The Black Stallion Mystery (8 page)

The big man nodded, hunching his shoulders still more as he thrust his hands into his pockets. Going to the door, he opened it and with Henry’s help lowered the mobile ramp from inside the plane.

Tired of his confinement the Black left the plane eagerly, his head held high and nostrils quivering. He listened to the long wail of a distant animal. There were no stars to be seen overhead, no moon, nothing but
shadowy peaks and rocks and crags. The green and red lights of the plane blinked on and off.

Henry said angrily, “What’s this anyway, González? There’s nobody here! Nothing at all!”

“It is simply a question of waiting now.”

“For whom?” Henry asked.

“You will see,” came the nervous reply. “They will meet you.”

Alec let the Black graze, concentrating on him so as to be able to stand the terrifying stillness that had enveloped them all. He listened to the quick, keen cut of his horse’s teeth as the stallion moved even farther away from the plane in search of better grass. Henry joined them.

Suddenly the Black raised his head and whistled an alarm. Far beyond the black wastes Alec saw a flickering light along the horizon. Was it the first beginnings of dawn? Long minutes passed but the light grew no brighter. He felt terribly cold and reached for his horse. The Black was shaking, either in eagerness to fight or with fear.

“Henry,” Alec said, “are you watching that light?”

“Yes,” the man replied slowly. “The false dawn, that’s all it is. Don’t let it bother you.”

From behind them came the loud eruption of the aircraft’s engines. They jumped for the plane together, their hands pounding its side. The rushing slipstream from the engines almost spun them around and they pressed their bodies into it. The aircraft moved away, its lights blinking.

“González!”
Henry screamed at the top of his lungs.
“González!”

He and Alec ran after the plane, shouting into the wind,
“Why, González, why? Don’t leave us alone here! What are you doing, González? What are you doing? Wait for us! Come back, González! Come back! You can’t leave us here!”

Nothing but the mounting roar of the plane answered their questions. Faster and faster it went, drawing farther and farther away until it became airborne.

In numbed silence Alec and Henry watched the plane’s lights disappear in the clouds. A strong wind came up and swept across the land. It moved the grass at their feet and changed the shapes in the night. It struck them in the face and they hunched forward to meet it. It bit at Alec’s hand and flapped the leather lead shank he was holding. He said, almost too quietly to be heard, “Henry, why did he do it to us? What kind of a game is he playing?”

“I don’t know.”

“He said someone would meet us.”

“I heard that too.”

“You think he was lying?”

“We’ll soon find out,” Henry answered gravely.

The wind marked the swift approach of dawn, and soon a distinct line of light appeared on the horizon. At first it was only a faint, luminous glow but then it began climbing ever higher in the sky. The masses of rock round about changed from black to gray.

Henry and Alec watched the east anxiously. The sun should be up soon. Even before they saw it climb over the horizon the tops of the mountains were ablaze with its rays. Then it came forth, a red, glowing ball.

They waited in silence, watching the land about them take shape in detail. They were in a long, narrow valley with a pass at one end through which the plane had come and gone. On every other side rose steep hills of rock and dirt split by pointed crags and deep rifts. High above them towered lofty peaks, some snow-covered.

Alec and Henry kept moving in an attempt to warm their chilled bodies. The Black snorted at the song of a lone bird, then lowered his head to graze again. Alec’s eyes were drawn by what seemed to be a black-rimmed plateau high up on the northern slope of the mountains. All the crags and winding canyons in the area seemed to run up to that great tableland.

Henry said, “Maybe our wait is going to be longer than we think. González left us some food.” The trainer had picked up a saddlebag from the ground. In it were dried meat and beans. “Want some?”

The boy shook his head. “Not yet. Do you really think anyone will meet us, Henry?”

“Sure. Don’t you?”

“I don’t know,” Alec answered. The sun was inching skyward with agonizing slowness and the wind blew stronger. The sound of it in this high and lonely place bothered him more than the flying dust and dirt that peppered his face. He talked to the Black, seeking solace in his horse.

They waited in strained silence, but as the sun rose so did their spirits. The wind, too, quit blowing so hard. Yet as more time passed and still no one came to meet them, they began to feel imprisoned and trapped. They
exchanged steady looks, each seeking to read a means of escape in the other’s eyes.

“It’s early yet,” Alec said.

“It’s been a long time,” Henry countered. “We’d better go. We can try to find somebody or at least a sign of somebody havin’ been here before … maybe tracks even.”

“Which way?” Alec asked.

“Whichever way he’ll take us,” and Henry gestured in the Black’s direction. “This is wild country, but we have a horse who knows the wild. We’ll let him show us the way. If there are other horses around he’ll find them.”

They turned to watch the tall stallion and listened to the familiar sound of his teeth tearing the grass. At that moment nothing interested the Black so much as his own hunger. Soon, though, he would scent the wind. Stretched before him was a maze of gorges, ravines, canyons and washes. Which path would he choose and where would it lead them?

The Black raised his head, suddenly restless and alert. The wind blew in gusts and despite the climbing sun the morning continued to be icy cold. Alec went to his horse, cupping the Black’s muzzle in both hands for warmth and comfort.

Henry said, “Send him on his way. See if he doesn’t lead us to some tracks.”

Alec set the stallion’s head into the mountain wind. “Let’s go, black horse,” he said, watching the ears.

As he walked beside the Black, his confidence returned. It might take a little time, he told himself, but they’d find their way to safety. Only when he lifted his gaze to the unreal shape of the peaks looming above did he have any doubts. He frowned as his eyes squinted into the blaze of the morning sun and suddenly he felt terribly
alone
beneath the vastness of the mountains and sky. His hand tightened on the Black’s leather lead shank.

The stallion turned to the north of the sun, and
soon he began snorting and neighing, talking the language of the wild.
A few moments later they came to a road leading from the valley
.

“What’d I tell you!” Henry said, running forward.

The fine dirt and dust were marked with the hoofprints of many horses. Henry studied the edges of the prints and said, “They’re pretty old.”

“Perhaps made by the Sales yearlings?” Alec asked.

“Could be,” Henry answered. “They’re light enough.”

Alec pointed down the road. “Look, Henry, wheel marks!”

They studied the deep marks in the soft ground. “A carriage or a wagon,” Henry said, “and a heavy one. The hoofprints here are different, too. These were made by heavier horses and more recently.”

They followed the winding tracks up the side of a mountain, stopping often to reexamine the ground. It was deathly quiet except for the pull of the Black’s hoofs in the earth. The sun climbed higher and reddened their faces. By midmorning they came to a small plateau where a rushing stream broke the stillness. Here the Black paused, drinking for a long while and without hurry. And here, too, in the soft banks of the stream, were the marks of many hoofprints.

“Let’s eat something,” Henry said, opening the saddlebag which hung loosely across the stallion’s back.

Grasshoppers jumped from beneath the Black’s hoofs. A bird circled lazily above them, and in the distance they heard the loud wail of an animal. A bit of dried meat and beans … How long was this food
supposed to last them? Alec wondered, chewing thoughtfully.

“Might as well get going,” Henry said impatiently when they had finished.

The Black paced into the high, bright sun, glad to be on his way again. The narrow road went winding and twisting upward, often offering no protection at all from the sheer precipices that dropped thousands of feet on either side. And always above them rose the bare peaks, so lonely, awesome and terrible. Without the sun Alec and Henry would have lost all sense of direction for sometimes they faced south, then north and east and west with the twisting of the road.

“It’s not what you’d call a bridle path,” Henry grunted.

The road had become more shale than dirt and only occasionally would they find a track. But they didn’t need prints as evidence of the road’s use. They had only to look at the banks on the sides, which had been put there to prevent washes during heavy rains. Someone was very much interested in keeping this road open.

The sun grew brighter and hotter and the sweat was caked on the Black’s side. Bright-brown water laced the road ruts but none of the travelers stopped to drink it.

Henry said, “This hard going will stiffen him up.”

“To say nothing of what it’s going to do to us,” Alec answered, trying to laugh despite his weariness.

“Why don’t you ride? Your weight won’t bother him much.”

Alec shook his head. “When you walk, I walk. It would be different if we could take turns riding him.”

Henry snorted. “I wouldn’t put a leg up on him for
all the mountain climbs in the world! How long do you think I’d last? He won’t tolerate me the way he does you, you know.”

Alec didn’t answer.

“It can’t be much farther,” Henry said, slipping on a loose stone.

Another hour passed and their doubts and fears grew stronger as the sky clouded and the land became more desolate. The wind, too, came up again, twisting its way through the jagged rock to meet them. It was icy cold. They no longer talked to each other but bent into the gale and listened, keeping their mouths tightly closed because of the flying grit. In the great distances they thought they heard the scream of a stallion … or was it the wind? The Black did not answer it but continued on his way with no change in pace or gait. Only once did he dance sideways and that was because he smelled a fast-flowing stream.

They stopped then, but when they went on again there seemed to be no escape from the sharp grains of gravel and dirt which tore at their faces. They became more and more desperate in seeking relief. Their eyes burned and their lips were cracked and swollen and cold. Sometime later they reached another plateau where the ground was soft and pock-marked with the prints of many horses. But their only interest was that here the wind swept over grass rather than shale and dirt.

They made a rough camp under some high rocks that jutted out from the western wall. There was no escaping the icy blasts but the wind was clear and free of grit. Alec tethered the Black and with Henry gathered all the wood they could find and started a fire. Warming
themselves, too cold and tired to talk, they stood beside the wind-driven flames in sober silence. Not until the fire scorched their faces and clothes did they move away, and then only a step.

Alec said, “When the wind dies down we’ll go on.”

Henry didn’t answer. His face was grim and gray beneath the grizzled stubble of his beard. He looked past the fire to the great tableland above them, guessing that it must be there that their journey would end.
If the wind would only stop.… Why must they endure this? What had they done to González to be left alone? Why? Why?

Coming down from the great heights, the wind grew in intensity with the passing of the long afternoon hours, giving them no respite, no chance to go on, shattering the gloom of the fast approaching night.

From the saddlebag Alec took the dried meat and gave half of it to Henry. They warmed it on the ends of long sticks, jealously guarding it from the golden flames. When they had finished, Henry said, “If I should fall asleep standing up, pull me out of the fire.”

Alec watched the Black and the whirling sky. It seemed the whole world was speeding by and he felt tiny beneath the immensity of it all.… Where were they and where would this end? Would they find anyone at all? He listened to the wind mingled with the swift rush of a nearby stream.

Then Alec went to his horse and staked him closer to the fire. The Black bumped his head against him and Alec put a hand around the horse’s neck, finding comfort and warmth in his nearness. Henry still stood by the fire, his eyes closed. An owl hooted in the distance, its call wavering with the wind. Henry opened his eyes,
looked around, and then without a word sat down, resting his head on upraised knees. Alec rebuilt the fire and sat down beside his friend. He, too, closed his eyes but his ears were alert to every sound.

Beyond the dim canyons and ravines came the howling of wolves. Occasionally Alec opened his eyes to check the fire and look at the snow-capped mountaintops that rimmed the plateau. Tomorrow they would reach the great tableland which rested at the foot of the highest peak of all. He shivered with cold despite the fire. He had no doubt that before long the ground would be white and shimmering with frost. He pulled his light sweater about him, rubbing his arms and moving as close as possible to the fire. If they kept the fire going, they’d be all right. He hated to think what it would be like without it. He closed his eyes again, and even though the heat scorched his eyebrows it felt very good.

The empty saddlebag lay beside Alec. The Black moved into the circle of firelight, pulling mouthfuls of dry brittle grass from the ground with each step. The wind swept across the silence of the night, ruffling the horse’s mane and tail; it bent the flames and sent sparks flying into the cold night.

Alec had no intention of going to sleep but his weariness was deep and overwhelming. It left no room for concern or thoughtfulness, only dreams.