Shakespeare McNair, Lane Griffen, and Bob Knorr were riveted in place by the paralyzing sight of the massive grizzly rearing on its hind legs and opening its gaping maw to roar. A relatively recent wound on the side of its head, a deep furrow dug by a lead ball, was all the evidence Shakespeare needed that here was the same bear responsible for cutting him open and nearly rubbing him out. Automatically his hands sought the pistols he would ordinarily have at his waist, but there were none. Nor did he have his rifle. He was unarmed, weak, defenseless, totally at the mercy of a creature that had no mercy.
Shakespeare’s only hope lay in the two free trappers. He glanced at them just as they did the last thing he expected; they broke and ran.
The grizzly came down on all fours and advanced, its great head swinging ponderously from side to side. It stared straight at Shakespeare, and McNair felt the icy hand of death stroke the nape of his neck as the bear’s warm breath fanned his face. He went rigid, not so much as a muscle twitching, his eyes locked wide. Sometimes but not always bears wouldn’t touch someone if the person played possum.
Growling suspiciously, its raspy breaths like the puffing of a steam engine, the grizzly stopped and sniffed loudly, its warm nose brushing Shakespeare’s chest. Shakespeare resisted an urge to cringe away. Steeling his nerves, he neither moved nor made an outcry, not even when the bear nipped lightly at his shoulder, its teeth shearing the buckskin but hardly breaking the skin.
Abruptly, the bear twisted its head and opened its mouth. Saliva dripped onto Shakespeare’s cheek. This was the end, he told himself. It was going to finish the job, eat him right there on the spot. He saw its glistening teeth, saw its tongue as the head bent toward him. Its bulk blotted out the sun and most of the sky. I’m dead he reflected, and offered a heartfelt prayer to his Maker that his end would be swift and painless.
Then the bear froze. Loud shouts had erupted. Snarling in annoyance it turned to ascertain the source.
Shakespeare McNair looked and nearly shouted for joy. Lane and Bob had run off, all right, but only as far as the canoes to retrieve their rifles. Both men were twenty yards away, jumping up and down and hooting to draw the grizzly off.
“Come on, you bastard!” Knorr cried. “Let’s put some lead in your diet!”
“Here, bear! Try me!” Griffen chimed in. “Why don’t you try eating someone who can fight back, you cowardly monstrosity!”
The grizzly did not like the taunts. Roaring its challenge, it moved toward the pair of trappers with astounding speed for such a gigantic animal.
Shakespeare’s heart leaped into his mouth. Should anything happen to the two trappers, he was doomed. He wanted to shout “Look out!” to them but it was too late and unnecessary. Besides, they were ready.
In unison the strapping frontiersmen tucked their rifles to their shoulders and cocked the hammers. Lane Griffen held a Hawken, Bob Knorr a Kentucky rifle. They sighted on the grizzly’s head and when the bear had only fifteen feet to cover, they squeezed triggers.
At the twin blasts the bear stumbled and slid several yards, almost to the feet of the trappers. Lane and Bob whirled and ran, each in a different direction. Reloading on the fly, they cast glances over their shoulders to see which one of them the bear would pick.
It was Griffen. Snarling viciously, the grizzly pushed up off the grass and took out after him, paws pounding the ground like hammers. The instant Knorr saw this, he halted and quickly finished reloading, his fingers flying. Lane Griffen had begun to curve back toward him, which in turn induced the bear to angle sharply to intercept Lane. And that gave Bob Knorr a clear broadside shot.
At the report the bear staggered, slowing and shaking its head as if it were being assailed by bees. Looking around, the beast spotted Knorr, then charged.
Immediately Lane Griffen stopped, aimed carefully, and fired. The ball caught the bear low on the side and brought it to a lurching halt. Roaring louder than ever, it whirled toward Lane and again headed for him.
Meanwhile, Knorr was reloading. He poured black powder directly into the muzzle instead of taking precious time measuring the grains in his palm. Next he frantically wrapped a ball in a patch, crammed both into the end of the barrel with his thumb and used his ramrod to shove them all the way down.
The grizzly had gained on Lane Griffen. Realizing he couldn’t outrun the hairy behemoth, the bearded man whirled, letting go of his Hawken in order to grab the pistols at his waist. He cleared his belt, leveled both simultaneously, and fired at the exact second Knorr fired the rifle.
Three balls tore into the bear. This time, though, it did not stumble, did not slacken its speed. Growling hideously, the grizzly barreled toward Lane Griffen, who at the very last moment threw himself from its path. The bear kept on running, but not very far. It slowed, blood flecking its mouth, then stopped and pawed at its side. Legs buckling, it collapsed and lay there, feebly attempting to stand.
Lane reloaded his rifle ahead of Knorr. He walked up behind the bear, placed the barrel so close to the top of its head that hairs brushed the metal, and squeezed off the final shot.
Thrashing wildly, the grizzly shuddered and snarled, both movement and sound growing weaker and weaker until it sagged lifeless on the bloody grass.
“Tough son of a bitch,” Bob Knorr commented.
“These devils are too damned hard to kill for my tastes,” Lane said.
Shakespeare nodded his agreement. Grizzlies always had been notoriously tenacious of life. It was not uncommon for one to absorb eight, nine, even ten balls in the lungs and other vital organs and still not keel over. One of the first white men to encounter them, none other than Meriwether Lewis of Lewis and Clark fame, had often said that he’d rather tangle with two Indians out after scalps than a single grizzly. And Indians themselves regarded the bears as so fearsome that some tribes accorded the same coup status to slaying one as they did to slaying an enemy warrior. Which explained why the Shoshones were in such awe of Nate King. He’d killed more than any man, white or red, ever.
Griffen and Knorr jogged over.
“Are you all right?” the former inquired.
“We saw it take a bite out of you and feared you were a goner,” his partner added.
McNair touched his torn shirt. “Almost, but not quite.” He gazed into the distance and quoted, “To die, to sleep. To sleep, perchance to dream. Ay, there’s the rub, for in that sleep of death what dreams may come, when we have shuffled off this mortal coil, must give us pause. There’s the respect that makes calamity of so long life. For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, the oppressor’s wrong, the proud man’s contumely, the pangs of despised love, the law’s delay, the insolence of office, and the spurns that patient merit of the unworthy takes, when he himself might his quietus make with a bare bodkin?”
“What?” Bob Knorr said.
“You must be feeling a mite better if you’re quoting that old book of yours,” Griffen remarked.
“That old book,” Shakespeare repeated with a tinge of melancholy. “Would that I still had it. My most prized possession, the immortal works of the Bard, gone forever, destroyed by one of Nature’s tantrums. I suppose there’s poetic irony in that, boys, but for the life of me I can’t appreciate it.”
“Is that why you’re so sad?” Lane Griffen said. “Didn’t we tell you?”
“Tell me what?” Shakespeare responded, hardly daring to believe the deduction Lane’s question inspired.
“I’ll show you.” Lane spun on a heel and sprinted to the canoes.
Bob Knorr hunkered down to examine McNair’s wounds. “The sooner we get you bandaged up, the less I’ll be worried about your innards oozing out if you make any sudden moves.” He glanced at the bear. “If we had the time, I’d take a couple days to skin that cuss and treat the hide so we could wrap you in it for the journey.”
“Blankets will do fine,” Shakespeare said, craning his neck in an effort to gaze past Knorr. He could hear Griffen running back but couldn’t see whatever the man was bringing.
“We found your guns,” Knorr mentioned offhandedly. “Your pistols were stuck under your belt. The Hawken was lying half in, half out of the river. I cleaned and oiled it myself. Wasn’t busted or anything.”
“I’m grateful,” Shakespeare said. Lane Griffen appeared, holding a waterlogged bundle, and Shakespeare felt the sort of constriction in his chest a man feels when setting eyes on a long lost lover after a lengthy absence. “William S.!” he said softly.
Griffen handed the bundle over. “Actually, if it’s poetic stuff you like, I’d say it’s pretty darned fitting for a man to be saved by his own book.”
“How’s that?” Shakespeare asked, not paying much attention as he swiftly unwrapped the heavy blanket stained by water marks.
“We wouldn’t have found you except for that bundle,” Lane explained. “We were paddling along when I saw it snagged on the limb of a partially submerged tree. Got me curious so we went over to investigate and as Bob was untangling the blanket we spotted you.” He paused. “It done saved your bacon, old coon.”
The blanket parted, and there it was, the leather cover slightly marred by new water marks. “William S.,” Shakespeare said again, and forgetting himself and his condition, he gave the book a gentle hug.
“Lordy,” Knorr said. “If you get this excited over books, you must be a regular hellion with the ladies.”
“It’s not just any book,” Shakespeare said, gingerly turning the pages. Only a third of them had been touched by the water, and although some lines had smeared, none were illegible. “It’s the sum and substance of what we are.”
“I have to differ,” Lane Griffen said. “Only the Good Book is all that, and more.”
“True as far as that goes,” Shakespeare said, tenderly running a finger along the edge of a page. “The Good Book tells us who we are and why we’re here and what we have to do if we want to go on living once we cast off this moral coil. Old William S., on the other hand, gives us a peek at what makes us tick. Read Hamlet sometime. Or Romeo and Juliet. You’ll understand then.”
“I’ve heard of that Hamlet feller,” Bob Knorr said. “Isn’t he the one who boiled a batch of witches in their own cauldron?”
“You’re thinking of Macbeth,” Shakespeare said dryly.
Griffen had turned to gaze inland. “Maybe this isn’t the best time to sit around chawing about books,” he reminded them. “There’s no telling who might have heard those shots. We are at the border of Blackfoot country, if you’ll recall.”
“I should have thought of that my own self,” Knorr said, rising. “Let’s forget the coffee and light a shuck before we have uninvited company.”
It took all of fifteen minutes. Shakespeare lay propped in the second canoe, swaddled in blankets, his precious book on his lap, while
Lane Griffen paddled strongly to take them out into deeper water. In the first canoe Bob Knorr glanced over a shoulder and waved cheerily.
‘‘Don’t you fret none, McNair,” Griffen said. “Once we hook up with our friends, Jacob will have you patched together good as new in no time. Might take a couple of hundred stitches, but he’s a real patient man.”
“I can hardly wait,” Shakespeare said. And, in truth, he couldn’t. The excitement and exertion had taken their toll, leaving him weak and flushed and feeling feverish. He tried not to dwell on the furrows in his flesh because every time he did he shuddered uncontrollably.
The gentle motion of the canoe lulled Shakespeare into drifting to sleep. He suffered disturbing dreams, all involving rampaging grizzlies tearing into his unprotected body, only snatches of which he remembered on awakening. Pushing up on an elbow, he scanned the tranquil stretch of river ahead.
Lane Griffen heard and looked back. “Figured you’d be out most of the day. It’s the middle of the morning now. How are you holding up?”
“I’ve felt better,” Shakespeare said. His fever had worsened while he slept and he felt as if he could fry eggs on his forehead. “Wish I could do my share of paddling.”
“Leave that to us,” Lane said. “We know you’d do the same on our behalf if things were reversed.” He dipped the paddle smoothly in a steady rhythm. “Folks need to look out for one another, just like the Good Book says. My pa made that clear to me before I was knee high to a grasshopper.” Lane grinned at the fond recollection. “Pa was a preacher man.”
“Surprised you didn’t follow in his footsteps,” Shakespeare mentioned.
“I was fixing to,” Lane responded. “Then I met me the finest woman this side of Creation. Abigail was her name, and she loved me as much as I loved her. So I decided having a family was more important than spreading the Word.”
“Where is your lady love now?”
The trapper broke his rhythm. “I wish to God I knew, McNair. Two years ago next month she disappeared.”
“Indians?”
“Piegans. I made the mistake of taking her into the mountains with me to trap. Everyone warned me not to do it but I was too pigheaded to listen. Thought I could handle anything that came along.” His voice wavered, acquiring a haunted aspect. “Why is it we think we’re invincible when we’re young?”
“For the same reason we think we know all there is to know and that no one can possibly teach us a thing about life,” Shakespeare said, making himself comfortable. “The way I see it, we’re always about twice as stupid as we think we are and four times as ignorant.”
“Ain’t it the truth.” Griffen stuck the paddle in the water and held it there, steering the canoe around a floating log. As he resumed trailing Knorr, he continued his account. “Things went really well for about a month. We made us a lean-to high in the pines where no one could find it and I’d go off most mornings to check my traps while she worked on the hides of the beaver raised the day before.” He looked skyward. “I tell you, McNair, it was heaven on earth.”
“True love always is.”
“Yep. Anyway, one afternoon I came back to the lean-to as usual and she was gone, the lean-to smashed to bits. There were plenty of moccasin tracks, Piegan prints by the cut of the soles. They’d taken her north so I went after them hell bent to wipe the varmints out.”
“Did you ever catch up with them?” Shakespeare asked when the trapper’s voice trailed off.
“No.” The word was little more than a whisper. “I tried. Lord, how I tried. Hunted for months, until the first snow came. It was hopeless.” Griffen’s shoulders sagged. “Later I heard tell from a couple of voyageurs of a rumor about a white woman living with a band of Piegans up toward Canada. They had no notion of where the tribe could be found or I would have headed right out.”
“And now?”
“Now I’m about plumb out of hope,” Griffen confessed. “God knows what she’s gone through. Even if I find her, she might be too ashamed to want to come back. Sometimes that happens, I hear.”
Shakespeare was having a hard time keeping his eyes open. Sleepiness pervaded his body and his brow was hotter than ever. “If she loves you she’ll never give up hope,” he said, putting a forearm over his eyes. “You should do the same.”
“Easier said than done, McNair,” Griffen said. “Hope is a lot like faith. Both are precious commodities, and when we run out it’s not simple to stock up again.”
“Sure you haven’t been reading old William S.?”
“I don’t read anything anymore. Not even the Good Book.”
“You should—” Shakespeare began, and had no idea whether he finished the statement because the next thing he knew he was sitting up and the sun sat balanced on the western horizon like a red plate standing on edge and about to slip off the end of a table. “Sorry,” he mumbled. “Drifted off again.”
“In your shape I’d do the same,” Griffen said. “You’d be wise not to do much moving around until we get there.”
“When will you pull over for the night?” Shakespeare asked, relishing the idea of that cup of coffee the grizzly’s attack had denied him and a good night’s sleep beside a warm fire.
“We’re not. Bob and I stopped earlier while you were sleeping. We agreed to push on through the night.”
“Too dangerous,” Shakespeare advised. “By morning you’ll both be too tired to keep your eyes skinned for hostiles. And I certainly won’t be of much use.”
“It’s for your benefit that we’re doing it,” Griffen said. “We can reach Jacob that much sooner.”
“No. I won’t have you jeopardizing yourselves needlessly on my account.”
“You don’t have a say in the matter,” Griffen declared bluntly. “We already have our minds set, so that’s that.”
“Darned idiots,” Shakespeare groused, knowing full well he would be unable to dissuade them and admiring their grit despite his misgivings. Placing a hand behind his head, he surveyed the countryside.
The Yellowstone River ran straight for as far as the eye could see, a scenic blue ribbon in the midst of the vast green grassland. Cottonwoods and willows lined both banks, the branches of the willows hanging so low they seemed to touch their reflections on the surface. To the south grazed a small herd of buffalo. In the undergrowth on the south bank several deer stood watching the canoes glide past. Overhead a red hawk vented the unique screech of its kind. On the north bank sparrows and a jay frolicked. On the plain to the north nothing moved, not so much as a solitary antelope.
And to the north lay the heart of Blackfoot country. Shakespeare had no idea how many villages were spread out over the countless square miles encompassing their domain. A fair guess would be dozens. Like the Sioux farther south and the Comanches way down near Mexico, the Blackfeet were a powerful tribe whose power in part derived from their well-nigh limitless numbers. That, and their confederacy.
Some years ago the chiefs of three tribes—the Bloods, the Piegans, and the Blackfeet—had smoked the pipe and formed a loosely knit alliance that became known as the Blackfoot Confederacy since the Blackfeet were the guiding lights and the real power behind the league.
Now the Confederacy controlled an empire a third the size of the eastern United States. They terrorized trappers, drove out traders, and generally made life miserable for anyone who had the gall to set foot in their territory. No amount of palaver could change them. No amount of trade goods would sway their attitude. They were implacable.
Shakespeare knew them well. Perhaps too well. And he would not like to see the two young trappers fall into their clutches because of him. So he resolved to stay awake as long as he could to help them keep watch.
“Is it true what they say?” Lane Griffen asked conversationally. “That you were one of the first out here?”
“I was,” Shakespeare admitted.
“When was it? Shortly after Lewis and Clark went through?”
“Before them.”
Griffen nearly upended the canoe, he turned so swiftly. “You’re tickling my ribs, McNair. No whites had gone west of the Mississippi before ‘05. Everyone knows that for a fact.”
“Just like everyone once thought the world was flat, for a fact, and just like most folks in the States, even today, call the country west of the Mississippi the Great American Desert because they just know, for a fact, that nothing will grow here and it’s as dry and lifeless as the Sahara.”
“Point taken,” Griffen conceded. “So what was it like way back then?”
“Not much different than what you see around you,” Shakespeare reminisced. “There was more game. And there weren’t quite as many Indians, but all the tribes, even the Blackfeet, were friendly in those days—”
“They were?” Griffen asked in astonishment.
“None friendlier,” Shakespeare said. “About a half-dozen whites were living with different Blackfoot bands when Lewis got into his famous racket with a small bunch of Blackfeet trying to steal the guns of his party. Once the word spread that whites had killed Blackfeet, those whites living among them were told to pack up and ride out or be roasted over an open fire.” He ran a hand along his eyebrows, noting how hot his skin was to the touch. “Most of those men had Blackfoot wives. A few had small children. They didn’t like giving up their loved ones, but they liked the notion of dying even less. So they went.”
“The wives and children must have gone through sheer hell.”
Shakespeare swallowed, then licked his lips. “I would imagine so,” he said hoarsely.
Griffen suddenly stopped paddling and asked, half to himself, “Now what the dickens has him so excited?”
Bob Knorr had also ceased paddling and was jabbing a finger at the north side of the Yellowstone. Shakespeare twisted to see why and spotted riders out on the prairie, hastening toward the river. Toward them. And although the distance was a quarter of a mile or more, much too far for him to note details, he knew they were Blackfeet.