Craig Johnson - Hell Is Empty

His strides were longer than mine and, even with him carrying the pack, I was having trouble keeping up. My mind was wandering, but I kept being brought back to the trail by his voice.

“When they returned, my grandfather said she told them that she would be going to the Beyond-Country, that two of her sons, my grandfather’s two brothers who had died in the wars, had come to take her there.”

Virgil stopped at the top of the ridge, and I ran into him, knocking my hat over my face. When I pulled it away, he had turned and was looking down at the half-filled tracks that led west around Mistymoon, across the meadow and into the freezing fog.

“They wrapped my great-grandmother in a buffalo robe, and she went away in her sleep. I tell you these things even though we Crows are forbidden to speak of the dead-you know this?”

I was breathing hard, trying to catch what was left of my breath. “I’ve heard it said.”

He nodded and knelt down to give closer inspection to the tracks, even going so far as to blow in them to clear away the drifting snow, his breath like a bellows. “The experiences you had before, the one on the mountain that you have chosen not to share with me-have you told anyone else about them?”

I knelt down with him, curling my arms around my knees. “No, not really. I discussed it briefly with Henry, but that’s all.”

His eyes rose after the grizzly’s as he looked north and west into the strands of mist. “The ones you call the Old Cheyenne.”

I shivered and not just because of the cold. “Yep.”

“They are not only Cheyenne.”

I looked through the binoculars, tracing the edge of the cornice with the power of the Zeiss lenses; the tracks continued across a sloping meadow and around the overhang to our left. “Where does he think he’s going?”

His shoulders rose. “Up.”

The satellite phone had no clock feature that I could find, and I was afraid to see what the water might’ve done to my pocket watch, so I glanced west to try to figure out the time; there was a vague glow within the clouds. “Late in the afternoon-they’re going to have to settle down for the night somewhere.”

“Yes.” He stood and stared down at me. “What did the Cheyenne say?”

I glanced up at him. “What?”

“The Cheyenne, Henry, what did he say about the Old Ones?”

I tried to realign my thoughts, but my mind remained off topic. “The Cheyenne, Henry, said…” I forced myself to concentrate. “He said that he wasn’t singing.”

“Singing? ”

I stood and was a little uneasy, feeling confused and angry. “When I carried Henry and this kid off the mountain, I was dehydrated, hypothermic, concussed…”

“Like now?”

I bit my lip but could hardly feel it, remembered the balaclava and pulled it up over my nose. “Worse; a lot worse.”

He laughed. “Well, the evening is young.”

I was fully annoyed now. “I thought I heard singing, and when I finally… when I got him back to the trailhead and the emergency people, the EMTs… I asked him if he thought-if singing with the kinds of injuries that he’d sustained was a good idea.”

The giant grunted and repositioned the base of his lance. “What did he say?”

I forced the next part out with my breath. “He said what singing?”

“Hmm.”

I stepped around him and looked up at his chin. “Hey, Virgil?”

It took a while, but he finally looked down at me and it seemed like I’d gotten the attention of Mount Rushmore. “Yes?”

“To be honest, I don’t care about any of that stuff right now. I’ve got two innocent people who are being led off to God-only-knows-where by a schizophrenic sociopath and no backup besides a seven-foot Indian who wants to stand here and discuss paranormal phenomena.” I breathed deeply after my little tirade, watching the clouds of vapor fly from my face and thinking about what exactly I was going to do if Virgil, my only volunteer, dropped my pack in front of me and went back to the comforts of his cozy cave.

He didn’t say anything for a moment but then smiled. “Just curious.” The indentation in his forehead deepened as he turned a little toward me. “Would you be upset if we continued the conversation while we walked?”

Now I was feeling stupid, and my head was starting to pound again. “Of course not; I just want to focus on what’s important.”

He smiled some more, then turned and continued over the top of the tracks on a course of north by northwest, his words tossed over his shoulder. “Me too.”

I was feeling bad about my little outburst. “I’m sorry, Virgil.”

The snout of the bear cloak swung around, but I still couldn’t see his face. “It’s all right; I suppose I have become talkative in my isolation.”

“Self-imposed isolation. You know there are no charges against you. You’re a free man and can go wherever you’d like.”

I suppose it was the sheer bulk of the man and the deepness of his voice, but even though he was a good two paces ahead on the trail, his voice sounded as close as if he were talking into my ear, the sore one. “Where would I go, back to the VA hospital?”

I wanted to be sure that Virgil understood that there were no official reasons prohibiting his return to civilization. “Back to the Rez? I don’t know… You’ve got a son who lives over in Hot Springs.”

“He wouldn’t want me there, and I have none of my people left on the reservation.”

“Last of your kind?”

“Yes, in a way. Something like you.”

I shook my head. “I’ve got a daughter in Philadelphia.”

“A daughter, yes. When she has her daughter, she will not carry your name.”

I laughed at the ridiculousness of our conversation as we were slogging our way toward the crown of the Bighorn Mountains.

“She is to be married this summer and when she has the daughter she now carries, that daughter, your granddaughter, will carry another man’s name.”

I stopped, but he kept walking.

His voice drifted back as the fog slithered over the meadow and surrounded us. “C’mon, Lawman, we don’t have time for all this talk-we have innocent people to save, remember?”

“Virgil, have you been talking to Henry? I mean, did he…”

“I have not spoken with the Cheyenne-they are a handsome people, but they are difficult.” We reached the cornice, and he floated into the mist, only his voice remaining. “I don’t know how I know these things; perhaps they’re told to me by the Old Ones, but I know in my heart of hearts that your daughter will bear a daughter.”

He reappeared next to a rock shelf and placed the pack on the ground between us. “Do you want a candy bar?” He unsnapped the top and sorted through a few items, finally bringing out two of the aged Mallo Cups. “I want a candy bar, and these are my favorites.”

He handed me one, took one for himself, closed up the pack, and threw it back on one shoulder as if the burden were a windbreaker. “I had a grandson once and a daughter. I had a beautiful wife. Family is important, don’t you think? I mean, they can make you crazy, but they’re very important.”

He knew he had a grandson? How did he know about Owen? Was it something that his son had told him while he was in my jail? I brushed a hand up to the pocket of my coat and could feel the bone there.

He was watching me, and I knew he had noticed my hand, but then he turned and started off. “C’mon.” He chortled. “Innocent people.”

I climbed over the top of the cornice and followed the hulking mass of him swaying with the effort of battling the headwind. “You know that story I told you about my great-grandmother, the one about her meeting her two sons, the brothers of my grandfather?” He mumbled, and I assumed he was eating his Mallo Cup. “I saw her the other day.”