Seven

March 29, 1903

From the vantage of a bluff, I spot a set-tlement of some type in the distance. Fifteen minutes later, Cody and I are trotting through a camp—a cow-camp. By all appearances, the few tents have been abandoned in a hurry—even the chuckwagon has been left behind. After a more careful inspection, I decide it didn’t happen recently. The tents have collapsed from the weight of snow, and the wheels of the chuckwagon have had time to sink into the earth.

I’ve come across cow-camps before. There are plenty around because a herd can only be moved ten to twelve miles in a day. But usually only the plank floors for the tents remain. And if the cowboys are on a drive, staying only one night, they often don’t even bother with tents. They roll themselves in their blankets and stretch out beneath a wagon or a canopy of prairie stars. I can’t tell what it was just by looking, but something chased these cowhands out of this valley. I lift the canvas and look beneath. It appears they took nothing but the clothes they were wearing. Their personal items—their soaps and washing flannels, even their straight razors—were left behind.

I open the drawers and compartments of the chuck-wagon, pulling out what there is on hand: a crock of sour-dough, coffee, beans and tins of tomatoes, stewed prunes and beef. There are also plenty of cooking utensils, so while Cody crops a few hearty tufts of grass rising from the snow, I set about making a stew. I also brew a pot of Arbuckles. Good, strong, cowpuncher’s coffee. After I’ve eaten, I sit on the cook’s stool and look over the long, empty valley while enjoying my coffee and a smoke. I’d come across a tin of Turrets in the chuckwagon and rolled myself a cigarette. It’s sure a sight—those hills spotted with jackpine—a magnificent sight, but lonesome as well. Not a creature stirs as far as I can see but for Cody. He’s settled down some. The scent of whatever he’d caught earlier probably carried right over the valley and away from his nose.

I clean up my mess, dump snow on the fire and stir it around to be sure it’s out. I don’t take anything but food, not wanting to root through any of the personal stuff. Cody starts out more cooperative. It isn’t until we reach the top of the next rise that he starts balking again. Cocking his ear to the right, he whinnies and snorts low. I really have a time keeping him to the trail. I also have trouble keeping the meal I’ve just enjoyed in my stomach. The stench of death hangs thick and sickly in the air.

Jumping off Cody, I lead him from the front so as to give me better control. I nearly land right on the cause of the smell. I look down—my attention caught by the slight jingle of a spur disturbed when my weight strikes the ground. The spur is attached to a leather cowboy boot. Inspecting it more closely, I leap back. I just about lose my lunch on the spot!

Lying face down beneath the low branches of sagebrush, and newly exposed by the receding snow, is the corpse of a cowpuncher. His Carlsbad, soggy and gray, still covers the back of his head where he lies. He is dressed in a long yellow oilskin slicker and heavy winter clothes; long johns poke out the cuffs of his trousers, and he is wearing woolly chaps. Cody is real edgy, so I walk him away from the body and hitch him to a tree. For several moments I lean against the tree myself. It takes some concentration to get a grip on my stomach as well as my nerves. I wonder at my run of gruesome luck—stumbling on another dead body in less than a month.

I return to the body of the cowboy. Because of the odor it is difficult to get too close, but I am curious how he died. Covering my nose with my sleeve, I hold back the branches overhanging the body. I bend down and look him over, but I can see no signs that he’s come to his end in a violent way. There are no bullet holes or knife wounds in his back. I search for a lever. After finding a branch, I pry him up enough to be able to see him from the front. He is plastered all over with mud and twigs, and his gloved hand still clutches his lariat. But I can find no wounds on his chest or what is left of his face. I lower him to the ground again. By all appearances, it looks like he’d been walking along and fell to the ground face first. For whatever reason, he was unable to get up again.

As I am obviously the first to come across him since the snow melted, I feel an obligation to tell someone. I decide to tell Mabel at the stopping house. In the meantime, I don’t have the means to bury him. Besides, he is in a fragile state, and I don’t want to start moving him around in case he doesn’t hold together. I also figure the more natural he is, the more likely those searching for him will be able to identify his remains. So I cover him in a pile of branches and leaves. I then lash together a cross, but before I leave, I think I should say something to mark his passing. It wouldn’t be right to just bury a man without saying a considerate word. I have no idea what to say. I obviously don’t know anything about him. Then I remember something John, the Carsons’ farmhand, said. It was one day the previous August when we’d all been working in the fields: Albert and Buck, John, Mr. Carson and me along with the men hired to do the threshing. Albert had struck me on the head for something. I can’t even remember what it was, but that doesn’t play into it.

Once Albert walked off, John had come up beside me. “Charlie,” he’d said, “those boys are mighty nasty to you and we all know it. But someday you’ll be out of this situation and on your own. Until then I advise you to live by a few words from the Code of the Range. This is how the cowboys manage their lives because theirs is not always such easy riding either. They work hard and get knocked around a lot, like you. The two cowboy commandments you’d be wise to pay heed to are these: You got to say little, talk soft and keep your eyes skinned. And don’t argue with the wagon boss. If he’s wrong, he’ll find out.”

I understood the first part all right. I’d been keeping my eyes skinned since the first time I’d been whipped. It just took me a minute to figure out that by my wagon boss, he meant Albert Brooks.

Remembering all of this, I take it upon myself to make a eulogy for the man lying beneath the leaves. I figure a suitable tribute to a cowboy would be recognizing that he’d lived his life the way it was laid out in the Code of the Range. “Here lies a cowboy who said little,” I begin, “talked soft and kept his eyes skinned. And he didn’t ever argue with the wagon boss. Rest in peace.”

I hammer the cross into the ground with a rock. I unhitch Cody and start down the trail again. Twenty minutes later we emerge from a wooded area at the top of a ridge. I glance down into the coulee to the west. It’s a sight to soften the toughest cowboy’s heart.

Laid up on top of each other, decomposing in the sun, are the bodies of a hundred or so cattle. Winter kill. Free-range animals that had wandered into the coulee when it was filled with snow to escape the bitter cold. Here, they had huddled together for warmth. But unlike the cowboy’s corpse, they do not give off the smell of rotting flesh. If these animals hadn’t frozen to death, they had surely starved. The drifts had set in and they’d had nothing left to forage. This meant they had no muscle or fat to stink when they decomposed because they were nothing but skin and bone when they died.

The corpse and the abandoned cow-camp now make sense. The cowboys had been attempting to drive the herd in where they’d be safe from the bitter cold. A blizzard swept in and they were lucky to save themselves—except for the dead one, who probably lost his way and, much worse, his horse.

I whistle for Cody to move on.

The land is much hillier now; it no longer rolls out so that you can see miles in the distance. Snowdrifts are receding from the floor of the heavily timbered valleys, and jackpine dapple the bare hills. In places I lose sight of the trail. I trust Cody to follow it with his nose.

It’s coming on dark by the time we arrive at Mabel Millard’s stopping house. I tie Cody to the hitching post out front. There’s a livery out back, but I think it best to approach Mabel Millard before I take the liberty of putting Cody in the barn. I have to walk around a pigpen to get to the back of the house. A large black sow, ornery as they come, follows along on the other side of the split-log fence. She screeches and grunts at me, complaining that she doesn’t like me walking anywhere near her. The foul smell of a turkey house reaches my nose. The sow’s complaints get the turkeys flapping and fussing, so that before I even reach it, Mabel Millard comes to the kitchen door to see what all the fuss is about.

“Lucy, stop that caterwauling,” she demands of the hog.

Mabel Millard is a big woman with a handsome face, even though she is as old as Hector Barnes. She wears her silver hair pinned in a coil at the back of her neck, and a worn but starched apron covers her gingham dress.

“Mrs. Mabel Millard,” I say, “my name is John. John Laurier.”

Mabel Millard does not appear nearly so kindly as her brother had made her out to be. She frowns as I speak, causing me to take a step back.

It dawns on me to take out Hector’s letter. “I pass on warm regards from your brother, Hector Barnes. He suggested you might be able to give me a place to sleep and a meal for a day or two, in exchange for some work. I can do just about anything.”

Mrs. Millard takes the letter. She inspects the seal, breaks it open and reads. To my relief, she smiles in an approving way. She has all her teeth, and they show nice and even. She looks me over again and begins to laugh. “How some things don’t change. Hector always was the one to save a bag of kittens from a drowning. Come on in, young man. But it isn’t John. I know it to be Charlie.”

My heart takes a tumble. I can’t think of what to say after hearing my name.

But Mrs. Millard takes me by the arm and pulls me into the kitchen. “Don’t you worry. I’m not about to put stock in anything Buck Brooks has to say. His reputation precedes him as one to take advantage where he can. That fella would turn his own mother in if he could get a nickel for it. I’ve had more dealings with him than I care to admit, haggling over feed prices in Pincher Creek. He was through here about an hour ago. Looking for an unsightly Home boy by the name of Charlie, skinny and evil-minded.”

Again, I am stuck for words. But I’m not as disturbed to hear Buck’s still looking for me as I am that Mabel picked me out from that description.

She laughs again. “Skinny and evil-minded were Buck’s words. Now, Charlie, are you starving? How about some mulligatawny. Then I’ll introduce you to my nephew, Roland. Not Hector’s boy, but the son of another brother who was killed many years back digging a well. Roly runs the livery and will put you to work. You can bunk with him for however long you stay. I sure can use the help with my husband working on the railroad.”

I thank Mabel Millard for her kindness. I dig into that mulligatawny while she pours a kettle of water into the wash basin and cleans up from her guests. I can hear them talking down the hall.

“Three families heading north,” she tells me. She wipes her hands on her apron. “Let me show you around and take you out to meet Roly.”

Mrs. Millard leads me down the hall to the sitting room, where the families are gathered. The room is set up with entertainments for those stopping in for a meal and a bed. For seventy-five cents a traveler gets an evening meal, a mat to sleep on and a bowl of porridge with salt pork before setting out the next morning. Mabel also keeps a store stocked with things that those traveling might need: canned goods, bicarbonate of soda, licorice all-sorts for fussy children, and needles and thread for quick repairs.

On our way to the barn I tell her about the dead cowboy. She says he must be the fellow gone missing in a January blizzard—up from Montana. Just as I thought, he’d been lost as the men tried to round up the drifting cattle. After I tell her the approximate location, she says she’ll pass it on to the Mounted Police. We walk past the travelers’ wagons, loaded down with all that they own. Roly is inside the barn, organizing horse tack. He’s already brought around Cody, who is happily munching hay.

“That chestnut gelding yours?” he asks once Mabel introduces us.

“Yes, sir, he is.”

“He’s of mighty fine breeding, handsome, sturdy and calm. You must have paid some amount for him.”

I don’t say one way or the other.

“Roly here loves his horses,” Mabel tells me. “But you can see that for yourself. Look how well cared for they are.”

Roly Barnes is around about thirty years old, pleasant and even in nature. He is most generous in sharing his quarters in the bunkhouse next to the barn. He sets me up a bed and a small table beside it where I place the contents of my rucksack, including The Pilgrim’s Progress. Once I’m established, he picks up the book, looks it over and asks if there is anything else I might need. I say no, that everything is just fine.

The next day, I help Mabel in the kitchen by keeping the woodpile stacked and the stove stoked, washing dishes and peeling vegetables. I also work alongside Roly, cleaning stables and feeding and grooming the horses. He does his share, always helping out when a job is bigger than one person can do. Roly is friendly and he talks to me like I have some brains about me, always explaining why he does things the way he does. But I can’t help feeling that something is bothering him. I pick this up from how his mind wanders off in the middle of a job we are doing, or how he gets a few words into a sentence and forgets the rest of what he is about to say.

I discover what’s plaguing him two days later. We’re sitting around the bunkhouse playing cards in the evening—Roly has won the final hand. We square up, with me owing him one more stall to clean out. I pull off my moccasins and lie back on my bed. After knocking out his pipe, Roly strolls across the room and picks up The Pilgrim’s Progress where I’d left it on the table. He’s picked it up a few times since I arrived, each time turning the pages, frowning and placing it down again. This time he holds on to it.

“Charlie, can you read this?”

I nod. “I have. Many times when I was at the Brooks.”

This seems to get him thinking. “How about writing? Can you write, as well?”

“I can. Maybe not as clear as some.”

Roly sets the book down and sits at the end of my bed.

“I’m wondering if you’d do something for me. If you’d write me a letter. See, I haven’t been to school since my dad died when I was twelve years old. That was when the well he was digging caved in on him. When he was gone, I had to step into his shoes. Anyway, what it comes down to is I can’t write or hardly read myself, and besides, I’m not so good with words.”

I shrug. “Sure, I can do that. What kind of letter do you want me to write?”

Roly presses the palms of his hands to his knees. “I want you to write a letter asking Olivia Newbold to marry me.”

Every afternoon, Roly drives the hay wagon two miles along the trail to the Newbolds, a neighboring farm. This is where he buys feed for the livery. The Newbold family appears to include at least a dozen children—Olivia is the oldest of the brood. She is ten years or so older than me, with broad shoulders, and she wears her blond hair down her back in a long, thick braid. On the two afternoons that I’ve accompanied him, she’s rushed out to greet us, smiling widely at Roly. Today she passed on a basket of eggs, and a jar of preserves she made herself. Yesterday it was a jar of the most delicious tomato relish. It was like nothing I’d ever tasted in my life.

So it isn’t so much a surprise that Roly wants to ask Olivia to marry him. It’s the way he decides to go about doing it. “But Roly, why don’t you just come out and ask?”

“Because I can see she’s the sophisticated sort. She’d think higher of me if I could write it out. Charlie, I’m thirty-one years old and it’s time I got my own place. I need a wife; someone kind and warm who will raise my children and help work my land. A man just can’t do it on his own. I’ve seen the results. I don’t want to mess up my chance. That’s why I want you to write it how it should be. Besides, I don’t know as I have the courage to ask her face-to-face.”

“But I don’t know the first thing about asking someone for their hand in marriage. I can write it, if you want, but you’ll have to tell me exactly what you want to say.”

Roly marches over to the table next to his bed and opens the drawer beneath. The supplies I need have already been placed close at hand. “Here’s ink and a pen and a sheet of Mabel’s writing paper. I don’t think there’s anything else you’ll need.” He moves the lamp in closer to illuminate his little table. He then begins to pace back and forth with his hands thrust deep in the pockets of his dungarees as he thinks about what he wants to say. “Sit down, Charlie. Okay? I’ll start dictating. Good, okay. I’ll begin. Dear Miss Olivia. How’s that for a start?”

I sit at the table, dip the pen in the ink and write. “Dear Miss Olivia. It sounds as good as anything to me.”

“Okay. I’ll continue then.” Roly ponders a moment.

“Seeing as how I’m of a mind to start my own place, and you’re of stout body and, I dare say, sound mind, with a good knowledge of cooking, laundering, gardening, caring for children…”

I put the pen down.

“Aren’t you going to write this, Charlie?”

“I will if you want. But Roly, like I said, I don’t know anything about courting or marriage, but those don’t seem like the right words to be starting off.”

“Why not?”

“Well, this kind of letter—I mean, if you’re trying to woo someone—it just seems to me that you shouldn’t start off with naming chores and things.”

“But those things are the important ones. What should I start with then?”

“I’m not certain, but I think it should be more—complimentary. Like the way Mr. William Shakespeare would have wrote it. Okay, here’s an example. There was one piece of poetry I read in school where he compared his sweetheart to a summer’s day. Can’t you think of something Miss Olivia Newbold reminds you of? Something nice, like a summer’s day? We could start out with that.”

Roly thinks about this. “Yes, okay.”

I pick up the pen again, preparing to write.

Roly thinks a moment longer. “Dear Miss Olivia,” he begins. “Seeing as how I’m of a mind to start my own place and you remind me of Lucy…”

I put the pen down again. “Roly, you can’t compare Miss Olivia to a hog!”

“Why not?” Roly appears thoroughly frustrated.

“Lucy is something nice. She may be a little ornery, but she farrows the strongest litters we’ve ever had. We’ve never lost a one in all her years of producing.”

“That may be so, but you still can’t compare her to a hog.”

Roly drops to the edge of his bed. He rests his head in his hands for a moment, leans forward and speaks to me in an earnest way. “Charlie, Olivia Newbold is used to children. She’s raised all those brothers and sisters herself while her mother was out helping in the fields. She’s used to this land, its coldness and the swarms of mosquitoes in summer. I don’t want a wife like some are advertising for in the East. I want one that knows what to expect. Someone who’s not going to hightail it out of here the first time she gets a blackfly bite or gets whomped on the head with a nugget of hail; someone who won’t holler ’cause she’s up to her ankles in mud after it storms.”

I dip the pen in the inkstand again. “Okay. We’ll just say it straight out with no extras.”

Roly nods.

“‘Dear Miss Olivia,’” I begin. “‘Seeing as how I’m of a mind to start my own place, I am judging it to be about time to take a wife. I am admiring of the way you raised your own brothers and sisters, and I certainly enjoy the preserves you prepare. I particularly find your tomato relish most delicious. Therefore, I would be honored if you would consent to marriage with me. I will be awaiting your reply at the livery at Mabel Millard’s stopping house. Yours most sincerely, Roland Barnes.’ There. How’s that?” I hand the letter to Roly.

He studies my writing with a mixture of confusion and awe, nods and folds it up.