Traveller (2 page)

Horses plunging, screaming. That mare's been blowed to shreds. She ain't dead—she's squealing, struggling. “Steady, Traveller!” The smoke! I can't see! I can't see anything! Stand still!
Must
stand still! The Blue men are coming! No, it's the Yell! The Yell! Over there—in the trees! It's Cap-in-His-Eyes is coming!

Oh, I—my legs! This straw—Where am I? I'm in the stable! It was jest another of those dad-blamed dreams! No Blue men—not any more. No guns. I'm all a-sweat. I'd better stand up.

What's that? Who's that moving over there? Who are you? Oh, it's you, Tom Nipper, drat you! Come on out o' that there straw! Hunting rats? ‘Say you're hunting rats on
my
‘count? Get along with you! It's on your own account. It's you that starts me on these durned dreams, comin' prowling in here jest when I've got to sleep, pushing up agin me in the straw ‘cause you want to keep warm. That a rat you got there? Good fella! Well, I won't say you ain't a good cat. ‘Fact, I heared Marse Robert say as much yesterday to your mistress. “That's a good cat you got there, Life,” he said. “Makes a mighty good friend for Traveller, too.”

Well, now, you settle down quiet. No, right there, where I can feel you. No more prowling around, giving me bad dreams. Tell me how you been getting along.

Yes, all right, I've heared that story ‘bout you an' Marse Robert. Baxter told me. How you was miaowling round outside his bedroom in the rain, and he got up and opened the window, an' it was too high for you to jump in, so he held out one of the old lady's crutches and you climbed up it. Yeah, and he got wet doin' it, too. I'll say some of you cats have got ‘nuff sass to jine the Texans! Fancy the likes of
you
getting Marse Robert out of bed and leaning out in the rain! And that Baxter! Hardly more'n a kitten, but ‘fore long he'll be sassy as you. You're all the same: never been real hungry, never been on a march, never gone ary a mile in the dust, never smelt the smoke—never heared a gun, even.

Well, I guess it ain't your fault. Do you know, Tom, there was a time when
I'd
never heared a gun? Can you believe that? A time when I was a little foal, all head an' legs, alongside o' my dam? Well, and to begin with, I didn't even really know she
was
my dam. The first thing I can remember—the first thing at all—is pushing my nose into the dark shadow between her legs, to get at the milk. All I knowed was I wanted the milk, you see. But there was another mare in the field, an when I went and pushed up to her, ‘course she druv me off. That's how you larn who's your dam. To begin with you jest want to push into the shadow between anything up-an'-down. Why, I've even seed a newborn foal push his nose into a deep crack in the bark of a tree!

It was all milk and green grass in those days, and larning to smell the difference between the kinds of grasses an' plants there was to eat. We do jest about hate anything bitter, you know, and soon as I started grazing, I was larnng to sniff out which was the bitter plants and let ‘em alone. I'd never have thought then that there could be sech a thing as not getting ‘nuff to eat. ‘Course,
you
don't eat grass, Tom, else you'd have a long nose ‘stead of a flat ‘un. A horse can poke his nose into the grass, you see, and still keep looking all round at the same time. No horse is happy when he can't see what's around him. You cats can trap a smell up your nose and hold it, though, can't you, good as any horse? I seed you opening your mouth and wrinkling up your face when you've smelt some strange cat's piss along the fence out there.

‘Course, it warn't long ‘fore I had to larn some manners in dealing with older horses. That was a big field, where I was raised. In those days I thought it was the whole world, with the split-rail fence all round it, the shed at the top of the slope and the oak trees an' the big pond down the bottom. There was a plenty of horses there besides me and my dam—a good many of ‘em born and raised there, like me. When you're a foal, you've got to larn to respect your elders and behave right. You've seed that puppy roll over in front of the old dogs, haven't you? Well, when you're a foal you don't roll over; you drop your ears an' stretch out your neck, and then you have to sort of draw back your lips and show your teeth while the older horse sniffs at you. Yeah, but as you grow up you soon stop that. I'd finished mouthing at older horses—oh, after my first year, I guess.

Of course, Tom, we grow up fast, you know. Faster'n a cat can imagine, I'm sure of that. You was a blind kitten, warn't you, crawling about for days in a basket? Why, the same day we're born we can stand up and walk, and follow along with our dams. Then there's the flies, of course. Don't take you long to larn to use your tail on them fellas. I've always wondered why there had to be flies in the world, but the way I figure it now, it's the Blue men turn into flies—you know, when they've finished bein' Blue men. Must be, ‘cause there's always too many of ‘em. Your first day, you start nibbling the grass; nibble a bit o' dung, too—that's important, else your stomach can't work, you know. You cats don't really make friends, do you? I've noticed: most other cats—you jest can't see ‘em off fast ‘nuff. Now horses—horses
need
friends. Who's going to keep the flies off your face and out of your ears? Who's going to get your tangles out and clean you up? And you gotta do the same for him, ‘course. Who's going to keep a lookout behind while you've got your head down, grazing? There was plenty of other foals in that big field, and as I began to stray away from my dam I soon got to racing and playing and pushing around. I had a few tussles—nothin' bad, though. But I soon larned where I stood, an' it was mighty high up. I could tell that much, jest from the way the men kind of seemed to be weighing me up while they was leaning over them rails and looking us over.

Back in those days we-all did jest about nothing all day. If only I'd ‘a knowed! If only I'd ‘a knowed! Grazing, and jest loafing around. Standing head-to-tail with a friend, swishing the durned flies, stretching, yawning, scratching. I had a friend called Ruffian. Sorrel, he was. And years later, that night in the mud—that night in the mud when Marse Robert—well, never mind ‘bout that for now. What else do I remember?

I remember the woods along the top end of the field, how the leaves came out in the spring, dogwood and redbud; and over the fence, in the wood, there'd be little white lilies; and down in the pond there was a pink, flurry kind of a flower used to grow in clumps in the shallow water. I tried eating it once, but it warn't no use. That's how you find things out—try everything. ‘Quisitive, Tom. A good foal's got to be ‘quisitive. Why, I can remember a young filly—Moonlight, her name was—no older'n me, actually teaching herself to drink. Wouldn't never think you had to larn
that
, would you? First she stuck her nose right in deep an' ended up spluttering a noseful. Then she tried nibbling the water, as if it was grass. ‘Took her—oh, a day or two—to larn to drop her ears and pull her nostrils back, the proper way.

We used to larn most things by playing, of course, same as you cats do. Sure, I've seed you and young Baxter playing around in the yard, jumping on the leaves and chasing each other an' all the rest of it. First of all I used to play with my dam—Flora, she was called—nibbling her tail, bumping her around. She took it all easy—well, she knowed I'd soon be off to play with the other foals, kicking around, pulling faces and swishing tails. You've gotta larn to get on with other horses, else you end up worse'n Richmond. Well, I ain't told you ‘bout Richmond, Tom, have I? I will, sometime.

It was all through playing that I larned not to be afraid of men. ‘Course, the men fed us in the cold weather, and combed us down, and took the older horses out to ride and all that. Men need horses same's they need dogs and cats. Without horses they couldn't get around. Without dogs they couldn't have cows or sheep, and I guess they'd all be robbing each other, too, with no dogs to bark for ‘em. Without you cats the rats'd have every durned thing—oats, bran—the lot.

How
did we play, did you say? My golly, I never realized then—well, ‘course I didn't—the luck it was for me to be raised and trained the way I was! Since then I've seed that many young horses beaten and ill-treated—spirits broken, tempers spoiled—all on ‘count o' what some men call training. They figure they've got to show the horse who's master—whips, spurs, hard words—until he's been driven jest about mad. And then they'll turn around an' say he's natcherly vicious! The Army—the Army was full of it; Marse Robert hisself was forever telling men not to whip their horses. But once a horse has been spoiled it's jest about too late, you see. There's no listening no more, no signals, no watching out either way.

Jim coming to play—well, I don't recollect ‘zackly when he started, but I s'pose it might have been the summer after I was born—that or the next; I don't rightly recall. I know it was after they cut me between the legs, but I don't remember much about that neither; not after all this time. I can recall being throwed and held down. That was bad, and it hurt some, but anyhow it healed up quick.

The men used to lean over the fence, chatting an' lazing around, easy; they'd chew tobacco an' watch us foals playing together. The way I figure it now, they was sizing up a whole lot that way: which of us was timid, which was lazy, or ‘quisitive, or heading to turn out steady—all that sort o' thing. ‘Course, in them days it never crossed my mind.

I remember, one day, there was six or seven of us herded off into another big field next to the one we'd growed up in. There we was, all larking around, hightailing, playing follow-the-leader, bumping each other and all the rest of it—having a high old time. An' then all of a sudden there was this young fella—Jim, they called him—I came to know later he was the boss's son—he jest came right on into the field an' sat hisself down on a log. I was kinda leery; I was wondering what he reckoned to do, but he never did nothing at all—not all the afternoon. He jest sat there, an' ‘bout sunset he went off again. Next day it was the same; and the next. Sometimes he was sitting a-chewing tobacco, and sometimes he was jest whittling away at a stick with his knife, or tossing bits of bread to the sparrows an' the juncos. ‘Seemed to have jest about as much time for doing nothing as a horse.

In the end I got kinda ‘quisitive ‘bout him—you know, wondering why he was there. So I quit playing with the others and wandered over to him. He never took no notice. Finally I went right up to him and smelt him over. He never moved: jest raised one of his arms, after a bit, real slow, and began stroking me. He treated me like another horse would—you know, scratching my back, sniffing his nose along my mane an' all the rest—'ceptin' he was talking all the time, kinda quiet an' friendly—I could tell from the sound of his voice. He scratched my rump, too, and that's something all foals like a lot.

“Jeff,” he kept saying. “Howdy, Jeff. Good boy, Jeff.” He cut some apples up into pieces an' I ate them out of the flat of his hand. They was sweet—the sweetest things I'd ever tasted; they was real good. After that, whenever he came into the field I nearly always used to come up to him straightaway. But if I didn't, he jest sat down anyway. After a while I'd stand still and let him pick up my hind feet, run his fingers through my tail—anything. Sometimes he'd take his hat to the flies, flip them out of my eyes. ‘Didn't seem to startle me none, the way he did it.

What about the play, you asked, Tom. Gosh sakes, that young Jim fella, it really used to tickle me, the games we got up to! I jest never knowed what we'd be doin' next. We'd get up to all sorts of tricks; like, he'd walk along in front and I'd come along behind him with a loose rope round my neck. One day we was taking a walk down the lane when all of a sudden this dad-burn rabbit run right acrost under my nose! I rar'd back an' jerked my head away. I would've run, too, but Jim jest stood there and kept talking quiet. “Jest a rabbit, Jeff. No call to be scairt of an old rabbit. Easy—easy—” All that sort o' thing, you know.

He never let the two of us get dull. It was always something new. Would you believe it, one day he brung along an old banjo and played it to me? First time I'd ever heared one, o' course. Heared plenty since. The soldiers—well, never mind that for now. Another day he laid down a big white sheet of cloth and called me to walk over it to get my apple. I warn't scared! ‘Nother time it was six poles laid across pegs in the ground; he'd call me over to him and I had to be careful ‘bout not knocking none of ‘em off. Tricky, that was. Made me feel real clever. ‘Nother day he came down to the field with a basket and put the handle in my mouth, for me to carry. We walked up to the big house, me still carrying that durned basket. There was a woman working in the yard. “Here's my Jeff, ma'am,” says Jim. “He's brung back your basket.” She laughed fit to bust. “You rascal!” she says to me, and then she give me a piece of sugar.

One time, though, when I was feeling a bit short-tempered with the flies, I turned my head and nipped Jim's shoulder—yeah, hard, too. He was on to me sharp as thorns! He cussed me out something terrible! He spoke to me real angry, and then he jest walked away, like he didn't want to have no more to do with a horse like that. I felt bad. I never wanted to hear him speak to me like that again. I gave over nipping right then. That was all he did—it was all he had to do. Since then I've often seed horses whipped for less.

Well, Tom, I guess you won't want to be hearing ‘bout lunges and bits and saddles and harness and all the rest of it. What's sech things to a cat? But you're a friend, all the same. You're company: I like company. A horse needs company. That young Jim, he was real good company. I can see now that's what he was aiming at. He wanted to make me feel like a smart horse, and he wanted to make me like going along with him and feel we was a-working together. And I did, too. ‘Took him a long time; but bless you, what's time to a horse? In the end, when he rode me out in the lanes I really used to enjoy myself. You wouldn't understand—no cat would—but I used to feel prop'ly interested in whatever we was doing—
included in
, you might say. I felt I was doing what a horse ought to be doing.