Wolf and Iron

CHAPTER 7

The wagon driver slowly lowered his rifle as Wolf disappeared among the trees. “All right,” he said. “He’s gone anyway.” The driver’s voice was a slight, reedy baritone. His eyes turned to look down into Jeebee’s face. “What is he, a coyote? He’s big.”

They stared at each other wordlessly for a couple of minutes. Finally, Jeebee got both his wind and his wits back together at the same time.

“He’s a wolf,” he answered. “You’re Paul Sanderson?”

The other nodded.

“I’m Jeebee,” Jeebee said. “Jeeris Belamy Walthar. Your wagon says you’re a peddler. I might be able to do some business with you.”

Sanderson’s eyes flicked up for a moment to the edge of the trees into which Wolf had disappeared.

“Maybe,” he said in a noncommittal voice. His rifle had not ceased to point at Jeebee, and there was a revolver holstered at his hip. “How many more of you up there in the trees?”

“I’m alone!” said Jeebee. “Except for Wolf, that is. Completely alone. Look, I threw my gun away, I just want to buy some things from you, if you’ve got them to sell.”

“We’ll see.” Sanderson nodded at the rider. “Check him out.”

Jeebee had noticed that she was female, but it hadn’t really registered; so now there was some shock as she—a young woman, if not literally a girl—approached him from behind. He felt businesslike fingers inserted into his boot tops and then hands run lightly up and around his legs; patting his hips, searching his back pockets, then feeling about his shirt, up under his armpits, and across his chest from behind. At last the woman ended by even digging for a moment into his long hair and beard. Then the hands went away.

“Nothing on him, Dad.” The voice was unmistakably feminine.

She came around to stand facing him. She had a healthy-looking round young face that would have looked cheerful, except for the moment just now, it wore an expression of suspicion. He caught a glimpse of short, clean, light brown hair showing under the wide brim of her dusty brown hat, and a light, dark-colored leather vest, unbuttoned over a regular tan workshirt and blue jeans. About the only concession to her femininity was the fact that the heavy work clothes had been tailored to fit her rather better than Sanderson’s fit him and the single touch of brightness that was the turquoise bandanna knotted around the column of her throat.

She was now wiping the fingers with which she had searched him on the legs of her jeans. He was offended, then suddenly embarrassed. Sanderson was getting down from the wagon seat, leaving his rifle up there, and the girl, for she could not be much more than that, Jeebee thought, had already reholstered her revolver in order to search him.

“All right,” said Sanderson, now standing on the ground in front of Jeebee, “what do you need?”

“A couple of horses,” said Jeebee. “Supplies and tools.”

Sanderson laughed.

“For someone just standing there with nothing on you,” the wagon owner said, “you want a lot. What are you going to offer for all that?”

“Oh, I’ve something to pay with,” said Jeebee.

He reached in between the buttons of his shirt to the money belt underneath. With three fingers he reached inside and gathered three of the heavy coins. He brought them out and displayed them on his open palm for the wagon driver to see.

“So that’s what you had in that hideout belt,” said the girl’s voice behind him. “I felt them there, Dad, but I figured they couldn’t be anything dangerous, so I didn’t say anything.”

Jeebee looked back at Sanderson and was surprised to find the man silently laughing.

“And you were right enough, Mary,” Jeebee thought he heard him say. After a quick glance at his daughter, Sanderson’s eyes fastened on Jeebee, again.

“Gold,” he said, and shook his head.

“But it actually is gold!” Jeebee said urgently. “These are gold coins! I collected them over about a two-year period. I belonged to a Gold Coin of the Month mail-order club.” He offered his laden palm to the wagon driver.

“Go on,” he said. “Check them out for yourself. They’re almost pure gold. You can bite into them easily. Besides, somebody like you ought to know gold when you see it.”

“Oh, I believe you. They’re gold. Those are Krugerrands, all right,” said Sanderson. “It’s just that they aren’t going to buy you a lot. I couldn’t offer you much for them. Too risky to try trading with most people, too hard to find a buyer you can trust. The safe things to trade now are low-bulk, everyday necessities people nowadays can’t find or make easily.”

After he finished, there was a long moment of silence and then Sanderson spoke again.

“Just what did you figure on buying besides horses?” he asked Jeebee.

“What I need to survive with,” Jeebee said. “I’m headed for my brother’s ranch in Montana. I figure once I get there, I’ll be safe. I’d hoped to buy just a couple of horses from you, one to ride and one to pack; and for the packhorse, say, a spade, an ax, some blankets, some basics like flour and sugar and maybe bacon. I need a sidearm of some kind. A revolver, if you’ve got one to spare, and ammunition for that and the rifle I threw down back there, plus another one I’ve got up in the trees. I’ve been waiting a couple of weeks now for somebody to come by who looked like they might be safe for me to try to buy from. I might not even have come out for you if it hadn’t been for Wolf.”

“How much of that gold have you got?” Sanderson asked.

“Twenty-three coins,” said Jeebee. “All practically pure gold.”

“Well, I’ll tell you right now,” said Sanderson, “that much gold wouldn’t even begin to buy you a packhorse. Maybe a shovel, an ax, and a sidearm—maybe.”

He looked at Jeebee awhile longer.

“Got anything else to trade?” he asked.

“Nothing I can spare,” said Jeebee.

Sanderson stood for a minute as if thinking. For all that Jeebee overtopped him by about an inch or so, and the fact that he must be twenty years older than Jeebee, Sanderson was square-shouldered, thickly built, and strong looking. He passed his rifle to the young woman. She took it without a word.

“Come on,” Sanderson said to Jeebee, “we’ll go pick up that rifle you threw away, and look at what you’ve got.”

“Dad—” began the girl.

“You just stay here,” Sanderson told her. “I’ll be all right. You’re the one could be made use of by someone hiding up in those woods. If they’ve got me, they’ve got nothing. Everything that’s valuable is down here; and you’ve got Nick.”

Jeebee blinked a little. “Nick” must be the third person he had seen by the light of the fire beside the wagon the night before. He assumed that this Nick, whoever he was, was in the wagon. In any case, Sanderson had already started toward the trees and Jeebee turned and caught up with him. They found the rifle—in fact Sanderson found it before Jeebee did, picked it up, hefted it in his hand, turned it about, and worked its action.

“Nothing great,” he said, “but you’ve kept it in pretty good shape.”

He had ejected the cartridge that Jeebee had automatically jacked into the chamber the moment the wagon appeared in his binoculars, and removed the clip. Now Sanderson picked up the shell and gave it back to Jeebee, along with the clip.

“Put that in your pocket,” he said. Jeebee took them wordlessly. He and Sanderson went on up into the woods and Jeebee found the .22, which he also handed to Sanderson. The .22 was a single-shot and Sanderson jacked the cartridge out of it as well and handed it to Jeebee to pocket, then gave him the rifle. Neither one of them said anything and they went on through the trees back away from the road and the wagon.

“Where’s your camp?” Sanderson asked as they stepped into the dappled shade of the woods.

“It’s in another grove behind this one,” Jeebee answered. “We can go there if you like, but there’s nothing there. Nothing at all. It’s just a place where I light a fire at night and sleep.”

“Let’s look anyway,” said Sanderson.

They went on through the little patch of woods, across the open space behind and into the further trees. When they reached the campsite, Sanderson swept his eyes around and immediately focused on the bag Jeebee had made out of the canvas and hung up in the tree, bulging with canned goods from the root cellar.

“What’s that?”

“Cans of food I got from a root cellar,” Jeebee answered. “Do you want me to climb up and get one to show you or would you like to climb up and see?”

“I’ve got a better idea,” said Sanderson. “You climb up and bring the whole thing down.”

Jeebee shrugged, climbed up the tree, and with some effort brought the container down. He opened it up.

“By God, you weren’t kidding!” Sanderson poked with his boot toe among the cans. “Any of them make you sick?”

“Not so far,” Jeebee answered. “They’re all still short of the expiration date stamped on them.”

“All the same.” Sanderson stopped poking at the cans. “It’s no good for trade with me. We’re not short of food back at the wagon, and I wouldn’t dare trade it to someone else just in case they got sick from it in spite of the date.”

He glanced around the campsite.

“You were right enough,” he said, “there’s nothing here but the ashes of your fire, covered over.”

“I told you,” Jeebee answered.

“Call that wolf of yours in,” said Sanderson. “I’d feel more comfortable with him in sight.”

“He won’t come just because I call,” Jeebee answered. “He comes and goes as he likes.”

Sanderson stared at him. “Then why do you say he’s your wolf?”

“I didn’t want you to shoot him.” Jeebee searched for a word that would explain his connection with a wolf. “He’s my partner.”

The last word sounded strangely on the still air of the little patch of forest. Sanderson smiled. It was just the slightest quirk at the corner of his lips. But his eyes looked back around the empty space of the campsite.

“Maybe,” he said. “In that case how do you know he’s not gone for good?”

“I can try if he’ll answer. He may not,” Jeebee replied.

He cupped his hands around his mouth, put his head back, and howled. They waited but there was no answer. Jeebee shrugged at Sanderson and howled again. Again, no answer.

“He may not be hearing me,” Jeebee said, “or he may just not feel like answering. Let me try it once more.” He turned more toward the interstate and howled a third time. There was a very long moment of silence. Jeebee shook his head, but just as he did so, from a great distance came the long, train-whistle-like howl. Jeebee smiled at Sanderson.

Sanderson nodded. His face still gave nothing away, but Jeebee got the impression from the way he stood that a great deal of the distant element in his manner had gone out of him. It was almost as if Wolf’s answering howl had struck a strange chord of understanding and friendship in the man toward Jeebee.

“Come on back to the wagon,” he said.

They turned and started back together.

“Tell me about yourself,” Sanderson said as they headed back. “Where are you from, and what brings you here?”

“I’m trying to reach my brother’s ranch in Montana,” Jeebee said. “I ought to be welcome there—and safe. I’m not all that safe by myself.”

Sanderson laughed shortly.

“Not these days, right? Even with the wolf for a partner,” said Sanderson. “But go on. What were you before you started coming west? And how did you get that way?”

He kicked at the site of Jeebee’s fire, uncovering the ashes.

“No. We’re none of us safe these days,” he went on before Jeebee could answer. “I was lucky. I saw it coming about five years ago and started getting ready for it. We’re not safe, either, at the wagon. But we’re safer than most. People’ve got use for a peddler.”

Jeebee did not dare ask why. He wanted to know more about this man he might have to deal with. But he did not feel that a direct question about the other’s background would be welcome. He decided to answer Sanderson’s question about his own.

“I was on the staff of a university,” Jeebee said, “part of a special study group from the University of Michigan. A little over a year ago when things started to get bad, the other people in the group began to leave, looking for safer places to be. Most of us felt pretty safe in the smaller place we were in.”

“And that was—where?” Sanderson asked.

“Stoketon, its name was,” Jeebee said. “Small town. Nice. But things began to go bad, even there, after the electricity and water shut off. And of course any long-distance phoning had been out a long time before that. At any rate, the others began to leave, looking for some place safer. I was the last to go, and I just got away with my life. That was some months ago, early this spring. I’ve been trying to make it to Montana ever since.”

Taking a chance, he added, “You make pretty good time with those horses on the interstate.”

“When we move,” said Sanderson, “but we stop for customers. Tell me how you got this far.”

Sanderson listened with what Jeebee found to be a surprising amount of interest for somebody who was simply a passerby on the highway, and who, by the very nature of his business, must be meeting new people all the time. Jeebee had not really finished talking about his background when they emerged from the set of trees over the highway and came down to the wagon. The girl’s horse was tied to the wagon and she herself was on the wagon seat. She jumped down as they came into sight and came partway to meet them.

“I’m glad you’re back, Dad,” she said. “I was just starting to think about leaving Nick here and going after you after all!”

“That wouldn’t have been smart, Mary,” Sanderson said, shaking his head. “You know I’ve always told you—stick with the wagon. That’s your strong point. Stick with it. You’re like somebody who’s got a fort and runs outside it where they can be picked off, if you leave it.”

He turned to Jeebee. “Jeebee,” he said, “this is my daughter—” Again Jeebee thought he heard the name “Mary.”

“M-e-r-r-y,” spelled the girl, looking hard at him. “Merry!”

“I’ll remember,” said Jeebee, to his own surprise, flushing a little under his beard.

“Merry,” said Sanderson, “this is Jeebee—what did you say that full name of yours was?” he added, turning to Jeebee.

“Jeeris Belamy Walthar,” Jeebee answered.

“Glad to meet you, Jeebee,” Merry said levelly. She glanced at the two rifles Jeebee now carried, one in each hand.

“That’s right, Merry,” Sanderson said. “That’s all our friend here owns, except that wolf of his, and he doesn’t even own that. But I’ve been learning about him.”

Swiftly, and briefly, he sketched in Jeebee’s background for her.

“What I’m thinking, Merry,” Sanderson wound up, “is we might offer Jeebee, here, a chance to earn what he needs.” He turned to Jeebee.

“How would you like to work with us for a couple of months before we turn south? You might just be able to pay for at least part of what extra you need.”