The Cowboy and the Cossack (Nancy Pearl's Book Lust Rediscoveries) (11 page)

Rostov was already working with Crab, rubbing his wrists hard between his powerful hands, and then putting his right hand very softly and lightly over Crab’s heart and on his forehead. With all his obvious concern for Crab he suddenly said a thing that shocked and almost stunned me. He said bitterly, “I’d have expected more from the modern, up-to-date United States of America!”

Rostov was leaning down over Crab, and Shad now leaned down over him again, one of them on each side of the hurt man. “All right,” Shad said, his jaw hard, “I told you this man means somethin’ to me! You and your goddamn Russians come up with somethin’ that’ll help him more than me and cowshit and bourbon can help him!”

Rostov put his hand on Crab’s face and worked with it softly. “Come awake. Be aware. I need one thing from you. Saliva.”

Crab kind of woke up but didn’t quite understand what was going on. He mumbled something, but nobody knew what it was.

“I can use my own, or others’, but it’s best from you,” Rostov said.

“This dumb bastard says he needs your spit!” Shad told him.

Chakko, Indian-like, nodded and grinned at this.

“Hell, I ain’t got any left,” Crab whispered.

“Then make some!” Rostov lifted him, cradling him in his arm.

“You
make
some!” Old Keats leaned down near Crab. “It may have t’ do with havin’ one arm or two—or bein’ dead!”

In just a little while I was really proud I hadn’t fought with Crab last night, because with no spit left in him, and too tired to hardly breathe anyway, he spit a handful of spit into Rostov’s hand. Part of it was natural and part of it was choking, but it worked either way, I guess.

And Rostov just mixed that spit with a little dirt he picked up from the ground in his other hand. And finally Rostov had a little handful of sort of wet spit and earth, and he said in a very soft voice to Crab that it was okay for him to go to sleep again.

And that American spit and Russian ground was the poultice.

Shad didn’t complain and he didn’t cooperate either. He stood back while Rostov and Old Keats bound the poultice around Crab’s arm with a piece of fairly clean cloth.

When that was done Rostov said, “If the swelling goes down within three hours, his arm will cure itself and he’ll live.”

It seemed a hundred years longer, but the top edge of the sun was just coming up over eastern hills now.

“Get ready to move when all of that sun’s in sight,” Shad said.

Rostov swung up onto his horse before replying. “No.”

“Why not? My men’ll be ready!”

Rostov took the time to swing his big black around. “My men have to attend a burial.”

“Burial?” For a moment Shad was really concerned. “One of your men—”

“No. One of our horses.”

“One of your
horses
!”

I somehow knew Rostov was talking about Igor’s horse, and I couldn’t help but agree with him, though I said nothing.

Rostov said patiently, “A warrior’s burial. He died bravely, and with honor. We’ll dig a grave for him and bury him with the honor he has earned. And after those things are taken care of, we’ll be ready to leave, about noon.”

He turned and rode away.

CHAPTER EIGHT

T
HAT WAS
some kind of a funeral.

Those cossacks always looked pretty shiny, but that morning they turned out with more gleam on their boots and their saddles and sabers than ever before.

Some of them had dug a grave, which was quite a job in itself, since it was big enough for the horse. It was more than six feet deep and about four by eight in top size.

Midmorning they were all on horseback, gathered around the grave and the dead animal. Us cowboys, not used to such a ceremony and mostly not putting a whole lot of stock in it, hadn’t fancied ourselves up at all, naturally. We just rode over partly out of curiosity and courtesy, and partly killing time until we’d get the herd moving.

But like I said, all those cossacks were scrubbed and polished up fit for the burial of a king. They were circled around the grave, so Shad and the rest of us just sat on our horses a little distance away, watching and listening.

Igor had ridden up on a kind of a scrubby-looking little splayfoot pony that was obviously second-string and had probably been a packhorse up until this morning. Slowly, with a ceremonious feeling about it, he and Rostov dismounted to stand at the head of that big grave.

Rostov started to speak. And somehow on that lonely Siberian plain, even with his tough voice, it sounded like Rostov was speaking in church. His voice was deep, resonant, and filled with emotion.

“What’s he sayin’?” Slim quietly asked Old Keats.

“Well—” Old Keats hesitated.

Mushy whispered, “He’s sure serious!”

“He’s
prayin’
for that damn horse!” Dixie muttered. “He’s lookin’ at the sky an’—”

“Shut up!” Keats said. “If you dumb bastards all talk at once, I can’t make heads or tails out of it!”

And then he began translating haltingly, in a low voice, as best he could. “Captain Rostov says—that horse was—part of everything living.—Man, horse, or beast.—Or anything.—Like everything else, it’s got its own feelin’s—it’s got its own courage.” He hesitated, frowning. “I ain’t sure, but I think he just said that that horse probably had its own sense of humor.—Which Rostov claims is almost always the better part of courage.” He waited for a while, listening carefully as Rostov spoke. “And he says he consigns that beautiful warrior horse to the place where all brave spirits go.”

Rostov stopped talking then, and Igor moved up beside him to speak one short, quiet line, his voice a little unsteady.

“He says because of its funny coloring, his horse’s name was ‘Spotted’ or ‘Spot,’ or somethin’ like that,” Keats said.

“Hell,” Dixie grunted. “Rotten name for a horse.”

But nobody paid much attention to him.

Igor was taking something out of a little leather bag, and it glinted in the rising sun. As he moved toward the dead horse it chimed with a crystal sweetness in his hands.

It was a silver bell.

Saying a few words, his voice still shaky, he started to tie the bell around the horse’s neck.

Old Keats was genuinely moved, and he said, “I think—he said—that the sound of that silver bell will help him to find his horse—in whatever land there is—beyond death.”

Then Igor, with the bell tied in place, whispered one last thing that none of us could hear, so Old Keats couldn’t translate it. He slowly drew his saber and touched its blade softly on the shoulder of his dead horse. And after that gentle touch he slowly drew the sharp edge across his wrist so that blood began
dripping down from it. Finally, he put his saber back in its sheath and stepped back to watch the final part of the burial, his damp eyes now, slowly, becoming stone dry, and his jaw firm.

“Christ,” Dixie said in a low voice. “Why don’t he just marry his goddamn horse and get it over with?”

Nobody laughed and Slim turned to Dixie. “How’d you like t’ get your head handed to ya’ on a tin plate?”

We were silent for a long moment as the cossacks very gently put ropes beneath the animal and, with men holding them at each side, started lowering him slowly into the grave.

It was quiet while the cossacks filled the grave in over that good horse, Spotted or Spot, or whatever his name was.

Shad hadn’t spoken all that time. As they were finishing filling the grave he said to me, “Go tell Rostov I want Igor riding with me in front of our bunch.” He called to the rest of the outfit, “Get ready to move out!”

I rode Buck the little ways over to where Rostov had just mounted. “Captain Rostov? Mr. Northshield, Shad, suggests that Igor ride with him. That way you’ll both have somebody you can send messages back and forth with.”

Rostov glanced at me with those hard, dark eyes. “He suggests?”

“Somethin’ like that.”

“Tell him I think it’s an excellent idea. I’ll send Igor over.”

I rode back to Shad. The other hands had left, and I told him that Igor riding with him was okay with Rostov. And then I said, “Listen, boss. There’s one more thing.”

“Yeah?”

“Well—” I couldn’t quite find the words. “Blackeye kinda’ belongs t’ me. Right?”

“He’s your second-string pony in the remuda.”

“But, I mean—” It was hard to say.

“Yeah? What d’ ya’ mean?”

“I mean—I want t’ give Blackeye t’ Igor. That’s what I mean.”

Shad looked at me with those tough eyes of his for a long, hard moment, and I couldn’t help wonder whether it was rougher being looked at firmly by him or Rostov. He said, “Blackeye belongs to Joe Diamond and the Slash-Diamond outfit.”

After that burial, I was somehow rough-out determined. “Then take Blackeye outta my pay! It’s a gift I wanta give!”

Right about then Igor came trotting up to us on his little pack pony, so I couldn’t say any more about the subject. He pulled up and said to Shad in that funny one-note way of speaking American that he had, “I am to report to you, sir.”

“That’s right!” Shad spoke so harshly, almost snarling, that it scared the hell out of both me and Igor. “And you don’t call me sir, you call me Shad!”

All in all, Igor had had enough hard time already. And now this sudden attack of Shad’s made his language go away. Struggling the best he could, he stammered, “I—I—am—to report to you—Sir Shad.”

“You’re goin’ t’ ride with me.” There was no mercy in the iron voice.

“Yes!” Igor was plainly trying to do the best he could, and yet it was clear at the same time that he was getting about ready to fight if nothing reasonable worked out. “Yes! Sir Shad.”

Shad looked at me with his eyebrows pulled down tight. “I hate bein’ called ‘Sir Shad’ even if it’s by accident.”

“You’re bein’ awful hard on Igor!” I said. “He’s just tryin’ t’ be polite!”

“An’ I’m gonna be even harder.” Shad glanced at Igor’s scruffy little pony. “Nobody can keep up with me or this outfit without a fair horse. Levi?”

“Yeah?”

“Go break out Blackeye.” Shad was sure a surpriser from time to time.

“Huh? Ya’ mean—”

“An’ bring ’im back for this cossack t’ ride. If he can.”

He was saying quite a bit, and I knew it, though he wouldn’t let on.

I welled up a lot more than I wanted to, so I didn’t say anything, but just rode over and roped Blackeye and brought him back.

Igor sort of got the idea when I came back with that feisty pinto on a rope. He still wasn’t too sure, but as we switched the saddle and harness from his raunchy packhorse to Blackeye, he began to realize what Shad was doing and it hit him kind of hard. With his black eye, Blackeye looked fairly ridiculous, but otherwise he resembled Igor’s dead horse in looks, fire and spirit more than any other pony in our whole string.

We switched the saddle and gear, and Shad swatted the packhorse on the ass, sending it back in the direction of the cossack remuda.

Igor swung up onto Blackeye and just sat there for a minute, feeling the pinto’s muscles between his legs. Then he said, “I will take good care of this horse.”

“You better,” Shad said. And then he nailed it. “Because he’s yours.”

“He is mine?”

“That’s what I said.”

Igor couldn’t decide whether to laugh or cry. Holding any possible emotion back, he rode Blackeye away a little bit, just sort of taking the top of him, and Shad and I were alone.

“I think, if you’re not careful, you just may make a friend,” I said.

“Fuck that.” Shad swung up onto his big Red. “He lost a damn good horse protecting our cattle. And this outfit always pays its own way.”

“Shad,” I reminded him, “I wanted t’ just give him that horse, before. And I wasn’t tryin’ to pay nobody’s way for nothin’.”

“Then it’s done both ways.” Red reared a little under him. “You outta friendship, and me because it just seemed like the fair thing t’ do. It’s his horse.”

“Okay.” I swung up on Buck. “Does Blackeye come outta my salary or the Slash-Diamond?”

Shad turned Red and looked back at me. “It was my decision and it comes outta my salary.”

Igor was riding back, and Shad called, “Come on with me, you goddamn Russian!” He spurred Red away.

Igor pulled up beside me briefly. “What is a ‘goddamn’ Russian?” he asked, toying with Blackeye’s reins and patting the horse.

“One of the best kind a’ Russians,” I said.

And then I rode toward the cossacks far ahead, as Igor joined Shad and the cowboys started whooping and hollering to move the herd.

In the next couple of weeks we went through some of the most beautiful country I ever saw. It was mountainous, some of it pretty rough, covered by vast but never crowded forests. And there was damnere every kind of tree you could think of, from oaks to birches and maples, from aspens to poplars and elms. And everywhere you looked, there was a green blanket of high grass. And just about every time you were thirsty, you came upon clear, sweet water, a lake or stream or creek. Those cows never had it better, nor probably as good, in Montana and they were getting fat and sassy and contented, even making about twelve miles a day. And some of the big bulls were getting rambunctious as hell. I could double guarantee, for example, that we had a whole lot more pregnant cows after those two weeks than we’d had at Vladivostok. And all too often, singly or in groups, those longhorns would up and decide that they just wanted to go their own way and the hell with the rest of the world. When that happened, it took some artistic, persuasive cussing and hard whacks on their asses with lariats to finally get them back to following the main herd and Old Fooler.

But those were the problems of the average, dumb cowhand. As an average, dumb messenger boy, I was spending
all my time trying to keep up with Rostov. Whenever he stopped long enough to talk, he talked pretty freely now. One time, when we were riding far ahead of all the others, he spotted two big deer, far off. By the time I’d seen them, now bounding away, he’d pulled up, jerked out his rifle and fired twice. They both went down, and at that distance that was some kind of shooting.

“One of them is for the Slash-Diamond outfit.” He lowered his rifle.