The Complete Elizabeth Gilbert: Eat, Pray, Love; Committed; The Last American Man; Stern Men & Pilgrims (95 page)

Eustace caught on tape an old Georgia cracker asking, “What kind of farm y’all have?”

“Well, sir,” Eustace began, “I have about a thousand acres in North Carolina. I guess you could say that I run a primitive and traditional farm up there, as well as a nature education center . . .”

But the cracker interrupted. No, no. He didn’t want to know what kind of
farm
Eustace had; he wanted to know what kind of
fire arm
Eustace had. Then on the tape you can hear Eustace laughing and laughing and politely clarifying.

And he loved the black voices in Georgia, too, like the elderly man on the porch swing who used Eustace’s tape to reminisce about growing up in a sharecropper’s family:

“My daddy would pass through the rooms and say, ‘Git up, boys.’ We didn’t have no lights. He say, ‘Git up, boys!’ and next time he say, ‘I thought you boys were s’posed to git up’ . . . Ain’t no such thing as child abuse back then and you
better
get out the bed, cuz I wanna tell you something—my daddy was 275 pounds of
pure man
, and when he say, ‘Git up, boy,’ you
better
hit that floor.”

It was easy to get people to talk. It helped, of course, that the riders were so romantically evocative. Eustace was all tall and lean in his antique U.S. Cavalry saddle, wild and bearded and often shirtless, wearing feathers in his hair and riding expertly without even a bit in Hasty’s mouth. He looked like a deserter from the Texas Rangers, some unfettered Jeb who’d lost his unit and turned Injun. Judson and Susan were dressed like dusty, old-time wranglers—all chaps and spurs and beat-up cowboys hats and long duster coats and bandanas. Their look was only partly self-conscious; these are exactly the clothes to wear when you’re on horseback all day, exposed to sun, rain, snow, underbrush, and dust.

To Judson’s eternal credit, he was willing at times to sacrifice his authentic cowboy image for practicality. He took to wearing pastel-colored spandex leggings under his chaps, which used to freak the hell out of the macho truck drivers and ranch hands they’d meet along the way. But the slick material kept Judson from getting saddle burns, and when he got too restless from endless riding, he could pull off his boots, toss on a pair of Nikes, and jog a few miles alongside his horse, just to stay in shape and work the kinks out of his legs.

The riders themselves were plenty compelling. But it was the horses that drew people in. “Everywhere we went,” Judson said, “we were a parade.” Suburban children outside Atlanta came running toward them without a flinch of hesitation, just to hug their horses. It would be the same story with the poor white farming families they later met in Texas.

It would even be the same story on the Apache reservation out in Arizona. The reservation was a desolate and impoverished land they’d considered skirting, because white people for hundreds of miles had warned them against risking their lives at the hands of “those scary bad-ass motherfucker Apaches.” But Eustace, who knew enough of both ancient history and current politics to respect this warning, wouldn’t budge from his chosen route. As he proclaimed to his nervous partners, “We do not change our course because of goddamn racial prejudice. What have we learned so far on this journey, people? Who has not been kind to us yet? Black, white, Hispanic—everyone’s been good to us. And if we start dodging people out of fear, then we’ve destroyed everything we supposedly stand for. You guys can take the detour, but I’m riding right across this goddamn reservation, with or without you. And I don’t give a shit if I get shot in the head for it, either.”

So the Long Riders did ride straight across the Apache reservation, all together. And the Apaches did turn out to be some scary bad-ass motherfuckers who took the Long Riders into their homes for the night, offering food for both the riders and their horses.

It would be the same story months down the road, when they passed through the urban squalor of the San Diego ghettos (“Don’t do it!” white people warned), and the Mexican kids came streaming out of their homes to ask for rides on the horses while the parents took pictures and handed out food and blessings. All across the nation, the same welcome. Everywhere TV cameras and sheriffs’ escorts would follow them from one county line to the next. They met mayors and ministers from coast to coast, who came out to speak for the people in town after town, welcoming them. It was a frenzy of hospitality and excitement.

Cars would pull over on the road, the drivers would jump out, run over to the Long Riders, ask the same questions over and over: “Who are you? Where are you going? What can we do to help you?”

And always this one: “I want to do what you’re doing.”

“You can,” Eustace would reply each time. “You can!”

Their days began at four A.M., when they took care of their horses and tried to imagine where, in the next thirty to fifty miles, they were going to find food and water for themselves and their animals. Every day, someone would have to drive the trailer miles ahead and then hitch back to the camp so that they could start riding together. This took a huge amount of time; sometimes two Long Riders would be delayed whole hours while the third tried gamely to get a lift. And their days didn’t end until after midnight. The pace of their riding was fierce. They were all limping and busted from riding so hard, but they never let up, never walked, only trotted.

They rode for such long stretches between vets and farriers that Eustace became adept at doctoring his own animals and caring for their hooves. He’d watched farriers put shoes on his horses so many times that he was sure he could figure out how to do it. He called Hoy Moretz, his hillbilly horse mentor back in North Carolina, and asked whether it would be advisable to do his own shoeing out here on the journey, and the man gave him a strong warning. “Don’t do it. You’re a smart boy, but you’re not a professional. You can learn how to shoe your own horses back on your farm at home, but there’s too much at stake on the road to risk injuring one of your animals through ignorance.” Sane advice, and Eustace couldn’t agree more, but he disregarded it in the end because we all know what necessity is the mother of. He had to learn, so he did learn. He also gave his horses shots and medicine and adjusted their feed and talked endlessly on the tapes about their physical condition.

“Hasty pissed really dark blood near the end of his stream; that has me worried . . . fell twice today, seems impossible, but it happened, hit his face right on the ground . . . I put a blindfold across his eyes and led him around to get him prepped for the bridge that’s coming up. Because there’s a chance if we can get one horse to cross this new kind of bridge with the metal grate that the horses can see under and are really afraid of, well, maybe they’ll all pass and we’ll be safe. . . . Found a little rock up in Spur’s hoof that’s making him hurt . . . trying to watch out for their ligaments; can’t let a single sore go untreated out here.”

Several times along the way Eustace realized that they needed newer or fresher horsepower, so he’d stop to buy or trade livestock. That’s how they came to acquire Cajun, Fat Albert, Blackie, and Chavez. It’s also how they got the immortal mule, Peter Rabbit.

Peter Rabbit came from down in Mississippi. Eustace was determined to buy the Long Riders a mule, because he wanted a strong pack animal. So he started putting out the word to everyone he met along the road that he was looking to buy. Someone had mentioned a horseman nearby with a big farm who surely had some animals he’d sell off. The farmer, Pierson Gay, was handsome, conservative, and elegant—a classic Southern Gentleman with a well-tended white mustache. The Long Riders telephoned him from the road and said what they were looking for. He agreed to put them up for the night in his stables and to discuss horse-trading. As Judson recalled it, though, “When we rode up to his farm, looking all long-haired and greasy and like a bunch of dirtbag hippies, Pierson literally had to turn his head from the sight of us. He’s such a clean-cut man, I swear to God, he almost retched in disgust.”

But there’s a way that horse people can communicate their expertise with horses—a private code, maybe. Just as Eustace had been immediately convinced that Susan Klimkowski knew how to ride by watching her show up at his mountain home on horseback, it didn’t take Pierson Gay long to notice that these kids knew what they were doing. And as far as livestock was concerned, Pierson had one animal he was willing to sell—a big, good-looking, white devil of a mule. Strong as can be. Name was Peter Rabbit. Eustace and Judson and Susan checked out Peter Rabbit and found him to be healthy and sturdy, just what they needed for their extra loads. Pierson told them he’d sell the mule for $1000. Now these Long Riders, especially Eustace, knew how to negotiate for an animal; you never accept the first price. They came back to Pierson and offered $900. At this, Mr. Pierson Gay walked away, muttering as he exited the barn, “A thousand dollars; that’s the price. That’s what the mule’s worth to me and that’s what I said he costs, so you can give me a thousand dollars or I’ll leave Peter Rabbit right there in the pasture; won’t hurt my feelings a bit.”

They coughed up the thousand bucks.

There were some problems with Peter Rabbit, though. Pierson Gay made no attempt to hide them. There are always problems with mules. Unlike most horses, mules are brainy and often malicious. Mules can think, reason, plot, and exact vengeance. You have to keep your guard up around mules, and this one in particular was satanic. Here were the rules. You couldn’t touch Peter Rabbit’s ears, or he would try to kill you. That made putting a bridle on the mule a life-risking operation. You couldn’t touch Peter Rabbit’s belly, or he would try to kill you. That made putting a saddle on the mule a dicey bit of work, too. Other times, warned Pierson Gay (who was a competent expert with quadrupeds and had long ago given up on breaking this mule), Peter Rabbit was apt to try to kill you for no apparent reason whatsoever. And you also couldn’t touch his feet. Or he’d try to kill you.

Still, he was a mighty powerful animal. So they bought him.

The Long Riders rode off the next day with Peter Rabbit all fresh and strong in their pack string. It wasn’t long before the mule made his presence known. It was pouring down rain, and Judson was trying to put a plastic tarp over his horse to protect the goods. The tarp was flapping and whipping about in the wind, and Peter Rabbit didn’t like that one bit. He hauled off and slammed Judson with a full-force kick that hit the cowboy right in the meatiest section of his thigh. If it had landed elsewhere, it could have been a knee-snapping, arm-breaking, hip-smashing, skull-caving, or gut-crushing blow. As it was, Peter Rabbit’s hearty kick threw Judson five feet up in the air and then landed him right on the ground, where, Judson admits, he lay quietly on the damp grass, letting the rain fall on his face and thinking how pleasant it was to rest on his back and take a breather for a moment on this brutal journey.

But Eustace sprang into action. He’d been keeping his eye on Peter Rabbit, expecting a clash of wills between them, and waiting for his moment to explain to the mule who was in charge here. This was the moment. Mule and man squared off for the first of what would be dozens of physical altercations. Eustace took a swing at the mule, as if he were in a bar brawl, and shouted right up in his face, “
Don’t you ever
kick my brother again!”
The mule swung around to kick Eustace, who grabbed the animal’s lead rope in one hand and grabbed a whip in the other and started beating the mule. Peter Rabbit kicked and dragged Eustace for a few hundred feet, but Eustace held on to that lead rope tight and fierce. Peter Rabbit slung Eustace up against trees and rocks, kicking and biting, both of them braying their lungs out. Judson and Susan ran and hid in the woods, terrified, and Judson kept shouting, “Jesus Christ, Eustace! Just quit! He’s trying to kill you!” But Eustace held on and took his kicks and then worked the mule over to a set of picturesque and antique gas pumps at a run-down old gas station and tied the mule up.

Then they had a little conversation.

Eustace, reduced now (or elevated) to a purely brutish state, clamped on to Peter Rabbit’s nose with his teeth and bit down, hard. Then he pried open Peter Rabbit’s mouth and bellowed into it like a grizzly on attack. Then he grabbed Peter Rabbit’s ears and chewed on them, too, all the while growling and howling like a wounded ogre. Then he circled the mule, beating him with his fists. Then he picked up each of the mule’s feet—one at a time, to show his dominance—and yelled into each hoof as if it were some kind of bestial telephone. Cars driving by on the highway slowed down—
way
down—as they passed this scene, and pale faces peered out from the passing automobiles, riveted. Judson and Susan, in shock, huddled in the woods, watching this all unfold.

“What can I tell you?” Judson whispered to Susan, both afraid and deeply proud.“My brother’s an animal.”

Eustace worked Peter Rabbit over for a little while longer and then let the mule go. Peter Rabbit slunk off, surely thinking to himself,
Holy
shit
. . .

A few more conversations like this occurred between Eustace Conway and Peter Rabbit along the course of the journey before the mule, who was no idiot, got the picture. He acknowledged, for the first time in his mulish life, that someone else would be making the decisions. And by the time they got to California, that mule was so polite and disciplined and well trained that the Long Riders had to let Pierson Gay know about it. They took a photograph of Peter Rabbit. In the picture, Eustace is standing in front of the mule, biting one of its ears. Susan is squatting below the mule, tickling its belly. And Judson is standing on the mule’s back, arms flung wide open, grinning.

They mailed the photo to Mississippi, to Peter Rabbit’s original owners. A few weeks later, Eustace called the Pierson Gay residence to see whether they’d received the photo. Mrs. Pierson Gay, a most gentle and refined Southern lady, answered the phone. Why, yes, she drawled charmingly, they had received the photograph.

“So what do you think of that old mule now?” Eustace asked.