Free Fair Land, Fair Land by A. B. Guthrie Jr. Page B

out,
sayin' one day we'd traipse back and git our traps, but we never did,
that we didn't."
    Old Charlie had been rubbed out by the Arapahoes a
year later, and the traps would be long rusted now or lifted by other
hands, and all that was left was the trapper's remembered words.
Summers fell asleep hearing them.
    They ate a late and scanty breakfast and rode on
until Summers spotted three bighorn sheep on a ridge above them. He
slipped from his horse. They were almost within rifle shot. He
sneaked closer, stooping for cover, and got a bead on the smallest
one and fired. The target made one jump and began rolling down the
hill toward him. For an instant the others stood, startled, and then
ran from sight.
    When he got to the dead sheep, he found Higgins by
his side. Together they dragged it to the trail, bled and gutted it.
    " Wisht I had a hunter's eye like you, Dick,"
Higgins said.
    "Good eatin', huh?"
    "Next to buffalo by my thinkin'."
    They started skinning, Summers telling Higgins, "See
the wool don't touch the meat. Makes it taste sheepy."
    " So my grandmammy told me down on the farm."
    While he used his knife, Higgins asked, "You aim
to look in on that squaw we heard tell of?"
Summers
shrugged. "You gettin' ideas?"
    " Curious is all."
    " There's two ways to figure her. Either the
tribe kicked her out or she flew the coop."
    " Why would they kick her out?"
    Summers shrugged again. "Maybe she couldn't keep
her skirt down. Indians are funny about that, some of them are. If
the man of the lodge agrees to it, then his woman can lay with
somebody else. If she sneaks off on her own and he finds out, then he
bobs off the tip of her nose."
    "What if she does it again?"
    " I dunno. Maybe they turn her out on the
prairie."
    Summers began wrapping the sheep carcass in a piece
of canvas. He went on, "Maybe she was just too ornery. Wouldn't
work, hands or tail either, though that strikes me unlikely."
    " Or maybe she just run off, things bein' not to
her taste."
    " I reckon."
    They roped the canvased meat on a pack horse, leaving
the entrails and head on the trail. Looking at them, Higgins said,
"If that brute of a bear is on our tail, he'll have him a feast.
Figure he is, Dick?"
    " Was you sick and hurt, wouldn't you follow the
grub line?"
    Higgins looked again at what they were leaving. "Not
to eat guts."
    They went down to the creek to wash their hands.
Feather had leamed to stand when the reins were dropped. As they
mounted, Higgins said, "My mind keeps goin' to that squaw."
    " She sees your pecker, she'll shoot it off."
    " She'll have to shoot fine."
    Well, Summers thought, kicking his horse, why not see
her? They weren't pushing to get any place in particular. He doubted,
though, that Higgins would get what he wanted, not from a squaw who
had pointed a gun at a man who wanted the same thing.
    The sun moved in a sky that might never have known a
cloud. The aspens glowed yellow but were dropping their leaves. Here
and there chokecherries hung fat and black. The cottonwoods rose
higher, naked as skeletons now. Here and there a dwarf pine hung to
its hold on soil and rock. Except for the sounds of their gear there
was silence around them, not an animal cry or a wing flutter.
Overhead, an eagle soared, voiceless.
    Feather lifted his head, his nose quivering. Off to
the right was the beginning of a gulch where aspens grew. Summers
looked for smoke but saw none. Neither did his nose find it. But a
horse knew what a man might not. Summers turned in his saddle.
"Visitin' time a-comin'. Put on your good manners."
    They forded the creek and pushed through the growth
that grew along it, and there, half-hidden, rose a tepee, and, in
front of it, a woman who ran and picked up a gun. Behind her a child
sat on a piece of old robe.
    Summers halted the string when he had ridden closer.
He said, "How." The woman stood unmoving, both hands on the
gun. Even at this distance he could see it was an old fusee, probably
a Hudson's Bay musket. He