Montana Unbranded

The lack of talk didn’t bother her, though. She was a quiet person herself and always felt strangely revitalized by her silent visits with the holy man. Today was no exception.

Now she headed south for the Arrow Root Mountains, the sun slanting off her right shoulder, settling toward the Absaroka Range, the Crow reservation off to her left. Her dogs had abandoned all their manners and were jockeying for position in the passenger seat, craning their eyes out the windows with mounting excitement.

A convoluted series of dirt roads took her into the high country. This was a seldom traveled place, but she noticed fresh tire tracks today. She wasn’t the only one with spring fever. Eventually, rotting snowdrifts closed off the road and she could drive no farther. She parked where someone else had parked very recently. Footprints in the mud indicated one person had continued up the unplowed road and returned, probably within the past day. A ranger from the forest service had no doubt walked up to check on the cabin, knowing she’d rented it for the weekend. The dogs bounded out of the Subaru, sprinting in tight circles of excitement as she shrugged into her pack and balanced the tripod over her shoulder. It was three p.m. and they had another hour or so of hiking ahead of them before reaching the forest service cabin. With any luck she’d have her camera gear set up by sunset and would get some good shots of the band stallion, his mares and hopefully some new foals.

She loved hiking in these mountains and photographing the mustangs that lived here. To Dani, they embodied the free spirit of the West, the part that would never be tamed. Her photographs had appeared in several major magazines, and she’d recently agreed to supply many more for a book that was being written about the wild mustangs of the West. The Bureau of Land Management, or BLM, had begun aggressive roundups in recent years to thin the population, but many felt their management goals were too low to maintain genetic diversity and long-term survival. The fight was on to preserve the purest strain of Spanish mustangs in North America, and Dani, through her love of horses, hiking and her photographic skills, had become a big part of it.

Her spirits were as high as those of her dogs as they hiked through mountain mahogany and juniper. The scenery was spectacular. Mountains framed every scene. The Bighorn, Beartooth, Wind River and Absarokee. Spring was in the air and the yeasty smell of the land, warmed by the afternoon sun, wafted in an earthy ferment around her. She knew in the higher elevations the wind would be thundering over the land like a herd of wild horses. When she was here she felt as if maybe there wasn’t a city west of Saint Louis. As if, in the four-hour drive from Helena, she’d traveled back through two centuries. Sometimes she wondered if she just kept on hiking into the Arrow Roots, would she vanish into the past? She wondered if perhaps she hadn’t already lived here in another life and maybe that was why, when she was with Luther Makes Elk, she felt no need for words. The silence between them was comfortable.

Sometimes the best thing you can do is nothing. His words came to her again as she took a breather. Luther didn’t say much, so when he spoke, she listened. As did everyone. He was, after all, a legendary holy man. What had he meant? Had Luther been referring to Molly’s brother Joe? Had he been telling her to leave the dark and dangerously handsome man well enough alone? Or had he been describing his own life, his days spent sitting on the old wooden bench in front of his shack, watching the occasional vehicle drive past?

She shifted the tripod to her other shoulder and continued on. Her breath came in short, hard gasps as the trail steepened. Her thigh muscles burned and her shoulders were already sore. She was pathetically out of shape. Cross-country skiing was good exercise and a fine way to enjoy a long Montana winter, but nothing beat climbing uphill while shouldering a heavy pack. She hadn’t slept very well last night, but she had a feeling tonight would be different. Tonight she’d forget all about how Joe Ferguson had turned her insides to mush and instead focus on finding the bright golden stallion, Custer, and his little band of unbranded mares. With any luck he’d be grazing his mares in the high mountain park that surrounded the old camp.

She was going to get some great photos. She could feel it in her bones.

* * *

“THIS IS KATY JUNCTION,” Molly narrated to Joe as Steven parked the Wagoneer in front of a small hole-in-the-wall diner called the Longhorn Café. The café comprised one of four buildings that made up a town that, except for the addition of telephone poles, didn’t look like it had changed much in well over a century. There was even a hitch rail in front of the boardwalk, which still looked well used, if piles of horse manure were any measure. “Guthrie’s sister, Bernie, runs this diner. She’s wonderful—you have to meet her. She brews the best coffee in the West, so you must have a cup. Badger and Charlie are probably here, too. They help out at the Bow and Arrow and spend the rest of their lives hanging out at Bernie’s counter and gossiping.”

Joe climbed out of the passenger seat, trying to keep track of all the names his sister tossed his way. His chest ached. His gut ached. His head ached. He didn’t want a cup of coffee and he didn’t want to go to the Bow and Arrow. He was beginning to wish he’d never gotten out of bed that morning. He’d passed on his six a.m. painkillers and that had been a mistake. He felt punk enough that Molly had put off visiting Luther Makes Elk on the way to the Bow and Arrow, and it was a good thing, too. Just climbing the three steps to the diner really took it out of him. When he reached the top step, the wall of the diner began to move in a strange way, and he grabbed on to the hitch rail to catch his balance.

“Joseph?” Molly’s face looked up at him, eyes full of concern. She’d been hovering ever since he’d arrived, as if he might drop dead at any moment. She had her hand on his arm and he felt another hand steady his elbow. Steven. Jesus. How embarrassing.

“I’m fine,” he said. “Jet lag, that’s all.”

“Bernie makes good homemade soup. We’ll stay for lunch,” Steven said.

The cold sweat passed as they helped him through the door into a small room. The tables were empty, but two men, both on the far side of ancient and dressed like the cowboys of old, sat at the counter. The slender, pleasant-looking woman standing behind it took one look at them and came around, wiping her hands on a towel as she approached. Her smile was warm and genuine. She glanced at Joe questioningly, then at Molly. “Why, Molly Ferguson,” she said, her smile broadening, “if this is your tall, dark and handsome older brother, you must introduce me.”

“How’d you guess?” Molly said.

“Except for the lack of red hair, there’s a strong family resemblance.” She extended her hand. “I’m Bernie Portis. Welcome to Katy Junction and the Longhorn Café. Won’t you have a seat?” Her hand gripped his arm firmly as she deftly guided him to the nearest table. He sat. Gave her a grateful look. She smiled and nodded imperceptibly in response. “Soup of the day is extra special because I’m using Bow and Arrow buffalo, not beef. Pony finally persuaded Caleb to take the plunge. They harvested a two-year-old bull, and I’m their first commercial account,” Bernie said proudly. “Buffalo’s wonderful meat—low-fat, low cholesterol and naturally raised on the prettiest wide-open range in the West.”

“Sounds great. We’ll take three bowls and three coffees, Bernie,” Steven said.

“Make mine peppermint tea,” Molly said.

Steven and Molly sat. Bernie looked between the two of them. “Are you feeling all right?” she asked Molly. “Is your stomach upset?”

Molly glanced questioningly at Steven, who gave her a calm nod. “We’re going to have a baby,” she announced, then to her visible mortification she burst into tears.

Bernie never missed a beat. She gave Molly’s shoulder a reassuring squeeze. “Don’t worry, Molly, babies aren’t so awful. I’ve had two myself and I count them as two of the three best things that ever happened to me, my husband being the third. Joseph, how long are you planning to stay?”

“You can call me Joe, and I’ll stay as long as Molly will put up with me.” Given Molly’s highly emotional state, Joe figured this was a tactful response.

Bernie nodded. “Good. It’s tough facing such big events as a wedding and first baby when your family’s all back east. Though I will say, Molly has plenty of family right here.” She gave Molly’s shoulder another affectionate squeeze before retreating to get their beverages. Meanwhile the two old codgers on the bar stools had slid off their perches and were turning in their direction.

“Did we hear correct?” the bowlegged bewhiskered one said as they approached the table. He removed his hat respectfully. “You’re expecting a baby?” Then damn if he didn’t pull a huge red bandanna out of his hip pocket and hand it to Molly, and damn if she didn’t use it to blot her tears.

“I’m sorry, I don’t know why I’m crying. Badger, Charlie, meet my big brother, Joseph,” Molly introduced through her tears. “He’s visiting us for a while. He lives in a big city back east and needs some vacation from all the smog. This is his first trip west. We’re taking him out to the Bow and Arrow after lunch.”

Joe shook hands with Badger and Charlie, feeling like he’d just stepped into a John Ford Western. “Good to meet you,” he said. “And the name’s Joe.”

“Katy Junction might seem small to you, being a big city slicker and all,” Badger said to Joe, “but some mighty big things happen around here. Just ask your sister—it ain’t never dull.”

“I’ve heard some of the stories,” Joe said. “I’m looking forward to seeing how wild the West still is.”

Badger rubbed his bewhiskered jaw. “Well, everyone knows the wildest critters live in the big city, and from the looks of you, some of ’em chewed you up good. But a few days out here’ll get you back on your feet. And your sister’s having a baby, that’s real good news,” Badger said. “It’ll give that little one out at the Bow and Arrow something to play with.”

“Little one?” Molly echoed.

“Ain’t you heard? Pony just took in another’n, just knee-high to a grasshopper. I saw it this mornin’ for the first time. Cute as a speckled pup. She don’t like my whiskers, though.”

“Who would?” Charlie said.

Molly wiped her eyes, blew her nose and cast an accusing look at Steven. “Why didn’t you tell me about the new baby?”

Steven shook his head. “Pony is my sister but she doesn’t tell me everything.”

* * *

BY TWO P.M. Steven was driving his Jeep Wagoneer down the last stretch of ranch road leading to the Bow and Arrow. Joe was dozing off his lunch, but he roused in time to take in the sweeping views, the creek and the old log cabin on its bank, the ranch buildings beyond on the knoll and what looked like the Continental Divide rising up behind it. There appeared to be a lot of action down by the barns. Horses in corrals, boys riding horses, boys leaning over the top rail watching another boy on a horse in a separate smaller corral. Clouds of dust. Puddles of mud. Two Australian shepherd–type dogs chasing each other in play and yapping with excitement outside the corrals. Class was quite obviously in session at the Bow and Arrow.

They parked in front of the ranch house and a slender woman in blue jeans and a red flannel shirt with a long jet-black braid over her shoulder emerged almost immediately, balancing a toddler on her hip. “That’s Pony,” Molly said. “Isn’t she beautiful? Oh, my, look at that baby girl.” Molly was out of the Jeep and up the steps before Joe’s feet hit the ground. “Steven!” she said, spinning around with the baby already in her arms and a wide smile on her face. “She’s two years old and her name’s Mary. Isn’t she just the sweetest thing?”

While his sister showed Steven the baby, Pony came down the steps to meet him. Her handshake was firm, her eyes dark and intelligent, and Molly was right. She was beautiful in a soul-deep, earth-mother way. “I’m Pony, and I’m glad you came,” she said. “I’ll tell Ramalda there’ll be three more for supper. She likes to set a big table. And, Joe? You’re welcome to stay here as long as you like.”

CHAPTER THREE

DANI PAUSED AT the old line camp just long enough to shed her pack and sort out her camera gear. The boot tracks she’d been following hadn’t stopped at the cabin, but had continued on toward the high park. Nobody had been at the cabin for several weeks. Now managed by the forest service, the camp was available by reservation year-round for twenty dollars a night, and Dani had reserved it for herself well in advance, though not many hiked up here in mud season. It was a simple setup: two bunks, a plank table with two chairs and a woodstove for heat. With the grizzlies out of hibernation and roaming the mountains, four solid log walls were a comfort. She stashed her pack at the cabin and hiked immediately toward the park. From there she would most certainly be able to spot wild horses. She called the dogs to heel and they fell in beside her. They knew not to chase after things or to leave her side when she spoke to them in that stern tone of voice. They knew work from play, and they knew this was her time to work. They also knew there would be plenty of time for play afterward.

She paused for a moment to take a deep breath of sweet, cool mountain air and drink it all in. It was so beautiful up here, so wild. One day she’d live on the edge of a wilderness just like this and be able to walk out in it every single day. And maybe, just maybe, there’d be a special guy in her life to share this with. Someone who wasn’t gone all the time. Someone who’d worry if she didn’t come home on time, and who would always be glad to see her when she did.

Dani laughed at herself. She’d sworn off guys after Jack left, and now she was spending way too much time thinking about Molly’s big brother. Foolishness. Joe Ferguson was a city boy. He’d never take to this life. Besides, he was probably juggling a handful of women. Someone that good-looking couldn’t be single. Get to work, she chided herself, and hiked onward.

She saw the vultures before she saw the horses, wheeling circles on mountain updrafts in their telltale, teetering flight. Something was dead or close to it. Rounding the crest of the broad sweep of high meadow, she spotted more vultures on the ground not a quarter mile distant. There were twenty or better scattered over the meadow in three undulating clumps, each clump feeding on something large and deceased. Vultures were big birds, and from a distance it was hard to make out what they were feeding on, but Dani’s good mood instantly vanished, replaced by a growing feeling of dread.

Walking slowly, she descended the gentle slope. Ravens in nearby trees croaked an alarm and took to the air as she approached, and on cue all of the vultures flew away. Their takeoff was heavy, loud and slow, and Dani stopped abruptly when she saw what the flight of the vultures revealed. She’d half expected this, but the shock ran through her like an electric jolt as she processed the scene. Three horses lay sprawled in the high park.

Three of the eight wild horses that made up Custer’s band. Dead.

Shaken, Dani stood paralyzed. She couldn’t believe what she was seeing. How could this have happened? How could three have been killed all at once? Lightning sometimes struck them in these higher elevations, but not in this number and not this early in the season. Was Custer one of the dead? Wild, beautiful Custer? The dogs looked up at her. They smelled death and sensed her distress. Their tails were still, their expressions solemn. This wasn’t what she’d come to the Arrow Roots to photograph. Nonetheless, this was something that needed to be captured for others to see. Photographs needed to be taken. Whatever had happened to the wild horses of the Arrow Roots, people needed to know their fate. Dani blew out her breath and steeled herself for the task at hand. “Okay, boys, you stay right beside me,” she said to the dogs. “Heel.”

She shouldered her gear and started walking down the hill. The dogs walked close beside her to keep her safe.

* * *

CUSTER WAS AMONG the dead. Of course he would be. This was his little band of mares. This was his home range. He would have fought to protect all that was his. Dani was overwhelmed by the enormity of the tragedy. The three dead horses were widely scattered. From the hoofprints left behind in the soft spring earth it looked as though they had been running in a wild panic, changing directions, not knowing which way to turn when whatever happened, happened. And it had happened very recently. Late yesterday, perhaps? Though the spring sunshine was warm and flies had begun to gather, the carcasses had not yet begun to bloat or smell. Vultures, coyotes and ravens had begun their feast, and Dani saw the fresh imprint of a large bear in the churned-up earth near one of the carcasses. The dogs were uneasy and their hackles raised when they sniffed at the track. She knew from experience they didn’t like the smell of bear. She snapped photos with her digital camera swiftly, but the hair on the back of her neck prickled. Where was the bear? Not far, she was sure, and it wouldn’t like her being anywhere near the dead horses.

She took multiple photos of Custer, that wonderful wild stallion that she’d been photographing for the past few years, then bent and zoomed the lens in on the neck of a bay mare that was not as mutilated as the others. She focused on what could only be a bullet hole. Large caliber. Not fatal, but she had several other bullet holes in her chest area that were. These horses had been shot multiple times. Deliberately slaughtered. Both mares had been pregnant. Dani thought about the tire tracks back where she had parked. Big tires with aggressive tread. Truck tires. And the boot tracks that had walked here and returned to the parking area. Big footprints. A man had come up here with a rifle, spotted the herd grazing in this high meadow and shot them.

Who? And why?

Dani pulled her cell phone out of her jacket pocket and turned it on. No signal. But she dialed Molly’s cell, anyway, just in case, and got nothing.

“Damn it.” This was the downside of true wilderness. No cell phone towers.

Remmie and Win were looking toward the bushes at the edge of the meadow. Their ears were cocked. Dani took a few steps closer and saw the legs of a fourth horse protruding from the brush. This mare was lying well apart from the others near the edge of the tree line and mostly hidden by the brush. A dun-colored mare with a long black mane and tail. Dark stripe down her spine. Dark barred stripes on her legs. A beautiful Spanish mustang with classic markings, and except for the bullet holes in her neck and shoulder, she’d been untouched by the scavengers. She was the perfect subject to prove the horses had all been shot. Dani moved closer, raised the camera and took a burst of shots. The mare’s eyes were open, which wasn’t unusual in death, but at the sound of the camera’s shutter, the mare’s ears flickered ever so slightly, then she blinked and moaned, a deep gut-wrenching sound of agony. Dani lowered the camera, a different kind of shock paralyzing her.

This horse was still alive.

“Easy, girl,” Dani soothed, but at the sound of her voice the mare thrashed her legs, struggled desperately to gain her feet, then lost strength, groaned again and collapsed flat on her side. “Easy, girl, I won’t hurt you.” Dani’s thoughts were as panicked as the horse. The mare was wild and didn’t want her near, but she was badly injured and suffering. Dani cast around frantically, as if help might appear on the horizon, but all she saw were the three other dead horses, a sky full of circling vultures and two loyal dogs. She was on her own.

The dogs suddenly looked beyond her, ears cocked, and she heard the crashing of something in the thicker brush beyond the mare. She backed rapidly away, her heart in her throat. Bear? She saw a flash of pale color. Bears were dark. Was it another wounded horse? Please, God, no.

But it wasn’t a bear or another wounded horse. A cream-colored foal stepped out of the scrub on long wobbly legs that could barely support it. When it spotted her it made a noise, the sound of a frightened young thing that needed its mother. The foal was a newborn. Tiny. Scared. Dani looked again at the mare. The blood from her gunshot wounds had masked the blood from the birthing. This mare had been shot twice and then, lying near death, had somehow birthed this foal, and very recently. The foal’s coat was still damp. It staggered unsteadily toward its mother, who raised her head off the ground and made a noise in her throat that knifed into Dani’s heart. The foal responded and came to her side, but the mare could do no more. Her life was nearly gone, bled out into the grass.

“I’ll find out who did this and they’ll be punished for it,” Dani said in a choked voice to the dying mare. “I promise you.”

Tears ran down her cheeks as Dani watched the mare draw her final shuddering breath. The foal nuzzled its mother, seeking comfort that would never come. Thin, watery milk leaked from the mare’s teats, as if even in death she wanted to nurture her foal. The sun was setting and the night chill would kill the newborn quickly. It needed food and warmth. She couldn’t just leave it here and run for help. Somehow she had to get the newborn foal down to her car and to the Bow and Arrow. They’d know what to do.

Would it let her approach? Was she strong enough to carry it down the mountain?

Dani laid her gear on the ground. She moved toward the dead mare and the foal watched with wide eyes but stood its ground. She reached a hand toward it. Her fingers gently brushed the damp, curly coat and combed through the short wisp of mane. She stroked its neck and could feel the taut skin trembling beneath her fingers. She removed her jacket slowly and used it to rub the wetness from the foal’s coat. She rubbed gently at first, then with increasing vigor. The foal braced its legs, lowered its head and stood its ground. Then Dani dropped the jacket and tried to lift the animal. Heavy. Far too heavy for her to carry. She set it back down gently. “Easy now, easy,” she soothed as she reached for her camera, took a few quick shots of the foal near its mother and slung the camera over her shoulder. She draped her jacket over the foal’s back to keep it warm, tied the arms together under its neck, took hold of the makeshift collar and tugged gently. The foal took a step, then another. Wobbly steps, short steps, but it was walking.

Two steps later Dani had another thought. The foal hadn’t eaten since birth and the mare’s udder had been leaking milk. Would it be possible to retrieve some of the first milk from the dead mare? She had a stainless-steel water bottle in her day pack. Dani hesitated. She could try at least. The critically important first colostrum milk might save the foal’s life. She wasn’t sure how long a newborn foal could go without eating but surely mother’s milk was best. She shrugged out of her pack, retrieved her water bottle, dumped the contents and returned to the mare’s side, where she knelt and positioned the water bottle before trying to strip milk out of the mare’s teat. This is crazy, she told herself. Even crazier with a grizzly bear lurking in the vicinity. But crazy as the idea was, and as clumsy as she was acting on it, milk finally squirted out of the teat and into the bottle she held on its side. Thanking her dairy farm upbringing, Dani stripped the milk as swiftly as she could, first from one teat and then the other, until no more came. It took less than two minutes but felt like hours while ravens called and vultures circled and she scanned the edge of the nearby woods for bears. She stood, capped the bottle, returned it to the day pack and shouldered it. The foal didn’t try to escape when she reached for the dangling arms of her parka tied around its neck.

“You can do this,” she said, wrapping one arm around the foal’s neck to steady it. “You can do this. You have to, because I can’t carry you. And if you stay here, you’ll die.” She looked over her shoulder. “Win, Rem, come on, boys. We’re going down the mountain now.”