Nevada Barr - Bittersweet

He leaned down from the saddle to kiss his wife. “Tell Coby I’ve gone out early to lose Moss Face. He can meet up with me at the bluff just south of Sand Pass.”

“I’ll send your lunch with him. It slipped my mind till just now.” Sarah folded her shawl more closely around her, and held the neck of her nightgown shut. A lantern burned on the ground at her feet; in its uneven light, her breath steamed.

“You’d better get inside.”

She nodded and picked up the lantern. “What shall I tell Matthew? First thing he’ll look for is that dog.” She laid her hand on the warm bundle by her husband’s knee. Moss Face stirred inside, whimpering, and Karl’s horse shied and sidestepped.

“Easy.” Karl gentled the old gelding with a touch. “Tell him the truth, Sarah.” A ribbon of light appeared around the porch door as it was opened a crack. “It looks like he’s up. Do you want me to tell him?”

She glanced over her shoulder. “No. You go. Quick, before he comes out. You’ll be at Sand Pass-south side-around noon?”

“That’s right-don’t forget my lunch.” He touched her hair lightly and turned the horse’s head to the southwest. Behind him the night sky was just beginning to lighten, stars paling into the day. The air was cold and still in the windless calm before sunrise. Karl turned his collar up around his ears and, looping the reins around the saddlehorn, shoved his hands in his coat pockets.

Where the desert began its ascent to Sand Pass, the road started winding, snaking up through the sage to a notch in the rounded mountains west of the stage stop. Over the pass, Karl turned his horse from the road and struck out through the sage, the eight-thousand-foot peak of Tohakum Mountain on his left and the ragged brown Pah Rah Range on his right. Moss Face lay quiet in his burlap prison. Occasionally he would shift or whine, and Karl would reassure him with soft words.

The sun was well above the horizon when Karl approached the pyramids at the north end of the lake. There was still no wind, but he rode with his coat buttoned high. The lake glittered a hard deep blue, the dark cobalt blue of the sea. He swung free of the saddle and threw the reins over the horse’s head. It began cropping the sparse dry weeds with a tearing sound. Karl lifted the gunnysack from the saddlehorn and crouched to untie the mouth of the bag. Both his knees cracked. “I’m getting to be quite an old lady,” he said, “creaking like her rocker. Come on, Moss Face, you’re home.”

On wobbly legs, the coyote ventured halfway out, the sack draped over him like a cassock, and looked around. He closed his eyes and pointed his nose at the sky, his nostrils quivering as he took in his new surroundings.

“There’s water here, and even such a hearth-dog as you should be able to find enough to eat.” Karl stroked the rough fur, then untied the neckerchief and put it in his coat pocket. “Come all the way out. I want my sack back.” He upended the bag, poured the rest of Moss Face out, and scratched him behind the ears. “Good-bye, old fella, you’ll be fine.” He looped the sack over the saddlehorn, gathered up the reins, and, digging his heels into the horse, started off at a stiff trot.

Moss Face sat where Karl had dumped him, looking around with the confused air of a sleepwalker awakened in a strange bed. As Karl rode past the first hillock, Moss Face shook himself vigorously and started out after him.

Karl turned for a last look and saw him. “Go on!” he yelled. “Git!” Moss Face stopped and sat down, but as soon as Karl rode on, he trotted along behind the same as before. Karl dismounted and picked up a handful of rocks. “Go on!” he shouted. Moss Face sat down to wait him out. Karl threw a rock at him. It landed short and the coyote nosed it curiously. “Scat.” Karl threw another, closer this time. Moss Face tried to catch it in his mouth. The third rock struck him in the shoulder and he stopped cold to stare at Karl. “Go on! I mean it.” Karl threw another rock, striking Moss Face in the side.

The coyote retreated a few feet, then turned back. The next stone struck him hard in the face, and Moss Face turned and ran. Karl threw rocks as long as the dog was in sight.

“Damn,” he said when the dog ran out of view, and let the rest of the rocks fall from his fist. “Karl Saunders just lost a good dog.”

The men got in late, after sundown; both were tired and cold to the bone. Coby’s face was chapped raw from the wind. Sarah turned down their offers to help with dinner, and the four of them dined simply on bread and beans. The milk was still warm from the cow and there wasn’t much of it. Karl and Coby cut theirs with coffee so Matthew could have the rest. He asked them if they’d seen his dog. He wasn’t really worried, he said, Moss Face had gone off before for a day, and once he was gone overnight.

Karl shot Sarah a hard look and she avoided his eye. “Sarah, tell-” he started.

She shushed him, and the conversation was strained for the rest of dinner. Coby excused himself early and retreated to the tackroom.

By the time Sarah finished up her chores and came to bed, Karl was a formless lump under the bedclothes. The sheets were cold and Karl’s back was warm, but she didn’t snuggle close. She was afraid he was still mad at her. For a few minutes Sarah tossed and turned, hoping to wake him. “I’m being childish,” she thought, and let herself drift off to sleep.

The frantic sound of chickens clucking and beating their wings woke them both several hours after midnight. Without lighting the lamp Karl pulled trousers and a wool shirt over his long night shirt and yanked on his workboots. Sarah sat up in bed. “What is it?” The violent cackling subsided, then burst forth in a fresh wave.

“Sounds like something is after the chickens.”

“Bobcat?”

“Maybe.”

She struggled out of the tangle of bedclothes, pulled on her shoes, and slipped Imogene’s hunting coat over her nightgown. Karl led the way through the darkened house, stopping to take the Henry Repeater from its place in the corner behind the bar. Sarah took the lantern from its hook by the door and together they crossed the yard.

The night was cold and still, with no moon. Luminous, the Milky Way streaked across the southern sky, and overhead the Big Dipper poured out its mysteries. Starlight picked out the Fox Range and the ghostly silver of the alkali flats. There was no noise except the shushing sound of something softly scraping the earth. Sarah held the lantern high. Half a dozen maimed and dying chickens littered the henyard. Feathers and drops of blood, black in the wavering light, were scattered everywhere. Two of the hens flipped pathetically on the frozen ground.

Suddenly a brown shape streaked from under the coop and squirmed through a loose place dug under the wire. Karl pulled the Henry to his shoulder, fired, and the coyote dropped. Sarah ran over and set the lantern by the dead animal. “It’s Moss Face.” She reached out to stroke the coarse fur, but drew back without touching him. “He’s dead.”

“I thought it might be him, it was too bold for a wild coyote. You see where he wormed his way under the fence?”

“Karl?” The call came from across the spring.

“Go back to bed, Coby. Coyote in the chicken coop. We got him.”

The chickens were quiet but for the two in the yard that were still thrashing. “He couldn’t have eaten six chickens,” Sarah said. “He must have killed them just for the fun of it.” She looked down at the inert form. “Poor little fellow, he did good for so long.” Imogene’s coat fell forward, and Sarah held it back so it wouldn’t touch the dead coyote. Blood trickled from the ragged neck fur and dripped onto the ground, bright glossy drops that rested like bugle beads on the frost. “We’ve got to bury him,” she said firmly.