Larry McMurtry - Lonesome Dove

Yet he didn't know exactly what he could do. They had no medicine, it was raining fits, the Indians had them surrounded, and they were a hundred miles or more from the Hat Creek outfit.

"It's a soggy situation, I admit," Augustus said, as if reading Pea Eye's thoughts. "But it ain't fatal yet. I could hold out here for a few days. Call could make it back to this creek in one ride on that feisty mare of his. Best thing for you to do would be just to travel at night. If you walk around in the daytime, some of these red boys might spot you and you'd have about the chance of a rabbit. I guess you could make it to the Yellowstone in three nights, though, and they ought to be there by then."

Pea Eye dreaded the prospect. He hated night travel, and it would be worse afoot. He began to hope that maybe the rain had discouraged the Indians, but that hope only lasted an hour. Three times during the day the Indians fired on them. They shot from downriver, and Gus opened up on them at once. They were so respectful of his gun that their bullets only splattered uselessly in the mud, or else hit the water and ricocheted off with a whine. Gus looked so weak and shaky that Pea Eye wondered if he could still shoot accurately, but the question was answered later in the day when an Indian tried to shoot them from the opposite bank, using a little rain squall as cover. He got off his shot, which hit one of the saddles; then Gus shot him as he turned to crawl away. The shot caused the Indian to straighten up, and Gus shot him again. The second bullet seemed to suck the Indian backward-he toppled off the bank and rolled into the water. He was not dead; he tried to swim, so Gus shot him again. A minute or two later he floated past them face down.

"I expect he would have drowned," Pea Eye said, thinking it wasteful of Gus to shoot the man three times.

"He might have, or he might have lived to cut off your nuts," Augustus said.

There were no more attacks that day, but there was no doubt that the Indians were still there. Before sundown they raised their war cries again. This time Augustus didn't answer.

The day had never been bright, but it seemed to linger. There was a long, rainy dusk, so long that it made Pea Eye feel gloomy. It was cramped in the cave. He longed to stretch his legs, and then made the foolish mistake of saying so to Gus.

"Wait till it's full dark," Augustus said. "Then you can stretch 'em."

"What if I get lost?" Pea Eye said. "I ain't never been in this country."

"Go south," Augustus said. "That's all you have to remember. If you mess up and go north, a polar bear will eat you."

"Yes, and a grizzly bear might if I go south," Pea Eye said with some bitterness. "Either way I'd be dead."

He regretted that Gus had mentioned bears. Bears had been preying on his mind since the Texas bull had had his great fight. It struck him that things were tough up here in the north. It had taken Gus three shots to kill a small Indian. How many shots would it take to kill a grizzly bear?

"Well, you ought to start, Pea," Augustus said finally. It had been dark for over an hour, and the Indians were silent.

"That dern water looks cold," Pea Eye said. "I was never one for cold baths."

"Well, I'm sorry we didn't bring a bathtub and a cookstove," Augustus said. "If we had we could heat some water for you, but as it is you'll just have to rough it. The rain's stopped. The creek could start going down any time, and the more water in it the better for you. Get out in the middle and pretend you're a muskrat."

Pea Eye was half a mind not to go. He had never disobeyed an order in his life, but this time he was sorely tempted, and it was not just the cold swim or the chancy trek that made him hesitate. It was leaving Gus. Gus was close to being out of his head. If he went on out of his head the Indians would have a good chance to get him. He sat for a while, trying to think of some argument that would make Gus let him stay with him.

"Maybe we could both swim out," he said. "I know you're crippled, but you could lean on me once we started walking."

"Pea, go," Augustus said. "I ain't getting well, I'm getting sicker. If you want to help, go get Captain Call. Have him lope up here with an extra horse and tote me over to Miles City."

Pea Eye got ready with a heavy heart. It all seemed wrong, and none of it would have happened if they'd just stayed in Texas.

"Just take your rifle," Augustus said. "A pistol won't do you no good if you have to stop one of them bears. Besides, I'll need both pistols-any fighting that happens here will be close-range work."

"I can't swim and hold a dern rifle, Gus," Pea Eye said.

"Stick it through your belt and down your pants leg," Augustus said. "You can float downstream, you won't actually have to swim much."

Pea Eye took off his boots and his shirt and made a bundle of them. Then he did as Gus ordered and stuck his rifle through his belt. He stuffed some jerky in one boot for provisions. All he needed to do was leave, but it was hard.

"Now go on, Pea," Augustus said. "Go get the Captain, and don't worry about me. Don't let the Indians catch you, whatever you do."

Gus reached out a hand and Pea Eye realized he was offering a handshake. Pea Eye shook his hand, feeling terribly sad.

"Gus, I never thought I'd be leaving you," he said.

"Well, you are, though," Augustus said. "Trod carefully."

It was then that the conviction struck Pea Eye that he would never see Gus alive again. Mainly what they were into was just another Indian fight, and all of those had inconveniences. But Gus had never sustained a wound before that Pea could remember. The arrows and bullets that had missed him so many times had finally found him.

After the handshake, Gus treated him as if he were already gone. He didn't offer any messages or say another word. Pea Eye wanted to say something else, but couldn't think what. Feeling very disconsolate, he waded into the cold water. It was far colder than he had supposed. His legs at once felt numb. He looked back once and could dimly see the cave, but not Gus.

As soon as he reached swimming depth, he forgot Gus and everything else, due to a fear of drownding. The icy water pushed him under at once. Floating wasn't as easy as Gus had made it seem. The rifle was a big problem. Stuck in his pants leg, it seemed to weigh like lead. Also, he had no experience in such fast water. Several times he got swept over to the side of the creek and almost got tangled in the underbrush that the rushing water covered.

Worse than that, he almost immediately lost the little bundle of boots and pants, shirt, all his provisions and part of his ammunition. He had reached down with one hand to try and move the rifle a little higher up on his leg, and the water sucked the bundle away and swept it far ahead of him. Pea Eye began to realize he was going to drown unless he did better than he was doing. The water pushed him under several times. He wanted badly to climb up the bank but was by no means sure he was past the Indians. Gus said to go down at least a mile, and he wasn't sure he had gone that far. The water had a suck to it that he had constantly to fight against; to his horror he felt it sucking his pants off. He had been so disconsolate when he walked into the river that he had not buckled his belt tightly. He had nothing much in the way of hips, and the water sucked his pants down past them. The rifle sight was gouging him in the leg. He grabbed the rifle, but then went under. The dragging pants, with the rifle in one leg, were drownding him. He began to try frantically to get them off, so as to have the free use of his legs. He wanted to cuss Gus for having Suggested sticking the rifle in his pants leg. He could never get it out in time to shoot an Indian, if one appeared, and it was causing him terrible aggravation. He fought to the surface again, went under, and when he came up wanted to yell for help, and then remembered there Would be no one around to hear him but Indians. Then his leg was almost jerked off-he had been swept close to the bank and the dragging gun had caught in some underbrush. The bank was only a few feet away and he tried to claw over to it, but that didn't work. While he was struggling, the pants came off and he was swept down the river backwards. One minute he could see the south bank of the river, and the next minute all he could see was water. Twice he opened his mouth to suck in air and sucked in water instead, some of which came back out his nose. His legs and feet were so numb from the cold water that he couldn't feel them.