The dog
first found the man bleeding in the snow on the lower slopes of the McKenzie
Mountains late one spring. The dog, an Alaskan Husky mutt watched the man as he
knelt in the snow the crimson stain before him. The man stared off down the
slope towards the town at the bottom- its lights ablaze in the late evening
dusk. The man did not move save for an occasional shudder between his
shoulders.
The dog
peered at the man curiously wondering why the man had come all the way upslope
to bleed and die so far from his pack. Cautiously the dog circled around the
man on the left where he would between the man and the woods if he needed to
run. The man made no move nor gave no sign that he had picked up the dog’s
scent. As the dog came around to the front of the man, he could see that the
man shuddered in sorrowful sobs not in the death throes of the dying. Hot tears
steamed on the man’s face running down until they froze on his beard.
The dog
wondered what it must be like to cry with tears as he sat his haunches to study
the man and his sorrow. This man was large like the lumberjacks that had come
north in the fall, but not burly with the saw-cut muscles that marked that
breed. His beard was new and thin not thick like the pan handlers that clung to
the streams for the gold rock. The man’s eyes were haunted like the fur traders
that returned south with empty traps smelling foul and defeated.
The dog
noticed the feathers clutched in the man’s right hand and the shreds of the
silk cloth in the other. Blood smell was thick on both, the dog decided that
the blood he thought’s was this man’s was another’s than. The man continued to
weep unabashedly into the cold of the night. The two of them sat there a long
time until the dog decided against all of his newfound instinct to pad over to
the man and lick his tears away.
The man
jerked at the warm wet contact and turned and stared hard at the dog for a
moment before throwing his arms around him and burying his face into the dog’s
fur coat. The Dog was very surprised and somewhat pleased by this renewed
contact with the member of his former masters. He realized he had missed the
touch of man since his own had slipped beneath the ice so many moons ago. He
had learned to run with the wolves and fight and eat with them. He had even
found a pack mate to run with on the long nights under the star filled skies.
The two of them sat there in the cold night air, the man with his face buried in the fur of the Dog. The Dog wanting to stay but wishing to return to his other, his wolf-mate. The Dog knew this man would freeze if he did not seek shelter and the fire of warmth.
ReplyDeleteThe man begin to speak, muffled in the shaggy coat of the Dog's winter growth, but he grew clearer with each word as he spoke them.
"Her name was Night-Hawk, not Julia! Her name was Pe'eNa not Julia! She was my Cheyenne Squaw not some gambler's hussy!"
The dog reflected on his words, of course he had no idea what the man was going on about but he could sense the man had lost his mate. The Dog licked at the man in an effort to calm him.
The man pushed back on his haunches and climbed to his feet and screamed into the night "Pe'eNa! néméhotâtse!"
He let the feathers go as the wind and snow swirled around him. Each of the stained feathers fluttered out into the night then fell into the drifts gathering around them.
The man looked at the silk in disdain, made to throw it away then suddenly crushed it to his chest and fell back down to his knees.
The man looked at the Dog, fresh tears steaming as they fell from his blood shot eyes.
"I killed her... I killed my Pe'eNa! I killed my stáha..." He held out the silk scarf stained in dark rich scents of death and yowled into the darkness. The Dog joined him.
The wolves answered his cry. The Man looked back at the Dog unafraid.
"Let them come, I would welcome death! I deserve no more, no less. I would not let the Gambler have her but she stopped me from killing the Gambler at the cost of her blood, her life. Aieee!" The man howled again. The Dog considered the Man and decided that it was best he go back to his pack. Men were trouble, more trouble then they were worth. The Man watched the Dog go, silently padding off into the darkness. He knew that the wolves were coming soon.
The Gambler walked up to the Man as he knelt there in the snow.
"I figured I would find you, you sonnovabitch."
The Man looked up at the Gambler and snarled, the Man tried to spit, but his saliva froze in the night air as soon as it was launched.
The Gambler sighed. He looked down at the Man in the snow with the girl's blood all over him.
"Her name was not Peena or Nightbird, you fool! Her name was Julia Westlake and she was from Idaho not some Injun tribe and you shot her down in some drunken rage and for what?"
"Her name was Pe'eNa" the man said through gritted teeth as he reached for his gun- which wasn't there.
The Gambler shook his head. Sighed, lit a cigaretto, flicked the match into the wind, drew his Colt and shot the Man between the his bloodshot eyes.
"Her name was Julia. You Sonnovabitch!"
The Dog waited for his packmate a ways off. He had known that Death was coming up the hill from the town. He knew the Man would have to die, the Man’s pack would not let his crime go unpunished. It was the way of the Man’s pack.
ReplyDeleteWhen his mate came loping through the snows to come nose to nose with him, he let her smell the man on his scent. She growled softly in unhappy jealousy. The Dog licked her and she nuzzled him back. They would remain mates for more moons at least.
The other wolves of the pack came into view and surrounded him and his mate. The Alpha came up to him and they exchanged stares. The Alpha growled but he already knew what the Dog would say and it didn’t matter. The Dog was right as usual, Men would be more troubled than one meal would be worth. The pack members howled into the night. The Dog took one last look back to where the man lay sprawled in the snow now in his own pool of blood. The dog shook his head before he too joined his mate and pack in their howl to the night.