October skies

CHAPTER 19

30 September, 1856

Ben stood back, exhausted by the morning’s work and sweating profusely, despite having stripped down to his shirt and rolled both sleeves up. Faint vapours of steam rose from his damp, exposed forearms, and out through the unbuttoned neck of his shirt.

He watched Broken Wing working with several spruce saplings, bending their pliable length to form an onion-shaped dome, the tapering ends at the top bound tightly together, the thick bottoms wedged deep into the ground. Meanwhile Keats returned with another armful of pine branches and dropped them on a substantial pile beside the frame to their shelter.

‘You helpin’, Lambert? Or just gonna sit on your ass and watch?’ he growled.

‘Sorry.’ Ben jumped.

Broken Wing finished securing the frame of their shelter and spoke in his tongue to Keats.

‘He’s asking for your canvas sheet.’

‘Oh, right. I’ll fetch it.’

Ben hurried over to where his two ponies were huddled together, and pulled out his tarpaulin from a saddle pack. He returned and handed it to the Indian. Broken Wing turned it over in his hands, studying it, and then looked up at Ben, flashing him a quick grin and a nod.

‘Isss good,’ he uttered in a chopped, guttural manner. It was the first time, Ben realised, that he’d heard the Indian speak in English.

‘C’mon, Lambert, help me get some more of this. We gonna need to pile it high on top of the canvas.’

Ben followed Keats to the edge of the clearing, looking around him as he stepped through the snow. The clearing was alive with activity and noise. The hacking of axes and zipping of saws through lumber bounced and echoed around their little world, framed on all sides by tall spruces and firs that grew up gentle slopes surrounding their bare basin.

He saw a team of Mormon men bring down an entire tree. A barked warning, then a creak and crash as it swung down amidst a cloud of dislodged powder snow. Then the men swarmed upon it. Other men worked diligently on their wagons, easing out lumber nails, carefully cannibalising the precious planks to use for their frames.

‘Here,’ said Keats, pointing to a pile of pine branches ahead at the edge of the clearing. ‘Take those back to Broken Wing.’

Ben bent down and scooped up as much as he could carry, the coarse needles and cones scratching his bare forearms. He stood up and looked into the thick tree line in front of him, an ascending gradual slope of tree bottoms, a world of only two colours — white, and the dark grey-green of bark.

‘Move yourself, Lambert,’ grunted Keats as he took an axe to a nearby fir and hacked another low-hanging and heavy branch from it.

Ben staggered back across the clearing with his load, nodding politely to Mr Bowen and Mr McIntyre, both working together on building their frames from the planks harvested from their traps.

He dumped his load of branches on the pile and looked at the progress Broken Wing had made with the canvas. It was already wrapped tautly around the sapling frame, and their shelter, for the moment, looked like a low, bulbous tepee.

‘Will that be strong enough, do you think?’ asked Ben.

The Indian looked up at him, his face a questioning frown.

‘The frame?’ said Ben, reaching over and running his fingers along one of the ridges beneath the tarpaulin. He gestured at the pile of pine branches. ‘These branches are very heavy.’

Broken Wing nodded. ‘Isss ssstrong.’ He whacked the frame with one hand. It creaked alarmingly, but barely moved.

‘It’s fine, Lambert,’ said Keats, approaching with another armful of branches that he dumped down on top of the pile. ‘The weight of this lot, an’ the weight of the snow, will make it stronger.’ He grinned, a mouth with as many gaps as teeth. ‘It’s all in the shape, lad.’

Ben nodded. ‘Yes, I suppose, like arched brickwork spreading the load.’

Keats shrugged. ‘Reckon.’

At that moment, Ben spotted Preston approaching. The minister, like every other man in the clearing, had shed his long dark coat, his white shirt and dark waistcoat and stood in a vanilla cotton undershirt, circled with dark patches of sweat.

‘Mr Keats!’ he called out breathlessly, as he took the last few strides through the snow towards them. ‘Mr Keats,’ he said again as he drew up beside them, ‘I suggest we have a clear plan for our camp, where things should be, if we are to winter here.’

Keats stroked his chin for a moment and nodded. ‘Reckon so.’

‘May I suggest the oxen be corralled centrally, in the middle of this clearing.’

Ben looked around. The clearing was roughly oval, about a hundred and fifty yards, maybe two hundred in length — an oasis of open space in an endless sea of unbroken woodland that continued all the way up to a horizon of bare, craggy peaks.

‘You un’erstand the oxen will die, Preston? They’re our food now.’

‘Yes, indeed. I suggest if we corral them all together in the centre of the clearing, in the space between your shelters and ours, they’ll keep each other warm and last longer.’

Keats pursed his lips. ‘Make better sense to kill ’em all now. Longer they live, the thinner they’ll get.’

Preston glanced towards the assembled herd of beasts — well over a hundred of them. For the moment, there was meat and muscle under their tan hides.

‘I’d like to keep them alive a little longer, just in case this early snow is a passing thing.’

‘It ain’t passing.’

‘Nonetheless, for now, I’d prefer to keep them alive.’

Keats shrugged. ‘The cold’ll get ’em before they starve, anyways.’

‘We shall have to be sensible and fair with how we ration out the food,’ Preston uttered thoughtfully. ‘You say we’re likely to be stuck here until spring?’

‘Yup.’

‘Hmm.’

Keats bent down and picked up his deerskin jacket. Now they were just standing, the cold was beginning to bite. ‘Reckon we need to be careful with the food from now on,’ he said, fastening the toggles. ‘Start as we mean to go on.’

‘Yes, of course.’ Preston nodded. ‘One of my people, Mr Stolz, is a butcher by trade. He might be best qualified to deal with each carcass as it becomes available.’

‘I think Mr Bowen is as well,’ cut in Ben.

‘Then, I reckon, they can both be in charge of the ox meat. That good for you, Preston?’

Preston nodded, even managed a faint smile. ‘That seems fair.’

‘Also gonna need regular firewood comin’ in.’

‘Yes, I suppose we can arrange some kind of rota. Start a firewood pile in the centre and make sure that it’s kept topped up each day.’

Keats grunted agreement. ‘An’ we need to ’rrange a night watch. Never know what’s out there in these woods, even in the winter.’

Preston looked surprised. ‘Is there likely to be anything out there, Mr Keats?’

Keats glanced towards Broken Wing, and they exchanged a few words in his language.

‘Broken Wing says it’s possible some Paiute huntin’ party might be aroun’.’ Keats looked up at the trees. ‘Hell, might still have a bear or two out there lookin’ to fatten up, yet. Be worth havin’ someone awake with a loaded gun.’

‘Yes, I agree with you.’

Keats managed a laugh.

‘What’s the matter, Mr Keats?’

Keats looked at him and shook his head with bemusement. ‘Seems like we foun’ ourselves agreein’ on a whole buncha things. Hell… never would’ve expected that.’

‘Perhaps it’s God’s will, Mr Keats, that we are marooned here together,’ Preston said, offering a genial smile, ‘that we can learn a little from each other.’

Keats’s expression froze for a moment. Ben half expected a caustic reply, but instead his craggy face split into a grin, his laugh a loose rattle. ‘Well, you can put in a good word for me if you like, Preston.’

Preston nodded politely. ‘We shall include you and your people in our prayers this evening.’ He turned to observe the men in his group working vigorously with their axes on the thick branches they had hacked from the trees. ‘And I will call a meeting amongst my people directly. As you suggested, we shall arrange things like the firewood and the allocation of meat from the oxen.’

‘Good.’ Keats nodded. ‘An’ mine’ll do likewise.’

Preston turned to go and then stopped, his eyes turning on Ben. ‘Mr Lambert?’

‘Yes?’

‘Would your knowledge of medicine be available to all of our… small community?’

‘Good grief, yes… yes, of course,’ Ben replied.

‘We would of course pay for any medicines we consume, and your services-’

Ben shook his head. ‘That’ll not be necessary, Mr Preston. I believe we’re all together in this now. I have a good supply of medicines in my chest, and I’ll certainly have enough time on my hands to practise doctoring.’

Preston’s long and normally severe face cracked with a good-natured smile. ‘That’s generous of you. My thanks.’ He nodded politely at Keats and then turned away, pushing through the deep snow towards the nearest of his men.

Keats looked up at the darkening grey sky. ‘Shit. Gonna start snowin’ again,’ he muttered.