we were attracting a considerable amount of attention from the town’s inhabitants. Some of them stopped to watch us pass, while others came to the doors of the shops they were in to get a better look at us. I knew some of them, and I suppose a few others knew me, by sight if not by name. Doubtless they were wondering what I was doing with this old derelict. It occurred to me that many of the townspeople who were much older than I was had never seen a buffalo hunter before, much less a buffalo. The occupation had died out while most of them were still children. I didn’t pay any attention to them, and I don’t think Jack was even aware of their presence. He was probably used to it.

  We dismounted in front of the livery and tied up our mounts to the hitching post nearby. Jack removed the rifle from his saddle boot before going in. It was a fancy piece, with an oversize butt and a barrel to match. The trigger guard, too, was larger than normal size, to accommodate the two triggers that reposed within, one in front of the other. The bore was huge. I had seen its like before, when an acquaintance of Pa’s had tried to sell one to him. It was a Sharps buffalo rifle, probably the famed “Big Fifty,” or fifty-caliber model, with which hunters had claimed to have brought down game from as much as a thousand yards away. I didn’t put any stock in those stories, but it’s a fact that, after Pa declined to buy the weapon for fear it was stolen, the acquaintance was hanged in Idaho for shooting a deputy sheriff with it, and that three days later they were still scraping deputy sheriff off the walls of the saloon where it happened. Whatever the gun’s qualities, Jack carried it casually, hanging down at his side, but ready to use if he were called upon to do so. I realized then why he never bothered to pack a pistol.

  Raul, the boy who looked after the stable in the owner’s absence, came out to meet us. Although he was my age, he outweighed me by at least fifty pounds and looked more like twenty. He wore a pair of dirty overalls and nothing else that I could see, other than a worn pair of work shoes. As far as I knew, he was as American as I am, so I never knew where he got a Mexican name like Raul, pronounced Ra-ul.

  He saw Jack first. “Howdy, mister. Can I help you?” Then he noticed me. “Oh, hello, Jeff.” It was sort of a snide, look-down-your-nose greeting, so I didn’t bother to acknowledge it.

  I said, “Where’s Mr. Brooder?”

  “He’s over at the hotel, eatin’ lunch.” His attitude toward me didn’t improve any. That’s the way it always is; the lower your station in life, the more uppity you act toward your betters. I ignored it. When you roll in the mud with a hog, you come out smelling no better than he does.

  Jack spoke up. “I need a good pack animal, son. What you got?”

  “Pack animal?” Raul scratched his woolly head. I half expected to see a flock of bats come flying out. “Gosh, mister, I don’t know. There ain’t much call for them nowadays. Most folks load up a wagon if they’re goin’ on a trip. Lloyd Slattery uses his motorcar.”

  “Wagons slow you down,” said Jack, “and horseless carriages don’t last long in the territory I’m planning to cover. You got a mule or a burro?”

  Raul’s face lit up. “Come with me, mister.” He led the way into the stable. It was dark inside, and much cooler than the street. In those days I think everyone in Oregon secretly wished to be a stable hand in the summertime. It was one way to beat the heat, if you didn’t mind working amidst the stench of sweat and horse manure. Of course, the coolness didn’t seem so inviting when you thought of the Oregon winter, but then there was usually a potbelly stove glowing red in the corner and roasting you to a turn, so I guess it was about as close to the ideal job as the average person was likely to come. We followed Raul through the fragrant stable until we reached a stall in the rear of the building. He opened the gate and went in. A second later he came out, beaming and leading behind him the sorriest-looking burro I have ever seen. It was small and spindly-legged, and its ribs showed through its hide so clearly that you could count them. Some kind of mange had eaten away the hair around its flanks and shoulders, leaving the skin beneath a raw and pussy mess. A pair of red-rimmed eyes shone dully from beneath its drooping lids. It smelled awful.

  Raul was grinning from ear to ear. “Some greaser sold it to Mr. Brooder last year for the price of a meal,” he explained. “Nobody wanted it. We was thinkin’ we might have to shoot it.”

  To my surprise, Jack didn’t say anything. He got down on one knee and ran his hands over the burro’s forelegs, first one, then the other. Then he did the same thing with the hind ones. He looked up at Raul. “How much?”

  Raul shrugged. “Mr. Brooder paid six bits for it. I reckon a buck’s fair.”

  Jack stood up and reached into his hip pocket. He pulled out a small crumple of dirty bills and peeled one off. “You aren’t going to buy it!” I exclaimed.

  “Why not?” said Jack, placing the bill in Raul’s dirty palm.

  “I wouldn’t give two cents for that mangy beast,” I said. “Why, he might drop dead before we get outside of town!”

  Jack stuffed the rest of the roll back into his pocket. “Boy,” he said patiently, “how long can you carry two hundred pounds of beans and bacon?”

  I admitted that I wouldn’t make it out the door of the mercantile.

  “I’m betting that this here burro will carry that much and more for as long as he has to.” He took hold of the end of the cotton clothesline that was tied around the animal’s neck. “If not, I surely would appreciate your pointing out a better pack animal in town.”

  I didn’t answer. He’d made his point.

  He nodded to Raul and we left. After he had tied the burro up beside the mule, Jack said, “I got to pick up some grub. Where can I get the best price?”

  “That’d be Slauson’s Mercantile, up the street,” I answered, pointing out the low, whitewashed building that stood facing the bank. “If you can stand Mr. Slauson’s disposition.”

  “You know him better than me. Maybe you can strike a bargain.”

  “I won’t be going in with you,” I said. “I’ve got some business to attend to before we leave.”

  “Suit yourself.” He stepped up onto the boardwalk and left me standing there.

  The two-story red brick building that housed the town newspaper and printing shop served also as the headquarters of J. Bottoms, Attorney at Law. That’s what it said on the sign; in reality, I don’t think my Uncle Jake Bottoms ever did get around to taking his bar examination. I think this was because he knew he couldn’t pass it. He specialized in probate cases, but he spent more time running against Randy Fleet for the office of town sheriff than he did pleading his clients’ causes in court. This was because it was a good “graft” position, and nobody had ever known Jacob Bottoms to pass up a chance to line h
is pockets with shady money. The fact that Pa had drawn up a will four years before he died hadn’t surprised me half as much as the news that he had chosen Uncle Jake to be its executor. I’m inclined to believe that Pa was more than a little in his cups the day he wrote out that document, because he hated his brother-in-law and had vowed not to die before he did. An honest attorney would have advised him to go home and sleep it off before he fooled with something as important as a man’s last will and testament; but we’re talking about my Uncle Jake and not William Jennings Bryan.

  I found him in his cramped little office in the northwest corner of the second floor, seated at his desk and reading a newspaper. It was a month-old copy of the New York Journal, which he received by the stack once a month by way of stagecoach from Portland. A huge headline across the top of the front page read: “Armed Intervention at Once!” I suppose it had something to do with Cuba. I didn’t get a chance to look any closer, because Jake heard me coming and put the paper aside.

  He was a huge fat man, weighing right around three hundred pounds, and he had a round bald head that gleamed in the sunlight slanting in through the big west window. He always wore pin-striped suits tailored loose to make him look slimmer, but they only made him resemble an elephant draped in a wagon sheet. He heaved himself to his feet and stuck out a pudgy paw for me to take.

  “Hello, Jeff, hello.” He had a habit of saying things twice for emphasis. “This is some mess we are getting into with Spain, is it not?”

  I ignored the hand and he withdrew it awkwardly. “Some people might call it a mess,” I said testily. “Others might say that we are only defending our life and liberty.”

  “True, true. Well, what brings you here at this time? It is not yet time for your monthly stipend from your father’s trust fund.” He indicated that I should take the straight-backed chair in front of the desk and eased himself into his comfortable leather one. The legs groaned beneath his weight.

  I remained on my feet. It never pays to get too comfortable when you’re discussing business. “I’m here to collect the balance of what Pa left me,” I said. “I’m going on a trip, and I’ll need it.”