Rising to my knees, I pulled down my pants to check the state of my leg. The skin was inflamed and I could make out the perfect circular shape of the barrel, or series of barrels, a half-dozen red zeros—the sight of these made me frustrated all over again and I wished the prospector might come back to life so I could kill him myself, but slowly. I stood, thinking I would return to mutilate his body further, to unload my pistol in his stomach, but after a moment I decided against it, thankfully. My pants were still down and after collecting my emotions I took up my organ to compromise myself. As a young man, when my temper was proving problematic, my mother instructed me to do this as a means of achieving calm, and I have found it a useful practice ever since. Once accomplished I headed back to the river, feeling empty and cold inside but no longer angry. I cannot understand the motivation of a bully, is what it is; this is the one thing that makes me unreasonable.
I located the dead prospector’s tunnel, so-called. I had imagined a head-high underground pathway with wooden supports and hanging lanterns, but it was barely large enough around to crawl through, and as it was located at the stream’s thinnest point, only a few feet across. We dragged the prospector over and pushed him into the hole. I rode Tub over top of this, marching from one side of the stream to the other to cave it in. We had found little on his person, a pocketknife, a pipe, and a letter, which we buried with him, and which read:Dear Mother,I am lonely and the days are long here. My horse has passed and he was a close friend to me. I think of your cooking and wonder what I am doing. I believe I will come home soon. I have near two hundred dollars in gold dust. It is not the pile I had hoped for, but good enough for now. How is Sis? I do not miss her so much. Did she marry that Fat man? I hope he took her far away! The smell of smoke is in my nostrils always and I haven’t had a laugh in such a long, long while. Mother! I think I will leave here very soon.Loveingly,
Your Own Son.
Thinking of it now I suppose it would have been best if I had posted the letter. But as I said, when my temper is up everything goes black and narrow for me, and such notions were not in my mind. It is lonesome to think of a headless skeleton under that cold, running water. I do not regret that the man is dead but wish I had kept better hold of my emotions. The loss of control does not frighten me so much as embarrass me.
Once the prospector was out of sight, Charlie and I began rooting around in search of his gold. It was not difficult to find. He had set it away from the camp twenty yards, marked with a small crucifix fashioned from twigs. It did not look like two hundred dollars’ worth but I had never dealt with the powder and chunky flakes, and so could not be sure. We divided it fifty-fifty and I emptied my share in an old tobacco pouch I found buried in my saddlebag.
Charlie spent the night in the shelter and I had tried to also but could not stomach the lingering smell, both the dead prospector’s and the horse’s, which had been butchered, its meat lying on a makeshift drying rack at the rear of the tent. I slept beside the fire pit rather than contend with these fumes, passing a night under the stars. It was cold, but the cold did not have what I have heard called ‘winter weight’—it chilled your flesh, but not your muscle and bone. Charlie emerged from the shelter half an hour past the dawn, looking a decade older and a good bit dirtier, also. He slapped his chest to show the cloud of dust rise away from him; he decided a morning bath was in order, and pulled one of the prospector’s pans to the water’s edge to fill it, afterward placing this on the fire. He then located a deep spot in the stream, stripped down, and leapt in, shrieking loudly at its coldness. I sat on the bank and watched him splashing and singing; he had not had anything to drink the night before and there had been no other people around to upset his volatile nature, and I found myself becoming sentimental by this rare show of innocent happiness. Charlie had often been glad and singing as a younger man, before we took up with the Commodore, when he became guarded and hard, so it was sad in a way to watch him frolic in that shimmering river, with the tall snowy mountains walling us in. He was revisiting his earlier self but only briefly, and I knew he would return to his present incarnation soon enough. He rushed naked up the bank to stand near the fire. His genitals were shriveled and he made a joke about how swimming always brought him back to childhood. Lifting the pan from the fire, he poured the hot water over his head, which inspired another round of joyous screaming and bellowing.
After breakfast, I took advantage of his good humor, convincing him to try my toothbrush. ‘That’s it,’ I said. ‘Up and down. Now, give the tongue a good scrub.’ Breathing in, he felt the mint on his tongue and was impressed with the sensation of it. Handing back the brush and powder he said, ‘There is a very fine feeling.’
‘That is what I’ve been telling you.’
‘It is as though my entire head has been cleaned.’
‘We might pick you up a brush of your own in San Francisco.’
‘I think we may have to.’
We were preparing to leave when I saw the boy and Lucky Paul emerge from the forest on the opposite side of the stream. He had fresh blood all about his face and head and looked to be half dead. He saw me and raised his hand before dropping from his horse to the ground, where he lay still and unmoving. Lucky Paul took no notice of this but approached the river to drink.
Chapter 26
We dunked the boy in the stream and he awoke with a start. He was happy to see us, amused as he sat up. ‘I have never come to in running water before.’ He clapped the surface with his palm. ‘My God, it’s cold.’
‘What happened to you?’ I asked.
‘At the start of the woods I met a group of trappers on horseback, four of them, said they were looking for a red-colored bear. When I told them I hadn’t seen the bear they hit me on the head with a club. I dropped to the dirt and they rode off laughing. After I got my bearings I climbed back on old Paul and he led me here, to you all.’
‘He led himself to water, is what he did,’ said Charlie.
‘No,’ said the boy, patting and stroking Lucky Paul’s face. ‘His thoughts were with me, and he did what was needed.’
Charlie said, ‘You sound like my brother and his horse, Tub.’ He turned to me. ‘You and this boy should come together and form a committee or association of some kind.’
‘Which way did these men go?’ I asked the boy.
‘The Protectors of Moronic Beasts,’ said Charlie.
The boy said, ‘I heard them say they were heading back to Mayfield. Is that a town? I wonder if that’s where my father is.’
‘Mayfield is the boss man around here,’ I explained, relaying to Charlie what the prospector had said about the hundred-dollar tariff for the elusive bear’s pelt. Charlie said any man who would pay that much for a bear skin was a fool. The boy, washing the blood from his face and hair, said a hundred dollars would buy him all he needed in a lifetime. I pointed out the camp across the stream and told him he might make use of the fire and find temporary shelter there. At this, he appeared confused. ‘I thought I would come along with you two.’
‘Oh, no,’ said Charlie. ‘It was humorous the one time, but that’s the end of that.’
‘Now that we are clear of the pass, Lucky Paul will show you his stuff.’
‘Last you said he was one for the hills.’
‘He is slick as grease on the flats.’
‘No and no again,’ Charlie said.
The boy appealed to me with a sorrowful look but I told him he was on his own. He started crying and Charlie moved to strike him; I held my brother back and he broke off, returning to the camp to pack. I do not know what it was about that boy but just looking at him, even I wanted to clout him on the head. It was a head that invited violence. Now he was weeping in earnest, with bubbles of mucus blooming from his nostrils, and no sooner had the right nostril’s bubble exploded than another took shape in the left. I explained we were in no position to care for children, that our way was a swift and dangerous one, a speech likely made for nothing, the boy being so engrossed with his own sadness I do not think he heard my words. At last, fearful I might hurt him if he did not cease his mewling, I walked the boy across the stream to the prospector’s camp and pulled the tobacco pouch from my saddlebag. Showing him the gold, I told him, ‘This will get you back to your home, and your girl, if you can avoid having your skull knocked from your shoulders. There is horse meat in that shelter. I suggest you feed yourself and Lucky Paul and rest for the night. At first light I want you to backtrack, just the same way you came.’ I handed him the pouch and he stood there staring at it in his palm. Charlie had seen the transaction out of the corner of his eye and he moved to stand beside us.