Hard Winter Part 20

Took some explaining, which we did in the cabin. I'm not sure we told them everything. Not sure we even remembered it. I forgot a lot, just blacked out whole chunks, but later, over the years, bits and pieces would come back to me. Fill in the holes. Some I was glad to know, happy to remember. Others . . . well . . . I wish I didn't recollect everything.

It hadn't just been h.e.l.l on the Sun River range. Cattle wandered down the streets of Great Falls, Ish told us, starving, eating the saplings the citizens had planted that summer in hopes of making their town more beautiful. Eating garbage. Dying in the streets. Dying in the doorways. Dying. Dying. Dying.

The temperature reached sixty-three below zero somewhere. Gene Hardee couldn't remember the exact place, and we told him how cold it had gotten here.

"How's Lainie?" I asked.

"She'll be finer than frog's hair cut eight ways," Ish Fishtorn said, "when she sees you two boys."

Camdan stood in the doorway, staring toward Sun River Caon. "We need to go," he said. "Need to find. . . ." His head dropped.

He was right, of course. We needed to go fetch his pa and Major MacDunn back home. Fetch John Henry home, too.

Figuring the last of winter had blowed itself out, we left the line shack, putting two horses in the corral. The 7-3 Connected rider, a man named Ryan, led the pack mule. 'Course, me and Tommy had no saddles, so we rode bareback.

Into the caon.

Oh, we didn't get far, not that first day. Ice and falling snow forced us back, so we returned to the cabin, and waited. Our first plan had been to split up, and fire a shot if we found anything, but Gene Hardee rethought that when he saw all the snow still packed atop the mountain. He wasn't about to fire no shot. Start an avalanche. Bury all of us.

The weather held, and, two days later, we rode back into the caon. Quiet, I remember, except for the wind, the sound of dripping water. The sound of hoofs pus.h.i.+ng through snow and mud.

That night we camped. Saying nothing. Wondering. Hoping.

Hackers come down the following morning, hauling a load of timber on sleds. When they learned what we was doing, they joined us, and we started covering the woods, and the wall of the caon. Working cautiously. Using poles to feel our way through the snowdrifts.

It was Tommy who found them.

Had to be toward midday when me and Ish Fishtorn rode out of a thicket, and spied him on the far side of the river, standing in front of a cutbank, waving his hat over his head with his right hand, his left clutching the hackamore to the horse he'd borrowed. We eased our mounts across the riverbed.

Tommy pointed. "They're around the bend," he said.

"Who?" I asked.

"The major," he said softly. "Gow."

My chin fell against my chest. I made myself look up. "John Henry?"

Tommy shook his head. "He's not there," he said.

"Wait here," Ish said, and he rode off to fetch the others.

I climbed from my horse, and me and Tommy stood together, silent. A coyote yipped, and I thought I even heard a bird sing out.

The hackers arrived, rolling smokes or lighting pipes. n.o.body spoke. n.o.body went around the bend to see for themselves. Maybe ten or twenty minutes later, Gene Hardee rode up, followed by Ish, the 7-3 Connected hired hand, and Camdan Gow.

The hackers agreed to hold our horses, give us our privacy, but said we could use the sled to cart those bodies to the line shack. Gene Hardee led us into the brush, but he turned before he had gotten to the path, icy still as it was well-shaded, and asked Camdan if he was up to this, said he could stay behind with the hackers if he wanted to. Wasn't no shame in that. A good thing, the 7-3 Connected man said. "Remember your pa as he was alive."

"I'll go," Camdan said. "I have to go."

Gene Hardee give a little nod. "You're a man now, Camdan," he said, and he looked over Camdan's shoulder at me and Tommy. "You're all men."

We walked along the side of the caon, feeling our way gently, hands pressed against the limestone rocks or shrubs to keep our balance.

Never found the horses or pack mule, not even the bones. Tommy pointed to the shelter. Gene went in first, then called for Camdan. We give him a few minutes before ducking underneath the overhand.

"So peaceful," the man called Ryan whispered.

Wolves hadn't gotten to Major MacDunn or Mr. Gow. I feared they might have. In fact, it looked like they'd just made camp there. Pretty good place, I thought. I bet Major MacDunn had carried some pine splinters soaked in coal oil, had gotten a fire going underneath that overhang. They'd stayed by the fire, their backs to the wall, huddling together when the last piece of wood had burned.

"What are those?" The man named Ryan pointed, and I saw the red hand prints.

"Indian sign," Ish Fishtorn answered.

"Wonder who made them," Ryan said.

"Shut up," Gene Hardee snapped. He walked over to Tommy, asked him in a low voice about John Henry Kenton, but Tommy just shook his head.

"We'll keep looking," Gene Hardee said. He glanced over his shoulder, saw Camdan Gow kneeling, staring at the two dead men.

"I'll look," Tommy said. "I'm the line rider here. I'm supposed to be here till spring. That's my job."

"There's nothing for you to do here, Tommy," Gene Hardee said. He suddenly sounded so old. "The Bar DD's finished. h.e.l.l, I think half of the ranches in Montana are finished. Maybe all of them."

"Can't be that bad," Ish Fishtorn said, but he didn't sound certain.

"I'll stay," Tommy said. "Leave me a horse and a saddle."

"You can barely walk," Hardee said. "Even Frank Raleigh quit after . . ."

"I'm not Raleigh. I'm staying," Tommy said. "I can walk just fine. And I earn my pay. You take care of . . ." His head tilted.

There wasn't no arguing with Tommy. Gene Hardee understood that.

"Well," he said, turning away, looking back at Camdan. "We need to get Camdan home. Need to get his pa . . . get the major . . . home." Sadly he shook his head.

I was looking at Tommy, but he give me a nod. "I'll be all right," he said. "I'll see you back at the ranch. When it's really spring."

That's how things would be. Tommy would stay at the line shack, searching for cattle. If any cattle were still alive. Searching for John Henry. Well, searching for his body.

Camdan's head was bowed, and his hands were clasped, as he prayed. We took off our hats, waiting, staring.

It struck me then, seeing Major MacDunn and Mr. Gow sitting there, together, leaning against one another, right hands clasped together.

Like they were shaking hands when they died.

Chapter Thirty-One.

Riding tired horses, heading southeast, they crest another hill, and Henry Lancaster recognizes the land, knows he and his grandfather will be home soon. As they head down the easy slope, Henry gives Jim Hawkins a sideways glance. The old man hasn't spoken much since they left Sun River Caon, but Henry understands there must be more to his story. Too many questions that haven't been answered, details left unexplained, and he knows he must have those answers before they're back home.

"So," he begins, "you married Grandma."

With a harrumph, Jim Hawkins spits to his side. "Appears obvious, don't it?"

The boy blushes, stares ahead.

Silence. He feels his ears starting to turn red, and he realizes he does have a healthy dose of Hawkins blood shooting through his veins, but a gust of wind cools his embarra.s.sment and anger, and his grandfather apologizes.

"I didn't mean to be smart, boy. I know you want more to my tale. I don't know if I got the words."

Silence.

Then: "Don't know what Lainie ever saw in me," Hawkins says with a mirthless chuckle, "but we've had some good years together. Some bad times, but mostly good."

"Did she ever . . . talk about . . . your friend, Tommy O'Hallahan?"

Another hill. A calf bawls. Henry sees a tree atop a hill just a few hundred yards away. Beyond that is home.

"Sure. We both talked about Tommy. Still do, often enough. Well, maybe not often, but I'll bring him up, or she'll mention something he did or said or read. I don't think she's regretful none, and I ain't jealous. Things burn themselves out sometimes. That's what happened between Tommy and your grandma. Not that she or Tommy knew anything. h.e.l.l, we was all kids." Jim Hawkins smiles, remembering. "Kiddoes."

He turns, one hand holding the reins, the other gripping the cantle. "I know you think I'm Methuselah, boy, but I ain't but fifty years old. That's how old the major was when he died. This country, though, ages you fast. Except Lainie."

Henry swallows. He feels impatient, but he wants to be careful. "Can you tell me what happened?" he begins.

"Thought I told you."

"Not everything," Henry says.

Silence.

"What happened to Tommy?" That's not the real question, though. He chews his bottom lip. A dog barks in the distance. Smoke serpentines from a chimney into the cloudy sky.

"What happened to John Henry Kenton?"

No answer. Hobo, their hound, has raced over the hill, barking, its tail zipping back and forth with happiness. Henry grins at the dog, but looks back, eyes hopeful, at his grandfather.

"Things change," Jim Hawkins says at last. "Between people. Like Tommy and Lainie. Like the major and Mister Gow. Like between me and Tommy. And John Henry. Things change. People change." He sighs. "Times change."

He opens up . . . one last time.

Spring, 1887 [The] day of vast herds is coming to a close . . . but instead of one man or one company owning 10,000, one hundred men will own them. The day of great losses, too, will then be over.

Honest cattlemen concede this. It is inevitable.

-Laramie Daily Boomerang, August 6, 1887

Chapter Thirty-Two.

Everything changed with the winter of '86 and '87. We thought the cold and snow would go on forever, but the Chinooks came, and spring soon followed. It always comes-spring, I mean-and with it blooms new hope. 'Course, it took me a long while to realize that.

Somehow, the 7-3 Connected fared better than most ranches, maybe because Tristram Gow's herds weren't fresh off the trail like a lot of Major MacDunn's beef, and he leased some range up along the Milk River that wasn't so overgrazed. Overall, the Gow spread reported a loss of twenty percent. Lucky. Only a boy, Camdan Gow went back to his spread, and took Ish Fishtorn with him, started building his daddy's ranch up again. Built it up by cutting it back, fencing in pasture, reducing his herds, growing hay. I don't reckon he was the first to change, to see how things must change, but he was one of them. Before long, a body would be hard pressed to tell a sodbuster and a cowboy apart.

But, I remember the afternoon when Camdan Gow rode up to the Bar DD. It was later that year, and he told Mrs. MacDunn he'd come back to school. Well, that teacher broke down crying, but she toughened herself up, and led us into that broken-down schoolhouse. That time, I was glad to go. Glad for her. I kept right on going to school, although Mrs. MacDunn would be the first to tell you that I never bettered myself as a student. Tried, but I wasn't cut out for schooling like Tommy. Or Camdan. Or Walter Butler. I was a cowboy. And Blaire MacDunn was a teacher, and a mother to us all.

The board of directors in Aberdeen liquidated the Dee & Don Rivers Land and Cattle Company, Incorporated, but offered to pay return pa.s.sage to Scotland for Mrs. MacDunn and Lainie. They wrote Sir Alistair Shaw back, thanking them for the offer, but letting them know they'd stay. Montana was their home. So Mrs. MacDunn went right on teaching at that schoolhouse till it burned down in '91, then moved up to Great Falls, and taught there till she went practically blind. Even then, she'd help teach anybody who'd stop by her cottage, and I expect she'd still be at if the influenza hadn't called her to Glory a while back.

The influenza also claimed Ish Fishtorn and that Fort Shaw girl he up and married. Killed a lot of good men, women, and children. It's always something, ain't it? If not the winter, then the drought. If not the floods, then the locusts. I remember one thing my pa told me. He said: "Farming starts with a seed and a prayer. That's the way it always has been, and that's the way it always will be." That's one thing my pa said that made sense to me, and I reckon it holds true for ranching, too. Ranching starts with a cow and a prayer.

Life's always a struggle here.

Gene Hardee stayed with us as foreman for a few more years, as Lainie and me tried to make our own ranch work. Finally Hardee got a better offer, took over an operation on the Tongue River, till he got too stove up to work. Don't know whatever became of him, or a lot of the other boys that rode for the Bar DD. Bitterroot Abbott got killed in Helena a year or two later. Not in a gunfight. No, nothing like that. Poor fellow got drunk, fell down some stairs in Helena, and broke his neck. Walter Butler? He's a dentist, got a fancy office in b.u.t.te. Doing well, though he lives in b.u.t.te. Never cottoned to that town none.

There's some who say that the hard winter wasn't so bad, that not as many cattle died as all the newspapers and ranchers and ranch managers and boards of directors reported. We heard the same things down in Texas after that January blizzard, too. Oh, I suspect some folks killed off book counts and not actual herd counts, but it wasn't no lie. Dead cattle were everywhere, worse than it had been in Texas. Thousands drifted to the frozen rivers, and got swallowed down the air holes. They'd get pushed into the water from behind, cattle being so stupid, and drown or freeze. Wolves got plenty, and the winter got plenty of wolves.

A lie? The Bar DD went under. Even Teddy Roosevelt had had enough, eventually gave up his Dakota ranch. Other ranches-even the big Swan Company in Wyoming-filed for bankruptcy. Bankruptcy. Liquidation. Them's big words. Lots of other ranchers just quit. They were beaten. Losses reached sixty percent, seventy-five percent, ninety percent.

Mrs. MacDunn and Lainie, though, had no quit in them. They were stayers, like Camdan Gow. Hadn't been for Lainie and her ma, I would have likely drawn my time along with Busted Tooth Melvin, Old Man Woodruff, rode south.

Instead, spring found me where I'd been early in '86, only not in Texas, but on the Sun River range, doing what no respectable cowboy would want to be caught dead doing.

When Tommy O'Hallahan loped up, I stepped away from the dead heifer I was skinning, wiped the mud and grime off my gloves, tried to shoo away the horde of flies. Tommy rode right up to me on Midnight Beauty, war bag looped around the horn, other possibles-including his books-strapped to his sougans behind the cantle.

For a moment, we just looked at each other, unable to speak. Finally I broke the silence.

"When did you get back from the line shack?"

"This morning."