Moontrap - Don Berry (13 page)

There was something they couldn't stand about having
Indians around. Something that got inside their minds and ate away at
them like maggots in rotten meat, and they couldn't rest until they'd
wiped out the "threat." A dozen times or better Monday had
tried to figure out what the "threat" was, that they were
always talking about. Only thing he could ever puzzle out was that
the Indians lived a different kind of life, and the settlers couldn't
tolerate it. They had to try to change them to farmer-thinking; make
Christians out of them, and when that didn't work—hell, there was
always the military. It didn't seem enough to produce the kind of
reasonless, blind hate but—it seemed to be the way it was. They
just couldn't stand to know that somebody was around that didn't live
the way they did.

Monday started walking back up to the cabin. Every
time he got to thinking about it, it made him low. It was so damned
unfair. And to have Mary thinking he'd be better off without her—it
was just too goddamn much. An Indian woman who could not be a wife to
her man was—in her own mind, at least—nothing. In the moment she
had no use, she ceased to exist. And it was what Mary was feeling.

"
God damn them," he muttered.

Well past the cabin to the north he saw the small
flame of Webb's campfire, just at the edge of the trees that walled
in the field. There was no use muddling over it all again. He'd
reached the old wall, where his thinking butted up hard and stopped.
Each time he thought he might somehow plow on through, but he never
did. He'd go listen to the old man lie a while, and maybe it would
cheer him up.

Webb's blankets were empty when Monday got there. He
threw another chunk of wood on the fire, standing close as the yellow
flames licked up, so his face was lit.

"
Come on out o' there, y' damned ol' squaw,"
he said loudly.

A few yards from him the brush at the edge of the
trees rustled. Monday would have sworn the little patch wouldn't hide
a rabbit, but the old man's angular shape slowly unfolded from the
ground, as though appearing from a pit. He shuffled over to the fire,
lowering the hammer of his gun and sniffing contemptuotisly.

"Y' damn leadfoot dunghead," he muttered.
"This nigger like t' filled y'r guts with Galena,
wagh!
"

"Look here, hoss," Monday told him. "You
got no call to be so skittery around here. We got all tame Injuns."

Webb snorted, squatting by the fire. "Y'allus
was a iggerant nigger, an' pokin' holes in the ground ain't made you
any smarter. One time right quick I'm fixin' to put a ball atween y'r
eyes. Learn y' not to come knockin' around a man's camp 'thout so
much as a good holler."

"Won't learn me much if'n I'm dead," Monday
observed.

"
Wagh!
That's truth!
Y'allus did learn real hard. But leastways I wouldn't be bothered
with y' no more."

Monday leaned back on his elbows, beginning to feel
more easy, his mind sloughing off the turbulence and tension. "How'd
she come out?" he said, meaning the poem.

"Hell of a damn thing," Webb muttered.
"Dunghead fish gets caught by a fisherman an' gets loose. Otter
grabs 'er, she gets loose. Eagle gets holt of 'er, an' another eagle
whomps him, an' she falls back to the river. All kinds o' goddamn
things happen! Then she gets to the falls that she's got t' jump
over.
Wagh!
Well, now.
She doubles up an' gives a try—then you know what the damn fish
done?"

"No, hoss. I didn't read it."

"Dies.' She goes under slick. After all them
awful things, that dunghead fish tries t' make a leetle jump, 'n'
dies/" He held his hands up in bewilderment. "It wa'n't no
kind o' poem t' end like that, now was it?"

"Don't seem like it," Monday admitted.

"
Hell, no. No kind o' poem at all. Fish ought t'
have more guts than that, is what I say. This nigger could've jumped
them falls slick, 'n' got that damned fry out o' the ova or whatever.
Even the fish around this country got no more guts than the people."

"Well, that's literary, like I tol' you,"
Monday said reasonably.

"All bullshit, anyways," Webb muttered.
"Puttin' in things a man can't understand."

Monday shrugged. After a moment he said, "Where's
y'r stick floatin', coon?"

Webb stared into the fire, then glanced up at Monday.
He turned back to the fire and blinked. "Was down to the
Bighorn," he started absently. "Met up with a old Crow
shaman down there. Says to me, 'O1d man, you going to die pretty
soon. You best go see y'r family first.' Approximately what he tol'
me, except it took three days f'r the dancin' and all."

"Hell, hoss. You oughtn't to take that kind of
medicine too serious. You going to outlive us all, just out o' pure
mean."

Webb spat in the fire. "It ain't I
b'lieve
the dunghead. They's all a pack of lyin' sonsabitches, them shamans."

"They are, now."

"Still, I expect the lyin' nigger's right, f'r
oncet. This child went around t' all his Crow people, 'n' it still
didn't feel right. Figgered I had to come round an' see what's left
of the old mountain men, bein' as how they was sort o' family oncet.
The bastards."

Monday rubbed his forehead, leaning up on one elbow.
"What about y'r own children?"

Webb snorted. "Pack o' Wuthless no-'count
breeds, they are. Man oughtn't to be allowed t' see his children
after they c'n walk, else he's like t' kill them or hisself out o'
pure mean disappointment. But they's good boys, all of 'em. Give them
an' their mother what I had, lodge, some horses 'n' foofaraw like
that, 'n' come off."

"
You takin' that shaman too serious, t' my way
o' thinkin'."

Webb looked at him again, then back to the fire.
"This nigger's old, Jaybird. Little bit older'n God, I expect. I
been here since the Beginning, I have, now."

"
How old are y', hoss?" Monday asked
curiously.

"Hundred and twelve," Webb said promptly.
"I come out when the trade first started. I was seventeen an'
with Ashley's first party up to the Roche Jaune."

"That was 'twenty-two," Monday said. He
figured in his head. 'That makes you forty-five years old."

Webb nodded. "Thought it was somep'n like that.
Forty-five or a hundred 'n' twelve. Round in there. I been here since
the Beginning."

Monday suddenly realized that Webb was, in his own
mind, being perfectly accurate. He meant the beginning of the
mountain trade; the only universe whose creation meant a damn anyway.

"
Forty-five ain't old, hoss. You got good years
ahead."

Webb looked up at him, and Monday was shocked by the
raw grief in the old man's face. A second later he thought it was a
trick of the flickering firelight, for Webb's face had not changed
visibly, yet there was no sign of emotion. "Good years behind."
Webb said flatly. "This nigger's fixin' to die."

"Bill Williams is older'n you."

"
He's fixin' to die, too, if'n he ain't dead."

"Well, damn it, Webb! Everbody's got t'die
sometime!"

"
Wagh!
That's the
idee, y'iggerant dunghead! Ever'body's got to die sometime. An' my
time's now."

Monday grimaced in disgust. "Webb, you ain't
talkin' sense. "

Webb poked viciously at the fire. "Ain't nothin'
wrong with my talkin'," he muttered. "You just ain't
understandin', is all."

"What the hell is there t'understand?"

"I reckon a man c'n die if he says so."

"
Hell yes! You c'd fill y'r ears with powder and
light it off, if y' wanted to. Nobody stoppin' you."

"Ain't going t' die like that," Webb said
calmly. "This child's fixin' to die like a man."

"
Dead's dead," Monday said sharply, angry
at the old man for talking this way.

Webb looked up at him quizzically, still toying with
the smoking stick. "You been away from people too long," he
said finally. "Made you weak in the head." He poked at the
fire again.

Monday was dumfounded. Crazy old Webb, solitary as an
owl, claiming he had been away from people too long.

"All right," he said finally. "Roll it
out, then. What's a good way t' die?"

"Way the old war-chiefs used to do 'er,"
Webb said speculatively, without hesitation. "Man gets old, gets
ready to die. He paints hisself up for war, an' tells the people what
he's after. He's a good old man, an' ever'body loves 'im. Takes his
gun an' runs off to the woods. "Then the young men paint up,
too, them as wants to go after 'im. Paint up like Blackfoot, maybe,
or some other. His sons get first crack at goin'. They hunt 'im down,
makin' like Blackfoot, an' the old man goes under fightin', the way
he's a mind to. Who kills 'im gets scalp an' all. Naturally, the sons
go after 'im good, not wantin' anybody else t' have his scalp an'
horses an' such."

"Why make a game out of it? Why not just shoot
the old man and have done with it? No cause t' go play—actin'."

"Ain't no game," Webb snapped angrily. Then
he leaned back and said, more quietly. "No game. I mind me of
old Walking Bird, him as took four o' the young men afore they got
'im. Three days, an' they had to call out the Dog Society f'r help."
Webb chuckled raspingly. "Oh, he come round 'em smart, he did,
now. Kilt four. No game to it, she's war right enough. Them as hunt
got to watch out. Man feels inclined t' lift a leetle hair, he c'n
show what he's worth, an' pick up a few horses besides. If'n he's
good. If'n he ain? good—" Webb swept his right hand under the
left.

Monday shook his head. It all seemed a long way from
him now. Things had changed so much. Seed wheat and missionaries . .
. He suddenly noticed that the old man was watching his face intently

"Now, look, hoss," he said slowly. "If
you're thinkin'—"

"Ain't thinkin' nothin'," Webb said
sharply. "Weakens the brain. You ast me an' I tol' you."

"Webb, listen, coon, I couldn't—" Monday
scrambled to his feet.

"I ain't ast if you could or couldn't any damn
thing!" Webb's voice was harsh and cold, almost a shout. "Shut
y'r pan an' get the hell out o' my camp!"

"
Webb—"

"
Git! y' damn dunghead!" The old man
snatched up his rifle, throwing the hammer back to full cock. The two
black scalp locks swayed violently

Slowly, Monday turned away from the fire. He started
to move into the empty field, then looked back and said quietly, "Y'
didn't prime y'r pan, hoss."

Webb looked down at the open pan of his gun and began
to curse slowly and steadily.

Monday walked away toward the cabin, listening to
Webb's low voice behind him until it was no more than the wind that
slipped and rustled through the trees.

2

Monday woke late again in the morning, feeling
unrested. As Mary heard him stir she poured a mug of coffee from the
pot and put it on the table. From the smell of it Monday could tell
it was not real coffee,  but parched-barley coffee. Glumly he
swung himself to the edge of the bed and sat with his hands resting
on the edge, staring down at the plank floor. At the edges of the
boards there were still dark stains where the winter's wetness had
seeped up. By the end of summer they would be nearly dry, and then
the insidious damp would begin again. He shook his head and stood up,
grabbing his shirt from the wall, trying to gather himself together
sufficiently to do what he knew had to be done, sooner or later.

He moved stiffly to the table and sat down before the
coffee, cupping it in his hands.

"
You are going to Oregon City today?" Mary
said.

Monday grunted and took a swallow of the scalding
coffee. "Expect I got to."

Mary began to broil the deer steak. In a moment she
turned to Monday and smiled gently. "The old man, he holler at
you last night."

"
Mm." This time there was no pleasure to be
evoked in the remembrance of their conversation. Mary turned back to
the fire. "Every year," Monday said absently. "Every
year I say to myself, This year McLoughlin's goin' to get tired o'
puttin' me down in his little book. This year he's goin' to say no."

"
Someday, maybe," Mary said. "But you
worry about it then."

"Seems like I used to live without having to beg
ever'thing I needed."

"Is easier to live by the gun."

Monday frowned. "Yes, but why? What I mean, why
is ever'thing so damn mixed up, why is ever'thing so hard down here?"

Mary looked up from the fire and met her husband's
eyes. He looked at her, half-silhouetted against the fire. Her eyes
are like a scared doe's, he thought absently. Big and bright.

"I don 't know," she said finally She
looked at the floor for a moment, started to say something, and
stopped herself. "I don't know," she repeated, turning back
to the fire.

"There's so many twists to ever'thing," he
mused. "Man's got t' walk so soft all the time, worry about what
he says, worry about what he does, there's always a thousand things
to worry about, an' I plain can't keep track of 'em all."