the Proving Trail (1979) Read online

  Pausing, I peered into the storm, turning my hea d slowly, trying to find something, anything. And ther e was only the snow, the staggered ranks of the spruce , and the howling wind that lashed the trees like a gigantic whip. We pushed on and on.

  Again I paused, trying to judge the distance we ha d come since finding the trail if this was it. A quarte r of a mile? A half mile? More . . . probably a little more.

  My brain seemed dull. It worked slowly, but I fough t desperately to remember. Had there been a place in th e part of the trail I knew, any place that offered shelter?

  A riding man in wild country naturally looks for suc h things, but I could remember nothing.

  We started on. I walked and walked. Then suddenl y I slipped. My feet shot from under me, and I fel l heavily. For a moment I lay there, ready to quit. Th e roan nudged me with his nose, urging me to get up. I p ut my hands down to push myself up.

  Ice. My hands were on ice. That was why I ha d slipped . . . ice under the snow. I struggled erect an d stood there, my shoulders humped against the wind. Ic e meant water. This must be the stream the old India n had mentioned. The stream that flowed from a cave.

  A cave?

  I turned left up the mountain and walked gingerl y on the ice, holding to the bed of the small stream. We walked on, the roan following meekly enough. Th e wind seemed to ease . . . or was that my imagination?

  We plodded on, one step at a time. The wind was easing off . . . or else we were in the lee of a cliff .. . s omething.

  No longer was I a thinking, reasoning being. Th e cold was numbing my brain as well as my feet an d legs. Enough of intelligence left to tell me that eithe r we found shelter quickly or we would both die.

  I slipped, almost fell. This time I gathered mysel f together more slowly. I took a step on. The ice wa s tilting ahead of me . . . or was tilted. It was a slope, a steep place in the drop of the stream. Working mysel f to the right, I tried to find an opening in the thick brus h along the bank. It was a wall, stiff, frozen branches , closely intertwined. We climbed, and this time th e roan slipped and fell.

  It was all both of us could do to get him back on hi s feet. I stood gasping with effort, pain stabbing m y side. Something was black before me. There seemed a break in the wall of brush. I went into the narrow opening, pulling the home after me. Suddenly we were ou t of the wind. I put my gloved hand to my face. It wa s stiff and cold.

  There was a path or opening. I followed along, an d suddenly the cave was there, a black opening. I wen t in, leading the roan.

  It was dark and still. I peered around, seeing nothing. My hands were numb, feeling like thick clubs. I b eat them against each other, against my legs, the n tucked them into my armpits. Numb with cold, I bega n to move, stiffly, slowly, sweeping the snow from th e saddle, from the roan's back.

  I must move and keep moving. My eyes slowly wer e adjusting to the darkness, and I could see I was in a room no more than twenty feet in diameter, off whic h seemed to run at least two dark passages. There wa s scattered wood on the floor, left from campfires of th e past. Overhead there was an opening, a sort of crac k through which smoke could find a way out.

  When I stamped my feet, it was like they were mad e of wood, yet stamp them I did. Working very slowly , I got a few sticks together, but my hands were to o clumsy to hold a match. What I needed was simply t o keep moving, and here, out of the chilling wind, I migh t slowly recover the warmth my body needed.

  Fumbling with the cinch, I succeeded in loosenin g it and swinging the saddle off the roan. With a quic k smash of the saddle blanket against the rock wall, I c leared it of most of the accumulated snow and ice, an d began to wipe the roan, rubbing warmth back into it , and at the same time into myself.

  It was a long time, for my movements were clums y from the cold, but slowly my own blood began to flo w more freely. Kneeling down, I gathered some sliver s together, a few pine cones and some sticks from a pac k rat's nest. With infinite care I put together some drie d leaves and part of the stuff of the nest itself. Then I s truck a match. It had long been a matter of boyis h pride that I could start a fire with but one match. Fortunately, it worked for me now.

  The flame caught, blazed up, licked hungrily at th e long dry sticks. I added fuel, extending my still-col d hands to the warmth.

  As the light grew, I peered around to see what kin d of place I had come to. There was a considerable pil e of fuel stacked against the walls, and an old tin bucket , several Indian pots, a gourd dipper, and some odds an d ends of rope harness. Somebody, Indians no doubt, ha d been using this cave.

  At the door I scooped up a bucket of snow and put i t near the fire to melt and warm up. When the water wa s warm, I took it to the roan, who drank long and gratefully. With my coffeepot, which I had in my gear, I m ade coffee.

  While the water was coming to a boil, I wiped m y Winchester dry, and my pistols also.

  Thoughtfully I looked at the twin six-shooters. The y were expensive, but hard up as he had often been, p a had never parted with them. For the first time I foun d myself curious about that. .

  Why? Why would pa, the least violent of men, hav e carried two guns? He never wore them both in public , and I had never seen him draw a gun except to clean it.

  It dawned on me then that I actually knew very littl e about my father. Little? Did I actually know anything?

  In the dark and lonely cave, with the storm howlin g outside and the bitter cold, I crouched by my fire wit h its light flickering on the walls and thought of my father, that strange and lonely man.

  For I knew now that he had been lonely. Only no w did little things come back to be remembered th e clumsy ways he had tried to show affection, and the los t man he had become when ma died.

  We never talked of her. Whenever I mentioned her , he got up, left the room, or turned from me. I kno w now it was because he liked to think she was not dead , that she was just out somewhere and would soon b e back.

  I remembered him as he was, in his threadbare froc k coat with its worn velvet collar. Even when shabby, h e had something of elegance about him. Yet why did I k now so little? Was there some reason for being secretive? Or was he just not given to talk of his family? I f there was a family.

  Where he was born, why he had come west, or wher e be met ma, I never knew, nor had I given thought to i t until now.

  Once, sitting in our room at the hotel, he had rea d something in the paper that irritated him. He slamme d it down and with a sudden anger that was so unlike hi m he said, "Son, get an education! Whatever you do, ge t an education!"

  It was cold. I went to the door of the cave, int o which the wind whipped from time to time, and peere d out. I could see nothing. That we were back from th e faint trail we had followed, I knew, but how far back?

  And when the storm ended, would we be visible?

  Again I checked the guns.

  From the pile of wood I took a fair-sized log an d added it to the fire. It was almost warm in the cav e now. At least we would not freeze.

  What would happen back there? Would they try t o get out? Or would they be trapped in the old cabin?

  There was a little food left, how much I did not know , but a little. There was not enough to last one man eve n a week, let alone several men, and some of them woul d die.

  Between the cave wall and the fire, I made my be d and lay down upon it, my guns beside me. Hand s clasped behind my head, I returned again to th e thoughts of my father. I hadn't spent much time wit h him, not as much as I could have. There'd been a couple of times when he seemed to want to talk, but I w as in no mood for listening. I'd been rude at times , and it shamed me to recall it. He had wanted to tel l me something, I think, but I'd been only a youngste r and full of myself and not anxious to hear a lot of tal k about the past or his boyhood. Because of that I'd missed learning what he might have told me.

  Dozing on the bed, I suddenly recalled ma's voic e saying, "Why don't you go back? Or is there some reason why you cannot?"


  If he made a reply to that, I did not hear it. Onl y her words, "I am not thinking of us, only of you."

  "It is too late," he said then. "It would not be th e same." And then, after a mintue or two, "I dare not . . .

  I must not start that all over again. It is better that the y never know."

  I was very young then, and the words meant nothing. Just grown-up talk. But why did I not forget th e words? Why did I remember them now?

  Pa was gone now. He was dead.

  Yet he had not killed himself. For one thing I kne w about pa-he wasn't a quitter. Until the end, fail as h e might, he would be in there trying.

  That started me thinking about his gambling. Whe n ma was alive, he had never gambled. Come to thin k of it, he had not gambled until just the last two or thre e years.

  One night I'd seen him throw down a deck of card s in disgust. "I'd just as soon never see a card again!" h e said suddenly.

  "Why don't you quit playing if you don't like it?" I a sked him.

  He stood there for a minute looking at nothing an d then he said, "It's the only way. It's the only chanc e now. Just one good winning! That's all I ask!"

  At the time I did not believe him. Now I began t o wonder. Little bits and pieces of things began to com e back to me as I lay there in the half-warmth of th e cave.

  Ma was gone. Pa never seemed to want anything. I m ean he was not much for spending money, even whe n we had it. All of a sudden the answer was there. He wanted it for me.

  I sat up on my bed and put a stick into the fire, an d then another. Of course! Why else did he want it? I r emembered a couple of times when he looked at m e wearing that old blanket-poncho of mine, and my boot s with the heels almost wore off, and my beat-up old hat.

  "Damn it," he said once, "I wish-"

  He never finished what he was going to say. He jus t taken his hat and left, and that night he lost the thirty--o dd dollars we had between us.

  Next morning I made six dollars breaking horses a t fifty cents a head. I got tossed a couple of times, but I r ode them. When you don't eat unless you ride, yo u ride. It's simple as that.

  One time when I was sick, he stayed up night afte r night caring for me. I was eleven then, or twelve. I jus t taken it for granted, and never really thought of hi s health. Only time I thought much of that was when I c ome in the room one time and pa was washing. I t was the first time in all the years I saw him with hi s shirt off, and I saw those two bullet wounds low dow n on his left side.

  I made some comment, but he brushed it off an d changed the subject. I kept after him, so he finally said , "I got shot one time. It doesn't matter."

  Lying there, I tried to piece it all together but I c ame up with nothing, and it began to irk me. Wh o was pa, anyway? Why couldn't he go back? And if h e could have, where would he have gone to?

  By that time I'd warmed up some, and I went to th e cave opening and stepped outside into the shelter of a corner of the cliff. The snow was swirling out there , falling fast and blowing just as much. If they were i n trouble back at the cabin, I was in trouble out here.

  Any time you get caught ten thousand feet up in a heavy snow, you're in trouble, and I was. Outsid e there was a deadfall, a tree that had toppled over clos e to the cave, and I tried to drag it inside, but it wa s frozen to the ground. I broke off a big branch, though , and it cracked like a pistol shot.

  I got that branch inside, then some slabs of bar k and other fuel lyin' about. It would help a little, whe n the ice melted off it.

  It was a long, long night. Every few minutes I'd have to wake up and add fuel to the fire, and on a cold, windy night a fire can eat up a lot of wood. Fortunately, there was a good bit stored inside.

  Come dawn I awakened stiff with cold and my fir e down to gray ashes. After a bit I got it going again an d built it up good and warm.

  I went to the cave mouth to size up the situation.

  Everything was white and still. The wind had die d down, but it was cold, real cold. It must've been thirt y below or better, and it didn't look like it was goin g to get better fast. Furthermore, if they came looking , they would find me. I had to have the fire to keep fro m freezing, and they'd smell the smoke if they got anywhere close.

  For a long time I stood shivering, studying the layou t before me. There was an Indian village down off th e mountain somewhere, and the trail should take m e there, but an Indian trail in the mountains can take a body into some almighty scary places, and somewher e there might be a lot of ice. Yet when I thought of wha t food I had, the fuel that was left, I decided I had t o chance it.

  The snow crunched underfoot when I went back inside. I added a couple of sticks to the fire and then I s addled up. The roan didn't offer any arguments, so I g uess he didn't take to that dark old cave no more tha n I did. About an hour after daybreak we rode out of th e cave and taken the trail to wherever we were going.

  We walked a spell, then trotted to warm up a mite , and then I got off and walked to keep warm. I ha d pa's watch and I figured to keep going at least fou r hours, and then see where we were. Meanwhile, I'd keep an eye out for another camp, as I had no ide a how long the roan could take it . . . or me.

  We dipped down into the spruce, ragged, windblow n trees that grew shaggier and shaggier. The snow wa s knee-deep, and in some of the canyons off the trail i t looked to be twenty, maybe thirty feet deep. But th e trail led down, circling among the trees, rounding boulders dropped off the ridge.

  When I'd been riding or walking for four hours, w e just weren't anywhere. I saw no tracks of man or beast , and my feet were like clumps of ice again.

  Once again the trail led upward, and I found mysel f riding across a great tilted slab of rock covered wit h snow. From where I came upon it to as far as I coul d see in the low clouds that shrouded the peaks, ther e was at least three miles of unbroken expanse. Nowher e was there a track of man or animal.

  A lonely wind prowled above the snow with eerie , threatening whispers. In the vast silence even the roa n seemed uneasy, and I was glad when I glimpsed a wa y off into the forested valley below, yet I held back, loo k ing doubtfully at the steep slide that would take u s down the first fifty feet or so. But the roan tugged a t the bit, so I let him have his head and he went right int o the notch and down the slide without hesitation.

  Now we were in a thick, dark stand of spruce, a place of absolute silence. We crunched along, but here , too, I saw no tracks. Animals were simply not stirring , and of course the bear and the marmot were bot h hibernating, although there was no telling about a bear.

  He might wake up, be hungry, and go on the prow l even in the deepest winter.

  At nightfall I found a corner of a cliff that gave u s a break from the wind. I found a slab of rock that I c ould tilt up to serve as a reflector for my fire, an d I got the roan in close to the wall, then built a fire.

  There was wood aplenty as there is apt to be in hig h mountain country where wind and frost wreak havo c with trees. It was a cold night, but come daylight w e were on our way again, and then all of a sudden th e trees petered out and there we were, facing a trail on e horse wide, covered with snow and probably ice unde r it. Down below, in a deep, wide valley, I could see a thin trail of smoke. So there were folks down there, o f some kind, there was warmth, probably food. And w e had to use that trail to get there.

  It was unbroken snow. What lay under it a bod y could not guess, but we were going to have to go tha t way, and one stirrup would be hanging out in spac e with maybe two thousand feet of open air under it.

  I tell you I swallowed a couple of times. I looke d at the trail and felt the cold sweat start. The roa n seemed edgy but willing. He started for the trail, tosse d his head a couple of times, then with ears pricked h e started forward.

  "Boy," I said, "if you slip !"

  He taken a step, then another. My boot scraped th e side of the cliff, the other hung out in space. The roa n walked on and headed for a bend around which w e co
uld not see. One thing I knew, that home had t o keep going. He couldn't back very well on that narro w path, and it was a cinch I couldn't get off unless ove r his hindquarters, which I wasn't aiming to do.

  He walked forward, stepping like he was on eggs.

  He'd been a wild mustang in his time and no tellin g where he'd gone then, but I hoped it was nothing lik e this. We edged around the corner of the cliff, and th e trail sloped steeply away ahead of us. I kept my eye s on the trail, trying to think that horse for every step , trying to hold him on there by sheer willpower. Onl y once did I glance aside, when some movement in th e valley drew my eye.

  Maybe a dozen to twenty Indians had come out o n the snow and were looking up at me. If I'd though t that trail was hairy before, I had no doubt of it now.

  Those redskins were out there to watch, and if it wa s that bad, it must be as mean as it could get. Indian s take most any kind of a trail, but it looked like nobod y took this one come snow-time.

  But that roan was steppin' easy and light. Once in a while he'd blow through his nostrils, scared as he was , but he knew the only way was down and he went righ t along.

  All of a sudden the narrow part played out and th e trail widened. I took a long breath and I felt the roa n do the same thing, then we trotted along the rest of th e trail, took two or three switchbacks, and then we wer e cantering up to that Indian village.

  It wasn't much, just three tepees up against som e aspen, but smoke lifted from those tepees and I wa s glad to see them.

  For ten days I stayed with those Indians. Old To m Beaver was one of them, and I'd fed him many a tim e up on that plateau. When I saddled up to leave, the y were pulling down their tepees, too. "If anybody come s looking," I said, "you don't know anything."

  Lying there in that Indian village, I had time to thin k back to pa and to wonder who had killed him.

  Blazer? Maybe . . . but why had pa always carried a gun?

  Of course, most men did. Certainly all of them di d when traveling, because there could be a lot of occasions when a six-shooter was essential. Occasion s that had nothing to do with outlaws, Indians, hors e thieves, or whatever.