Moontrap - Don Berry Page 8

  "Yes," Mary said.

  "You understand, when you feel the baby coming, you should send your man for me."

  "Yes."

  Beth sighed and leaned back against the table. There was absolutely no way to tell if she was reaching the Indian girl or not. She simply sat with her hands quietly folded and said "Yes."

  Beth knew the baby was coming breech. The one time Mary had let herself be touched, Beth had felt the head up high, too high. Sometimes they switched ends in the last couple of weeks, sometimes not.

  "Listen, child," Beth said. "I have to touch the baby again. Do you understand? I want to see how the baby is."

  "No," Mary said quietly.

  "Mary, listen—"

  The Indian girl lowered her eyes and looked at the floor. "I think it is better if you do not come here any more," she said.

  "I'm just trying to help," Beth said. "I don't want to hurt the baby"

  "No," Mary said. "But I think is better. Because—I am Siwash. I am Shoshone."

  "So?"

  "I think maybe—the white women not like you to touch me, and then touch them."

  Beth stared at her, the calmly folded hands, the gentle patience of her body. The Indian girl had spoken quietly, with neither anger nor pity for herself; stating a fact of minor importance.

  "Mary, you don't understand—" Beth started.

  Mary looked up, her face lit warmly by the flickering of the fire and the lighter glow of the candles. "I understand," she said.

  Beth felt suddenly tired and unable to find anything to say. All the high moral talk that came to her mind—none of it would make any difference. It was just talk. The girl sitting quietly beside her knew the way things were, and the theory could never compete with the reality.

  Mary stood up. "The man is coming now," she said. She had been listening to the sound of the two horses approaching while they talked. They were just outside now, and the girl reached down to swing the coffee pot near the fire.

  As the soft sound of moccasin-shod feet sounded on the porch, she started toward the door. As she was reaching for the handle, it swung open. At the threshold was the terrible figure from some nightmare of long ago.

  The old man peered at her as though over the sights of a rifle, his bright, indifferent eyes holding her pinned immobile; then she was dismissed. He pushed past her into the room, bent and shuffling, muttering something she caught only as ". . . no gun, anyways."

  He moved over to the fireplace, glancing sharply at Doctor Beth but not greeting her. He squatted on his haunches before the fire, grumbling and looking around the cabin, the long rifle planted upright between his knees and clasped in both hands.

  Monday came in then, and the solid familiarity of his shaggy blond head and wide grin broke the web of fright that held her. "Damnedest thing, Mary," he said. "Just ran into old Webb out in the hills. He come all the way from the mountains to see us."

  "Yes," Mary said. She closed the door softly behind her husband.

  "Doctor Beth!" Monday said, surprised. "Saw the horse, but I didn't recognize her. That's a good-lookin' animal."

  "New," Beth said shortly. She was watching the old man's back as he squatted before the fire. Suddenly she said in a hard voice, "Old man, don't you know enough to take off your hat in a house with women?" Webb's head turned slowly to survey her, and he made a grunting "Wagh!" very softly. After a moment the leathery skin around his eyes crinkled with what might have been amusement. He leaned his rifle carefully against the fireplace and slowly lifted the limp hat with both hands.

  Dr. Beth leaned forward, full of sudden interest.

  The top of Webb's head had been scooped out. An area the size of a man's palm was sunken in nearly an inch deep below the sides, a gaping cavity in the crown that seemed impossibly deep. The crater was rimmed with heavy ridges of scarred tissue, and the inside was a dull, bluish gray; the very bone of his skull.

  "Well, damn me," Beth breathed, leaning forward to inspect the exposed skull more carefully. A leather headband circled his head just below the cavity, and from it were hung suspended the two long locks of black hair that dangled from beneath his hat brim. Monday suddenly laughed, and the sound was abrupt and shocking in the silence. "Wagh! you ol' coon! They got to y' at last!"

  Webb had obligingly tipped his head forward for Beth's interested inspection. "Well, they did," he grumbled. "Lifted this child's ha'r slick as a hound's tooth." He looked up at Monday triumphantly and bounced one of the headband plaits in his hand. "This here's the Piegan nigger as lifted her, though. "An' this'n here's a friend o' his." He flipped the other scalp lock over his shoulder.

  Monday leaned over to peer into the crater. "She's a damn strange color, now," he said speculatively.

  "That's bone, boy, " Webb said proudly. "She'll weather down some."

  "How'd you dress that?" Doctor Beth demanded sharply. She was fascinated and delighted, never having seen a scalped man alive before.

  "Wagh! Hell's full o' dressin's," Webb muttered. "Slapped a fresh-kilt beaver pelt on top and pegged her down with a string. Had that by-god beaver tail a-slappin' at the back o' my neck f'r a week or better." He chuckled at the remembrance, a thin, breathless, rasping sound.

  Monday frowned, started to speak, and hesitated. "Hoss," he said seriously, "I don't mean t' call you a liar, or nothin' . . ."

  Webb looked up with annoyance. "Best not," he said. "Can't y' see the damn bone your ownself?"

  "No, it ain't that. But—how c'n you be sure that Piegan topknot you're wearin' is the same as lifted yours?"

  "Why, y' damn dunghead! I took it off'n him right there, wagh! I did, now. Was runnin' my line up to Marias River with a Pikuni Blackfoot name of Baptiste. He wa'n't full-blood Piegan, but a breed. Half white an' half Injun, an' that's damn bad blood both sides. Wagh! Heerd somep'n in the brush, an' first thing I knowed Iwas eatin' mud."

  "Wagh!" Monday said. "That's some, now. "

  "Baptiste, he had both moccasins planted in the middle of my back, just a-rippin' an' a-tearin' away at the old topknot. Must of dazed me f'r a minute, for I can't recollect him takin' the knife to 'er. Well, now."

  "There's doin's," Monday exclaimed, lapsing into the almost ritual encouragement of the story-teller.

  "That made me so mad, but I didn't say nothin'. Truth is, I was a leetle mite confused, though you can't hurt a mountain man by hittin' him on the head. Baptiste, he had one turrible time liftin' that ha'r, he did now. Pretty soon he gets her off, though, an' leans down to wipe 'er off a bit on the grass.

  "Wagh! Up jumps this nigger, like to eat a painter. Couldn't see nothin' whatsomever, account of all the blood. Fetched that child up by feel, I did, wugh! Smote 'im hip and thigh, like the Scripture recommends, till I guessed he wa'n't about t' run off. "

  "You did, now!"

  "Outs with my knife, same as I got in my belt now, 'n' slips it inter his hump-ribs slick. Then I takes my turn a-—dancin' on his back 'n' liftin' ha'r a while."

  "Hooraw, coon!"

  "An' wa'n't there whoopin' when I gets back t'camp! This child was livin' with Heavy Runner's band at the time. One thing you got to give the Piegans, boy, they give a right smart coup dance. And they never 'low but four scalps off'n any one head, not to count coup on, anyways. Them dunghead Rees take half a dozen or better, just little-bitty pieces 'n' get half the tribe puffed up on one man's hair.

  "Well, now. It wa'n't long thereafterwards that Heavy Runner's band come down with the smallpox, wagh!" Webb swept his right hand under the left, signing "gone under." "Ever' one o' the niggers. It were a fearsome stink in camp, now. and the hollerin' were somep'n to hear. This child didn't set toe near them lodges. he didn't. Turned around smart and high-tailed it down to Absaroka country, 'n' been livin' with the Crows ever since."

  "That's some, now," Monday said admiringly. "Didn't ever figure you had enough hair t'be worth takin', myself."

  "No," Webb said, fondling the long black strands that hung from his headb
and. "This nigger got the best o' the bargain, that is a fact. The Absaroka call me Has Three Scalps, my own 'n' two others. Lost m'own some'ers along, but it wa'n't no 'count anyways. Gettin' ratty, it

  was, like a summer pelt."

  "How long it take that to heal?" Dr. Beth asked. "You put any kind of medicine to it? How long you keep it covered?"

  Webb was flattered and pleased by the attention. He became almost embarrassed as he tried to remember. "Fact is," he said uncomfortably, "this child never did pay too much mind afterwards. If I'd of knowed somebody was to be so hell-fired interested, why, I'd of wrote 'er down or somep'n."

  "You aren't much help," Beth said accusingly. "That ever happen again, you pay better attention."

  "Yes'm," Webb muttered unhappily. "I surely will." He suddenly pulled the hat on again. "But I don't guess it's like to happen twice," he apologized.

  Beth smiled at Webb's discomfiture. She stood from the table. "I best be movin' on, now," she said. "Mary, you think on what I said."

  "About what?" Monday asked curiously.

  "Woman talk, Mr. Monday, and none of your concern." She went to the door and opened it. She turned back briefly and said, "An' don't you go pokin' into things that don't concern you." She closed the door before Monday had time to answer.

  "Some punkins, that 'un," Webb said admiringly. "Right peart for a woman, an' a white 'un at that. Had me a Nez Percé wife oncet summat like that 'un. Lodge-poled the bitch from Powder River t' Bayou Salade an' back again, for she wouldn? quit. Finally swapped her off f'r a Hawkens gun 'n' three pounds o' powder."

  "What's she got her back up at me for?" Monday said. "I didn't do nothin'."

  "Nothin'," Webb muttered. After a moment he added mysteriously, "Y' don't have to."

  3

  Webb and Monday unloaded the meat they had brought down, and Mary put it all out on the counter for wrapping. There was a stack of Oregon Spectator; in the cupboard, carefully collected from the newspaper office when the paper was being run by Doc Newell. They were reject sheets, crooked on the press or double impressions, but most of them were still legible.

  Webb watched with interest as Mary took the stack down and began to roll up the chunks of meat. He grabbed a sheet from the top, muttering, and took it to the fire.

  "Goddam, coon, y' look like a English gentleman," Monday said. "Y' do, now. Sittin' there with y'r paper in front o' the fire, an' all."

  "Jaybird," Webb said patiently, "y're just a heap o' shit with teeth, 'n' for oncet I wish y'd cut out clackin' the teeth 'n' lie there still."

  "Hell, Webb," Monday said dubiously, "you can't read now, can y'?"

  Webb's proudest achievement was his reading, and it was an almost sure way to make him come.

  This time, though, there was no violence—though Monday had seen knives drawn over the same question in the past. Webb calmly turned the page. "This nigger c'n read slick," he said equably. "He c'n read never mind what. If'n they c'n write it, he c'n read it, 'n' that's truth."

  Monday grinned at his back. Mary had turned slightly around, and Monday winked at her. She smiled and turned back to the wrapping of the meat. Webb crouched on his haunches in front of the fire, the two long Piegan scalps dangling down between his knees as he read. For a long moment there was only the sound of the crackling fire and the rustling of the papers as Mary wrapped the meat.

  Then Webb said angrily, "W'hat 'n hell's 'ova' mean?" He looked accusingly at Monday as though the big man had perpetrated the word himself.

  Monday looked at him, surprised. "Means 'above,' coon. Y' put y'r gun ova the mantel."

  "That's over, y' damn dunghead," Webb snapped. "Ova, o-v-a."

  Monday rubbed his forehead. "I don't believe that's a real word," he said finally. "It don't sound right."

  "It's got to be a word. Right here in the paper, ain't it?"

  Monday went over to the fire and looked at the column where Webb was pointing. It was a long poem, fifteen or twenty stanzas, with the title ADVENTURES OF A COLUMBIA SALMON. The paper was several years old and yellowed, but the type was still legible enough. Webb was on the second stanza:

  'Tis a poor salmon, which a short time past

  With thousands of her finny sisters came,

  By instinct taught, to seek and find at last,

  The place that gave her birth, there to remain

  'Till nature's offices had been discharged,

  And fry from out the ova had emerged.

  "They got a literary association over to Oregon City," Monday explained. "Call it the 'Falls Association,' an' they're always doin' somethin' like that in the paper."

  "Don't give a damn where it come from," Webb said querulously. "Just what's it mean, ova?"

  "That's what I'm sayin'," Monday said. "It's literary. When they put stuff in you can't understand, that's literary."

  "If'n it's a word, this nigger c'n understand it right off." Webb snorted.

  "Well, you read better'n me," Monday admitted. "What's this'n here mean?" He pointed to the third line of the stanza, the word "instinct."

  "Wagh!"' Webb snorted. "That's 'instinct'."

  "Hell, I c'n sound it out if I want to," Monday said. "That's nothin'. Anybody c'n sound a word out if he wants to. But what's it mean?"

  "Iggerant child, y'are now. Instinct, that's when you do something you don't know what y're doin'."

  "That's just stupid, to my way o' thinkin'," Monday said.

  Webb stood, clutching the paper tightly in his fist and glaring at Monday. "Nobody ast y' for y'r dunghead opinion," he said furiously. "Just do you know what 'ova' means."

  "Don't get y'r back up, hoss," Monday said placatingly. "Mary, 'ova' ain't a Shoshone word, is it?"

  Mary thought for a moment. "No," she said, shaking her head.

  "What does it look like?" She came over to the paper. Webb had partly crumpled it in his anger and they had to smooth it out on the table.

  "C'n she read?" Webb demanded of Monday while Mary looked at the column.

  "Hell, yes," Monday said with pride. "I bet she c'n read better'n you."

  "Never heard of a squaw could read," Webb muttered. "Goes against nature."

  Mary said, "I think maybe 'ova' means 'frying pan.' See, is where they take the fry out of. "

  "That's it, Mary got it!" Monday said. "See, right there. 'Fry from out the ova.' That's it."

  Webb puzzled at it for a moment. "Fry means baby fish, don't you even know that?"

  "Hell, yes. Ain't you ever had baby fish fried? An' see there, it says about 'nature's offices'. That means when you're hungry, don't it?"

  Webb muttered something unintelligible, tracing the lines with his finger again, trying out the meaning. Then he stood straight and looked Monday square in the eye. "Then the son of a bitch don' make any sense."

  Monday shrugged. "That's account it's literary, " he said affably. "Like I said. Listen, hoss, you don't want t' worry too much about this literary stuff or you go crazy."

  "The bastards," Webb growled, staring down at the paper. "The dirty, lousy, rotten-men." Deliberately he crumpled the sheet into a tiny ball in his fist, his teeth clenched in anger. Slowly he bent to put the wadded ball on the floor, his movement tense, almost shaking with rage. Methodically he began to stamp on the paper, mashing it flat with his moccasins and cursing in a steady stream.

  "That ain't what God made words for!" he snarled.

  Monday started to laugh, and the sound only made Webb more furious. He looked up at Monday, and for a moment Monday thought he was going to be attacked. He held his hands helplessly in front of him, weak with laughter, while the old man raged incomprehensibly.

  Finally Webb stalked to the door, snatching his rifle from beside the fire. He slammed the door back, and with one last implacable curse stormed out into the night, to make his camp under the open sky. Monday sat helpless at the table, unable to speak. Mary went back to the counter, but she too was smiling. It had been a long time since the cabin had been full
of cursing and laughter.

  After a few moments the door exploded inward, slamming loudly back against the wall. Webb came in again, staring challengingly at Monday. He went over and picked up the mutilated newspaper and shoved it defiantly in the flap of his hunting shirt. He stood for a second, arms belligerently akimbo, waiting for Monday to say something. Seeing that the big man lacked the courage, Webb spat in the fire and went out again. Monday put his head down in his hands and began to shake again.

  From the counter Mary said, "I think maybe he eat it, now." Her hands deftly rolled the packages and put them to one side.

  "No." Monday gasped, wiping his eyes. "If I know the coon, he just can't stand to quit without finding out how it came out. How he is."

  Mary smiled. "He is not like the others, that one."

  "He's still the same as ever, god damn him. Just like he used to be."

  "He is Absaroka?" Mary asked.

  "No, he's white—he's livin' with the Crows, is all."

  Mary shrugged. "Was that I meant. It makes no difference to the Absaroka. He lives there, he is Absaroka. Same as when you were Shoshone."

  "I expect," Monday said, never having thought about it.

  "He is very much mountain," Mary said. "He is free, not like white men."

  "White men are free too, Mary," Monday said, frowning. "It's just a different kind of life, is all."

  "May be that way, " Mary said quietly. "You know, that one, he is the Wild Man Thurston talk about."

  Monday laughed. "Wagh! He is, now. Won't Thurston be surprised when he finds out it's just an old friend."

  Mary finished the last of the meat and stooped down to open the trapdoor to the cooler. "No, I think he not be surprised. But he will be angry."

  "Angry? Why the hell angry? Webb ain't going to hurt anybody."

  Mary stacked the packages carefully and methodically, moving slowly because of her bulk. "I think maybe he hurt you."

  "Webb?" Monday laughed. "Hell, he's just playin'. It's like old times, Mary."

  "No, is because the old man is—Absaroka. It hurt you to have a friend like that here. Thurston, he does not like mountain people around here. You know."