Whippoorwill (22 page)

They began to mutter among themselves. They hadn’t thought of it quite like that.

“Right, Mr. Worthy,” someone said.

Alfonso stomped away, satisfied that he’d dealt with a sticky issue in a satisfactory manner.

The guilty crowd dispersed, leaving Eulis to get himself out of the trough. His steps were dragging as he recovered the rest of his clothes from where they lay. Holding them between his thumb and forefinger, he dragged them through the dust to the trough, then doused them up and down a few times to remove all the critters before putting them back on, dripping wet.

With his head throbbing and his mouth gone dry, he went about the business of draining the ant-ridden water, then refilling the trough with clean water just as he’d promised to do. Every step that he took squished. Every move he made dripped. And there was still a bit of molasses in his hair and his beard that he hadn’t gotten out, but the ants were all gone, and he was some cooler than he’d been in quite a while. All in all, it wasn’t such a bad way to start a new day.

A PREACHER BY ANY OTHER NAME

“Good bread. Good meat. Praise the Lord. Time to eat. Amen.”

The sanctimonious expression on Parson Sutter’s face disappeared as he lifted his head, gauging his partner’s attention span before aiming for the skillet of fry bread.

Henry Wainwright looked back over the campfire with a warning glance. The last thirty-three years of his existence had been spent with Elmer Sutter. And at each meal, no matter where or what condition they were in, Parson said grace before he ate.

Henry reached for the aforementioned bread just ahead of his partner’s fist, thanking his lucky stars that he got a goodly portion on his plate before Parson got to it. Parson Sutter had an appetite bigger than his feet. And while he was a good man to have at your back in a fight, he was hell to feed behind.

The evening sun was at their backs as they crouched before the campfire. The concoction in the cast iron pot hanging over the flames bubbled slowly from the heat. A day-old jackrabbit, wild onions, and a bit of sage added for flavor, composed the contents of the pot. It was the rabbit’s last dance.

Parson lifted a ladle, dripping with stew. “How ’bout another round, Henry?”

Henry nodded. “Don’t mind if I do.”

He offered his plate as Parson poured an extra-full ladle of rabbit stew onto the battered tin. Overflowing droplets fell into the fire with a hiss, bringing a familiar frown to Parson’s brow.

“Waste not, want not,” Parson said, and ladled his own helping more carefully.

Henry shook his head as he ate, chewing on one side of his jaw while talking out of the other. It was the same dinner conversation they’d had for the last thirty-three years, but it suited the two old trappers just fine.

“Do you hafta preach at every dang meal?” Henry muttered, sopping at his stew with what was left of his bread.

“A godly man is a decent man,” Parson said, then belched and farted at the same time to prove he was also on the same plane as his buddy, Henry.

Henry nodded. “Yeah, and a decent man would ’a died out here long ago and you know it.”

Parson shook his head in disgust at his partner’s lack of reverence. He leaned against the tree at his back, smoothed a hand over his long gray hair and then did the same for his beard.

“When I die—”

Henry spit into the fire and then interrupted. “Hells bells, Elmer, as if I ain’t already heard this a thousand times. When you die, you want proper words spoke over your body a’fore you’re planted in the ground. Not by just anyone, but by a real man of the cloth. Right?”

Parson’s expression brightened. “By a real preacher! Not some old coot who got religion after the shit was scared out of him. I’m talking about the real thing. That’s what I want.”

“And ain’t I been telling you ever night for thirty-odd years that I’d find you one?” He waited until Parson nodded. Satisfied that he had his attention, he finished off the conversation and the last of his bread at the same time. “Well, I ain’t had no reason to change my mind. If I said I’ll do it, then I’ll do it.”

Having said his piece, Henry glared at the rapt expression on his partner’s face. Parson was like a gnat buzzing on a sore. When he got to talking religion, he didn’t know when to stop.

Parson gave Henry a long, hard look. “You promise?”

The conversation had taken a change from the norm and it startled Henry enough that he answered without rancor. “Well shore I promise. I’m your partner ain’t I? If you can’t trust your partner, who the hell can you trust?”

“Then that’s that,” Parson mumbled.

Henry frowned as he scratched at his privates out of habit. Except for that time last year when they’d gotten stranded in Lizard Flats and he’d visited the White Dove Saloon, it had been years since he’d used them for anything other than relieving himself, but it still felt manly to shift them from side to side now and then.

“What’s the big deal, Parson? You act like you’re about to cross over any minute, gettin’ all serious like that on me, and all.”

“You never know when your time is coming,” Parson said. Then he shook his head and tilted it sideways before he belched. There was too much sage in the stew for his liking. “You just never know.”

“Hey, Parson, what was that pretty little woman’s name at the White Dove Saloon?”

Parson frowned. “Lord have mercy, Henry, I told you then and I’m tellin’ you now, you’re too old for such foolin’ around.”

Henry snorted. “A man is too old for foolin’ only after he’s been planted six feet under. Besides, I didn’t say I was gonna go see her. I was just tryin’ to remember her name.”

Parson swatted at a stray spark from the fire that had come too close to his beard, then leaned against the tree at his back and looked up at the night sky.

“As I recall, I believe her name was Leticia.”

Henry shook his head. “No, that weren’t it.”

Parson’s frown deepened. “Yes, it was. I remember because I had an aunt named Leticia. She always smelled like moth balls and licorice.” Then he added. “I’m speakin’ of my aunt… not the saloon girl. However, I may have heard that bartender call Letty.”

Henry’s eyes widened. “That’s it! Letty! Everyone was calling her Letty.” He leaned over and pointed a finger in Parson’s face. “By golly, the only way you would have knowed that about her name is if you visited her, too.”

“Personal matters are best left unspoken,” Parson said shortly.

Henry slapped his leg and whooped so loud it spooked the horses tied nearby.

“By golly, you old fart! You gave her a poke, too.”

Parson’s mouth pursed angrily, but he refused to comment further. Instead, he emptied the contents of the coffee pot into his cup and sloshed it around for effect. It was useless. No amount of stirring would thin down Henry Wainwright’s coffee. It was dark and bitter, but in a pinch, was a fairly good substitute for antiseptic, should one be needed. He took a long swig of the black drink, coughing once before it slid on down his throat.

Substantial. That’s what Henry’s coffee was. Substantial.

Unexpectedly, Parson shuddered. The action came upon him without warning, like the time he’d sensed the blue norther of ’44 that froze the ears off his mule. Without thinking, he looked up from his cup and out into the darkness beyond Henry’s shoulder, as if he expected something—or someone—to materialize before them.

At that moment, firelight reflected off of Parson’s eyes, giving them a strange and god-like appearance. Had flames suddenly shot out of Parson’s mouth, Henry would not have been surprised. Startled by the image, he flinched, and in doing so, forgot all about the whore at the White Dove Saloon and spilled what was left of his stew into his lap.

“Shit!” he shouted, and began brushing at the hot stew he’d inadvertently dumped on his britches before it boiled his balls.

Parson frowned. “Profanity is the curse of—”

“Dammit, Parson. Just shut the hell up, all right? That stuff was hot, that’s all.”

Parson grinned. He loved to get Henry’s dander up. It was Parson’s private opinion that it kept the blood flowing in the old bastard.

“Better get some sleep soon,” Parson said, scraping what was left of the rabbit stew into the fire. “These Rockies are higher than they used to be.”

Henry snorted.

Before long, the two old men had fallen sound asleep, each lost in similar dreams of times gone by—of valleys where rivers flowed swift and sure, where game was rich, and the only sounds of humanity were the sounds of a man’s own voice.

By daybreak they were gone.

***

Just before nightfall on the seventh day into their trek, they entered a canyon they’d never traversed before, following it to the face of a mountain and then packing up through the gap Henry found in the rocks. It took the better part of a day to move through the pass and when they emerged, they found themselves several hundred yards from a towering precipice. Henry yanked his hat from his head and slapped it against his leg in disgust.

“All this way and it warn’t nothin’ but a dead end.”

Parson dismounted, relishing the opportunity to stretch his legs. “Maybe so, maybe not,” he said, and walked toward the edge of the cliff.

The closer he got, the wider his eyes became. When he was standing on the edge, he took off his hat and held it against his breast in a gesture of respect for the wonder of God’s creation.

“Praise the Lord,” he said softly, then started to grin. He jammed his hat back on his head and began frantically waving for Henry to come see. “Praise the Lord! Praise the Lord!”

Henry started to run. His reaction was less fervent, but he felt no less joy. A look of disbelief came and went as a gap-toothed smile broke the somberness of his face. In mutual silence, they gazed into the valley below.

It was deep and wide—cut in two by a swiftly flowing river. To the north, a herd of elk were moving through a clearing. Overhead, a pair of eagles circled the sky, as if keeping watch over their domain. Off to the left of where the trappers were standing, the land began to slope downward in a perfect access into the valley.

Parson looked at Henry.

Henry looked at him.

A wide grin broke across both their faces and they let loose a shout. Within moments they were mounted. They kicked their horses in the flanks and down through the trees they rode, ducking low branches and laughing and whooping as they went. Startled by the unaccustomed sounds, rabbits darted into thickets and birds took sudden flight.

By the time they reined to a halt, the horses were winded and Henry’s hat was hanging beneath his chin like a bib. He straightened the leather string and slapped it back in place, then looked up at the way that they’d come. Even though he was stunned by the foolishness of their stunt, he would have done it all over again. He looked at his partner and grinned.

“Hell of a ride, Parson.”

“It was at that,” Parson said.

They dismounted then, letting the reins trail to the ground as they quickly removed their packs and saddles. The horses began to graze, their heads almost out of sight in the knee-high grass.

Henry shook his head. “This is it, ain’t it, Parson?”

Elmer Sutter shoved his hat to the back of his head and squinted. There was green as far as the eye could see.

And there was the quiet.

He held his breath, for the moment, unwilling to sully the silence with sound. Finally, he exhaled slowly.

“Yep, Henry, I reckon it is.”

Henry’s fingers were already itching to get to his traps. “I reckon we could winter here.”

Parson nodded. “That sounds like a plan.”

Henry sighed with satisfaction and then picked up his rifle. “I’ll go see about fetchin’ us some supper.”

“I’ll set up camp,” Parson offered.

And so it began.

They named the place Plenty Valley, because it was. There was plenty of everything, from fish in the river, to game on the ground. And the old trappers knew that when the seasons changed and the animals put on winter pelts, that trapping would be plentiful, too. One day moved into the next and then the next, until before either knew it, a month had passed.

And then, as one might have expected, perfection slipped—but only a little. Not enough to ruin their vision of Eden—just enough to make them remember that they were still at the mercy of the Almighty and His whims.

***

Rain poured off the leaves, onto the top of their lean-to, and down the back of Parson’s shirt. He sat beneath their makeshift shelter with his rifle across his lap, his gaze fixed on the gap between the place they had named Three Pines. By his estimation, more than four hours had passed since Henry had left to go hunting. In this downpour, anything worth eating would have long since taken to its own sort of shelter. Parson couldn’t quit thinking that Henry should be back. And then he would remind himself that Henry Wainwright didn’t need a keeper. He had been taking care of himself for the better part of fifty-five years. But when another hour had passed and the rain was still falling and the thunder still rolling, Elmer Sutter could not rid himself of a growing anxiety.

A shaft of lightning came out of the clouds, piercing a nearby peak. The crack of sound seemed to solidify some purpose that Elmer had been contemplating. Suddenly he was on his feet. Ignoring his stiffened joints and aching knees, he tossed his blanket aside and started toward the gap in Three Pines. He would at least go that far. After that, he’d see.

***

Henry was in trouble. If only he’d paid more attention to the clouds than to that deer he’d been tracking. It wasn’t until he’d felt the wind shift in his face that he’d thought to look up—straight into the underside of a mixture of dark, boiling clouds. Now, thunder was rumbling overhead and while he watched, a shaft of lightning streaked across the sky. He shivered. He hated storms, and on a mountain, they were dangerous as hell. He remembered a cave about a mile or so back and turned, heading for it on the run. Halfway there, it started to rain. There was nothing subtle about it. It was an immediate downpour.

Staggered by a sudden lack of visibility, he stopped to take stock of his location. The best he could figure he had another fifteen minutes before he got to the cave, but the raindrops were peppering his shoulders and hat like bullets. He pulled his hat low upon his forehead, leaned into the wind, and started to walk. Other than the fact that he was getting cold and wet, he thought nothing of it. He’d lived his entire adult life at the mercy of the elements. It wasn’t the first time he’d been rained on. It wouldn’t be the last.