Charles West - Day of the Wolf

Billie Jean and Lorena exchanged perplexed glances. “Never mind,” Lorena said. “You never meant to give him any idea. He ain’t likely to find him, anyway.”

Ned spent the better part of the morning studying the different tracks that were in profusion around the stable and corral. Trying to think as Wolf might, he looked out over the prairie beyond the gathering of buildings that made up Three-Mile and picked out the way he would go if he was heading to the Black Hills. Following a path that led across a small stream, he urged Brownie forward. He stopped again before crossing over the stream and dismounted again when he noticed a hoofprint in the soft sandbank. Seeing at once that it was left by an unshod horse, he knelt down to examine it more closely, looking for anything unusual about it that would allow future identification. There was nothing out of the ordinary about the print, but still he felt that he might have hit upon some luck. There was nothing beyond his natural instincts that told him the print was left by the bay horse Wolf rode. On the other hand, it was from an Indian pony, only one pony, and it was a fresh track. He felt that put the odds in his favor and he decided to bet on it. If I’m wrong, hell, it won’t be the first time, he thought. He rose to his feet again and looked ahead across an expanse of prairie toward a pair of hills in the distance. Then he walked for a while, leading his horses, following the hoofprints until satisfied they were going to continue in the same direction, toward the twin hills. It just made sense, he thought, that the man would guide on the hills, so he spent no more time studying tracks and started out directly toward them.

While he rode, he speculated on the thinking of the man he hunted, and why he picked the Black Hills for his escape. He wondered then if Wolf had any idea of what was happening in the Black Hills: the fact that gold had been discovered there, and prospectors were already sneaking into the territory in spite of the treaty that prohibited it. Most likely, he decided, the poor bastard thinks he’ll be safe in a place whites can’t go .

More than fifty miles ahead of the deputy marshal, Wolf sat beside a shallow creek while he let his horse have some well-deserved rest. He had pushed the bay hard during the night, up through Rawhide Buttes, and across the rough prairie. The willing horse had not failed to respond to his master’s bidding, but Wolf was reluctant to push the animal farther. He had hoped to make it to the Cheyenne River that night, but he feared it was asking too much of the bay. There was deer sign all along the creek, and the temptation to stop there long enough to hunt was strong. Fresh meat would be welcome, so he climbed a short slope to study his back trail. As before, there was no sign of anyone trailing him. He didn’t really expect to see anyone, feeling fairly certain that an army patrol could not travel as fast as he, but it never paid to be careless. His intent was to outlast the soldiers, thinking they would more than likely start out after him with rations drawn for only so many days. And when they were used up, they’d call off the search and go home. He had done nothing wrong, so surely they would not follow him long. It would be a waste of the army’s time to continue looking for a man who had done no more than break a soldier’s arm. In fact, he told himself, they may not be after me at all . Lorena had said she would send them off in another direction, and he believed she would do as she promised, so he decided he could afford to take time to hunt.

He pulled the saddle off his horse and prepared to camp by the creek for the rest of the day. Once his horse was taken care of, he took his bow from the saddle sling and set out along the creek bank. A thick tangle of bushes intertwined with a stand of trees looked to be a good place for a herd of deer to settle down in the middle of the day, so he worked his way cautiously toward it. Sharp instincts, honed by the years he had spent as a boy and a young man living in the wilderness, did not fail him as he worked his way silently through the brush, pausing often to listen to the wind in the leaves overhead. They were there. He didn’t know how he knew it, but he was as aware of their presence as they were of his. When it became clear to his prey that they were in danger, they bolted. He reacted immediately, loosing an arrow that struck one of the five does as they jumped across the creek. There would be fresh meat for his supper, and there had been no gunshot to alert anyone who might be within hearing distance. The thought brought to mind the loss of his treasured Henry rifle. He had had no occasion to fire the Sharps carbine he now carried. He supposed it was an excellent weapon. From what he had heard, it was a more accurate weapon at longer range than his Henry, but it just didn’t give him the same sense of confidence. Cartridges to fit it might be more difficult to find—he wasn’t sure. It made little difference, he supposed, for cartridges of any caliber would be hard to find where he planned to go.

The rest of the day was spent skinning, butchering, and preparing the meat. The doe was young and tender and he filled his belly with the fresh-roasted meat, a welcome relief from the salt pork the prostitutes had served while he was with them. He could not take the time to cure the hide, so he rolled it up to ride behind his saddle until he established a more permanent camp in the mountains ahead. Already, he was beginning to feel the release of pressure that had been brought about by his recent exposure to what people referred to as the civilized world. The soldiers, the saloons, the world of prostitutes, was a life of which he had very limited knowledge, and he was not favorably impressed by what he had seen. Cautioning himself, however, that he could not assume he was free of the army’s pursuit, he periodically climbed up the slope to scan the horizon around him to make certain. The day passed with no sign of an army patrol.

The next morning, his horse rested, he left his camp on the creek and struck out for the Cheyenne River and its confluence with the Lightning. Reaching the fork where the two rivers joined a short time after noon, he stopped to rest his horse before pushing on to follow the river to its confluence with the Beaver. He made one final camp on the Beaver before varying his line of travel slightly east to head into the heart of the Black Hills. As he rode deeper into the foothills, he was aware of his understanding of the Indian’s reverence for the mysterious region they called Paha Sapa, which was Lakota for “Hills That Are Black.” Wolf could understand the reason for the name, for from a distance the thick stands of ponderosa pines appeared to be black. The Sioux especially considered Paha Sapa the very center of the world. It was a place of mystique and magic, where young men would go to seek visions that would provide their pathway of life. To Wolf, it was a place where he could hide from those who would imprison him. Even though it was a place the Sioux held sacred, he was confident that he could fade into its high peaks and lush valleys with flowing streams of clear, cold water, much as he had done as a boy in the Wind River Mountains.

“Looks like our boy stopped here awhile,” Ned Bull announced to his horse. He dismounted and let Brownie drink from the creek while he poked around the campsite. “He went huntin’,” he continued musing aloud, “got him a deer, looks like.” The tracking had not been easy up to that point, although it did not appear that Wolf was taking great pains to try to hide his trail. But Ned was still confident that the tracks he had followed to this creek bank were those of the single Indian pony that had left Fort Laramie. I’m going to feel like a damn fool if they ain’t Wolf’s tracks, he thought.