Montana Unbranded

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 (#u9e926cd9-1a8a-5dda-8f74-bdcf0cbb19ef)

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.”

* * *

SATURDAY BARBECUE AT the Bow and Arrow was a tradition that Ramalda presided over with the practiced efficiency of a seasoned military commander. Joe was seated on the porch beside Pony. She’d already given him a house tour, showed him where the bathroom was, where his bedroom would be if he chose to stay and poured him a tall glass of water from a pitcher with lemon slices and ice. “Just relax and watch the show,” she told him with a smile. “I hope you are hungry, because if you don’t eat a lot, Ramalda will think you are sick, and if she thinks you are sick, you are doomed.”

Joe was content to sit and watch, and Pony was right—it was a show. Boys running every which way between the barn and corrals and ranch house. Stout, maternal Ramalda, blue bandanna tied over white hair, scolding them to no effect in nonstop heated Spanish while basting the ribs roasting over the coals with her special sauce, baking corn bread in cast-iron skillets in the reflector oven and stirring a huge pot of spiced chili beans. All of this was being cooked on a giant outside grill beneath a covered patio flanked by two picnic tables. Pony was in and out of the house constantly, setting the two picnic tables and helping Ramalda with the preparations. Joe sipped his water and enjoyed the aromas of mesquite smoke and barbecue. He marveled that in just one day he’d gone from lying in a Providence hospital room that smelled of rubbing alcohol and sickness to sitting on a Montana porch admiring a spectacular Rocky Mountain sunset and hearing the distant whinny of a real horse as the cool air sank into the river valley. His sister was smitten with the baby she still held in her arms as she interacted with the rest of the kids. She was clearly in her element here, among a pack of lively Crow children and some very good friends.

Steven Young Bear walked up from the corrals and dropped onto the bench beside Joe. “Do not let those young renegades talk you into any rodeo activities,” he advised, brushing some dirt off his jeans. “You will pay for it.”

“Don’t worry,” Joe said. “I’ve never ridden a horse and I’m not about to start now.”

“That is what I said when I first came here.”

Joe eased himself on the bench and took another swallow of water. “I can see why Molly likes this place.”

“It grows on you,” Steven agreed. “My sister has done a good job with the school. The boys were difficult at first, but two of them are about to graduate with their GEDs, and Roon is doing well enough that Pony thinks he might go on to college. She has made a big difference with these kids. Caleb has given her a good life here. She is happy but it is becoming too much. The buffalo herd is growing, the market for range-raised buffalo is getting bigger... Pony cannot do it all, especially with that little one to watch.”

“Maybe Caleb should hire more help.”

“When he gets here, you can tell him that. He’s tried to hire outsiders, but Pony won’t let him. She thinks the boys should be able to help keep the ranch running, but they are kids,” Steven said, settling back on the bench. “Caleb will be back shortly. He took two of the boys to a livestock auction. He gives them each a certain amount of money to bid. He says it is the best way to teach them about math and critical thinking at warp speed.”

“Huh,” Joe said. “What happens if they win what they bid on?”

“If they win, he brings it home and they have to take care of it. This teaches them responsibility.”

“And this is a livestock auction?”

Steven nodded. “Yes.”

Joe thought about that for a moment. “We grew up in the city and couldn’t even have a dog,” he said. “I wonder if Caleb would be interested in adopting me. I’m good at math, but I’m not so sure about the critical thinking at warp speed.”

Steven grinned. “You will have to ask him. He should be here soon. He just called Pony to warn her about the goats.”

“Goats?”

“It would seem one of the boys bid successfully.”

Sure enough, within minutes, a big Chevy Suburban towing a livestock trailer came into view, climbed the gentle grade from the creek and pulled up near the corrals. Doors opened and two boys climbed out. A tall, athletic, sandy-haired man with a mustache emerged from the driver’s seat, raised an arm toward the house in a casual wave and turned to embrace Pony.

Steven pushed to his feet and brushed more dirt off his pants. “Do you like goats?” he said to Joe.

Joe stood. “Guess I’m about to find out,” he said and followed Steven down the steps. When they reached the corrals he was introduced to Caleb McCutcheon, a retired baseball Hall-of-Famer, and the boys, Jimmy and Roon, who had pooled their auction money to buy the goats. “They’re an Alpine/Saanen cross,” Jimmy said as Caleb lowered the ramp on the back of the livestock trailer. “They make the best-tasting milk and cheese. It was a really good price for all five of them, and they’re real pretty,” he added.

“Pretty does not pay the rent,” Pony said, opening the corral gate. “Let’s have a look. We’ll get them settled in, give them hay and water and then you boys better get washed up. It’s time to eat.”