Part 5

He appeared not to be giving much attention to the scene below him. Really he was surveying the ground he had selected as a hunting spot and was missing no detail. He could creep out on the windward side of the mare where a clump of buckbrush grew. From there he would have two mighty leaps to make. He would wait until the colt had moved away from his mother’s side. Perhaps the youngster would wander close to the buckbrush. His black whiskers jerked and his yellow eyes flamed through slitted lids. Softly, silently he skirted the piled-up rocks and slid into the timber to windward of the feeding horses. Like a tawny shadow he passed from one bit of cover to the next, his lank belly close to the ground. He often halted his unhurried descent to stand staring down on his victim.

On reaching the last of the cover he flattened his belly to the ground and crept forward through the tall grass. He kept moving, slowly, noiselessly, until he lay behind the clump of buckbrush. There he lifted his head and stared out through the green leaves.

Midnight had finished his supper and was nosing about a few yards from his mother. Lady Ebony had dropped her head and was pulling grass. She turned slowly toward the open meadow, her back toward the killer. She had no thought of danger at the moment. The big cat listened intently. He wanted to be sure the yellowbelly whistlers had all gone in for the night. His head rested on his forepaws. There was no sound except that made by the horses, but he waited, rigid.

The dusk deepened and the big cat stirred. He raised his head and peered out across the grass. And now his eyes were wide open, yellow pools of savage eagerness contrasting with his relaxed body. Midnight was strutting about, sniffing and snorting, humping his back and shaking his head. Lady Ebony was moving steadily away from the clump of buckbrush. The cat’s belly dropped to the grass, his hind legs drew up under him, his head flattened between his massive forepaws. His yellow eyes had located the exact spot where his first leap would land him, a bare spot where the grass was dead. From there he would hurtle upon the unwary colt. He meant to strike the little horse down with a broken neck so that no matter how well the mare might give battle the colt would lie waiting for him when she moved away.

For a moment the great body of the king killer was tense and still, then he leaped, his body arching upward, his great claws reaching out before him. He landed noiselessly on the patch of dead grass and poised there a split second while he drew his legs under him; then he leaped again, rising high, hurling his body toward the colt.

An odd quirk of energy made Midnight jerk up his head. He began bucking and bouncing. That sudden impulse saved him from the smashing blow the cougar intended to land. The yellow killer landed where Midnight had been standing. His scream of blood lust rang out, but his long fangs and ripping claws missed their target. Midnight squealed in terror as he saw the yellow killer clawing and lashing beside him. He plunged toward his mother, and Lady Ebony leaped to his rescue.

She sprang at the enraged lion with uplifted hoofs lashing and flailing. Mother instinct had completely banished her fear of the yellow killer. The cougar reared back and lashed at her but he did not stand his ground. Before her hoofs could smash down on him he leaped back, spitting and snarling. Lady Ebony did not stop her charge. Her slender legs pumped madly. The cougar was knocked off his feet and sent sprawling in the grass. He rolled over, righted himself, then fled before the pounding hoofs of the infuriated mare. Reaching the cottonwood timber he bounded up a tree and lay licking his bruises and spitting angrily.

Lady Ebony charged back to Midnight and shoved him up across the meadow. The cougar leaped down from the tree. Circling, he followed the pair, limping. Blood stained the weeds and tall grass along his trail.

Lady Ebony headed out of the meadow and up a deer trail. She kept moving, forcing Midnight to stay close to her side. The white starlight dimly outlined rocks and trees. They came to an open meadow but she did not halt. Midnight forgot the fear that had very nearly paralyzed him. He wanted to stop and rest. In the center of the meadow his mother halted and let him drink. As he eagerly fed she kept testing the night air, stamping her feet nervously and looking back down the trail. When Midnight had finished his lunch she moved on toward the high, dim hills looming above the canyon.

The cougar followed the trail of the horses for a while, but his smashed shoulder was giving him much pain, and he finally climbed on a ledge where he stretched his tawny length on a rocky bed and fell to licking the gash. Had he escaped unhurt he would have circled above the mare and her colt until he found a ledge from which he could attack again.

Lady Ebony kept moving throughout the night. The gray dawn found her going steadily upward. Just before noon they entered the oak belt at the base of the Crazy Kill Range. There she found a stream and an open meadow. Midnight insisted upon lying down to rest. No amount of coaxing would rouse him. He lay stretched out in the sun and closed his eyes. Lady Ebony was hungry. She began feeding close to where he slept. By the time he had finished his sleep she was grazing peacefully.

Mother and son spent long, sunny days in the meadow surrounded by oak brush. Lady Ebony seldom thought of the high mountain meadows. She had no desire to go anywhere at all. Midnight was beginning to feel that he was a grown horse. He danced and kicked and raced around. He even tried to make his mother do what he thought she should do. When she calmly ignored him and went on feeding he would lay back his ears and bare his teeth, nipping at her until she humped her back and threatened to lash out at him.

Many enemies passed the meadow and several paused to look at the fat colt and his mother. Two old lobos halted and calmly watched the colt at play. Coyotes trotted through the meadow in pairs or singly. An old bear shambled out of the oak brush and charged after a ground squirrel. He passed close to the frightened mother and her son but paid no attention to them. The killers were finding life easy. The hills abounded with grouse and rabbits as well as every species of squirrel. There were many mule deer, too. Old does watched over playful fawns growing strong and independent. The killers need not face the lashing feet of an infuriated mother horse to kill all they could eat. So they looked and went their way.

Midnight tried to make friends with the does. They were not afraid of him but they were not friendly. They stared at him out of calm eyes when he came near them, and they snorted and trotted at him when he tried to run with their fawns.

One evening Midnight saw a deer feeding at the edge of a clearing. He trotted over to the big-eared one in a friendly manner. But this one was different from the does. He had long, branching antlers and snorted aggressively when he halted and whinnied eagerly. Midnight stood staring at the strange deer with branches on his head. The buck snorted again. His horns were beginning to harden and the velvet was dropping away from their sharp spikes. With the hardening process his shoulders had begun to swell and his temper was becoming uncertain.

Midnight moved a little closer. He humped his back and kicked up his heels. The buck grunted angrily, then snorted. With a shake of his head he lowered his sweeping antlers and trotted toward the colt. Midnight circled and the buck circled. Midnight whirled and raced away. This fellow wanted to play. He’d give him a run around the meadow.

The buck jerked up his head and shook it. He had routed the enemy and was satisfied. He began feeding again, cropping the weeds and shoots, champing steadily. Midnight circled and galloped back to the old buck. This time the big fellow charged. The colt realized that the antlered deer wanted to fight and not play. Kicking his heels high he fled to his mother’s side.

Lady Ebony ran toward the buck and the big fellow bounded into the timber. Midnight felt he had won a great victory. He celebrated by charging around the meadow at a terrific pace. Lady Ebony watched him as he ran.

But a day came when the mare felt an urge to move on. Summer had slipped away and fall had brought frost and sharp winds from the peaks above. The high, barren reaches above timber line were white with new snow. Lady Ebony remembered the roundup when riders came to the high mesa and drove the horses down to the feed grounds in the valley. She moved about restlessly and finally struck off up the slope. Winter was coming and she was ready to go down the long trail to the home ranch. Her brief training with the wild band was forgotten, she was again a willing captive of man’s way.

* * * * *

With the passing of summer Sam grew more listless and weary. He hated to take his daily walk in the padded yard behind the high walls which shut out the sight of his mountains. He preferred to sit in his cell and stare at the changing cottonwood branch. He had chalked another fall on his cell wall, but he thought about it for a week before he put the mark down. He was tired but he’d get over that once he was back on his mountain mesa where he could sit in the sun and watch his neighbors.

7. The Way of the High Country

There were many inviting meadows along the trail which led up to the high mesa. The aspen groves were inviting in the daytime, the rugged hillsides were rich with herbs and frost-ripened grass. Lady Ebony and Midnight did not hurry. Indian summer filled the valleys below with purple haze and the air was warm and smoky. They passed through a wild, rough country, across a high ridge by way of a deep saddle, then they dropped down to the mesa where Lady Ebony was born and where she had spent all her summers except one.

Below the mesa the aspen belt flamed in garments of brilliant yellow. The rustling leaves would cling to the branches for a few more days. The first gale sweeping down from the snow peaks would loosen them and send them sailing to their beds along the slope. The oak belt, below the aspens, was red and purple like the upholstery of a piece of expensive furniture in its design and blending of color. Fall was flaunting its brightest colors for a few short days. Lady Ebony stood on the edge of the meadow and looked across the brown grass to Sam’s cabin, silent and deserted. She nickered softly and trotted toward the weathered cabin. Halting before the closed door, she pawed the ground and whinnied louder. There was no answer. Old Sam did not come shuffling out to give her lump sugar.

The old yellowbelly sentinel chuckled from his perch on the high rock. He did not seem to understand that the black mare had been away. He did not shrill his warning whistle or jump down from his high perch. The calico chips dashed about in frantic haste, their cheeks pouched out with seeds and dry bits of roots. They realized that there was but a short time in which to complete their work of filling caches of food. The fat-bellied rockchips sat and stared into the blue-and-purple haze. They intended to do a little more work but the sun was warm and they were fat and lazy.

A saucy chipmunk jumped to the top of a weed and sat there, swaying back and forth. His high-pitched “chock, chock, chock” rang across the meadow. Instantly every member of his tribe mounted a sing perch and their chorus rang out. The song pitched higher and shifted to “check, check, check, chir-r-r-up.”

At the far end of the meadow the dog town burst into excited barking and saucy “squit-tuck’s.” Lady Ebony tossed her head. This was home and her welcome back was what it should be except for the closed door of the old cabin. Midnight bounded around, kicking his heels high and bucking. Lady Ebony walked around the cabin and sniffed eagerly. Her nose told her something was wrong. The familiar smells were dim and cold, the taint of Sam’s rank pipe, the pungent smell of the man himself, a smell so definite and different from that of the dwellers of the wild. Midnight raced about. He was not greatly interested in the cabin, though he had never seen or smelled anything like it before. He wanted to play, so he galloped away across the meadow, dry clods flying from his pounding hoofs.

Lady Ebony settled down to wait. She expected Sam with his lumps of sugar and she expected Tex and the boys from the ranch. These thoughts were rather vague, but they were strong enough to keep her in the meadow and to overcome her uneasiness as her nose warned her of coming storms. A week of Indian summer passed with warm hazy days and snapping cold nights. Both Lady Ebony and Midnight had grown thick, warm coats and the nights did not bother them. Frost carpeted the meadow with white jewels every night, and every day the sun melted the frost. Sam did not come and Tex did not come galloping out of the timber at the head of his roundup crew. The crew had finished its work in the high country the week before Lady Ebony’s arrival, and had left the brown grass and the everlasting green spruce to the blizzards and the deep snows. The horses and the white-faced cattle were all accounted for.

One afternoon a change came in the weather. The air had been snapping cold for days with the sun’s rays softening it but little. It became softer and warmer. Gray clouds raced over the timbered slopes, rolling low, touching the tops of the highest spruce. The gray wall swept down over the spruce and over the meadow. Snow began falling, big, soft flakes that sailed down like loosened leaves. The snow settled through a deep silence which filled the woods and lay heavy on the meadow. The chickaree squirrels in the tall spruce worked frantically, cutting cones from the branches, dropping them to the ground with steady, thumping sounds. They chattered and scolded as they worked. The old yellowbelly left his perch and romped to his den under the castle rock. The calico chips and the chipmunks and the fat-bellied brownies retired for the long night which was to last until spring came. The mesa was deserted, leaving only Lady Ebony, Midnight, and the big flakes of snow.

The wind rose and came roaring down. The great spruces swayed and moaned as the wind rushed through their branches and tore at their needles. The big flakes were powdered to fine dust and eddied in and out among the brown grass stems. The aspen leaves danced and swirled as they floated from the white branches. In less than an hour the uplifted arms of the silver trees were naked. But where each leaf had loosened its hold a brown bud peeped down, wrapped up in a warm little muffler and hood. The round leaves whirled along the ground and piled deep on the lee side of big trunks and in deep hollows on the slope. Under the bed of leaves the columbine and the paint weed and the lupine felt safer and warmer.

Lady Ebony led Midnight to the lee of the cabin where they stood with heads down, backs to the sifting snow. All afternoon the white wall pressed close around them. Darkness came early, a black, solid darkness which blotted out every object, even the cabin wall close to their noses. In the morning the blizzard was still raging furiously. The snow was deep on the meadow, as deep as the knees of the black colt.

Lady Ebony fought her way out to the edge of the mesa and began pawing for grass. Midnight went with her and helped. They dug down and found a mat of rich, cured grass. With their tails to the lashing wind they fed. When they had eaten their fill they returned to the lee side of the cabin and Midnight had a scant but warm meal. Then he lay down. The snow melted around his body and froze into ice at the edges of the curves.

For three days the storm raged. When it cleared and the last of the gray clouds scurried away over the tops of the green spruce on the wings of the dying wind three feet of snow lay on the level mesa and four or five feet in the hollows and drifts. In places the wind had swept the dry snow away from the grass and feeding was easy for the horses. But snapping, biting cold followed the storm, making their breath plume out in wreaths of white fog and causing icicles to form on their nose hair and chins. Their faces were covered with white frost from their breathing.

Midnight showed keen interest in this new world. It was a white world, a silent world of snow and green spruce. The biting cold made him plunge through the deep drifts and snort eagerly. One other dweller of the high country, who could not sleep through the cold months, came to the meadow. An old timber-line buck had chosen to stay in the high mesa country defying the cold and the snow. The does and the fawns and the spike bucks had drifted downcountry before the storm. The two-points had gone with them and most of the four-points. The timber-line monarch stayed because he was wary and shunned the ranch-dotted valleys below the storm belt. He preferred the savage cold and the stalking killers to the rifles and dogs of the men who lived in the low country.

He dug down into the snow seeking herbs and twigs. He did not care for the dry, rich grass, and he watched the mare and her colt without interest, staring at them, then shaking his heavy antlers and returning to his feeding. The old fellow knew the dangers he faced, he had met them before and expected to meet them again.

The clear, cold weather held for a week. The days were sparkling and crisp, the nights blue and bitterly cold, with white stars reflecting their countless points of light upon the gleaming snow fields. In the aspen groves trees snapped and popped as the frost sought their hearts. Lady Ebony left the lee of the cabin and found a sheltered spot beside one of the big castle rocks at a point near the edge of the deep canyon. A narrow ledge trail led up to the shelter and an outthrust layer of rock furnished a roof so that the earth under the shelter was free from snow. A shoulder of the wall shut off the wind, making the retreat really a barn.

A crevice in the roof of the shelter harbored a nest of pack rats. Sticks, pine cones, bright rocks, and other things dear to the heart of a trade rat had been crammed into the crevice until they spilled out on the floor. The whole cave was tainted with rat smell, pungent and musty.

The black robes of the mare and her colt grew shaggy and thick, as the bitter cold deepened. Lady Ebony and Midnight were forced to seek grass at the upper end of the meadow below the cabin because the wind struck that part of the mesa, clearing the snow away. Every morning they plunged through deep drifts to reach the wind-swept portion of the meadow, returning again at night to their shelter.

The week of clear weather was broken late one afternoon. Clouds began to cluster around the high spires of the Crazy Kills. They crept into high craters and wound around the tall, granite cathedrals on top of the world like great cats stalking their prey. Above they were silvery white and gleamed like jeweled blankets, below they were dark gray and, in spots, black.

A feeble sun shone on the mesa, and two yellow sun-dogs blazoned forth on either side of it like sentinels. The air was still and the silence deep. Slowly the temperature rose and Midnight sniffed eagerly and plunged about in the snow. He was disturbed but did not know why. Lady Ebony jerked up her head and tested the air. She knew another storm was coming. Then the clouds rolled down over the spruce, blotting out the shining mountain peaks, the big soft flakes came and later the lashing wind. Another blizzard gripped the high mesa. With the wind came cutting cold that stabbed through even the thick coats of the horses. Lady Ebony headed across the meadow toward their shelter.

For many days the blizzard raged and roared and the snow fell. When the storm cleared, the snow was deeper than it had been in many winters. It piled in great, hundred-foot drifts along the comb ridges, in lips which thrust themselves out over the spruce below. Slides roared into the canyons as those lips broke and shot down the steep slopes. The white terrors mowed swaths through the spruce and tore great boulders from their beds, grinding them to dingy gray rivers of twisting, roaring debris which cascaded into the creek bottoms and slid up the far slopes. The thunder of the slides shook the mesa and the ridges, starting new rivers of snow.

When the white death roared, Midnight always crowded close to his mother’s side and stared up at the ridges trying to see the monster that could roar louder than any animal he had ever heard. Lady Ebony was disturbed but she nickered reassuringly to her son and did not lead a charge through the deep snow.

Digging for food was a job which required all the short day. The upper end of the meadow still offered the best feed ground, though the snow lay three feet deep on that part of it. The timber-line buck came down from a bed in the rocks and fed close to the horses. He ate much grass now because he could not scoop the snow away so easily as the horses did. And he browsed on willow growing along the stream, but such feeding meant fighting snow six feet deep. Sometimes he followed the horses and ate the weeds they uncovered and left untouched.

Lady Ebony and Midnight came to expect the timber-line buck to join them in their battle for food. The three fed close together in comradeship. Theirs was a common fight against a common enemy. The buck no longer charged at Midnight when the little horse walked up to him. And Lady Ebony no longer whinnied warningly when her son approached the antlered monarch.

Life was hard for the three on the mesa, but not as hard as it was for the killers who roamed the silent forests. The gray wolves and the cougars hunted daily, their sides gaunt. The snowy owls beat along the edges of the timber, their glassy eyes staring down savagely. But there was little food. The snow had not crusted and the gray wolves and the cougars could not overtake the hardy mule deer remaining in the mountains. They wallowed and floundered while the deer and the elk bounded up and clear of the clinging drifts. Night and day the killers hunted with savage intensity, their yellow eyes flaming with savage hunger. When one of a wolf pack was wounded or crippled, the pack turned on him and devoured him as they would any lesser prey.

A day came when the weather moderated, the sun shone, and the snow softened and settled. A warm wind blew from the valleys below. The wind melted the top snow to a depth of several inches. That night the cold returned, the trees popped, and the air was still and brittle. Frost crystals coated the willows along the stream and made brilliant jewelry of every branch and twig rising above the snow. The trees looked like rock candy. The slushy snow froze into ice and the world was coated with a hard armor. And now the gaunt killers could race swiftly over the surface while deer and elk broke through. The killers slaughtered savagely, gorging themselves on fresh meat until they could not run. The coyotes and the owls fed at the tables of the great ones after the hunters had passed on to fresh kills.