October Skies (26 page)

Keats stood up. ‘Well? We gonna sit around like a bunch of lady folk,’ he grunted, ‘or we gonna go find ’em?’

Preston nodded firmly. ‘Lead the way if you will, Mr Keats.’

Keats glanced round at the group of anxious men. ‘Just remember, folks, we got them goddamned Indians out here in these woods still.’

Ben looked at the snow-frosted tangle of branches, ferns and long-fallen trees ahead of them and wondered whether he would shame himself if they happened across these Paiute.

‘Keep your guns nice an’ handy,’ Keats grunted loudly, ‘and don’t be bunchin’ up right behind me, neither. If I need to turn an’ run, don’t want to be runnin’ smack into one of you fools.’

There was a ripple of hesitant, nervous mirth from one or two of the party as the old man nodded to Broken Wing to lead the way, stepping out of the glade and pushing his way into the foliage, his beady eyes locked onto the frozen dabs of blood that marked the way ahead.

Ben followed him, a few yards behind.

 

As they made their way down a shallow incline, Keats ten yards ahead of them, Broken Wing ten yards further, the Shoshone suddenly dropped down onto one knee and waved for everyone behind to do likewise. The men did so obediently.

Broken Wing studied the scene intently for a couple of minutes before silently shuffling back to Keats and relaying what he’d seen.

Ben suddenly got his bearings and recognised the lay of the land, the dimple in the hillside . . .

The trapper’s shelter.

Around them, the forest was utterly still and completely silent save for the distant and knowing cry from a cowbird he could see through the winter-stripped branches of a spruce, flying impatient circles high above the trees. Huddled low amongst frozen ferns and twisted thorny briars, Ben’s breath hung before him - anxious clouds of steam that floated lazily up like smoke from the muzzle of a musket. He shivered in the knee-deep snow, partly from the seeping cold, partly from the anticipation.

Whatever had done for Sam and his mother had dragged their bodies up here to this forlorn place. He dreaded what he knew they were going to find.

Keats finally waved an arm for the men to make their way forward and join him.

Ben shuffled forward with the others and presently they knelt beside him, looking out past shoulder-high undergrowth down a shallow slope at the crudely constructed shack, more of it concealed by drifts of recent snow than the last time he’d seen it.

‘Trapper’s place, by the looks of it,’ whispered Keats. ‘No sign anybody been using it recently, though.’

‘It’s abandoned,’ said Preston.

Keats turned to him. ‘What?’

‘We came across it some days ago. It’s not been used in years.’

‘You didn’t think to goddamn well mention it to me?’

Preston frowned indignantly. ‘It’s a man’s grave.’

‘Why the hell ain’t you told me ’bout it?’

‘I’d rather people didn’t come up here and strip it for firewood. The dead man inside deserves at least that.’

Keats shook his head, hawked and spat. ‘Didn’t occur to you that them Paiute might be camping in it now?’

Ben expected Preston to thunder an angry response to save face in front of his men. But instead he was impressed to see the minister nod humbly. ‘You’re right, Keats. I should have mentioned it.’

Keats scowled at him. ‘Yeah, perhaps you should’ve.’ He turned to look back at the shelter. ‘Preston, have your men spread out and along this ridge and ready their guns. We got a good field of fire on ’em if they’re inside.’

Preston nodded and issued the word quietly to his people.

Keats stood up and handed his rifle to Ben.

‘What’re you doing?’

‘If them Paiute are inside . . . gonna go talk to ’em first.’

Keats strode down the incline casually, Broken Wing beside him, and called out in Ute, making enough noise to ensure his approach would be clearly heard by anyone inside. At the bottom of the incline he walked across the clearing, between the old wooden hanging frames a few yards away from the small entrance, and called out again loudly.

From inside the shelter came a sound of startled movement. Ben instinctively flexed his finger on the trigger and lined his sight on the small rounded entrance at the front. A moment later the dangling tatters of canvas that hung down from the door-frame fluttered to one side as several crows emerged, their wings a frantic confusion of dislodged feathers and panic. He watched them flap noisily away, strings of crimson dangling from their beaks.

Battlefield scavengers.

That was how his father used to refer to these birds. As a much younger man, a junior officer in the British army, he had witnessed the morning-after carpet of battle. He had described to Ben seeing the ground undulate with the shimmering beetle-blue of crows’ feathers as they worked on the bloated bodies, and the sky darken with their startled wings - swarming like flies at the sound of a discharged gun, only to return moments later with a renewed vigour to feast on the soft faces of the dead.

Ben waited anxiously along with the others, his rifle braced against his shoulder and aimed at the entrance.

‘If there are Indians in there, they must sleep like the dead,’ muttered Weyland, one eye squinting down the barrel of his gun.

‘Maybe Indian dead too,’ whispered Hussein in reply.

Weyland took a deep breath and let it out in a cloud. ‘I’m not sure I’d find that entirely reassuring, Mr Hussein.’

Broken Wing called out, his sharp voice cracking with the effort. It was the first time Ben had heard the Indian speak in anything other than a soft murmur.

There was no further sign or sound of movement from inside. With a casual hand gesture to Broken Wing, Keats stepped forward. One hand resting on the hilt of his hunting knife, he pushed the tattered canvas flap aside and then cautiously stepped inside and out of sight.

‘The old boy’s got balls of iron,’ whispered McIntyre beside him. ‘Walking in like that.’

Hussein nodded. ‘He has much . . . kuh . . . cour . . . ?’

‘Courage?’ offered Weyland.

‘Yes. Is much courage inside him. Much.’

‘That’s for sure,’ McIntyre whispered.

A full minute passed in silence before the flap finally jerked aside and Keats emerged, stooping low through the entrance and then standing erect. Ben watched him breathing deeply for a moment, hands on hips, like someone mustering something from inside. He leaned over and spat . . . or maybe he was heaving - it was hard to tell.

What’s he seen in there?

Keats wiped his mouth, his cheeks puffed and a languid cloud of vapour rose. Then he turned towards them and silently waved at them to come down and join him.

They rose as one and clambered down the incline, stumbling carelessly on the snow-blanketed branches, twigs and roots, dislodging little cascades of powder that sifted with a gentle hiss down the slope towards the clearing.

Preston approached Keats. ‘You found the body of the trapper in there?’

‘The trapper? Oh, yeah. I noticed him as well.’

Ben regarded Keats’s weather-worn face and saw something in those narrow eyes he’d never seen before.

As well?

‘Preston, you better come look inside with me.’ He turned to the rest of the men, gathered together in front of the entrance. ‘Rest of you spread out an’ keep your eyes wide open.’

He took another deep breath before stooping down, pushing the canvas aside and leading the way in. Preston looked around for a moment at his men and nodded. ‘Do as he says,’ he said curtly. He turned to Vander. ‘Eric, you come with me,’ he said and then followed Keats inside.

Outside, the men spread out in no particular pattern, gazing uncertainly at the wooden hanging frames and the bones of animals dangling from them, the macabre decoration of the row of animal skulls nailed to one of the shelter’s walls.

Weyland sauntered over to where Ben and Broken Wing stood a few yards from the doorway.

‘Can’t say I’ve ever been amidst so many trees and heard it as quiet as this,’ he almost whispered. ‘Can you hear, Ben? No birdsong at all.’

Broken Wing frowned for a moment as he processed Weyland’s drawl, then nodded. ‘Bad spirit ssscare birds.’

‘It’s unnatural,’ Ben heard himself reply, and then immediately cursed himself for sounding like some superstitious old crone.

‘That it most definitely is,’ Weyland said nervously, stroking the handles of his moustache. ‘Very unnatural.’

They heard footsteps coming from inside the shelter; a rapid scraping of feet and then Vander emerged with a face as white as the snow on the ground. He took several staggering steps away from the shack before vomiting.

‘Lambert!’ he heard Keats calling from inside.

Ben exchanged a look with Weyland and Broken Wing and then headed towards the entrance. He shot one last glance at Vander, emptying his guts onto the snow - a steaming puddle of bile that quickly sank down through the fresh powder and out of sight.

Let it not be Sam . . . please.

He took a final breath of crisp, cold air, suspecting the next breath he took would be tainted with the fetid odour of . . . something. He ducked down and pushed his way past the canvas flap.

 

For a moment he stood stock still. It was too dark to make sense of his cluttered surroundings. He allowed a moment for his eyes to adjust.

‘Lambert,’ he heard Keats’s voice growl quietly, ‘over here.’

Soon he could pick out the dark shapes around him. He shuffled his foot forward, finding, to his surprise, two very steep steps taking him down.

The floor of the shelter was dug out of the ground.

Of course, that made sense. The shelter was more protected from the elements this way and that much more insulated. Ben had expected to be stooping uncomfortably as he made his way through the interior. Instead, having taken two steps down, he was standing erect. He reached a hand up and found a foot clearance above his head before his fingers brushed against branches and dried mud, crumbs of which rattled down through his fingers.

Thin beams of light speared down through slender cracks in the roof and front wall, dappling the uneven earthen floor with pin-pricks of light.

His eyes adjusted, he could make out some things he expected to see: bales of dried and compressed beaver pelts, traps hanging from hooks on the wall along with a few simple tools with which to work wood, and a bag of long iron lumber nails. On a crude workbench he saw skinning and gutting knives, a tub of salt . . .

He heard the shuffling of feet nearby. ‘This way, Lambert,’ Keats grunted again quietly.

He looked towards where the voice had come from and saw the shack was divided by a flimsy partitioning wall - no more than a row of stout branches standing vertically side by side from floor to ceiling, and a wattle of strips of bark woven through them. Keats stood in a gap in the middle of the partition staring impatiently at him.

‘In here,’ he said. ‘We found one of ’em.’

Ben felt his heart sink. ‘Which one?’

Keats offered him a weak smile. ‘It ain’t Sam,’ he reassured him quietly.

He made his way towards the opening, but Keats remained where he was, blocking his way. He leaned forward so that the bristles of his beard almost tickled Ben’s face. ‘You done a bunch of doctorin’ . . . so I guess you’ll be readier than Vander was. It’s the Hearst fella.’

Ben felt a small rush of relief and then felt immediately guilty. ‘What condition is the body in?’

‘Well, it ain’t pretty,’ he whispered.

Ben nodded, took a deep breath and vowed silently that he’d remain calm and composed in front of the other two men. Keats stepped to one side and allowed him through.